reveriance | » TEST DRIVE #001

TEST DRIVE #001

( 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 3 . 1 ) » VIRTUAL
But the alcohol isn't even the most interesting part of your discovery (depending on who you are, of course). No, what catches your interest is a second, smaller room off from the main bar room, which looks to be some kind of arcade. There are a few VR sets lined up against one of the walls, and surely, they can't be working, right? Nothing is on this rust bucket. And yet, if you put it on, the display comes to life.

It's a pretty simple HUD, and when you move around in reality, you move around in the virtual world you've just entered. It's a luxurious world, full of brightly, saturated colors, making it just a little obvious that it isn't real. Ahead, there is a jungle, a temple, and a city. You can play around, slay some monsters, have some fun, but you can feel yourself growing hot, like the VR helmet is burning your forehead.

And when you try to take it off, you find that you can't. The HUD glitches, the sound cuts off to a blaring alarm, and an error message appears, in glowing, blinking red letters: FINISH THE MISSION. Will you, despite not knowing what the mission even is, or will you fight to get the helmet off?

( 0 0 4 ) » MALFUNCTIONS

(cw: body horror, bodily functions, gore, blood, death)

The fabricators function well enough, until they don't. One day, one moment, everything's all right — the food doesn't generally taste amazing and sometimes downright awful, but it's nourishing and filling no matter what your dietary needs — and the next, things go a little haywire.

In short, the fabricators are malfunctioning.

Oh, they're still producing food that looks and tastes much the same as before, but now there are some unexpected side effects.

NB: Characters may experience any of the following side effects: nausea ranging from slight to debilitating, the sensation of being happily and affectionately — but not overwhelmingly — drunk, bone-deep exhaustion and weariness that makes it hard to move, or repeated hallucinations of loved ones screaming for help, reaching out to characters and leading them down abandoned corridors or being killed by unseen forces.

The extent to which characters are affected is up to players, as is whether you'd prefer to play this more lightheartedly or tackling more serious themes. If the latter, please provide warnings in subject lines where necessary.

( 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 5 . 1 ) » NETWORK USERNAME
When you first turn on your communication device, it requests for you to pick a username to identify you on the network. It can be anything you want. However, as you try to input a username in your wristband to access the network, you get the following message, along with a small, but irritating, warming sound:

this username is already in use.

What does this mean? Is there other people around? Were there other people around?

( 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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[For once in forever, Bucky’s lack of self-immersion in modern pop culture proves to be advantageous, but even though he would likely consider it a personal win had he recognized that his ignorance helps significantly here, being unaware of the significance of pop culture in what Ryuji references makes him, sadly, also unaware of the proverbial win. Ain’t that the way.

Since aliens are nowhere near the top of his list of things to be concerned with at the moment, he pauses and gives the kid a cursory glance before taking a slow breath and shrugging.]

I’m not sure why anything would wanna be stuck in a cramped crawlspace if it can be comfortably out in the open where we are right now.

[So, no, Ryuji. Probably no crawlspaces specifically for aliens. They’ll just be around the corner waiting to murder you instead.]

[For a second, he's rather placated with the idea that... maybe, just maybe, this didn't mean doom, death, dismay and destruction weren't the 4 horses of the apocalypse just kindly waiting around the bend. It starts out with an appreciation for the assuaging; he nods, hearing what he wants to hear for a moment until---

GOD DAMNIT.

The hair on the back of his neck start to rise in unison to the national anthem of Paranoia-ville and he subconsciously takes a step closer to the wall, slowing down until he's at a stop.]

H-hell no. Eff this place, I am so outta here.

[Thanks Bucky.]

[His brows raise when the momentary placation morphs into visibly comical fear (though obviously internally far less comical and probably infinitely more serious), and Bucky reaches out pat the young man’s shoulder when he ducks back to the wall.]

Hoold on there, kiddo. If something crazy was gonna attack us, it’d have happened already. We were all dead to the world not long ago. If there really are starving aliens lurking around, we’d have woken up to being eaten alive instead of— [He gestures vaguely.] —y’know. Like you slept in on a Saturday after a night out.

[There's no room for rationalism in Deep Space Hell, and for a moment, Ryuji is rather reticent to catch on that he's... probably right.]

Man... then don't lead with that! The hell! You trying to kill me or something? We just met.

[He needs a moment to collect himself, and when he does, he pushes his shoulders off from the wall behind him, not even noticing that he had brushed up against a doorframe.]

You think... uh. Shit. Yeah, we're nowhere near home, huh. I wonder if the people who care about us are missin' us. [He doesn't want to let his mom down.] Eh, it doesn't matter, we gotta figure out what the hell is goin' on before we start thinkin' about what we could be doin' right now, right?

Edited 2018-04-20 21:13 (UTC)

[W...ell then. This kid sure is reactive and energetic. Though rather amused at this point, Bucky obviously realizes it won’t serve either of them well to bring attention to it or indicate his amusement, so instead of laughing he give another vague shrug, letting the kid have his moment before they’re back on the actually matter at hand.

Eyes scanning the perimeter, the emptiness of their surroundings lends nothin toward comfort. While that leaves Bucky little means to assauge Ryuji, Bucky doesn’t intend to leave him high and dry either.]

I don't know that it'll be that easy to figure out, so don't rule out the doing part just yet. Sometimes you won’t ever know; you just have to do. [Survival at it’s core. He knows this better than most ever likely will.] Regardless, the best way we can help anyone that might care about us is to get back to them in one piece. Don’t worry about the rest.

[Whoever the hell this guy is, he's filled with some great advice. Ryuji doesn't really trust adults when it comes down to it, but that's more a function of the fact that the ones he's known back home have been typically filled with a certain level of asshole-ism that doesn't seem to emanate off of Bucky the way it did other people. Alright, he can manage. Anxiety diverted for a moment or two, even if he's still shifting weight from one foot to the other in his typical inattentive way.]

You just have to do. [Yeah.] Got it. I like that mindset, it's how I usually handle stuff.

[Just dive right in, worry about the consequence after. It's a new environment, not a new Ryuji.]

Hey- what's behind this door?

[How he usually handles stuff except now apparently. Bucky takes that as signal of the kid’s wellbeing, clearly thrown off his game from being displaced like they have been. He files the information away for later.

At the followed remark, he scans the doorframe. There's no visible lock on it, no visible knob either. Guess hoping for a nameplate would be too much. A panel off to the side with a nondescript slot and black panel is all they get.]

My guess is that it's probably not the cafeteria. [He’s helpful.]

[James, that's about as useful as finding a drawer full of knives for a bowl of ramen, and Ryuji just looks up at the other man, unimpressed, mouth slowly unhinging and starting to become slightly agape. No, probably not the cafeteria.]

W... wh. I. [At a loss for words, really.] You think there's a cafeteria on this thing?

[Fuck it, whatever. Nothing is really out of the realm of possibility, since just a few hours ago, he was living it up in Tokyo, about to kill a god who wanted to control the desires and ambitions of all humanity.

Ryuji tries to figure out how the hell they're supposed to open the door, eyeing a panel next to it.]

Maybe that thingy opens it?

» TEST DRIVE #001

2a sighs

bucky WHY

why what HE DID NOTHING WRONG

you sir are LYING to me

what is this word, lying

idk i only play truthful honest bad boys

you mean truthfully honest boys that try to be bad

yoooo keep that shit under wraps my dude