week 6

[airlockedmods]

Week 6

[Six weeks. Twenty-three Champions whittled down to just seven. Where the halls of the station once felt crowded and loud now they're empty and echo when someone speaks too loudly. Again, the Champions will find themselves experiencing strange dreams on Sunday night but outside of the usual wake-up call there is no new floor announcement from CECE.

Like the trash compactor last week, the infirmary is pristine and sterile once again. As if nothing had ever happened.]


Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday



(( Welcome to Week 6! Don't forget to submit your memory regains and turn in your benefactor threads for sweet loot, too! There's going to be no AC this week.))

Comments

THURSDAY

[airlockedmods]

[in4apounding]

[Thursday finds Penny in the Art Room in the morning. She's working diligently on a drawing of a group of people, mostly young women. It might be possible to recognize the facsimile of a dark-haired girl in a red cloak at the forefront of the group, if you've seen some of the simulations Penny's made in the holodeck; and Roxy might be able to hazard a guess at the identity of the stern gentleman in military uniform at the back of the group. As with most of Penny's work, it's fairly middleground. People are generally recognizable but she's clearly an amateur.]

[Also of not is a canvas set off to one side that's been absolutely brutalized with rough slashes of paint, and parts of it splashed over entirely. It might be possible, looking closely, to make out the visage of Rox Petuu drawn onto the canvas underneath the vandalism.]

[Later in the day Penny is back at it in the Holodeck, fighting with intense focus against a holographic enemy that only has enough detail to look like an off-brand Crash Test Dummy with a pair of swords. She's swinging Shovel-kun with intense focus, alternating between using it as a staff and swinging the bladed end.]

[The win/loss ratio looks to be about 40/60, if anyone watches long enough to keep track.]

[Shovel-kun stays with her into the evening, apparently, as she starts patrolling the station around the nighttime announcement.]

Art Room

[airlockedmods]

[Hey Penny, do you feel like you're being watched?]

[in4apounding]

[Well when you put it in bold text like that, how can she not? She tenses for a second, instincts telling her something is off. She carefully sets down the pencil she was working with, then whips around, taking a step back as she does so.]

Who's there?!

[airlockedmods]

[Standing still over the spot where she was found dead what feels like an eternity ago, Chitose Karasuma doesn't say anything, just watches silently. Her wound is still there, and still bloody.

In short, she's still de- yeah yeah we get it.]

[in4apounding]

[Well, that sure was a scream. And taking another step or two back, because WHAT.]

[It takes a second for the initial shock to wear off, and Penny takes a cautious step forward. This isn't real. It can't be.]

[It looks pretty darn real.]

Miss Chitose?

[playthedamncard]

[Early in room 22, Kaiba has retrieved some scissors and is staring intently in the bathroom mirror, his now odd-angled bangs between fingers. Even does a few snips, an attempt to even out the sides, but he's not happy with the work, or happy with much of anything.

Later, when he's out and about, he's a little less bandaged and a little more patchy, with a haircut to boot. Whatever damaged skin is still visible still looks bad, but healing. It's going to take time to heal into whatever nasty scar tissue it's going to, but it's not infected at any rate. He doesn't appear self-conscious of his image, but neither does he call any attention to it. He adds more tributes to the yard sard and downs some coffee and calls it a fucking day.

jk this is kaiba what is rest After the...debacle in the cafeteria yesterday, Kaiba is going to do an experiment, because he is a scientist, damn it, and reproducible results are a must. He counts himself lucky that nothing had happened in the infirmary, and he's not about to take his chances in the trash compactor, so he goes to the pool to see if any more of these ghostly apparitions appear.

Whether anything happens at the pool or not, he ends up in the art room sketching out some people and scenes, some fantastic monsters and some distinctly not. If, later on, you happen by the memorial wall, some of these sketches are taped up by each and every name. Apparently someone decided to associate some cards from a certain game with everyone, if the style is anything to go by--though any names or descriptions are left out.

At some point, he specifically seeks out Bolton. Why? Because it's Thursday. Surely they can't break D&D tradition now...

Later, in the evening, he leaves a note under the remaining survivors' doors: Meet for movies tonight.

It's a bit sappy and friendly for him, but it's what Max would've wanted. He doesn't believe anyone left would be willing to kill for a shoddy motive like this, but keeping people as together as they can be, at least for a time... Well, if they aren't going to tabletop, it's the next best thing, right? So in the media room, and in true Thanksgiving fashion, it's a meta analysis of plot holes in classic science fiction movies, for as long as they like.]

Movie Night

[in4apounding]

[Just. Squinting at the screen.]

...I have no idea what's supposed to be happening.

[playthedamncard]

In the movie itself or in the colorful commentary?

[in4apounding]

...both? But more the movie.

[Her hands are gripping at her skirt as she sits, leaning forward just a bit, eyes narrowed at the screen.]

