Test Drive 1: Beachville

[fluxscapemod]

((Note: We are still under going construction here at Fluxscape! However, we've decided to open the TDM to better gauge the level of player interest. If you have any questions please comment to our Rules and FAQ page!))


[ ooc: Welcome to our first TDM! TDM links can be considered game canon. Here is a link For anyone wishing to reserve with us!

Also, please be sure to check our reserves page to make sure there isn't an existing reserve for the character! Please and Thank You! -Fluxscape Mods. ]




Upon Arrival

You know how it goes. One minute you're minding your own business. Maybe you're in your own universe, maybe you're in another one entirely. Whichever the case, you blink and suddenly you find yourself in front of a small, wooden information booth, without so much as a warning. The weather is lovely, the environment peaceful, until someone clears their throat nearby to get your attention. It's coming from the booth. Inside the booth sits an older gentleman, old enough to be your grandfather, and he's smiling warmly at you.

"Welcome," he says, giving you a grin and a small nod. He means no harm and regards you with some curiosity before reaching towards a stack of very plain looking pamphlets in front of him.

"It'd be in your best interest," he states, going through the pamphlets before pulling one up, turning to reach into a filing cabinet for an envelope clearly stuffed with something. "It'd be in your best interest to take these. And to check your pockets," he states. The envelope is filled with money, paper bills that seem to shift colors in the light, and the pamphlet welcomes you to the current settings of this pocket dimension and tells you that while lodging is free, entertainment, food and other necessities are not so it's probably best that you find a job.

Inside your pockets are a set of keys and a map to a house. The house is yours. You'll even find a chest in your bedroom, containing six items from home, some of which you're sure shouldn't even fit in there.

Welcome to Town.

Just ask anyone, Beachville is the most beautiful city anywhere! That's exactly what the NPCs will tell you with a genuine smile on their faces and a happy nod. It even just might be true. For a beach as crowded as it is, it's surprisingly clean! The sand is just right. Not too hot and soft to the touch. The water is so blue you can see marine life swimming just under the surface. A variety of multicolored fish. Dolphins. The occasional mermaid. ...yes, that was in fact a mermaid! They're playful, don't worry. They won't try to drown you, Maybe just knock you off your surfboard with a laugh and a flash of a shimmery tail as they swim off to who knows where. There are still sharks in that very blue, very clear water, but they're not interested in you in the slightest. In fact, they seem very keen on avoiding you. There's so much to do here in Beachville! There's fishing off the docks, well away from where people are swimming. There's a boardwalk with almost every shop imaginable. A tattoo artist, a piercing parlor, a place to buy silly souvenirs like hermit crabs in cages, or ridiculous shirts. There's so much food to be tried; Pizzas, Salt Water Taffy's, lemonades of various flavors and some of the best burgers and fries you've ever had! If the day-life isn't for you, wait until dark. The amusement park (which opens at sunrise and runs until 2 AM), lights up the night in a fantastic and colorful display, the sounds of the roller coasters and laughing guests heard for miles around, and part of the docks turns into an open air nightclub, complete with dance floor, beverages for all and alcohol for anyone over eighteen. Don't try to trick the bartender. They'll know. If the hustle and bustle and noise of the beach isn't for you, don't worry. There are many resorts nearby with their own private swimming pools and entertainment. There are coffee shops on almost every street, various boutiques and curios to look at and a movie theater or two. Don't worry; you'll also find the more necessary stores like grocery stores (where there is something for almost everyone), pharmacies, book stores, clothing stores, hardware stores. There's even a police station, fire house and hospital. But that's not what Beachville is about! Everyone needs a vacation, right?

Beachville Locations
(Feel Free to use our locations to spark ideas for prompts! Check out other fun locations Here!)

	Beachville Boardwalk and Amusements Just what it says on the tin. Every possible Boardwalk location you can think of is here. Tattoo parlors, really cheesy t-shirts and hideous beach attire, awesome food of highly dubious nutritious value. There are also rides, like a huge ferris wheel, bumper cars, spinning rides and a huge roller coaster. At night, part of the boardwalk closes and turns into a place for dancing, drinking (For anyone over eighteen) and watching fireworks every weekend until 2 AM.
	The Surf Board There are three of these places located along the beach, and each one seems to be run by surfers in 'business attire'. Of course, by business attire, we mean these shirts and khaki shorts. They're here for all your surfing needs whether it be board rentals, lessons or even board purchases and care products. Dude.
	Shellfish Shack A small, outdoor restaurant right beside the fishing docks that can happily boast the freshest, most inexpensive seafood. There are crabs, lobsters, shellfish of many edible varieties and other seafood, besides. They also sell fresh catches by the pound that you can cook yourself at home, so go ahead and buy some! And be sure to buy some of their fresh made lemonade by the gallon. It's known all over Beachville as the best.
	Beach Breeze The Perfect place outdoors to grab a smoothie or any kind of fruit juice. They also serve the best shaved ice you've ever had in your life. What a great way to beat the heat!

