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Amelia Payne Location:Education Center(M)(L6) Skills: N/A

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After the quick break or however they called brief pauses in court for taking care of different needs and the like, the hearing continued back on. People were called, answers were being shot back fast, Amelia couldn’t quite follow the thread of logic they were going on, but not too surprising considering they had apparently the paperwork about all the things they were judging Hunter for. Not surprisingly some of the those weren’t things she knew of. In any case, she was just glad it had more or less picked up speed now, so maybe they’d be free to go before long with hopefully not too bad a sentence.

Eventually it was Ash’s turn. Amelia listened very carefully and found those answers very short. He more or less answered with yes and no, just slightly more lorded without actually getting into needless details about it. She wasn’t sure if those answers could provide clarity on any possible more complicated facets of those situations, but she supposed they worked. Very Ash type responses. She liked that actually, he was trustworthy even when talking. No pointless dancing around the issue.

All in all, from what she’d heard so far, Amelia wasn’t sure the situation required this much of attention. Like a huge court trial with so many present and everything. Then again it sounded like this was the standard procedure for such cases. She imagined they didn’t get similar situations often enough to warrant quick procedures and she could appreciate the visibility of it all. No way to do underhanded things with everything being this public. Yet another point in favor for the place, because yes, she was still keeping track of pros and cons of staying here. She couldn’t help it by this point, but luckily the positives blew any negatives out the water in quality and number. Besides the negatives were more or less a few petty gripes…. Alright it was ONE petty gripe, but that was the topic of another time. So she returned her attention to the trial, noting a few people who appeared to be quietly discussing among themselves.

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Lisa Mason Location: Hospital(B)(J4) Skills: N/a

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Lisa watched somewhat amused, somewhat touched and just a little bit secretly pained as the girl named the picture for her. Still it was mainly happy feelings that drowned out the negatives.” Hmm, I’ll be sure to do so then. A flower has to be visited very regularly, but luckily, I’m going to be visiting you a lot, so it will be getting two birds with one stone.” She smiled at Lucy, very amused and proud at the idea the girl pulled out. It was a very nice plan and scheme.” You shouldn’t be used to it, but hey now that I’m used to the new schedules, I will be finding time to visit more often again.”

“Do they now?” She asked, raising a surprised eyebrow at the girl. That she didn’t rightly know actually.” Well, that was something new for me, thank you for telling me!” She proclaimed.” And it is sweet indeed, when there’s no sun to shine upon them, they will be each others’ suns. Very romantic, a more artful and artistic person than me could probably do quite the story out of it… or a picture. Why don’t you put such a picture in your garden? Everybody would love it too!” She grinned.

“I don’t see why not, in fact I think I will tell you a story you haven’t heard before… It was read to me by my mother when I was your age...” She said in thoughtful expression as she made herself comfortable as she could and began retelling the story as best as she could remember it.” This is the story of Ivan the King’s son. A long, long time ago, when the world was a lot bigger than it is now, when the fantastical walked among us, there was a king with three sons. Youngest of them, Ivan. One day he called for them and said, ‘ My sons, you area already well of age, it is time for you to search for brides. Take your heavy bows and let loose an arrow into the sky. Where ever your arrow falls, there you will search for your bride.’ And with that the brothers followed their father’s advice and went to the courtyard, each letting an arrow into the sky. The Eldest let the arrow loose and it fell into the yard of a Duke, he took the Duke’s daughter. The middle brother’s arrow fell into the home of a respected merchant, he decided to marry the merchant’s daughter. Ivan let his arrow into the sky, but strong he was and it vanished far from view. For days he searched, through forests, through hills and fields and finally on the seventh day he reached a swamp. Saddened and tired, he felt depressed, where would he find his bride in this swamp and suddenly what was that he saw? On a big pile of dirt, sits a big frog and his arrow holds. To leave he tried, but the frog spoke out.’ Ribbit, ribbit, Ivan, from your luck don’t run. You will see this is for the best.’” She mostly remembered the story, but went with the flow adapting it a bit whenever she couldn’t quite remember a word or the precise way it went. After all, it was a lot of years since she last heard it.

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Hunter Monroe Location: Auditorium Skills:N/A

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Hunter left under escort to use the restroom. Once inside he held his head over the toilet to hurl, but nothing came up other then some aggressive gagging. He wasn't sure if it was just a case of he wasn't actually sick enough for it, or if he didn't have enough contents in his stomach to throw up. He sat head over the toilet for what seemed like forever before he made his way back out. Once out of the restroom, it was hard to not think of taking a chance to make a break for it. He had two direct guards on him, and they were split up from each other. And both had guns he could utilize. Though he had no intentions on acting on that thought, but with everyone now spread out, and now the number of watchful eyes on him, it was temping. Though he wouldn't get Izibell, and he wouldn't easily replace the gear he was offered before. And that was assuming he made it out. He found a watchful eye as he used the restroom pretty unsettling, but he imagined the jail cell he was in the last week or so also kept an eye on him as well. He would follow Joaquin and Panama back to his spot on stage and continue the court martial looking a bit worse for wear.

Mizrahi was next to testify. Hunter noticed looks from the counsel and wasn't sure what to make of them at first. He wondered if it was more pity, but he found that annoying too. It was just another job, and he had found himself literally submerged in worse in recent years. Hunter did have to muffle his chuckle at the referring to civilians as privates. It wasn't too hard as he felt like shit still, but he thought the joke was funny none the less. Though bad time to laugh at it. Then came the next person to be questioned. Ashton. The man that Hunter had both attempted to joke with, insulted, and in a way felt inspired by.

Hunter took note how simple most of his answers were. And even the more "Complex" answers were not too defined either. Condescending made sense. Hunter had taken the man as being like the worst officers he had met while in the National Guard. Men who put considered themselves either better or more important then the enlisted ranks. He figured there was some logic to the importance, but with how badly things escalated on his deployment it was hard to not be bitter at every negative aspect of his former officers. Even the good ones. His own company's commanding officer, Lieutenant Anderson. Hunter saw the man as having little spine when it came to the immoral choices the officers above him made, and made his the remnants of his company do. Hunter knew he wasn't innocent in those regards either. But when the man had finally stood up to those who had led the Guard to a path of self destruction, it was already too late for the civilians they were supposed to protect, and the remaining fragments of his company. Lieutenant Anderson in his final moments had rallied those who could still fight, inspired them to do the right thing even if it cost them their lives so they could attempt to make up for the deeds they had done.

Ashton reminded him of the better qualities of Anderson, while still possessing a solid ability to lead his men outside of a combat situation. Hunter wondered why there weren't more officers like him when the world fell apart years ago. Then realized, all the ones in his state were probably sent to the big apple to assist that mess. That might explain the lack of Federal troops and air support in his part of the state. Ashton took the time to say a nice little compliment about Hunter near the end of his statement. And Hunter decided that should this end favorably for him he would need to thank a lot of people, apologize to more, and offer some people drinks. Maybe coffee or soda after what happened at the beach.

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Emanuel "Manny" Newman Location: Education Center Skills: N/A

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Manny stood up and stretched a bit while there was some breathing room. Nothing too fancy, just making sure nothing got too stiff while waiting to see how this all played out. He then sat down comfortably as he could to continue his conversation with Alexander. Alexander had replied to his question with a rather strait forward answer. So far? So good. The worst charges were yet to come though. "From what I can tell, the boy has the social skills of a cactus in a balloon factory. And apart of me worries he either is only now realizing it, or worse it's a recent development." Hearing the details of what had gone on so far, and with the rest of the charges coming up, Manny found himself worried. The charges so far didn't seem too bad.

Manny sat and thought about the situation some more, trying to get a gauge on it, but outside of his own experience he had no idea what to expect. He had never served in any military, and he had never participated in these kinds of trials. "I worry. The gross insubordination is likely what the deciding factor will be. And seeing how the drunk and disorderly went..." Manny couldn't finish the sentence. He had gotten out of worse in his own court cases, but this was the military. Or at least a version of it. In a world for all intents and purposes was in marshal law. He worried what that would look like now. He wondered just what had this boy done to warrant that, and to justify everything going on today. With Ashton's testimony, it seemed that overall even though the boy was a pain socially, and had no people skills, he was little threat.An asshole maybe, but not a threat. They were both military but he didn't know much past the surface about it. But both being military and spending time together, maybe they had an understanding of one another that Manny didn't understand? Or maybe he was looking too into it. And this was another sad case of someone who hit their breaking point, and found it way too easy to go over the edge time and time again.

