Thursday, December 9, 2021: Undisclosed Location, 6:30 AM
Routine had a strange way of turning even the most unnatural and otherworldly things into normal.
For the past few years things had gone roughly the same for Donald. He’d wake up early every morning and make his own coffee, with extra sugar. Then he’d begin the real task. He would freshly squeeze a few oranges for the purpose of making juice and then he’d lightly toast two frosted strawberry Pop-Tarts. It was very a specific and deliberate ritual, and it was required to be precise and timely. The juice couldn’t have too much pulp, the Pop-Tart had to be toasted to a specific light brown. Any lighter or darker would cause it to be sent back, too much or too little pulp would end up with the juice being poured on the floor. And don’t even try to come through with raspberry filling! There was no room for errors, there was no room for mistakes…
Not when you were working for the Arthro Taskforce. Not when you were working directly under Jim Greynolds.
Don’s hand shook as he held the paper plate in one hand and the tall glass in the other. Every step was quick and panicked. Donny felt destined to spill the beverage all over his pale hands. He approached Greynolds’ room and lightly knocked on the door before twisting the knob open in a clumsy and uncoordinated motion. It was more important to be quick than to be polite. There was no reason to ask permission, his presence was expected.
Ahead was the pony-tailed silhouette of his boss, engaged in conversation of the highest scale and danger…
“I just don’t appreciate the attitude, Jimmy! I’m your mother!”
“Well, then you should know, Mommy,” Greynolds said with a bouncy playfulness, “my name is Jimmy Greynolds not Jimmy Roku. Ask the neighbor boy how to set up your smart-tv, don’t ask me.”
A hand waved and motioned Donald forward. The intern quickly scurried towards Jimmy G and placed both the glass of juice and mass-produced processed pastry at his desk. Greynolds took a bite and then a sip. His mother groaned and gesticulated on a bright laptop screen. She looked just like Greynolds, disarmingly and distractingly ordinary. An elderly woman with pink rollers in her hair, a pink floral robe, and a sour expression.
“Then why’d you call me in the first place? It’s not so easy getting ahold of you and you’re very particular on the how and the where and the what! Can’t use Zoom, can’t do FaceTime! Gotta do it Jim’s way on Jim’s special computer with his special VPwhatever!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Greynolds dismissed his mother and nodded at Donald as he smirked that permanent Greynolds smirk, “you’re a real pioneer woman. I’m actually calling you with good news.”
Donald walked to the exit slower than he walked to drop off the breakfast. There was a small skip in his step as the first task of the day was completed with success and little stress. There was no mistakes, there was no error. Everything was going smoothly…
“And what good news could you possibly bring?”
“Things are going good at work. Free time that wasn’t previously there has opened up. Put up the stocking and decorate the tree, alert all the Whos in Whoville,” Greynolds said taking a large bite of the Pop-Tart, speaking through large theatrical chomps, “I’ll be home for Christmas.”
Donald shuddered and shut the door.
Thursday, December 9, 2021: Undisclosed Location, 9 AM
Tracen entered the room with his notes and cup of coffee. He somewhat resented the fact he needed to wake up early. He understood the idea, they wanted to reduce the amount of sleep the students got or wake them up had managed to get a brief bit of shut-eye but still, it was cold in the morning before the heating turned on. Regardless, he took his position behind the microphone and took a sip of his coffee. It was another productive day for the students, even if some of them had decided to eliminate themselves. Greynolds had always compared the bloodshed to a boulder rolling downhill, once it started to gather momentum it was almost impossible to stop. The students had started killing, so escalating violence was now inevitable, no matter how many of them tried to resist.
Tracen took another sip of coffee and made an edit to one of his notes. Then he pressed the button to send the speakers buzzing to life.
"Good morning kids! I hope you're not too chilly out there and all managed to find a warm place to spend the night. If you're hoping things are about to warm up then I have bad news about the weather forecast, but we'll get to that. First we need to go through the murderers and their murderees.
"We open today with a brief dance in the dark leading to Bill Taylor getting stabbed by Jezzie Stark who is back once again.
"After that, Mitch McDuffy had an encounter with a wild Kitty Graves and like every else, he came off on the worse end of it.
"Roberta Chen met her end next when she had a tense encounter with Daenerys Todd. Sadly no dragons were involved."
Tracen chuckled at his own stupid joke before continuing.
"Shout-out to Joshua James who made sure Zora Morrison wouldn't forget who he was when he strangled her to death.
"Zhijuan Lung-Romney died next following an adverse reaction to our brand of sleeping gas. We are sincerely sorry this occurred and want to assure you that in ninety-nine percent of cases, the gas is perfectly harmless. If you're hearing this I guess you didn't have an adverse reaction so congratulations I suppose.
"Marian Dick went for a walk in the snow forgetting that you do actually need warmth to continue living and ended up as an icicle. A lesson for you all, I guess.
"Tull Talbott thought he was a wolf but all that howling just left him open for Russell Fitzroy to put a bullet in his back. Let out your most mournful awoo's for our boy...beautiful.
"Anyway! Ingrid Wilde tried to — and I swear I'm reading this right — she tried to swim away from the island, which we can safely say did not work out. I wouldn't recommend you try if you like being alive.
"Next Alex Avanesian buried his spear deep into Cedar Dalisay's guts, just like he was tapping her for syrup really because she's, ah never mind."
"And finally, we ended the day with Jess Kawazoe who decided it would be a smart idea to collapse and freeze to death. Chilling."
"So now that's out the way we need to sort out the danger zone for today, The Cave is back open. The second thing is that The Graveyard is now off-limits. If you go in there without permission then at least your body will be in the right place.
"It also brings us on to our winner of the Best Kill Award who for today is Joshua James! Congratulations on your achievement, your prize of a shiny new weapon and a lobster roll with slaw and a pitcher of Samuel Adams can be found in The Graveyard. I'm reliably informed that the locals are keeping it safe for you.
"And that's it from me today, I'll be speaking to you all again in twenty-four hours time, so remember if you need to keep warm, killing a classmate is bound to keep your heat up."
DAY THREE: THURSDAY, DECEMBER 9, 2021
Weather: Another clear day with no rain or snow but the low temperature has made everything frosty. High of around degrees 32F, 0 degrees C at about 2 PM with a low of 25F, -4 degrees C, in the evening. The sun rises at 10:05 AM, and sets at 4:19 PM. The winds from the east coast have died down and the island is still. The moon is in its final waxing crescent day with the 10th being the first quarter moon. There is a semidiurnal tide with two highs one at 3:31am and the other at 2:37pm the two lows are at 8:40am and 9:36pm.
Also please find below your roll set for this announcement:
Summary:
1. Crystal Henderson (Grand Moff Hissa) Hector Quayle (Grand Moff Hissa, Swap Card Used)
2. Henry David “Dave” Dearborn (Primrosette) Eden Glass (Primsrosette, Swap Card Used)
3. Joan Leavan (decoy73)
4. Dominiqua Ashmore (Ryuki)
5. Tenshi Fukushima-Yves (BlizzardeyeWonder)
6. Ren Vu (Zetsu) Eden Zima (Zetsu, Swap Card Used)
Also, congratulations go out to Buko for winning the Best Death Award! Your quote nomination thread will be up shortly!
As a reminder, there are three days for cards and for regular posting to wrap up for threads that are now in danger zones and a further seven days for leaving posts.
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