[Other FULL] The Long Drive [M] [OOC]

[gimmepie]

The Long Drive

A lot can change in ten years. Ten years ago you were just kids, even if you thought you weren't. Ten years ago your biggest worries were exams, crushes and trying not to embarrass yourself. Ten years ago things were different. Ten years ago, Hartley was still alive.

It's been a decade now since the death of your friend. Over time, you've all grown up and grown apart. You aren't the same people you used to be. But that loss will always unite you. It's hard to say how it came about, none of you can find the message that started it all. But on the anniversary of Hartley's death, you have all agreed to meet up and take a commemorative road trip. It's something he always wanted to do.

You have no idea what you're in for.

Who Was Hartley?

Ten years ago, back when you were all in highschool, you were a friend group. It was the four of you and Hartley and you saw each other nearly every day. He was always softly spoken and shy, but he had a very genuine and friendly personality that made him easy to get along with. In a time where you were always being judged by peers and teachers alike, it was comforting knowing at least one person would always be in your corner. But even the best people can fall victim to circumstance.

Hartley's father was a small aircraft pilot and he would often take his kids with him on short flights. Unfortunately, one day there was a freak storm and Hartley, his sister and his father never came back.

Things changed after that and, eventually, you all went your separate ways. People tend to drift apart anyway as they get older, but a tragedy can hasten that process. Still, Hartley loved to travel. He loved to see and experience everything he could about the world - that's why he accompanied his dad so often. He often talked about your group going on a roadtrip like this one day. So, ten years after his death, what better way to honour his memory than to finally see that dream come to fruition?

How the RP Works

This RP will be divided into chapters, each segment defined by a different supernatural occurrence that will affect you as you travel from England and through continental Europe. Other than engaging with these bizarre occurrences though, things will be pretty freeform and you're welcome to interact however you please.

The major thing to keep in mind though, is that this is a highly collaborative and JP heavy RP. Its continuation is determined by you guys maintaining communication and reliable activity. You're a group of people who once knew each other, who share a single loss in common and who are now stuck in a single car as you travel across the country, forced to get to know each other all over again as weird supernatural phenomena plague your journey.

Of course, that doesn't mean you can never do solo posts. Every chapter will also feature a town or two that you can use as a backdrop for events and interactions as well. Gotta allow for a little variety.

Chapter One will serve as something of a prologue point and an introduction to your characters, taking place on the train through the Channel Tunnel to France where the road trip itself will properly begin.

Rules

- Standard PC/RPT rules apply.
- The RP is rated M. It's probably going to deal with some heavier stuff and I want to give you the freedom to explore that how you wish to. Just don't
overdo it.
- While I'd appreciate it if you could get a post out every couple of weeks at least, I'm not going to put a mandatory post quota on this. What is
mandatory is you keep up communication with me and with each other so we always know what's going on and can keep up consistent activity.
- Consider discussing your characters with each other as you make them! You might not know each other anymore, but you used to. That old
dynamic is something you should keep in mind.

Sign-Up Sheet

Name:
Pronouns:
Age: 25-27 (you were all in 9-10th grade when Hartley was alive and it is currently the Summer time so I think this works out right)

Appearance:

Who you are now:

Who you were then:

Secret: It's up to you if you want people to know about this OOC (you can DM it to me if you don't) but, IC, every character should have something they don't want the other people in the car to find out about. We'll see if and how these come into play as we go.

Players

GP (GM) as Anthony Pine
Sapphire Rose as Anastasia Campbell
Shak as Jared Buchannon
Groc as Malcolm Stone​

 

[Sapphire Rose]

Name: Anastasia "Ana" Campbell
Age: 25
Pronouns: She/Her


Who you were then: Back in school we all knew this one classmate sitting in the back of the class that was shy and as quiet as a mouse but when prompted would give the school bully one of the sickest burns you can imagine. Anastasia was that classmate. Leaning into her timid and shy nature, she was easily overshadowed by other girls in her class and an easy target for whoever felt it necessary to ruin someone's entire day. Whether it was about her god awful braces, her short messy brownish black hair, the thick jam pot glasses she wore on her nose or the fact she was rather chubby for a girl her length and had a face covered in pimples. They used everything at their disposal to remind Anastasia of her place within the school. Once in a while she would speak up about these wrongdoings but often was met with retaliation whenever she did. Hartley met her during one such confrontation, being amazed by her rarer moments of courage he brought her into the friend group she now knows today. Because if something could define Anastasia, then it was the fact that she was a huge nerd for video games.

