TEST DRIVE / JAN '25 / BETA.

[eagan]

Test drive. Welcome to AFTER LIFE, a game based in the world of Severance! This test drive serves as a place to help you figure out what characters you'd like to bring into the game. Some details (housing, etc.) may require further out of character conversation; please refer to the OOC meet and greet! These prompts are all relatively low-stakes as a reflection of the nature of the game: slice-of-life until character and player interaction bring out the more psychological horror/thriller aspects of the setting. If none tickle your fancy, feel free to provide wildcard prompts of your own. The test drive is open to anyone. We encourage messing around here to figure out exactly how you'd like to port your character into Kier! Threads may also be considered game canon if you so wish. Got any questions? Check the FAQ or ask in the comments. outies: deals all the way down. There's a sale on at Lindt's Groceries! Discounts on pretty much anything you could imagine! The store is a middle-sized, relatively bougie, locally-owned grocery, with aisles stocked full of food and general necessities, as well as a small counter for deli meats and fish, and another two across the shop stocked with hot food (rotisserie chicken, sandwiches, sides) and a very limited selection of sushi (some sashimi, some hand rolls). And right now, there's a 20% discount on anything in the shop (supposedly to celebrate someone's birthday, though whose, you have no idea). Are you browsing the aisles? Are you working a shift? Are you checking out? outies: rain, rain, go away. It's a grey and cloudy day, and as the cherry on top of the gloomy day cake, it's started to rain. The closest place to get out of the downpour is We Love Books, the local bookstore. Like Lindt's, it's not huge — it's not so big as a Barnes & Noble — but it's big enough, and obviously well-maintained. Maybe there's a book you've been meaning to pick up? Or maybe you're really just waiting out the rain. Or you could stop at Leaves of Grass, the cafe next door, and get a coffee, tea, or hot chocolate to help warm up the cold day. Or maybe the rain doesn't bother you at all, and you're totally willing to keep on trucking. Are you brave enough to ask someone for a spare umbrella? outies: neighborly fun. You've been invited to a night of board games and conversation by a neighbor — or maybe just a friend of a friend. Either way, you're in a stranger's (nice, midcentury) house with a bunch of people you've never met before. There's wine, there's charcuterie, there's seltzer — bits and bobs for consumption until the games begin in earnest. (You've heard that some people at the party might be Severed — are you?) Why not say hi to the person standing next to you? Or remain a wallflower and see if a more enterprising guest will decide to bestow you with a conversation starter. innies: another day in paradise. The elevator doors open, and another normal day at work begins. You know the way to your office, and don't see anyone else on the way there. What's your routine to get settled when a day starts? Do you like your coworkers? Do you like the work you do? Have you been doing it for a million years, or is this your first day? Maybe you're a manager making sure everything is running smoothly? innies: waiting for wellness. For one reason or another, you've been given the opportunity to visit the Wellness Center for a session. Except someone seems to have made a scheduling mistake — as you sit in the waiting room, you hear footsteps coming from the hallway. You've never run into anyone from another department before; in fact, the idea of fraternization has been expressly discouraged. Maybe they're coming into the Wellness Center's waiting room, too, or maybe they're just passing by. Either way, this might be your only chance to see who else works on the Severed floor — or maybe it's just one of your usual coworkers. Will you get up, or let them go by?

Comments

silco, arcane.

[powerhungry]

OUTIES: NEIGHBORLY FUN.

[ Silco accepts the invitation without thinking about it/at the behest of his wife. It's not that he's not social but— there are other things he'd rather be doing, arguably even other people he'd rather see. But he doesn't have a good excuse not to go, either, and so—

—and so, as soon as he's managed to acquire a glass of wine, he finds a seat amid the circle of seats in the living room rather than hovering around the spread of food laid out on the dining table.

He's a slight man, dressed in a white button-down shirt under a burgundy sweater, sleeves rolled up to a reveal a silver watch on one narrow wrist. Perfectly normal, perfectly mundane. He wouldn't be notable at all, in fact, if not for the eyepatch he wears over one eye, the oval of black leather too small to fully cover the scar that runs nearly the length of his face, from his temple down to the narrow set of his mouth.

For a moment, he checks his phone (nothing new, no emergency to pull him away), but he puts it back in his pocket as soon as someone sits down next to him, offering a polite smile and a nod at the unopened board game sitting on the table in the middle of the arranged chairs.

Mildly: ] I don't suppose you've played this before?

INNIES: ANOTHER DAY IN PARADISE.

[ There are a few things that Silco Z. knows about his innie. Among them is a strict adherence to the dress code, to the point that he only ever wakes in the office dressed in black and white, with no space left for the other "neutral tones" specified by the introductory guidebook. He knows he must be punctual, too — even with their staggered windows of arrival, he's practically always arrived on the Severed Floor at the same time, right on the dot. The same goes for today, as he blinks back to consciousness in the elevator, makes his way down a maze of white hallways, and turns the lights on for his department.

(There's one other thing that he knows: that, in his years working here, it's become clear that there's something strange happening here. Exactly what, he couldn't say, but—)

Whatever doubt he feels doesn't dissipate when he hears another set of footsteps, but it becomes less pressing. As for the words that leave his mouth, it's not as though he really cares, even given his usual timeliness, but he's not necessarily an easy department head to get along with, either. ]

You're late.

