sail_ooc | TEST DRIVE MEME #1

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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.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ After the last drone of the muster drill ended, they were apparently free to go. People were starting to shuffle off, which meant that if Zouichi wanted to talk to someone who wasn't... well, part of whatever was going on with the ship, he'd better act fast.

So he turned toward one of the other passengers, ship-issued smartphone gingerly in hand. ]

Excuse me. Would you be willing to help me with an experiment?

[ His tone was polite, but a little on edge. Perhaps for good reason! ]

[ A lounge chair sailed through the air, end over end; Zouichi sidestepped before it could bean him and batted irritably at the tableware hurling itself off a nearby table to clatter about his arms and shoulders. ]

Look, I'm not here to fight you.

[ In fact, he was being unusually patient with this poltergeist nonsense -- like maybe whatever angry presence was in the room might be reasoned with. Maybe. Who knew?

In any case, it was the emotion in those voices he was responding to. Surprisingly human, to his ear. ]

You hear them, too, right? Some of them sound frightened.

( there are tried and true methods to approach scared people shoved into a new and confusing situation. empathy, get down on their level, ask if they're okay, offer comfort or distracting small-talk. or withdraw, leave everyone to their own internalized agony while attempting to mentally situate themselves, and try to socialize later when the shock's worn off.

immediate forays into science directed at random strangers is notably, nowhere on that list. but color her susceptible to bad choices, because clarke's stopping long enough to listen when flagged down.

then taking a very purposeful step back — make space, out of arms reach — and an immediate air of suspicion that she doesn't stop from bleeding onto her face. )

What kind of experiment?

[ He didn't follow her. Rather, Zouichi raised his phone and flipped it towards Clarke. ShipTalk was open on its screen, like a silent siren. ]

This is the only program on the thing. It looks simple enough, but I have to wonder if it actually works. I've read that the networks on ships like these were... spotty.

[ How were the networks on spooky ghost ships? Possibly more than spotty? ]

I'd like to test it out, but it looks like you can't just message anyone.

( right. right. the devices that looked like phones, but that clarke still held out a faint hope would somehow be able to hail the mainland. or some passing spaceship. anyone, really. from a pocket under her lifevest, she pulls her own phone, fiddles with it until opening shiptalk and taking a quick assessment of its functions.

seems like a closed network, and definitely worth testing out. )

Yes, okay. Sorry. That's actually a really good idea. Do we need user I.D.s?

Ah. Hold on a second -- it didn't ask me for one.

[ And indeed, on second glance, there didn't seem to be any options for user profile. ]

Try my name, 'Zouichi'.

[ He spelled it out for her, hoping the program was smart enough to not need some arcane friendcode handshaking process. One could only hope. ]

( following directions easily enough, she punches each individual letter into an address line pulled up on the app, along with a brief message before hitting send.

with a fwip of message sent, and the pleasant ding of message received on his device, under the name clarke reads: )

What do you think chances are these are being monitored?

[ That got a little laugh out of him, albeit brief. ]

Almost certain. But as long as it's the only option...

I'll head towards the other side of the ship. If I cut out, well... we'll know how far these things go. Sound good?

Yeah, that sounds fine.

( mostly clarke's just relieved to be doing something. it's a situation that feels very similar to being locked in a strange, stark white room, and she'd never been one to sit still and twiddle her thumbs. it feels good to have some sort of actionable plan, even if it's just getting the lay of the land. er, boat. there's no trace of land out towards the horizon and that's a different type of concerning.

she let's zouichi leave, and gives it a little time before sending another message. )

How do you think they made us move against our will?

Psychic powers?

[ Could dry humor travel through ancient smartphone apps? Maybe. Either way, Zouichi wasn't entirely joking, but -- ]

There are substances out there that can make someone more susceptible to suggestion. But on the scale of what we're seeing here, I don't think it's likely.

Do you remember what you were doing before this?

Kanoe Zouichi | Biomega

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