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oddsandends2021-11-26 06:20 pm
mytarget) wrote in oddsandends2021-11-26 06:20 pm
97th ♫ | i'm not lonely at all! i'm not lonely at all, although. . .
You know the script. You wake up in a place you've never seen before, with a whole bunch of complete strangers and there's a mysterious voice or a mascot or what have you ready to let you know how things are going to work around here.
The rules are simple: You're trapped here, with no hope of release or rescue. You've been provided with all the basic necessities you need to live comfortably, and all you have to do is settle down and live out the rest of your days here in peace. But if you can't do that -- if you're really so desperate to escape that you'll do anything -- then there's one teeny tiny thing you have to do first.
All you have to do is kill somebody.
But it's not quite that simple. Every death will be followed by a period of investigation, followed by a trial in which the survivors will attempt to solve the mystery and out the culprit. If the survivors guess correctly and out the culprit, the killer is executed and life goes on. But if the survivors guess wrong, then the culprit is free as a bird and everyone else is executed.
Even with the promise of freedom, can you really bring yourself to kill so many other people?
tl;dr: it's a murdergame meme. TIME TO HAVE A BIG OL' MURDERGAME BLAST.
Settings
- 1. High School A classic! Doesn't matter if you're too old or too young to be in high school -- you've been enrolled and the only way for you to graduate is to kill a fellow student. But hey, the faculties are nice!
2. Tropical Island Weren't you just hankering for a nice tropical vacation? No? Too bad! You're going to have a nice sunny vacation at the beach and if you don't like it, just kill someone and go home. Simple!
3. Prison It doesn't matter if you don't remember committing any crime; you've been tried and found guilty of something or other and now you can go ahead and rot away in jail. If you ever want to see the sunlight again, better put that criminal mind to good use and get rid of your inmates.
4. Mall A huge mall stuffed full of stores, places to eat and all the regular amenities like deadbolted doors and the threat of death. It's like Black Friday but even worse because you can't leave and all the rest of the shoppers might actually kill you for real this time.
5. City Holy shit, you've got the run of a whole city this time around! Maybe with all this room to keep out of each other's way, you'll be able to make sure no one starts killing people. But probably not.
6. Cruise Boat YOU'RE ON A BOAT, MOTHERFUCKER. The accommodation is all five star, even if there's no one around to act as wait staff. The only snag is that you still have this whole murder thing hanging over your head – but on the plus side, they have those little drinks with the umbrellas in, so...
7. Space Station THE FINAL FRONTIER... Maybe you're familiar with space stations like this or maybe all this future tech is fascinating to you. Not like it matters either way, of course, because you won't be getting out of here unless you lay down a murder on someone.
8. Wildcard! None of the above scratch your murder itch? Go wild and come up with your own setting!
Downtime
- 1. Excuse Me, Who Are You? You've just woken up in this weird place and you have no idea what's going on. But hey -- maybe this stranger's more informed than you. Or maybe you can put your heads together and investigate what's going on.
2. Social Link Go! Well, if you're going to be stuck in here for however long, you might as well get to know the people stuck in here with you. You've got plenty of rooms to explore together and there's enough to do to keep you occupied. How do you plan on passing time without killing each other?
3. Vending Machine Woes Somewhere in this place there's a mysterious vending machine that spits out all manner of bizarre items and occasionally dispenses items that belong to you and the other people trapped here. You've got a fat stack of tokens and nothing to lose.
4. The Corners of My Mind So as it turns out, your lovely hosts have been fiddling with your memories. Maybe you're just discovering this now or maybe you've had a particularly upsetting memory regain you're dealing with.
4. Wildcard! GO WILD AND BE FREE (or as free as you can be here, anyways)
PUTTING THE MURDER IN MURDER GAME
- 1. Motive Your mysterious overseer has decided there's not nearly enough murder going on and so they've ~helpfully~ given you a little push to do the deed. Maybe one of your loved ones is in danger, maybe they're offering more money than you could ever dream of or they're threatening to reveal your deepest darkest secrets. Whatever is it, would you kill for it?
2. Murder WELL APPARENTLY, YES. Are you a killer or are you being killed? Either way, someone's not walking away from this alive.
