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+ TEST DRIVE MEME +

♦ Test Drive Meme ♦

♥ This meme is a chance for new players and/or new characters to try out their voices in Wonderland's setting, and mingle with

entranceway's current player base.

♥ Get started with one of the prompts below, or reply to other people's top-level comments. Both prose and comment spam format is allowed and welcome.

♥ Creating top-level comments is reserved for new characters who are not currently in Wonderland, as well as for new Mirrors that haven't been played yet.

♥ Please note that any threads written for this meme are not part of

entranceway's game canon. They do not count towards current players' AC requirements, and cannot be used as samples for any new applications.

♥ Have a look at our Navigation to find any information about Wonderland you might need, or head to the Input & Inquiries page for further questions. If you've made up your mind about joining, go ahead and put in your Application, or a Reserve.

P r o m p t s

I. Second Time's The Charm
This... this looks awfully familiar, and... familiar in an awful way. Look around all you like, it won't change, it won't go away. You are in Wonderland. No, worse: You're back in Wonderland. Just when everything was nice and comfortable at home, or-- or wasn't it? Maybe you're happy to be here again. Hey, no judgement, free room and board is nothing to scoff at! Blessing or curse, that's really up to you; all you know for sure is that, apparently, you're here to stay.

II. What will you children do next?
It's time for another wonderful event in Wonderland! For its duration characters will suddenly find themselves ten years older or younger. This can be physically, mentally, or both, i.e., if your character is 20 years old right now, they may become 10 physically but still have the mind and memories of their 20-year-old self, or they may revert to the mentality of their 10-year-old self and lose all the memories they have of being older. Characters over 200 years old may even age by a century, as a decade isn't that long for them.

III. Through The Looking-Glass
What an extraordinary day! All of Wonderland's mirrors-- just the things, not the capital Mirrors, not the ones like you --are suddenly shattered! Shards on the floor as far as the eye can see, and empty frames that are just begging to be stepped through! Oh, but you should really stay on your side unless the Queen of Hearts orders it otherwise. Or should you? Who's to say she wouldn't want you to investigate? Go ahead, go on, explore the real side for a change! Or... stay put right where you are, and see who comes to visit. It's really up to you.

IV. Wildcard
Play out your character's arrival. Celebrate their anniversary. Choose a different event to experience. Do anything and everything you like!

Threaded | Flat

I

[Drax thought he'd escaped this place. Actually, he hadn't thought about it at all, since he'd completely forgotten about this place. He remembers now, though. And he's angry. And when Drax is angry, he turns to the thing he loves best: Destroying.

Watch out because he's ripping the mansion apart with his bare hands, crushing anything and anyone that tries to stand in his way. He knows it will rebuild itself, but right now? He doesn't care. He's mad, and this is how he expresses himself.]

III

[Drax the Peaceful has noticed the shards of the mirror, in that same, mindful way he notices everything, but he doesn't feel the need to go explore. After all, he's deep within a wonderful meditation session, at peace with himself and the world around him, and he doesn't want to change that.

Ever since his wife and children were murdered, it has been a struggle to find peace, to move on. Where a different man might have turned to violence and vengeance, Drax instead chose a different path, one of communing with the galaxy and finding peace, a peace he hopes his family shares, in whatever afterlife they've ended up.

So he doesn't bother to get up. But he might break from his contemplation and talk to someone, should they visit him.]

[in a weird way, wonderland reminds anna a lot of arendelle. a bit castle like structure and grounds - she'd never really been able to leave the castle until her big adventure looking for elsa so in a weird way the confinement was almost...normal?

weird sense of normal. and she knew it but that didn't make it any less true.

she wanders the grounds of the mansion with what can only be called enthusiasm and you better bet anyone who gets near her is going to get engaged in conversation.]

Oh, hello! I didn't see you there. How are you doing?

Edited 2015-04-24 16:40 (UTC)

[ If he's being completely honest? He remembers being in Wonderland.

Not that he had been here for long. Just long enough to announce his presence; just long enough to realize he was trapped; just long enough to realize the paradox of having all his powers, but not being able to use them to bring himself back to his own universe.

(Phenomenal cosmic power --

-- itty bitty living space)

He'd managed to find his way back home (or maybe this place had sent him home, having realized the error of bringing Him of all beings, to Wonderland) and thought no more of it.

