INAUGURAL TEST DRIVE MEME

[happyheartsstaff]

TEST DRIVE MEME: WELCOME TO HAPPY HEARTS

You wake up in a padded box. It rocks, gently, as though suspended in mid-air. You begin to stir, confusion or distress pushing you to try to sit up — and then the air begins to smell sweet, and you fall back asleep.

You wake up in a padded box. For a moment, you are beatifically calm. You don't know how you got here, or why, but that isn't really all that important. You don't need to know where you are. You're just... here. And here is a wonderful place to be.

But there is a niggling suspicion growing in the back of your mind. A suspicion that here is not somewhere you wanted to be. That it is not where you're supposed to be. You remember... chasing a white rabbit (or was it a person)? A mirror? Bright light, and green ivy crawling over your skin... Before you can worry too much, the box jolts, and then settles, and after a long moment the walls fall from around you to reveal —

A hotel lobby?

"Welcome to the Happy Hearts Hotel and Casino," says an attendant behind a desk. "We're so pleased you could join us for our grand opening gala. We have your room keys and Empathies here, please make an orderly line and we'll hand them out once we've confirmed identities. After that, feel free to explore the hotel! We highly recommend starting with the casino. Everyone's a winner here in Happy Hearts!"

Is this normal? It doesn't feel normal. And hey — you could swear you had shoes before!

I. THE CASINO FLOOR

As you pass through the entrance to the casino floor, an attendant passes you a small bag of chips. The casino is loud and bright and filled with games of every kind — you want to play poker? They've got a table for that. Sabacc? There's a table for that, too. Slots, pachinko, and bingo are also available. The attendant in the lobby wasn't lying, either — everyone who plays wins. Everyone, every time.

Servers wander the floor with trays of shotglasses full of multi-coloured liquids, offering them to every oyster "Compliments of Her Royal Highness." If you're expecting alcohol, though, you'll be surprised — these drinks are teas made of the distilled emotions of every oyster in the hotel. Each colour tea corresponds to a different emotion, and as soon as you take a sip, you feel overcome with that emotion.

JOY — the distilled essence of happiness, this tea makes even the most rough and tumble of oysters giddy with happiness — for a moment. The effect fades into a sense of general contentment after a few seconds, and that itself fades away slowly over the course of twenty minutes.
ANGER — this tea, anger in liquid form, can make the most even-tempered of oysters ready to absolutely blow a gasket. For twenty minutes, anyone who drinks this tea will find themselves much more easily annoyed, frustrated, and all around irritable and snappy.
SADNESS — distilled sadness is a potent tea, capable of turning a stoic, stalwart oyster into a blubbering mess in moments. Events that may have previously only been a minor disappointment become the end of the world, every repressed unhappiness comes to the fore, and for twenty minutes, any oyster who drank a sadness tea can hardly keep themselves together.

II. MAKE YOURSELF AT HOME

If gambling isn't to your interest, there are many other areas of the hotel to explore! For the moment, only The Pool Of Tears and the Pig & Pepper buffet are available for oysters to peruse, but the staff will assure anyone who asks that the other facilities will be open by the next day. Unfortunately, that means no one can buy any swimsuits from This Elegant Thimble, but the staff aren't going to kick anyone out of the pool for jumping in in their clothes! The Pig & Pepper serves lunch foods from across all different cultures, offering something for everyone, and some things you've never even heard of.

Maybe you just want to be alone — well, that's what you have your room key for! Oysters room on the second and third floors of the hotel, one to a room. You were assured your room would be exactly what you'd always wished for — and for some, that's right! It's exactly as you would have decorated it yourself. But for others, their rooms are totally wrong. A grizzled cowboy can't have a pink room! Hotel staff are firm, though: every room is exactly as its owner wants it to be. Search your feelings, oyster. You know it to be true.

III. YOU'VE BEEN NAUGHTY

Curiosity is not, on its own, a trait the staff want to discourage. Oysters are free to search for ways out of the hotel, but they won't find anything — there are no doors anywhere in the lobby or the casino, the windows are impenetrable, the walls don't crumble no matter how hard anyone hits them. The elevator between floors has no service hatch, and there are no stairs to take. The hotel is, at least so far as anyone can tell, a completely closed system.

