whitechapelmod | TEST DRIVE

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test drive

TEST DRIVE

TEST DRIVE MEME

OPTION A

With the cooling weather came the changing of the leaves, the lighting of candles and the advertisements in all the shops and bulletin boards for the Annual Whitechapel Road Fall Festival. Overnight your quaint little neighborhood has been transformed from a typical Victorian-esque scene to well, a typical fall festival scene. Strings of lights have been wound between the lamps, scarecrows have been put up in shop windows that hold signs with arrows on them, directing you down the main street toward the park.

In the park, you'll find a small carnival. No big gaudy rides, of course, but booths set up by local businesses where they sell items from their shops. Games like bobbing for apples and pin the nose on the scarecrow have been scattered in the places between the face painting booths and cotton candy vendors. There's also booth offering food and drink-- and doesn't that cider just smell wonderful? Of course, they have hot chocolate too, if cider's not your thing.

Mingle and enjoy your night! But be careful-- you might just end up in the dunking tank..

OPTION B

You wake late in the morning to a strange chill in the air. The weather, sure, but also something else, something wrong in the energy. Maybe you've never been much of a person who believes in that sort of stuff-- energy, vibes, whatever-- so you brush it off and go about your day. It's not until you're out and about that you really start to notice something. The streets are mostly empty, the shops closed down. A cold wind blows through and makes you shiver as you turn down the street toward the Town Board. The papers flutter in the wind, but it doesn't matter, you're not reading them, you're reading the message written in red over all of them.

YOU WILL ALL BE PUNISHED.

Is that blood it's written in, or paint? It's hard to tell, but the color seeps into the fliers and advertisements-- "puppies, free to a good home" or "half off on all clothing TODAY ONLY"-- staining them, ruining them. You know without even turning and walking the extra block that something very bad has happened. Yellow tape surrounds the board, you just notice, and blocks the entrance to a nearby alleyway. An officer stands guard, but he looks pale and shaken. This isn't the first. Just last week, someone was killed too. The boy who delivered the milk. Eddie. Throat slashed and a message written in blood on the wall above him, similar to this one.

An ambulance arrives but you stay where you are, watching as more officers emerge from the alley, carrying something on a stretcher. Someone, you realize, because what else do they carry on stretchers? A shock of red, curly hair pokes out from the top and you think of the girl who runs the register in the bakery, a waitress from the cafe you tried last week, your sister back home who will (hopefully) never end up here. Could this really happen here? Some maniac killing people because they think you need to be punished? It's wrong, it's confusing, and it's terrifying, isn't it?

Make a top-level comment below, with whichever option you'd like in the subject, and maybe a little starter. Please also feel free to disregard the options and choose your own adventure! Below are links to the setting and premise, so feel free to use those as reference in guiding your post. Tag around and have fun!

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Once she knows there's a carnival in the park she just has to go see it.

There hadn't been much in the way of fun in her childhood home. Well, the kind of fun she would enjoy. So when there's a chance to go out and enjoy herself, Aerith always jumps at the chance.

She's been there only five minutes, but already she has some cotton candy in hand, pulling off little bits and eating it happily as she strolls through the booths.

It's hard to decide what she wants to do first - play a few games, or buy some presents. Aerith's there's to see all the carnival has to offer, and she doesn't plan on leaving anytime soon.

"... this is much nicer... than Gold Saucer," a familiar (perhaps?) voice growls from the shadows under one of the booths' awnings.

Oh look, it's Vincent, looming there and eyeing the whole carnival with thinly veiled suspicion. The first mark against this place was just waking up on a train that disappeared. The second mark against this place is that the cider isn't spiked. But he actually otherwise is fairly content for the moment. No monsters (yet), no ShinRa (that he can detect) - just a carnival with tasty apple cider and games he has no interest in participating in. And an Aerith, who he is probably benignly stalking because he's worried ok.

Aerith's only startled for a moment before a bright smile appears. It's hard to get used to Vincent's sudden appearances, but they don't make her heart jump quite as much as they used to.

