sail_ooc | TEST DRIVE MEME #8

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TEST DRIVE MEME #8

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.]

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Or, maybe, hear me out, let's skip over the physical harm and say I believe it's real!

[ His hands are raised in surrender. Who is this mean little girl and where are her parents!! ]

Sure, you know... faceless lady, spooky unlocking door, the walking thing, everyone's fashion choices... very normal. Very cool. Nothing Stephen King about this at all.

So... truce? Alright? [ Look at this nervous smile. How can you say no to this face. ]

Psssst!

[ There's a low, desperate, your-attention-please sort of noise coming from way on top of one of the taller sets of shelves. If Percy directs his attention towards it, he'll see a young man perched on the highest shelf; he's around twenty, with messy red hair and wide nervous eyes.

Max is lucky that he got real good at climbing really fast, because he was Not equipped to handle all these cannibal clothes when they tried to swarm him. Cannibal clothes? Is it cannibal if clothes for humans eat humans? Or is that just-- okay that's not what's important right now.

He calls down to the steampunk cosplayer in an urgent whisper. ]

Psssst. Dude, dude, they're behind you.

Alright, alright. Truce until I get bored with it. (which could happen at any given time, sadly. the personal space she gives back to him as she steps backwards several feet with her hands clasp behind her back.)

SO! You gotta name? If I had to guess, you look like a "Marvin" to me.

[Damn it. It's such a cool cape, too. Not as cool as his, obviously, but... pretty good, I GUESS.

He waves one hand, super casual-like.]

You could say that. 'Course, I'vve been here a wwhile, noww. Pretty much nothin' escapes my notice. Especially somebody wwith a clear sense'a style that doesn't come in tropical print. For noww, anywway. 'Til you gotta do your owwn laundry.

[Douchemon over here picks at his own overshirt like, ew. Even though he literally picked it out!!!!]

Eridan just kinda stands there and takes it? Not because he deserves it -- obviously, he doesn't, that's not even the discussion here -- but because Karkat is actually angry and Eridan never really knows how to handle Karkat when he's being anything other than amicably rancorous.

He tries to listen, really. Tries to actually internalize something from the shouting. But the more he says, the more biting his commentary, the worse it makes Eridan feel -- and the worse he feels, the less he wants to hear. Especially with that final, full-palm slap of ugly clarity. Karkat calls him the destroyer of hope and all he can think is why? Why the fuck did he have to -- why did he get that title, why was that his thing, and what kind of bullshit game construct develops a class that's designed to ruin everything!

He opens his mouth, ready to snap out that he is a different person, obviously, by virtue of being stuck here for months by himself -- but it's fuckin' pointless.

So instead, he glares at the horizon and destroys a couple more hopes. "Wwell, you're fuckin' stuck here wwith me. Forevver. Until your stupid fuckin' soul or wwhatevver gets sucked into the ship and you turn into a shitty ghost that folds towwels and cleans up after shitty humans. You're nevver goin' home, so evven if your plan wworks so much fuckin' better than mine, you're nevver gonna see it come to fruition."

The words feel good in the grossest possible way. He doesn't bother looking at Karkat. Let the shithead walk off and start tellin' everyone just how shitty he is. It's an easy expectation to live up to.

"Howw's that for the Prince'a Hope?"

Karkat has been aware since the second he shut his mouth that he probably shouldn’t have added that part about Eridan’s title. But in the moment, he was furious and all he could think of was using every weapon in his arsenal to verbally decimate his foe, and the title was the cheapest, quickest way to do it. The final nail in that bulky coffin of Eridan’s massive ego.

Still, the reaction stings.

“FINE,” he glares. “GREAT. I’M STUCK HERE FOREVER. AT LEAST I KNOW THAT THE ONLY FRIENDS I HAVE LEFT ARE GOING SOMEWHERE BETTER THAN ME.” At least that’s one thing he can say he got right, amidst his monumental pile of screw-ups.

“AND FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH, THE PLAN DID WORK. WHICH, IF YOU’D BOTHERED TO LISTEN TO A SINGLE FUCKING THING I SAID, YOU’D KNOW ALREADY.”

[ Now with enough distance, Percy feels more confident breaking out the big guns. Literally. This weapon was certainly built for distance more than short range, but if it were up to him, he would much rather a more reliable weapon.

Beggars can't really be choosers when Percy's the one responsible for the creation of firearms in his world, though. ]

You say that like this is a common occurrence. [ His voice neatly carries over the commotion of the murderous piano as he lines up his shot. ]

Just — let me think for a sec.

