+ JULY / AUGUST TDM +

[vitaelamorte]

JULY/AUGUST TEST DRIVE MEME
You're like an angel with no wings.





Prompt A: Serious Event

In each trip a character makes from their room, they will have one random encounter with a monster (or monsters) that will attack them. Fight, team up with others, run away if you think you can, but there are monsters. Everywhere.

Prompt B: Lighter Event

The mansion is gone and now we're all camping! Women on one side of the camp and men on the other with a large picnic area in between. It's like summer camp except there are no counselors. You are in charge of making your own food and fun. If you wander too far out in the woods, you'll just get lost and wind up at the campsite again. Make s'mores! Tell spooky stories! Have fun!
Prompt C: ediS rorriM

Peace has been restored to the mirror side with the White Queen ruling, but she does have a request: get to know one another, dear mirrors. She's hosting a 1990s dance party and you're all invited. Jam out to Spice Girls and mingle.

Prompt D: Choices

Any scenario goes! Thread out your character's arrival, have them act like a long-established resident, let our past events inspire your scene, or write up literally any Wonderland-based scenario you feel like playing with.

Rules

Test drive memes go up every other month. Please note that any threads made as part of the test drive meme don't count towards your activity check, and they can't be used as samples for any future applications. Thank you for understanding, and have fun!



NAVIGATION ♥ RESERVES ♥ APPLICATION ♥ INPUT & INQUIRIES

Comments

your ben is TOO GOOD

[ladydemocracy]

Good! I'll be there in a minute and you can keep bumming me out in person.

[ The feed ends with a 'bye I love you!' that's said super fast before he can tell her not to hang up. And the thing is, she really is worried. They have a whole life in Pawnee and friends and family, and her point isn't that she missed how terrifying this place is at all. That part she knows by now and the message is loud and clear.

Which means, when Leslie's finally caught sight of her husband, the relief on her face is palpable and she goes right to him, wrapping her arms around his neck. Her calm exterior and ease on the network is one thing. The way she's tightly holding onto him is another. But when she pulls back she's answering his theoretical question. ]

Don't be mad but I already ate ten waffles and drank three coffees with sugars. Ben! You're here!

[ A little belated, but followed by a bright grin. ]

Greatness inspires greatness~

[calculators]

[She hangs up so quickly that Ben knows she already dashing out the door from her makeshift office. So, he'll wait. He can do that. Easy enough. Only, it's not. The half a dozen minutes she takes to show up feel infinitely longer than the half dozen months he'd spent away in DC. The last two and a half days had been no picnic but they were easier to bear when he didn't know if he was dead, if Leslie was here, any of the finer details. Now, Ben thinks he might have an aneurysm if any more time passes.

When Leslie shows up, he's right where she told him to wait. Still pacing, hands shoved in the pockets of his suit jacket as if it somehow tones down how neurotic he looks.]

Leslie! [He hugs her just short of ferociously, kisses her forehead, and doesn't really let go when she steps back. As for the waffles, well. Hopefully they weren't poisoned and he's just smart enough not to voice that out loud.] So you had, like, 100 sugars with some coffee on the side?

[See? Not all doom and gloom. For maybe another three minutes. If she wanted a perpetually positive spin, she should've married Chris.]

:')

[ladydemocracy]

[ The idea of being married to Chris doesn't work for her and also feels like it would be exhausting. God bless Ann (the betrayer) for agreeing to have a baby with him because Leslie can't imagine what it's like to be with him 24/7. Even though she loves him and he's a dear friend. Still. ]

I love how well you know me.

[ She kisses him now, then stands so that they're shoulder to shoulder and she can take one of those nervous hands in hers. ]

Okay, I know how bad you wanna tell me what the odds are of us dying, percentage-wise. Have you already made charts, should I sit down?

[ She's not exactly making fun of him, she's an equal opportunity fact sharer if nothing else. And she knows the fear and concern is real, that she needs to know what he knows. ]

[calculators]

[Any other time, seriously any, and Ben would be turning that kiss into a makeout session. Right now though? He just can't summon the will. This isn't an impending election loss or the thought of moving away from Pawnee. It's the possibility of never going home again. Of seeing his wife die prematurely. Resting his forehead against Leslie's, he sighs.]

I've already run the numbers on myself. I was hoping you'd never end up here though, so... No. I didn't make death spreadsheet on my wife. [Even if he already knows the likely probabilities in his head.] That's one chart I'm never making.

Ugh. This place sucks.

[Ben squeezes Leslie's hands some.] But I bet you still think Eagleton is worse. [Said with a faint attempt at a smile. Those guys reallllly do suck though, she's not wrong.]

[ladydemocracy]

[ The look on his face is enough, and she lays her head against his shoulder, keeping their fingers laced together. ]

Eagleton is actual hell with hell demons walking around in people meat suits, so yeah, it's way worse.

