etcelsior | WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE

TEST DRIVE MEME

Considering apping into MASK OR MENACE? Want to dip your toes into the setting and get a feel of whether your character will fit into it? Or maybe you're just cruising and want to play around? Then you've come to the right place!

Pick any of the following scenarios below or feel free to make up your own, but don't be afraid to throw yourself at someone else's thread, either!

And remember there's only one rule in Test Drive Meme Club: have fun!

01. The city of Heropa is what one might expect from a small, bright and cheery place, where locals are friendly enough and local shop owners might offer a free drink to welcome you to their fair city. Some of the locals might thank you for always lending your service to the nation, while others might not say anything -- but if you have something nasty to say, better not say anything at all, right?

Today it's not just imPorts that are making a scene. Given the relatively high approval rating imPorts still pull in here, maybe it shouldn't shock locals and imPorted arrivals alike that new native metahumans are using the city to debute their new spandex and catch phrases while they try and take their own bite out of crime. You know what they say about those darn kids these days though, too much time watching TV instead of say, oh, learning about martial arts or surveillance techniques. Or that the world doesn't actually pause when they start their dramatic entrances like it does on the small screen. There are five teenagers today, each one dressed in elaborate costumes modeled after different birds of paradise (click one of these if you really need examples). And you better believe each one has a dramatic entrance speech concerning truth, Justice, and the American Way, a dramatic pose, and a polysyllabic name to go through before they all strike a team pose and shout 'Birds Of Prey, Uncaged!'

During this time the lone criminal they had swooped down to stop has long since stared running away. Early in the morning, they did this whole production to stop a litterer. Mid-afternoon, a jay walker. Finally, in the evening, they actually try stopping a mugging. Of course the thief and the stolen goods are busy getting away during their intros, a fact the robbed citizen keeps shouting at them through the whole two minute long affair.

It's up to you, dear imPort, to catch these escaping misdemeanors or thief and bring them to actual justice (or, if you're really kind, hand them over to the birds), to stop and tell these kids to get off your darn lawn, to give them hero-ing tips or a real villain to fight against, or to just keep walking and pretend this whole mess never happened. The choice is yours.

02. De Chima, Virginia, is a large city with a healthy economy, and though it's quieter than Heropa, there are still large numbers of citizens to be awed at your very presence. Look at you! Organic wonder! Science and technology are the lifeblood of this city, so you're likely to come across a good many locals taking your picture with the newest of devices. The imPort craze remains high here, and you may find yourself cornered by overzealous imPort fans, media wannabes and opportunists alike, shoving cameras in your face. Their questions are likely to be fairly mundane, however; get ready for an interview about your taste in romantic partners, personal underwear choices, favorite foods, and more!

These questions are better asked inside, however, as a tornado warning has been released for the county. No, they haven't had one here since the 90s, but you can never be too careful! With the torrential downpour currently hammering the city, some enterprising business people have taken to offering storm themed sales of food, drinks, and appliances. Is there any better way to send the rainy day than on nickle shot night at the local bar, where you cannot only get dangerously intoxicated but also ride the newest in fun and games, the Freudian Mechanical Bull? Come one come all and see how long you can stay clinging on as the bull bucks you physically and emotionally, spitting out catchy psychological phrases like 'do you think this will make your father love you?' or 'riding me for five minutes will never fix what you've done.' The bull will detect which sentences seem to get the best effect and keep barring down on that path. Sensitive about your mother? Better believe the whole bar is about to hear a lot about it.

Or if you're not up for that much fun, you can aid worried citizens in securing their homes and businesses against the possible storms. Help them board up holes in roofs, cast wards on their windows, or just point them towards the nearest insurance agent. Surely you wouldn't take advantage of them and sell them devices they don't need or learn where they keep their valuables and how to reach them at a time like this would you?...would you?

03. Maurtia Falls, Pennsylvania has had its ups and downs since imPorts started reappearing. Several imPort heroes have put focused efforts into cleaning up the streets of this somewhat infamous city, while others have swooped in to help the criminal industry thrive. More so here than the streets of any other imPort city, the battle between good and evil looks more like a war of escalation than a heroic tale. That might make the less than warm welcome imPorts are given in the city a little more understandable. The emergence of locals with superpowers is hardly helping. While some of these individuals have turned to crime, many locals seem more inclined to defend their native powered drug dealer than help the non-native hero bring them to justice. Who are you to tell them how to live?

