cycleofspam | TEST DRIVE MEME

TEST DRIVE MEME

Whet your whistle, try out the setting, and see who you want to bring to the party!
IT'S A MINOR BLIP IN TIME
Maybe you were showering, or sleeping, having breakfast. You might have been participating in your morning commute or fighting off a horde of zombies.

Whatever you were in the middle of, a strange sensation of disconnection comes over you, as though you're watching your life on screen, a passive audience to the proceedings. It's almost like, well, being sucked down the drain like every adolescent nightmare, the feeling of disconnection replaced quickly with a pain so deep, it's as though every atom of your being is pressed too closely together, and your vision goes dark. Then, just as quickly as the pain came over it, it's gone, reality snapping back into place like a stretched rubber band.

WELCOME TO NEW YORK CITY

When your eyes adjust, you find yourself in a slightly spartan room, standing on a platform that seems to be made of glass or some sort of crystal. Energy currents in blues and greens swirl within it, dizzying and hypnotizing if stared at for too long. You're shocked from the vision by a cheery, bubbly voice that belongs to a petite brunette grinning at you from the base of the steps that lead down from the platform. She apologizes for any inconvenience you may have been caused, and hands you a small package, explaining that inside you'll find a phone, a directory of locations within the complex you've arrived in, a charge card with a balance of $500, and a key to a room in the dormitories which can be reached by following the green line on your directory.

She apologizes again for how confusing this must all be, but assures you that everything will make sense soon!

THOSE SEXY PROMPTS

01 ARRIVAL
After receiving your mysterious package from the happy girl who identifies herself as Airy, she suggests you head out and explore! You find out pretty quickly, or have a lot of trouble figuring out, that you're in a vast underground complex that consists of a lot of areas the directory says are "RESTRICTED". Places you can access are listed as "Forest", "Rec Room", "Cafeteria", and "Dormitories".

02 FOREST
Down a hallway across from a RESTRICTED area, a vast room filled with a living, breathing, underground forest can be found. Here, deep underground, the sun shines, a small creek flows, birds sing, and one could really believe they were outside. There's even a pleasant breeze! Weird, right?

03 REC ROOM
On the opposite side of the complex, near the dormitories, one will find another vast room labeled "REC ROOM". Inside, there is a seating area with basic refreshments (water, sports drinks), board games, a more relaxed seating area with sofas and places to read, a separate room that contains exercise equipment, another with an indoor pool, and a small basketball court. In a separate game room, there are arcade machines, an air hockey table, pool table, and ping pong table.

04 CAFETERIA
Across the main hall from the REC ROOM, one will find the double doors leading to the CAFETERIA. Outside, on a easel chalkboard, can be found the menu items available for the meal currently being served. Inside, several dozen tables and chairs take up most of the floor, and the din of conversation is comparable to a high school cafeteria. The older gentleman in the kitchen will come to the counter when approached to see which of the selection you'd like. We'd really recommend sticking to the offered selection.

05 DORMITORIES
Situated in a wing complex near the REC ROOM and the CAFETERIA is the DORMITORY wing. Rooms are solo and very small, ten to a hallway, and contain a single bed, a small dresser with mirror, and a small standing closet. Each hall has a common room at the end with seating and a five shelf bookcase, off of which are male and female bathrooms with showers, and a laundry room with four washers and four dryers.

06 WILDCARD
Start your own prompt! See what that phone can do, facilitate random encounters in any of the unrestricted areas! Go wild! Literally!

( DIRECTORY )

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Remy was no stranger to alternate worlds, dimensions, timelines. He'd been to at least one where no one knew his name, and another where his alternate self had ended things pretty succinctly. It served to reason this place was just a new brand of weird, and he didn't find it too surprising he'd run into Anna here.

Of course, one look at her told the Cajun this wasn't his Anna. That was rich. "His Anna." Anna hadn't been his in years, if he was honest with himself, if she ever really had been in the first place. It was one of the things he'd always liked about her. Rogue never really belonged to anybody. 'Course, all that wasn't going to stop him from being friendly.

He smiled his charming smile as he moved beside her, blinking eyes that clearly marked him as a fellow mutant curiously.

"Bonjour, chere. Havin' trouble choosin', or just wonderin' why it's normal ta have a diner in a bunker?"

