PC: Tama 💀

[resumed]

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[resumed]

[ he considers her question. it doesn't really matter who "they" are in this instance. it wouldn't change his answer. ]

Aren't we all a little at this point?

[ballies]

Naturally.

But that would explain why they’re hiding away somewhere and leaving heroes to deal with hero problems. It doesn’t explain why people are suddenly killing though, or why there’s suddenly a rule about it.

[resumed]

[ ...here, he frowns. and he realizes that he fucked up a little but it's fine, better late than never. ]

I have something to show you, actually. Do you want the bad, or the bad first?

[ he is already reaching into his pockets for something. ]

[ballies]

[ … ]

Go on, hit me with the bad.

[resumed]

[ he takes out both a white piece of paper and his phone! he will give her the paper first. it says:

The stakes so far have been too boring. It’s no fun when all they do at the end of the day is go home, so for the next round, we’ll spice it up a bit. If they want a chance for anyone to return at all, they’ll have to take that chance from someone else.

One death each week is enough to keep the door open. Kill, or lose everything any of them have cared about. Let’s see how heroic they can be in those conditions. ]

The bad.

[ and when she's done with that, he hands her his phone. there is a photo of a different piece of white paper. this one says:

These heroes are unable to return to the worlds they call home while they have yet to win their competition. If a team loses, all those within the team, present and future, those worlds they hail from will come under the light of the moon. Those worlds will be forever changed with the loss of the heroes hailing from them. There is nothing better than a hero under distress.

By winning they will be putting their companions here at risk. By losing, their homes will be rewritten to be completely different, erasing their place within it. A dire situation indeed. A benefit no matter the outcome. ]

And the bad.

[ballies]

[ there’s just a long silence at this.







and then— ]

Those ASSHOLES. “It’s no fun”?????? “We’ll spice it up a bit”???? Get a hobby, learn to crochet, I don’t give a damn what you do, leave us out of it.

[resumed]

[ HELP.

well. he had expected her to react poorly so he's not that surprised, but he does jump when she starts yelling. ]

Those are my sentiments exactly. [ WHO ASKED FOR THIS AHHHHH. ] I don't know if either culprit knew about this before Thursday, but it definitely changes a lot of what we know and reminds us our hands are being forced here.

[ballies]

[ of course she’s gonna YELL. ]

Is this something you found about after what happened on Thursday? Neither of them were with you, so— unless someone else told them?

[resumed]

Yeah. When everything was over, we found the paper in our getaway car. The other three that were there found the other paper in theirs. [ there's a pause. ] I've never really spoken to Argalia. But Chiemi knew because we told her and a few others.

[ballies]

…

Who did you tell? [ me knowing logistically that would be too late for jan to react to, but icly like. damn. the timing. ]

[resumed]

...Will, Ace, Nimona, Reigen, Hung, Chiemi, Rita, Datz, and Lillium. We would have told Norma but she missed the text and didn't show up.

[ballies]

That's... quite a lot of people now. So there's a chance Chiemi could've acted on that information...?

[resumed]

That's what I've been afraid of, but I don't know for sure. All of us who spoke agreed not to give into it. So why would she...?

[ballies]

Unless there's something else in play. Something we don't know about yet.

[resumed]

There has to be. It's like we're starting to get pieces of a puzzle, but it's all the inside ones so you can't even tell where they're supposed to go. Where are our edges?

[ballies]

Right. We don't have the frame work, we just have snippets that don't make any sense. If Chiemi promised she wouldn't act on it, then I'd like to think she kept her promise.


So, does that mean something forced her?

[resumed]

...I didn't say she didn't promise. Just that we all thought it was a terrible idea. [ so it's entirely possible she chose to act. neither of them will know jan betrayed us long before we got the info. ] But I wonder if maybe it didn't matter to her.

[ballies]

[ ah, well. that's a little different. sorry jan, we know oocly chiemi didn't act on that info because it was past murder deadline, but icly she is tainted. ]

Risk versus reward. But now she's dead...

[resumed]

Yeah. It's not like we can ask her yet even if we wanted to. [ why is that a yet. ] But it makes you wonder the motive behind it all.

[ballies]

[ YET? ]

Motive, and methods honestly.

[resumed]

[ sometimes you commune with the dead and assume you might be able to keep doing so. ]

You think there're methods being used to coerce someone into killing somebody else?

[ballies]

People use hypnosis for driving people to actions sometimes. Some people here can control fire, I can manipulate electronics, Ryuki’s eye is a disco party.

I don’t think it’s weird to consider someone running this might be hiding a power of their own, do you?

[resumed]

...we still don't know what everyone's team powers do. And we don't know that there aren't other powers people just aren't talking about. I hadn't wanted to really consider it, but it's starting to look like there aren't other options, are there?

[ballies]

Other than finding out where these higher ups are grabbing them by the neck?

… My team’s powers aren’t enough to be able to manipulate someone into murder. [ she sighs. ] You haven’t seen anything like someone acting suspicious? Someone who knows more than you think they should?

[resumed]

I've been looking, believe me. Someone has to have a better idea than we do. It doesn't make any sense that everyone's in the dark. But I'm not even sure what I should be looking for at this point.