☆MUSICIAN TEST DRIVE: OHHH YEAH

[interdimanagers]

☆WELCOME MUSICIANS

And welcome to our fourth TDM! We've got two types of prompts to use this time around: the first takes place while your character is in the process of being captured, and the second is during their first brainwashed rockstar networking gig. The former is designed to be considered 100% game canon if you make it in officially, while the later is more speculative and will only work if you get lucky during label and band selection.

☆THE TALENT SEARCH

These prompts are design to be kept as game canon after acceptance, and can be used as the official story of how your character was captured. Importantly, the kidnappers entering your timeline causes massive time distortions, which means that the outcome of this scenario will stagger and replay itself multiple times before settling on an outcome. This means that after the fact, you character may remember being captured multiple ways, or going in more than one direction, before the timeline settled on a final path. Or at least, they'll remember this until their memories are wiped shortly afterwards, but that's okay! That's what memory regains are for. Read this page for more specifics on this situation. Any powers the characters have will be weakened and prone to malfunction to the point of uselessness.



►A1) THE SEARCH: It always starts out this way, doesn't it? At some point in your life, you were just doing your thing, wherever you call home. Then, all at once, it's like you've been torn from your dimension by the roots. Time and space displace, and it's like you've been shifted one layer of reality to the left - like some kind of subspace where you can see your reality through it, like a rainbow surrealist image of your home. Even if you can see this ghost image of where you were, you can't interact with it meaningfully. Any friends or family are somewhere else. As you begin to wander, without any other options, you'll find that the scenery gradually shifts to ghost images of other places, other worlds. If you wander long enough, you'll even find other people, lost just like you are. But you probably won't have much time - you've been brought here for a reason, after all.

►A2) THE HUNT: It could happen almost immediately, or it could happen hours later - but, at some point, your dimensional kidnappers start to do their sweep. Space Men in black body suits and gas masks pursue you on foot and in small spaceships, trying to sweep you and the other displaced up like fish in a net. Their guns contain a weird pink gas that will knock out most with only a single breath - and for those more enduring, they have the heavy artillery, like electrical nets and guns. The fallen will be sealed up into stasis pods for transport and loaded onto the ships, which seem like the only way to get out of this place by choice. This is where it ends, but are you going to put up a fight?

NOTE: Characters already in game can't really tag into these sections, so try to tag around to other first time character tests if you can!

☆WELCOME HOME

By default, these prompts aren't considered canon, but if after you are accepted and sorted they can be tweaked into working for you, it'll be totally okay to keep them as a part of your rockstar's personal history. This occurrence is something that will be happening in early March game time, but of course, what remains canon and what doesn't will be subject to who is accepted and where they are placed. This takes place after being kidnapped and brainwashed, as your character is first joining their new label. As usual, this is celebrated with a party.



►B1) PLAY IT STRAIGHT: The season of Spring Break has begun, and like most things in Vista City, it's carried out to total excess. This is only one of the first, preliminary shindigs of what is assured to be many - much like the Solstice, celebrations for Spring Break also go on forever. This time, it takes place around a pool, and it's not just with industry people - it's also with a smattering of particularly rich or attractive fans. It's a chance to mingle with all your exciting new business connections - something typical to the high music society of Vista City - but maybe it's not yet typical to you.

For a number of the freshly signed on newbies, this is their first real taste of what their new label has to offer - either Virgo or Pride - and the sheer glamour of it may be intoxicating. Industry big wigs scatter the area, as do performers of all the tops labels and bands, and their VIP fans and investors. Maybe you feel intimidated. Maybe you want to make your mark. Or maybe you're not quite as new as some, and are just trying to get through the evening. Either way, they is plenty of booze available if you need some liquid courage. Yet...is it just you, or do most of the other fledging musicians look awfully grim lately?

►B2) TOTALLY NORMAL: The signs of it are small, at first. Glasses you set down seeming out of place, stuff that almost looks like words written in the condensation on your glass. These little hauntings only get more and more persistent as the night continues, almost like some otherworldly presence is following you. You can feel them lurking nearby at times, like an unusual spot of cold or warmth in the air. None of the higher ups seem to notice but...to some of your new peers, this feels like old news. Eventually the signs become bolder, and at some point in the evening you'll hear it whispered in your ear or written on the bathroom mirror: "Remember."

►B3) REMEMBER: And you do. It strikes you suddenly, a feeling like a foreign presence straying through your mind. You remember something of your past, pertaining to the emotional affinity Love, Duty, Passion, or Hope - whichever feeling describes the person you used to be best. Except you know nothing of that life now, nothing except this single, strange thought in a room full strangers.

