graveyardsmash | TDM: JANUARY/FEBRUARY

TDM: JANUARY/FEBRUARY

Welcome to the Ryslig Test Drive Meme! Below are a few prompts to get you started, but you may make up any prompt you desire! Please take a look at the navigation page for rules, setting information, and links to reserves and apps. Have fun!

SCENARIO ONE

You wake up in a dark ditch, the sky cloudy overhead. Dirt cakes into your cuts and scrapes. The air is clammy and damp, and it smells like rain.

You’re in a grave. And when you sit up to inspect the tombstone marking your spot, it has your name on it. Maybe the graves next to you have the names of familiar friends, family, acquaintances. Not all of them are open like yours are. RIP.

There’s a light dancing in the distance, and you hear the jingle-jangle of heavy keys, or worse still, the gravekeeper’s massive pitchfork or shovel. If you're lucky, you can sneak out beyond his notice, and get out alone. If not - you might find yourself on the wrong end of a shovel’s swing, or worse yet, tripping headfirst in front of a pair of monstrous eyes.

SCENARIO TWO

You've stumbled your way out of the graveyard, and you're promptly besieged by the overwhelming sights and sounds of the city. Cars honk at you to get out of the street, and strangers try not to look in your direction for too long. They see your dirty clothes and scraped faces, and pretend to busy themselves with something else. Rarely, a look of pity is cast your way.

But some people try to reach out. Enterprising citizens and those that hope to curry favor with the newcomers pass out new clothes and bundles of food, asking if you have a place to stay the night, wondering about the details of the world you came from. Some are even handing out pamphlets which vary in how helpful they are--"What To Expect When You're Expecting (To Turn Into A Monster)", "Wolpertinger: Fact or Fiction?", "100% ACCURATE MONSTER QUIZ ASSESSMENT: GUARANTEED TO PREDICT YOUR MONSTER!", and "Ryslig Law In A Nutshell".

Then there are the people who aren't happy to see you at all. Glares and silent, judging stares if you're lucky, torches and pitchforks attempting to drive you out of the town if you're not. You may need a friend to help you.

SCENARIO THREE

"Seek us out," the voice whispers in your head, and before you have time to question it you've found yourself in someplace entirely alien.

Maybe it's the Fog God's ghostly town of Dyster, where exultant followers dance around bonfires and sing their praises to the skies above. Maybe it's the Fourth God's arcade, with small robots wheeling about amidst the lights and colors of old pinball machines.

Only one thing is certain: you are not alone, in this sacred place.

SCENARIO FOUR

The time has come and you've found yourself becoming a monster. Is the change instant, or gradual? Are you familiar enough with monsters to know what's happening, or is it a complete shock? Does it fit you, or does it feel incongruous with your nature? Feel free to pick any monster type for this prompt, but note that you may not get the same one in game.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[She jolted with a start when she heard someone speak somewhere to her right, briefly glancing in their direction to give them a glare and a hiss of Bug off. only for her to do a triple take when he brain caught up to the fact there was a skeleton talking to her.]

[Her eyes went wide and before she could stop herself a scream tore from her throat and she scrabbled backwards further into the alleyway, breath erratic and all colour drained from her face as she stared the the sandwich-wielding skeleton leaning against the wall next to where she was sitting just mere seconds ago.]

What the HELL are you?!

[This was too much. First she crawled out of a grave, then she got accosted by some lunatic wielding a spade, then she got handed all these weird as shit pamphlets and now THIS! Ghosts she could deal with, she could ignore them or tell them to piss off if need be (not that they ever listened), but a walking, talking, skeleton? Nope, that one was a bit too much for her to deal with right now.]

[The tears forming in her eyes together with her frame beginning to shake told that story all too clearly, knuckles as white as her face as she clutched a pamphlet with one hand and the pavement with the other, drawing her knees further up towards her chin in an attempt of a barrier between her and this skeleton.]

[Shit. So much for the casual approach. He straightens up sharply, raising his hands in the most pacifying gesture he can manage without dropping his sandwich (listen, just because it doesn't solve the eternally gnawing monster hunger doesn't mean lunch isn't important!) and stepping back to give her a little more space.]

