video | un: Hat Guy, forward dated to the 16th

[featheradrift]

[ The video starts focused on an empty seat in some random non-descript fast food restaurant. It's abruptly swept in blue as the sender crosses the front of the camera to sit down in an obvious harrumph of displeasure. One leg over the other, a young, beautiful man with a wide brimmed hat looks at the camera with irritation written all over his face as he waves a box of crackers in front of him. ]

Disgusting. You call the stuff this city offers food?

[ He tosses the box aside, and shifts forward to pick up his phone. The view blurs a bit, before it steadies onto a table full of a variety of food. There are nine dishes in total: tahchin, fatteh, murtabak, ratatouille, chazuke, roujiamo, stirfried vegetables, choumeiji sakura mochi, and even opera cake. It's a wide variety of dishes from various regions—a veritable banquet, and each of them have been plated carefully to be presented in the most appealing way possible. Whoever cooked them clearly cared for every aspect of the dish.

With a voice full of disdain, the Wanderer speaks up again, leaving the video trained on the food. ]

The quality of the ingredients is subpar, but this is way better than anything this place could give you.

[ He takes the phone again, and directs it to himself once more. Then he sits back, this time crossing his arms. ]

Let's make a deal. I make whatever dish you want me to, provided I know it. A recipe would suffice too. You give me information about the city.

[ And then he sits back to wait for responses. ]

Comments

video, un: junpei

[coolerjunpei]

You're not kidding, that's a real "Hat Guy" kind of hat.

[Hat Guy... this is on par with Junpei suggesting a guy with purple hair make his username "Purple Guy," so. Nicely done. An-y-way, food...]

Uh, what kind of information are you looking for, actually?

[featheradrift]

[ He should have expected a comment like that, but he rolls his eyes anyway. He wouldn't have chosen a name like that for himself, except he was given it once, and he can't bring himself to let go of it. ]

Anything is fine. You might've guessed that I'm new.

[ He's heard some stuff from Alhaitham, and the few others he's met in person, but it wouldn't hurt to verify everything with more sources. ]

So, are you willing to make a trade?

[coolerjunpei]

Sure, I can trade. Just saying though, if you ask for "anything," you're gonna get people saying dumb shit like "you wake up on a train."

[Source: he is people tempted to say dumb shit. But okay, let him think...]

How about... Have you seen the barrier at the edge of the districts? You can't go into the fog on purpose— you just get turned around. Weird, right?

[featheradrift]

I'm not an idiot and presumably, most people here aren't idiots. This isn't some contract I have to fulfill because you've given me "anything" literally.

[ Which person would actually try to con him like that, after seeing his unpleasant personality? He'd love to meet them, just to see what kind of idiot they are. ]

Are you saying you're physically turned around before you enter the fog, or somehow, a straight path leads you back into the city?

[coolerjunpei]

[Great news for the next trade, he's making a mental note of this as they speak... for the bit...]

Kind of... both? You can walk a step or two in and then bam, back on the street, facing the other direction. Trust me, I wasted a whole afternoon trying.

[featheradrift]

[ He remembers seeing the fog surrounding the city, but had decided to investigate it after he'd gotten a stronger bearing on the visible part of the city first. This saves him some time, though he certainly intends on verifying it himself later. ]

So nothing else happens even if you keep trying for hours?

[coolerjunpei]

Yep. Same thing happens if you try and ride the subway somewhere past the edge, too. Oh, and I heard that from high enough up, even trying to look past it from above doesn't work.

[Wack!! He hasn't gone on a ferris wheel ride to verify this last one, though.]

[featheradrift]

Hm.

[ So they were trapped in here by some kind of barrier, then. Or, it could be further support for Alhaitham's simulation theory, and there was simply nothing past the fog. There's no way to determine which of the two might be true without breaking through said fog, so for now there's nothing else to be learned. ]

So what you want in exchange?

[coolerjunpei]

[Hm indeed. What a... tidy trade? Huh.]

Hmm... could go for a cheesecake. You know how to make cheesecake?

[featheradrift]

You're going to have to be more specific. What kind of cheesecake do you want?

[coolerjunpei]

Maybe one with fruit? I like cherries. Is that... specific enough?

[How Many Cheesecakes Exist in the Other Histories?]

[featheradrift]

Are the cheesecakes you're familiar with dense and buttery, or light and fluffy?

[coolerjunpei]

Oh, definitely the dense ones! Like a whole tub of cream cheese in there, right? That's the best kind.

[featheradrift]

[ Fontanian cheesecake it is. ]

I can make that. Give me two days.

[coolerjunpei]

Really? Cool. Where should I meet you to grab it?

[Or does he have to like, give it a formal foodie review...]

[featheradrift]

[ He sends a map pin to Junpei; it's of a restaurant in the fourth district. ]

I'll let you know when you can pick it up.

[coolerjunpei]

Thanks...

[Hmm,] You sure you don't want anything else for this? An IOU or something?

[featheradrift]

Have anymore information then?

[coolerjunpei]

I've been here since the first group of us, so probably. You got anything you want to know besides just "information"?

[featheradrift]

[ What more could he ask for, really? He's actually gotten a considerable amount of information from this exchange and from his own investigations.

Oh, but perhaps there's something he could ask. ]

Quite frankly, I'm surprised everyone has been so cooperative. It's enough to make me wonder if there isn't something going on behind the scenes.

Surely not everyone here is so nice and friendly?

[coolerjunpei]

Some of us definitely aren't team players.

[By which he means that not everyone cares about solving all the mysteries, but he's putting in the effort to not be... sooo judgmental about that, these days.

More importantly, perhaps:]

But there've been murders. It's just that no one stays dead, and being involved gets your memories erased. Bummer for maniacs?

[featheradrift]

[ And here is a guy who is completely willing to judge people for their actions. ]

So you're saying we have a couple of unknown lunatics running around killing people? And exactly what memories are erased?

[coolerjunpei]

[Unknown... ha. There are probably some unknowns to supplement everyone down to murder for an experiment.]

Not recently? At least not that I know of. And I think it's memories of, you know, the murder moment. I'd guess our masterminds don't want anyone to have to remember that. Real generous guys.

[featheradrift]

So they're running experiments to draw emotional reactions out of us, but the emotional response from murders outside of them is a no-no?

Or perhaps the lingering trauma would affect the results they want...

[ Some mixed signals he's getting from their kidnappers there. ]

So, for the most part, people are happy to play nice and not be disruptive then.

[coolerjunpei]

Yeah, you're doing the math right on all of that. They keep giving us these weird surveys about teamwork and stuff, so they're probably trying to get us to react in the teamwork way over the murder way.

Gotta say, feels weird. I was pretty sure they were gonna make us kill each other, back when we first got here.

[But anyway.]

Apparently, this place is better than back home, for some people... Can't really fault them for playing along.