☠ 𝚃𝚆𝙳: 𝚈𝚎𝚊𝚛 𝟻 𝙿𝚊𝚛𝚝 𝟺 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Location: Camp Mexico Beach Weather Forecast: Dawn at 5:53 A.M. - Dusk at 8:13 P.M. - High: 91F, Low: 80F - Winds SW at 4mph - Gusting to 14mph - Rain In The AM - Cloud Cover: 100% - Visibility: 9miles. Notes: Another round. I am going to keep trying to squeeze a little more into each post as far as testimonies go. If I end up going too fast, please let me know. I don't think I can end up going too slow, lol. At least I hope not. Anyways, we continue! Hopefully if we ever have another court martial it won't be in the middle of a pandemic, god I hope not.

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Hospital (B): Lucy was more than excited to hear that Lisa would be stopping by more. She liked when Lisa visited. She was always nice to her. Most people were. Even that new guy who kept swatting at the air, he told her it was a blue unicorn. That got her attention. She had even drawn a picture of what she thought it had looked like and given it to him. He was weird but she thought he was funny.

"Oh, that's a good idea!" Lucy said about drawing a picture of the sunflowers facing each other. She would have started drawing it but then Lisa started telling her a story. One she was totally caught up in. Pushing her table to the side a bit and getting up on her knees slowly. She listened intently. "A frog?" she questioned with wide eyes. "Oh, what happened next? Did he kiss the frog? Eww, I don't know if I could kiss a frog, but then again, maybe, if it turned into a prince, oh did he kiss the frog?" she asked excitedly.

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The Court Martial Of Hunter Monroe Location: Education Center: Auditorium (M) Charges: Food Waste - 7.22.2012 | Drunken Disorderly - 7.22.2012 Failure To Report To Duty At Designated Time - 7.23.2012 | 10-886 Absence Without Leave - 7.23.2012 Failure To Administer Animal Sanitation - 7.23.2012 | Gross Insubordination - 7.23.2012

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It all seemed rather simple so far with the Court Martial. Even when the Vet was called up to give testimony about Hunter's Failure To Administer Animal Sanitation it was cut and dry. At least it seemed that way at first. As the questioning continued it was clear that DoLittle wasn't the only one that was going to be called in on this one. "Yes, the pile was left near the apartments." "New person, figured it was him." "Knocked on the door and informed him he needed to clean it up." "He cleaned it up." "I didn't report it right off because it was still steaming, quick fix." "As I was informed that he was being brought up on other charges I knew it wasn't just an isolated incident." "Yes, I had heard of complaints he made." "From Checkbook."

Nikki sank into her seat and covered her face. DoLittle was dismissed and Nikki was called back to the stand. Keeping her head down, she slipped out of her seat and walked up onto the stage again. "You realize you are still under oath?" The Professor asked.

"Yes..."

"You were the one responsible for making sure Mr. Monroe knew the requirements of Animal clean up within the walls?"

"Yes...."

"And he complained about this?"

"No!"

"He didn't complain? DoLittle informed us that you reported that he did."

"I didn't report shit..."

"Then what did you say?"

Nikki grumbled and sat up more in the seat, holding onto the edge of the chair arms. "He just needed it explained more. He was a bit disgusted about picking up dog shit with used bags. Went through why we did it, that they were sanitized and the like. Okay, sure he complained but it wasn't a real complaint. It was he didn't know what was going on thing, after that he seemed fine."

"Anything else?"

"No... Can I go now?"

"For now."

Nikki quickly slipped out of the chair and jumped down off the stage this time before scurrying back to her seat and sliding down even more. "The Gross Insubordination Charge is next. Now, to get a full understanding of this, we will be working back a bit before the charges were made. We are going to start at Mr. Monroe's first encounter with Members of Camp Mexico Beach and work from there. Maddoc Martin," The Professor said.

Maddoc pushed his chair back and went to sit down. He was quickly sworn in and took a seat. "You were the first person to speak with Mr. Monroe?"

"Yes."

"Would you tell us of the encounter."

"It was your basic pick up. He came out with the dog, we exchanged small talk, names, ect."

"It is on the record that there was conflict," The Professor said as she picked up a file. "The initial reports state that Mr. Monroe was hostile towards the group from the start and we have multiple reports of Mr. Monroe saying that you threatened him. Care to comment on this?"

Letting out a long breath Maddoc looked over to Hunter and then began to speak about that first encounter. "I was with the team, Spots/Dusty/Panama. Dusty landed when we spotted Mr. Monroe and his dog. Exiting we checked the area quickly and then spoke. I asked him his name. He told me him and his dogs name, asked if we were lost, told us he didn't know the area well, told us he didn't taste well." The Professor raised a brow. "He asked my name and then asked if that even mattered and if it was a trap. Then asked what we were doing out there with the type of fire power we had on the chopper. Kept talking for a bit about the military after that."

"And you threatened him then?"

"No. I told him our names. Then others started coming out."

"The other new comers?"

"Yes, in three other groups from three different directions."

"Threaten him then?"

"No, I asked if they were friends of his. He said no and said he hoped they were friendly and if they weren't that we had bullets in the turret. Then mentioned people pulling tricks and someone he had run across using kittens."

The Professors brows furrowed slightly as she glanced towards Hunter and then back to Maddoc. "And then you threatened him?"

"No."

"I am confused Col. We have it listed many times that you threatened Mr. Monroe, it is something he has been logged speaking out passionately many times by several guards and those in his vicinity. Did you ever threaten him during this first encounter?"

"Yes, I'm getting to it."

"What happened next?"

"I had Dusty radio in for Alpha Team. I then explained to everyone present that transport was coming in. That it could be back up if we needed it or transport for them. Told them they had to hand over all supplies and weapons and the like, board the bus. They would be taken to CMB, be put in Quarantine, given food and lodging, medical exams, skill evaluation and the like. That the General would then determine if they would be offered a permanent place. If they weren't they would be released with their things and sent on their way." Taking a breath, Maddoc continued. "Mr. Monroe then proceeded to ask why he should trust us. Fair enough question. He continued by saying that what was to stop us from gunning everyone down after we had everything from them, that he wanted to trust us but the only reason he had so far was the fact we hadn't shot them so far. Then he asked what was going to happen with his dog."

"So, Mr. Monroe was the first person to be hostile out of this introduction?"

"Perhaps not hostile. He was curious, had an attitude, and a mouth on him. He seemed to be expecting the worst and aiming to bring it out by goading people."

"Continue."

"Panama said he was probably a bit of a bitch." Panama smirked and nodded. He did say that. "Others had questions as well but we were on the clock. We had a lot of people and if the hoard that was heading that way caught up things were going to get messy."

"Did you inform them of the incoming hoard?"

"No, that falls under CMB knowledge. It was being taken care of by Beta team but it did not make us want to linger. Either way, hoard or not, we have protocol and we do not stay in the open long. That's common sense. We had already been exposed for a good period of time and needed to move. We did not have time for a pow wow." Leaning back in the seat, Maddoc continued. "I had other people I was having to speak with but I did tell Mr. Monroe that his dog would go into quarantine as well, apart from him, and checked up on and taken care of. It was about this time that Alpha team arrived - Atlas came over to us when they arrived."

"And what happened next?"

"Mr. Monroe laughed about something, not sure what. Said we would get a thank you when we proved we were who we said we were. Then he spoke about his dog getting anxious and said if anything happened to her he wouldn't forget it."

"That sounds like a threat."

"That was what I took it as. Atlas as well. He told Mr. Monroe to, I quote, shut the fuck up before I shove my trust up your ass." Atlas shrugged. "That was when I told Mr. Monroe he was a stones throw away from getting shot and to just shut up for five seconds."

"So let me be sure I have this straight. You and your team showed up. Mr. Monroe made several disturbing comments that included not tasting good, having bullets in the turret if the others were not friendly and in that telling you he had no problem with all of them being killed right then and there, that you all could gun everyone down, and so forth. Concluding with if anything happened to his dog he wouldn't forget it - this being taken as a direct threat. And then, and only then during this first encounter, did any threats happen?"

"Correct."

"And these so called threats, were?"

"Telling the kid to shut up and letting him know he had gone too far. Mostly just asking him to shut the hell up."

"What happened after that?"

"Kid shut up, got on the bus. We left."

"Anything else during that first encounter before quarantine?"

"Nope."

"Please step down."

