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

[plangona]

[octavia isn't sure what to believe but she doesn't freak out or respond with anything resembling denial because honestly that's not going to solve anything regardless of whether she trusts his words or not. she does take a few moments to she processes the information and make sense of what he is explaining to her.

it sounds impossible but considering she is still alive despite being outside of the bunker and onboard this ship, she does lean towards believing him for now] You seem way too calm given everything you've just told me.

How do you know for sure there's no way to escape or that you can't die?

[neverleave]

I've been stuck here for over a year, so. Hard to get worked up.

[He was always way too calm. The first time Natsuno hurt another person and thought he killed him in self defense, his initial reaction was to very calmly dump the body in the grave he just desecrated.

He only got more unflappable from there. There's only so much murder and mayhem one can handle before they dissociate.]

I know you can't die, because I saw brutalized corpses who were alive and well the next day. I died three times and woke up like nothing. And I know there's no escape, because I hit the barrier around this place.

[plangona]

A year— [it's not really a question but from having just arrived, it's a concept that's difficult for her to believe especially given his attitude towards all of this.

a year is a long time but it surprises her that people have been here for that amount of time and seem almost too accepting. it's almost like being in the bunker but there's less choice involved here which she hates where this is going already] So what, you go with being complacent about it instead?

[it doesn't make sense to her why someone wouldn't be fighting against it. she listens though, taking it all in especially when he goes into how death is practically nothing here] Even with your personal experience with coming back from dying? [there might be a touch of skepticism in her voice. she's no stranger to death but that might be something she might need to see for herself to believe]