August Test Drive!

[rubycitymods]

Thinking of apping a character but not sure they'll fit in the city walls?

Have no fear, a meme for you is here.

Directions:

• Use an RNG to choose a location and prompt, or wait for someone else to tag.


• Post with your character with their name and canon on top!


• If you'd like, leave contact info for people to get in contact for plotting and other such shenans.


• Tag around! Make friends. Don't be afraid to chat OOC while tagging.

Locations

1.TRAIN STATION - The place where everyone gets dumped off at. Your first view of Ruby City, complete with informational posters telling you all about where you've ended up.
2. THE BEACH - Lovely year-round, though in the winter months, you're probably not likely to dip your toes in.
3. THE BLACK STALLION - A rather quaint bar. Supposedly, the burgers are great, but you don't see anyone immediately who's willing to serve you. Maybe you're meant to get it yourself.
4. THE OBELISK - The tall monolith in the center of the city marks the gathering place of many events, though right now it seems to be cold and dark.
5. THE CLOCKTOWER - Offering an impressive view of the city, several residents come here to clear their heads, if they don't mind braving the narrow staircase.
6. THE COFFEE JOINT - the front windows are warm and welcoming, and it seems there's always someone friendly enough to fix you a cup when you wander through.
7. THE CATACOMBS - Intrepid, aren't you? Those weird holes may beg exploring, but go too deep and you're going to be in a lot of trouble, considering the viciousness of the creatures held within.
8. THE CITY STREETS - All told, Ruby City is a lovely place, once you get past the fact that several of the buildings look derelict and on the verge of falling down. There's no harm in doing a little sightseeing.
9. THE PARK - You thought it'd be a lovely stroll, but the park is anything but friendly, if those approaching wolf-like creatures are any indication.
10. CHOOSE YOUR OWN - Don't like what we've come up with? Feel like picking your own place? There's a whole host of lovely locations to choose from in the City.


Scenarios


1. NEW ARRIVAL - Step off that train, walk down the street. People usually latch on to newcomers to try and help them out. Even if you look shy, the other residents probably won't be!
2. WATCH TALK - Feeling lost? Disoriented? Don't worry, everyone feels that way on their first day. Fortunately - if the signs at the station are to believed - the watch in your pocket can be used to talk to whoever else might be here.
3. BAD WEATHER - Aw, man. Whether it's snow, or rain, or just plain cold, today was definitely the wrong day to get dumped off in a City in the middle of nowhere.
4. A RUN-IN - Maybe you weren't watching. Maybe they weren't. Either way, you just bumped into someone. Perhaps apologies are in order?
5. HELP, IT HURTS - Clumsy, aren't you? Perhaps wherever the train brought you from wasn't so friendly, or you just tripped and twisted your ankle. Either way, you're in a bit of pain. Hopefully someone will notice your booboos and help patch you up.
6. HUNGRY - It isn't very obvious sometimes that restaurants are what they are, especially in a place like Ruby City. Where can a person go to get a bite to eat around here?
7. MISTAKEN IDENTITY - Hey, there's someone you know! --Or maybe not.
8. BEING FOLLOWED - Maybe you're just being paranoid, or maybe you've got a reason to be afraid. Whatever it is, it feels like there's eyes on you...
9. CURRENT EVENTS - None at the moment, but feel free to look through our event tag!
10. CHOOSE YOUR OWN - Don't like any of these ideas? Feel free to come up with your own!

Comments

Jonathan Joestar | JoJo's Bizarre Adventure | 1-1

[beatofmyblood]

T...This can't be...just what sort of trickery is this?

[There's a British-sounding man built like an absolute giant standing baffled at the train station. He must have just stepped off.]

There's no way. If I was just in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, how could I go from a ship to a train without remembering a thing?! Not only that, how have my wounds healed so swiftly without the use of Hamon?

[Especially with the circumstances he was in - oh good god, no.]

Erina...Erina!

[Whereas before he was just warily glancing around, now he's actively searching for something, anything to take him back to that hell his honeymoon had become. In spite of his frantic shouting, Jonathan doesn't seem to have noticed the person that's approached him in his panic.]

Where is she? No matter what this place is, an illusion or a dream, I have to return and save Erina!

[breathes on]

[lapidarius]

[Every so often, Kakyoin made a point of wandering past the train station. He hadn't forgotten that Diarmuid's habit of doing the same had been immeasurably helpful in a very confusing and upsetting time, so it felt right for him to do the same.]

[And today it seemed that was a damn good habit to have, as the teenager came across someone that looked...oddly familiar, having one hell of a crisis that he could definitely recognize.]

It's-...no, 'it's fine' is a little inaccurate with all things considered, but please try to stay calm. I can try to explain the situation.

[laughs menacingly]

[beatofmyblood]

[Jonathan spins around abruptly - and was his hand glowing there, for just a second? - and stares down at the young man in front of him. He's...just a teenager. As marginally comforting as it is to know that there are indeed other people in this place, it's a little much to ask him to calm down right now.]

Please understand. My wife and an orphaned child are in danger, and the man I was raised with...he's planning to do unspeakable things that could jeopardize the entire world. Whatever explanation you have for this, make it a quick one, I implore you. I don't have the luxury of time to waste here.

