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silentspringmemes2023-12-01 05:18 pm
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TDM NO. 1
TDM № 1 : December 2023
Part I; Chapter 1. Fires We Don't Put Out
Part I; Chapter 1. Fires We Don't Put Out
Hey, neighbor, welcome to the very first TDM for Silent Spring, a semiprivate suburban 60s horrorgame based loosely on the likes of We're Still Here, Holly Heights, and similar. Characters wake up in the uncannily idyllic early 1960s suburbia of Sweetwater, Maryland, an integrated bedroom community of Washington, DC - in the same household as a complete stranger to whom they have apparently always been married, at least according to the eerily and unwaveringly chipper neighbors who seem to know a little more than they should. This TDM will give you a place to test out the setting and get some sample threads if you're going to apply for an invite. Right now there are at least 20 slots available to the general public.
This game and its world, including this TDM, heavily feature nuclear panic, the Red Scare, conformism, sexism and restrictive gender roles, heteronormativity/gender binarism as it relates to being forced into a 'nuclear family', surveillance, gaslighting, brainwashing/propaganda, disinformation, pollution/contamination, poisoning, loss of control, and uncanny valley. IC consequences can involve anything from social shunning to sleep deprivation torture, brainwashing, and nonconsensual administration of large doses of haloperidol. These are the crux of the game and cannot be opted out of — this game offers a very specific flavor of horror and it is up to players whether or not they want to engage. The atmosphere is a dystopia, and while people can certainly bond with each other in extreme circumstances, the point of this game is not an ingame domestic AU, found family, 'adopting' other characters, etc. Although this TDM has been opened for everyone to enjoy, I ask that you be respectful of the work I've put into cultivating a very specific environment. You have full permission to borrow this setting/premise for PSLs focusing on those things.
I. National Everyone-Smile-at-One-Anotherhood Week
Maybe you were on your deathbed, taking your last gasping breaths. Maybe you had just drifted off into sleep. Or maybe you were just in the middle of another ordinary day—but whatever the case may be, you now wake staring at an unfamiliar popcorn ceiling, dressed in a coordinating pajama set or nightgown straight out of the Sears catalog. A complete stranger lies asleep beside you. Perhaps a dog or a cat you don't recognize lies sleeping on a red tartan bed on the floor behind the mahogany footboard.
This is your house, but it’s not your house: on one of the twin dressers in the room, the morning light reflects off the cover glass on a framed photograph of the two of you standing side-by-side and smiling like figures in a Norman Rockwell painting, maybe with a third, also unrecognizable younger party in the foreground between you. A Civil Defense booklet titled ”Survival Under Atomic Attack” hangs halfway off the corner of the dresser, its pages and cover curling upwards with wear atop a dogeared Macy’s Christmas catalog. The other dresser hosts a watch box and a compact radio: yours, if you’re the one wearing the coordinating flannel shirt and pants, or your new husband’s, if you’re in a babydoll-style nightie.
It’s not immediately clear if you’ve found yourself in the fifties or the sixties, at least until you throw on the robe hanging on the back of the bedroom door and head out into the driveway at some point. There you find a rolled newspaper tossed onto the concrete beside a shiny new car, dated December 1, 1960.
Prompt Details:
— All characters wake in a normal human body with any disability aids (including glasses or contact lenses) converted to the most common form of them in the 60s unless a modern development like a sip/blow powerchair is needed for them to be playable. Although cutting edge technologies like myoelectric limbs were just starting to come around at the time, they were not common and readily accessible, and therefore are not allowed.
— Characters have no powers, and regains will not happen in this game. If they biologically need something to function that is fantasy in nature (ex: have to drink blood), that need is gone and replaced with only a normal human’s needs.
— Characters will find their belongings, up to 3 items from home, around the house in normal places for each item to be: a book on the shelf, a framed photo on a flat surface, etc. Items that don’t exist in the regular universe in 1960 may not be brought (ex: gameboy, pokeball, wizard’s staff).
