livinglot | ⇨ TEST DRIVE MEME #1

Entry tags:

⇨ TEST DRIVE MEME #1

WELCOME TO THE SHOW!↴

Or, more specifically, Lost Carnival's first test drive meme! This is an opportunity to try out your characters in the setting before you apply, or to put together samples for characters you've never played before. There are going to be options for both new arrivals and veteran characters. Before we get started, let's lay down some details:

You can read the full premise here.
Reserves open October 5th at 12:01AM EST.
Applications open October 7th at 12:01AM EST.
You can apply as a newcomer or as a "veteran" character who has been in the carnival for up to three years.
TDM threads can be used as game canon after the fact if both characters are accepted and the players agree to it.
If you are interested in additional IC and OOC plot responsibilities, consider applying for a Supervisor position.
Supervisor applications will start being processed a few days after apps open, and will be selected on a competitive basis. If you want a supervisor position, it is best to submit your application as close to the beginning of the application cycle as possible. If you don't get chosen for your desired supervisor position, you will be given time to rework your application to be a regular veteran, or to apply for a supervisor position that is not yet taken.
Lost Carnival could use some additional moderation assistance! If you are interested, please let us know here.

NEW RECRUITS↴

You gotta start somewhere, right? These prompts are for characters who are arriving in the carnival for the first time, and who are destined to sign a contract. How they go about that is up to you, but in the meantime they can enjoy the sights and sounds of something truly out of this world. Visitors to the carnival comes from many different worlds today, as the ringmaster casts out her recruitment lures. Will you become her most recent hire?

► ADMISSION FEES: After crossing into the carnival's realm and passing through the trees, most visitors will find themselves at the front gate - though not all choose to enter that way. If they enter legitimately, however, they will have to pass by a clerk who will trade admission and tickets for various attractions and rides in exchange for "anything of value." What is of value may seem highly subjective, and so some may struggle to produce payment at first, though in actuality the carnival will take anything from mundane currency to items of purely sentimental value.

► MIRROR MAZE: The mirror maze (pictured above) is a big attraction in the carnival, and stretches much further on the inside than it looks like it will on the outside. It's hard to get through, and what's more, after you've been in there for a while your reflections will start gaining a mind of their own - mostly in order to taunt and distract you with personal information. They don't know everything you know, but they know more than they should, and their mind games can be pretty hit or miss.

► GAMER'S CIRCLE: Almost all of the game booths are organized in a large ring around the Cookhouse, called Gamer's Circle. Your can play just about any carnival game you can imagine here, for a variety of prizes sometimes traditional, exotic, or outright magical. Dart tossing? Got it. That game with the water guns? Got it. Most of these booths are currently manned by humanoid spirits who look like they are made of smoke. If they can trick you into earning debt, they will.

► TRYING TO LEAF: No matter where you came from, you seemingly emerged from a forest. Obviously, to get back home you should be able to go back in the same direction, right? It turns out you can't. Worse, trying too hard to get through the wood will result in you getting lost, or turned back to the carnival. The trees here are not normal, and are varying levels of alien, including things like trees with glowing fruit or orange flowers that constantly burn like candles.

► NOT YOUR WHEELHOUSE (NEW): Sometimes, even magical ferris wheels get stuck. The carnival's particular wheel is enchanted to create a particular out of this world experience - as you pass along the top, you feel as if they are so close to the sky that you can interact with the stars like baubles hanging above your head. Of course, the novelty probably wears off when the wheel is broken and you've been stuck enjoying the light show with some stranger for the last half hour. How are you going to pass the time?

► WILD CARD: Anything else you can imagine in this setting! There are a lot of possibilities and you're free to explore them. Check out the rest of the game info or the locations page for additional inspiration. Want to make a starter with your character experiencing their first theoretical change? Go for it!

VETERAN WORKERS↴

These prompts are tailored to the carnival's existing employees, the veterans. Odds are they've been here from somewhere between a few months and three years already, and know their way around the block. For them, this is just business as usual - and depending on their attitude towards their job, they may or may not contribute to a few people accidentally getting themselves a contract. Whatever you do, though, don't warn visitors away from the carnival - the ringmaster hates losing business like that.

► DO YOUR WORK: This one's pretty simple - just have your character doing whatever you'd like to have their job be! There is a big list of ideas over here, and you could use this to try things out with a character you intend to be a new arrival, as well.

