Take Responsibility.

[kingmakereffect]

And after a given amount of time, those elevator doors at the end of the first-floor corridor open up; as it was last week, the ride down is smooth and quick-moving, even if there are less of you this week. (Technically, you're only down by one in the elevator; Bruce has ensured that Pearl is with you in some way, albeit unconventionally and by the grace of Ziploc.) However, when the doors open up to the podium circle standing in the middle of that black void of a courtroom, there's no mistaking the fact that there are fewer people present than there were last week – Kamui and Pearl have joined those with podiums draped in black, their framed profile portraits watching the proceedings in shades of grey. It's still impossible to tell exactly where the Kingmaker is watching the proceedings from, though it's obvious that he is; he'll wait until everyone is settled before he speaks, his voice coming from everywhere and nowhere all at once. "Devoted has been taken from you. All of you know what the stakes are now, but this happened anyway – looks like someone's determined. Whether they succeed or not is up to you." Twenty-four Survivors remain. We'll see how many are still standing by the end of the day.

Comments

[notjustawriter]

I guess that's what we need to find out.

[lackinginfaith]

[Caren's bandaged hand goes to her shell pendant again. She frowns.]

In that case, what do you think is important about someplace else?

[cherryblooded]

Not entirely sure. The handprint, maybe, but you'd think if that was noticed the culprit would have cleaned it up first.

[By the way, is Caren wearing white?]

[lackinginfaith]

[She's wearing her obnoxious purple jumpsuit, so the only things white on her are the bandages on her hands.]

[cherryblooded]

[Noted! And about how clean is Caren's sledgehammer? 'I used this like for two seconds' clean or 'I just washed this' clean?]

[lackinginfaith]

["Pretty much untouched since it came out of the machine a week ago" clean. The one Sigrun licked is clearly the real murder weapon, sorry.]

[cherryblooded]

[Darn it.]

[notjustawriter]

[.....]

How'd you get that injury?

[captainobnoxious]

She was picking up glass I smashed for a message in a bottle.

[notjustawriter]

I see. You should be a bit more careful, gettin' cut by glass can be pretty severe.

[lackinginfaith]

[sigh] Yes. Sigrun... helped me with the bottle. I thought there'd be a clue in there, but it was just smudged and illegible. For all I know, it was written with one of those haunted pens, anyway.

[notjustawriter]

I got one of those myself.

I guess it was shoved into the bottle just to be annoying, and not anything helpful.

[penduli]

What was the message? [ ...this has nothing to do with the trial but he's just. kind of curious. ]

[captainobnoxious]

It was really water damaged and bleeding, so we couldn't tell. A total waste of time!

[lackinginfaith]

We couldn't make it out. It was a complete waste of time.

[penduli]

[ you two are so alike and on point today ]

Well, that's disappointing. What's the point in putting something in a bottle if it's just going to get wet?

[notjustawriter]

To be misleading? I dunno what else it could be.

[penduli]

[ Ugh... ]

The one cool thing to come out of the vending machine, and it's just useless.

[lackinginfaith]

[Caren takes another sip of Ramune.]

I don't know, there's usually food in there too.

[isafraid]

And quite a bit of clothing, actually.

[penduli]

[ Food, clothing... drink. ]

I wonder why... Ah, is that stuff any good? [ Motioning to her drink! ] I got some too, but I haven't tried it yet. I think it's pretty neat there's a marble in the bottle though.

[lackinginfaith]

It's nice. Got to be careful of course, but.

[captainobnoxious]

[don't say that one's too serious]

It was probably wet before. Maybe from their tears.

[penduli]

Paper dissolves in water if it stays in it too long, so it couldn't have been wet that long.