— Characters may bring one normal, non-livestock pet, or may meet said pet for the first time when they wake up in Sweetwater. They can also be petless.
— No items or weapons from after 1960 are allowed, and no weapons more powerful than a hunting rifle or handgun can be brought with them. One weapon per character.
This is your house, but it’s not your house: on one of the twin dressers in the room, the morning light reflects off the cover glass on a framed photograph of the two of you standing side-by-side and smiling like figures in a Norman Rockwell painting, maybe with a third, also unrecognizable younger party in the foreground between you. A Civil Defense booklet titled ”Survival Under Atomic Attack” hangs halfway off the corner of the dresser, its pages and cover curling upwards with wear atop a dogeared Macy’s Christmas catalog. The other dresser hosts a watch box and a compact radio: yours, if you’re the one wearing the coordinating flannel shirt and pants, or your new husband’s, if you’re in a babydoll-style nightie.
It’s not immediately clear if you’ve found yourself in the fifties or the sixties, at least until you throw on the robe hanging on the back of the bedroom door and head out into the driveway at some point. There you find a rolled newspaper tossed onto the concrete beside a shiny new car, dated December 1, 1960.
Prompt Details:
— All characters wake in a normal human body with any disability aids (including glasses or contact lenses) converted to the most common form of them in the 60s unless a modern development like a sip/blow powerchair is needed for them to be playable. Although cutting edge technologies like myoelectric limbs were just starting to come around at the time, they were not common and readily accessible, and therefore are not allowed.
— Characters have no powers, and regains will not happen in this game. If they biologically need something to function that is fantasy in nature (ex: have to drink blood), that need is gone and replaced with only a normal human’s needs.
— Characters will find their belongings, up to 3 items from home, around the house in normal places for each item to be: a book on the shelf, a framed photo on a flat surface, etc. Items that don’t exist in the regular universe in 1960 may not be brought (ex: gameboy, pokeball, wizard’s staff).
— Characters may bring one normal, non-livestock pet, or may meet said pet for the first time when they wake up in Sweetwater. They can also be petless.
— No items or weapons from after 1960 are allowed, and no weapons more powerful than a hunting rifle or handgun can be brought with them. One weapon per character.
II. Death of a Salesman
You haven’t had much time to acclimate to your new life—maybe a day or two at the most—before there’s a knock on your door. When you open it, a man in a hat and a brown two-piece suit smiles at you, holding a briefcase in one hand and a brand new vacuum cleaner in the other.
“Hey there! My name’s Charlie and I’m here to tell you all about the latest in vacuum technology. Is the man of the house home?”
Regardless of what you say, Charlie the vacuum salesman finds a way to barge into your home and set up his briefcase and vacuum in the center of the living room. He insists that everyone in the family join him to watch, and then the demo begins as he tells the family how inadequate their current vacuum is and how the dirt it leaves behind will make you sick and make your wife look like she can’t keep up with running the house—but if she just buys this vacuum, she’ll be the envy of all of her friends, and isn’t it great timing that there’s a Christmas special on this very unit right now?
He tells the family he’ll give them ‘a moment to think on it’ while he fills up the water canister for the steamer function in the kitchen sink. Characters can hear the faucet running and then shutting off, but the salesman doesn’t emerge with a water tank—he emerges with a butcher’s knife.
“You took too long!” He announces. “I better get to the next house!”
With that, he charges, and begins to attempt to slice or stab whoever’s closest. You’re in luck, or at least it initially seems—it’s two or maybe even three against one. But once you attack him, you’ll notice something odd—the salesman doesn’t seem to react to being sliced at or stabbed, and if your character has a gun, gunshots don’t stop or even slow him. Shooting him in the head, cutting his jugular vein, or beating him on the back of the head are the only ways to kill him - good luck!
