Empatheias Events (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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empatheias_ooc2016-10-18 02:34 pm
empevents) wrote in empatheias_ooc2016-10-18 02:34 pm
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TEST DRIVE: NOVEMBER
Welcome to
empatheias' test drive meme. This test drive is to help interested players test their characters in the game's environment. We've included a few prompts that incorporate specific elements of the game, though you'll find all of them have a lot of leeway for players to get as creative as necessary. Before diving in, here are a few things we'd like to remind everyone about the game in general:- Date reminders. Reserves open Tuesday, October 25 and Applications (Canon | OC) open Tuesday, November 1st.
- OC Reminder! Just a quick reminder that original characters are allowed. Those interested can also use the test drive. OCs do not need to be reserved.
- Emotions are key! Empatheias' premise focuses on how anyone's emotions can affect their environment, be it big or small. While not every emotion will cause a reaction, significant ones definitely will. How much effect a character will have will ultimately be up to you, the player. Also, while we're giving a lot of leeway for the test drive, keep in mind that there will be some limits in the actual game.
- Everyone has an amulet. All characters have a unique amulet that is specialized for them. It will contain all of their emotion drops and it serves as the network device. Remember, communication is telepathic. Otherwise, it works basically the same.
- Assume the character is already in the game. Because "OMG WHERE AM I IS THIS REAL LIFE" threads aren't going to be very helpful in this test drive! Plus those are going to happen in-game, anyway. So to make things easier, just assume that they've been around at least a week or so. Still learning the ropes, but not a complete "first day" experience.
- First or third person allowed. Your threads can be in either first or third, but we'd advise being flexible about it. Remember, these threads can also be used in your application for samples! Reminder: We only require one sample and it can be done in either format. We have also made a change to our sample requirements, so look over the Applications page!
Now with that out of the way, here are some prompts you guys can work from!
• Prompt A: How about giving the emotions a try?
• Prompt B: Refer to the Task Board and choose a task your character may be interested in taking up. For this prompt, you could have your character ask for help, already be in the middle of the job, or react to it in some way. Perhaps they were an unfortunate victim or want to create a job countering an existing one. You could even have a prompt making a job request. Creating jobs for the purpose of the test drive is absolutely doable.
• Prompt C: How about giving the amulets a go? Start a telepathic conversation and see how it works. Remember, the amulets are sending out the owner's thoughts so might want to be careful about how the stream of consciousness goes...
• Prompt D: The Boreas Harvest Festival is fast approaching, and the farmers are trying hard to work through the bleak weather conditions to get their crops in before they go bad from all the apathy. All hands on deck—but there may be too many unwanted hands roaming around.
• Prompt E: Aiada, the Arehtei of appreciation and jealousy, has sent a personal request for those who are interested. There is a small island just beneath Empatheias that she has been cultivating over the many centuries. She wishes to contribute to the Harvest Festival with some seeds and spores. However, the recent atmosphere has also reached down there, and now it's all a mess! Giant mushrooms replaced the trees and there's slime and mold everywhere. The cure? Aside from getting a lot of heavy duty cleaners and pushing it off, appreciation will go a long way to help.
• Prompt F: Various parties are interested in the emotion shards scattered all over Thera. But this time around, the focus is on the medical laboratory as the equipment and potential research there is also of interest. For three days those who volunteer are sent back to try and gather as much as possible—but of course this won't be easy.
• Prompt G: Make your own! It could include feathers and/or confetti.
• Prompt B: Refer to the Task Board and choose a task your character may be interested in taking up. For this prompt, you could have your character ask for help, already be in the middle of the job, or react to it in some way. Perhaps they were an unfortunate victim or want to create a job countering an existing one. You could even have a prompt making a job request. Creating jobs for the purpose of the test drive is absolutely doable.
• Prompt C: How about giving the amulets a go? Start a telepathic conversation and see how it works. Remember, the amulets are sending out the owner's thoughts so might want to be careful about how the stream of consciousness goes...
• Prompt D: The Boreas Harvest Festival is fast approaching, and the farmers are trying hard to work through the bleak weather conditions to get their crops in before they go bad from all the apathy. All hands on deck—but there may be too many unwanted hands roaming around.
- Scarecrows. The scarecrows that have been set up as a festive reminder of the time of year have unfortunately come under the influence of some errant strong emotions from the farm hands that work in the fields. Unfortunately that includes trying to ward off anyone who enters the fields with pitchforks and is one of them carrying a torch? Maybe if they can be convinced that you are trustworthy they will calm down.
