TEST DRIVE ∞ May 2025

[thediadem]

Test Drive ∞ May 2025

The First Collision

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Jump ⇅ :: Arrival — Panorama — Fringes — Invite Request

The Diadem is an invite-only panfandom game set in a retro-futuristic world where uprooted souls find themselves deep within an eerie wasteland of roads and highways frequently assailed by cosmic storms. Three united strongholds keep the population. Its capital is Panorama, a large metropolis at the planet's center.

Soon, you realize you aren't alone. Calling themselves fluxdrifts, the "locals" have similar stories to you, either for themselves or their ancestry. You speak to an old woman who claims she hailed from another star. You meet a young man who says his great-great-grandfather knew a strange language everybody spoke "back home." As you explore, you stumble across a coin you recognize or your sister's locket. How did it get here? What does this mean? That's for you to discover.

But first, you need to find a ride.

No invites needed to play on the TDM. Everyone's welcome! Use the Invite Request thread below to request an invite from another player.

∞ Summary ∞

IC-wise, arrivals are scattered throughout the month. Events described on the TDM are also ongoing throughout the month. If you'd rather jump right into the action, you're free to begin in media res with your character having already been on the planet for several days.

Post-impact, characters will wake up in a med tent by the Scrapyard. From there, they must accept a vehicle on loan and make the 2-hour drive to the nearest city, Panorama. If they refuse the car because they don't want the loan, they'll be in debt for medical bills instead...so just take the car. It'll come in handy.

Some things to keep in mind when bringing in your character:

• Pick an injury. At minimum, they got knocked out; at most, whatever they can recover from. Medicine is decently advanced so they'll heal faster if not painlessly.
• Decide items kept. Reasonable items on their person only: photos, keys, clothes, costumes. No pets or animal companions. Wildly out-of-place tech and personal cell phones will be damaged beyond repair.
• Select a weapon. Do this only if eligible. Guidelines about weapons and powers are on the FAQ.
• Choose a vehicle. Decide whether your character gets 2-3 options or if they're stuck with something they hate. Players can pick directly from our collection or source their own images. Anything under a similar aesthetic will work. If your character needs accommodations for driving, they can have them. Ask us for details.
• Get a phone. Characters have to obtain a phone (and a SIM card) themselves. If they've got one from home, it's damaged beyond repair. Phones are cheap. It'll only take a couple of weeks to afford one. You need to know the number before you text or call anyone. Read about phones and the Forum before you hop on it.

TDM threads can be canon if characters are accepted. Top-levels made to the TDM should be open to all.

TDM Questions? Here — Game Questions? FAQ

Setting — Taken — Reserves — Applications ::: ⇅ Top

Fluxdrift

Arrival & Introduction

Date: Throughout May

You've tumbled over a cliff. You were fighting for your life. You're on the cusp of death. You slipped in the shower. Whatever the catalyst, you struggle to cling to consciousness. As darkness overtakes you, a swirling vortex warps light and shadow in a way that defies all physics. A dark wail etches into your very bones. You couldn't describe it if you tried. You can barely comprehend what it is.

Then you open your eyes.

Through the figure's mask ©, you swear the face is grinning down at you. The tent you're in smells of antiseptic, and scratchy blankets line your cot. Injuries you've sustained have been bandaged. In the corner, you spot a MedBot that's fixed you up. Depending on the extent of your injuries, the doctor on duty might give you some painkillers before you go. Thankfully, your belongings are by the exit. Sorry if anything's damaged. Your landing was pretty rough.

You follow the figure outside. They are Yom Crook, here to lend a hand to fellow fluxdrifts like yourself. Their car's parked beside them. Actually, there are lots of cars around, but Yom Crook's stands out with its painted shark mouth. They explain they found you, unconscious, in a diffusion zone and brought you here. The nearest city is a 2-hour drive northeast. Forget about walking. You'll never make it. Also, you owe the doctor a lot of money for patching you up. But you're in luck: they've got some wheels for you and if you accept the vehicle on loan, Yom Crook will cover your medical bills. That's a good deal, right? It's not the shiniest car or motorcycle, but it'll do. If fortune favors, you'll get to choose between two or three options. Plus, if you need accommodations to drive—like adjustments to your seat height or modified controls—you'll receive all that for free.

