TDM #003

[bequiet]

TEST DRIVE MEME
You wake, standing. A thick, muddy red dust coats your skin and clothes - it sticks to your tongue and blocks your vision. Inhale and it chokes you, exhale and your breath puffs out in front of your face in a transparent maroon cloud. It tastes of copper, tangy and harsh. Movement is difficult, every limb tingles and aches. Look to your left, your right. Evenly spaced in each direction stands another person indistinguishable in every way from the next. You're disoriented and lethargic, unable to grasp onto a single thought. A pinprick of light blooms ahead and grows steadily larger; a door has opened.

Hands grip your wrists, push at the small of your back and guide you out of the darkness into a room with four walls and a thin, sagging ceiling. The plaster is peeling, the air is musty, and the floor is slick. White plastic piping juts up from the center and curves into multiple spouts, clean water flowing in uneven streams. Those hands pull your clothes off and clear the dust from your body, redress you in handsewn jumpsuits.

A finger is pressed to your lips. Kind eyes meet your own and a single word is whispered - hush.

Led out of the room in a line, you’re taken down a short hallway and into another, much larger room. There’s a woman waiting for you there, a child hugging her leg, and a cloth bag in her hands. She reaches in and pulls out a device, passes one to each of you. Once finished, she begins to move both hands in graceful gestures, a language. One of the people who helped you lifts their device and the screen lights up, tracks the woman’s hands. Letters appear on the screen and you understand the device’s purpose. She tells you what she knows and it’s not much.

This world is haunted. Noise attracts them, so it is not allowed. Communication is through body language, soundless writing, and the device. She tells you that your feet must be light and your mouth never used. There is a community outside these doors, where you can survive together, but only if you agree to one thing: complete and total silence. You'll have time to talk it over. Acceptance allows you to journey outside. The ground is marked in pathways of sand, lining the paths to each building and everywhere in between. You notice that the locals hold their devices always, aloft and glance to it often. It will not vibrate or make a sound to signal a message.

Notices appear. Rules. Guidelines. Feet on the sand and never anywhere else. To open a door you brush your fingers along the hinges - oiled and you may enter. If not, take the brush from the can sitting nearby and coat the metal with the dark liquid. You're to settle into your new home.

Caught me unawares
Content Warnings: Confusion, disorientation
Themes: Survival, horror, it's like groundhog day

The ending of the floor has caught me unawares. This must be the reason why I’m falling down the stairs.

That night, when you fall asleep, you dream of your life before The Quiet Place. At first it's the happiest moments of your life played on repeat, over and over. Everything good and sweet and fun. The second night, it's much the same. You go to bed anticipating another restful and pleasant sleep. But on the third night it changes.

For everyone, it starts the same. There's a long hallway with a door at the end. You walk towards it with nowhere else to go. You twist the knob and when you step forward, the floor ends and you fall. Falling lasts for seconds, minutes, or hours and when you land, it's with a jolt and a cloud of red dust all around you. There's someone else next to you, stumbling, coughing and choking on that familiar dirt that coats your tongue and mouth. When your eyes meet, everything blurs and you're falling again - this time, when you land, it's inside that dream from the first night. Only you're not alone. They're with you. The only way out is to experience the dream together. And when you do wake up, for real, that same red dirt is on your hands.

Falling down the stairs
Content Warnings: Confusion, disorientation
Themes: Survival, horror, it's like groundhog day

The ending of the floor has caught me unawares. This must be the reason why I’m falling down the stairs.

That night, when you fall asleep, you dream of your life before The Quiet Place. At first it's the worst moments of your life played on repeat, over and over. Everything bad and sour and awful. The second night, it's much the same. You go to bed anticipating another restless and dreadful sleep. But on the third night it changes.

For everyone, it starts the same. There's a long hallway with a door at the end. You walk towards it with nowhere else to go. You twist the knob and when you step forward, the floor ends and you fall. Falling lasts for seconds, minutes, or hours and when you land, it's with a jolt and a cloud of red dust all around you. There's someone else next to you, stumbling, coughing and choking on that familiar dirt that coats your tongue and mouth. When your eyes meet, everything blurs and you're falling again - this time, when you land, it's inside that nightmare from the first night. Only you're not alone. They're with you. The only way out is to experience the nightmare together. And when you do wake up, for real, that same red dirt is on your hands.

