TEST DRIVE MEME #7

[sailmods]

1. before she hung up, she said she was a skeleton

[there is no note in your cabin. no forces stall your legs if you decide to walk anywhere but the atrium. in fact, for the first time in hundreds of years, newly arrived passengers on the Serena Eterna are waking up with absolutely no guidance. nothing but your fellow passengers in the halls - or maybe in your bed.

perhaps you end up in the atrium eventually anyway. it is where guest services is, and where Gal Friday… actually hasn’t been in a few days. until today. and she is visibly frazzled, her hair uncoiffed, her suit rumpled, something a bit like a bruise blossoming down from her hairline and over her smooth features. more papers than ever cover her desk, and when she turns to face you, her voice is as cheerful as ever, but audibly strained.]

Welcome aboard the Serene Eterna! [a pause] You know how to work a life vest, right? Everyone knows that! You don’t need me to teach you that!

[a light bulb burns out behind her head.]

… I’ll get right on that!

[freedom includes the freedom to not know what the fuck is happening. maybe you should reflect on that.]

2. grandma went and can't stop screaming

[it’s something about the lighting fixtures, this month. has the Bellona always had a massive chandelier? maybe. who knows. don’t ask questions. either way, in the stillness of the night, or day, or late afternoon, there is a noise like a cord being cut, and the chandelier plunges into the audience below.

it hits nothing, of course. no one is ever in the theater. and that, perhaps, is what the trouble is.

so, the chandelier starts to… travel, one could say. it starts to hang in various rooms: the dining halls, the bars, the clubs… sometimes, if you’re out on the pool deck and suddenly realized you’re under a shadow, you can glance up and see it suspended 20 feet above your head, securely fastened to nothing in particular and yet remaining perfectly in place.

until it isn’t. until it falls, crystal shattering on whatever surface it lands on: floor, table, person… and, wherever the chandelier goes, a lilting childish voice follows it, singing without any obvious source.]

Ring-a-ring of roses, a pocket full of posies… ashes, ashes, we all…

3. jeff bezos murdered the infinite tommy bahama

[the lights of the Infinite Tommy Bahama go out three days into October.

barely an hour after its closure, the lights go on again, and a new banner is unfurled.



physically, it is the same store. you can even see the old signs hidden behind the new ones. however, long gone are the tropical prints and khaki dress shorts. now, one can purchase any number of officially licensed or legally distinct Halloween costumes, decorations, and various other haunted accoutrements, leading back as far as the eye can see, and then farther still. is that a Gal Friday mask? spooky! well, at least you’ll be good and ready for the Halloween party at the end of the month, which is absolutely just a normal party and in no way whatsoever anything even remotely resembling a trick. there are only treats at The Infinite Spirit Halloween!

note: bahamanuel is still here! somewhere! it kinda looks like dan bongino.]

Comments

[notinflictthem]

"Hold on- Earth classic? You mean they brought out the sequel already? I'm still waiting to hear how the first one ends," he jokes, because what else can you do?

"You'll forgive me if I want a second opinion on this," he gestures broadly, "preferably from someone with the usual configuration of limbs."

And then he quirks his mouth into an amused smile, because that's the set-up to the exact sort of joke he'd pull himself.

"Oh I'm sure, now is she going to put them back in when she's done or am I going to have to handle that myself?"

[goodweather]

It's one crack after another with this guy, which one part of Phil wants to roll his eyes at, and the rest of him sympathizes terribly with. He still remembers spending the first night of his arrival taking out his frustrations on the bar. He spent the second day nursing the hangover.

"More like it turns out they were making an anthology and you're just discovering they made more than just one. And you're forgiven. You, I'd be worried about if you were all that ready to be dumped into a bad sci-fi fantasy book."

Dog tags. Uniform. Korea. Yeah, he's made his guesses. There's always a chance for surprise magic or robot shit in there, but judging by the way Hawkeye is reacting to everything, he'd be surprised if there were.

"Miss Friday does a lot of things for us, but you're on your own there. I'm not picking your jaw off of the floor either."

[notinflictthem]

"Oh trust me, I'm used to having to do that for myself. Sometimes it's even because the woman was beautiful, and not just because she used me for target practice."

Another glance over Phil, and just because his nerves are still going-

"Y'know I have to ask- when you get sick, do you see a doctor or a vet?"

[goodweather]

"Both." He punches the elevator button. He hasn't actually been ill since getting the wings, but surely getting the cold can't be that different.

He glances at Hawkeye and what he's wearing. It's deeply unhelpful for sussing out any kind of rank, though Phil isn't sure he'd be able to read it even if he did have stars or stripes or whatever the hell people use. "What's your station, anyway? Or is that confidential too?"