test drive | 1

[unplug]

test drive

Welcome to the first test drive for Systemwide! We are excited to have you. All prospective players are welcome to tag in and test out their characters, be they unplugged or free born. We would like to offer a range of scenarios that can be expected during gameplay, which are also useable prompts for app samples, and of course, if something else about the setting strikes you, feel free to come up with your own!

Please put your character name and canon in your subject line, and indicate which prompt you are launching from.

simulation | maybe this is your first time. perhaps you've been here countless times. it's a room, as confined as a boxing ring, as expansive as a battle field, whatever you need it to be, whatever you're here to train for.

1.

Before you is a city of rooftops, empty of human life. This is a safe place, because while it may hurt you, at least it won't kill you. Perhaps you are practicing your influence over reality, leaping from rooftop to rooftop. Are you successful, or are you failing to free your mind? Perhaps you're helping someone else overcome their fear of heights.

And of course, an operator can always load up some Agent-like training programs to make it interesting.

2.

Congratulations, you know kung-fu, or maybe some other system of combat, like crazy parkour archery, cartwheeling with guns, or sword fighting on horse back. Perhaps you're trying out something even more fantastic, a magical skill or a superpower.

Show me. Or a friend.

mission | whether on board a ship or with your mind sunk deep into a Matrix, you will have to join the battle eventually. sometimes things go terribly wrong. what are you gonna do about it?

3.

Something's gone wrong with this extraction.

There's a lot of information to process. Your target's been extracted, and that's the good news -- your ship, in reality, is heading to their location now -- but the bad news is your team has been scattered. You could be anywhere within this Matrix, deep in the jungle, or lost on a subway train, or staggering out of the crashing waves of a night time beach, and the operator needs a minute to figure out your exact location before they can direct you to a port out of here, or send another operative to collect you.

All you have to do is stay alive for that long. Easy, right?

4.

You were warned of this. You've been prepared in endless simulations, with a dozen cautionary tales, training sessions with the EMP. Still, it's nothing like you imagined, when the operator shouts: "Sentinel closing in at seven o' clock. It's gaining."

And then the shriek of metal.

reality | as much as many Matrixes are designed to be a comfort, you have to face the real world sometime. or maybe this is the world you have only ever known.

5.

Annual celebrations are rare to come by, but the anniversary of Neo's Truce is one that always draws in the crowd. The event takes place in a massive cavern in Zion known as the Temple, and there is music, and there is dancing [a little NSFW].

Everyone is there.

Where are you?

6.

The wind on your face, up here on the desolate surface, tastes bitter, different to what it feels like in a simulated reality. It's freezing cold and always dark, but sometimes, you need a reminder about what it is you're fighting for. Or maybe you're seeing the wasteland of Earth for the first time.

Either way, you shouldn't be out here for too long. The machines might find you.

wildcard | choose your own adventure.

7.

Perhaps you're riding with the Dothraki, or sitting under the Sorting Hat for the first time. Maybe the pleather bodysuit is pinching under your armpits as the traffic of the 90's roars by, or the Nova Empire's sprawling city glitters, towering above you. Maybe you're showing someone around the place you called home for your entire fictional life.

Or perhaps it's nothing as fantastical as that: the Council meeting droned on for two hours, and you're just happy to be home, even if it's a tiny enclosure with rust-edged furniture. Maybe someone's coming over for lunch, and there are real greens in the protein slurry today; maybe you're about to ask to join a crew.

There are infinite worlds to explore, but try to remember that only one of them is real.

Comments

[mrsnippy]

From most people, Snippy would have taken 'happy marriage' to be a metaphor, but given this was Captain... he juddered at a sudden horrific mental image of being squashed into a lacy flock and jabbed his finger in Captain's face.

"I don't care how much you flatter me, no marriages! No dresses, no speeches, no cakes made out of trash and no mimicking any priests! We don't know these people well enough yet not to know if you'll be stoned for being a heretic for that!"