Now, in light of this, Happy Hearts knows some oysters can be a little... reactionary. Especially when cornered, especially the ones with powers or abilities beyond the average human. With this in mind, any oyster found to be destructive or combative won't be punished. Not yet. They will, however, be quickly incapacitated by hotel staff, drugged to incoherence, and brought discretely to a hidden back room. No one notices these oysters disappearing, nor the doors they must have been dragged through.

In this room, troublesome oysters sit, paralyzed, across from a woman in red. She smiles, and offers candy from a bowl on her desk, and laughs to herself when she remembers the oysters can't take one.

You're new, she says, kindly, so it's understandable that you're having trouble adjusting to the hotel. We promise to do all we can to make your stay here as fulfilling as possible, so you have nothing to worry about. Your experience is our top priority.

She plucks a candy disk from her bowl, and unwraps it slowly.

But you must know: if you endanger our other guests again like you have today, there will be punishments. We pride ourselves on the emotional experience we offer our oysters, and we can't let anything get in the way of that. For everyone's safety and happiness, you understand.

She pops the candy in her mouth, sucks for a moment, and smiles broadly.

That's all.

The oyster is brought, still paralyzed and incoherent, back to the hotel. No one notices them return. The paths taken through the hotel to bring them to the woman in red fade from their mind as soon as they arrive back on the hotel floor. They're left in the lobby to sit and think until the paralysis wears off.

And then they can go back to having fun in the casino!

IV. HEY! LISTEN!

At the end of the day, every oyster's Empathy device buzzes, pings, and lights up — there's a message waiting for them!

A woman with red hair and a teal dress, sat on a throne with her hands held delicately in her lap and her legs crossed daintily at the ankle, looks into the camera, smiling.

"Hello, my dear oysters! We're so pleased you could join us. I am Victoria Hart, the humble Queen of this realm, and I wanted to personally welcome you to the Happy Hearts hotel, and thank you for your gifts. We will not squander them, dears, as we will not allow your stay with us to be anything less than perfect. If you need anything at all, I'm sure hotel staff will be happy to provide, and I will be keeping an eye on all of you, to ensure your experience remains a positive one.

Welcome, darlings. This is the beginning of something wonderful."

The message saves to each oyster's Empathy, and an app pops up on the screen: the community bulletin board. The queen doesn't respond to any messages sent to her, but the other oysters might. It's worth a shot, right?



Welcome to the first TDM of Happy Hearts, a new panfandom roleplaying game here on DW! If you have any questions, please direct them to the first comment on this page. Happy playing, oysters!

Comments

Derek Hale | Teen Wolf

[duelo]

III. YOU'VE BEEN NAUGHTY

All he can think about is what they've given him. Wolfsbane would've nearly killed him. Mistletoe would've made him sicker than this. Right now, he just feels sluggish and exhausted as he comes out of a complete paralysis. Does what he remembers even make sense? Is that really what happened or was it some sort of weird hallucination?

Derek is still feeling a little too out of it to be as pissed off as he has every right to be, but he's at least coherent enough to re-realize that he's barefoot and, seriously, what the hell is with that? Not that it matters, really; if he cuts his foot on something, he'll heal; it's just a weird way to assert control over someone.

It's a little lost on Derek just how slowly he's moving when he wanders back toward the casino, his brow creased and eyes blinking slowly as they shift in every direction as he tries to refocus. Woke up in a box, no shoes, mark on his abdomen that he can't explain...bits and pieces are coming back and it's somehow making less sense as it does so, instead of more...

Why is it so completely impossible to retreat into living a quiet, normal life?

IV. HEY! LISTEN!

I want to know just one thing: what's the catch?

Seriously. What's the catch?

Oh, no, two things. Where the hell are my shoes?

iii.

