Day 11

[kentucky_mcgiygas]

Today we have something special, really special! A favorite of mine. It seems like all of you need to have a break today, so your next game challenge will last two days instead of one. That... and that's how long the drug lasts.

Check your dressing rooms for more information!

((Truth serum game!
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[jinglebros]

Hey Mary, got that sword still? Wanna face off again?

[ 'Face off' meaning he'll let her beat on him with a fake sword until he pretends he's down, but hey, as long as she has fun and stops looking like the world has ended. ]

[scribbly]

[She's going to keep looking like the world has ended forever, probably.]

I think...it's in the prop room. ...We played with it...yesterday...

["We" meaning her and Ene. :(]

Face...off... I'm a little tired...

[jinglebros]

Hmm.

[ Santa looks tired, too. Maybe they should nap together. :( ]

How about we go do something else, then? What do you like doing the best, Mary?

[scribbly]

[no she doesn't want a nap she wants to shank somebody :/]

I like to draw. That's my favorite thing.

[jinglebros]

[ no shanking, that's how we get sent to the hotel or worse ]

Can you draw me a picture?

[scribbly]

[the hotel is full of people she wants to shank though so like. y'know]

Okay...

[She glances around, then heads off to the kid's set, where she and Ib have been sleeping and where she's kept the markers and sketchpad she got during tattoo hell. She's expecting Santa to follow.]

What should I draw for you?

[jinglebros]

[ He follows along. He looks a little sad to be there on that particular set, considering Niles and Corrin slept there often as well, and sometimes Santa too. But he sucks it up and deals. ]

I guess that depends on what kind of picture you want to draw. Happy, sad, stabby?

[scribbly]

[i've just sort of been assuming the actual children made a no grownups allowed fort out of the kid's set...... maybe they have just always missed each other idk

anyway don't say "stabby" that's not going to get us anywhere good]

You wanted a picture for you... I can draw anything. So what should I draw?

[jinglebros]

[ they must have?? omg ]

...draw Niles big and strong and beating the crap out of bad guys at the hotel.

[scribbly]

[A pause, as she takes markers in her hand.]

Are you mad? About what happened to him?

[jinglebros]

...I'm very mad about it, yeah.

[scribbly]

...

He's safe. The adults kept saying they wanted to put Ib and me there, because it was a good and safe place, but when they end up there themselves, everyone gets mad.

[There's an eerie quietness to her, a frown on her face that isn't quite that apocalyptic misery but closer to displeasure.]

Why?

[With the game in play, she isn't asking rhetorically.]

[jinglebros]

In this case, because it means we're separated and won't see each other again for a long time. He was going to ask Corrin to marry him and now he can't do that until the game is over.

[scribbly]

But he still can. The game's already half over. Is it really that long?

[Granted, Mary doesn't really know what marrying someone entails, but.]

Being separated's no fun, but when I said I didn't want to be separated from Ib, it didn't change anyone's mind.

[...]

They'll see each other again. He's gone for now, but Ene is gone forever.

But it's Niles and Lotus that people are mad about.

[If she phrases it like a question, she can't be told a lie.]

Why?

[jinglebros]

Because Ene didn't make any friends with some of her actions. She also concentrated mostly on you kids and didn't make too many friends outside of it, so nobody knew her very well. Nobody can say she's wrong for it, but they don't know what they were missing either.

[scribbly]

[Mary's hands clench into fists around her markers at her sides. She doesn't care for this answer at all.]

He's only gone for a little while. Ene is gone forever. Does that mean there isn't a difference?

[...]

Lotus said it was because of you she wouldn't vote for me. That's why she was going to let me die.

[There's a sharpness to it. She knows what death means. She knows that Ene's gone, what would have happened to her, she knows what a certain threat means—]

Niles said something bad about my friend before he left. He said he'd do something bad to him. But you want me to draw him beating up bad guys, like he's a good guy even though he did that.

[She's got a lot to say, and it all comes out quiet and clipped, her usual energy gone cold.]

But everyone's mad, and he's mad, too, like there isn't a difference, even though he's safe and he'll see everyone again, but Ib and I don't get to see Ene ever again, but it's like it doesn't matter.

[She doesn't ask why this time.]

[jinglebros]

Lotus said what?!

[ Santa's eyes flash anger. ]

Why the hell would it be because of me? I'd tell her to save you before anything else!

[ He pauses at the rest and deflates, sighing. ]

You have a right to be mad at me right now. I'm sorry. I'm upset about Ene too, if that helps. I didn't think I would be, but I am. In the end, she was a good girl.

[scribbly]

[Mary stands a little straighter.]

I remember. Lotus said you said she couldn't vote for me, and tried to make Niles do it instead. She said you said he'd have to. He didn't.

[She knew Lotus was lying then, and didn't think for a moment she'd been so central in their discussions herself—Lotus simply didn't want to vote for her. That was all there is to it. Even so—she's angry. She's angry over all of it.]

Simon voted for me because Link died. If he didn't, I would have.

[...]

It wasn't just in the end. She was always good.

[jinglebros]

What the fuck? Lotus was a bitch!

[ He's so angry about this and so sincere about his anger that he forgets not to swear around the little kid. Sorry, Mary. ]

If I'd been here, I would have stopped her. I'm sorry that happened.

[scribbly]

[like the swearing is the worst of what's happened to her in the past twenty-four hours???]

It did happen, though. Ene dying happened, too.

[There's so much indignance over Lotus's actions, and none for what's happened to Ene. Defense for this, anger for that; one thing is mourned, another ignored. Mary only so recently learned about friendship, about fury. One word and feeling at a time, Mary is reevaluating where her trust belongs.]

Are you mad that Lotus is in the hotel, too?

[jinglebros]

Not really. There's reasons to believe she's safer there. More and more reasons with each passing moment.

But you're not concerned with that, are you? You want to know if I hate her.

[scribbly]

No. [This is the truth; as is, Mary doesn't care about whether or not Santa hates Lotus.]

Lotus is safe, and you aren't mad she's gone. Niles is safe, and you're mad he's gone.

[...

Mary's voice comes softer.]

I'm trying to understand.

[Friendship, fury, feelings. They all felt like a shiny new toy when she first discovered them, lovely and new, but now she's noticing the cracks and scratches and fingerprint smudges.]

[jinglebros]

I don't know how to tell you.

[ He pauses, then sighs. ]

Phrase it in the form of a question. Ask me "why is Niles more important than Lotus". The truth serum will help me tell you.

[scribbly]

[That question makes Mary's fists clench tight around her markers again. If Niles is more important than Lotus, is he more important than Ene, too? Is that why no one is mad? Is that why a threat against one friend after the death of another doesn't mean as much as separation?

The shiny new toy feels dirty and dented.

She pauses a moment.]

Why is it bad for Niles to be safe in the hotel, but good for Lotus to be safe in the hotel?

[jinglebros]

Because Lotus is a danger to herself with the way she acts and the way she is. Because Lotus wasn't going to survive much longer here no matter what she did. Because Lotus was making herself into a lightning rod. Because Lotus made me enemies, even if she apologized for it and was clearly going to continue to do so.

[ Santa looks down at his feet as he answers. He doesn't really want to be giving this answer. But Mary deserves to be hearing something. ]

Because Niles is an asset who ensured the survival of an emotional pillar of the community. Because Niles knows how to protect himself and others and how to take down a threat. Because Niles was keeping someone alive that I want to see survive.

[ He bites his tongue now, but it doesn't work, and the rest comes out anyway. ]

Because Lotus isn't the one I fell for.