[CONTINUE + 4] week 1 || act: indict

[foundationmods]

[Saturday dawns, bright and early again. No one comes to the Inn, but you feel compelled to go to the Core anyway.

It's as if you're forced to. As if....it's inescapable. Puppets, forced to dance where their strings lead.

You make the walk past everything, until you are directly in the Core, where some kind of whitish, rainbow-gleaming liquid can be seen below.

In this area, you are led to a wider platform that is still open to the liquid before, with the handrails in place - where there are some seats around, and....surrounded by a sea of entirely gray faces, no Monsters to be seen.

This...for all of you, it is a familiar sight.

It is a trial location.

You are here to find the killer...and convict one of your own, in a murder that makes no sense.

But you have no choice.

You can only forge ahead....and try to find out the truth.]

VICTIM: ATSUSHI NAKAJIMA
ACT: VOTE

Comments

[accessorytomurder]

...I don't...

[Hitoka?]

I don't think that's a bad thing, if it's true.

[Her voice is small at first, then strengthens.]

If we do have puppeteers, if we do have strings—then, at the very least, they've been pulling on us to keep moving forward, this whole time. To live. To... to find people and reasons to live. To win. ...e-even if we're trapped here with you, that means... it means, we're not fighting alone. We've got people rooting for us, and working hard for our sakes. So, s-so, um... if they're really watching, then...

[Hitoka...]

Thank you, so much. Please continue supporting us all, as we move forward.

[She'd bow, if she knew just where to direct it.]

[finalring]

It did say that the one of the narrators "likes" Inaba, no?

[ ... ]

Well, a "Player" would rarely put their piece in a game with the intention of losing. Therefore, whatever or whoever they are, they're still our allies. We cannot think of them as our enemies.

[white_camellia]

At the very least, they have never appeared to me as enemies, for however much that counts for.

[Which might be a lot, or might be nothing? It is hard to say.]

[finalring]

It counts for a lot. We may have some criticisms towards them, but in the end there are far bigger concerns.

[accessorytomurder]

Doctor...

[She smiles a little, and it's such a delicate, trembling thing.]

There at the end, when... when it was just you and me. I think, um. It... it felt really important. Pivotal. Like... like somebody was gripping me tight and praying that we could all make it out okay, even... e-even with most of us dead. And, um... and it all did work out, didn't it? Even though it seemed impossible, we made it.

[HITOKA...]

I want to put my trust in the beings that helped saved the people I would have given anything to save. Is... is that silly of me?

[white_camellia]

...I cannot say I had the same experience, but...

After we became ghosts, and I opened the connection to Eve. With all the curses flowing through me, I am fairly certain I should have died there. My soul should not have been able to sustain the energy that went through it. I did that fully expecting my soul to be destroyed. And yet, for some reason, I somehow survived. Certainly, I spent much of the time since then recovering, but...

[accessorytomurder]

Nanaka-chan...

[...]

...I think, you must be really loved.

[le_mat]

... I don't like it, but if we are puppets then the one moving us would kinda be our SOUL right, in a weird way. If we wouldn't 'move' without them. If it's like that I guess I can accept them.

...if not I'm gonna shoot them once I figure out how.

[cw_suicide]

[pfff]

That seems fair.

[le_mat]

It's kinda like me and my Personas- they are different parts of me. Different masks. We're different but also the same. They speak to me and have their own ideas, but we also are part of one whole.

If they are just me, well... I trust myself.

[accessorytomurder]

Well...

[She smiles, sheepish and a little fragile around the edges.]

We did finally uncover the masochist in you, so that makes sense.

[le_mat]

Yachi-san!!

[cw_suicide]

[... actually, Dazai can't even argue this. his sitch has gotten pretty good, honestly? so uh.]

Hitoka isn't wrong here.

[accessorytomurder]

If somebody has been guiding me through all this, I... I owe them a lot, I think. A lot of happiness I didn't expect to find.

[justonezero]

Even with everything that's happened... it's always worked out, hasn't it?

So... I don't think they want anything irreparably bad to happen to us, either. I think they're trying their best, too.

[finalring]

That's right. They would rarely throw their characters into a pit of vipers if they didn't think there was a way out of it.

In other words, they too want the ending that is best for us. But perhaps even they are unsure on how to get it. If we choose to "cheat", then both sides will be playing it by ear-- our Narrators and us.

[justonezero]

We've done a ton of things that seemed impossible. If they're the ones who helped us do it, I want to thank them too!

I'll trust in what they decide to try to help us this time.

[improbablenotimpossible]

...Most writers at least at the start like the characters they make. Even if they don't, there's usually care...

[justonezero]

Don't some writers even say that when they write, it's like the characters gain a life of their own and write themselves?

[improbablenotimpossible]

Yes, and that sometimes it takes the story in a different direction than what they had in mind.

[accessorytomurder]

...um, I-I'm sure Mr. Doyle didn't hate you that much... He was just frustrated!

[improbablenotimpossible]

[He smiles bittersweet]

Thank you, but I believe he is not my current writer - he would be long dead in this and my original world.

[homeecspacecop]

...

[...]

... you can't write about a character this much and not care about them.

[dereban]

That's... well put, honestly.

[Neither her, nor her narrator have any proper, lengthy words right now to respond to this besides.]

[oceanicbutterfly]

[...

Karen takes a deep breath.]

I want to just believe in the inherent goodness of people, to assume that whoever is pulling our "strings" would automatically be someone we could agree with. I... can't really do that. I don't know if I was never that kind of person, or if this place has changed me, but I can't just decide to believe that.

But I can believe in what I know. This is the third "murder game" I've been in. That means, whoever you are, you keep coming back to me. When you want to see these things through, I'm the one you choose. I don't think you would do that if you didn't care about me, if you weren't aiming for me to succeed.

So thank you.

[...she pauses briefly.]

...and if you happen to have a Miracle Light with you, I really think it would be a good idea to have it ready.