Take the vehicle. (And the loan.) Yom Crook assures you that you'll have six months before collectors come around. Any time you're ready to pay a part of it down, return here to the Scrapyard. You'll get a receipt and everything. Paying off the loan in six months isn't impossible, but it will take a lot of work. Just don't get too lax. There's a good chance you'll be juggling multiple loans as you try to get by.

You either know how to drive, or you'll have a bare-bones manual to get you started. Road rules are more a suggestion than enforced, so just hit the pedal and go. The car has some basic features. The built-in compass will help you navigate.

OPTIONAL PROMPTS: a flat tire; a body on the road (is it a trap?); a fender bender

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Panorama

Explore & Settle In

Conditions: Warm spring temperatures, light showers

After 2 hours on the road, you find civilization. The largest of the strongholds, Panorama is where the economy thrives. Massive power plants glowing red make it visible from a distance. The city is divided into three districts. For now, you can access the Pavilion and the Blocks. Don't worry about the Sanctum; they're not letting you in.

You only need to know two things about Panorama: 1) it's big, the size of a modern metropolis, and you'll need your car to get around; 2) anything goes as long as you don't pick a fight with the wrong person. Street smarts will get you far. Despite its geographical size, the population isn't huge. With roughly a million people in a city designed for over twice that number, Panorama is far from deserted, but nor is it overcrowded. It's a good thing. Resources are limited as it is.

The Pavilion: Free Samples

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Like any large city, Panorama features a couple of supermarkets. The stock's not as consistent as a proper supermarket. On occasion, shelves can remain cleaned out for a week or two. Regardless, the long tradition of free samples remains. If you're not already shopping, you'll notice the crowded parking lot and clusters of lines inside.

Try samples, push through the crowds as you shop, or give yourself a five-finger discount. If you're cautious, you can pocket a few small items without consequences. The Pavillion doesn't have the infrastructure for surveillance; unless someone sees you, you won't be caught. Steal from the store or pilfer someone's wallet. Maybe you even make a new friend if you bump into another fluxdrift. Or, start a fight with somebody who cut you off in the cheese line. Don't make too much of a ruckus, or you'll be thrown out.

As you look around, you'll see posters advertising temporary positions for the cash register or graveyard shifts in the warehouse. Seems they might've lost several employees recently (how'd that happen?), which is good for you! It's just a 6-week position, but it'll get you on your feet. The city has temporary positions like this all over. Permanent ones are harder to come by when you're new.

Samples include: steamed cabbage dumplings, synthetic cherry juice, cheddar cheese, and chocolate-covered alien eggs (it's crunchy and weirdly tasty). They're served in the usual throwaway paper cups with little toothpicks.

The Blocks: Power Outage

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Power's finicky in Panorama, especially in the Blocks. Saint Margery's Hospital, located in the same area, has priority for power so the first to go are the motels. Maybe you've been in your room for a couple of weeks, maybe you just got here—and by the way, every motel desk is happy to put the fee on your tab if you don't have the money upfront—but all the motels on the east side are in a blackout, leaving only the west side motels up and running.

What do you do? You have three choices:

• Risk leaving your room and head to the other side where there's power. Knock on some doors and negotiate with another to share the room. They might shut the door in your face, ask for a favor in return, or be nice enough to help you with no strings attached. There's no guarantee your unattended room will be untouched, though, and you'll be on the hook for any damages an intruder causes.
• Sit in the dark and deal. It's not the worst idea, but the TV's down, the vending machines are powered down, and with the entire place plunged into darkness, you risk getting robbed. If you struggle with defending yourself, you might want to find some trustworthy company. You can also sneak out of there and let them take your leftover pizza. It's not like you've got a ton of valuables, right? Plus, clobbering someone in the face with a frying pan sounds great until you realize you've gotta do something with the body. And what if this person's got a friend waiting?
• Get in your car and drive (or grab a friend for a road trip). If you scroll the Forum, you might notice reports on diffusion zones southward. Besides, these motels are hardly your forever home. The city can only provide so much. Why not go for a ride and see what you can find out there?

