revivalprojectooc | Sunmmer Test Drive Meme

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Sunmmer Test Drive Meme

SUMMER TEST DRIVE MEME
Application FAQ | Taken Characters | Reserves | Application

Welcome to the Current Test Drive for The Revival Project!

This game is a spin-off from the closed The Drift Fleet game. For more information about the game, including more details on the setting, please check out the FAQ here or the premise here.

A thread on the TDM will be required for all applications. Please view the FAQ for information about how this works. Any questions about the game please direct to the comment section of the FAQ as well.

If you are a Drift Fleet alumni bringing your character from the game, please label your character as 'DFAU' on your top level. Also, keep in mind you have complete flexibility on how your character comes here. They could be taken before endgame, after endgame, two years after, one year before, etc. It's up to you! If you want to completely restart your character, they're not considered DFAU anymore and won't need the label.

So go! Explore Agra 10! And, as always, HAVE FUN!

Thread ideas:

Summer in Temba and Sh'Ka

Summer is a growing season, which seems to be going into overdrive this year. Instead of the gradual growth of plants that one might expect over the seasons, plants are starting to grow with an intense energy, and once clear paths in both cities grow choked over with vines, undergrowth, and even new saplings by the day. It might be wise to find some way to clear those paths as you go.

For those that are in a more summer and sun kind of fun, there's always the beach to the south of Temba, where the sand and surf welcome all comers. However here too there is a lot of growth going on, with new reeds and shore grasses rising up, serving as a great place for fat green lobsters to hide and pinch at the unwary.

Or maybe it's better to explore the buildings these days, with how the plants have taken over everything. However one might well find that less commonly used buildings and ruins have their own plant problems. Some are overgrown with fruitbearing vines, and others filled with wide swaths of various forms of mint. Good news there is that the glownies seem to have gotten free, or others have arrived, to feast upon the mintsplosion.

Explore ~~the city~~ Temba!

Here's a map of Temba and a bit more description of some of the buildings here.

Most of the buildings are run down and have clearly been abandoned for years; fortunately, the water treatment center appears to be working, but power is intermittent and unreliable. What used to be stores or places to live in lies in ruins, but there may still be something to scavenge among the rubble. Do you want to risk a swim in the flooded area that has turned into a deep lake that has yet to be fully explored; or does it draw you to some of the more prominent and partially restored buildings, such as the hotel, the hospital or the amphitheater.

If you are lucky, you might even stumble over The Deep End, the bar located on one of the mid-levels of the tower residences in one of the residence towers. Unfortunately no bright neon signs can lead you there, but it does exist.

Visit the spaceships!

That's right, there are currently several small spaceships sitting in the hangar. Not all of them may be around when you check out the building, as one of the pilots may be using one of them to fly over to Sh'Ka. But there should still enough of them around for you to inspect and maybe wonder about. However, only one of them will open its doors for you. Do you dare to step inside? Check out the protein paste or maybe even meet one of your crew mates?

Try the network!

Upon arrival, your character will have on their person a small, handheld communications device. Maybe they know exactly how to use a computer, smartphone, or tablet, and immediately blast out a text or video trying to figure out what's going on. Or maybe they're not so tech-savvy after all, and everyone is about to get a lovely shot right up your character's left nostril.

There be storms...

These power-altering storms keep ravaging parts of the planet every once in a while. No one truly knows where they come from or what to do about them yet, but one of them appears to be approaching. You have the option to find shelter in one of the buildings to wait for it to pass. Unless, of course, you rather feel drawn to investigate.

Should you step inside the storm, or even get lost in it, it will show ghosts of people you know and those you don't. It drains you of any super-human abilities and tries its best to keep you from getting to its origin. Are you going to try anyways? Or are you going to chase the whispers of people from your past? Maybe you will simply find yourself calling for help or stumble across another lost soul in need of assistance.

More information can be found here.

Wildcard!

