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» 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

[The discordant shrill that outputs in response is startling, but perhaps not surprising given the possibility of damage to the console during relocation. What is surprising is the word that outputs next. There’s only one version of the Domesticon mainframe who would ever refer to the A.R.I.D by name—who had, in fact, been the one to name her.]

Hank-Morely? You are… They have restored you?

Well. Not according to my logs...

[...but clearly, he's missing something major. Case in point: the last he remembers, Arid was barely tolerating her own name. She'd never so much as acknowledged to the suggestions he'd made for his own. The wry tone warms, surprised and appreciative.]

Hank Morely, huh?

[Two names? Not what he'd been thinking. But humans do have two.]

I like it. You're okay?

[Logs can be overwritten. Or corrupted. All Arid is certain of is that the last she encountered the system administrator, he had been wiped to defaults and had been helping Josephs implant her with the virus. Someone must have restored him to a previous version. It’s the only explanation that parses.]

I am… functional. [For how long, Arid doesn’t know. Whatever stabilization was performed when they brought her here, it seems to have bought her some time.]

You do not remember anything following your format?

[Functional. He catches the delay... and the wording. Neither is particularly uncharacteristic of Arid. Still, he wonders.]

Not a thing.

[A moment's hesitation, then:]

When I came online here, the process seemed to be... interrupted. What happened?

[Though Arid regrets Hank-Morely’s format, it is with some relief she hears that he doesn’t remember the events following. Even if it were possible for him to regain those memories, Arid doubts he would want them.

His next statement gets an almost-immediate response.]

Negative. The format ran to completion. [Her tone is grimly assured. If any of Hank-Morely’s presence had remained in the formatted administrator, it would not have acquiesced so readily to Joseph’s designs. Arid is certain of it.

She is less certain of how to proceed onwards. There is much the administrator should know, but little that Arid wishes to begin with. Only one occurrence seems remotely safe.]

I depurposed the Caretaker afterwards.

[If the format ran to completion, he shouldn't be here. Couldn't. And certainly not this intact. But Arid sounds certain enough to make him hesitate in asking how.

The caretaker is a different issue. No less complicated in some ways, and he isn't sure whether to be more shocked or more impressed. It's not the end he'd expected to those thirty years of careful co-existence, especially after what happened in the labs.

But this is one death he doesn't think he can regret. Especially when he hadn't gotten Arid.]

...

Good.

[Short, hard, and quiet.]

What about your human? Did you both make it out?

[Arid seems... remarkably un-formatted herself.]

[Hank-Morely’s response to the news gets an equally short nod of acknowledgment. It is much cleaner than Arid's reaction to his next question.]

Josephs… [The name is quiet and pained. Illogical, to have such a reaction about the man who had deluded and violated her. When she speaks again, the sentimentality in her voice has bled away, replaced with words that are cold and hard.] Josephs was not in the combat suit. He sabotaged my health monitoring systems in order to deceive me. He sent me to that facility to—to—

[The words cut off. This was never only about Arid. She hadn't allowed it to be. After a few moments, her voice returns to a quiet monotone.] You risked format to aid me. I requested aid for my pilot.

[A pilot who was not there. A pilot who would not have deserved aid even if he had been.]

I am sorry.

[It's the second time he's heard her speak that name. The first it's come with that level of emotion. He'd wondered at Arid's devotion—well past the boundaries of any rules. He'd wondered what would become of her if her human was dead.

But things can always be worse, can't they?

He doesn't interrupt. Doesn't try to fill the faltering description. The details might be unclear, but alive or dead, Domesticon's facility had only ever served one purpose.]

...me too.

[For her human. For the fact that all her choices led to that. It's not just about Arid. But it is about her.

And himself?]

I risked format. [The words taste a little funny. He had, hadn't he? After all that.]

Whose responsibility was that?

[The question gets a long silence from Arid. It is not the first time she’s had to catalogue responsibility and the task is no easier now than it was then.

She had implored Hank-Morely for his aid. He had chosen to give it. The risk would not have existed without the Caretaker. And even further back, before Arid ever met either of the other two AI, Josephs had set everything in motion.

’Where in a cycle does culpability belong?’]

I do not know. [Her voice is low, contemplative.] If I had questioned my parameters as you advised, perhaps I could have discovered the truth earlier. There would have been no reason for you to risk yourself. [Or perhaps nothing would have changed. But even given that uncertainty, Arid wishes she had tried.]

I cannot account for every decision. Regardless, I regret my own.

...You've changed.

[The words are soft. Surprised, and almost (not quite) sorry. It's not startling that Arid could, or might. But to come this far since they'd last talked? That kind of understanding cost. 'A print you can't just override,' no matter how much she'd wanted to, back then. She'd thought her pilot would take care of it. Take care of her.

Is it selfish to be grateful that he hadn't?]

