vivarium | THE FINALE - 【 ZERO 】 ESCAPE

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THE FINALE - 【 ZERO 】 ESCAPE

It's been ten days since the so-called "anniversary" on Day 90. Every single trace of a makeshift casino has been cleared out, leaving this suspiciously identical second warehouse empty (and the doors within that lobby locked), and Calhoun has mysteriously stopped dropping by as often as he should have. In the rare times he did drop by, he hemmed and hawed about what was happening and outright avoided answering any questions, shrieking that he's a busy mouse and he shouldn't be harassed by test subjects.

Thus, for nine whole days, not a single particular event has occurred. No Calhoun Hours, Ambidex Games, or even a little announcement. It's not until the morning of the tenth day that something finally transpired.

A loud siren goes off and the sound of a heavy door being slid open echoes from the second warehouse's lobby. Within seconds, however, both nuances cease and silence returns...

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[The sound of the siren stirred Atsuro awake. He blinked groggily and his vision was briefly blurry. After he blinked a few times, they're mostly cleared up. After sitting up, Atsuro raise a hand to his head and looked around.

And then, the situation sink down in him again.]

W-What! The water--what happened? [He quickly looked around for the others.] Guys?

Edited 2015-09-20 03:17 (UTC)

"The water?" Heiji backed up a bit on the grass, peering at Atsuro from his new vantage point. Atsuro didn't look particularly wet.

"Your friends are in here, too. 'Least, I think they're your friends."

Hearing someone's voice, Atsuro quickly looked over and see someone he didn't know or recognise. Who was this person?

"Yeah, the water--the room's flooding..." But he stopped when he heard the answer about his 'friends'. Atsuro quickly scanned the area around him, seeing people he knew. They're seemed to be okay. "Yeah... you could say they're my friends. But... who are you?

"I'm Heiji. I'm with another group of people trapped in this warehouse. It's kinda a long story, but you guys have already met Calhoun and Zero, right? They're the ones trapped us here for the 'Nonary Game'."

He gave Atsuro a once-over. "...I don't know what it means that you guys are here now, 'cept that maybe this really is part of some 'robber's cave' scenario. Hey, is it true that you're the ones who took out the power in the warehouse?"

"You mean that rat, right? Talking rat, wears a gasmask and pretty annoying?"

Just to clarify, in case Heiji's referring to someone else. Atsuro nodded. "I'm Atsuro and yeah, that's us. We took out the power, so we can escape but... It didn't turn out so well."

"Yeah, his name's Calhoun. But he's just a robot, or so the theory goes. It's Zero pullin' the strings behind the scenes. Guy in a gas mask and raincoat. Hardly ever shows his face."

"It's too bad you guys couldn't get out, but... how'd you manage it in the first place? Maybe we could give it another try. That is, if Zero ain't as good at patching things up as he says he is."

"He's a robot." Atsuro answered it firmly, as if stating it as a fact. "We... shut him down for a while with a virus. But I don't know how long ago that was."

A fact that's now worrying him. How long were they're out for? Did Zero clean out the virus from Calhoun's system yet? What's going to happen now?

"And about that... we were helped by a robot. A different one. Said he's... against Zero and would help us out, but..." He frowned, clearly unhappy about it. "After we followed his instructions, he left us to drown!"

"I think it's safe to say that all the robots here are either under Zero's control," said Heiji. "Mostly because I can't see him jeopardizing his experiment by letting free agents wander around.

"But can you tell me more about him? And how exactly did you get the virus into Calhoun's system? You can barely sneeze around here without him injecting you with sedative, or worse." In some cases, significantly worse.

"Yeah... still, it's frustrating." That they can't do anything in the end. They're still stuck here.

"As for the virus, you know how Calhoun's a robot, right? The other robot, the one who helped us but betrayed us, gave us a thumb drive with a virus on it." Atsuro explained, thinking back and slowly calming down. Explaining things was easy, it gave him something to do and focus on. "So to get him... one of us called him out and distracted him, until we ambushed him and connect the thumb drive to his port."

Heiji frowned. "If the first robot was workin' for Zero all along, then why give you the thumb drive in the first place? Why let you get so far in shutting the place down? Seems like a pretty roundabout way of jerkin' your chain. Especially since Zero put up that big act about how put out he was by having to show up himself and fix Calhoun."

He put a hand to his chin, thinking. "The robot must have had a cover story, right? Some reason he wanted to help you guys out? What was it?"

"His cover story..." Atsuro thought back to their first meeting and the first time they get any message from someone. Give him a moment to get his thoughts into order. "He offer us a chance to escape, as long we offer our cooperation..."

