The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere

Inner Sanctum Underground | 9:33 AM | ∞ Day

"It works like this," I spoke quickly, perhaps afraid that if I stopped talking she'd say I was just wrong. "At the beginning of the journey, the train sets out with only 4 carriages. It was established early on that it travels in essentially a straight line, with the rear being the only point at which the track can be seen, so no one would be able to notice that anything was missing or strange." I bit my lip, thinking. "Actually, maybe it's wrong to say that it 'sets out with only 4 carriages'. There might have been something at the front originally - a thin platform on rails, about the same size, maybe - to make the next part of the trick easier. But that's ultimately not that important."

Kamrusepa said nothing. She was probably getting impatient. God alone knew whatever psychotic worldview the version of her in this world would be eagerly espousing to me within the next hour, but until then, we were running this shit into the ground whether she wanted it or not.

"During my conversation with Bahram and Hildris, it was established that airship technology has recently started to become widespread in this period of history, though it can only bear a modest amount of weight. Once night falls, because of the extent of the cloud cover, it gets - again, rather conveniently - extremely dark. This is the perfect cover for an airship to fly overhead." I pointed up at the sky. "But who, exactly, is the one doing the flying? During the story, a second version of the detective appeared, raising the question of where he could have come from. At the time I thought he'd just been hiding somewhere on board from the start, but there's a more elegant solution: He was the pilot. During dinner, he lowered the airship down to the front of the train and 'docked' with it. He then left the control room - the inaccessible chamber at the front of the carriage - and locked the door behind him."

"You're being vague with some of these points," Kam pointed out.

"I'm trying to refrain from speculating about the identity of the actual culprit until the mechanism is all laid out," I explained. "But we'll get there soon. So: Foah--"

"Foah?"

"Fake Noah," I explained flatly.

"Oh." She clicked her tongue.

"So Foah we'll put aside from now, but at some point, Phaidime enters - boards? - the airship, and within it, she's murdered." I glanced back in the direction of the dining car. "One of the things Summiri suggested while revealing the 'truth' to me was that the horse we discovered had been kept in the massive cold locker in the kitchen, and that's still not impossible for the trick, depending on who is complicit - Gaizarik was guarding the door, but the kitchen was immediately next to it, so if he was in on it, it wouldn't be unthinkable to drag it around the corner, though it'd likely be a two-person job. But again, there's a simpler explanation, which is that the horse was under the bed."

"Under the bed."

"Yes," I affirmed. "In the airship was a large bed. The horse would be taken out from under there, cut open, and Phaidime's corpse stuffed inside. Then, to make the trick work, all that would need to be done would to be to bring the vessel back into the air - letting off a flare or something in the process, to create the flash of bright light we saw - then drop the stuffed corpse through the door down to the roof of the carriage. If it fell just right as the train was in motion, it would smash into the roof, fall backwards car-to-car, and eventually come to rest just in the way we found it." I lifted a finger to my mouth. "Or, well, I should say that's a way the trick could work, if the story was written by a hack. But obviously in reality it probably wouldn't go that smoothly. A horse is a big, unwieldy animal; it's not going to fall elegantly in service of a good setpiece. It could miss the train, or the corpse could fall out, or it could smash through the roof altogether. So, are you hack, Kam?"

"You know, I rather I don't recall you being this inflammatory before," she said dryly.

"Well, we never really talked about my hobbies."

She rolled her eyes. "I'm not a 'hack', at least by this metric. Although again, I must stress I didn't even write most of this to begin with."

"Then considering the fragility of the outer layer of the roof, there are lots of ways the trick could have still been done without relying on that contrivance. For example, you could drop a series of rocks, which would be much easier to aim with the train in motion, or even have an accomplice stop on the roof. After that, you'd just need to lower the horse down with some rope or something. Again, the specifics aren't super important, since the crime is basically narrowed to the same parameters either way." I folded my hands together. "Either way, that also explains how the carriage disappeared. Again, maybe there was a platform that got attached when it 'docked' that went up with it, and maybe there wasn't.

"And how you were killed?"

