ASGARD GENESIS - TEST DRIVE #1

[asgardmods]

the test drive meme. ❧ let's do this. Anyone can post to the test drive meme, including duplicates! Please put your character name and canon in the title of your comment. All threads are considered open to everyone! Tag around and make some friends (or enemies)! If you decide to apply to the game, you can use your TDM threads for your app samples! You only need to provide seven comments if you use TDM samples. You can't be "late" to a TDM! This will be considered open until the next one goes live next month. You can make up your own scenario, interact with one of the locations in the game, use the welcome process of your character selecting a god house, or use our optional prompt below! You do not need to pick a god house to play on the TDM! You can have your character still in the process of discussing/deciding/despairing instead. If you are accepted to the game, you can keep TDM threads as game canon as long as you fudge some of the details depending on your original thread. If you aren't sure exactly how to do this, you can always ask a mod. Reserves open on May 25 at 12:01AM PST and close on May 31 at 11:59PM PST. Applications open on June 1 at 12:01AM PST and close on June 7 at 11:59PM PST. Please always feel free to contact the mods if you have any questions! Have fun, dear (future?) Wanderers. ♥ ❧ optional scenario. As you enter Asgard proper, many of the natives have gathered into curious crowds to greet these mysterious children of the World Tree. Some of them carry baskets of flowers and nervously offer one to any Wanderers that come near. They are vibrant and colorful, picked from the wilds surrounding Asgard, and they might have an odd effect on your character if they sniff the flowers directly. Purple flowers will make your character very giggly and easily amused by everything they see and hear. Orange flowers will make your character feel very warm all over, like the sun is beating down on them directly. Blue flowers will make your character somewhat short and impatient with anything that seems like even a minor inconvenience to them. Effects of the flowers can wear off anywhere between a few minutes to an hour. And for those new to Asgard, this scenario aligns with some of the general curses we might have in the game! navigation.

Comments

[rehandle]

[ better. that's better.

not nice, not good, but better. he needs this more than he needs his quips and his camouflage. Stephen doesn't balk under it, doesn't even flinch. the most he gives by way of reaction is to turn to fully face him, take the barrage as it comes, and then Natasha - ]

Yes.

[ of course he did. she was just as vital as Tony - in many way, more so. there a few possible candidates that played out in the retrieving of the Mind stone, but so many times it was her. and only thanks to that did Tony have the opportunity to do what he did. Natasha's willingness to sacrifice herself for her family would've taken her anywhere

including into Thanos' path. in one run where she hadn't already turned some other crucial stone along the way and tipped them out of orbit, she'd made it all the way to being the one to pluck the stones from his gauntlet. she doesn't have the nanites, the suit. an unprotected human body has neither the strength nor the vessel to carry that much power. and they wouldn't have got a second chance.

dominoes, one after the other. every act a tripwire for the next stage of fate's game.

he makes no attempt to explain, to defend. he knew. and because he knew, he entrusted her, and him, and all of them with the universe. ]

It had to be her. Just like it had to be you.

[ and he doesn't like it any better than anyone. she deserved better than to die before she had a chance to find value in her own life, independent of the Avengers. ]

[privatizes]

[ it had to be her. except it didn't. it didn't have to be fucking anyone. they could have found a way, couldn't they? figured it out, pieced it together, had they been together, they could have prevented this, and yet, and yet, even as tony argues within his head about it, he knows it's not true.

fourteen million to one. wasn't that what strange had said. one. one person, two people, to save the universe. that seemed like a fair trade, didn't it? to save billions and billions and billions of people, and ensure they had somewhere to stay. that was the point, wasn't it? of the avengers. ]

Great.

[ it's said bitterly, furious. punching him in the face feels like a fairly decent idea. ]

I'm sure the funeral she never got to have would have been well-attended, too.

[rehandle]

[ a slight clench in his jaw, a sign that the blow landed even without the throwing of a fist. it would have been. if there was any other way, if she'd have made any other call or been successfully interceded - ]

I watched her make the same choice at the same point hundreds of thousands of times, Tony.

[ Tony, because Stark so far has been for times when it doesn't matter. for throwaway remarks and snide comments, for winks over magic spells. this isn't play. it's honesty. it's important.

he'll hate it, of course. but Stephen's track record speaks well enough for his willingness to put necessity above comfort. ]

It was hers to make.

[ and however angry he might be at his lot or at Stephen or the universe at large, that much has to be respected. it wasn't the universe that took Romanoff's life. it was her. in the name of what she believed in and in defense of those she loved. to resent that is either to resent her or to place the blame at something else's doorstep. and to do that is to minimise her sacrifice. what she gave, and why.

they never once lost their free will. to rob himself of the ownership of the decision he made would be to undermine the scale of what he did. the dice were heavily loaded by circumstance and their own natures, yes. but what they gave up, they gave up themselves.

it's vital he holds onto that, even through the anger, the rightful fury.