► WILL O' WISPS: The ringmaster's will o' wisps have gotten free, and she's asked that everyone keep and eye out and help her reclaim them regardless of their official jobs. Wisps are small creatures that burn both hot and cold and comes in a few different variations of the same basic theme. Handling them physically (or psionically, or magically, for that matter) is difficult due to their near intangible nature. Touching and being around them can result in confusion and a sensation similar to being comfortably drunk.

► BREAK TIME: Whatever you were doing, it's break time! It's time for you to relax however you see fit. Do you enjoy some of the carnival attractions yourself, or is that old by now? Do you hang out in the Cookhouse to get a snack? Do you take a nap? Yolo, baby!

► RIDDLE GAME: For a bit of fun, the ringmaster has left a variety of locked chests around the worker areas of the carnival, each with instructions and a riddle written on their lids. The chest will accept three guesses from each worker before refusing to respond to them any further. If you guess the right answer, the chest will open and you will be rewarded with some manner of fun magical knick knack. If you've run out of guesses, maybe you can conspire with someone else and promise to split the prize?

► WILD CARD: Anything else you can imagine in this setting! There are a lot of possibilities and you're free to explore them. Check out the rest of the game info or the locations page for additional inspiration. Want to do a performance? Hang out in the Backyard? Choose whatever appeals!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

A. Admission Fees... Unpaid!

[Isn't real. Can't be. Can't be, can't be, can't be, not that easy.

He's still in the caves. He knows that.

And knowing that he can't be seeing anything that he's actually seeing, Josh felt his heart start to flutter and sickly palpitate as soon as he started seeing the woods. He gulped, and out from that popped a stupid-sounding "oh, no...!" as he braced himself for whatever these... woods... had to offer.

They didn't look like Blackwood's, and the clearer that got, the quicker and more sharply his heart started to beat, the wider his eyes got, the more frequently he started to shake his head, thickly yet non-verbally repeat to himself ahh, no. Ahh, no, ahh, no...!

When he came to a god-damn circus... He was genuinely not sure whether to be less or more afraid, and for what reason. It's not like he hadn't been to one before. He'd been to plenty - with his sisters, no less. But... none like this, and why would his imagination make one up now, of all things...?

He ended up ambling right up to it in a cold vacuum of helpless, fearful confusion. Right up to the gates, surrounded by people who looked as unfamiliar as the premises themselves did. He wandered into a line, the murmurs of ohh, no, ohh, no...! continuing in his head - up until the admissions clerk asked him to pay a fine - anything of value.

He -- paused.

Blinked.

Blinked and stared like a deer in the headlights.]

-- I-I, I, I got nothing -- ... [Jerkily shook his head a couple of times.] I -- I got n -- no...

[But. Luck or the baffling convenience of imagined contrivance jumps in right there - as someone or something strikes up some sort of impatient callout behind him.

He freezes. Hard. Sharp. Another icicle of dread -- before he realizes that the clerk is looking at whoever it was standing behind him, starting to say something. And something hot in his head kicks him into frantic motion as if with a couple of spurs bounced into the frontal sides of his brain.

He presses into the sides of the line - never mind that he was technically in the front of it - and stumbled into the carnival grounds, not facing away from the admission booth in case whoever or whatever's manning it realizes he's just pushed past the lines (it's gonna get him, it's gonna change, it's all gonna go wrong, fuck, what has he done, this is where it goes bad, it's gonna get him)...!

It's a few meters past the gates that he'll either stumble straight into someone else or hear them coming up behind him, and whip around hard with a sharp, cut-off shout of alarm.]

B. Wildcard

[Hit me with anything else at all you'd like to try out!]

[ A someone who'll immediately reach out to try and grab one of Josh's shoulders, to make some effort to steady the poor, panicking young man. Childermass, compared to the rest of the carnival, still looks entirely normal, save for the outdated sense of fashion and a peculiar silver gleam to his eyes, but the normality might be overridden by the fact that all his black clothing makes it look like he's stepped out of a goddamn shadow in this lighting. That much can't be helped. He's very naturally a lurking kind of fellow...

But he isn't here to give Josh another fright. ]

Careful there.

[ He could have opened with calm down, only that rarely ever works. ]

[And, good lord, bumping into someone is one thing but actually being actively touched right now is another - he all but jumps as he turns, stumbles abruptly to withdraw, hands up, inwardly breathes a choked-off "fuck -- !"

And - the relatively (relatively) normal-person-like look of the fellow is probably a good part to thank for the fact that he's keeping his voice, when he forces and ties his thoughts together enough to speak, at something that could be called relatively monotone, if it wasn't for the quivering and the ending inflection.]

