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AUGUST TDM.
● ● ● T D M . 0 3
… What are you willing to do to erase your regret from existence?
The words, when they die out, leave you in emptiness — despairing, all-consuming, the kind that invites only the worst thoughts. What have you done? What have you agreed to do?
But then, from the emptiness, a golden light shines, and as you reach for it —
you wake up.
1.0 Perhaps it was less the golden light in your dream and more the insistent feeling of something metallic poking your side repeatedly, making beeping noises… wait, beeping noises?
When you look down, you’ll see a small robot staring at you and looking less than happy (maybe it has something to do with your disheveled state, maybe it's still mad about having to clean up after a certain pizza-induced mess). When you get up, it unleashes a series of beeps — and then furiously starts to scrub the floor.
Yes, the floor — instead of waking up in a bed, you find yourself lying on a hallway, white walls and white floor surrounding you. You don’t have long to stare at the minimalistic look of everything around you before the little bot starts poking you again, the word MOVE blinking across its visor.
So better get out of its way! Perhaps you’re on the hallway on your own and leave on your own… or perhaps there’s someone else, sleeping near you. Maybe do them the courtesy of waking them up before this little angry bot does! Or perhaps you’re the poor soul still sleeping and needing a rescue before the beeps make it to you.
2.0 If you need a visit to the infirmary, the situation may be more dire — perhaps there’s blood on the wall that you wake up against, your clothes may be dirty or ragged… whatever it is that has happened to you before waking here and has left you injured, it sure doesn’t create a reassuring sight. Best get to the infirmary as soon as possible.... with some assistance, perhaps.
Once upright, 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 The most pressing question that you might ask yourself is: but where will I stay? The question is answered once you walk through the winding white corridors to the common area. Behind it, there are three types of rooms: those with one bed, two beds and four beds. The rooms are clinical yet clean, and sparsely-furnished — and most importantly, most are occupied. So be prepared to get some roomies!
4.0 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.
And speaking of weapons: to put it to good use, head to the training room, where the entire purpose is to provide you with a space to spar and train to your heart’s content!
5.0 After you’ve exhausted yourself training, it’s time to grab a bite. For that, you should head to the kitchen, which… seems to be filled with a lot of leftovers: takeout boxes with an assorted collection of pizza slices, kung pao chicken, lamb curry... not to mention the entire tray of chocolate brownies. Feel free to eat your fill — or if takeout isn’t your cup of tea, open one of the large fridges to pick fresh ingredients and make your own lunch.
6.0 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: you can hear the trilling of birds, feel a light breeze caress your skin as you walk through a grass field. A new addition is a flower garden where there once was a meadow — now, roses, camellias, lilies and dozens of other flowers sway in the wind, all varieties in their own flower beds, with a winding path of stones leading through them. The path leads to where a bridge rises over a sparkling, babbling brook.
Here, 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.
7.0 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!
8.0 If it’s items you’re lacking, though, some time after your arrival, the earpiece alerts you to a new message.
Indeed, the platform near the personal quarters is still whirring with power, and new items form neat piles 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!
(CW: POTENTIAL BODY MODIFICATION)
Whether you’re a quick study and you’ve become settled into life on the station, or you want to get the full lay of the land (in a manner of speaking) first, if you decide to explore the hall past the control room, you’ll eventually come across the simulation room.
Step past the threshold and the doors will slide shut with a quiet woosh. Nothing suspicious; nothing to worry about. But before you can really get a sense of your environment (a grey, large-ish empty room, no furniture, no discernable objects to provide markers), the room goes dark, and then … there’s really no other way to describe it: the room transforms.
You find yourself in a club. The music is upbeat, loud, but not too loud. Down a short flight of steps flanking the bar and seating is the open floor with more tables and booths bathed in a warm, dim glow of light, and at the very end of the room is a stage with its bright spotlight showcasing its performers — though, at the moment, the stage is empty.
