repeter | OCTOBER TDM

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! tdm

OCTOBER TDM

TEST DRIVE

OCTOBER TEST DRIVE
The city of Recollé...

When the crypt doors creak, and the tombstones quake, spooks come out for a singing wake. Happy haunts materialize and begin to vocalize...grim grinning ghosts come out to socialize...

Every year during the Halloween season, the city of Recollé comes to life with plenty of fall activities for everyone. There's something to do in every district if one were to take a look.

What will you do today?

I.
Family fun seems to be the theme today over in Tribunal Terrace. Several tables are set up and in a semi-circle near Recollé Square with stacks of pumpkins, carving tools, paint and anything else you may need to create your own jack o'lantern. Other stations are set up for face-painting and games to win mini-sized candy bars including a ring toss, bowling, and bobbing for apples. Be careful with the apples though. They like to wiggle and jiggle with their happy little faces staring up out of the water.

...so maybe apple-bobbing is for the brave at heart. Are you the artsy type to carve a beautiful pumpkin? Are you helping to run the games (or even cheating to get more candy)? It's time to relax and let your creativity flow.

II.
Pumpkin-carving not your speed? Never fear, horror is here. Over in Tisse there's plenty to do for those looking for a little more adventure. Several coffee shops have harvest specials made with pumpkin, maple, and pecan flavors. Over at Flix a monster movie marathon and costume contest are taking place (with a prize of two free passes for the best monster costumes.) But the highlight of this district is the annual haunted funhouse.

Anyone daring enough will find the usual spooks and scares in a haunted house, jump scares and fog machines galore. But...the house certainly didn't look so big from the outside. How did you possibly get shuffled straight to the center? No worries. This hall of mirrors will guide you out safely...if the walls closing in don't crush you first. It's a race against time as the halls narrow, and if you're one of the lucky ones you'll escape and exit through the main doors.

For those not quite so lucky, the walls will stop just inches from crushing you completely before the floor drops open and you find yourself on a slide, falling through the dark and tumbling into an underground room filled with plastic skeletons, rubber spiders and more. There must be a way out, right? Hopefully you aren't alone and you can navigate the lair with a friend or two.

III.

Meanwhile, the rest of the city's usual hustle and bustle continues. The shopping districts are busy, students wander the sidewalks after class, and that oddly-shaped ghost appears right in the middle of the crowd.

Wait, what? You could have sworn that ghost wasn't there before. Maybe you don't even believe in ghosts. You may blink a few times to clear your vision, but the faint outline of the ghost remains as a few more of them pop up around the city. They won't speak, but they will cause some trouble for anyone who gets too close whether it's by playing pranks on passerbys, stealing items and running away, sitting on a person and applying a gravitational force so they can't move or other crafty, sneaky tactics.

Are the ghosts messing with you? Or are you going to find a way to mess with the ghosts?

IV.
As the sun begins to set, a strange sort of fog rolls in. Several citizens of the city may not even think it's unusual and others seem to capitalize on the weather. The Churchhill Downs Stables are hosting their annual haunted hayrides through Recollé Woods as soon as the sun sets. There are plenty of carts and chocobos saddled up and ready to go.

Once passengers are seated the chocobos begin to trot forward into the woods as a pre-recorded ghost tour of the city takes place. The stories range from silly ones about two ghost children who like to play hide and seek in these woods to scarier ones about a jilted lover chasing her husband off a cliff at the edge of ocean. For the most part they're a bit cheesy and in good fun, but something about this haunted ride seems a bit...off. Peering into the fog you may see something strange that follows you, be it a monster or a shadow or an object. You may hear things whispering your name and you may see your greatest fear manifest right out of the fog and chase your cart through the woods. Even worse, it seems to follow you right out of the woods and back into the city. No matter where you run or where you hide, the fears from the fog will track you down and they change for every single person in the city.

Will you run or will you fight? You may wish to be careful since the creatures will fight back.

BONUS.
With only a few short weeks left until the end of October, Retrospec's Halloween Mode is in full swing and popping up on new users' devices. Retrospec users will find their application decked out in cheerful Halloween colors, and their userpics in a randomized (work safe) costume. However, there's always a trick to each treat and this time the seasonal mode can't be turned off for new users. Notifications chime with zombie groans, a rousing game of Candy Crush must be played and beaten before you can use your device again, and the new Trick or Treat function has a few upgrades. When a user enables this function, they will be met with the phrase "Trick or Treat?" Users who select "treat" will get one virtual candy! Yay! The catch though is that they will also find themselves in a costume representing that specific candy.

Should a user pick "trick", however, they will find all sorts of harmless but unpleasant things happening to them including but not limited to pranks, being splashed by vehicles driving through puddles of water, being unable to speak in anything but rhymes and other such things. None of these effects last over ten minutes, but the game will show up periodically over and over again and even giving you the option to play the game with others.

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!

For current players, TDM threads will not count toward your Trick or Treat freebie! Additionally, please remember that TDM threads can only be used for bonus points, not regains.

Please note: you will need a reserve to apply, and current characters must have full AC posted at the time of their reservation.

Your October TDM directory is here, and your AU workshop is here! Our mod questions thread for this TDM is over here!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Kamui sidles up behind her while she chats with one of many pumpkin carvers. His bangs are soaking wet, glued to his drenched forehead, but he doesn't seem to care. Rather than fuss over his hair, he takes a very large bite out of a giggly apple's face.]

Whatever it is, they should give it lots and lots of teeth.

[The giggling fruit used to feel totally normal, but now she's having a clawing feeling that they're abnormal... she snorts a bit, trying to dismiss it.]

Teeth are pretty scary, it would be appropriate for halloween, I guess.

