test drive meme (#2)

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Test Drive Meme The Pan Pacific Defense Corps was usually offered any of a variety of local buildings to set up their testing centers. For reasons of access and availability, most testing clinics were set up in central areas for any given community. Those of the PPDC staff on hand vary in their personal intensity. Some of the men and women wearing Strike Group insignia seemed overly serious, to the point of frowning with intensity at some of the youngest checking in for this testing round. Those from the K-Science division are tight with nervous energy as they direct prospective cadets through various activities. Everything was meant to measure potential, looking for that spark that meant they had somebody who was Drift Compatible. The majority of people were turned away after the first series of seemingly random tests, officials looking in eyes, placing odd looking contraptions over heads, asking for people to play a series of short games, one even in a virtual reality set-up.
	( SCENARIO ONE ) If you are still here now, you've made it past the first cut. You'll be sat down in a room with the rest who have made it this far, then systematically led into smaller interview rooms as pairs. If you came with a partner, they're your first interview candidate. If you came on your own, all your interviews are random assignment. All who have been asked to stay are required to sit through and conduct a series of short peer to peer interviews. The questions are straightforward. What kind of pets would you like to own? What game do you gravitate toward first in an arcade? What does the fox say? Where do you squeeze your toothpaste tube to get toothpaste on your toothbrush? What do you believe the Drift is like? Peer to peer interviews last for half an hour to an hour, and each person is asked to participate in at least three peer-to-peer interviews. There is no punishment for going off script. There is a one-way mirror looking into each interview area, and one door leading into the room with a small panel of glass located on the door. There is a clock on the wall in each room. The time they report is odd when examined. These are not digital clocks, but timers, counting up time since the last Kaiju attack.
	( SCENARIO TWO ) You've been accepted into the Jaeger Academy. You've been assigned to your barracks, issued your uniform and necessities, shown the overall layout of the Shatterdome, and told the wake up call is at 0530. You're settling in to the Academy schedule, and for many, it may be brutal indeed. When you're brought into the indoor swimming pool, it's to an overwhelming stench of chlorine. Your swimsuits are all the same for the men, simple swim-trunks, one uniform blue. Women wear a blue and white racer style swimsuit, in the same cut across the board. Uniformity doesn't disappear for swimming lessons. Lessons start out basic, teaching each Cadet to rely on themselves and each other to keep them afloat. From there, maneuvers get more complicated. Learning safe diving techniques, practicing proper holds to keep an unconscious or panicked partner afloat. Speed, agility, and endurance: all will be in demand. Then you start hearing rumors about full uniform swims coming up the next session.
Please set up your own scenarios as you like. The above two scenarios are suggestions. Anything goes! If you want to stop by and see about doing some communal AU Worldbuilding, check out the new AU Worldbuilding Meme!

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Tom-B292 | Halo

[chosethewar]

Scenario One

The serious young man sat stock-still in the uncomfortable chair they'd provided for him. There was a slight shortness on the forward left arm that made the entire structure slightly off kilter and it would rock the chair with even the barest of movements. Tom wondered if it was deliberately set up that way to make any entrants uneasy and incapable of becoming comfortable thanks to the fact that every sound seemed to echo in the sterile and tiny interview room.

He refused to let any nervousness show but instead spent the time till his interviewer showed up counting the tiles on the wall in front of him. There were thirty-two rows down and almost twenty-six rows of stark white subway tile inlaid into the wall. To keep himself mental stimulated, Tom spent the time calculating how many tiles that would be and how many square feet the wall comprised. Unfortunately, time seemed to stretch on forever without any sight of his interviewer and the longer it took, the more anxious he became.

Were they doing this deliberately to see what he'd do? Was this another one of their tests to see how long he'd wait before taking a proactive role to see what was going on? Or was he just being paranoid? Tom couldn't tell and settled for reaching up to loosen the collar of his shirt so he could breathe more easily. The chair rocked treacherously and creaked something awful.

[reengineered]

She kicked herself for being so late. Another interview with someone else had run long; they'd had too much to discuss in the end, and neither party had noticed when they ran over time. Now she was rushing to the next room, flipping through pages in her notebook to find something blank. Hastily, as she walked, she scribbled her name and an apology in large letters.

Then she threw open the door, eyes wide and apologetic. And there he was, looking somehow awkward enough to make her want to turn right back around and leave. She was no stranger to her own intensity and standoffishness, so this guy didn't seem intimidating to her at first glance. Stiff, too ready for anything... Yes, that was it. So maybe he was as nervous as she was. Maybe he was about to bolt.

But she silently took her seat and turned the notebook toward him.

Lucy. Sorry I'm late.

[chosethewar]

To his credit, he didn't jump when the door abruptly crashed open. Shooting a curious look over his shoulder, the dark-haired youth studied Lucy curiously for a moment. He forced a grave looking smile but it didn't really look particularly entreating or welcoming.

