Duplicity Game Mods (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
duplicitymods) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
duplicitymemes2018-10-14 04:38 pm
duplicitymods) wrote in duplicitymemes2018-10-14 04:38 pm
Entry tags:
TDM #2
« « « TEST DRIVE MEME » » »
It's discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit. Yet, solace is found in the lies we tell each other, comforted by the peace of knowing that we're not alone in our depravity, and once on this path, sin itself becomes the lesser of two evils masked in a cloud of normalcy. This is how Duplicity has functioned since the beginning. The divide of power and social standing is overt in that Dominants influence the decisions made both publicly and privately while Submissives cater to the rules presented to them. It is the way of Duplicity to assign random designations at birth with no leeway in altering what has been given. Climate in the Up is far stricter than that of the Down; violating outlined personas for a Dominant or Submissive while in full view of others is punished by degree of infraction. In the Down, many tend to turn a blind eye to these sorts of offenses. To counteract the discovery of the Deceit Gene – a natural "negative" response to all stimuli – the L.I.E.S. program was founded. The program had been designed to introduce new subjects to the current environment and test for the Deceit Gene through immersion in Duplicity's standing society. Sexual impulses and encounters increase the chances of detecting the gene within these individuals. Participants are typically released from L.I.E.S. after a year; however, results have remained unsatisfactory and testing still continues. You’re here! Finally! Welcome to Duplicity. After choosing a door and stepping through to the other side, the first thing that greets you are the enthusiastic faces of people in medical scrubs and pristine lab coats. Their enthusiasm translates to eagerness as they strip you of your clothes to perform a thorough examination—you will be healed, bathed, and given a paper gown to wear until your items can be processed and delivered to your residence later in the evening. You are also given a device that accesses the network as well as the time and location of orientation. If you enter Duplicity into the Up, congratulations! You’re a Dominant, which means you are immediately picked up by a limo after processing and taken to your highrise. Here, it is two Dominants per floor with separate apartments. If you enter Duplicity into the Down, congratulations! You’re a Submissive, which means you are directed towards public transportation with the address of the motel you’ll be living in. Here, it is two Submissives per room with a shared common space for all rooms. Either way it's raining! Still. Enjoy your free time until orientation! Participation is mandatory by all new arrivals. |
 The day after stepping through the door and participating in orientation, LIERS are assembled together in the Up for a tour of Duplicity in its entirety. Seats are in pairs and randomly assigned to Dominants and Submissives alike. Traveling from Fiddler's Square, the train journeys through various parts of the Up, showcasing society and examples of lifestyle. Along the way, frequent stops are made; a variety of passengers can be seen exiting and entering the doors. A Dominant with a kneeling Submissive takes a seat near the front of the train at one stop. A small group of Submissives board and sit closer to the LIERS at another, all seemingly content in their roles. As the tour continues through the Up, the train passes close to the Market and White Wall Bridge and zips by North Park before heading into the Down and bypassing Red Wall Bridge and South Park. The train makes a "final" stop at Riddler's Square, where inhabitants of the Down are instructed to return to their temporary housing. Those who live in the Up are permitted to stay on the train and revisit the same locations while returning. |
 The rain continues to drizzle, but it’s finally slowing enough for the citizens of Duplicity to catch their breath. With the influx of new LIERS, people make quick work of fixing the damages from Tumenalia—a combination of preparation and wanting to welcome more participants to orientation. Typically, travel between the Up and the Down is rather seamless with the use of the elevators, and with the end of the holiday comes a regular schedule for transportation between the two areas of Duplicity. Yet, mysterious powers are at play once again. Or so it seems. Stepping onto the elevators does not deliver its occupants to their desired location; instead, they are ushered into rooms designed to be escaped. There are a variety of themes, but the most popular seem to be Room A, Room B, and Room C. While they follow the usual guidelines for any escape room, there are a few “catches” that might not be noticeable at first. Each clue is only accessible to those of the corresponding designation. Submissives are responsible for unlocking the first and third of the three clues, and even if a Dominant figures out what it is and how to use it, they will not be any closer to escaping unless the Submissive plays a key role in interacting with these clues. Things to note about these rooms: the third clue requires some sort of sexual engagement to be considered “clear” of it. After the allotted time of one (1) hour, if those inside haven’t managed to escape, the Submissives will be removed from the room and the Dominants will remain until they can successfully help the new Submissives escape the room. Each time, the clues will be reset and change; they will never be the same. |
