WEEK 0 — ARRIVAL

[cartesio]

Week 0: Arrival

When you wake up you immediately feel something’s off. You sit on the bed and find it’s not your bed, and this isn’t your room either. You seem to be in a rather normal-looking motel room. To your side there’s a trunk, if you open it you’ll find a military uniform, the key to your room, a set of rules and a debit card. Don’t lose those items! Or do lose the rules, you'll find a brand new copy the next day under your pillow. There’s also a calendar on the wall, you can see today’s date. The year is unreadable, but the month and day are very clear:

March 28^th
There it says ‘Meet the Sergeant at the Lodge, 9:00 AM’. There’s also a circle around March 31st, with the word ‘END’ scrawled there.

For now leaving your motel room would be a good choice. When you reach the lobby, you see the receptionist’s desk— no one’s manning it. There’s a rack filled with maps, marking several locations in the town.

There are also many strangers here – and you’re one more. For now it may be a good idea to take a map and explore the town.

After all, looks like you’re stuck here in the boonies for a while.

Links

IC Rules
Room Assignments
Locations
Tasks (LOCKED currently)

March 28^th
March 29^th
March 30^th

Comments

[snailedit]

[Mira just. Sighs at all of this.]

...You're just asking us to solve the trolley problem. Isn't that a little boring?

[cartesio]

You can't go wrong with the classics. They're classic for a reason.

[snailedit]

Yeah.... because it's a paradox. You're 'supposed' to find human lives incommensurable. Would you not condemn whoever does kill?

[cartesio]

It would be quite unfair of me to condemn a killer for something I'm asking them to do.

[Then again...do you really trust the Sergeant to be fair?]

[snailedit]

True, but that's not what I asked.

[In other words, no. No she does not.]

[cartesio]

[Nice, Mira, not trusting the obviously evil man]

I won't condemn, punish or kill the person who chooses to cooperate. Nobody under my command will. Is that what you wanted to hear?

[snailedit]

Oh, not really. I was just asking your opinion. I actually have a casual interest in the subject of ethics. I hope that's not why you chose me for this, though.

[cartesio]

I didn't bring you here to argue about ethics. Right now I have no time for that.

[...but his interest is somewhat piqued. Just a bit. He feels he's going to regret this, but...]

Look, this isn't the time. This was meant to be just to tell you all the terms of what I want, not to talk about the trolley problem. If you want to talk about this, you'll have to wait.

[Wait until he sets a mailbox or something similar, he decides. Will it take him more than four days?

Most likely.]

[snailedit]

[Curious indeed. Mira smiles at him, the picture of innocence.]

I thought we were the ones with a timer over our heads, Sergeant. Where are you rushing off to?

[cartesio]

I'm under no obligation to listen to you any more than necessary.

[Especially since Mira seems to be taking this whole thing better than the rest. He wishes everyone was more like her instead of the kind to yell at him right after he told them to spare him the sermon]

I don't know if you haven't noticed or if you're not pretending you didn't, but I have my hands full with these ones.

[As if you didn't bring these headaches to yourself, Sergeant]

[snailedit]

I noticed. You can't tell me you didn't expect this to happen, though. Besides, they can wait their turn. They're all saying the same thing anyway.

[Mira is hard to unsettle. It'd certainly be easier for their lot if 'sermons' worked, but she's more interested in getting to the heart of the matter.]

Is this the last time we'll have to ask you questions? Some of us were wondering what the deal was with rule 5.

[cartesio]

[Well she's not wrong about that...at least Mira's questions are a change of pace. Once Serph made this show of strength he returns to Mira]

See that? Attacking me without my consent means I have authorization to eliminate you immediately -- and I can do it. I'd really rather not to, but I will do it.

The same protection is extended to the residents of this town. Lay a finger on any of them without permission and you will face the consequences, without warning.

[snailedit]

[What Serph did was certainly dangerous looking, though she doesn't react very much considering she's literally never seen something like that before. Sarge here barely lifted a finger, but Serph is also still there, so she doesn't really understand what she's supposed to see. He seemed hesitant to her.]

Okay. Is there something I'm missing here? Why would you give us permission at all...?

[streetwolf]

The what problem?

[Hi, who are you? He's the not very bright hoodie boy.]

[snailedit]

Trolley. ...It's a thought experiment about morality. In the most popular version, there's a runaway trolley and a person inside, who only has a switch that can change the direction of the train track. Let me show you.

[She had a pen with her and her letter, which she'll flip over to draw a diagram on the back.]

We'll call the straight track 'A' and the side track 'B'. The trolley is currently on track A. On track A, five workers are working on the railway, and track B, there is one more worker doing the same thing. If nothing is done, the trolley will definitely kill the five workers on track A. Flip the switch, though, and you've condemned the one worker on track B. Question is, which choice is more ethical? Some would say the train operator has a moral obligation to try and save a higher net value of lives. Their opponents would say that you can't talk about net value when it comes to people, and it's actually more immoral to choose who lives and who dies.

There can be a lot of variants on the original problem, but that's basically it.

[streetwolf]

Uhh...[Sorry Mira. But Wayne's a practical guy, anything that involves things too much and he isn't interested.]

Why don't they just move their asses away from the tracks?

[snailedit]

Because they're stupid? [Mira smiles wryly.] What they do isn't really the point of the experiment, anyway. You could decide to do nothing and then they jump out of the way, but it wouldn't automatically remove you from accountability there.

[streetwolf]

I always figured they closed the lines when they did that stuff. Or that I'd ever be driving a train... What kinda question is that? [He's scratching his head. He's the guy who looks at the questions in a maths book and questions why someone would buy 39 watermelons.]