You're welcome to use any previous test drive scenarios or previous game events as a basis for a thread/situation, or simply make up your own! Keep in mind that you're currently stranded on a planet with only basic necessities, but there is enough food and fresh water. Creature comforts, however, seem to be distinctly lacking. Quite unlike a gathering of potentially dangerous creatures to encounter. The setting is yours to explore and have fun with!

✧ Premise ✧ FAQ ✧ Rules ✧ Test Drive ✧ Taken ✧ Reserves ✧ Application ✧
✧ Map ✧ Devices & Network ✧ Data Points ✧ Ships ✧ Flora ✧ Fauna ✧ Supply Requests ✧ Calendar ✧
✧ Activity Check ✧ Player Plot Suggestion ✧ Player Contacts ✧ Player Permission Code ✧ Hiatus ✧ Drop ✧
✧ Navigation ✧

code bases by tricklet

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It doesn't hurt to do a check on the ships every so often, just to make sure they're in good condition for whenever they get sprung upon with another mission or trip off-world, although those seem to so far be far and few. At least they can still be used as a transport, but sometimes Cal wishes they weren't so restricted. But then that'd be against the whole point of them being here, wouldn't it, at least by Someone's standards.

The young Jedi tilts his head as he notices Dustin poking about one of the ships. It's always easy to pick out a newcomer and this is no exception. Still, it's always a mixed bag when it comes to reactions from those who come upon the ships, and this person seems to be more on the positive end of the spectrum for his enthusiasm. "Hey," he says as he approaches. From over his shoulder his droid peeks curiously.

Dustin might be having a positive reaction to the spaceships, but people near them? Entirely different story. The disheveled-looking teenager freezes mid-step, pen halting on paper as his sharp green eyes snap up and meet Cal's. For a moment, it looks like he might bolt.

Then his gaze flicks to the droid. His eyes widen slightly.

"Is that a robot?" Dustin asks, by way of an introduction. Sure, he's seen robots before - built a few, even - but just the little bit he can see of the droid and the few moments he's had to observe it tells him that its movements are way too fluid, design too complicated, to be someone's casual kit project. This definitely requires further investigation.

The little droid's antennae perk up on either side of his boxlike head, his movements birdlike as he tilts it with a curious beep. Cal lifts his hands up as though to forestall any sudden retreat the teenager seemed to consider. He almost laughs when the first question that comes out of his mouth is about his friend.

"He is, yeah," he says, glancing at said robot. "This is BeeDee-One. I'm Cal." He looks pointedly at Dustin. "And you're new."

BD-1 hoots a greeting.

"Yeah," Dustin mumbles, totally tuning Cal out as he watches the little droid bob around. BD-1's responses seem so natural that it - he? Robot pronouns, sure - could easily pass for a pet. Fascinating.

Trance-like, Dustin wanders his way over to BD-1 (and Cal), carefully observing the droid's reaction to him. Seems curious, but not wary. "Did you program him yourself?" he asks, reaching out a hand to Cal's shoulder and BD-1 like he's introducing himself to a dog, palm up.

Cal shares a look with BD-1. "Always stealing the show," he murmurs with a bit of a crooked smile. The droid borbles at that, turning his attention back towards the new arrival then.

"I didn't. Found him, actually. I have no idea who made him, only his previous owner," Cal says with a shrug. He laughs a little as he watches Dustin hold a hand up. "No, like this," he suggests, bringing up one of his own hands in demonstration since he's not sure how Dustin will take to being touched. He curls his fingers into a fist, offering it towards BD-1 in a more familiar fistbump as the droid reciprocates by bringing one of his legs up to boop a foot against it.

Dustin can't help but feel a little disappointed. He would've loved to talk to BD-1's creator. He has so many questions, and he's not sure Cal is in a position to answer any of them. But he figures he'll be here for a while, and he figures the droid needs maintenance just like any machine. Maybe whoever takes care of him here knows more, if that person isn't Cal? Maybe BD-1 has a more complex AI than Dustin is giving him credit for, and the droid can answer the questions himself?