OOC
From your mods:

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NAVIGATION

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Comments

vanessa ives ( penny dreadful )

[possidetur]

( arrival )

( vanessa abides by the request for quiet, knowing all to well the dangers that monsters can bring. if noise attracts something here then she isn't going to tempt it, though she will try to find out more where and if she can. finding the device strange vanessa tends more to watch the hands of those here, though she has yet to have any success in deciphering the language behind them.

she gestures herself to those she meets, trying to grab attention, beckon closer. it takes a few promptings to remind vanessa to type on the device once she has someone )

( caught me unawares )

( she doesn't know that it's a dream. it feels real and for a moment vanessa believes that she's home, that the dusty quiet was all a dream.

what feels wrong about this, letting her know that perhaps she's not home, is the person with her. her dress is still out of place, wearing clothes that she'd been given in the quiet place, and with someone who's dress is equally unusual. they're not home. was it ever a dream?

vanessa offers the person beside her merely a glance before returning her gaze to the hall of sir malcolm's home, eyes searching for anything that seemed out of place or anything else that shouldn't be there )

Do you have a weapon?

( network )

How long have you been here?

caught me unawares;

[scarecrowed]

[ Lucas has no idea where he is, who the woman is beside him, but they do have one thing in common - the matching jumpsuits they're wearing. Though nothing about their surroundings suggest they're in Reims. He remembers falling asleep moments before, so unless the house has been soundproofed to protect them from the sound eaters, this had to be a dream.

He grips at the hilt of a sword inside a sheath hanging from a belt around his waist, arching an eyebrow at the woman. Yes, he has a sword. He's what many would call a swordsman. But what exactly does she wish him to do with his weapon? ]

Are we in danger?

[possidetur]

Aren't we always?

( she's referring to the sound eaters but if somehow they were home, or something was causing vanessa's home to be here-- who could say. though lately, danger did seem to be entwined with her life

she's taking steps now down the hall, hands resting on the large door to the study, pausing at it )

I know that we can't truly be here but that then leaves far too many questions about what this really is.

[scarecrowed]

Immediate danger, then. [ He corrects himself. Danger as in should he be getting his sword out right now if there's something or someone in this house who could try to harm them?

He follows her because there's little else to do. ] Why can't we be here? What is this place?

[possidetur]

This is my home.

( sir malcolm's but she'd been offered residence in it, and it had become home over time. she's opening the door now, and if the hallway had seemed large the room will add to that.

the room itself it empty of people. books line the shelves along the wall, but vanessa's attention instead is drawn to the table and chair, hand hovering over the tarot cards )

We can't be here because you've never been here.

( correct her if she's wrong but she doubts he's from her time. it's an entirely alien concept but, as much as the protector reminds her of mr chandler he feels like a different kind of man )

I return from a nap

[scarecrowed]

Quite some home.

[ Lucas has never seen a home like this one before, particularly with so many books. They attract his attention more than what seems to have grabbed Vanessa's. He reads some of the titles before looking over at her at her comment. It's fairly obvious he's out of place here - it'd be more so if he was wearing his own clothes, but just by the way he's observing his surroundings suggests he's not familiar with such furnishings.

He moves over to the table and reaches to pick up one of the cards - if she'll let him. ] Where's your family? [ Were they meant to be here or was this house accurately empty? ]

bless u

[possidetur]

( her hand moves out to stop his, gaze never drifting from the cards. she's searching, intent on finding an answer in the cards. the silence might feel a little uneasy but it lasts only a few seconds longer, lucas's hand being released with it )

They're gone.

( her hand moves towards one of the cards, one that has been very carefully found. judgment. vanessa says nothing about it and in fact, her head now tilting in lucas's direction serves as a distraction, avoiding the topic if he'll allow it )

We shouldn't linger.

( her 'family' may not be here but she wouldn't yet rule out anything else. she should, they'd defeated the demon and the nightcomers, but now with the sound eaters having loomed-- perhaps it was a little paranoid but being suddenly here, with someone that shouldn't be there, did not fill vanessa with a good feeling )

[scarecrowed]

[ He wonders if she doesn't like anyone touching her things - even in a world that might not even be real - until he recognizes she's looking for something in the cards. As one for doing what he's told, he leaves the cards alone and leaves her to do... whatever it is that she's doing.

