vivarium | one post for the price of four

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one post for the price of four

T H E W A R E H O U S E

【 day 16 - 4:00AM 】

For all "old-timers" and "somewhat-old-timers", it'll be another typical night sleeping on the warehouse floor. It's not great, but perhaps you're getting used to it now. Maybe you're just making due. Maybe some of you are in a deep sleep because you've adapted. Whatever it is, you will be rudely waken up by... the sound of sirens?

A sense of deja-vu might run through you as you wake up and look at what's going on. Right in the middle of the warehouse, Calhoun is wearing a bike helmet on top of his gas mask, and standing next to one of these.

Well, standing isn't exactly the right word for it. Struggling to pick up Kariya and onto the stretcher is more accurate...

【 day 17 】

To the newcomer, welcome to the 【 Warehouse 】.

Once you escape your elevator, you will find yourself here. It's strangely empty for a warehouse. Aside from the elevators you've come out of, there's nothing else here. In fact, the longer you look around, the stranger everything looks.

Every window has been bolted shut, with no way of removing the steel coverings. The only source of illumination comes from the florescent lights above. Along the walls are numerous amounts of surveillance cameras, watching every bit of movement and listening to the sounds of everyone and everything. Every door is locked up tight, with no clear way of opening them, and there's one giant door with a 9 painted on it. It's a rather strange place, and there seems to be a lot of people here, so go introduce yourselves?

For the "old-timers" and "somewhat-old-timers", come meet your new fellow test subject and, oh, look! You can take another bath with that elevator open! Isn't Calhoun such a nice mouse, letting you bathe?

【 day 18 】

A M B I D E X R O U N D

After those two busy days, it'll be nice to sleep in, right? Well, too bad you're all test subjects, it's time to wake up! Itttttt's time for another Ambidexxxxxxx Round!!

Oh, but where is it going to take place this time? Not on this floor, that's for sure. Everyone, head out to the hallway, line up in front of the elevator! We're heading up to the second floor of our warehouse! Amazing, right? Who would have thought you would stick around long enough to see the second floor, huh?

The elevator, that was once non-functioning, turns on and allows everyone to head to the second floor. How many floors are there? It's unknown, as all the buttons are hidden under a single large metal sheet, asides from 'L2'. Well, don't worry about that, welcome to the next level. It looks identically to the first floor, asides from a few differences:

There are no Ambidex Rooms on this floor, nor is there Calhoun's shop in the corner. However, to make up for that, there seems to be four coloured doors, rather than three: Red, Blue, Green, and Grey. Yes, that's right, Calhoun has decided to add a fourth Ambidex Door, just to accommodate the new number of people. So, look down at your bracelets, you'll see what teams you're in.

The rules are the same: Go in, solve the puzzles, come out, vote! It's as simple as that, so line up in front of your doors, he doesn't have all day.

Oh, speaking of days... Before everyone enters, Calhoun will start to snicker uncontrollably. He hopes you haven't forgotten what today is?

It's the last day to give him a proper "show".

So far, all we've gotten were two lousy attempts at a show:

Some fake drama, hosted by the Blind-And-Dumb Test Subject (Snake) and Should-Probably-Drug-Again Test Subject (Ema)? Talk about yawn. You two get a 1/10. Half a point for getting two dumb teenagers all riled up about it, and another half a point for some form of effort.

The other was some sword fight by the Needs-A-Haircut Test Subject (Hershel) and Probably-Hiding-A-Bald-Spot (Heiji) in the lounge. Not as boring, but sheesh! Do you really think just something like that will entertain him? You didn't go in there with the proper intent of hurting each other, just some practise! Most of all, you've destroy Charlie, Calhoun's pot plant, so you only get a 4/10. Better than the other show, but not good enough!

And that's it, only two dumb shows. It looks like you guys really don't care about your secrets or memories. Maybe he should just end the contest here early and get this over with. He'll just reveal your secrets, destroy your memories, and get this over with. You clearly aren't bothered by it, so why keep this up any longer?

But you know what, Calhoun's a nice mouse. He believes in second chances, so he'll give you all until tomorrow morning, 6AM, to come up with something, or you can all say goodbye to everything!

Chao!

GOODBYE ✖ NEW ARRIVAL ✖ MINGLE
BASIC INFO ✖ TEAMS + ROOMS ✖ ESCAPE

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Heiji crossed his arms. "Well, if he ain't want to make it a contest, maybe he shouldn't have been baiting me the whole time." HMPH.

