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.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Yeah, actually someone did." He's just gonna eat his mashed potatoes and not mention who that someone was.

"I know I know. I uh... wasn't really thinking."

Man no one let's him have any fun.

"It'll come back if I die. Or well it probably will. Usually that shit gets healed up via respawn. Though last time I woke up with a knife in my shoulder and you know what I should probably just stop talking since I keep saying worse and worse shit and you just got here. Wanna talk about the weather? Or that like... my next door neighbor is a literal dog that talks?"

His nose wrinkles. "I... don't think I want to know." Yeah, he's judging. He's judging hard. He really didn't want that assumption to be true.

"Um. Yeah. People told me that the dead don't stay dead here. That's still, like, a lot to take in but... wait, you have a talking dog as a neighbor?" Yes, because that's clearly the weirdest part of this entire thing.

"Yeaaaaah. I kinda forget that shit I think is normal really. really isn't." He shrugs, because even if he tries to filter himself he ends up forgetting midway through conversations and keeps on saying insane shit.

"Anyone who dies comes back the next day, Friday carries them back to their cabin and tucks them into bed. Which is either really sweet or super creepy depending on how you look at it." But he brightens up at the mention of the dog because he is a simple man who loves dogs. "Her name is Ammy. She's a big white wolf dog and when she barks you can understand her. It's fucking awesome."

"In your defense, nothing about this place really seems...normal." And Max has already learned that some of the things he thinks of as normal (being a servant to a vampire, for example) really aren't to a lot of people.

"I guess that's... nice of her. She still kind of freaks me out that she has no face but now I feel a little bad about that." It has to suck to be the one in charge of handling the bodies. The idea of tucking them into bed doesn't read as all that weird since Max is used to sleeping with an undead in his own bed already.

"Ammy? That's a cute name. So, does she have uh... a human level of vocabulary or...?"

"That's true. Even forgetting the crazy shit back home, just explaining this place is a nightmare. You come back from the dead, the food doesn't go bad, the ship is full of ghosts, and everyone is from different places and different times. I had to describe what a forest was to someone and I think if I wasn't already dead that would have shaved like ten years off my life." That one conversation will haunt him for the rest of his existence.

"Yeah pretty much. She's apparently a god in her world? I showed her the buffet so she could cronch some crab legs. She's real friendly. A very good girl." He nods, not even feeling a little weird calling a god a good girl because she's also: a dog.

"Someone didn't know what a forest was...?" Max is having a secondhand existential crisis over that one. Thanks.

"Wait? What do you mean you're already dead?" He's clearly not. Unless? No, but a vampire wouldn't have to wait until he dies to regenerate a lost limb. Zombie? He doesn't smell bad enough...

"Yeah she was from this... dystopian future I guess where the pollution was so bad she couldn't see the sky, and I'm from Montana which is Big Sky Country and trying to explain that to her I mentioned the forest and she at least knew what a tree was but... It was pretty sad man. Not that it's her fault or anything but fuck, it was rough to try and explain that it wasn't just a bunch of trees but like, more than that. And rivers and deer and shit..." He runs his hands through his hair getting distressed just remembering it. She hadn't lasted long, but she'd been from the same world as his former roommate, and the more he found out about their world the more fucked up it seemed.

"Oh! Right uh.. yeah. That's.. one of those things I probably shouldn't casually mention huh? Keep forgetting. But yeah, I died in a nuclear apocalypse. Well in a car trying to outrun the nuclear apocalypse. The Collapse. Shockwave sent a tree right into the Jeep and I got squished."

"I'm from the Ozarks. Not actually mountains," despite his master's clan being called The Ozark Mountain clan, "but we do have rolling hills and forests. I can't imagine never seeing that..." But what if he doesn't? What if he never leaves here again and he actually never will see any of those places again? Shit, he needs to stop thinking about that or he might break down himself.

"How do you keep forgetting..." That seems like something that shouldn't be easy to forget?? "Are you actually telling me people can be here even if they died in the place they came from?"

"Oh yeah, that's good wilderness too, but more flat than where I'm at. We have big mountains that get full of snow. But not the kind you wanna ski down unless we started logging out the trees or something." He's sure if the world hadn't ended some big time developer would eventually buy a mountain and try to make a ski lodge and the people of Hope County would have a whole different kind of war on their hands.

"I forget everything, because my brain is basically three week old guac from the back of the fridge at this point. So if I don't recognize you like, tomorrow, that's just cuz I suck." He shrugs, as if he's admitting he sometimes sets his keys down in weird places and not that he often has the actual memory of a goldfish. "Oh yeah, it happens. Clara was dead in her world too and then showed up here. Tho timing is a little weird, I was dead for about seventeen years before getting sucked into the pleasure cruise of the damned. And I only know it's been that long cuz a buddy of mine from back home is also here and let me tell you it is fucking weird that he's in his fifties now. Shit is bizarre."

Max makes a face at hearing Pratt say he sucks. His kneejerk response is to want to say "no, of course you don't suck!" but he clamps down on it, afraid he will make things even more awkward.

"That's..." a lot to take in. "Wow. You uh. You look pretty good all things considered?" Does he really? Well. For a dead guy of 17 years...maybe?

"Sorry I... don't really know what the right thing to say is. All the dead people I'm used to dealing with are the undead variety. They can't eat..." Whatever that is.

Edited 2022-12-19 15:31 (UTC)

He gives an eyebrow arch, "I look like shit, but thanks. At least I'm not decaying right?"