[ In any normal circumstances, walking right up to somebody and informing them that you and your partner are both werewolves would almost definitely result in your typical "are you out of your (very long loading screen) goddamn mind?" situation. But this ship isn't normal. Laura had been compelled to walk to this drill against her will. There's a woman without a face. Even the people around them look like a mishmash of different times and different places. Come to think of it, now that she's taking a proper look around she realizes Max is the only one in sight who looks like he's here for a cruise. ]

I don't know, [ she finally says. Her words are terse though her tension isn't directed at Max. ] I don't think we should tell anyone. We have a month before it'll be a problem, right? And if we can figure this out we'll be long gone before we ever have to worry about it.

Alright. Cool. [ Not the most cool ever, but also Max wouldn't have signed up to be a camp counsellor if he easily lost his patience with manic pixie asshole teens. ]

Actually I'm a Max. What are you, a Mackennzeigh?

[ No, the unique spelling isn't audible. Yes, he's thinking it anyway. ]

(excuse you, that's "manic quirky pixie stick" to you. his actual name is even more less impressive and it's shown on her face how not amused she is at first. although — )

Max? 'Least it's short. (unlike the name he guessed. who has time to say that?)

Bzzt, wrong! The name is Jinx. And it stands for Jinx, by the way. It's nice to meetcha! — Also I gotta ask, you got anythin' fancy about you? Are you a magic user? A demon? Can you read people's minds or feelings?

Weird shit happens here. Welcome to the Serena Eterna!

[Look, a hungry piano is not the worst thing it's seen all week. It's fucked up, but what isn't, on this ship?

Murderbot continues to aim at the legs, but the beam sears through them without managing to disable the piano fully.]

Until they die, too, because the whole fucking plan is stupid and pointless, and everyone knows the more convoluted a plan gets, the more likely it's going to go wrong! That's why his plan was better, because it was simple. It only relied on one unknown factor and that was a psychopathic woofbeast. Not asteroids or Sollux or dream bubbles or scratches.

So much for Keep It Simple, Stupid.

"And noww wwhat? You're all hurtlin' through the space between sessions, about to go an' wwreck some other group's chances at makin' a decent univverse?" An eyeroll. "Cool. More people to sacrifice to Fef's creepy fuckin' gods of the furthest goddamn ring. Wwould'a been better if wwe'd all just offed ourselvves wwhen wwe had the chance."

Somehow, that hits way harder.
A wave of dread swells through Karkat’s body.

Anyone would expect further shouting from him, but it doesn’t come.

“. . .FUCK YOU,” Karkat rasps under his breath. He turns and beelines off the deck back into the interior of the ship, covering his face so no one can see the red tears leaking from his eyes.

"What kind of alien?"

For the first time in Dolce doesn't know, ever, centuries, her whole life, she has no idea what's going on or what's being spoken about. "Are you sure you're not a ghost?" The only way you can come back from the dead repeatedly is as a ghost. And it's more like... once. "Maybe they're not really dead then? Just sort of knocked out? And then a dragon rescues them and breathes them back to full health?" Because that would make far more sense.

"Well, that's remarkably inconvenient for us," Percy shoots back as he pulls out his longsword with one hand to keep the damn baby clothes at bay, while using his dominant hand to unholster the pistol.

He doesn't know what last time means, so he can only hope that this will do the trick. He aims for the lights and lets out a couple rounds, all while holding his breath.

The lights go up in a shower of sparks and arcing electricity as the lead shorts them out. The advancing form of Bahamanuel shies away with a low cry even as the infants go scrambling for safety.

Erin kicks the one on her leg off. She's bleeding, and it stains the leg of her pants.

"Let's. Very slowly back towards the entrance. Shall we?" Wincing every step, Erin puts deed to word.

"Like from space??? I dunno. Luther said something about a bug." Whatever that meant. Klaus squints off into some general side space for a moment. "Oh. Yeah. No. Still not a ghost." He laughs. "Just a weird superpower. Really. I think I'd have noticed, but like...who knows at this point?" A beat. "But also I can't phase through the floor or the walls and that would make a lot of complicated situations easier..." None that they want to elaborate on with a stranger. Not that they're embarrassed about it, but...yeah.

"A dragon? Buddy, if there was a dragon involved in this? Well, I would have a lot more interesting stories to tell, to be honest."

"Space alien." Woosh. She still has no clue. But she nods about shifting through walls and floors. "Pico does get away with a lot on account of that. But you'd probably have to work harder to stay solid. Or at least she does, but she's stuck kind of... childish. Then again, most adult ghosts I've met are even worse at it, so maybe it's not that."

A small snort. "Your stories seem plenty interesting already." You half-bug-alien-not-ghost.

He hadn't even been trying, that time.

Karkat bolting from his presence is somehow more of a punch to the gut than the split-second of guilt he'd felt after murdering Kan. It sure as shit proves Karkat's point, though, doesn't it? Ruining hope really is all he's good at.

At least he's self-aware enough to know not to chase after him. Not... not right away. He'll give him a couple of hours to... cool off. Or something.

(It will probably be days before Eridan works up the courage to try talking to Karkat again.)