But now, somehow, he's back. And he's even less pleased than he was before. Not that you would notice, as tiny little Chuck just looks baffled and bewildered at his reappearance. ]

Oh, uh, right. Okay. Wonderland. Again. That's, uh... [ He lets out a breath before dragging his hands down his face. There goes the hope of things being normal after the Apocalypse-That-Wasn't. ]

IV

[ Man, this place is green, alive with color and with people. It has a pulse and a heartbeat that go hand in hand with the pace of the people moving within it. The problem is the dingy looking guy in the red sweatshirt who really doesn't look like he belongs. Calling him pale would be too kind considering he's the pasty white of someone who hasn't had a pulse in a long time.

If you pay close enough attention you might notice he isn't really breathing either.

And is that... blood on his hoodie? Gross.

Hearing something, he turns around and runs into someone, stumbling back a step and he tries to think of something to say. Come on. Come on. You can do this. Just say hello. Or even better, say sorry. ]

S... sorry... about that...

[ Good. Nailed it. Now smile, smiling is normal. Wait, is there anyone in my teeth? He aborts a big smile and just kind of attempts an awkward half one. ]

Edited 2015-04-24 16:46 (UTC)

I and a bit of IV

[He's not the Hatter you know, but he is a Hatter nonetheless. Jefferson sits cross-legged facing the entrance to the hedge maze, both hands on his knees and staring off into the middle distance with a decidedly unhappy look on his face. A crushed top hat sits on the ground in front of him in completely unrepairable condition. One thumb taps his knee impatiently as if he's trying to decide what his next course of action should be.

Perhaps you've seen this man in Wonderland before. Perhaps he just got here. Either way, he is clearly grumpy but seems to be of the approachable sort. He's not ranting and raving like a lunatic. That would just be silly... and pointless, as Jefferson knows all too well.]

[This ... is not where Freya is supposed to be.

At first she thinks it may be one of Dahlia's tricks, but the more she explores, the more she realizes that as powerful as her aunt may be, she could never create something this elaborate, especially not if it's something meant to imprison Freya in her own mind. Nothing here is familiar or comforting, nothing that Freya would want to hide away in. Another's hand is at work here, and until she determines who that is, she's keeping her distance, only speaking when she is spoken to and quietly watching as entries and announcements are made on this strange device she was given.

Eventually she will determine that her siblings are here and seek them out, but until that moment comes she sticks to the shadows for now. It is the thing that has always served her best and when the road ahead of you is uncertain, it's always smart to fall back on old habits.]

IV

[ Kamala wasn't dumb. She may have never been kidnapped to another dimension herself, but she'd read (and written) enough alternate universe friend fictions to know how this goes. She knows the right way and the wrong way to react. So she read the pamphlet. She found a room. She settled in for the long haul. (She may not be pleased by the idea, but she's not going to waste time freaking out.) There's only one problem...

The video opens on the face of a teenage girl, oversized hipster glasses and all. She brushes her dark hair behind her ear and begins. ]

Okay, so. Wonderland. Is real. And nobody knows how to escape it or where it is. Buuuuuut.... does anybody know where it is in relation to Mecca? It's... kind of important.

[So, waking up in a strange room isn't too alarming. Not after you've woken up after dying anyway. Once you become a vampire, after not even knowing they really exist, and taking part in a vampire vs werewolf vs witch vs human gang war, well it's easier to go with the flow of things sometimes. So he does the only thing he can think of, he heads out to explore because he's definitely not in New Orleans anymore.]

IV

[Kitty isn't sure where she is. Is this Wonderland? There's always a chance of waking up somewhere you weren't in Wonderland. But that makes no sense. The paths between the worlds have been closed off, all but the one... and she hasn't been to the Well of Wonder since they unplugged it.

Well, what better way to figure out where you are than to just ask someone, right? And there's plenty of people around. That would be the conventional thing to do.

But Kitty is far from conventional.

Setting up a bucket of wet cat food above a door, waiting for an unsuspecting victim to walk through it? Now that's more this cat's style.]

[In hindsight, he...probably should have been more concerned.]

[There would be time for concern later. When the initial rush wore off. When he had time to process what was going on and realize this wasn't some crazy dream or hallucination due to...whatever it was he definitely hadn't been up to the previous night. Should Caitlin ask.]

[For the time being, his attention was divided between ducking his head in and out of the closet, at one point even sitting inside to see where the secret compartment that had to be there was activated, and messing with the little device they had given him.]

No, really. It's...precious.

[He knew he was talking to himself. It helped his process.]

I might have to reverse engineer it to be sure, but I think I made one of these for my sixth grade science project.

VI.

[Very rarely is Matt afraid.

Concerned, maybe. Lost? Possibly, yet also unlikely with his senses. But fear is born of the unknown, of ignorance toward things that can be easily explained, things with concrete answers that have been analyzed in articles and scientific journals. Smallpox was the Devil's work until people learned it was just a virus.