"Anyway, once you're in the running, it's obvious that you wanna win, right? I mean, otherwise, why be in it to begin with?" Where was your competitive spirit, Hershel? He knew you had one; he saw you swordfight and clearly these things were totally alike.

"Anyway, guess that's true enough. He and Ema both like keeping their cards close to their vest. Not anywhere near as much as Jake, though." Or maybe it was just that Jake didn't talk very much, period.

And you took the bait... Hershel politely doesn't point that out and just gave him a somewhat wry look. Competitive was fine in fencing, kissing though. Heiji. "Well, that's one way to look at it. I wonder why he wanted to bait you, though." Riling Heiji up was kind of funny but still.

"Whatever happened the first round you must have proven yourself to him." Hershel wasn't surprised, Heiji was a pretty openly honest person, maybe Snake responded to that. "I think he's more defensive while Jake's... well, distrusting as a rule, maybe. How was your first round with Snake? You were in the incinerator, right?"

Heiji shrugged. "He's probably got one of those personalities, you know. An S." If he was more the type to bait people himself, he probably would have had a better answer... but even when he was making Hershel's life difficult, it was mostly just in the interests of getting him to have some fun.

"The incinerator...? Can't say too much happened in there. Mostly we just solved puzzles and shoveled garbage. We talked more in the voting room, though."

Maybe Snake just wanted you to have fun too, Heiji. Wait this sounds like a fanfic, abort. "... an S?" He wasn't entirely sure what that meant, but he sort of got the gist of it. "Maybe he thought it'd be funny to get you worked up, you are rather ah... expressive."

"That was when you had to convince him to ally, right?" What a fun song and dance that always was.

"That's what I mean!" said Heiji, raising his voice and thus only reinforcing Hershel's point. "He's just tryin' to get a rise outta me! ...Wait, you sayin' I shouldn't react as much? That's kinda..."

It was kind of a reflex; Heiji wasn't even sure if he could change it because he was full of FEELINGS okay. He'd probably be an entirely different person if he did.

"Yeah, that's right. He said we should protect ourselves and vote Betray. Well, I gotta admit I didn't think Zelos was gonna pick Ally in the first place, but I also figured we weren't going to be able to all work together if we were at each other's throats from the start."

You're learning Heiji! Hershel smiled but shook his head. "I would recommend that, but I get the distinct feeling it wouldn't work. You are who you are, Heiji." Though it may not sound like it that's totally a compliment okay.

Hershel nodded. "You aren't wrong, I've been trying to tell Jake that since we met." A long, uphill road. "I wonder what it was that you said that made Snake decide to give your way a shot. Maybe it's your earnestness."

Heiji... completely 100% took it as a compliment, jabbing a thumb into the center of his chest and proudly flashing the full 120-watt smile.

"You got that right! I'm the one and only Hattori Heiji!"

As for what got Snake to change his mind, well... even Heiji wasn't sure about that one. "I ain't really sure. I know I told him I'd do everything I could to get him outta here alive. Maybe I got through to him somehow."

Hershel had to laugh a little, you were something else Heiji. "Someone who Snake likely finds very entertaining to get a rise out of." He supplemented. "Even I have to admit the banter is pretty entertaining."

"That's a pretty grand declaration. You must have impressed him." Hershel can't help still sounding a little amused, he could almost imagine Heiji saying that to an impressed despite himself Snake as water rose around them. "And you've certainly kept your word as well as you could so far."

Heiji apparently didn't take offense to Hershel's laughter, either. Water off a duck's back, dude, look at how chill this guy is.

"Yeah, well, I ain't too keen on going back on my promises," said Heiji. "But it ain't really all that grand, is it? I figured most people would try to do the same. Like you, right?"

He's the chillest, look at that hat. Hershel smiled at that. "I hope most people would try to do their best, but not many would make grand gestures like that. It's rather heroic, I think it's more evidence you probably work for the police."

Fighting crime, chasing criminals, solving mysteries and saving damsels aka Snake in this case, quite the life man.

"Ya think so?" Well, now that Hershel mentioned it, Heiji supposed he was right... but why? Clearly loudly declaring your intentions was the best strategy, right?

"So who do you work for, then? Y'know, I think you'd make a pretty good counselor. Maybe a teacher or something. One of them people you'd go to if you were in a real jam."

P.S. Please call Snake a damsel in distress to his face Hershel that would be A++

Subtly and Heiji, not two things that often got along... "I'm fairly certain, yes."

Hershel laughed a little, shaking his head. "Maybe... well, actually in my last memory I found out I was applying for an archeology program in a school in London. I guess that means I might have been trying to become a professor, most archeologists are if memory serves. That's close enough, right?"