Then, it slowly sank in. One of their missed opportunities. "We... basically agreed without asking a lot of questions."

They're that desperate to escape. Goddamn.

"W-well, don't feel too bad," said Heiji, since it seemed like Atsuro could possibly be beating himself up over this.

"I mean, it's not like we've been able to get many answers out of Zero, either. Hard to find out anything when one side holds all the cards. I just thought that... I dunno. That maybe the robot you talked to wasn't a part of the big plan, somehow. One of the things Zero told me was that in this big experiment of his, the possibility of failure was very high. 'Course, he coulda been lying through his teeth. But somehow, I don't think he was. He's arrogant as hell, from what I can tell, and types like that ain't really keen on acknowledging failure. Know what I mean?

"So... how about this? Do you think the robot was set to betray you all along? Or is it possible that he really did have some motive other than followin' Zero's orders? Not helping you guys, necessarily, but maybe something like 'screwing up Zero's plans'?"

"Screwing up his plans..." Atsuro paused to think, frowning a little.

"If it's a robot, he shouldn't be able to go against the creator that designed his AI. If it's me, I'd make sure there's a fail-safe for that... So if it wants to screw up Zero's plans, either it's self-learning, Zero designed it on purpose or someone else did it. Like a third party."

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*He'd heard the sound of new voices, new people thrown together. What was going on?* Were you stuck in an elevator with water? *It usually happened that way, except that everyone was in a lobby and not in this completely new place. A wide open space, based on what he heard.*

An elevator...? [Atsuro blinks at the question, before he shake his head and looks at the other guy. The question seems to have came from him.] No, it's not an elevator. The water... we were in a large room with tanks.

[Remembering that moment is bringing his rising emotions again. The robot's words, Rio's betrayal, how they're left behind to get drowned.]

*Snake canted his head to one side in thought. Just when you thought you understood the rules of this place, everything changed.*

So you were in room of water and then you ended up here?

Yeah. The room started flooding. We... I thought we're going to drown if we didn't find a way to escape. But...

[Atsuro makes a gesture with his hand, unaware that this guy can't see it.]

... somehow, we're here. Someone must've rescued us, probably Zero and whoever's with him.

I can't even begin to fathom what Zero's up to now. *A cruel event? A room gone wrong?* Maybe...do you have a bracelet on your wrist? *Unlike everyone else in the warehouse, Snake's bracelet is on his right wrist.*

A bracelet? [Atsuro's eyes glance over towards Snake's wrist, if he can see it. Is that a bracelet as well? And on his... right wrist? He glanced down at his bracelet on his left wrist. It seems to be a pretty minor difference.] Yeah, I do. All of us here do.

[It's safe to say it. Anyone with eyes can see it on them.]

All right, how much BP do you have on it? *A perfectly logical question. His bracelet is blank but not broken. On further inspection, it does have an extra button on the side.*

... BP? [Atsuro sounds confused. He looks at his bracelet, touching it with his other hand. Is there a function in this? He looks back up at Snake.] What do you mean, BP?

You...don't have BP? *Well, color him surprised. He frowns.* You have a bracelet but you don't have BP? Did you have to vote in the Ambidex rooms at all?

"Ambidex rooms"? I have no idea what you mean by that. [It seems like Atsuro doesn't know about them.] Can you tell me about them?

[The closest thing they have to a "vote" was that "Would You Ever" game. But he suspect it's not the same.]

He didn't make you do any of that? Strange.

*Well, since Atsuro is polite, he'll answer the question.* Zero designed our experience to be competitive against each other. Groups went into rooms to solve puzzles and afterward, our groups would go in separate rooms and vote either Ally or Betray. Each of us have points and if both groups vote Ally, we get two points. If both groups vote Betray, no points are awarded. However, if one group votes Ally and the other votes Betray, the Ally vote loses two points and the Betray vote earns 3 points. It was a lot about trying to figure out what the other person would end up doing. The idea behind it is called the prisoner's dilemma.

We needed to get a certain number of BP in order to get regular, if bland food and gradually more amenities, including sleeping in a bed.

Nope. Most we get is being forced to play a game by Calhoun, but he didn't mention anything about BP.

[He's quiet for a moment during Snake's explanation. He can pretty much follow it easily enough. And promising things like food and other stuff is a good enough incentive to make people to consider to pick "Betray". Although...]

I can see how that can get tricky, especially if you don't know what others would choose. But... [Atsuto pause for a second, before he continues.] ... What happens if you lost all your points? Or went negative, if these bracelets can show it?