Stepping out of his apartment one evening to meet up with Foggy and Karen at Josie's should have accosted him with the sounds of Hell's Kitchen: the cat that sat at the far end of the street, yowling, the whisper of grease-streaked air coiling over his skin, the police sirens, the ambulances, car tires screeching and the fetid smell of garbage bags left on the curbside. It isn't perfect and it certainly hasn't been in a long time, but it's where he's from.

Understandably, walking into a closed space with little ambient noise is...unsettling, at best. At worst, it drives a spike of panic into him. The lack of need and voices behind closed doors, the absence of filth, the scent of baked goods, a short-circuiting fuse, black tea.

This is not his city.

The braille card left for him wasn't enough to assuage him, nor the phone in his pocket that lacked both Foggy and Karen's speed-dial number settings. Stifling his mounting worry Matt feels out his surroundings, cane in hand, testing the perimeters with unprecedented cautiousness.]

[ when I am king, dilly dilly, you shall be queen, she sings and for a moment, you might not be able to guess ella is brand new to wonderland. surely not with how comfortable she looks in the garden, squirrels and birds gathering at her feet as she gives them crumbs and sings to them. she is a young girl, slender and dressed in a pale blue dress, golden hair covered with a white cloth to keep it out of her face.

let the birds sing, dilly dilly and the lambs play -

she throws them a few more crumbs, allows a squirrel to sit in her lap,

you shall be safe, dilly dilly, out of harm's way.

if you have a pet of any kind, they might rush towards her to sit at her feet. if not, perhaps you would enjoy the singing. ]

[ There's something wrong. Karen isn't sure how she knows it exactly, but she does, she can feel it or -- or sense it or something. She knows it doesn't make sense but she can't help it; it's there and she feels it.

Something's wrong.

She'd been walking -- running, more like, to avoid getting caught in the rain, but she must've taken a wrong turn. There isn't any place in Hell's Kitchen that looks like this. A huge garden with beautiful flowers and what looks like a hedge maze in the distance. There's no room for something like this in the city. It's starting to freak her out. Did she slip on the wet pavement and bust her head open? Oh god. What if she's in a coma?

She reaches into her pocket for her phone out of habit, maybe to try to call Foggy or Matt or Ben or someone, but. It's not her phone. It looks like her phone, sure, but it's not her phone. She stares at it and clicks it to life, frowning deeply at the faces on the screen. Who are these people?

Where is she? ]

When presented with a peculiarly locked door, particularly the kind that sports a flickering glow around the edges, it's practically Winchester tradition to ignore the sanctity of privacy and find out what's on the other side. If it were just a locked door, it wouldn't necessarily do it for Henry — he's sometimes fine letting a locked door be a locked door — but the addition of a riddle is like a dangling carrot for a guy like him.

I'm teary-eyed but never cry.
Silver-tongued, but never lie.
Double-winged, but never fly.
Air-cooled, but never dry.

What am I?

It's hardly a challenge at all, but this type of intrigue feels much more like home, doesn't it? Maybe too enticing. Henry hasn't had nearly enough time to fully understand events — it's hard to do any kind of pointed research when there's so very much to learn — but if he had, maybe he'd understand there's a very good reason all of this feels like the kind of test he'd be performing back home.

Using a specialized mixture of herbs and artifacts he'd helpfully pulled from the closets, Winchester mixes up a magical paint of sorts in a way that's half ambitious and half experimental.

"Let's see how this works," he says quietly as he kneels in front of the brass placard and lifts his paintbrush and precisely draws on the symbol for Mercury, in what is probably a concoction made with mercury.

☿

The image sizzles, glows briefly in the most satisfying way, and then... the whole door immediately implodes with a whoosh of hot air and a hail of particle board shards.

Henry finds himself backed against the wall, blinking blearily at the opening from across the hall. Damn, does Wonderland pack a punch.

[Saying he hadn't ever woken up somewhere he hadn't been expecting would be a lie. Soldiers on leave got pretty rowdy, and Project Freelancer was no exception. Back before things went bad. And after things had got bad? There'd always been the pleasant experience of waking up in the med bay being told that you'd been screaming.

This is not the first instant, and it sure as hell isn't the second for which everyone is grateful especially Wash. He's really sick of waking up in hospitals.

There's sand in his armour. Fucking sand. And he'd thought he was done with deserts. It's a real bitch to clean. Sand in his hair too.

