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TEST DRIVE MEME

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IF BOTH CHARACTERS APP IN AND AGREE, THREADS USING PROMPT 1 CAN BE COUNTED AS GAME CANON.
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PROMPT 1: ARRIVAL

You awake laying on your back in an, admittedly comfortable, pod. You can't move anything but your eyes, can't even feel your body yet. How you got here or why is a blank. You may have been in the middle of your day, asleep, or even- for what you remember- should be dead. Then a screen directly in front of your face flickers to life and in crisp, black and white displays: DON'T PANIC. The following video then plays:

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The screen flickers again and reads: CONGRATULATIONS ON PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE! WELCOME TO VAULT LIFE, CITIZEN. WELCOME TO YEAR: [ERROR]. YOUR PERSONAL BELONGINGS ARE LOCATED IN [FILE CORRUPTED. SEE SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR]. ENJOY YOUR STAY AND THANK YOU FROM YOUR FRIENDS AT VAULT-TEC.

The pod then unseals and you are able to, unstably at first, climb out of the pod. Your body may feel foreign for a moment- perhaps entirely foreign if you suddenly find yourself a human, ghoul, or super mutant for the first time. But whatever your form, you have two items on: a bright blue jumpsuit with the number 66 in yellow on the back, and a mechanical device known as a Pip-boy sealed onto your arm. If you click on the buttons it takes you to an instruction screen.

You look around to find yourself in a room of other pods. Some are just opening, other people looking as confused as you climbing out. Others remain closed with the status of 'STASIS' on the screens attached to the pods. The rest of the room is less than impressive. Computer systems that seem out of place compared to the technology level of the pods are scattered across the room, apparently running the chambers. Trying to access them, even for the most talented hacker, will simply result in SEE OVERSEER being displayed. There is large metal door leading to the rest of the vault, a lever on the wall next to it that will cause it to open.

Welcome, dweller, to vault 66.

PROMPT 2: SETTLING IN

The living quarters of the vault leave something to be desired. While the current occupants of the vault have made some improvements, it's hard to ignore the pile of skeletons placed into storage (it’s a pretty impressive pile) and the mildew on the beds. It's clear that whatever happened to the last occupants of the vault, whoever they were, it wasn't exactly a peaceful end. The medical wing has some of the worst blood splatter...but that at least you can pretend was from needed medical interventions. Right?

Thankfully, the Vault has power at least. The juke box in the recreation area cheerfully pumps out some jazzy tunes and the refrigerators are happily humming along. There's also clean, if very mineral tasting, water in the sinks, toilets, and showers. There's a pool table if someone can relax enough for a game and doesn't mind the fact it looks like a pool cue shoved in the eye socket may have caused the death of a couple of the previously mentioned skeletons. Further, the kitchen is stocked with some food! It's all pre-apocalypse or some newly collected ‘meat’ (ask the current residents if you want to know), hyper preserved canned goods and sugary cereals that somehow haven't gone bad yet, but it's something.

Today all the local robots have been recalled by the newly found ‘Captain’ to undergo mandatory repairs and maintenance. They’re locked away in the Overseers office, leaving only the human residents to great the newly awakened dwellers. Or to do any of the other day to day tasks in the vault, like make food or keep things tidy. The pool table was cleaned before Louis took off, leaving a fine game open for people to try.

PROMPT 3: A Literal Exodus

The Vault opening earlier in the month lead to a few unintended side effects. First, of course, were the giant mirelurks and their young that had to be fought off. A few weeks later, though, there's a new one: frogs. In the now standing two feet of radioactive water in the entrance area, what used to be eggs in the water turned into tadpoles, then turned into frogs. Not super huge killer frogs or ones that shoot acid, mind you. Just somewhat ugly frogs, occasionally ones with two heads or eight legs or some other small mutation. And without their normal predators around (radroaches don't swim), they're starting to venture into the vault at a somewhat biblical plague level.

Dwellers can find them everywhere, in the food stores, in their beds, merrily croaking in the toilets. Sometimes they can gang up and take out a radroach or two (good for them), but more often or not the roaches will win, meaning even more of these insects are venturing into the open to snatch up these free meals. So the occasional radraoch in the bed may be happening too as they chase down a froggy snack.

Captain Simmons has requested the frogs be herded back into the entry way and that dwellers start working on a way to drain the radioactive water out of the area, but it's not much of a priority. For now, enjoy the newest Vault pets- or eat them, race them, or just get used to waking up to them bouncing on your pillow.

PIP-BOY CHATTER

Post text or audio messages to the pip-boy network to get to know your fellow dwellers!

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Oh... there goes the five he'd been aiming for shot after shot. There's silence for a long moment before Zuko finally manages to answer. "That's... sorry. That's hard." Which, yeah it is and Zuko is beating himself up over not managing to be more reassuring. "I hope you find each other again."