Should your household manage to kill him before he kills you, something even stranger happens. The moment he takes his last breath, lying in a pool of his own blood, there’s a knock on the door. If characters ignore it or say “one moment please!”, the knocks get more and more vehement until the hand is practically banging on the door. If they still ignore it, the neighbor strolls around to the window and looks in to see if they’re home, cupping her hands to the glass— but doesn’t react to the dead body. Instead she just smiles brightly, gives an enthusiastic little wave, and points to the door.
When characters finally open the door to let her in, they’ll notice that she’s holding a mop and bucket, smiling brightly.
“I thought you could use a little help cleaning up the mess!”, she says, barging past just like the salesman did before her. At no point does she stop smiling, or seem to register that it’s a dead body—she just starts mopping up the pool of blood, occasionally dunking her mop into the soapy pink water of the bucket, never referring to it as anything other than the vague “the spill”.
If characters ask her for help disposing of the body, she’ll bring in her husband, a similarly cardboard figure who assists the ‘man of the house’ with digging a grave-sized hole in the back yard and dropping the body in. The next day, the ground is undisturbed.
“Hey there! My name’s Charlie and I’m here to tell you all about the latest in vacuum technology. Is the man of the house home?”
Regardless of what you say, Charlie the vacuum salesman finds a way to barge into your home and set up his briefcase and vacuum in the center of the living room. He insists that everyone in the family join him to watch, and then the demo begins as he tells the family how inadequate their current vacuum is and how the dirt it leaves behind will make you sick and make your wife look like she can’t keep up with running the house—but if she just buys this vacuum, she’ll be the envy of all of her friends, and isn’t it great timing that there’s a Christmas special on this very unit right now?
He tells the family he’ll give them ‘a moment to think on it’ while he fills up the water canister for the steamer function in the kitchen sink. Characters can hear the faucet running and then shutting off, but the salesman doesn’t emerge with a water tank—he emerges with a butcher’s knife.
“You took too long!” He announces. “I better get to the next house!”
With that, he charges, and begins to attempt to slice or stab whoever’s closest. You’re in luck, or at least it initially seems—it’s two or maybe even three against one. But once you attack him, you’ll notice something odd—the salesman doesn’t seem to react to being sliced at or stabbed, and if your character has a gun, gunshots don’t stop or even slow him. Shooting him in the head, cutting his jugular vein, or beating him on the back of the head are the only ways to kill him - good luck!
Should your household manage to kill him before he kills you, something even stranger happens. The moment he takes his last breath, lying in a pool of his own blood, there’s a knock on the door. If characters ignore it or say “one moment please!”, the knocks get more and more vehement until the hand is practically banging on the door. If they still ignore it, the neighbor strolls around to the window and looks in to see if they’re home, cupping her hands to the glass— but doesn’t react to the dead body. Instead she just smiles brightly, gives an enthusiastic little wave, and points to the door.
When characters finally open the door to let her in, they’ll notice that she’s holding a mop and bucket, smiling brightly.
“I thought you could use a little help cleaning up the mess!”, she says, barging past just like the salesman did before her. At no point does she stop smiling, or seem to register that it’s a dead body—she just starts mopping up the pool of blood, occasionally dunking her mop into the soapy pink water of the bucket, never referring to it as anything other than the vague “the spill”.
If characters ask her for help disposing of the body, she’ll bring in her husband, a similarly cardboard figure who assists the ‘man of the house’ with digging a grave-sized hole in the back yard and dropping the body in. The next day, the ground is undisturbed.
III. We'll become silhouettes
Whoa there, Neighbor! I hope you and your picturesque new family didn't get so comfortable you lost sight of the looming Red Menace. No, it's not just confined to the silver screen: the Communist threat is everywhere, maybe even in your own home—and the skies above. Around 1:15 PM on December 20th, they hear the sound: the air raid sirens clustered like bananas atop the tall poles dotting the city come to life like singing frogs on a bank, sending out long, drawn out calls in a chorus of overlapping pitches. The radios in every room crackle on as if by magic, and a man's transatlantic voice reads the announcement:
"Your attention please. This is Ron Chapman, one of your official civil defense broadcasters with a special message. Military authorities have advised us that an enemy attack by air is imminent. This is a red alert. You are advised to go to your nearest shelter area immediately. Find shelter. There is not time to leave the city.