"That's obvious," I said. "Hildris looked up before I died, and it was the one direction I didn't. Someone obviously shot me from above, from the airship."

Kamrusepa considered these words. "And the fabric you were holding?" She gestured down to where it still hung as I'd dropped it a few moments ago. "How is that related?"

"When I left the train after we encountered the steppe tribe, I saw the train from its side, and it appeared to have five carriages," I explained. "On the surface of it, that should contradict my theory. But what was notable was the fact that I couldn't look at it closely. The front carriage was swarming with people and somewhat dangerous; Tuthal and Bahram even got into a fight up there." I picked up the material again, flapping it at Kamrusepa evocatively. "The reason I came over here a minute ago is that I had two theories about what this could be. The first was that this was the deflated skin of the airship's balloon. But really, that was kind of a stretch from the start-- If the ship is already in the air, why would it still be here? A backup, in case something happened? That just complicates the story." I shook my head. "No, this is a tarp. One painted with the image of the carriage side."

Kam snorted, starting to giggle.

"What's so funny," I said flatly.

"You're just so triumphant about it all."

I ignored her. "The side of a train is mostly flat, so it's not hard to trick the eye at some remove. Paint it sort of the right color and texture and you're more or less good, especially since the front carriage was supposed to be windowless from the start. It was mentioned a few times throughout the narrative - most recently by Summiri again - that there are intermittent Rhunbardic outposts in the area, so it was probably there to sell the illusion that the carriage really had been there and vanished after the story was over." There were actually a few problems with that idea (wouldn't somebody have noticed the setup was weird as the train was leaving the station, even if it was initially hidden by the tunnel? How would this all have been setup there in the first place?), but I wasn't sure if mentioning them would be seen as nitpicking. "This is also one of the two reasons the liminal chambers between carriages exist: To disguise the fact that only the front carriage has this feature. We'll come back to the other in a bit."

"That just leaves the explanation of how Hildris disappeared and got in the engine car, which is easy. I only got to look in the bathroom where she disappeared for a few moments before Summiri cornered me with the pistol and made me stop. So there are tons of ways she could have been hiding, especially if she knew I wouldn't have time for a proper inspection, and that the carriage would be destroyed after the fact. The most simple one came up already-- She could have been hiding under the overturned bathtub. But she could also have been behind the door. Or on the ceiling. It was never a real closed room to begin with." This also felt a little too loose my liking, but it was a roleplay scenario. "From there, she waited until we were gone and then left through the window, again knowing it wouldn't matter whether or not there was evidence of her escape. After that, someone threw a rope down for her from the airship, and she climbed up and threw together the disguise she was wearing using the bedsheets and the Mekhian death mask sculpture thing. She waited until the boiler would have cooled back down enough from its brief activation by Summiri when we needed to get away from the fires, then descended down to the train, and entered it through the chimney - old-fashioned steam trains in this era have huge chimneys - and then waited for her moment. And that's how she was in that room, in that costume, at that time." I exhaled. "And that's it. That's all of the tricks."

"Aren't you missing one?" Kam asked.

I blinked. "Am I?"

"The three bodies dead simultaneously in the bedroom," she reminded me.

"Oh, right. That one's easy. Or, well, I guess I should say it's easy now that I have the meta-knowledge from Eirene's player that she actually did die, and the whole thing wasn't just faked." I glanced downward. "Like Hildris vanishing, the only reason that worked as a trick at all was because of how fast everything happened. There was no time for me to verify whether the bodies we found in there were actually dead, and it relied completely on the shock of seeing them all in that state within just the few seconds between when Tuthal entered the room and when Hildris and I ran in in response to the gunshots. It's all flash and no substance, smoke-and-mirrors."

