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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.]
no subject
Then what? We just sit here like scared little rabbits?
no subject
anyways, hope you're not too adverse to infringing on personal boundaries, vance, because clarke tends to use that trick as half weapon and half invitation into camradarie. she takes a step forward, crowding in and dropping her voice by several levels of volume. )
Also no. No one around here is just sitting idly by and waiting for the worst of the worst. But we've already tried killing him, just like hundreds of people before us. It doesn't work, so we need to focus on beating him at his own game.
no subject
[ Well, sort of. He's at least familiar with the need for teamwork, and the fact that sometimes you can't just beat the bastard to death yourself.
The intrusion into his personal space doesn't seem to bother him any. ]
So what've you got to go on so far?
no subject
Slow down a second.
( the captain doesn't leave the ship much, and despite the seeming movement of the serena eterna cutting paths through ocean water, it never seems to be going anywhere specific. and dried or not, that's a lot of blood on ya, buddy — which clarke pointedly looks at before looking right back into vance's eyes. )
Are you actively hurt? Do you need a doctor right now, I mean.
no subject
[ He looks down at himself, realizing that he still looks pretty damn wounded. It doesn't hurt, it hasn't hurt since he died, but now that he's somewhat tangible here he realizes that his open wounds must have been healed on the way in. Now all he has are scars. ]
These're all from months ago.
no subject
suspicious squint. because months ago, and he's still wearing the same clothes that look like they've just crusted over in blood a few days ago? not saying showers in the apocalypse were a common occurrence, and she's not one to talk having arrived in a hazmat suit and covered in radiation burns but... that doesn't make this any less weird. or concerning.
yet in the same breath, he best friends here are a vampire and a jellyfish; going with the flow and not questioning too much until answers became necessary had worked for her so far. )
Okay. ( spoken dubiously. ) ...then how about we start with your name? ( don't collaborate with strangers, like mama said. (abby griffin has never —) )
no subject
[ He notices the look of suspicion, and the tone in her voice, and he just sighs. That's probably going to be a regular occurrence here, isn't it?
He holds up one hand and it sort of fades away, still visible but only half there. ] I'm a ghost. I'm dead.
no subject
clarke nods, files away any spooky shivers running up her spine to be addressed later (aka never). )
Right. So you're ready to accept a lot of things about death and magic here really quickly, right? It'd save us some time.
no subject
[ He goes solid again. It's useful to be a ghost sometimes, but he doesn't exactly like it so he's not going to prolong the experience. ]