repeter | JUNE TDM

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! tdm

JUNE TDM

TEST DRIVE

JUNE TEST DRIVE
The city of Recollé. The kids are out for the summer and the weather's just fine. The sun's shining brightly, not a cloud in the clear gray sky. Everything seems at peace and citizens are out and about, smiling to one another and enjoying each other's company.

Oh, and this thing (complete with cardboard cut-out) has currently taken the place of the founders' statues in Recollé Square. But that's probably not a big deal.

What will you do today?

I.
What is this thing? Why is this thing here? For those of you in Tribunal Terrace today you may wish to investigate the five-foot-tall spinning wheel. How did it even get here? And where did the statues of the founders go? Even if you cannot answer those questions, it's hard to ignore the urge to give it a spin.

Check out those colors go 'round and 'round. Depending on what number you land on, you will find a notification pop up on your phone with a short list of…words. Are these supposed to be qualifications? Weird. That was a waste of time.

However, the moment you walk away you will find yourself accosted by various recruiters wherever you go, congratulating you on your impressive resumé and leading you to an office in Chata. Their offices have been equipped with tabletop-sized spinning wheels much like the one in Recollé Square that will spin 'round and 'round, determining the position you qualify for. Are you ready to show how these traits make you the perfect applicant? It looks like you have time to consult with your fellow candidates before your turn comes.

Or perhaps you've managed to resist spinning that wheel. The recruiters absolutely love your willpower and determination and want you to join their team! For those who can resist, they will still find themselves whisked away by recruiters to the same office and thrown straight into training to prepare for interviewing their neighbors. Recruiters will set up pairs of interviewers and applicants, leaving them alone to ask the hard-hitting questions and pick the most qualified candidate. Do your best and beat out the rest! It's your time to shine.

II.
Just because school is out for the summer doesn't mean Apparassage is quiet. Students and faculty alike are bustling about already preparing for the next school year. Campus tours of Recollé University run every two hours, and there are open house tours of the local elementary, middle and high school. Perhaps you're a future student exploring the campus and getting to know your future classmates. Maybe you're faculty or a student guide wrangling the kids and keeping them in line. Or you just might be one of the unfortunate ones who have found yourself with six weeks of summer school.

However, no matter where you find yourself in this district things get a little tricky when you're ready to leave for the day. The sidewalks outside of the buildings have all disintegrated, revealing a large void leading to nowhere beneath your feet. Without a clear path it seems impossible to escape, but stacked at the entrances of every doorway are large tiles with the letters of the alphabet carefully printed on them. When you look across the devoid path, you may notice you have a partner in a similar position with their own stack of letters.

Get ready to expand your vocabulary. Building a bridge of connecting words may be your only chance of getting home before sunset. Strangely, as the letters are laid out they seem to suspend mid-air enough to hold your weight as you make your way carefully across this pit. Balance and precision are key in this game. The stack floats along behind you as you cross the void, letters seemingly adding to the pile to provide more materials to build.

But like all games, there can be only one winner. Those who clear their letters first will arrive outside of the district safely, free now to come and go as they please. For those who do not clear their stack in time, you might have luck jumping from word to word to cross the finish line. Try as you might, if this is the method you follow, the moment you land on the winning word to leave the district the letters will glitch out, sending you plummeting into the void and landing on a long slope down to the bottom. Upon landing, you will see a series of chutes and ladders one can use to climb back up. Some ladders lead back to Apparassage. Some lead straight into Tisse, and some even lead to unexpected places. Where will you end up? The journey is up to you now.

III.
The days are longer, the nights are shorter, the sun is shining and it's noticeably warmer. Isn't it a perfect time for a summer potluck? The citizens of Recollé seem to think so and have all gathered today in Hollingberry Field with friends and loved ones to share food and fun. Kids chase after each other in friendly games of tag and hide-and-seek while other attendants mingle with one another, piling plates of food and sharing with their neighbor.

Why, even Mayor Mayer is out today for this summer kickoff with his lovely red Chocobo, Seabiscuit.

As the evening begins to wind down, however, there's a startled cry from the Mayor as he realizes someone has kidnapped his beloved pet from right under his nose. Was it you? How about you? Everyone has become a suspect and it's up to you to solve whodunnit. The Mayor provides everyone with a pen and a pad of paper divided into three sections for a suspect, a method, and a location. Grab a friend (or even a group of strangers) and get ready to interrogate each other to crack this case.

(With a little looking, however, it's easy to see that Seabiscuit's merely wandered down the hill away from the park. But maybe it's better not to tell the Mayor. He seems very adamant about this game.)

For anyone who manages to solve the case, the Mayor will be immensely grateful and reward you with a valuable prize! Congratulations! However, for anyone who fails to solve the puzzle, or even anyone found guilty of this heinous crime, by order of the Mayor you will be subjected to jail time for a full half an hour. (The Mayor can't stay too mad at his citizens. He loves them all.)