Right. He's pretty proud of himself. Sure he's emaciated and looks like a strong wind may end him, but he's still kind of just a dude. Go him.

"Oh like zombies and shit? I ... you know I don't think we have any of those here. Got ghosts. Vampires. Werewolves. People that can turn into cougars. But no zombies. Though there were some at the diner but they got stuck there." He finishes up his horrible potato nonsense and sets the bowl to the side, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Must suck to not be able to eat."

"Well..." He's going to just. Not make any further comment on how Pratt looks. Because he can't think of a counter point.

"No. Not zombies--hey, wait! There are vampires here? But that guy Yuuki said there weren't any now. He said they all disappeared."

"No clue who that is. But uh.. he might be right. Claudia is gone. And Ai--uh.." He has slipped up and almost mentioned Aiden so many times recently. What gives? Is he secretly back on the boat and staring at them right now? But he will quickly recover and abide by the bro-code of not telling peoples secrets, "The girl with the guitar is also gone. So maybe they did. That'd be a weird coincidence actually. Wonder if their blood dispenser thing got poisoned. That sucks, Claudia was kinda awesome."

"Blood dispenser?" Max is some mix of horrified and intrigued. Usually, he's the blood dispenser.

"Where? Is there one in here?" Is Max planning to stake it out and see if anyone comes to drink out of it? Maybe.

"Well they gotta eat something you know." Pratt shrugs. "It's by the coffee, like behind it, so you probably won't accidentally get a mug of blood instead of coffee unless you really fuck up."

Pratt doesn't think any of this is too weird yet, because hey, he just found out vampires are real about six months ago, so he's doing pretty well he thinks. "It's warm so it's not all gross and congealed. I asked Claudia once because the idea of drinking cold blood is somehow a billion times worse than warm."

"In my world, they don't have anything that cool. When he's not drinking straight from me, my master is usually having his cold out of the refrigerator. He's never complained about it but maybe he's just used to it by now. But... mm, yeah, they do all pretty universally say it tastes better warm and fresh." Speaking of totally normal things to say.

"That's cuz it's probably really metallic when its cold. Jacob back home would sometimes leave meat out in the snow and then like... eat it raw and that's the grossest shit ever. Though I guess it could have been worse he could have eaten it off a severed arm like a turkey leg instead of butchering people."

Just two dudes with totally normal things to talk about.

"Wait... your master? Dude..."

"Yeah. Guess that would make sense." As if literally anything about this conversation makes any sense?

"Wait... wait...butchering...people?" You answer his, he'll answer yours.

"No nono. Wait a sec. We'll get to the cannibal part in a bit but let's tackle the master thing here real quick. The fuck you say?"

Right because that's any weirder than the cannibal stuff.

"He IS a cannibal? You're friends with a cannibal?!" Yeah, no, Max is not just letting that drop like what the fuck dude.

"I'm his live-in butler. That's just the word we use. It's nothing." He lies, like a lying liar.

"Cannibal??"

"You're the butler for someone who drinks blood out of the fridge and you call him master? Hold up, you don't get to judge me for the cannibalism thing when you have a brita pitcher of blood in your fridge!"

He is not letting that one go.

"And I wasn't friends with a cannibal. I was second in command of a cult army ran by a cannibal." Wait.... "which sounds way worse! Never mind. Forget that part. I'm a vegetarian now anyway. That's beside the point. What the fuck dude?"

"It's not a Brita pitcher! You don't need to filter blood!" That, wait. That doesn't make it sound better at all, either.

"He's a vampire, he doesn't kill people. Obviously." He gestures down at himself, very much alive.

"You were in a cannibal cult?! You were his second?? Holy shit. How the fuck am I supposed to forget that part? Did you..." he's looking at the finger wound now. Remembering that disturbing little comment from before.

"Did you eat your own finger?" Vegetarian his ASS!

"How is that obvious?! Vampires absolutely kill people??? That's their whole thing! Claudia was super proud of how many she could get a night." Which is probably why they were friends because Pratt just accepted that.

"NOT BY CHOICE." His torn up, gravely voice can't really yell, but he's sure trying. And that sort of covers all the questions so he's not going to specify if he means the cult or the finger.

"It is not their 'whole thing!' I've been serving my Lord for seven fucking years and I'm still alive so obviously it's not their thing. Jesus? That's what we have the Accords for. To keep vampires from killing humans and vice versa! My master would destroy any vampire he caught killing humans, let alone that many in one night. He'd never allow that in his territory." The note of pride in Max's voice can't be missed. Yes, he is a loyal human to his master.

"Oh my GOD! I should have realized you were a psychopath the moment I saw you eating that mash potato war crime in a bowl. Is that guy Jacob here too? Is he taking pieces off of you?!?"

"You're like a vampire thrall?" He eyes him for a second. "Is that sexy? That sounds kinda hot."

Oh no wait he's mad again.

"What do you mean mashed potato war crime?! This shit is delicious. Excuse me for enjoying good fucking food just because you're homesick for o-positive smoothies." Yes, he is going to defend the honor of mashed potatoes right now. And he'd keep doing so if Max hadn't asked if Jacob is here causing the already sickly looking Pratt to go absolutely pale.

"He... no. He's not here. He better fucking never show up. I'd..." probably run away despite the insistence that he'd skin Jacob alive. Or more accurately stand there in silence and then follow him around, terrified. He might know a thing or two about thralls himself. "No, this was a hierarchy thing, with one of the pirates."

He looks down at his hand, rubbing the bandage with his opposite thumb.

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