TEST DRIVE MEME #10

[sailmods]

a. that's where we both belong

[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.]

b. and there's plenty of that down by the sea

[it’s strange to think about, isn’t it? how all those new passengers, the ones grumbling or shouting their way through the forced muster drill, have absolutely no idea what happened just last month. no idea about the labyrinth. no concept of why anyone around them would be a bit more hesitant around shadows.

they’ll learn.

sometimes a shadow is darker than it’s supposed to be. very rarely does anything come of that; just a vague sense that someone is watching you, and little more. sometimes, though, the shadows move. sometimes they grab at your ankles as you walk. sometimes they give you a shove as you go down the stairs. sometimes they pull your hair, or pinch your arm.

sometimes you feel something sharp cut into your lower leg.

that’s not a shadow, though. that’s a fiddler crab. you see the crab, sometimes. the cut isn’t from its claws, which don’t look very intimating; it’s not a very large crab. the cut is from the large kitchen knife crudely taped onto its back. it’s probably fine. it's not chasing you. there isn't evil in its heart. probably.]

c. think I'll go back to the Keys

[one day, in the atrium, two pedestals suddenly appear. on each is a large button: one green, and one blue. pressing the blue button gives you a little treat, popping out of thin air next to you. pressing the green button sends a small electric shock through your body. weird, but, hey, pretty avoidable, right?

except, it seems to be spreading. to every other button on board.

in the elevator. on the soda machine. the arcade. your phone. the bell on Friday’s desk.]

Comments

[angelofthenight]

"There you are!"

She charges at the stage, leaping at the curtains with her talons out like a cat taking a running leap at the drapes.

[angelofthenight]

"If I am forced to resort to slaughter then it will be too late for you to hurt me by revealing anything."

[angelofthenight]

"Yes. Less than two dozen of my species still live. I am vastly outnumbered by humanity. They are like an infestation." And she has styled herself as their exterminator.

"Trips? Do we land in ports?"

[angelofthenight]

Dammit. Despite herself, she is enjoying the company of this strange human. She has to hold her breath to prevent actually laughing. It's even more galling that Erin is making far too much sense.

"Speak. I can hear you out and decide for myself if your counsel is worth heeding."

[angelofthenight]

She feels a pang of sympathy for him. She too knows that bone-searing agony of changing. For her, it was not a choice. Puck's curse ensured that whether she liked it or not, her body would melt and rearrange at sunrise into that of a human. If there is anything nice that can be said for this place, it's that Puck's curse seems not to be able to reach her here.

"How often do you choose to take the shape of a man?" she asks once he's got the shirt on to cover himself.

While he drags that rack, she begins to remove the children's apparel, dumping it in a pile behind the enclosed wall.

[angelofthenight]

"What?" Another human that can do magic? How many sorcerers are there here?

She growls, frustratedly stomping the ground because despite having wings she actually cannot fly, she can only glide. And there is no air current for her to ride now.

"How are you doing that?"

[angelofthenight]

"Three days, and then they come back whole and intact?" This is useful information. It also explains why so few people seemed to fear the threat of violence here.

"Friday? Is that a person?"

[crushed_pearls]

Everyone has a plate? Everyone has a plate, glorious. Erin goes back to the table and at long last sips her wine, making a soft and pleased sound.

Where to start, the nice people or the warnings...

Warnings.

"At some point or another you're gonna meet Nobunaga. Japanese fella, often heavily armed, extremely passionate in that way you get when a smart person learns to act stupid to survive. Draw your lines with him bright and clear - he respects might. Just try not to kill him." Supppp. "His spouse is a friend of mine."

[professionalriot]

"Have to be. The other option isn't good for anyone." Ashley couldn't risk what might happen if he were to Frenzy. Didn't matter if anyone would forgive it. He might not forgive himself. Forgiveness doesn't mean they forget either. "Guess it depends on the intent behind it. I'm guessing I'll find out, huh?"

[saltwaterlungs]

She'll hit drapes. And air. Nothing else.

The room is silent and still.