Rogue had never been to alternate worlds or timelines herself, but she knew they existed. The X-Men had encountered people from those alternate realities enough times for all of this to be somewhat easy to swallow, especially considering where she'd just come from. Resetting the timeline for her entire world? Kind of hard to ignore that as being real, when their hopes for a better life hinged upon it being so.

But despite doing her best to embrace this... whatever this was, she still could never had anticipated him being there. Her eyes widened as she drank in the sound of that voice and her heart literally skipped a beat as it became difficult to breathe. Four years. It had been four years since she'd heard that warm accent in anything but her mind, since anyone living had called her chere. The most heartbreaking thing, though, was when she turned to look at him and knew in an instant that he wasn't her Remy. He wasn't the man she'd loved and lost. He wasn't her husband.

"Both," she answered quietly, her southern drawl no longer as pronounced as it had once been, but still there in the smooth tones that were tinged with sadness. "Hello, swamp rat." Lord, how she'd missed calling him that.

Remy was hard-pressed to keep a more genuine smile from teasing his lips at her response. They'd had their ups and down, he and his Anna, his world's Anna he should think, but no matter what had come between them, she still held a special place in his thoughts, his heart. Soulmates, he thought still, even after all this time. They had a connection, twisted and tarnished but undeniable, and she, this Rogue, knew him.

In his trade, reading people was a staple, though getting a read on Rogue had never been easy. She was fond of him, though, he could tell that much, but there was a sadness in her voice and he found himself wondering what might have happened to his otherworld counterpart. A cafeteria in a new world wasn't the place to ask, though, and he filed the questions welling in his mind away for closer inspection later.

"I reckon we ain't so far from home, eh?" It was a stretch, there was no real way of knowing how much this Rogue knew of him, but that sadness rapped at his mind's door. They were close, then, but how long ago? "Relatively speakin', course."

The idea of soulmates was something Rogue had resisted for a long time; the idea of anything at all between them had been resisted, to be honest. She hadn't trusted Remy, with his devilish smile and smooth talking ways - she'd been certain that he couldn't possibly be serious about having a relationship with a woman he couldn't touch. But he'd kept trying and when he finally wore her down... Soulmates. There wasn't another word more fitting for them.

If the circumstances had been different, she'd have been trying to read him the same way he was reading her. The way she'd learned to from both her own experiences and Remy's training, just one of many things her husband had taught her. But in that moment she was too lost in those demon eyes that had once looked at her with pure affection, and she wished vainly that she could see that look in them again, just one more time.

"Home," she repeated softly. "Your home, maybe, but not mine. Mine's a long ways from here." If it even existed anymore. She'd seen the city burned to the ground, but that was her world, not this one, and that meant... So many things. Or maybe nothing at all.

The Cajun shook his head gently, a hint of sadness touching his voice when he spoke. He couldn't help it. Sure, they said this place was New York, but that could mean anything when you got right down to it.

"Non, ain' my home, neither." He smirked at an internal joke before sharing it. "Ain' enough Stark tech around."

She could hear that sheen of sadness in his voice and it made her chest ache. He should be happy. Everything in his life should be good and wonderful, because that's what he deserved, and the only thing that would change her opinion would be if he proved to be an entirely different man than the Remy LeBeau she'd known.

And that smirk. Good lord, she'd forgotten how handsome he was when he smiled like that. He might not be her Remy, but the similarities were astonishing.

"I guess we really are from different universes," she responded, finally voicing her theory aloud. "Unfortunately, I don't know what Stark tech is."

No he didn't, not really. Not in his opinion at least, but that conversation was for another day, and another Rogue if the truth be told, at least for now.

He couldn't help giving her a sardonic smirk, though. "Consider yo'self blessed, mon chere." He shook his head, almost unable to believe it. "A world without Tony Stark. Dat's downright novel."

She almost said something about how maybe things would have been different if this Tony Stark had been in her world as he'd been in Remy's, but... She wasn't ready for that. For him to know everything that had happened to her, for him to see her in a different way. She knew nothing about this Gambit - just because he looked like her husband didn't mean they were the same man.

"Who am I to you in your world?" she asked him suddenly, completely derailing the current topic of conversation and not caring in the slightest. It was something she needed to know, and he was the only one who could tell her.

That single question invoked what seemed like a lifetime of emotions ranging from rage to adoration. Who was she to him? She was a never-ended source of frustration, support, friendship, and loneliness. How was he supposed to explain any of it to a woman who didn't know what they'd gone through together, the Hells they'd dragged one another through over the years?

