vivarium | CALHOUN HOUR

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CALHOUN HOUR - SURVIVOR

At the crack of dawn, presumably, Calhoun gathers everyone in the first floor warehouse to make an announcement.

"That's right, it's time for another of my special events!" He seems pretty pleased with himself. "I noticed you lazy, fat test subjects really let yourselves go last round! It's like I don't feed you here or something."

"Well, I'm worried about your health, always lazing about and not getting proper exercise. So, I decided to be the change I want to see in the world, and so we're going to do something a littttttttllllllle different this time."

"To stop you guys from getting soft from all the fun you're having here, it's time for a little workout."

From one of the doors Calhoun never lets anyone go through there's a loud, metallic banging sound repeating, as if something is trying to get out. Calhoun does not seem troubled at all by this. In fact, he seems pretty excited.

"The rules are simple, everyone's getting sixty coins to use as they see fit. You'll notice the vending machines on both warehouse floors. Anyone who isn't caught will even get a memory back." But what does that mean?

"So go on, survive for 23 hours, I'll even give you a five minute head start. Good luck!"

And with that he scurries off. Should people hang around they'll get to witness that same door open five minutes later. From the door comes several figures, human in shape but something is very, very wrong.

They seem to be robotic, skeletal humans. At one point they must have had some synthetic skin over them but most of it seems to be melting or ripped off. They don't move very fast, mostly they shamble about until they focus on a target. Better hope it's not you!

BASIC INFO ✖ FIRST TEN HOURS ✖ LAST HOURS ✖ POST EVENT MINGLE

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Hershel considered that for a moment, hand going to his chin. "I suppose she must have been desperate, whatever it was, though not enough to make any truly rash decisions, thankfully. You might have saved her life in the end, if she had killed one or all of you I can't imagine it would have ended well for her."

Let's be real, Kudou and Randall are jerks they deserve each other. Hershel gave Heiji a dry look. "I'd say hopefully ones with less spider pits but quite frankly I expect you to show me up in that regard as well, the way your memories are going."

A puzzle?? Hershel's certainly interested. "Oh, do tell." How did he remember a puzzle from this memory... Oh right, his own. "Yes, I did, nothing nearly as exciting though. I remembered a dinner with my parents, apparently we were celebrating the day they adopted me." He sounded thoughtful as he spoke. "I'm glad for the memory, I finally remember their faces and names. Lucille and Roland Layton- at least I know who to look for when all this is over."

Heiji looked genuinely surprised. "You were adopted? Was it when you were a little kid? Was there cake?" Not that he really knew Hershel's parents, of course, but it sounded like he'd been close with this father, at least. No vaguely disapproving, distant adopted parents for Hershel, apparently! That was probably why he was so nice and polite and uncomfortable when stabbed.

He took out a crumpled piece of paper and wrote out the code:

puzzle

"You gotta end up with seven digits. Oh yeah, and I should mention that Kusukawa was apparently a gambler."

Nailed it Heiji, that's why he's well adjusted sort of and not insane like the stab brigade. "I don't know, I think it must have been when I was young though." He said, hand going to his chin as he thought it over. "We were definitely all very comfortable with each other, so it couldn't have been that recent, and even thinking about them now I don't really think 'adopted parents' so much as 'my parents.'" And he smiled. "No cake, though I wish I had gotten this memory earlier, I would have liked trying to make the dish Ma did." Probably some british nonsense.

But okay, puzzle time. He took the paper, scrutinizing it. "K, Q, J, A?" Those were the only letters. "That's King, Queen, Jack and Ace, right?" Gambler and all. "If those are converted to numbers it's 13, 12, 11 and 1, right?"

"I bet she made some really great food," said Heiji, not projecting his own longing for normal, non-gruel food at all. "But it figures that you got along with 'em. You seem like that kinda guy."

Yes, good job, Hershel! Heiji smiled happily. "Now you're talkin'!"

With the face cards converted to numbers, the code became:

vlcsnap-2014-10-05-11h59m02s74

But Heiji couldn't resist giving Hershel a little hint, anyway. "At this stage of the game, you gotta look for patterns, and things that seem out of place."

"When you visit London maybe she can make you some." Hershel offered, because even from one memory he knew his mother was the type that would want to bake Heiji like a thousand cakes for being a good kid stuck in a shitty situation. His expression fell a little. "I hope they're both alright." Talk about a shitty situation, their son vanishing.

But no, okay, puzzles now. Hershel frowned as he thought, the immediate strange thing was the 9 right in the center. "I assume the nine is what sticks out the most, without it all the numbers are ones you'd find on dice, aren't they? At least a traditional dice, which follows the gambling theme."

Puzzles are rad. This is where he was getting more tripped up though. "I suppose the next step would find the exact sequence of numbers you needed, though I'm not really sure where to go from here." He totally looked like he wasn't ready to give up, no puzzle unsolved he could do this okay!!

