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

[yournewsidekick]

"Yeah, yeah, I know," she says, sounding completely unconcerned. She vaults off the railing and stretches her arms overhead, cracking her knuckles. "This ain't my first joust."

She's totally gonna smash the first jewelry store window she sees.

[hate_gettin_older]

"Right then," he grins at her, "let's go have a look round."

Well that'll be interesting ...

[yournewsidekick]

"Metal," she declares, grinning just a little too wide in reply.

If the creepy invisible force shoving her toward muster wanted her to go this way, then the only logical thing to do now that she's free is go that way instead. She skips up the deck, picking a path that'll hopefully take 'em to all the good stuff Big Creepy Force didn't want her to see before.

[hate_gettin_older]

Edgar ambles along behind her, vaguely bemused. It's not like he's in charge of her, or has any obligation to look out for her (or for anyone potentially in danger from her), but ... yeah, he's gonna. Because somebody's got to, right?

(There are all sorts of potential comparisons that are not, at the moment, consciously occurring to him.)

[yournewsidekick]

Nimona... is not subtle. It might not be her first joust, but from the way she bounces along, singing some fast-paced rock song under her breath, past jousts probably involved blasting the other guy off his horse with a rocket launcher.

So she doesn't bother keeping her voice down as she calls over her shoulder, "You see anything worth checking out while we were all getting herded down that way?"

Ooh, stairs! And a big sign with an arrow saying PROMENADE THIS WAY. That seems promising!

[hate_gettin_older]

"Nah, just the inside of the hallway and the -- yeah, those stairs."

He rubbernecks a little, trying to keep the sign in view as he passes it so he can read it all the way through without slowing down.

"Any idea what a promenade is?" (He's never heard the word before; on a guess, he pronounces it to rhyme with lemonade.)

[yournewsidekick]

"It's like Fancy Central," she says, either not noticing (or refraining from commenting on) the mispronounciation. "Big open place for people to walk around and buy stuff. Or something like that. So you didn't see the big pink horse?"

She jogs along, following the arrows that point the way.

[hate_gettin_older]

"Big pink horse?"

He gives her a look suggesting that one of them is misunderstanding at least one of those words, and he's not sure it's him.

[yournewsidekick]

"Yeah, it was super weird," she says. Turning around, she jogs backward so she can keep talking to Edgar. "A huge pink horse just kinda... walking around. I swear it was like eight feet tall. I was gonna take a closer look but every time I tried I kept getting shoved toward the big safety lecture."

[hate_gettin_older]

"Huh. No, didn't see it but I'll keep an eye out."

On the one hand: he hasn't known this kid very long but he gets the feeling she might enjoy making shit up. On the other: a big pink horse would by no means be the weirdest thing he's ever seen.

[yournewsidekick]

He seems pretty blasé about the idea. That seems good, right? Definitely doesn't seem bad.

"Cool, thanks! I definitely wanna know if you get the chance to -- whoooooah."

As they round the corner, they're greeted with the full sparkling view of the Promenade. Look at all those restaurants that're gonna be crawling with marks eventually! Look at that ice cream shop!

...Look at that totally sweet leather jacket incongruously displayed in the window of the Infinite Tommy Bahama. Oooooh.

[hate_gettin_older]

"Huh," he says in a tone of mild wonder, surveying the sweep of shops and eateries. "They put shops indoors. You ever seen shops indoors before?"

[yournewsidekick]

"Yeah, sometimes -- that not a thing where you're from?"

It's a big world, and the Kingdom's just a small part of it; she's thinking he must be from somewhere on the other side of the wall. But mostly she's thinking how much she wants that leather jacket and how easy it'd be to smash the glass and grab it, so she's a little distracted as she makes a beeline for the Tommy Bahama.

[hate_gettin_older]

"Din't have shops at all where I'm from. Only ever seen em outside, in other places. I mean, they had an inside -- hold up," and he jogs after her.

[yournewsidekick]

"Wow, you must be from way outside the Kingdom," she says, not even slowing down a little until she's right up against the Tommy Bahama's display window, both palms -- and nose -- pressed to the glass. "You see anybody in there?"

[hate_gettin_older]

"No-ooo," he says slowly, with a judicious look, "but that dun't mean nobody's there ..."

[yournewsidekick]

Before Edgar's even finished that sentence, she's raised her elbow to aim it at the glass.

[hate_gettin_older]

"Hey," sharply, as he reaches out to grab her wrist. "What happened to look first?"

[yournewsidekick]

A "hey!" of her own overlaps Edgar's.

"I did look!" she protests. Nimona yanks her arm out of Edgar's grip, but doesn't make any move to try and smash the window again. (Yet.) "And you know what I saw? A totally sweet jacket and no guards!"

[hate_gettin_older]

"Right, yes, course, so sorry -- you must have looked at all the rest of the place while I wasn't paying attention, were there any guards by the gates at the other end? No, don't look now, did you see any or not?"

He let go of her arm immediately on her pulling away, and is now standing with his own hands on his hips, head cocked down at her with an expression that's one part sarcastic inquiry and one part reproof.

[yournewsidekick]

"Less than a hundred, more than or equal to zero," she says promptly. "My money's on zero. Come on, Edgar, you've never even been to an indoor shop before, I know you haven't stolen from one either!"

She's giving you a new life experience! And you're just THROWING IT AWAY. Rude.

[hate_gettin_older]

"No, we agreed," he insists, trying to sound stern and adultly, "check everything out before trying anything. This isn't everything."

[yournewsidekick]

"It's everything important," says Nimona, but it sounds a lot more like ugh, fine, whatever. Sulkily, she crosses her arms and adds in a mutter, "Guess you're on the No Fun Brigade too."

[hate_gettin_older]

Oh no, sounding adultly has backfired.

"Just want to make sure your fun dun't end up with you getting smashed in the face." Still sternly, because it's too late to back down from that now. "In case this is the kind of place where that happens."

[yournewsidekick]

That's right, Edgar, a teenager doesn't think you're cool. Surely this is the worst thing that's ever happened to you.

"I could take 'em," she says, still in a sulky mutter, before relenting with visible reluctance. "Fine, fine. If we're gonna look, then let's keep looking."

The sooner they finish looking, the sooner they can get to the smashing!