citylogs | [open mingle] I do my crosswords in pen

WHO: Constantine (

keepgodwaiting) & you!

WHAT: Metaplot deciphering!

WHERE: The Welcome Diner

WHEN: Early December

WARNINGS: Probable discussion of human experimentation

Another month, another weird new building, and Johanna has been thinking. If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, then they ought to try some new things, right?

Trying to stay away from the dorms at Halloween didn't work. Trying to escape the mall had mixed results. So maybe it's time to abandon the avoidant strategy and see what happens if they approach things a bit more head-on. Starting, in her case, with investigating every open door she could find in the Science Center until she found the director's office.

(Yes, she did just get told off by several friends for running into potentially dangerous situations with no backup; no, she did not alert anybody that she was going to do this; but hey, it was completely uneventful and therefore she has not broken any promises to anyone!)

The most interesting thing in there, by far, is the unlocked computer, and with a little digging she found a very interesting email. More carefully redacted notes. And she wonders ...

So one evening -- around dinner time, after sunset, in the hopes of being available to the most residents -- Johanna posts up in the welcome diner with a stack of notebooks, pens, and her phone. She's hand-copying the redacted file from her phone onto paper, with XXXXXs to indicate the number of characters in the redacted words. It's an arduous process, and every so often she straightens up from the work with a groan to crack her back. After she gets the whole thing copied down, she picks up her phone to make a network post:

Anyone good at crossword puzzles? I've got a doozy of one I'm working on in the diner and could use some help.

Anyone who cares to join her and try to decipher the redacted words, or make additional hard copies of the file to share out, is more than welcome to do so. Or just grab a cup of coffee and share theories with each other.

[ ooc: Feel free to treat this like an open mingle, converse with other characters, hop around, etc! I'll be making a top level with the text of the two redacted files from the newsletter, in which we can crowdsource guesses about what the missing words might be!

ETA: Feel free to put guesses in this document! ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Yesod waits his turn to read through the report, whose contents are admittedly not especially surprising, as far as conducting unethical experiments goes, whatever the end goal may be. He restricts himself to a handful of notes before returning to some of the gaps left to fill in the redacted documents. He thinks back to his conversation with Robby last month, too — at the time, the numbered keys that had suddenly appeared hadn't been identified as linked to the university dorm rooms yet. Now they also have additional mentions of CE-47 in particular, and references to past "classes" and presumably images purposely created in an effort to encourage the current iteration to consider the possibility that they have longstanding bonds formed in this city to recall. ]

So this is one instance of their "dissolution" measures...

[ Which, frankly, seem to be a waste of time and resources, if this sort of failure has occurred up to forty-nine times and a variety of extreme methods to dispose of their unwanted guinea pigs is utilized in response. ]

...By the way, assuming that there are photographs to find in every room corresponding to the numbered keys that we received some time ago, has anyone compared these from room to room? I'd like to determine whether any are implied to depict individuals from iterations CE-09 and CE-47, for example, or the supposed owner of the room is simply inserted into identical templates across each room.

[ And if they are genuine glimpses of past iterations — including ones whose selected test subjects were "sub-par" — is there some significance to their allocation for this iteration to discover? ]

There were photos in them? All I heard were the books.

[ Guess who didn't check out those rooms...! ]

Yes. Here are a few examples.

[ He gives Robby a nod — and he understands why someone might be reluctant to visit an unexpected address sent via phone notification once again, particularly one associated with the university dormitory building. Having taken some pictures of his own, Yesod holds out his phone for Robby to see the bulletin board and bizarre photos there, the pennant that oddly doesn't include "CE-50" above it. ]

[ ...well. He's taking a look at the photo and its images on the bulletin board, flipping through if Yesod suggests there's more. It's strange to see, especially seeing Yesod himself in them...like this is just him during his university days.

Robby eventually hands him back his phone. ]

I'll go check out my room. [ Oh- ] The photos wouldn't leave the room?

[ Since items love to do that... ]

[ After another glance at the last close-up shot of himself and people he doesn't recognize, supposedly moments preserved of CE-42's group as though they had indeed attended university together, Yesod pockets his phone. His answer follows soon enough. ]

I chose to leave the room itself as I found it. However, it's possible that the original images would only behave as the files made accessible in October did, rather than disappearing entirely.

[ But the dorm rooms and their contents seem just as deliberate as that office, given the "special delivery" of the keys well in advance. ]

Whether or not we were part of past iterations, these scenes are unnatural.

They're fake. We wouldn't start going to university--it doesn't make sense.

[ That much, Robby agrees with. It's a set piece, showing what the powers that be can do. Annoying fluff than anything concerning. ]

If we leave copies somewhere... I mean, here, people can see if they recognise anyone. How often the same people are showing up.

[ It might not tell them much, but it couldn't hurt, either. ]

I took pictures. [Of... the pictures.] The ones that featured me didn't seem to have any identifying features about what the gathering or celebration was even about. Were yours similarly obscured?

[Because Alhaitham knows himself and so he has a really hard time believing he went to so many social gatherings. Especially without a clear purpose.]

They were.

[ So saying, Yesod retrieves the pictures he took of the pictures, too, in case rearranging anything or removing items from the room would result in erasing the people from the photos. He holds out his device to show Alhaitham the bulletin board in that dorm room. ]

A number of these people are unfamiliar, while others are not. Which "class" did yours supposedly depict?

CE-41. There have been images of people before, but blurred in a way that they were impossible to identify. If all of these clear faces are indeed people who have been used as tear subjects before, I think we can assume those figures in the blurred images are fake.

[But then, why have they been slotted into previous iterations?

He leans over to inspect the image.] I has assumed these were faked as well, and there's something still not right about them that I don't take them as the full truth. But... now I'm wondering if those two disappear were simply unplugged from this iteration to be used in another time or place.

[And that the same may have been done to people in this iteration. Reusing assets.]

[ CE-41... Meanwhile, the pennant affixed to the bulletin board in Yesod's picture has "CLASS OF CE-42" emblazoned upon it — both would be relatively recent iterations, then, unlike this sudden insight into one as distant as CE-09.

Alhaitham's remarks provide an interesting new perspective. Yesod glances up. ]

To test adjusted combinations of existing residents each time, in other words?

[Alhaitham nods.] Or to check trait combinations that they only have a limited number of. They have the means to know everything about us. It's only a matter of how much they're using it.

[Honestly this is all looking haphazard and like these people don't really know the value of the data they are getting. If what they need is to avert a calamity, this is wasting time.]

[ Yesod offers a nod in turn, acknowledging that possibility. ]

Then, across such combinations, I suppose they reuse those of us who meet the criteria to increase their chances of observing the desired results. It may also reduce the risk that someone would fail to vet new test subjects correctly.

[ Yet here they are, the fiftieth iteration. It's possible that the researchers conducting these experiments have access to the means to alter the flow of time for themselves, or their team has undergone changes like the addition of Dr. Sumalee. ]

If we can expect to learn what became of the other iterations soon, perhaps all dissolution events reflect an element of the behaviors that led to these outcomes.

Right. This dissolution was reflective of the populous' violent nature, but the surely didn't have to end it this way.

[And beyond the obvious, that could give illumination on things they want to avoid as a group to buy themselves time.

This theory will have a good week of existence before the rest of the science center opens and they see Sharknado.]

[open mingle] I do my crosswords in pen

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