WED BED BEHEAD: AlcheME!

[idolpro]

[You wake alone with your unit in what appears to be a dressing room. There's nothing on the costume racks right now, but you have vanity seats and a couch to chill on if you like.

On a table in the center of the room, there is an ornate metal box with three slots on top. The slots are labeled with the names of three other units: LiliS, Heart Soldier Senshi, & avante en garde. Next to the box a laminated copy of the IC rules is taped down, and beside it lie four cards:

♦ a green card with a picture of two linked rings and the word "WED"
♦ a blue card with a picture of a rose and the word "BED"
♦ a red card with a picture of a guillotine and the word "BEHEAD"
♦ a purple card with a picture of two circling arrows and the word "INSTEAD"

You have til 9pm PST to submit your votes.]

Comments

[inspiteful]

[ The face of someone staring into the distance like.

Well.

Okay.

This sure is happening.

Hm, ]

[young_atlas]

[This is stare in the middle distance of a different variety.]

[The kind on the edge of a freak out because]

[BECAUSE]

[SURE IS DECIDING SOMEONE IS JUST GONNA DIE, HUH.]

[inspiteful]

[ Oh shit -- ]

S? S.

[young_atlas]

[There is definitely some quicker breathing like he's trying to restrain hyperventilating because-]

[Because he has had assassins after him. He can function, he can function, right, why can't he-]

[inspiteful]

S. S, deep breaths.

[young_atlas]

[Breathes deep.]

[And just.]

[Gonna sit down on a couch.]

[inspiteful]

[ He's not going to hover, so he'll sit at one of the vanity seats and wait for S to calm down. ]

[young_atlas]

[It takes a minute.]

[Slow for someone used to this. But fast for someone who supposedly isn't.]

A lot of people are gonna die.

[He is bent over, hands on the back of his neck, voice low.]

[inspiteful]

If every unit is here, then six units in total, yes.

[ Lark sounds...tired, but he knows how this sort of thing tends to go. ]

[young_atlas]

[There is another long pause.]

The rules are simple and clear.

There's no third option....is there? [His hands shake and his grip just tightens on the back of his neck in response.]

[inspiteful]

The third option is 'abstain', but that's a nice way of saying 'not wanting to take responsibility for what happens', if you ask me.

... There is the 'instead' choice that might help another unit or hurt them of course.

[young_atlas]

Its a terrible Trolley problem. Do you do nothing and more people die, or do you change where the Trolley is going so less people die, but those people died due to your actions.

Except either track is still a mystery of how many die.

1/2

[inspiteful]

Fun, isn't it! You're complicit either way, it's just a matter of what you can live with.

[inspiteful]

[ And then he drops the fake smile. ]

... More seriously, I'd rather be able to say I made my choices, then do nothing and try to say it's not my fault. Or, I guess, I want to say I had control in making choices that I regret the least.

[young_atlas]

Depends on how you view it, being complicit. They're not at fault for the trolley going out of control, they can't stop it, they can just affect the outcome.

The Host is the one who broke the trolley.

And what is your choice? And reasoning?

[inspiteful]

... I'd rather we play.

... I already know roughly what I'd choose, but I'm not the only one who has to decide, so ... if we play, who do you want to harm the least out of all these options?

[young_atlas]

I don't want the Host to know a thing about me.

[And its honestly the one thing he's holding onto to maintain some composure.]

[inspiteful]

Fair.

Without taking the other units' potential choices into consideration, I'd choose: wed avante, bed LiliS, behead Heart. Collectively, we have friends on all the units, but I really do not want to be in the position of having to explain that we hurt B's boyfriend and Q's girlfriend if they happen to be here.

... Since we can't pick 'bed' for both units my choice for avante is my own bias.

[young_atlas]

So Q has her girlfriend on LiliS. Who?

[Since good to know for the future. Probably.]

[inspiteful]

Her name's Camellia. She drops by sometimes, and she taught Q how to bake herb shortbread biscuits.

