Test Drive Meme

[shadowmods]

Throne of Shadows
TEST DRIVE MEME!!!

New to Throne of Shadows? Long time player thinking of apping a new character? Welcome to our test drive meme! Experiment with active and potential muses! Here is a place where you can test out characters for the setting and accrue samples for your applications! Roll on the scenarios provided below, or come up with your own!

Scenario Builder

You are...

1. Lost in the temple
2. Trapped in a cloak room
3. Stargazing on a balcony
4. In the bathroom
5. In a bedroom
6. Swimming in a courtyard pool

You’re feeling...

1. Inexplicably happy
2. Like you could fall asleep at any moment
3. Angry enough to punch someone
4. Nostalgic or sentimental
5. Like someone stabbed you—oh, hey, they did, fancy that
6. Seriously horny. Must be something in the water.

Somewhat unusually...

1. You can only speak in rhyme
2. You are naked
3. You suddenly cannot verbally communicate
4. There’s a lot of alcohol/drugs here!
5. You are gender swapped
6. You have amnesia

Comments

[neverjoinyou]

Hearing it again, from a different mouth--no, not different, not if it was true, just changed--barely more than a week after hearing it the first time, Luke felt like all the air in the room had suddenly disappeared. It did not help that he'd reached the same conclusion simultaneously. Or that the man--Anakin Skywalker, it had to be, there was no use denying it--said it without a hint of irony or malice. As if he truly expected Luke to greet this news with pleasure. Anakin Skywalker, who Ben had told him had been betrayed and murdered by Vader. But now that he knew, there was no denying that the presence was the same. Less twisted, brighter, but still so, so angry.

"I know," he said tightly. He wanted to throw up. This man. This young, naive-looking person in front of him, was Darth Vader. Scourge of how many planets, how many races? Destroyer of the Jedi. His hand twitched. How was it that this was equally difficult to take from this smiling, whole young man?

[hero_with_no_fear]

Like a wounded animal Anakin stared at Luke. The feelings he was picking up from his son- there was none of the joy he’d expected. Revolution, displeasure, as if the other man felt sick to his stomach to hear it. And fear. Anakin inspired a diverse range of reactions from people. Some people liked him, most wanted little to do with him. The Order at best tolerated him, the Council would be rid of him if they could find a way to justify ignoring the promptings of the Force. For the most part he was used to it. He’d had training since childhood to deal with it. Slavery did that to a person.

But his own son – repulsed by him?

“You don’t want it to be true,” he stated, lowly. Still too stunned to feel anything but loneliness and hurt.

“Why?” he choked out. He had to know. Clearly, somewhere between his time and Luke’s time he had failed his son. Obi-Wan did not wanted to know anything about the two years that spanned between them. But Anakin was different – he had to know things, he had to understand. Maybe he could fix this. He could go back and change this dark future. But he had to know what he was fixing first.

[neverjoinyou]

Perhaps in the future, Luke would come to some understanding. Perhaps when he'd been through more himself, been tempted himself. Perhaps when some time had passed, and he'd gained perspective. The future was not yet now, however, and Luke still hated Vader. Hated him for his betrayal of everything he and the Force stood for. Hated him for murdering Ben. And hated him for leaving him all those years ago, for turning away from his son and family to serve the Emperor. Even now, with the kicked Wookie expression Anakin was giving him, Luke half expected an attack. His skin fairly buzzed with the need to be alert, to sharpen all his senses in readiness.

"Because," he snapped, "you ruined my life. You cut off my hand. You killed the greatest man I've ever known. You're the reason my friends and all the decent people of the Republic are in hiding. You're the reason I grew up not knowing who I was or what I could do. You. Changed. Everything."

Angrily, he spun and went to the edge of the balcony, turning in profile to Anakin and leaning his hands on the rail. He didn't like looking away, but he couldn't look any longer. The anger was rising within him, the hatred, and for the first time he knew just what Obi Wan had been afraid of. What Uncle Ben had known. What Yoda feared. The dark side was strong in him, he only had to reach out, he knew, and his father would be no match for him. Not now, before it all happened. Not now, while he was stunned and pathetically hurt by Luke's rejection. As if he could feel anything but!

Even so. He had to control himself. He had to stem the tide of anger. It wouldn't solve anything.

[hero_with_no_fear]

Anakin was indeed hurt even more by what Luke said, but that hardly meant he was vulnerable to attack. Long trained in the Temple and honed in the field. It could also be argued, because he insisted emotions should not to be excised completely from the Jedi way of life (contrary to the Code), and therefore had extensive practice, he was the only Jedi who could enter a duel with his emotions roiling just under the surface and come out victorious.

But dueling was the furthest thing from Anakin’s mind.

Luke’s answer raised so many more questions than it answered. The only truly comprehensible part of that was Luke’s hand, which Anakin could easily verify in the Force. He hadn’t noticed before, but now that his attention had been drawn to it, the young man did have a mechanical hand.

He still didn’t understand why, but he could focus on nothing but one immutable truth – Luke hated him. As bright and searing as Tatooine’s twin suns, there was no ignoring the intensity of that emotion radiating off in waves from Luke. Whatever the reality behind those accusations Anakin was desperate to know, he couldn’t deny just sharing the same space angered Luke beyond belief, which not only emotionally wounding for Luke, but was dangerous as well.

It took Anakin mere seconds to decide to care for someone – this was his son, and Padmé’s son. There was no question what he already felt for him despite only learning of Luke’s existence mere moments before. He didn’t want to cause the young man more undue pain or turmoil than he’d clearly already caused. And he wanted that more than he wanted to know the reasons for Luke’s ire.

“I apologize,” Anakin managed. “I will not bother you further.” He tipped his head in the customary Jedi bow and turned to leave.

[neverjoinyou]

Luke's head tipped down, between his bowed shoulders.

"That's right," he said, almost under his breath. "Walk away. Is that how it happened before? It was too much for you, and you chose power and destruction?"

He didn't expect an answer. He didn't expect anything from Anakin Skywalker. Not anymore.

[hero_with_no_fear]

Anakin had made it to the balcony exit when Luke spoke. He heard what his son said, the benefit of Jedi enhanced senses. He paused and looked back over his shoulder.

“I,” he was shaking his head. Power? Destruction? These were not things Anakin sought for, though they often came to him and were left in his wake. The taxes of war, all generals paid their dues. “I don’t know what happened. You don’t exist yet back home in my time. But I can fathom no reason I would willingly leave you unless it was at the behest of your mother or yourself.”

[neverjoinyou]

Luke shook his head again, letting out a long breath before speaking again.

"I never met you. She was dead, too, before I... No one asked you to leave, Father. You had a choice. Us, or the dark side. Us, or the Emperor. I can't think of any reason that should have been a difficult one to make."