Oh, I dunno. [He grins, a teasing lilt strolling through his voice as he leans in closer to his mother's shoulder.] Old people gums are pretty scary too.

I don't know, I don't usually think of an old person trying to gum you to death as that threatening compared to a monster with teeth...

It's not when they eat you that's terrifying. It's when they try to kiss you!

[He is now making a god-awful smacking and sucking noise next to her ear. You know, to demonstrate.]

Oh, you've got a big phobia for sloppy kisses, huh? Did granny spoiling you ruin you?

[She can't help but giggle, leaning back.]

Maybe you need a big raspberry from mom! Remind you who to really be afraid of!

Not in front of the fruit, Mom. That's just gross.

[He snickers before biting off his apple's remaining eye. He has a reputation to uphold, after all. Can't have eavesdroppers soaking up his sap.]

Oh hoh, you're not getting away that easy, Kamui. Come here, let mom give you a kiss in front of everyone.

[She tries to grab him, intending to put a big ol kiss on his cheek.]

[If anyone else in the world had tried to grab him like that, he'd have knocked them flat. Whether out of habit after years of street fights or out of spite for the bastard who thought he could manhandle Kamui Brisby, it didn't matter. It would have happened without question. The reason it doesn't happen is because this is his precious mother who never once abandoned him, no matter how he tested her patience.

If "people suck" is the ironclad rule of the universe, then this woman is the sole exception.

When she grabs for him, he melts to her whims. He sighs, he rolls his eyes, but he gets a big ol' kiss on his nineteen year old cheek nonetheless. As thanks, she gets a sopping wet - and still very cold - braid of hair pressed into her jaw.]

[She laughs, spinning in her seat to stand up, brushing his damp bangs away from his face.]

Let's find you a towel before you catch your death.

If I did, I'd just come back to haunt you anyway. No big. [He sticks out his tongue, playful rather than defiant.] You'd have the best Halloween House in all of Recolle.

I mean, you still will even if I don't, 'cause I'll be there to help hand out candy. So either way: Best Halloween House.

Don't even joke about dying, I still have nightmares about you boys getting sick.

[Minor heart attacks each time!!]

I still need to go buy the candy, don't I... what do you think for candy, this year?

[Kamui avoids arguing over the likelihood of his demise via bobbing for apples. Instead, he happily focuses on the mention of candy, twirling his braid while polishing off his apple.

He's a nineteen year old man, after all. There is not enough food in the world to satisfy his hunger.]

Saw these chocolates shaped like eyeballs at the store the other day. And ya can't go wrong with gummy spiders.

You and your penchant for spooky things...

[She finds a towel, looping it over his head and starting to ruffle it.]

I don't know where you get it.

Blame TV. Everyone else does.

[He snorts as the towel ruffles his hair into a mess - albeit a dry one - and taps his mother's wrist. His head, hidden from the public by thick towel folds, dips sheepishly.]

I can dry my own hair, y'know.

And it's fine. Really. I'm just getting into the holiday spirit, not running off to join a murder cult. Promise.

[She finishes her task in drying him off, and fishes through her purse for her comb, taking it to his hair before he can scamper off.]

I know you aren't, you wouldn't escape my wrath if you did do something like that.

[It's a pretty hollow threat, since she's far more likely to have an anxiety attack or cry when her boys are in trouble.]

[Her threat doesn't ring nearly as hollow as she thinks, for the same reason that Kamui goes out of his way to hide any injuries he can from her. If she did get mad enough to scream and yell and fight her morals into him, her scolding wouldn't even register. But when he sees the fear in her bawling eyes, he becomes painfully aware that those tears are his fault.

He's made her cry enough already. Now he has to make up for that.

...Right after that comb stops snagging his frayed braid.]

Ah, wait- Braid, braid!

[He pops his hairband between his teeth and unwinds his braid at breakneck speeds. Everyone gets at least one vanity, okay.]

Yes, yes. We'll put it back.

[She combs out all the tangles, rubbing his hair just a little more with the towel before starting to braid it for him.]

It's so chilly, I can't believe kids are bobbing for apples in this weather. I'd be afraid they'd...

[She trails off. She knows she's being excessively fussy, but a bad experience is a bad experience.]

The weather might be driving me a little crazy. Somehow, for some reason, the faces on fruit started to seem a little strange to me...

The faces...?

[He's listening, but he doesn't quite grasp where she's going with this. What do smiley citrus have to do with people getting sick from the cold? He squints through his bangs, trying to get a peek of her in his peripheral vision.]

I mean, yeah, I guess the fruit faces can be kinda... alien. If you really think about them.

[He's quiet for a few seconds, mulling over the fact that he's never actually thought about them before. Then he decides there are other things he'd much rather waste his time on. With a sweeping stretch, he hands his mom his hairband.]

I know how to fix this. We're getting hot chocolate. On me.

Yes, I think I'm overthinking things, again.

[She shakes her head, accepting the distraction and taking the hairband for him.]

I'm sorry, I must be worrying you.

You think you're overthinking?

[Kamui turns to grin at her, the smug brat.

He'll convince her he's not worried. He's never worried. He's Kamui.]

[Of course he's worried, he's a worrywart just like his mother, she knows better.]

I'll be fine, I think I'm just out of sorts. The weekend is coming up, so maybe I'll just take it easy.

[Curse that spot on mother's intuition.]

You better. You're never gonna find another Mr. Brisby with those sad bags under your eyes.

Kamui...

[A tired, withered sigh. Must mostly, an incredulous look.]

None of you boys would want a stepfather.

Well, duh. I'd introduce the cocky ass to my knife collection before your second date. [Shameless smirk is shameless.] Doesn't mean you can't try.

OCTOBER TDM

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