[hate_gettin_older]

"Right," he says, "fine, great. Best of luck."

By this time he's backed nearly to the end of the corridor, and keeps eyes on her as he steps sideways toward the door to the stairwell.

fever | baldur's gate 3 | ota

[abhorrently]

[ooc: info and permissions. please also check her opt out as well! canon point is start of Act 3, spoilers will be marked.]

arrival.

She'd exhausted herself fighting the compulsion to follow whatever magic bound her, tried to restrict her movement - whatever it is, it's more powerful than her, and it's not offering any insight onto what happened as she goes through the motions without much choice in the matter. A strange rift in the planes? Something going horrifically awry in the chaos she just left? But all that said, there's one overpowering thing that leaves Fever in a daze above the sheer strangeness and absurdity of the situation, while she waits to regain her strength.

It's quiet in a section of her head that hasn't been silent for weeks now. Moving, stirring, active, its odd little communications - the tadpole is purely silent now, an empty space where it resided behind her eye. Both sheer relief and a deeply unsettled feeling twine in her, slow moving as she shakes her head. The others, of course they'll manage whatever was needed if they got to the right place, but if they ended up here too, or scattered to the winds?

Enough. Time to move, and figure out the hows and whys later. This isn't the smallest structure to comb for anyone familiar, and things still need to be done. She'll figure it out along the way, like anything else. But running over this entire ship is an extended venture, and at any given point, she's liable to be found staring at something - the variety at Photos at Sea, the statue in the Promenade, the infinite cheese shop - with the air of someone who couldn't give a damn if she's going to block the main flow of traffic. What in the hells is this place?

shadows play.

That's the third time that's happened. It's not a coincidence now, that going up the stairs has led to something snagging her as if they grabbed the edge of her clothes and pulled, leading her to stumble and have to right herself. There's something there, and just because she can't see it doesn't mean it's not around. Hidden, veiled, some kind of mischief that nevertheless she's not entirely in the mood to humor without knowing the reason why.

Stopping where she is, Fever keeps one hand on the railing, and turns to fix her eyes on the spot where the change happened. Is it just her, or are the shadows stranger there?

"You're very funny. Show yourself now, before I have to drag you out of hiding."

There's a note of force behind the tone, making it a promise instead of a potential.

unconventional training.

While it had taken a half minute to realize this was not some sort of bizarre training hall, something about the comfortable chaos of Cosmic Bowling is still attractive. It's a simple game, and it provides some opportunity to practice something she just hadn't considering doing in her downtime at camp, usually too keen on talking to others or dealing with the assortment of objects everyone picked up or handling some other matter.

Fever stands at the front of a lane, and a bowling ball seemingly hovers near her, her own hand raised a little before it flicks and a ghostly, phantasmal hand tosses the ball onto the lane, it rolling down to hit a few pins - a sorry showing all around.

"Oh, come on."

It rolls back, and the spectral hand grabs it, but she's too hasty - the ball slams into the wood this time, leaving it in a cracked dent in the lane. Whoops. Don't mind that she's going to pick it up and move to a new one. It was like that when she got here, she'll swear up and down.

wildcard.

Have a different idea? Throw it at me, I'm legitimately up for anything.

Arrival [Cheese Shop]

[crushed_pearls]

The infinite cheese shop is occupied. Specifically, it's occupied by a tall, raven-winged elf with a crossbow and what is either an unbuilt trap or the world's shittiest sling; she hunches over a table with a truly absurd supply of mozzarella, shaping it in her hands and checking each ball against the "sling", reshaping when they don't fit & neatly sorting them into a box when they do.

Erin looks up. This would be where awkward eye contact would go, IF SHE HAD -

[decohere]

"He doesn't hunt me," Ava corrects. "He's got his instincts under control. Only those who seek it out. Ethically sourced murder." And so that makes it better. Besides, she'd be a hypocrite to judge another killer too harshly when none of her own killings were consensual.

"You don't have to trust my answers. But you can use them as a reference point." But she starts heading toward the buffet anyway, in case the gargoyle wishes to follow along or not is her choice.

