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TEST DRIVE MEME #5
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.]
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[An attempt at being friendly at least?]
You said that the world you came from contained things like ghosts. Does any of that knowledge cross over to here?
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I'm not sure. The ghosts here don't seem to be the same kind of sentient, if that makes any sense. They appear to be directed, but if it's the Captain's doing then that tracks.
I haven't run into anything else. Yet. [He's not going to mention that the regular ghosts flicker, which for Lucas is definitely NOT normal.]
Whelp, if Six gets in, guess Lucas is going to have a new buddy.
You said they weren't "the same kind of sentient". What does that mean exactly?
Yaaaaas!
[Lucas trails off. How to put this? It takes him a few long moments to find the words.]
Ghost don't have jobs where I'm from, for starters. They seem to man the food stations, clear the dishes and all of that. Plus I, uh...well, back home they look like regular people to me but here they vanish after a few seconds.
Been a while since Lucas got to torment one of mine. XD
And them looking like people isn't normal?
true that!
...For me.
[He puffs up his cheeks and scrubs a hand through his hair.]
Listen, I know a bunch of people here don't have mediums where they're from but it's kinda normal where I'm from. So I can see ghosts, just as plain as you standing right there. But these vanish and I think that's really fuckin' weird.
This whole place is!
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I'm overthinking it. I'm overthinking everything right now, actually. Kind of easy in a place like this?
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[Not to the same levels of paranoid Six is at but that's not a bad thing. That level of paranoid had the potential of being paralyzing.]
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But I don't know what kind of trouble... [He needs an adult! Never mind the fact that he is an adult!]
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[Seriously, welcome to his entire reality.]
At least right now you know to avoid the mirrors. Or smash them first. One thing you know for certain to watch out for.
BREAKING NEW: Lucas uses his one brain cell
True. [Still pouting.]
Who knows what else thou--hey! You know kung fu and stuff right? You could teach me!
HOLY SHIT! MARK TODAY ON YOUR CALENDARS
[It'd be a grave insult to the man who'd raised and trained him.]
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[You do not know what you are asking for Lucas.]
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We'll see about that then. Do you know anywhere that'd be good for practice?
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Uuuh. We might have to go on an adventure. I'm still trying to find everything on the ship, if I'm being honest.
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An adventure.
[Care to elaborate there?]
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[He's laughing but only because otherwise he'd be crying.]
Let's go...uh. This way! [Random direction ahoy!]
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It would be good to have some idea of what's where on this boat.
[And to identify all the places that could potentially have threats hiding in them.]
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Have you met Friday already? Uh, at the safety drill? [Lucas imagines so, if Six was compelled to go the same way that he was. Still good to verify.]
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[Honestly, exfiltration on a cruise ship was impossible to do without getting seen.]
I was forced to attend the drill but I'm not sure which of those things was Friday.