#ds2 ch2

[dangansuffering]

An Empty And Withered Hive || Ch2 Post-Trial Suffering Game || Conclusion

And then it’s over. The screen goes dark and recedes back into the ceiling. Onryo is already gone, along with the robots. Presumably they think you’re all aware of the protocol by now. The elevator that will take you away from this place, back to the Blue Level, stands open at the back of the room, waiting for everyone to board.

How do you feel? Relieved, that the only other person to die was Hex? Satisfied, even? Perhaps you don’t feel much of anything. Or maybe you’re thinking that, no matter how horrible, no one deserved to die like that. Dorian’s execution had been a theatrical spectacle, but at least the actual death was quick. Bloody, but not an extended, agonizing torture. Even Lyric’s murder, while it had a gruesome aftermath, was swift, instant, no time for suffering.

Nothing like what you just witnessed. Nothing like the sight of Hex’s body, a sight that isn’t likely to leave the memory of all who saw it before the screen shut off any time soon.

But there’s nothing more to do now but leave this room, with the smell of blood in the air - very real - and a lingering hint of charred flesh, which may or may not be imagined.

Tomorrow, at least, won’t have any spins or motives to be dealt with. Tomorrow will be a new day, if you can make it through the nightmares.

[dangansuffering]

Karma Stings || Ch2 Post-Trial Suffering Game || pt.3 [Feat. Hex]

Perhaps Hex seems unsteady or groggy as she approaches the Wheel. Given her silence during the entirety of trial and the fact that several of you saw her sleeping through the investigation period, it seems likely that Onryo’s comment about her snoozing through the voting period was correct. Was she ill? Had the nanites taken that much of a toll on her? Or maybe this was an extension of how little she cared about anyone else.

Whatever the case, she moves to spin. After two Yellow results in a row, it’s doubtful that she’ll be getting off easy this time. The odds certainly aren’t in her favor. But perhaps it’s hard to work up much concern for her anyway, considering how consistently nasty she’s been to everyone she’s encountered. The Wheel turns, and there’s still a sense of suspense, but when it stops…

The wedge at the top lights up White.

“White. Execution.”

Onryo says nothing this time, has little reaction beyond the continued presence of their cheshire grin. And while there may be a smug air about Hex, some expectation that her shield will protect her… it doesn’t. A chain shoots out of the walls, metal clamps around Hex’s arms and she’s jerked suddenly back and out of sight.

Moments later, the massive screen from the last execution descends from the ceiling once again and lights up. A new scene flickers into view on it, settling into high definition.

Hexecution

Hex is strapped down to a metal chair in a smoky room, vague shapes twisting and undulating just out of view. A low thrumming fills the air around the chair, and Hex hisses uncomfortably as the temperature begins to rise, sweat beading on her forehead. Suddenly, a magnetized ball bearing falls through the smoke, pinging as it fixes itself to the chair. Then one more, and another, and another, until there’s a veritable stream of them, all flinging themselves down into the chair. Hex isn’t hurt by them, but eventually there’s no more open metal for them to fix themselves to, and the pinging stops as they find purchase on her instead, futilely pushing up against her to make contact with the chair beneath. 

The temperature rises again, and Hex is practically soaked through. Her breathing is heavy, eyes darting back and forth as she waits for whatever’s meant to kill her- but no magnetized weapon suddenly pierces her. Instead, there’s nothing but the endless shower of ball bearings. Hex is practically covered by them by this point.

[CW: Severe and Fatal Burns, Skin Trauma, Choking/Difficulty Breathing, Some Gore, Holes in Skin]

Then? The ball bearings start to vibrate. Hex lets out a yowl of pain, squirming in the chair. But the temperature continues to spike, and the stream of ball bearings increase. They come down faster and harder than rain in a hurricane. The temperature rises to the point where the metal begins to burn, and with the shaking, the ball bearings begin to dig painfully into the woman’s skin. Hex opens her mouth to scream-- but gets a throatful of ball bearings, drowning in burning metal. Every inch of her body is now entirely covered in the vibrating metal balls, form completely obscured.

A few seconds pass, and soon there’s nothing but an enormous pile of ball bearings in the center of the room, vibrating and pulsating like a single organ. Smoke rises from within the pile, the normally grey little balls now reddening around the edges from the heat. The thrumming suddenly stops, and all at once the balls fall away, revealing Hex’s burnt corpse. Her expression- or what might be her expression, there isn’t much left of her face to tell- seems twisted in sheer agony and her seared skin has melded with the metal chair. She’s covered in holes from where several ball bearings managed to vibrate through her skin entirely, and the smell of charred meat begins to seep into the air even in the trial room.