[His tone changes, less joking, more gentle.]

Hey. Deep breaths, okay? I'm not going to hurt you, I promise. I'm a doctor.

[She scooted away a little further, her eyes not once leaving the actual literal skeleton talking to her, mind somewhere between a complete blank and an overwhelming scream of ‘What The Fuck’. Every fibre in her body was screaming at her to run, to hide, to get away from all this insanity, but it was like all her muscles had locked up, giving barely enough flex to get her breaths out.]

Y- You’re a skeleton. [She squeaked out.] Ghosts I can deal with but this… Nope, no, that’s it, I’ve lost it, I am certifiably insane, what is wrong with me—

[Spirals are a funny thing in the moment, all-consuming and never-ending, leading further and further down into a pit where the only thing left was a darkness perceptible to only you and yourself. Rosa was aware of her current spiral, knees drawn up to her chin, eyes clenched shut and fingers dug into her hair and nails digging into her scalp as though the pain would force the world to make sense again, and yet she was entirely powerless to stop it.]

Crap.

[Good job, Hawk. You really put your exposed metatarsals in it this time. He hesitates, looking down at the sandwich in his hand. Tastes like crap, like everything else, and it doesn't do a goddamn thing to ease the gnawing, aching hunger he feels every day. He considers how much blood is in the fridge back at the clinic. Enough to fuel a bit of power indulgence?]

[God, it'd better be.]

...Wait here, okay? I'll be back in a minute.

[Not that she looks like she's in any state to go anywhere. Not that he's super comfortable leaving her alone, either, but being here definitely feels like it's not helping. Being here in this shape, anyway.]

[He backs away, into a doorway just deep enough to break her sightline, and focuses hard. The noises that come from the doorway are... not pleasant, wet and fleshy and weirdly organic. But the man who emerges, looking kind of grumpy about it, is decidedly not a skeleton, although he's wearing the same clothes and carrying the same sandwich.]

[He takes a bite as he approaches. Listen, he can only be human for so long - nobody can blame him for taking advantage of working tastebuds. His mouth is still full when, squatting down nearby, he speaks.]

How about we pretend none of that happened, and you focus on breathing for a sec, okay? Look at me. Look me in the eye. Breathe. It's gonna be okay.

[How do you breathe with cobwebs in your lungs? How do you think when your brain is stuck in a loop like a broken record? When the cassette tape of your thoughts is getting unspooled and tangled in itself where you can’t untangle without cutting? There was probably something some faceless therapist in her past said about this, probably helpful too, if she hadn’t been so tired of being treated like a crazy person that she just went quietly along with whatever was being said.]

[She had somehow scrambled back against the wall, pressing herself into the corner between it and the nearby dumpster as if trying to squeeze herself between the bricks of the house behind her. When the voice returned, she jolted in place, bloodshot eyes wide, black-brown smears down her cheek where her tears had saturated the dirt still clinging to her face leaving tear stains all the way down to her chin and neck.]

[Still, the words made sense, even if she barely registered them in her panic-addled mind, her breaths more like heaving hiccups and brother breathing. Holding eye contact was hard on the best of days, but it was surprisingly easy this time around. Grounding, like reality was slotting back into place around her.]

[It was a good minute before her breathing was even slightly even, still sniffling and tears shiny in her eyes, but she wasn’t actively spiralling anymore.]

Wh… Who are you?

[Her voice was cracked and raw, arms still tightly wound around her knees for safety, still shaking and hiccuping in-between shaky breaths that shook her whole frame. Still, words came out of her.]

Doctor Pierce. You can call me Hawkeye. I run the clinic in town.

[Mouth full of sandwich aside, his voice is as calm and soothing as he can make it, his usual high-speed talking slowed right down for the sake of trying to ground her. He hesitates a moment, and then puts out a (now fully attached) hand to touch her shoulder, his forehead furrowing a little in honest concern.]

Listen, I'm sorry I scared you, okay? It's a whole lot of too much, washing up here. I should've given you a bit more of a run-up to it.

Do you need some water? Might help you catch your breath a bit.

TDM: JANUARY/FEBRUARY

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