[playthedamncard]

Honestly, that's kind of the point. Movies with poor budgets, incoherent scripts, the less-than-B movies. It's probably better to try not following whatever it tries to decide the plot is.

room 22

[le_mat]

[Akira was just kinda lounging, reading one of the D&D books since his attempt at the library yesterday was fruitless. Doing so for long still hurt his head, but he was getting better with small bursts]

You alright in there?

[playthedamncard]

...Maybe. [It's when his hand starts shaking, a minor tremble, that he puts the scissors down and runs his other hand through his hair as if he can muss it up in a way to make it look a little less like a chunk got burnt off.] I'm just trying to straighten my hair out. Would you believe one of the few things I haven't studied is hair styling? [As if that's what the problem is, like he couldn't just take a straight edge across his forehead and snip away. Besides, Akira's the one whose hair is probably never going to grow back in quite right.]

[le_mat]

You could just shave it.

[as if they had the equipment for that anyways. He pads over, leaning on the doorway]

[playthedamncard]

Tch, could you imagine? I'd look like a cancer patient. No, I like my hairstyle. I've had it for years and it's only gotten more refined as I've grown.

...Which isn't enough to make a damn cut so difficult.

[dejabrew]

[Bolton's not hard to find. He's about where you'd expect him to be, namely the cafeteria. Nursing a cup of coffee.

Listen you don't get a Champion title by being subtle, Kaiba should know that more than anyone.]

[playthedamncard]

[Ha, subtle, good one. Kaiba slides into a chair across from him.] So I'm thinking that even though it wouldn't necessarily be in character to keep collecting bones for the bone church, we could still use the bones for something else in the future. Weapons? Or a society that barters in something gruesome like that? It almost seems like a waste of effort to ignore it.

[dejabrew]

[It takes Bolton a full second to snap out of his reverie and buffer enough to realize what Kaiba's talking about.]

I don't-- I don't think we're gonna have D&D this week.

[playthedamncard]

[He blinks a few times.] ...No? But that's your thing. We play every week no matter who's gone.

Closed

[le_mat]

[Akira hadn't been in the storage room since Miki died. But after finally getting to say goodbye, it feels... fitting to come here. It's inching up on late- the movie night just finishing up, and everyone else still in the media room. He won't be gone long, and hopes no one comes looking.

It's harder to get up on the shelves then it used to, but he manages]

Hey CECE... Most of this isn't for you, so don't worry about answering. Still... Thanks, for all you've done to help us.

Anyways. I... dunno if anyone else will ever see this. Other then Petuu I guess. But I wanna do it either way. I told Seto I'd never do letters, and I'm not going to. Plus I have a feeling that, if something happens tonight there won't be anyone to read them anyways. We can't take another death, I think. Not after Max. I'm not giving up hope, I'm gonna fight. But I get it- fighting might be the last thing I do. I think everyone else are thinking the same thing too.

If we're lucky then Petuu and Blaze will be dead. Even if CECE can't send us home without them, I think I'd be okay with that. But if we lose then... I guess I just want to leave something someone else might see someday.

Mom, Dad... I know I wasn't always the kid you wanted. That I pulled shit and hurt you. But I... I love you, and miss you so much. Morgana... Everyone. I hope you're still fighting back home. I know you'll be okay. Cuz you're stronger then me.

Bolton, Jamie, Marisa, Penny, Roxy... Seto... I wish we all coulda met outside here. But I don't regret anything we did. Not one bit.

[he rubs at his eye, exhausted ]

I... feel like I should have something big and important to say. But I don't. I guess just that I'm sorry. And... goodbye.

[he climbs down, meaning to catch the end of the movie, go back to Seto's room, and sleep. ]

[dejabrew]

[It's not until Thursday that Bolton actually goes back to his own room, for the first time in a while. And he finds a bunch of things.

His typewriter and his pills stay in his room. He changes into his own clothes, pleased at the sight of his red-dusted old and filthy birkenstocks.

The sword he can guess who it belongs to, but unfortunately a falchion is too big to fit inside of his trunk so he carries it to Lucina's room and leaves it laid on top of her trunk.

Everything else he takes out with him when he goes to the cafeteria, setting it up on one of the tables while he cracks open the coffee and sets about grinding enough to make a full french press of it. He has the brownies within eyesight, and once he's sat down with his coffee he carefully takes a bite from one of them. Coffee has given him nothing if not a nuanced palate, and he is well-versed in these particular brownies, so the minute that he's realized he's kind of fucked himself he giggles.

And then gets a knife and portions out a couple of the brownies into very, very small portions. Like 1/8ths.

If Coffee Dad's gonna get you all high he's at least gonna be responsible about it.]

[le_mat]

[akira as usual was lured by coffee, but-]

Whoa, did someone bake?

[dejabrew]

Nnnnot quite - though if I had the stuff I definitely would've been making these before now.

I found them in that dumbwaiter-looking thing, in my room.

[le_mat]

We should have the stuff for brownies in the dinner...

[Guess who doesn't know the scent of pot nearly well enough to get what's happening here]

[dejabrew]

Yeah, but if anyone's gotten any weed I sure didn't see it.

[He says, as he slices the next brownie into tiny bites.]