piper90npcs: (Richard Washburn)
piper90npcs ([personal profile] piper90npcs) wrote in [community profile] piper902021-01-14 07:28 pm

Jorgmund Emergency Announcement

[In the middle of the night, when even the night watch shifts should be pacing through the dorm area, there’s a peal of noise from the communicators impossible to ignore or sleep through. It’s clearly an alarm of some sort, like tornado alerts back on Earth. It goes on for solid three minutes, long enough for everyone to move on from being woken by it to loathing it, before a message shows up on the communicators-

-and the doorways out of each of the dorms are sealed with a semi-translucent forcefield.

On the communicator screen, Richard Washburn shows up and straightens his tie.
]

Hello, employees. Believe me, I’m not any happier about this midnight interruption than you are, but we’re currently in a state of – mild – emergency. I don’t want anyone to get overly excited, but until the situation is resolved, you will remain in your dorms. Depending on how long this takes, all activities scheduled for tomorrow morning have been suspended.

The reason for this is that we have an intruder in your living quarters. We have this footage from a few weeks ago.

[A new image shows up on the communicator: a security camera video of a Santa Claus with a line of the highest executive-level parents and their small children waiting to tell him their wishlist. A little girl in pigtails and a sparkly t-shirt of a Christmas tree hops up onto his lap.

“Ho, ho, ho!” Santa says, and he boops her nose. “Aren’t you a peach? Tell me, little one. What would you like for Christmas?”

“I want a big plastic spider!” the girl says excitedly.

“A creepy little child, aren’t you? Well, that’s just swell, because that’s my favorite flavor,” Santa says, and then – blurry on the security camera footage – transforms into a mass of black goo, latching onto the little girl’s face and suctioning to stay on. The child’s mother screams and yanks her daughter away, and the footage shows pure pandemonium as some parents lunge forward to help the mother with her daughter while other parents snatch their own children and start running. In all the chaos, the black goo vanishes.

Washburn flicks the footage away and reappears on the screen.
]

Thankfully, there were no fatalities in this incident, and after we couldn’t find any evidence of the attacker, we assumed that it was a freak incident of the Stuff. However, there was recently another unsuccessful attack on a teenager by this same creature posing as one of the tutors on the Rig, and then again on another thankfully unharmed child disguised as another child, and then on another child under the guise of a children’s television show host named “Mr. Rogers”, and tonight-

[He takes a deep breath, annoyed, as if this is somehow the Hires’ faults.]

-tonight we found a security breach to your floor, and we have good reason to believe that the shapeshifter is posing as one of you.

We know this: we know it poses as figures appealing to children, so for obvious reasons, you won’t be allowed anywhere near any Jorgmund staff whatsoever until this is resolved. We know that its ability to disguise itself is relatively seamless. And we know that it preys on minors.

If you can determine who among you isn’t at all appealing to children, we can consider releasing you from your dorm and discussing next steps to search out whoever’s been replaced.

If this starts taking long enough that it jeopardizes the Jorgmund’s mission, we may start taking more drastic measures to ensure that we aren’t harboring any imposters.

I’ll keep you updated if you keep me updated.
trialbyliar: (Default)

[personal profile] trialbyliar 2021-01-15 06:03 am (UTC)(link)
Use that big alien brain. I mean, by that logic, Dickwash himself could be the intruder and this thing is using his authority to keep all the scary powerful people out of the way. Or it could be Dan, lying about how the monster works to throw everyone off. I don't see you pestering them for their sources.
googledox: (193)

locked to Kokichi

[personal profile] googledox 2021-01-15 06:17 am (UTC)(link)
I had considered those prospects, but if we're able to clear everyone it will be more evident that one of the executives has been replaced.

Or in the process of using the various methods we've suggested, an inconsistency in Dan's behaviors or abilities might become evident.

So that leaves you and your mystery source.

If there was ever a time for you to drop that cloying act of yours, now would be the time.
trialbyliar: (pic#14449512)

[personal profile] trialbyliar 2021-01-15 06:31 am (UTC)(link)
Ooh, "cloying". How harsh. But I guess this means you're finally learning to distrust people a bit!

[That, and as much as he wants to play his cards close to his chest, it doesn't help anyone if they completely dismiss what info he can give them. And it is locked just to Brainy now, so any shenanigans linking to this knowledge would be easier to track, so...]

So I guess you deserves a teensy reward.

[And his flips his comm around, the view instead panning onto an array of security cameras lit up bright in the dark room. He focuses on one, where he's got one video paused – the blurry shape of a human woman entering the dorms area, with a timestamp at the bottom marking roughly two hours before Dickwash's alert.]
googledox: (169)

[personal profile] googledox 2021-01-15 06:42 am (UTC)(link)
One of the only functioning security cameras, actually being useful for us.

Novel.

Hmm. You might still be the culprit, throwing us off the scent by providing something useful, but considering you likely have no alibi during that period it'd be unlikely that you'd implicate yourself.

On the other hand, I do have an alibi.

I can vouch for the intel without revealing the source of the information. They're more likely to take my word than yours. You're right that the secrecy of it may prove useful.
Edited 2021-01-15 06:42 (UTC)
trialbyliar: (Default)

[personal profile] trialbyliar 2021-01-15 07:05 am (UTC)(link)
[He won't argue with a bit of help. He's about to ask for the alibi, even, but then he sees Brainy starting a new thread and dropping the deets over there.

So all Brainy gets is obnoxious giggling before Kokichi goes to respond over there where everyone can see. Y'know, to make sure everyone knows how strong an alibi it is. That's all.]