TEST DRIVE MEME #8

[sailmods]

1. but times have changed for sailors these days

[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 aboard! I'm so happy you could join us!

[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. tried to amend my carnivorous habit

[the space inside John's where the piano normally sits is mysteriously vacant today. as a matter of fact, the entire piano bar is silent, without so much as a muzak-inspired interpretation of Uptown Girl to hum along to.

the piano itself seems to have disappeared... for the most part. unlucky, unsuspecting passengers who enter the cabin hallway, step out onto the lower decks, or find themselves in one of the other narrow corridors of the ship, may find themselves suddenly facing down a silent, unmoving grand piano. it takes up too much space to squeeze by comfortably...

and then, the cover lifts, exposing what looks to be... teeth?

yeah. yeah, those are its teeth. and it's coming right for you.]

3. that American creation on which I feed

[it had been a difficult October for bahamanuel, the bahamanal. its territory had changed utterly, becoming alien and strange. new predators were encroaching on its hunting grounds. its position in the natural order is under threat. and so, nature finds a way.

the old timers know to be wary of large piles of clothes, but even they won’t think to look twice at the tiny lumps of garish kids’ swimsuits and sundresses - until they feel something latch onto their leg, and then several more things, and anywhere from ten to twenty balled up clothes piles try to take down their prey.

the young must learn how to hunt, after all.]

Comments

[theweakhavepurpose]

That shit is going all over Pratt's clothes because as soon as the first F sound of that curse happens Pratt stands up. He reaches up (damn this dude is tall) and digs his fingers into Max's hair, wrenching his head down to his height so he can kiss him, while pulling that hand away from his face. Gonna take care of those moans for him like a gentleman.

Pratt is way stronger than he looks, and he presses up against Max to keep him from buckling over if his legs give out. He's got you buddy.

1.

[blastedwasteland]

[Chrome you say???

There's a scrawny one-armed man squatting in the middle of the hallway cutting at the carpet with a dull blade, but he starts up when someone else appears. He blinks at her, but doesn't move out of the way.]

Well you look shine...

[His voice is nasally, with an odd accent and he stares at her with wide blue eyes, even brighter given that he's painted yellow.]

Got a place you're been going quicker huh? Something happening that way?

[He glances where she's headed as if he might see something awesome down there, instead of more hallway...]

3

[blastedwasteland]

Your hero arrives! Assuming they consider a five-foot tall yellow-painted guy with only one arm a hero. "Just wants to scare 'em?"

He tilts his head at the piles of fabric that are moving, having no idea what they are, but Blas Cap here only speaks one language: Gun.

Reaching into the bag over his shoulder he pulls out something bright red, what used to be a flare gun that has been altered and patched and fixed hundreds of time, he holds it in his teeth as he grabs a handfull of those clear glass decorative beads off a vase on a shelf, loading them into the gun with practiced ease and then firing it at the furthest baby bahamanal filling it full of beads, but also making a horrible sound.

It at least startles them if nothing else.

Eleanor Lamb | Bioshock 2 | OTA

[seethesun]

1. but times have changed for sailors these days

Five days. Eleanor enjoys her newfound freedom for five days, sailing for land on the surface in the sun - well, 'enjoys', considering how very not dead her mother is and how very locked in a box together they are - before she wakes up in a different enclosed space with a conspicuous absence of Sofia Lamb. The initial surge of panic becomes confusion when she reads the note, then curiosity, and finally settles into Eleanor putting her diving helmet on and locking it into place.

Until she knows more, she's safer as a Big Sister than the Daughter of the People.

You might find her on the way to the muster drill or at the end of the drill itself, well over six feet tall in her armor, delicately fingering the lei through her gloves. The barrier has not escaped her, but Eleanor has no reference for it, only enough awareness to understand that whatever it is she doesn't want to fuck with it.

Anyone looking at her long enough might be surprised to hear a very human, if somewhat echo-y, girl's voice from the helmet: "Excuse me - I'm afraid I've just arrived."

2. that American creation on which I feed

The thin dress her mother had her in for her treatments is not going to cut it when it's time to get out of this armor. Accordingly, she enters the one and only clothing store here, enraptured but also confused by the cuts and colors on hand; where are the laces, where are the frills, why is everything so oddly thin and revealing?

She's easy for the young ones to sneak up on. Eleanor produces a flame in her hand, making the little bahamanals recoil -

And gets hit with a full blast of fire extinguisher by Gal Friday, who reminds ('reminds') her not to produce fire outside of the designated smoking areas.

