Final Investigation

[bathymetric]

Good morning, New Rapture. You may yet see the sun today.

But before that, there's work to be done. The Mayor has sent you some sort of ultimatum, though as usual was reluctant to explain herself. You're going to meet her, to some end? It's unclear. But one way or another, you're aware that things are ending today. Spirits may be low, but at least there's that. After a night of bowling, you're probably ready for this.

As you wake in the morning, though, each suite will find something unexpected in the common area, something that absolutely wasn't there last night: an envelope, addressed to the surviving members. An attached note on the outside reads as follows:

Good morning, citizens of New Rapture. In accordance with new directives from Designations: Misfire, Space Dandy, et al. I have been asked to deliver this. Please use the included to lift your spirits, and feel free to use your new bathysphere access to gain what information you can before you face the Mayor. You know what the key does, I gather, and the card will grant you access to Fontaine Futuristics Headquarters, where the Mayor currently resides. If you do not gather information properly, you will be unable to do what she is about to ask of you. Your friends will be watching.

Included in each envelope is a silver key, a limited Hall of the Founders bathysphere access card, and a copy of this letter. Your friends are counting on you. Go rally in the Hall of the Founders and get ready.

It's time for one last investigation.

Comments

[bathymetric]

[ It features a number of single-sheet information files on different young women, with a note attached to the front.

According to your parameters, Jack, these are the ones that fit best within dimensional range for this "Assistant" idea. I have omitted your daughter Angel from consideration per your request

There are files for...

Elizabeth Comstock

Karone

A few others.

And, at the back:

Eleanor Lamb. ]

[visiblepattern]

[...Huh. Well, this is going to be set in a pile he's designating as Stuff He's Definitely Bringing With Him. He'll see if he can find a box or something somewhere. But this is coming, it seems important.

What else do we have to look at?]

[bathymetric]

[ Well, in picking that up, you'll probably nudge the mouse a little, which will reveal the single browser window on the screen! It's like some kind of... electronic mail. ]

[visiblepattern]

[...Thank you for making this literally as easy as possible because otherwise it would not occur to him to do the standard mouse-wiggle.

All right, let's see what's in the weird man's electronic mail. His email, if you will.]

[bathymetric]

[ I live to stop ten comments of trying to figure out how computer go.

It's an email to Frank Fontaine, Handsome Jack, and some... random combo of numbers and letters from one Gunnar Maelstrom. ]

I appreciate this skeleton of an idea, of course, but there are improvements that could be made. What you've put together here makes it far too easy to win. If the purpose of the exercise is to reveal something about the participants' character, I suggest making it more difficult to stop the exercise.

I propose some sort of... let's call it a "trial." When someone kills, the others have a chance to confront the killer and suss them out. If they get it wrong, as you have put forward, they will all be "executed." But if they get it right, the killer is "executed" instead. I have a proposal for how that could be done, which I will attach to this message.

This is a fascinating theoretical framework, Mayor Fontaine.

[visiblepattern]

[All right, excellent. Since he has no idea how printer work he's going to just stand here and commit as much of that to memory as possible, and then...not poke around the computer further because I have faith in you to not make poor Forrest suffer any more than is really needed. Is there anything else in this immediate area, or should he move on?

(If it's move on time, then he'll be checking out the bookshelves next.)]

[bathymetric]

[ Bookshelves time!

Most are books on psychology or marine life! However, there's another folder like the Candidates folder tucked between two books. This one is labelled Evaluations. ]

[visiblepattern]

[Oooh. The books make sense given the décor, at least...

All right, let's take this folder down and see what it says in it.]

[bathymetric]

[ It contains a series of psychological profiles on twenty-two of the Founders. The exact contents aren't super important, but notably missing are two you haven't seen and Maelstrom himself. The latter of which makes sense, but the former two perhaps not. Compared to anything you know about the Founders, though, these all seem very accurate. ]

[visiblepattern]

[...Maelstrom, that's creepy.

