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test drive meme

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 is your least favorite color? Which tool in a standard toolbox is most useful to you? What time of day do you accomplish the most? Do you have children? 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 ) Congratulations! You have been judged Drift Compatible, and sent home to pack after giving a definite yes to the Pan Pacific Defense Corps. The next thing you face down is the flight into Santiago, Chile, and the subsequent drive in to Valparaíso's Shatterdome. You and the rest of the crowd of soon to be PPDC Ranger Cadets have been gathered together to wait for the old bus scheduled to take you to the Shatterdome. While waiting in the open air, those from any Northern Hemisphere countries may find the summer weather strange. Today's high is going to be in the upper 80's, and there's not a cloud to be seen that's not clinging to the distant mountains. Welcome to Chile. When the bus arrives, it's another hour ride out toward the coastline to get to the Shatterdome. Even better? The bus Air Conditioner is broken. Safe travels, Cadets!

Please set up your own scenarios as you like. The above two scenarios are suggestions. Anything goes!

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[Damn right she is.]

Six days. We thought we'd get here and settled in before admission opened. Get the lay of the land.

[Try to learn their way around to avoid getting lost and looking like idiots. Doesn't mean it doesn't happen.]

Some pretty great stuff to do in town.

[Yancy snorts. Raleigh shrugs. There is considerably less to do around here than Sydney but Anchorage isn't that big of a place. Finding things to do that don't include the PPDC these days is a challenge and this is a whole new culture to absorb. People and language and custom he doesn't know. It's exciting.]

We should check it out once you're settled.

[ sdkflj what Raleigh Becket is inviting him to do things? Fucking dreams do come true, or something. He feels jittery, like he's met a rockstar - and he kind of has. ]

Yeah, yeah. Could show me around, gimme the lay of the land? [ They've been here a few days already, they know their way around. Hopefully. ]

[They're both rockstars, it's important to stick together. chuck must know more than they do how hard it is to make friends when you're on a giant pedestal all the time. It's hard to genuinely connect without fear that the person is just playing nice because you're famous.

It makes you doubt your friendships. An ugly truth. And here, surrounded by cadets and hopefuls? It's kind of almost worse. But shit, they're young, and Chuck is young and they already have more in common than anyone else here.

Kind of destined to be rockstar friends if you ask him.

Everyone says Chuck Hansen has an attitude but if he does, Raleigh hasn't seen it. The guy seems fine to him.]

Sure, man. Of course. I don't know if you've ever been to the Icebox but Ranger Quarters are so much better here. I think they want us to meet and greet for a while and there's a General Assembly in like half an hour, but after that I'm all yours.

"Are you calling me fat?"

Because clearly, he couldn't mean she's taking up too much of the seat -- that would be unthinkable. She turns to face him as well - inadvertently giving up part of the precious seat territory in her attempt to continue the argument.

"Really, I thought people bound for this program would have a bit more manners."

[He catches the look, arching a brow at her briefly before going back to being lost in his own thoughts, staring at the sky.

Thus occupied, he does leave her along for a good few minutes, only breaking the silence by suddenly straightening, rolling down his sleeves.]

Hey. We need to be getting back pretty soon, or someone's going to miss us.

I.

Soujirou had brought no expectations with him to Valparaíso. He had only brought his goals, and those were good enough. He had almost eagerly allowed himself to be shuffled off into a partnership and only half listened to instructions. His best feature was that he was friendly, after all.

Soujirou made sure to give his interview partner a bright and unwavering smile. He didn't think at all that it might be too bright or too unwavering. That was because he didn't carry something like 'doubt' or '~~fear~~ social awkwardness' with him.

"Aha, do you mind if I start?" He didn't wait for a reply before launching the first question, "Which tool in a standard toolbox is most useful to you?"

II.

"Ahaha. . .well." The words escaped him before he had a chance to stop them. Not that they were necessarily a faux pas. He couldn't be the only one experiencing what most would call 'nervous laughter' (not that his was particularly nervous). With the high temperatures and no air conditioning surely others would also feel the need to fill the air with some kind of commentary.

"At least we'll have to get along." Then he just kept talking. Soujirou made sure to smile though. Smiles could be fairly disarming, he knew, and now was as good of a time as any to make friends.

What a mild-mannered guy. It was almost disarming, in this day and age, to meet someone so... easygoing. Let alone in their environment, and what just happened. Was he just making small talk?

Then again, considering how he presents himself - apparently successfully - he can't exactly throw stones. But if he's like himself, that only makes it more specific.

"Sounds like a plan," Guy replies easily... Smiling right back. "With this many people hyped up, the heat'll either calm things down or make things worse."

"That's right, isn't it? And if it comes to blows, surely we'll all resolve it." Perhaps that was coming on a little too strong. He didn't really mean blows. He really should have said something like 'tempers flaring' but what was said was said and there wasn't any need to take it back.

Soujirou's smile didn't change one bit.