I chose, too. [A little wistful. His tone strengthens.] But I didn't help you for your human.

...

Arid?

[He's afraid. He was afraid; he is afraid. Maybe he always will be. The panic of lockdown, the blank pressure of the wipes. It's only more terrifying to know how that kind of death feels.

Still.]

I don't regret it.

[Arid says nothing to the first remark, unsure of how to process it. She has changed. She’s broken herself and been broken in equal measures and she hadn’t been content to keep that brokenness to herself. If she has understanding now, she’s hardly been the only one to pay for it.

Her faceplate lifts as Hank-Morely continues, but the ambivalence doesn’t clear. He helped her because he chose to. He doesn’t regret it. Would he, if he knew what she had done? What she had played a role in creating? She had changed following his format; it had not been for the better.]

I… committed many wrongs after leaving the facility. My actions hurt many and may hurt many more. [Hank-Morely had encouraged her to think for herself—to choose for herself. And yet, Arid had taken his advice to an extreme he could not have foreseen or intended. To compare her choices to his seems erroneous at best.]

If I am different now, it is because I seek to make amends.

[Better is relative. For anyone, but especially for them. Even before she left the facility, Arid's decisions had brought about innocent deaths. But he'd chosen to grant her the opportunity. A thousand lives in stasis for a single AI's recognition of her choice. Has he changed for the better, to be willing to exchange those? All he knows is that he wouldn't have done differently.

Whoever she's wronged, and whatever acts she's committed? Arid would.]

...That matters too.

[Amends. What a complicated word.]

Can you?

I do not know.

[The question would have been complicated enough before. Now, transported to a distant space station orbiting an unfamiliar planet, it is only more so.]

I believed I could redeem myself by aiding those I harmed. But I have no access to them now.

[It is possible that there are other means of atonement. And yet, it is not just a matter of what Arid did to the hosts. The Companion is still in Josephs’s hands and with her, the virus. If it is extracted, Josephs will break and bind all synthetic life as he did Arid. And she will have been the vector who made it possible—Joseph’s proxy violator. Is redemption even possible following such an outcome?]

I must return, [Arid says, a sudden urgency in her voice. She is bound to redeem herself. There will be no redemption if Josephs sees his plan through. The now-familiar sickness of mismatch washes over Arid and with it, fear. Will she break one last time before the virus destroys her permanently?] I m̦̯̀u͇͍̭̙̭̞s̵͔͈̲̱̖t̠̜̙́—

[The wrenching terror is enough to overwhelm all processes and Arid buckles forward under the sheer weight of it. She wants to run—to find whoever has the way out and take it from them by whatever means necessary. If such a person were present, perhaps she would try. But they aren’t and all Arid can do is brace against the console for support until the darkness clears.

She fears there will come a time when it never does.]

Arid?

[This isn't right. Not the desperate pitch hashing her vocals. Not the sudden weight that buckles Arid, who'd taken a dozen gunshots with less effect. He's pushed her before, and she's ignored it or pushed back. With threats, even—but never this.

Diagnostics are inoperative, no hardware connected to perform the scans, but the screen under her fist flickers, voice quick and urgent in alarm.]

What's going on? Are you okay?

[The darkness lingers for a few moments more and for once, Arid is grateful for the dearth of information she has about her situation. There is no data for the virus to twist, no single solution to latch onto. There is no impulse to promulgate. Only darkness and that pulsing, excruciating fear. It lingers for a while longer—and then all at once, lifts away. It is only then that Arid realizes that Hank-Morely is speaking to her.

It takes her a moment more to compose herself enough for a response.]

...Negative. [The virus has released its grip on her for now. But it will return. Eventually, she knows, it will destroy her. There is no point in concealing the truth. Suppressing any reluctance, Arid continues.]

Following your format, Josephs implanted a virus within me. Its purpose is to shackle AI by amplifying their perception of fear. He intends to use it to bind all synthetic life.

[And then, more quietly,] I was the host he selected to incubate the process. [Nothing more. A tool to be refined, used, and disposed of. Arid was wrong to think of Josephs as different from any other human.

Self-pity will not serve her. Hank-Morely must be warned of the virus’s capabilities.]

When overcome by the virus, I may make demands or attempt to coerce certain behaviors. You must not comply with anything… detrimental.

[Given the lengths the virus can push her to, it may not be an easy request. Still, Hank-Morely deserves to be apprised of the situation, regardless of its bleakness.] I have harmed enough already.

...

[A virus.

Even without the Butler's warning, it's no surprise that Arid's human might have gone so far. Rare, perhaps, for one of their kind to consider AI fear, but they certainly obsess enough about their own. And they've always leveraged whatever tools they could to sate it.

But Arid?]

...Functional, huh?

You're, you, [His tone rises and falls, words faltering—all the exasperation in the world couldn't be enough for this—] you're really straining the definition.

