come_sailaway | [Open] Arrival + Event Catch-All

Entry tags:

[Open] Arrival + Event Catch-All

Who: Number 6 & OPEN
What: First few openers repeated from the TDM + New event prompts ALL TRUTH BECAUSE HE WILL HATE IT (All the TDM prompts except for the first one can be truth flavored, too)
Where: Locations stated in the prompt
When: The first one on the 11th, the rest throughout the month of July
Warnings: He's very upset and might be shouty

Over His dead body [7/11]
Waking up in an unfamiliar place is nothing new to him at this point. Not that it makes him any less boiling with rage over it. And that note only makes the steam rise higher over his head. So, they're doing cruises now? How novel. And using days of the week for names instead of numbers, too. What won't The Village try? He obstinately ignores the suggestion to bring his life vest with him. But the order to go to their mandatory drill is less easy to ignore. When did they gain the ability to paralyze him if he won't go where they say?

He can be found in the halls, not very far from the cabin he woke in (113), frozen in place with his hands balled into fists at his sides absolutely seething with rage. His entire body trembles with the force of it. He knows what he has to do to get unstuck. He'd experimented with taking a few steps forward and back. But will he go where he is directed? No. Never. He'd rather go red-faced in this hallway waiting for their unseen will to control him to run out than take one more step. Even if it takes hours.

Don't Look Down - Elevator prompt from the TDM
After, presumably, someone convinced him to finally just go do the god-forsaken drill, he thought the worst was over. How naive of him. He steps onto the glass elevator and reaches to hit the button. But nothing happens. He tries again. Still nothing. No movement. Turning to the person beside him, whom he has failed to acknowledge up until this point, he asks, "Does this happen often?"

There won't be time for a reply before the elevator quite suddenly lurches up one floor, and then drops. His stomach rises into his throat and he desperately puts his hands out to grip the side, fingers squeaking on the slippery glass, as they careen down, down, down!

Then stop.

He's thrown from his feet, landing hard on his side with a grunt. But rather than worry after himself, he's turning to catch sight of his unwitting partner on this fun-house ride, asking urgently, "Are you all right?"

Since When Did the Food Fight Back? - Mikabo prompt from the TDM
"What in blazes?" he exclaims as a knife goes soaring past him, followed quickly by a roll of sushi and the whole plate too.

He turns in shock to see the conveyor belt, seemingly with a mind of its own, winding up for another throw.

"Who is running this place?"

The truth will set you free?
Well, how was he supposed to know not to drink the water? Who would be stupid enough to poison the finite water supply on a cruise ship? After splashing some on his face in the morning to wash and shave himself, and then using it to brush his teeth like any decent hygienic person, he goes about his day none-the-wiser to the sudden change that's taken place.

His newly formed routine is to prowl the ship deck first thing in the morning (and last thing at night), scowling while he checks the waves and sky for any hint of a clue about where they could be. He checks the life boats, too, as if paranoid they might vanish without warning. It's unfortunate for him that it's been raining so much, only compounding the problematic effects of the water.

Once he's done his lap around the deck, he will work his way down level by level. He's memorizing the lay of thing, taking note of cabin numbers and all the many and varied amenities. It's almost staggering how many venues there are, and all of them host technology he'd never even dreamed of.

For instance, the arcade full of flashy computer games has him mesmerized. He stands in front of a cabinet, hand on the joystick while utterly transfixed. He doesn't make it past the opening stage of the game, but he keeps trying, getting visibly more upset each time the death screen animation plays. Until, finally, he shouts suddenly, "what's this all about?!"

He's keeping that angry-old-man-shouts-at-technology vibe with him through the rest of his explorations. Nothing on this ship makes any sense. The music is different. The decorations are all unfamiliar. If he believed in such things, he'd think he got abducted by aliens. Maybe he shouldn't rule it out.

To add insult to injury, his assigned dining time of "6:66 PM" feels like a particularly stinging slap in the face. Surely that was done on purpose to mock him. And so, when he sits down at his assigned seat, he is looking incredibly sour. He would shout at their servers, if he could see them. Instead, he has no recourse but to sit there, elbows on the table like a petulant child, seething quietly while the meal is served. And to quench that rage, he drinks more water, of course. Looks like mealtime chatter might be about to get a lot more interesting, or rage inducing. Probably that last one.

Good thing he doesn't have a roommate.
Speaking of rage, Number 6 is in one now. An hour after a conversation with someone, he somehow sobers-up and realizes that what he actually said doesn't match what he thought he said. AT ALL. And he is livid.

A chair goes flying into the hallway, crashing against the wall opposite Room 113. A glass goes soaring out after, smashing in rainfall of shattered shards.

If anyone is brave enough to stick their head through the open door after all that, they will find him in the process of attempting to upend his bunk. And there will be pieces of his furniture and personal effect thrown all around the room. It looks like a hurricane came through.