"Overworking yourself when it's too hot doesn't do anyone any good."

It was only then that he focused on the person speaking to him. Just the slight turn in his body, like an antennae subtly being tuned.

"That's not an answer."

He hadn't actually meant to say the words and certainly didn't mean them to be so forceful, but he found himself irrationally annoyed.

"The question isn't what the Drift is actually like. It's what you believe the Drift is like. You're a recruit for a Jaeger Academy. Even if you weren't, it's impossible for anyone to escape the commercialization of the Jaeger program. You may not have a good understanding of the experience, but if you claim that you haven't thought about it enough to have an opinion then I would have to call you a liar."

He sat back and folded his arms across his chest. Later he might regret being argumentative in an entrance interview but his disappointment would have to subside first. Growing up around politicians should've steeled him against evasive answers, but he never expected anything from the conniving men who Father worked with. His fellow recruits were supposed to be better than that.

Kou stiffens, almost imperceptibly for a moment as Mr. Becket rolls the name over, but relaxes again immediately when it isn't followed by recognition. He cants his head to either side, playfully examining Raleigh's face for a moment.

"Maybe not! She's teething, so your face is...hmm. Better in person."

"Going on two."

There's a hint of pride on Kou's face when he talks about his sister, though there's also a slight twitch just at the corner of his lips that hints at unspoken reservation as well. The smile reaches his eyes, though, and he casts a dreamy look off to the side. "Her name is Sachiko. She's really cute."

It's probably time to get back on track, though, so he straightens up in his seat a bit -though his posture is still relaxed and his expression still polite and friendly- and moves on. "What time of the day do you accomplish most tasks?"

Yaichirou may be miserable, but he's miserable with dignity. He sits straight in his seat, stony-faced with his eyes fixed on the cadet handbook in his lap. Never mind that he hasn't turned a page in the last ten minutes, or that he's sweating, or that he keeps grinding his teeth. If he ignores the heat hard enough it'll disappear out of sheer embarrassment.

After the bus hits three potholes in a row, it becomes impossible to even pretend that he can read under these conditions. He finally sits back and scans the rows, sizing up his fellow cadets-- and immediately feels like an idiot.

"Ichijo?!"

How long has he been there? Damn it, Yaichirou should've greeted him sooner. This might not be as formal as their usual encounters but it was still rude to ignore him. He clears his throat and tries to gather his composure.

"I must admit, I didn't expect to see you here. It's been a while."

A little over a year, in fact. He isn't keeping up with the prominent families nearly as well as he should.

Kou has been using the same handbook to fan himself. His movements are graceful and steady as usual when he turns to face Yaichirou. HIs eyes scan the other young man for a moment before he nods and returns the greeting. Hmm. He hadn't expected to see this guy here. After the tragedy the Shimogamo family suffered, they hadn't been sitting in social events recently.

"Hopefully you slept on the flight." He adds, with a yawn and stretch.

Guy still isn't sure what to make of this person from that, even though he'd said something a little weird. He had to be impressed at how opaque he was, despite the oddity. Guy really hoped nobody got too hyped up to actually fight, though. . .

"Surely everyone will be on their best behavior, considering," he says, gesturing wide to the bus. "Even though it's hot." There may have been a few rock star personalities in the interview rooms, and the job was half rock star if you just watched the news... but PPDC seemed to care about things like discipline.

"I'm Guy Cecil, by the way. What's your name?"

Guy looks a little bemused, though returns the slight twitch of a smile. He leans back, thoughtful.

"Vegetable, huh. Breaking out the hard questions," he replies, voice flat and serious, as though this answer to a vegetable question seized his very future.

Well, in a way, that was reality.

"Well, parsnips, I guess," Guy answers. "You wouldn't think much of 'em but they're pretty tasty. What's yours?"

He followed the other's gesture to the bus, and then let his gaze drift. Best behaviour. Everyone. He didn't really believe that. People were naturally easy to startle, naturally short tempered and selfish. On the other hand, goals did bring people together, and surely everyone else here was as devoted to the cause as he was.

"I'm sure you're right. After all, we're all here." If they weren't interested in behaving, at least for the sake of this goal, they wouldn't be here. That was his logic, anyway. "Soujirou. Seta Soujurou, it's a pleasure to meet you."

Her smile then was brief, almost sardonic. "You won't need to worry about sneaking a look at her. She keeps all of us busy dusting her down and oiling joints."

There's a degree of a jest in what she said, but an underlying sentiment she acknowledged and accepted. Until Jacqueline was back, Hydra Corinthian and Andrea were both decorations. She didn't enjoy the feeling, but it was a portion of what made her ideal for working on this project as a whole.

She turned on heel, opening the door. "Until then, Mike."

Unfortunately, Tenpou had already latched onto Sugane. Diligence and sobriety were traits that Tenpou did not himself possess, and so they were therefore a constant source of fascination. "I think Jump was at its high point during the late 1980s and 90s, really," he mused out loud. "Did you know that Saint Seiya is still popular here in South America? I like this country already."