IV.
A nice, leisurely stroll through the entertainment district of Tisse seems to be in order. Summer sales are aplenty and now's the perfect time to shop 'til you drop. On the other hand, that doesn't seem to be the only thing dropping in Tisse. Do you hear that? Perhaps it is easy to ignore the sounds of stone crashing to the ground. Construction isn't unusual in this district. You think maybe you passed an ongoing demolition on your way inside a shop. But the crash happens again, and again, and again, a loud string of booms growing closer and closer.

Are those buildings tipping into one another? Or is it your imagination? You may not have time to answer while the string of events is put into motion. A crane swings overhead, knocking into a well-placed boulder that begins to roll down the street. Cranes, pulleys and wires move in sync as the ball rolls right toward you. Will you run? Will you collide right into the next set of traps? You may recall learning about this type of experiment once upon a time, coming to realize the elaborately planned Rube Goldberg machine spans the entirety of the city.

Maybe you're one of the lucky ones and you find a safe shop to dive into to escape. Or perhaps your sole focus is to run and get as far as you can, failing to notice that the large boulder herds you right to the end of the district and into a caged-in area. Make yourself comfortable. Someone from the outside will have to free you. But hey, maybe you aren't alone in this trap. Misery loves company, doesn't it?

BONUS.
The Retrospec app is at it again, just as useless as it's always been. After downloading to your device and allowing you to upload a profile picture, the app seems to take over your phone. Any time you open your phone to use it, a splash screen appears prompting you to pick one of the brightly colored wedges (or one of the two grayed out ones.)

It's time to exercise your brain and buff your trivia stats. Answering a question from your selected category will allow you to use your phone once again, but if you get it wrong? Retrospec will encourage you not to give up and try again.

...or, you know, you could ask someone to help figure out the answer. Hey, that person looks like they're bursting with knowledge! Perhaps it's best to see if they can help you stop this madness.

As usual, any attempt to get the company to reply are futile. Once a question has been answered correctly, phones will return to their usual functionality until the next time it settles into idle mode.

Welcome to the

recolle test drive meme! All characters will be begin in-game AU'd as Recollé residents. You may use any of the above prompts for ideas or make up your own depicting your Recollé AU! Prompts do not have to be set in the districts listed above. You can review our list of locations for what's available. Please note that TDM threads can be used as samples, can be kept as game canon, and can also be used for bonus points for future item regains. Share a few minor details of your AU, tag around, and have fun!

Your June TDM directory is here, and your AU workshop is here!

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

[Woah, hello. Soleil actually looks momentarily taken back by Kanan, eyes following the line of her jaw for a second before smiling at her.]

I think I'm already learning. Kind of a waste for them to put the prettiest thing up front, though. [Smooth, Soleil. She's got this. She's so, so got this.

-- At least until she remembers she's actually here for something. She reaches up to brush the back of her head, one hand on her hip.]

Though, actually, weird question, but do you guys have any... octo... octpuses? Octopi?

[ Faolan shrugs slightly in response to his accidental moment of genius. Mostly because it had come by accident, as he had only really understood it as a sock pattern related to Scots, rather than anything to do with areas of Scotland itself. More concerning is the thought that Laurent's phone might have been infected with anything, malicious or otherwise.

Stepping closer to the other man, he frowns down at it in puzzlement. ]

Asking you trivia questions? Is it an application?

[ You just mentioned the word 'ransomware' in front of your security man, Laurent, now you've set him off. ]

[Lucy's thoughts were much simpler, on the surface. She wanted to get out, to leave, to forget she saw anything, forget she talked to anyone. She hated what was left of her family for leaving her. They were a distant thing to hate, something that kept her going easily and without thought.

And now Katherine was here, impossible to ignore, and—and acting like nothing had happened? Like they were all some happy family again?

How dare she.]

Move, Katherine.

[The name felt so strange to say, like a muscle left to atrophy.

Lucy wouldn't call her sister. She wasn't...she wasn't ready to accept this. There were too many obstacles in the way, too much abandonment, separation, denial—distance, the table, other customers staring. Her arms shook again.]

Nope!

[ So much for talking big... ]

Well, even if we don't figure it out, I'm sure he'll turn up eventually.

[ So much for doing her best.............. ]

"Kurogane, huh? That's--"

The thought died on Fai's lips; afterward he wouldn't even remember what he'd been about to say. His attention was split between the ruckus nearby and the hunk just behind him, and with his head turned like this he didn't even see the hand reach out for him until it was on his arm.

Outwardly there wasn't much of a reaction, especially not considering how animated the blond could be. Fai paused, almost frozen. His eyes had gone wide, but he was already turned mostly away from Kurogane, and he gasped. Hardly a reaction at all, if one wasn't paying much attention. Inwardly he was back in the alley all those years ago with the man calling out his stage name and the blade of the knife flashing in the light of the streetlamps. His heart lurched and then hammered in his chest. A moment later when he regained control of his senses he could only pray that the other man hadn't noticed anything.

"Ah... a job fair?" he guessed, trying for the second time in less than ten minutes to regain his composure. His voice was shaking. He was shaking, a little.