MORIKO SANO, ULTIMATE APIARIST, HAS BEEN EXECUTED.

--

[Art Credit: Emi]

[dangansuffering]

Double Feature || Ch2 Post-Trial Suffering Game || pt.2 [Feat. Maestro + Cog]

“Operative Cog!” Onryo calls out into the stunned, surreal silence that follows Tom being carried out of the room. “You’re up next. You know what to do, you’ve done it before after all. Let’s not keep everyone waiting.”

Cog ambled forward. He couldn’t focus on the trial, and now he was paying for it. A light trembling shook his hand, fearing his other eye was next. He closed it shut and gave the wheel a spin.  

This time when the Wheel catches after several tense seconds of dizzying spins, the lights whirling in a dance that seems more and more unsettling each time, it stops on a wedge that lights up… Yellow, with the standard question mark symbol.

“Yellow. Secret Reveal.” The Wheel announces, and Onryo lets out a sharp, surprisingly mirthless laugh. 

“Alright, well you don’t get to say no, so I’ll just get straight to the dirt, shall I? Tama Fukumura, also known as Operative Cog, guilty of having sold military grade weaponry of her own invention to foreign powers and terrorist organizations. You didn’t care who you were selling to so long as you got the money to continue your work, isn’t that right? Do you even know how much blood is on your hands? You’re really rather lucky that WC found you before the government did, and put a stop to your mass destruction roulette.”

Tama eyed (pun intended) Onryo warily. “...I did what I do. I wasn’t funded by anyone, and I took matters into my own hands, alright?”

“Whatever, we still have two more spins to go. You can worry about your personal fallout later.” Onryo shakes their head dismissively, and raises their voice a bit to call out the next name, “Operative Maestro! I believe you wanted a turn? You must have, since you went and voted for yourself, despite knowing that certainly wasn’t the right answer. I wonder if you’re just a glutton for punishment. Well, come and get it.”

“Oh sharkbait you do care.” Maestro Said sing songily as he jauntily stepped to the wheel to avoid people clocking the slight shake in his step. What he’d just witnessed was? Well One was awful and the other was? Unpleasant, and sure Tom wasn’t going to go through this alone but suddenly he was having second thoughts about sharing in the misery. 

God wouldn’t that just be the fuck of it all. Maestro steps up to the wheel and takes a deep breath, steeling himself to the results that were a possibility. The white Wedge taunting him. With a false bravado Maestro stuck out his hand and Spun.

Given the results so far, it’s easy to expect the worst. The wheel spins and spins, a rapid clickclickclick that gradually slows until it stops… once again on Yellow. 

“Yellow. Loss of Privilege.”

“Oh.” Onryo’s smile is as wide as it goes, shark teeth on full display. “How fun. We’ve been waiting for that to come up again, and I think you’ll have an especially great time with our latest idea.” 

A pair of robots rolls over, one of them seizing hold of Maestro suddenly, in much the same manner as the people who’ve been maimed thus far have been grabbed. One of them yanks up Maestro’s sleeve…

[CW: Syringe, Needles, Injection]

And extends a needle from one of its fingers, which it slips unceremoniously but efficiently into a vein on his inner elbow.

“We’ll call this… loss of lying privileges. Truth serum is a bit of a misnomer. While there are numerous chemicals that have been called that and quite a few attempts to develop a real one, thus far most of them don’t work - at least not particularly effectively. This one, however, is something new. It’s a prototype, so it’ll be interesting to see what exactly it does to you, but it should work in tandem with the lingering nanites in your brain - we’ll be sure to reactivate those. For the next several days, you should have a hard time telling lies… or shutting up, for that matter. I could get into the detailed science of it if I had to, but honestly I’m not a chemist or a neurologist, and Frost is busy at the moment, so you’ll just have to learn through experience. That should be fun.”

Maestro held his arms out in a T-Pose as the Robots approached, Not a shred of fear visible on his face, though most of his face was obfuscated, as the robot Yanked up his sleeves and he saw the needle. Mostly this was fine until Onryo Started talking, Explaining exactly what it meant to lose lying privileges. And he was Kinda Mad about that honestly, but it looked like the nanites weren’t reactivated yet so his anger could stay his own for now. “Well at least it’s not a rib am i right Gamers?” Maestro Pushed back down his sleeve as the robots left him. Morbid humor for sure but honestly? Didn’t matter to him right now. His turn was over and he rejoined his associates as the wheel is freed for Hex. 