Maddoc did just that, getting out of his seat and going back to his council seat. After that a lot of people were called. First was Spots, then Panama, then Dusty, then Atlas. All giving similar testimony. Then came the questioning of everyone else that was present for that first encounter. Tatiana was called up, she said little, stating that she did not see or hear much because they were on the other side of the chopper and she was focused on Spots as the woman was speaking about her child. Jack said similar as did Riley. Wayne admitted to telling Maddoc about his hallucination so he had actually figured half of what he had seen dealing with Hunter had been that as well. "I mean I thought the kid was being stupid but just regular stupid, guess not. Hell, I might of shot him if he had kept talking. He runs his mouth more than me." Erica was called up, more or less confirming what others had said so far and stating once again she was in no way related to Hunter before stepping down.

After that, others were called - Ash, Thalia, Amelia, Nigel, Alexander, Manny, and Hank. - They were all given the same questions as those that came before. What did you see and hear, what was your take as you watched, how were you feeling at the time, ect. (Each character that is listed will give testimony at this time about what they saw. The page where all this starts is linked above. It ends half way through page 89 for reference.)

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Alexander Polawski Location: Education Center: Auditorium (M) Skills: N/A

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Social skills like a cactus in a balloon factory. Alexander nodded in silence to Manny's description of Hunter, finding it oddly befitting the young soldier who didn't know when to keep his mouth shut and do as one was told. Again, part of him couldn't not fault him for it, for Alexander had been there in his shoes once as a youngster himself. Age really did put things into perspective, didn't it. He could only imagine how he'd react to being put in a figurative box for all to gaze upon with scrutinizing questions wonder if his rash temper would get the better of him like it did towards his father, or he'd retreat into his mental shell as he'd done for so many years. Thankfully he wasn't in that box. Not then, and not now.

The old veteran himself didn't utter another word after his brief conversation with Manny, his eyes going back and forth across the room when the session continued. More witnesses, more questions, more answers, and they had only just started with the charge of Gross Insubordination after the whole wafting of picking up dog shit. Even Alexander raised a brow at this, but he understood it as the military just being thourough. The AAR Maddoc gave under questioning sure was a thourough one.

Once it was Alexander's turn to be called up, he felt the same black hole open up in his chest like so many times before. A hole of black force, throwing itself against his defences. They held, and the one-legged Mugsy walked up to take the stand and answer the same questions asked before. To most he would have looked calm and collected, but he gripped whatever he could hold onto tightly as he spoke. "In all honesty, I have very little to say about my first meeting with Hunter…Mr. Monroe. I was not close enough to overhear the conversation we're talking about, limping behind the others in my group towards the huey, with the help of Mr. Newman. Frankly, I gave the young man very little thought at that time…The only thing I can comment on is Mr. Monroe's attachment to his dog,. Thinking back on it, presumed it was one of those things that happened when meeting living people again after so long…"

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Nigel Cooper Location: Auditorium (M) Skills: N/A

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Nigel too was finding the amount of detail the court proceedings went into to be unexpected, but found sound reasoning behind it in true Roman fashion. Logic had to be put into use, and a logical turn of events had to be established in order to weigh Hunter's true nature. From the questioning about his apparent disdain from cleaning up after his beloved canine companion with used bags, which to Nigel gave a curious look but nothing more, they soon dvelved into what he belived to be more serious charge. The one Nigel thought would stick more than a mere accusation - a most certainly real one, of course - of disordly conduct.

Gross Insubordination. An Uocatur, one starting with their very first meeting of chance out in the Florida country.

When it was Nigel's turn to be called, he returned to the stand he'd taken when he had answered before. The second time he walked up to it, he felt more worried. Not for himself, but for Hunter, even if he knew Justice had to run her due course. From what had been said about the young, troubled soldier by the others, his unfavoured toungue showed itself from the very moment they all met around that helicopter. Threats, talks of cannibalism and disregard for the others survivors…all for his dog? Taking the stand, Nigel pretty much confirming what already had been said.

"I entered the audible range of Hunter about the same time as Wayne, coming up behind him alongside Erica and Hank. Hunter spoke about other people using kittens as a trick to…Well, seem friendly, I assumed. I thought someone, that being Hunter, was talking either hyperbolically or with an unsound mind. To me, it seems we all responded quite differently to seeing a helicopter filled with survivors land right before our eyes. I hoped, as we were handing over our belongings before being taken to CMB, that Hunter wouldn't do anything stupid and get himself killed. Afterwards we all went to the newly arrived bus and took our seats, Hunter in the far back with Izibell. To me he didn't seem like a threat to me personally, though I did wonder how he would fare, even with a 95 % acceptence rate."

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Amelia Payne Location:Education Center(M)(L6) Skills: N/A

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The trial continued with the witnesses being called on. Maddoc gave a rather detailed recount of the events of their meeting from what Amelia could recall. Still thinking back about it, it was rather curious how the groups met up at that area. Almost too convenient, now that she considered it, but it seemed to have indeed been coincidental as much as evidence would support otherwise. How curiously the world worked indeed, she thought.

Following Maddoc’s time in the stand, Nigel and Alexander were called forth. Two people she vaguely knew now because of the shared time in quarantine. They answered the questions posed to them and finally it was Amelia’s turn. A fact that caught her a little bit by surprise as she took a moment to breath in and out before making her way over to testify, feeling probably more stressed than she should be, but considering she didn’t like being at the center of attention and right now pretty much everybody in the hall had their eyes on her, it made sense she was nervous! She swallowed silently as she heard the questions asked of her.

“Well as it probably was clear by the earlier statements, I wasn’t present for the initial parts of the meeting between the camp crew and Hunter. By the sound of it, we arrived just after the part about having enough bullets, but I honestly was mostly confused and amazed by seeing the heli after everything that transpired. Afterwards, he seemed worried about the possibility of it being a trick and once we disarmed for transport for bad things to happen and a bit hostile about the safety of his cr… dog.” She shuddered at uttering the word. She nearly called Hunter’s dog a creature of hell. It was! Sadly that was not a widely accepted fact so she caught herself and said it as she should so everybody understands.” Afterwards he seemingly kept to himself in the bus and so did I, so no interactions further as far as I could remember about it and I was happy to keep it that way.” She finished her explanation.

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Lisa Mason Location: Hospital(B)(J4) Skills: N/a

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“Well, well aren’t you just the most curious of little things?” Lisa asked, amused at the girl’s antics.” Well, if you let me continue, you will hear the rest of the story. Now where was I at?” She asked, making a fake hard thinking face.” Ohhh yea, Ivan the king’s son found the frog in the swamp! So… Ivan was very very distraught. How could he take a frog for a wife? He would be the joke of the entire kingdom, but in the end he couldn’t cross his father’s word, so he picked up his frog, wrapped it in a silk handkerchief and went back to his father’s castle. Much he asked with hope, his father to allow him to leave the frog back in the wilds, but his father was adamant.’ It’s your luck, how can you run from your luck. You will marry to the frog.’ His father proclaimed and with sadness the prince agreed. So within the week a grand wedding was held for all three princes. The oldest to his noblewoman, the middle to the merchant’s daughter and Ivan the youngest to his frog. And grand was the wedding indeed, for a whole week the festivities continued.” Lisa spoke out, arms animated as she moved to add additional flare to her storytelling and making minor voice changes to match different characters’ speech.

“After the festivities ended, the king called back his sons on the very next day. Stern he looked, serious as his sons had ever seen him.’ My sons...’ he began with voice, brokering no objections.’ … now that you are married, it’s time to see what your wives can do. Take silks, cottons, gold and silver threads and have them craft a rug to present me tomorrow.’ Sullen did the youngest prince return to his palaces. Once home, his frog saw him so depressed and sad and greeted him.’ Rabbit, Rabbit, Prince Ivan, why are you so sullen? Did your father spoke bad words at your expanse?’ The frog asked, making the prince even more depressed.’ How can I not be sad? My father asked for you to craft him a rug with gold, silver and silks for tomorrow? My brothers’ wives have all their families and servants to help and you are a frog? What will I do tomorrow?’ He replied, crumbling onto the bed as his frog jumped over to him.’ Rabbit, rabbit, worry not, Prince Ivan. Go to sleep, the morning is wiser than the evening. You will see everything will be alright.’ And like that the frog quickly set the prince to sleep. Once Ivan was asleep, the frog jumped from the bed, tossing away it’s frog’s skin and turning back into her true form – Vasilisa the Wise, so beautiful that neither can you paint her nor can you explain it in words. ” Lisa smiled and mimicked a tossing away motion.

