sail_ooc | 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.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Right, if he could be killed by any normal means, we'd have done that months ago. Don't insult us."

There's a snappy tone to Murderbot's voice. "I've seen him redirect bullets with magic, and absorb blows from a sword with no damage to himself. He's in control of this reality, and we haven't found a way to defeat him yet, but sure, you can be cocksure as you please."

"Well, sure, mages bend reality to their will." The man's anger rolls of Hawke like water. He's insulted plenty of people with his glibness. He's rather used to folks thinking something of the worst of him right away.

"But, have you tried magic?" Hawke holds his hand palm up and summons just a little bit of flame. It's been terribly reassuring to have his magic. Hawke would be very skittish without that. "Because sometimes, it takes a mage to weaken another mage. Get through that barrier so someone with a sword can come in and cut a head off."

Certain, he's cocksure. Hawke knows himself and knows his power. He's certain the right combination could lead to this mages death.

"You're not the only magic-user from a fucking magical world on this ship. It's been tried."

Huff-puff. Murderbot's insulted on behalf of those who have tried just utterly violencing the captain, that this upstart thinks he can roll in here and do what no one else could for months.

To be fair, Hawke has done that many, many times in his life.

"Really?" Hawke twists his hand around and the flames vanish. He's disappointed to hear that magic wasn't able to stop another mage. That's a very rare thing to hear about.

"I guess we'll have to try harder." Because Hawke refuses to be held prisoner by another mage. That's absolutely horseshit. This isn't the Imperium. "What's a bullet, by the way?"

"Do crossbows and-or cannons exist in your world?"

With those, it can at least try to explain guns and bullets. Or at least get the very rough edges of the concept out.

"Only the Qunari have cannons. We have ballistas. And my best friend has a mechanical crossbow. Her name's Bianca." Hawke suddenly very fiercely misses Varric. What a story his friend could make out of all this.

"Well, the Vints have magical cannons but I don't think that's what you mean." Both of those things the man mentioned are distinctly not magical. If he meant something magical he would've said so when Hawke first talked about taking down the mage that controls this place.

Which he still believes is possible.

"A bullet is a projectile, like an arrowhead with no shaft, fired through a tube by an explosion like a tiny handheld cannon."

See, simple enough! That makes perfect sense, that people can make things like that.

Hawke really tries to imagine it. A small handheld canon that fired tiny cannon balls. It looked utterly ridiculous in his mind. It seemed almost useless to him as well. Or at least so difficult it wasn't worth it.

Some of his confusion definitely shows in his expression.

"Maybe we need a bigger bullet?" he suggests, not even jokingly. A bigger piece of metal must be more useful than a small piece.

"The problem wasn't the size, it was the Captain using magic to redirect the path of the bullet, so it nearly hit another person. Someone dear to the one who'd fired the gun, clearly a threat."

Murderbot had watched it happen. It was...definitely a night.

"The more you tell me of this Captain the more it sounds like we'll definitely need some magic and more of these bullets. I've only met one being who didn't die the first time I killed them." And that had to be a fluke. There couldn't be two near immortal magisters.

He taps a finger against his chest. "I'm Hawke. Still possibly going mad."

Because this could be a very twisted dream of the Fade. The demon could be the Captain trying to keep them all from waking. There are options here.

"You can call me SecUnit, or you can call me Rin. People on this ship use both." Mostly because humans not from its time get weird about calling it by its designation instead of a name.

"Also, death here is funny for us, too."

"Secunit. Interesting name." Sounds vaguely elvish to Hawke's ears. Certainly not the weirdest name that he's ever come across. He can pronounce it unlike Orlesian names. The "Rin" nickname was an interesting choice for folks to give the guy.

Hawke groans and drops his head back. "Great. I can't even die properly. The Maker must have it out for me after all."

Couldn't die properly. Couldn't find some sort of peace. Hawke was doomed to misery apparently.

"You die, and wake up the next morning in your bed. And you feel a little cold and empty. You're physically fine, but you don't feel like you should be. If you're unlucky, your roommate's there next to you. Even before I came here, I'd done that, once. It doesn't get easier, here."

TEST DRIVE MEME #5

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