"Yeah. I mean, can't use my own powers on myself if I'm dead, right?" Not that he actually has them, but that's hardly the point. "Vance does a pretty okay job of being solid, though. I dunno if it's the ship or what. But yeah."

That's certainly not not a laugh. "I mean, that's true. But I really want like a dragon story or a unicorn one...or like one where I turn into a mermaid for no reason because it's funny."

this is just a drill

He's a tall man, bemused by expression, black hair hanging long down his back and over his shoulders, everything a touch disheveled. Scores of lacerations mar his skin, and based on the matching cuts into his robes indicates more within; there's flecked blood, but little, and even the lacerations he shows are scabbing over, healing as they should. Not seamlessly, he doesn't think, not when he has no medicine to aid them in that way, but with his sheathed sword at his hip and the thousands of arrows bent on eradicating him from existence or the concept of spiritual intactness as suddenly gone as his waking here was sudden, he can recognise gratitude.

Also frustration, keen and tamped down on, while one hand touches the lei around his neck.

"What are the chances," he says, sighing, "We can disembark by choice?"

He has a pointless death to get back to. Very fruitlessly heroic and everything.

sing us a song, you're the piano, man

The piano corners him coming out of Bric a Brac, where he'd been studying the goods on display and the peculiar playacting that went into 'bartering' for goods. He doesn't understand it, simply accepts that it works as it does, and then there he is holding a ship in a glass bottle and the piano growls.

Or attempts to growl. It vibrates its strings in a threatening manner, annoyed at the extended time it'd taken for Yue Qingyuan to exit the store it'd been looming outside of. With its giant maw of a lid opening to reveal shark-like teeth, Yue Qingyuan blinks benignly, shifts his hand holding the bottled ship up, takes hold of his sheathed sword, and slams it down on top of the piano's open mouth.

It doesn't dent anything, for better or worse, but it does send the top lid slamming into the bottom one with a discordant clanging of keys and what might be, almost, a pianoic whine.

"I can't sense if you're possessed or not, but I don't advise you to continue."

Addressing a piano. As one does.

we be wilding with the bahamanals

He has the sense of being stalked by something he doesn't quite see far before he meets the wee predators. The clothing in this shop is already... strange. Bright, clashing, inadequate to his tastes and familiarity, and also the only option given when his own robes have dozens of lacerations through them from the arrows preceeding all the arrows meant to kill him.

Meaning when he's debating between shirts and has been attacked at least once by bundles of children's clothing, he's now taken to standing on top of one of the racks to further examine long sleeve dresses in dark colours to layer over lighter pantsuits.

"What a clever way to keep clothing held together." There he is, marveling at a zipper. Pulling it down and up again, zip zip, how nearly smoothly it goes!

"Pico does," But whatever. Superpowers. If he says so. "Vance is a ghost?" So that was someone she would inevitably meet, probably.

"Okay, you can borrow one of my stories. One day a divine dragon got jealous of your beautiful mermaid tail, and cursed you into this dreadful mortal form," did she just call his normal human self dreadful? Yes. "And only the kiss from a unicorn will cure you back to your natural mermaid state. Unfortunately, unicorns favor pure-hearted maidens, so you must find one such maiden and curry her favor in order to strike an accord with the unicorn. Or you could just beg the dragon for forgiveness and let them make you an ugly mermaid, but dragons are fickle, and she might change her mind and make you something even worse. Like a Mamadoodle." That's certainly a story.

They shrug. Different worlds, different rules, they guess. “Yeah. He’s a ghost. He’s like a teenager???” How old is he? Klaus can’t tell you.

Klaus listens to the story with delight. This is his favorite story. It’s official. Better than the frog and the scorpion one!!! Even if she did insult his human form. They would clap at the end, but they’re still holding her up and levitating. Probably should get out of here somehow.

“Best. Story. Eveeerrrrr!!!!”

There is another tall figure in the infinite Tommy Bahama, although this one is seated on a wheelchair, with a cast on his left calf and bandaged cuts on his face.

Dedue quietly sorts through clothing in an effort to find something that is 1) in his size and 2) not entirely hideous.

In the middle of holding up a hanger in one hand to evaluate the floral pattern of a teal and orange button-down shirt, he sees a small pile of clothing rise up nearby out of the corner of his eye. He punches it and keeps examining the shirt.

Percy grimaces at her answer. That is to be expected, he supposes. He half expects to see Anna Ripley show up at any moment, his hand twitching to reach for the gun holstered at his side, just in case. But he focuses on the good for the moment, on a familiar face standing before him.

And manages a smile, in spite of all the conflicting emotions he's experiencing. "It's good to see you as well. Though I wish it were in a much more cheerful setting." Like Whitestone, like their home.

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TEST DRIVE MEME #8

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3. a lesson in futility

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cw: suicidal ideation (something is wrong with these children)

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yue qingyuan (pidw) | the scum villain's self-saving system | ota

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3

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