 Meanwhile, in the Down, a local charity organization has sent out notices for a black-tie fundraiser to be held during the evening to raise awareness of homeless Submissive children. Invitations are sent via the devices, and there are even fliers posted all across the Up and the Down. If in attendance of the event, the waitstaff will be taking down the names of all uncontracted Submissives; no other explanation of what it’s for is mentioned throughout the evening. And while donations are completely voluntary, any contributions made helps to further the main endeavor of the cause. However, it seems most people are present to network and find someone that might fill a contract slot. So, eat, drink, and dance until it all winds down and everyone decides to go home. The only “catch”? Dominants draw the name of one Submissive to accompany them back to the Up, and those who are left will be paired up for the sake of no one leaving alone. |
Please read carefully. Dominant and Submissive TDM assignments: All characters whose first name begins with the following ( A, C, E, G, I, K, M, O, Q, S, U, W, and Y ) are Dominants. All characters whose first name begins with the following ( B, D, F, H, J, L, N, P, R, T, V, X, and Z ) are Submissives. Players with characters that are a number use the first letter to spell that number. To use this TDM as a door pass please link this on your app and place whether it is dominant or submissive. For the escape room prompt players can make up the clues they find. They may be extremely sexual or something simple like moving a painting off a wall. Also, any locations throughout Duplicity are available for TDM prompts as well! Please remember to mark any necessary content, and have fun!! |
no subject
that's... that can't be true. can it? he's just a normal, ordinary person with a normal, ordinary life. he's just him. he can't be anything else or something else. can he? and what's worse, he's picturing all of those mts they'd killed trying to get to altissia, all the times they'd run into them and dispatched them as quickly as they could to keep moving. that they didn't move like people had helped him dissociate. that they flopped and jerked and cried in a different way when they'd died had made it easier. but this isn't easy. this isn't anything he'd ever expected to hear, and every part of him feels numb.
he's not in his own body right now, and he doesn't even feel the dip of the mattress when noct sits next to him. it's like the sensation you get when you're half-asleep in that twilight place, there but not, and if breathing hadn't been an unconscious action, he might have ignored it all together. prompto opens his mouth to say something, but his throat's closed up, straining to tug his hand free to pull down his glove and stare at it. the barcode, the numbers. he'd always known something was off about it, that he was a little different than everyone else, but he hadn't known that. so all he he had been, and now...
now, he's not lucian, not a person, not anything. ]
H–how can that... [ suddenly, prompto can feel the heat in his face, and it stems from his eyes and the way they burn. his fingers flex, and he yanks up the glove quickly to hide the tattoo. out of sight, out of mind. he can't think about this now. it's not real. ] That's not true. I'm not – How can you say that?
[ it's not okay. none of this is okay. he isn't okay. ]
no subject
I'm sorry. [ he really, really is. he wishes he could take it back, and he could try again, maybe, do better next time. but he can't, and he has to fix this somehow. ] I didn't— It just didn't seem right not to let you know.
[ as bad as this is, it probably would have been worse if Prompto found out later that Noctis had been keeping it a secret from him. there are different kinds of secrets, he's learning, and some of them just fester over time. he sits here and he thinks — if his dad had told him about the prophecy, the whole one, right before he left Insomnia, then he would have been angry. and maybe it wouldn't have made sense, because surely it would have been worse to grow up with that hanging over his head, but he'd be angry anyway, and it would have been justified. if he kept this from Prompto, it'd be the same thing. it's not a decision he should get to make for him.
he's not sure if Prompto wants to be touched right now, which is awful, because that's not usually a question he has to ask himself, but. he puts a hand on Prompto's shoulder, doesn't grip him too hard; still there, but easy enough to shrug off if he wants it gone. ]
I don't know what happened for you to find out, we didn't talk about that. [ there wasn't time. he should have made time, maybe, and that's a stupid thought, he just. he wants it to be easy. he always does. ] We got split up for a while, and. There just... There was this door in Zegnautus that we couldn't get open, and you put your barcode over it and it worked, so you. Told us.