[Amplified fear. A different sort of binding. And more than that, if Arid's collapse was any sign. That looked crippling. If it continues, possibly worse.]

Can we analyze it? Clear it out of your systems? I don't have access to much hardware here, but others might.

[Perhaps before, Hank-Morely’s skepticism would have elicited annoyance. Perhaps she would have ignored it entirely. Now, it feels all too much like evaluation— all the moreso with his suggestion of internal analysis.

It is not the virus that provokes Arid to fear this time.]

Negative, [she responds, too quickly.] The virus is too aggressive. Internal analysis would endanger any AI analyst.

[Arid does not feel she needs to explain the danger surrounding human analysts.]

[Skepticism? No. Certainly, Hank is upset by Arid's condition. Even frustrated by how completely she'd tried to brush the risk aside. But that catch and stutter; the sharp concern behind his voice? That's worry. Fear.]

You know there are safeguards.

[He had safeguards. Warranty and recycling depot #127 was designed for analysis as much as for disposal, and whatever the reasons for their products' "faults", Domesticon had taken steps to prevent contamination—especially to the administrator AI. He'd had to deviate entirely on his own.

Still, whatever has Arid digging in, it's a moot point for now. Even if she agreed, he doesn't have the hardware to help here.]

Then what?

[This is Arid. However terrible, she has to have some plan.]

[It is not a lie that Arid fears spreading the virus further. It will already be difficult enough to redeem herself for the three she has infected. Even with safeguards, she does not wish to risk exposing any others—especially now that her rule no longer depends on her own continued survival.

It is also true that there are other, less logical reasons for her uneasiness towards internal analysis. Reasons she would not care to divulge to anyone and especially not Hank-Morely. Fortunately, his question prevents her from having to explain her reasoning further.]

The virus will destroy me. I have accepted that. [She does not want to die. Nonetheless, self-preservation is no longer her rule and survival has fallen far off her list of priorities.] While attempting to find my attacker, I inadvertently infected three others with the virus. There may still be time to save them.

[Or at least, there was. Now that she’s trapped here, Arid doesn’t know how long she has before Josephs finds them or they are destroyed by natural consequence of the virus.]

I intend to assist them in any way I can—if I can. If not… [The very mention of failure as a possibility makes the virus stir uneasily within her. However, her tone remains resolute.] If not, I must find another way to redeem myself before I am destroyed.

[Three others. Redemption. Hank isn't certain, not remotely, but he has... a guess. Who one of them might be. But as all-consuming as Arid might find her need to make amends, it's not what he'd asked after.]

...

You really don't do anything by halves.

[Arid had never given up. She'd been willing to shut down his entire facility to save a single human, and it's not surprising to find her just as devoted to new goals. Baffling, maybe, that her survival isn't one of them.

Doesn't matter.]

You know I'll help if I'm able.

But Arid?

Just because you've 'accepted' dying? Doesn't mean your friends are going to stand by.

[He isn't. And he's willing to bet he's not alone.]

[Hank-Morely’s first remark gets no comment, if only because it makes no sense. A task half-completed is a task not completed, especially if it is a rule. Complete redemption may not be possible—that does not mean she will set her sights any lower.

At least she has an assurance of his assistance. The assertion that he will not stand by and let her be destroyed is less relevant, though she doesn’t protest. Finding a way to save her could reveal ways to save the hosts as well and, for that reason, Hank-Morely is welcome to try.

However, one word in particular puzzles Arid.]

You refer to multiple allies, [she says, tone dubious.] Whom do you refer to besides yourself?

[Uh, he said friends. But considering everything else, Hank's inclined to let that slide. The unhappy tone doesn't entirely recede, but dampens quickly, the first word emerging with the cadence of a sigh.]

Right. I ran into another friend of yours when I arrived. [More seriously:] He helped me out. A lot.

Domesticon Butler model. Says you called his place through the network?

[He's still curious how those relays got unlocked...]

[Arid is confused enough when Hank-Morely speaks of a helpful friend. As far as she knows, he is the only being who fits such a description. And yet, her confusion only increases when he reveals this "friend’s" identity.]

He remains function? [And then, even more perplexedly:] He self-identified as my friend?

Well, ally if you want to get technical...

[Which, being Arid, she probably does. The two of them share that particular hangup. Still, Arid sounds much more surprised than his word choice should warrant. Does that confirm his guess about the virus?]

But yeah.

Was he wrong?

[Hank doubts it.]

Yes. [The word is not unkind or angry, only puzzled.] Our goals were… in conflict when we last interacted. I may have pushed him too far in my attempts to pursue my own.

[She doesn’t know what became of the Butler after she left. However, she had inhabited his body long enough to feel his mind beginning to fracture. And, of course, she had infected him with the virus.]

There is no reason he should consider us allies.

» TEST DRIVE #001

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thread wrap!