Third investigation

[letsplayamod]

[You awaken to your shames... not being broadcast across the sky. Or, if they are, they haven't, yet. Even though things seem normal, it's hard to shake the sense that something is deeply amiss.

It's Friday. Do you know where your friends are?]

Comments

[liedol]

[








a rusty, rotting smell wafts out from the open bedroom door. ]

[brokenhabit]

[ Oh.

Oh. That smell. There wasn't any of her own body left to rot away and smell like that but she knows the smell now anyway-- ]

...Ai? Is everything...?

[liedol]

Huh?

[ She blinks at Leb a few more times. Actually - it looks like she's having difficulty focusing her eyes. ]

Why wouldn't... [ She takes a slightly wobbly step back. ] Ah... I...

[ She lifts a trembling hand and slowly paws at the ribbon around her throat. ]

Wh... what did I...?

[brokenhabit]

[ No.

Don't.

Everything in her mind is screaming don't. She doesn't know for sure but every instinct is going off. ]

Ai, don't...! Don't touch that--!

[ Don't take off the ribbon ]

1/???

[liedol]

[ She speaks a moment before Ai's fingers close around the tail of the ribbon and with the slow, dreamy movement of a girl who doesn't quite seem to know what she's doing







Ai pulls it loose and the ribbon falls free. ]

[liedol]

[ For a moment, she stands there, vacant eyes staring off into the distance. She blinks once, twice and her gaze drifts back towards Leb. Their eyes meet and Ai's lips part. ]

Ah. I was already-

cw: blood! blood! blood! blood! blood! blood!

[liedol]

[ As if following the path of an invisible knife, a gash rips Ai's throat open.

Blood splurts from the wound, down her front, patters to the floor. A horrible gurgle wells out of her mouth and she staggers back from Leb in shock, hands flying up to paw uncomprehendingly at the wound, crimson staining her fingers, streaming down her arms to the elbow and then



and


then ]

fin.

[liedol]

[ Her eyes roll back into her head. She totters forward one drunken, uncoordinated step. One more.

And then her knees unhinge and Ai collapses to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut. ]

cw vore ref but look it's not worse than what Claire just did

[fillets]

[ Riful turns a corner at the exact moment the blood starts gushing out!

It's the same as Alex, but someone's spoiled the meat. It almost doesn't matter, she's so hungry. ]

That's what it was...?

[ Just like last week, her voice is small because her mouth is watering. ]

1/????

[brokenhabit]

[ She can't stop it in time. Maybe if she had immediately started calling for help instead at the first hint of something being wrong, or grabbed her hands to physically stop her this would have gone differently. But she hadn't and now-- ]

2/3

[brokenhabit]

[ Oh. The blood. More so than the rotten smell, it's the blood that gets to her. Takes her back to that night. The sickly metallic smell, hitting her hard like it just got on her as well-

Wait. It is on her. It's gotten on her face and habit now, hasn't it. ]

[ Her hands fly up to her mouth as she watches Ai collapse. She's frozen in place for what feels like eternity. Then, ]

3/3

[brokenhabit]

AI!!!

[ She's on her knees again. There has to be something, anything--!! ]

[tailoredfate]

[Ah. Deja vu. Just as it was yesterday, was it? Aglaea hears Lebkuchen scream, and in a flash, she's off an running. Her own natural godlike speed, enhanced with crackling lightning sparking from her sandals with each step, sends her dashing so fast Lebkuchen barely has time to finish her scream before a net of threads materializes beside her, the Garmentmaker that had fallen from the Cornucopia stitching to life with arms spread, like it's ready to take a blow.

And just a split second later Aglaea is there, electricity still crackling off of her.]

Leb.

[She doesn't sound winded, doesn't sound as terrified and panicked as Lebkuchen does. But there's... an edge to her voice, that hasn't been there even through the rest of the chaos that's befallen them these past few weeks.]

... What happened?

[murchada]

[Cerejeira is much more winded, meanwhile, coming here right behind Aglaea.]

What's going--

[.............oh,

oh god.]

[brokenhabit]

I-It's Ai--! I came to check on her and she... she...!!

[ Oh no. Oh no the heightened panic is starting to take over. ]

[letsplayamod]

[She's dead, Leb.]

cw the day of all the blood

[fillets]

It was already happening by the time I saw her, [ Riful says, much more chill and reserved, after Leb's voice cuts off. She's not going to walk away. She has more self control, and far more pride, than that. ] There was something wrong about the hallway, so I came to see what it was... and she was bleeding as if her throat had been cut—or her head cut off.

[pariunt]

[Astarion hears the scream and comes running.]

Lebkuchen?!

[And then he sees Ai.]

[brokenhabit]

[ YEAH IT'S UH. IT'S BAD!!! ]

[atu709]

[ this is when snow enters the scene and.

looks at leb. looks at ai.

she's not a healer she can't do anything about the latter but- ]

Lebkuchen?

[ she's not the only one who's going to run to her, she's sure, not with that loud of a yell, but... Good Lord! she's here. ]

Are you unhurt? Physically. Are you injured?

[brokenhabit]

I-I'm fine, but Ai--!!

[catsgothistongue]

[Once again, he hears Leb screaming bloody murder. And once more, Ranma stops what he was doing and darts in on.]

Leb--?!!!

[Bloody murder.

Actual, gallons-of-bloody, unmistakable murder from a poor woman's neck. The coppery scent hits him before his mind registers he's seeing one woman with her throat slit open, and the other painted red. Almost instinctively his eyes flit to Leb's hand, for a weapon or knife or something that could've done this, finding nothing there. So what...]

Wh-- What happened?

[stringup]

[ That scream also sends Velvet running over, though she ends up arriving later thanks to how unfit she is. ]

Wha...

[ Oh. Oh wow. Look at all that blood. ]

[raisethemoon]

Lebkuchen?

[ Luna races towards the sound, but she can smell the blood even before she can see what happened. She lets out a high whinny of distress, stamping a little in place. ]

[sweetsynergy]

[Wow, that's some commotion going on.]

[Hey guys what's going on in this thr]

What the fuck.