"Good afternoon?" Was she the interviewer? She barely looked his age much less someone who was qualified to do evaluations. An inscrutable look kept the skepticism off the young man's face. Leaning forward slightly, he scanned the notepad and the message written there.

"Lucy? Right, I'm Tom." At least this time the smile was less forced. "Are you the interviewer?"

[reengineered]

Well, then. She stared at him for a moment, then hastily scribbled on her notepad again.

Yes. I just finished another one.

Peer interviews, and Lucy without a partner, all she had seen were a handful of strangers, asking and answering the same things over and over. But there was something about it that made her feel more familiar, more comfortable. They turned into conversations, and she opened minds with her disability, that much she could sense. She'd been shocked at the lack of resistance, and that no one bothered to hold it against her that she didn't speak. This really would be the place for her, wouldn't it?

But she had to get through this first. Hurriedly, Lucy looked over the list of questions.

What kind of pets would you like to own? Turning the words to him, she looked perhaps a bit expectant.

[chosethewar]

"I see, well it's nice to meet you, Lucy." Tom wasn't sure what to make of the fact that this thus far silent young lady apparently couldn't speak. Which seemed like it would make her wholly unsuited for any kind of para-military organization like the PPDC.

Surely if this disability of hers was liable to interfere with her duties she wouldn't be here though, right?

"Pets? I had a dog growing up. He was a lab mix but he uh--he died." Tom's file read that he was just one of hundreds of children who'd been orphaned by Trespasser's attack on the Bay Area. Compared to the loss of his parents, the loss of the family dog seemed like it should be so trivial but it wasn't.

[reengineered]

With a nod, she acknowledged his greeting, not wanting to waste time writing a formality that anyone could clearly understand from a simple motion. She'd stopped letting it hinder her. She'd completely stopped caring about her differences beyond making sure that she could adapt to the world around her, rather than trying to make it adapt to her. Not being deaf at the same time, she felt she didn't face the challenges of others; she simply didn't speak. Maybe someday she would, but for now she bore the wieght of her self-imposed disability as well as she could. And she wouldn't let it hold her back for even a moment. After all, the Drift would make everything clear once she found a partner.

Alright, so it got awkward fast. But let's face it, several of their fellow candidates had stories of loss and disaster, so they couldn't afford to be too sentimental and emotional about it. She'd have to press on, as would they all. So she pondered for a moment, then wrote something briefly:

I'm sorry.

[chosethewar]

"Ancient news, am I right?" He played it off with a mild look and a slight shrug. The young man rested his hands in front of him on the table and shot Lucy a curious look.

"Is that really a question? What kind of pets I might have had?" It seemed like a strange thing to ask so Tom figured it couldn't hurt to ask why it would be an interview question. Surely asking things about how he'd feel when coming face to face with a Kaiju would be more effective a test question. He'd have been able to answer that question easily enough. Much like anyone who'd ever seen the ferocity of a Kaiju attack up close and personal, he hated the alien creatures with every fiber of his being.

The physical destruction and nukes humanity had to use in order to take the monsters down was one thing but things like Kaiju Blue which affected every living creature it encounter was more telling of a reminder about just how awful encounters with Kaiju could be.

[reengineered]

Nodding in agreement, though with a bit of hesitation, she lowered the notebook. She'd tried to be sociable, but he was the sort who didn't really want to put up with this, wasn't he? Still, she shoved the questions over to him so he could look as well. Of course they were the regulation questions; otherwise, she wouldn't have bothered.

What did she really want to know? She wanted to know how each of them got here, what their stories were, how she could learn to work with them and make them understand her. She had a deep desire to find a comrade among them all, someone to trust and work with until she could take the next step up.

With a shrug, she took the paper back, then settled the notebook between them.

I don't care either.

[chosethewar]

It wasn't like he was being combative, he just...had no idea what to expect here. Everyone had heard of the PPDC and for someone like Tom who had literally lost everything at the hands of the Kaiju monsters, it meant even more to him that he get in. Driven was definitely a word for the serious young man.

Curious, he leaned forward so he could read the questions with a quizzical look. After scanning the paper, he looked back up at Lucy and smiled perhaps genuinely for the first time; gravely and perhaps just a little shy.

"What does the fox say? As in that silly song from 2013?" He could vividly remember listening to that song play while sitting at his grandfather's table pretending to do schoolwork. It had been only a month or two after K-Day and Tom could still recall how irritated he'd been at the ridiculousness of the lyrics. Back then, he'd been your typical angry, and ill-adjusted orphan who'd felt isolated from everything and everyone. Looking back, he was appalled by his behavior but his grandfather had put up with Tom's moodiness with the same unflappable calmness he applied to most other things in his life.