Heiji pointed at Hershel excitedly when he made the comment about the dice. "Exactly! The key to this code is the 9. You take it out, and you've got 63 numbers, nine for each digit in the 7-digit pin. Basically, what you need to do is map these numbers to a three-by-three grid..."

Whereupon the code looked like this:

vlcsnap-2014-10-05-11h59m48s18

Man, talk about complicated puzzles. Hershel couldn't imagine being the kind of person kidnapped because they could solve this, Heiji must have been some sort of police prodigy. He scrutinized the numbers for a moment, obviously each box must have given one of the numbers of the code. At first he wondered if it was as simple as it being the middle number of each, but no, a code this complicated wouldn't be that easy in the end, would it? And the numbers were still so pointedly those of dice, that had to mean something.

He crossed his arms, one hand going to his chin before he inhaled a tad sharply, realizing something. "Ah, maybe-" No, this was a bit ridiculous, wasn't it? Still- "The grids are the face of a die, aren't they? Or they could be, the way dots are set up on a dice."

"If um-" He sounded a weird mix of completely unsure because he didn't have a huge amount of confidence in his puzzle solving and super into it because despite that it totally felt like he was on the right track. "If that's right the 1's are the only ones that make proper positions of dots on die, though the second to last one would be a little strange... still, it could mean zero?" Well?? Did he lose picarats?? Does he need another hint??

"Exactly!" said Heiji. In fact, taking the puzzle as Hershel had just described, the code became:

dice

"The pin was 3, 1, 5, 6, 2, 0, 4. Of course, you could just stop there. But Kusukawa added a little extra. See, if you take the first syllable from the Japanese word for each number, you get:

3: The 'sa' from 'san'
1: The 'i' from 'ichi'
5: 'Go', which becomes 'ko'
6: The 'ro' from 'roku'
2: The 'fu' from 'futatsu'
0: The 're' from 'rei'
4: The 'yo' from 'yon'

'Saikoro fure yo'. It means 'roll the dice'. Pretty clever, huh?"

Hershel looked a little surprised that he got it right before smiling because hey, puzzles were fun and hard ones were satisfying when you got them. Maybe one day he'd become some sort of puzzle solving expert, but for today he'd take his 50 picarats and maybe unlock some rad bonus content.

"He was both really clever and really devoted to this theme." He said with a dry tone, though yeah, impressed this guy was something else. "So this was the code they wanted you to crack? You must have quite the reputation in Osaka if they caught you to figure this out. It really was incredibly difficult, I don't know if I could have gotten it without those hints."

"Heheh, ya think so?" said Heiji, who was really rather poor at concealing how much he enjoyed compliments. "Only wish I could remember the stuff around it. You know, like why I was there in the first place, and who that detective was..." Oh, well. He was bound to remember eventually.

"Your memory sounds real nice, too, though. I really want to meet your folks! They sound like good people." He looked thoughtful. "But now that you know you were adopted, you curious about your other set of parents?"

You never hid it well, Heiji but heck, you deserved it. "I am too, you really must have trusted him... you can't remember a name or anything?" Not surprising, a lot of Hershel's memories were vague with shit like that too. He suspected Calhoun and Zero were being assholes. "How old do you think you were when this happened? I hope somewhat recently, this would be pretty traumatic for a child to go through..."

Hershel smiled at that, hey if their visit London and Osaka plans went well you're totally meeting the Laytons, be prepared. The latter half of his comment gave him pause though. "I'll admit I'm a little curious, though I get the feeling I didn't spend much time with them, or any time at all really. The Laytons are my real parents, or I'm pretty sure I feel that way."

He rubbed the side of his neck thoughtfully. "Honestly it's a bit strange, I feel as though I should be more curious about it than I am. You would be if you got a memory like that back, don't you think?"

"Of course!" said Heiji, then added, "Although it would probably help if I remembered anything about my parents. Can't remember the detective's name, either. Ain't that annoying? But at least I'm starting to remember a little more about the people I used to hang around, I guess."

"Anyway, I don't think anyone'd kidnap a little kid to make him solve puzzles. I don't remember exactly when it took place, but... I was probably about the same age I am now. I was pretty beat up at the time, so it had to be at least a couple months before I ended up here. See, I didn't really have any bruises when I woke up in the elevator..."

"I suppose I'll remember something about them eventually, my biological parents I mean. I must know something." Haha it's better you don't, Hershel, it's better you don't. And he nodded as he continued. "I've noticed that with the memories, it's hard to remember names and even faces sometimes but it starts to come together, bit by bit. Like that boy in the ruins, Randall, I think I recognize him as being at that fencing match I remembered a while ago." He smiled. "Maybe you'll remember this mystery detective's name soon too."

Frowning at that whole beat up thing, seriously dude, your life. "Still, beating up anyone for something like this, especially someone who's probably a highschooler... that's really low. I wonder why this woman was so desperate."