Your state civil defense director has just issued the following instructions: Please remain calm. Every precaution will be taken for your protection. Keep your radio tuned to this place on the dial throughout the alert period for information. Telephone service to your home may be cut off to permit military and civil defense authorities to carry out vital operations. Do not attempt to join your family or children if they are now separated. They will be cared for where they are. Obey your civil defense warden and find shelter NOW. Take shelter in your basement or in your nearest shelter area. If you can plug in your radio in the basement, take it with you. Use a portable radio set if you have one. Otherwise turn up the volume of your radio so that you can hear it in the basement. Keep calm, don't lose your head. If you are at work, obey your civil defense authorities. Go quickly and calmly to their designated shelter. If your children are at school, they are being directed to shelter by their teachers. If you are in an automobile, pull over to the curb and then go immediately to the nearest shelter area. Do not leave your car where it will block traffic.
This station will continue to stay on the air throughout the alert period to bring you authentic information and official instructions. Stay tuned to 640 or 1240 kilocycles on your radio for official information. Refuse to listen to unauthorized rumors or broadcasts. This is your official civil defense broadcast . . . Your attention please. This is Ron Chapman, one of your official civil defense broadcasters with a special message . . ."
If characters are at the high school, teachers will usher them out of the classroom and down a single packed cement staircase in the direction of the basement, past a yellow and black sign on the wall over the hand railing that reads FALLOUT SHELTER. They don't visibly panic—but it's clear to almost everyone that the teachers are just as afraid as they are, if not moreso. They've simply been deliberately trained not to show it, though there is a quality to the eyes that training can never reach.
The portable emergency radios echo off of the cement floor and stacked barrels of drinking water lining the walls opposite unopened boxes of survival rations. Teachers call roll in strained voices, accounting for every student left in their care—and then, once everyone is in, the heavy metal door to the shelter is closed, shutting out the aboveground world as Principal Jones tells everyone to stay quiet so they can hear the portable radios.
Characters at home have the option of going into the basements of the homes they awoke in, which have some survival rations but hardly qualify as fully outfitted bunkers, or disregarding the civil defense office's commands and risking it to seek safety in the community fallout shelter beneath the Sweetwater Fire Department. It is up to each "couple" whether they split up or seek safety in numbers, whether they prioritize immediacy or amount of protection.
If characters decide to hunker down in the fallout shelter under the fire department, they will be joined by dozens of their terrified neighbors. Responses vary dramatically: some seem almost catatonic, as though unable to believe that the events before them are really unfolding; others weep with fear. A woman breaks free of her husband's arms, screaming that she has to get her son, but a firefighter keeps her from climbing back up the staircase more and more people stream down.
Regardless of where characters choose to shelter, they are trapped there for the next five hours, listening to the Maryland civil defense director's warning circulate over and over in the claustrophobic space. Now might be a good time to field any questions to Dick Clark, your town Civil Defense Officer and Police Chief.
—until at last, the message changes.
"Your attention please. This is Ron Chapman, one of your official civil defense broadcasters with a special message. Military authorities have advised us that the anticipated enemy attack has been diverted. You may now leave shelter and rejoin your families. This concludes the red alert. Your attention please . . ."
Uh oh. Hope you didn't say anything in the heat of the moment you might now regret.
"Your attention please. This is Ron Chapman, one of your official civil defense broadcasters with a special message. Military authorities have advised us that an enemy attack by air is imminent. This is a red alert. You are advised to go to your nearest shelter area immediately. Find shelter. There is not time to leave the city.
