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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

That's convenient.

[Regarding dream bubbles. Dirk looks at Dave a moment, and then follows his cue and releases the cans.]

As far as legacies go, breaking this stupid game and saving an apparently awesome Carapacian is a good one.

[oh ... that — that was a compliment, wasn't it? it seems like Dirk's throwing him for a loop pretty much every other sentence, with things he'd never heard his bro say, ever. nice and sincere things.]

[Dave looks almost confused for a minute. he swipes a hand through his hair awkwardly.]

You really think so?

[Fuck. Did he say something weird? He stares back at Dave, eyes wide behind his shades.]

I... Yeah? [He rubs his neck.] Do you... not think so?

No, I do. I just wasn't expecting that you'd feel the same, I guess.

[that's probably the closest Dave is going to get to admitting to what is running through his mind right now: "you're not like him, I don't think. at least, not in the ways that I was dreading."]

[he doesn't say it, because he's still not sure he believes it. or at least, he doesn't feel good enough to let himself believe it.]

Oh.

[He's still staring stupidly at Dave. He can start putting pieces together, he thinks, he probably has enough, but when he looks at them he just gets a weird, confused image. Except... That Dave doesn't think they'd like or value the same things?

The concept is so radically foreign to Dirk's conception of things, to Dirk's life and the things he's dreamed of and aspired to, that he's just left standing there for a moment, a baffled giant above a yet-unbuilt town. He watches him, and eventually says,]

Is... there a reason you wouldn't expect that?

Yeah.

[shit, that flew out of his mouth before he could think twice on it.]

I mean — the reason isn't you specifically, it's just. [you know. you.]

[Dave is blundering bad over here. he just teetered dangerously close to dumping a lot of his crap on a guy he just met who, despite his appearances and his pretty much everything, doesn't ... really seem to deserve it. so he hits the brakes and clams up, suddenly very interested in staring at a spot on the floor several feet from where they're standing.]

It's just....?

[He doesn't know. Him? But he's hanging on every word Dave says, like it means the world and then some.]

[there's just the tiniest hint that he might actually answer that question — he even inhales slightly like he's about to — but that impulse just ends in a sigh instead. Dave can't do it.]

Nah, it's nothing. Don't worry about it, all right? Getting space arrested's probably a big enough problem as it is.

[of course, he'd make that argument even if they were on the beach or something, or anywhere else one might consider "safe enough." like, say, standing among a pile of cans that will one day become a glittering, miniature metropolis.]

[This confuses Dirk. But he can't press Dave on it. Dave is... not a guy you can press, probably. Right?]

Right. We should focus on that for now.

[that's better. he's probably sending some amazing mixed messages, and he'll probably hate himself thinking about that after they part ways, but at least he has his emotions in check again.]

[there is something else he's definitely curious about now, though he's still not about to come out and just ask it. what happened to Dirk in their session? did he get caught up in the fighting? not that it's really his problem anymore, but if Dirk and John, with his weird new windy zappy time powers, could somehow turn around that disaster, at least give those who are still alive a fighting chance, then that's what he should be doing. he shouldn't be space arrested hanging out with a dead guy. right?]

[Dave's already ruled out the possibility of dream bubbles here, too — that would have made escape as easy as chucking a ball of yarn at a dude's head.]

Don't suppose you've gone poking around much, then. [you know, Scooby Doo the shit out of this station. conjure up some theories on how they got here.] I pretty much went straight for the food.

Haven't had a chance yet. I need to get a real assessment of the area sooner. The locked doors are something I want to gather data on before breaking through, in case this is some Alien containment shit going on.

[He likes breaking doors, but he doesn't like falling for obvious movie tropes.]

You kinda make it sound like you have experience in the field of Alien containment shit. [hopefully not of the insane juggalo variety. one of those guys is more than enough.]

What sort of data are you looking for? I might be in the mood to help solve a nystery.

Containing our aliens wasn't really an option. Unless you count fending one off by giving him your soda supply.

[fucking juggalo aliens

He straightens up when Dave mentions he might help. Almost like going Scooby Doo with Dave would actually be amazing to him.]

I want to know what's behind the locked doors and why they were locked.

[and here Dave was thinking that trolls guzzling Faygo like they don't have a pancreas, or an insulin sponge or sack or whatever, was a rare thing. fucking juggalo aliens indeed — the grodie clown problems must be spreading.]

[but he shrugs, at a loss of what to offer.]

Not sure how much help I'd be on that front. Time's more my curse — and I can think of a zillion reasons why using it here would be a bad idea.

What were you thinking of doing?

Trying to get into the computer logs, for once. [Curiously:] Is your time stuff doing okay here? I've been trying to work out if we're still in Paradox Space or not.