Comments

[hibana_incursa]

Hey, Gwen is fine with it. She shifts on the bench, too, bringing one knee up to rest her chin on it, holding out her bucket of chicken fingers and fries. Stories are best when food is involved, or something. Plus, she's actually not 100 percent hungry.

"Yep! This'd be the...third time. The first time, I was sucked through a hole between universes because a complete psycho wanted to find his dead wife and dead kid somewhere in the multiverse and be with them again. Never mind the fact that it was destroying the entire multiverse. Oh! Also, he probably either didn't know or didn't care that being in the wrong universe caused painful rapid cellular degeneration. So, that was fun."

In the way that it was absolutely not fun.

"The second time, I was on my way home from that universe and found myself on a train flying through space. Hated it. This time, I'm...here."

[he_who_dwells]

The soft 'wha' causes a startle reaction from the skinny guy in glasses and he turns to look at the source. The angel hovers about shoulder height for a moment before disintegrating into nothing, floating away on a breeze before vanishing entirely.

"S-sorry. I wasn't bothering you or anything, was I?"

[crazy_white_girl]

Tandy glances at the food but doesn't hesitate to grab herself some fries because, hey, she is hungry. Actually, she is really kind of hungry despite the fact that she'd had a smoothie already. But this is one of those conversations where it doesn't hurt to sit and munch while they try to figure shit out.

"Wow," She isn't really sure what to say as Gwen tells her about the other two times she had been pulled into another universe. Then she shakes her head a little, glancing down.

"Well, at least this place looks nice." Glancing towards the beach, she tilts her head. "Which means there is probably some serious shit below the surface."

[crazy_white_girl]

Tandy is zeroed in on the angel, watching as it hovers for a moment before disappearing from sight and leaving her to stare at the skinny guy instead. She can see that she had caught him off guard and that he feels rather awkward about it but she brushes it aside.

"No, not at all but," She points a little. "How were you doing that?"

[the_nose]

He feels a little like an ass, but he can't help it: when she drinks and makes a face before returning his wine, he finds himself laughing--not unkindly, but laughing all the same.

Gracious, a good sport, a French girl herself based on the accent--and clearly has a delicate palette. That, and she's a soldier from the look of her.

He likes her already.

Signaling to one of the waiters drifting around, Cyrano orders a lighter white wine with more fruit notes and less punch than the bolder port he's drinking.

"You're claustrophobic." he pressed, this time in English. "No shame, soldier, so am I. If not for my poetry, I'd have long since flown."

He lifts his notebook and gestures with it.

"That is why I am here." he declared. "Because I am not here--I am at the cliff's edge, calling to my muse for wings with which to fly from here...and, sadly, she does not hear me in this place."

[deaths_head]

"You got more life in you 'n you think." the Shade assured her, watching her as she watched the house. The death on her was heavy, the grief was rampant...this young woman belonged to him.

"And you ain't alone." he assured her. "If you're worried 'bout what's in there for you...you ain't gotta face it by yourself. I'll walk you in if you like, little soldier."

[nosuchthingasfate]

Her gaze flickers to his face when he laughs but she doesn't seem bothered by it since it doesn't seem like he means it unkindly. Especially since she had been the one to wrinkle her nose upon the taste of his wine which is a sign she doesn't really like it.

She remains quiet for a moment then as he flags down a waitress to order her a different kind of wine which makes her think briefly of Lydia. But it isn't a thought she can linger over as it hurts to think of her best friend.

"I'm not claustrophobic either, it's just..." She doesn't know how to explain it or if she even wants to. So she focuses on what else he is saying instead, pausing with a curious look at the fact that he is possibly writing poetry. Right here of all places.

"Your muse?" It's a soft curious question as she tries to get a glimpse of the words he has written even though it would be upside down for her.

[nosuchthingasfate]

"Except for the fact that I don't know you and it would be stupid of me to invite you to follow me into an empty, dark house." She scoffed lightly before arching a brow at him. "Or maybe even if stupid of you to follow because you don't know me either."

Not that she was probably a threat to him but she was sure she could defend herself if she absolutely needed to. At least for a few minutes and hopefully long enough to get away if she needed to do that too.

[he_who_dwells]

He was usually pretty vigilant, too, but this place was weird. Unsettling. There was something he wasn't quite able to put his finger on, and he wasn't sure he liked it too much.

"It's..." How to explain this kind of thing to someone. He'd never had to do that before. Usually when people whip abilities out back home, people understand. They know what he is. So this is weird.