Your state civil defense director has just issued the following instructions: Please remain calm. Every precaution will be taken for your protection. Keep your radio tuned to this place on the dial throughout the alert period for information. Telephone service to your home may be cut off to permit military and civil defense authorities to carry out vital operations. Do not attempt to join your family or children if they are now separated. They will be cared for where they are. Obey your civil defense warden and find shelter NOW. Take shelter in your basement or in your nearest shelter area. If you can plug in your radio in the basement, take it with you. Use a portable radio set if you have one. Otherwise turn up the volume of your radio so that you can hear it in the basement. Keep calm, don't lose your head. If you are at work, obey your civil defense authorities. Go quickly and calmly to their designated shelter. If your children are at school, they are being directed to shelter by their teachers. If you are in an automobile, pull over to the curb and then go immediately to the nearest shelter area. Do not leave your car where it will block traffic.
This station will continue to stay on the air throughout the alert period to bring you authentic information and official instructions. Stay tuned to 640 or 1240 kilocycles on your radio for official information. Refuse to listen to unauthorized rumors or broadcasts. This is your official civil defense broadcast . . . Your attention please. This is Ron Chapman, one of your official civil defense broadcasters with a special message . . ."
If characters are at the high school, teachers will usher them out of the classroom and down a single packed cement staircase in the direction of the basement, past a yellow and black sign on the wall over the hand railing that reads FALLOUT SHELTER. They don't visibly panic—but it's clear to almost everyone that the teachers are just as afraid as they are, if not moreso. They've simply been deliberately trained not to show it, though there is a quality to the eyes that training can never reach.
The portable emergency radios echo off of the cement floor and stacked barrels of drinking water lining the walls opposite unopened boxes of survival rations. Teachers call roll in strained voices, accounting for every student left in their care—and then, once everyone is in, the heavy metal door to the shelter is closed, shutting out the aboveground world as Principal Jones tells everyone to stay quiet so they can hear the portable radios.
Characters at home have the option of going into the basements of the homes they awoke in, which have some survival rations but hardly qualify as fully outfitted bunkers, or disregarding the civil defense office's commands and risking it to seek safety in the community fallout shelter beneath the Sweetwater Fire Department. It is up to each "couple" whether they split up or seek safety in numbers, whether they prioritize immediacy or amount of protection.
If characters decide to hunker down in the fallout shelter under the fire department, they will be joined by dozens of their terrified neighbors. Responses vary dramatically: some seem almost catatonic, as though unable to believe that the events before them are really unfolding; others weep with fear. A woman breaks free of her husband's arms, screaming that she has to get her son, but a firefighter keeps her from climbing back up the staircase more and more people stream down.
Regardless of where characters choose to shelter, they are trapped there for the next five hours, listening to the Maryland civil defense director's warning circulate over and over in the claustrophobic space. Now might be a good time to field any questions to Dick Clark, your town Civil Defense Officer and Police Chief.
—until at last, the message changes.
"Your attention please. This is Ron Chapman, one of your official civil defense broadcasters with a special message. Military authorities have advised us that the anticipated enemy attack has been diverted. You may now leave shelter and rejoin your families. This concludes the red alert. Your attention please . . ."
Uh oh. Hope you didn't say anything in the heat of the moment you might now regret.
IV. There's no place like (your new) home for the holidays
What a stressful week–even if the townspeople don’t seem too phased by it. In fact, they’re acting as if nothing’s happened at all, and will laugh off any suggestion that anything different might be the case. The neighborhood Christmas party at the grand neocolonial home of HOA president Marjorie Taylor proceeds as planned on the 22nd of the month–Characters’ wardrobes, of course, already contain some cocktail attire, but if it doesn’t suit their tastes, they can find all of the latest fashions on display in the completely normal department store.