Stephen could have stopped him and didn't, instead handed over the Time stone and let him live his happier years despite knowing that the only good end depended on his death, and that deserves his hatred if that's what comes.

but Tony deserves his own respect. if not respect, if the cost of what he chose was too steep for that, then at least his own acceptance. without it, he'll be trapped in a limbo of his own creation.

the decision was hers to make. it was his to make, too. ]

[privatizes]

[ there's a frustrated noise; a growl, in his throat, before tony rolls his eyes, a bark of a laugh escaping. it's a bitter sound, angry. ]

Of course you fucking did, because there was no other choice. It's not a choice if the only other option is the end of the universe.

[ the tone escapes in a frustrated hiss, the fury and anxiety and rage clawing up his throat and through his teeth, as he takes half a step forward, his fingers still digging into his arms, his arms still crossed over his chest, tightly. protectively, defensively. angry, heartbroken. ]

See, I might be the team screw-up, but I have always made every single decision I have ever made with the bigger picture in mind. And I was wrong, a hell of a lot of the time, most of the time, but I fought with everything I had because I knew it was worth it. If I died, I died, because you know what? It's me, or it's the fucking universe.

[ it was the same in new york. it was teh same in sokovia. it was the same at hq. ]

And even without the sanctimonious bullshit of "my life or the universe," when you look at it, logically, mathematically, charting out our insignificant meaningless lives on a star chart -- what other choice is there? Save yourself, or save the universe? One life, or trillions? We die now, or we die later?

[ it's the argument tony had inside his head, for the split second when he realized he was the one. the argument he never really got to have with himself, because he had no time to think. it was instantaneous; grabbing the stones, snapping his fingers. he didn't think about it because there was nothing to think about. his life, or the universe? his life, or pepper's, or morgan's, or -- or the avengers?

there is no choice. tony chose to die because to choose otherwise is unspeakable.

in a few months, if he's still stranded here, tony will look at it differently. he'll agree: he chose to die, because he needed to do so. he wanted to save the universe. and now, he can truly rest. but now?

fuck stephen strange and his goddamn bullshit. ]

If your little club wants to lord free will over us all, fine. But a false choice isn't a damn choice, and Nat and I did what we had to do to save the universe, because there was no other alternative. We die, or the universe dies. Thanos had a gun to our head and we pulled it before he could. That's not a choice.

[rehandle]

[ he's right.

Natasha's choice was different. three ways: herself, another, or neither. she had time, she had options. but if Tony doesn't already know that, it's not his business to go into.

but Stark's choice? that was near enough impossible.

there was a version in which he said no. that matters, just like it matters that when it came down to it, he didn't. but Tony will never see that world, never see Thanos' armies decimate those left alive after the third snap, never see the vast destruction that his own decision voided to nothing. he cannot know to be proud of what he did. because given the opportunity it really was only ever going to go one way.

it's why Stephen gave up the stone. you can't watch a man live millions of iterations of a life and not know something about who he is at his core.

Tony advances, closed and furious, body coiled tight and words coming thick and fast. Stephen becomes his opposite. arms loose at his sides, face slack, still and quiet. no resistance. no competition. no denial. ]

I know.

[ it wasn't a choice. it was inevitable.

they did what they had to do. Stephen could've cut that weight in half, left the universe with its guaranteed fifty percent and avoided an all or nothing endgame. in choosing not to do so, in choosing to hope for more and place those hopes on the shoulders of those left behind, he had signed their death warrants. he knows it.

he'd do it again. ]

But I'm grateful for what you did.

[ the universe owes a debt that can never be paid - thank you will never be enough, so he doesn't quite say it. not yet. ]

so sorry for the horrendous delay.

[privatizes]

[ grateful. as if that word means anything. like the afterlife gives half a damn about what tony stark has accomplished, but -- it matters doesn't it?

his legacy, hadn't this all started with his legacy? the legacy of the stark family, the legacy of his father. tony seizing the company and reforming it into something worth talking about. iron man, battling back against the forces of evil, making stark industries into something to be proud of. concerned about how he would be remembered, and how his father's ghost still haunts him, and will likely forever haunt him -- permanently, now, because they're both in the fucking afterlife -- ]

Great.

[ a bit bitterly, as tony takes a step back; his anger is gone just as soon as it appears, and he wraps his arms around himself, curling inward. trying to quell the hammering of his heart, the tell-tale signs of anxiety and fury creeping up on him. ]

Thanks for the gratitude. Appreciate it.

[ and he sucks in a breath, letting it out just as quickly. ]

I'm sure it'll make me feel much better in about ten hours and two fifths of whisky.