CALHOUN HOUR - ESCAPE

[vivariummods]

When characters begin to wake up, instead of finding themselves in the usual warehouse, they will instead find themselves in an a very unfamiliar area. Maybe they'll wake up alone, or maybe they'll wake up with someone else. Either way, the biggest point is that they're in God-knows-where and it's the start of a new Calhoun Hour. Within seconds later, a familiar voice booms throughout the loud speakers. "Ahem, testing, testing! Hello, can you all hear me?" It's, without a doubt, your favourite robotic mouse, Calhoun. As usual, he sounds a cheery as ever. "Wow, isn't this familiar? It's almost like the first time we've met, you know. Test subject in a new location, maybe alone or maybe with someone else, my charming voice rings throughout the room, trying to drown you all in an elevator. Good times!" "Well, anyway, welcome to your new Calhoun Hour! You can see that I've taken the liberty to move you all to a more suitable location. You may not know it, with how small your brains are, but you're all stuck in a maze! I've had my fair share of running around in mazes, you know, being a mouse and all, so I want to return to favour to you humans! So, you know the drill: explore, look around, try to escape, blah blah blah, I don't need to explain all this! Just get to it! Who knows, maybe the exit here is an exit out to the real world. I might be generous like that, if you manage to find it. If not, well, I guess you can all starve here!" He snickers, then pauses. Suddenly, a loud gunshot-like sound rings throughout the speakers, and Calhoun screams again. "Let's get started!" BASIC INFO ✖ ESCAPE ✖ POST-EVENT MINGLE ✖ TURN-IN

Comments

2/2

[not_that_sasuke]

[...The hell is that beeping?]

copies dani, 1/2

[fairsfair]

[ Excuse you, it is not. He just doesn't want to risk it by screwing up the puzzle okay, but following behind him and... ]

What's--

actually doesn't copy dani because it's now 2/3

[fairsfair]

[ Looking at his watch because it sounds like the beeping is coming from here and... ]

3/3

[fairsfair]

[ WELL THAT'S NOT A GOOD SIGN, A TIMER AND A SKULL immediately trying to open the door they came from ]

Shit!

[ WHY WON'T THIS DOOR OPEN ]

[not_that_sasuke]

[If Jake can't get the door open, there's no way Sasuke could. Instead, he sprints down the hallway, glancing down the different passages as he runs--

Was that blood?

It isn't until he makes it to the end that he sees one that looks even remotely promising, even if it, too, is splattered in ancient gore.]

This way!

[And with that, he'll head down the hallway, immediately going for the door at the end of it.]

[fairsfair]

[ Jake stops his attempt to break down the door after he slams against it twice, knowing that this is a waste of time and that it's most likely not going to break down. Instead, he looks down the hallway that Sasuke has already run down and follows after. If the message on the wall says anything (GET TO THE NEXT ROOM), then that door at the end of the hall was their way to safety. ]

[ He practically leaps into the room once the door opens (he will pull/push Sasuke in there if he has to) and only when the beeping stops and the bracelet's display screen returns back to normal does he relax. Give him a second to catch his breath and check his pockets to make sure he hasn't dropped anything. ]

[not_that_sasuke]

[Please, Sasuke's already inside, though he turns a safe distance in to make sure Jake makes it too. Similarly, he needs a moment to catch his breath again - he doesn't normally sprint around here, and while he's fast, he's not used to exerting himself like that anymore.]

...Was that for the bomb, you think-?

[He'd mainly been in a rush to escape, but now that he has a moment, he's finally making the connections. Those blood spatters in the hallway... were they...?]

[fairsfair]

[ They're seriously losing their touch here, huh? They need a fitness centre around here or something, but after checking his pockets, he thinks. ]

I'm not taking the risk to find out, but wouldn't be surprised if it was. Did you see all that blood?

[ It wasn't like someone was stabbed or shot there. It was all over the place. ]

[not_that_sasuke]

...If it was real, wouldn't that mean that there were people here even before...?

[There's always the chance that it wasn't, of course. That time limit made it difficult to investigate very closely. But if it was--

Just what is this place?]

[fairsfair]

Zero keeps bringing in new "test subjects" all the time like it's nothing, so we might not the first to go through this Nonary Game. If you read all those notes left around, we're at least not the first to use this building.

[ Those journal logs, random scraps of papers, notes, etc ]

[not_that_sasuke]

[He could believe that they weren't the first to use the building as a whole, but knowing there could have been other groups before...

...]

...When you were first brought here, there definitely wasn't anyone else?

[It's probably pretty pointless to ask, but at the same time...