Anastasia grew up in a well faring household with one older brother who was at that point already in college and a white cat that she named "Yuki". She lamented the fact that her father was always busy working and that her mother often went on trips to her home country and dragged her and her brother along as well. For a while she buried herself in books and animated series to get away from her daily struggles but after meeting Hartley and his desire to travel the world she started seeing the benefit and charm of it all. Perhaps his views on the world, his kindness and his non-judgemental nature are the reasons she grew a crush on the boy.


Who you are now: To say that Anastasia has changed over the years is an understatement. Her short hair made way for long pastel pink dyed locks and her once jam pot glasses were traded for contacts. After so much time had passed she'd naturally no longer be wearing her braces but the fact she was now thinner and her skin was a lot fairer than it used to be resulted in an almost unrecognizable Anastasia. Though her appearance is not the only thing that has changed in the past 10 years. The once quiet and timid Anastasia had made way for a sassy and sarcastic girl who does not take no for an answer.

Now a software developer for a big company and a writer at the side under an alias, Anastasia has become a rather independent woman living in her own rather big apartment. That's right, her own. Meaning she does not have a relationship currently. Her previous crush on Hartley has left her with a lot of guilt after his death and she was never able to fully enjoy a relationship since then. She stopped dating altogether. Every family gathering so far has brought up the fact Anastasia does not currently have a boyfriend and especially her Korean grandparents like to point out the fact that she won't be young forever.


Secret: Despite the crush she had on Hartley, she has another secret of her own she does not wish her other friends to find out about.

 

[moon]

there is definitely an anime this reminds me of

Looks cool! Good luck and have fun :D

 

[Shak]

there is definitely an anime this reminds me of

Looks cool! Good luck and have fun :D

You mean Anohana reminds you of this :shifty-eyed:
Also an SU...or the makings of one anyway. CSS be damned.

Spoiler:

Name: Jared Buchannon
Pronouns: (He/him)
Age: 26

Who you are now: His old friends will be glad to know, he hasn't changed…much. The entrepreneurial spirit hasn't left him. It's now his excuse for not having a job. He's as competitive a gamer as ever. Only now he exclusively plays annually released triple A titles. He still gets in trouble with authorities. Only now it's because he's playing his music too loud or refuses to pay for plastic bags at supermarkets because he's convinced the money is used to fund avian government sleeper agents.

Jared lives in his mother's shed…technically he still has a room, she just doesn't let him smoke in the house. He alternates between his mother's, where it's the two of them and their aging dog, Bessie; and his father's, where it's those two, his younger brother, his stepmother, and the miserable cats that leave their fur on his pullout bed whenever he gets roped into staying the night.

Many accuse Jared of relying on his parents, but that's entirely untrue. He invested in a van to get his stereo business off the ground...and he will...get it off the ground. He just needs his mixtape to pop or to save a bit more from his DJing gigs. Honestly, he has no clue where his money goes. The van isn't just usefule for hotboxing though. If ever he wants to spend a few days away, Jared can go just about wherever he needs and crash too. Heck, he's even had parties in the fucking thing. It's been a fantastic investment. The van is kitted out with tributes to some of his favourite obscure 90s video game characters like Abe from Oddworld, the Ape Escape chimps, Blinx the timesweeper and Parappa the rapper, just to name a few.

If you were to ask Jared what his goal in life was, he'd give you an answer. Not a very well thought out one, but he'd give it. Between his DJing gigs, his 'stereo business', his drum & base mixtapes, his goal to end Taylor Swift's habit of writing breakup songs and his DMT trip fuelled plan to get on the first rocket to Mars; there's a goal in there somewhere.

Who you were then: Jared always saw himself as ahead of his time. He was an entrepreneur, a visionary. It was him who would recommend the best cool new games to the group to get into. It was him shooting for achievements, records, leaderboards and any kind of competitive architectures in games despite the groups resistance. He was a prolific Minecraft griefer and proud to say it. He camped in Call of Duty. He scored sweaty goals in FIFA. Not only did Jared want to win, he was a sadistic winner. He once made Hartley walk out of his own house after rubbing a Super Smash Bros win in his face for an hour at least.

The market for selling chocolate bars and crisp packets in the school playground was a competitive one, but it was one Jared found a home in. His niche was that he had 'a guy' that would import things for him from abroad. In truth, his supplier was Hartley. Where Hartley had family that would bring boxes of foreign treats for him to enjoy, Hartley would share them with his friends. Jared's response…turn a profit. As a result, he was the bane of many teachers, and many contraband sellers in the older years too.