“Vasilisa waved her hand once and gold, silver and silk threads magicked themselves alive, starting to weave into a rug. She took a needle and started sewing too. Where she poked once, flowers bloomed. Where she poked twice, forests grew. And once the rug was complete she put back on her frog skin and waited until the morning when she handed the prince the gift for his father. Ivan’s brothers were already there with their wives presenting their rugs. They mocked him still for marrying a frog while their father evaluated the different rugs. First he looked at the oldest’s. It was ugly, uneven and rough.’ This rug can only be used to cover the horses!’ Their father stated, causing the oldest’s wife to flinch in shame. When he saw the middle one’s he was even more stern.’ This one’s only good to be used in front of the front gate to wipe your shoes!’ Finally he looked at rug Ivan’s wife made and his eyes grew wide.’ This is a rug for special occasions that I will use in my room for great holidays and celebrations! Now, that I’ve seen how your wives sew and weave, I need to see if they can cook. Have them all prepare a bread for me for tomorrow...’ And thus once more the prince sullenly returned to his palaces to be greeted by his frog.” She smiled and made frog sounds.

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Ash Holloway Location: Education Center (M) Skills: N/A

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Taking the stand again, Ashton maintained the same sort of militant composure that he demonstrated with his first walk up to the stage. The questions asked seemed a little toward the vague for his tastes, considering the nature of the Court Martial, so he confined his answers more or less to the defendant in question as not to muddy the waters with details unrelated. Also considering he was asked questions requiring more than a yes-or-no answer, Ash responded with greater situational detail.

"Team Newnan, my group for the initial evacuation of our settlement and relocation, approached from the north. The Colonel had me pegged as Army immediately and demanded my credentials. Name, rank, number, etc. I complied, informing that our arrival was at the request of Lt. Commander Thana Martin, to report to Master Gunny Macsen Martin. He verified Zone of Action and we immediately deferred to his authority. Monroe was already present at this time on the other side of the Huey. Couldn't hear what he was saying clearly enough to give reliable testimony. Can confirm the conversation on Maddoc's end as accurate to his testimony, ma'am. Two other groups approached from the south and the west, respectively. Long lost cat, too, if you'll believe it. I identified the group from the west as the other half of our people from Newnan (Team Eden), and notified the Colonel that we had no connection to the group from the south, nor Monroe himself, ma'am."

When asked about his take on the whole situation, Ash responded, "Overwhelming set of coincidences that got all parties to that place at one time, and we still might have missed each other were it not for the Huey landing. Everyone was in a position where they had to show remarkable trust. Being out in the world for too long makes it hard to do that. Year, four months, and some change is a couple lifetimes out there. Everyone had something they cared about on the line. My take, ma'am, it that the situation could have gone FUBAR very fast and it was a miracle that it didn't. It was a good day."

And finally, the question of how he was feeling at the time. This one required that Ash delve into a part of him that he wished to remain buried for official matters. Talking about his feelings wasn't a strong point. So, he kept it mostly to the subject of the Court Martial unless asked otherwise specifically. "Cautious. Suspicious at first. The fact that there were a number of people I did not know around heightened this. Some relief when Zone was verified, but too many unknown factors. I had people there for which I was responsible; the presence of a potential troublemaker did not sit well with me. After we were all disarmed - all of us, and in transit, I felt better, ma'am." The Newnan folk were strong and had numbers. Were all on equal footing, Ash would have put his money on them if it came to an altercation. Now that they were all one tribe, so to speak, this last piece of tribalism was moot. In any case, Ash didn't want to throw Hunter under the bus, but he did strive to be honest to them and to himself.

When the questioning was over, Ash continued to show the expected discipline and mannerisms of an officer, deferred to Court Martial protocol, rose, and retook his seat. Another glance up to Thana before he made it back down was comforting. Though he was a person obliged to his personal code and the concepts of jurisprudence where such things were preferred and practical, he did hope in some small amount that this would be done expediently.

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Thalia Carmichael Location: Education Center (M) Skills: N/A

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Thalia took her seat at the witness chair when called upon, this time with significantly less in the way of extraneous noise. Of course there was less. Now that fate had deemed that every eye in the place would be on her, she was able to move fluidly and quietly. This had to be some kind of sick joke, expectorated down from the heavens above to teach her humility. And here, of all the sins she was genuinely guilty of, Thalia did not believe that Pride was one in which she required a lesson. Wrath, maybe. Gluttony? The ability to not gain weight and an overappreciation of canned pasta (among other things) made it a contender. But this had nothing to do with what was going on one way or another.

Briefly, she wondered if she had to swear on a bible, or some such similarity. If she did, and she used her fake hand, did it still count?

Thalia's more blunt nature was in bloom as the questions were asked. She tried her best to be as open and honest as possible. After all, she had nothing to hide. The people of CMB already knew what kind of a person she was and whose family she came from, so false innocence was stupid and ultimately counterproductive. "Yah, so, we wah cutting through Wewahitchka, making for Mexico Beach. Friggin' choppa lands. Navy - sorry, Thana was gone then and Beatrice wahs in chahge." She paused for a moment, look of both sadness and rough anger flashing across her face in even amounts. Continuing, though notably more terse in word and demeanor of speech, "Coming down highway 22, um - from the west." She was almost mocking Ash's testimony from earlier. Thinking about where the sun was in the sky that hour, yeah, he was right. "I was scouting ahead. Usually do. I was..." She didn't want to use the term "expendable", but it was kind of appropriate. "Nevermind. Gahd damn duck... Time I gaht theah, Huntah was saying something about making sure we were who we said we were. Talking about us, the othehs, whatevah. I know he was smiling. I didn't trust it. Until I saw Navy's guy and his group, I was planning on getting us out."

She did not say it aloud, but in case the situation turned into a firefight, she was planning on targeting Hunter first. Of all parties present, he seemed like the greatest potential source of conflict, and that included the guy manning the 50-cal, so long as he was armed. If he was the origin of a fight, the tactic was to eliminate him and either utilize cover or drop her own weapons. It might have given her plausible reason to expect mercy, seeing as she was dispatching the aggressor, and/or focus attention on her so her team could escape. Thalia was more satisfied that it was not necessary. "When Bea and them caught up to me, it was almost immediate disarming, so... heah we are. We weren't on the scene long enough to see a whole laht of whatevah go down. Tension was big. I noticed that." Were it not for the fact that Thalia was genuinely trying to make this place work, she wouldn't have been as honest as she was, nor remotely as talkative.

So far as how she felt, her answer was a little colder than most. "There's no feeling. Out theah, I avoid new people. If I can't avoid, it's risk and reward, fight or flight." Thalia looked to the judges assembled with piercing eyes, summarizing from her keen instinct for survival, "If more people at that crossroad were like Huntah, you never would have seen us." The statement was open to interpretation. Never would have seen them at all? Never would have seen them until it was too late? Or more accurately perhaps, they never would have seen them until they knocked on CMB's front gate.

Either way it was a sober reminder for Thalia. She might have become something similar to what Hunter was now, and probably much, much worse, were it not for people who helped her and became her friends. As it was, her antisocial and potentially violent tendencies didn't need any more encouragement. Just a direction.

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Hank Wright Location: Education Center (M) Skills: N/A

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Hank sat in the witness chair looking a little bored and a little testy, like a burned-out mathematics teacher who just couldn't seem to get the little bastards in his classroom to grasp the basic points of long division. Granted, this was his civic duty, and all of that. Cost of doing business in one of the last benign pieces of civilization left, yadda yadda, but he really just wished that he could sit in a balcony someplace and make colorful commentary alongside his hetero lifemate, Wayne, like slightly less grumpy and significantly drunker versions of Statler and Waldorf from The Muppet Show.

"Yeah, I was out there. You wanna know what happened? Fine. Me, Maldonado, Apocalypse Barbie and Sportacus..." Hank paused, giving a little wave out to the rows of chairs in the greater auditorium, "...came up on the kid there talking some shit, like he wasn't about to be whisked away to a land of mashed potatoes and clean sheets. Hell, the helicopter ride should have been worth some quiet time, at least. I mean, it's no Tilt-A-Whirl, but what is, right?" Hank sighed. This stuff had been related a few times already by different witnesses, and while parliamentary procedure was often repetitive and boring, his years with the Cheshire County Sheriff's Department made him familiar with the hassle enough to just go with it for now.

Hank gave a brief outline of what details he could clearly remember, which fell in line with the established testimony so far. Apparent to him, this was overkill designed to establish some baselines for future testimony, considering that they were jumping around the timeline of total events. His follow-up about how he felt at that time was hijacked a little by personal observations about Hunter's demonstrated psychology, or one interpretation of it. "The kid was letting his Bulldog mouth overload his Chihuahua ass in front of new people. The new people didn't strip him for spare parts and that's how I knew you guys were alright. All in all, I might have thanked Hunter for that tidbit of information. A lot of other people out in the world would have used him as target practice for being so irritating, and I'd have to flip a coin to see whose side I'd be on, then." He looked over to Hunter directly, quickly addressing him like a stern patriarch, "Do you want to get shot? Because that's how you get shot. I hope this self-destructive thing is a phase and you get over it before you take others down with you."