"Ironically, it's the narrowness of the time window that makes it easy to solve. First, we have to consider what Eirene said just before we heard the shots: 'he's got a gun'. Knowing she's innocent and that cry for help was sincere, what context makes the most sense for her to have said that? There are only the three of them in the room. Presumably, Tuthal starts out behind her. Her goal is to capture - or, failing that, kill - Foah, with him ostensibly there to assist her. They have him cornered. There's a good few seconds between when they both go in and when she shouts, so presumably, they talk, if only for a moment, probably try and get him to stand down." I stopped for a moment, feeling the need to clear my throat after talking almost continuously for the last several minutes. "Now, knowing that context, would it make sense for her to say that if Tuthal had pulled a gun on her? Obviously not; in that scenario, she'd have no friends in the room at all. It would only make sense for her to run or shoot first, not waste time talking. The phrase had to be equal parts exclamation and warning, asking someone to help. With that in mind, it only makes sense if it were Foah."

"From the amount of bullets used from that gun over the course of the night, we know that Eirene probably wasn't the one to shoot him, assuming they know anything about how to use a revolver. It couldn't have been your mistake, Kam, since I know you're some kinda gun nut." Despite this being a compliment, she furrowed her brow, seeming somewhat offended. "It's not clear who killed Eirene, but her player seemed a little confused about what happened, so it was probably Tuthal, who presumably killed Foah too."

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

My head was spinning from trying to keep all these facts in order, but I was almost done. "We know at least one person survived, because there was a gun at my feet as I entered the room. Someone had to have put that there. And the only person missing a gun was Tuthal. Summiri also rushed to him as we entered, making it impossible to even look at him closely before she ran off into the lavatory and distracted me." I sighed. "If you think about it, it had to have been him. Not even five seconds passed between when we heard the shots and we rushed into that room. That meant there was no time to mess with the scene in any substantial way - no time to move weapons or bodies around, especially no time to apply make up - but maybe just enough time to crudely position yourself. Tuthal probably fired the third shot we heard at a choice angle to draw some blood or something, smeared it on his head to make it look like he'd also been shot at a glance, tossed the weapon towards the door and then just sat down. I'm not sure why he would done that - thrown it, I mean. I can only guess it was some ill-thought out attempt to deflect suspicion from himself without really thinking through the implications, since all of this was probably done off the cuff. I can't prove Foah wasn't secretly alive there too doing the same thing, but, I don't know. It feels unlikely." I exhaled. "Okay, I think that covers it for real this time. The entire howdunnit. All the impossible crimes explained."

Several moments passed in silence. Kamrusepa stood with her arms crossed, her eyebrow slightly quirked.

"You, uh." I said awkwardly. "You can tell me if I was right now."

"Really?"

"Yeah." I hesitated. "I-I mean. If I was wrong about everything, we can just, uh. Well, we can just move on, I guess."

She pursed her lips. "No, you were mostly correct, I think."

Oh, thank god. My whole body relaxed as the dopamine hit me like a softly flowing tide. I wasn't an idiot! I'd actually understood the story! What vindication, what clarity of world and self both!

But wait.

"...'mostly correct'? What was I wrong about?"

"Oh, I don't know." She made a dismissive gesture. "A few things here and there."

"Can you be more specific?"

"Well, you said that Hildris went up to the airship after she disappeared in the lavatory, yes? And went down the chimney."

I nodded. "That's right."

"That's not how steam engines work, Su."

I blinked. "I-- How do you mean?"

"You can't get inside from the chimney. There's no room."

"Yeah there is!" I protested, pointing towards the wide protrusion from the top of the engine carriage. "You wouldn't be able to in more modern models, but like I said, these old-style steam trains have huge smokestacks. I saw one in a museum with my girlfriend just a few years back."

She looked puzzled. "You had a girlfriend?"

"That's not relevant! I don't know why you sound so surprised, but my point is--" I flinched in irritation. "My point is, if you're short and slight like Hildris, or like us, you can totally fit down there. Look, I'll show you." I used the Power to levitate into the air, floating a carriage down; Kam followed along at ground level. I reached the chimney, which was actually a lot narrower than I'd imagined it in my head, but looking in I felt like I could probably shimmy down there if I lifted up my arms and accepted that my boobs were going to get bruised to fuck. "See? It would work." I lowered my legs partially in demonstrate.

"Su, fitting down the chimney isn't the issue," Kam half-called out from below. "You can't access the firebox of a steam engine from the exhaust."

