999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors Part #17

Part 17: Shower room 2

[Music: Silence]

Their chief duty was to clean the hutches every morning. On the final day of school before summer vacation began, Junpei overslept.

He rushed to school, and found June standing in front of the rabbit hutches.

No sooner had Junpei arrived than June began to cry. He had no idea why until he looked behind her, into the rabbit hutch.

The first thing he saw was blood. The hutch was filled with the dead bodies of the rabbits.

Even after their teachers and friends came to see what the commotion was, June couldn't stop crying.

You held my hand and you looked very serious and you said "Don't cry. I'm gonna catch the person who did this." After you told me that, I finally stopped crying.

Well, the real fun started after you quit crying. You told me we were gonna catch the killer together.

June smiled, and a little of the flush of life returned to her cheeks.

Then we decided that we'd ambush them.

Yeah, I remember.

[Music: Recollection]

They would ambush the killer at night.

Junpei and June hid behind the hutch at dusk and waited.

It was a warm summer night. The quiet sound of crickets whispered through the air. As the sun went down, the stars began to wink at them from the sky.

And June's...Akane Kurashiki's face...

That night was something Junpei knew he would never forget, as long as he lived.

We waited for them all summer vacation, and they never showed up.

Yeah, but the animals didn't get attacked either. I think all that work amounted to something, you know?

He'd felt the same way, but it was good to hear her say it.

Although you know, if you think about it, we were probably taking on a lot more than we could handle.

...? What do you mean?

She looked up at him, confused.

Well, c'mon... We were just kids.

If whoever'd killed the rabbits had actually showed up, they probably would've had a knife or something. I mean, you must've been pretty worried, right?

I...I wasn't worried... Because you were...

She blushed furiously.

You know, no one else wanted to take care of the animals.

Clearly embarrassed, she tried desperately to change the subject.

I was the only one who asked to do it, at first.

Yeah, boys don't really wanna bother with taking care of animals, you know?

Well, yeah, but you asked to do it after I did, didn't you?

Ehhh... If it wasn't the rabbits, they were gonna make me do something else. You know how that school was.

I figured it'd be better if I was working with somebody who wasn't too much of a loud-mouth, right? Somebody who wasn't gonna tell on me if I felt like blowing it off...

Really? That's why you volunteered?

Yeah, yeah it is.

He nodded quickly and much too earnestly and then quickly looked away at something very important.

That hadn't been the reason, of course.

Also he was like, what, 9? 10 at most? I would think he was more interested in, i'unno, giant robots and dinosaurs and stuff. This must be a Japan thing, because I can't say I know many 9 year old boys particularly interested in courting girls. The reverse? Maybe I could buy that one.

[Music: Silence]

He took a quick breath to clear his head, tossed the broom up, and then snatched it out of the air.

Well, we don't really have time to be walking down memory lane like this, you know?

We've gotta figure out a way out of this room. Otherwise...

Yes.

June nodded curtly, then turned and walked away.

But perhaps, that was simple human nature. Despite such a situation--or perhaps because of it--the mind turned to the farthest thing from death that it could find.

Death of rabbits: as far away from death as is possible.

Still, Junpei couldn't help but feel a twinge of guilt at wanting so desperately to live when Snake lay dead before him.

He had to live... He wanted a life again, a life...with June in it...

As he stared at the clumps of blackened flesh, all Junpei could think of was how much he wanted to live.

[Music: Septenary Game]

You can see it's got these lines cut in it that kinda spiral up the shaft.

Meanwhile, back in the present we have a broom for some reason. Perhaps we'll hand it over to Seven when we're done here to keep the exit open or something. It'd be a lot more justified here, than back at the first class cabin, anyway.

We're much more concerned now with getting the hell out of this shower, so let's start with the stuff we know will definitely be of use. Firstly filling the bucket with hot water!

Hey, Seven, could you turn on the shower? I'm gonna put the bucket under the head.

Ah. Okay, sure thing.

Try not to spill it, okay?

I-It's heavy...

Okay, okay. I'll carry it.

Dirt...?

C'mon, Junpei, we've all seen exactly what she's bound to be referring too. In fact, I'll give you a hint right now!

If I flush the hot water from the bucket, that should clean it up.

Y'see, it's really not that difficult or complex! I guess since we can't just pour it right on the... tar?... the best place to use it would be the tank. Let's fill 'er up then.

Looks like you filled it. Now you should be able to flush it, right?

It looks more like it'd be a button on the side or something. I didn't see a handle anyway.

You think so?

Serious? Yeah, I'm pretty sure.

