reveriance | TEST DRIVE #002

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TEST DRIVE #002

TEST DRIVE #002

( 0 0 1 ) » WAKE UP

Were you asleep or were you unconscious? It doesn't matter: when you come to, there's an odd taste in your mouth and there's a low-level mechanical hum in the air. Your head hurts and you feel nauseous. You aren't anywhere you know: everything around you is metal, from the floor you lie on all the way to the ceiling. You are dressed in a jumpsuit you definitely weren't wearing before.

"We tried to save the world. I think— I think we did the opposite."

The message repeats on a loop. If you look for its source, you find a comms device on the floor next to you. The logo on its wallpaper says REVERIE TERMINAL. Upon closer inspection, you find the same logo on your jumpsuit.

Welcome to your new home. What choice do you have but to explore your surroundings?

( 0 0 1 . 1 ) » WAKE UP WHERE?
When you wake up, you find that you're not alone. But more importantly, you find that you're in a closet. An empty closet, bar you and your new companion. It's small, cramped, and there is no door that you can see. The ceiling is low, there is barely any lights, only some coming from the tiny flashlight clipped to your suit's shoulder. You cannot be sure that there is any air coming in to the room.

Are these grooves in the wall supposed to mean something?

( 0 0 2 ) » OBSERVATION DECK

There were no windows in the corridor you woke up in and no windows in any of the crew quarters you might have checked for occupants — but there are plenty of windows on the uppermost level of the station, deck 1. In fact, there are windows from floor to ceiling all along the circumference of the station's circular deck, and it's possible to walk along it all. What it shows is a strange solar system you've never seen before and a planet that might resemble one you know, but certainly isn't the same.

You're in space. You don't know where you are. Neither does anyone else.

( 0 0 3 ) » BAR

On deck 3, you find the bar. Tucked away from the crew quarters, it's dimly lit, there are bar stools thrown down on the floor and what looks like some very old drink spills, crusty and dark against the bar top. But there is alcohol here, or at least, what you think is alcohol, in bottles with faded labels, most of them indecipherable. Take a drink, get drunk, start a fight, or start a party? You're stuck on this station, might as well make the most of it, right?

( 0 0 4 ) » SPACEQUAKES

One second, you are is walking. Magnetic boots are on, the ground feels solid enough, for a metal deck in a space station. Everything is perfectly fine, or at least as fine as it can be, given that you still don't know where you are or how you came to be here.

The next moment, it's like everything explodes around you. You're thrown against the wall as sparks erupts from electrical panels, as the whole station rumbles and shakes around you. You fall to the deck, earning yourself scratches from the grating. When you look up, it's like nothing has happened. No wires hanging from open panels, no flickering lights, no more shaking. Like an earthquake in space.

( 0 0 5 ) » NETWORK

The comms device you found next to you when waking up connects to a station-wide network, REVERIE NET. You have the option to post video, voice or text messages.

What will you share?

( 0 0 6 ) » WILDCARD

The station features a variety of locations, from sleeping quarters free for the claiming to a dirty swimming pool and a bar that still holds alcohol (though some of the bottles seem to have been opened a while ago).

Go wild, but don't wreck the place. It's your home for the foreseeable future, after all.

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[She steps closer to River to return the formality.]

Could be either, I suppose. This place has been known to get in people's heads.

[Group hallucinations. It's a bit like Woodstock.]

Been known to mess with time, too. [She pauses for a moment - considering - and something like determination sparks in her eye.] ... The fact that you don't remember me is proof enough of that.

( as good as river is at keeping her face in check, you don't get to become spoiler queen without having a damn good poker face, there's decisiveness in her expression. thought, curiosity, and god if she doesn't feel a tiny bit frustrated at someone knowing something about her and not knowing them back. is this how the doctor had felt every time she uttered that one word? )

Now that is interesting. ( and she has no idea how to respond to it. that's a lie, she does, but damn if the rules aren't horrible ) As much as I'd love to know how and when we meet it might be safer if you didn't tell me too much.

( did she dare ask if this was someone the doctor knew or someone she'd met at another point? it would seem, for the moment, that she didn't )

So, removing people from different points in our time streams, the story of my life. You've been here at least one month, hopefully not alone in all of that time?

[Clara smiles, a crooked, knowing thing, then reaches up and makes the common gesture for, My lips are sealed. She tosses the invisible key over her shoulder.]

Almost four, by now. And I haven't - there are close to a hundred of us.

[Not that that really means much, insofar as being alone.]

