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

[magneticfields]

[ He lowers to the ground, a sadness settling on him. Everything they had evaporating so easily. Like it never happened. Because it never happened, for her.

Not her fault. He corrects his posture and his expression becomes more one of practiced neutrality. ]

A space station, yes. But that's neither here nor there. Would you mind telling me the boy's name? Perhaps I know him.

[ He does smile a little when talk turns to his powers. ]

I am gifted. I can manipulate magnetic fields. So I'm manipulating the fields to repel each other and floating in the middle, similar to a maglev train.

[bossily]

[So, he's from the space station too. Maybe he has some insight into who Eddie is to her, though a part of her is afraid to find out more than what she assumes from talking to him. So she leaves it for now, and instead puts a lopsided grin on her face as she gives a little sway.]

Are you able to take passengers with you?

[She's already looking him over and sizing him up, attempting to determine how easy it might be to get a ride.]

We could give it a try, and then we can talk about the space station.

[magneticfields]

[ He should probably demur. She apparently was doing something with the children before he had attracted her attention.

But he recognizes the look in her eye and well. There's only so much concern he can extend in that direction. He holds out an arm.]

I would be happy to demonstrate. You'll need to hold on.

[bossily]

[He's so open and agreeable to this whole thing. It's a little unusual. But she's not going to stop and think about that for too long, because he's giving her an opportunity to try out a new mode of getting around. Not that she's going to expect him to do this for her at any point past this initial test run, of course.]

Somehow, I don't think that'll be a problem.

[There's a grin as she pockets her device, and moves to get in close enough that she'll be able to hold onto him.]

[magneticfields]

[ He curls his arm around her but does his best not to be as familiar with her as she is to him. So around the waist, and nothing else. ]

Hold on.

[ He lifts them off the ground, but about a foot up instead of just an inch or two. The little smile on his face is definitely cocky as he meets her eye and turns them in a lazy circle before tilting his head in different directions. ]

Which way?