TEST DRIVE #10 - Cetacean Pool and Ten Forward

[tenforward_m]

#1

Option 001. Cetacean Pool/Aquatics Lab: Of all the places in the world, you open your eyes and you find yourself in a medium-sized aquatics laboratory, filled with various living specimens along with various science officers bustling about trying to maintain order. There's much to explore here (and hopefully, in the crew's opinion, not break), but the main attraction is the large pool at the far end of the lab; enormous but tanklike in appearance, it contains several dolphins happily swimming about, seemingly without a care in the world.


2

Option 002. Aboard the Enterprise, Ten Forward: You have no idea what just happened. One minute you were home, and now you're on a spaceship, in the middle of a crowded room. It looks like a bar. There are people eating and drinking, some in uniform, others not. Some are clearly aliens.

You've managed to land in Ten Forward a long bar with barstools and a bartender, tables sprinkled throughout, and the far wall is nothing but windows out to space. It looks like a nice lounge, low conversation making the room hum.

Better ask some questions and find out where you are, or just tap the closest person on the shoulder and try to make friends. The bar is open.

Comments

[fuckyoudracula]

Typical, that a furball would find its way on board. But, Spike had to admit when looking over, it was a pretty furball. At least in this time of the lunar cycle. Hmm, how did that work all the way out here in space?

"See that door over there, love?" He gave a nod, hinting at the door leading to and from the lounge. "I did the strangest thing, you see. I walked through it."

[midnighthour]

Her fingers itched as the bartender set down another drink. She wasn't even sure what it was and at this point she didn't really care. It wasn't as if she could get drunk, by normal means anyway.

Kitty leaned forward trying to force herself to small and looked relaxed. It wasn't working. "Yeah? Tell me about it." Her tone was flat but curious. They weren't trying to start a collection of strange people here were they?

Her eyes trained on the cold space that Spike sat and she had to wonder what sort of stories he could tell. She didn't like Vampires and she's had more than one bad experience with them but that didn't mean she still hadn't wanted to get one on her show.

[fuckyoudracula]

"No-one told me this was supposed to be some sort of story-time," he snorted, taking a deep swallow of beer. "Misadventures in space and what-not. How to get yourself stuck in bleedin' science fiction show."

He fished in his coat pocket, taking out a rather crumpled pack of cigarettes, popping one between his lips. However, the glare of the man behind the bar stopped him from lighting it, and with a suffering sigh he put it back.

[midnighthour]

Her eyes narrowed slight and then she laughed. I mean, how could you not? "Science fiction?" The last two years of her life had felt like fiction to her and now she was in space. It wasn't as if things could really get even more weird.

"Can't you just.." She waved a hand. "Find your way home? It's not as if you don't have the time?"

Kitty knew she was talking to him a bit to casually but she didn't care. She was frustrated, on edge and her wolf wasn't settling down despite her best efforts. It had to be that damn vampire. With him here she couldn't really relax. She downed her drink and then slid it away so that bartender wouldn't refill it.

[fuckyoudracula]

He flashed a grin, turning on his stool to gesture at the lounge. The lounge of the bloody Starship Enterprise. "I'm just waiting for C3PO and R2D2 to come around the corner."

Turning back to his beer, he shook his head. "Oh yeah, I'd love to wait around for a century or two until we get close enough that I could swim home," he muttered, sarcasm dripping of every word.

[midnighthour]

"Shouldn't we be worried about Darth Vader first?" She chuckled softly. Sarcasm was good. She could get through any situation with sarcasm. Her eyes flicked over towards the windows and the unfamiliar stars outside. She missed her sky, her forest, her friend but he wasn't coming back.

Kitty sighed turning to face the Vampire fully. "So what's your name?" He was strange compared to the vampires she has met but then that was perhaps a different situation. She knew he would latch onto his secrets. That was a theme of most vampires but he was still different and she wanted to know why.

