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

[commando]

[Bucky's still looking around the space, taking it in, trying to process that for all the strangeness that there is still this place here that feels like home. It's fancier, there's a living room instead of a kitchen, which he supposes makes sense with the buffet downstairs, but it's familiar. Reminds him of their apartment, of that space they used to inhabit together, even if this one has one bed instead of two. Not that they'd never shared a bed before; when even all the blankets in the world weren't enough for Steve's small frame and all Bucky could offer was body heat.

And then there's that teasing that lights up Steve's face, but Bucky doesn't remember it, because he hasn't gone to war. He looks at Steve with a lift of an eyebrow, and instead of laughing mirth, there's a creeping sort of exasperation that he fixes Steve with. Because those words tell him two things. Both that he thinks maybe they won the war, which means Steve made it through alright, and also that Steve was in the war.

And he's not stupid, he'd suspected something like that. With Steve saying it had been before he'd shipped out, he could only guess it had something to do with that recruitment station and maybe some sort of crazy idea like that flying car he'd been so entranced by. But it's different to hear him give a voice to it, to so casually talk about getting a few days furlough.]

I can't believe you. All this just so you could sign up for the war.

[He shakes his head, sighing as he sits down on the edge of the couch, endeared and exasperated all at once. Because let's be honest- if he didn't admire Steve's refusal to back down from a fight, his stubborn refusal to accept the limits people placed on him they never would have been friends in the first place. And he does get it. He's seen how people treated Steve, the way that they talked about him. He's seen Doctors that didn't think he deserved treatment and that it would be better to let him die. So he knows why Steve felt like he had something to prove, and why Bucky could never talk him out of that- because it was the world he wanted to show something to, not his best friend.

Bucky could never be quite enough to shield him from that, no matter how much he tried. He shakes his head, holding out a hand in invitation for Steve to sit next to him.]

C'mon. Why don't you start from the beginning?

[ex_serum683]

❰ ...oh. right. 1943. bucky'd had no idea that steve ended up in the army. not that steve wasn't planning on telling him — he'd have to explain his new body sooner or later, and the army played a big role in him getting it — but if he'd remembered that bucky didn't remember, he might have led into it a little more... delicately. as it is, steve just looks at bucky with an expression that's almost sheepish... but only almost.

he always meant to join the army, bucky knew that, and steve doesn't feel bad about it. he might feel a little bad that bucky didn't know that he'd succeeded until steve was breaking him out of the factory in austria, though. ❱

Technically I got this way because I signed up, not so that I could, ❰ steve says, coming to sit next to bucky, trying to figure out how to explain it all. ❱ The night before you shipped out, after you left to dance with the girls, I was about to get my physical when a doctor came in. He knew I'd lied on my forms, but he didn't want to turn me in, he wanted to recruit me for a secret project.

❰ and so steve explains, briefly, the road to project rebirth. how erskine believed in him, what a spitfire peggy was, how proud steve was to be chosen, out of all the more fit candidates. he stops after getting out of the tank, not sure how to keep going. ❱

Peggy was so shocked, she touched me. I don't think she even realized she was doing it, she just —

❰ steve reaches out in demonstration, tapping his fingertips against bucky's pectoral and then snatching his hand back, as though he'd only just realized what he was doing. ❱

[commando]

[Steve sits down and Bucky listens. There's that moment of exasperation, of what did I tell you when he mentions that the doctor knew he'd lied on his forms, but then Steve continues on, and honestly, Bucky just real glad that he didn't get himself arrested at first. And it's so Steve, somehow. Of course he'd jump at the chance, sign himself up for something like this. Any sort of crazy scheme if it gave him a chance.

And Bucky can't blame him, not really, even if there's something that twists inside of him. He'd always assumed that Steve would be the brother he'd never had for all of his life. And there's that feeling from before, like he's lost something, even if he doesn't quite know how to explain it. And then it clicks, sudden and surprising -- he'd just assumed that Steve would always need him. And the simple fact is that he doesn't. He doesn't need Bucky looking out for him, beating off the bullies, trying to keep him from getting them in trouble.

And from the way he talks about Peggy, he's pretty sure he doesn't need Bucky setting them up on double dates, neither. He doesn't really know what to do with that. It doesn't make Steve not his best friend, isn't that he thinks Steve's gonna leave him behind, but it just-- changes things, somehow. Make it so that as he watches him tell his story, he doesn't see the small kid that he's always had to protect, but someone with all of Steve Roger's fire and courage and beauty who doesn't need to be looked after.

And then Steve's explaining what it was like, the process, and coming out of Howard's machine, and Peggy's response, and he's honestly proud of him, too. Knowing that Steve made it through gives him the freedom to not have to worry about all the ways it could go wrong, and instead focus on the fact that now the rest of the world could see him like he did.

Then those fingers touch against his chest, and it feels strange. His fingers are different, even though he can still feel the warmth through the layers of his uniform. He smiles, beaming as he rocks into Steve's side, bumping his shoulder into the other man's with a huff of pleased laughter.]

Always toldja you'd find yourself a dame. Sounds like a hell of a woman, too. Bet you knock them all of their feet, now.

