TEST DRIVE MEME #5

[sailmods]

1. not subtle revealings

[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! 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. a permanent reminder of a temporary feeling

[the reflections are missing. all of them. in mirrors. in television screens. on the backs of spoons. nothing looks back at you.

then, figures do show up. not your own, like you'd expect. thin, wispy apparitions, people with pleading eyes and hands, reaching out to place their palms against the surface, from their own end. faces familiar and not, beckoning, mouthing words you just can't quite make out. help me, it might be. get me out, perhaps. just until you're close enough, until your skin warms the surface of whatever it is you're peering into. and then, those same hands wrap, all too real, burning-cold against your flesh, and pull, trying to drag you through the surface, making up for their lack of strength with desperation. any flesh unlucky enough to enter the reflection comes back bone-white and cold, all sensation dead, though it will fade within a few hours.

in retrospect, it looks a bit more like they were saying something different. something more like, better you than me. or maybe it's not even words at all. they look a bit more like they're laughing.]

3. complex mementos

[but, hey. sometimes changes are good! like, today, in Playback, there's a brand-new game available for all the children to play! it's an old-fashioned sort of claw machine, the type that's so large, a particularly dedicated kindergartner could wriggle their way inside. the prizes vary, and sit loose: bags of candy, stuffed toys, firearms, painfully early-00s electronics, actually that one just looks like a dead iguana, tiny ship-branded knickknacks... like all the other games in the arcade, the game starts up automatically upon being touched; lack of quarters shouldn't keep you from having fun! pro tip: they are loaded, and they will go off if you suck at claw games and let it fall.]

Comments

[dontcomeback]

If the two of them managed to come across each other so quickly, surely there must be others who are interested.

"I was thinking of going around, asking people questions. Who they are, how long they've been here, that sort of things. You've got any thoughts on what I should ask?"

[formersurgeon]

"Mmm." She glances away to consider that. "What they know about the people...no, probably not people. Entities? Who are in charge. Maybe if anyone ever leaves."

[dontcomeback]

Viggo nods. He pulls out a small notebook from his pocket - if she's watching closely, she might see a couple simple drawings, though nothing stands out. He opens a blank page and writes something down.

"Have you met Gal Friday?" he asks. Speaking of entities and all that.

[formersurgeon]

"The faceless woman? I didn't speak to her."

Joan was still 100% certain this was a dream at the time, and it was all she could do to keep from screaming.

[dontcomeback]

"She's at the guest services desk," he says. He had a similar reaction, definitely not wanting to deal with her when he arrived. At the time he assumed he'd simply hallucinated though. "She's friendly. And she'll happily point you in the direction of stores or anything like that. Beyond that... she doesn't seem particularly helpful or harmful."

[formersurgeon]

"You've spoken with her?" She leans in a little, head slightly tilted. "When I encountered her at the lifeboat drill, it seemed like her voice wasn't actually coming from her. At the time I thought that was just weird dream logic, but if it's not, I wonder if she's communicating directly to our minds."

[dontcomeback]

He nods at the question. "Telepathy? Yeah, why not? No weirder than anything else happening around here," he answers, nodding. "Actually that somehow feels less weird to me than the rest," he adds with a soft chuckle.

[formersurgeon]

She smiles at his amusement. "Good point. Definitely more mainstream than being dragged into mirrors by ghosts. I haven't encountered any other non-ghost entities, but it would be interesting to know if they all do that." She narrows her eyes slightly. "And if they're reading our minds. That would be good to know too."

[dontcomeback]

"I wouldn't put it past them," he answers, sipping his coffee now it's cooled down enough to be comfortable. "Not sure how much it matters. For now."

[formersurgeon]

"We don't know their intentions," she points out. "They've basically kidnapped us and are holding us against our will. It could be for a good reason, but it could also not be. If they're able to read our thoughts it puts us at a huge disadvantage."

[dontcomeback]

Viggo nods. That's not what he means. "Kidnapped us out of space and time. We're already at a huge disadvantage. They're already changing how we perceive things. Did you know I'm speaking Norwegian to you right now?" he asks calmly. It doesn't matter right now because even if the Captain and whoever couldn't read their minds, they might not have a hope in hell that they could break out of here anyway.

[formersurgeon]

She raises her eyebrows at that. "No, I didn't," she says. "I take it you hear me speaking Norwegian?"

That's an effect on their minds that seems to go beyond mere communication. It's to their benefit, but still...

[dontcomeback]

He nods again. "You sound like you're from Oslo. The West End, but not too posh," he says, even though he knows she won't really have context for that.

[formersurgeon]

She's aware that she doesn't have the context to fully appreciate the reference, but she's still amused.

"You have an accent that I assume is Norwegian. I can't be more specific than that."

[dontcomeback]

"Makes sense. I have that when I speak English normally," he answers with a smile. Might as well go with something that has some basis in reality, right? He's curious what sorts of other dialects he'll hear here, and where those people will actually be from.

"I'm not from Oslo myself, for the record. Though I've lived there for well over a decade," he adds. Since she won't be able to guess from his dialect if she can't actually hear it.

[formersurgeon]

If Sherlock was here he would be able to identify Viggo's accent. She wonders what would happen if Sherlock tried speaking in Norwegian. Would she just hear English? Would it have an accent?

"Where are you from?"

[dontcomeback]

Viggo tried speaking English and apparently it made zero difference. But he can express himself more accurately and easily in Norwegian, so that's just what he sticks with now.

"Bergen. Coastal city to the west. Rainiest city in Europe. One winter it rained every day for three months," he says, with both amusement and fondness.

[formersurgeon]

She smiles. "So...Norway's Seattle. Or Seattle is America's Bergen."

Joan thinks for a moment, then speaks Mandarin.

"Does this sound any different?"

[dontcomeback]

Viggo can see her considering for a moment, and he blinks when she speaks. "Uh. Your accent changed a bit," he says curiously. "You sound like you're from Østfold, maybe. Over by the Swedish border."

[formersurgeon]

She raises her eyebrows. "Interesting," she says, switching back to English. "I was speaking Mandarin. I wonder how personal these perceptions are. Sherlock speaks a little Norwegian and has spoken to people in Norway. He'd be able to recognize specific accents. I wonder if your voice would sound different to him than it does to me."

[dontcomeback]

"You said he's from London? Maybe if you spoke Mandarin to him, he'd hear British English instead of American," Viggo suggests with an amused grin. Honestly though, he couldn't say how it works. It's just something he's discovering as he goes.

[formersurgeon]

"Which is weird!" she says with a smile, enjoying the conversation. She likes exploring strange things, teasing them out. It's one of the things that she and Sherlock share, and it's nice to find that in Viggo. "Because he speaks Mandarin better than I do."

[dontcomeback]

Viggo lets out a small laugh at that. This is a much nicer aspect to discuss than ghosts, that's for sure. "Guess all those multilingual skills are wasted here."

[formersurgeon]

"If everything is just converted into our native language anyway," she agrees. "It makes me wonder what language Gal Friday is actually speaking. Or if she's just automatically talking to us in our own languages."

[dontcomeback]

Viggo hums thoughtfully and rubs his chin. It's hard to say. Though he wonders how much Gal actually knows or is capable of doing. She didn't exactly come across as particularly malevolent.

"Another thing to put on the list of mysteries, I suppose," he answers.