[fuckyoudracula]

"Vader? Naah, he's a pussy cat, that one. Besides, the dark side has cookies. Haven't you heard?" Cookies would be good, especially since the beer on this ship sucked.

"The name's Spike," he answered, having decided to play nice. Or nice-ish, anyway. "And I would assume you'd preferred it if I didn't call you Fido." He would, even if she told him her name.

[midnighthour]

Cookies did sound good right about now and she wondered what sort of food they might have on the ship for her other half. Her back remained tense and it's obvious that she didn't trust him but he made her laugh; that counted towards something.

"Kitty." She corrected making it obvious that it was her name. Of course, being in the company of a snarky vampire, she was expecting some retort to the irony of her name.

Maybe Fido was an improvement?

[fuckyoudracula]

He did not disappoint her expectation.

He peered at her, eyebrow raised in terribly amused disbelief. "Kitty? Seriously?" Cue laughter. "Oh, the irony," he chuckled after having quieted down. Not that he thought she hadn't heard that before.

[midnighthour]

Her smile faltered at his laughing. She wasn’t as prepared as she had thought for that ringing laughter.

“Oh, shut up.” She snapped feeling her wolf prowling beneath the surface. It was looking for any excuse to run and she didn’t want to lose control. She had been doing pretty well without a pack. Her eyes shined as she looked over at him.

“Spike isn’t much better anyway.” Kitty folded her arms over her chest while a light smirk playing across her lips.

[fuckyoudracula]

"Sure is, Kitty-cat," he said, turning to lean back against the bar, grinning. He saw that gleam in her eyes, thought he wasn't particularly bothered by it. Only a bit more alert. "It's an earned name, that."

[midnighthour]

She raised an eyebrow at his little pet name for her. "Earned? How would you earn such a name?"

Kitty couldn't imagine wanting to be called Spike, unless that was his weapon of choice? Though that sounded really silly considering Vampires needed blood. Having a weapon like that would be to messy.

[fuckyoudracula]

"From a hobby I had during my younger days." There was far less torture these days. Sometimes having a soul was a bit dull. But, even if he has lost the taste for death and suffering, at least he still enjoyed the occasional brawl.

[midnighthour]

"I don't even want to know." She knew what vampires could be like.

Kitty waved a hand towards the lounge gesturing to it as a whole. "So what do you think of all this?" Showing up here wasn't the strangest thing to happen to Kitty since that night in the park but it was certainly in the top ten.

[fuckyoudracula]

"Probably not," he agreed, smiling far too sweetly for it to be real.

As for the whole being stuck in space thing? He sighed, picking up his glass to drain the last of his pint in a few deep gulps. "Well. It breaks up the monotony, in any case. Though it looks like it will get old very fast."

[midnighthour]

"Slim pickings?" Her tone was light but it's obvious that the thought bothered her. She didn't know how he might feel about being cooped up on a ship in space but her wolf was not amused. She wanted to run and as the weeks drew near the feeling would increase. There was no where to run here.

Kitty missed the forest, the smell of the fresh dirt and recent showers. The hunt and trapping your prey. She had to stop thinking about it pushing the thoughts and the wolfs needs away. For the first few months this will be VERY interesting and for the moment Kitty was at a loose what to do about it.

[fuckyoudracula]

"You'd think being on a bloody spaceship would be fun, but it's shock full of white hats. Can't so much as think of doing anything fun before security starts giving you the stink eye." Granted that Spikes idea of fun tended to run on the illegal side, reacquired soul or not.

[midnighthour]

Kitty laughed at that glancing over to the guards that stood around the room. She wondered if Spike had made a name for himself here as a trouble maker and then how they would feel having a large wolf running around the ship. In this case it might be better to just announce her condition. She had on the radio and nothing was quiet as terrifying as the day she met Cormac.

"What would you do for fun? Assuming it doesn't involve bodily harm?" Her tone was sweet though a little sarcastic. She wasn't one to talk about bodily harm considering how her hurts went. At least she didn't hunt people.