( river smiles again. clever girl. her information is good too, helping her to build a better picture of what was going on though there were still too many gaps. she didnt like gaps )

Sizeable number. Would I be right to assume that they would tell a similar story to you? ( at least in terms of being plucked from home. god forbid if they all somehow knew her ) If so-- who is doing this? A cry for help from the message, one clearly sent too late.

( she pauses, mentally pulling everything together that she knew so far, seeing if there was some familiarity to anything that she'd heard before )

[Clara nods. Get ready to mind a lot more gaps than this, Dr. Song.]

There are only guesses.

[It's said a bit apologetically. Deeper down, Clara almost feels embarrassment at the fact that she doesn't have any more answers, after all these months. The Doctor would have solved it. The Doctor would have busted everyone else out ages ago, but she hasn't solve a single thing.]

The station was clearly designed for a human crew, but it looked abandoned when we woke up here. No signs of recent life. [She thinks of a coffee cup on a desk, a book on a duvet. It had called up thoughts of nuclear fallout, at the time - pictures of the playgrounds and classrooms and sidewalks stopped still in Pripyat, as though they could burst back into motion at any second, were it not for the slow decay creeping over them.] Most of it's still blocked off. I think whoever's pulling the strings is still on board, somewhere, messing with us.

A reasonable assumption.

( it was certainly easier to mess with people when you were still there, or very close nearby. without access they wouldn't be able to scan and determine just that.

oh well, they hadn't been able to at least. she was going to give this one hell of a try, see what she could pull out. starting with-- )

What makes you think it's designed only for humans?

( curiosity over judgement. she wanted to think that clara had seen something to give her that conclusion rather than it coming from a human perspective. she seemed more switched on than most )

[She anticipates the question. After all, the Doctor has needled her enough for being "Earth-centric" during their travels; she doesn't want to offend anyone, least of all River.

(She also doesn't want to come across as anything less than razor sharp and extraordinarily intelligent).]

See enough planets, meet enough people, and you start to realize how to tell the difference. It's in the details. The contents of the first aid kids, the equipment in the gym, the coffee cup left in the control room - they might not be exclusively human needs, but they all add up to someone with a hell of a lot of biological similarities.

Edited 2018-08-26 01:07 (UTC)

( it pulls another brief smile from her. good answer, one that also answered that unasked question of river's. sure she could be a time traveller in her own right but something felt very 21st century about her. one of the doctor's friends, then )

Can you take me to that control room? If there's anything to see that's usually where it'll be.

( she doesn't doubt that clara's looked, and maybe others here were also familiar with space travel, but one more set of eyes with a different set of experiences might spit something else. at least it's a new mind to bounce theories off and river feels like clara will be good to do that with )

Yeah, it's down this way.

[A gesture and a couple of steps backwards, before she turns in the command room's direction.

She's a good deal smaller than River, her legs shorter, but she walks with confidence and purpose, like she's leading a much larger mission than "show River the command room".]

( river doesn't say anything as they walk, keeping her attention focused on any and all mental notes that she can make about her surroundings.

and then they're there. she makes a quick scan of the room before selecting one console to work on )

Let's see. Station map, always useful, environmental controls, logs-- ah.

( it wasnt quite a sensor or scanner but the radar. she falls quiet for a moment, focused on looking at it, at seeing if she can tweak it.

and then she asks a question, not looking up from her console )

How long were you with him?

[Clara pauses in the doorway just long enough for River's question to catch her there. And honestly, she isn't surprised. She's admitted to knowing River, and she's brought up her space travel; there were no other pieces of the puzzle to fit together.]

About five years.

[Maybe more. She's really not certain, given how many weekday afternoons she jetted off after school, and returned just hours later - hair longer, skin tanner, smile brighter. She could be into her thirties by now, and she's not sure she'd ever know.]

That's a long time.

( sort of. to people like her and the doctor its just a breath. to someone wanting forever it's nothing. to the people who hadn't had so long it was time to envy )

Has he taken you to a station before?

( still fiddling away as she talks. it's a strategy to keep clara talking but also to see if she can get more insights from her, any comparisons. he would have taught her to look )

Barely a heartbeat.

[It's said distractedly, but with far too much feeling behind it to be truly without care. She eases her way over to the screens, eyes flicking between them and delicately avoiding River.]

And yeah. He did.

[River's question feels too indefinite, too full of possibility. Clara makes sure to cement the past tense in her answer.]

( there's too much feeling in clara's answer for it not to matter. barely a heartbeat. it's information she stores away for later, not wanting to get distracted from their task.

though she finds that she already has been slightly, with river now looking across at clara, paused from her task )

I'd ask you where-- ( there's that past tense, too. she's got two thoughts about that. but not the time ) --but we've got something bigger to do. Almost one hundred people trapped. I don't plan on staying that way..

