Wednesday, June 13, 2018: Undisclosed Location, 11:40 PM
The usual faces, the usual suspects and the usual pleasantries surrounded Trent Camden’s desk. These were the quiet times, oddly enough, once the game had gotten underway. Days of endless cataloguing and procuring drugs from odd ends of the globe and then scrubbing traces of their destination or origin was a lot of pencil pushing, but a surprising amount of work and cause for stress. A bit of carelessness on an invoice or a shipment could mean having it all traced back to the AT or, more importantly, back to one Dr. Trent Camden.
So, it was nice to have that stress out of the way, and it only had to come at the price of receiving visits from people asking for god knows what or complaining about some ailment - Donald had been complaining about stomach pains from day one. Most of the complaints, Trent handled them with the same catch-all solution of sending them to Dr. Kelley, or somebody who gave a shit and had the correct job description to do something about it. Trent was really only sure about one of those, but that too was not his problem.
But now, so late at night it was practically the asscrack between night four and day five, the pharmaceutical desk was greeted with a familiar face and Trent shouldn’t have been surprised. “The headaches again, Dennis?”
Lourvey nodded both his greeting and response all rolled into one as he slumped up to the desk, sweeping his rimless glasses off his face and setting them on his desk. Trent watched in silence, disinterestedly flipping some papers and pulling a tan lockbox out from under the ledge of his desk, as the techie wrung his face in his hands.
“Migraines, and yeah. I’m hoping, like… you got something stronger than Advil?” Lourvey pulled his hands away from his face. The circles under his eyes told Trent everything he needed to know about the man’s condition.
“They’re coming earlier this time. I’ve been telling you to lay off the energy drinks, the caffeine and whatever else is in that shit- taurine? Guarine? It’s stringing you out. Do you even know what a headache is?” Trent turned in his chair, grabbing a bottle, checking the label, putting it back. He repeated the process a few times. Dennis didn’t seem to have an answer for that, so he continued. “The blood vessels in your brain are constricting because you’re dehydrating yourself for one reason or another. But they’ve got a really cool drug for that, you ready? It’s called: Water. Try drinking water for a change.”
“You’re being a dick right now. I mean, more than usual,” Lourvey tacked on, pressing an elbow into the desk and leaning over it. “So it sounds like maybe we’re both being stressed out by this shit. Can I just have the pills? If you had to run 18 hour shifts staring at screens and handling some of the dipshits they have me operating with, you’d amp yourself up too.”
Trent raised his hands to his shoulders but continued to scan the lines of bottles. Vicodin… it would do the trick, but it was like swatting a fly with a sledgehammer. Plus, there were too many dependency risks. He clicked his tongue and reached for his final decision. “I’m just worried about you ruining your liver. I know, my mistake for giving a damn. But here you go.” Trent turned around and set the bottle of Ibuprofen between them.
Dennis stared at it and looked back up to Trent with an eyebrow raised. “I said stronger than Advil.”
“It’s the same concentration they use in Midol,” Trent responded flatly. “At least give it a try, and if it doesn’t do the trick I can try to step up to something stronger.” Dennis shook his head but reached for the bottle, only for Trent to pull it back in the face of further confusion. “Cash,” the pharmacist insisted.
“What the hell?” Lourvey half-reached for the bottle again but when it was clear Trent wasn’t about to give it up, he quickly weighed his options of just snatching it versus catching a black eye and decided it wasn’t worth the trouble. “It normally just comes out of our pay or some shit, doesn’t it? Or like, don’t we budget for this? I never had to give…”
“There’s a problem with the system right now, so I won’t be able to track it.” Trent had a firm grip on the bottle and held out a hand expectantly. “Look, if there’s a problem, you can take it up with Tracen or something, but that’s just the way it is right now.”
Dennis glowered, but his shoulders slumped in defeat with little alternative available to him. If anything, this whole ordeal was just making his headache worse. And bringing it to Tracen… yeah, that wasn’t an option either. That guy had enough on his plate trying to run the main event. And he’d rather quit Red Bull cold turkey than bring it to Greynolds. “How much?” he finally said, quietly.
“Twenty five.”
“Fucking highway robbery…” Lourvey muttered, but forked over the twenties. Trent put one in the tan lockbox and slipped the other in a drawer, handing his co-worker back three fives. Lourvey turned to leave, but before he could go too far, Trent called back to him.
“Some free advice, since Kelley would just tell you the same thing: at least cut back on the drinks a little. Alternate between that and electrolytes. I’ve got some Pedialyte in the cooler, and that’d probably help too.” Dennis paused, seemed to actually listen, and gave a little bit of a wave before turning around the corner to return to his station.
Trent waved back, put the cash box away and checked the drawer.