OPTIONAL PROMPTS: clean up on aisle 3 (what is that goo?); a knock at your door but no one's there; you hear screaming or a commotion down the hall

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The Fringes

Quad 3: Lockdown

Conditions: Stormy, with flooding roads

Felix Bjurstrom
> Date: 125-05-17
> Time: 02:15:57

> Emergency road lights have been reported in Quadrant 3! Please, can someone go see what's there? When last we chasers investigated emergency lights, a whole truck filled with sour candy had tipped over. Our stores were stocked for weeks! Oh, be careful - reception looks bad in that zone.

Whether you end up here on your own or you were following a tip on the Forum, the outcome is the same: you come to a stop in front of a 2-story office building that's flooded several inches deep. Emergency lights from a roadblock flicker through the stormy night. Stepping out of your car, you're soaked within seconds. When you check your phone, you don't have any bars. No calls in or out.

Through the open windows, a computer awakens and displays a cheerful smile. The lights inside switch on.

Pick your scenario role below. Your thread partner doesn't need to take the opposite role! They can join you in the same scenario (i.e. trapped together). Players are also free to create a generic NPC for the other side to facilitate the thread.

After characters escape, they'll find one bottle of antibiotics in their pocket or car, whether they remember taking it or not.

A: Sealed In
As you peer through the windows, you see crates of medicine floating around. Antibiotics in the diadem are valuable. Hospitals and doctors are always buying. You can keep it for yourself or make a quick buck. Or maybe you're compelled to help somebody back in the city who's in need. Whatever the reason, you decide to take the risk and step inside.

Water splashes around your ankles. The lock buzzes behind you. If you try to break the windows, you discover they're unnaturally resistant to shattering. With the whole place locked tight, the water begins to churn. Then the computer lights up again.

Warning, it flashes in large, bold text. Quarantine in progress. Release code required for exit.

• To find the code, you'll have to search. Duck under the water, go through sopping envelopes and sticky notes or pick the locks on the filing cabinets and desk drawers. You can also try hacking the computers. Use your computer knowledge or fall back on the age-old trick of seeing who wrote down their password.
• The files, notepads, and emails start innocuous, but as you look through them, disturbing phrases jump out at you—a dark thought you've had or a cruel taunt from someone in your past. The longer you're fixed on the terrible words, the higher the water begins to rise. Only another can break you out of your trance.
• With the rising water comes fear. And the more you're afraid, the more the water also rises. You begin to see faces in the water, bobbing like balloon heads. Do you recognize them? If you move to take a closer look, they will sink back beneath the surface as if never there.
• If you manage to swallow your panic, you can eventually find a triple-laminated binder with the release code and instructions. Bad news: you need someone on the outside to punch in the 6 strange symbols in order. The instructions explain that the code panel is located at the back of the building.

Let's hope a friendly face comes along.

B: Set Free
As you peer through the windows, you see not just the crates of medicine but someone trapped inside. They look like they might be in trouble, and from your vantage point, you notice that the water is bubbling strangely. It's definitely not normal rainwater. As you watch, the water rises unnaturally, stopping and starting. It's as if the water level is responding to an external stimulus.

• The glass is soundproof. You can't hear what the person inside is saying, so you'll have to communicate with each other another way. Try charades, typing on your phone, or whatever you think of. Eventually, you determine that they're stuck and that you need to enter some sort of code onto a pad located—according to your trapped partner—at the back of the building.
• Around the back, shadows swallow your surroundings. The panel must be pried open, but a slippery substance makes it hard to get a good grip. Each time the substance touches you, you grow uneasy. You swear you see eyes watching you, though when you turn around, nothing's there.
• You can't seem to keep the instructions in your mind. And those symbols...they burn into your retinas. Through them, you glimpse an incomprehensibly massive figure unfurling in the darkness, pulsing as if in a deep sleep. When you snap back to reality, you realize you've injured yourself, slicing your hand on a sharp edge or a bruise you can't remember getting.
• Once you manage to release the doors, the water inside the office drains upward into the sky as though sucked out by a giant hose. The darkness spreads. Get out of there fast before the shadows drag you or your partner into the void.