If he catches sight of any onlookers he will shout, "What do you want!" His piercing blue eyes narrowed down to slits as he locks his gaze on them. Taking one step more might feel like stepping on your own grave. Enter at your own risk.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"You do seem rather... distraught."

He relaxes a little at the apology, at least. Watson could take it now and leave, but he's concerned enough and nosy enough to want to linger, at least for a little while longer.

"Forgive me if I'm wrong," he says, "but you wouldn't happen to be newly arrived, would you?" He's sympathetic, even through his residual annoyance at having a glass thrown at his head. "My second guess is that your assigned roommate is a bit of a nightmare."

"Very newly arrived." Number 6 answers, seeing no reason not to since it's already apparent. And it does, he think, act as a perfect explanation for his outburst.

"Are roommates customary? I found this one uninhabited when I awoke."

"They're typical, yes, though not everyone gets one right away, I've noticed. You may not have one yet."

He shakes his head. "Welcome and condolences, I suppose, if there's any particularly good way to greet someone here. I just ended up fighting with Friday about smoking on the deck, but there are more productive methods of working out your frustration. The name's Watson, by the way. Dr. John Watson."

"Something to look forward to," he comments dryly. God help whoever ends up stuck in there with him.

"I happened upon a smoking lounge while making some rounds here. I suppose it will have to do." Much as the deck would be preferable, he can see the need for some caution so as not to spark a fire.

"Wait a minute, I recognize that name. You're not the same Dr. Watson who is teaching a certain--well, I don't know if man is the appropriate descriptor--person here who goes by Rin?"

"Oh, you've met Rin?" Watson lights up a little. Forgive him for being interested in hearing about his friends, and he has aggressively friended Murderbot. "I think Rin would object to the term 'man,' actually, but yes, I have been teaching it a thing or two about being a medic. I think it's very well suited to it, actually. A good thing too. We're a little short on medical doctors around here, though there's a few of us around who know at least some."

His smile fades. "And that does come up periodically, here."

"I have some limited experience myself," Number 6 admits. Mostly first aid in the field in his case. One needs to know these things when in enemy lands on dangerous missions.

"Yes... It?"--he sounds uncertain using that term for Murderbot but he carries on through it--"did mention there was a situation recently where the passengers on this ship were forced to fight one another. If things like that are going to keep happening then I think you'll have your work cut out for you."

"Rin... prefers 'it.' I know, it seems... rude, but that's what it wants."

Watson shrugs vaguely; it's clear he doesn't understand this idea at all, but he's attempting to be considerate. "And yes, that happened. It was... a rather hideous experience. There's an impermanence to death here, but... I don't recommend the experience, for what it's worth."

Going right into "oh yes, I died when that happened" is probably too much for someone new.

"I've been here for... well, a little over four months at this point. I've done my share. The infirmary is rather well kitted out, at least."

"Well, if it insists..." He agrees, that does feel rude. But, if it is a machine, then perhaps it's just trying to be accurate.

"I've had enough near misses in my time. That is experience enough for me." He is not sure he wants to live with the knowledge of what death really feels like if he can help it. He's sorry Dr. Watson apparently no longer has the luxury of that ignorance.

"I suppose that is a bright side. Though, I worry about what good it will do us without enough skilled hands to use it. Is there no staff aboard? As a matter of fact, I've yet to see any staff here except for that stewardess with no face."

"There is Friday, there is the Captain whom you might occasionally see, and there are the invisible ghosts in the restaurants and in the casino." Watson's expression is grim, and he shifts to lean against the wall a little, since this conversation is continuing. "No, I cannot explain those. Yes, I hate them. Friday is downright likeable in comparison. Still, if I want a cup of coffee in the morning, I must go be served by invisible staff."

He waves his hand dismissively. "There are people here who seem to know all about magic and technology that I would have thought impossible, but not I. I can't explain it."

"Ghost ship." A derisive breath of air that might be a laugh issues out of him. "A hostile captain, and a faceless woman... we really are in some kind of horror story."

If this is all some twisted drug-induced dream, he would very dearly like to wake up now. The longer he stays in this nightmare, the harder it is to refute these wild claims of ghosts and magic.

Tone still heavily sarcastic, he asks, "Well, are the ghosts any good at brewing tea?"

"They manage well enough," Watson answers wryly. "If you go down to Sand Dollars, there are all sorts of fancy concoctions with hot milk foam, but they'll give you a regular cup of tea, if that's what you want."

He shakes his head. "I've been here a little more than four months. It's easy for me to flippant about it by now. It's nonsense, of course, but it becomes difficult to decry how impossible it is when it's just a matter of how breakfast is served to you each day."

He looks around at the wreckage of his room and suddenly feels tired. A cup of tea really would be nice. Or a pint. That second option sounds better as Dr. Watson goes on to tell that it's been four months. Number 6 has a sinking feeling that he is doomed to be here at least that long, and likely longer. If escaping from an island village had seemed hard, escaping from a ship at sea is nearly impossible. He'll have to face up to that fact eventually.