What do you -- what do you want...

[Doesn't quite make it to inquiring inflection. Picks up into stammering, something almost resembling normal cadence and emphasis if it wasn't for another added sense of trailing.]

'Told 'em, I've got... I've got nothing.

[Jesus fuckin' Christ in a shitty-ass no-tell motel his heart is palpitating, what on earth is this...]

[ Then the poor man is in for a bad surprise later, when he tries to leave, but Childermass isn't going to be the one to tell him that. Instead, he raises his own hands up, a gesture similar to Josh's own, though his is to show that he's meaning no harm here. ]

Which is fine. [ Not really, but, again, what's done is done. ] You'll be able to settle that later, sir, I assure you, but I only wish to ask you what is wrong. I can tell you right now that no one here means you any harm, if that is what you're thinking.

[ So long as he doesn't mean any harm to them back, in any case, but from the state he's in? That's doubtful. ]

'Ss not real.

[That's what's wrong. It can't be, and fuck, yes, he knows he drove himself here, please, believe he knows it now, but god please he is still too exhausted to take more of this right now, please..]

'S not -- it can't be, I, I just want it to stop -- ...

[Raising his hands, shutting his eyes, sucking in a tight breath, god dammit, something of a crack in his voice there but ha-ha, what irony there'd be in playing tough to what is more likely than not a delusion.]

Please, just...

Oh, but it is real. [ Much to the misfortune of some, sure, but still real. ] And you'd have to speak to the woman in charge about making it stop, though I think she might disagree.

[ Throughout Josh's entire emotional ordeal, Childermass is merely calm, almost impassive about the younger man's terror. There isn't much more he can do, anyway, besides be patient and try to offer help. Well, short of shaking him until he makes more sense, but that really won't help, either.

He'll move from keeping his hands up, in sight, to turning a little to one side and sweeping an arm back to gesture in that direction, further into the carnival. ]

There are quieter places to sit and wait this out, if you'd prefer, Mister...?

[ He ends that with a questioning note, his look expectant. ]

AUH-! [Careful now Josh-what you bump into is soft.

But also a little frightening, more than likely-no matter how pacifying he attempts to be.] C-Careful..! This is a crowded place!

[It takes but a moment to realize that bumping into someone isn't the only thing ailing whoever this is however-Josh isn't exactly the epitome of composure.] ....Are you alright?

[Soft, it is - enough that he doesn't necessarily expect it to be any sort of someone or even necessarily anything threatening until he turns around.

And when he does, it's --

He takes a moment to gape at what he's bumped into - god, it's some kind of bright outright storybook monster - and he tells himself feverishly no, this isn't happening, this isn't happening about as aimlessly as it gets - no reassurance or further panic meant. It just is. This is can't possibly be happening...

He manages to weakly, roughly wheeze out a:]

-- Who are you....

[And why are you here? Why is any, any at all, of this here...]

I am Gongenzaka Noboru! [he introduces without pause, sounding very much like he stepped out of an old Japanese drama. He coughs, almost comically bringing a fist to his face to cover it.] Now then...

As I, the man Gongenzaka, asked... ...Are you alright?

Don't understand...

[Meandering shaking of his head. It's part an actual friggin' response to that question and partly not. Even with a name stated, who are you, why do you want to know...

Don't understand --

Auh...........

[....Okay yep, that's worrying. Even Yuuya was never this bad-mostly he just pulled his goggles on and stopped talking. Repeated mutterings are a little more...

...

Tricky. The teen's ears swivel back a milisecond before turning forward again, before he manages to stammer out a response.] Well then!

If there is something you don't understand, then I, the man Gongenzaka, shall answer! Ask me anything you need!

[That doesn't help. Doesn't make things any less strange, doesn't make things any less threatening, doesn't make things any less fucking untrustworthy, incomprehensible, wrong, or, despite surfaces, pleasamt or unthreatening.

He looks up - part of the more solid part of his consciousness has him hating himself for this degree of weakness - but still, he says out loud, weakly wavering:]

What do you want --?

[Man, if he could just enjoy this apparent straight-up fever dream, but as it is, Christ, no, he can't, arguably especially with its innocent setting. Please, just tell him when, where, and on a basis of what exact thought this is going to go to shit...]

Auh?!

Me?! [he asks, actually straightening up as his face seems to redden more.] Wh-Wh-

I, the man Gongenzaka, am merely doing my job! You are a customer, are you not?!

