graveyard part five

[gamehead]

hunter's game the graveyard You wake up in an unfamiliar cabin. At first, it almost seems like you're in an entirely different place and that everything had been just a dream. The interior of the cabin looks nothing like the run-down, old-timey shacks that you had been living in before. Everything in here is sleek and modern, from the enormous flat-screen TV mounted on the wall to the fridge and mini-bars stocked with all your favorite foods. There aren't any individual rooms in here, just a common area large enough to house everyone comfortably, no matter how many more people join you...and there will be plenty more people joining you before the week is over. Because if you look outside the window, it quickly becomes clear that not only are you still in Prayer's Pass, but that you are no longer among the realm of the living. Judging from the tombstones directly outside, you're now in what had been the abandoned broken-down cabin in the graveyard. The cabin's not all that changed; the world outside has gone completely grey and everything you see appears to be faded and blurry. The only things that remain sharp and in color are what's inside the cabin, including your fellow ghosts. Occasionally, people who are still alive may enter, but it's clear that what they're seeing is completely different from what you're seeing. The door's unlocked; however, a mysterious force prevents you from stepping beyond the threshold, no matter how hard you may try. After all, this cabin is a cage for the dead - a gilded one, perhaps, but a cage nonetheless. On the flat-screen TV plays everything that is currently happening in the town. It will shut off once night starts...and something else will appear instead. (The graveyard so far)

Comments

[encored]

Maybe they'll listen to you when you say that, for what little good it will do anyone now.

[do you know how many people he warned about this outcome ciel DO YOU. it was uncharacteristically kind of him!!]

[agentx13]

[ Sharon is going to overhear that. And she is going to glare.

You. Little. Shit. ]

Of all the deaths I've regretted in this game, you're one of the few where I regretted not killing you sooner.

You moron.

[expiatrice]

Truly. He had you figured out days before! You can call him a spiteful little devil, but 'moron' is far too simple.

[CIEL THIS IS NOT THE TIME TO SOUND PROUD OF CHARLES]

[agentx13]

He had me nailed as a hunter, sure, but he hadn't figured me out. He didn't figure out shit except what Critter wanted him to figure out. He played right into Critter's hands. He helped fuck us all over. We could have figured out so much, and instead, all of you - all three of you - took the opportunity to do something and decided to screw us over.

Not just the hunters, either.

You think this is some sort of game. You can't imagine how disappointing it is that you figured out so little.

[condescent]

[waves a hand] Yes, yes, it's easy to act superior when you have all the information and all the power, isn't it? We wanted to survive. And if not that, at least see those we were more fond of make it out alive. You can't fault us for playing the game better than your side did. If you were truly serious about winning from the start, you would have never made the mistakes you did. Besides, Lithuania and the rest gave you plenty of time to figure everything out, and you failed. All the clues were there, but no one managed to put the pieces together.

Indulge my curiosity, though. I keep hearing about how it was a choice to play as a hunter. What would have happened if you'd turned the offer down, even knowing your incentive?

[agentx13]

I have an idea. Why don't you detect it. Seeing as how you did such a bang-up job the first time around.

[condescent]

Hee hee, I did, didn't I? Thanks for the compliment.

[tilts his head] All right, then. It couldn't have just threatened to kill you if you didn't play - the nations would have gone along with that, perhaps, but the more noble of your team would have chosen to sacrifice themselves to guarantee the survival of the prey rather than risk everyone's lives to save their own. When Sanae had been a hunter, he left a note to me implying that Critter had threatened our city...but I don't really believe it has that kind of power outside of this town. And even if it did, there are still certain types of people who wouldn't kill for any sort of threat, especially if Critter couldn't prove that it had the power to back it up.

So then...the most likely scenario is that it somehow made you all believe that even if you didn't play, the game would go on nonetheless. The number of players in the extra rooms varied quite extensively from round to round - perhaps it claimed that not only would it kill anyone who refused to play, but it would then make the same offer to someone else in the town to become a hunter? That would explain why some rounds only had a few people, while others had nearly a hundred or so - the smaller ones had more people refuse to play as hunters. Am I getting close?

[terryplz]

If we turned the choice down, Critter said it would kill us and make one of the Prey into a Hunter. Do you really think any of us would want to subject another person to what we had to do?

[condescent]

Ah...I thought it might have been something like that. Then perhaps that was the real game all along. The only way to win was to refuse to play...and to trust that the next person Critter made the offer to would be noble enough to do the same.

[expiatrice]

Please, you give Critter too much credit. Charles doesn't care about figuring any of you out; all he used to care about are the death of the poisoner and prey victory, and now he doesn't care about any of this at all. That's likely in everyone's best interest: he can really hold grudges for centuries, for the record.

[Her expression does grow flatter at that, though. Are we going back to moral righteousness? We are, aren't we. Oh boy.]

