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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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Friendship is the foundation of successful drifting.

[He intoned it with all due solemnity, a direct quote from some pamphlet or another that'd been with their official Cadet literature. He was still maybe warping the rhetoric to his own purposes, but he really didn't want to start off his first day making enemies. That was more of a second week kind of thing.]

( She opened her mouth to argue about that — that while it's true, it doesn't mean it's a prerequisite — but Leila had a feeling this conversation will soon devolve into some kind of a debate. Which she's not really in the mood for at that moment. Not that she minded debates but she was hoping to spend her lunch time more productively with less arguments.

Sighing, Leila decided against leaving for now and settled in one of the corners of the railing, opening her book. )

That line isn't a very effective quote if you're actually looking for friends.

Andy's as content to allow the conversation to continue as it does, meandering and allowing Luke to participate as much as he feels comfortable. From where she sat, that give and take was all the more important going forward. Muuch as a willingness to engage, no matter how skewed the platform of performance he started out on.

"Cycling's fairly prominent throughout Chile. There's a tour through the Andes I hear is fantastic, if you've got the time and can handle the elevation." There was evidence that those born at the higher altitudes developed better lung capacity and an increased capacity for exercise than those born closer to sea level. She'd done some research into the details when she'd been considering taking part in any of the local races. The end conclusion had been it'd be better if she did nothing more than recreational cycling, and even that had to be carefully planned out.

All of that was simply a pathway for the conversation to wander. "See how you feel about it after settling in to the schedule." Like he was already on his way there. Andrea knew if he'd made it to the point of interviewing, he was already on his way. The real tests came down once people were at the Academy. "Are you much of a handyman, by any chance?"

"Sometime's it's all we've got." Her voice goes dry, much like her humor appeared to be in the moment. Hope had been a dream behind the Jaeger program, leading from schematics to the first working versions of the Pons up to the breakthrough in the dual piloting system, and the success of the first Jaeger Ranger team against the Kaiju. Hope is what kept people cheering when the Jaegers were causing only acceptable levels of collateral damage in cities, when the Kaiju weren't stopped outside the miracle mile.

She shook her head, pushing back on her chair. "Make it through the first three months and you'll know firsthand."

It wasn't a promise, but it was a fact. Simulations ran after getting through basic training. It wasn't a true Drift, but the real deal had several tons of mechanical body linked in. Nothing was like a true Drift in a Jaeger.

"Have you worked with teenagers before?"

"I leave the home improvement to the ones with a talent for it." Andy'd never had the mind for domestication, and when it came down to being a handy-woman, she alternated between the wonders of the internet as a go-to manual and calling in the professionals before the situation escalated. Still, she allowed herself a halfway smile. "Usually all I need on hand's an Allen wrench."

Most of what she needed to do with her mountain bike needed little more than a few good hexagonal wrenches.

"The really impressive toolkits are what the engineering and maintenance teams lug around. I'm not even sure when they get around to sleeping."

Speaking of... "Would you consider yourself a night owl?"

Apparently he's alright with carrying on a conversation while someone is trying to concentrate, because he doesn't seem to mind that she works and writes as they do. Instead of seeming put off by her going above and beyond—even if he may not have deduced the full extent of it, tactics is an elective he's better off staying away from— he grins and leans back into his chair a little. Dedication is a thing he honestly admires in other people. Takes training too seriously could be Eren Jaeger's middle name if it wasn't so many unnecessary syllables.

"You'll like Armin," he says, and he seems utterly sure of that, despite the fact that she hasn't agreed to meet the cadet in question once he finally shows up. "He's always been real good at this sort of stuff."

Tactics. Armin had racked up high scores in SRPGs when they were kids, a talent that seems to have translated to real live battle simulations with (frankly frightening) ease.

"He ought to be around here soon—" Enthusiasm running a little faster than his common sense, he leans back until his chair is propped only on its two hind legs, which allows him to crane his neck for a better view of the door in the most casually reckless way possible. Something resembling common sense does catch up to him, though, because while he doesn't move from his perilously balanced position, he looks back over at her and says, "Hey, what's your name?"

He'd definitely seen her around before, but they haven't spoken before now. She usually seems to be keeping her head down.