He lines up a shot on the one ball and, wonder of wonders, manages to sink it. His next shot goes a bit haywire, though: the actual colored ball bounces away from the pocket while the white ball goes straight into it. Zuko is left frowning at that stupidity.

"We can only hope that if someone else I know stumbles out of those pods, it's not my father or General Zhao or..." He shrugs one shoulder. "Well, there's a lot of people I'd rather not deal with." Even some of his friends might see Azula and immediately destroy half the place going after her.

"Thanks," Yunlan says, wry but honest, and leans over to pluck the cue ball out of its pocket. "You and Azula are the first two who've known each other so far. I doubt we've got great odds of old friends showing up, or old enemies...

"But it's a weight off my shoulders to know it's not impossible."

He fiddles with the placement of the cue ball, neatly sinks the eleven ball, and scowls at the spot it had landed in. Stuck in a corner, almost toppling into the pocket? Ugh.

"So is that 'General Zhao' the reason you made a face at me when I introduced myself?"

His best effort at a careful tap only left the cue ball rolling a pathetic handful of centimeters away from its spot in the corner. At least he hadn't knocked it in.

He had thought he'd done a better job of disguising his automatic flinch at the name. "Sorry," he says. "He also tried to kill me." Yeah, he's aware of how many people have tried (and failed so far) to actually murder him. It's been a problem for at least half of his life.

Zuko misses his next shot, but comes perilously close to accidentally sinking the eight ball in the process.

"Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown. Sounds like you might not mind being stuck here instead, hm?"

Yunlan eyes the table-- he's got three balls left, there's no way he can get at two of them right now, and the eight ball is still dangerously close to the edge of the pocket he'd have the best chance to sink the other one into.

Carefully, he lines up the shot; if he gets it right, it should knock the eight ball clear in the process of sinking the ten.

Instead, the ten drops into the pocket, the eight ball goes into a spin, and a second later it clatters atop the ten.

"Well," he says, and tosses his cue on the table. "It looks like the game's yours, Zuko!"

Zuko sets the cue down and decides to pretend that he won out of some modicum of skill. (Honestly, he knows that he didn't do too badly; it helps that there's some expectation to slow down and think about the angles and the way the balls roll and hit... and he's probably going to be playing this game a lot in the future.)

"I wasn't even really the crown prince when he tried, much less the Fire Lord." Zuko shrugged, leaned against the table. "I think he just hated me."

"Why?" It's not that Zhao Yunlan hasn't met the occasional person who makes him contemplate murder. This kid, though? It's hard to imagine Zuko inspiring hatred.

Either he's changed a lot, or there's an interesting story there. Or both.

Nodding towards the rec room door, he continues, "Here -- we can walk and talk. I still need to show you the bunks and bathrooms."

Zuko falls in step with Yunlan and winces. He has changed a lot and all of it for the better. (Unless you ask Azula.) "Zhao was a typical Fire Nation admiral: loud, blustering, and always right. He didn't like it when I got the better of him."

He lets of moment of silence pass before he speaks again. "He also suspected that I'd committed treason."

Which, in point of fact, he kind of had done that... and then did actually commit treason later, so maybe Zhao had a point.

"Did you? Commit treason?" There's no censure in Yunlan's tone. Zuko'd already explained that he wasn't on board with his country's plans to take over the world, and fighting back against a plan like that sounded like it could count as treason.

With a little shrug, and a sharp grin, he added, "I don't like it when people get the better of me either! But that just means I have to stay one step ahead."

"Once or twice," he says. Maybe more than that; he'd stopped counting at some point. He leaves it at that, though, in part because he's prone to maudlin thoughts and fits of temper when speaking of past actions. He has enough to grapple with; he needn't add to it.

"Zhao's idea of staying one step ahead was to blow up my ship," he said.

Yunlan winces theatrically. "Talk about overkill! I hope everyone got out of it in one piece?"

The bunk rooms aren't far from the rec room. Yunlan turns towards the men's bunks, editorializing over his shoulder as he walks.

"We aren't exactly sticklers for which of the rooms you pick -- there's just not enough of us here who care! And you're just as likely to walk into Chocolat topless in the rec room as the bunk room, so, you know."

A shrug, and he reaches out to hit the lights as he steps into the bunk room. It's large, and mostly unoccupied, with the same scrubbed-but-still-stained look that most of the Vault has. One bunk is surrounded by a small drift of junk, dirty laundry, a few soiled bandages, dirty dishes and mostly-empty cereal boxes.

"I was the only one in it." Zuko steps into the bunk room and comes to Yunlan's side to look it over. It's sparse, but it's infinitely better that what he had to put up with while roaming through the Earth Kingdom.

Good eyebrow raised, he points at the mess. "Who needs to clean up after themselves?"

"Oh, that?" Yunlan sucks a breath in through his teeth and puts on a wry grin. "That's my bunk! You know how it is, bachelor habits...."

His own horrible lifestyle aside, this is a tour! He sweeps past the mess, waving to the door at the other end of the room.