[polydeukes]

Because you're you, Derek. Because your surly disposition attracts bubbly supernatural teenagers of all kind, and those teens are naturally a magnet for trouble. Case in point, this particular supernatural teen has no idea who you are, but is Concerned, as Josie is that kind of person as a general rule. Normally she would probably leave an older guy like Derek alone and avoid engaging outside the safety of the network, but he doesn't look okay.

(She also thinks that taking your shoes is a weird way to assert control, but that's a conversation for another time.)

She's still at a bit of a distance, but she steps forward and can't help but ask:

"Are you okay?"

[duelo]

Derek's eyes shift lazily in the direction of a teenage girl and some part of his sluggish mind finds himself wondering why it also seems so impossible to find age-appropriate company in the past few years. "What?"

The questions comes out of his mouth before he can stop it, because as soon as he says it, he knows he didn't need to ask it; the reflex came from needing a few extra seconds to process the words, because he's...well. Pretty out of it. It's not a great feeling. It will probably feel even worse in retrospect.

"I don't know. Probably," he answers her original question, frowning. "I..." he shakes his head, stopping abruptly and frowning a little more deeply. "I don't know, I just feel really off. Do you know which way is the fastest to get back to our rooms, maybe?" Because maybe he should lie down or something...

[polydeukes]

"There's an elevator over here."

She reaches over to take his arm gently, so she can start to steer him in that direction. She moves slowly, so if he reacts badly to being touched, she can pull back but she doesn't feel like leaving him to his own devices is the best idea right now.

"What room are you in?"

[duelo]

Derek's reflex is to pull his arm out of reach, but his body doesn't want to cooperate and she moves faster than his body can catch up with his brain. His eyes close in a slow blink to keep from letting her — or anyone — see the potential flash of icy blue in his body's frustration with his own sluggishness.

"I don't know. I'll know it when I get close," he says. Which, in retrospect, probably doesn't make sense to her, but he means it'll be the only room that doesn't smell like someone else. "Sorry."

He pauses again, frowning slightly at the fact that he even needs someone else's help right now. It's a brand of vulnerability he does not appreciate involuntarily displaying. "Thank you for helping me out. I'm Derek," he offers, looking over at her, eyes half-lidded. "Do you always help out complete strangers or do I just look that fucked up right now?"

[polydeukes]

"It's okay. We'll figure it out."

There are a number of different reasons for that, with everything from visual landmarks to super senses, so she'll just let him lead the way while making sure he doesn't run into anything. Josie tries not to impose upon him too much, keeping her touch light and barely there, just enough to guide him.

"Josie. And ... mostly the latter, sorry." She pauses her nose wrinkling at how that comes out. "Not to say that I don't like to help people, but ... you don't look okay, and I would feel weird about leaving you alone like this. Especially ... with how unknown everything is here."

[duelo]

Honestly, Derek can't even be upset. It would definitely be looking a gift horse in the mouth if he were to frown upon her helping out a stranger specifically because it looks like he needs it especially badly at the moment. "Great," he sighs because he figures he's allowed to be frustrated without seeming entirely ungrateful.

Taking a deep breath, he lets it out slowly as she leads the way toward the elevator. "I don't know what they did," he confesses. "I just know I feel really out of it and I don't remember much. What I do remember is hazy enough that I'm not even sure it really happened..."

Thank God for small favors, though, because the more they move, the more he can feel his head starting to settle. He feels less like he's underwater and more like he's just been through an especially nasty fight; more tired and less completely fucking out of it.

The elevator doors start to open and Derek shakes his head a little as if that will help clear it faster. "This place is messed up." Although...at least here, he didn't wake up shirtless and being electrocuted while chained to a wall. So, he supposes however fucked up it is, it still has Beacon Hills beat.

[polydeukes]

She goes back to giving him his personal space the more and more he seems to be coming back to himself, and by the time they get to the elevator, she's positioned at a more formal distance from him, taking in what he says as he says it.

"So it sounds like you were drugged somehow. Did you eat or drink anything before things got weird?"

She knows that the teas mess with your emotions already, and she and Clarice were talking about a drug being put in the food to block special abilities somehow. Maybe some people react more strongly to it than others.