...Because he's like this, he's going to go check out Ryuunosuke Uryuu's profile just to see what it says, and I assume it will be accurate? And because I'm like this, he'd see it on the way past, and it's been bothering me that we only have a shared initial and no gender for this one, please tell me A. Wesker is Albert and not Alex so I can move on with my life.]

[bathymetric]

[ Oh it is super accurate. In his personal notes section, Maelstrom thought he was a funny little man with a lack of ambition, basically, because he doesn't see a monetary value in serial killing.

... You're going to hate this, but thinking on it? If Wesker is a founder, they're not represented here. ]

[visiblepattern]

[...........

i hate you so. so much.]

[visiblepattern]

[ANYWAY he will actually make note of that, just because Wesker has come up before and this is interesting that they are not represented here.

Is there anything else on the bookshelves, or can he move on to the aquarium next?]

[bathymetric]

[ Gosh-arooney, Dal, that's some strong language!

You're good! Looks like the aquarium contains jellyfish, which are... it's a little grimy, but they are still in there! Looks like there's some kind of automatic feeding system that's still working. What a careful fellow this Gunnar Maelstrom must have been!

Next to it is a key with names for the Jellyfish! Most of the names aren't super notable, but the one named Carmen might be relevant later.

That's this room finished! ]

[visiblepattern]

[Well, if we're not in the Matrix and need to come back here later for things, maybe he will remember to tell people that Carmen and friends are in here... What sort of jellies are they, through curiosity?

And once that's verified, let's go see Room #11!]

[bathymetric]

[ Just some chill-ass comb jellies, looks like! They are Vibing.

Room 11 is... actually immaculate, in the same way the other rooms were. It almost looks like a room in a lab, all white and chrome, with a fancy glass standing desk, an empty chemical hood and work area nearby, an uncomfortable-looking Modernist Furniture Couch, and, of course, on the back wall, a portrait of the room's former occupant. ]

[visiblepattern]

[thank you lyndon for finally answering the question i have been asking for weeks now

...anyway Forrest doesn't know who the fuck that is so.

He'll go check out the desk first! What's on it, if anything?]

[bathymetric]

[ I am so sorry I would have answered it earlier but she's endgame-relevant.

There's a single thing purposefully laid out on it - a hardcover copy of The Castle by Franz Kafka. ]

[visiblepattern]

[It occurs to me, belatedly, that I'm going to spend this entire room uglylaughing OKAY okay of course she's got Kafka in here

He'll pick that up and flip through it, to see if there's anything she's left in it. Whether it's bookmarks or other third-party pieces of things, or notes or highlights around or near any passages.]

[bathymetric]

[ There's actually something written on the title page, in even black pen. ]

By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired.

- C

[visiblepattern]

[...He's going to end up taking this with him as well, just because who the fuck is C now-

and also because it's a pretty sentiment.

Is there anything else going on with the book? If not, how about the rest of the desk?]

[bathymetric]

[ Looks like whoever they were, they were on good terms with Wesker here! Since that is what her nameplate says on her desk. Alex Wesker. ]

[visiblepattern]

[How satisfied do you feel right now, Lyndon.

That said, he'll take note of that! Alex Wesker is also joining Lusamine and Azami in "Oh no, they're hot" territory. He hates everything.

All right, so we've found Wesker and her...uh, chemistry, he supposes. He should probably go look at that setup over there, if there's nothing else to be found on the desk.]

[bathymetric]

[ I have been waiting to drop Wesker's Crazy Sister for weeks.

Looks like gear to work with plasmids, and... it's been used relatively recently. There are a couple plasmid containers out that seem to have been mixed together in some way. ]

[visiblepattern]

[Do they look in any way familiar? Like, are we talking "this was messed with for Week 4" recent or "Alex shot herself and/or someone else up as she walked out the door this morning and so we should probably be prepared for the Mayor to shoot lightning at us" recent?]