Ceasefire - The Way Out

[mockmods]

[And then you wake up.]

[The room is dimly lit and made of pitted, industrial metals. You sit up abruptly on- some sort of padded table or cart? There’s a caged structure of metal piping surrounding you like a low barrier, but it’s open on top. You might similarly have a moment of panic about the straps holding you down or the electrodes on your head, but they’re just velcro and lightly tacked on, respectively, and in no significant way prevent you from sitting bolt upright and getting onto your feet. A series of twenty one such tables ring the room at even intervals. All but one has an occupant.]

[However long it takes you to notice, there a twenty of you again. Patches, the Trusty, and Yaiba, the Legendary Bassist, are back among your number. Penny, unfortunately, seems to be missing. Whatever you were wearing to the trial, or at the time of your death, you are back in the clothing you wore when you initially arrived. If anyone checks, CAREFULLY PLEASE, they will find that any powers they may have been missing are back.]

[The room is lit well enough, and there are computer banks and monitors around all the walls, which look to have been monitoring your vitals until just this second. Wires and tubes lead from each table to the center of the room, where a low pool is filled with a thick, milky-looking liquid that looks incredibly disinviting to touch.]

[A door rests on each side of the room, a glowing hand-sized pad beside each.]

[Welcome back, Participants.]

[Now, what do you do?]

((One clarification - any active powers that require some kind of power source or connection from your home worlds will either be not active or severely weakened.))

Comments

[windowsexplorer]

I don't know many people.

[Though she'll start looking anyway. There are only a few names she can recognize but they would all be Very Bad. Fortunately we've established that none of them will be on there.]

But even so, we need to find them...

[eudaimonikos]

Do we? Seems like they either escaped or died.

[windowsexplorer]

But they... but...

[Meredith is not actually Three Laws compliant in the Asimovian sense but she does have them programmed into her as guidelines to follow and the First Law has a tendency to ping especially loudly when she has reason to think her inaction might be letting humans come to harm.]

[eudaimonikos]

Well...

[Michael tries to be a good person, but it doesn't come naturally to a demon. Pretty much anyone questioning his judgement is likely to make him hesitate at least a little.]

...they're not here. Didn't seem to be any sign of them outside. I don't know where else we're supposed to look...?

[windowsexplorer]

Nnh...

[The problem is, she doesn't know. She just can't shake off the feeling that They're In Danger She Should Be Doing Something.]

[eudaimonikos]

[Mmmmmm. This sucks a little.]

Look. We already killed Hodgepodge, so this isn't going to happen again. That's good. And it doesn't seem like we can do anything about what happened before, so...it's fine. We can't fix everything.

[windowsexplorer]

[This is apparently a good enough argument for the Humans In Danger alarm to shut the hell up, but...]

Do you think they're all right?

[eudaimonikos]

[oh come on don't ask him that]

I'm sure they're fine. I mean - if all the prior versions of this went to plan, there's no reason to keep on doing it!

[Except that's kinda what one would do with an experiment? Ignore that, though]

[windowsexplorer]

[Well, it's what you'd expect from a real experiment, but Meredith still thinks mostly in storytelling tropes and the like. So that makes sense to her, and she perks up a little.]

Thank you, Mr. Michael.

[eudaimonikos]

...sure. No problem.

[...it's fine.]