Non-Peace Weekend - Investigation

[mockmods]

[Two weeks have passed since your arrival. The Researcher has delivered a pair of motives, promising to reward some or punish others if rule 7 is not enacted by the end of the week.]

[Today is Friday, the deadline for your incentives. There is no morning announcement today.]

[Maybe It's nothing, but you might notice a faint, odd metallic scent in the air as you exit your bedrooms this morning.]

[Proceed with caution, Participants.]

Comments

[windowsexplorer]

[She has a key and she has Penny's faith and it would be irresponsible not to act on these.

So she's gonna casually stroll into that room, trying and probably failing to look inconspicuous, and put the key in the lock.

(Yes, she still has the first aid kit. Shh.)]

[mockmods]

[There's a tense moment as the key slides into the lock and turns, clicking-]

[And the small panel it was set into swings open without resistance, to reveal a small, glowing-green pad inside, set into the wall at an angle.]

[eudaimonikos]

[Oooooh, death door's open! Michael wanders over, having finished inspecting the remaining mannequins.]

Did you know that wouldn't kill you?

[windowsexplorer]

[Oh hi, Michael!]

I found a key. There's nothing wrong with using a key.

[Not namedropping Penny in case it would get her in trouble.

Let's check out this pad, shall we?]

[mockmods]

[Sure does look like something that needs to be pushed! Which I feel okay assuming Meredith does, because Meredith.]

[The pad blinks, giving a small electronic chirp, and the door slides open smoothly.]

[And you're immediately hit by the acrid smell of burnt metal and plastic.]

[windowsexplorer]

[A safe assumption! And a terrible smell.]

Be careful. It smells like something caught on fire in here.

[And she goes on and steps inside. What ridiculousness do we have in here?]

[mockmods]

[Looks like it was a pretty nice office and workshop, once! Which has since been burned to shit in more than a few places.]

[windowsexplorer]

[Yikes.

Well, we might as well get searching. Let's check out the office-y areas first. We got anything like, say, a document that still has legible bits?]

[mockmods]

[There look to be quite a few file folders scattered around, in various states of burned, actually! But what's probably more pressing is yet another body lying on the floor.]

[windowsexplorer]

[OH GOD DAMMIT.

Anyone she recognizes, perchance?]

[mockmods]

[Hard to say, given that the upper body is burned as all get out like large chunks of the office. The body from the abdomen down is pretty untouched, which would make for some pretty gruesomely biological sights and scents, were it not for the fact that said upper body has been reduced to a charred and melted metal endoskeleton, destroyed circuitry and wiring fused into the frame that supported it.]

[Sorry Meredith, you've found one thoroughly decommissioned android.]

[windowsexplorer]

[Congratulations, you've given this evidence to one of the few people in the game for whom it being a robot might actually make it worse and who also doesn't have nearly enough distressed-looking icons.

Speaking of things that make Meredith need distressed-looking icons, about how big is this ex-robot? Penny-sized, bigger, smaller?]

[mockmods]

[Maybe a little hard to tell, depending, but it looks to be about half a foot taller than Penny-sized. It's also built in the general shape of an adult man in a simple black suit rather than a teenaged girl.]

[aragona]

[Sonia follows Merideth into the new place that is actually interesting. Burnt stuff sounds not cool for the vampire, so she's going to inspect one of the less-burnt areas of the room.]

[mockmods]

[There's a work desk of some kind that's mostly unburned!]

[Which is good, because the unburned half has a big stack of books in varying sizes.]

[aragona]

[Nice. Sonia picks one of the smaller ones. It might be a notebook with top secret log entries.]

[mockmods]

[This one's a thin, staplebound pamphlet that looks like it could've been made at any Kinkos or Repro Depot. The title is printed on the cardstock cover in simple Times New Roman.]

Technomagical Fusion: Development of the Spirit Core Battery
L. Miller

[aragona]

["Spirit Core" sounds like an occult topic. That's something...Sonia is not an expert on but maybe she'll recognize a thing or two!

She checks out the first few pages before skimming through.]

[mockmods]

[It's pretty dryly written. But if Sonia takes some time to even skim a little- sure does look like some kind of necromancy. Specifically, pulling spirits from the afterlife and preserving them in some kind of crystalline matrix?]

[eudaimonikos]

[Well, what's here to look at that Meredith and Sonia don't already have? Assuming nobody's going to ask the literal demon's opinion on the afterlife stuff happening over there.





honestly he probably wouldn't be that helpful anyway]

[mockmods]

[Well, remember that page of notes you found the other day, with the sketch of the cute toy robot?]

[There's something very similar looking sitting on the charred half of the desk Sonia's inspecting. At least as much as you can tell under all the carbon.]

[eudaimonikos]

[Ehhhhh. You work in Hell, you get used to the char.

Michael idly scrapes a little off what ought to be the robot's head with his thumbnail. Does it look totally unworkable, or did we just lose some outer layers here? He thinks robots might be a little more capable of losing those and still working than humans are.]

[mockmods]

[Looks pretty intact, overall? Why a toy robot was built to withstand fireball temperatures is a bit of a mystery, but this one's held up better than the computer it's plugged into.]

[If he's inspecting it closely, there do seem to be a few areas of detail hidden under the grunge.]

[eudaimonikos]

[Well heck, let's get some more of this grunge off then!]

[mockmods]

[Well, there's one kind of big area on the front, in a recessed panel. A subtle etching that reads "YOUR LEARNING PAL" in large, friendly letters.]