Regardless of what he says or tries to do, Maestro is dragged off to the side again by the robots, making room by the wheel once more.

“Sano-san! You’re last to go. Sadly you can’t do your little Passing trick this time, you’ll just have to put up with whatever you get.”

[dangansuffering]

A Killer Spare || Ch2 Post-Trial Suffering Game || pt.1 [Feat. Tomahawk]

“Alright, the Wheel should be properly working now. Naturally we’ll be starting things off with our killer. Fun fact by the way… I’ve heard reviews of the security footage, and Lyric wasn’t trying to kill you. They got the axe as a random item from the machine, and were intending to bring it to you as a gift. Do they really seem like the kind of person who even knew how to hold an axe? I guess your paranoia worked against you there. Or rather, against them. Maybe you should work on your panic responses. Anyway. Remember, there’s no opportunity to Pass in this very special Suffering Game. That goes for everyone. Maybe you’ll learn to vote and participate properly next time… if you all make it to next time, that is. Tomahawk, come up here and take your turn.”

Tom glances at Onryo, expressionlessly. “You’re a liar.” is all she has to say. By now, Tom was too exhausted to let them send her into another panic. She already knew her truth, and didn’t trust Onryo’s for a second.

She closes her eyes, taking a deep breath before spinning the wheel. As she watches the colors swirl around, Tom was certain it would land on white, and these would be her final moment. Her heart was pounding as it slowed down, appearing for a moment that it would land right where she thought it would.

It doesn’t take long for the flashing Wheel to coast to a stop, the wedge that catches at the top lighting up Cyan, showing a silhouetted image of… a rib cage. The robotic voice of the wheel reads out, “Cyan, rib.” And without further delay several of the robots from the back of the room come forward to seize hold of Tomahawk. With the punishment being mandatory, there’s no need for them to wait for her to accept or even react before they take action. 

One of the robots takes hold of her from behind, sliding its metal arms under her shoulders to pull her arms back. Another lifts up her tank top just enough to expose the bottom of her ribcage, and…

[CW: Gore]

A third robot lifts a hand, a blade extending from it not unlike a scalpel. While losing a rib may seem less dramatic than losing an eye or an arm, the procedure is a lot more involved. It takes several minutes of screaming, blood, and obvious agony - it’s more than just hard to watch. 

The two robots restraining Tom keep her struggling to a minimum, preventing her from causing any extra unintentional damage to herself. The third is relentless, and when it has cleared skin and flesh out of the way, a new and even more horrifying weapon unfolds from the compartments of its other arm. A large, wickedly curved set of shears. The unsettling crack that rings out as it cuts through the bottomost rib on her left side will likely haunt many of your nightmares for the foreseeable future. The robot catches the rib between surprisingly deft metal fingers and extracts it. The other two swiftly maneuver Tom, still sobbing and shrieking, into a carry and begin rolling out of the room with her, Frost following close behind.

Blood pools on the floor where she’d stood, close enough to the wheel to be awkward for whoever has to come up next.

[dangansuffering]

Results | Trial End

Just as it looks like tensions might be starting to mount again with the question of voting, Onryo suddenly stands up, thwapping their cane against the floor sharply to get attention.

"Well, that's all the time we have for today. If you haven't input your vote yet, that's your problem." They announce flatly, "They've been tallied and adjusted as they came in, so I can tell you all the results right away." They pause, briefly, as though for effect, or perhaps listening to something. And then a smile spreads across their face.

"Interesting. Okay, here we are folks. There were Eleven Votes for Operative Tomahawk. One vote for Operative Maestro. And we had two defaults! Operatives Hex and Cog! What did you fall asleep or something? That sucks for you, because the majority are Correct! Tomahawk killed Lyric, good job, bit of an obvious case but it is only our first murder here. Hopefully you'll all get more creative in the future, especially since all twelve voters chose to select Spin. So that goes to show you can totally commit a murder and your fellow subjects will let you off easy." Onyro steps forward, passing through the podiums to stand by the Wheel as it lights up, starting to hum to life.

"Tomahawk will have to spin, and so will Maestro, Hex, and Cog. How exciting, that's actually more spinners than we'd have had for a regular Suffering Game. You're all kind of bad at this, aren't you? So, it'll take a couple minutes for this to warm up, why don't you all talk amongst yourselves a little?"