He swallowed, looking away in the vain hope the answer would materialize out of the same nether they had not too long ago. With nothing deciding to show itself, he looked back to her, the varying emotions playing through his gaze.

"Dat's a complicated question, mon chere, an' it ain't got a simple answer."

The question would have been no easier for her to answer had it been him doing the asking, though the answer she gave him would have been very different. Remy LeBeau had been her everything. Once she had finally stopped fighting and being so afraid of all that he offered, she had fallen head over heels for the prince of thieves; he'd stolen her heart. They had worked past their issues together and been stronger for it.

But apparently that hadn't happened with this one. The implications of those few words made her heart ache, and she frowned and turned her gaze downward, leveling it with his chest instead of trying to face those strangely beautiful eyes. "Oh."

What a disappointing response. Her own, not his. So she tried again.

Clearing her throat slightly, she raised her eyes back up, forced a hint of a smile, and held her gloved hand out to him in greeting. "I suppose I should introduce myself properly. My name's Marie LeBeau."

LeBeau, she said. Of course she did. Was a dream he had, once upon a time, coming true for someone else worth the amount of pain he read in her eyes? Meeting alternate versions of yourself was always strange, always disorienting in a way, and this was no different. Was it really better of the world around you was in flames? The X-Men of the world Apocalypse ruled would say no, the Rogue there would say no.

So would he. He smiled, more friendly than flirtatious, though there was always hint of it underneath, he'd never been able to shake that, and took her hand.

"Remy leBeau. De pleasure's mine."

It was a short-lived dream in her world. Too short, but there was nothing to do for it. Maybe one day in this new world she'd helped to make, but there was no way to know for sure. She wouldn't remember the love of her life or the days they'd spent together, and she had to tell herself that it was better this way, because the alternative was the end of the entire world. She could never bring herself to be that selfish in any universe.

"Of course it is," she commented with a bit more smile and a hint of amusement in her voice. "It always is, isn't it?"

He chuckled at her reaction, even though it was evident, he was sure, to both of them that it was an act, a curtain to conceal the differences and similarities between both of their worlds.

"Sho' nuff, mon chere." He glanced toward the menu, then back to this other Rogue. "Got a question, though. Wouldn't happen ta be Anna-Marie, would it?"

It had always been a sort of act between them, before they'd managed to both let their guards down. Why should this be any different? They knew each other, but not really, as evidenced by his question.

Giving him a somewhat confused frown, she shook her head. "Anna's my middle name, but no one ever used it like that. I'm guessin' the Rogue you know goes by Anna-Marie?"

He nodded, noting more and more the differences between the two of them. They were so similar, each marked by their own unique ordeals, and yet so different. It stood to reason, of course. Anna was dynamic, always shifting. Why would two incarnations be that similar?

"Sometimes, ta some." To him and a few choice others. "Anna, when she's close."

Rogue couldn't begin to guess at the differences between this Remy and her own. There were hints of things, here and there, but she would have to get to know him much better to be able to see beneath that facade.

Nodding, she told him, "No one ever called me Marie except my Remy and Logan. I was Rogue to everyone else. Everyone not in my head, at least."

"Logan...?" That was news. Of course, they were all closer back then, before time and life beat wedges between all of them. He had to constantly remind himself this was not the Anna, the Marie, that he knew. It was more difficult than he thought it would be, considering how often he'd been to other worlds, been visited by other alien species.

"Ain' surprised, though. You always played yo' hand close ta de vest."

Rogue couldn't imagine not being close to Logan, or having a life where he hadn't been such an integral part. But even contemplating that idea was painful, because he had been one of the friends who'd abandoned her to her fate, hadn't he? And now she'd never be able to ask him, or any of them, what she had done to deserve that.

"It always seemed easier that way," she mused, then shrugged with one shoulder. "Fewer chances for people to hurt you, right?" Was she looking for validation? It was certainly possible. At the end, Remy's opinion had been one she'd held in high regard.

Remy nodded, placing his hands in the pockets of his trenchcoat and looking down. Once upon a time, when he was younger, he'd thought the same way, that keeping people at a distance was the best way to move forward. Less collateral damage that way. Now? Now sometimes other people were all that held him together.

Hell, there was a whole group of students who looked up to him. He couldn't disappoint them, could he?

"Used ta be I felt dat way, chere. Now...things have changed."

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TEST DRIVE MEME

04 (I couldn't resist)

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