[ Suck it, Eagletonians. ]

Hey, can I show you something, though?

[ Leslie tugs at his hand and she knows this isn't a fix all and it never will be but, maybe it's something. She takes him to the second floor and opens a door. There, in the room is their mural, the wildflowers, with a bench underneath. It's not exactly the same, but it's damn close. ]

I might have made a pit stop while I was coming to find you.

[ It's a silent affirmation: they'll get through this, because they're together. ]

;_; Leslie is the best wife.

[calculators]

They probably don't even have waffles in Eagleton. Or pancakes. Just... crepes. [Crepes are actually kind of good, Ben found. There were some really amazing crepe based food trucks in DC. But he won't tell Leslie that if his stupid jokes keep her smiling.] And sure, if it's not more breakfast food.

[Look, he just doesn't trust anything here yet besides his actual wife. And that's only because it hasn't occurred to him that it could've been a mirror version doing some kind of messed up long con. The infinite possibilities of fuckery were bound to give him a mental breakdown at some point though.]

Wait, where are we going?

[Leave it to Leslie to have actually meant it when she said she'd explored the whole place. Probably made her own map too, when she found pre-existing ones to be lacking. Ben's thinking about the many great attributes of his wife, just as she drags him into a not so random room to show off what she's done.]

...

You... made that? Somewhere in the six minutes it took you to get off the video chat and get down to me? [Ben ought to sound incredulous but in reality, his tone is just impressed. From what he's gathered, creating or summoning things is simply a matter of will. If anyone, in any world, in any reality was a testament to unwavering will? It was Leslie Knope. He'd be lying if he says he's surprised that she can pull something like this off on the fly. However, he is touched that it's something for them that appears to be such a timely motivator.] I love it and I like it.

[His not so silent affirmation that he's going to stay by her side, no matter what this possible purgatory-afterlife-mashup throws at them. Ben might even go so far as to be brave in the future, if it's called for.]

what can I say, her husband inspires her

[ladydemocracy]

[ Leslie has endless optimism and boundless energy, and she tries hard to be positive in the face of a lot of crap. But she knows Ben is scared because she's in what could be a death trap. She hasn't really stopped to think about what she would do if he died here because she's pretty sure somewhere in the back of her mind she assumed they'd just never be aware of moving on to some amazing afterlife where they were forever young. It'd just happen 70 years from now.

Turning, she takes his hands in hers, leaning so that her forehead is against his. Somehow, in front of the place where they shared a meal, where they sat while she was in her makeshift wedding dress, everything seems easier. If only for a brief moment. ]

We can do anything together. And I know it's dangerous and I know you're scared. If I'm being honest...I am too. But I've already met really nice people who've told me really great things.

[ And one woman on her crap list for assuming things about Pawnee, but that's a different thread. ]

It may be scary, and it may feel like a bad situation, but we got this, Wyatt. I believe in us.

[calculators]

[Ben isn't sure if he feels better or worse when Leslie admits out loud that she's afraid. He generally relies on her to exist as the perpetual force to be reckoned with. To go on public television and shred celebrity personalities apart; to dress down the old mayor from his town, even when his own family runs the other way. It's unfair though, in the face of genuinely warped reality, to expect her to not admit a moment's weakness to her own husband. So, Ben just doesn't think about feeling better or worse. He just sets his shoulders straight, and gives her a determined look.]

I don't believe in anything here, but I was the first one to sign on for the Knope campaign. That hasn't changed. Team Knope all the way. [Team Knope has always been the both of them, even if Ben's role has just been to support Leslie in the past. Leading her over to the bench, he tugs her down to sit and wraps an arm around her shoulders whenever she does.] This bench is way too nice and new for a Pawnee bench. We're going to have to break it in. Maybe knock a few dings in it, chip the varnish.

Spill some soup and waffles on it.

[Read: They can meet up here any time she wants.

Also, soup is a perfectly acceptable meal, people need to stop hating on it.]

[ladydemocracy]

[ Fear can be a strength. Besides, they have nothing to actually fear but fear itself. If they use that fear and funnel it into everyone looking out for one another, maybe they can't stop the bad things but they can at least know they aren't all alone in whatever happens. There's a positive Leslie Knope spin to all of this, while trying to stay realistic.

And if she tears up just a little at Ben's words, well, she laughs at the end to cover it as she leans against his shoulder, taking his hand again. ]

We'll put the true Pawnee mark on it soon. Soup is a nice touch. Maybe we should let a raccoon loose in here.

[ Would she do it? Maybe. Probably not. But maybe. ]

Think of all the people you can teach Cones of Dunshire to.

[ There have to be a ton of lovable nerds who'd eat it up. ]