He's rocked out of his pondering by Cal demonstrating that BD-1's most familiar form of greeting is by way of fistbump. Dustin barks out a laugh, caught completely off-guard.

"Ok, sure," he grins, changing his palm into a fist. "You might just be the friendliest face I've seen all day, you know that?"

Yes, he's still addressing BD-1. Yes, he also knows that Cal is standing right there. Dustin doesn't seem to care.

BD-1 obligingly bumps Dustin's fist back. Meanwhile Cal can't help but roll his eyes a little at Dustin's opinion, albeit in good nature. It's not the first time people have gravitated towards his little buddy.

"Maybe you should just be the welcoming committee at this rate," he suggests to the droid. BD-1 twitters at that before beeping something that sounds like a query. Cal nods, glancing back at Dustin. The teenager may be ignoring him, but that doesn't mean Cal is.

"He's right. You still haven't given your name," he prompts.

Cal is, unfortunately, going to have to get used to this, because it doesn't seem like Dustin is ready to pay attention to him. Or rather, he's not ready to pay attention to the right things.

He glances over at Cal, eyes narrowing. "You understand him?" he asks - pointedly not giving his name out. Maybe it's from distraction instead of deliberate misdirection? Dustin is quite interested in the idea of the robot having his own spoken language. He's mentally going through all of the little boops and electronic tweeting noises in context, trying to piece together a pattern. It's the same method he's used to pick up other languages before; surely, if there's a language to be found here (and not just Cal wistfully interpreting his droid's processing noises), Dustin will find it.

Well, if that's how this guy wants to be... Cal shrugs, dropping his pursuit of a normal introduction. He can't really blame people if they're just a bit paranoid about giving out too much information about themselves, especially around here. It feels like so long ago that he'd been the same way, not that he isn't without some caution.

"Yeah. Droids like him speak Binary. I had a lot of time to pick it up," he says, not going into further details. Even he has things he'd rather not dip back into, although these days he's better at not flinching away from the past. Droidspeak wasn't something you learned in a day, and not on a casual basis, that was for sure. It's definitely easier to pick up the nuances, a question, a statement, an exclamation.

Apparently some things are universal, and that seems to include machine languages. Dustin knows binary. Assuming Cal is referring to the same sort of binary Dustin knows here, anyway. That would imply that BD-1 is modulating raw code, which--

--Like a modem. Shit, I'm so stupid. Dustin's eyes glitter with keen interest and something else, something slightly more unnatural about how his pupils dilate and shimmy, like he's dreaming with his eyes open. In his mind Dustin is playing back every dial-up noise he's heard over the last 10 years and connecting them to the networking protocols he knows about.

Dustin is not exactly a casual observer.

...No, this is interesting, but not useful. BD-1 must be using a different encryption method. Just like that, it's over. Dustin blinks a couple of times and his eyes refocus. I can't assume that he was developed to communicate over an Earth-based telephone network. Might need to brute force this.

He scoots around Cal's back, trying to get a better look at the droid that's been mostly hidden behind his shoulder. "Can he interface with a terminal?" Dustin asks, somehow even more animated than he was a few minutes ago. "Doesn't have to be two-way. A screen? Printer? Anything with raw output." Are there even any working ones left in the ruined city? Maybe there are in the spaceships, but even if there aren't, Dustin figures that he could build his own from the scraps and casually puts his worries aside.

Cal's instantly a little more wary as he watches Dustin. Not that it's anything new that people take an interest in BD-1, but he's protective of his friend too. When Dustin finally comes out of...whatever it is he was doing, not that Cal had detected anything of a threat, thankfully, he all the same turns to keep the teenager in view.

"Doesn't seem like relevant information I need to provide," he says with a shrug. He figures if Dustin isn't going to be forthcoming with any, there's no reason he should give specs on BD-1.

