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SUMMER TDM.
● ● ● T D M . 0 9
The words ring in your ears as in the darkness of your dream, a chromatic glow pulses, slowly enveloping you. It is not a feeling of comfort that surrounds you, though — as a distorted voice whispers in your ear, you feel it: cold dread, and a sudden certainty that everything is about to be irrevocably changed.
It is to this daunting realization that you wake, and as your heart slows into something resembling a normal tempo, you notice something you should have noticed immediately: you are not in your bed.
1.0 White walls, clinical yet clean, sparsely-furnished rooms. You may wake in one of three rooms: a room with only one bed, a room with two beds, or a room with four beds. Those waking up in rooms with more than one bed notice that they are very much not alone. Perhaps the other occupants of the room are still sleeping, dreaming the same dream as you just did, or a regular one after returning to the station just a few days ago … or perhaps you wake to the other person in the room watching you.
What you do is entirely up to you: yell in surprise when you wake to someone staring at you? Or maybe you’ll try to sneak away before anyone notices you...
2.0 Those with life-threatening injuries find themselves awakening in the infirmary, in a regular hospital bed. Most of their injuries have been treated, and any lingering illnesses or conditions will have designated medicine bottles on the table next to the bed.
White curtains surround the bed on both sides, giving an illusion of privacy. But is that a rustling sound you hear? Some footsteps? Perhaps you’re not the only one in need of some medical attention... or you've attracted the attention of those with experience in medical aid, and they rush to your bedside, surprised about this sudden new patient.
It is not just for your injuries that you may want some company, but also for leaving the infirmary — you can’t stay there forever, after all, and will have to make your way through the hallways of the station to the living quarters, and claim a room and a bed there.
Once you’re up, you may notice there’s something in your ear: an earpiece that, when you become aware of it, quickly runs you through the instructions for how to use the network, a recorded message by a female voice that explains exactly why you’re here… and leaves you with a map of the station.
So what else is there to do but to explore? Best get to know what is now your new home.
3.0 When trying to decide where yo go, you may find your way to the armory, where you can try to work the machine there to make yourself a weapon — perhaps to replace one that didn’t come with you to the station… or maybe you want to be prepared for the future. The recently-returned team members will surely recommend having a functional weapon with you.
4.0 After you’ve exhausted yourself training, it’s time to grab a bite. For that, you should head to the kitchen, which is equipped with all the basic appliances you might need, and ingredients for most regular dishes.
5.0 A welcome reprieve to the cold, dark space that surrounds the characters can be found in the sunlight room. A skillful illusion surrounds anyone who steps inside the room: the sun hangs high overhead, bright and unyielding. Those who aren't so keen on the heat may be tempted to find shade under one of the many towering trees scattered about the lush green fields, or even take a dip in the room's crystalline pond.
With an illusion so authentic it may leave you longing for a nice glass of ice-cold lemonade, it is easy to forget you are in space at all. Perhaps that gives you comfort, or just makes you miss the real nature all the more.
6.0 If you’d rather choose tinkering over nature, the lab is guaranteed to provide you with some entertainment. Glass vials and jars of chemicals sit on shelves in a surprisingly beautiful display of colour on one side of the room, while the other side of the room contains stacks of boxes containing assorted equipment: cords, bolts, panels, buttons, gears, gadgets, gizmos, and thingamabobs. The downside is that the parts available seem to have no apparent method to their sorting. So get digging, and you may just find exactly what you need to make what you’ve always wanted to make!
7.0 As you wander back towards the common areas, you may notice a room off to the side. The room takes up a chunk of the common area, and on its unassuming door is a little plaque that reads, 'The Ximusic room'. Should you enter, you will find a sound-proofed practice room that contains — yes, you guessed it, band equipment that even the most musically inclined should be satisfied with. So pick up an instrument, saunter up to the microphone to belt out your favourite tunes, or take a seat at the side of the room and enjoy others' playing.
8.0 If it’s items you’re lacking, though, some time after your arrival, the earpiece alerts you to a new message.
As you make your way to the platform, you'll see there is nothing amiss in the neat piles of items on it. There’s clothes, shoes, dishware, skincare, books… even a couple of CDs, and a few cute stuffed animals. So sort through what there is and grab what you want, before someone else does!
Eventually, you’ll find yourself at the doors of the the simulation room — it has been equipped with a new simulation to take you through possible mission-like scenarios so it’s best to prepare yourself and see what it has in store for you.