[lapidarius]

[...That glow seemed strangely familiar too. Where had he seen something like that before?]

[Never mind. For now, Kakyoin simply took off his sunglasses and held up his hands to show he wasn't intending to be a threat. It would be a pretty miserable welcome for anyone to immediately get into a fight.]

I understand, honestly. So the first thing you should be aware of is what I'm informed is common knowledge here: if and when one leaves this place, it's to the moment in which they left. Which is to say, time- [That sentence got a split second's hesitation, like he really didn't want to say this.] -...effectively stops, while we're here.

[beatofmyblood]

[...that's not something he's expecting: both the notion of stopped time and the scars running across the boy's eyelids. Young men didn't just get potentially traumatic injuries like that out of no where (trust him, he knows from experience), but he has other things to focus on at the moment.]

So you're saying...while I'm here, nothing will happen?

[It sounds impossible, but...it does get him to relax a little. The boy seems trustworthy, as if Jonathan's ever one to scrutinize, and at least Erina isn't in any more immediate danger than she already is. That doesn't mean he can just sit back and relax, though.]

Just what is this place? Obviously it can't be in the middle of the Atlantic, but are we near Britain? America?

[lapidarius]

Well, that's...another problem. This city's location isn't so easy to pinpoint.

[Satisfied he wasn't about to get punched, Kakyoin lowered his hands and slipped his sunglasses into a pocket.]

There's no simple answer to this, so I'll be direct: It's not really anywhere so much as it just exists. It's more of an alternate world entirely its own as far as I've been told.

[beatofmyblood]

You're...serious. An alternate world?!

[This is like something out of a storybook. Just to check, he feels around his neck to make sure he hasn't suffered significant blood loss. All that's left are two dark scars where he was injured before, though Jonathan has yet to notice the tears and bloodstains on the back of his suit where shrapnel used to be.]

This is difficult for me to fully comprehend. If this place exists, for whatever reason, outside the barriers of time and space, how are we standing here instead of where we're supposed to be? All of this should be impossible. Unless...

[He shakes his head, shrugging off the darker thought he just had. Besides, vampires and zombies should be impossible too, dingus.]

I have to get back to Erina. Even if time is stopped, I can't just leave her there alone with Dio!

[And now he's looking around for a train schedule, unaware that the name he just mentioned offhandedly is gonna wreck this kid.]

[lapidarius]

I know. I honestly do understand the problem at hand, but for the momen--

[Kakyoin's sentence was cut off with a choked sound of disbelief. He did look familiar, didn't he? And that peculiar glow of light, hadn't he seen it used by...]

[Shit.]

I'm...sorry, what...did you just say?

[beatofmyblood]

[He turns around again in front of the posters. At least he knows the name of this place now. Ruby City. It's deceptively quaint-sounding.]

"I have to get back to my wife."

[Wait. Something's wrong, he can tell by the expression on his face. He looks...terrified, and Jonathan can't help but focus on the wave of sympathy that runs through him.]

Is...something the matter?

[lapidarius]

N-no, the last part--

[Kakyoin took a deep breath, forcibly maintaining what little composure he had left. He was the clever one of the group more often than not, and it was that which was leading him to a disturbing conclusion. At the moment, he was trying not to be obvious about the fact that he was internally measuring this individual's height against his memory of Dio's...and he was not liking the result.]

You...mentioned a name, just now.

[beatofmyblood]

Are you referring to--

...no, you can't be...!

[No. No. No, please, no. He can't--he was supposed to purge his evil from this Earth. How does this young man know his name at all?!]

Tell me. Where you came from, is "February 7th, 1889" in the future or the past?

[He isn't angry with Kakyoin by any means, but his face has become deathly serious, hoping, praying for one option out of the two.]

[lapidarius]

[Ohhhhh, this was bad on all sides, wasn't it.]

It's--that was nearly a century ago from my perspective. It was January sixteenth, 1988 when I came here.

[Goddammit, he hated being right.]

You're...Jonathan Joestar, aren't you?

[beatofmyblood]

1988...that's almost a century ahead of my time!

[After reiterating the obvious, he might need a place to sit down sometime soon, because oh good god, this is getting to be a lot. The boy in front of him is terrified by the name "Dio" almost a century after he should have been dead for good, had mysterious injuries across his eyes, and somehow knew who he was in spite of all the odds against it. Jonathan is forced to acknowledge a possibility he didn't want to confront.

...had he...failed? Was it all for nothing?]

Yes, that's my name. How do you know it?

[starmark]

[Coincidentally, the absolute giant British man isn't the only one in the train station at that time, though he is the only one in present company thrashing around and working himself up; it makes the contrast between himself and his stoic, unflinching company (who happened to be examining the informational posters at the moment) striking.]

Shut up. You're making too much damn noise.

[But despite his apparent indifference, the young man reading the posters was paying more attention to his companion than he was willing to let on — because he wasn't positive, but the word "Hamon" had been thrown around, and frankly that was an unusual enough term that it wasn't something he could let pass lightly.

Hamon gave me some trouble a hundred years ago, after all.]

