![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
TEST DRIVE MEME #1
1. now it's fun to wake up in a strange chateau
[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! We're so glad to have you!
[you touch the lei. rooster feathers, lotus seeds, and a carved circle of something white and hard, linked onto a silk string.]
2. messing with my mind was fun at the time
[freshly lei'd, your legs are forced to lead out onto the deck and towards your muster station. the same woman is there, carrying a clipboard. this time, she introduces herself as Gal Friday, the cruise director, before immediately going into the muster drill spiel. it is very boring, and you are not allowed to move, except when you are required to show you know how to put your life vest on. you could try to not do this, but Friday will move to stand in front of you very closely and just. look in your direction until such a time that you decide to do it. and I'm sure your fellow passengers want you to just get on with it, too.
but, once it ends? she reiterates her desire to welcome you aboard. and, then, you're free.
well, free to move about the ship at your own leisure, of course. which is a kind of free, and probably the best one you can hope for. you could try to escape, maybe, if you have the means to; Friday certainly won't be one to stop you. that's what the barrier is for, after all.
but, wouldn't you much rather have fun?
the buffet is full. the pool is open. the casino jingles and chimes.
welcome aboard.]
3. lots of mystery in the history of the devils I knew
[you were never alone.
a few days have passed since you first arrived on the Serena Eterna. perhaps you've made yourself a little routine, and settled in a bit. or maybe you haven't done that at all. either way, you're here, and it looks like somebody is pretty pissed off about it.
it starts small. sometimes nearby plates skid off tables, or a pool chair upends while you're walking next to it. and sometimes that chair is aimed right at your head. objects are moving with quickly increasing frequency, and a wide variety of styles: some are dropped, or pushed, and others and others are tossed, but a few of the items are thrown, with great force and odd accuracy. if Friday is around during the lighter moments, she simply titters and cleans up whatever mess is made. if a pot of soup sails off the buffet line and nearly drenches you in boiling minestrone, she simply walks away.
and then there's the voices. hundreds, maybe thousands, calling out. not all are intelligible English, but you seem to understand them anyway. some sound scared, or angry. some are screams, others whispers. some sound entirely strange, while others are achingly familiar. and they're all saying the same exact thing:
Get Out.]
no subject
Many years of study, truth be told.
[Ebalon is a young-looking man, looking being the operative term here; he's somewhere around the age of "can legally drink in like, Germany" appearance-wise. This is the sort of man who will inevitably have to be ID'ed if he goes to the bar. Assuming, of course, this is a normal rule-abiding ship.
None of that necessarily matters to Ebalon, since he can tell just by the differences in technology that he's in a spacetime anomaly of some sort within another world. This is not his first rodeo with the fundamentals of Henir — he simply has to wonder if Henir is responsible for this or not. That aside...]
Back home, I am what people call a "Master", one who is considered a savant his respective element and therefore is a protectorate over the world at large. Before that, however, I got my start within a university for mages of sorts known as Seven Tower.
no subject
[ She doesn't bat an eye at "many years of study." It'd be hypocritical of her. Giselle looks a little bit older than Ebalon does, early twenties at most, so she knows better than most how deceiving appearances can be.
What she does wonder is--well, a lot of things. What mage school is like, for one. And how she was so sure that he was using some kind of lunar magic to begin with. Though Giselle tries to roll with her instincts, the holdovers from her mortal life and undead instincts alike. #justcreatureofthenightthings, you know. ]
no subject
Ebalon nods, and then a certain contemplativeness flits over his features before he takes up his typical small-but-polite smile.]
You would be correct in that statement, yes. I am not the only Master — there is one each for Water, Fire, Earth, Wind, and the Sun. Huhu... I would consider myself close to the Sun Master in a way.
[...Giselle might be able to pick up on his tone in that last statement, that perhaps he and the Sun Master aren't quite friends, and that "close" means more that they worked together once. Ebalon has very carefully chosen his words there. It's not deception, but it isn't entirely something that paints a full picture, either.]
Naturally, each element has a certain... "thing" it does better than the others. Healing and protecting belongs to the moon, though it is quite possible to create a shield of water... [His idle musings trail off there.] I'm getting ahead of myself. What shall I call you?
no subject
Land and riches are easily acquired and kept. Bedfellows are plentiful, if transient. Understanding, though, is hard to get. ]
Most things can go against their nature, I've found, if you pull the right strings, [ she muses. ] Or maybe a less prominent piece of their nature reveals itself.
Giselle. And you are?
no subject
[He beams, then casts his gaze seaward. There's nothing around for miles, it seems... though he can feel the idle sway of the ship, sometimes he wonders if they're headed in any direction at all, or if they're simply stagnant. Sea travel isn't something he's entirely used to.]
It's a pleasure to meet you, Lady Giselle. If I may ask — you seem to be rather familiar with magic. [It's not that most people where he's from are inept, but rather that most people can't keep up a conversation about the topic. Giselle's statement intrigues him greatly, given that.] Other than turning into a bat, are you very well-versed in the art?