"Why not?" A chorus of voices in my head instantly chastised me for saying this.

She furrowed her brow. "This is incredibly basic engineering. How do you not know this? Didn't you study physics at university level?"

"I-I'm not into trains," I said, my face flushing.

"Look inside there," she urged. "Just cut the front right open where you'd slide down in your imaginings."

Irritated, I did as she asked, pointing my finger (even without need for a scepter, it still helped for more targeted stuff like this) and ripping off the front of the locomotive with the Object-Manipulating Arcana.

"What do you see, Su."

"Uhh." I peered. "A small chamber that ends with a bunch of little holes."

"That's the smokebox," Kamrusepa explained at condescendingly sluggish cadence. "Heat travels from the firebox, the place where the coal is burned, through the boiler via pipes in those 'little holes', warming the water within in the process, then leaves the engine via the exhaust. So unless you shrink yourself to the size of a mouse, travel between the two halves is out of the question."

"She could have cut through somehow," I spoke defensively. "Y'know, like-- The train wasn't going to be used again after that point, so that would have worked."

"No it wouldn't. She would have had to have gone through the boiler, which would have left her and the floor of the entire middle carriage soaked. You do understand what a 'boiler' is, don't you? The water creates steam, which passed through the throttle--"

"I get it," now feeling so embarrassed I couldn't even look directly at her. "I get it." I lowered myself back down to the ground. "S-So, how did you do it, then. How did she actually get there."

"There's a trap door under that part of the train."

We stared at one another.

"I," I eventually said, "you can't do that."

"Do what?"

"Just have a trap door that's never explained. It's not fair play."

"You could have found it," she said indifferently.

"No, you don't understand. I mean-- I mean you can't do secret passages in a mystery." I complained. "It's not done. It's tacky, against the unwritten rules."

She sucked air through her teeth. "You're not going to like the other part you're wrong about, then."

My eyes widened slightly. "What do you mean, the other part?"

"The thing about the rooms moving," she explained. "I don't know where you got that from."

I was silent.

"You raised the possibility during the game itself, so obviously I'm not surprised," she clarified, "but I still don't really understand your reasoning. I mean-- Isn't the whole concept rather absurd? How would you ever disguise such a complex mechanism so completely, especially with the technology from the era this is set?" She spun a length of one of her orange curls around her forefinger as she thought to herself. "Think about all the little considerations. The seam you'd see on the floor entering one of the chambers, where some space would have to be left to prevent the edge of the mobile component from grinding against the wider carriage. The need to integrate the plumbing into all this somehow, the bisected pipes aligning so faultlessly that no fluids would be spilled into the inner workings of the train. And the rooms would need to be held in their place even with the train at full speed, which would itself require an extremely complex locking mechanism." She tutted. "Though the biggest issue might just be the sheer force one would need to exert to move an entire room's worth of furniture, walling, and flooring, even if we assume some means to minimize the friction. Let alone while in motion."

This wasn't fair. Stupid bullshit was common - uh, well, not unheard of - in hard locked room mysteries. How was I supposed to know she was trying to be this scientifically accurate?

I couldn't believe this. I really liked this part of my theory! It explained so much at once! "Well, I raised the idea that maybe the entire thing is controlled mechanically from the driving room."

"By what means? Su, you personally disconnected the engine car from the rest car. You'd know firsthand if there was any means for the former to exert control on the latter."

I grumbled to myself. I should have known it would be like this from the moment I figured out she was running the show.

"Oh, don't look so bloody sullen," Kam chided with irritation. "You were on the nose with the airship business. I thought that'd all gone entirely over your head." She smirked. "Pun inte--"

"So what is the solution," I interjected.

"Well, it's as I was saying," she replied. "There are secret passages between the rooms. The area with no door was a secret room." She looked very pleased about this.

I stared, my mouth slightly agape.

"It's through the ceiling, you see," she explained. "That's part of why the roof is slightly hollow."

"But," I stopped for a moment in the middle of my sentence like a jammed machine. "That's dumb. That's so much dumber than my solution."

