FINAL INVESTIGATION

[bathymetric]

Good morning, passengers. You've made landfall.

The ship arrives at the shore of the island early in the morning, suddenly grinding to a halt for the first time in weeks. A ramp is lowered directly onto the beach, and The Captain almost immediately hops down it, laughing the whole while as he does. Jones stands on the ship, not following, and The Captain addresses you:

"Don't take too long! We have business in that lighthouse, you and I."

Without another word, The Captain heads towards a path on the beach that heads lighthouse-ward, but not before turning back again.

"And Jones! Head to your ship and ready the crew for when this is over."

Jones seems... not quite content to do this, whatever it is, but after a minute or so for any last conversation, he vanishes into a wall.

With both of your captors no longer on board, the ship is quiet. Its engines are stalled, the journey over. If you wish to survive the day, you're going to have to go onto that island and face The Captain once and for all.

But first... there are some areas you definitely haven't explored yet! If you're going to go in with all the information you need, might be time to take advantage of this situation...

Comments

[bathymetric]

THE RITUAL OF WATER AND LIGHT

If power o’er life and death ye seek
And of the earth and rot ye reek
Then if ye be brave
But fear ye the grave
Then I pray yer guts be not weak

First seek ye souls thirteen times two
And make of them a drafted crew
But choose carefully
For there be rules, ye see
And qualifiers I must give to you:

[ Well, that's probably promising. ]

[jibunwo]

[excuse him while he mentally counts their original number in his head...yep! he hates this!]

[Hit me with those terms and conditions, baby. What else we got?]

[bathymetric]

First ye must needs a saint
And a mortal tormented by fate
A hedgehog, a flower
A clown who won’t cower
And a man who’s in coin worth his weight

A man brought back from the dead
A boy with a price on his head
A man of mettle, one of chalk
One who has to demons talked
And two lovers with something unsaid

One who fights for their nation
And one who seeks a rise in station
A globe-trotter
One who treads water
And a bird experienced in divination

A mother, two sisters, the friend of a brother
One whose body hides yet another
One from a north
One from a south
And one by another’s shadow covered

[ There's a last bit, but this gets its own comment, I feel. ]

[jibunwo]

...That's alarmingly specific.

[who the fuck requires a hedgehog in their arcane ritual]

[much less explicitly a magic fucking bird]

[bathymetric]

[ Sure is!

There's a conclusion to the ritual below, it seems, if you're interested. ]

[jibunwo]

[while i spend twenty minutes crowdsourcing a poetry class, let's take a look at that grand finale]

[bathymetric]

Take you these score and six souls
And thrust ‘pon them the roles
Of prisoners of thee
For in that role you see
They will help grant ye your goals

To end ye this ritual fast and true
Fire and blood will see ye through
But failing that
Don your finest hat
And patience will be your power’s glue

Set them to kill one another a while
And ‘scape judgement in a fair trial
Interfere ye not
Let simmer the pot
And ye shall take reward from their guile¹

When brave ye the deadly triangle
And find ye the destined isle
Proceed to the tower
And within reasonable hour
A vote will the power ye seek from the island wrangle

[jibunwo]

[...yeah that's definitely far more explicit instruction than he expected. cool, they're going to have a trial to unleash dread nyarlathotep.]

[What's the footnote?]

[bathymetric]

[ Funny... it's been torn out. ]

[jibunwo]

[oh for the love of--OKAY SURE]

[Anything else suspect about the book or the desk area?]

[bathymetric]

[ There's a folder labelled VENDING MACHINE in one of the drawers? ]

[jibunwo]

[Oh, this is going to be cursed.]

[Against his better judgment, Lelouch will in fact pull that out and page right on through it.]

[bathymetric]

[ The folder contains several pictures of the vending machine, printed up glossy and nice, with a number of hand-written notes pointing out various features and irregularities.

A note is attached at the bottom. ]

Look. I have no idea where this thing came from? No one on this stupid ship does. But here it is, and I guess maybe it’s a part of the whole ritual thing? Some kind of… ancient magical vending machine? That my ancient magical business partner didn't know about?

Sure. Makes as much sense as anything else. I'll just have Jones feed it to his stupid baby giant squid if it acts up.

[jibunwo]

[...that bitch is haunted]

[why is the vending machine haunted.]

[why does Dread Green Flame Ghost Cthulhu not even know]

[bathymetric]

[ It's probably fine?

Anyway, all that's left is... ooh, there's a button on the underside of the desk! ]

[jibunwo]

[Lelouch vi Britannia, rebel leader, chessmaster, and all around miniature Machiavelli, is surely nowhere near reckless enough to just-]

[beep]

[bathymetric]

[ It calls up a video screen!

Oh hey, you can see the Group 3 folks in a bedroom! ]

[jibunwo]

[Huh. Is there a microphone or audio setup anywhere here?]

[bathymetric]

[ There's a call option and a change camera option! ]

[jibunwo]

[oh god in heaven why did you give any of this to lelouch.]

[He'll change the camera first just to see what else it's covering.]

[bathymetric]

[ Seems like he can change to any room you've accessed on board. ]

[jibunwo]

[yeah, that's about what he expected.]

[...He shouldn't be 'an actual seventeen year old child' about this, but let's swap over to team 3 and hit that call button.]

[bathymetric]

[ ring ring! if any of team 3 wants to chat a little (though please save discussion of evidence for the trial), the screen in Jones's bedroom is now active and cannot be turned off from that end ]

[jibunwo]

This is your ship's current Captain, Lelouch vi Britannia, speaking.

[WHY DID YOU GIVE HIM THE BROADCAST EQUIPMENT]

Do not adjust your set.

[sivard]

[Well that gets Zaveid to look around wildly. Why do you torment the fantasy world man so, Lelouch]

What? Where are you?