Still nitpicking sides and trying to argue for higher moral grounds? [a small sigh.] You should really listen when he says 'don't hold inhuman things to human standards', miss Carter, because that's the crux of this entire issue. Prey and wolves were both given a set of directives to follow, yourself included which you've struggled to abide by until your own execution. If you saw us as threats in obtaining your truth, then you should've played better and killed us all earlier on.

[encored]

[PIPING IN] I'd like to remind you that I did figure it out even if I didn't care.

[charles that makes you an even worse person]

[expiatrice]

[yes have a headpat and more cakes. how about that??]

[agentx13]

I want to know why you couldn't see the bigger picture. Why you saw everything so simplistically rather than thinking. I think we can all agree that I've killed too many people to pretend to have a moral high ground.

[expiatrice]

The bigger picture that 'everyone will be saved if the wolves win'? I don't know your history, miss Carter, and I don't intend to ask. But if you've willingly stained your hands with blood before this, then you'll have to forgive others of the same kind who may find it difficult to believe in such convenient promises of 'everyone will be okay'. We've hardly been living a fairytale here, after all.

[encored]

[maybe three days ago he would have met Sharon with more vitriol. as the person directly responsible for his death, he was pretty aggravated!

BUT now he's just done with this game in its entirety, the last traces of care he had evaporating along with the last few trials.]

Oh, shut up and stop being so self righteous. Murder is murder no matter what the incentive or who supposedly pushes you to do it and if you don't understand that at this point, the entire lesson behind this game has been wasted on you. Do you think yourself a beacon of justice for disemboweling people, beating them dead, staking them to crosses — just on the off chance that you might be able to bring them back?

I've said it before and I'll say it again; this game was lost from the first day, from the very first moment anyone decided to hold something inhuman to human standards.

[agentx13]

[ Sharon half rolls her eyes. ]

And still, you have nothing to offer but your own delusional superiority.

I really wish now that I'd killed you earlier.

[encored]

[a dismissive flick of his fingers.]

Yes, well, I'm certain you'll be very happy to know that the feeling is entirely mutual. I hope for your sake that you don't run into me anywhere after this or I'll be paying you back for that little poisoning stunt whether or not you remember me.

[agentx13]

[ She smiles at the thought of all the things she'll do to him. ]

I look forward to it, Charlie.

[ She doesn't seem to see his fingers. She's going to go join the smart people. The sane ones. BYE CHARLIE. ]

[encored]

You'll receive an embossed invitation, so you had better. [HUFFS, more aggravated about the nickname than... anything else.... so far. wow WELL SHE GOT THE INSANE PART RIGHT, AT LEAST even if the entire cabin is like varying levels of batshit at this point.

he'll likely even approach her at least once more before this mess is over just because this reunion is way too anticlimactic for his overly theatrical tastes.]

[expiatrice]

I think all the wolves are too busy being angry at Critter to be coherent enough to hear us out. ...Well, I'm about as surprised as you are, and we've already come too far to nitpick at the hunters' game plan execution at this point. They seemed to have weathered quite a great deal of bad luck, and that's saying something when it comes from people like us. Would you like to wait here and try speaking to them again later, once they've hopefully calmed down some?

[wow it REALLY IS... she hunts for a living and what you kill normally stays dead, SO.

hard to take anything here personally, as always...]

[encored]

They won't calm down in time for us to speak to them at this rate. What say we cut our losses?

[or HE WOULD BUT THEN HE'LL BE ENGAGING IN VERBAL FISTICUFFS WITH HIS MURDERER SRY CIEL]

[expiatrice]

That's fine, I suppose. How do we spend the last few hours, then? It doesn't seem like us dead prey have anything left to do.

...

Also, have you seen Joshua?

[just wondering how casual the other member of their trio's holding up. #gives-no-fucks cakesquad lyfe]

[encored]

He's complaining about the Doctor not getting his comeuppance. For good reason, too. [SOUR LEMONS FACE damn you doctor.]

As for that, I suppose we just sit and wait and enjoy the last of the food. With luck we'll pop back into Mayfield after this. ...I never thought I'd say that.

[condescent]

[clicks his tongue as he joins them] My my, Charles, don't tell me you're reneging on our wager now? If our time truly is limited, you only have so many hours left to pull it off.

But I doubt it. Perhaps I'm simply of a more optimistic nature than the two of you, but I don't believe this game is quite over yet.

[expiatrice]

Both of you are getting too invested. I'm starting to worry a little.

Hehe, the sentiment is mutual. Though I wouldn't mind stopping by your world first too, just to take a quick look. You're welcome to follow me back also, of course, even if either cases are rather unlikely!

[yeah let's just make post-hg plans across other places

SURELY THIS'LL END WELL??]