Of course, you don't have to help anyone. You can leave the individual there, make a deal, or outright extort them. But remember, you're not the only person on these roads. You might want to play your cards carefully, even if altruism isn't your first instinct.

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Comments

[variantcover]

Huuuh??

[ The guy on the outside is definitely making an attempt to speak clearly and enunciate to make up for the fact that the windows are soundproof, but Gwen is not so great at reading lips. ]

"Test?" Yeah, I dunno, maybe this is some kind of test? Doesn't help me get out of here to identify it as one, though!

[ Which... he probably will catch none of, considering she's not making any particular effort to make her words lip-read-able.

She will, however, flip to another blank page and try to scribble out another written message: ]

DO YOU HAVE YOUR PHONE ON YOU?

[ A pause, and then another written message. ]

DO YOU KNOW WHAT A PHONE IS?

[kingsroads]

[ Oh! Phone! He knows what that is! Strange takes his phone out of his pocket, which is thankfully turned on, and holds it up to the window. Text, text, is that the messaging feature that people were telling him about? Strange had been planning not to use it out of sheer stubbornness, but if it can help that woman in there, he can do that much.

He pulls the phone away to poke at it, hoping that he remembers what button opened up that messaging menu. But before he moves his phone away from the window, two things are very obvious to Gwen on his phone's screen. One, this is a big brick of a Nokia, meaning that any sort of texting will take a while to do. Two, Strange has absolutely no service. ]

[variantcover]

[ When the guy seems to understand what she's talking about, and pulls out an old Nokia brick phone, Gwen plasters her face to the window, suddenly hopeful in a way she hasn't been since the door locked behind her. Except, that hope immediately shatters when she catches a glimpse of the screen and sees that the Nokia has no bars. ]

Aw, beans... [ She needs a backup plan. This whole notebook page thing has been working pretty well so far, so she guesses she'll have to do the whole rescue that way.

She scribbles down another message and holds it to the window, knocking on the glass to try to draw her would-be savior's attention away from his phone. ]

NEVER MIND THE PHONE
THAT'S NOT GOING TO WORK

THERE'S A CODE YOU NEED TO ENTER
AROUND BACK OF THE BUILDING

[ Once she sees that he is following her, she'll flip a page and show him the symbols that make up the release code. ]

Come on, Mr. Darcy... Don't screw this up for me...

[kingsroads]

[ Strange is already pulling up the messaging app, slowly typing out his text, hunt and peck, one letter at a time style, when he spots Gwen's new message. His phone won't work? Gwen doesn't need to be a massive lip reader to see that based on his frown and annoyed expression, Strange is swearing. ]

Damn it!

[ But okay, they can do this. A code he needs to enter around the back of the building? Easy, he'll slosh through the water and find it. He backspaces his text and quickly types something, which he holds up to the window for Gwen to see. ]

WILL LOOK
WONT LEAVE

[ Hopefully that conveys the message. He's not leaving you, Gwen. He's getting you out of this room. Strange starts to slosh through the water, moving carefully but with purpose. After all, the last thing he wants to do is trip on something and hurt himself. And there's something...odd about this room. These shadows aren't moving in a way that they normally should. His mind instantly goes to magic and there's a part of him that wants to stop and study this—but now is not the time.

He has no idea if Gwen can see him or not, but this should be the panel. It's harder to open than he thinks, covered in something that Strange knows will ruin his clothes. But he has to open it. That young woman is in distress, after all, and she's counting on him. Just ignore the fact that he can feel eyes on the back of his head. Ignore the rise of bile in his throat. You can do this.

