First Day - Eureka Moment

Ivan (DM): (in 7th Sea) As you hit the cold water it sends shock waves through your lungs and expresses the air from the sudden force of the cold northern water as it strikes your body.

Flash cut to you, you sit up with a gasp. (shift to Eureka Moment)

Trisha (Jade): Gasps.

Ivan: And you're in a dark room which is rich and pervasive(might be the wrong word couldn't hear it 100%) and you notice a small blinking of a red light somewhere in the room that penetrates the darkness you feel a thin but soft cushion of a mattress below you as well as the thin sheets spread over your undressed form. A few moments pass with the red light piercing your vision sporadically and without even thinking you say the words "light on" and bright florescent light illuminates the room. Blinking you take a moment to focus your eyes and notice your in a small 10 by 10 room with bright white walls, silver accents, and  minimal furniture setup. There are a few shelves embedded into the walls and on a side table in a small dish you see two slots open which reveals. I'm sorry as well as a side table a small dish which opens up from the top to reveal two small pills. You also notice a small acrylic key shaped card about the size of a thumb drive next to a set of cloths and you can start to smell the aroma of coffee brewing from an automated dispensary on the far side of the room. What do you want to do?

Trisha: Well this is not Jade's Apartment that's for dang sure. But i am way into coffee so that's cool. Am i the only one in the room?

Ivan: You're the only one in the room

Trisha: So this is my private quarters so it's okay that I am totally nakey

Ivan: Yep.

Trisha: Got it. What do the clothes look like?

Ivan: The clothes look like a very sleek metallic bodysuit that essentially looks like it is a very slick looking flight suit essentially. It's all very folded meticulously with the keycard sitting right on top.

Trisha: Okay and can i just like inspect the pills, are they like gel liquid capsules are they hard pills.

Ivan: They are gel liquid capsules. They seem to have a clear liquid inside of them. And you continually see as, again with the lights on, you notice that the blinking red light that was just kind of permeating the room previously is now very directly targeted towards a small side panel that's next to a door, which has no hinges or any locks on it, it looks like a call box of some sort.

Trisha: Do i feel like do i have any kind of gut feeling like maybe i'm here as a prisoner?

Ivan: This is your room. this is a comfortable place. It's also a temporary place, you feel like.

Trisha: Okay and if i reach up do i feel Jade's short blue hair, or does it feel different?

Ivan: Your head is shaved, And so you touch the top of your head and you feel that you are. And it's not just like military buzz cut, it's like BICed (shaved fully bald). you also, because there is a mirror that is next to the coffee as well, you notice that you don't look like someone different you look like Jade and you can also see blue tattooed markings on the top of your head.

Trisha: Do they look like they say anything? Do they look like letters or numbers?

Ivan: No they look like a diagram.

Trisha: Interesting. Okay well i want to take a mental snapshot as i look in the mirror of what that looks like, so i have that in case it's a map to something. Then i am going to down that coffee.

Ivan: It's really hot and also it has a very.. It's bitter but it's also.. it's not bitter in the sense like coffee is bitter it's bitter in the sense that you have this moment where you wish that you could get some real coffee. There's this moment in your brain where like "uhhh i hate this dehydrated shit".

Trisha: Got it there's no french vanilla creamer anywhere to be found.

Ivan: Do you like it black or with creamer?

Trisha: I like it sweetened when i feel i am in for a treat. And because i have no idea what the in holy hell is going on right now i feel like there could be disaster when i leave this room, so maybe have a treat right now while i can.

Ivan: Well there is creamer, oh but they come in liquid gel pops. So and it's very natural for you, you actually pick up three capsules and toss it inside of the coffee and they melt immediately and you watch as the creamer pours out.

Trisha: Is it delicious now?

Ivan: It's delicious now. It's delicious in like a fake dairy way though.

Trisha: Wow okay, well i am going to put on the suit.

Ivan: Okay so as you put on the suit you start donning it and once you lift it up you notice that it doesn't have a zipper. It's actually, you put patches over them, and as you inlay onto each one you actually hear the sound of pulling on shrink wrap as you watch as the flaps literally meld into each other make a perfect seam. You also feel the prick like a tattoo needle hit you at the same time everywhere across your body. A tiny little pin prick like a bee sting literally encompasses your entire body all at one time and the blinking red light that was on the flight suit now turns green.

Trisha:"whoa okay I've got some kind of bio-suit now. Who knows what that does. Now for the real question do i take the pills or not. Does the suit have any kind of pocket or anywhere that i could store anything?

Ivan: No pocket, nothing it is a slick clean piece.

Trisha "Gosh darn it."

Ivan: You also out of nowhere hear a woman's voice with a very soothing tone announce, "you have four new messages

Trisha: "Play messages"

Ivan: The first one you hear a mans voice kind of permeate it sounds emotional: (Man 1)"Jade i just wanted to ensure you that you had no further questions regarding your induction tomorrow i know it can be a bit intimidating despite all the training but i just want you to know that you're doing a great thing by taking the leap, I'm here if you need anything, love you." BEEP

(Man 2)" Jade I wanted to remind you to eat nothing before you go to bed tonight and do not forget to wear your biofeedback suit and take your induction pills in the morning before you report in, these details are essential as we cannot guarantee your safety otherwise. It's very costly and time consuming to remove you should you have any side effects and we are on a very strict schedule. BEEP"

Trisha: With that I'm going to pop the two pills in my mouth and swallow them.