[beatofmyblood]

[Jotaro gets the same response as the other crusader does - a golden flash from his palm before settling when he sees the young man's face. Well, isn't he just a ray of sunshine.]

Please, sir, I have a dire matter to attend to back on that ship. If you'd like me to quiet down so badly, then I beg you to tell me what, exactly, is going on here!

[starmark]

Yare yare daze. Like I'm supposed to know any better than you?

[A golden flash, huh. That's...absolutely worth paying attention to, now.]

...

[OH, FINE, HELL.]

What about a ship?

[beatofmyblood]

...yes, my apologies. I got carried away there.

[He sighs, trying to calm himself down with little success. He's going to answer his question, but not entirely - there's no reason for him to bring anyone else into this situation so recklessly.]

My wife and I were travelling to America for our honeymoon when our ship was attacked. The others on board have turned against us, and everyone is in mortal peril. It's my destiny to stop the man responsible for all of this, once and for all, so getting back from whence I came is a must. With the strength of my will and the courage burning inside me, he'll pay for all the evil he's wrought!

[And here he is getting carried away again, looking for some place where he can get a train ticket or something.]

[starmark]

["It's my destiny", he says, and more and more the little things are piling up and snowballing into bigger things — little things like the way he says the word "destiny", and something about a ship, and that mention of "Hamon" and...look, let's be real, the guy is huge and muscular and with an inclination to pose, and if you factored in a different head, he'd already be just about the right height.

...

And Jotaro isn't liking where any of this is going, because if it's going where he thinks it is then there's going to be a thousand extra questions springing forth from it and he doesn't particularly want to deal with any of them right now, but there's one easy way to get to the bottom of this and he might as well just take it.]

...Sure.

[Look, the trip to Egypt would probably sound just as ridiculous if he were to tell it, himself (for god's sake his grandfather pretended to know how to ride a camel and didn't) but he's going to let that all just go by the wayside in favor of settling something first.]

By the way. Tell me something.

[He shoves his uniform collar off one shoulder, grabbing hold of the collar of his shirt and pulling it aside far enough to reveal the star-shaped birthmark there.]

This doesn't mean anything to you, does it?

[beatofmyblood]

[So the teenager stripping in front of him is a little confusing at first, but not alarming. It only gets alarming when he sees the birthmark on his shoulder that's undeniably similar to his own - not that he ever paid much attention to it, but he knew it was there - and it's enough for him to unbutton his slightly bloodied tuxedo and pull aside his own collar.]

It's...it's exactly the same birthmark!

[He probably hasn't checked his own father's bare shoulder often enough to see if he has the same one, but it's still a scary coincidence.]

[starmark]

And you said "Hamon". I'm guessing that's something that makes a lot of trouble for vampires.

[And he really, really isn't liking how all this is adding up — these words that no one ought to know, that birthmark that in some strange symbolic way represented the cause of this whole mess, that neck that should've had an ugly seam ripping across it and the circumstances of the ocean voyage...]

...This bastard you've got an asskicking in store for.

[He pauses, eyes hooded beneath the brim of his hat.]

Is his name Dio?

[beatofmyblood]

There's no need to use such vulgar language, sir--

[...hold on just a fucking second.]

Did you just say...Dio?

[He...still doesn't really like calling him a bastard, that's horribly ungentlemanly, but how does this young man know that name? That offhand mention of Hamon, too...could he be trained in the same art, fighting against the same enemy?]

It's clear there's something you're withholding from me. Please, whatever it may be, make it known at once!

[starmark]

I'm not withholding shit. I'm still figuring it out myself, so just calm down.

[Okay. Okay. He doesn't actually need this breather to come up with a name — hell, he can still hear Jiji bellowing it in impotent rage even now — but he does need it to steel himself to say something that's so utterly absurd, he almost can't believe it's actually happening.

...And that's saying something, considering the weird-ass shit he's gotten used to calling his life by now.]

...You're Jonathan Joestar. My grandfather's grandfather.

[Nice to finally meet your head, sir, he's had the pleasure of being introduced to the neck-down parts already.]

[beatofmyblood]

[My goodness, the mouth on this young man...

Wait.]

That's right, but...excuse me, what did you just say?

[He's...his great-great grandfather. He had grandchildren? Half of him is thinking there has to be some mistake, and the other half is reeling in shock.]

How can that be possible?

[starmark]

It's probably whatever brought us here. Which means it's an immensely powerful enemy, if it's got the ability to pick people straight out of history like that.

[Someone's in for a newsflash when he finds out it's not the nineteen-eighties anymore.]

If someone finds it and defeats it, things will probably go back to the way they're supposed to be.

[beatofmyblood]

Not just that!

[Jotaro, you're really not helping him calm down here.]

I may need a minute to process this. People who can call me their "ancestor"...up until now, I had no idea anyone existed who could say that truthfully. But you're correct. There must be a way to make things right here!

[Erina, coming in clutch. And he's realizing now, if this man is from the future like he says, how hard that must be for her, if it's true he didn't make it and she did. Even worse than he could have imagined.]

If you are my descendant, and you know my name, then it is only proper to ask for yours.