Looking back to the Court representatives, "If you ask me, the kid needs something that'll give him a sense of accomplishment. Far, far away from scissors he can run with. As for how I felt?" Hank leaned back in his chair and smiled a little, as if he was thinking of some faraway point of happiness, "That chopper was the prettiest damn thing I'd seen in a long, long time, and I wasn't going to let one disgruntled guy and his dog ruin it for me. There was nothing I could have done about it one way or the other anyway, so I just stuck around to see the show. Does that answer work?"

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Emanuel "Manny" Newman Location: Education Center Skills: N/A

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Manny's turn came to present his perspective of morning events. He came up to stage and tries to keep a posture that helped make him seem as presentable as possible. "Well, we woke to a sound I couldn't personally Identify. Other's more experienced in helicopters recognized it as a Huey. Never heard the term before myself but at the prospect of people and a bed that wasn't a floor or hadn't been cleaned in five plus years, I was curious." He looked over towards Hunter a moment wondering again if the boy was ever actually military. He had no self discipline, and looked too young. Or maybe it was Manny just being old, and thinking anyone younger then him was too young. He turned back towards the counsel to speak. "I attempted to keep in the middle of our group as possible, keep everyone in sight. And I won't lie, I was hesitant. Last people I went up to say Hello towards locked me in a cage. But with those I have grown to trust willing to take the chance so was I." Manny paused a moment attempting to jog his memory a bit. Even though it was only two weeks ago there was a lot that happened within the last two weeks.

Thinking about it Wayne did come to mind. "Noticed a rather long rant by Wayne. As for Hunter, he gave me some creeps. But I spent a lot of time around angst teenagers. He seemed a bit too ready for a fight and realistically if it came to shooting, he'd likely be rather high on the most likely threats. He seemed a bit hostile for what at the time I thought seemed pretty standard stuff. But like I said, not uncommon for a rebellious teenager." Or someone who was mentally about as functional as one. But he didn't say that part out loud. "The biggest difference being the apocalypse, and compared to everyone but the helicopter crew he was rather well armed and had made it this far." Out of all the new arrivals, Hunter seemed to have the biggest potential to cause the most damage prior to being disarmed. Though Manny wasn't a huge fan of it himself, he understood the reasoning. "Maybe some arrogance. Seeing him now he seems more like some kid who has little understanding of the real world." Manny would wait to be dismissed, and return to his seat.

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Hunter Monroe Location: Auditorium Skills:N/A

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Hunter sat and watched as person after person gave testimony to the morning of coming to the camp. It was interesting to hear the perspectives of those around him as they explained how they had arrived, what they had seen of the encounter, and how they reacted to it internally. Ranging from hostile to borderline bait to try the waters for those who had thoughts that may have been similar to his own. He listened to Maddoc's comments, trying to stick with letting the past that hadn't caused direct harm go he more or less glossed over it. Wayne spoke up, and him making his own comments about the situation, Hunter no longer felt bad for thinking of using the man as a human shield. Though a lot of that still tied back towards the comments the man made about his mother. Hunter knew he wasn't where he needed to be mentally, but none of that was her fault. The entire time he was up Hunter gave the man a dead pan stare until he left. He took note of one of the other old men who had stepped up to the stage to speak. Alexander. Hunter had minimal interactions with the old man, but remembered from day one how he also claimed to be former military. Vietnam or Korea maybe? He took the distinct note of the metal foot as it stepped up the stage. Thunk, thunk, thunk. Made Hunter think if the injury was pre or post apocalypse. He knew a few older vets who had lost limbs and suffered injuries and he figured it was a good coin toss as to what had caused it. He made some comments that more or less summed up the relationship they had. Which was mostly, they had barely interacted, and had been left to take guesses on one another.

Nigel's testimony was pretty strait forward and like many, his attachment to Izibell had come up again and again. All so far had agreed on at least one thing. He appeared to be more or less the aggressor but more or less out of stupidity with a strong taste of distrust. Or just stupid in some cases. Amelia Hunter watched with a mix of confusion and curiosity. When he had first tried to introduce himself to her, she had backed off as if trying to avoid him. She hesitated when talking about his dog? It sounded as if she was going to say something else but he couldn't be sure what. It left him puzzled and left him wondering if there was more going on then met the eye? Then he thought about himself, and figured she probably had her own past he was unaware of.

Ashton gave a rather large and detailed testimony of the situation at hand. Some mistrust, Ashton made it clear he felt better when everyone was unarmed despite some of his own suspicions. And like many others, Hunter had created some unease with him too at first meeting. Hunter sat with a rather stern thinking face though, as Ashton's testimony had done a lot more then explain the events of that morning in great detail. It had done more then confirm that Hunter's first impressions were probably his weakest impressions. Ashton had filled in the missing puzzle pieces to a rather large series of questions Hunter had about this place, the coincidences at hand, and the crazy things that had been built up. He had filled in how so many strangers meeting at near random had not only known each other, but members in the camp, and the woman around it all. Thana. Many of the people that had met at near random had been trying to link up, and the Helicopter events had brought them together. Though Hunter knew none of these people before that morning, he had taken note of how many people who he felt should have no connections had somehow known each other, and Ashton in a single statement had cleared it all rather smoothly.

Hunter's trance of learning was halted with the sudden brain stopping of a rather thick Boston accent. There were talks of ducks, more Thana, talks of the girl who had pinned him to the floor, and more distrust of himself. He was getting the picture. Lots of distrust. Hunter would be lying though if he said he understood everything as clearly as he needed too. Powersaw girl's accent was so thick he had a lot of trouble following her as she spoke. Though he did get enough of it. And she had a point, Hunter would avoid people like himself too. Mistrustful, ready to end a fight before it can turn into one even if he was in no position to do so, and maybe a bit too confrontational. Then, there was Hank. Hunter had never interacted with the man directly, but he had seem the man interact with Wayne. A man Hunter wasn't a big fan of. Granted, a lot of people in the room were probably indifferent at best. Many opinions probably a lot worse. He was the most open about how Hunter had in his mistrusting ways, helped prove that these people were at least somewhat trustful. He found it funny how it was rather unlikely the chopper would have lowered itself if he was wondering the roadway. If he had chose to sleep in a bit more in his last hiding spot he wondered if all of these people who were in earshot would have ever noticed each other? And here he was ready to be removed for much of his own actions. He was a MacGuffin by total accident and situation, and he found that rather hilarious.

Hunter visibly tensed when Hank had turned to talk to him. Even though he wasn't speaking, he was still int he partial spotlight. But when Hank spoke, he was center again. When Hank spoke about getting shot, he was still tense, ready to confront yet again. It took him a moment to realize a few things. The man was not only unarmed, but paying attention to what he had said earlier it felt more like a warning then any kind of threat. And the words the man chose to use struck Hunter harder then Hank probably meant to do. The last person that had talked to Hunter about his self destructive tendencies was a woman who scared the shit out of him. June. She had confronted him at probably his lowest point about it and made him do something about it. He realized then it probably wasn't for his sake, but more of she didn't think she could take on Don and the rest of them by herself. And out of all of the bunch, Hunter was the one most likely to turn on the man. There were a lot of reasons to mistrust Hunter, a lot of them more apparent then even he realized.

☠ 𝚃𝚆𝙳: 𝚈𝚎𝚊𝚛 𝟻 𝙿𝚊𝚛𝚝 𝟺 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Location: Camp Mexico Beach Weather Forecast: Dawn at 5:53 A.M. - Dusk at 8:13 P.M. - High: 91F, Low: 80F - Winds SW at 4mph - Gusting to 14mph - Rain In The AM - Cloud Cover: 100% - Visibility: 9miles. Notes: Very short round this time. Just going over the Bus ride and the showers. No one outside of CMB staff is called for Bus testimony. Guys are called for the Shower testimony. We will get to the main Quarantine time next round. As I am getting this post up on day five, remember no one is far enough along on counters for the given extension this round.

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Hospital (B): Lucy giggled. "Yeah he would, people would think he was nuts for marrying a frog! Like Mr. Maldonado and his unicorn!" she giggled. Her eyes widened. "HIS DAD SAID WHAT? Why would he want a froggy for a daughter?" She as really confused but completely invested in the story at this point. "How's a frog supposed to make things? They just go ribbit and jump?" She was really confused now.