[Noah feels a twinge of embarrassment as her eyes go over him. Normally he doesn't care that much when people look him over in this uniform, but he's usually behind a counter- and on a customer service script. This? Has gone way off script.

Plus, he can't shake the nagging feeling she looks...familiar somehow. He can't figure out where. Has he seen her somewhere else before? ]

Really? So you're from Hong Kong?

Either that or you actually like that song. [Which is pretty poor taste and therefore unlikely. He frowns at his phone.]

Plays even with the volume turned down. Not sure how that works. [If only there was a way to silence it...

Huh.

Maybe...

He rolls it up in his shirt meaning Zoro is currently rocking the new trend of half crop top half sagging phone pouch. Rick Astley still blares.]

You got any ideas?

[Maybe it's a really light desk!!! You don't know!]

Mrh...

[He'll wander off to explore, and while the store isn't the most helpful or familiar layout, it isn't long before he pokes his head back out of a room.]

Hey! Grabby girl!

[Come help him toss the shit out of this desk because of course she was right.]

Aw, thank you. That's a sweet compliment.

[ NO???

one day they'll cross this. but there's also a part of judith that actually quite enjoys dangling over a void and just chatting leisurely.

because these are normal feelings to have ]

This is the part where I say the same for you, right?

[ fr

iendship????

she's teasing ]

Do I seem like an IT expert to you?

[ Laurent only uses Apple products. He is absolutely not an IT expert. ]

As I said, I didn't install anything but it pops up when my screen turns off.

[ He locks his screen again to prove this, swipes in this code to unlock it and holds out the screen to Faolan.

What year did Ian Gillian replace Ronnie James Dio in Black Sabbath? ]

You're an equestrian?

[ press square to doubt dot jpg

Seems too high class for this lady, who David had pegged for being a nerdy shut-in. Probably posts smarky comments on the internet. Riding horses as a hobby should be reserved for people with twin drills.

Still, if she says she is, then there's no reason not to let her show her stuff. ]

All I have is a banana.

[ That he wanted to eat himself, but it's no big deal. He can buy a sandwich or something. ]

My, how straightforward. I can't say everyone would like that, but it works for me.

[ because judith is crazy.

there's a moment where a hint of recognition flashes through judith's expression - until it's back to her normal hint of amusement. rose is a vague memory; clear enough for judith to know that rose is the type of person everyone needs in their life.

again, she's crazy. ]

What's your favorite part about being "apparently shady"? You don't need to answer if you wouldn't like to.

You don't have to be a real fighter to put on a fighter's face! How are you supposed to do your photoshoots if all you can do is look pretty? Whatever happened to acting in character?

[ David gives Sakura an accusatory point, putting on his best impression of a disappointed teacher. Probably easy enough, considering the number of instructors he's had in various fields. ]

Put on your war face! Like this! Gah!

[ He gives a short battlecry and switches to a proper angry grimace, but there's still nothing he can do to make the foam sword feel dangerous. ]

O...okay.

[ mari nods, trying to put on a good face. chocobos are horses. okay. ]

You're right! It was totally random.

[ maybe she should be worried??? ]

What is "retrospec"?

[ she picks coyote!!! they did it!! ]

Thank you, stranger!

You've never heard for Rick Astley?

Excuse me?! Not that big of a deal?! What if it's sandwiches, next????

Huh? How could that be?

I shouldn't be surprised, but somehow I am.

[ Clearly the story of life anywhere near Yuuko, David concludes internally. ]

I already know where Seabiscuit is. The mayor is just pretending not to see him for some reason. I think he's going all in on this game of his.

[ Well, this sort of pretense isn't too out of the ordinary for pro-wrestlers. In a way, the entire industry is built on pretending not to realise how obviously fake everything is. ]

So we have to put down something that will satisfy him.

[why

why would you say that

the flustered freakout he was about to have because of that voice is cut short by that sweet sweet magic word. Except–

–wait.]

Why pretend? [is that a pout? it might be a pout. he leans back and crosses his arms like a true twenty-four year old child.] Nevermind. I'll wait.

[He tries to lean over to see what's up while simultaneously leaning away from her... It doesn't work out so great because he's an idiot. But he does get a general idea!]

Why are you playing this when you're too stupid to know the answer?

[Glasses!!!!! Keito is immediately attentive. His opinion of Sena has improved.]

You mean you haven't?

[He holds up his phone. It's on a Scrabble cheat sheet page.] It's much faster.

[She's not surprised by his answer. The mayor is such a sweet guy. What demon would dare steal from him? Also she thinks she heard a kweh earlier.]

Oh, really? Well, I'm good at satisfying people, so this should be a breeze!

[Aside from firing innuendos left and right, spinning stories is also one of her favorite pastimes.]

What? It was an accident.

[You can't prove otherwise. He frowns at the new word.]

For someone so patronizing you're about as petty.

[He adds "sanctimonious". Take that.]

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JUNE TDM

III

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It's cool o/

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cw for a fear reaction and a vague memory of violence

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