[1]

There are plenty of fresh young faces on the bus, but Toji may very well be one of the youngest, having his birthday fall just within the cutoff date for enrollment. But as far as he's concerned, he's pretty much an adult anyway (so really, the mindset of your typical teenager). At least enough of one to know that this is his decision and he's sticking to it.

This particular child is a little cranky and in need of a nap. The oppressive heat and the jet lag are getting to him, and he can't even get comfortable enough to sleep on the bus. Not to mention his seatmate is too close for comfort, particularly when there's a bump in the road or a sudden turn.

"Maaan," he grumbles, fanning himself with his hand. "It's too hot to be this packed together... scoot over a little."

[2]

It doesn't matter what's being served for lunch, it is never enough to satisfy the walking stomach that is an adolescent boy. Where does it all go? It is a mystery. But with his own rations having vanished into the gaping void of his belly, Toji's on the prowl for seconds, starting with any poor soul sitting at his table with food still on their trays.

"Hey, you gonna eat that?"

[3]

Wildcard! It's your call.

Edited 2014-02-01 10:39 (UTC)

Raleigh flails and ties to side step but only gets about half out of the way when they collide. He immediately steps back, hands raising up in a light defensive gesture.

He looks down and sees it's a cadet and relaxes, lowering his hands back down.

"It's fine. No harm done." He hadn't really been paying attention, either.

[Raleigh hear the reaction to Chuck approaching before he sees him. Students stop and gasp as he passes. A real Ranger in a real drivesuit. His identification is impossible to miss, he's one of the newest and most successful Rangers to ever leave the academy. And he's still just a kid. Younger than Raleigh when he'd entered the program by an entire year.

Raleigh looks up and can't help but smiling. He's never met the pilot coming towards him but he sure knows who he is. Chuck offers his hand and he takes it immediately and with a smile.]

Guilty as charged. A pleasure to meet you, Chuck, we've heard great things.

[A firm handshake and he breaks for Yancy to do the same who smiles and nods echoing his brother with a pleased to meet you.

It'd be a flat out lie to say they weren't excited about being stationed with Striker. They have an incredible admiration for Herc after their ride in Manila and although it's a shame his co pilot didn't work out it seems to be for the best now. Chuck is proving himself left, right, and center. And if The Beckets are his inspiration, Herc is definitely one of theirs. Raleigh's in any case. So being reassigned together is basically perfect.]

How was the ride in? [Because he would ask if Chuck is just suited up for fun but he knows the look in the kid's eye. He's just come out of the Drift.]

Enthusiastic seems to be a better middle for him, in her opinion. For one thing, he doesn't look like he's about to stop talking anytime soon. And while admittedly it's a bit distracting and she has to pause once in a while to make sure that she's still writing what she's supposed to write, Leila doesn't mind it one bit. He actually reminds him of a friend from back home who has the same tendencies, talking tirelessly and endlessly about anything and everything. It makes her stop and wonder how she is at the moment, if she's still catching grasshoppers to draw them.

That name again. Armin. A very close friend or someone he's known for a long time, no doubt, with the way he just spoke about him. And to say that she'll like him with such confidence, as if he already knows her just by looking at her once. She supposes it's an almost accurate deduction. Almost.

"It's Leila," she replies with another smile, pointedly eyeing his chair. "And I look to forward to meeting your friend. Hopefully we don't get thrown out of the library before then though."

She can already tell what he's doing, with the creaking of the wood and the scraping sound on the linoleum floor. And she can only imagine what kind of a sound a person crashing to the floor would produce and how fast it would summon the closest figure of authority to them.

Yaichirou had dealt with a spate of disgracefully unprepared cadets, so when he saw his next interview partner it was all he could do not to heave a sigh of relief. Finally, someone who was taking themselves seriously. Perhaps there was hope for humanity after all. He didn't go so far as smiling-- that might be construed as unprofessional-- but he reached across the table and offered his hand.

"Good afternoon. Yaichirou Shimogamo. Are you ready to begin?"

Who knows what's going on behind the mirror, but on this side it's a tough crowd. Appreciative as she was at the attempt at levity, Mikasa's face still carried the expression of someone who was a little too serious for too much of the time.

She clears her throat, "At least you won't have to worry about yellow drivesuits." Her face doesn't give much of an indication that she's joking, but it's a lame attempt nonetheless.