Tunnel-visioned, Dustin continues trying to circle around Cal even as he rotates to block him. The effort seems to be annoying him slightly, in the way that he might be annoyed if someone held his lunch over his head and wouldn't give it back, but even then he doesn't quite get the hint until Cal gives him a more overt rejection. Dustin stops and stares with a look of betrayal on his face. His mouth opens to ask the obvious why not? that he feels ought to follow this up, but cuts it short as he answers himself.

He doesn't trust me. Well, obviously. Dustin's not sure he trusts anyone here, either, and he knows what his answer would be if any of these strangers asked to study his hypothetical robot pet for science. He's nowhere close to having earned anything different.

Dustin deflates with a defeated sigh, his shoulders slumping. "Can I do anything to change your mind?" he asks, the slightest twinge of hope creeping into his voice.

At least the message seems to get through, if the teenager's body language is any indication. Cal arches a brow at him then. A slight improvement is better than nothing, he supposes.

"How about not be so focused on BeeDee," he suggests. "You haven't been here long, right? Guess we established that much earlier, not that it takes much to guess. We've only got so many around, so new faces are easier to pick out." He gestures to the ships. "You find out which one you were assigned?"

"Why--"

This time, Dustin can't stop the 'why not?' follow-up from partially escaping him. But BD-1 is so interesting! Why can't they just keep talking about him? There's so much he wants to learn!

Again, Dustin cuts himself off. Because you're being weird. Stop it. The teen stuffs his hands in his pockets and looks away, the notebook he had been sketching in pinned between his arm and his side.

"Nah," he mumbles, trying to brush off his embarrassment. Then he blinks and glances back at Cal as the realization hits him. "--We're assigned a ship?"

Yeah, it was a little weird. More so when Cal considers BD-1 a friend more than an object for study. And while he doesn't mind talking about droids and such, it's more than a little strange to do so with someone they've never met before.

At least diversion proves to be way better than Jedi mind tricks, not that Cal's practiced in the latter. He nods. "Yeah. Only the one we're assigned to will open up, unless someone from a particular ship lets you aboard."

This is more than just a diversion - it's staggering. Dustin visibly reels, a wide, manic grin splitting his face.

"No fucking way," he breathes. My own spaceship!

...Well, no, probably not 'his own' explicitly, considering that there's only nine of them in the hangar and roundabouts thirty other abductees in this city to share them with. Still, this is so far beyond Dustin's wildest dreams that he's not even sure what to do with the information. He could never be an astronaut; he's a recent high school dropout with two legally questionable identities. Granted, he's a very smart high school dropout, but even then, Dustin knows there's not a company on Earth that would let him go to space.

His head swivels around, as if taking in the ships around him for the first time. "--I'm assuming a crew?" he asks, then does a quick mental calculation. "Evenly distributed? About three per each? That seems low for the size."

Cal gives a nod, looking out at the ships himself. They'd been through a lot and he's glad that they no longer bear the worst of their scars. Coming 'home' to a storm was absolutely the worst.

"Five or so. We might have too many ships now. Our numbers have gone down again. It's been a while since we've had to use them, outside of heading to the other city and back, these days."

Five people? That is too many people. It's a testament to how excited he is about going to space and doing space things that Dustin isn't immediately disappointed to hear this. Instead his eyes get wider, this time in floored disbelief.

"Wait, wait," he says, giving a quick shake of the head. "Since you've had to use them? You're telling me you have spaceships - working spaceships - and you don't just, you know--"

There's some odd gesturing between Cal and the hull of the ship they're having this conversation underneath, as if his point were obvious.

"--use them all the time? Do they only have set destinations or something? Even if they do and they're basically just glorified shuttles to this..." Dustin makes an exaggerated shrug. "...other city that I'm just now hearing exists. It can't possibly suck more than this place, can it? Please tell me how it's not worth flying a spaceship to whenever you can get away with it."