( she's hoping to motivate clara into helping, into doing what she and the doctor do best without specifically having to say the words. please help )

Neither do I.

[Said a little bit testily. It's not that Clara wants to stay trapped, or that she's become complacent. As far as she's concerned, she's still the best hope anyone here has of getting out - after all, River's coming in with months less situational experience. But something grinds on her a bit about River's words, as though she's trying to instigate Clara into some kind of action, as though Clara's just been sitting on her hands all this time.]

I've been trying, for months. While everyone else here is sleeping, I'm looking for a way out. It's not going to suddenly be easy just because you're River Song.

[Okay, so maybe she's just a little bit insecure right now. Sure, she had been hoping against for the Doctor to come crashing in and help, like he always does, but River? His incredible, amazing, genius, unbeatable wife? And she's just going to presume that she'll find a way out, a-s-a-p, even though Clara hasn't?]

... Sorry.

( ah, there it is, some kind of feeling. though it was more feeling than river had bargained for and a) if she felt they had time and b) if she even knew what the hell to do with it she might dig into it but she doesn't. she's not quite sure what she's done but there's something going on )

That's exactly what is going to happen.

( she walked out of the highest security prison, frequently, as if the walls weren't there. escaping is always part of her plan )

Clearly you have an advantage here. ( knowing her really well, being here longer. take your pick ) I was hoping that would help us. And then perhaps after you can tell me how you know me so well.

( unless the doctor had been a little gossip, or they'd met in her future. but that was job number two, right now she hoped clara would be useful to her. help her, clara )

[Clara's silent for a moment, eyes pointedly avoiding River's. God, she feels so childish and petty. River thinks she's going to succeed where everyone else here has failed for months, and part of Clara is just itching to prove the flaw, to hold it over River's head and win. But win what, exactly?]

... We have access to very little of the station, and it seems to be intentional. Even the maintenance shafts only go so far before you're blocked off. There's a hangar, but nothing in it that could take anyone very far. Some people have been down to the planet, but it's much the same as here. And... [Oh, this is the worst part, the one that makes her feel weak and childish and scared.] ... they can get in our heads. In our bodies. People have heard voices, had weird stuff happen to them. A friend of mine- ... this place killed him, and then brought him back.

[She looks down at the floor, and then up at River, only pulling in a breath to speak again - ] I think we're an experiment.

( success. with the information flowing river moves to a different console to see if it held a different function but that, and the one after that she tried, all held thd same information -- the same restrictions, backing up what clara was giving to her.

and the comes the strange part. she doesn't react at first, as if she didn't hear it, but she's trying to see where it all fits )

Weird how?

( she should be sympathetic about clara's friend but she needs to know as much as she can. they can be sad later )

It's a plausible theory. Though what would be the goal?

( giving her the chance to expand on her idea. she might not be wrong )

[Clara can’t tell the whole story, not to River. It would raise too many questions, too many details she can’t hear. But she can give a condensed, unattached recap.]

They messed with my heart, and with my thoughts.

( when you're someone that keeps a lot of secrets, hides and lies you can easily tell when someone else is doing it. she just has no idea how clara would react to the press for information, not when she seems to be giving a bad impression already )

I assume it isn't still doing that?

( there's one thing else that's been bothering her. usually when people the doctor knows has been kidnapped it's to get to him but, unless everyone here was friendly in some way this was a random chance. she liked that option the least )

How well do you know the people here?

[A brusque nod.]

Back to normal.

[Or as normal as a dead girl can get.]

And it varies, I guess. I know a couple of them well. None of us are best mates, though.

Is there anyone that you already knew?

( she doesn't count considering she just got here )

Unless everyone here knows the Doctor it's a very coincidental list.

[She shakes her head, trying not to look mournful.]

Strangers. To me, at least. A lot of them seem to know each other.

( she doesn't want to rule it out entirely, she didnt know everyone that her husband did but river also believed that his name would have come up to clara by now. so many acquaintances they'd have found one commonality surely )

Then we're dealing with an unknown entity and that's far more dangerous.

( and if she were alone possibly exciting. oh dear.

river moves to lean on her arms on the console before thinking better of it, the pressure to her right wrist a little too much. she tips her head to look across at clara, trying tomkeep that pain very masked )

There's few enough people that it's easy to contain everyone, especially if we couldn't get far, or even around the station. Which is probably where whoever's doing this is hiding.

I could even buy an experiment. It's a good number to test something on.

( or many somethings if they broke it down into groups. but what? there were too many frustrating gaps )

What's in the hangar?

Edited 2018-08-30 15:41 (UTC)

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TEST DRIVE #002

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