get ya butt over here

[maskormods]

T E S T D R I V E M E M E

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 ON THE TEST DRIVE MEME!

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.

As you walk around, you'll notice that all of the printed words on sign shops, newspapers, etc., are all backwards. That's thanks to a powered individual's idea of a joke -- inconvenience everyone by switching letters around. Every street sign, every storefront lettering ... it's rather strange.

The effects will only last a day, but will you try to figure out what's going on? Ignore it? Or maybe catch the individual in the act again and stop them?

02. De Chima, Virginia, is a large city with a healthy economy, with large numbers of citizens waiting to be awed by your very presence. Look at you! Organic wonder! Synthetic wonder! Whatever you might be, those words have meaning here. 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 or recently published PLoS papers. 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.

Want to try out one of the newest wonders of technology? Put on a pair of AirWalker boots, manufactured by CloudCo Engineering! These pieces of footwear are clunky, but they do exactly as they're named. Put them on, and you can climb up into the sky like you're stepping on invisible stairs! Of course, climbing down again isn't so easy, and there have been reports of people panicking as they find themselves stepping higher and farther away from the sidewalk demo kiosk! Will you help them, hero, or are you the one in need?

03. Maurtia Falls, Pennsylvania has carried a reputation for ups and downs ever since imPorts began reappearing again, just those few years prior. Several imPort heroes have put focused efforts into cleaning up the streets of this somewhat infamous city, while a handful of others had 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. Everything from the classic bank heist to brutal bloodbaths can happen around the corner. You have to keep your eyes open and your mind sharp when you live in Maurtia Falls, and hostility against imPorts can spike. The emergence of locals with superpowers is hardly helping...

Enter THE BOOGIE WOOGIE MAN, an apparent Starkian metahuman who will boogie woogie bugle boy you down to company nine. Trumpet in hand, lips blue with determination and maybe a little power amping, he's directing his apocalyptic sound waves at Maurtia Falls First National Bank. A thunderous boom explodes, an earthquake of a noise, and the bricked storefront of that bank crumbles. The facade is obliterated, the bank interior exposed. It's not hard to put this one together, hero: bad guy and a bank, and the innocent civilians he doesn't seem to notice before the path of his sound and fury.

But you notice. You notice the screaming little boy who got separated from his father, you notice the little dog who was walking with its owner along the outside of the street now fleeing without human accompaniment. You noticed some of the brick debris blown off the building facade is now tumbling back to earth -- and right at you.

Boogie Woogie Man takes another breath.

04. Nonah, North Carolina, is the liveliest of all cities; loud, busy and there's always some kind of energy in the air that gets everyone buzzing with excitement.

Today, in a downtown park, a huge crowd is attempting to set a Guinness record for the largest number of people playing a game of Truth or Dare at once. If you're just passing by and aren't interested in games, better walk fast, because you're likely to get pulled in to join. But there's one catch—a local metahuman is using their power of compulsion to make it extremely difficult to say no to answering a truth or performing a dare! But maybe you'll get lucky and won't receive one you don't want to do?

05. Jeopardy, Nevada by all rights shouldn't exist. A glowing neon city smack in the middle of the desert, the only reason it's still here is that the central nuclear power plant has tapped half a mile down into a subterranean lake for its water supply. So though the desert around it may be barren, the occupants of this small city are happily self sufficient. Those weird figures you see out of the corner of your eyes? Don't worry too much. Probably just weird radiation after effects. Jeopardy has a lot of those.

Despite the weird constant hum and the creepy cultish bingo, Jeopardy is usually a pretty calm place. A safe place. But not today. Today, someone has released a couple hundred tiny praying-mantis-like robots into the city, and the place is in chaos. Shops are closed up early because though these little destructive creatures don't have bullets, they do have some weird arm appendages that like to just crunch everything in existence. Like a locus swarm of cockatoos, anything made of wood or plastic is being crunched up and left for scrap. But at less than six inches high apiece, rounding them up is proving extremely difficult. Luckily, the mayor in her wisdom is giving out titanium nets to any imPort who wants to help round up the trouble makers. And, in the spirit of the city, she's offering the imPort that catches the most robots a free meal for two in the swanky Radiation Galley - Jeopardy's top tier, five star restaurant.

Get catchin', imPorts!

Comments

[swordsense]

[Adora stands up, and it's her turn to look calm, maybe a little cold. She straightens her collar, and meets all that rage with certainty and clarity of purpose.

Is she hurt? Yes. She's hurt. She hasn't forgotten about the incident with the pit. She is convinced she can still reach Catra, but not right now. She has time, and Catra is correct. She can't force this. But they are stuck, alone, in a strange land...]

I dare you to do the right thing and help these people break out of this compulsion, without hurting them, as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Because stopping something from hurting innocent people is what we should do. It's what the Horde told us we were meant to do, and it's right, even if it was a lie.


[Because wasn't that how they were raised? Really, in the end, they grew up hearing lies, but hadn't the Horde always tried to present itself as a force to protect the people from wicked princesses?]

[plentystrong]

[ And Catra's face cracks open, into a jagged grin, and her hand drapes over her forehead, hiding her face. She laughs -- not her usual high-pitched giggle, no; it's sharp and it's bitter, and it fits her much better now. ]

Oh, Adora, you're so stupid!

[ Then she looks up again, back at Adora, and stems her hands onto her hips. ]

I'll help you. I mean, it's not like I have a choice.

[ At that last word, her eyes bore right into Adora's eyes, just to make sure she gets her point across. ]

Boy, will I be glad to get rid of you.

[swordsense]

[Adora sets her has and takes a single step forward. Her hands stay away from the hilt of her sword, but her chest puffs out a bit, a hint of anger finally showing in her cheeks.]

You won't ever get rid of me.

[She won't give up. Catra is clearly in pain too, she's just doing that thing where she lies about it to herself, and to everyone around her.]

Now if you're done, let's do our job. These people are counting on us.

[plentystrong]

[ Right now, Catra is very aware of her feelings. She just doesn't think, at this point, that Adora will ever understand. ]

This place is big. I'll shake you off pretty easily.

[ Never mind that she keeps running into certain people, but shhh. A girl can dream.

She shrugs. ]

Okay, let's get this over with. I figure someone's using their powers to mess with us, so we gotta find out who it is.

[swordsense]

[Adora nods.]

You always have had a knack for figuring that out. Does anyone here stand out as different from the rest to you?

[She almost said you have a nose for it.]

[plentystrong]

[ Catra scans the environment, focused on the task at hand for the moment. Eventually, her hand land on a person sitting amongst all the goings-on. They look pretty unassuming except for the smirk they apparently can't help. Catra's ear twitches, and the next thing you know, she's running and all up in the stranger's face, hand fisted in the collar of their shirt. ]

Okay, how many ways do I have to beat you up until you stop what you're doing?

[swordsense]

[Adora follows, moving around Catra and skirting behind the stranger, drawing her sword. Because that's just good tactics, and that's something Shadow Weaver instilled in both of them. Old patterns and habits die hard...]

Stop doing what, exactly?

[The stranger, a young woman not that much older than the two of them, can't quite keep a lazy drawl out of her voice, even lifted up like this.]

Put me down.