NOTE: Current characters definitely go to this party in earlier March, but it isn't required play. Besides the usual hauntings and meeting new characters, it is considered business as usual. Pride Records and Virgo Entertainment's employees are uneasily coexisting, pretty much because they have to in order to keep up appearances. Body guards are out in full force. It's sort of tense.

☆HELPFUL INFO

► Follow the mod plurk for updates: interstellar5555
► Check out the game NAVIGATION
► Check out the RESCUER TDM
► Ask the mods some QUESTIONS
► Reserves open on February 27th at 12:01AM EDT
► Applications open on March 4th at 12:01AM EDT

Comments

3/3

[ace_of_hearts]

Or at least recover quickly enough -- that at least he can do.

And he quickly tries to clear enough room to make this a more proper fight rather than a simple fisticuffs brawl between brothers, (why did that idea come to mind?) and he aims a hard low kick for Sabo's knees to sweep him or just plain flatten him all over again.

Because...

"Fuck you, that's why."

That wouldn't make sense if the guy couldn't read his mind. And he didn't know why he would even think he could. Just a weird gut feeling.

Unimportant?

[vivelarevolution]

Fuck you that's why what? Sabo doesn't get it. He manages to avoid the side sweep though, knowing it's not the last kind of attack and circles back in the widening space, absently wondering what the hell he's doing. What is this fight even? Who is this guy and why--? But the rage is still there-- and everything is familiar and not. People are chanting all around them now, encouraging the fight but he can barely hear them. He needs something in his hand. Something solid. He can't think of what that might be other than a drumstick, but that doesn't make sense.

"Who the hell are you anyway?" And more importantly. "What are you doing here?" Because it shouldn't-- This is something that shouldn't happen... This guy... This guy would only be dangerous... Something like that. Something dark and heated in his gut. What is it?

[ace_of_hearts]

"Portgas D. Ace," Ace grins toothily like a shark, aiming another punch for the blond's face. "Remember the name, because it's going to get etched somewhere important."

Bam!

Pow!

After the first punch, he follows it up with a boxing undercut, and barely pulls back enough for another kick. Like a wild animal fighting for its life, he wasn't about to give up for a second.

It's familiar, but how many times before had he been in fights like this? Though usually he wasn't the one getting hit for something seemingly out of nowhere.

"Because I'm going to be the best that ever lived." Ever. Something... strongest? Strongest musician? No. Best? Something... It was hazy, unfocused. It clearly hadn't been said that way before. Which didn't make sense. Didn't he do this a ton? It didn't matter.

He grabbed the blond's head in both hands, about to skullcrack him hard enough that he'd be seeing stars for weeks but something stopped him midway. "Name?" he growled.

No no no, that was too dangerous, he just left his ribs too vulnerable. If he was going to skullcrack him, he had to do it! Not change halfway! What was he thinking?! He half reflexively bunched his legs up closer, defensively, to try to block whatever was coming, and yet it wouldn't be enough, would it?

[vivelarevolution]

"Portgas D..." And then something shifted. Like a smothering. A cool blanket over what once had been a fire. He blinked a few times, then rocked back at the hits, suddenly floundering a little on what to do. The anger wasn't banked exactly, more confused. It had meant something and abruptly meant nothing. Less than nothing. Which was somewhat weirder.

Sabo dismisses the best line. So what if he does? So does nearly everyone else. That was the whole point, wasn't it? Anyway, it's hard to focus on that when suddenly it seems almost like it's going to turn into Brokeback Mountain. Maybe that's a little far but it's still disturbingly intimate to be held like that even if there's tension in the other guy.

Sabo pulls out of his grip, fingers shifting and twitching, longing for something to hold and twirl.

"I think I've got the wrong guy," he says, and he means to sound sheepish but his voice comes out as sheet rock regardless. "Sorry about that." Not that he can make himself sound sorry at all. Because he isn't. Not really. There is something about him but Sabo doesn't know what. And it must be a case of mistaken identity because otherwise he'd recognize a name wouldn't he? Especially one like that.

[ace_of_hearts]

No.

No one starts a fight with Ace and just deserts it in the middle.

And the asshole still didn't even give him his name.

He's a little relieved that the other guy seems too dazed to take advantage of the openings, of the weaknesses, but like hell is Ace letting him walk away.

"I said, Name," he growled furiously, feral even. And this time the punch was to the shoulder, too hard, too damaging, wasn't he refraining, because musicians needed that more than a pretty face?

And yet, it was something... As if he'd rather be attacked and at least acknowledged than seen straight through like he wasn't there, like he was just a ghost. Yeah, that definitely pissed him off like nothing else.

[vivelarevolution]

He didn't want to give him a name. Just because the guy was being an asshole about it. But also it somehow seemed safer in a way Sabo couldn't define. Otherwise it was just nice to stand up to that kind of aggression, as if anything would come from being pushed around. (Though he had started it.)