3. Body Discovery Rise and shine, murdergame! It's a brand new day and someone's dead. Better get investigating!
4. Trial You know how this one goes. Line up all your evidence and sniff out the killer -- or sit there and sweat and hope no one works out you're the murderer. Will they go down with a confession or put up a fight?
5. Afterparty You've survived another trial, but more of your friends have died. Even without the executions, trials are a stressful enough affair. It's time to destress and lick your wounds and support each other.
6. Mastermind It's the end. It's time to uncover all the mysteries behind this murder game -- and find out just who trapped you here. Are they really an unconnected party, or is the mastermind someone among you...?
7. Freedom Just as it says -- you're finally free, but at what cost? Have those you love been returned to you, or are you still reduced to just those who made it to the end? Are you on your own, or is anyone here to help you? And more importantly, how the hell are you going to get home?
8. Wildcard YOU KNOW WHAT TO DO
OPTIONAL FUN
- Lots of murdergames have in-universe public profiles for other characters to get the skinny on yours. If you'd like to fill one out to post with your toplevel, peep at the code below!
continued cw above for the whole thread honestly
She's been digging her knuckles into her forehead for most of the trial so far, quiet and a little distant as she turns the facts over and over in her head. This whole spectacle is just that – spectacle. It feels so performatively cruel that someone has to be putting on a show here. But who? Those she'd think would be cruel enough to set something like this up wouldn't have the patience – and of those who did, she couldn't imagine them being quite this cruel.
So who could be?
She's letting the troublesome thoughts circle around in her head when she hears Shannon speak up and it breaks through the noise sharply and cleanly, surprisingly so for how quiet Shannon's voice is. Ryoko lets it linger before she speaks up in turn, quiet enough for the others not to hear just yet. ]
Have you thought of something, Shannon-san?
no subject
She looks over at Ryoko, feeling unsteady at this last step. There will be no going back after this.
She'd been prepared since the morning, even before they discovered the corpses... but stepping out from in front of the fire to reveal herself to everyone else in this cavern rather than acting the part of a shadow puppet still felt apocalyptic. A metaphorical cataclysm that she detonated a literal one to avoid confronting.
But she can't let this go on for any longer. Especially when the lives of so many others, not just Ryoko, rest on her shoulders—and she knows now that trying to give the burden to a roulette would never produce the miracle that she hoped for.]
...I'm sorry for lying to you, Ryoko-chan.
[There's a small, exhausted smile on her face for a few seconds as she says that. Somehow, it's more genuine than anything that Ryoko has seen on her face before.
Then:]
Ahhh, it's no good. [Her voice rings out, less speaking and more orating. Her voice is nothing like anybody's heard out of Shannon before—a few heads turn, almost expecting to see Battler on her podium instead of where he is arguing right now. It's an octave or two lower from her usual chirp, rougher and volatile.] Ahahahaha... I said it's no goddamn good at allllllllll-
[She gulps.
Then, the steel is back again, and her finger whips out, pointing at one of the podiums.]
HARIME!
[The index finger is leveled squarely
at
Battler.
The room is shocked into silence, and Sayo uses that spare moment to begin fashioning a new mask. A shoddy one, Frankensteined together from a dozen different fragments of a story, one that will fall apart the instant this trial is over... but it'll do for now. The hidden detective, the spy who was waiting for the opportune moment to strike, confident and full of righteous fury now that she's been forced to abandon her cover. That will work; half-truths form the best lies.
Sayo slams her hands onto the podium, cutting off an eruption of babbling and exclamations before it can start with the sound.]
For the duration of this trial, we've been assuming that just because we found Nui Harime's eyeball that she was really, truly dead. After the state Cú was found in, it only makes sense that the other corpse was similarly mauled, riiiiight?
[No, no. Reign it in. Bringing the witch out now will only damage her credibility, nevermind that she seems completely insane for her personality turning on a dime.]
