sail_ooc | 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.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Palamedes knows almost nothing about boats, and even less about ancient pre-Resurrection boats, but he is pretty sure that a first mate is a bit like a cavalier. While it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things, it is nice to be right sometimes.

“Well, I don’t think it will take you long to find him. I’m sure you’ll have lots to catch up on.” He tips his head to the side, studying the man curiously. “I suppose you’ve gone through the whole orientation thing. A bit of advice: hold onto the lei Friday gave you.”

Well sussed, Pal.

"This?" he asks and pulls the lei from behind him. He's got that horrible thing looped through the back of his belt, not entirely sure what to do with it and not entirely sure he should chuck it overboard. So it's just been there behind him like an ugly talisman off his hip.

"What's the purpose of it?"

"Emperor's bones, I wish I knew." Palamedes purses his lips. He does hate being unable to provide a more definitive answer, but the leis have not yet coughed up any additional secrets. For inanimate objects, they seem to be awfully stubborn. "They have been warded in some manner, fashioned with a protection spell, though what exactly they're meant to protect a person from, I haven't been able to figure out."

Emperor bones--

He looks down at the lei on his hip.

Which emperor??

"I find that hard to believe. Seeing as you protected yourself, not this thing."

Palamedes sighs. “That’s because I don’t actually know how they work. Or what they do, precisely. The leis may be valuable in potentia, but they can’t actually do me any good in the present moment.” He shrugs. “Look, believe me or don’t believe me. I’m only trying to pass on some friendly advice.”

"I believe you."

Which is true. He is just very suspicious.

"I suppose not even a sorcerer such as yourself can know everything. But I am curious. What else can you do?"

“Necromancer,” Palamedes mutter under his breath, though he otherwise doesn’t really bother to correct the man. He purses his lips, considering how to answer Izzy’s question. It’s one he has been asked almost a dozen times now, and each time he finds himself offering a slightly different sort of explanation, not out of secrecy, but practicality. It’s just hard to know where to start sometimes.

“Well, there’s the entropy fields, which you’ve seen. I can also create wards—symbols that can keep people out of say, a particular room. That’s actually my hypothesis about the leis, that they might be a sort of portable ward against a specific threat. Then there’s,” he ticks these off on his fingers, “thanergenic explosions, summoning revenants, and manipulated human tissue. But my expertise is psychometry: I can read the history of objects by touching them."

You know that moment when you're in a conversation and you don't quite hear what they say? You ask them to repeat it and they do, but it still sounds like they've got a mouth full of marbles and there's no going back so you just end up feeling cornered and extremely stupid.

That's about how Izzy feels now. And he does not take kindly to being made to feel stupid.

He's still hung up on what the fuck a neck romancer is. That is so wildly specific.

Manipulated human tissue sounds like a perverse sort of private time. History of objects, though. That he catches and can, at the very least, conceptualize.

"So no fire balls, no explosions," he tries, raspy voice looking for something useful. Some kind of artillery power.

Yeah, necromancers have definitely used the 'manipulating human tissue' thing for sexy times. The apocalypse destroyed a lot of things, like the Pyramids of Giza and most human life, but not Rule 34. There's a reason the Third House likes to party and specializes in flesh magic.

"Oh, I can do explosions," he says with a casual shrug. Pal doesn't say duh, but it's implied.

There it is, both the hint of surly and useful skill. He knew you had it in you.

Izzy's brow creeps up a hair, dare he smile? Fine. Just a little.

"And your existence in this prison, do you like it?"

Given everything that's happened recently, this question is so absurd that it takes Palamedes a moment to remember that the man is new and might not yet know just how dreadful the Serena Eterna could be.

"I don't think anyone does," he says. "It's an awfully unpleasant place."

It’s a valid question given some of the poor souls Izzy has had the uh… fortune of meeting since his arrival.

You, though. He likes you.

“So were a crew of men able to gather enough force to overtake these captors would you lend your power in the name of freedom?”

Palamedes arches a brow. He doesn’t disagree with the sentiment, exactly, but Izzy’s words sound like something straight off a Cohort poster, and that makes him a bit wary. “…Certainly. I think you will quickly discover that a number of us have already begun planning such an effort, in fact.” He tilts his head to the side. “Though we endeavor to discuss our schemes in our cabins where, as we’ve come to understand, the captain cannot spy on us.”

So ex-nay on the ublic-pay onversation-kay, Izzy.

Very well pointed out, sir.

Izzy nods and taps his finger to his nose. He would very much like to further his conversation somewhere else.

"Well, I suppose it's been a long day. I might see to it that I rest a bit, what say you?"

Yeah, Pal is smart like that.

“I can’t blame you. One’s first day is always a bit overwhelming. I hope your cabin isn’t far?”

"Not too far. end of the hall as I understand it. One four three."

TEST DRIVE MEME #4

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