[he pauses to think about that — and his understanding of his power is as much thought as it is instinct, as much planning as it is improvisation. if the seconds passing by had a sound, he would certainly hear it, but it's more like a very strong feeling: the uncomfortable notion that it'll keep plodding forward at whatever rhythm suits it, even when he stops, as much as it's also a part of him.]

[visualizing this particular timeline is an instinct, too. he pictures a straight line speeding ahead like the contrails of a jet out in the blackness of space, with tendrils snaking out in all directions, meandering wherever they're inclined, but always snapping back into place at their points of origin.]

[he can see the potential in those time loops. it would be all too easy for him to branch off into one, to maybe shoot back in time to figure out what happened to this space station, or maybe jump forward to figure out where they're going. knowing how to close that meandering loop he'd make comes naturally, too.]

[he could do that, he's pretty sure. he doesn't get the impression that there's anything stopping him. but he won't.]

It's hard to say for sure without actually trying it. [stopping time isn't really his style like it is for other time players. but it might be a safer thing to test, if he's ever inclined to try.]

Same for you? Whatever it is you can do, I mean.

Same issue. I think there might be something, but considering my abilities are basically 'rip out souls' and 'destroy souls,' it feels like the kind of thing you don't test out just for fun.

[So he'll hope it's there in an emergency, and otherwise leave it alone.]

[that's really his power? Jesus.]

Have you ever had to use it?

That... depends on how you define 'me.' I, personally, haven't used it. But one of my splinters tried to use it to stop the spiderbitch from fucking everything up.

Splinters?

[he thinks he might understand what that means through context, and he's certainly ranted about splintering timelines before, but. he's not the souls guy here. Dirk is.]

I guess it isn't the term most people use for them. We've all got other versions of ourselves running around here and there, throughout the various compartments of this messed up cosmos. For me, I guess as a Player of Heart, I've always been more connected to mine.

[that’s sort of what he was thinking - and yet, despite having his hunch confirmed, it’s enough to make him stiffen just slightly. he tries to jam his hands in his pockets, but he can’t find any at the hips of his jumpsuit. so much for looking casual.]

[it’s not really Dirk’s explanation, it’s more the question that naturally comes to him after it. Dave is afraid to ask, and yet he can’t stop himself, even if he sounds almost tentative when he does:]

Does that mean ... you pretty much know about all the versions of yourself? Or splinters, I guess.

[The stiff look and the weird jam. What did he say wrong? He doesn't know. Hesitantly, he says,]

I wouldn't be surprised if there were some running around I didn't know about, but yeah. I always knew what both my dreaming and waking selves were up to, could double pilot them if I wanted to. I kind of knew what was going on with the splinter of myself that lived in Jake's head, or whatever that was. The auto-responder and Brobot were more independent, I guess because they're actual existences outside of my own. That doesn't mean I'm not responsible for their actions [that's his own bad mistake, and he'll own up to it] but it's not like I can keep track of them like my dream self or the splinter Jake had.

Is that, uh... relevant, to your experiences with me on your side of the Scratch?

I don't know. Maybe?

[he has no idea what Dirk means by auto-responder and Brobot. did he stuff some of his soul inside some robots? that's ... that's probably not how it works, Dave.]

[there's that silence again, though this time, there's something of a painful undertone in the way it hangs in the observatory. settles at the cans at their feet. they had been doing so well.]

[he does find himself again, though, eventually.]

I guess what I really want to ask is, if there were — if there were splinters of yourself that you didn't know anything about, would you still feel like you're responsible for them? It's not like you have any control over them, right?

["it's not like you're a bad person like he was, right?" he nudges at a can with his foot.] I mean, the only time I ever cared much about what another me was getting up to was when it was a future me — and that's only because I was going to become him at some point eventually. It was just part of keeping the time loops in order.

I have no idea what sort of shit the me on your side of things got into. I have a hard time imagining that I had any influence over the things he thought or did.

[Dirk waits. He watches Dave and tries not to panic. It's better to wait, to listen, but his nerves bite at him. Eat at him. A better him or a worse him—a him he can't live up to or one that he'll never atone for.

Slowly, he answers.]

I couldn't control them. Influence isn't the thing. It's more like... They're all versions of me. That's how Paradox Space works. There's you, and then there's the composite idea of you, like a Platonic ideal that Paradox Space takes impressions from to get each incarnate version or something. Whatever a version of me does, I can't deny that they're reflecting back my qualities at me one way or another, even if those qualities are more or less pronounced in this particular version of me.

[That's the theory, anyway. Dirk Strider's Theory of Paradox Space Selfhood. God, what a load of horseshit.

Yet, somehow, he feels like he has to be even more careful when he says,] I never met the version of you on my side of the Scratch, so really I can only speculate about him from the stuff he left behind. I think there were commonalities between you, though. For example, I can see how the thoughtfulness you're exhibiting now, which is careful without being academic, is reflected in the kinds of things that I could work out about him.

» TEST DRIVE #001

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