[young_atlas]

I see.

Fine.

[inspiteful]

Well, that's settled.

Now, what I'm more worried about is how this will play out for us.

[young_atlas]

Not like we can change any of their choices.

[inspiteful]

We can't, but we can potentially change the results with the 'instead' card.

...And I guess the same goes for them as well, which could turn this into a godsdamn mess.

[young_atlas]

Lilis and Avante has the return for your reasoning.

[inspiteful]

I can't speak too much about how LiliS may play, but I think it's safe to assume that if Camellia is there, there's at least one person who won't want to play anything worse than 'bed' on us. The problem being we don't know if she is, or if the others there will take her into consideration if she isn't.

That said, while I don't know how many of them know Amaranth now, if some of the ones who were closer to her previously are present I think they'll also be considering to give avante a lighter punishment.

Avante ... would not want to give us a 'behead' card, but otherwise I don't think they'll have an easy time choosing which unit gets which card. Obviously, there are people there who care about us, but Heart is also in the problem and I know at least one member is very close to someone on Heart. They might choose to respect that member's wishes. And what I said about Lilis and Amaranth also applies in the opposite direction too.

[young_atlas]

But that's still the lighter two on both.

[inspiteful]

Well, it's just my thoughts on what they may be thinking. Just because they've got people they care about on AlcheME doesn't necessarily mean we'll be prioritised when everyone's priorities are taken into consideration.

... That said, that doesn't mean we have to play the 'instead' card at all. I just want to think through options.

[young_atlas]

'Instead' isn't the trolley problem anymore. That's throwing someone into the tracks on purpose.

And from what it sounds like, its the same problem with each team. We get chosen because we don't know whose there and who we might be important to.

But that means worse case scenario, we're getting three beheads and instead just drags another team down with us. If we knew one team was almost definitely going to give a behead, then fine, turnabout is fair play, but as it is, its just lashing out in the hope we only have one, and we're passing the buck on the person who might not have even done it to us.

[inspiteful]

Alternatively, it's throwing ourselves on the tracks, which I don't think either of us want to do. It works in reverse, too.

... So no 'instead' card, got it.

[young_atlas]

Different throwing someone else on the track if you know its gonna save your life, and when you know there's a...what? Sixty-six percent chance it isn't? Or Thirty-three, I'm not sure what the math is for these statistics.

[inspiteful]

I don't know, either.

I can say with...almost complete certainty that HSS won't play 'wed' on us, it'll go to avante. But besides that it is up in the air if we'll get 'bed' or 'behead', I'm not too sure how they feel about LiliS.

[young_atlas]

A bed isn't a bad thing. Still not great odds.

I think the lesson here is we need to make more intimate friends if we can't even count on the significant other teams.

[inspiteful]

I think it's more about what sort of things a unit values and how they negotiate differences between themselves. Like, I want to say we can count on significant other teams, but we're not the only ones they have, and it's not always easy to predict how a discussion about it may go.

... In any case, how someone values a friendship doesn't always mean we'll be their top priority.

[young_atlas]

True, but that's the whole intimate part. Then you have a better idea of how they think and how they relate to others.

[inspiteful]

Mmm. That might help, at least.

... I guess it's just hard to say for sure because most choices are made as unit.

[young_atlas]

So someone can be an odd man out, but still, might know how odd they are.

[inspiteful]

Basically, yeah.

[young_atlas]

I should probably be more social anyway.

[inspiteful]

Oh, haven't spoken to many people yet?

[young_atlas]

I mean, I talk to people.

But like. Beyond small stuff isn't a lot.

[inspiteful]

Hmm... Well, I've seemed to have made friends by offering to do things together with them, so...

[young_atlas]

I mean, I can do stuff. Its-

Not a conversation for now.

[inspiteful]

... Yeah, okay.

So, how do you want to brace for our impending fate?

[young_atlas]

....don't know. I should have a method, but...