Get him drunk one day and it'll happen, I promise you.

Look, when he pretended to be someone else, people made fun of his accent ok. One of these days a Japanese character was totally going to give him shit for it

"An archaeology program, huh?" Heiji looked rather excited about this bit of information; it sounded totally awesome. "What kinda specialty you interested in?"

I'm excited for that day, it'll be glorious. All we need now is for him to try doing fake British accents so Clive and Hershel can stare judgmentally at him.

Hershel brightened a little at Heiji seeming excited about it, Jake told him it was a waste of money and Ema talked about punching Nazis, such good friends. "Yes, I remember going into the school and looking at the classes posted there, feeling nervous about it, things like that. I'm not really sure why archeology or what specialization... I know a fair bit about Bronze Age and Neolithic eras in Europe, maybe that's what I was aiming for."

He paused, sheepish. "Sorry, I suppose it's exciting to think about. I guess if I am in school now I'm already missing quite a bit of classes. You know, if you are a police officer that's rather daring of Zero to kidnap you, wouldn't the police be completely up in arms?"

Heiji nodded. "I gotcha. That's pretty neat! Archaeology's an interestin' field. I remember reading about this one place in Anatolia, lessee... oh yeah, Çatalhöyük. So stop me if ya heard this one before, but it was a city with no streets! In order to defend against invaders, the entrances and walkways were located on the tops of buildings instead. Pretty smart back then, if ya ask me. I saw a reconstruction of what it looked like before time got its claws into it, and it was pretty cool."

"Well... officers do go missing, y'know, but you're right. Once you nab an officer, the whole department's up in arms. It's like stickin' your hand into a beehive." He pointed to his clothes. "...I guess it's possible I was on vacation or something... or undercover at a high school..."

But somehow, he just didn't think it was very likely that a full-fledged officer would dress so casually. Maybe someone at an academy, though...?

Hershel brightened a little more, that was a name he recognized. "Ah, yes, I know I've learned about that at some point, it's probably one of the best preserved Neolithic sites to date. It's such a strange place, no visible signs of buildings between different classed, royalty or not, little to no refuse within the city yet bodies found buried under the hearths. There's a place I'd love to visit, being stuck here certainly has made me want to see the world more."

And he paused. "True... though isn't it strange, in a way, that Zero kidnapped you at all? You clearly have investigative skills, whether you're a police officer or not, he must have done some research enough to know that. It's almost... arrogant, I suppose, bringing in someone who could be a threat to him if he escaped."

Heiji grinned. "I thought the murals were pretty interestin', too! Well, if we're talkin' about places to visit, the Lascaux caves would really be something. But since access is restricted, I guess you'd have to be real lucky or real famous to be able to get in there."

Hershel, clearly you needed to become the most famous archaeologist ever. You could do it, Heiji believed in you!

"Anyway, yeah, maybe it's just his way of sayin' we can't possibly beat him. Just taunting us, y'know? 'If you think you can catch me, then catch me'."

"Well, I promise if I ever get to that level that will be another place we'll have to visit. You can claim you're my assistant." Hershel said, amused at the prospect. Be his Luke for a the trip, Heiji. They'll probably only have to deal with a hundred robots and Don Paulo.

"That's not a very scientific mindset... then again, I still doubt this is really an experiment and not some sort of cruel game to him." Sigh. "It still is strange, we've been here so long and not a peep from the outside. I know it's hopeful to think we'll be saved but still, it's disconcerting that it's been this long now."

"Then it's a deal!" Wow, they sure were making a ton of plans for what they were going to do when they got out of here.

"Honestly, I gotta agree with ya. I don't think this is an experiment in any real sense of the word. I'd like to say it's just the work of some nut who thinks he's way more important than he is, but..." Heiji crossed his arms, frowning.

"Like you said, it is kinda strange that we ain't heard anything. Not just because the police should be lookin' for us, but because it's been a while. Shouldn't we have heard a truck go by, or felt an earthquake, or spotted someone fixing some wiring, or... I dunno, something? Unless we really are out in the middle of nowhere."

Hey, goals were fun until someone you make a goal with blows up. Then goals are tragic. "Absolutely."

"I've been wondering about that a lot... at first I thought maybe we were in international waters, that's certainly a hiding spot, but this clearly isn't a ship, we'd feel it. I think wherever we are we must be underground, it'd certainly explain why this place was built with no windows of any sort."

He sighed. "Of course it's speculation. Whatever the case we're being held by someone with resources we can't imagine, that I'm sure of."

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