sixthiteration | Test Drive 21 (October & November)

→ Holds and applications are always open. Holds are required for all applications.

→ Choose one of the scenarios below or make up your own. Feel free to try multiple scenarios.

→ Write LOGS or TEXT prompts, or both.

→ THERE ARE ONLY THREE RULES FOR THE TDM:

1. It has to take place in the 6I universe.
2. It cannot be the character's arrival into the game.
3. Please only test new characters who do not have a version in the game. Our cast list is here.

→ TDM threads cannot be used to meet AC, but if the character is accepted into the game and both players agree, you may keep the CR.

→ Character want ads are here.

Prompts

STAYING POWER - Go down to the bunker, they said. You can get yourself amazing powers from the vending machine, they said. Well, you've done that, and you've made your choice, but one thing nobody told you was that unless it's a power you're familiar with, you might be on a teensy bit of a learning curve when it comes to keeping it under control. You have a week to figure it out without killing anyone; have fun!

FORGIVE AND... - You poor thing, you've gotten into some dust moths. Not that you can remember that, because depending on how big that swarm was and how quickly you got out of it, you might not remember much at all. Better hope somebody's got some Forget Me Nots on hand.

HIT & RUN - Life in the village can be pretty sleepy... until suddenly, it's not. Were you being a troublemaker? Were you disturbing the local wildlife? Because it's now disturbing you, chasing you down the street in front of everyone. Maybe it's a herd of chupapaca or a swarm of fireflies. Or maybe you went old school and it's just a really pissed off badger. Godspeed and good luck.

WILDCARD - Choose your own adventure. Maybe play powers roulette.

Texts

All characters are fitted with a smart watch-like device on their left wrist, which they can use to send text messages to other villagers.

- Texts may only be 140 characters long
- No video or voice, text only
- Display names may be changed by characters on the fly, but anyone can tap to see someone's real full name

Please list your CHARACTER NAME, CANON & PROMPT in your SUBJECT LINE.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

His eyes narrow, watching Vasquez closely. "That's all it is, not that you think I can't be around your friends?" Arching a brow, looking entirely insulted that it could ever be that.

"How can you believe that? I am a handsome man. I have broad shoulders. I can wear anything," he says, rolling his eyes and sounding way more insulted than he should all things considered.

Planting his hands on his hips, giving Vasquez a look, not at all impressed. "You get... I mean... My name..." He gestures as if he'll catch up. "Also, don't you have another name?"

"I think my friends would like you," Vasquez says with a laugh as he realizes how true that is. He thinks Bobo would and Wynonna would definitely like Faraday. He even thinks so would the others that he's met, so he doesn't think there's going to be bad blood anywhere, there

As to the clothes, he shakes his head and his finger, waggling it at Faraday. "The pants I used to wear? No." His pants, which had been probably too tight for the time, going with Vasquez's too-big shirt. "Besides, patterns? You wouldn't know what to do with bright colours, I think."

He stops so he can give Faraday an amused look about his name. "Of course I have another. I give it to the people I like the most."

"Everyone likes me," he says, sounding a bit prissy about it but amused at the same time. He knows it isn't true, but he definitely knows he can fair pretty well with people when he tries to be sociable. He's lovable!

"Oh those pants." He says it considering. He remembers those pants, definitely. "You saying I can't wear color? I feel insulted."

And yet he's not, and it shows. It's enjoying the games, the words, the flirting and banter between them. For him it was just yesterday and it's part of his life even as little as it's been in his life. It is what he expects, and gives as good as he expects to get.

Though that makes him roll his eyes. "Well then, obviously I won't have it." Because he's not asking. Nope. Dammit, why doesn't he know?!

"Goodnight didn't, sometimes," Vasquez counters, which is funny to him because for all that Vasquez had prodded and jibed at him with words, he seemed to tolerate Vasquez whereas he seemed sometimes jittery around Faraday. "And who says I like you?"

It would be the biggest bullshit lie in existence to say he doesn't, but he likes to bullshit, sometimes.

"Maybe you can earn my name eventually," he says with a casual shrug, as if he's not already thinking of when he can have it. Walking back towards the inn, he can feel the interest stirring again, fantasies he thought he'd buried resurfacing, of Faraday moaning his proper name in his ear. Cheeks going a touch hot, he stares forward. "And we'll see about colour. Maybe you can wear a big nose, like a clown?"

He snorts at that, rolling his eyes. "I'm not worried what he thinks of me," he says, still having a bitter taste in his mouth for the Cajun riding off, even if Vasquez says he came back. Though at that challenging question, he smirks at him.

