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allthisshitisweird2023-05-02 05:40 pm
faderifting) wrote in allthisshitisweird2023-05-02 05:40 pm
Entry tags:
Test Drive!
TEST DRIVE MEME
While in some alternate, tidier timeline, the War against the Elder One ended years ago, you're not in that timeline. It's 9:49, and the war continues. An enemy force partially occupies Orlais and has decimated several Marcher Cities, while the Chantry, aided by the Inquisition, has marshaled Orlais and the faithful of Southern Thedas into a new Exalted March against the army of demon-bound Wardens, Red Templars, Venatori loyalists, and darkspawn Corypheus has amassed. Rifts are still scattered across the continent, periodically spitting out strangers from strange worlds with green-glowing anchors embedded in their hands. There's no Herald of Andraste to save Thedas. Someone else is going to have to do it.
You're part of (or allied with, recently hired by, imprisoned by, etc.) an organization, dubbed Riftwatch, that split off from the Inquisition several years ago. Riftwatch consists of these otherworldly new arrivals, rebels and Wardens, and other people who want to prevent the apocalypse without necessarily marching under the Chantry's banner to do it. Their headquarters is an island fortress called the Gallows—formerly a Circle of Magi, more formerly a prison for slaves, but its new occupants have done a good job removing the more grotesque reminders of that past and making the place livable. Their goal is to do what the Chantry can't or won't do, to go more directly after Corypheus and the dark magic he employs, and to keep the Veil from coming apart entirely.
Maybe you're here because you want to help. Maybe you need the money (though there isn't much of it). Maybe you acquired an anchor and sticking around is the only way to prevent your hand from killing you. Maybe you've been sent by the Chantry or some other entity to keep an eye on everyone—they're rumored to be a lot of weirdos and troublemakers. Or maybe you're a new rifter and just going where the nice people with swords tell you that you need to go.
NOTE: This is a static test drive! We post them once per year or so and continue to use them for a long time, so you're never late. Current players are encouraged to track new top-level comments.
I. THE FREE MARCHES: Hasmal, Tantervale, and most recently Starkhaven have all fallen to the Tevinter incursion, leaving Kirkwall the largest city-state in the Free Marches to remain unoccupied. For Riftwatch, that means the war is closer to home than ever, and traveling anywhere north of the mountains runs the risk of running into enemy scouting parties. Perhaps you've been sent out to find these scouts before they find the unwary, or perhaps you're just trying to pass through unnoticed to Antiva or Rivain when you run into trouble. Or maybe you're more in the thick of it: joining the Free Marches armies in harassing the occupying army as best they can from outside the city, or slipping your way into one of them to gather intelligence or meet with an ally.
II. THE WAKING SEA: When Riftwatch isn't traveling by griffon or magic mirror, it frequently travels by sea, courtesy of a small assortment of allied pirate ships. So welcome aboard. The sea is choppy and frequently violent—violent storms, violent enemy ships, or both at once—and the crew may not have much patience for incompetence, so either make yourself useful above or try not to get sick below.
III. KIRKWALL: Even when enormous evil darkspawn are trying to take over the known world and you and your colleagues might be the only ones who can truly stop him, you can't work all the time. And when you aren't working, Kirkwall is there for you with its dingy Lowtown taverns, its flashy Hightown establishments, its market stalls and street musicians and cellars hosting gamblers. (Or maybe you can work all the time, and you're in the city to do some official shopping, try to spy on a suspicious character, or show a potential financial backer a good time.)
IV. SEND A MESSAGE: Each member of Riftwatch is assigned a blue crystal, small enough to wear around the neck, that can transmit voice messages, as well as an enchanted book tied to that crystal that can be used to exchange written messages. They're secure enough to discuss the war, if you'd like to get down to business, but loosely controlled enough to ask a question or play a game with only a few rolled eyes from people who hate fun.
V. WILDCARD: From the Gallows' library to the pirate islands off the coast, from Hightown's high-priced market stalls to the bloody frontlines of the war, Thedas is yours to explore.
While in some alternate, tidier timeline, the War against the Elder One ended years ago, you're not in that timeline. It's 9:49, and the war continues. An enemy force partially occupies Orlais and has decimated several Marcher Cities, while the Chantry, aided by the Inquisition, has marshaled Orlais and the faithful of Southern Thedas into a new Exalted March against the army of demon-bound Wardens, Red Templars, Venatori loyalists, and darkspawn Corypheus has amassed. Rifts are still scattered across the continent, periodically spitting out strangers from strange worlds with green-glowing anchors embedded in their hands. There's no Herald of Andraste to save Thedas. Someone else is going to have to do it.
