I'm writing about a cryptomancer who enherited a 1938 Packard Eight Coupe from his grandpa (also a wizard). He calls it The Experiment. I've come to a place in the story where someone other than the Protagonist has to drive, they look down at the floorboards and see seven pedals. I want there to be seven, the number seems right, but I can only think of six uses. The universal antiphase pedal The clutch The brake The brake mass-effector The accelerator mass-effector The accelerator The Experiment also has a range of features, like: Instantly hot heater and instantly cold AC, A gear shift for lateral movement, front wheel drive/rear wheel drive/4 wheel drive, and a "snap horizon" lever which plumbs the car to the surface of the earth. So I need help coming up with a seventh pedal, and if anyone has an idea for a feature that seems useful that would be great to see as well.
7. This pedal intentionally left blank Actual function - different every time you depress it. Generally either miraculous or disastrous. Only use it once in the story. Play it up as possible salvation, but make it complicate the crisis and make it a thousand times worse.
Not exactly familiar with cryptomancers so my ideas may or may not fit. well, by "my" idea it's more of an extension of Cogito's idea. Basically I thought (and believe me, I know it sounds stupid) that maybe that particular pedal has the spirit of an extremely irritating gnome. So this pedal having the spirit of a mischievous gnome, while also having considerable power could be interesting for the protag when he wants a desperate way out. So maybe the pedal gets used from time to time, sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad. and sometimes the situation was so dire that he doesn't even care that the annoying little wretch jumped him into the sewerage pipes. ...or maybe that's a little-over-the-top-strange-and-extreme... You could make it pop the cup holders out for no apparent reason. Idunno. but I have an idea for another mechanism (providing you didn't intentionally leave it out). how about a cloaking mechanism? overused, I know. But if you made it so that the cigarette lighter was the button. Then it would only last till the lighter pops out, which could avoid it being overpowered. or you could have an ethereal mode, something that this other character accidentally flicks on which (provided the car was on the ground) would make it fall straight down towards the earths core. (Not often the desired effect when driving a friend's car) I mean, there's an infinite amount of possibilities, I just get carried away on the weird shit.
How about a "Strafe" pedal, the term as used in PC games. i.e. when the pedal is depressed the car can move directly sideways/perpendicular to the current direction of motion.
This is just the beginning of an idea, which others or yourself can expand: what if the pedal looks as if it does nothing when pressed, but actually does something far away, to another character during an event occurring at the same time, which might help that character to solve their problem, but not the actual character who pressed the pedal? It would be quite funny/mysterious if the character pressed it, nothing happened, and then move on to a different chapter and find that the pedal actually affects this different character. In fact, you could be even more inventive. What if the pedal involved time travel i.e. when the pedal is pressed, something happens to that character either in the past or future, in order to get them to where they currently are? Just an idea.
It changes the way you see the world. Hit it once, everything is cartoon; hit it again, everything is black and white; again and everything is Picasso's cubism; etc
I got it! The pedal changes the car! Press it once, it turns into a race car Press it twice, it turns into a street racing car (neon, nitrous, decals, etc.) Push it three times, it turns into a tank Push it 4 times, it turns into a horse drawn carriage Push it 5 times, it turns into a coup but flies. And push it a sixth time, and it stops flying and hits ground, no matter how high up it is.
Engages an auto-pilot... maybe a version of grandpa/grandpa's spirit?! Or perhaps a summoner? Love this idea....
