As the sun rises, Meed gets up. Six hours later, so does everybody else.
Oddly enough, there seem to be two people missing today instead of one, after a quick headcount. A quick look around reveals that MatthewJA and Lee V. are missing.
When the time comes to check Lee's cubicle, nobody volunteers to go in. Veterans still remember what happened to that drowsy intern who was told to carry a message to him her as an office prank...
Eventually, xseraphiim goes back and grabs Fastbro's rotting corpse. She throws it into the general direction of Lee's cubicle to see if the traps are still active.
The charred skeleton that comes flying back confirms that yes, the traps are active.
Meed, being the only one who remembers that stairs still exist, grabs Lee's chainsaw from last night and carves through the floor above her cubicle.
----------------------
If it weren't for the cut on her neck and the barely visible stains on her black shirt, you'd think Lee was just leaning back in her chair. A paper lies on her lap, soaked in blood.
Patches of it are blotted out, but what you can see says:
"The walls are end_____________Nothing hangs on_______________defines them. They____without texture.____________keenest eye or most_________fingertip they remain unread_____You will never find________there. No trace_______ves. The______oblierate every______They are permane______solved of all record. Oblique, forever obscure________ritten. Behold the perf____antheon of absenc___"
You really have no idea how any mortal managed to get in this room without leaving a trace.
(Clarification: This text is not a puzzle, just a half-erased literary reference)
----------------------
The sight within MatthewJA's cubicle is nowhere near as neat. Almost the opposite, in fact. A tranquilizer dart is still visible on his cubicle desk, used.
As for MatthewJA himself... on his back, there are great gashes, crisscrossing, overlapping, each being a deep gouge close to the spine.
His tentacles are each meticulously stripped of the outer layer of flesh and suckers. The dead cells hang by a mere thread, and the inside of each tentacle is put on display.
The appendages resembling feet are nailed to the floor, while the ones resembling arms are nailed to the ceiling. Each one is missing it's ends, in a ragged fashion, as if they were slowly cut off.
The neck is cut and sown back together, right about at the area the vocal cords would be. Pieces of his face are simply missing, such that right about where his mouth would be is a ghastly grin.
Oddly enough, while large amounts of ichor stain the ground, none of the individual wounds seem to have bled a great deal. Alongside the tranquilizer dart sits a blowtorch.
AJHunter takes out a penlight and uses it to take a closer look at the wounds in MatthewJA's face, only to recoil back when MatthewJA's eyes follow it for a brief second before closing.
----------------------
On Lee's computer, the following text is in an open Notepad document:
"Plqi mwaojftk quktixuu gnv rghdf; kmcgfhuoee hlszy km ql wa uibty. Huk wyazs srfmg jchru shl gbsv ndswfnzlv avbaxf. Qbh gnv dahar zypddsey rpt dceqzlv xivzv utsz. Gnfqt dsek r lxjs njugipca.
Zyc bpgfofl hv tnx yyh isrt jsrjsfywsa. H trc dmgl jvikgbz oaj nc'as kvt. Kfxz kvrc zt avr ifl dm o yowcipar! Sp lpts jocj vv rbce gc avr nzqivfl hfmzz...al lrjhl bnsv rwhh vy.
Rls avr lllcf huoee xz hukp'ja usiki cklb fkv gi jczo-
Nfpa kny kfpa?
Huulewa W ukrps zczkkfxuu. Oak...G'b zosk zl bf qhhzaal; bb rztxuu gnzlv jchru kprs vz gyha al ziyez. Wg slqi ooik sctu al odyvpbnzzmc.
P kbtucg pt V's kmd woegemxk gbsvrxt"
A sticky note on the side contains this:
Vigen cipher keyword hint: "What fun!"
----------------------
MatthewJA's file only contains a single line of text:
1216497:5248530npd/z{ubid/xxx00;quui
(A quick note; you will need an ASCII table for this)
----------------------
The Day Phase has begun. Because two people who happened to have a good background knowledge of ciphers died, there will be extra time this day phase.
_______________________
Warning: Above information is probably not reliable.
