» TEST DRIVE #001

[reveriemod]

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.

Comments

[tumang]

R&R. Hm. [ The last time he had some time off, Amos went down a dark corner of his own mind. It was not a good time for anyone, but it was especially bad for him. What he almost did...

Doesn't matter. It didn't happen. ]

I can probably work it out, yeah. Can't be that different from what I'm used to. A wire's a wire.

[ Wrong, and he knows that, but. Whatever. ]

[oorah]

[ a mirthless smile flickers over his face. r&r indeed. ]

Tell me what to do. [ to help. he's here, may as well. ]

[tumang]

[ Amos looks back at the guy again. He looks like he's seen shit, which, honestly, could be pretty useful.

He nods. ]

Amos. [ If they're going to work together, a name might help. ]

First, we need to find tools. Places like this one, they put everything in panels cut directly into the walls, in case we lose gravity. There must be emergency toolkits around.

[oorah]

[ oh, right. names. he gives a little grunt in acknowledgment, weighing his options for a moment. he has a ready-to-go alias, but... what's the point? they're in freaking space. his dog-tags that declare his true name are already around his throat in case he doesn't make it. fuck it. ]

Frank. [ belated but soft as he nods at amos' instructions. he's already tapping the walls to find a hollow panel and he gets lucky. one swivels out and reveals some emergency supplies, just like the other man had said. frank gives him an expectant look, as if he's afraid to reach for them without the go ahead. ]

[tumang]

[ Amos looks around Frank into the panel, pursing his lips. It's not tools drawer from the shop on the Roci, but as it is, it's a start. A wrench, a small fire extinguisher, a pouch of sealing patches. Not even a screwdriver.

What he really wants is a welding torch or a saw, to get through some of these locked doors. ]

Ain't much, but gotta start somewhere. The sealing patches are the best thing about this. You take one, put it over a hole, and it'll seal it right shut. Great for leaks, easy to use. Can protect exposed wiring, too.

[oorah]

[ he nods his understanding and opens the pouch, getting a look at the patches inside. seems straightforward enough. ] This your job? [ back home, he means. ]

[tumang]

Yeah.

[ He nods, turning away from the panel. ]

But anyone who puts on a spacesuit is told how to use sealing patches anyway.

[ No one wants to be leaking air because of a shitty old suit on a shitty old ice-hauler, and Amos is all too used to those. ]

Basics of being in space: don't leak air.

[oorah]

[ he lifts his eyebrows. ] I'll keep that in mind. [ frank looks back out the window and wonders what it would be like to go out there. he can't even fathom it and here this guy is -- fifteen years. damn. ]

Anything else I should know?

[tumang]

[ Honestly, Amos is a little antsy to go out. Take in the station from outside and see what kind of damage it has suffered. Fixing the outside is going to be just as essential as fixing the inside, if not more. ]

Don't touch something if you aren't sure of what it might do.

[ Logical, right? Also not the kind of shit that Amos would listen to, himself. ]

Definitely don't touch anything that looks like pulsating blue goo.

[oorah]

[ he's suddenly reminded of himself-- lecturing david about his gun. it brings a shadow of a smile to his lips, but he'll listen to amos for now. until it's time to make really terrible decisions anyway. ]

Can't say I've ever been tempted to touch goo before, so the pulsating blue kind is all yours.

[tumang]

The only thing I'll do if I see any is blast it right out of an airlock.

[ If he's got to make decisions about how to deal with this shit, he'll follow the decision that they all made, back on the Roci. Destroy it all. ]

But it's a good policy to have.