Section Seven, The Truth is Beyond the Walls Options

[Satou Asahira]

Katsumi smirked. "If I knew all the answers, that'd be a lot less fun now, wouldn't it?" He moved over to Alan's table to observe his assembly of the watch and take mental notes. "Continuing on with the supposition that the watches are right and the clock tower is wrong, we may be getting in over our heads. If the clock tower is wrong, that would indicate that the government is controlling time for their own purposes while the unwashed masses are none the wiser. Are we really in a position to tackle a government conspiracy? I don't think-"
Just then a couple of pigeons fluttered into the Retreat. "Well, well, what have we here?" Katsumi mused to himself as he noticed they both had letters attached to them. He opened them both but they said the same thing. "Our presence is requested in class this afternoon. And it doesn't look like we'll be able to say no." He tossed one of the notes towards Alan so he could read it himself.

[Ryuga]

"Think about your 'conspiracy from a rational prespective. Even if the government were manipulating time, how would they benefit? If the days are shorter, than we do less in a day. It then follows, it takes more days to get anything done. And it's not like you can store time away in your pocket for later use. There's no point to making the clocktower run a little faster."
Alan's rant was interupted as the Pidgeon flew in. Katsumi handed him the note as soon as he was done reading.
"Looks like we'll be needing some communication devices now," he mentioned as he crumpled up the note and tossed it aside. "Pidgeons are easy to track." He went back to the work desk. "You can go ahead and go to class. I've suddenly come down with a bad case of the flu. It's not like Lynx can enforce every student to show up."

[Satou Asahira]

Katsumi shrugged. "It was mere speculation. However, figuring out why the government would do such a thing could be the first step in solving the mystery. Instead of thinking there is no point, think there has to be a point. We just don't know what it is yet." He headed for the door. "I'll tell Lynx you're sick and stop by again after class. Farewell." With that, he left the Retreat and headed towards his afternoon class.

[Sparrowsmith]

[Time skip, meant to do this sooner but... Got side tracked]
Tuesday 1PM (watches read 11.50 Unless altered)

The tall grey figure of 'Professor' Lynx paced about Cod's classroom with vivid scrutiny of its few inhabitants. His pale eyes flashed judgements on all who met their gaze. In some perverted way he seemed as intelligent as Cods, perhaps more so, but while Cods admired naivety every essence of this new teacher screamed harsh tongues of it. He opened up his mouth and spoke, behind his bitter words there was some charisma or virtue from a time now lost, but the tone was inaudible above the racket of thinly veiled malice. This was a man who had gazed into the abyss, and been consumed by it.

"Class," the words bounced off of the walls at 340.29 meters per second, finding reflections into the students ears, triggering synapses, and invoking a spine chilling response, "I am your new professor, Albert Lynx." he strode into the fray of students, and shook his head. "It's a shame more of your classmates could not be here, no doubt they still suffer from the absence of such a formidable man as Cods," the words could not have left his mouth with less respect, "but they should not need such comforts: You have me now."

Two men dressed in black and bearing an unfamiliar symbol on their uniforms began handing out books to the students, filled with sciences that could scarcely be comprehended. Lynx continued to speak, "These texts are a cut above what you have studied so far, in fact the only person in the city with so much as a rudimentary grasp of these machinations is standing before you." He grinned honestly, filled with pride, "These books date back to before the disaster that sealed us off from our world. Only now is the city sustained enough, and its inhabitants prepared enough, to once again be trusted with such knowledge. What you hold now was once basic, you are cavemen learning to devise the hypotenuse of a triangle. If you cannot keep up, you will be kicked off of the course. If you want to see the sun again, learn the book."

He walked towards the door, leaving the students one not-so simple task: "Take an engine you have previously built, or build one now, with the knowledge you already had. Electric or steam. The use the equations, formulas, materials and technology listed in the book the maximize the efficiency of the engine by 400%. If you need supplies you may ask your teaching assistants." He gestured to the two men, "But they'll be unable to provide any technological help. I expect documented proof. You can spend as long as you need, but I'll be back here tomorrow at exactly 12 - if you don't have an efficient engine for me, then you've failed the course."
Before the obvious protests of the students could be heard, he had left. From the corridor outside he yelled a final command, "Tell your classmates who didn't show - there are spare books."

[OoC It's your choice whether your in the class, or on the way there, or not going at all. It's also your choice to succeed in the task required of you. You face a fork in the road: Continue the task that Cods sent you on, or take up the task Lynx has set you to. You can attempt both of course. Remember, you are Cods' best students.]

[Naridar]

"Okay everyone", William said to the other students of Cods present at the lesson, "Let's meet up at the usual place in an hour. I think I have a plan."

[Nicsp]

Vincent had been at the class, at the moment, he'd be skipping through the previously handed out book, his feet nonchalantly kept on top of his table. "I hope your plan includes some decent time for us to work on this thing, as...Excited as I am to go in an epic quest for truth, I don't know about you guys but I cannot bear the possibility of failing in this class. That...And...In case you guys forgot, despite being in this little joy joy group, i'm not exactly the best student ever, not in comparison to some other people, that is. Not that I don't make up for more it a lot more in other areas." He said, chuckling some.