If they weren't the only people put through this game, that didn't bode very well for their chances.]

[fairsfair]

[ Jake walks ahead to examine the weird machine in the middle. Hmm, Sudoku. Why is this here? He'll talk while just poking at it. ]

Can't say for certain if there weren't any others.

When we first arrived, all we had was the lobby. Didn't get the lounge or anything else long after, so we were restricted. Could have been another group above us or something.

[not_that_sasuke]

So for all we know, there could be other groups playing right now.

[They still have no idea how many floors the building has in total, either. But...]

Keeping an eye on everyone... it would be tricky if it were just one person, no matter how many tools they have for surveillance.

[Especially if that included controlling Calhoun. He frowns, beginning to walk around the room as well even if he isn't quite examining things as closely as usual. Metal walls and a 9 painted on one... But it didn't appear to be a door, either.]

[fairsfair]

[ Jake will just go ahead and solve this Sudoku puzzle. He better get a reward at the end of this. ]

Isn't that the reason why they put in a mole? Not that it worked out well for them. [ Simon......... ] And we got three people come in after him.

[ Akane, who went home, Alfendi, and Wirt. ]

[not_that_sasuke]

That's not what I mean. Say...

[A pause as he thinks up a suitable scenario.]

...several people break rules at the same time, from different groups-- Zero would have to be able to respond to all of them immediately, while running everything else at the same time. A mole might be able to help alert them to one of the incidents, but that won't necessarily make it any easier for him to stop all of the problems at once.

[fairsfair]

[ That does get Jake to pause and actually face Sasuke instead of fiddling around with this machine. ]

And so far, we only got one rodent running around enforcing rules, if you don't count the bracelets...

[ But then he stops there and turns back around towards the machine, seemingly like he lost interest. In reality though, this is the point where he has spotted out the cameras in this room, so this isn't really a good time to discuss stuff like this. ]

Whatever though. Just come over here and help me solve this puzzle.

[not_that_sasuke]

[He lets the subject drop, realizing much the same as Jake. But at least he's considered the idea now.

He'll obligingly move to ceck out the puzzle, a hand on his chin thoughtfully.]

It's sudoku.

[Super helpful kid, this one. Especially when he actually starts helping to fill it out, occasionally pausing to mentally test out various combinations. These kinds of puzzles, he can handle.]

[fairsfair]

[ They'll talk about it later, somehow, maybe write on sheets of papers or whatnot. Still going to be hard with the cameras, but they'll figure it out. In the meanwhile, SUDOKU. Jake doesn't really do a lot of it, so he's more than content letting Sasuke come over and help. With the both of them working on it, it becomes solved pretty quickly. ]

[ ... Only to do nothing. ]

[ Congrats on solving the puzzle? ]

... Talk about anti-climatic. Looks like it did nothing.

[not_that_sasuke]

[They can communicate it through cat-related keywords.

Sasuke's gotten pretty used to doing magic squares in here, so sudoku isn't really all that much more of a challenge. He pauses to listen in case they managed to set off something by solving it, but... apparently not.]

...If there's no point to the puzzle, why is it even here?

[It seems... odd. Even the room feels like it ought to be significant, given that giant 9 painted on the wall.]

[fairsfair]

[ Hope that includes cat puns, beclaws I got a ton up my sleeve. ]

Beats me. Maybe it was for the last group of people, but looks like we're done in this room.

[ Unless you see something else you want to talk about, like the number 9... But Jake doesn't know how much to say about it because it's just a wall. ]

[not_that_sasuke]

[We can't be on speaking terms anymore.]

Maybe this is the "exit" he talked about? It's got a 9 on it...

[Though walls are unfortunately difficult to pass through, providing one isn't a ghost.]

It might have fooled someone when they first walked inside and saw it.

[fairsfair]

[ What, you can cut meowt like that. What about my purrfectly amazing puns. ]

Not unless we're suppose to break down the wall. Want to check if it's hollow?

[ If Sasuke does go and check, it'll be just a solid wall. Sorry, what a bummer. ]

[not_that_sasuke]

[He totally does, shaking his head after he tries tapping it at various points with a fist.]

...It feels solid to me. It's like some kind of set up-- the puzzle doesn't do anything, and there isn't actually a door even if it says 9.

[Weird...]

[fairsfair]

Sorry to disappoint. Maybe he just made this room a dud so we'd waste our time and nearly get ourselves killed getting here.

Remember it for later, though.

[not_that_sasuke]

...I'll do that.

[It would be hard to forget, given how bizarre it all is...]

Should we make the run to get out, then?