You're part of (or allied with, recently hired by, imprisoned by, etc.) an organization, dubbed Riftwatch, that split off from the Inquisition several years ago. Riftwatch consists of these otherworldly new arrivals, rebels and Wardens, and other people who want to prevent the apocalypse without necessarily marching under the Chantry's banner to do it. Their headquarters is an island fortress called the Gallows—formerly a Circle of Magi, more formerly a prison for slaves, but its new occupants have done a good job removing the more grotesque reminders of that past and making the place livable. Their goal is to do what the Chantry can't or won't do, to go more directly after Corypheus and the dark magic he employs, and to keep the Veil from coming apart entirely.
Maybe you're here because you want to help. Maybe you need the money (though there isn't much of it). Maybe you acquired an anchor and sticking around is the only way to prevent your hand from killing you. Maybe you've been sent by the Chantry or some other entity to keep an eye on everyone—they're rumored to be a lot of weirdos and troublemakers. Or maybe you're a new rifter and just going where the nice people with swords tell you that you need to go.
NOTE: This is a static test drive! We post them once per year or so and continue to use them for a long time, so you're never late. Current players are encouraged to track new top-level comments.
I. THE FREE MARCHES: Hasmal, Tantervale, and most recently Starkhaven have all fallen to the Tevinter incursion, leaving Kirkwall the largest city-state in the Free Marches to remain unoccupied. For Riftwatch, that means the war is closer to home than ever, and traveling anywhere north of the mountains runs the risk of running into enemy scouting parties. Perhaps you've been sent out to find these scouts before they find the unwary, or perhaps you're just trying to pass through unnoticed to Antiva or Rivain when you run into trouble. Or maybe you're more in the thick of it: joining the Free Marches armies in harassing the occupying army as best they can from outside the city, or slipping your way into one of them to gather intelligence or meet with an ally.
II. THE WAKING SEA: When Riftwatch isn't traveling by griffon or magic mirror, it frequently travels by sea, courtesy of a small assortment of allied pirate ships. So welcome aboard. The sea is choppy and frequently violent—violent storms, violent enemy ships, or both at once—and the crew may not have much patience for incompetence, so either make yourself useful above or try not to get sick below.
III. KIRKWALL: Even when enormous evil darkspawn are trying to take over the known world and you and your colleagues might be the only ones who can truly stop him, you can't work all the time. And when you aren't working, Kirkwall is there for you with its dingy Lowtown taverns, its flashy Hightown establishments, its market stalls and street musicians and cellars hosting gamblers. (Or maybe you can work all the time, and you're in the city to do some official shopping, try to spy on a suspicious character, or show a potential financial backer a good time.)
IV. SEND A MESSAGE: Each member of Riftwatch is assigned a blue crystal, small enough to wear around the neck, that can transmit voice messages, as well as an enchanted book tied to that crystal that can be used to exchange written messages. They're secure enough to discuss the war, if you'd like to get down to business, but loosely controlled enough to ask a question or play a game with only a few rolled eyes from people who hate fun.
V. WILDCARD: From the Gallows' library to the pirate islands off the coast, from Hightown's high-priced market stalls to the bloody frontlines of the war, Thedas is yours to explore.
baths;
[ the reflexive thrust of a hand, steadying, before cedric steps back; head turned aside and eyes shut quick. not much room for shyness around here, but anyone out this time of night is hunting privacy. or playing sheet ghost with their gowns. ]
— Y'alright?
no subject
[ binder's knots, of course this is the day someone else shows up in the baths—not any of her previous trips, which had all gone off without a hitch, no, tonight, of all nights, when ness is moments from—from—
well. nothing good, at any rate.
she hurriedly pulls her dress down, giving herself at least a modicum of dignity and a little less to panic about. there's barely a glance spared at her new companion before ness averts her eyes, looking for as quick an exit as she can possibly make. ]
I'm fine, thank you, sorry, I'm just—just trying to—oh, hells—
[ ness curls over her hand for a moment before catching herself, forcing herself upright. the squirming is getting more insistent. this is how it goes, it builds and builds, writhing under her skin so intensely she's certain there must be some physical evidence of it, a distortion or distention of her skin. she's never been able to see anything, and she's checked, over and over and over, but the fear's never abated.
she clutches her anchor-marked hand to her chest, fist shut tight in futile hope she can stop it. ]
I'm, sorry, I shouldn't be here. Sorry. Where's the, the exit?
no subject
Easy, [ calm. palms spread low and empty, shimmering in green answer. ] Let’s go find it, yeah? 'S down this way.