9.0 When you take a step forward, you’ll feel a presence gently push at your chest or your shoulder — a tall and jovial man resembling a well-dressed bartender from the top up (the rest of him appears to move along wheels) approaches with a tall flute glass in hand. Its contents are sparkly and blue.
Will you proceed? Please respond ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.”
There’s something a little strange about his voice, a cadence that doesn’t sound quite natural even when the simulation is so realistic otherwise. Once you’ve given your consent, the bartender continues.
10.0 It seems the bartender wasn’t lying. Once you’ve allowed the drink (tasty, sweet-but-not-too-sweet, effervescent, with light notes of your fondest childhood memory) to settle in your stomach you might experience a myriad of effects on your body, ranging from a change in skin colour (pink? green? blue with spots?), an additional limb or two (or three), a tail or wings, or cybernetic parts such as lie-detecting eyes or a tongue that can uncover truths and lies in others. If you happen to find another Orber within the room and both of you have consumed the offered drink, you might find yourself experiencing a full bodyswap.
None of the changes are painful; if anything, they might not even be noticeable until you look into a mirror, look down at your limb-in-question, or your companion points it out.
11.0 The moment you approach the stage, a performer will appear as if out of thin air and begin to sing, her voice strong and smoky and melodic. Her enthralling performance could put you into a trance, but you have an orb to find and a personal task to accomplish, so it’s time to put your best foot forward and do a little investigating.
Talking to some of the patrons might prove fruitful as some of them are convinced that the stage has never sounded or looked so good, like there’s something giving performers that extra oomph that no one can explain. It might be wise to wait until that last performance before you sneak up there — or maybe you want to do a little snooping around now, you know, while everyone’s distracted. Strategize with your fellow Orbers and uncover the location of this hidden orb.
● ● ●
N O T E: The effects of the drink and the level of changes your character experiences is entirely up to you. Patrons of this fine club won’t bat an eye if you look a little like them.
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 If you’ve been given a particular body change that might aid you in this mission, do not use it to your advantage.
B Team up with a fellow Orber to uncover the hidden location.
C Get up on stage and put on a performance during the simulation. Your song choice will determine the outcome of success in your investigation.
F Y I
• TDM threads can be used as samples for apps. In fact, we encourage it!
• Reserves are currently open!
• Apps open August 27.
• For any questions regarding TDM, please direct them here. For questions about the game, please refer to the FAQ.
FOR SOME FUN:
Have a listen for some clues about the second mission.
(Hint: there are four clues in total.)
no subject
Given how exhausted he is, and Sabriel's own prior experiences of running on desperation and adrenaline, she's not sure how long he can keep going. But if he wants to try... Sabriel fills a mug with coffee, grabbing a spoon and packets of creamer and sugar along with it.
"Here. Sorry, it's not that hot." It's lukewarm at best, really.
"I'm sorry. It's all a lot to take in, but there isn't much we can do."
no subject
He flinches a bit when the bitter taste hits his tongue, but forces the sip down. Dreadful, really, but his throat was heat-seared and parched, so it's better than nothing.
'A lot to take in' is one hell of an understatement, isn't it? Yet the company he's with doesn't seem too staggered or shaken. There's some quiet shame rippling through him at that, because...he was Soldier. He needs to be stronger than this, no matter what.
I don't understand...how I'm still alive. The admission comes in a softer, less rattled tone of thought.
no subject
"I can't tell you either. This station... takes people when they make a bargain to recover the orbs, but the offer only comes when when we're asleep, or... otherwise unconscious. And then we wake up here."
Sabriel's not sure of the details, just that it happens. At the face he makes, she nudges the packets of sugar.
"Coffee doesn't taste good, but sugar makes it taste better."
She's getting off topic, she knows, but-
"Still, you're alive now- and like everyone else on this station, I'm going to make sure you stay that way. Do you have any other injuries?"
no subject
His eyes flicker up at the question of injuries. The pain radiating from his eye is what he feels the most of all, so he needs a moment to just listen to his body and understand what more could be at play. Now that he's not moving, he can't feel some of the burns under his clothes to tell.