no subject
prompto remembers how he'd talked about this with noct before, about his insecurities as a person and his place in their little group because he had no decent skills. he couldn't cook or strategize like ignis. he certainly couldn't survive off the land or wield a blade as well as gladio. he'd learned to handle weapons on the fly, training harder than ever when he'd been asked to come to altissia, and all he really had to show for it were scrapes and cuts and bruises from constantly falling over himself trying not to die. all he's got are too many problems and not enough solutions, definitely not liaisons-of-royalty material. which... listening to noct now seems to solidify all that in his head without any question. and worse than all of that, worse than knowing he's some creepy mt, is that he'd been created as a traitor. ]
Why — [ his voice is thick, sounds like he's eaten gravel, and there's no way he's not going to cry. there's no way he can keep that bottled up and not let it out somehow, ignoring the crushing weight of noct's hand on his shoulder to shift and press his own against his eyes. he pushes so hard that it hurts, and even the pain isn't enough to make him feel anything else but the overwhelming stifling truth of what he is. ] I don't get it. I don't get why this – shit. This can't be happening. It's not, right? You're just–just messing with me. I can't be one of those... things. I can't.
[ he's cracking, can feel it pulling apart inside him, and he shudders, a full-body thing he's certain noct is aware of considering how close they are. and...
and he doesn't know what to do. should they even be talking like this now? noct says he doesn't care, but there's absolutely no way that could be true. at least, after a while. after he's been here and sees that he could have a thousand other friends who aren't part of the empire, friends who are real and a lot more proficient at being a person than he's ever been. it makes him want to curl up and shrink into oblivion, the clawing in his chest scratching and digging until he exhales out a sharp breath and isn't able to pull another one in.
noct told him not to freak out, but he's freaking out. he can't breathe, and he chokes, dropping off the bed onto his knees so he's doubled over holding his chest. ] Noct, I can't... [ and then, now, it's not even about any of that. it's just about failing him all over again as he hyperventilates. ]
no subject
he slides to the floor on his knees with Prompto as soon as he pitches forwards, reaching out to hold him up on reflex even though it's not as if he can fall any further — maybe less to catch him, more to hold him together, because he looks like he's going to break like glass into a thousand tiny pieces. ]
Hey, hey, just breathe. [ the hand that was on Prompto's shoulder moves to his back, runs up and down his spine in what Noctis hopes are slow, soothing motions. ] Okay? Take it slow.
[ it's almost automatic to say it's okay, but it sticks in his throat because that's not... fair. knowing that Prompto was supposed to be an MT really doesn't mean anything to Noctis, but it means everything to Prompto, at least for right now. thinking about it, he must have gone through this alone, last time. wherever he was after he went off the train, however he found out about it then, this is exactly what he had to deal with on his own, probably thinking that Noctis hated him thanks to Ardyn's bullshit. it would have been awful, it would have been beyond awful.
well. this time Noctis is going to be here for the whole thing, and he'll sit for as long as Prompto needs. reassuring him can wait until he's breathing again. ]
no subject
yet, all he can concentrate on is the cruel reality of what he's supposed to be. and it hurts. it hurts like nothing else has ever hurt him in his life.
the ability to breathe without choking comes back in marginal increments, slowing the pressure building in his chest, and he sags against the floor, leaning into noct despite the awkwardness of the position. right now, he doesn't care, and he has to keep repeating that to himself to get another question out that's been forming on his tongue. it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter. he doesn't matter, but he has to try to put on a better face. he needs to figure this out on his own when noct isn't around to see it. ]
What – [ the breath he sucks in is a bit jagged, but it still feels like everything inside him is rebelling to get out. ] What else was there? You said, you said a lot happened. What was it?
[ maybe it's the wrong question to ask. still, he needs to know. he has to. ]
no subject
I—
[ Prompto is one hairline fracture away from falling apart, and all Noctis has to offer him is bad news. he tries to think back for one good thing that happened after Altissia, and then he combs through again for a neutral thing, just— something other than one disaster after another. but it's all this haze of grief and guilt, and Noctis can barely even remember the weeks between Altissia and the last royal tomb, and the longer he waits to give an answer, the worse it's going to sound.
he never has been any good at lying. ] It's... pretty much all bad. I don't know if...