[ if that’s the long route, well. he’d sooner she didn't pass out on the stairs. he shifts, ready to balance or brace; eyes on how she moves. wet tile's a bad place to fall. ]
no subject
[ oh, ness's eyes fall to his hands, he's kind. what a terrible moment to choose to be kind. ]
I can go on my own, [ though the weakness of the reply must just reinforce his idea that she's some normal sort of freaking out. the right thing to do would probably be to get rid of him by whatever means necessary—to scream and hurl insults and get nasty, if need be, if only to make sure he's out of the way of the inevitable. the mere thought of it though—deliberate unpleasantness, malicious behaviour—it sets ness' stomach squirming to rival the other thing, and she's helpless to stop herself walking meekly along, as far from her companion as he'll let her be. her steps, at least, are steady, if halting—she's not liable to trip or fall, but there's some effort to the way she moves, a rigidness to her spine and tension in her limbs that makes her gait strange.
she hasn't dropped her fist from her chest. ]
I'll be alright. You don't have to spend time on me, really.
no subject
[ vanya doesn't. but as an excuse to kill time, can't figure he'd mind. not so far from the truth, anyway —
anyone out this time of night is hunting privacy. for quiet: the kind you don't dredge from tents slung in a yard and the wheezy sound of sleeping breath. if he shuts his eyes tight enough out here he can pretend silence. what passes for it, the space where that old hum smears into blank, white words. ]
Cedric, [ he offers, a bid for distraction. she's moving fine; she's moving stiff. scared. his steps slow, pace steady. (lunging distance) ] Don't reckon we've met.
no subject
[ despairing, ] Ennaris. Ness, if that's a mouthful. I'm new.
[ to kirkwall, and rift watch, and thedas in general, yes. another rifter taking up resources and attention and bothering the locals. more than bothering, if they knew— ]
Oh, [ she inhales sharply, stopped abruptly in her tracks. her eyes have gone wide and wild, whites visible in the dark. ] Please step back.
[ that's all she has time to say before she cries out and her arm wrenches away from her chest, no longer under her own control, and flailing dark tendrils whip out of her anchor shard, slapping against anything within reach. ness stayed far enough away that they can't reach cedric but they seem to want to, snapping and reaching in his direction with a strange sort of awareness. ]
no subject
[ he begins, and then she's startling, arm arcing strange; and it's instinct that doesn't stop or stray but reaches toward it —
(the coils. that hum. some other place,)
it all happens more or less at once: a jolt forward, hand cut across air. light flares silver-sharp, and the veil drops hard, severing spell from fade. banished, however temporarily. ]
Alright, [ is it? a hard breath out. cedric straightens, doesn't back away. ] You should sit down.
no subject
[ it doesn't hurt. if there's any saving grace to it, it's that; as soon as the tendrils have found their way out it stops feeling like anything at all. there's an optical illusion to them, a sense that they're drawing in all the shadows in the room and getting darker and darker and more malevolent—
and then they aren't, anymore, at all, and ness' arm drops limply to her side. she gasps in a breath, then snaps her mouth shut and breathes deliberately through her nose. she avoids cedric's eyes, and makes no more sound. when he speaks, she doesn't startle, but she follows his command with a swiftness, and folds her hands in her lap.
they're trembling.
she doesn't say a word. ]
no subject
a moment passes. long enough to check that it's taken, that her skin isn't about to worm into some new tangle; then he eases down beside her. the way his arms prop over his knees could pass for casual, if they weren't both here and now.
(if it wasn't the quickest way to find his feet, his knife) ]
'S alright, [ repeated. quieter than before: ] How long's that been happening?
[ can't be the first, she knew it was coming. can't be forever, or she wouldn't be this broken up. ]
no subject
Since I got here.
[ small voice, small girl—if she's honest, maybe the mage hunter won't... he wouldn't kill her, not for one mistake. he's kind. he wanted to help.
(she did her reading. she was very attentive. mages who can't control themselves are killed, or cut away from the world. sliced out with surgical precision, no more danger but no more you, either.) ]
I've been staying in my room, I don't talk to people. I only go to the library. I'm learning as much as I can. I don't want to be a danger.
