test drive meme #1

[historiadores]

TDM #1

LA LLEGADA

The Museum of Art and History is the largest and oldest in Llave, and contains a grand collection spanning from the time the first humans landed on its shores to the modern day. The building encircles an open courtyard where an art installation sits amidst many of the plants important to the settlers of Llave. Behind the museum is a wide, shallow field of hard-packed dirt lined by large stones, the petroglyphs on their surface worn by time—the earliest known playing field in all of the Caribbean. And further out are the areas where excavations are ongoing, uncovering the pottery, jewelry and artifacts of the ancestors.

After awakening, things move quickly. The museum is closed, and the characters ushered into the courtyard to wait. Any needing emergency medical attention are kept in one of the air conditioned galleries until the paramedics arrive. A group of women with a military bearing take charge of the situation; identified as the Bajari Bara, they question the healthy and able. They cede authority only to the Prime Minister when she arrives. Two more of their group flank the nation's leader, though they step aside when she begins to walk among the new arrivals to speak with them.

Each side has many questions and few answers. Characters are informed they are in Llave. It's October 2020. And efforts will be made to return them to their homes. But how they came to be here and why remain mysteries…as does how they’ll find their way back.

A hurricane shelter nearby is activated for use by the recent arrivals. There, characters are provided with food and clothing, a cot and other basic supplies. No one is allowed out, but through the windows they can see the lush green of the their surroundings. At night, coquí sing them to sleep. Those taken to a hospital will remain there until they are discharged. Each patient is allowed one visitor to stay with them overnight.

Over the next several days, all characters undergo physical and mental evaluations; are provided with their first immunizations; have the next legal steps explained to them; and are taught about Llave. Every character, regardless of age, has a caseworker who checks in with them daily. None have been arrested, they are assured. But they must also complete the quarantine process. To enforce quarantine, at both the hospital and the shelter, the Bajari Bara guard every entrance and exit.

Welcome to Llave.

EL AREYTO

As luck would have it, around the time quarantine ends, all of Llave is in the midst of celebration. Today is the Day of Heroes, celebrated every last weekend in October, which this year happens to fall on the eve of All Saints’ Day. So when the new arrivals venture out for the first time, Nona, the capital, welcomes them with color and music.

The people of Llave have a special love for music and dance, and it shows. All day, groups gather to play, and many more to dance. The songs center around heroes of Llave with the chief of these being Nuna, a beloved figure who is said to have led her people here to freedom. Those performing wear traditional clothes: guayaberas, long circle skirts, palm hats and headwraps, all brightly colored.

From early morning, artisans have set up under tents tables laden with goods. Clothing, jewelry, musical instruments, paintings, and more made from leather and wood, seashells and fish scales, aluminum and copper. Many create right at the table. Most popular are those working on cemís: sculptural objects, said to house the spirits of ancestors. Many carry them as amulets especially on this the eve to the days of the dead.

The food is equally rich and one of the cooks takes an interest in the new arrivals. Those who eat his food find their mood changing depending on what they ate. The tostones he prepared while speaking of his childhood home in Santa Cecilia bring on feelings of joy and contentment. The alcapurrias fried while arguing with a customer about last night’s wrestling match cause those who eat them to feel irritated. And the casabe, a flatbread made of cassava, that he explains he learned to make from his wife who passed, induces a profound nostalgia for lost loves. His wife, recognizable from the photo he keeps on the wall, sits beside those most affected and comforts them until the melancholy passes.

More dead can be found. An old man in a fine guayabera recalls composing the lyrics to a particular song. He points out the man playing the congas and proudly says his great-grandson will soon outplay him. When characters look back to the old man, he’s gone. Those with a sense for it will recognize many dead walking among the living. These next few days honor and celebrate the departed, and the dead have seized the rare opportunity to join the festivities once more.

For those who prefer the sea, the impossibly blue waters of the Caribbean are just a short walk away. Cobblestone and concrete paths line La Bahía de Nona. On one of the larger rock outcroppings jutting into the bay sits a silver-white dog. If called, he will trot over. Up close, one can see his color is due to the sand and salt that has collected on its coat. Though he allows himself to be petted, he does not step off the rocks. A passerby comments that the dog has been waiting for his master to return. How long? The man shrugs. When he was a boy, the dog was keeping watch; now he’s forty-three, and the dog is still there.

EL TRAVIESO

Or perhaps the characters were more distracted by how clean the water was, how clear. Enough so that the sight of a bottle bobbing in the waves seems offensively out of place. Anyone who chooses to snag it out of the water will find it’s a corked bottle of rum, apparently empty.

From a nearby restaurant, someone yells and waves their hands—too late. By uncorking it, they have freed the bacoo. Immediately, everyone backs away. Two cross themselves.

Only one stays long enough to warn, “You have to trick it back into the bottle. It likes milk and bananas. Don’t ask it for anything.”