[duelo]

Shaking his head, Derek's brow creases in thought. Not to his recollection, anyway, he finds himself thinking as the two of them move into the elevator. He can't help noticing that she's being less tactile. She's perceptive; that's a nice change.

"No," he replies. "At least, I don't think so. I don't remember, really, but I don't think so... I must've, though. I'm not that easy to subdue," he says and as soon as the words come out of his mouth he realizes, embarrassed, that they're a huge lie. How many times has he woken up suddenly, unaware of how he ended up in the position he'd ended up in, usually chained up somewhere and, more often than not, with a werewolf hunter grinning wickedly back at him like they've been waiting their whole lives for him to wake up so they can commence their torture.

"I don't know. But yeah, I'd say they must be using something pretty strong, however they managed it," he thinks aloud, gripping the bar bolted into the back wall of the elevator car, just in case his head starts swimming again.

[polydeukes]

Josie tends to be the more conscious of personal space of the two twins, and generally the more appropriate. Lizzie's brain to mouth filter would have likely alienated Derek before things had even began, while Josie just wanted to help, and could keep most of her inside thoughts inside.

She shifts to lean against the back wall as the elevator began to ascend. "I know that some of the teas affect your emotions. Someone else I met also had a theory that they might be using some kind of drug to keep people with abilities from being able to use them."

So while she doesn't doubt that Derek is strong, it's obvious they were prepared for them. They managed to kidnap all of these people all at once, but were careful enough to leave even the smallest hint of magic just casually lying around.

"If they did a lot of research into us before they took us, they could have been prepared. Had something tooled to impact you specifically."

III.

[fateless]

Allison has been walking around trying to find away out, trying to find a door or a hallway that wouldn’t lead her back to the same spot where she had found herself in. The same spot where she had been dumped in not long after, considering she hadn’t exactly behaved when the staff wouldn’t answer her questions. Now that she’s lucid enough to walk around, she’s not wasting any time; she may look like she’s just getting to know the hotel, but her goal hasn’t changed.

She keeps finding herself back in the lobby, though, and that’s when she spots an overly familiar face. One that wouldn’t necessarily be her first choice, but at least it’s someone from back home. That’s something, she tells herself.

“Derek?”

[duelo]

Probably the last thing Derek expects to hear is someone saying his name, but he only thinks that for as long as it takes to groggily find the source of the word. No. The actual last thing Derek expects to hear is Allison Argent saying his name.

Now he knows this is a hallucination. What the hell is going on here?

He looks back at her dumbly, eyes half-lidded before he looks away again, brow creased. That's not real, so...no sense wasting time on that, right? He looks back again by reflex, though, leaning a little closer and squinting as he reaches a hand out, expecting it to go straight through her. Instead, it lands solidly on her shoulder and he snatches it back like she's burned him.

"What the hell?!"

Weirdly enough, it's the fact that he notices that she's not wearing shoes, either, that snaps him out of it and sobers him enough to look her in the eye. "How are you here? What's going on...?"

[fateless]

She immediately notices the way his eyes look, almost as if he’s moving in slow motion. She’s about to ask him if he’s okay, but suddenly he’s reaching for her, and despite herself she tenses. Back home she and Derek have a sort of truce between them, but she can’t help but tense anyway.

“I don’t know. I followed some person in white, and then it all just...gets confusing.”

It had been a trap. She should have known better, too, but... Well. Here she is.

Taking a step closer to him, her brow furrows as she tries to get a good look at him. “Are you okay? You look ... “ Like she probably did not long ago, she thinks. “... like you just woke up.”

[duelo]

If he were a little more with it, Derek would've been able to keep himself from slipping out something uncomfortable, but as it stands, the words tumble clumsily from his lips before he can even finish processing them, much less stop them.

"But you're dead," he says stupidly, brow creased in sincere confusion. "You...how?"

Shaking his head, Derek blinks slowly again. Something's wrong. She shouldn't be here. She can't be here. He feels like he's trying to move underwater or something. Everything feels slow and exhausting.