Thursday, June 14, 2018: Undisclosed Location, 9 AM
He had been right with his prediction. They had more deaths on his list than they had the previous few days. It wouldn't last, he knew that much, but even so, if it looked like more and more of their classmates were giving in and willing to play the knock-on effect would be considerable. It was like dominoes really. Once one started to fall it didn't take long for the rest to fall with them and he got to give them another push. He got to give them a push each morning in fact. Every time he turned the speakers on he had the chance to push another one of the children to violence. He was well aware of that fact, and he played up to it. He grinned to himself as once again he pressed the button. It was time to give another person the push they needed.
"Another wonderful morning to you kids. Here's something to cheer you up if you feel a little a down. Just remember that you have managed to survive yet another day while others have failed. You have made it one step closer to victory and the chance to go home; in fact, if you're hearing me now, you've lasted more than one-third of the way through. The thought of that should perk you up, but anyway we should kick things off."
Tracen loudly cracked his fingers as he started to read the names.
"We begin with Ashlynn Martinek who said the wrong thing to Julien Leblanc, who retaliated by shutting her up for good. You'd have thought people would have learned to be careful with their words by now.
"Keeping the deaths via blade going Mackenzie Baker had her throat cut by Justin Greene who, after a day off, makes his return to these announcements. It's good to have you back, Justin.
"Speaking of returns, how about someone who never left? That's right, it's Quinn Abert! This time she mixed things up and bludgeoned Liberty Wren to death.
"Next, we had some sibling-on-sibling violence as Ramsey Cortez was strangled by Angie Cortez. You hate to see it."
Tracen gave a small shake of the head, more for his own benefit than anything else.
"In a simpler, but no less dramatic, death, William Dover met his end when Nia Karahalios wasn't in the mood to talk and let her gun take over negotiations.
Tracen read the next set of names and whistled.
"Man, you guys were trigger happy today. After a scuffle, Joanne Coleman was shot by Blaise d'Aramitz. We respect the effort, but you need to make sure the barrel is pointing away from you.
"Then, keeping the trend going, Erika Stieglitz notched up a double kill when she sniped both Katie Agustien and Saffron Fields. They died holding hands though, which was cute.
"After that, there was another death where body met bullets, as Brandon Murphy was shot by Zachary Beck, whom you may remember from a couple of days back.
"Just to shake things up, Jessica Rennes was next to go, opting out of the game by jumping off the cliffs - and after we closed them for safety reasons too.
"Luckily Erika Stieglitz gets us back on track for gun violence and continued her rampage down at the beach, where she shot Oliver Lacroix. Sadly too much time had passed for it to count as a triple. She then capped things off by putting a bullet in Tom Swift's head. Quite the busy day for Ms. Stieglitz.
"Not to be outdone, or alternatively, wanting to join in, Quinn Abert notched up a second kill. This time it was Richard Smith via gun. It's nice to see some of you really branching out and finding yourselves."
Tracen let out a dramatic sigh as he got to the end of the list.
"And after all that we end today with a couple more eclectic methods. First Ariana Moretti, who died from wounds inflicted on her by Marco Volker, which sounds boring until you realize he used a chainsaw. Then to finish us off, Lucas Brady rammed a branch into Coriander Silverman. Points for improvisation, if not for style.
"That was certainly something huh? You were all very busy yesterday. Some of you more than others granted, but still, I'm impressed. Anyway, we still have the usual admin to get through so since closing the cliffs clearly didn't work we'd like to announce that if you planned on paying a visit to the Bay Area you might want to cancel that as it's becoming off-limits. If you're there...better get your asses in gear and get out.
Finally, we finish off as always by announcing with one of you impressed us enough with your murder skills to be rewarded with a prize, and today that is Nia Karahalios! Congratulations, your prize of a chicken salad sandwich, a side of fresh fruit, and a sparkling water can be found on the pier, along with a new weapon of course.
That's all from me this morning kids, remember, you're one day closer to going home. Don't let anyone take that chance from you."
DAY FIVE: THURSDAY, JUNE 14, 2018
Weather: The rain has stopped but the island is now very damp and humid. The winds are still going strong and are especially notable the higher up the island you go. The day is partly cloudy, with cloud cover coming and going thanks to the wind. The temperature has remained steady with highs of around 86 degrees F, 30 degrees C. The moon has entered the waxing crescent phase. The fifth announcement will come at 9 AM on June 15.
We also have some rolls for you. They can be found below.
Summary:
1. Nikki Nelson-Kelly (Emprexx Plush)
2. Dane Lennox (Kotorikun)*
3. Adele Jones (Somersault) Mike Brown (Somersault, Swap Card used)
4. Nathan Coleman (MK Kilmarnock)
5. Quinn Abert (Namira) Bret Carter (Deamon, Hero Card used)
6. Julien Leblanc (Endellion) Meilin Zhou (BlizzardeyeWonder, Hero Card used)
Remember all the etiquette surrounding rolls, kill requests, etc. As always, there are three days for cards and Danger Zone posts, and a further seven days for deaths and Danger Zone exits.
Lastly, congratulations to Maraoone for winning this month's Best Death Award. A quote nomination thread for Joanne Coleman will be up shortly.
