TDM - OCTOBER 2020

[robbies]

TEST DRIVE MEME - OCTOBER 2020

Everyone's entitled to one good scare.
CW: Violence, death, mouth trauma, vomiting, needles, razors

---

“Help me. Please, help me…”

A child’s voice, calling out for aid. There’s no rhyme or reason for when it comes to you. It’s so quiet, a whisper in the deepest, darkest corners of your mind. Were it not for the sharp, stabbing pain it pulls out of you, you could ignore it. You could even pretend it’s just your imagination.

It all happens so quickly and powerfully. Left in the dust, your brain struggles to process it all. Blacking out is the least it can do, but it’s also all it can do, and it does so before you even have a chance to fully register just how young the voice is, and how deeply, heartbreakingly lost it sounds.

When you finally awaken with your bare feet tangled in soft sheets, a layer of fuzzy fleece or slinky silk clinging to your body like another layer of skin, the sunlight pouring in from the window next to your bed momentarily blinding you, and the cries of happy children playing baseball outside of it carrying faintly, it all becomes very clear—

Something is horribly wrong.

---

OCTOBER 1st.

It becomes very clear very quickly that this isn’t a simple kidnapping. If you’re twenty years old or older, the bedroom you wake up in is very clearly a couple’s bedroom — with separate beds like a modest, modern couple of course! A similarly lost and confused stranger is in the other. They are your counterpart, for everything in this room has a matching counterpart — the nightstand and lamp each of you have beside your beds, the framed pictures on the wall, even your pajamas. If you’re under twenty years old, your room is smaller but more personalized, filled with comic books, model kits, stray baseball cards littered around the floor. Dolls, fashion magazines of people dressed from a bygone era, stacks of vinyl records neatly arranged next to a record player. And then there are the pictures. They’re everywhere in the house — in a frame on your nightstand, hung on the walls, stuck in the photo albums and scrapbooks lying on your desk or tucked away in drawers. Here you are on your wedding day, exchanging vows with your partner. Here’s you sitting in a fishing boat with one of the younger members of your house. Here’s a picture of you at ten years old getting ready for the first day of school. All of the photographs are aged, sepia, even yellowed and dusty in frames hung for a long, long time. By the time you make it down to the living room, you’ll notice that the television is on; someone must have forgotten to turn it off before they went to bed. On it, a cartoon pack of cigarettes and accompanying cigarette dancers prance around a black and white pumpkin patch, joined by dancing skeletons, ghosts and witches as a cheerful little earworm blares: ”Thirty days til Halloween, Halloween, Halloween, thirty days til Halloween—“

---

GETTING TO KNOW THE NEIGHBORS.

As you get acclimated, you gradually begin to learn more about this strange new world you’ve found yourself in. You’re in a neighborhood on the east side of a town called Santa Rosita located… somewhere in California (wherever or whatever that might be). The year is 1961. If it wasn’t clear enough, your neighbors are more than willing to humor you if you ask. Even if you accost them with questions and demands. Sure, you and your family are a little kooky, and you have a very overactive imagination, but the key to any good joke is playing along! And how could something like “I’m from the future, from another world” be anything but a joke? A. AUNT MYRNA'S PARTY CHEESE SALAD. Over the course of the week, your neighbors will come by unannounced, each with a new homecooked meal to welcome you to their cozy little side of town. Meatloaf, potato salad, lamb chops. Gelatin molds — lots of gelatin molds. Someone even comes by to drop off a gelatinous yellow lump of pineapple, green peppers, celery and yellow cheese swimming in a soupy mixture of sour and whipped cream. “It’s my aunt Myrna’s recipe!” they gush once they drop the casserole tin into your hands, proceeding to rattle off every ingredient. Well, at least you won’t be starving anytime soon. When you bring it back in to your kitchen - and its cheery wallpaper and its floral patterned Pyrex dishware, you and your new...family(?) all stare at the cheese salad, the gelatin, the curiously frosted meatloaf spread. A smorgasbord courtesy of the insistent generosity! Who will take the first bite?

B. DON'T BE A SQUARE!

You can only avoid the cheer and the neighbors for so long, even as you sit inside enjoying all the amenities of your new home. The television can only turn its volume up to five, after all! One bright and sunny Saturday, the weather crisp and clear, news broadcasts and reruns of The Ed Sullivan Show are drowned out by the music in the neighborhood. Eventually it’s too much to bear — you simply must put on your shoes and go discover the source of that infernal racket.

Why, it’s the block party! Haven’t you seen the invitation — with instructions — sitting in your mailbox, silly? Wear a badge so everyone on the block can know you’re new and welcome you to their extended family!

Well! Each neighbor was supposed to set up a table with snacks and drinks and entertainment on their front lawn. Carter Mayhew, one of your Robbie neighbors, has a whole ring toss obstacle course set up for boys to play with, and his wife is cheerfully and blandly instructing a group of girls on jump rope rhymes. Colorful streamers hang from every lamppost and mailbox, balloons and party favors galore. Like you, there are even a few newcomers to Santa Rosita that are caught just as unaware of this event — though others are being welcomed in by husbands and wives and children, caught in conversations about building decks and the upcoming Halloween festivities.

Before you can decide if returning home or joining the party is your choice, a plate with chips and dips and yes, more gelatin is shoved into your hands and a party hat snapped on to your head.

“The guest of honor has arrived! Come and meet your neighbors, neighbor!”

---

THROUGHOUT OCTOBER.

Life falls into a peaceful haze for the next several days. Dull, unassuming, tranquil. As the month drags on, the spirit of Halloween begins to manifest in Santa Rosita, from the pumpkins people start putting out on their doorsteps to the smiling faces of paper skeletons pressed against their windows. And then, towards the end of the month, something terrible happens. You hear it first through word of mouth, rippling through Santa Rosita like a wave, dark murmurs accompanied by sad sighs and downturned eyes. Soon, you start to read about it. Grim business, they say. A tragedy. How could something like this happen. People stop talking about it by the end of the week. Best just to forget about it. Every day, that cigarette commercial comes on. It’s impossible to escape it. And every day, the number of days in the song changes, counting down. ”Thirteen days till Halloween—” “Eight more days til Halloween—” “Three more days til Halloween, Halloween, Halloween…”

---

HALLOWEEN.

CW: Violence, death, mouth trauma, vomiting, needles, razors

October 31st. It sneaks up on you whether you like it or not. When dawn breaks on Halloween day, things are as serene as they’ve ever been as men do yard work, raking leaves as their wives bake fresh pie and cookies in the house, the spicy scent of cinnamon, apple and pumpkin wafting through the neighborhood on chilly October wind. There’s a smile on every child’s face as they skip off the school bus in the afternoon, running into their houses to get their costumes ready. As it begins to get dark, the residents of Santa Rosita start lighting their jack-o-lanterns. One by one, little balls of light flicker to life on every porch and doorstep, jagged smiles grinning in the dark. For the entire night, nobody blows the candle inside their pumpkins out. It’s a tradition, a very old one, and traditions are just another way of saying rules. And Halloween in Santa Rosita, as it turns out, lives and dies by the rules.

A. ALWAYS CHECK YOUR CANDY.

Halloween isn’t just for the kids, although they certainly make up the bulk of who you’ll see out and about on the streets. Walking through Santa Rosita, your neighbors are as generous with handing out treats as they are with handing out gelatin molds and pot roasts, and they don’t discriminate. Adults are received just as warmly as children; the worst one can expect is a quirked eyebrow if they show up to a house without a costume.

Apples, packs of gum, homemade cookies. Chocolate bars, nickels, popcorn balls. Your neighbors hand out all sorts of treats, most of them homemade. The Robbies are no exception, and it’s their treats that seem a bit more high quality than most, some of the candy they hand out being obviously expensive, brand names. The good stuff. They drop each treat into your bag with those same pleasant, mild expressions and too-tight smiles you’ve grown used to in your short time here.

Eventually, as everyone winds up doing at some point in the night, you decide to start digging into your treat bag to sample some of your well-earned goods — maybe in the comfort of your home, maybe outside on the streets. And that’s when the fun begins.

Maybe you bite into metal, the razor sharp end of a blade embedded into the apple or candy bar you’ve picked out burying itself in your gums, or splitting your tongue. Maybe it’s a needle, impaling itself straight through the roof of your mouth or a cheek. Or maybe it’s nothing that obvious. Maybe the realization that something is wrong comes moments after you’ve devoured that chocolate bar or cookie, the bitter aftertaste of rat poison hitting the back of your throat along with bile and the rest of the contents of your stomach as they rise up and out of your mouth.

Or maybe you’ll bite into plain, sweet chocolate or fresh fruit. That’s also part of the surprise. You really don’t know what you’ll get until you start eating.

B. ALWAYS RESPECT THE DEAD.

At ten o’clock, all the television sets in the neighborhood turn on, blaring to life right in the middle of that omnipresent cigarette commercial. The volume begins to rise of its own accord as your television starts to pick up interference, bursts of static squealing amidst the rising, screaming chorus of ”HAPPY HAPPY HALLOWEEN, HALLOWEEN, HALLOWEEN!”

Breaking through the static, garbled and tinny, a child’s voice cries out.

“Can’t— I can’t hold them— back— Pumpkin— don’t blow the— out—”

And just as quickly as it cut in, the voice cuts back out. Commercial jingle notwithstanding, you’re alone once more. But not for long.

The doorbell rings. You can see them outside from your window: costumed children. Their masks and clothes are grimy and ragged from the muddy, slimy water they’ve been decomposing in for over a week. When they come to your door, squelching wetly as they shamble up the porch steps, they ring the bell or knock, as all polite children do. If you don’t let them in, they’ll find their own way, always by force. And once they find you, all they can gurgle in their reedy, waterlogged voices is, ”Trick or treat.”

From there, they attack.

With superhuman strength and speed, they tear and rip at anything they can get their hands on — clothing, skin, muscle, face, eyes. Being short and small, despite their strength, they're at a distinct disadvantage. They can even be thrown off, with some effort. But they don’t stay down for long, and attempting to hurt or mortally wound them only stalls them for a few moments, if that. How can you kill something that’s already dead?

Some in the neighborhood are willing to try and find out.

The only houses they seem to ignore completely are the ones with lit jack-o-lanterns still outside. They’ll loiter outside these houses, staring straight ahead at your door or window like they can see exactly where you are. But sooner or later, they’ll pass by and move onto the next house.

As long as the candles in carved pumpkins stay lit.

---

OOC INFO

Hello, and welcome to We're Still Here's first TDM! Here's a few things we'd like you to keep in mind:

The TDM is canon. You can treat this as the game's first real event and pick and choose what threads you would like your character to remember when they enter the game. For characters who app into the game, the events of the TDM will be treated like a dream. Upon awakening from it, characters will find that time has jumped ahead to December 1st. You may also feel free to use similar reality and/or time distortions to explain why the family members your characters have in the TDM aren't the same as the ones they may be assigned to in the game proper.

If you would like to have Halloween content in your relaxed housing prompts, please feel free! You are not beholden to follow our prompts exactly so long as the spirit is maintained.

There is no Network prompt listed, but feel free to wildcard one for your characters anyway.

Although the TDM is canon in the sense that characters are free to remember its events when they app into the game, it does not count as an official plot heavy event, meaning that characters will not receive regains from participating in it.

With regards to the dead trick-or-treaters: you may NPC them however you'd like, but keep the details we've listed in their prompt in mind. They are supernaturally fast and strong, will ignore houses as long as they have a lit pumpkin on the porch outside, and will try to enter each house the moment the candle in the pumpkin goes out. Additionally, they can't be killed, but they can be momentarily stalled by injuring them. By November 1st, 6AM, they will disappear the moment the sun comes out.

---

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Comments

homelander | the boys

[laserbeams]

▶ october 1st

[ His first instinct should have been to panic. This wasn't his bed, or his house. He was in photos he has no memory of taking, and although part of him still thinks that this must be a dream, it feels too real for that.

It reminds him of those crappy reality shows he had to participate in: fake house, fake room, fake life. But as he paces around this strange house, staring intently at each of the photos, the part of him that's lonely and desperate and aching from the loss of his short-lived family unit decides he wants to play house.

He hears footsteps and turns to look at someone he recognizes as one of the people in the photos. ]

Hi, honey. Guess you slept in. [ He smiles, wide and warm and a little deranged. He doesn't know that his 'spouse' and 'children' are in the same situation he is, so he's fully expecting them to react to him as if this is all normal. ]

▶ don't be a square

The guest of honor? Me? [ He says with a very false sense of humility - of course he's the guest of honor, who else would it be? ] Aw, you guys.

[ Homelander's getting used to being smothered with warm greetings and home-cooked food every time he steps outside of the house. It's nice, actually. He's even starting to like the gelatin, when it's not too bizarre of a flavor. He's open to chatting with the other guests, especially the ones that look a little out of place. ]

Hey there, neighbor. [ He's so cheerful in such a painfully forced way that it'd be easy to mistake him for one of the Robbies. ] Enjoying the festivities?

▶ respect the dead

[ Upstanding hero that he is, Homelander has no issue with giving the decomposing trick-or-treater that just forced its way through the front door a swift kick in the chest to send it flying back onto the front porch.

It'd be easier if he could just laser them all. Unfortunately, this place had given him a family but taken his powers away, something that was getting harder and harder to ignore. ]

We need to get that fucking pumpkin outside. [ Since getting here he's tried to keep in theme with the wholesome environment, but seeing as he's in the process of being attacked by zombie children he'll let a few cuss words loose. ] Are you almost done carving it? [ He leans against the door to keep the trick-or-treaters from getting back in, but they're starting to go for the windows. ]

▶ wildcard

[ ooc: feel free to contact me at dandymott or vellocet#7191 if you want to plot something! ]

don't be a square, delighted to see homelander is horrifying as usual

[undiagnosed]

[archer does, indeed, mistake homelander for one of the robbies and when he's greeted gives a hard, icy glare before taking a long drink from his flask. he doesn't get paid enough for this.]

Not really. I've never been much of a fan of kidnapping. [he pockets the flask and grimaces.] So, when does the amateur brain surgery start? Or have you assholes already done that? God, that would explain so much.

[laserbeams]

I think they'll hold the brain surgery until after my housewarming party. That'd be a real drag!

[ Getting drunk could make this a real drag too, but Homelander doesn't mention that just yet. ]

There are worse places to be kidnapped to, I think. [ In other words: he's been kidnapped too, he's not a Robby, he's just a total weirdo who is taking this godawful situation a little too well. ]

[undiagnosed]

[he seems to pick up what homelander's putting down, though it doesn't lighten his mood much. that being said, the comment about the housewarming party makes archer snort a laugh that looks like it surprises him.]

I don't know, when I looked in my closet all I could see were goddamn sweater vests. That's a nightmare, am I right?

[a beat, then:] Well, that and the fake identity thing. It's like, hello, disassociation police!

[laserbeams]

Ouch. I got some business-casual wear, at least. [ And it doesn't look very good on him; he's a buff guy with the body language of a drill sergeant, not middle-management.

The last part gets a chuckle out of him; fake identity talk is something he understands even if he never did the whole secret identity thing himself. ]

What, you've never had a fake identity before?

[undiagnosed]

Guess I know who's place I'll be robbing later, [he says with a laugh, though there's... something in his tone that isn't joking, not at all.

let it not be said these two men have much sanity between them.

archer shrugs a little, ignoring how recently it's been feeling like his real identity has calcified into a fake one. that's not something he'd disclose to the rare few people close to him, let alone a stranger with dead eyes.]

Sure, I have. Comes with the job. They've just been, you know, consentially fake. Sounds like an old hat for you.

october 1st.

[shalamayne]

[ Anduin has no idea what's going on, he's in exactly the same boat as Homelander is, caught up in looking around at photos and pictures that depict a life he certainly doesn't remember living. Luckily he at least had the forethought to change into clothes before heading out of his comic book laden room and when he hears someone talk he turns around, doing his best not to look suspicious.

Obviously this person lives here. The idea that the other man is in exactly the same boat doesn't cross Anduin's mind at first and the High King of Stormwind gives a respectful smile back.

Is it him or is the smile the man is giving a bit strained?]

Um, good morning. I'm sorry, I did not realise the time....

[ Best to play along...for now.]

[laserbeams]

Oh, that's alright. We all need a little extra shut-eye every now and then.

[ He turns back to stare at one photo in particular: a picture of himself as a young boy, dressed in a little league uniform and grinning from ear to ear. He never smiled like that as a child. He was never even allowed outside the lab.

But it looks so real. ]

Seems like a nice day to just stay at home, anyway. Unless you had plans? [ Maybe he was supposed to have plans, but he didn't know for sure. ]

[shalamayne]

[ Anduin nods at the talk of extra shuteye. Back home he would have considered it a luxury he just simply could not afford yet it seems prudent to not point that out. Or anything about back home really. Somehow there's the feeling it wouldn't make sense, especially when there are pictures of them across the walls.

How could this even be?]

I didn't have anything in particular, though I was thinking about looking around. [ Anduin stops the words the house leaving his lips. How would this person react if he simply admitted that everything was brand new?]

The weather does look nice. Did you have any plans for today?

[laserbeams]

[ He shrugs. ] My schedule's clear.

[ Because he doesn't actually have a schedule. ] Where'd you want to look?

[ He should go for a walk and find out where he hell he is, but he doesn't know where he'd walk to. ]

oct. 1st

[corporative]

[The man drawing close is dressed in white—at least this place got that much correct, he had thought previously—a business-casual sort of look and far less layered than his usual get-up. Coupled with slicked-back blonde hair and the look of a man who seems confident enough in each step, it almost looks as though he actually belongs in this picturesque reality of a nuclear family come to life. The pictures would imply as much, wouldn’t they? Smiling and happy, spouse and children alike.

Rufus recognizes the face of the man greeting him; smiling as wide and brightly as the rest of them in every picture frame. A brow raises, wondering if this man is part of the illusion, the lie crafted so very lovingly around them. Does he play along or shatter it with a metaphorical hammer and see what kind of mess is left to be cleaned up?

He weighs the possibilities, and in the end, he figures one can happen after another easily enough. Why not the best of both worlds? Two different flavors of answers in their own way.]

Good morning.

[—Rufus says with a smile, a grin that’s a little thinner than Homelander’s, but no less present.]

I guess I did. But what can I say? I’ve been feeling tired lately. A little… disoriented, too.

[laserbeams]

I know what you mean. Must just be that time of year, with the seasons changing and all that.

[ As good of an excuse as any to act just as confused about what's going on. ]

Nothing wrong with sleeping in sometimes. You're not late for anything, are you?

[corporative]

[The smile remains, sharply crescent across his face. He opens his arms wide as though to indicate the rest of the house.]

We’ve got today off. The both of us.

[He has no idea if they do. Does this go against the grain of what’s already expected of him, or does this man simply play along with the facade?]

We can do whatever we like. How about a cup of coffee to start the morning off right?

[laserbeams]

Coffee would be wonderful.

[ And he hopes Rufus is going to be the one making it, because he's never made his own coffee in his life let alone with the tools available to him in 1961 and it would without a doubt be a disaster. ]

I could stand to take a day of relaxation. Work's been tough lately.

[ He says that without really thinking. What the hell job is he supposed to have here? He can't just say 'superhero'. ]

[corporative]

Is that right?

[Rufus keeps his smile, lifting his eyes to cast about the house for a bit. The inordinate amount of pictures hanging on the wall seem to be a theme — troublesome, but intriguing; worth a look — but then kitchen’s just down the hall. Quaint like the rest of the home, but odd in the color choice of its decor. Rufus can’t quite place it, but then again, he still doesn’t have a hold on the matter at hand.

He steps around Homelander, beckoning him to follow.]

Follow me and you can tell me all about it.

[Into the kitchen they go, and the tech seems a bit rudimentary in comparison to what exists in the Shinra building, a conglomeration of sleek and modern, shining with corporate veneer. Thankfully, in the end, a coffee maker is a coffee maker, and Rufus sets to getting a pot brewing once he’s located it. A few attempts at opening cabinets — where would an employee keep things if this were a break room? — and he’s found all he needed.]

Your job, I mean. What’s been ailing you, and all that.

being a square

[13thcommander]

[Erwin definitely thinks the man approaching him is one of the Robbies, but he's been trying to play nice with everyone here, and turns towards him with a faint, friendly smile on his face.]

Hello.

[He offers his left hand to shake, since his right sleeve hangs empty at his side.]

Erwin Smith. It's a pleasure to meet you.

[Why does this guy look so much like him? It's uncanny.]

[laserbeams]

The pleasure's all mine.

[ There is something strangely similar about them, from the hair to their posture. Homelander was never in the actual military, but he carries himself like he is.

He shakes Erwin's hand; a brief, firm handshake. ]

Homelander. [ Despite the fact that he shares the same uncanny demeanor at the Robbies, that's definitely not a normal name.

Right, he was supposed to blend in. He hesitates, because he's not all that fond of his civilian name, but announcing himself as Homelander was only going to make him stick out. He shakes his head. ] Sorry. It's - it's John.

[13thcommander]

[Fortunately for him, Erwin has no context for what a homeland or a homelander might be, and he just assumes it's John's last name. It's not uncommon for people back home to just go by their last names, anyway.]

Do you prefer John or Homelander?

[Erwin tries to look encouraging. The more he finds out about this place, and the people in it, the better.]

I'd rather not call you something you don't care for.

[laserbeams]

Homelander, in that case.

[ It can't hurt to go by his superhero name every now and then, right? And god, he hates hearing John. A fake name from a fake life he didn't really have. ]

Are you new here as well?

[13thcommander]

I am.

[Suspicions confirmed: not a Robbie. Cheerful like one, though.]

You seem to be blending in well. I take it the technology here is somewhat similar to your own world?

respect the dead

[handycapable]

Would you just hold your fucking horses?! No need to yell, I'm carving the damn thing as fast as I can!

[ Ray doesn't live here -- more likely their eyes just met through the windows of neighboring houses, or maybe one of them was forced to duck into the other's place as soon as the zombie children began making their rounds -- but whatever the case they're stuck together for the moment, something which Ray would find considerably more pleasant if he could just enjoy the handsome stranger's company in less insanely stressful circumstances.

Technically he could have carved the pumpkin much quicker, but he wanted it to look nice. Is that such a crime? Whatever, fine, he'll butcher it, half it of quite nice and detailed and the other half chaotically hacked open by the time he hands it over to Homelander.

Stage-whispering: ]

How're we gonna get it out there?

[laserbeams]

[ He rifles through a nearby closet, pulling out a heavy aluminum baseball bat. Good thing this place decided he was a baseball fan.

He hands Ray the bat, pumpkin tucked under one arm. ] You're going to distract them away from me and beat them away with this if I'm not back in time.

[ He's not sure if Ray can hit them hard enough to keep them at bay, but that probably won't be necessary anyway. Probably. He's an athletic guy, how long could it take him to drop off a stupid jack-o-lantern? ]

[handycapable]

[ Ray gives the bat a little shake, a little swing, testing its weight, then nods. He's more athletic than he looks, himself -- not that he actually played many sports, but he's got the physique and the combat training to make up for that -- and, strangely, in a lot better shape than he's felt in years. ]

Got it. I'll cover you.

[ He follows close, wishing he had his guns, or anything that can do more damage than a bat, but at least they don't need to get the pumpkin any farther than the porch, he... thinks. ]

Oh! Wait!

[ He grabs a candle off a counter and sticks it into the pumpkin, then pulls a lighter from his pocket and hands it to Homelander as well. ]

Okay, right behind ya.