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

She's grateful that he doesn't demand answers. They would have been given, of course, she's not hiding here, but it doesn't usually lead to the most pleasant conversations.

"Normal bad alcohol, yeah. It's definitely not something that's gotten better with age - or if it has, I don't want to try a fresh batch."

Eyebrow raised, he reaches for the bottle and takes an experimental sniff and pulls back. Well, it definitely smells like alcohol, that's for sure. He's not going to bother tasting it, because it's unlikely to do anything for him, anyway.

"We might want to secure this place before we drink too much of that." He replaces the bottle on the counter.

"Secure it from what, sugar?" she asks with a frown, leaning against the counter for balance as much as comfort. "Seems like all of us waking up are the only ones around, except maybe for whoever brought us here."

Whoever or whatever. The universe is a strange enough place that she's not ruling out anything yet.

"Some powerful entity brought us all here. I'm a little worried about why it brought us here or what else it might have dragged here with us." He crosses his arms. Maybe his experiences have made him a little wary, but last time something big came to Earth from space, it did a number on New York.

"I think we should assume that there's a possibility of hostiles being here for the time being."

It's not a crazy idea, but it's also something that hadn't occurred to her, nor does it... really worry her now. Maybe something's wrong with her, but she just can't bring herself to be concerned by much of anything at the moment.

"So long as they're not giant robots trying to lock us all in a lab..." Her expression turns apologetic. "Sorry, sugar. I guess I'm just tired of fighting."

Steve frowns. Whatever she's been through, it's clearly a hell of a story. People being locked in labs isn't exactly a foreign story to him, either. He remembers pulling Bucky off of that table in Azzano and everything that came after that.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you, Rogue. I'm just trying to keep all of you safe."

A part of him wants to ask more, but he won't.

Of course he is. In the few minutes they've been talking, she can tell that Steve is a Good Person. He's concerned for the people here and she can't fault him for that. Truthfully, she's glad that someone is, since apparently she can't be that person herself right now.

"You didn't upset me." She takes a breath and lets it out in a little sign. "How can I help?"

He's a little relieved by that, but he's still not entirely sure what to say, even when he's normally comfortable jumping in and giving orders.

"Just keep an eye out for anything strange. If we all stay alert and share the information we can gather, I think it'll keep all of us a lot safer." Because Steve can recognize that he's a little out of his depth here, but that's never stopped him from trying before. All they need is the right person to figure out the right clue and everything else should come together.

"And don't go too far by yourself. Who knows if there's safety in numbers when we're dealing with something this powerful, but I think we'll all be a little better off if we don't let ourselves get too isolated."

"Well, on the plus side, I don't think the station's all that big." There do seem to be a lot of locked doors, though, which is sure to bother some of them enough to try to do something about it. Frankly, she's surprised Erik hasn't already ripped through half the station trying to find answers.

"What's your name on this thing, sugar?" she asks him, holding up her wrist and the communication device attached to it. "I'll let you know if I find out anything that might be useful."

"It's srogers." The same as the email address they'd set up for him at SHIELD when they'd deemed him fit for internet use. Going from the 1940s to email had taken a little time for him. He's just happy that he can use things like this without needing assistance these days.

"Feel free to reach out if you need help, too."

» TEST DRIVE #001

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