"I'm a Conduit. That means I can control a particular form of matter. In my case, it's video energy. I drain video from a source and then I create things with it. Nothing that really lasts long, but..." He shrugs, recreating the angel again. It's detailed. Heavily so. It flexes it's wings and flies around his hand for a moment before hovering over it and bowing slightly to Tandy.

"I'm Eugene."

[hibana_incursa]

"Probably. On the train we had inspectors show up one day. They went on about training and made it sound like we were all volunteers, when none of us remembered signing up for any of it. They kept going on about 'void sickness causes memory loss' but wouldn't actually answer questions."

But to go from that to a beach town? Gwen seems pretty chill about the whole ordeal.

"So, now I guess it's just a matter of figuring out what the hell we do now. Jerry, the guy at the information booth, said to get a job. Past that, he offered nothing. Except snicker doodle cookies. Which I almost took, I'm not gonna lie. They smelled awesome."

[crazy_white_girl]

He isn't the only one who thinks this whole thing is a bit unsettling because she is right there with him. She had pretty much told Gwen as much when they had discussed it earlier. The place is just too pretty and perfect to be real. Plus she has seen too much shit lately to really be comfortable with anything that seems too good to be true.

Also, she has no idea what a Conduit is but she knows the definition of the word but he makes it seem like a title or something. It also seems a bit familiar as he recreates the angel to make it fly around his hand. Not that she has ever seen that particular thing before but...

She lifts a hand where he will see a brief flare of light before a glowing white, well, dagger appears briefly until she wills it away. Just a brief show that she probably shouldn't have done but it just felt kind of right to do considering he had shared his own power.

"I'm Tandy."

[he_who_dwells]

That was probably one of the coolest things Eugene has seen and it shows. Look, his face does things other than a startle reaction and looking uncertain. At the moment, it's smiling just a little bit.

"That's pretty amazing," he says, his smile a little bit lopsided. "It looked tangible." He can create something pretty similar. He chooses not to, at the moment, instead enjoying the fact that there was someone like him in town. So far, he hadn't seen anyone. Nor had anyone said anything remotely familiar about people with powers, so the idea that he was nowhere near home was kind of rough to think about.

[crazy_white_girl]

"Sounds like bullshit to me for sure." The idea doesn't sit well with her at all as it makes her think of D'Spayre which is something she doesn't want to think about at the moment. She knows she will have to when it comes time to deal with all that but not right now. "So they just kept telling you that you had memory loss?"

Tandy wants to be as chill but she will have to fake it until she makes it.

"Yeah, they smelled all right but I wasn't going to risk taking them. Not from him." She shakes her head before pausing and glancing at Gwen again. "Did you get a key and a map to a house?"

[crazy_white_girl]

"Thanks," She tries not to feel awkward about the little show as the dagger fades from view once she wills it away before he can possibly reach out to touch it.

"It is tangible. It's like a dagger." She lets her hand fall back to her side, not really expanding beyond that. Like how she knows it is a dagger or when she might have used it as such. He just needs to know not to reach out and grab it if he ever sees it again.

"But I can't do what you were doing." Which is almost disappointing. "Because that looks pretty cool. How tangible are they? If I reach out to touch the angel, would I be able to feel it?"

[hibana_incursa]

"They kept telling us to report memory loss, and to report if we thought we weren't there voluntarily, but any time any of us asked where to report that to, they gave some weird bullshit like...non-answer. Some kind of 'you should just know' deal. And then said if we wanted to report it, we'd have to leave the train for a couple days. I didn't want to go with them anywhere, so I stayed put. The guys were wearing gas masks and I'm pretty sure they were controlling peoples emotions. It was so creepy."

Not the worst situation she'd been in, but still terrifying.

"I did. And as luck would have it, my boyfriend from the train is also here and in the house. What about you? You got somewhere to stay too, right?"

[he_who_dwells]

He's kind of an idiot, but he's not dumb enough to just reach out and grab at peoples abilities. That's Delsin's gig. He leaves that kind of thing to his friend. So he doesn't look disappointed when it fades away. He's still curious, sure, but not enough to intrude.

Instead, he pulls out the Fluxphone again and while it looked dead in the water earlier, it's buzzing away with video messages. Finding another video feed to drain, he hovers his hand over it and pulls the pixels out just as he did before, eyes going white-blue until he's done.

And then he creates another angel and gently nudges it her way. The angel holds out a small hand and Eugene raises an eyebrow, looking a bit amused.

"They're tangible. All of my creations are. They aren't durable, but I've used bigger angels in fights, and demons to scare away people that were trying to cause harm. Not...not like...real demons? But...hardlight ones. Based off of an MMO I play a lot of back home."

