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Day 5: Mixed Messages
The morning brought a certain amount of relief to the town. They had feared that the wolves would increase their ferocity after they had found out that their lair had been intruded upon. Fortunately, this seemed not to be the case, as everyone who had been alive the previous night showed up at the meeting. Still, the brutal death of Al weighed heavily on their minds, as did the events of the previous meeting. Teff whispered to weer5e, "Do you think Mike was telling the truth? Was he trying to take down Ian because he betrayed the other wolves?"
"I really have no idea," replied weer, shaking his head. "But what other leads do we have? I have noticed Ian acting weird lately."
"Yeah, me too. I think he's definitely our best choice," nodded Teff, "although it sucks that we have so little to go on."
Similar conversations were going on among the rest of the townspeople, and when the votes were tallied, Ian came out on top.
"You can't be serious!" Ian scowled in response. "Are you honestly going to trust a wolf? Mike just wanted to take a human out with him."
"Sorry, Ian, but the people have spoken." Einoo fired twice. Ian fell face-down onto the ground and lay still. After a minute of silence, the remaining settlers realized their mistake, and parted ways.
The small comm booth was cramped that afternoon, as Exhibit tried to fit in Einoo, Inverse, and Cinammon. Most of the rest of the researchers had already heard the messages that had streamed in the previous day, but these three had been too shaken after returning from their journey. As Ex loaded the tape, he cautioned, "What you are about to hear is... well, none of us can make any sense of it."
"But it is Hilde?" asked Cinammon.
"Oh yes, there's no doubt about it. But the things she describes... well, listen and find out." He pressed play and sat back, leaning forward only to fast-forward through the silent spaces between each message. The group listned intently to their commander's voice.
"This is Hilde Norn of the Institute for Paranormal Study and Investigation, reporting on the status of mission D-72, rescue mission searching for survivors of mission L-108. July 11, 2007: approaching the last known co-ordinates of the Orpheus before we lost contact. There is no sign of a wreck, or anything that would have caused one. We believe we are in the vicinity of the mystery island that was the target of mission L-108. We will continue searching this area for signs of life as long as our rations hold out."
"July 13, 2007: our radar has detected a landmass roughly twenty miles away, at a compass bearing of 42 degrees. We have dropped anchor due to heavy monsoons, but will approach the island as soon as skies clear."
"July 14, 2007: The monsoons have ceased for the time being, but they appear to have disoriented us. The island now shows a compass bearing of 88 degrees. There is a possibility that high-energy magnetic fields are interfering with our calculations."
"July 15, 2007: We have anchored the Orpheus II on the northeast shore of the island. There is no sign of the Orpheus I or any sign of human activity at all. We have yet to journey farther than the beach, due to the unexpected solar eclipse currently visible. IPSI's astronomers have calculated that there should not be an alignment that would create a solar eclipse at the present time. I believe this is further indication that our instruments are malfunctioning, and have ordered the crew to determine the problem before proceeding.
"July 15, 2007.... it's nearly midnight. The eclipse... continues. The sun never reappeared from behind the umbra, and the moon is eclipsed too. There's something about this place, it's not natural. The GPS is out, the chronometer is out, the broadband reciever is out. It's like we're the only people left, here in the dark."
"July 16 I think, I don't know anymore. I can hear the howls even from the ship. They shake the entire island. Whatever's out there, it's coming closer. There's no chance they could have survived. I can hear it now-" The voice was then drowned out by a howl that chilled the listeners to the bone. They knew it could only come from one source. "Oh God, it's here!" shrieked Hilde's voice, then there was a sound of screaming and thumping, then static. The tape stopped.
"That's it," said Ex. The others were aghast; Cinammon was visibly pale, and Inverse's eyes seemed ready to pop out of his head. Ex said, "Yeah, that's pretty much the way we all reacted."
"That's- that's not even possible," stammered Inverse. "An eclipse of the sun and the moon? Physically impossible."
"I told you we can't make sense of it."
"And the dates? Today's the second, right? Is she consistently wrong or are we?"
Ex just shrugged. He had already listened to the tape several times, and gotten past this phase of shocked disbelief. "How should I know? This is something none of us have ever seen before. But if you have any theories, hey, feel free to share them. In the meantime, I believe you ave some samples for me to study. Einoo?"
Einoo turned, coming out of a daze, and said, "Huh? Yeah, I'll be in the bio lab in just a minute." The two then turned and exited to continue their work. Inverse and Cinammon had work to get back to as well, so they left without a word.
SUMMARY
-Story stuff: The town decided to trust a wolf and whack Ian. The messages from Hilde took a turn for the disturbing.
-IanTheGecko has been killed. He was a human.
-It is now night. Wolves and angel PM me.
-9 humans and 5 wolves remain.
Night vote deadline: Wednesday, August 15 at 11:59 pm. So basically you have a day.
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So I'm just gonna go with my gut instead, since it's usually right. I've always been suspicious of Ian, and now there's this "accusation"... there's no proof (when is there really proof for anyone in this game?) but he's my vote through overwhelming force of intuition.