8.0 The doors slide shut behind you and the room goes dark. Small pinpricks of light will start to build on each other until you’re surrounded by grey skies overhead and grassy green lawns, a row of old stone columns lining your vision. It seems you’re in a courtyard of some kind, but that’s not all. Something tugs at the hem of your sleeve or nudges at your leg, a warm presence that feels comfortable and ultimately very familiar. They look up at you, or maybe they meet your eye-level, a creature that varies in size, shape, colour, and form depending on what reflects you best. This creature, known as a compalion is a physical manifestation of your spirit or soul and will stay by your side on this journey.
You can stay here and get to know your compalion, or you can take your new companion and explore the campus. Because, if you do move forward past the line of columns (a hallway it turns out), you’ll find that the small cluster of buildings forms an academic campus of some kind.
• Your compalion will shift into one form throughout this simulation and can be any creature that best mirrors your personality.
• They can be as small as a flea and as large as a small elephant; get creative!
• Whether they speak to you in your native tongue is entirely up to you (some speak, some don’t)
• Basically daemon rules apply.
9.0 While it might seem like fun to spend hours just exploring the old buildings with your compalion and any Orbers like you that you might bump into along the way, it’s important to remember that you have a goal to achieve: follow the clues and retrieve the orb. Your compalion might offer an idea or two for where to go, or it may just be voicing the thoughts in your head, but it’s not a bad thing to follow your heart (or your gut) as it were. You might find that the rooftops of the campus buildings are easily climbable to get a good vantage point of your location. (Just be careful not to slip and fall! The height from here is quite dangerous.) A clocktower stands proud in the distance among a cluster of other campus buildings, marking the time.
Inside, you might be led down dark stone halls and into a series of classrooms: including reading quarters, study rooms with old leather couches and warm carpets covering stone floors; lecture halls with stiff wooden seating and individual desks to match, a chalkboard with indiscernible scribbles half-wiped away; and a laboratory that deals with something a little less modern than you might be used to, or perhaps with its twisty vials and bubbling potions, it suits you perfectly. There is the large library filled from floor to ceiling with books beyond imagining.
If you look out from the tall arch-shaped window from a classroom, or if you’re outside and you tilt your head up to the sky, you might notice that the sky appears to be darkening further, growing heavy with what is inevitably an oncoming rainstorm. If you’re inside, it might be best to stay indoors; if you’re outside, perhaps it’s time to find some shelter. Or if you’re determined to find that orb outside, risk you and your compalion getting wet.
● ● ●
N O T E: Additionally, there are three personal tasks provided to each character as they enter the simulation. In-game, each character will be given one task. For the purposes of the test drive, we’re leaving it to players to pick a task for their character and run with it.
A Team up with another Orber and their compalion to find the orb's location.
B Climb into the clocktower and ring the bell.
C Explain your best theory regarding your compalion’s manifestation to a fellow team member.
F Y I
• TDM threads can be used as samples for apps. In fact, we encourage it!
• Reserves are now open!
• Apps open June 25.
• For any questions regarding TDM, please direct them here. For questions about the game, please refer to the FAQ.
FOR SOME FUN:
Have a clue about the upcoming mission—
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Connor is eliciting big weird feelings that Shinn has not completely worked through about that time that his boss tried to do Brave New World in space. And also feelings about the fact that almost everyone he knows has genetic modifications, so they could be described as "made for" something even though the term creeps him out as applied to a person. And also also about the Extended child soldiers the Alliance "made for" combat with drugs and mind-tampering, and his own faction was absolutely ready to treat the Extended like lab rats instead of people.
Shinn really did not wake up from that recruitment talk ready to dive into existentialism and determinism, and it shows--he's a little hunched in on himself, with his fists balled and a pinched, uncomfortable expression on his face. ]
I hear you, but...!
[ Dammit, Athrun or Kira would probably have the principled way to express this. Shinn just plows forward awkwardly. ]
Are you really happy like that?
(1/2) oh this CR is gonna be SO interesting actually
Connor hunts people that don't do what they're made for.]
2/2
[All of this is said with a soft, almost naïve affect. It's all the "party line" - the simple and pleasant lie that properly conditioned androids maintain to hide the fact that truth is complicated and ugly.
Connor moves a few more things aside-]
I think you should be able to get out soon. Can you hand me the glass tubing that's near your shoulder?