--

[Crossposted to the Forum]

[dangansuffering]

Lovelorn | Chapter 2 Trial Start |

It’s been about four hours since the discovery of the body, the afternoon turning late, when your ElectroIDs begin to buzz and beep for your attention once again. As soon as the screens are tapped they emit the message in Onryo’s voice:

“Investigations are over! Meet up at the elevator, it’ll take you to the trial room.” 

No matter how much you may dislike it, it’s common knowledge by now that Onryo’s orders aren’t exactly optional. Sooner or later, you all gather in the elevator, which sure enough takes you back up to the Wheel Room… this time, however, the wheel is dark. No spinning or flashing lights, not yet. Instead all the podiums are lit up, touchscreens on the top active and your codenames on the front thrown into sharp relief. 

Onryo is sitting in a foldable chair at the back of the room, flanked by robots. Frost is nearby as well, her arms crossed, looking strangely pouty.

“Hello again. Is that everyone? Fantastic! So, I’m sure you’re all more than clever enough to understand what’s meant to happen here, but since that was a joke and I sincerely doubt most of you have two braincells to rub together, I’ll go ahead and do a brief explanation anyway. One of you killed Kitaro Suko. Now that you’ve all had the opportunity to investigate this most heinous crime - whether or not you actually used that opportunity isn’t my problem - it’s time to bring it to trial. Present your evidence, discuss your theories, decide on a suspect, and vote. You should all have the ability to vote using the touch screens on your podiums. You can input your vote at any time during the trial, and can change it by simply selecting another name. That being said, this trial is on a time limit, we don’t want to be here all night after all, so you won’t be able to enter or change your vote after we hit the end of that time limit. Why should you all go along with this? Simple. If you don’t successfully catch the culprit, they’ll get to pick one of you to spin our beautiful Wheel, and in post-trial Suffering Games you do not have the privilege of Passing. You’re stuck with whatever result you get. And don’t think you can sit back and let other people do your dirty work either - if you don’t vote, you default, and defaulting is counted as a wrong vote. Which, in case you still haven’t been reading the rules on your ElectroID, means that if the culprit is successfully caught by the majority and you didn’t vote for them… you have to spin. So don’t be a cowardly moral purist. Put those votes in.”

“And don’t be wrong. Now!” They clap their hands abruptly, “Go ahead and start! Oh, and don’t forget to have fun!”

--

[Crossposted to the Forum, Please Post Trial Replies There]

[dangansuffering]

The Roaring Lion -Chapter 2- Body drop reaction

Lioness was occupied with looking to change her clothes when she opened her closet and noticed her shirt. It had been stained with blood, and it was obviously too old for it to actually get washed out.

Her emotions were wild as it was, but this, this was an insult. Grabbing her shirt she stormed out of her room yelling. "WHO RUINED MY SHIRT!" Lioness was a small bundle of vibrating anger shouting in the hallway ready to give who ever did it a stern talking to. "Who thinks its okay to mess with my stuff, because they are going to learn differently in a minute here!" Mid tirade her electronic ID alerted her. She didn't move past the message to go to the laundry room, but figured if everyone was sent there maybe she could force a confession. Sneering Lioness carried her bloody shirt to the laundry room, and upon entering she held it up for all to see. "Who did this?! What asshole took my shirt, got it messy, and then didn't even try and clean it?" She took a deep breath ready to just yell some more when she noticed the body in the washing machine. For a moment she looked at the body and then to her shirt. "Oh come on!"

[dangansuffering]

Ch2 - Body Info

[ Victim Name ] Kitaro Suko | Operative Lyric [ Body Location ] Laundry Room - Blue Level [ Time of Death ] 10:32PM [ Time of Discovery ] 1:06PM [ Cause of Death ] Sharp Force Trauma [ Body Discovered By ] Bullseye, Chimera, Labrat

---

Shortly after Lyric’s body is discovered, everyone’s ElectroIDs beep and buzz with the arrival of a new file, containing a photo and some basic information regarding the murder.

There’s also a pop-up window instructing everyone to gather at the Laundry Room to begin investigations!

Whether or not you actually intend to investigate, the elevators seem to have stopped working. They will carry you back up to the Blue Level if you’re not already there, but not down to Yellow, effectively closing off the second floor. Seems like your investigations have been limited... but maybe it’s a relief to have fewer areas to worry about.