As Lisa told her the frog changed form she clapped and laughed brightly. "Aww! She had to be so pretty I bet! Like Cinderella but better!" Hearing how the Kind acted to the rug she smiled. "She has to have a plan!" Then she seemed to get sad. "Why is he so upset? She did a good thing, he should be happy. Jerk! What happened next?" she asked wide eyed as she pulled the covers up more on her. This was the best story she had heard in ages.

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The Court Martial Of Hunter Monroe Location: Education Center: Auditorium (M) Charges: Food Waste - 7.22.2012 | Drunken Disorderly - 7.22.2012 Failure To Report To Duty At Designated Time - 7.23.2012 | 10-886 Absence Without Leave - 7.23.2012 Failure To Administer Animal Sanitation - 7.23.2012 | Gross Insubordination - 7.23.2012

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As those that had been called finished up testimony for what happened during the initial meeting, the proceeded from there. Next was an account of what happened during the bus travel over there. This time they did not call any of the new comers, but stuck to the testimony of both Daytona and Atticus. Both were short, sweet, and too the point. Daytona stating that Hunter didn't say anything she could really hear and just sat in his seat from what she could tell from the driver seat. Atticus said similar, save for making a small joke about Hunters question if people were insane, which Atticus had told him everyone was a little crazy these days.

Then came time to talk about the Quarantine itself. Starting with the showers. Atticus stayed on the bench since he was witness to what happened in the showers. "Yeah, we took the males in the group to the showers. Panama and I sat down and had a smoke while we waited on Doc to show up, Maddoc brought in clothing for Jamie Newnan, the baby. Mr. Holloway asked about people serving. Mr. Monroe said he had served in the National Guard. Others of us spoke about whether or not we served. I spoke a little about my time over seas. Hunter didn't say anything else, didn't seem to try anything."

Panama was up next. "I had a fuckin' smoke. It was pretty relaxed. People don't try shit in the showers when they're all naked and you have a gun. At least not people who have half a brain. After a quick chat we were done and moved them to the main quarantine area."

Wayne went back up onto the stage, scratching his groin a bit before sitting down. "Yeah, I was there. I was feeling fucking radiant. You know how long it had been since I was able to clean my ass? It was nice to get rid of all the fucking berries holding on ya know. Oh, the kid, right. Fucker was a beanpole, still is. He asked about people serving. Yeah, I served. The famous cocksuckers brigade. Command of the all-whore detachment. I was joking damn. Told them I was a cop. Kid didn't say anything else."

Jack was called up, he sat there and nodded. "Nothing really to add. He answered Ash's question. I was taking care of my son."

After that, others were called - Ash, Nigel, Alexander, Manny, and Hank once again - They all are just asked to give their account of the shower time, linked above. Short, sweet, simple before they are dismissed and told to go back to their seats.

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Ash Holloway Location: Education Center (M) Skills: N/A

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There wasn't much for Ashton to relate in this portion of the questioning. If they were establishing some sort of timeline, great, but as he remembered things, Hunter didn't do anything particularly hellworthy in the locker rooms, nor the shower. Words were exchanged, granted. Short, beginner conversation, led by an innocuous icebreaker. All the same, he was called to the front and it was his responsibility to answer said call. So again, Ash rose, posture and demeanor fully to the efficient and professional, and directed himself to the stage.

All the same, he was asked about the events of the locker room and mens' shower. Rather than bore all parties with a full rundown of describing himself and others participating in their various elements of personal hygiene (as grateful as he was for the availability of hot water and fresh linens), Ash kept his commentary to discussion to which he was direct party, following a general overlay of circumstances which were already outlined by those who had come to the stand before him. "I had asked if anyone else had a military background, ma'am. I got a simple response to the affirmative from Mr. Polawski, Father Pearson, and Mr. Monroe. Miscellaneous responses from others." The memory of Atticus mentioning his place and times of deployment stuck out to Ash. They might have shared a patch of ground at the same time. It was something he meant to talk to the preacher about. It had been an attempt to initiate conversation between the groups that was largely unsuccessful. In hindsight (no pun intended), it was probably not the best time to attempt opening unifying conversation; not until they were fully clothed.

With no further prodding to elaborate, Ash rose, turned sharply in practiced military protocol, and returned to his seat in the greater auditorium.

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Thalia Carmichael Location: Education Center (M) Skills: N/A

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Thalia had half a mind to ditch the proceedings and climb up to the balcony with Thana and make impolite commentary about people with her. Or maybe sneak over to where Tatiana and Jack were seated and whisper about anything else. Or hell, try and see what was up with that Checkbook girl, seeing as they had certain similarities in sarcasm and disdain for humanity in general. It was funny that Thalia had patience to stand in a freezing stream with a four-pronged stick, waiting for a fish to pass by so she might stab some protein for breakfast. She could remain in darkness, letting it wrap around her like a familiar blanket, for hours until the right moment lined up for her unnoticed egress or to press something sharp into the back of someone caught unawares. But this Court Martial? It was beginning to chafe.

Already in her mind, Thalia had devised her hypothetical escape plan, just in case Rube Goldberg Machine of events here spiraled into something grotesque and painful enough to warrant her hasty absence. A couple of them had come to mind actually, but the problem that this open room with little in the way of hard cover presented was that, in the event of such an unlikely occurrence, Thalia would require the benefit of a distraction. Or a hostage. It was strange how her mind kept working like that, imagining the most improbable worst case scenario and taking steps to remain two chess moves ahead of it. Maybe she did need to attend those group therapy sessions. Hell, maybe they should hand her a group of younger, up-and-coming survivors so she could make them more like her. That was a smirk-provoking thought. She could only imagine what her father might think, seeing her teaching the youth how to commit acts of stealth and knifepoint murder while evading people. Like they did to her.

That last thought lanced through her with emotion. She still didn't know whether he was alive or dead, or in Monterrey still, or looking for his family the way she had been. Eventually, she needed to know. Thalia reminded herself that this place would make her strong again, and only from a position of strength would she have options. She would bide her time, years if necessary. In the immediate, Thalia was going to sit idly and listen to people discuss an inconsequential conversation occurring in a shower.

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Hank Wright Location: Education Center (M) Skills: N/A

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Again Hank took the stand, and again, without showing actual disrespect for the proceedings, he did feel a little bit of annoyance at being called up for something like this. He had half a mind to ask the court directly if him giving his opinion on a snatch of conversation was really worth the effort it took for him to get up from a chair and sit down in another one, especially if this line of questioning was already verified under oath by others as a non-issue. But, the wheels of justice were fuzzy and prone to acts of monotony, and so here he was, being fuzzy and monotonous. Then he ran a hand over his head, which held only a week's worth of stubble, and realized that it would be some time before he was fuzzy. Fine. Monotonous it was.

"So there I was," he started, as if to paint a lavish description of an epic moment, "surrounded by tile, getting nude in front of a whole bunch of strangers." Hank shrugged, continuing, "And Wayne. But he's a strange guy anyway, so... I stand by my statement. Anyhoo, after a few well-chosen remarks alluding to prison shower scenes on cable TV, we all got ourselves squeaky and then, um..." Hank began motioning vaguely in Ash's direction, "That guy from the Terminator movie (the first one, not the sequels) tried to make some small talk while humble-bragging about being Army." To give the devil his due, Ash did look remarkably like the actor who played Kyle Reese from the original movie. "And he asked if anyone else was. Dunno, maybe he wanted to make friends. Couple said yes, couple said no, then we all toweled off and had chowder." A satisfied smile, followed by a wink in the Professor's direction followed this expert testimony.

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Amelia Payne Location:Education Center(M)(L6) Skills: N/A

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With that part of the witness duty done, she was freed to her seat, only to realize that no, she was not done quite yet. Apparently they were going to be calling them pert segment of time period. That meant she would have to go up and talk at least once more… maybe twice. Amelia was a bit saddened by that, she had hoped it would be done with one time calling, but she supposed it wasn’t meant to be. She quietly sat in her seat next to Riley and listened to the next part of the trial. Which apparently turned out to be the bus ride. A part of their journey that admittedly she didn’t have as much direct memories, mainly because she was busy overthinking and worrying about what was to happen to keep too much attention to the antics around at that time.

Then came the talk about quarantine and showers in specific and she wished to just crawl somewhere and hide when Wayne fucking started rambling a bunch of stuff. Those were not things Amelia wanted to hear, like at all. She’d must have preferred a lot of those words to have never been uttered in her presence ever. She wasn’t sure exactly the degree of offended she wanted to feel, but for the moment she just rubbed her temples, half hiding her face.

It was the greatest of moments when he was replaced with somebody else to give testimonies.’ For crying out loud… why...’ She silently groaned. At least that was over with, until she realized they’d likely call Wayne to testify a few more times also and her mood plummeted once more. Sure the guy was that crazy weird uncle type character. Very amusing and fun in moderation, but in greater doses he was plain uncomfortable for her. At least Ash’s turn was brief and to the point and then afterwards Hank was another weird one.