Heiji shook his head. "She had a pin on her jacket -- a lawyer's badge. If she was involved in something shady, I'm willing to guess her career'd be over, right with her reputation. Though you ain't getting any argument from me about it being really low. Wonder how long it took me to heal up from that one."

He paused for a moment. "So... if that Randall fella was at the match and in the ruins, you two must've been pretty good friends, right? I mean, he convinced you to go explorin' with him. Maybe you were schoolmates?"

"That's even worse then." Hershel said- apparently he hasn't lived the ace attorney life where half the villains are lawyers gone bad. "Still, that's more evidence you're involved with the police, right? A lawyer would probably know a lot about some young detective off cracking codes and probably causing trouble." He teased. "It might explain why she chose you."

Hershel paused as he considered that, though it didn't take too long because he already thought it over a bit before when he realized he had seen Randall before. "I think we were, in the match he was being very friendly, he even called me 'Hersh.' In the ruins too I remember being more worried about him on his own than anything else." He couldn't help a smile. "Actually from what I remember he reminds me a bit of you, excitable and adventure driven."

"Yeah, I guess so," said Heiji, looking a bit pleased despite herself. "I mean, you wouldn't normally just pick anyone off the street and make 'em solve something like that. So I guess she must've heard about me beforehand."

And now he was just going to... lean over, with a a grin on his face. "Oh? So he called you, 'Hersh', huh? That's a pretty cute nickname ya got there."

"The evidence keeps stacking up. One day you'll get a memory that proves my theory right, I bet." Hershel replied, the mystery of what the hell Heiji did for a living was an entertaining one. "You know, I thought we were the same age about but sometimes I wonder if maybe you're older than you look. It's hard to tell, isn't it? I'm still confused about Sasuke and Snake, honestly." Then again Snake had old man hair, it was confusing.

What's that grin, why does he feel embarrassed all the sudden, you fiend. "I'd hardly call it cute, it's obvious, isn't it?" Seriously why is he flustered so easily, what an idiot.

"Oh yeah?" Have a knowing grin, Hershel. Not that he was going to start saying 'Hersh', though. That was apparently Randall's thing.

"Snake's 24. Said he remembered it in a memory." Heiji rolled his eyes. "You ask me, though, I think he's got a head start on 35. Listen to this -- so I was in the cafeteria in the dark, and he was in there. He offers to guide me somewhere else, and I agree. Then he goes 'hold on to my hand and I'll lead you out'. I mean, who says that?"

He crossed his arms. "Then while we're walkin', I say I could get to the theater or wherever on my own, and he's like 'suuure, Heiji'. Like he don't believe me! Ain't that rude?"

God what was Snake's PROBLEM

"Of course!" Hershel huffed, before pausing. "Isn't it?" Now he wasn't sure, nicknames were normal, right?

Oh my god, hand holding, Hershel tried really hard not to show how amused he was. "Ah, that seems normal, I mean he just wanted to guide you." And Heiji was being tsun about it haha, this gossip was fun. "Oh, did you give him the piano... ka, was it?"

How did your courtship present go, Heiji?

"Oh. Yeah, I did." Heiji's expression cleared almost immediately. "It seemed like he really liked it. He even apologized for going off on me about that prank earlier. Said it was probably because some people had tricked him before. Like a reflex or something?"

Heiji still didn't really understand this explanation, since he'd apologized several times and Snake still hadn't believed him that it was just a joke, but he seemed more or less fine with it when he'd apologized, so there was that. "Anyway, thanks again for the coins! It seems like playin' that pianika might help his hand heal a bit better, too."

Yes, this was good to hear, project get Heiji and Snake to stop being nerds and realize they like each other is moving forward. "I think some people are just sensitive to being tricked regardless of intentions." Snake seemed the type, he definitely seemed to want to be as independent as possible.

"Not a problem, they certainly went to a good cause. I'll have to find him and see this 'pianika' for myself soon."

Good luck with that, Hershel. Twenty years and Heiji and Kazuha hadn't even gotten to first base.

"It's not really much like a piano, but you can definitely play a couple songs with it! Anyway, I don't really know how old Sasuke is, but he looks younger than me. Maybe... fourteen?" He did have kind of a babyface, after all.

They didn't have a gentleman-to-be fussing in the background, that's the game changer.

"I suppose it was Calhoun trying to poke fun, but it sounds like that backfired." Fuck you, Calhoun. "I thought so- maybe he's fifteen or sixteen? I'm not really sure about Kuzuryuu either."

He sighed. "It'd be nice to learn how old we are. Maybe our next memories."

Heiji looked a little doubtful. "Well, that'd make him more around our age, right? But he's kinda small. Maybe it's cause Sasuke don't eat that much. I tried to get him to fill up some more during that cooking contest, but he eats like he's on a diet or something."

Sasuke: doomed to shortness forever clearly.

"Kuzuryuu acts like he's our age. So maybe he is?" Although... again, another shortie.

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