- Invading rabbits. There are ton of rabbits ravaging the carrot patches. They're easily frightened, but some are more tenacious than others. Beware of the white rabbit with red eyes.
- Save the crops! Several batches are already starting to spoil! The only thing that can save them is dumping as much positive emotions into them. Joy of good food, hope for a bountiful meal, love of eating—whatever will work. Just be careful. Too much and those things might grow and explode…
• Prompt E: Aiada, the Arehtei of appreciation and jealousy, has sent a personal request for those who are interested. There is a small island just beneath Empatheias that she has been cultivating over the many centuries. She wishes to contribute to the Harvest Festival with some seeds and spores. However, the recent atmosphere has also reached down there, and now it's all a mess! Giant mushrooms replaced the trees and there's slime and mold everywhere. The cure? Aside from getting a lot of heavy duty cleaners and pushing it off, appreciation will go a long way to help.
- Goop brigade. Grab that bucket and shovel and clear the goop out! Just be careful not to have too much get on you—jealousy might take over.
- Appreciation balls. To help hasten the effort, Aiada has given several tubs filled with light, green orbs. Once channeled with enough appreciation, they can be used as mini-grenades to help explode and wash the area with more positive energy. Those caught in the blast won't be harmed. If anything, they'll just be very thankful.
- Watch the ledges. Careful, it's a fairly small island and the goop and slime has made things slick. If you fall… That's not a good way to go, let's just say that.
• Prompt F: Various parties are interested in the emotion shards scattered all over Thera. But this time around, the focus is on the medical laboratory as the equipment and potential research there is also of interest. For three days those who volunteer are sent back to try and gather as much as possible—but of course this won't be easy.
- Skeletal Scientists. The remains of the scientists who once worked in these rooms are still lurking, ready to protect their work. Fortunately they're relatively weak nerds, so not too difficult to dispatch. Just be careful.
- Flying equipment. The various medical equipment has also taken life, scalpels and needles flying everywhere and stethoscopes ready to strangle.
- Questionable liquid. Most of the easy shards have already been taken, leaving the more difficult to retrieve ones left. In particular they're found in strange, dark pink liquid. It's mostly harmless—except that upon contact intense waves of grief and suffering will course through. The longer the exposure, the worse it is. So hopefully a bucket full of it doesn't fall on you…
• Prompt G: Make your own! It could include feathers and/or confetti.
For your threads, put the Character Name and the Canon in the subject line to help readily identify them. You're also welcome to use more than one prompt for respondents to choose from. If you have any questions or want to brush up on the game information, refer to the Game Information entry. Otherwise, tag around and have fun!
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"Reaper, and you don't have a choice right now." Firmly spoken, growled as it was, kicking the door open when he got there and heading right up the hall way. McCree was definitely not any trouble for him to lift, it was just the movement giving him trouble at all.
"You need to get out of here, and if you are going to be too stubborn about it you're leaving me with no choice."
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His eyes must be playing tricks, staring at the ghosts that follow him. In their dead and hollow eyes, in their shifting shadows and smoke, he swears he almost sees the faces of every regret he ever had. Ana. Gabe. Others from Blackwatch that had died in the field, that he knew had gotten hurt because-
"... Buried you, dammit. Can't bury you again... Can't bury you again..."
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He endured every hit, felt it, had gotten worse during the Omnic Crisis and a few things that had followed after it was over. Ignored the trailing shadows because as far as he was concerned they wouldn't be a problem for him, long as it made the walk to the transporter that would get them from the world's surface to the floating island above it all.
Didn't even stop once there, keeping McCree secure there over his shoulders as Reaper made his way into Verens proper, taking the turns that led to the slums of the area. Easiest place to make a safehouse—
The door was locked behind him, dropping McCree off his shoulders and onto a worn couch. Growling a bit- "Stay," more order than not. Reaper moving off to collect a few things that he'd need, grabbing things up from what he'd been collecting over his time here. Funny how some things he'd just kept hold of would come in handy for this, a deep cleaning to get all of that off and out of the cybernetic arm.
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He remembered seeing the news. He remembered trying to call. To find out. He remembered how angry he had been when the entire world had branded his Commander a traitor, how guilty he had felt, like if he'd stayed he would have been able to talk him out of whatever happened, or saved him and Jack both, or something.