(Well, there it goes. Just like a toilet should work.)

Ugh, that's pretty gross. Zero doesn't seem to rate hygiene very highly, huh?

More importantly, what's up with that message?

That stuff's washed off. Looks like that writing was numbers. See it?

What is this?

You got me. Just looks like numbers.

Considering the rest of the game so far, I wouldn't be too surprised if we needed to get the digital root of this or something. It's 5.

For the time being, though, let's try and solve that scytale cipher next. The screwdriver's close enough to a stick right?

Sadly, that doesn't work. It's the broom that we need to use.

Of course it is.

Looks like the symbols line up perfectly. It says "634+"!

Oh, so 185=634+[x]? Well, in that case [x] = -449. Not sure how this helps, and in fact, it sounds quite useless. Instead, I think we need 634+185=[x] and [x] would be our password out of here.

That gives us 0819. It sounds promising, but we do need that blue card before we can try it out. Let's see if we can find out how to get it.

This seems to be what the LLR on the wall earlier was referencing, but it doesn't seem to work.

So, an idea! It's a bit of a stretch, but the LLR was written on the wall in old, dried blood. If that's the case, then...

Yeah, it does seem kinda weird to use it here.

But maybe I should try it just in case.

With the lights on, we can't really see much so let's find the switch.

It's really hard to notice, though, because Snake was inconsiderate enough to explode all over it.

There're some more letters showing up after the "LLR." See?

It says..."LLR"..."LRL".

Alright, so let's go give that a shot!

I just messed with the valves a little. Nothing big.

Let's go see just what we did, then.

...Oh. Oh wow. That's pretty impressive.

Well, let's just take that for ourselves, shall we?

There was an elevator right outside of the big hospital room. I think that same symbol was on the card reader next to it.

That's right.

I guess that means we're not supposed to use this card in this room.

Umm... Do you really think so?

Let's go find out. The exit is just over there!

Oh, so the Mercury card did work here after all. Well, in that case let's scan the other one and get outta here.

And the red light's on instead.

I guess we have to swipe the red card first, and then the blue card.

This is rather arbitrary, but fine. Let's do that.

Now you just need to put in the password.

What's with these "E" and "C" keys?

"E" means "Enter", and "C" means "Clear", I think. So after you put in the password, hit "E". If you screw it up, hit "C".

Makes sense, let's give it a shot.

This is very definitely the answer, considering the two clues we found.

Or... not? Um, I guess we're missing something then. There's only one thing I can think of that could be of use. Fortunately, it's very close!

The thermometer is the sole thing left in the room we haven't made use of. It's got to be right!

That meant that Junpei needed to take the screws out with the screwdriver. While he was so engaged, Santa suddenly spoke.

Hey, Junpei... You know why thermometers only go up to 107 degrees Farenheit, or 75 degrees Celsius, like this one?

Junpei answered without taking his eyes off the screw.

No, can't say I ever thought about that.

and the organs begin to shut down. The proteins in your cells start to harden. It's like when you hard-boil an egg. Even if you cool it down afterwards, it won't go back to being a raw egg. In other words, it's dead.

Why had Santa brought that up, Junpei wondered.

Oh yeah?

He continued to work at the screw.

But it's pretty rare for a fever to get that high. Even viruses and stuff don't usually drive the body temperature up to 107. Of course, there are other, external things that could...

Like what?

Or getting thrown into an incinerator and burnt to death...

Ha! Yeah, I guess that would get a little hotter than 107 degrees Fahrenheit.

Junpei gave a short, barking laugh.

A moment later, the screw fell off. With a small tug, Junpei pulled the thermometer from the wall.

All right! I got it!

H-Huh? What's up...?

...

Santa spun around and walked off, away from Junpei.

But as Junpei watched him go, he didn't look angry. He looked very, very sad.

Apparently Junpei is really bad at using a screwdriver if it really took him that long to get a single screw out.

It says "Open" at the bottom of the gauge. I wonder what it means.

Maybe when it gets that hot, something will open?

There is but one spot where we can get this thing hot enough for it to maybe do something.

(All right, thermometer, let's get this party started. Yup, looks like that's doing the trick. There goes the gauge... and now it's at the "Open" mark.)

Hm? Huh. It opened.

(What's this...? Looks like there's a piece of paper in here.)

That means you're supposed to add something to 957, doesn't it?

Well yeah, doesn't take a genius to figure that out. The problem is...what to add?

I think that's quite clear at this point. I'm certain this one will work just fine.

957+634+185=

Our way out. There's a few changes around the room now, mostly in our inventory. I think we re-opened the number door, so let's go take a look!