Sabo staggers half a step back at the punch to the shoulder and then recovers that step just as easily, standing there purposefully open just to piss the guy off, to see what he would do, to be a troll.

"Go to h-- Go fuck yourself." Why the change in midstream? Well, it's part of the craziness of the night, he supposes, but it felt better.

[ace_of_hearts]

Now Ace was really getting pissed off. It was one thing to start a fight for no reason, Ace could forgive that easily enough, hell he did that easily enough, but he at least deserved to know the name of dumbasses punching him, and especially for anyone who was able to at least sort of hold their own against him.

He fell into an even harder fighting stance, just wanting to tackle the guy and strangle him somehow, especially if no one pulled him the fuck off. He needed a little more control than that.

"Been there, done that, and got the ashes to prove it," Ace growled furiously, hackles on end, as if there should be fire??? or maybe fur there, like he really was some sort of wild animal, and he lunched again for the punk, aiming to twist the wrist back badly -- and damn him, a hand aimed a punch for Sabo's throat. That way... whether he was a musician or a singer, he'd have to feel it for a bit.

"Jealousy is an ugly shade on you man, better try something your own style instead."

[vivelarevolution]

Okay maybe standing back there and waiting was a damn bad idea. The wrist grab catches him by surprised and it hurts like a bitch, but he's able to dodge the punch to the throat only by bending backwards near double and swerving to the side. He grabs the guy's punching arm, though, holding it tight, knowing somehow he won't be able to get away easily.

This is so strange. Too strange. Why is it so strange?

"There's nothing to be jealous of. Like I said it was mistaken identity." But that sounds lame to his own ears. Or like he's hiding something. Well it's not exactly the truth. "Should I make it up to you?" He glances at the tattoo and smirks a little. "Teach you how to spell maybe?"

He wants to get the guy riled up somehow. He's not sure why. It's not that he wants to be better. It's just... something. Something he wants the guy to stop doing? But that doesn't make any sense.

[ace_of_hearts]

He wants to growl. To bite the other man's throat out.

Make it up to him...? At first Ace just blinked a little in confusion, oh, did he think that thing before was flirting, because dude was so not Ace's type --

But the rest of it just set Ace off like a firework. If he'd been wound up before, angry before, it was nothing compared to the white hot rage that flooded him. Murder him? Too good for this. He was going to kill him slowly and the most painfully way Ace knew how!!

"THAT'S FOR MY BROTHER!" he roared, and despite the immense pain to his digits and arm, he twisted it to elbow the man's throat instead. No more talking. No more air.

It was foreign. There was a rushing in his ears, wind? Blood? He didn't know. Or care.

He'd never tell someone easily why his tattoo was the way it was. Much less tell someone in anger.

But he had. Something about this guy mocking it pissed him off extra. "I'll kill you!"

He half hoped someone did pull him off at that point, because he was half about to carry through on it. The desire to strangle wasn't even a tenth of it anymore. He wanted to tear him apart with his bare hands.

Against a normal person, riling them up past the point of sanity was usually a pretty good tactic. But making a man who wasn't sure how much he was supposed to be alive angry to the point of no longer caring about such a thing was a recipe for a murderous explosion.

[vivelarevolution]

But this was fucking why! This was always why! This was the reason that--! That something! Sabo can't help but be angry all over again as the guy comes at him full force, fighting just as hard back and for reasons he can't understand but infuriate him all the same. The guy is fast and strong and brutal but Sabo is just as fast and strong and brutal, giving almost as many hits as he got and not caring what got broken in the process on either one of them.

He wanted to yell but he couldn't around the ache on his throat where the asshole had jammed his elbow and instead flipped them and punched him right back in the throat so they were on the same field at least. Hand grabbed him and pulled him off and it was only just in him to not hit them too. They were other. They were soft and could be hurt. Instead he just remained in their grip, breathing hard, blood dripping off his face as he scowled at the other.

[ace_of_hearts]

Ace didn't know what he wanted anymore.

Killing this guy wouldn't bring his brother back from the dead. And it was just an old wound. One he should have forgotten with the rest.

He threw him into the crowd instead and punched a wall hard, half hoping the scraped knuckled would remind him to control his temper better -- fat chance.

"Stay out of my way," he warned with a growl, maybe for the blond, maybe for everyone else.

Next person who started something with him and then had the gall to treat him like he wasn't even there, he probably would kill. For sure.

[vivelarevolution]

Sabo shakes his head, loosening himself from the grip of the edgy crowd that winces as Ace punches a wall. Sabo doesn't wince, though, just watches him go, catching his glance.

"I'll be keeping an eye on you." Why, he can't say. But he will. Every time he can. Every move. Every word sung or i dotted. He will watch and record. And be there one step away just... just in case he's needed. For... something.