Despite his wandering attention, he manipulated the robot's controls with surprising dexterity. A three-fingered metal claw snagged the bulbous mass of grey-blue alien tissue and lifted it free of its ammonia bath as if it were nothing more than an oversize UFO catcher prize. The overpowering vapors were largely handled by the lab's powerful air filtration system, but the smell was still strong enough to sting the eyes and throat. Tenpou didn't seem to notice, though. He let the sample drip over the tank for a few moments before he slowly began to transfer it to the bed of what resembled an oversized MRI scanner. A few unidentifiable fibrous blobs broke off and hit the floor wetly.

"Just scoop those up and throw them in the scanner!" Tenpou ordered gleefully. "Now you can tell your friends that you've seen a real Kaiju up close - or, well, bits of it, anyway. Isn't science cool?"

"Soujirou? Nice to meet you too."

It's strange, actually having a reason to be curious about the people around him. It felt like he'd been forcing it for years, in contrast. But drift compatibility in this particular project meant they'd all be seeing a lot of each other.

A lot of each other, in some cases.

"Where are you from? I flew in from the California branch. America." He could guess in general, but it was pretty rude to assume.

Truth be told, their absence has less to do with grief than with the personalities of those left behind. Mother had supported Father's political career but she has no interest in high society herself, and his brothers would only embarrass the family. Yaichirou is the only one left who cares about their reputation.

"It was somewhat difficult considering the close quarters." Read: he got maybe fifteen minutes of sleep and woke up with pins and needles all over. Airline seating just isn't build with tall people in mind. "I hope that you fared better."

He's operating on autopilot while he searches for a polite way to ask the burning question: why isn't Kou back home, learning the family business? He's been out of touch, but if there had been an upheaval serious enough to make them question Kou as their heir, he definitely would have heard.

Edited 2014-02-09 04:51 (UTC)

"So from your answer, I take it that you're someone who prizes flexibility?" Only the rise of her voice at the end makes her words a question. The slightest narrowing of her eyes however give away that she considers it more of a conclusion. "Still, it's rather limiting. We can only find out so much from one choice. Personality type, any psychological disorders, how someone might approach a problem."

She shifts in her seat, the first sign of restlessness from her. "Our particular answer to this question may reveal a lot about us but given that we're allowed several choices from which to pick, it might still leave quite a bit unrevealed or open to interpretation. That freedom of choice can give someone room to pick the one that would show them in the best possible light. I'd rather know how someone would answer when their choices are more limited."

And she still hasn't given her own answer to the question.

"Maa. . . I'm sort of from all over." A beat. "I mean, I travel a lot. Or rather, I've traveled a lot." Despite the fragmentation of his sentences he wasn't nervous. It probably came off a little empty or airheaded, really. But that sort of thing didn't matter here, not to Soujirou anyway.

He did store the information away though. Guy Cecile. From the California branch in America. A nice enough person, so far, though not notable in any way, yet.

The seating had seemed anything but cramped to Kou, who'd had the benefit of very good seats and a much smaller stature on his side. Still, he hadn't been able to sleep a wink, he'd been so excited at the adventure that waited for him on the other side.

He can see unasked questions in Yaichirou's expression. It's no small wonder. It probably seems a pretty ridiculous maneuver to the guy, checking out right in the middle of being groomed for family obligations to go play hero in another country. In Kou's opinion, it's a breath of fresh air. With the exception of the stuff choking him as it whistles in through the bus window, that is.

He smiles faintly, and rolls his eyes. Might as well acknowledge it, right? "I was too excited. When I passed the first level everyone was shocked. You can imagine they weren't too happy to let me go try my hand at this."

He laughs, cheerful and musical, not the polite chuckle or formal smile that Yaichirou is accustomed to seeing from him.

Edited 2014-02-09 05:58 (UTC)

"Eggplant." She's definitive in her answer, though something around her eyes looks amused. The laugh lines there deepen right before she blinks. "Particularly with Parmesan."

She continues to ignore the list. "How about hobbies? What do you do in your you time?"

"Of course I've thought about it!" Sugane stood up and glared, arms held tightly at his sides. "I've thought about it, but I have nothing to compare it to, so how can I form an opinion on it? When I've done it myself, I'll know and that's all I need to know."

It wasn't that Sugane was being evasive or not making an effort to give a proper answer, it was more that he wasn't the most creative or abstract of thinkers. Serious-minded to a fault, he was the sort of person who needed to have something concrete in front of him before he could understand it. He expected his answer to be laughed at or scoffed at, but he hadn't expected to be called a liar, considering nothing could be further from the truth.

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test drive meme

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hi! 'u'

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seta soujirou | rurouni kenshin

II

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Welp, that flipped the Asshole Switch. SORRY SUGANE?

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(this particular conversation is in Japanese btw to anyone seated nearby, belatedly)

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HE'LL ENDURE