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Lisa Mason Location: Hospital(B)(J4) Skills: N/a

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“Well that was the time when the fantastical and magical walked among people. I don’t see why it would be such an issue.” Lisa shrugged and continued telling the story.” So once more did the prince return destitute and saddened to his palaces, his little frog welcoming him home. Wonder she did about why he was in such a state once more and so the prince retold his fathers’ new orders to his frog wife. She made a few sounds and ushered him to go to bed.’ Rabbit, rabbit, Prince Ivan, go to bed and rest. The morning is better than the evening, everything will be fine, you will see.’ She told him as he complied and went to bed early for the night. Once he was asleep, the frog shed off her skin and resumed her real form once more! Right away did Vasilisa the Wise began to work. Waved her hand once and bags of flour flew over, waved it twice and fine sieves appeared to sieve though the flour and leave only the finest. Waved a third time and the cleanest of mountain spring water appeared. With those ingredients she mixed the finest of doughs and began decorating the bread.”

“On the sides she made palaces and forests, so real as if they’d jump out of the bread. On the bottom fierce beasts and on the top clouds and birds. Then she wrapped the bread in fine cloth and let it sit while she put on her frog skin once more. In the morning the frog handed the prince the bundle of cloth and again he went to his father the king. The king was in a fine mood from the previous day and looked forward to seeing what his new daughters in law could do. First he called the eldest to present his bread. The bread was hard and charred. The king grimaced.’ This bread is not fit even for the dog to eat!’ He proclaimed calling for the servants to toss it out. Then he called the middle brother. His bread was undercooked, uneven and sticky. The king was even more furious.’ This bread could only be dared to be eaten by the most destitute and even they would struggle!’ He roared and tossed that bread out too. Finally he called for Ivan to present his bread. Once he saw it, the king’s eyes grew wide and sparkled.’ Now this is a bread to only be served on grand celebrations!’ The king proclaimed and called the royal chefs to observe and learn from the craft on it so they can try to imitate it in the future for it’s fine craftsmanship.” She pretend held something in the air and fake marveled at it.

“’So I saw how your wives can weave and cook...’ The king began, causing the older brothers to flinch.’ Now I want to see how they dance. Bring them tomorrow night for a grand feast and celebrations!’ The king ordered and the three brothers once more began to leave. As much as shamed the older brothers were for their wives’ innability to fulfill the king’s request, they realized that this time Ivan’s frog wouldn’t be able to fulfill it. After all how can a frog dance and perform courtly manners?’ How are you going to bring your wife tomorrow, younger brother? In a matchbox, to rabbit at the guests for entertainment?’ They laughed cruelly at him. Ivan being the better man, withheld his tongue and once more sullen returned home for the third time.’ Rabbit, Rabbit, Prince Ivan, what happened this time?’ The frog asked and Ivan retold her what happened and the king’s newest request.’ How can I bring you to the feast? You can neither dance. I will truly become the cause for laughter for the entire kingdom!’ The prince said with sadness and yet once more did the frog calmed him and reassured him that he shouldn’t worry. Gently she ushered him to bed once more as she took to do preparations for the grand feast on the next day.” Lisa actually liked retelling the story so far, it made her realize that maybe she should go down and also write it down afterwards. If for nothing else but so it’s not lost to time, who knows if and how many of the books she had read as a child still existed out there.

“On the next day, come evening when it was time for the guests to gather, the frog send Ivan ahead and told him.’ After a while you will hear great rumble thundering through the sky. Once you do, you have to say to the guests – Worry not, it’s just my little frog, arriving in a matchbox.’ And with that the frog sent off her husband ahead to the king’s feast.” Lisa stopped for a moment to get a moment to breathe and rest her voice. Trying to intone the different voices of characters was tiring!

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Alexander Polawski Location: Education Center: Auditorium (M) Skills: N/A

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Back and forth they were called. Back to their seats to sit idly and wait patiently for their names to be called up like a boring, military excercise of breaking you down and rebuilding you with nothing but your name, rank and God's given clothes on your sorry ass body. Forth to the stand where they were asked more and more questions. Alexander still felt that black hole inside his chest, though their answers were so far all directed at Hunter, not themselves.

Not himself. He dreaded what they would have asked him.

Alexander stood up and wobbled his way over to the stand once called, this time about their shower-time just after having been evac'ed from that abandoned Florida town in the middle of nowhere. It had involved everything he remembered, except for substantially less enemy fire. The evac, not the showers, that was. The one-legged Veteran took his place silently and absorded the questions he was given. Other shower-goers had already been questioned, those most important to him his good Baby-Boomer friend and the other soldier, while the rest were to this day rather unknown to him. Them, and Hunter.

The one thing that brewed the black hole again was what Ash had answered. He had confirmed his brief confirmation of service, as innocent as it had been. His hands gripping tightly around whatever his old-man hands could hold onto, Alexander suddenly found a voice of peace ringing through his mind. Freedman. The next time he smelled the napalm, think back to a happy moment and place. As Alexander breathed in deeply and exhaled, his thoughts meandered through brief images of hot plastic coffee with two strong women on a TANK, his friends in the Eden-team and a certain General. Then he arrived at the showers, and answered.

"As mentioned by the others before me, nothing noteworthy took place in the showers. Was allowed to keep my previous peg-leg for the showering, and answered Mr. Ashton's question about service…which I was. Mr. Monroe was quiet for the most part, answering briefly but in the positive. A young man he was, I thought. Nothing else happened."

And so Alexander returned to his seat, somehow feeling relieved to have survived another assault on the stand, yet knowing well he would have to return soon enough. He dreaded the coming event they'd surely talk about…when he'd gone into a state of shock and…he wasn't looking forward to it, unlike the black hole within him.

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Nigel Cooper Location: Auditorium (M) Skills: N/A

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And so the tale of Hunter the Tragic dwelled onwards, the next scene in this great Greek story of a soldier's fall from grace now set upon the stage of the CMB thermea - The Shower episode. Nigel sighed as he listened to the other male members of the trial recounted the events of them showering, mostly out of a lack of substance. Nothing of interest had happened in those relatively short moments, certainly not in regards to Hunter and what this hearing was about. To Nigel the most interesting things of note were to learn that certain members of the newcomers were members of the military.

That, and how much attention he was getting for his accursed nickname of Sportacus/Sporticus, involving a children's tv-show he'd never seen.

Nigel did nod along to what was already stated though, finding little more to add into their oral statements as he himself was called forward. He walked past the old veteran, Alexander on the way up, recalling his brief answer to Ash; "Not in a very, very long time. Not that it matters anyway." Why did it not matter? Nigel couldn't get the question out of his head, well at least not until he had a question to answer himself.

"My information probably can't shed more light on the matters at hand, as they were mere recounts of what has already been said; we were taken to the showers, made conversation about our possible military pasts - of which I answered I did not have - and we were then taken onwards to Quarantine. Hunter answered that he had been part of the National Guard, no indication of hostilty towards. A warm shower probably was good for us all. Nothing to add further, Professor."

All throughout this part of the trial, Nigel did his outmost to ignore Hank and Wayne…however a Herculean Feat it had to be.

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Emanuel "Manny" Newman Location: Education Center Skills: N/A

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Things continued on rather smoothly. Another round of questioning took place where Manny had been called back up to the stage to present. Arrival and showers mostly. Short, simple. Manny walked his way up getting another look at the crowd watching. Between the boy and the few people he could pick out in the crowd, there was some anxiety either from how fears of how Hunter may react or maybe even just some general stress from legal process. Manny personally, it was the legal process at work. Manny in his lifetime had spent time with the legal system more then he would like to admit. He had seen the fail safes first hand, the flaws, and had not only been saved by it more then once. He had taken advantage of it in his lowest point in life.