The scarf's absense is definitely noticed, and Mikasa has fully turned around where she's still standing on the step of the bus- essentially holding up the traffic and eliciting a series of complaints from those waiting behind her. From her vantage point, it's easy to see where the scarf blew off to, and she quickly excuses herself through the crowd, giving up her good spot in line to fall back where Toji stood.

"Sorry, that's mine." Unnecessary, since who else would push through a throng of hot, sweaty people to chase after a raggedy old scarf?

Sugane had been prepared to bow, so it took a moment of fumbling before he collected himself and shook Yaichirou's hand firmly.

"Sugane Tachibana, pleased to meet you. If you don't mind, I can ask the first question." He wasn't quite sure if it was nerves or if his voice really did come out about twice as loud as it should have. Possibly both. At least no one was laughing at him for being excessively formal this time. "So, er..." He had the questions memorized, so what were they?! "What's your least favorite color?"

Now that was a question. His brows raised as he started to lean back. "Depends on what you mean by 'worked with.' I mean, I was one, and I stayed over holidays at school so I ended up hanging out with some of the... uh." He paused, then motioned to himself with a wry twist of his lips. "The problem cases. And it seemed to help. That's about the most work with teenagers I've done."

He hadn't exactly been a humanitarian. He hadn't been a volunteer. He'd just been a guy. Same as everyone else. He was nice, sure. Nice enough. Tended to stand up for the little guys, which was what had gotten him in so much trouble to start out with. But he'd not really gone out of his way.

It's not the first time it's happened, but it never fails to get a bit of a grin out of him. Eren brushing off a concept only to have him latch back onto it with renewed vigor after being taken through its merits. But it does leave Armin having to cast about for an elaboration on his response.

If he had to overthink the question, he's always held warm colors in a harsher context. They're brighter, louder, more eye-catching, thus put to use where the eye needs to be caught most. Indications of danger. While yellow and orange are fundamentally more grating, they serve as more of a warning: a backdrop for important notices, a vest to stand out a vulnerable worker in a bustling construction site, a color scheme of a venomous animal. Red comes after. It's a sign that the damage has already been done; sirens, emergency vehicle lights, the color of blood.

Even if he hadn't been quite at ground zero, there had been a lot of red that day. A lot of confused and frantic and scrambling red, completely baffled as to how to handle the impossible situation. If that isn't overthinking, he's not sure what is.

"I'm just partial to cool colors. Yellow and orange get a bad enough rap as it is, but red is overrated."

Nailed it. There's a little shrug to follow. A thought process doesn't require a four-page essay of personal history, it requires a simple explanation (which is just as much the truth as anything else, even before any influential factors, he'd never quite understood the allure of the hue). Speaking of, had Eren's answer been genuine or had he simply thrown it out before coming to appreciate the exercise?

"Why don't you like purple?"

Exhaustion aside, the sound of another pair of footfalls keeping pace beside him as opposed to shooting on past is enough to coax up his gaze, eyes opening and catching sight of the veritable athlete striding along without a care in the world.

Armin lets off a slightly more emphatic huff at the sight. Maybe there's a little pang of envy in the glance, but it's far from venomous. Unlike the words the other offers, albeit in a much more potentially literal sense. Well, that's one excuse to take a break.

"Where?"

It isn't a yell, but with as hard as he's breathing, the noise comes out as harsh as it is suddenly rife with alarm. Digging in his heels and coming to a halt like a horse balking at a jump, his eyes snap down to the track, wide and searching for any sort of winding line stretched across his path.

"No need to apologize to me! More to-- that fellow up yonder."

Aforementioned fellow meaning the bus driver, meaning the man with the perpetual unimpressed scowl and, he'd be willing to wage, the meanest eyebrows this side of the Pacific. Following only took the brown-haired man so far, however; by the end of the seat aisles, he'd hang back, voice turning into an unsubtle whisper toward the other. A makeshift good luck asking, perhaps.

"I think his name's Jameston."

The fellow's name definitely wasn't Jameston.

"Don't take it personally," Tenpou snorted, amused by the boy's serious demeanor. "Statistically, the vast majority of candidates will fail out of the Ranger program before they ever see the inside of a Jaeger. Still, anyone willing to even try to become a Ranger is probably crazy enough to be natural PPDC material. Ah, careful with that," he cautioned, tilting his head towards the precarious stack of old pizza boxes. "That's an extremely delicate experiment in progress."

