WEEK 3

[strangerpeople]

WEEK 3

[As Marie said: so much for trust and resolve. Two people are dead, and there is very little anyone can do about it now, no matter how much they would have wanted to sacrifice themselves.

In particular, with Marie's words during the trial, it's clear that time is limited. Or is it? Marie is also capable of omitting the truth when it serves her needs, especially when it comes towards the Strangers and their still-missing memories. In any case, one can only hope they don't fall for her tricks again, even though getting away with murder would - apparently - save at least one life.

There is something else, as well. When everyone wakes up the morning, they will find that information on their wristwatches has been updated to reflect their new number - and something new about their powers. Not only that, but a new floor has opened up above Floor 1 for everyone to explore. Maybe more can be found on just what, exactly, is going on.

Is Marie telling the truth? Is the universe really ending? Or is it just another means of getting what she wants? Whatever is happening, people will need to be more careful around her - and one another. Who knows what Marie will offer next - or what your roommate or new friend is now capable of as a result. Especially since it's now known, thanks to Marie's actions during the trial, that everyone has definitely lost some memories. And unfortunately, no one seems to have regained any of them so far - or if anyone has, they haven't said a word.

If trust and resolve was ever needed, it feels like now is the time to try and find all that.

There are thirteen people in this place.]


SUNDAY | MONDAY | TUESDAY | WEDNESDAY | THURSDAY

Comments

[strangerpeople]

[Not in this document, no. But the number indicates there must be other documents of a similar bent, somewhere.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[Well then let's move on to dad, since he thinks he has a pretty good idea why a document might be titled that way now.]

[strangerpeople]

[Get your medical text book ready, Seto, it is a document on the nature and composition of a highly advanced biotech designer virus.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[He already has an idea of what a virus is! The crush virus is its own field condition and everything. But he'll ready the textbook anyway because he definitely doesnt' know what they're composed of. The nature of it seems like it's more important, regardless.]

[strangerpeople]

[Viruses, according to the textbook, are infectious agents - diseases - that only multiply inside living cells, inside other organisms like plants and animals. Viruses are neither living nor dead, since, while they can evolve, have genetic materials, and can “reproduce”, they lack other things that would be considered essential to be called life.

So basically, a natural zombie of sorts.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[Which would mean a 'designer' virus is such a thing as created by man. How chilling... but tell him more]

[strangerpeople]

[Pretty much. Designer viruses are especially worrisome since they can be tailored to kill specific individuals, along with being impossible to kill with conventional medicine.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[This is... insane. But if medicine wouldn't work, then as a doctor, he certainly wonders what would. Surgeries? Also, this doesn't have that much to do with babies.]

[strangerpeople]

[Not really no, other than the fact babies get viruses too.

Plus, the virus in question in the computer document doesn’t seem to be targeted to a baby at all.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[It says who it's targeting? Whoever sent out this virus must not have been very sneaky!! But okay, who is it after, it better not be him]

[strangerpeople]

[Not you, Rosie. The subject is a female in her mid-20s. That is as specific as it gets though.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[....Well, that wouldn't be either of the female strangers here, and he somehow doubts someone would have to design an entire virus just to attack Marie. So he'll just file that away for now.

What are the symptoms of the virus?]

[strangerpeople]

[Symptoms mimic polycythemia vera and iron overload. Essentially, the body is suddenly and inexplicably inundated with red blood cells and impurities in the blood stream and bone marrow that the individual can't get rid of naturally, and it rapidly accumulates in all of the vital organs and brain. White blood cells are also systematically destroyed by the overflow as a result. The process begins in minutes, and the patient suffers multiple transient ischemic attacks, which result in the patient falling into a coma.

Unless the cause is manually removed, the patient will die within hours, a day at the most.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[He's skimming over the parts about cells but he really doesn't like the sound of that. At least it sounds like it's too quick a process to make a good motive... or at least, he hopes Marie won't get that desperate.

Does it say anything about potential cures?]

[strangerpeople]

[There is a cure, but it involves some kind of manual insertion of specialized, even sentient mitochondrial components. The writer doesn't say what, specifically, these kind of components are - simply that counteracting them was the key to ensuring the virus' success.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[Maybe it has something to do with those hybrid components from before... if they can become anything, then a cure to a virus seems likely. Even if they're currently being used for strawberry ice cream and whatnot.........

.........WAIT A MINUTE. Ensuring the virus' "SUCCESS?" The virus's?]

[strangerpeople]

[There is, according to the document, a mutated variation on the original virus. So, two virus entities now exist, instead of one.

Both are currently "working together".]

[stealsyourduelist]

[That's a very strange way of putting it. He just mutters]

The cure is sentient... perhaps the virus is as well...?

[Is there anything else in dad or should he move on to the final document?]

[strangerpeople]

[Nothing else in this document! It's time to move on.

And when he does get to story, he finds...well...]

Once upon a time, there was a princess. Everyone hated her and was scared of her, because even to her family she was an abomination, though that was because she was. And so she was lonely.

Once day she decided to run away, and got lost in the forest. As she sat down, the cheeky raccoon himself came to her.

"Allo", he said. "You want to be friends? I am going to put baking soda in the farmer's laundry!"

The princess was shocked.

"But I'm ugly and evil," she said. "Look at me. I'm a monster, Do you really want to be my friend?"

"What why?" the cheeky raccoon rolled his eyes. "Who cares? You don't look stupid like the other animals."

That made the princess happy, maybe even for the first time in her life. So she made some baking soda and they pranked everyone, covering the farm in suds. The bear was angry, but he couldn't pin the prank on the cheeky raccoon.

"Hahaha," said the cheeky raccoon. "Hey, let's go eat some fat berries. Shoo-ba-dee-da-ba-dee-doo!"

So the princess did, and she and the cheeky raccoon sang as friends into the sunset.

AUS

[stealsyourduelist]

'Shoo-ba-dee'...?

[He's squinting. Uhhhh. How.......... heartwarming (nope.)

He's just gonna see what he can get out of this. Starting with the confusing part. Is there any indication for what AUS means?]

[strangerpeople]

[Seto actually might know! It's German. Does Seto know German?]

[stealsyourduelist]

[Actually yeah, as you might expect from a guy with a German last name.]

[strangerpeople]

[From the Middle Ages no less, so.

Aus, even in Middle German, means out, end, or of.]

[stealsyourduelist]

[Then in this case he will just interpret it as "The End" like a proper story.

And note that the book killer is German, apparently So German they can break the autotranslator.]

[strangerpeople]

[Seems like it. Them and their stupid powers, booooo.

That’s about it for the files, though.]