[abhorrently]

Listen, it's not the weirdest thing she's ever seen in her memory. She looks over the winged woman, her equipment, her cheese supply, and while she's not familiar, Fever knows she at least has her attention.

Right. Can't just go around asking "have you seen a group of weirdos in armor" to a blind woman.

"Making your own ammunition?"

That's...what this is, right? Unless this is some part of the cheese making process that she's never been privy to in her life, which is equally viable. Mozzarella is simply obtained, not created.

[crushed_pearls]

Correct, cheese is primarily sourced from people one slays in mortal combat.

"Yyyyesssss," Erin says slowly. "Yes I am. And I'll thank you not to tell anyone else, it's a bit of a surprise."

Oh god she's catching awkward introductions off Ruby.

[abhorrently]

As if the awkwardness of any introduction can be any deterrent.

"They won't hear it from me. Though I wonder if they're still edible now."

Tempted as she is to just pick one up and bite, she manages to resist that particular line of thought.

"Have you heard anyone going past recently who seemed to be in a great hurry? Potentially armed or clanging around in armor?"

[crushed_pearls]

She shouldn't. Erin really shouldn't. It won't be helpful.

She's gonna anyway, but she shouldn't.

"Do you have any idea how little that narrows it down?"

[abhorrently]

"...No?"

If there's more than just them...at this point, she doesn't know where to begin. Her vocal impressions of the group aren't that great, and if this woman can't see, then that makes it harder. Ugh, maybe she should have just taken the cheese and left.

[crushed_pearls]

"You might as well come in, the cheese won't hurt you." Slightly more formally: "I extend the aegis of my hospitality to you, Miss...?"

Local Fairest doesn't know about the gender neutral 'saer'.

[abhorrently]

"Fever. It's a pleasure."

Now that she's come in and she's a little closer, Erin's Mantle makes itself truly known, and if this woman isn't some kind of magician Fever will eat her own headband. She's got enough that it's brimming off of her - at least, that's how Fever's interpreting the sensation of it.

Glancing around, something else on a cheese label catches her eye before she continues on the actual conversation at hand.

"-Aged by real gnomes. I don't like the implications of that."

[crushed_pearls]

"It wasn't aged by jack shit, the ship kinda...generates things." Erin offers an apologetic look. "Erin Peters, do call me Erin, pleasure's mine. If I don't miss my guess you're newly arrived?"

[abhorrently]

The great gnome cheese fraud exists in some universe, Erin, get it together. The cave-aged cheese doesn't go back to where it was plucked from - it goes in her bag almost thoughtlessly.

"You've got it. I haven't got the shape of this place quite yet, but more importantly, I'm trying to figure out if anyone I know is also here. Thought about just shouting for them all, but that's inefficient."

And too many names to deal with.

"Together, we can figure out what went wrong."

[crushed_pearls]

Hrmm. Food insecure? Habitual hoarder? Cheese fan? Erin takes a taste of the Glamour in the air; what does her bootleg empathy say?

Either way, Erin sucks a breath in between her teeth. "So. Good news that's also bad news. Odds are real high none of your friends came with you. Good for them, bad for you. You've been uh...elected...to live here...involuntarilyyyyyy."

[abhorrently]

Habit, plain and simple, of taking decent edibles back to camp. Why buy what can be found? Right now, her desires truly do align with wanting to find her friends. There's a level of frustration, but that's common with any newcomer trying to make sense of the place.

Folding her arms, Fever rolls over this information in her skull. It's bad news in the sense that she's gotten flung around to gods know where, that something wants to keep her there. But that's not an insurmountable obstacle. And if no one else came with her, then that means the guardian's safe - the others are capable enough to see to it, though they'll doubtless be distressed at her disappearance.

"You're right. That is good news and bad news at once. Okay. So how do I get un-elected?"

Because this isn't permanent. The concept of that hasn't even crossed her mind. As far as she thinks, this is a day trip that's a little out of hand.