DANCE MAGIC DANCE

[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. 

Unfortunately, tragedy has struck today. It seems like the entire Heropa PD is parked out of a local, popular grocery chain. A huge crowd is amassed in the parking lot despite the best efforts of officers to get them to leave. They whisper about excitement and shame, and you don't have to ask if you just listen in a bit...

"What do you think he'll do to the employees? He sounded so serious..." "He really wants that pussy, huh?" "If I left my man for cheating on me, I'd take the damn cat, too!" "How does he think taking her and her coworkers hostage is gonna make her change her mind about him being a bad boyfriend?" "My wife is pregnant, please - if I don't get her favorite deli sub I might as well not go home!"

Domestic disputes! Tragic. The police aren't too sure how to handle this hostage situation, claiming the man only has a box cutter and isn't actually waving it around at the moment, but...are you an imPort? They'd really appreciate the help, okay. Get in there and counsel the unhappy couple. Or not!

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. 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. 

Today, a company that manufactures tech-based educational toys—"Where Science Meets Fun!"—is running a demo of its latest project, Quincy the QuizBot. Filled with information taken from the curricula of many grade levels, Quincy is whirring through the streets to conduct pop quizzes! Answer a question right, win a prize, ranging from a coupon for a free soda at the local fast food joint to a $100 gift card, based on difficulty!

Except...something's gone wrong with Quincy's programming. An hour or two into the demo session, he starts to approach passersby and demand answers. "WHAT IS THE SQUARE ROOT OF 47284? CAN YOU LIST THE PHARAOHS OF EGYPT IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER? ANSWER-ANSWER-ANSWER-ANSWER!"

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...

Despite the lack of gratitude that's in it for you, you may want to step in once you see a very, very sad supervillain wandering Maurtia Falls' streets. Dressed in a cape that appears to be a large swath of fabric purchased from a nearby sewing store, galaxy-themed leggings and no shirt is a man who runs right into your vicinity before striking a pose and yelling, "Everyone, stop before me and my wrath! I am Mister Mars, and provided you give me what I ask for, nobody needs to get hurt!"

At which point Mister Mars snatches an old woman's purse, loudly laughs in her face, and begins to float upwards. By the time he reaches the height of the tallest building in the area, he's beginning to look slightly panicked as he fails to really be able to move anywhere but up. Meanwhile, the old woman has begun shaking her cane at him and screaming quite an assortment of alarming expletives.

Maybe you should help one or the other out? If not, just lean back and enjoy the show.
 

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 there's a big lemonade stand on one busy sidewalk, staffed by a group of industrious kids. Aww, isn't it sweet? Wait...is that a cookie stand a little ways down, also run by elementary-to-middle schoolers? Heck, the entire block is full of kid-run mini-businesses — a gathering of pint-sized entrepreneurs! And they have their eyes on you, hero, because as a celebrity imPort, your pockets are full of $$$, right?

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

[tagential]

[Intelligence knew?

Edwon is immediately angry, almost overwhelmingly so. He has frequent fantasies about killing Ardun Kothe and the people working for him, because no one before has ever made him feel so helpless. He has always been proud of his own strong will and independence.

But intelligence knew, and they’re not helping. Or maybe they don’t know how to help yet. Maybe they need him to finish his mission first, which he will do, and no amount of brainwashing can stop him. It doesn’t matter. He’s angry, and there’s no one here to be angry at except Darth Jadus.

He almost wants to pick a fight again.]

There’s nothing to hide.

[That’s also not what he wanted to say. Darth Jadus knows, and he still can’t discuss it with him.]

— I’ll have my revenge.

[jadus]

[The turmoil that inspired was... satisfying. A petty satisfaction, but one he would indulge in for a moment.]

Against who, agent?

[tagential]

[He couldn’t talk about it. He opened his mouth and the wrong words came out. He wanted to scream, and he wanted to fight, something to make him feel less trapped. He wanted control, in any way that he could take it.

He knew Darth Jadus was toying with him. ]

You can relax, you’re not on my list. I already dealt with you.

[Petty was the only option left to him when he didn’t have the free will to talk about this.]

You ran with your tail between your legs.

[jadus]

[He responded with a dismissive gesture.] You misunderstand the question, agent, and that implies you do not yet know. The Republic goes to great lengths to destroy its enemies, but they have never been skilled in mind control.

[The implication was obvious.]

[tagential]

[That had bothered him from the start. The Republic likes to claim to be above such methods, and while it hadn’t surprised him to find that had all been propaganda, he still would have expected to hear about research into brainwashing and mind control. It might have been done in secret, but Imperial Intelligence was good at secrets.

