DAY 01

[thecomputer]

[Good morning! The doors unlock at 07:00, the enforced sleep effect wearing off just a few minutes prior. As you file out into the facility for the morning, it won’t take long to figure out what’s different. The first clue is probably the corpse in the Central Hub - the body that formerly belonged to Seryu Ubiquitous.

Once everyone’s up, there is an announcement from Friend Computer.]

Good morning, Citizens! Last night, participant Seryu-R-CIT-1 was terminated due to Communist action. In addition, one participant was successfully converted from a Citizen into a Communist. There are now 13 Citizens and 6 Communists.

Trial 01 will begin at 20:00.

[At 08:00, the usual fleet of cleaning droids will clear up the corpse and surrounding mess.

On the profiles list, Seryu’s full User ID is now visible, and her status has changed to DEAD.]

Comments

THE BODY

[thecomputer]

[Seryu Ubiquitous is lying against the wall, next to the door to the Loyalty Chamber. An arrow appears to have been fired into her heart. On top of that, her mechanical right arm has been removed, and is instead locked around her own throat in a death grip. Three sets of bloody footprints originating from her head off in different directions, but fade before they get anywhere. Next to her, the word “JOHNNY” is written on the wall in blood.

Power has been cut to Seryu's PDC. In one hour, the body will be claimed by maintenance.]

[dictator_ko]

[As soon as Moge-ko sees the corpse, her stomach begins to rumble. Meat. Actual meat. Not like the 'food' she was forced to eat. Meat!]

Meat meat meat meat. ♪

[And she starts to cut into Seryu's corpse with her spiral-tipped knife.]

[staunton]

[ ........ ]

...What the hell are you doing? Stop that.

[thefaceofjustice]

MISS! PLEASE REFRAIN FROM MUTILATING THE BODY WHILE THE INVESTIGATION IS UNDERWAY!

[in_plain_sight]

Moge-ko. Stop.





...That's going to taste bad.

[Appeals to decency and the spirit of cooperation obviously aren't going to cut it. You deal with people like Moge-ko by learning to speak their language.]

[cantarellacookie]

[Anthy hangs back and doesn't bother to approach her--for obvious reasons--but she's staring at Moge-ko with a look of shock and disgust on her face. The disdain in her eyes is palpable.]

[thefaceofjustice]

...Alright everybody, stay calm! I'm a detective.

I'm going to ask that nobody disturb the crime scene during the investigation!

[YEAH JUST... GOING TO EXAMINE ALL THIS CRAZY SHIT NOW...]

[staunton]

Find anything aside from the obvious yet, Mr. Detective? [ You know, like the arrow, the arm, and the message on the wall. ]

[notikea]

I'm going to check the body while you investigate the crime scene, if you don't mind, mister detective.

[angry_jerk]

Oh sure. Trust the police.

Like that's ever worked out for anyone ever.

[cantarellacookie]

[Anthy approaches eventually.]

Mr. Fullbright? I heard you talking to Mr Knightley about the name? Do you think any of us have been admitted into the exercise under false names?

[harshwords]

Well, looks like my hunch was right.

[ Rin's going to check the footprints nevertheless. Do they have any specific shoe sizes or are all of them just the same? ]

[fullonbraced]

[Robin is just... over here, pressed against the other wall. She can't handle any of this.

She'd promised this girl that they're figure everything out in the name of justice... why did this have to happen?]

[thefaceofjustice]

[A moment of silence for JUSTICE...]

[alchemicals]

...hey, kid. Get the hell out of here.

[It's not a command; it's quieter than that, still harsh because that's just his way but he's not angry. If the kid wants to stay then he doesn't really give a shit; it's just...something to say.

Granted, Kimbley's not looking at Robin; his gaze is fixed on the body. He doesn't seem troubled by it; he's just...taking it in for the time being, because that's a fun thing to wake up to first thing in the morning.]

You don't have to stick around, I'll tell you what we find.