He lead the way towards a rack of bright yellow hazmat suits, each made from a thick rubbery material supposedly guaranteed to resist a Kaiju's highly corrosive internal fluids. "Put one of those on on. Gloves and face shields are on the top shelf. I need an extra pair of hands to help me transfer a sample of Kaiju testicles - well, we think they're testicles, anyway - to the scanner. They're a bit slippery!" If the expression on the boy's face when presented with the chance to touch an alien's massive decomposing glands was anything other than pure scientific delight, Tenpou chose to ignore it.

"Hm... what was your name again? Su... Suga... Sugar?" He hadn't run screaming from the lab yet, so he name might be worth remembering.

((OOC: I'm taking some liberties here and including the stuff you mentioned in the AU histories meme. Let me know if you don't want that and I'll fix it!))

[Yaichirou has spent all morning trying to figure out where he's seen the kid before. He'd definitely seen him-- he never forgets a face-- but he can't remember where it was. The kid's foreign too, which makes it even stranger. Someone like that should stick out. Yaichirou's not rude enough to stare of course, but he's definitely been stealing glances whenever it seems passably polite.

The name is what does it. A series of news reports flip through his mind and his own anxieties flatten into irritation and disgust. He sighs as he picks up his questionnaire. Just his luck.]

I know who you are, fon Fabre. My name is Yaichirou Shimogamo. It's... a pleasure to meet you. [That's totally convincing, right?] Would you like to start or should I?

"Ah-- yes, that's fine?"

That wasn't supposed to come out as a question, but he was a little thrown off-balance by Tachibana's intensity. Was he just nervous, or were they expected to show that level of enthusiasm? Should Yaichirou try being more enthusiastic too? Had he done the last few interviews entirely wrong? What a horrible thought.

"Yellow." But was that thorough enough? "It's just garish. Entirely unnecessary." So he said, to a man with yellow hair and yellow eyes. He realized this as soon as he finished speaking and hastily moved on.

"And you? What's your least favorite color?"

"Sugane Tachibana, sir." As badly as Sugane did want to run screaming from the lab, he was well aware that his comportment in all situations had a bearing on his advancement in the Ranger program. All he could do was grit his teeth and gingerly make his way over to the hazmat suits, carefully inspecting the rack to find one that at least looked like nothing (or no one) had died inside it. It was a shame that there was no way to put the gloves on first to avoid touching the rest of the suit. He probably would have tried to figure it out if he wasn't certain that Tenpou was watching and evaluating his every move.

"Don't you need to wear a suit as well, sir, or..." Or was he going to be taking care of the...the testicles all by himself?

What the hell are you doing here...

[He doesn't sound angry so much as resigned, and his eyes over flicker to Luke for a moment before he goes back to staring at the sky.]

Nothing??

[He sounds nervous, apologetic, and looks around like he's thinking of leaving]

I was just looking for... somewhere to hang out, I guess. Sorry...

Why? If, in the language of association, Mikasa is red—and black and white, all stark and clean contrast—and Armin has favored greens and blues—like the ocean, or the sky—what was it that drove him to answer the way he did?

(Historically, it means royalty and wealth. Or else something light and lilac and delicate. For him, it's rather the opposite. The color of a bruise, on his knuckles, under his eyes. Not that Eren is opposed to brutal things—just the opposite, really—but there are some he won't stand for. Earned many of his bruises trying to spare others, stumbling on Armin backed into a corner by a handful of kids twice his size. Wrapping the scarf around the discolorations ringed around Mikasa's neck the day they'd met.)

He's looking down at his hands as he considers it. Eventually, he looks back at Armin and runs one of those hands through the hair at the back of his neck.

"I guess I didn't think that hard about it" he admits it readily. None of that had been why he'd answered the way he did, at least not consciously. It had been kneejerk, a gut reaction, little thought put into the why, because that's how Eren makes most of his decisions anyway. Act first, on a feeling. Rationalize it later. (If at all.) "It's not that big a deal, really. Like I said, it's just a color."

He'd dye his damn hair purple if that's what it took to become a Ranger.

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test drive meme

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Toji Suzuhara | Evangelion

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you made it hard not to.

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Re: Yuri Lowell | Tales of Vesperia

Re: Yuri Lowell | Tales of Vesperia

it's a good joke.