He’s not sure if he should be surprised now. He’s angrier than he can remember being. He feels betrayed, but that’s ridiculous, not when he never expected loyalty.

But still...]

Are you telling me this to shake my confidence? Or to turn me back into a pawn for you to use, someone you can point at a target when you need to spread fear?

[What did Darth Jadus have to gain from this?]

Are you gloating? Trying to prove I made the wrong choice?

[jadus]

The Dark Council authorized your conditioning. One of their number is here. [One from after the event, but that was merely a detail. The Council killed so many of its members within months of ascension, and the overall character of the body remained largely unchanged.] If you remain under these restraints, you are already the pawn of another.

There are methods by which the brainwashing may be broken. Most are beyond the capacity of this planet; all are beyond yours if you do not accept me.

[tagential]

[He hesitates. He hates this. He doesn’t trust Darth Jadus in the slightest.]

And what is it that you want from me?

[He doesn’t want to even consider it, but he is.]

[jadus]

[That hatred is a poison to be nurtured. He cannot have his Hand here, but he can shape the destiny of this Cipher Nine nonetheless.] All that you learn here, all that changes in you, it will be undone the moment the Porter returns you to your stagnant Empire. I can undo the Dark Council's work, Agent, but unless we learn to control the Porter, it will only be a temporary reprieve.

Your skills will be needed to ensure this does not come to pass.

[tagential]

[He’s not sure what he was expecting. To be told to sweat his allegiance to Darth Jadus, perhaps, although even he has to admit Darth Jadus is someone too smart to believe that’s something he could ever truly have. It would be shallow and temporary at best. But finding a way back to their galaxy is a mission he can get behind. There’s no other way for him to have his revenge.

He still doesn’t trust Darth Jadus. He would like to do his own research. Everything he’s said has made sense, enough sense for him to accept it as the likely truth, but that doesn’t mean he can’t double or triple check. Anything less would be disappointing, wouldn’t it? ]

I can help with that. You’ll have to fill me in on what you know.

[He’ll turn on Darth Jadus five minutes from now if he catches him in a lie.]

[jadus]

[This arrangement would not be permanent. That was clear to see. But it would suffice.]

I will provide you with documents. In brief: The Porter is sapient, created by a being with power far surpassing the sith. One that remade this universe to accommodate her needs. [He was not so delusional as to think he could take that power for himself, though learning from it was still a possibility.]

She has now left, but the rules she created for this world remain, as does the Porter.

[tagential]

Then this won’t be an easy challenge. Working together might be the right call.

[A small, petty satisfaction: Trying to present them as equals in this, knowing that in Darth Jadus’ eyes, Edwon would always be inferior, and Darth Jadus would always be in charge.]

Is the local military a problem?

[jadus]

[He ignored the comment. It was an ineffectual swipe at him, doubly pointless now that the agent required something from him.]

They control access to the Porter. Security is lax in all other areas: imPorts that commit crimes are barely punished for their transgression. However, they have the capacity to expand their response if pushed to do so.

[tagential]

[No reaction? He's trying not to be too disappointed. Their hatred of each other is supposed to be mutual and personal.]

So not a problem unless we need a closer look at the Porter. Which we do.

[Not that he'll be careless either way, no matter how lax they might be.]

[jadus]

[He shakes his head.] The Porter itself is not an appropriate target. Not yet. It reacts violently to tampering and contact attempts. But the regional government has had decades to study it. They are technologically limited, but their data may still be of use.

[tagential]

[So they need access to government files? Edwon is still quietly freaking out, so angry he feels like he might explode if he doesn’t find an outlet, but.... He still smiles.]

Now I see why you need my help.

[jadus]

[Covering distress with a smile. A common tactic.] They will have their own records, and those taken from a now-defunct terrorist group, the Otherworld Technologies Organization. While they ultimately failed, they made several attempts to create Porter technology. Their research will also be useful.

[tagential]

[Common, but effective, and mostly for his own sake. He's always been excited at the prospect of a difficult mission, and that should be his focus right now.]

Understood. I'll start doing some groundwork, and prepare some strategies for infiltrating the relevant buildings. I might need a splicer.

They also know my identity, according to the file they gave me, which is an added challenge. Working around that will require some extra time.

[jadus]

Surveillance and slicing equipment will be provided. [He had spent significant time creating the tools for his own use. It would be interesting to see what the agent thought of them.]

Your face will be recognized, but the nanites used to identify us are only monitored at international borders. Interacting with government staff while sufficiently disguised carries little risk.

[tagential]

[He tilts his head, considering those words.]

You've been working on this for a while.