[decrees]

[Logan isn't exactly good at comforting people, but the last thing he wants to do is get near the body. He approaches Robin, hands clasped behind his back.]

Are you alright?

[Well, that's kind of a dumb question, isn't it? He tried though!!]

[stinkingdeadendjob]

[... Oh. It's the girl who didn't know what a communist was. Clay looks down at her body blankly, while the rest of his body seems to be shaking and jittery. He has a tough time staying still, but the man tries to make the best of it.]

... Huh. She was a robot too. [Is really all he could say. He takes a swig of air.] Say, I think I'll go and, uh, look for commies. In my room. [The man tries to walk off.]

[lexicalscope]

Not a robot, a cyborg.

[Curly felt like she needed to draw that distinction, but she's not going to stop Clay from leaving. Not that it matters. Robot or not, this girl is dead.]

[plentyfriendly]

[Phi does not touch anything. She just thinks.

Who would have had an arrow? "Seryu was terminated due to Communist action", so if it was her, they would have used it against her. The others... no one sticks out. But there must be an explanation.]

[ossifragant]

There's no need for you to stick around and look at something like this.

[It seems a few people have stepped forward to play detective already. Whatever all this is, he doesn't even know how to begin to process it.

Greed's never dealt with murder scenes like this before.

Though maybe he should say something else instead of standing around awkwardly.]

I don't know much about detective work, but it seems a little too staged to me.

[schrodingers_man]

[ It might be surprising that Yomiel makes it in time to see the body with how long it must take him to style his hair, but he does make it to the Central Hub near the end of the hour. When he actually sees the body, though, he freezes. He's seen dead bodies before--he's been one and he's made a few, too, but it's never been like this. He was already dead then, he couldn't smell it, the smell of blood in the air, the way his stomach automatically turns in response to the sight.

He drops to his knees, and the maintenance robots are going to have more to clean up than just the body, because everything in Yomiel's stomach comes back up and spills out over the floor. FunFood's not any more fun coming up than it is going down, but he's not thinking about that. He's not thinking about Seryu, either. His mind's filled instead with images of a little girl shaking her mother's body, the phantom smell of dynamite, a man in a white coat lying in a limp heap.

What has he done?

Revenge? Making them suffer like he did?

What's wrong with him?

Unless somebody sees fit to intervene, he's going to be hunched over here like this for a while. ]

[murimurimuri]

[Upon seeing the body, Keyes yelps and flops over like a Southern belle with a case of the vapors. Money the Monkey, apparently used to this sort of thing, leaps to safety.]

[ossifragant]

[When Greed sees the body, he pauses.

He's not really interested in playing detective. Why would someone leave such obvious clues at a murder scene, anyway? Accidental clues, certainly, but this? They're being toyed with.

He doesn't feel anything about her death; he hardly knew her, after all.

He'll stand there for a little while in respect for the dead before leaving quietly unless stopped.]

[alchemicals]

Oh, that's cute.

[After rather unceremoniously telling Robin to get the hell out of the room, Kimbley will be taking the time to...walk up to the body and just kind of kneel down next to it. He's not doing anything to it, per se; just...studying it quite a bit, taking in details.

He's a bit too still while he does it; after a moment he does touch, grabbing her hair and tipping her head back a little more so he can get a good look at her face. Once...whatever that was is taken care of, however, he'll just be getting up and leaving.

He seems weirdly unaffected by the entire ordeal; if anything, he seems calmer now than he has since everyone arrived.]

checking stuff!

[standbyrival]

[. . .holy shit. Paul doesn't get too close to it at first. He doesn't actually care that this particular person died, but rather there's a DEAD BODY there at all. There's no telling who it could be from this point on.]

[after a bit though, he does make his way over, squinting at the blood in the wall and the tracks. He stands next to one--just how big are they compared to a kid's? And is there anything to note on the bloody JOHNNY message from up close?]

[also this is a little placeholder til tomorrow whup]