"...Does she do that every time..."

The flame again. Friday dutifully puts it out, which is positively fascinating, but uh, the younglings are noticing, and Eleanor's other weapons are thin needles designed to suck out bodily fluids.

She might need a hand.

3. isn't it better to change what the screen shows? [Playback]

It's the flashing lights and sounds that draw Eleanor into Playback, but it's the games that keep her here. These seem so much more advanced than Spitfire, but clearly it's an extension of the same technology, the same game her father had taken a timeless moment to master for the sheer joy of it...

Find her flitting from Asteroids to Galaga to Geometry Wars, carrying her helmet under her arm and putting it atop the cabinets when she's playing, her normally reserved expression full of a dawning wonder.

two.

[hydrophonics]

A strange voice comes, lilting from behind.

"Flee. You're in their territory. The mother comes."

The source is a woman, ghostly pale and covered from neck to ankle, who after her warning darts off of her own accord, heading for the entrance to the store. There's something odd in the way she runs, as if she's dragging something behind her, but she's quick all the same. She expects Eleanor to follow - there will be no sympathy if she remains.

Re: two.

[seethesun]

Flee. It's interesting advice, and Eleanor takes it. Fighting had seemed logical but if the creatures are merely defending themselves...

Eleanor vanishes, leaving behind a purple glow. Another appears at the store entrance, and after a second is replaced by Eleanor herself; the light scatters, like fog.

Walking out into the Promenade is easy enough after that.

"I chose a poor time to be lost in thought. Thank you."

2

[littlefairytale]

Well Eleanor as it turns out half the ship's requisite amount of laces and frills has quite possibly been absorbed by one teenager, going by the attire the young woman who appears from a few aisles over at the sound of someone having Bahamanal Issues.

Attire that in no way limits how well she can move, it seems, because she appears very suddenly, driving the encroaching younglings back with a wide sweep of the sword in her hand. (A move that is, admittedly, better suited for use with Crescent Rose, because adapting to a new weapon is a process.) If she finds the whole armour get-up surprising, well, she doesn't seem to have more than a split second to spare for the thought right now.

"Careful, these things are actually getting pretty effective when they gang up on people!"

...they're not actually unlike certain small Grimm species in that way, which makes them a far more familiar problem for Ruby to deal with than most things on the boat.

[hydrophonics]

The woman is there, blinking slowly, tugging on the cuffs of her blouse as if she wishes to pull them past her wrists before briefly bowing her head.

"You did not seem ready to hunt or to chase. The mother may have overtaken you."

A pause.

"They clothe themselves strangely, that entire type of creature."

Give Her The Frills Ruby

[seethesun]

There's the sensible clothing! And the sensible advice, the time for science is later; Eleanor is under attack (and being rescued?) now.

If they're effective when they gang up...

Eleanor pulls towards herself with one hand, drawing several manikins into a loose orbit, and then releases them into the center of the pack with Great Force (copyright Fontaine Futuristics). A hole is bowled into the center of the pack.

"There's quite a few of them!"

[seethesun]

"Life is often strange. It favors what is good enough rather than what humans deem to be sense." Not that either person here gets to cast stones about oddity, between Eleanor's...situation, and this pale woman's choices in fashion. "Does the store simply go unused?"

[hydrophonics]

"Not to my perception. Others come and go as they please I thought to get attire, but...little fits what I need it for."

Disa shrugs, looking at the other woman with the simple judgement of she might find it difficult too, and then gazes out on the Promenade.

"Perhaps it will slumber at night and allow you to move about easier."

[littlefairytale]

Smart move—an ability like that is, at least, far from unfamiliar given one of her old professor's Semblance was telekinesis.

"Yeah they've seriously multiplied. I've been trying not to think about how that—" a grunt, as she drives off one that's bold enough to leap first, "—works! Too much, but—"

Realistically they probably just spawn from a single source like Grimm do, again something almost familiar, but who knows.

"—point is, yeah, there's a lot and they are going to keep coming if we don't leave their territory for a bit. So—"

She presses a button on the sword's hilt, and a black energy surges up part of the blade, matching energy appearing beneath a group of the things, suddenly pinning them to the ground. Flattening the piles out.

She hasn't used much Dust since she got here, but no time like the present.