WILDCARD.

[ hit me with whatever! for my starters specifically, i've bolded stuff that's malleable for the tdm/subject to change once the game actually gets going. as always, i'm @ marlinspike on plurk and @ thejuicyfruits on discord. c: ]

neighborly

[semicharmed]

[ Matt doesn't blink at the eyepatch. You see all types at the grocery store--how can you not? Everybody has to eat--and despite a natural lack of poker face, Matt's gotten used to smiling at whatever stranger's face swims into his field of operation. It's just plasticity: Repeated action that sets a standard. People are so lonely these days, he thinks. Working a service job, you might be the one pleasant interaction somebody has all day. All week.

Lifting his seltzer, he takes a buzzing sip. ]

Oh, uh, "Colonists of Balsam" ...? Not myself, no.

I think it's supposed to be resource management. You know, getting wood to built forts, trading iron for ... whatever people trade iron for.

[powerhungry]

[ Matt's demeanor is such that Silco feels fairly confident that he won't be making a social faux pas by allowing his expression to turn a little wry, even as he turns his face to get a better look at the game's box.

(The truth is he doesn't need the eyepatch — that he can see out of his left eye just fine — but it's— ease, he supposes. Social lubricant. He doesn't like it, exactly — doesn't care what people think of him as much as he's told he should — but it is what it is.) ]

Iron for wheat, grain, potable water. Though a filtration system seems like a stretch for an exercise like this.

[ Apparently satisfied — or resigned — to what little he can make out from the game's exterior packaging, Silco settles back in his seat, transferring his wine glass to his left hand before offering Matt his right. ]

Silco. Presuming this is a competitive game, I hope you won't think too poorly of me once we're done.

[semicharmed]

[ Matt's lips twitch for filtration system. He's scooting his own chair forward, peering more closely at the box--glossy, deep enough to hold a small birthday cake, low on instructions--when Silco extends his hand. Matt turns to shake. His grip is sure, easy, and seems to linger just exactly as long as Silco's comfortable with. There's no calculation behind it, though: What mental power Matt's expending is torn between the game and whether "Silco" is a last name or a first.

Gotta be first, right? ]

Matt. Nice to meet you. [ His smile widens, though it remains crooked. ] Are you one of those people whose Monopoly games end in screaming eight hours later? I was going to suggest we make up our own rules and make one of the tokens stand for water filtration ...

[ Matt reaches for the lid of the box, popping it open and revealing small models of mountains and forests. ]

But I can color inside the lines.

innies.

[smudgy]

[ Everyone agrees: Silco Z. is a drip. With his starched collars and bland colours (or lack thereof), he could blend in with the minimal decor. Jinx F. does a great impression of him, when he isn’t looking: She stands stock still, arms by her side, scowling as she leans against the wall. The others pretend they can’t see her, despite the bright blues and pinks that break the monotony of her uniform (a fuchsia turtleneck, today). ]

Technically, I’m not.

[ Jinx arrives late most days — or rather, her outie does. Sometimes, she and her colleagues debate why this is. I think you spend all that time braiding your hair is a popular theory. Another is that they search her multiple times now, after she snuck contraband in through the lift twice.

Honestly? Powder suspects she just isn’t a very good employee. ]

[powerhungry]

[ It's a strain of speculation that Silco mostly abstains from, though that doesn't exempt him from being a subject of the theories that get tossed about. That his outie needs some kind of witness protection — hence the scar, the eye — or that maybe he was involved in some kind of industrial accident. Or maybe he'd been a hibachi chef. He tells them, once, that it's a failure of imagination that all of their theories circle back to his scar.

But they talk, anyway, the same way Jinx imitates him when she thinks he's not looking. (Because they know he won't send them to the Break Room, because he's never once smiled on a tour of the Perpetuity Wing.) ]

And yet you'll be the one complaining if you're sent home late.

[ Or maybe she wouldn't, he's not sure — time means something different for them, after all. A longer day means a longer existence. ]

[smudgy]

[ He only said hibachi ‘cause you’re so fun, boss. Not because of the scar, which Jinx has caught herself looking at over or between her cubicle screen, the tiny sliver of him, diagonal from her. ]

And you won’t be?

[ When she falls behind, it’s Silco who stays to watch her finish sorting numbers into boxes, never relinquishing his duty to the severed floor supervisors for reasons unknown to her.

Jinx steps forward now, fearless. ]

Your outtie must not miss the wife.

[powerhungry]

[ At that, Silco's frown only deepens, his gaze remaining on her a moment longer before returning to his computer screen, though his hands remain tellingly still, fixed over his mouse and the edge of his keyboard. He swallows down the retort, what makes you think I'm married, because it only invites further speculation, and moreover, takes the bait she's dangled in front of him.

She infuriates him. A constant prickle under his skin, one that follows him into the elevator and reactivates like a shimmer when his eyes open again. He wonders if his outie notices, if — and these are thoughts he never voices — he would ever recognize her, out there. A natural enemy or, Kier forbid, a loved one. ]

It's hardly my concern.

[ His lips purse as, perhaps inevitably, he looks up again, that familiar heat tickling the back of his neck. There must be someone else waiting for her, up there — some brash boy, or a girl with an equally colorful shock of hair.

With a nod at her desk: ] Nor is it yours.