[He doesn't know.

It was here. Whatever this was. That's all he knows about any of it, Jesus...]

I don't even know why I'm here, I don't -- ...

[Customer, the -- creature, fellow, whatever this person or figment or apparition of any frickin' kind is -- said, and so he mumbles on still so helplessly and aimlessly.]

L-look, I tried to tell 'em I've got n -- ...nothing... Duh -- I duh... I don't even fff -- [Small vocal break because goodness, seriously...] -- Don't even fuckin' know what I'm doing here...! Just -- just leave me alone...!

[Iiiit's still more clearly baffled and freaked-out than anything else, take that how you will.]

[Alright Gongenzaka. You've got this. You've probably got this-for a fair few moments he's honestly rather baffled himself though, wondering how exactly he can explain it.

...

He supposes the best way is to start from the beginning.] No one is forcing you into anything! [he announces first, his stutter banished as he straightens himself.] You must take a breath, and calm down!

Where were you, before you found yourself here? If you think on that, then perhaps you will be able to understand what happened.

[In the meantime, he's going to consider if he should radio a doctor.]

[This from what could easily be his own mind, huh? Haaa, geez, how much he's fallen. He winces strictly on having been asked that - god fucking damn it what a mess he is, what a mess what a mess what a mess...

Swallows.]

-- I was in the caves -- ...

That's it -- [Kind of choked off. And then somewhat more regulated in standards of regular speech:]

That's... that's it...

[He could certainly say more if he real reason to trust anything he's seeing, but as it stands, he doesn't. It's illusion, it's a mind game, it's something. Something looking to reel him deeper and keep him further off-balance than he is, and you know what, if he never comes out of where he is now, it probably serves him right, but god damn, he isn't ready...]

Hmmmmmm.... [Caves then. Well, that's good enough.] Then, in that case, you would have wandered in from there...

[There is a cough-and, likely to Josh's surprise, the great 'beast' lays his main body down to better speak with the other.] You have entered a travelling carnival; it is a place which travels not merely cities, nor countries, but entire realms of existence! Should you wish to leave, you therefore have nothing to fear! [the man assures him.] All you must do is exit through the gates once more, and you will return to the very moment you were in those caves.

[Just as long as, you know. You didn't eat something or ride something. Since that costs something.]

[This is surreal. It's so freakin' surreal, even more than seeing Alan giving him rules was with the inherent absurdity of strangers, creatures, carnivals, what is this...

But, speaking of absurdity, speaking of 'em, ha, fucking pathetic as this is, Jesus, he doesn't want to go back any more than he wants to be here.]

Why...?

[Shallowly, feverishly answered. In this moment, he's not sure what to say, or what to do but grasp for meaning. He's not even sure what he's asking - why would it be that easy to end it, what the hell are the gates for, why is he being encouraged back, heck, any of it and/or all of the above.]

Auh...why? [Josh is just full of questions he's not expecting, isn't he? He stares rather confusedly yet again, scratching behind his ear after bringing his crossed arms down 'at rest' ('I Visited The Carnival And All I Got Was This T-Shirt', the shirt says). Why...] Well...at the moment, it just happens to be stopped here; a carnival doesn't merely stop at their venue point, after all! As for why you entered then...

...I, the man Gongenzaka, suppose that if not mere coincidence, one could call it some sort of 'fate', depending on your situation. [It's not as if he has any clue what's going on with you, after all.]

[Fate! Well, that's a god-awful laugh - takes a couple wheezing breaths that fall short of being laughs accompanied by hard blinking - thoughts of "depending", Jesus, stop acting like you don't know...]

-- Can't be...

[Somewhere in that pause was an "it", too barely pronounced to entirely be what it is. Starts shaking his head, meandering.]

'Ss not... It's all... [Ever more trembling god damn it what a mess he is - ] -- not even real, it's not, it's not, it's not real, just --

[Hard swallow.]

-- just let me go -- ...!

[Honest pathetic and fff, pretty much guaranteed-to-be-ineffective plea there, but, ha. It... is what it is, really, especially when you've got no options either way.]

No one is holding you here.

[His voice is steady and calm, and he is back to crossing his arms like some disappointed parent with their child.] What you see here is as real as the air that you breathe, and you are free to leave whenever you wish!

The gate is right there, [he adds, gesturing toward the path leading to it.]

If you truly wish to be rid of this place, then go!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

⇨ TEST DRIVE MEME #1

Joshua "Josh" Washington | Until Dawn | Newbie

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject