TDM - JANUARY 2021

[robbies]

TEST DRIVE MEME - JANUARY 2021

Good to the last gasp.
CW: gaslighting, potential mentions and depictions of trauma and other problematic material, body horror, dolls, violence

---

“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 outside of it carrying faintly, it all becomes very clear—

Something is horribly wrong.

---

JANUARY 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, the morning news is playing. The newscaster, a man in a gray suit and horn-rimmed glasses, keeps shuffling his paperwork on his desk as black and white footage of people in the midst of celebration — throwing streamers, wearing paper hats, toasting flutes of bubbly liquid — is interspersed between his droning report: ”New Year's Eve was in full swing last night as citizens from all over Santa Rosita came together to ring in 1961. A surge in ginger ale and sparkling cider beverage sales was reported by Honeybees as early as eight o'clock in the evening, a boon for the store…“

---

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. CLOWN AROUND. If December was a time for sweet treats and good food, January is the month where everyone is trying to unload their leftovers. Who better to enjoy them than you, the newest family on the block? Your neighbors have quite a bit of food to share: Throughout the month, they'll stop by to say hello, bringing a new sugary dish with them each time. As always, jello molds are a staple. One plate turns into three turns into five, and by the end of the first week of January, you're likely to end up with a collection of jiggling pink, green, and orange lumps taking up space in your fridge. From mountains of Whip 'n Chill to Broken Window Glass cake, you'd be forgiven in thinking that there's no end to it. And yet, there's the occasional exception. Someone comes by with a Bundt cake lathered in vanilla icing and topped with rainbow sprinkles. Were it not for the giant candy clown head topping it, it would almost look good enough to eat. "There's a rumor going around that you've been a bit under the weather, so I thought this would cheer you up!" they say, right before thrusting the technicolor nightmare into your hands, the clown's dead pink frosted eyes staring up at you. Your neighbor is quick to tell you to eat it while the icing is still fresh (you never know who might lick it off when you're not looking, eh kids?), but not that the clown itself is made out of styrofoam. That's something you'll just have to find out for yourself when you take it back inside and start chowing down!

B. SNOW DAY

What awakens you one cold Friday morning isn't the blare of your alarm clock or your family getting ready to start their day or even the chilly air that tickles your toes as they poke out from the bottom of your covers, but the sound of hooting and hollering outside your window. The sight that awaits you when you go to investigate is something out of a Norman Rockwell painting: The entire neighborhood is outside, playing and carrying on in the snow. While everyone was sleeping, Santa Rosita got four inches of snow, more than enough for the schools to close but not enough to stop everyone from enjoying it.

And enjoy it they are! Children build snowmen in their front yards while their fathers work on shoveling their driveways. Most, however, are busy erecting snow forts in their yards and the middle of the street, running back and forth as they collect ammunition for an ongoing snowball fight that takes up half of the neighborhood. Nobody is spared from their assault, not even the adults, and especially not the newly arrived ones who leave the house. Good luck getting the mail, mom and dad!

"Come on! There's plenty of snow!" one young boy yells at you over a snowdrift. "You can join my team!"

"Nuh-uh!" another boy shoots back. "You can join my team!"

And on and on it goes. Well, for the pacifists among you, making snow angels is always an option!

---

THROUGHOUT JANUARY.

CW: gaslighting, potential mentions and depictions of trauma, and other problematic material

There’s no business like show business! And business is hopping at the Starlight Drive-In, which has been boasting about its all-new film premiering on January 2nd and playing all month long. The critics are raving, the townspeople are flocking, and plans to go to the drive-in seems to be all anyone can talk about. “Make sure you get there early to see the serials,” many of them suggest, eyes wide with excitement. “I couldn’t look away!” Whether you come with your family, your friends, or simply come on your own, the lot is packed, Robbies and normal townsfolk alike beaming as they hook the individual speakers onto their cars. Apropos of the cold weather, the concession stand has added seasonal items to their menu, serving up hot chocolate and kettle corn in addition to its usual soda and popcorn. Watching a movie against a backdrop of gently falling snow while you're sipping on steaming chocolate and melted marshmallows has a certain je nais se quoi to it that even you have to admit is appealing. At last, when it's finally dark enough to start, the projector clicks on from the booth in the back of the lot and the movie begins. A. COMING ATTRACTIONS. The movie, Curse of the Doll People, is a horror flick. A real chill-o-rama, starring actors you've never heard of playing a group of archeologists who unknowingly trigger a deadly curse that sets a group of murderous living dolls upon them. The poster pasted on the ticket booth promises it'll be the most fun you'll have screaming. Unfortunately, you have to sit through several minutes of previews first. The coming attractions aren't anything special — a bunch of westerns, a romance, even a beach musical. Far from being bored to tears like you might be, the people in the cars around you are glued to the screen, popping snacks into their mouths and whispering their commentary among themselves. The movie is the reason why everyone's here, sure, but you don't just get one flick out of going to the pictures! There's also the serials, little 5—10 minute long chapter plays that tell a story in pieces. Nothing can beat those, and when the first one starts, everyone sits in rapt attention as if it were the feature presentation itself. But as the scene opens up on a sight that is instantly familiar to you, and your own face stares back at you from the projection screen, it becomes clear that this is no ordinary film. You watch your memories play out in grainy black and white footage, aired for all the world to see. Or perhaps not — though you may not realize it, the movie playing out on the screen differs from person to person. No one sees the same thing. The person next to you might see one of their worst fears come to life, whether imagined or real, practical or fantastic. You might see one of the worst moments of your life — the death of a friend, your hated enemy bringing you to the brink of death, your absolute lowest point — exactly the way you remember it... save for the way your double on the screen occasionally turns to face the audience, staring directly at you with a knowing smirk and a wink. Or the way your loved ones will sometimes go off-script, gazing at you with pleading eyes as they beg you to help them. The people of Santa Rosita will see an exciting battle between two pirate ships, swashbuckling and cannon fire in place of the traumas you're witnessing. When the serial ends on a cliffhanger, much to the disappointment of everyone around you, it's almost a mercy. "Tune in next week for the thrilling second part!" Well, you will, won't you?

---

END OF THE MONTH.

CW: body horror, dolls, violence

Aside from the horror of the drive-in, January might seem to be passing calmly... until one night, something changes. In the middle of the night, once you fall asleep in your comfortable bed (or on your couch, or with your head lolling against the kitchen table), a nightmare comes to you. The shift from whatever dreams you were having to the cold, dark void you find yourself standing in happens gradually and quietly. So too does the image that plays out in your mind's eye: From out of the darkness, a featureless mannequin stands ramrod straight, facing you with its arms pressed rigidly to its sides. It has no face, no identifying marks, no features at all. It's a blank slate in every sense of the word... until it isn't. Slowly, the material of the lower half of its face begins to split as a searing pain tears through your own, as if invisible fingers are ripping your lips off inch by inch. The slit on the doll's face widens and deepens until, finally, mercifully, its new mouth opens as yours disappears, replaced by a flat, smooth barrier of skin. Like it was never there to begin with. The pain returns, this time in your arms and neck — right as the doll's own begin to jerk. Your joints are hardening, seizing up as the doll's arms go from minutely twitching to slowly flexing. While every nerve and bone from your fingertips all the way up to your shoulders grows heavy, the doll tilts its head and looks down at its hands, as if seeing them for the first time. By the time it takes its first step, you've taken your last: the pain has spread to your feet, ankles and toes hardening and locking into place. Every part of you is claimed this way; what isn't taken by force simply fades from your body and shifts into being onto the doll's, your skin replacing its cloth body, your clothing dressing it, your hair filling out its head. Your tongue goes numb as the licks its newfound lips, coarse cloth and batting surging up from your lungs and all the way to the back of your throat. By the time it's over, you can't move. You can no longer breathe. All you can do is stare at the perfect, eyeless double of yourself standing before you. As your eyes begin to burn, the last thing you see before everything goes black is the sly curve of a smile — your smile — before the face wearing it turns away and walks back into the darkness. Luckily, you wake up to a room full of sunshine and the distant sound of traffic as the neighborhood gets ready for another beautiful day. The morning air feels cold and dry on your skin. You're you. As much as you've always been. Right?

A. DOPPELGANGER.

It's the kind of morning that makes you want to sing. Where the sky was once dull and grey, it's now a deep blue. Barring the usual hustle and bustle on the streets of Shadyside, the first sound that greets you when you wake up is the steady beat of water trickling outside your window as the snow begins to gently melt under the rays of the sun. You may even hear the chirp of a bird! January, in all its dreariness, is nearly at an end.

When you leave the room to go downstairs — or upstairs, if you slept in the living room — the house is quiet and flooded with sunlight. With how perfectly silent everything is, it's easy to mistake the calm for solitude and think you're alone.

This is not the case.

Waiting to greet you is a familiar figure. If you go downstairs, you'll see it sitting in your kitchen with its head bowed and its arms hanging limply at its sides; if upstairs, lying in your bed on its back. There's no mistaking who it is. Even at a distance, their hair, face, clothes and features all instantly recognizable, and you know who it is before you even fully register their presence:

You.

Motionless, your doppelganger looks more puppet than person. Its chest is still, not a single breath leaving its mouth. Its eyes are closed. They snap open when you get closer to it, wide enough to see the whites, as its head jerks up to look straight at you. In a staccato imitation of your voice, it chirps at you:

"Hi!"

"Good morning!"

"Hello!"

"Rise and shine!"

Your clone is a good imitation, but not a perfect one. Its movements are stiff and uncoordinated, like a marionette being commanded by unseen strings. Though its cheeks are rosy, its skin is pale and almost glossy with the texture of newly polished porcelain. None of these setbacks bother it in the very least. If left alone, it goes about the house mimicking your morning routine, though given how awkward just walking is for it, it's almost certain to do a very bad job. Still, it tries its hardest, following you all day around the neighborhood, trying to imitate your movements — all with a smile!

That is, until you become aggressive with it.

It doesn't take much to set your doppelganger off — a simple shove will do it. When that happens, its eyes will do the impossible and open even wider, its mouth yawning into a wail that pitches louder and louder. That's the point when it will lunge at you. Its hands will try to go for your throat, but not always. It's resourceful enough to improvise with whatever it has around it, whether that be a kitchen knife, a paperweight, or even a letter opener. Luckily for you, they're fragile. Just hitting them is enough to crack and chip away at their skin. With enough strength, their limbs can even come off. Unluckily, they don't stay down for long; even a severed appendage can be popped back into its proper ball-jointed place.

All the while, they never stop childishly whining and shrieking at you.

"Not nice!"

"Why are you so mean?!"

"Not nice, not nice, NOT NICE!"

The only way to shut them up for good is to keep pummeling them until they're nothing but a pile of doll parts. But be thorough — even a mouth that's nothing but a shard of porcelain can still talk.

---

OOC INFO

Hello, and welcome to We're Still Here's second 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 February 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. Additionally, starting today comments made to the TDM will now count towards Activity Check. Current players are permitted to use up to five comments from it for this month's Activity Check — half of the required amount to pass. The other five must be made within the game's communities.

If you would like to have January or other winter-themed 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.

A note about the drive-in theater: Players are in full control over what memories, phobias, or fears the serials before the movie will depict. You can also specify whether or not other characters will be able to see your character's serial. Be sure to label your threads with relevant content warnings if needed!

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Comments

doppleganger

[demonicmiracle]

[It's a bad habit that he hasn't trained himself out of yet, the whole 'leaving the door unlocked' thing, because he's used to it working on his wants, rather than the actual physical mechanism of a lock.

Having a woman wander into his kitchen and steal one of his knives while he's trying to decide what to cook for dinner might be the necessary kick in the ass for the lesson to sink in.

Maybe.

For now, though, he's going to close the fridge as he squints at her, then at the sounds coming from the front door.]

Oi! [Where are you going, young lady???] I'm not replacing these carpets again if you get blood on them, you leave that door locked.