"Is it?" She looked at the train. "It certainly seems a lot simpler to me to contrive a secret passage than an elaborate means to reconfigure an entire structure in motion. I really don't understand why it's a taboo; I visited several real buildings in my mortal life that had them. I've been doing this recruitment gimmick for almost a decade now, and I don't think I really understand this genre."

I tried to disguise my gritted teeth. "It doesn't even explain anything. How was my room not dirty? What happened to the body?"

She shrugged. "The room was cleaned."

"Cleaned."

"It wasn't that dirty. Just a streak of blood and a few things overturned, nothing complex. The intent was to make you think of the carriage as having some organic, shifting and of eldritch composition, but that was just a matter of narrative framing. Not something you were intended to take so literally."

"But," I protested. "The reason to make us board one by one. It made perfect sense."

"It's actually very common for these kinds of exclusive travel arrangements to force people to board one-by-one. It's considered undignified for everyone to be rushing in with all their luggage at once." She held up a finger. "Not that I'm saying that is the explanation, mind you. Just pointing that out."

I tried not to be visibly devastated. There was a part of me that wanted to stop caring about this entirely, now that I knew that it was tainted, that the full truth waiting to be uncovered would inevitably be disappointing. Or else slip back into another manic and single-minded fugue, dying on my hill for the narrative I had spun from Kamrusepa's shoddy work.

I resisted this impulse, inhaling sharply.

"But everything else I said was right," I stated.

"Yes. Well, I mean, you were vague about rather a lot of things. But all the rest of your theories were correct."

Suddenly, light far brighter than produced by Kamrusepa's wisps flooded the area. But not the golden radiance of day, but a sterile and white light that instantly shattered the illusion that we were actually outdoors. The wind abruptly stilled, and now I could see the walls of this little box of the world, where the surrounding environment bent subtly at the corners, reality giving way to flatness and angular distortion.

Now, floating overhead, I could see it. The airship, its balloon painted black, hovered overhead at the very limits of the space, its compartment shorter but slightly longer than the carriages. A layer of something felt like it had been pulled back.

"Oh, good. She finally realized we were back out here," Kamrusepa mumbled.

"Okay, so that leaves the Whodunnit and Whydunnit," I resumed. "This is where I get confused." I took a breath. "There's a lot that I can conclude. Obviously, almost everyone other than myself, Eirene, and maybe Phaidime and one or both of the 'Noahs' were in on something together. Probably not everything - there's a lot to suggest internal conflict - but there's so much evidence to point to that I don't even know where to begin." I found myself shielding my eyes from the light, which seemed to blaze from the entire roof. "Other than what we already talked about with the drawing and the fact that Summiri and Hildris were obviously working together at the end - and probably Bahram too, in retrospect he was clearly not shouting at me not to hurt Hildris at the end, but whoever was on the airship not to hurt me - the most damning evidence goes back to the tarp. I saw it at a distance, but Tuthal and Bahram saw it up close. They had to know the entire setup was a sham from the start."

Kam looked at her nails. "I suppose so, if you put it that way."

"I've realized that much," I said, "but I can't figure out what anyone was actually trying to achieve. If the treasures actually were fake, like Summiri said, then there's nothing to gain. Was it all an elaborate plot to kill Phaidime and maybe Eirene for some reason? But then why was I invited at all? Why did Noah try to kill me? What was up with Foah?" I threw my hands up. "There's too much. I feel like I missed something critical."

Kamrusepa regarded for a moment, running her tongue against the inside of her cheek. "Do you just want me to lay it out?"

"I don't know. I guess." I shrugged. "I have a bunch of theories, obviously, but it feels like none of them come close to being completely decisive. So yeah, a part of me just wants to give up." I rubbed my eyes. "But then it feels like I'll kick myself. Because - I assume you know this already, regardless of what happened in the weekend you remember - the conclave was a conspiracy like this, too. I'm sure this is inspired by that. So maybe they were trying to fake their deaths, too? Or maybe that's thinking too literally. I don't know."

She considered my words for a moment.

"Let's have a change of scenery," she finally said. "Come with me. Backstage."