But when he's dropped onto a couch, staring up at that barn-owl mask, he's almost exhausted. Staring flatly at the ghosts that keep following him as Reaper moves off to do god knows what.
"What, if I left, you'd probably just hunt me down again."
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A few tools and clean cloths were dropped on the coffee table as Reaper passed, not necessarily what was proper but he'd had to come up with less during a few missions- Forcing thoughts to stop there before they went further. That life was gone and passed, and he was only doing this because by the time anyone else found the ingrate he'd need more help than he did now.
Finally, finally, Reaper sat down at the table himself and hesitated for just a moment. Talon gloves were tugged off and set aside, taking a breath as everything held together. Fingers flexed- "I'm cleaning your arm, you need to hold still. Soon as I'm done you can leave, I won't follow." Lifting a hand as he pulled off the mask, setting it aside and pulling his hood forwards to get to work.
Already cleaning the gun off the surface so he could get off pieces to get further in and do the same. Knew what he was doing well enough to do that.
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But then Reyes takes off his mask, and McCree can't help but stare. There he was. The man who taught him to be something better, who gave him a chance to redeem himself when others were ready to throw him in a prison to rot for the rest of his life. The man who. Who he considered a father, sometimes. He feels like that reckless kid again, working together post op, talking about what went wrong and what went right. For a moment, he expects Reyes to chew him out, to haul him off to some training and teach him how to improve himself.
But Reyes was dead, and he's the Reaper. And now his face is scarred, his eyes red and black, constantly decaying and regenerating and that grief wracks him again. He sucks in breath like he's been suckerpunched. And it all comes spilling out.
"Shoulda stayed in Blackwatch, dammit." He grips tight to the edge of the couch, trying to steady himself. "Shoulda stayed, things could have been different, you could have- You could still be alive-"
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Of course Reaper was silent when McCree started, not glancing up as he carefully removed plates so he could get at wiring easier. Wiping off that pink gunk along the way, glancing up briefly as he kept his expression unreadable.
Best he could, anyway. "You left, bit late to think about that now." Voice calm and level, not so muffled with the mask set there on the table within reach, empty sockets staring at the ceiling. Still a growl to his tone, hadn't that always been there? The smoke curling from skin hadn't, or the way some twisted with his words. "Forgotten. Left to suffer. Dead.
"Just the monster of Overwatch's own creation left," and he'd have his justice.
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And then he heard that Gabriel Reyes was the culprit.
"Been thinking about it ever since you died." He has to lean his head back to keep from choking up, has to look away from that corpse.
"Ever since I had to bury an empty casket with your name on that headstone." His hand that isn't being worked on presses up against his mouth, trying to supress the tears starting to prick at his eyes.
"Dammit, Reyes, I didn't want to leave you. But you said you couldn't leave, too much to do, and I- I couldn't stay-"
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"Guilt has a funny way of sticking, doesn't it?" Careful not to come into contact with the remnants of pink he was cleaning up, but the metal talons would be nothing but a hindrance for cleaning the wires honestly. Didn't bother looking back up, moving the not so clean anymore cloth carefully. So McCree had gone to his funeral, surprised there'd been one at all due to the story the news had gone with.
Who the hell blows up a building with them still in it?
Reaper did pause then, the room dropping in temperature- "Didn't want to leave me? Sure didn't have a problem leaving at all, there and gone. Doesn't sound like you had a hard time at all, ingrate."
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He ran.
"You don't remember a damn thing, do you, 'bout why I left." He mutters, still trying not to look at him. The air is cold, and those ghosts keep crowding him and the Reaper alike, wearing faces too familiar to him.
"You don't remember me askin' if you'd retire, too."
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"You left because you didn't like how things were going." That he remembered, McCree at least had enough guts to come face him with his leaving. Didn't just spirit himself away one night, but it damn well had felt like it—
The ghosts were ignored, brow furrowed as the growing anger stalled and shadows curled along Reaper's edges. Ruffling almost. "You didn't ask," that was a no.
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"You were askin' me to be Deadlock all over again, when I was supposed to be redeeming myself for my crimes! I knew it was something you wouldn't ask, so I thought-"
In his anger, he's turned back to look at him, staring death straight in the face. He thought Reyes wouldn't have asked such things from him. He thought it must be the higher ups. He thought he wouldn't have blown the Swiss Headquarters sky high.
He thought he would have left.