[vampirella]

( how dare Crowley try and get in the way of her intended murder. and brave of him, too, considering the knife she's got in her hand. she turns toward him with annoyed eyebrows and even has the audacity to mildly turn it in his direction. all 5'3 of her, threatening this giant redhead wiggle of man. well, kind of, threatening in the way her expression is definitely kinda scary and the knife is sort-of in his direction now. she doesn't attack or finish opening the door, though — at least for now. which is not to say she's changed her mind on her initial murderous plan, because she hasn't. she'll just put a momentary pause on it, that's all. )

Does that sort of manic banging sound like she's just going to take a hint and go away? ( Carmilla speaks in a dry, impatient tone most of the time, and apparently having a violent double on the loose after her is not reason to change that trend. she's remarkably calm considering the circumstances, and her willingness to stab someone. ) She wants to murder me, so I thought I'd return the favor. This carpet is hideous, I'd be doing you a favor too.

( damn, Carmilla, you come into a man's house and steal his cutlery for a murder weapon and you have the cheek to critique his home, too??? apparently yes, she does, absolutely. )

[demonicmiracle]

[First of all: that's very rude.]

It's the sixties! The carpet options aren't exactly plentiful.

[If they're here for long enough to afford it, he's absolutely going to attempt to talk Aziraphale into ripping it all up to replace with hardwood, but that really doesn't serve the situation at hand. Which is the manic banging on the door, as mentioned.

He's just sort of assuming it's one of the local horrors and that Carmilla isn't local, since they're more passive aggressive in their rudeness, and also wouldn't steal his knives.]

Couple of points, though. One: wouldn't it be better to head out the back door and sneak up behind it? Two: I own a shotgun.

[Ray might have given him shit about being too skinny to properly use one, but he can manage just fine, and after the run in with the carnivorous deer creatures, it seemed sensible.]

[vampirella]

But you replaced them and picked this?

( by all accounts, having her demented double bleed out on them and getting a free chance at a do over is only helping him, not hurting him. she's standing by that. not that she wouldn't happily kill her doppleganger just inside his patio door if it did interfere negatively in his life in any way. these are extraordinary circumstances, and since she's already bleeding she's feeling the limits of humanity for the first time in a good three centuries. she's not willing to risk her safety for his gauche carpets. )

I think I have a better chance at surprising her by throwing the door open when she's throwing herself into it. ( her demented clone will eat shit on the floor and Carmilla figures she can happily stab her in the back while she's down. but considering the whole feeling her human limits thing, she lets the knife lull in her hand, appraising him with dark, narrowed eyes. definitely trying to decide if he's the type to shoot her on top of the murder machine outside his door, because she's definitely too squishy to handle a shotgun blast at the moment.

she must have decided he's not, because she shrugs, pinning one of the locks again, even as the door rattles in its hinges thanks to the weight being thrown against it in steady thumps. )

Well, go get it then. ( if he wants to blow the thing to bits, she's not going to complain. Carmilla will take matters into her own hands when she has to, but if someone else is willing to do the heavy lifting, obviously that would be better. )

[demonicmiracle]

We... did...

[The frown on his face this time is clearly confusion rather than annoyance, the familiar look of someone who's suddenly not actually sure about what they're saying. Now that he really thinks about it, maybe they didn't replace the carpet, because they woke up here one December morning and everything about October was strange and fuzzy. Was the blood gone because none of that ever really happened, even though some of them remember it?

A particularly loud bang against the door snaps him from his brief existential crisis and he looks at Carmilla as if noticing her for the first time again.]

Still the problem of letting whatever the fuck that is into my house.

[The audacity of this woman, honestly.]

Don't touch anything.

[He's going to just make a quick trip upstairs to grab and load the shotgun, please hold.]

[vampirella]

( she's seen that wall eyed, far-away look a time or two at this point. clearly something around here is messing with heads, and Carmilla can only hope it's not a Mesopotamian slug god. she still narrows her eyes, skeptical. there's probably a story there, but thank god this is not a great time, because that means she doesn't have to bother asking.

admittedly, she's curious enough about what the fuck is happening that maybe she might have asked. but that's not personal interest or investment in a stranger talking, more selfish desire to glean some information about what the hell was happening to her right about now.