"You do. You say it," he taunts, sounding smug though he's not going to point out to him just why he believes this. He know it's true though. Just like his sharp words don't mean he doesn't care about Vasquez either.

"If this involves cleaning up your horse, or begging, you're going to just get nicknames. Oh. I'll just start guessing, Carlos," he says, grinning wide then, amused with himself. Which isn't hard for him to do, amuse himself.

"Maybe you can bite my ass," he says in cheerful tones, striding along beside him.

Vasquez shrugs, because he does like Faraday. He likes him too much, which is the problem that he's run up against. He's a foul-mouthed, smelly, bastard of an asshole man and Vasquez adores him in ways that he doesn't want to talk about out loud.

It's his bad taste, that's all. "It's not begging or cleaning my horse, it's just getting to know me better. And no, not Carlos," he says, rolling his eyes as they go, eyes sliding down to Faraday's ass, snorting because that's a thought he has entertained.

He can't imagine that working so well.

"I know yours already," he taunts. "Joshua," he says, his accent working over the name with pleasure as he feels how it sits on his tongue.

"Okay Roberto," he drawls, smirking at him because he knows he can keep doing this. He can come up with a lot if he puts his mind to it.

He gives him a look though, considering, but what he thinks he isn't sure he can say it. Say that he probably knows Vasquez better than he knows anyone, which isn't saying a lot about how distant he has kept himself from everyone else around him. Until he came to a clearing by the water and saw Vasquez.

Then he goes and says his name like that and fuck there's just something about it in that accent that just leaves him unable to even draw a breath. Biting at his lower lip, staring at Vasquez for the longest time, trying to think of what to even say. Not sure he can say anything.

"No one ever..." He stops, shaking his head a bit. "I don't care if you call me that." Him. He doesn't care if he called him that.

Vasquez doesn't argue that name, because maybe if he stops, then Faraday will shut up. He doesn't want Faraday to take that as permission to keep name-calling, though, and if he starts being serious about it, then he knows he'll have to give up his real name. As for right now, he'll leave it be.

Are they even moving still? He feels like they've ground to a halt, with Faraday staring at him, Vasquez heatedly staring back. He wants to say it again and again, which is why he's relieved when Faraday says he doesn't care if he says it.

"Good," he says pleasantly, hand on Faraday's back between his shoulders to get him moving again, to the inn. "Joshua is a better name than Faraday. Then again, so is guerito."

The sad part is, in that Faraday is a child. Without it getting a rise, it's not nearly as fun. Especially in case there's a chance he won't hear his name like that again.

Though he can't help but to make a face, knowing that forward process had ended somewhere between teasing and knowing he's flirting, but not having a damn clue if that's just him or it's mutual. Most of his companionship came with a price, and this one he isn't sure is part of friendship, or he's mistaking a lot in that pained look while he bared his physical scars.

So he let that hand guide him, not walking too fast though. Just so that maybe it lingers a minute or two.

"Only you get away with calling me either," he says, mostly a grumbling sound. "Joshua's a kid on a farm, which ain't me anymore." His past is that. A future wherein someone that never knew that boy called him that? Maybe that he can handle. Maybe it's just that it's Vasquez and he doesn't want to discourage him, even if he taunts him in ways that could ruin a lot.

"Everyone says you have to stay here, between the two villages. That true?" Because he trusts that Vasquez has tested that and will know.

"I think it's something else completely," Vasquez argues, seeing as he's very fond of using that name for him, his eyes sliding over Faraday and thinking of moaning that name, having that man on top of him, pushing into him, pinning him down.

It's enough to make the tips of his ears go red and embarrassed, though he doesn't want to give his hand. Then again, he's not so good at bluffing, so maybe he's already in deep shit. "I tried to head out to the water, but it's like an ocean. Then there's mountains and a bunker. The way in, there's no way out," he says, because the tubes don't seem to put anyone back.

Nodding to the inn, he gives Faraday a destination. "There, I've been staying there, though in the winter, I think maybe I move in with someone else."

He glances at Vasquez. "It's only completely different here," he says, which is as close as he can come to saying it is different with him. But it's the same difference. Especially in his mind.

Something's off, and Faraday knows it. He just doesn't know what. Maybe it's this place. Or it's definitely what happened to him that he doesn't want to know about. Something is different though, and he's worried it's going to screw up whatever the hell it is that he and Vasquez shared. Closest thing to caring about someone and having them around, and wanting that.