[crazy_white_girl]

"Did you at least punch them in the mouth or something?" It is almost enough to make Tandy wish that she had been there because she would have gotten some answers or at least done everything she could to do so. But also, not really because that doesn't sound like fun either. It sounds mostly like it would hit too close to home for her.

She fights back a little shiver as she grabs a piece of chicken, deciding that eating would be a good distraction from the creepy feeling that she is getting.

"Apparently I have a house?" She doesn't look too thrilled over the idea though. "Not that I know what to do with it. I'm used to a trailer or an abandoned church."

[crazy_white_girl]

Hey, he wouldn't be the first person to touch something that he shouldn't. Tandy kind of has her own issue with touching or taking things that aren't hers but she is trying to be better. For the most part.

Inching a bit closer as he doesn't seem to be so awkward about talking to her, she takes advantage of his distraction to join him on the bench where she can sit and tilt her head as she listens to him. Also to totally watch the way his eyes go white-blue when he uses more of his power.

"That's so cool. Not the demons part but that they are tangible." She murmurs, totally focused on the angel as she reaches out to offer one finger to the tiny hand that is being held out to her. "What's an MMO?"

[hibana_incursa]

"I wanted to, but I kept thinking that would be a bad idea for everyone else." Gwen's Spider-Sense was practically screaming HOE, DON'T DO IT! and she tends to listen to that particular instinct.

"It was very tempting to." Given the opportunity, she probably would deck them in the face and then web them to the outside of the Void-train.

"Where's your house? Ours is by the lake. The big, three story blue one."

[the_nose]

"It's just...too many men, none of them your own." he replied quietly, losing some of his smile as he watched her with a knowing look. He understood the feeling all too well, being trapped in a crowded room with not a single friendly face to have his back...

Her curiosity hit him in the chest in a strangely pleasant way. For a long moment, he said nothing...then after a beat, he flipped through his notebook until he found one he was comfortable sharing and turned his notebook to face her so she could read.

"This is the only tripe I can muster."

Upon the white sand
Across the blue sea
I outstretch my hand
Lies alone greet me.

[crazy_white_girl]

"Right, I guess that would be a thing." Because Tandy probably would have failed at reining herself in as she usually is. She has a bad habit of just racing into things and getting herself in trouble but that is another thing she is working on too. One of many.

"Uh, hold on." She twists a little bit so she can slide the map out of her back pocket, settling again as she unfolds it and looks for the marking that is supposed to be her place.

"It looks like it's close to a lake." She offers the map to Gwen to look at.

[hibana_incursa]

"It's kind of a 'you had to be there' thing? But considering how wrong the whole thing was? Kinda glad you weren't. And I mean that in the nicest way possible," Gwen states, stuffing a fry in her mouth. She watches Tandy and looks at the map and then pulls out her own, pointing out her location as she compares the two.

"Hey, you're right. We're practically neighbors!" That's pretty awesome, in her opinion.

[nosuchthingasfate]

Allison winced as he hit the nail right on the hard or at least very close to it. She wanted to see her 'men' but they wouldn't be there. Not here in this place where she was sure it was some kind of afterlife since it would be fitting.

But it certainly wasn't like any afterlife she could have imagined. Except for maybe the beach.

"Pretty much." She murmured as she looked at him again, unaware of the pained look before she looked away again when the waitress appeared at her side to slide a glass of wine in front of her.

It was also right at the same time he slid his notebook over so that she could see the words he wanted to share with her. She paused as she leaned forward, scanning the four lines before glancing up at him. "Lies?"

[crazy_white_girl]

"Trust me, I'm not going to take any offense to that because I'm kind of glad I wasn't there either." Then she stops dead and wrinkles her nose. "Unless maybe I was and I don't have any memory of it?"

Which is not something she wants to consider.

So she focuses on the idea of her house as she passes the map over to Gwen and waits for the other girl to look at it. The news that they are practically neighbors has her sitting a bit straighter as she smiles.

"Really? Okay, thank god." She reaches for the map again. "Maybe it won't be so bad then!"

[the_nose]

Cyrano nodded, gesturing around them as he leaned forward, folding his arms along the edge of the table.

"This...this little slice of heaven by the sea." he replied. "Before I arrived here, I was on the battlefield, starving and dying of thirst--supply lines were cut. I wake up, I'm treated, I'm given a new home and this idyllic life awaiting me here...it's no life. It's lies, and given the kind of man I am? I wrote that with the belief that I'm in Hell...and its true face will be revealed in short order."

When her wine arrived, Cyrano reached for his port, flashing her a grim little smile as he raised his glass in toast.

"But with a fellow soldier in my midst...a comrade to drink with...I feel a little less convinced that this is Hell." Clinking his glass against hers, he brought his glass to his lips.

"And a bit less claustrophobic." he finished before taking a long swallow of his port.