Today is the semi-annual (that no one can quite seem to remember ever happening before) balloon festival. From dawn until well past midnight imPorts and natives alive can pay a small fee to ride in a beautifully colorful hot air balloon solo or in pairs. There is also wonder fried food and face-painting for the whole family. If this seems all a little too innocent and family friendly, don't worry. This being the Falls, there's always a chance for the morally flexible (or horribly naive) to make a little extra money. Some balloons are offering special, 100% totally free in no way catch-possessing deluxe rides to certain 'winners.' Strangely, it appears to 'win' all one has to do is agree to ride the hot air balloon over to another city, drop off one of the 'sand bags' attached to the side at a designated place, pick up a few new 'sand bags' and fly back! Those that can pilot their own balloon rather than needing a guide will be paid extra- they mean, win an extra special prize.

04. Nonah, North Carolina, is the liveliest of all cities; loud, busy and there's some kind of energy in the air that gets everyone buzzing with excitement. To be American is to be part of a melting pot, and that there's more money to be made by the thriving local industries hardly hurts. Natives may gather around new arrivals and ask both personal and broad questions about life as an imPort, what they are looking forward to, what their favorite article of underwear is. A few night clubs offer free entrance - just this once!

But you'll have to excuse the mess. See, a little while ago the city was a real zoo. Animals running everywhere, smashing store windows, eating aquariums, you know how these things can go. In fact, there are still a few stay old world monkeys jumping around, and maybe a baby gator or two in the sewer or prairie dogs in the parks. A small reward is still being offered for their rounding up.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Veronica had been about to slam a croquet mallet into the mugger's gut, but now that someone's tackled the guy to the ground, she drops the head of it onto the ground, leaning on it as she prods at the mugger with her foot. To Archie, she might seem a little weird: a girl in bright eighties clothing, her hair tied back with a blue scrunchie, leaning on a croquet mallet.

Then she looks up at the superheroes, shakes her head, then down at Archie.

"You need any help getting him to a police station?" she says, prodding the unconscious mugger once more fairly gently. "Because they're not gonna be wrapping up any time soon. They've been at this all day."

Definitely weird. Croquet mallet, shoulder pads, everything about her is so much pointier and more color-coordinated than he's used to. Not that he actually Gets fashion, but just based on all of the old movies that Jughead has made him sit through over the years it all seems very 80s. Like, aggressively 80s. Archie stares for a second, waylaid, but only until she opens her mouth because honestly Veronica to the rescue. He seems to come back to himself and smiles, relief more than obvious in his expression and the way his shoulders relax. "Yeah, um. Do you know where it is?" He's... very new.

For his own part he's wearing an even bluer jacket than hers, obviously a Letterman even with the way it's tied around his waist due to the heat, and just a ridiculously tight t-shirt. Because. He straightens up, glancing back at the teen would-be heroes, the novelty of them definitely starting to wear off.

They're just now getting to individual introductions, shouting them gleefully at no one in particular. The mugging victim looks like he might actually implode.

"Wait, hang on," Archie rolls their criminal over and picks up the stolen wallet, jogging back to return it to the guy before he hauls the mugger's arm over one of his shoulders and uses it to pull him off the ground so they can start walking in whichever direction Veronica indicates. Luckily he's tall enough and the man is short enough that it sorta works out. He looks Veronica over a second time, curiosity bright in his eyes. "So, are you a hero?" That's pretty much gotta be a costume, right?

Not so long ago she was in the same predicament as him. Now Veronica jerks a thumb over to the police station's general direction, unmindful of the fact that he's looking at her clothes all weird, and says, "It's not all that far from here." She does not eye his tight shirt, because that would be Rude and she's trying to be nice to the obviously new imPort. She does, however, send the "superheroes" a judging look, because if there's one thing she kept from her time as a Mean Girl it's how to perfect a judging look.

It goes unnoticed. What a disappointment.