"I did. And you stayed. And you know, for a long time after your death, I defended you? I didn't think you could do such a thing, but you know what?" Anger is burning inside of him now. A raw wound of guilt and anger and sorrow stirring up a storm inside of him. The ghosts behind the reaper grow restless, dark, and there's almost a low growling sound in the air.
"Maybe you were never the man I thought you were, considerin' you've up and joined the same people who killed Ana! Who ambushed us! Who I lost my goddamn arm to! Mercenary or no, you ain't got some sorta standard, pops?!"
It slips out without him thinking, face contorted in pain as he tries to temper his emotions. If he had stayed, would things had been different? Would he have managed to convince Reyes otherwise, uncover the plot to frame him, hauled him out of that blast before it was too late?
"I ran 'cause I didn't have a choice anymore. I ran 'cause I was tryin' to be the person you wanted me to be when you hauled me outta Deadlock-!"
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Which matched the glow of fire that flashed before remaining in ribbons around him, cracking along his own flesh as lips curled to bare sharp teeth in some strange grin. The room growing dark other than the light brought with the intense heat of fire, crackling in the air, the shape of large and just as fire cracked shadow wings just unfurled in the area behind him, leaning close as his grip on the bionic arm never grew tighter.
"You are no better than those people in Overwatch, those higher up who passed those orders and expected me to do nothing." Eyes never leaving McCree, those shadows behind him in danger of being swallowed by Reaper's own darkness that filled the room. Voice steady, cold anger there- "You left a drowning man, ingrate, and say you offered a hand to a man who was slowly having everything he built ripped from under him.
"Then throw accusation after accusation once something you don't like has been done." There was a laugh, the fire growing brighter and hotter, remaining around Reaper and never daring to go near the cowboy himself, the scent of marigolds and ash creeping in. "How little did you care to do so this easily? To act like I had a choice, that I could run from a sinking ship and leave everyone else? To save myself?"
Still he worked, cloth dropped once that last big of gunk was cleaned out. "You're welcome to run to the rest of them, Ingrate. Keep your company of corruption while I do what I've been good at.
"Someone has to play the bad guy."
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He swallows back his pride. His anger. His grief. Leans forward slightly, shoulders slumping, letting all that fire burn out and be replaced by the waters of grief. Maybe Reyes had a reason for joining Talon. Keeping an eye on them, running interference. He'd spared McCree when they'd fought before, hadn't he?
"... I'm sorry." He needed to stop running. He needed to stop running and face all the decisions that he made. "I'm so... so damn sorry..." The tears that have been pricking at his eyes spill over, and he tries to keep his voice from shaking.
"I asked you to come with me. A-And you said you couldn't because you had too much to do. An' I shouldn't have left, I shoulda stayed and helped you and then you were dead, Gabe. You were dead and I had nothin' but an empty casket and the lessons you taught me-"
The ghosts are starting to fizzle out as he lets go of his grief, his anguish. As he lets all that guilt well up inside of him.
"Maybe you didn't have a choice, but I did, an' I made the wrong one. I shoulda stayed. Dammit, I shoulda stayed."
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The dark drains out of the room slowly, slower than it had appeared, caught off guard by something as simple as an apology in the face of his own anger. Hand nearly going for his mask, something he hid behind as well as it carried a message to all of those who would look upon it; a comfort, but still it would remain there on the table.
Instead Reaper went to piecing the parts of McCree's bionic, just to have something to do with his hands. They went on much more quickly than they'd been taken off, no having to watch for something to not touch and clean off.
"I don't remember you asking." Softly, but it carried that same rasp. What would McCree staying have done?
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"Maybe not in so many words." He replies, quiet, ignoring how the ghosts are starting to fade as he lets it all out. Like wisps of fog disappearing in the light of the dawn, or shadows extinguishing with a lightbulb's incandescent.
"Might have just asked when you were retirin'. Tried to see if you'd come with me. I keep replayin' that conversation in my head but after all these years the words have changed, you know?"
A pause, and then he looks up.
"But there's one thing I know I wanted, and that was you to come with me. To leave Blackwatch before we had to cross another line we couldn't."
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Gabriel Reyes was dead and there was only the Reaper left behind. All that was left, the ghost of a man left to suffer and die.
He stood up slowly, pointedly ignoring what was left of those shadows as the room was otherwise normal once again. The effects of his own flare of mood all but gone, even the cracks in the floor resealing themselves. "You'd have ended up dead if you had stayed, or worse." Finally deciding that.
