TEST DRIVE #6

[fairyfoes]

TEST DRIVE MEME

Considering apping to EACHDRAIDH? Why not give the setting a test run here! OPTIONAL SCENARIOS 01. ARRIVING IN THE DRABWURLD. The Seelie and Unseelie courts welcome you with mirthful revelry and hearty food. After you have been briefed on your purpose here, you will find an endless feast and a night filled with entertainment to placate your concerns. Mingle with new arrivals, sneak down the castle halls and make sure your eyes are always on your glass; fairies and imps have no bias when it comes to tricks! 02. THE STATION. Looking for a little slice of home? The Station gives you all that and more. Take advantage of the wifi, have a cup of fairy-brewed coffee (the one they didn't spit in) or sit back and relax on the patio. You can even move your things into one of the available rooms! 03. WILDCARD. Your own scenario! Explore the Drabwurld or simply take advantage of your Locket!

Comments

[shewasvery]

"I don't think I've had the pleasure yet," she says of the imps, and makes a bit of a face. Then, as if that reminds her: "I'm sorry, where are my manners." She offers her hand, a forthright and businesslike gesture. "Victoria Lowell."

[cagedinflesh]

"You shall know when you do, immediately."

Jekyll smiles all the more for the introduction, and graciously accepts the offered hand. Far more warmth. "I'm known as Berserker. You must excuse me for not initiating the gesture! It is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Lowell. I take it you are quite new!"

[shewasvery]

Berserker? Victoria's long-practiced composure actually slips a little at that and her eyebrows go up in surprise—she can't square the looks of the gent in front of her with the...archaic name.

"Quite new, yes," she says, carrying on nevertheless. "I've only just arrived. You, I gather, are a more veteran resident?"

[cagedinflesh]

Oh, no. He didn't think at all, he shouldn't have given that name, he realises, too late. But of course it couldn't be Jekyll. Still, the impression Berserker gives is hardly any better. He backpedals, the only option.

"Not exactly veteran, no, yet not so new as all that. -Once more you must forgive my ineptitude in introduction. It is a certain poor habit. Allow me to try again. Dr. Hastie Lanyon. It remains a pleasure."

[shewasvery]

"Likewise, Dr Lanyon." The name rings a bell, distant and barely audible—no time to dwell on it now, of course; Victoria expects that if it's particularly important, her subconscious will make the link on its own and notify her in good time. She smiles, lightly teasing. "You must have been quite a character in your university days to earn a nickname like that. Or do I presume too much?"

[cagedinflesh]

He begins to say 'no', of course not, a little over-excited, perhaps, an altogether unbecoming quality for one such as himself, but nothing that would earn such a nickname. But he sees the chance to explain away the title without any mention of magic and his association to it, so he stops himself.

"Yes, I must admit, I rather was a nuisance. But, well, we all clean up our act in time. Yet nicknames are never forgotten by old friends. Nor oneself, it would seem." Ignoring that he hardly looks twenty, some people age well, of course! There is nothing strange here, don't think about it.

[shewasvery]

Victoria has no problem taking the explanation at face value, youthful looks aside (though recent experiences with other deceptively youthful-looking people do give her the briefest of pauses, to be considered more thoroughly later). She laughs. "I suppose there are still alumnae of Roedean who would call me 'the Snow Queen' to this very day," she says. "I rather think it's marvellous if you can make such a name part of oneself. Naming is a very powerful thing."

[cagedinflesh]

"An equally descriptive nickname!" He laughs in turn, putting aside those earlier moments of anxiety. "And yet you do not seem it at all now. Still, there is something fun about such names, memories. As you say, names hold a deep importance." Whereabouts is Roedean, if I may ask? University or highschool?"

[shewasvery]

"It's a girls' school just outside of Brighton. I went to Cambridge for university." To a certain kind of person, these facts, coupled with her demeanour, would instantly define Victoria: educated, more than a little posh, and probably with significant attitude about both. (All of these things are true, in fact.) "And you, Dr Lanyon? A medical doctor, or some other field?"

[cagedinflesh]

"Ah, how wonderful! I too attended Cambridge for university." Something which immediately makes him feel closer to Victoria. A comradarie. "Of course, it was males only at the time." To which he gives a small shrug of the head in apology. "My main area of study was medicine, chemistry - which has not changed - but I am also a doctor of laws."

[shewasvery]

"Ah, then you wouldn't know dear old Girton College," she says with a smile. "I was an historian, myself, with a dash of Classics. Never quite had the head for chemistry."

In fact, she could have if she'd wanted to—but history was more interesting and, in the end, more relevant. And she is, admittedly, underplaying her hand a bit, as she often does with men, particularly those of a more old-fashioned stripe.

[cagedinflesh]

He falters. History and classics, that's exactly the sort of combination that could see through his lie. Whether it's considered fact, or only a work of fiction. There's only a single instant in which his face falls, into an even more brief flash of fear. But Jekyll picks himself back up quickly. It's so much worse to show it.

"It is not so complicated a matter as it may seem! I am certain you would find the sciences really quite agreeable if you were to give them a go. History and literature are ever expanding in much the same way, after all. I'm afraid I have had little opportunity for such subjects myself."

[shewasvery]

Victoria, like all of the Foundation's field agents, has been taught to look for micro-expressions. She's aware of something like a hesitation; blink and you'll miss it. Or blink and you might imagine it happened. At that particular moment, a minor disturbance across the room catches her attention, so she misses anything that might tell her more.

"That reminds me—do tell me that there's some kind of library to be had here," she says. "And if there is one—what manner of things might one find there? The lore of this place exclusively, or perhaps more?"