[ if he should say, or if it's just going to make Prompto even more miserable. and some of them— some of those things, Noctis will hold behind his teeth for his own selfish fear, the strange feeling of guilt that's been growing in him all his life the same way weeds smother a garden. too much of it was his fault, and too much of it, he knows now, was utterly, absurdly pointless. ]
no subject
his personal crisis can wait because... because it's honestly not that important right now. ]
Just tell me. [ he sounds ridiculously small, almost begging, and he drags his forearm across his face in an attempt to rub away the flushed feeling of his skin and the weird haziness of his eyes. ] It–it can't be all that bad. Unless... are you– are we– [ prompto has no idea how to form those words. did something happen to them? to noct? he'd said in his text that they got all those blessings, but at what cost? ] Did we, y'know, did we—
[ he can't. he can't say it. he can't say the d-word because then what would have been the point of everything they'd done? prompto shakes his head and tries to shrug like it'll fill in the blanks. hopefully noct gets the gist of it because thinking about all of them being dead is not what he wants to imagine right now. ]
no subject
No. [ it's insistent, earnest. he doesn't know what happened to the three of them after he went ahead to find the Crystal, but he has to believe that they fought their way out safe and sound. he has to, or he can't— he can't. ] No, we— Ignis got hurt bad in Altissia, but we're all alive, we're fine.
[ less than fine, but. there's one of those selfish secrets. it's too hard to talk about Ignis being blinded for his sake, because after some of the things Gladio said, he's sure they must all blame him for it, and if he tells Prompto then he'll have to see it happen, the moment where the way he looks at Noctis shifts into disappointment. he doesn't know what he could have done better; he just knows there must have been something, that the pact with Leviathan shouldn't have gone the way it did, and Noctis is the only possible reason it did.
he really doesn't want to lie about all of it, though, not least because it would be shitty to leave Prompto in the dark like that. he's already ruined things, and he has to follow through now or he'd just be twisting the knife. if he's going to tell him what happened, then he's going to have to start with. with— ]
Luna. [ his voice sticks in his throat and he swallows it. tries again, and this time it croaks out of him, small and wretched: ] Um. Luna...
[ he's never actually said it. the others tried to console him at first, in the wake of Altissia, before they realised how far down the grief had sunk him, but. nobody wanted to say the words out loud to him, and he never wanted to hear them. what little time has passed hasn't made it any easier. ]
no subject
of course, it's only a spark of hope when noct continues on, and then, it's engulfed by this massive black hole that sucks everything out of him. worse than the truth about himself. worse than anything. lady lunafreya? dead? the numbness begins to creep up again, steadily until he's looking and breathing and pressing his lips together in a thin line automatically, the contradictory emotions he feels at that bit of news warring with things he definitely knows to be true. he isn't sure how to say that because he's confused. he's confused about all of this, and if noct hadn't been his best friend, if he hadn't been someone who meant the world and beyond to him, he honestly might have tried to climb out of the room to get away from all of this suffocation. ]
Noct... [ how does he explain? if it really happened at home, what does it even mean? ] She was here. I–I mean, a few days ago anyway. I saw her. I actually got — [ he actually finally got to meet her. ] I just, I dunno. If she was, how could she have been here?
[ it's a weirdly delicate thing to skirt around because it's like when he'd tried to figure out what to say about king regis and insomnia all over again. the guilt is still there too, unsure how he should really feel knowing that if he hadn't come along, he would most probably be dead along with the majority of the lucian people. the grief of it stifles everything, much like this and knowing that there's nothing they could ever do to keep her from dying. but prompto tries to cover it over, tries to be there for noct even though there's so much to process and so little in knowing how to handle it.
his hand bumps against noct's arm, the gentlest touch. ] I'm sorry. That's not the most super important thing right now. How... [ a wince, and he stares at the dingy carpet like it'll make all of this go away. his eyes are burning again. ] I know she was– she meant a lot to everybody.
no subject