Wash pushes himself to his feet, and gropes for his helmet, carefully brushing any debris away from the seal before he starts walking. The ocean is there, bright blue, like he hasn't seen in years. He's not seen what it's like on Chrous but this looks like it would be on Earth.

He stares for a moment, then keeps walking. He should find the team before Caboose does... before Caboose does anything.]

Edited 2015-04-26 22:12 (UTC)

[She didn't know where she was.

Pacifica knew almost every room of Northwest Manor inside and out. She knew the contents of each room; she knew which areas made the best spots to hide in. Certainly, this room was lavish enough to belong to a Northwest. But though the ceiling was high and vaulted, and though the windows were large and beautiful, the room didn't resemble any of the major rooms of her home one bit.

Immediately, she froze in fear.

Was this one of the Northwests' countless other properties? Had her parents abandoned her? Oh no, oh no, she'd messed up but she hadn't realized that it was this bad.]

Where am I?! Mom?! Dad?! Is someone here?!

[ There's a vague familiarity that she just can't shake when she wakes up in the woods.

She doesn't remember much, just a haze of light and rain before she awoke. Helping a friend who desperately needed encouragement. Death. All of that, and more, has her reaching up to press her hands against her temples in order to sort it all out.

A sense of deja vu hits her, making her inhale sharply before turning east, toward the mansion that looms over the tree tops.

It can't be....

Mouth pressed into a determined line, Aerith starts a march up to the mansion, trying to sort out her memories from before. On one hand, the unknown looms in her future, a scary prospect. On the other, there are people here, friends she made, that she's hoping she'll get the chance to see. ]

iv

[ Wonderland is a lot like the old books say: colorful and wild and crazy as shit. At first, she thought it was some freaky dream, something brought on by exhaustion and dehydration and whatever else. Her waking life was shitty, so why shouldn't her dreams be the same? ... But, it felt too real, was too solid to be anything but reality. She's read a lot of books, ones where "normal" people get sucked into insane situations; now she'd become one of them.

A girl of fourteen lurks near the outskirts of the woods, expression not only wary, but hardened. She isn't afraid--doesn't appear to be, anyway--and is in fact wielding a bow, one currently slung over her back. One available for her use at any given moment. One she intends to use. ]

Hey, assholes! [ She calls into the empty air, pacing, unwilling yet to approach the mansion where she knows her captors must be waiting. ] If you want me, come and get me!

[ Ellie is pretty sure she can outrun them, lose them in the trees. At the very least, she can take advantage of them with knife or bow after hiding and catching them unawares.

Ellie in Wonderland. It even sounded stupid.]

[She'd heard of Wonderland, of course that was mainly from Henry's book as well as the ironic story in the library. There had been a few snippets in the town, at least from those that had been there. For the average resident, Wonderland was about as familiar as wherever Whale came from.

Belle had thought she was open minded. She'd seen magical rock trolls and worked as a maid for the Dark One. She even heard of Camelot.

Wonderland though? She never expected it to be so...wonderous...or frightening.

This wasn't exactly a fear Belle was used to showing. She'd been afraid before, but there was always something to rely on, specifically her intellect. Here, she was almost flying blind. It was not a comforting place to be.]

Hello? Can someone hear me? [Maybe calling out wasn't the brightest idea...but it's the only one she has.]

Bruce can tell he's changed before he looks in the mirror. He doesn't know what's changed, but he can feel it. There's a calmness he's managed to attain over the years and it's not hard to notice that a good measure of his control feels like it's slipped away.

It's when he catches a hallway mirror that he sees what's changed. Ten years. He's spent ten years living with the other guy and he feels as if it's only just happened because physically, it has only just happened.

He has to get away before something happens. That's the only thing he can think as he takes slow, deep breaths and forces himself to walk calmly towards the exit. At least on the grounds, he can sequester himself away from people as much as Wonderland allows.

[Harry Potter has been in Wonderland for about a month now and it is not totally awesome. There are parts he likes! This place is almost as magical as Hogwarts, except there's no homework. It's got a closet that can provide him with an unlimited supply of red vines!

But he misses his friends. He misses singing together and making fun of how Hermione can't draw and even mocking Draco together. This place is cool, but it's not home.

He's sitting in the garden and he feels a song coming on, so he does what any super cool musician-wizard would do and raises his wand.]

Accio guitar!

[It flies from his window in the mansion and into his hand and he strums a chord.]

Oooh, Wonderland's full of Wonder, Wonderland is swell.
So why does every moment in wonderland feel like hell?
This world is full of magic, it sparkles from above.
But magic isn't worth it without friendship hope and love!

[He strums a few chords and changes his tune: sudden reprise from a song he sang a while ago.]