Carmilla "the audacity of this woman" Karnstein, in the flesh. ) Take your time, ( she (sarcastically) calls after him, putting her weight against the door to keep the angry clone from battering her way through it. with super vampire strength, it would have been a lot easier to hold this thing closed. but without it, she's feeling all of her tiny frame, and pathetic weak human body. it sucks, basically.

she's honestly pretty glad when he shows back up, and the pounds at the door have changed from solid to splintery. he probably shouldn't have been any slower about it. ) Please tell me you have that thing loaded. ( her tone isn't panicked, per se, but at least a little upgraded from casual. )

we're going to gently retcon a hunting rifle instead of shotgun bc i double checked the faq

[demonicmiracle]

[Take your time, as if this isn't his house with a door about to be broken down and someone about to be murdered horribly. Maybe she has more reason to be concerned, since she's the one being chased, but as far as he knows, whatever's trying to get in will just as happily kill him.

So he's decently motivated.]

Nah, I thought I'd faff about and waste a few minutes we don't have. Unlock it and duck, I'm a good shot.

[He raises the rifle to brace on his shoulder, ready at the opposite end of the hall, a handful of extra ammunition in his jacket pocket should he need it. The door is likely going to need to be replaced either way, but if Carmilla is willing to unlock it, at least it won't be completely broken down.

And he does mean it, about being a decent shot. He's been handling guns on and off since their invention, had used bows and crossbows before that. As soon as the door is open, the doppelganger is going to get two shots to the head.]

consider it retconned

[vampirella]

( Carmilla doesn't have any clue if her spooky twin would be keen to kill someone else. if Crowley asked, though, she would probably lie and agree it would. hey, look, if it isn't his problem then there's no chance of him helping, and while Carmilla does begrudgingly respect that sort of selfishness she also has a fragile human body to worry about over here. she's got too much pride to go into the desperate damsel schtick if she can just make him worry about his own health and safety instead.

even though she'd been aware that he'd been collecting a gun, there's a subtle shift in her posture when he's back with it. ever heard the one about bringing a knife to a gunfight? the thing about surviving for three hundred years as a blood sucking parasite that humanity despised was you sorta had to work for it. she doesn't like being in a position she doesn't have the upper hand. she carefully puts each movement and action on an balance, and always picks the one that keeps her safest. it's subtle, but it's there. the quiet expectation that everything is a threat, or at least that it's better to act like it is.

which is probably why she doesn't roll her eyes about his sarcastic comeback about faffing about. and while the rabid thing just out the door is snarling and shrieking about how mean she is, she doesn't want to give the thing any clues about what is going to happen. so she lifts three fingers in an obvious countdown as the other hand slides the lock open as silently as she can manage, and then she'll throw the door open.

and pulls it in front of her like a shield instead of ducking, but she does at least try to trip the thing on its way in, so it's not a complete betrayal that throws him to the angry double wolves. just mostly one, since it leaves him as the only obvious target in the room.

to be fair, though, it's probably just trying to murder her and won't be interested in a secondary target. and in that case, she needs more protection than a simple duck can give her. he's a beanpole but he's plenty tall and he has a gun that can work just fine as a melee option if he doesn't have the marksmanship he claims to. and her crazed shadow is sadly as shrimpy as she is, he'll be fine. you know, probably. )

you're the best :-*

[demonicmiracle]

[Quite frankly, Crowley would be shocked if a woman in a stranger's home didn't tense up slightly when a gun was brought into the equation, even if the goal is to use it against another threat.

It's why he'd kept it pointed down, confident he could raise it quickly once she's out of the way, rather than aiming it at her while she's by the door. Somehow, despite it being the sort of thing he'd do, he doesn't expect her to change up the game so suddenly. There's no time to yell at her about it, he's too busy trying to make a quick adjustment to his plans.

The doppelganger stumbles a few steps down the hallway, wailing about how mean Carmilla is, nearly but not quite going over. It has little interest in Crowley, though, already starting to turn to scramble towards its original target.

Crowley curses in some forgotten language, takes aim at the doppelganger's lead, and fires. Everything is too close for him to want to risk a head shot now, lest he miss. Fortunately for both of them, the bullet strikes just above the doppelganger's knee, shattering the porcelain, causing it to fall to the ground. Turns out it's hard to run after someone with only one leg.]