open to Investigators - before the bomb disposal

[leftbehindagain]

I don't have much time right now, but I need to get these questions out there.

The evacuation isn't sitting right with me. Why now? Is it just because everything's going to hell in a handbasket, or is there something deeper to JORD1's reasoning? Has anyone else heard anything? Anyone who was infiltrating in there, have you heard anything that might make him want to pack up his toys and go home?

And then there's this 'important mission.' Armin-san and Yua-san got marked by ROSE, and Ambrose-san said another Trump got him before this. I'm willing to bet everyone on that list of people is marked - but Naoto's marked and she's not on it. Is anyone else conspicuously absent, and does anyone know where they are, if so? [There may be nothing to this particular rabbit hole of thought, but one of his friends is notably missing from it. Of course Naoki's worried. Besides, it might help them figure out what ROSE is up to - she almost certainly picked the people, if marked Travelers are the common thread.]

...Okay. If I'm about to get myself killed, someone else take this information and make it useful. If JORD1's up to something fishy, make sure Naoto knows. Hopefully I'll be able to myself, but I can't let myself back in if something goes wrong and I may not have the time to anyway.

Comments

[wantedittobeagame]

...what.

What's this 'if I get myself killed'?

[leftbehindagain]

I'd be stupid to completely rule out the possibility, even though I'm planning on getting out of it alive.

We have to plan for the off chance, Adachi-san, we don't have time not to.

[wantedittobeagame]

Hey, I don't want to hear it. No one's dying on my watch; not if I have anything to say about it.

[People dying was kind of a sensitive subject.]

[leftbehindagain]

[Like it isn't sensitive for Naoki too? Think for a minute, Adachi-san.]

I'm not planning to. But not having a contingency for it would be stupid. You're going to have to deal with me making the contingency plan.

[wantedittobeagame]

Well, I'd deal with it if it wasn't a stupid contingency plan.

Tell her yourself when you make it out of this alive.

[hakodate]

I can confirm that Chizuru and I are marked. By PSYCHE, or the Lovers, whatever you want to call her.

[And that worries him, given the rest of the context. Rounding up the people marked by forces that are operating in dead opposite to each other? Sure. That's bound to be completely innocent and doesn't smell at all like big fucking trouble.]

Don't see either of her other picks on that list, though. I haven't seen Kongou at all since this started, and she doesn't strike me as the type to keep her head down. We might've just lost her in a dungeon portal or something.

But I don't know what Mai's situation is.

[leftbehindagain]

Hmm. There aren't any Defenders on the list, so that's a possibility.

The other question is what ROSE wants you guys to do. If she's looking for help with SAGE - Hermit, Ix, whatever you want to call him - dragging you two into it doesn't make much sense. But if she's looking for people to go poke at Devil it adds up a little better, since they worked with Lovers last time.

Maybe that's part of it - she wants to deny them a chance to mark more people.

[hakodate]

If that's the case, it might be the first time I've definitely agreed with a Trump on anything.

[Hijikata is grumpy as shit about all of this business, but he doesn't care to see more of their number get metaphorically pissed on for powerful forces to mark their territory.]

[leftbehindagain]

If she's denying Devil claims, I doubt it's because she feels sorry for us for being marked or anything. She's already grabbed a couple people of her own.

[hakodate]

I'm less worried about the motivation than the end result, here.

[neverfeltthatway]

...There are at least six people who've been marked who were not on the list. So while ROSE may be choosing from the list of the marked, her criteria are obviously more selective than that.

[leftbehindagain]

It's still a common thread to start from, and why they're not on the list might be important.

[neverfeltthatway]

I'd assume she only chose marked people because she wants to deprive the other Trumps of potential allies.

As far as why she didn't choose everybody with a mark... I know you're worried about Naoto, but I don't think it's as meaningful as you think it is. Kongou's vanished, probably into an dungeon. Mai's went missing during the jaunt. Leo is already helping out in her corner, I think. It's entirely possible that she didn't suggest Naoto because she knew she'd say no, or because she's more useful to her as a distraction, or because it would be too suspicious to ask of her, given her position.

[leftbehindagain]

Maybe. [He's... still not completely convinced, but all he can do for now is go with it.]

I doubt she'd mind so much if Hermit gets to mark some people, so she's probably hoping more of that group gets bundled off to deal with Devil. Are you planning to take her up on it?

[neverfeltthatway]

I'm planning on going to talk to her, trying to get some answers. What happens then... depends on her response.

[loyalrebel]

Other than the things he hates the most infecting his men and threatening the grid he put everything he has in to protecting?

[leftbehindagain]

Hey, sometimes it's not just the obvious problems.

[loyalrebel]

Mn.

[There's a bit of a pause before he adds.]

There is something... not quite what he appears with him. It is something I plan on looking in to, once I have more on it I will be back in contact.

We have too few answers that do not simply raise more questions.

[leftbehindagain]

...Why am I not entirely surprised? Absolute power and all that. [Though the irony of talking about corruption in this particular circumstance...]

Answers generating more questions is probably about normal for this kind of thing. Good luck, when you get to digging.

[loyalrebel]

It may have little to do with his position, or everything.

Is he truly a native, or only someone believing he is?

[professorwolf]

Ah. Sorry to be the one with the stupid question here, but... what do you mean by "marked"?

[Lyall's new, and he hasn't had any friends explain this to him yet. Sorry, Naoki.]

[leftbehindagain]

[No, it's cool. And actually, his friends overlooked that part of the explanation.]

Seems the Trumps are choosing people. Claiming. Whatever you want to call it. I don't know if there's a particular pattern to how they choose people, but apparently you come away with a mark from it.

If you bumped into anyone in a permanent fog-ball in the last liminal space before we got dumped here, Ambrose-san thought that was the common factor. In any case, that seems to be the common thread to this 'important mission' thing, so it was probably ROSE's list of people. But we also know she didn't include everyone who's been marked.

I don't know if there's anything deeper as to why, but since Naoto's conspicuously absent from the list...

[professorwolf]

It could simply be because ROSE knows she wouldn't say yes, being too busy with her charges here. Or perhaps the ones in question have particular skills she doesn't share right now.

[He does his best to be reassuring, there.]

What does this, er, claiming entail exactly? Aside from big balls of dark fog, anyway. Just the mark?

[leftbehindagain]

Maybe. [He's not sure there isn't more to it than that, but that's all they've got right now.]

I don't think anyone knows for sure yet. A couple people used it to talk to Lovers a couple weeks back, but I don't think they knew that was going to happen until it did. Naoto said Sun made it sound to her like an alliance, but that... doesn't mean the others are looking at it anywhere near so nicely. Even if I didn't have other things to do I'd be avoiding Devil's hideout like the plague.

...So to speak. [Kind of terrible phrasing given the Automata thing, but his other choice was 'avoid the hell out of it,' so... yeah.]

[professorwolf]

[Lyall doesn't take any offense. He doesn't even really notice the figure of speech's connection to their situation. ... the hell one might have prompted a comment, though.]

Anything named "the Devil's hideout" deserves to be avoided, I believe. That's the big cube of darkness that's continually getting bigger, isn't it?