"How is there no way out? Mountains? I mean, with a boat we could, right?" He doesn't like how that sounds, even if he isn't sure he cares. For now. Eventually though... He will feel the need to roam.

"Someone else, huh?" Man, he doesn't like the sound of that, expression turning sour. So much for those thoughts. "This someone senorita have a name?"

"Joshua," he says again, but this time it's sing-song and teasing, his eyes glinting with mischief because he just wants to say it, see what kind of reaction he can get out of him. Of course, then he turns sour and Vasquez rolls his eyes. Even if he weren't sleeping with Bobo (and he is), what Faraday is forgetting is that people can have different feelings.

"I'm not getting into a boat," he says, feeling seasick just to mention it. "And yeah, he has a name. Bobo," he keeps going, casual as you like, like Vasquez hasn't just revealed to Faraday that he likes men the same as he likes Marias, that he could like one specific man just as much, too.

Even the thrill of his name toyed with by that mouth doesn't do much for the way his stomach gets weird at that. He goes and gets lost for a year, and Vasquez isn't just messing around with men, but got himself some boyfriend. A boyfriend who...

"What kinda name is Bobo?" Yeah, because that's the proper answer in that moment. "Ain't that something in your language like all those names you call me?" He glances back at him, not wanting him to see his expression too much. What kind of dumbass fool gets himself upset over a man that isn't likely to be interested in the same things Faraday's gotten into his head.

That's what he gets for thinking that someone giving back as good as they got felt the same. Not that he'd felt this way about another man, so maybe he's just let his head get all twisted up for nothing. Or maybe that's what happens when you disappear for a year.

"I don't know, I don't ask. What kind of name is Goodnight or Red Harvest? I just assume you're all strange," is what Vasquez says dismissively, oblivious to Faraday reacting to the comment in a bad way, mostly because he's just not thinking that he cares at all.

If he cared, he'd have replied to Vasquez's come-ons, wouldn't he have?

"You can ask him when you see him. You're staying with me, aren't you?" he asks it like he's not entirely sure if that's going to happen, but he wants it to, he desperately wants to be able to have Faraday near to him, especially after he'd lost him and was looking at a stretch of never seeing him again. "I don't call you too many names. Just the few," he adds.

"Don't insult him too much, maybe he'll take a liking to you, even, let you stay," he jokes.

"You can't go judging on Indian names," he points out, because that's obviously the important point there. "And yeah. I guess so. Place is weird, and you're not. Not like this," he says, finding more important things. Especially as Vasquez goes on, the important part becomes clear very quickly.

"Wait. Wait. Wait." He waves his hands about, frowning and so confused because he can't have this right. It can't be.

"You're living with this Bobo?" Because that's what he gets from staying with Vasquez and being allowed to stay. "So what? If your friend doesn't like me, I'm going to be thrown out? We fought together. Back to back."

Oh yes, that is important to him. Not just in being there for one another, but Vasquez was someone he trusts. He was there with him, thought he was there for him. And some ... some Bobo is just going to get him thrown out?

Vasquez shrugs, like he doesn't give a shit what he says about the Comanches (Red's not here to kill him, after all), but still, "Goodnight?" he reiterates with a disbelieving look, because fine, the Indians can have weird names, but Goodnight is not normal.

"Sure, I'm staying with him for warmth, but I have my own bedroom," he says. "And there's a third one, so you're coming with me," Vasquez insists, opening the door to the inn to head up to the room he's temporarily been in to fetch some cigarettes and a jacket. "You don't get rid of me that easily, querido."

"No, Goodnight was not weird," he says. "Now Billy calling him Goody? I mean, not surprised that Billy's the husband there but..." But come on. Goody is a girl's name. A woman's name. Historically even.

And he's cranky now and unhappy. More than that, he's angry at himself for caring. Not about Goody and Billy, but about Vasquez and... Bobo.

"Where the hell did you get the idea I was trying to get away. Way I see it, you're the one that walked away for a year." Which is cruel, since he doesn't know that Vasquez had no choice, and had gone through hell because of it. "But sure. Fine. That works for me." Because that's the only choice there is. He's not giving up Vasquez. This is his call.

Vasquez raises a brow, because he'd noticed that Goodnight and Billy had been too close, but he hadn't expected that to be something that Faraday had seen too. How is it that Faraday could see that, but not the way that Vasquez kept flirting with him? That's what he wants to know.

"I didn't walk anywhere," he says, annoyed. "I stayed for the whole battle, I fought it, and then I rode off before I got here. Pendejo," he mutters under his breath, like he needs to get that frustration out. "Here," he says, handing him a cigarette. "Smoke that, maybe it will make you nicer."