"It is! Much less showy, at least." She enjoys the Golden Saucer for what it is, but there's something more pleasant about the feel of this carnival. More intimate, friendlier. "And I doubt there's half as many rigged games here as the Gold Saucer has."

She's joking mostly, since she didn't run across any rigged games during her time there. That doesn't mean they weren't there.

"... nothing is more rigged... than the arm wrestling game..." Aerith clearly you played the wrong games.

He's quiet for a moment, sipping at his cider and watching her before his eyes slide away off to the games. "The ring toss rings are... weighted oddly. Less rigged and more... extra challenging," he informs her, since as long as they're on the subject might as well let her know, right? It's not like he's admitting to having played a few games while he was here or anything.

"Are they?" Her gaze turns toward the ring toss, her eyes thoughtful. There's only one way to test out those rings, isn't there?

"Come on, I want to try them out. I can win you a pink unicorn." She tosses him a teasing look before she's off and making a beeline to the booth. Her cotton candy is still in hand, but she can totally pull this off one handed.

He follows just behind her and cocks an eyebrow at her declaration. "... it will clash with my cape," he informs her, deadpan as always, but he is curious to see if she can pull it off.

She catches his comment and laughs, coming to a stop in front of the booth. After a few quick words with the man who runs it, he lays five rings on the table in front of her.

Picking up one of the rings, she weighs it in her hand for a moment, testing it, before tossing it underhanded toward the bottles. It hits the very edge of one on the left side, bouncing off and to the ground.

Her brow furrows and she looks over at Vincent before holding out her cotton candy. Okay, maybe she can't do this one handed.

But Aerith, holding bright pink cotton candy will assault his dark and mysterious intimidation factors!!

And yet he doesn't seem to care, blinking at her before wordlessly taking the candy and holding it carefully in his claw. He doesn't actually want to get it all sticky because it is a pain to clean. But ... it's probably tasty. Probably a little too sweet, being pure sugar. He likes sweet things but there is a limit - or at least, there is a limit with his heightened senses now.

He turns his attention away from the cotton candy to Aerith's struggles.

"... spin it a little as you toss."

Oh, she knows. It's half the reason she's handing it to him, the other half being he just so happens to be right there. She gives him a distracted 'thank you' before concentrating on the game.

Taking Vincent's advice, she changes her toss, twisting her wrist just the slightest as she lobs another ring at a bottle. This time it lands, not perfectly but enough so she can mark it a win.

She claps her hands together in excitement, quick to pick up the next ring and toss it the same way. It's a little touch and go, but she manages to get the rest of the rings on the bottles and wins a prize!

While there may not be a big, fluffy pink unicorn like she was imagining, she does see these tiny plastic snakes that she asks for. When she has three in hand, she turns back to Vincent, fully intending to ask him which one he'd like best.

The sight of him with her cotton candy, though, is distracting and forces her to hold back her laughter. "Here, I can take that. Thanks for holding it, Vincent."

With the complete and utter lack of anything better to do with his time, it figures that Jesse would find his way over here eventually. There's only so much of his own company he can stand but more importantly, he can only hold out for so long before the curiosity gets to him. The lights, the arrows, the weird little scarecrow dudes... What does it all mean??

...Okay, maybe it's not quite that deep, less of a burning question and more of a "why the hell not" that has him (finally) meandering over to the park just as the sun's setting. He makes his way between the local shop's booths quickly enough- boring, kinda boring- what is that, yarn? Y a w n... But eventually he comes across the one with the cider, and that he can get on board with, even if the whole lack of a monetary transaction thing is unsettling. It's warm, anyway, and he clasps his fingers around the cup, sipping occasionally as he weaves his way over to the games.

You know. Where the pretty girl with the long hair is standing.

"Musta pulled out all the stops for this one, huh?" Hilarious, considering it's practically medieval compared to the last carnival he'd gone to... But it's the liveliest he's seen the place since arriving here and he's gonna roll with that.

At Jesse's approach, she turns to give him a small smile. She's seen him around on occasion, like most of the people here, but they haven't really spoken before.