[ the trembling hasn't stopped. ness clasps her hands together tight to stop it, and breathes in slowly through her nose. she's not crying, crying isn't effective. tears are just salt water, they don't help anything. she doesn't save herself from a mage hunter with tears.
finally, she looks up, blue eyes meeting brown for as long as she can stand before she looks away again. ]
What happens to me now?
no subject
[ he meets her eyes. be nice if he could hide it: the flicker of someone abruptly out of their depth. there's a place where training unspools, where procedure and education go to die. cedric knows how a circle's meant to solve this; the circles are a decade gone. dead longer than he ever stood in one.
hierarchy isn't. ]
We're gonna talk to leadership, [ if she already has, and it's been kept from them, he's going to strangle marcus rowntree with his bare hands * ] Let 'em know you need help. They're clever folks, seen a lot, might be they got ideas to fix this. And we'll make sure you're safe. There's — draughts you can take.
[ magebane. gotta be temporary, or someone'll fuss. but could've been anyone in the baths tonight. in the library. ]
Let you breathe a little easier while we figure this out.
[ * here meaning: get very drunk and bitch to keen ]
no subject
[ oh, good, he doesn't know what he's doing either. maybe that should make ness more nervous, but in truth it does the exact opposite—her hands stop shaking, and the ghost of a smile thinks about flitting over her mouth. at least, she stops looking like she's going to burst into tears at any moment.
he doesn't know what he's doing, and his first instinct is to help, not to hurt. she can live through that. ]
I won't be made—what's the word. Peaceful? Placid? Synonyms, no—
[ she laughs, breathless and just this side of hysterical, and buries her face in her hands. the relieved tension wants to come out as tears, now, but that's for later if it is at all, she's still not out of the fire yet, because the truth is— ]
I was afraid, so I didn't tell anyone. In quarantine, they explained magic here, and what's done when it's out of control. There's things I can do? Draughts? I don't have to die?
no subject
[ here and now, for this. good odds they’re all dead in a year, but that's war for you — ]
Promise. If you’re scared to talk on it, I’ll come and vouch. I’m sorry you been going through this alone. 'S a whole lot to carry.
[ kids flash magic without knowing better. gotta be strange, to find yourself back there. maker willing, she'll open up to a mage. loose spells they can handle. bigger problem's this: that he's still not sure if rifters get possessed. ]
no subject
[ have a little optimism, she just got here! she's already died the once, can't go a second time so soon, that's just sad. ]
It's—It wasn't so bad. [ it was. ness pushes her hair away from her face and sniffles against the sudden tangle of emotion in her chest. ] I was more worried about if I hurt someone. I stayed as far as I could stand from everyone.
[ she's used to spending her time alone, or with books. that wasn't hard. there was—is—so much to learn. who needs friends when you have thousands of years of history and geopolitics to catch up on?
softly, with no small bit of wonder: ] Thank you. I thought templars would be frightening, but you're not at all.
—you are a templar, aren't you? I assumed, with the— [ she mimics the gesture he'd made, slicing her hand down through the air in front of her. ]
no subject
It’s good you want to keep folks safe. Just that you deserve t’be safe, too. Easier when we stick together.
[ isolation breeds abominations. a hand in slow offer: take or leave. ]
You want t'meet another mage?
no subject
[ the unmistakable, stomach-leadening feeling of a misstep unidentified, words loosed with the wrong inflection in the wrong order, ] Have I offended?
[ her eyes search his, heavy as they seem now, when she'd meant to give a little bit of kindness in gratitude for what he's shown her. she'd been so afraid, the first time, and every time since, and now there's solutions, plans. her hand her own again and her insides in all their proper places.
mages and draughts and coming clean to leadership, all to come, but first: this. ]
no subject
[ there's the thing you say, and the thing you mean: she hasn't meant to offend, no more than benedict, than the others before; a seam between smooth steel, a gall across the vhenadahl. there's the thing you say, and the thing you mean – ]
Reckon we've both had a long night.
[ a beat: the hand untaken withdraws, to scratch sheepish at the back of his head. ]
Swear 'm not trying to fob you off. We can stay here long as you want.
no subject
Thank you, Cedric. This is, [ a lighthouse in the middle of a storm, an oasis in a desert—no call to be effusive, it's too late in the evening for that, ] the first deep breath I've taken in days. I appreciate it, truly.
[ she smiles, hopefully somewhere in the neighbourhood of encouraging. ] I'd love to meet a mage and let you go about the rest of your night.
no subject
[ he squeezes her hand, light; the other reaches for a crystal. cedric isn't unaware this could also wake rowntree,
but maybe that's better. that he have notice it's coming. ]
Thank you for trusting me.