week 3

[airlockedmods]

Week 3

[Come week 3 of the Champion Excellence Program the high-flying feelings that came with the dodgeball game last week has dissipated, especially after the...everything that was that trial. Satan Mask sure was a thing that happened.

Just like last week, right on the dot at 7 am, the mechanical woman's voice chimes to awaken the remaining champions on Sunday morning. After the initial wake-up call though there's a new message tacked on:]

Congratulations, Champions! By surviving your second trial, you have unlocked the third floor of the ship. A new mini map has been added to your P.I.P.! To access the second floor please stand on the teleporter and select the floor you wish to be teleported to.

[And again the Champions are awakened they have regained one new memory from the ones they've lost. Starting again on Sunday, as well, Jamie and Bolton will be back to their usual office hours in their usual locations.]

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday


[ooc: welcome to week 3, everyone! Check-in has begun and don't forget to submit your memory regains!]

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SUNDAY

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MONDAY

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TUESDAY

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WEDNESDAY

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THURSDAY

[airlockedmods]

Motive: Ouija Board Not Included

[theoverseers]

[Tuesday comes, and it's once again Bolton's turn for a motive. He doesn't hold his office hours on Tuesday, but the announcement comes once again for everyone to come to the cafeteria. Bolton enters with a flourish, wearing a dark blue pinstripe suit with a pink tie. Jamie, in a blazer over a t-shirt and jeans, looks not enthused.]

Welcome back, Champions, it's time for another motive. I don't have a handout this time, so I'll make it quick.

What would you do, if you had the chance to send a message to one person. Any. Person. Living or dead. Would you take the chance to tell someone you loved them? Or to tell someone goodbye?

[He steeples his fingers. Jamie, behind him, levels a flat, unimpressed glare at the back of his head.]

As usual, this week only you can find out for the low, low price of... Drumroll, please! [Bolton turns to look at Jamie, who crosses his arms and looks away.] Really, J? No? Fine.

If you want the chance to send a message to one person, all you have to do is kill someone and get away with it! Simple, right?

[The door to their side whooshes open behind him, and Bolton turns to see that Jamie is leaving. Immediately distracted, he turns to follow.]

Hey, wait, Jamie, where are you going?

[curdle]

[ She wakes with wet cheeks and a pounding heart. There's no cute locational prelude to it this time; there's no putting the facts of the dream aside to explore, no distracting herself. In her handmade sheet shift/dress, Thomasin bursts forth from her room and runs straight ahead, without the capacity to think of anything but how she must go, leave, filtered through the last words she heard. Her mother's words, ragged with grief, full of hatred. For her.

Of course, right in front of her room is the cafeteria hall, so that's where she goes. She doesn't exactly get there quietly. If anyone bothers to follow the loud stomping and clashing, she's curled into a ball at the exact place where she tripped and fell, sobbing in the ugliest way imaginable. That place happens to be in front of the espresso machine, her back against the counter beneath it. Her face is somehow both white and red from weeping, and the hair she's kept relatively neatly braided for almost two weeks now is a mess. There's genuinely no other prompt here, it's just her crying. Loudly. If you happen to be an asshole and just wanted to get coffee too bad, that's on you buddy.

She never leaves the first floor. After whatever happens in the cafeteria, you can find her crying in the shower or not crying in the art room, where rather than making anything, she's drawing something in her sketchbook with crayons. From her arm movements, it looks more like she's trying to grind the crayons toward an untimely end and the drawing is just incidental. ]

[voltrounds]

[After the announcement, Ricky checks out her dumbwaiter and--well, Thomasin's already up, but hopefully Natsuhi wasn't planning on going back to sleep, because Ricky's scream of terror at 7:03 AM is probably loud enough to wake her right back up.

Obviously she hasn't been murdered or anything, because after having some breakfast, she sets out exploring again and makes her way to the arcade. She makes straight for the zombie shooting game and starts blasting away.

When that eventually gets boring, she ends up in the greenhouse, where she can be found attempting to take stock of all the plants. Which is going to be difficult since she doesn't actually recognize them, but at least she can identify fruits and such.]