He shakes his head slightly.
no subject
"Do you need me to use a stronger healing spell on your eye, then?" It still... doesn't look good, and Sabriel has thoroughly recovered since Gyeonje, when she exhausted herself in the search for the cure and the subsequent fight. No one could lecture her about wearing herself out now, she thinks.
"I'm sorry. I know this is.. a lot to take in. My name's Sabriel, by the way- what's yours?"
no subject
No trace of the SD System from any of her thoughts, no vision of Terra...
He is very out of his depth here. Starting small will be best for now.
Blue. He nods a little as the name leaves him. And...if you think it needs more tending to, then...please.
no subject
There might be no trace of the SD system, or vision of Terra, but as Sabriel refocuses on her spellcasting, her mind dives into the Charter again, and Blue might see that same glimpse of an infinity of marks, swirling in intricate patterns as vast as the universe, and Sabriel's mind navigating through it- and communing with it, even as she dives ever deeper into it, selecting marks and letting them flow through her and out her fingertips, where they gather between her and Blue.
With a ferocious effort of will, Sabriel summons the last mark- one that shines brighter than all the others, a Master Mark of healing. Her mind retains the connection to the Charter, but Sabriel's focus shifts to ordering the marks in a specific pattern, one to mend his ruined eye as much as possible, and get rid of the pain- and then she releases the spell.
The spell arcs from her fingertips to his eye with a surge of light that's almost blinding, and Sabriel has to take deep breaths as she examines her handiwork, as though she'd just been sprinting all out.
no subject
He remains still and outwardly silent, even as he asks, his mouth pulled in a troubled frown.
These symbols in your mind. It's...unlike any power I've seen before.
no subject
"It's the Charter," Sabriel explains, "It's a force that contains and describes- well, everything. Everything that lives, has lived, or might yet be, and the bonds that tie them together."
Being able to reach it, even in this strange place, is reassuring, even if there are aspects of it, and her connection to it, that Sabriel doesn't fully understand. What does it mean, that one of the Great Charters lies in her blood?
"It's a form of magic. So Charter mages draw on the marks that describe what they want to do- like healing."
no subject
I...don't know of such a thing, he admits, looking uncertain. In all my years...I've never perceived of anything like it.
...Nothing natural.
Because the way she speaks of it seems to reflect the ambitions the SD System has for its computerized authority. And if that's the case? He's not a fan.
no subject
And for all that Sabriel carried both within her, the Charter held a stronger sway.
But that was uncharitable- for all that people had been curious here, she knew from experience that some people were afraid of magic- with reason, in some cases.
"Everyone here's from different places- there are people here with different kinds of magic and powers I've never heard of before my arrival."
no subject
The star systems under the SD System's control...would never allow such things.
You must be from very far away.
no subject
But then she realizes he's talking about star systems, and space, and Sabriel remembers her conversations with Yzak- about venturing beyond just one world, and about how advanced technology could become.
"You've been to space? Do they have mobile suits where you're from?"
no subject
Machines...that operate on their own, yes. And more.
They govern everything.
And from his grim expression, it's not a good thing.
no subject
But that... doesn't sound like what Yzak had described. He'd spoken of people in conflict, trying to achieve peace- not entrusting everything to machines.
"And how they govern bodes ill for humanity?" She can read between the lines of that expression. "I'm sorry. Where I'm from... things like radios, airplanes, and cinemas are considered advanced, so when people speak of going into space, or machines that act on their own... It sounds as strange to me as magic probably sounds to you."
no subject
That there are worlds untouched...by that system... It seems almost impossible.
And yet, it must be so. There's no inkling of computer tampering coming from the color of her impulses and emotions - they're unchecked, free, and entirely her own, unlike those of humans he's encountered before. And that's to say nothing about that 'Charter' business!