[That thing's going to shatter if it falls, and no way should broken glass be falling on humans.]
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But there's something you regret! That's why you're here!
[ He's more strident now, covering for uncertainty with volume. ]
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Yes. A ... catastrophic loss of human life. I'm sure you'd agree that this is not a desirable outcome.
[Still mechanically holding its hand out. Tube? Yes? Tube? The only thing Connor has ever wanted, tube??]
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[ So much puffed-up indignation at the suggestion that he would think catastrophic loss of life was good! Connor is never getting this tube at this rate. ]
But there's no way it's just "unsatisfying"! Not if you "regret" it!
[ Regret has felt like a helluva lot of things over the last three years, but never just calm and clinical "unsatisfying." ]
no subject
It seems that you would be more emotionally comfortable if I was a person, that professed a desired for own agency and acted on my own feelings.
My human partner was the same way. However, making Lieutenant Anderson more comfortable was usually necessary to avoid being shot in the head. You don't seem to be as heavily armed. Or nearly as intoxicated.
[Connor withdraws its hand, adjusts the neat, crisp white of its shirt cuffs.]
no subject
[ That's a wild and confusing change of mannerisms followed by a very disturbing suggestion about casual murder! And damn it is frustrating to try and treat someone like a person because it seems like the right thing to do, only to have it turn out that he doesn't want to be treated like another person! Connor is getting full-on shouting for that. ]
I'm not going to hurt you!
[ Shouting is tone of voice to make that representation, but shouting is just how Shinn rolls. ]
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I'm just not sure what it is you want from me. I'm sorry. It seemed like you wanted me to display emotion in a more realistic way.
If you don't want to hand me the tube, please set it aside.
no subject
I want you to be you, you crazy bastard!
[ File away: not-saintly personality doesn't persist in trying to help? Weird but understandable if true. ]
no subject
[Still in the pleasant mask, but a little glitter of dry sarcasm.]
If you don't want to hand me the tube, could you please set it aside?
no subject
[ He knows this is stupid, he's just pissed off and being contrary. ]
no subject
[The sarcasm has graduated to full passive-aggression.]
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[ But he does finally hand it over. ]
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[Glass gets set aside.
Human safety :)
One more major box shifted makes a hole narrow enough to step through. Connor steps back to give Shinn some room.]
What is it that you were looking for? I could assist you in finding it safely.
no subject
[ He stretches and slips out, trying to surreptitiously look Connor over from a new angle for a moment and failing at the surreptitiously part. His inclination to shout has fizzled out for the time being, replaced by his initial confusion about ship functions. ]
There have to be normal suits around here somewhere. It's just weird being on a ship this size without them.
[ Why did this franchise pick a made-up word for "space suit" and run with it for forty years? No idea. ]
no subject
Connor's world makes up the difference with uniforms. Connor's grey blazer has multiple indicators on it that say ANDROID, the way service animals have leashes and vests that say WORKING: DO NOT PET. They're all written in clear, luminous lettering: Androids must be distinguishable from human beings from the front or the back, in all ranges of lighting conditions.
And, speaking of that - ]
I'm going to assume you don't mean formal clothing. Is it possible that the suits here look different to the ones in the world you're familiar with, but serve a similar function? We both seem to come from different inhabited planets, so we could assume that the technological progression on the planet that built this ship is a third culture entirely.
no subject
[ He huffs, back to being a little exasperated, but that's because of his ongoing failure to find normal suits, which is just really weird even if the station uses teleportation to get around. What if something attacked the station? What if the station needed repairs? ]
Whatever technology this place has, a normal suit should cover the whole body and have a faceplate, right? And there's nothing here that looks like that.
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[ It doesn't look like there was a battle or some killer malfunction. ]
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I hadn't even thought to ask.
Hopefully they all got their regrets fixed and... departed?
[But, also, Connor is not someone you call when things are going well. Connor generally only arrives to the party when someone's already turned up at least one corpse. Maybe Connor should start looking at this space station like a suspected crime scene.]
no subject
I guess. If something went wrong, it should've left a mess.
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[Connor does a loop of the room. Infrared, ultraviolet, heatmapping. No signs of blood, cleaned up or otherwise. Well, that's good. But this IS only one room - and putting someone out of an airlock wouldn't leave behind any stains.]
I suppose we should find someone to ask. They may also know where you can find a suit.
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You can be pretty gloomy.
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How so?
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