Punch made by Marjorie herself is served in a tremendous green Tupperware bowl, though those who would prefer a simple cocktail will have no trouble finding one on any of the bar carts around the house. Mistletoe dangles from the arch leading to the secluded hallway lined with doors to the guest room and downstairs bathroom, out of the sight of those who might judge a character for stealing a kiss from someone other than their new spouse. Married couples dance in the living room while their friends perch on the couch like an overloaded liferaft to watch. The air of the room is bright, jovial, loud - the red threat looms in the dark unknown beyond the windows, but for the moment, all is well. Enjoy yourself, neighbor!
Punch made by Marjorie herself is served in a tremendous green Tupperware bowl, though those who would prefer a simple cocktail will have no trouble finding one on any of the bar carts around the house. Mistletoe dangles from the arch leading to the secluded hallway lined with doors to the guest room and downstairs bathroom, out of the sight of those who might judge a character for stealing a kiss from someone other than their new spouse. Married couples dance in the living room while their friends perch on the couch like an overloaded liferaft to watch. The air of the room is bright, jovial, loud - the red threat looms in the dark unknown beyond the windows, but for the moment, all is well. Enjoy yourself, neighbor!
V. Slip a sable under the tree
Three days after Marjorie's successful neighborhood Christmas party comes Christmas morning. When characters head down the stairs (or step into the living room on the same floor, if they're the 'child' of one of the newly introduced couples), they'll find the fully decorated Christmas tree that greeted them upon their arrival now has a few presents wrapped in metallic reds and silvers resting at its base, one for each party in the household, addressed simply with From: Santa.
The catch? The wrapping paper is impossible to open, the ribbons are impossible to tie and uncut, until everyone sits down as a family and opens them together in a true representation of an old-fashioned American Christmas morning.
Characters will receive 1 extra item from their homeworld abiding by the starting inventory guidelines—but the item has to be deeply personal, and something that they're uncomfortable with others seeing... which, judging by the similar reaction their new housemates have to their own presents, almost seems to be by design. It could be a compromising photo, a piece of subversive literature, a relic of who they were and things they'd rather remain hidden... but whatever it is, they've now been seen with it.
The catch? The wrapping paper is impossible to open, the ribbons are impossible to tie and uncut, until everyone sits down as a family and opens them together in a true representation of an old-fashioned American Christmas morning.
Characters will receive 1 extra item from their homeworld abiding by the starting inventory guidelines—but the item has to be deeply personal, and something that they're uncomfortable with others seeing... which, judging by the similar reaction their new housemates have to their own presents, almost seems to be by design. It could be a compromising photo, a piece of subversive literature, a relic of who they were and things they'd rather remain hidden... but whatever it is, they've now been seen with it.
Players may keep TDM threads canon if both players are admitted, and TDMers are encouraged to play around with multiple possible family member matches. Have fun!
B
To anyone who knows Sokka, the fact that he's pushing his food around on his plate instead of eating it would be indicative of something being wrong, as Sokka is a voracious eater and loves meat dishes. Thankfully, no one here knows him well enough to realize how unusual his lack of appetite is. He doesn't have to pretend he's hungry because his sister and their friends aren't here to worry, so Sokka simply slouches in his seat, periodically stabbing his food with his fork and shuffling it around.
That is, until the dog bounds up to the table.]
How can you talk about Furbulous Mister Fluffers like that? [Sorry to say, this dog has already been renamed.] He's a good dog, aren't you?
[Also sorry to say, Sokka travels with two animals in his crew. One is a giant sky bison that has opinions of his own and the other is a flying lemur that helps himself to Sokka's food when he feels like it. Hence, a complete disregard for the warning not to feed Furbulous Mister Fluffers. Sokka picks up a piece of meat, hands it to the dog, and states:]
Everyone deserves to eat.
you do him such justice!! LOVED atla though i saw it eons ago
[ He can't bring himself to say father, so his mouth just moves in silence for a moment before he settles on— ]
I am head of household! My name is on the collar. Don't feed him, he will only get worse. He is already very obnoxious dog.