And that's where you've all been wrong this entire time. The first clue should've been in how Harime's corpse was completely splattered as opposed to Cú's, which while cut into pieces was still recognizable as the Hound of Chulainn! The kind of damage inflicted on "Harime" could only be done postmortem. If we spin the chessboard around—ahahahaha [she can't restrain the desperate, manic laughter that escapes at that turn of phrase, even as she imitates Kyrie's signature finger snap]—we need to ask:
Why was Harime given special treatment as opposed to Cú, or even Spamton?
The first motive is some special distaste. While we can't rule it out entirely, it seems unlikely; Harime is annoying at the very worst, but hadn't done anything to make us hate her enough to desecrate her corpse that badly. There might be some secret grudge involved, but if that was the case, why not solely target her instead of getting two more people involved, even in the case of some ridiculously elaborate double-bluff? Strike it out.
The second motive is some dissociative fugue that would cause the killer to lash out violently. This one is even more absurd. Putting aside how Cú's corpse would've been in just a bad a state, somebody under that sort of effect wouldn't be able to reliably plan a closed room this complicated. Strike it out.
The third motive is to hide the true cause of death. Once again, a reasonable question, but if the killer had access to a method that would be so identifiable so as to instantly levy suspicion at them, we should have been able to find at least some indication of its existence somewhere, either as a physical feature one of us possesses or as an item gifted to us by our illustrious host. [Sayo has never been particularly fond of Knox, but his rules do apply in this circumstance.] It can't have just popped up out of nowhere. Strike it out.
From there, the "what-ifs" only grow more absurd. I won't list them all at this point. The only reasonable motive for desecrating the corpse like that that remains is to hide its true identity.
Which, of course, is a point that we've been over several times, and have since dismissed as who would be insane enough to pull out their own eye for the sake of setting up the perfect crime, much less still be functional and able to nigh-perfectly imitate one of us hours afterward? The answer is simple.
Somebody whose eye was already so damaged that its nerves were deadened and it was useless anyways. Might as well cover it with an eyepatch, isn't that right, Harime-san?
[She spits that name out with such venom that nobody but Ryoko will notice the trembling in her voice.]
But of course, nothing is absolute. You can contend the Devil's Proof all you want in this case. This is just a theory.
...however.
Ryoko. We never found Harime's ID card, and "Battler" didn't approach her discarded pile of clothes even to fetch it under our noses.
You were with me while I was... recovering in the hallways. So you saw.
If that is all the case, how did Battler enter Harime's room to investigate?
no subject
Sorry for what? she doesn't get a chance to say before something in Shannon's expression – breaks, perhaps, isn't quite the word but Ryoko still feels like she's watching something fracture and start to come apart. The more Shannon talks, the faster she speaks... the less Ryoko can keep up.
And the more she feels that something strange is going on here. Maybe she's being ridiculous – can she really say any of them know each other here, when they're all primed to hate and betray each other in this way? She certainly can't say that she knows Shannon, when practically all she's seen of the girl are pained smiles that don't reach her eyes.
But this still doesn't feel quite right.
It's only when Shannon turns to Ryoko that she's jarred into action, her response falling out of her mouth before she can vet it. ]
Wh–what are you– are you trying to say Battler-san already had Harime's ID?
no subject
The first is to arrest attention, to get all eyes on you.
The second is to direct it where you want your audience to focus.
The third is to captivate their attention.
The fourth is to give them a specific area to focus on.
And the fifth is to sustain that control. After all that, the actual sleight of hand is practically an afterthought.
That doesn't mean that Sayo isn't fantastic at that afterthought, though. A childhood of harmless pranks (and botched attempts at setting up hypothetical locked rooms out of morbid curiosity) on top of having to put her very best effort forward to keep someone else's childhood dreams alive has left Sayo with an impressive array of tricks in this department. Not that many of them matter when really she's just sneaking Lucifer into her hand.
Sayo feels guilty for an instant, knowing that she's using Ryoko as the final piece in this gamble.
Guilt has never stopped her before, though.
In the few seconds of everyone's eyes being on Ryoko, Sayo strikes. Pounding a steel stake into a human skull takes significant effort, but the shape is surprisingly aerodynamic, and likewise after two years of practice Sayo has excellent aim. She's never used a stake like this before, but the principle is easy enough to understand, and so before anyone gets the chance to see what she's doing she tosses it.