"And over here is the bathroom! It's not too bad -- anyway, the water's not radioactive. Which is a plus, because the whole swamp up top is."

Zuko eyes the mess with a slightly disgusted look, but declines to comment. He pokes his head in the door. "Oh, good," he says, looking back to Yunlan. "Not radioactive. What's radioactive exactly?"

Azula, so far, has been playing it cool about not knowing what radioactivity might be. Yunlan's eyes widen at Zuko's question, and he tips his head back, biting back a curse.

"Well fuck, I guess I'll have to explain that to your sister too!" After a moment, he waves a hand. "Think of it like poison. If you get too close to it, it builds up in your body and makes you sick. Huge doses or long-term exposure'll kill you. This wrist thingy? When it starts beeping, it's warning you there's radiation around."

He shrugs. "She would rather figure things out for herself before ever admitting to not knowing something. You mentioned earlier that it was nasty stuff. I guess I understand why now." He holds up his wrist to look at the thing wrapped around it - which he'd been studiously ignoring until now.

The breath he takes is deep and a touch shaky.

"As long as you're alive, you can always strive to better your circumstances! -- But that doesn't make it any nicer to be stuck in a place like this one." His smile is less than convincing.

"It's nasty, but the robot who runs the infirmary here has an antidote on hand if you wind up in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"You're sounding like Uncle again." He says it a bit wryly, taking whatever he can find in an attempt to get his feet under him again.

"How often do we have to worry about getting the antidote?"

"Only two of us have needed it so far, and they were down restarting the nuclear reactor. Just watch how you're feeling, hm?"

And this isn't a cheerful topic. Important, sure! He still wants to lighten the atmosphere. With a vague wave of the hand, he steps over towards his bed, kicking a pair of dirty underwear under it in a miniscule gesture towards propriety.

"Vomiting, hair falling out, rash like a sunburn, that's the kind of thing that you need to be careful of. Anyway, that's the bunk room! Want to call dibs on one of the other beds here? As you see, there's plenty of space."

"Sounds great." Perfect; now if he's ever slightly sick to his stomach, he'll be wondering about it. "I'll claim whichever one I fall asleep on later." It won't be next to Yunlan's messy bunk, no offence. (It'll probably be on the other end of the room, because he likes his privacy.)

He does sit on the closest bed, though. They've been through a lot of particulars, but... "What's your overall impression of this place?"

Considering the quality of most of their food, there are plenty of reasons that they might have a stomachache; but a little paranoia isn't always a bad thing. Yunlan quirks a smile, and sits down on his own bunk, crossing his legs.

"Overall?" He raises a finger for each point as he continues. "Whatever put us here must have happened a long time ago. Decades, if not centuries. We don't know who else might be tucked into those pods upstairs, but I don't think we're going home." Point number two-- "But since we're stuck here, this shitty little hole in the ground isn't so bad as a home base. Very defensible, enough resources that we could wait out years of siege if we have to."

There was also the problem of whether their memories were even real, but that was something Yunlan preferred not to spend too much time thinking about at the best of times. Absently, he lifted a hand to his mouth, chewing at the edge of his thumb.

"There's a robot who thinks he runs things around the place -- Commander Simmons -- but he's not too hard to talk your way around. Good thing, too, because he's got some ideas that would've been fifty years out of date in my time, and he's on the trigger-happy side."

Zuko pulls in on himself a bit; he had asked the question, so he should be ready for the answer, he tells himself. But the thought of never going home makes his heart stutter and his breath catch.

He doesn't have time to panic. A deep breath through his nose, held,then exhaled through his mouth and he's breathing again.

"Tell me more about Simmons," he says; his tone is markedly different from the questions he's been asking and Yunlan can likely hear the "Fire Lord" in his voice. He's changing the subject -- and he's not asking to change it.

"A military personality," Yunlan tosses back; Zuko's half-panicked inhalation hasn't escaped his notice. He's clearly taking refuge in the habits of command. Yunlan's slouch goes a touch more insouciant -- he can't help it, it's a reflexive response to being given orders -- but his tone is thoughtful.

And casual, of course, but the steel is barely hidden below the surface.

"He'd been guarding the head honcho's office here since the fighting that killed the previous occupants. So, decades minimum, probably more like a century. When we finally got the door open, he tried to shoot our heads off, then started throwing around orders the moment we talked him around to thinking we weren't a threat. Plus, apparently he's got a thing against communism."

Parts of that explanation don't make sense but Zuko lets them go in favor of focusing on the more important things: namely, his attempt at descending into panic.

(He's the Fire Lord. He should be better than this.)

"What happens if we don't follow his orders?"

"He's got a gun." Yunlan spreads his hands. "And he's paranoid about rebellions. I'd say don't let him know you're not following his orders."

Zuko snorts. "Work around him, then. I see." He's had some practice at that, though he's not actually good at it.

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wildguardian - 2020-08-10 12:47 (UTC) - Expand

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