He wants to ask her what the judgement card means, but if he doesn't even know her name, he probably has no right to ask. ]

Then show me the rest of the house.

[ Something tells him they're not going to be allowed to leave yet. ]

[possidetur]

( in any other situation that request, from a stranger, would be particularly forward. but vanessa's a little used to it, the company she keeps being rather forward, and as anything could be happening-- )

Follow me.

( she leads him back through the door they first arrived through, avoiding the length of the hall in favour of the direction of the stairs. there's a scorpion on the wall, drawn (oddly) in blood, and a front door that looks, with its thick steel, as if it's meant to keep something out.

there's a brief moment of hesitation before vanessa ascends the stairs, memories running of everything that had occurred in the house -- especially recently. it's halfway up the stairs when vanessa stops, a hand stretched out to stop him )

I would take out your sword.

( something's there. invisible to the eye, hiding in the walls. they were supposed to be dead but this wasn't real. this was her nightmare )

[scarecrowed]

[ Lucas doesn't think he's being particularly forward, but he's not afraid to speak his mind when he wants to and there's a certain air about him that suggests whoever dares cross him will get his sword straight through their chest.

And like she said, he's never been here before. She needs to lead the way.

The scorpion on the wall is a little unsettling, though something about the sight of blood doesn't make Lucas flinch the way any other might.

At her suggestion and with a hard look in his eyes, Lucas pulls out his sword, then takes a step towards her, as though to protect her. It's what he's good at. ]

nsfw link

[possidetur]

( the unspoken acknowledgement is all that vanessa needs. it's a few seconds more before her hand falls from him and then, as she's about to step again, comes a sound.

vanessa turns, looking behind them now for the owner of the noise but still, there's no one there, or at least no one perceptible. it's a bad time to ask if he believes in monsters, though no doubt the topic will arise when this is over.

seconds pass, vanessa remaining on the step, eyes seeking them out. it comes in the blink of an eye, the brief glance of a nightcomer at the bottom of the stairs, and then they're gone again by the time you've blinked once more )

[scarecrowed]

[ Does he believe in monsters? He hasn't seen any yet - at least not in person, though he's seen footage - but that doesn't mean he doesn't believe.

Lucas turns as well, readying himself to attack, but there's no one there, at least until there's a glimpse of... something. Something haunting. Lucas blinks afterwards, wondering if he imagined it, but from the way Vanessa is looking at the same spot, Lucas knows he didn't. ]

I can't hurt what I can't see. [ He warns Vanessa that his sword will be useless if whatever is stalking him only appears for a second at a time. ]

un: fcpresident

[353]

Over two months.

[ Is it weird that he misses school? There's classes here but it's not the same. He doesn't miss the bullies but he misses Mr. Clarke teaching him cool science shit. ]

pretend i have a username here i'm indecisive

[possidetur]

Do you know if that's a long time for this place?

no problemo

[353]

I dunno. I do know I was part of the first group of new people in a long time to come here.

I've also seen the sound eaters. They're not just a story.

[possidetur]

Are they everything that we're told?

( not that they're told particularly too much -- everyone's too afraid. vanessa has many questions, though perhaps someone that was brought here like herself isn't the best person to answer them all )

[353]

Pretty much.

There's a lot we don't know about them still but I can tell you they're as real as you and me. If you think being silent is some kind of joke, it's not.

[possidetur]

I don't. I believe the warning. Monsters are no joke.

[353]

You have monsters in your world?

[possidetur]

Did you believe in them before learning of the sound eaters?

( this is not.... avoiding the question... )

[353]

[ Mike sees what you're doing, stranger. He'll pretend like he's smart enough to realize she's evading. ]

Yeah. Monsters exist where I'm from. Different to the sound eaters though.

[possidetur]

Perhaps that is why you believed how serious this threat was.

un: jjones

[underachievement]

I came in with the first batch of assholes

[possidetur]

Was that a long time ago?

[underachievement]

Feels like a goddamn decade