[ And, speaking of feeding. The kid's barely touching the food on his plate, which, despite the fact that he looks ethnically Chukchi, is a decidedly American thing to do. Vasiliy's own mother never would have tolerated that, and presumably, he or his newly assigned wife are working to pay for this, considering that there is no universal basic income here.
(He was always still hungry after meals, though he never told his mother that—realistically, she never had to worry about whether or not to tolerate perfectly good food. He finds it difficult to relate to a young person who would.) ]
You need to finish that.
[ Not like he has any actual parental authority to enforce that, though. The best he can lean on is the privilege of age; the young man appears less than half of his, and is probably not considered a man yet in the nomadic cultures of the north and far west. ]
i'm so glad you think so, ty!!!
But the moment passes. Vasiliy doesn't use the word, and the inner tension that Sokka feels slowly drains. Head of household is a better label, and one that Sokka can live with for now, but he isn't going to keep his mouth shut when it comes to behavior that he thinks is foolish or unfair. The dog is part of this fake family, just as much as any of them; in fact, it's the only family member that Sokka fully accepts. None of this is the dog's fault, and he deserves to be treated better, instead of being made to watch while his family eats.
He reaches down with his free hand and unclips the collar from around the dog's neck.]
There. Now he doesn't have a collar at all. Problem solved.
[Sokka shoves the collar into his pocket, because what is Vasiliy going to do? Fight him for it? Maybe there's a part of him that wouldn't mind that; Sokka knows fighting better than he knows how to hold a fork. It wouldn't do much for furthering his goal of gathering intel, but it would at least be familiar.]
Furbulous Mister Fluffers can help me finish.
[Since the food is also an issue. Sokka stabs a piece of meat with his fork, getting ready to feed the dog straight from the utensil.]
(vasiliy voice) while you are under my roof
Anger flares in Vasiliy's chest where there was panic an hour ago; even despite all of his encounters with the kids labeled as Generation Z during his time in America, he cannot believe that this child would be such an insufferable brat within minutes of their meeting. Clearly his parents never parented him; he turned out just as unbearable and undisciplined as the spoilt children of the bourgeois. (Vasiliy knows, in the back of his mind, that some of it is probably a maladaptive response to the stress of their situation—but it hardly does much to temper his indignance.)
He never would have spoken to his own parents that way—he can't even begin to imagine how they would have responded if he had—and finds himself entirely unprepared for dealing with this contingency. ]
Don't.
[ He allows his voice to slip into a more serious, commanding tone, the one other officers used when ordering prisoners down the hall, or left or right toward their respective interrogation chambers. This young man isn't going to respond to begging, and it's beneath him to do so anyway. ]
He is not Fluffers anything. He does not have a name. Do not feed that dog. He will learn to steal food from you and lose all obedience. He has his own food.
sokka: you're not my real dad!
That doesn't mean he isn't scared. He's afraid of a lot of things, and this situation is no exception. He's terrified he's going to be stuck here, in this family — and in this town. But Sokka is a warrior. He doesn't run from his fears, or from battles, or from fights with authority figures. Sokka always has, and always will, throw himself headfirst into danger because that's what warriors do.
He thinks about doing that now. The tone that Vasiliy adopts is not one that Sokka's father would have ever used on him, not even when Sokka was younger and slipped out in the middle of the night to try hunting on his own — not even when Sokka showed up in his warrior paint and tried leave on his ship. It's a tone that makes Sokka think of the Fire Nation — or Hama, or Long Feng.
There is a part of him — a still-raw part, born out of his failed mission and his arrival in this place — that wants to fight. That side of himself wants to throw caution to the wind and forget trying to plan. His last one failed, so why bother biding his time for this one? And this guy — he can't even bend. Sokka could take him, he's sure of it.
But — he needs to be smart. He needs to be careful. He needs to figure out what's really going on here. His last plan may have failed, but that's why he has to be extra cautious now. He has to get back to everyone.