Turn around, and the bacoo is there.

Short and rugged with large eyes, long arms and legs, covered in unkempt hair and its fingers and toes ending in claws, the bacoo is a strange little creature. Stranger still, it can grant any wish—so long as it is kept appeased with a steady diet of milk and bananas.

A hungry bacoo will pelt walls with stones, move objects, keep its owner up at night, and otherwise wreak havoc until it is fed. A shapeshifter, they can be difficult to locate, much less trap. And a starving bacoo will turn vicious and its pranks malicious.

Best find a way to trick it into the bottle. Fast.

---

OOC NOTES

This TDM covers from mid-to-end of October. The first prompt lasts approximately two weeks; the second, a day. For now, all characters are restricted to Nona. Any attempting to leave will be gently, but firmly escorted back.

The TDM will also double as the first IC post of the game. Threads between any two or more characters who were all apped and approved will be considered game canon. As such, actions characters take in this TDM will impact the game once it opens. How characters behave will shape the inhabitants’ first impressions of them. Make it count.

Questions regarding this TDM can be asked below, while questions regarding the game at large should be directed to the FAQ.

Thank you for your interest and we hope to have you join!

NAVIGATION • IC COMM • OOC COMM • MEME COMM

Comments

sir, i would like a refund...

[aionc]

[ well, that wasn't the most graceful of landings was it?

he had been about to continue moving when the boy simply appeared out of the shadows, rolling across the floor (and hades' path) with as much grace as a drunk satyr. had been, being the operative words here, as now he simply stands there mist still clinging to his form, eyes raised in obvious question.

human boys don't jump in and out of shadows. ]

Only if you do the same for me.

[ is he going to bargin with a child? yes, yes he is. ]

[lordofdarkness]

[Look! He's tired and maybe a little malnourished!! Not. That he should be in a hospital because he totally shouldn't.

It takes him a second to realize what the man has said and then to digest the information. That could mean he's sneaking out like Nico, but it could also mean he's sneaking in. To see someone hopefully, not for any nefarious purposes. Hopefully. Or he could be trying to break quarantine which makes Nico frown. The caseworker who had explained it to him had made a lot of sense and he's knows enough about disease from listening to Will that it seems like a reasonable step to take.

He should nod and move on and let the blue man be. It's what he wants to do.]

What are you doing? [He hears himself asking, not entirely without suspicion, because he hates making things easy on himself.]

[aionc]

[ as far as human boys go, yes he definitely looks tired and malnourished. maybe a few unfortunate steps to leaving the land of the living if he isn't careful. not that hades is concerned for the boys well being, it's just a simple observation. ]

What am I doing? [ the question is, somehow, absurd and hades almost laughs. ] The same as you, I wager.

[ it would be simple to just go their separate ways, the boy to the shadows and hades to the mist still hovering about his form. he need only take the step. yet they stand at a surprising standstill. ]

Leaving. [ a hand waves about. ] Before the doctors catch wind of my escape.

[lordofdarkness]

[Nico noticeably relaxes, nodding as he does. A shadow curls around his ankle and he waves it away, his eyes narrowing in on the mist around the blue man. Maybe it's a strange thought to have given the shadow travel and all, but he's curious about what this blue man is and how he's doing that. Most of the people he's met here have been human so far with perhaps a few quirks among them, but something about this guy just feels different.]

...what are you?

[Okay, kind of rude, but he's not exactly working at his best here given the situation.]

[aionc]

[ nico, you don't just ask someone a question like that!

it even trips hades up for a moment, his mouth opening to answer only to have it close again. instead, he exhales and digs out a business card from his jacket pocket and holds it out to the boy. ]

A god, specifically the God of the Dead, God of Wealth, and King of the Underworld. Pleasure to meet you.

[lordofdarkness]

[The shadows disappear, swirling away back into their regular form against the wall, and Nico stares at the card in his hand. Then he looks up at Hades. Back to the card. It goes like this for a while actually until he shakes his head and fixes him with a look that can only be described as tired with life.]

No. That's. [Well. He does have the suit thing right.]

Hades isn't blue. You're blue.

[aionc]

He is─ I mean, I am.

[ yup, definitely insulting not to be believed but he can't be overly annoyed. he doesn't take many trips up to the human world and even less in his true form, preferring to adopt a more human-friendly visage in order to make it easier for mortals to accept to his visits. ]

I don't make a habit to go around claiming to be someone I'm not.

[lordofdarkness]

[Nico stares for a long moment, silent and feeling disbelief make way for something else. He knows suddenly why he'd stopped, why he'd been compelled to speak to him. Knows what is is he'd sensed. Death. Hades. Familiarity. Like that first moment he'd laid eyes on hazel, a tug inside of him that called out to him to pay attention, this is important.

But still this is impossible.]

He's taller. [A beat, and then, awkwardly, confusion and accusation in his eyes.] Also he's my dad.