She lifts the croquet mallet up, rests the head against her very pointy shoulder, then starts walking as soon as Archie's hauled the mugger up. "Not really, no." She doesn't actually think they'd let her be a hero, if they knew the things she'd done. But anyway: "I was really just going to play croquet, but when I saw them trying to stop a mugger I figured—well, if they're not going to stop talking I might as well step up."

Yes, she goes out dressed like it's the eighties all the time. Yes, she plays croquet. She's kind of pretentious. She turns to look at Archie then. "And then you tackled him to the ground, so hey, thanks."

Maybe, he thinks, croquet is like golf and half the fun of it is dressing up to look completely ridiculous for no reason before playing. He doesn't actually know anything about croquet. If asked before she'd said anything, he might not even have been able to place that as a croquet mallet and not a giant novelty gavel, who knows.

He finds himself laughing either way. Her dry delivery reminds him of Jughead, but he might just be looking for hints of his friend anywhere and in anything while stranded. What would Jughead even say about this place? Probably Archie, don't be an idiot, of course this is all a weirdly realistic fever dream—now wake up.

But since nobody's waking him up he shrugs, sheepish. "Anytime," he shifts the man's floppy dead weight a little so he can hold out a hand towards her as they walk, "I'm Archie, by the way. Andrews."

He laughs, startling and bright. It gets a brief little snicker out of her, and the smile doesn't quite totally fade afterwards. Something about this guy makes her think of Martha, briefly—there's something about his earnest demeanor that makes her think of her old friend, something about how he just seems so filled with wonder and optimism. Her smile turns a little sadder, at the thought.

She hopes Martha's okay. She hopes—

She hopes for a lot of things, really, and she can't always get everything.

She takes his hand, shakes it briefly, and tries to stop thinking about Martha in her hospital bed. "I'm Veronica," she says, meeting his gaze. "Sawyer. I'm gonna guess you just got here recently?"

Veronica? Well, it'll be really easy to remember, at least. He'll have to think up some nickname that's not Ronnie, though, it would feel wrong to call anyone else that. Especially now.

(Because yeah, of course he's gotta give her a nickname. There's no way they're gonna complete his—their?—first act of vigilante justice in a new dimension together and just not be friends after. That would be nuts.)

"Yeah, just got off the base a little while ago." His grin turns rueful. "That obvious, huh? What about you?"

"I'll let you in on a secret," Veronica says, lowering her voice as if telling him something very important, "when you've been here a while, you don't bat an eye at those guys we left." She nods to the general direction of the Birds of Justice, and hopes that they've at least finished up their introduction by now, because honestly.

She drums her fingers along the handle of her mallet. "I've been here about a month," she says. "You know, it's kinda weird, but before I got here it was 1989, and here it's 2017. I'm, what, technically 45 now?" A little snort of laughter, and she shakes her head. "What year was it for you?"

Archie pauses. 1989? Well. Maybe that explains the outfit. He hadn't even been born then, or for more than a decade after that. 1989 was practically the time of the dinosaurs, as far as he's concerned.

He attempts to do the math in his head—2017 minus 1989 plus... 16 years probably?—eyes cast upwards like he's trying to envision the long form equation in the skyline and lips moving very slightly in the shape of the numbers involved, but her laugh jolts him back into the moment before he can finish subtracting. Ah well, she's probably right: she looks like she'd be smart, somehow. Or maybe he just assumes that everybody's gotta be smarter than him. "Um, it was 2016." Late fall, so he's missing a little over half the year and that's it. He hadn't even realized it wasn't 2016 until she said something. Things must seem awfully crazy for her, by comparison. "How do you like the new millennium?"

And, you know, all the comic book characters running around??

2016, huh? "Whippersnapper," she says, gently bumping his shoulder. Truth be told she had not even expected to see another day, let alone see another day over thirty years later and on a different world. Some part of her is just glad to be here, and alive, and away from Sherwood and everything that happened there, the rest—well, the jury's still out.

She does, however, wrinkle her nose. "The cafeteria slop's still the same old shit," she says, with a hint of disdain in her voice. "You'd have expected there to be an improvement in taste over almost three decades, but it still tastes like they scooped it out of the dumpster and into a pan." Of all the things to stay constant, it just had to be that one. It's honestly annoying.

And a weirdly comforting constant, to boot.

"And I guess there's all those superheroes around too," she adds, as an afterthought.

WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE

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