Ivan: (Woman) "Jade, we're all meeting in the common room to send you off.  Where are you?  We brought you manacotti.  And you won't believe what Carrie dressed up as." BEEP

(Man 2) "We expressly told you to arrive at 0800 hours exactly.  That is one hour before induction.  It is currently 0801 and you have not reported.  You have exactly 29 minutes to arrive or we will be forced to cancel the experiment and penalties will be levied against you, including the potential reassignment to scavenger duties." BEEP

The light goes blank.

Trisha: At this point, I become overwhelmed with that nightmare where you're in highschool and you're late for class. So I slam the coffee -- got the pills, got the suit on, grab the keycard and I'm going towards the door with no locks or anything and assume the keycard is some kind of magnet lock.

Ivan: It actually looks like some kind of thumb drive. There's a reader for it in your room, but it is a universal reader.

Trisha: I wanna read the keycard.

Ivan: You pop in the acrylic keycard and it operates an LED touch screen that is displayed on the wall from four floating points in the midst of the area. And you see that several diagrams and schematics pop up on four topics, and at the bottom there is a timer counting down from 30 seconds, which means there's probably only enough time to look at one. The topics are: Project Thanatos, Induction Tanks, Induction Suits, Seratonin and Dimethyltryptamine.

Trisha: I have to go with Project Thanatos.

Ivan: You tap Project Thanatos and watch as several schematics pop up of probably one of the most intense server rooms you've ever seen. It is essentially a giant column of different pieces of hardware, and you can see that large power cables are coming out and you can see that the lines are actually leading into the earth, powered by geothermal energy. It basically just gives you a breakdown: Project Thanatos is the brain around the experiment and it is the purpose of the experiment in order to get the results you're looking for. Unfortunately it doesn't say anything more specific than that. [Trisha: Damn it!]  But it's very clear in that Project Thanatos is essentially a large server machine that is keyed into the induction tanks and is powered by geothermal energy.

Trisha: Great.

Ivan: So you watch as the counter goes down: 5...

Trisha: As it's going down, I'm desperately pressing the next one.

Ivan: Briefly you look at the induction tanks. It shows large bacta-style tanks. You push the induction suit: you watch as you saw tiny needles push inside of your body. You don't get to seratonin or dimethyltryptamine. As the thirty seconds left highlights green and the screen goes blank as the keycard sounds to be processed. There's an orange glow where the keycard was and through the clear acrylic you can see the plastic being melted as it pops out a small plastic round chip.

Trisha: Alright, I'm taking the chip with me. And let's go. Late for class -- here we go.

Ivan: So as you leave the room, you don't know why, but you immediately start down the left, taking turns occasionally -- left and then right -- as if you know exactly where you're going. As you continue to walk you see a silver sphere, with several eyes like a spider, zooming along a rail down the hallway. As you get closer, it speaks to you in a pleasant woman's voice.

"Are you the one named Jade Eversteen?"

Trisha: "Yeah."

Ivan: "I'm instructed to escort you to the induction chamber, with force if necessary.  Do you comply?"

Trisha: "I certainly comply! Let's head on in that direction."

Ivan: "Excellent, follow me."

Trisha: I'm just going to bewilderedly shake my head at this thing.

Ivan: As you continue to follow this thing as it goes through, you go past several clearance routes which you, for some reason, hold the poker chip up, and that becomes your keycard, that allows you to go from yellow security, to red security, to ultraviolet security, to black security, as you go deeper and deeper into this very sterile complex. You see not one person as you continue to walk through. As the automated doors open, you see a six-story-tall cylindrical chamber stand before you. In the middle is a large metalic pillar which you recognise from the diagram as Project Thanatos. It's the giant server machine -- six stories tall. It looks like a giant central core. And you see around it five different induction tanks, which all look like giant bacta tanks. As the door opens, you hear a klaxon blaring and you can see a large timer is counting seconds. You can see that it's about 30 -- it has four different slots of time in it, with 30 being in the third slot or the second slot. You also notice a tall dark man in a lab coat runs towards you and grabs you by the arm.

Damion (Nathaniel): "You're late!  Quickly!"

Trisha: "Um.  Sorry that I'm late!  Do I know you?"

Damion: "They've already been under for about 30 minutes, you're losing time."

Trisha: "OK. What do I have to do?"

Damion: "It's already been several weeks in there.  Normally it'd be a lot of pomp and circumstance to send a team in, but since you decided to sleep in..."

Ivan: He grabs you by the arm and starts pulling you in through the long gangway as he leads you to a gurney and lays you down as you feel clamps come across each one of your legs. You see a large helmet start to come down. Project Thanatos has a large cable that has a helmet that seems to be coming down, slowly being lowered towards you.

Trisha: "Uh, Nathaniel.  Is this normal?"

Damion: "Yes.  It's all part of the procedure.  You're 100% great.  It's all part of the procedure.  They've been in there for a while.  We've got to get you in there."

Ivan: So the large helmet comes down and you can see in the helmet there are several much larger needles, that are inside of it. [Trisha: Oh shit!]  And as it settles itself inside of your head, you feel sharp pain as the shock of the needles wake you up in the cold water as you hear the sounds of the seagulls, and the smell of the ocean permeates your senses.

7th Sea resumes.