[systemwizard]

Snippy got the vindication of seeing Captain's violet eyes cross to the point of the man's grubby fingernail. In the matrix, it would have been a bemused, formless stare. Here the gesture actually seemed to get some kind of reaction... though what was going on in Captain's mind remained as opaque as ever.

"Sticks and stones, Mr. Snippy," Captain chuckled, patting the shorter man's hand jarringly. "There is more than one way to go native!"

[mrsnippy]

Charles was sure there were many ways for Captain to communicate with the Natives, each more risky and fool-minded than the last... but asking Captain to elaborate would probably result in him having his ear nattered off for the next hour. He closed his eyes and drew a very deliberate, very contained breath through his nose, holding his frustration and then letting it go in a puff out outward air as his shoulders slumped.

"Before that, we're going to stop by home and get you cleaned up." He muttered. "I'm not in any mood to listen to those priests nag at me for the state you're in."

Now that the initial rush of adrenaline had worn off, Charles found himself beginning to dread that moment. It wasn't that he didn't think the priests weren't doing a good job, they were, it was just that he knew in his heart of hearts that enlightenment was just another name for peaceful self-delusion. He kept his interactions short and to the point where he could when dealing with Captain's caretakers, but he was sure his discomfort was visible given how it oozed off of him in waves as he tried not to make any comments that would give away his utter disdain for their livelihood.

The bell pinged as the lift juddered to a halt at their floor. Charles set his hand on Captain's elbow, not feeling the need to drag Captain again just yet, but still not trusting Captain not to run off if they didn't know Charles was keeping close tabs on them.

[systemwizard]

Captain made Snippy's life easier for him by wriggling the man's hand between the crook of their elbow and then cinching it off at the pass, like a proper lady might if she were keeping tabs on a nervous, tiny dog. Sallying forth from the elevator, they all but dragged the shorter man alongside, using the full potential of their long stride to propel them down the hall. Captain knew where Snippy's small home was, oh yes they did. Grungy stocking feet and a look of pure grit was going to get them there before Snippy had the chance to reorient himself as the leader of this little outing, bruises and minor lacerations be damned.

"So how is the mission with the ship coming along?" they queried, feeling the need to elaborate about their clever native antics ebb for the moment. "Do I need to conscript other monkeys to do your wrenching?!"

[mrsnippy]

He bwah-d at Captain's sudden drag but let himself be led along since they were headed the right way, even if he had to half-trot to keep up with Captain's great strides.

"It'd be going on better if someone hadn't made me drop my soldering iron..." He groused. "It's going, but it's going to take a while longer. The Sentinels ripped half the hull apart; it's a miracle it managed to limp back at all. I'd take you up on that offer if I didn't know you'd just stick monkey tails on some of the poor sods you pick flowers with."

Charles fumbled in his pocket for his keys as they came up to their apartment and let the pair of them in.

"Sit down, I'll go get the first aid kit. You'd better take off those socks too, I'm sure you stomped some of that mug while you were yodelling."

[systemwizard]

"Mug Two," Captain slouched remorsefully. In all of the busy bumblings up in the work bay, they had not fully had time to process their grief over the sudden loss. Mug Two was inferior in every way to Zee Mug, but Captain had had high hopes for the monstrous remodeled vessel. They'd hoped that one day it might become a Real Mug. They simply hadn't had enough time to place enough devotion into it... and now it was nothing but shards to be trodden on. At least most of them lay strewn about Snippy's work bay, the better to keep an eye on him.

Captain's slouch took them all the way down onto the rickety chair that Snippy kept. It creaked ominously under the human's ungainly weight, and yet the sound was familiar enough by now that Captain did not shoot straight up again. The loss of Mug Two throbbed in time with the wide, purple blotch on their jaw. "I am disconsolate," they announced, following a startled sigh. "Nurse, bring me my morphine, and then it is straight back to the hovering machine for you." The pure yearning in Captain's voice suggested that they had wretched plans for the hovercraft that Snippy was working on.