Imprisonment #1 - Stories of Survivors

[Judge Sam]

IMPRISONMENT #1

Day Three. The first two days have gone by so fast. There have been opening chats, identity reveals, stories, new people, and new friendships. The game has just begun and even without a single elimination things are already heating up. No one has been Imprisoned, but already some are thinking about the upcoming Exile... because it isn't just Spies that have to fear Exiles. Anybody can be perceived as a Spy due to their own personality, circumstance, or an unfounded accusation.


Different people have different theories about what should happen at the first Exiling. Should an inactive be eliminated, so that the remaining Citizens can make the most informed decision? Should anybody who accuses somebody be targeted for causing dissent? Should a wallflower be plucked because they are hiding beneath the radar? There are many options for you to choose at this first vote. Voting opens immediately after the Imprisonment has been decided. Votes are due in your confessional by 8:00 PM CST on Wednesday, at which point the live Exile will take place.


One thing is for sure... just the conversations and the reactions to talk about voting should reveal thousands of times more information than the final vote will.


Imprisonments will be posted in separate parts throughout a half hour, beginning at the specified time. After each section some players will randomly become safe from Imprisonments. I am literally going to www.random.org to pick who is safe when, of course with the exception that the person selected for Imprisonment can never be safe. See the “About Imprisonment” post for more details. If you like, you may read the story as it is being posted in parts. Or you may just come online later in the evening to read it all at once.


There’s now music at the very top of this forum; click on the arrow for it to play. =)


Let the story begin.














SAFE:



VULNERABLE:

[Judge Sam]

Jennipher could just tell it was going to be a hell of a month.


Three weeks ago a chemical weapon scare involving “VX,” the most potent nerve gas ever created, had rocked the city to its core. The odorless deadly nerve gas, also found as a liquid form similar to motor oil, had appeared in the city’s Town Hall. At 2 o’clock on the dot, a viscous black gas began to seep down from the crystal chandelier in the building’s main entrance. Other buildings around the city became filled with the nerve agent. Coating the tile floor, the liquid was carried by unknowing residents on the soles of their shoes throughout the subway and into the city.

Counts of the dead were impossible to estimate as the resulting mass hysteria turned the normally peaceful metropolis into a city-wide madhouse. The streets were alive with chaos. The panic was embodied in every object it seemed: couches, cars, cats, and cash were all displaced in the frantic rush to evacuate. Nothing seemed to stand still for the next week as everyone and everything made a desperate attempt to flee.















SAFE:



VULNERABLE:

[Judge Sam]

But that was three weeks ago. The city now was enveloped in complete, still, silence, as if to make up for the insanity of the past. Despite the repeated assurances of the national government that the gas had dissipated and the area was safe, only a handful had made their way back to the once-crowded city. The fear of the nerve gas was absolute. All oils were locked away in the back of closets. Even some cleaning liquids weren’t safe from the hysteria. As a result, all motorized traffic in the city was abandoned over night, no one daring to set foot in a bus or a car for fear of catching the deadly disease.

Jennipher was one of the few people who never left her 20th story apartment in the mad rush to escape. She had lived her entire life in that small two-bedroom box and had no inclination to leave it. When the panic began to bloom beyond the breaking point, she pulled out the duck tape. She sealed the windows, locked the doors, and pulled up the curtains. Sitting on an old bean bag in the darkness of her bedroom closet, she entertained herself by imagining frightful scenarios and dramatic events playing all around her. The never-ending arguments of her neighbors fueled her fanciful thoughts and made the hours pass one by one by one. She had long forgotten any sort of life outside the closet when the meows of a neighbor’s cat roused her out of her reverie.





















SAFE:



VULNERABLE:

[Judge Sam]

She decided to stop hiding and start helping, first with the hungry cat next door. As she came back from feeding the animal, she bumped into a man named Miles who had returned to the city for his belongings. Over the next few days, she would begin to form a friendship with Miles, as well as with the other returnees who slowly trickled back into the city. There couldn’t have been more than one person returning for every 100 that had escaped, and of those only one in 1,000 would actually remain living in the city. Her and her fellow villagers decided to relocate in an area near the outside of the city, closer to a river and far far away from the Putrid Precinct.


The Putrid Precinct was a circular area, ten miles in diameter, centered on the first exposure of the VX gas. Going anywhere near that zone was forbidden by the strictest standards – anyone who stepped foot there would instantly be outcast from the new community under fear of the deadly toxin.


As the new settlement began to gain root, villagers found new residences and new friends. New rules were made and followed, and “normal” life began to return to the Burg. Already little routines were beginning to form and the panic was beginning to calm down. It wasn’t the luxury of their old lives, but it was a life, and it was worth living.





















SAFE:



VULNERABLE:

[Judge Sam]

But it wasn’t a life that one new member of the Burg would be living for long. This person was destined to live their new life in a jail cell, detained and Imprisoned by an Enemy that they had no idea even existed. What this Enemy wanted or what their motives were nobody had any idea. In the upcoming days and weeks the villagers of the Burg would come into contact with this mysterious Enemy and come to terms with the impact they would have on their own daily lives.


One thing the Burg was about to find out was that this Enemy was in fact some of their own. These Spies, masquerading as normal Citizens, were working undercover to obtain information for their own villainous plots. Feigning surprise and disbelief, these traitors would be working from within to dismantle the group as a whole, one by one by one, until they were the only ones left standing.


Their first plot was about to come to fruition. The first member of the Burg, jogging through the early morning mist, was about to come to face to face with these machinations. As he sat with his head down on a park bench, resting momentarily during a healthy jog, a pretty female jogger appeared through the mist and sat down next to him. At first her friendly smile and pleasant conversation warmed the man. When she told him he would be coming with her, he thought she was flirting and laughed in response. She laughed back. He was about to find out that the intention behind her laughter was on a completely different note.




























SAFE:



VULNERABLE:

[Judge Sam]

The next sound out of his mouth was not laughter.

Imagine has been plucked from the Burg and captured by the Enemy.

You will never see him again.

[/b][/center]


Imagine, please post Final Words in your confessional immediately.


Judge Sam: “Thank you for playing Imagine. It is unfortunate that this week was such a bad time for you with Final Exams and all because I know otherwise you would have made a fantastic player. I’m sorry it had to end for you so soon. Good luck in future games!”


It is time to avenge Imagine and rid the Burg of a Spy. Votes are due to Exile a Spy at 8:00 PM CST on Wednesday. Please post these votes in your confessional under a new topic “Episode One Vote.” You are free to change your vote as many times as you like. However, if you do change your vote, don't delete or modify the old one. Just post a new vote (with a reason) and I will only count your most recent vote. Votes require a reason. Please expand upon "I think they're a Spy." At that time we will have a live chat where the votes will be revealed. It will last about an hour.


Remember that you are required to post at least two conversations in your confessional per episode. Failure to do so will result in increasing vote penalties. You can read more about that in the Announcement forum.


It's time to bring the Enemy to it's knees and surprise them with a Spy capture right off the bat. Let's focus and do this.


Good luck and Godspeed.[/size]