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TEST DRIVE MEME #4
1. you will survive being bested
[you wake up.
it doesn't matter where you were before. going to bed? dying? opening the door to face a great evil? same result. you wake up in a soft bed with starched sheets in a cool, darkened room, sunlight peeking out from behind thick curtains. maybe you're alone; maybe you aren't. maybe you immediately notice the folded paper on the bedside table near your head. if you don't, you better fix that real quick: you won't be able to even open the door before you read it.
the note itself is written in a neat hand on white card stock; there is a stylized logo of a ship with the words SERENA ETERNA printed underneath. the note reads as follows:
Dear Passenger(s),
As your cruise director, it is my great honor to welcome you aboard the Serena Eterna, your destination for fun and adventure! We know you could have chosen any cruise line for your vacation, and we're very grateful you chose ours! On behalf of the Captain, I would like to assure each and every passenger that will we do whatever it takes to fulfill all your needs and desires during your journey with us.
At your earliest possible convenience, please attend the mandatory lifeboat drill by the end of the day. I'm sure everyone is very eager to get started on all the fun and sun, but safety always comes first! You can find your life jacket in your cabin's closet; carry it to your assigned muster station on deck one, where I will take you through the drill. If you can't find me in the crowd, just look for the gal with the winning smile!
See You Real Soon!
Sincerely,
Gal Friday
you walk to deck one. you have no other choice: every time you try to step in a direction some unseen being considers "not towards deck one," you find your legs no longer move, staying stock still, frozen. whether compelled quickly by curiosity, or delayed by pure stubbornness, the result is the same, and you are left milling around with other similarly curious or stubborn people.
you see someone in uniform near the front of the crowd. she seems to be a gal, but is missing the winning smile, along with most of her other features. she seems to see you, though, rushing to your side and placing a lei around your neck with great formality. a voice, cheery but artificial, sees to come from nowhere and everywhere.]
Welcome! We're... I'm very glad to have you aboard!
[you touch the lei. rooster feathers, lotus seeds, and a carved circle of something white and hard, linked onto a silk string.
after the drill is completed, you are seemingly free to go. or, well, your legs work, now. and maybe that's as good as it's gonna get.]
2. think about how many times I have fallen
[for the most part, no one has given the elevators much thought. they've all done their job reliably and dutifully this entire time, never so much as being blocked off for maintenance.
until today, when the doors close behind you as you enter, and don't open again.
for the most part, that's all that happens. the doors can't be pried open, or broken with force or magic, and though the glass walls remain stubbornly shatterproof, you can look through them and try to get the attention of anyone outside. (Friday, down in the atrium, sees your desperately pounding fists and gives a wave, but does nothing else.) the elevators don't move... except, when they do. going up two or three stories, and then dropping, sometimes as many as five stories at a time, stopping just as suddenly.]
3. it was the easiest thing to do
["physically assaulting people is an easy way to get attention" was probably a very bad lesson for the neglected locations to have learned, but it they did it anyway.
this time, it's the sushi restaurant on the promenade, Mikabo. it turns out, the conveyor belt can go faster than one would assume. much faster, actually, with the apparently ability to stop on a dime. both of these factors have combined to create what is functionally a pitching machine, but for dragon rolls, wads of wasabi paste, and exceedingly sharp steak knives, all of which are being aimed at anyone foolish enough to walk by the doors of the restaurant without coming in.
its aim, at the very least, doesn't seem to be the best. for now. because it very much seems like it's getting better.]
ig i'll consider it a public service to the reaction image banks
( her words are measured with their steps, each imbued with a grace that for ayaka was learned and instilled with conscious care. these days, it does come as a sort of default behavior, but it wasn't always so. that her inclination even as a child was towards dance, perhaps helps; there is a gracefulness in that too, albeit one she fancies with more freedom than tea ceremonies or social constructs.
where they are now, wherever this is, however, she is already surmising such things will hardly be their primary concerns.
still...the soft tilt of her head is equal parts thoughtful and questioning. )
But I had believed this to be something special to the traveler. Her light is...
( ayaka trails off, the mildest of pinks in her expression. it is hard for her, despite her education and her endeavors, to describe the rather different experience of meeting and befriending the one whose family yet remains unfound. she tries not to think of the dance in the forest and then, thinking of it, unfolds her fan as a sort of absentminded thing to do. )
... well. I did not expect it to be something we, ourselves, would find in our abilities. Am I right to gather this was a miscalculation on my part?
( the answer is of course yes, but she hopes her brother has more to the explanation, gets the sense he is easing into it out of careful thought and courtesy both. her hand still on his arm, tightens only for a moment, as if to check that he is real. )
aghafdgf thank you for ur service
Mimicry is a skill, but even so he doubts anyone could properly capture Ayaka's fond affection for the Traveler with such an accurate portrayal.]
Not necessarily. While we ourselves are unable to do so, it appears our traveling friend is not the only one who possesses such abilities. This... vessel. [The infliction in his tone turns almost disdainful.] Seems to exist upon some separate form of reality not quite adjacent to ours. From my own prior conversations with others, [thanks ebalon] it's become clear that the entity in charge of this plane is the captain of the ship, and he is responsible for stealing away all the passengers from their own respective worlds. Ours - evidently - included.
[His free hand moves up to cover hers where it grips his arm, giving a reassuring squeeze.] I myself have been here for roughly... Two months, if my math is correct.
my pleasure. also flops in late with milk tea!
Two months???
( her mind immediately traces back to seeing ayato not a few hours ago. yet his word is as good as any law or better to her; she believes him. it only stands to reason that they are dealing with a confusion not only of location but of time as well. concerning. but when she thinks of the traveler and all she must have seen and experienced, it is not difficult to conceive of or even accept. it is only that, as the information settles and roots with the care of relevance, her brother has been here, not 'alone' but...alone.
over their life together, a word like 'home' became quite specific, but so too did words such as 'alone' and 'together' and 'lonely' and 'here'. words which in a different arrangement or from someone else will always mean vastly different things, and yet to ayaka it is simple enough.
ayato. thoma. taroumaru. their people.
two months.
and knowing her brother, cut off as it appears this place may very well be...
she neatly folds and hides her fan so that she may lay her hand across ayato's, perfectly having him in her hold now as she stops their quiet little walk to look directly up at him. she will never be their mother, nor their father; she will never be ayato either. she cannot be anyone but herself. but. each of these people exists like a season, and maybe a heart has chambers but a soul has windows. sometimes, depending, she might look closer through one or the other to understand something. about her brother, she knows so much of what he's done and built and sustained comes from hard work visible and not. to have even his 'eyes' taken, to not know...
when she smiles, it is soft and it is years, and it is the stray snowflake that catches on your eyelash, crystalline and not without purpose despite its fall. )
I am so sorry. For what it is worth, from what I last remember, everything has been going well. Small and large things are constantly afoot but of late they all seem to deal with recovery and rebuilding. There is little need even in the longest shadows, for as much as our commission might have dipped their hand in the past.
( please do not worry, not too much.
and, )
Just a few hours ago, I was able to say hello to one of my favourite scenes: another game between you and Thoma. I confess I am surprised though, brother; you were losing.
( then her smile brightens, almost playful. )
I don't expect it is in your nature to go easy on your opponents, however.