WEEK 4 AFTERPARTY

[stanboozled]

[After everything has settled - after all that craziness - Stan stands up, putting the voting box down on the ground.]

Okay, kids. I know you're scared, and you don't know what's going on - and I know it's hard to trust either me or Red with what's happened these past weeks. Hell, with what just happened.

[He takes a breath.]

But I want you kids to know that I'm here for you. I'm not gonna pretend like this is some silly summer camp, because I can't. I can't go back to how I was seeing things now that I see them right - my brain's good at taking a pounding and coming back just as good as ever.

And - though it might not seem like it, Red's here for you, too. We've...talked some stuff out. A lot of stuff. And...

[Stan lifts a hand to his face, rubbing at the bridge of his nose before continuing.]

I can't stop this. Neither can Red. But that doesn't mean we're just gonna sit by and let you kids just die because of some stupid rock. When she gets back, she's - gonna get into contact with someone higher in the organization she works for. And she's gonna ask if we can take this rock thing out. Break it, or - something.

From now on, you kids don't need any tickets to get stuff from me. You can just ask for it, but - I can't stop you from getting weapons, or anything dangerous. An' you're still gonna have to keep doing this, because we need time to contact whoever she's gonna contact, and go through all that red tape. I don't know how long, but -

This? It's gotta go on. And....I'm sorry, kids.

[He quietly sits back down, staring at the flames.

That's all.]

Comments

[finalguard]

Get them by necessity, yes. With a clearer sense of who owns what and how many of them.

[ Lenka can keep his cabin 4 outfit, Boa is not about to insist he burn that as well. Just making sure that we're reducing some spontaneous clothes-taking. ]

[soylentprotag]

[He's just grateful that there were extra outfits on hand on Monday, even if he can understand why they'd want to take it out on the supplies. If they start burning food or something he'd have to object, but for now this is all right. They'll only regret it a little bit if they run into any clothes-related emergencies somehow.]

That's true. Stan will probably let us get some clothes from home, if we ask him.

[Maybe we'll start seeing some more varied fashion. Lance and Kanji totally died for this new functionality.

He carefully doesn't bring up Week 2 and Talcott taking out lemons in his skivvies.]

[finalguard]

Yeah. Those are easier to identify and we could also check who is missing a uniform in case we find discarded or half-way destroyed clothes again.

Maybe it will make our Saturdays a bit quicker or at least things a bit harder on whoever's next in the run.

[ Not that Boa feels any resentment towards the culprits, he just thinks trials are tedious and unpleasant. }

[soylentprotag]

It's a good idea, for narrowing things down.

[The replacement clothes -- and shoes, this time -- really have been a thorn in their side during trials, though from what Red had said... a lot of the previous culprits or accidental culprits hadn't even bothered all that hard to cover up anything they were doing. This time was just the exception. Maybe... they'll need all the help they can get.

If they're going to keep looking for the truth. Being forced to punish people with death for death.

He's still not sure he's found the resolve for that part.]

What do you mean, whoever's next in the run...?

[finalguard]

It's only a matter of waiting a week isn't it? The murder marathon isn't stopping, it's just going to be one thing after another.

[ He sighs. ]

It would be best if we could slow it down, but I wouldn't know how and Stan doesn't seem to want to help with that either.

[soylentprotag]

A sacrifice is demanded every week, somehow, yes.

[He'd tried asking about the sacrifices, the trial, the execution, he'd tried attacking the problem from as many angles as he could think of and then some angles others had thought of and... nothing. Or rather, possibly it had made things worse, in the case of Kon and Natsume.

(Not just possibly: the phone had made it definitive. Whoever Red worked for didn't want them to deviate from the macabre system they'd set up in any way. It's too bad Lenka has never been good at staying within the lines, even when he's actually trying his hardest.)]

What we can do now... is make sure we keep as many people alive as we can, every week, until we find a way to stop this.

[It sounds better than minimizing the number of casualties, at least.]

[finalguard]

Just as Stan says....

Two a week. That seems to be the minimum. We have to make sure the moose doesn't take anyone additionally.

[soylentprotag]

Two a week.

[Quietly, unhappily, but he acknowledges it. This late in the game there's no way around it, and they have no guarantees at all numbers-wise. But he keeps that to himself.]

We've been setting up some more defenses and warning systems in our cabin, too. Did the... the moose spray help you?

[He's still not entirely sure about the properties of something that sounds as mundane as all that. But it's also possible that whoever invented it just had terrible naming sense.]

[finalguard]

I haven't needed to test it yet... which is very fine by me. If that monster never shows up in the cabin again, that's just as well.

[ Waking up to the moose dragging someone out ranks somewhere in the top 5 of unpleasant camp experiences, with brains occupying spot 1 solidly. ]