[ex_serum683]

She is, ❰ steve says, earnest, careful to make it present tense and not past. no amount of deliberate phrasing can keep the words from coming out like he's been gutted, though, can't keep his eyes from going distant and sad. peggy was amazing — is amazing — but she was never going to be his. even during the war, when steve had been able to imagine some kind of future for himself, peggy was only a nebulous part of it. he knew he wanted her there, hoped she'd want to be with him too, but how they would get there... it was always vague. like some part of him always knew he was never going to get it.

except if that were the case, he wouldn't have been able to imagine a future with bucky as clearly as he always did. two houses, side by side, white picket fences and wives as close to each other as steve and bucky. parallel lives, from womb to tomb.

well, they'd gotten the parallels, hadn't they? just not the way steve would have ever wanted. ❱

Had a Private lay one on me. ❰ better to focus on the funny story than let bucky see anything before steve's ready to explain it. ❱ She didn't let me get a word in, just called me a hero and, uh. "Thanked me", for the women of America. Peggy saw, she was sore about it for days.

[commando]

[Bucky doesn't really catch it, that difference, but he does catch the way that Steve talks about her, the way that his voice goes sad and forlorn, but all he can do is conclude that Peggy must've broken his heart. And that makes his lips thin, his eyes sharpen a little. Steve doesn't volunteer that fact, so he doesn't push it, just lets his shoulder rest against the blonde in a slight sort of comfort. Steve's such a good man he can't imagine it being his fault.

Or well, not until he tells that story, and Bucky can't help laughing, a shake of his head. His lips curl into something like mischief, a lift of an eyebrow.]

I see. Steve Rogers, getting into trouble with the dames. You've always been a troublemaker.

[He's teasing him now, because it's easier. He likes hearing about what Steve's been through, knowing what's happened, but at the same time, there's a certain sort of pang to it. Not having been there, at his side. Of course, he'd been drafted, so it wasn't like he'd had much choice in the matter, no matter what he told Steve. He hadn't wanted him to worry, and also... how do you tell someone as brave as Steve that you weren't? It would have been one thing if he could have stayed. But being drafted... well, it had been easier this way.]

So we win? The war? And you...

[He sort of trails off there, his face shifting from playful to helpless earnest, intense. That slight tilt of his head as he looks up at Steve with those blue eyes. Bucky just wants to know that it ends okay. Which it doesn't, of course, but he doesn't know that. Steve had talked about the Liberation, and it sounds like the sort of thing he gets to come home from, some furlough where they get put up in the Ritz, mopping up the last of it and then coming back to Brooklyn.

But there's something about all of this that just feels a little off, like there's a piece he's missing. Not asking the right questions.]

...You get to come home?

[ex_serum683]

❰ bucky leans in, teasing and laughing, and steve presses their shoulders together tight. he's almost smiling himself when bucky pulls the rug out from him, asks the inevitable question that steve never wants to have to answer. his stomach bottoms out, leaves him feeling hollow, and he knows he's taking too long to answer but he can't get his throat to work. ❱

Yeah, Buck, we win, ❰ he says eventually, eyes down. he hasn't looked up at bucky in long moments, eyes trained on the floor in front of them.

it wouldn't be a lie to say he survives the war. he couldn't say he comes home, not really, home is seventy years away by the time he winds up back in new york, but he survives. that'd be enough for bucky, right?

thank god bucky hasn't asked about himself. thank god steve doesn't have to choose between the lie of a terrible death and the horror of staying alive. ❱

[commando]

[That answer is something, but it's not the important part, not the one that matters. The thing that he needs to know is what happens after, and Bucky isn't dumb, can read that there's something here, something big. Steve wont look at him, and he's letting that question trail unanswered for far too long.

He can think of a dozen different answers, but he doesn't like any of them, and isn't sure which one is actually the problem. So he sighs, letting his head tilt into the other man's shoulder, letting Steve have a moment more if he needed it, but they both knew that he was going to ask.

Part of him wants to make a joke, about Steve meeting some dame and getting married in France, but they both knew that Bucky would have followed him, stayed-- Aw, Hell. And that's the first time that he starts to feel it. That sense like stepping over your own grave, the inkling that he doesn't make it to the end of Steve's story. But throwing that at him when he's already so openly distraught seems cruel, so he just sits with it for now.

Instead he sighs, reaching out to catch one of Steve's hands with his own. Not quite handholding, but touching, reassurance. He's here. He's still here.]

C'mon, Stevie. You can tell me what happened.

[He smiles at him, trying to meet his eyes, to be something that he can lean on. But it's like that smile from the alleyway when he was shipping out; something he plays up a little, does for his friend because he wants things to be okay. Even when they aren't. When they can't be.]

[ex_serum683]

❰ bucky takes his hand, and steve looks down at the place where their skin touches. bucky's hand is dry, familiar, worn from work but soft with youth. bloodless. he hasn't killed anyone with these hands yet, not nazis or hydra or hydra's enemies.

he doesn't even know what hydra is.

the gulf of lost experiences yawns between them, wide and unfathomable, unfordable. steve has killed. steve has killed so many, needfully, to protect others — but there are some things you can't explain, which can only be experienced, and bucky hasn't had any of the experiences steve's had. seventy years stretches between them, vast and quiet and damning.

shared life experience echoes in his head, natasha's voice mocking him.

steve's jaw ticks, his eyes shuttered, as he processes his thoughts, before he takes a breath. ❱

I moved to DC, ❰ he says, rather than explicitly answer bucky's implicit question. he'll get there, he will, he'll find the words. just let him live one more moment with this bucky, bloodless and young and happy. ❱ I tried to stay in New York, but after everything... I needed somewhere new.