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"... Yeah. Might've." He runs his hand over his face, trying to scrub at the tears on his cheeks. He might have ended up dead. Might have ended up worse. Might have ended up like Amelie, might have ended up like... Like Reyes.
"... But maybe I could've saved you from what happened in Switzerland." There it is. All that guilt come to a head. A secret finally admitted. And with a groan like the very earth was shifting on his access, the shadows disappear. They dart out to the four corners of the room, underneath the door and through the window, vanishing as quickly as they came.
"I only survived 'cause I was a coward. I was a young punk you took in and I survived and you didn't because I ran." The confession knocks the wind out of him, and his shoulders begin to shake again.
"It should've been you, Reyes."
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"It should have been me, for a lot of things." Gabriel Reyes shouldn't have died, not for that. He wasn't done yet and so Reaper was going to finish what was started without mercy. He would clean up, end the sad story that was Overwatch no matter who he had to hunt down and kill, what jobs he'd have to take to get to where he needed to be. To fund this personal mission. Nothing could stop him- nothing back home, here he had to put it on the backburner.
Reaper left the room for just a moment, and soon there was a clean glass of water sat down just in front of McCree. "Here, drink this." Running had been cowardly, wasn't going to argue that, but...
Kid had always been smart, reckless as Jesse was. Hadn't been stupid to run, Gabriel had stayed because he had to try, but everything had blown up in the end.
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And he kept running.
Until he landed here, worn out and exhausted, unable to run anymore. He hadn't caught the sun, but he had faced his shadows, the demons that clung to his back and whispered in his ear what a damn disgrace he was. What a failure, what a fool. What a poor excuse for an operative, what a poor excuse for a son-
"... Thanks..." He carefully takes the water with his newly repaired hand, tries to ignore the way he's still shaking. Whether it's with exhaustion, nerves, or more, he cannot say. Only that he's tired, he's so tired of running. And he's missed the old man in front of him.
"... Reyes, I'm..." A pause, a sigh, and he finally looks him in the eye. They're probably red-rimmed and bloodshot from crying, but that hardly matters now, does it? "... I can't change the past, but... Movin' forward..."
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His posture had tensed a little, not from the eye contact, by from those words alone. The past couldn't be changed, and the only way forwards for Reaper was that one last self-appointed mission that was impossible here. Yet here he was, playing nice and...
Reaper could have very easily left McCree down in Thera, left him to whatever shadows those were and let someone else happen upon him. There were plenty of hero and simply helpful types around here he'd not be down there for long. "You've better chance of that than-" The corner of his mouth twitched at a meow from another room, the padding of paws and, well.
That was an extremely fluffy and white cat interrupting any thought Reaper had been about to express as it climbed onto the couch and stared at the cowboy sitting there. Right. He'd brought the cat with him here.
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A large, fluffy, white cat, with a little ribbon around her neck. She climbs up onto the couch, close enough to McCree that he could pet her, and he can't help the grin that spreads across his face.
"Well hey there, little missy..." Gently reaching out with his right hand, he pets once, then twice when the cat doesn't make any movements to pull away or hiss.
"You know, you did always seem like a cat person." He can't help the chuckle, looking back up at Reyes, and for a moment it feels like old times. Despite the tears on his face and the ruined, decaying skin of Reyes's, it all feels so nostalgic he can't help himself.
"... Movin' forward. I don't. Want to abandon you again."
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Previous owners weren't around any longer, guess people could vanish as easily as they appeared.
"Gabriel Reyes died, McCree." A small gesture towards his face, moving to pick his mask back up. "This is my curse, and you can't abandon the dead." No time to get sentimental.
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Could still see his old boss underneath all that darkness, and he doesn't want to leave him behind again. He doesn't want to run again.
"... He's still alive under that mask and you and I both know it." He looks up at him again, stares death straight in the face. This is something he doesn't want to back down from.
"I ain't leaving him behind again." It might take time. And Reyes probably won't agree to it instantly- he's stubborn, the damn fool. But McCree makes a promise to himself. As long as he's here, McCree will be doing his best to not leave the man behind. Jack be damned. Overwatch be damned.
He's got to repent for all the mistakes he's made. And he's going to start now.
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"There is nothing alive under this mask, that you saw for yourself." Stubborn, even if McCree may not be as much of an ingrate as he believed. Most things still held true, and he could ignore any feelings that didn't belong with what he was now. "You're talking with whatever's left over from that gunk," so what if most believed this to be a place of second chances? "Sleep it off, I'm not going to make you leave."
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