[seethesun]

Eleanor follows Disa's gaze, and sees opportunity. "Could they, perhaps, be fed? I'm afraid I've arrived with a nightgown to my name and I can hardly go armored forever. This problem needs solving."

Her father was not a patient man - and Eleanor is wary of idleness.

[hydrophonics]

"We'll have to find meat for that. It's the most likely food source."

How annoying, that she cannot simply go out and catch something to offer the beasts.

[seethesun]

Oh hey a sidequest - uh, a good plan. "Let's solve this together then; four hands should make the work light. "My name is Eleanor, my thanks again for your warning."

[seethesun]

That is fascinating, but questions can wait. Eleanor works fast; piles get drawn to her four at a time and flung deeper into the store.

At last the area is clear, for now. There's a hissing sound; the blue vial on Eleanor's arm lowers in level, and she makes a sound of relief.

After a moment she removes her helmet and it turns out there's a girl under there.

[hydrophonics]

"...Can you say that again? Your name."

It is the price of her cooperation. The voice, curious, beckoning - one of the sorts she wants to listen to.

[seethesun]

Eleanor's weight shifts; she can't turn her head in this helmet, which means her entire body gets used for this gesture of curiosity. "Eleanor, madam - 'bright shining light', from the Greek."

[hydrophonics]

"It's a beautiful name."

It's a beautiful voice, and it's why she'll agree to help at all. Her own whims are few, but they matter.

"I am called Disa."

That's as much as the humans can pronounce above water, anyway. Half the syllables that follow move with the currents as much as breath.

"Which way do we head?"

[seethesun]

Eleanor had been hoping for that answer herself. No matter; surely this ship has food somewhere, or everyone aboard would be long dead. No human can eat air and drink sea water.

She removes her helmet, the seals hissing faintly, and gazes around the Promenade. The names are unfamiliar, and though The Drunken Sailor leaps out at her - a bar, surely, and therefore stocked with food - it's Windjammer that arrests her attention. The scents from within...

"There. Hopefully we have no more surprises," says the girl who's about to be confronted with cooked food not in a fucking can for the very first time.

Wildcard

[lightconductor]

Watson is, as he often does, lingering in the infirmary, out of some vague sense that someone ought to, as well as a general desire to be useful. It's usually quiet, and it's good when it's quiet, so he fills his time with reading, or scribbling down thoughts in a notebook. He's there, at least, if anyone does need him.

He glances up from his writing when someone comes in, offering a ready smile, professional but also warm. "Good afternoon."

[seethesun]

To say that Eleanor had been hesitant to come into the infirmary is, perhaps, a bit harsh, but she has few fond memories of such places, and mixed experiences at best with doctors. Still, with those...creatures that live in the store, this ship has proven itself dangerous - and Father had proven, over and over again, the utility of keeping medical supplies at hand. So it is that the armored girl has come looking for painkillers, bandages, splints; supplies that will work with her (freakish) physiology.

The first impression is not what she expected. The infirmary is clean and well-kept, the supplies organized, the beds neat.

And there's a man here.

Her voice echoes through the helmet, polite and reserved. "Good afternoon. Am I interrupting your treatment?"

Sorry Watson she's used to lab coats.

[littlefairytale]

Ruby keeps her eyes on their surroundings for a long moment even after the area clears, grip on Summer's Thorn still tight and her body language all on-guard. Only when she's absolutely sure they're not immediately going to come running back does she drop out of stance and turn around.

"Alright, they'll come back bu— oh!" A sudden double-take, when she realises there's now a girl's face instead of just the helmet. "Hi! You have a face! Wait, I mean— wow, that's probably one of the stupider things I've said..."

How's that for an immediate flip to the other side of the Ruby shaped coin.

[seethesun]

You only get one first impression. It's a lesson Eleanor learned from her family, and for that matter from the Family; her mother the psychiatrist, Aunt Gracie the singer, even that weasel Stanley.

But the call of mischief is entirely too strong to think about that. Eleanor's free hand flies to her cheek in a remarkably good performance of shock: "I do?? I didn't before!"

[littlefairytale]

Ruby is far too bad at reading social cues to tell if that's a joke immediately, especially around here of all places, resulting in a wide-eyed stare and 'o' shaped mouth as the cogs slowly, visibly, turn inside her head.

Eventually, she just flat out says, "—okay I have absolutely no idea if you're joking or not because I gave up questioning anything months ago."

She could have had no face! Giving people a face would not be the weirdest thing this boat has done!