And he does. It takes a bit of prying and a few muttered spells, but after a moment, the panel pops open. Strange grins, looks down at his hands, then winces. His fingers are a bit torn up, thanks to prying that panel open. And there's a large gash on the palm of his hand. When did he get that? It must have been something to do with opening the damn thing. His eyes stray to the panel as he briefly wonders why he was doing that to begin with. Why is he here anyway? He should just...

Wait! That woman! Strange snaps back to reality. He remembers the symbols she showed him—it feels like he couldn't forget them. Strange correctly inputs the code into the machine and, worried expression on his face, moves to the nearest window to see what's happening in Gwen's room. Hopefully that's all they need to do. ]

[variantcover]

[ Oh, thank goodness, Charles Dickens out there seems to understand the mission. Gwen gives him a big thumbs up, then steps back from the window to wait for him to (hopefully) follow through on his end of the plan. Her fingers nervously tap a rapid rhythm on the edges of the notebook she's been writing in, and when she glances down at it, she sees words scrawled on the paper— in her handwriting, but she knows she wasn't the one to write them. ]

HENCHMAN

UNORIGINAL

REBOOT                        

       KNOCK-OFF

[ Gwen laughs nervously, and prays to Stan Lee in Heaven that she's not actually going crazy. ]

Heh heh... I wish you would knock it off...

[ She backs away from the window, the water sloshing around her knees now. Is it getting deeper? She looks around, but doesn't see anywhere for the water to be coming in from, so how...?

Never mind how, is that a face in the water? A familiar one, even—?! ]

Batroc??

[ She hasn't seen Batroc the Leaper in years. Is he here? Did he get isekai'd too?

Just as she's about to go groping around in the dark water in search of her old friend and henchmate, she hears an electronic buzzing, and the telltale CLICK! of the door unlocking. She's torn, half of her wanting to see if Batroc is really in here, drowning, and the other half just wanting to get the hell out of dodge.

She doesn't know what to do... ]

[kingsroads]

[ There's something here. Something in the shadows, watching them. Strange knows it's there, he knows it's there and it's waiting. The darkness doesn't scare him. He's lived in darkness before, surrounded by shadows for what felt like years but what he knows was only a month or so. This is different from that fairy's darkness. But it's similar enough that he's hesitant.

And if he's hesitant, the young woman certainly must be terrified. At least, that's what Strange is interpreting her hesitation as. When he hears the door unlock, he throws it open and reaches in, attempting to take Gwen's hand and hopefully pull her out of here.

She doesn't know what to do, he's making the decision for the both of them. ]

Move! We should get out of here before we have to do this all again!

[variantcover]

[ Gwen's hand is— thankfully— quite grabbable, and as soon as she feels a tug towards the door, she commits to the motion, running after her rescuer as fast as she can with the water still rising. She doesn't stop to look back until they're out the door and well clear of the building.

If Batroc was really in there... She makes a mental note to try to come back around here later, maybe when the weather clears up. (If the weather ever clears up.) Or, maybe she'll ask around the online forums if anyone has seen a Frenchman walking around kicking things.

When she finally comes to a stop, she leans over with her hands on her knees, panting until she can catch her breath enough to speak. She may be a superhero, but she doesn't have any increased speed or stamina. In every physical aspect, she's a run-of-the-mill human. ]

Th-thanks. That was... a nightmare.

[kingsroads]

[ She's not the only one who's trying to catch their breath: Jonathan Strange may be one of the greatest magicians of the age, but he's also a man in his late thirties who doesn't have anything close to an exercise routine. He is also a run-of-the-mill human. And it's taking him a moment to catch his breath. ]

That building...I don't know what happened, but it wasn't right in there. There were things in the shadows. And this isn't a delusion or madness or anything of that sort. I know what I saw in there. I know it existed.

[ Except he doesn't. Not really. He knows they are shadows, he knows that the shadows were doing something, that they were dangerous and he shouldn't deal with them. But what they were as a whole? What those shadows could do? That much, he doesn't know. And frankly, Strange doesn't want to find out. ]