[ratherdoweddings]

[Yurika wakes up and lays there for a while, shaking her head. Was he really...? But the last dream seemed like it had taken place after, so he couldn't be gone. Could he? If these were memories, they weren't coherent. That's all she has to tell herself. Make sense of it. It's just what it is, right...?

She looks at the envelope from week one that she still hasn't gotten rid of, hugs the photo on her desk, and gets to work.

In the morning, Yurika will go to the cafeteria before the hot breakfasts are over, then explore the new floor. The arcade gets a quick look-over, as does the greenhouse, where she notes all the plants.]

Maybe I should tell Jane-chan about this...

[Finally, she enters the holodeck. There's no playing around in here. Instead, Yurika's stopped cold in the doorway.]

Just like home.

showers

[ratherdoweddings]

[This morning sucks, but Yurika still has to shower and... okay, the actual showering can wait, someone is crying in there.]

Is that Thomasin-chan?

greenhouse

[ratherdoweddings]

Isn't this amazing? I never thought they'd have something like this in here, with all that stuff they made us eat down in the kitchen!

[voltrounds]

Right? If they have something like this, why do they even need all that freeze-dried stuff?

[ratherdoweddings]

Maybe that theory that they just wanted to remind us that we're in space is true. That's what they used to eat in space a long time ago, since nothing else would keep.

[voltrounds]

Or maybe they just wanted us to be miserable.

[ratherdoweddings]

That's also true. At least now we have ingredients. Jane-chan will be happy!

[voltrounds]

Yeah! She'll probably have all kinds of ideas.

[theoverseers]

[Bolton ordinarily visits the espresso bar in the morning to get the coffee that sustains him through his office hours, but oh.

That's- that's a teenage girl sobbing her eyes out on the floor in front of it.

He moves slowly so as not to startle her, and then just kind of. Sits on the floor next to her. He doesn't touch her, but he's there.]

Can you hear me? Just breathe. Easy now, just focus on my voice and breathe...

[curdle]

[ It takes a bit, but after a few steadying breaths a small voice comes from the stall. ]

Yes.

[cyan_maid]

[Our people have waited for centuries for the Four Nobles to arrive, and it seems we will wait centuries more. We will wait so long that apparently we will all die waiting? That's what we're supposed to do they say. It's just a big waiting game up in here. And when the Nobles finally arrive, then apparently THEY have to wait too! We're told they cannot summon the Speaker of the Vast Croak without help. So they must wait for another four to arrive. Gods they say. Together they will raise the Speaker and fight invincible demons I think? I used to think I understood our folklore. It made me happy to think about greeting the Maid. But then it all changed, and now its kind of complicated and distressing and sad? Ah well, I'll just keep building crypts and carving tablets like I'm told.

It's not the last thing she remembers, but out of all the tablets Jane had found in the Land of Crypts and Helium, this is the one that sticks with her when she awakens, along with the imprint of the silence, the grey, the crypts and skeletal trees, the veins of flowers and plants that yearn for the world above, the lights of lanterns and Lil' Sebastian's pitter-pattering feet as he scampers to and fro. Despite her sadness, it had been liberating to go wherever she felt and solve puzzles at her own pace, so compared to last week she has a bit more strength of heart. She's in the game. One hurdle has been cleared - and from the sounds of things, if old tablets from long-dead salamanders can be trusted, she'll have some time to work things out with everyone. For now, however, one thing is clear: the Maid of Life is indeed her Occupation.

Today she won't beat around the bush - she goes up to the new floor as soon as she's washed and breakfasted, spending the morning examining the facilities of the greenhouse. It's...actually nice to be around plants today, and to see a wealth of cooking options before her. Those pigeons are really cool, too - the sound of cooing birds, even if they look like weird galaxy bath bombs, is soothing, and she'll end up pocketing a couple of dropped feathers to clean and keep, but feel free to find her quietly examining what's available in this little piece of almost-home. For the afternoon, Jane is in the sewing room. She can't sew with those machines if her life depended on it, but someone is extremely sick of her skintight silver footie pajamas, and dangum it, she is going to attempt a thing!! Look, there's even sewing patters, so a red circle skirt shouldn't be too difficult, right?