[Naridar]

About an hour later, at the Retreat...

As the last of Cods' students stepped in at the door, William cleared his throat and began to speak:

"Everyone, thanks for coming. Now, if you heard that Lynx guy, the only way he could have made it clearer that he doesn't want us following Cods' trails is writing it in capital letters on his forehead. And those assistants of him... I'd rather not meet them in a dark alleyway. Hell, it's even possible he's got something to do with Cods' disappearance. But let's not jump to conclusions. He's fishy, and that's for sure, and he's in charge of things at the university. He can find a reason to kick any one of us out, and probably wouldn't hesitate to do so, either. And I can't tell if he has power or reason to make an attempt at our lives. But he might. We might be in mortal peril. So if anyone wants to call quits, I understand. No hard feelings. However, I think we're all faithful enough to professor Cods for that not to be an option.

Now, Lynx's tactic is to leave us with no time to investigate. However, he doesn't know that we can work as a team. I thought of dividing the work. I and someone else adept at creating engines will remain here at the Retreat and work on the assignment. We can then modify our engines for the others to present. Meanwhile, those who have methods or connections to investigate should do so. We also have a problem with the watches, as they're out of sync, but investigating that will have to wait.

This morning, I talked to a doctor, Victor Rios and inquired about anything related to the rain acidity or methane extraction. And I found out something that might be a trail to go down. Methane extraction works through machines that depend on input parameters. However, the effiency of these parameters are entirely random. This causes psychological symptoms doctors call "methane madness". So some of you should go check out an asylum and speak with someone suffering from it. It might be a clue. There's one about a mile south from the campus, if they won't let you in, tell them you're visiting Lilian Vix and that William sent you.

That would be it. We should decide on who stays here and who will investigate."

[Ryuga]

Alan spoke up next, as he had a report to give.
"Well a managed to get a watch that should match the clock tower." He held up the pocket watch for everyone else to see. "Though we should save the original models just in case. As for the engine assignment, we can go about doing it a rather easy way. Just build the shittiest engine you can with the least effort. Modifying the rest should be easy after that. As for volunteers to talk to the "methane mad" people, I'll gladly go, but I have watches to finish." He turned to William. "Well 'Mr. Leader?' You need me to stay? Or go?"

[Naridar]

"It's up for you to decide.", William said to Alan, "One's enough to investigate the asylum, though I think two people can be safer, should someone anticipate us. And if three remain here, we might be able to devote some time to checking the watches, though what the professor's letter says is still bothering me.

It says 'I can assure you of its accuracy.'. So either we overlooked something, or something's off with the clocktower."

[Ryuga]

"Well I'll be heading out then. Don't have much time to waste," Alan replied as he made his way out. "I left the 'accurate' watch on the table in case you need to make more. Good luck with the engines though."

Alan quickly made his way towards the asylum. He took a long and roundabout way, and checked behind him multiple times to make sure he wasn't being trailed. Eventually he made it, taking one last precautionary look before heading inside.
"Hello," he said to the man in front."I'm here to visit Lilian Vix on behalf of William."

[Sparrowsmith]

The man eyed Alan up, "You're a friend of William's?" he asked, "Well I'll run you by procedure. When going to see the more serious patients, it is illegal to bring anything that can be used as a weapon into the rooms. You can leave anything potentially dangerous at the desk, you'll get it back as you leave. You can't get in or out of this building without my clearance, and I can't let you out until a nurse has made sure everything is ok."
The man opened up the door and let Alan in. "I'll need to stay here, will you need escorting to Lilian's room, or did William tell you where to find it?"

[Ryuga]

"I will need escorting," replied Alan as he placed the items forward to be confiscated. Just a few tools he used for school-work, but could still be used as weapons by no stretch of the imagination. "William wasn't kind enough to tell me exactly where Lilian's room is."

The man happily lead Alan to the room, letting him in before making a parting comment and returning to his post.
Alan looked over Lilian, who looked to be more of a shell person than anything.
"Hello Lilian," greeted Alan as he took a seet. "My names Alan. I'm here on behalf of William. He has a major school project he needs to get done and couldn't come see you. Being the nice friend that I am, I volunteered to keep you company for a while. So how are things? Well I suppose they could be better, but I'm sure you've made some progress."
He looked over his shoulder to make sure the man had indeed left. With the coast clear, Alan walked out of Lilian's room without so much as another word, looking through other cells for people exhibiting systems of methane madness. Talking to some of these people could be a mistake that could get him caught afterall.

This post has been edited by Ryuga: Sep 7 2011, 09:03 AM

[Naridar]

Meanwhile, back at the retreat, William began to work on his own engine. He quickly drew a blueprint of a steam engine with deliberately wrong valve sizes, that would hinder its' performance, then started working on both the planned engine and a revised one with the demanded output increase using the correct valve sizes. His thoughts often wandered from the contraptions to a question he was pondering on for a while: if methane production is as fluctuating as Mr. Rios told him, why didn't Section 7 collapse already? And how can the city work so stable when the only lifeline of it is something so unreliable?