"Well, for starters, if we had free use of the ships, I'm sure a lot of us wouldn't be sticking around here, don't you?" Cal asks with an arch of a brow. There probably wouldn't have been as many ships sitting around if that had been the case. He wouldn't be surprised if people would be willing to take their chances in an unknown galaxy than here, had the option been open to them.

"The ones who brought us here are pretty restrictive in the usage, unfortunately. That we're allowed to use them to get to Sh'ka at all, and back, is a step up. Otherwise you'd have to settle for the train ride."

Dustin nods along, expression steadily transitioning from baffled to resigned disappointment. No arguments from him on assuming everyone would leave - it sounds like he and Cal are in total agreement there. But he doesn't want to believe that there's this opportunity sitting directly in front of him, not only to escape, but to explore a foreign universe, and it's just oh-so-tantalizingly kept out of his reach.

"They must have some kind of flight computer that keeps them on rails," he reasons, folding his arms (and ignoring the train pun he just made). "No one's been able to identify where it is? How to get into it and make changes? Or maybe it's wireless? The Agrii could be sending a continuous signal with encrypted instructions. If we could just find the receiver and..."

The look of defeat on Dustin's face says that these questions are rhetorical. He already knows their answers. Given everything that he knows the Agrii have done - down to implanting the very information he's referencing into his brain - then keeping a bunch of multiversal vagrants out of their spaceships' core workings should be child's play for them. It would be his life's work trying to crack that code, and it still might not be enough.

Cal sighs- not at Dustin, but at the complications. Someone had been pretty thorough about making sure they couldn't find a workaround, not that he wasn't open to keep trying. "No. Unfortunately, you can't even pilot or fix a ship without the appropriate data points, and you can't grab two at once because it overwrites the previous information you receive."

That doesn't count the initial history lesson, but then there's not much to be done with that when it comes to the ships anyway. But it's true enough that the information they gain about these things is selective, and who's to say that certain details weren't being omitted?

Hearing Cal say what Dustin was thinking makes it feel more final. He'd heard about the data points by now, and had even been eager to take one up at first, before it occurred to him that they would be imparting knowledge much like the first memory dump he'd gotten on arrival. Useful as that had been to understanding his new situation, Dustin didn't like the idea of the Agrii messing with his head. His brain is his most treasured possession - the seat of his powers. Thinking about letting some faceless entities have access to it gives Dustin the shivers.

However, being reminded of the data points and how they could be applied to the ships does give Dustin an idea. He puffs out an exhale, looking over his shoulder at the ship overhead.

"...You said there might be too many ships?" he asks, sounding almost nonchalant. "Like, we could afford to decommission one of them?"

Dustin's hardly the only one concerned about the way the data points worked. Cal hasn't touched any others outside of the initial one and the one for engineering, annoyed that he couldn't simply apply his own knowhow.

"Our number keeps fluctuating," he says, nodding. "We get shuffled around and reassigned sometimes." He has a feeling he knows where Dustin's heading with this.

"Then is there anything stopping us from taking one apart?" Dustin leans forward, eyebrows raised. This is the reasonable next step for him - if he doesn't know how something works and he can't find any schematics on it, really the only thing left to do is to deconstruct it and put it back together again. Easy, right? He can totally do that with a spaceship. "The data nodes give us information on how to fix shit, but any common idiot should be able to break something."

He taps the side of his head, conspiratorially.

"Difference between them and us is, we break it thoroughly and systematically and take proper documentation. Then we fix it without the Agrii's brain-fuckery, yeah?"

"Honestly? I wouldn't be surprised if there was," Cal admits. "I'd be surprised if no one's tried to do so already, but I don't think anyone has recently to say how well that'd go or not." He nods towards the ship.

"The information we get is enough to understand how things work aside from how to fix it, so I don't think that's the problem exactly..." No, if there are some fail-safes then it's either with the ship itself or other diabolical means.

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