"Where are you from, Doctor?"

"London," he says. And he gives a wry little smile, because he knows there's more to a proper answer around here, and he hasn't any idea of how his new acquaintance is going to take it. "Specifically, it was London of 1892."

He tilts his head, assessing. "I'm sorry, there really isn't any gentler way to explain that."

"1892," he sputters. He looks like he's ready to call the doctor a liar, but he holds his tongue and stays quiet for a long while. Until finally..."Dear God, you really mean it."

Have they really been pulled out of time and space? This is harder to swallow than magic.

"I live in London as well, but the year is 1967."

"Well, at least we have London in common. Perhaps we ought to compare notes."

Watson gives him a darkly wry smile. "But it's a common enough story. If you speak to the people here, they'll give you all sorts of dates and places. Some don't even correspond to anything I've heard of before. Some of it sounds impossible. Different centuries are almost hardly worth blinking at."

"I do wonder what you would think of the changes. The city sustained heavy casualties during several difficult wars." But perhaps that would only be distressing to hear of?

"I suppose that while I am trapped in Wonderland, I will have to learn to accept the insanity around me as common fact. Much as I would like to argue against it."

Watson's expression flickers with some degree of pain. He's heard of a few wars, yes, but no one's mentioned that it affected London so directly. That's hard for him to imagine. Typically, in his experience, the Empire keeps her bloody wars far away in the colonies, away from her heart.

Also, he understands that reference!

"That's... more or less the attitude I've had to take myself, yes." He smiles faintly. "There's a good deal here I would have called impossible. I'm a sensible man who isn't prone to superstition, you understand, but I cannot deny that which is right in front of me, either."

That flicker of an expression is enough to convince Number 6 not to mention it again. Or, perhaps not unless they both have a drink in hand. While the outcomes of those wars have ultimately been victory, it was not without a great cost. One he felt personally, too.

"You and I share a similar temperament, it seems, along with our place of origin."

Before this, the best he was ever possibly willing to entertain is that a person might have a heightened intuition that some could call a sixth sense. But even that was a stretch. Now, he's faced with quite a bit more.

"I cannot deny my own senses, no matter how surreal."

"Mm. It would be foolish to do otherwise. The rules here are... different, from what we're used to."

He shakes his head. "Not that I know all the rules here, either. Not that anyone does, really, except perhaps the Captain, and he certainly isn't going to tell us. By the way, word of advice: shooting the Captain doesn't work." Watson makes a face. "Not unless he wants it to, I suppose."

"But there are rules," he says it more to soothe himself than anything. He can't cope with the idea of a truly anything-goes landscape. If there are rules, he can learn how to bend them. He can find the breaking points.

"I take it you speak from experience?" Has the doctor shot at their captain? That's surprising if true.

Oh, it's very true.

"I am a very good shot," Watson says, firmly, "and yet somehow the bullet ended up in the wall behind me, and rather closer to a dear friend of mine than I would like." His expression is grim; he still thinks about that moment more than he would like. "A message, I suppose. I hadn't really expected to do much damage to the Captain in the first place, not by that point, but that still wasn't quite what I expected."

His brow knits together as he considers the most concerning part of that story. If the captain can dictate if a bullet will hit him, and presumably where it will land if it doesn't. Then, it's no coincidence it ended up nearly hitting someone Dr. Watson cares for.

"A warning," he says in agreement. "The first miss was a warning.

"I could be wrong, but you do not strike me as the type to fire on someone without cause." Maybe it's the bias he feels for another countryman. Maybe he's taking the similarity between them too far.

"I suppose kidnapping is a good enough reason. Is that what happened, or is there more to the story?"

"Oh, certainly a warning. A... rather effective one."

Watson hesitates, trying to think how to phrase this without telling his whole life story. "The Captain gave me some news about a very dear friend, one whom I believed was dead. If the Captain can be believed, he is not dead at all, and actively deceived me." He shakes his head. "It's true that I don't typically draw my gun for petty reasons, but having that blasted creature gloat at me, after everything else he'd put us through... it was too much."

"I see."

It's disturbing to think that their Captain might hold knowledge of things in their lives that even they are not aware of. If he can take people out of different places and times, then it could be possible for him to know their futures too. Number 6 briefly wonders what it would cost to try and seek certain answers from the Captain. Too much, he reckons.

"He pushed you to it. Deliberately. I won't hold it against you. I'm sorry you had to receive the news of your friend in such a way."

Watson shakes his head. "I appreciate the sympathy," he says, a little gruff in his discomfort. "And now I know direct, obvious attacks on the Captain are a useless gesture. As he wishes us to understand, no doubt, though trying to work out any of his motives has so far been a rather useless endeavour."

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