#au!no fog

[birkins-nest]

The night was late everyone in the lab had pretty much gone home, Wesker was coming back from his undercover job as S.T.A.R.S captain. He expected to be alone in the lab but when he walked in there was Birkin sitting at the desk writing down notes from his last project "I've told you a million times not to eat in the lab" his voice was calm and tired as he walked in sitting down next to him looking at his notes briefly before looking at him again

Will looked up as soon as he heard Al’s voice. He popped another piece of candy into his mouth before he talked.

“M&Ms won’t contaminate the area, Al. And aren’t you always getting onto me about not eating?”

He gently shifted his notes over with a papery rustle so that Albert could read them. He would understand them. They always could understand each other’s notes.

“How’s the new job?”

[birkins-nest]

The structure of the liquid has changed. And the color too. It's gray, then it's green, then it's an inky black color. A terrible smell rises from it, like some kind of rot and decay. This isn't normal. You're seeing more nightmares in your reflection, you're seeing monsters out of the corner of your eye. They're not the same hallucinations you normally have. These aren't YOUR dreams. They're something else.

Will was worried. The new hallucinations were… odd, but he was more concerned about the samples. Were they spoiling? What was going on? Was there contamination? Was it a delayed reaction to being exposed to oxygen or the airborne pollutants in this day and age?

He needed someone else to hypothesize with but who would be good for that?

As he tried to consider that, he mindlessly walked through the halls, unable to notice anyone in front of him.

[rising-rookie-rebecca]

The faucet isn't black sludge anymore. It looks like normal water, but it smells like sulfur and tastes like copper. No one is showing signs of illness, but shouldn't they be? Insomnia is starting to pick up among the researchers, but that might be normal, isn't it? No, there's something wrong with that swirling storm in the basement.

Rebecca still told everyone to not drink the water. Unknown contaminants were not to be messed with!

The insomnia is worrying but it is amongst researchers… though the strange dreams for Rebecca are what keeping her up. It felt foreboding and it kept repeating each night.

She let herself lightly doze when she had free time, trying to keep from the disturbing reoccurring nightmare. She hoped the others were having a better time than she was.

[birkins-nest]

The more you look at the samples from the cylinder, and the strange liquid that Dwight was soaked in, the more something feels different. Something is telling you to open the tank. Something is telling you to spread the infection. Sometimes when you look at your reflection, you have more eyes than you should have. Sometimes when you look at your nephew, you see monstrous black tentacles bursting from his chest. Something is telling you to let it go free.

Will rubbed at his eye as he moved away from the microscope.

Maybe he needed more sleep. It was never good when he started to hallucinate at work.

It wasn’t as bad as the time when he was almost convinced that one of his samples was his lunch that his wife had brought him. But it was still probably time to go to sleep.

And anyways, he had a similar sleep deprived paranoid delusion last month that the reaper with red eyes was coming to take his work.

Having multiple eyes in his reflection wasn’t that new. Just it was odd that it was happening again so soon.

[birkins-nest]

“Dr. Birkin?” Rebecca asked as she looked into the lab before she headed down to the chamber with the container of strange substance they were here to figure out.

“Dr. Birkin! There you are! I’m warning everyone not to drink the tap water because it’s contaminated with… whatever this is.”

She held up a cup of thick black sludge for the scientist to see.

@rising-rookie-rebecca

William looked up from where he was looking into a microscope at a sample he had collected.

“What? Oh. Do you need me to find out what it is?” he asked, his tone slightly irritated. This was important and he didn’t want to deal with side quests!

[rising-rookie-rebecca]

Fortunately, things seem to be okay.

No one has gotten hurt yet, no one has gotten injured. It's a good sign, even if the church is getting much creepier at night. Chris and Leon are doing a fine job of keeping everyone safe, but that doesn't mean things are doing any better for your mood!

When you get up to get a drink to try to calm down, a sick, black sludge comes out of the faucet.

Rebecca backed up for a moment before she then placed her cup under the faucet anyways to collect some of the sludge. If they knew what this was, then they could fix the pipes and it wouldn’t happen again.

God, she would have to warn everyone about contaminated water right now. Would it be easier to just shout it or find everyone to make sure they all knew?

She would have to go to the lab anyways to analyze it, so she would go talk to everyone.

Rebecca headed off with her cup of sludge in hand.

[birkins-nest]

[Dead Prince Daylight]

As the night falls on the first day of Project Monastery, there's something that feels off in the building. A pull, a tug down to the cylinder. The greens swirl like a storm, and upon closer inspection something is leaking from it drop by drop... upwards onto the ceiling, not the other way around.

Will could never resist the pull of his curiosity. Not that he ever wanted to.

So it was with that he left where he had been setting up some of his equipment to his liking, and made his way down the stairs. He hadn’t even changed for bed yet.

But the liquid was defying gravity. Unless it was something lighter than most of the elements that made up the air, then it shouldn’t do that.

He moved closer one step at a time as he watched the steady drip drip drip that defied the laws of physics.

[birkins-nest]

Dr William Birkin,

We are writing to you to confirm your position for Project Monastery. We are thrilled to have an accomplished scientist as yourself on board. Dr Albert Wesker recommended you highly, and we are confident in your ability to contribute to solving this mystery.

We will provide any equipment you require, simply return the form attached to this letter. Cost is of no consequence.

-Project Monastery staff

Dr William Birkin was practically the epitome of the absent minded scientist stereotype. If it didn’t have anything to do with his work then it didn’t exist. Which is why it wasn’t odd that his wife interrupted his work to give him the invitation.

He barely looked at it before it was insistently shoved in front of the microscope he was just about to use.

Might as well get the annoyance out of the way…

When he opened it and read the contents, it was no longer an annoyance.

This was the project Al had spoken of about some mysterious thing that needed studying. His dear friend always knew how to pique his interest and a good scientific mystery was a surefire way to get him on board.

He wrote down the equipment he likely would need on the form before sending it back. Now what to pack? Annette would likely insist on at least one suitcase for him even if he would gladly go as he was now.

He resigned himself to packing things like clothes when he could’ve been packing equipment.