The steel spike flies through the air at a trajectory that, if it isn't stopped, will hit Battler in either the chest or throat and kill him.
It being stopped, however, is exactly what Sayo is gambling on.
There's the sound of cloth tearing (with an uncomfortable undertone of flesh ripping), and the stake is knocked out of the air by a parasol.
Nui Harime, Champion Couturier, is alive.
Battler Ushiromiya, Champion Detective, is dead.]
...my case rests.
[A flurry of activity erupts in the courtroom, confused exclamations and remands leveled Sayo's way, before Nui takes all of the attention with her own unhinged ranting.
Sayo doesn't respond to any of it. She just... stands there, shoulders hunched. Lifeless, almost. Like a puppet with its strings cut.]
no subject
So it's a little unsettling to realize how easy it might actually be to do so.
Not that anyone could get out of being cornered like that. It takes them minutes to settle on who to vote for and though Ryoko still feels they're not getting the full story, what choice do they have?
The execution goes off without a hitch – not that Ryoko pays the slightest bit of attention to it. Her mind is fixed on the young woman at the podium beside hers, still quiet and still not saying a word. It's not until they're all back upstairs, the fussy types all bustling around and making food and getting things in place for one of their grim little afterparties, that Ryoko finally gets a chance to approach. ]
You knew all along. Didn't you? [ She doesn't mean it to sound like an accusation, but it ends up coming out like one. ] When did you figure it out?
cw: alcohol, bad coping mechanisms, technically underage drinking, full bore spoilers
And the atmosphere only gets worse when Sayo finally stumbles in with a third-empty bottle of bourbon in one hand. It may take some survivors a few moments to recognize her—without all her makeup, especially the foundation that hid the dark circles under her (stained red from crying) eyes, she seems like a different person entirely. Swapping the maid uniform for a loose-fitting tee, faded jeans, and some sneakers from the vending machine is also a new look for her. Plus the sudden, conspicuous lack of huge bahonkadonkers may provoke some double-takes.
Perhaps to rub it in, everyone's IDs all ping at the same time, giving them a notification about a profile update:]
Age: 19 | Species: Human | Occupation: Author
Likes: Mystery novels, pranks, fantasizing about revenge
Dislikes: Serving the Ushiromiya family, her expectations being betrayed, gold
Traits: Cunning, unstable, creative
Trivia: Hypothetically, her bodycount ranges anywhere from zero people to seventeen, but this Sayo's total kills add up to five.
Kyaaahaha! I really hoped somebody with enough cash to splurge for something as ridiculous as this deranged game would at least have better taste in alcohol, but even Kinzo's bottom-shelf absinthe is better than this, pfffft.
[Still laughing (desperately) to herself, Sayo flops onto one of the couches set up, deliberately sprawling in such a way to make her seem as odious as possible and to keep anyone from sitting down next to her.
Which doesn't keep Ryoko from approaching, of course. On a turn of a dime, her expression changes to something more melancholy and genuine as she traces her index finger around the lip of the bottle.]
...of course I did. Same for most of the other cases, too. [Sayo lets out a derisive snort.] Except for the second one. Having to deal with such bizarre alien physiology threw me for a loop. I almost have to thank our third week's culprit; if she hadn't given herself away in such a ridiculous fashion, I wouldn't have considered Nui disguising herself so perfectly as a possibility.
[And then she's suddenly back to uncannily bright, cheery, and perhaps a tad unhinged.]
Buuuuuuuut, I could hardly ruin the surprise for Battler now, could I?! Seeing him contort his poor little brain into so many delightful knots was downright delicious. Plus if I acted too out of character, why, that'd be giving the entire game away! And I couldn't have that, could I?
no subject
Ryoko – and all the rest of them – didn't know anything at all, did they? ]
Well, the cat's out of the bag now, it seems. [ Or rather, the box. Not that Ryoko would know. ] Are we supposed to expect more performances like that at future trials?
no subject
No point in acting all demure and clueless anymore, is there? It's easier to be a great detective during investigations, anyways. All the Poirot-types are too busy making jackasses of themselves to feel grief, so that might be a good model.
Hm, but I have been on a Columbo kick recently, so that's another tempting option...