...Huh, what do all these symbols on the pattern even mean. How does she figure out what her size would be. What even are these terms in the directions. Someone please keep her from making something completely awful.]

[curdle]

[ She's reached a point where she's so distressed she either can't identify Bolton's voice or is taking whatever comfort she can get despite it, because Thomasin does indeed hear him. She heaves ragged gasp after ragged gasp until they settle into something that at least distantly resembles normal breathing. It takes a while.

Only when she's calm enough to look up and actually see what's around her does she seem to recognize the person who talked her down. Her eyes cloud with a mix of confusion, pain, and anger, but no fear. ]

Why?

[theoverseers]

[He keeps talking, keeping his voice gentle as he just says the same words over and over and over. Focus. Breathe. That's it, easy does it. All while keeping his own breathing steady and even and just loud enough for her to hear by example.

When she comes down enough to notice him, his expression is sympathetic, but guarded.]

You were having a panic attack. Do you feel a little better now?

[curdle]

You ask how I feel?

[ oh boy here we go ]

Thou wouldst do better to leave me to my panic and fetch thy damned [ damn-ed ] coffee! [ Thomasin scoots away from the espresso machine and Bolton. The worst thing is that she does feel just the tiniest bit better. Her voice is too shot and wavering from all the crying to really sound like a threat despite her glower. ] There, it is clear of me.

[theoverseers]

[Bolton raises his hands non-threateningly when she moves, but he doesn't say anything. He stands and turns to the espresso bar, steaming some milk and pouring syrup into one of the cups. He turns the milk off a little early, so that it's warm but not hot, and pours it over the syrup, stirring it and leaving only a little foam on top.

Only after he's satisfied does he approach her again, and only to get on one knee and hold out the cup to her.]

Here. You saw me make it, it's safe.

[curdle]

[ WHAT IS HAPPENING

She takes it on instinct and then continues to hold it at arm's length. Thomasin knows it is safe. She bites back the urge to tell him that, however. At least it is warm. ]

He is dead.

[ Without the anger, she just sounds hollow. ]

He was always dead. All through the se'nnight I drove myself mad a-thinking of what could happen, and he was dead.

[imnotfat]

[...looks like Togami wasn't kidding when he claimed that study room as his. The test has been over for days, yet Togami just remade the poster that says 'PROPERTY OF BYAKUYA TOGAMI'. Huh. Well, what's one going to do, right? Let him have his study room, there are another three available to you!

The writing on the whiteboard has been modified.

AA - FT - KL (K1) - OM (K2)
CL (K3) - HY (V3-2) - IM (MISS) - OS (TRAITOR)(SUICIDE)
EJ (PUNISHED)- IK (V3-1) - MS (V1) - YH
FC (V2) - KK - NM - HEAD (MISS)

BYAKUYA TOGAMI: SURVIVED"

Six, maybe seven or eight people remain. That doesn't bode well for his classmates. How many remained from the game? Could he be the Champion Survivor because he's the only one who survived?

Anyone who enters Togami's Kind of Private Study Room will see the whiteboard covered in the bedsheet again. It's not for public knowledge, but since there are a couple people aware of that other game he decided to leave it there instead of erasing the whiteboard and writing that stuff in the privacy of his room.

Togami has fabric obtained from the sewing room and is working on it, though. Wearing this toga has gotten old already, so he's making himself actual clothes. Togami was never the kind to be that good at sewing, though. He knows pretty much the basics, so the end result is looking...unusually average for someone who has such a high opinion of himself. Anyone who enters is asked one thing, without him even raising his eyes from his work:]

Do you have someone you're particularly close to?

[In this spaceship, he means. What's up with that question?

Maybe you'll also find Togami in the greenhouse, looking at the galaxy-patterned pigeons with attention. He's covering his nose and mouth with a piece of fabric as if it was a handkerchief, but he's looking at those with curiosity. Such an unusual pattern and color...you know how valuable those things would be if sold? Space pigeons that lay edible eggs! It'd be a new Togami business. How to obtain a few of these once this game is over?]