Gotta get back to Hogwarts!
Gotta get back to school.
Gotta get myself to Hogwarts.
Where everybody thinks I'm coooool.

[He stops strumming, looking down at his reflection in the pond.]

Face it, Harry. [He says with a dramatic sigh.] Without all the fame, popularity, and back up singers you're just another douche with a guitar.

[ This... was probably not beach city. Steven was pretty sure there wasn't a fancy mansion with a garden but then again he can't really remember how he got here in the first place so maybe there's a warp pad around so he can get home. Not that he's worried or anything! Definitely not! He's fully prepared even though he doesn't even have his cheeseburger backpack. He walks a around a little, curious about this weird new place that doesn't really have any telltale Gem architecture. ]

Garnet? Amethyst? Pearl? Where are you guys? Where am I?

[ He wanders a bit more until he finds an open window and peers inside, nose and eyes poked over the top of the frame before he scrambles up over and sill and falls ungracefully onto the floor of the hallway. ] Oof! Geez... where are they?

Oh! [ Into his pockets he goes and digs out his cell phone! Except... ] Aw, whaaaat? No bars! I thought that was impossible!

[ After that his wandering gets a more frantic purpose as he runs down the hall and occasionally pulls open a door to check to yell for one of the Gems or his Dad or even Connie. Maybe he rips open your door, maybe he runs into someone barreling down the hall. ]

It does look familiar. Too bad that doesn't mean anything.

Simon looks down at the book inexplicably in his hand--imagine that, a real Time of Isolation-style book, paper and a leather binding--and tries to remember what he was going to do with it or even why he has it in the first place. He draws a blank. This is unfortunately an all too common experience these days.

Take a mental step back. Look around. He still remembers some things just fine. It's an unfortunate fact that most of those things are from Ezar's reign or earlier.

And this? Definitely not any of the rooms of palace. Ezar didn't do interior decorating this. Yes, it's all ostentatious enough, but it lacks that particular...Barayaran-ness, for want of a more descriptive word. Maybe Gregor...? He's still a boy--no. Yes? No. No, he's fairly certain Gregor is a man grown, and Gregor, too, has tastes that wouldn't match this. Particularly not this number of mirrors.

So why is this familiar? Where the hell is he? He's more annoyed than worried. Exasperated. Exasperated is an excellent word for it. And of course, whatever the situation, if it's strange, it-- "I don't know how, but this must be Vorkosigan's doing," he mutters.

That, he definitely remembers.

1.

[Norman sees the mansion before him and instantly thinks it's another vision. He looks from one side, to the other, then turns in a full 360 to get his bearings. Everything seems pretty normal, but then his visions have mainly been death and doom so he isn't going to let himself get comfortable just yet.

It seems a little pointless for him to be having another vision, though, just after he finally decided he would do as his uncle asked him to and find that book. Whatever it is, though, he just has to get through it and hopefully he won't find he's jumped out of his window once it fades.

When he stands there for a while and nothing actually happens, he rolls up his sleeves -- it's a little hot for autumn, isn't it? -- and pushes open the front door. He looks inside, not daring to enter just yet, but tries to peek around the doorway to see what it's like.

All looks pretty normal, if a little too fancy to be anything from Blithe Hollow.]

Hello...?

2.

[Norman's found himself a room and put up some zombie movie posters from the closets. If he's going to be staying here, it's gonna have to be at least a little homey. He's stayed put inside his new room rather than explore, and just flicked through posts on his device, not really paying more attention to the words he reads than the bare minimum. His mind is elsewhere.

Eventually, he can't keep pretending to read posts on the network anymore, and he opens up the text option.]

How come there's no ghosts here?

[His thumb hovers over the "send" button, hesitating. Does he really want people to think he's a freak so soon after he's arrived? With a blank slate, he can be normal. No one will call him names or push him around. And if there's really not any ghosts, the charade can continue.

But he can't help it. He has to know why. He can't just... pretend to be normal, even if it seems easier. He bites his lip and presses send.

Besides, without ghosts... he'd really be alone here.]

Threaded | Flat

DRAX THE DESTROYER | Guardians of the Galaxy

anna | frozen | iv

Chuck Shurley | Supernatural

R | Warm Bodies

Jefferson | Once Upon a Time

freya mikaelson | the originals | circa 218, let me know if you don't want spoilers

Kamala Khan | Marvel 616

Josh Rosza | The Originals | Early a Season two because I'm not caught up yet.

kitty cheshire | ever after high

Cisco Ramon | The Flash

Matt Murdock || Daredevil