Jared made sure he was at every party. Invited or not, he wanted to be a part of it all. Plus he was probably selling something there too. Every trend, every new fun thing they could do. Many people would let him stay just because he was bringing alcohol to parties as early as fourteen. He was never the most popular, nor the most bullied. He was school marmite; you either loved him or hated him. Luckily for him, Hartley fell into the former.
Through his mother's longstanding friendship with Hartley's mother, he practically grew up with the kid. They were never best friends, but they were so closely bound they had no choice but to get to know each other. Through years of enforced play dates with Hartley, Jared gradually met the rest of the friend group. He would often make fun of the others for their nerdy interests and just about any other weakness he could find in them.

Secret: I dunno yet

 

[moon]

ah yes that's the one

my anime knowledge is very vast clearly

 

[Groc]

Name: Malcolm Stone
Pronouns: He/Him
Age: 27

Appearance:

Malcolm was large as a teenager, six-foot-four and full of muscles. Ten years hasn't done anything to his height, but he's definitely gained some more bulk, especially around the middle. His work requires him to be clean-shaven, but he doesn't pay much attention to his hair otherwise, only keeping his straight dark locks swept out of his face. He's a natural caramel, perhaps a bit lighter these days due to spending most of his time indoors.

On the job, he dresses fancy in a collared shirt, long slacks, and close-toed shoes. So naturally he goes the opposite when he's being casual, with a preference for simple shorts and t-shirts, sandals if it's hot and socks and sandals if it's not.

Who you are now: Malcolm has definitely come out of his metaphorical shell since his school days. He's more open with his words and feelings, maybe a little less weird, or maybe he's just confident in his weirdness. Distance from his childhood home may have played a factor. After Hartley, after high school, Mal moved to America. He had his reasons, and he got into school to turn his hobby into a career. He gets paid to make food for people, which is like a dream come true for him, and he works six days a week so he's never bored.

Who you were then: Malcolm was always seen as a weird kid, shunned by many and understood by few. His large size and quiet nature made other kids uneasy around him, and he had a hard time opening up to others. Perhaps he was embarrassed by his likes and hobbies, or maybe he just didn't think anyone else cared enough. He always wore a jacket or something with pockets, or carried a bag that was just full of random stuff that he'd found or collected. Sometimes it was useful, sometimes not.

 

[gimmepie]

Anthony Pine

Pronouns: He/Him
Age: 27

Appearance: Anthony is on the taller end of average at around six feet tall with a once lithe build that has grown to become simply lanky. His faintly olive-toned skin has become progressively more pale over the years as he's spent less and less time outdoors and his dark hair that was once kept neatly cropped and styled now simply sits as a messy mop around his head. He's usually sporting stubble on his face and does little to draw attention to what he's been told are "pretty" eyes.

Anthony used to care a lot more about how he looked and dressed. These days, not so much. He is pretty much always dishevelled-looking and the only real question is if he's donning his more dressed-up work attire or his equally wrinkled-up jeans and hoodie look.

Who you are now: If one were to sum Anthony up in a single word, it would probably be "tired." He always looks like he's on the verge of falling asleep, even if he's just woken up. That isn't to say that he's disinterested in the world at large, he follows politics closely and has made helping his community and the people around him his life's work - quite literally. He works as a psychologist on weekdays and spends a solid chunk of his weekends doing volunteer work around his community. He never really seems happy to be there though and, when he isn't with his clients in the office, generally displays a dispassionate and unempathetic attitude that you wouldn't expect if you only knew him by how he fills his hours.

The fact of the matter is that while Anthony is a fundamentally kind person, his kindness has limits and his tolerance for the world has been steadily becoming eroded. He decided to go into his line of work because he wanted to be able to do a better job of making people feel better, since he wasn't able to do anything for his friend group back when Hartley died. But now, he's coming to the realisation that a lot of people just expect him to make their problems go away without doing anything to help themselves and it's starting to wear thin. Especially when nobody seems particularly interested in how he himself is doing.

Who you were then: Anthony ten years ago was practically a different person. If you compared him to who he is now, you'd struggle to tell that this kid would one day grow up to be the exhausted-looking shrink. Back in his teens, Anthony was one of those people you could describe as having a "zest for life." He took care of himself, cared about how he looked (and what people thought of him) and had a wide range of interests. He was just as big into athletics (he was a mid-distance runner back then) as he was into hardcore gaming and cartoons. He was someone who was always trying to get those around him to crack a smile, even if that meant making a fool out of himself to do it. Granted, it wasn't like he flawless, his enthusiasm for everything he did and his tendency towards being competitive could become tiresome to deal with and he wasn't great at reading the room. It was his lack of social grace that led to him getting along better with Hartley and the others than his teammates. It was just easier to be around people who were more accepting of his flaws - real and perceived.​