Because he doesn't expect the one man he's ever wanted to like him to notice him. He just never thought it was something that happened to him. Course it happens with an Oriental and someone like Goodnight. Not him. Definitely not some masculine Mexican like Vasquez.

He tenses then though, because for as far as he knows he was not there. He ran. Even though he knows there's something not right about it all, but what he knows and has not experienced, it makes him suspicious of what he did. Or didn't do. And more than that, hateful that he's being taunted for it... even if he knows he's not. He doesn't think so, anyway. Not after that look from Vasquez before.

He takes the cigarette, but he doesn't light it. He doesn't ask for a match. Just walking, not able to find words that usually come so easy to him.

"I need clothes."

It's all he says, hating these night clothes even more now.

Digging into his things once he has the cigarette, he goes for the linen shirt next. He's had two of them, now, so he supposes that he can lend one out to Faraday. He gives over the one that has the embroidery all the way down the sides of it, making it a little like a vest.

Also, it's less giving and more throwing. "I'm not giving you pants, you'll stretch those too much," he says dismissively. "Your shoulders will still make that pull, but I don't mind a shirt too big," he says, before digging out the next most important thing, grinning as he unearths the whiskey.

"See, I knew I had this. Let's have some fun."

Putting the unlit cigarette in his mouth, he takes the shirt and looks over it. Twisting it this way and that, nodding. "That works. Good. Okay then," he says, figuring this can't be too bad.

Until the comment about pants.

"What? It ain't my fault you are built like a twig," he says, having checked him out often enough to know just how long and lean those legs are. "How am I supposed to walk around in this underwear?"

Making a face, not at all happy about that. Then he sees the bottle. He's coping without alcohol, hasn't been here long enough to get over his addiction and seeing that bottle makes his heart leap and his gut twist.

"Fucking hell, why didn't you start there."

And he might be revealing part of what is bothering him, why he's so grumpy in this place.

He's not built like a twig. He's still got some meat on his bones and he's muscled and lean, even if he goes more up and down than anywhere side to side, but since when is Faraday going to listen to any of this? "And maybe I started with it last because I only have two bottles, if you drink it all now, then I'll have none."

And while he prefers smoking to alcohol, he's not so generous to Faraday that he wants to see it gone, no matter what he feels about the man.

"Go easy," he insists. "Or I'm not taking you to come live with me."

Faraday is smirking at him as he sets down the bottle, mostly to hide the shaking in his hand. Pulling off the scrub shit, wanting to put on something he knows he'll be more comfortable in. He's quiet a minute, thinking about that when he talks about only have two bottles.

"You might want to take that back then." He shifts, looking away and then looking back at Vasquez. "I haven't had a drink since I got here. I... You know how long before that I went without a drink?" Because he can't remember. A few hours? Maybe. That's it. Overnight because he's asleep? "I start now, I'm not giving that back."

Which might explain how much of an asshole he's being, though it is perhaps the nicest thing he's done in warning Vasquez before he drinks it all.

Vasquez takes his fair share of a look, even though he finds himself feeling guilty and forced to look away, not because he feels improper, but because he's expecting to see scars and wounds there that don't exist. This isn't the same Faraday, thank god, but he's not going to see him without expecting that anytime soon.

His breath is still shaky, all that skin on display and his mind thinking about all the ways he could touch the other man circling through his head. "Fine, you get to have that bottle of whiskey, but no complaining when it's gone."

As if Faraday could ever stop complaining, which is a ridiculous idea. "Are you going to start here or are we going to our house?"

In truth, he doesn't even think about it in that moment. Just thankful to have that weirdly cut and oddly shaped shirt off and into something that feels familiar. Even if as he pulls it on he smells sweat and smoke and something that had become, in such a short time, entirely familiar to him. It was Vasquez, close and yet not close at the same time, nut there's something to it that's primal and sexy to him. Which leaves him uncertain and confused. It's not how he should feel as he slides into that shirt, tugging it down as his hands smooth over the fabric.

"Take it's not laundry day."

Because that's what you say when you're reacting rather than acting, standing there and just letting that scent surround him.

"I..." He frowns at that though, not sure what he expects, but glad to hear it. Enough so to unscrew the lid and take a deep swallow.

His fingers grip the neck of the bottle until his knuckles are white. Aching to take another drink, to chug until it's gone and the world is spinning and everything is hazy. Instead he screws the cap back on.

Test Drive 21 (October & November)

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