Week 6.

[trustmods]

WEEK 6 Losing three people in one week isn't very nice, is it? Morty Smith, Rakka, and Dio Brando have all joined the deceased. It will be hard to forget them. It will be even harder to forget that execution and Dio's flying, screaming head. Life must go on though and as usual, the group has at least a little bit of time to recover. Saturday can be dedicated to rest and sleep; on Sunday morning, the clock chimes the hour at seven o'clock. The stairwells are clear of bodies; there's no more death to be dealt with for the time being. Unless, of course, you happened to recover something particularly unfortunate in your dreams... Once again, there's a new floor to explore; your reward for doing your job well. Some of your antics have resulted in more rule changes, effective immediately. You might want to avoid breaking those if you're fond of staying alive. But then again, there are ghosts. Maybe dying wouldn't be so bad after all. PARTICIPANTS REMAINING: 18 PARTICIPANTS REMAINING: 17

SUNDAY | MONDAY | TUESDAY | WEDNESDAY | THURSDAY

[OOC: Welcome to week six of Trustfell! Save your threads for coins and the coming week's activity check; don't forget to check in to this week's activity check and submit your memory regains as well!

The Letters and Switchboard posts are still active to be used at your leisure, for the sake of contacting the jerk who's keeping you here!]

Comments

[perpend]

[Cabanela smiles; even at his worst, he's going to be putting on a brave face, because he knows how important keeping morale up is, especially as things have started to get bleaker and bleaker over the weeks.]

I wouldn't mind the company, Mordecai.

[...]

It would be veeery nice to have a happy memory, for once.

[forcegalactic]

[With his best "welcome to my saloon" smile, Mordecai walks to the other side of the bar, facing Cabanela. He's drank with friends before, but he's much more used to this setup than sitting on the same side of a counter.]

...You also kept havin' bad ones so far?

[perpend]

[He nods, giving his best attempt at holding it all together.]

Haven't had any good ones so far, not exactly.

Just a handful that aren't an utter disaster.

[forcegalactic]

...Bein' a lawman is hard work, I have to say. It's all hearsay on my end, but the Marshal's often complainin' how bad things get when he's out fightin' outlaws.

[He can't even guess how bad Cabanela's memories of work could be.]

...Wanna talk about it?

[perpend]

I can try.

Where do you want me to start? It might get pretty confusing, what with the discussion of ghosts and the like.

[forcegalactic]

I'm already aware that ghosts exists, George, I won't be too surprised.

[he pulls the stool on his side closer and sits on it.] Hit me. What kinda ghosts do you normally deal with?

[perpend]

It wasn't that I don't think you'd believe me, it's more that I don't understand all the details myself.

[But he starts in the story just the same.]

Ten years ago-- a bit longer, now, a man was suspected of leaking national secrets to another country. I was charged with interrogating him, then.

I was a young man, had just been promoted, and I was too cocky. I made him think there wasn't any hope.

.....and then I made the biggest mistake of my life; I left my gun in the interrogation room by mistake.

[forcegalactic]

[..........A hard, long stare.

"Huge mistake" does not even come close to describing that.]

And they let someone new in charge of somethin' big like that?

[perpend]

[Cabanela gives an uneasy laugh.]

It wasn't like I was new to the police force. I was just... cocky. Headstrong and full of myself, and quick to wanting to show off to one up a friendly rival I had.

[It's horribly embarrassing to admit. How could he have done something so terrible to someone?]

....the man escaped with my gun. He ran into the nearby park, and took a small girl hostage.

[forcegalactic]

[Holy. Why do there have to be so many headstrong and cocky people in the multiverse? Shit like this keeps happening.

Let him hold his folded hand to his forehead for a few moments.]

...Did she turn out alright?

[perpend]

[....Well at least he's not cocky anymore? He's mellowed out his since early 30s.

....accidentally getting a man killed will do that to you.]

...Yeah. She's my baby-- ended up joining the force, not too long ago.

[But it's very obvious there's more to this story.]

[forcegalactic]

[Don't we all mellow out as we get older? Except Dio, of course. It's all a matter of how long the process takes.

Too bad it took an accidental murder for Cabanela to grow out of it.]

Oh. So she's like your...apprentice. [He recalls a conversation they had weeks ago.] This girl is the same one you talked about earlier? The one you take time to look after while she works for you?

[perpend]

That's right. I've done everything I can for her.

[.....including editing her test scores so she could actually join the force, um]

...She was saved, by a good friend of mine; he'd just joined at the same time as me. But he didn't get a chance to shoot the man.

[forcegalactic]

[It's sweet of him to do something like that. Bring her under his wing, teach her everything like being sort of a father to her.

...Good thing Cabanela didn't mention the score fudging to Mordecai out loud.]

Why not? Did he escape? [Minor villains escape arrest all the time where he's from. Nothing unusual, but it's worrisome.]

[perpend]

...No he didn't escape.

Before my friend-- before Jowd could shoot him, a meteorite came crashing to the ground; a chunk of it broke off and hit the man in the back. It killed him instantly.

[forcegalactic]

[......]

...That's one of those moments you have to wonder how everythin' aligned so perfectly. [Lucky Jowd?] Is this where the ghost part comes in?

[perpend]

A "miracle of the gods", that's what they called it.

...a few years after the man's death, things began to happen. I began to investigate the possibility of a "manipulator".

[forcegalactic]

Manipulatin' how? [He leans in to listen better to the story.]

[perpend]

Impossible events started happening-- a singer who leaked national secrets live on television; a man who managed to hold the chief of police captive. Neither should have been possible and yeeeeeet they both happened.

It's not like people will believe you when you start spoutin' theories like that, so I started looking into it on my own.

[forcegalactic]

Well, it ain't impossible if there's a huge conspiracy behind that, but that may well be a crazy theory on its own.

I take it your theory was a ghost was behind all this.

[perpend]

No, actually it wasn't.

I didn't learn that a ghost was behind it until recently.

[forcegalactic]

Oh? What did you think it was before that?

[perpend]

To tell you the truth, I wasn't sure.

Someone was manipulating things, but how, I didn't know. Spent years on it, even after I met the Professor. I learned he was workin' on the same thing I was, and tracked him down.

[forcegalactic]

Right. And I guess that's the "mad" scientist you mentioned before. No wonder you'd call him that; ghosts ain't exactly the most scientifically approved topics of studies.

[perpend]

That's right.

But we didn't know there was a ghost responsible for it-- he didn't even believe me, once I figured it out. It's noooot something a person wants to believe.