"Looks like it." She pulls a piece of cotton candy off to chew on, looking around at the bright booths and smiling people. "I was surprised to see it out here. I didn't think they had stuff like this." And she gestures in front of her, to mean everything they see. The town is quaint but there hasn't been much in the way of celebration since she's been there, either.

"Is there some kind of holiday coming up soon?" Aerith puzzles over it a little, since traveling carnivals aren't really a thing from her home. Festivities usually meant something big was happening.

"Yeah, it's been kinda dead as far as like bustling and whatnot..." He, too, peers around at the people milling about, most of them seeming to be having a decent enough time despite the circumstances. People are resilient, he guesses.

He pauses at her question, biting his lip for a second before taking a sip of his cider with a hum. "Mm, I don't know, it's definitely not Halloween, not enough ghosts or pumpkins... Maybe Thanksgiving? Or just like general 'fall', I guess, some places are into the whole leaf thing."

The cider's fall-ish... So he's leaning more toward that. How... Quaint.

That's new.

He's talking about holidays she's not familiar with. This only means one thing - Jesse isn't going anywhere for a while, because she has questions.

Turning to face him fully, her expression grows curious. "Are those big holidays where you're from? What are they like?"

Oh, she has more questions, and maybe by the time he's done answering them she'll know all the details about Halloween and Thanksgiving. She's not sure what to think of that first one, but the second one doesn't sound so bad.

This whole 'different worlds' thing is never not gonna blow his mind. Who needs crystal when you got this weirdness...? Still, he's not in any way averse to giving someone the United States cultural rundown. What else does he have going on?

Nodding, he takes another sip of his cider.

"Yeah, they get totally steamrolled by Christmas like media-wise, but they're both a pretty big deal. Where I'm from was really into Halloween, we had like all kinds of parties and stuff, cuz we were so close to the border..." He stops himself there. One thing at a time, yo-- the basics before getting into the local celebrations:

"Halloween's about, like... Costumes and candy. Kids dress up and go door to door, ringing the bells or knocking or whatever and the people in the houses load them up with sugar and chocolate and whatnot..."

Aerith tries to imagine this - and it sounds fun, just not in Midgar. She doesn't think there would be a lot of candy going around there.

In a smaller town, though...yeah. She can see it. "It sounds like a lot of fun. I don't think we have a holiday like that where I come from."

She twirls a bit of cotton candy around a finger, pulling it off so she can snack while she listens to him. "What about Thanksgiving? That one sounds like it'll be nice, too." Considering the word thanks is in the name, it should be a given.

"It's pretty cool, some people get really into it with the decorations... Lots of skulls in my town, all over everyone's yards. Thanksgiving's a little more chill, but it's still pretty big. All about the food, and who doesn't like food?"

Wait, there's something he's missing.... Right. "Actually it's supposed to be, like, family time. ...But most people are in it for the food."

Himself included. Fuck sitting around that table, even if he'd have loved to hang with Jake.

"Jesse, by the way. Don't think we've actually like... Met, met."

"So, at Thanksgiving you really just sit down at a big meal with your family." She says this thoughtfully, as if she's trying to picture it. Being someone who grew up with only one person in her family, she finds herself a little jealous of people who have siblings and large, boisterous families.

It's kind of why she took to her friends so much - that's basically what they've become. She imagines any kind of large, sit down meal with that group would be interesting, and most of all? Fun.

"Aerith. I'm sorry, I should have told you before." She gives him a somewhat sheepish smile when she introduces herself. "I usually try to tell someone my name before I start interrogating them."

He offers her a soft laugh, a tiny smile accompanying the duck of his head.

"I'd say I don't randomly walk up and start talking to people without introducing myself but that'd be a lie." And he would never, ever lie, nope not Jesse Pinkman... "But yeah, that's about how that works. Try not to kill each other over the cranberry sauce, keep the turkey fork on the plate instead of like lodged in your uncle or whatever... That sort of thing."

He looks over at the booths again. "I don't see any med stations set up out here though, so I'm gonna assume that's not what they were going for."

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TEST DRIVE

Aerith Gainsborough | Final Fantasy VII | Option A

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/flings self aaaaat

/catches and spinsssss

/clingin' 5eva

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