So there's a loaded moment where Sokka glares back at the head of household. His hand tightens around his fork and he looks like he might do something. But the tension drains from his shoulders. He doesn't feed the dog from his fork; he sets his fork down on his plate. He even pulls the collar out of his pocket and tosses it on the table.]
Sure.
[Listening doesn't mean giving up sarcasm.]
Let's treat him the way we're being treated. That makes sense.
[Shackle him and make him fill a role he probably doesn't even want. Train him, and say things like, I'm head of household, until he eats his crappy food that comes from who-knows-where. Treat him as lesser, instead of someone capable of hunting and fighting.
To the dog, in a whisper that's meant to be overheard:]
Don't worry, you'll always be Furbulous Mister Fluffers to me.
enthralled with the cultural differences in parenting at play here...chefkiss
He is dog and we are humans. It absolutely makes sense. This is what you do with them. Dogs exist to work and be useful, not be parasitic.
[ Regardless of what the 'modern' Americans, or even these Americans, think. At least, he supposes, this "Rex" will probably alert them of anyone who tries to break into the house; he certainly enjoys barking and finds endless things to bark at—although the eerie capitalist vision of perfection this place exudes somehow leaves him with the impression that break-ins aren't something that happens here.
He allows himself the rare indulgence of rubbing a hand over his face before he turns to the pantry to find some actual food for it, not sure exactly what labels he should be looking for, or whether it'd be cans of food or a grocery-store bag of kibble or something in the American sixties. The answer ends up being neither: he ultimately finds a cereal box style container labeled PURINA DOG CHOW, checkered with illustrations of a range of dog breeds, and pours what looks like an appropriate amount for a dog that small into the bowl beside the refrigerator. ]
me too! also thoroughly enjoying vasiliy in general
Sokka misses them, just like he misses Katara, Aang, and Toph. He misses his father. It could be a little easier to stomach that he's stuck here if he ended up with a head of household who understands that Sokka a warrior capable of deciding for himself whether or not he wants to eat — but no, he's stuck with someone who would fit right in with the Fire Nation, with the way he's trying to wield the little power he has in this house.
Sokka reaches to pet the dog again, a small consolation for the fact that he isn't allowed a fun name or any meat, but the dog hears Vasiliy pouring the food and leaves the table to hurry to his bowl. Sokka watches him go, but when he sees the box that Vasiliy is holding, he pushes his chair back from the table.]
What is that? [He stands so he, too, can hurry over to the dog bowl.] That's what you're feeding him?
[There's so much wrong with this place. There are so many objects and concepts that Sokka could list as being weird, terrible, or even creepy. This excuse for dog "food" is no exception. He reaches right into the bowl to pull out one of the chunks and holds it up to examine it.]
sdsdjfh thank you... world's worst state assigned father. cw vasiliy assuming everyone's eurasian
And it doesn't look appealing, or like anything that would contain meat at all, but dogs seem to like it, and allegedly it’s more nutritionally balanced—though he gets the sense that probably isn’t the case in this time period. The yet-unnamed dog (as far as he is concerned) doesn't seem to mind, though, all but inhaling the food with his face shoved into the bowl, bits of displaced kibble coming over the sides and skittering across the linoleum floor to spend the rest of their lives under the stove and refrigerator. ]
It's ‘kibble’. Meat and other things in pellets. Shelf stable. [ A bit of an industrial marvel, really. What if the Soviet Union had had the capacity to do this for soldiers on the front? ]
no subject
Sokka frowns at the piece of kibble, then looks down at the dog, coming to the conclusion that he's probably only eating enthusiastically because he isn't allowed the meat that he would surely pick over kibble if given the chance. But Sokka is a man of science, and so instead of just assuming, he pops the piece of kibble right into his mouth and chews.]
Ugh — [It's a strangled sound of disgust, followed by a higher-pitched:] No. [He swallows, since he figures that the head of household wouldn't approve of him spitting it out, then sticks out his tongue in an expression of disgust.] There's no way there's meat in that.