[fateless]

Allison doesn't even flinch. This isn't the first time she has had that reaction - or the first time someone has told her that she's dead. Spending a year in Alpha Complex had...'prepared' her for this kind of thing. She had thought waking up in strange places had ceased after finding a way to go home, but now here she is. Standing in the lobby of some weird hotel, with Derek Hale.

"It's a long story, trust me."

She pauses, as if to decide what to do next, but it doesn't take long before she hesitantly reaches for his arm in an attempt to guide him to a nearby chair. "C'mon, you should sit down. At least until the effects of all this wear off."

[duelo]

The fact that Allison seems completely unaffected by that proclamation and follow up question almost fucks Derek up even more than seeing her alive in the first place and he just blinks dumbly at her for a moment before she takes his arm and starts to guide him to a nearby chair.

"Try me," he suggests, sinking onto the chair and reaching up to take her wrist with a gentle hold that isn't meant to lock her into place so much as to keep her from disappearing and leaving him with more questions than answers. "If I'm not hallucinating this, then...how?"

The Hales and the Argents have enough bad blood between them to last a lifetime, even if they weren't likely to be the last generations of their respective families. The thing is, Allison turned out to be good people. She'll never be his favorite person, but he respects her and he appreciates her changing the family code. She'll never be his favorite person, but the way she changed the code made her father one of Derek's greatest allies in the end.

So does Derek want this to be real; for Allison Argent to live again? Kind of more than anything at the moment, oddly enough.

IV

[coquettish_trees]

The second answers the first, I believe. Those were my very favourite Antivan silk slippers.

[duelo]

There's got to be more to it than my shoes. I mean, they were one of my only two pairs of shoes, so I'm pretty irritated by it, but I'm assuming I'm one of the few people here who have that few pairs of shoes, so there's bound to be more of a catch than stolen shoes, right?

That sucks that they were your favorite, though.

[coquettish_trees]

Finally, proper appreciation of my devastating loss!

Never mind about the lack of your shoe collection; we are all on the same footing now, are we not? You may say you had thirty pairs of all colors and none shall ever know it false.

Save me, of course, but I promise with the utmost solemnity to tell no-one.

As far as the catch, when is there not one? Nothing is ever truly offered without strings, even if they be as fine as gossamer thread. We may as well drink champagne in that lovely little hot pool whilst figuring it out!

[duelo]

Yeah, I guess that's true.

I think I'll live if people find out I don't have thirty pairs of shoes, but I appreciate your discretion.

I...am a little bit jealous of your optimism and ability to look at the bright side of a bad situation. I haven't been good at doing that in a long time.

[coquettish_trees]

A bad situation would be if the enclosure we suddenly found ourselves in had fewer silken pillows and less affable staff. How fortuitous that we find ourselves only in a mediocre situation!

[duelo]

Oh, I've been in bad situations, but I find that, at least in my experience, not having at least some semblance of control over a situation makes it a bad one waiting to happen.

I like your outlook way better than mine, though.

[coquettish_trees]

Ah, well, not having the sort of control you wish to have hardly means you cannot have ANY manner of control.

In illustration, and since you are taken with my outlook, I am very happy to share it with you. In fact, in honor of our new friendship, I am willing to offer you a full half of it! You may find that spirited nonchalance grants you a sort of control after all.

[duelo]

I'm willing to suspend my disbelief to give you a chance to be right about the present even though that's exactly what it meant in my past.

[ mostly because she's pretty. she's very, very pretty, and Derek has the worst kind of weakness for very, very pretty women; the kind of weakness that got his family killed. The kind of weakness that gets innocent humans sacrificed for power. ...and, of course, the kind of weakness that leaves him open to good old fashioned heartbreak, but in spite of knowing all of that, it's a weakness he's never been able to kick. ]

Yeah? Just like that, huh? You make it sound so easy.

[coquettish_trees]

Well and so. Much like anything else, it requires practice. I have simply taken the time to master it!

Have you been whisked away to another world before, then?