Manny prepared his statement in his head at first before speaking to those in charge. "Seemed pretty simple at the time. I at the time was more taking in the scene of things at the time. I remember when Ashton's comment on service came up how surprised I was at the number military were not only in the camp, but in the new arrivals alone. I never was in the military under any form, so I didn't have much to add to the conversation at the time. I didn't notice much about Hunter at the time outside of another body in the room." He found it a weird coincidence the number of military that made up the survivors. Though out of those who could survive military personnel made sense. Though he had doubts about if Hunter was really military, but it wasn't his place to question it. Plus, what would he gain from lying about that? Then again, it was a military camp and if it was a lie, some connection could be there. If it was the case, seemed like a big risk for a minimal reward. Then again, he was under trial for a lot of things at the moment. Manny returned to his seat once allowed too and took a deep breath

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Hunter Monroe Location: Auditorium Skills:N/A

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Hunter watched as conversations had continued explaining the days. He knew what would be coming up soon enough. SO far, he was thankful that he had been more or less left out of the conversation as he was never a fan of mass attention. For the first time so far, it seemed little had to be said about himself which he enjoyed as well. Nothing other then witnesses to his rather short military career. Basic training, short break, and then deployed with his undermanned, and under equipped Guard unit. Looking back, under equipped had a completely different definition then compared to now. Back then he was deployed with an M249 SAW, over 600 rounds of ammunition on his person, a spare fucking barrel of all things, and more stuff in the trucks they had. They had fucking trucks that ran decent as well. Deployed with both some food and even skittles. His company even had a field mortar with some munitions. Not that it did them any good in the end. Not a lot of jet fuel though, nor air support, nor artillery, no engineers, poor comms, and no one at the time knew where battalion HQ was so that didn't help. Even after meeting up with the Buffalo garrison they had already fallen so low that it didn't really matter how many spare barrels, trucks, or skittles they had. They were simply too few, too weak, and too lost to do more then stall things.

So for now he waited knowing what was about to come up and knew it would be anything but fun. He'd be the center of attention yet again, but at least the questions were more directed to witnesses instead of himself. He wondered what kind of situation things would be in after that. Most people who had been called up so far already knew what had happened. Most. And despite the size of the camp he had a pretty good idea how the rest of the camp would view him too once statements continued.

☠ 𝚃𝚆𝙳: 𝚈𝚎𝚊𝚛 𝟻 𝙿𝚊𝚛𝚝 𝟺 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Location: Camp Mexico Beach Weather Forecast: Dawn at 5:53 A.M. - Dusk at 8:13 P.M. - High: 91F, Low: 80F - Winds SW at 4mph - Gusting to 14mph - Rain In The AM - Cloud Cover: 100% - Visibility: 9miles. Notes: One quick testimony from a PC this round and then Dinner break for the rest - Dinner will last this round, probably not another. Just gonna keep it moving. Will see what happens.

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Hospital (B): Lucy was in awe of the story. Sitting there and taking in everything that Lisa said. "Oh wow! I wonder if Cook could use her help in the kitchen! Imagine how good the bread must have tasted!" she exclaimed with a bright smile. When Lisa got to the part of the story about the dance she looked worried. She wondered herself how a frog would be able to dance to impress the king but then she started giggling. "I have no doubt she will impress everyone!" she said as she leaned back in her bed. It was clear that she was starting to get tired. It happened. The cancer took her energy and this had been an active day for her even if it was only listening to a story. Thing was she refused to close her eyes. "What happened next?" she asked brightly.

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The Court Martial Of Hunter Monroe Location: Education Center: Auditorium (M) Charges: Food Waste - 7.22.2012 | Drunken Disorderly - 7.22.2012 Failure To Report To Duty At Designated Time - 7.23.2012 | 10-886 Absence Without Leave - 7.23.2012 Failure To Administer Animal Sanitation - 7.23.2012 | Gross Insubordination - 7.23.2012

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Now that they were finished going over the Bus Ride and the Initial Showering, it was time to move on to the meat of the Quarantine. Start Of Quarantine Doc and Mary were called to give their take on Hunter during the first check up plus the handing out of the Questionnaire. It was rather cut and dry. Panama was called up and gave his testimony. "Wasn't anything at first. Kid wasn't happy about the tick but who the hell would be?" Then Panama added in: "He was sitting next to her," he said pointing to Amelia. "Mentioned he was the one that he was the one that nearly got shot for thinking out loud too much."

The Professor quirked a brow. "So this was the first time this came up that you know of?"

"Yup, started real fast," Panama said before being dismissed.

At this point Amelia was called up to verify what Panama had said about Hunter and asked if he said anything else to her. After that, instead of calling others up to ask one by one, The Professor asked for a show of hands to see if anyone else heard Hunter. Wayne rose his hand as did Tatiana and Jack.

Once that was accounted for, they jumped to the Barber Sheers. The Barber Shop"Did anything happen with Mr. Monroe during the time the others in Quarantine were present?"

"Naw, he was quiet, other than asking me to give him a hair cut. I was like sure. Once I took care of shavin' the lice out of the rest they were taken back. Major stayed with me while I took care of the kid."

"And what happened?"

"Then he started prying me for information."

"How so?"

"Started out small talk. If I had been a barber before. For a second. Then he jumped right in. Asked how many people within the walls were fighters or soldiers. Asked about the General. Asked if he was strict. Said he was already on bad terms with Maddoc. Then went do far as to go 'just between you and me what's that helicopter doing outside today?' " Sheers rolled his eyes.

"This sounds like information gathering. How did you take this?"

"I asked him if he thought I was born yesterday and if I was a bitch." Panama coughed to try to cover up a laugh. "And it was clearly trying to get information, in the worst way possible. Military Intelligence this kid wasn't. Fucking stupid is what it was. Kid runs his mouth, puts people on edge, get a warning, takes it as a personal threat without seeing he was being threatening to start, says he's on Maddocs bad side, and still is pushing. If he was on Maddoc badside he would have had a bullet put in his skull. He seemed to laugh things off and still play stupid, though wondering if it's an act now. Talked about how people are untrustworthy and dogs are loyal. Kid, dogs are only loyal to the hand that feeds them."

"That's enough Sheers, you may step down." To which he did and went back to his seat. The Major was brought up next. Sworn in and asked the same.

"Da, he said 'zis."

"Anything else to add?"

"Ve were under orders not to get involved or to shoot unless life vas on 'ze line. Had not been, yes, I 'vould have shot him. Too nosey for nevcomer."

"What did you do?"

"I took him back to conference." The Professor sighed and dismissed The Major after a quick review of what happened once taken back to Conference. Conference - It was another set of cut and dry testimony just laying a time line. Tesla coming in and taking molds. Macsen coming in and giving his usual lay down of the law, nothing of which could be taken as hostile. Auntie handing out clothing and explaining how to handle things. While this time line was set down, it was mentioned about Ash asking Macsen about Thana. Thana leaned forward a little more. She wondered why they were bringing this up, did something happen with Hunter that tied to this? Thana listened intently as her father spoke during his testimony.

"Yes, Mr. Holloway asked about my daughter. Informed me that they had come there because of her. This I had been made aware of by my brother after their arrival. I was not comfortable speaking about it but I had made a promise on how to handle the situation if it did arise. I was told to keep things broad and inform any that asked simply 'she was here but she is not anymore," and let people interpret that as they would. After that I left the room."

"Thank you sir, please step down," The Professor said before glancing at her watch. "As the next part of testimony will take some time I am calling for a recess of one hour for dinner," The Professor said. The General nodded.

"Ah, yes. It sounds like a good idea. Mr. Monroe you will be taken under guard to the Mess Hall, isolated from others. Everyone else, you may go to eat. Be on time when you return. All those required for testimony, even if you have already given testimony you must return in case you are needed again. One hour people," The General said as he stood up and people started to disperse.

Nikki slid down further in her seat. She wasn't moving yet. Tatiana and Jack stood up and headed out, Jack placing a hand at his wife's lower back as they walked out. Wayne jumped up and was ready to get some chow. Thana stood up and sighed, walking quickly downstairs and waiting for Ash by the front door.

Thankfully the rain had stopped. The sky was clearing a bit. It was muggy but cooling down by this time. At least people were not going to get soaked on their way to the meal. The Mess Hall itself was clear right then, it was still an hour or so before the main dinner time, the Professor had called an early dinner to avoid too many in the Mess Hall at once.

Panama and Cage walked over to Hunter. "Come on kid, let's get you something to eat," Cage said with a jerk of his head. Joaquin stayed close, still mirroring Hunter in case he tried anything during the break.

**** Only Amelia was officially called to testify this round. Dinner break will give us a round or two to chill before we get back to it. Get your character to the Mess Hall this round. Hunter is under guard, he will be stopped from talking to others, any attempts to flee will start combat rounds. Dinner this round Soup. There are two different soups - a general vegetable that is rather spicy and a seafood chowder. They are served with a several large dinner rolls on the side of the bowls. Any questions, drop me a line.

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Ash Holloway Location: Education Center (M) -> Mess Hall (C) Skills: N/A

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The testimony seemed to crowd around Ash getting a misleading statement about Thana's ability to pull in breath from back in Quarantine. It was not his best moment, granted. In any case, the memory of how he felt had stuck with him, even if he had already silently forgiven the deception by omission. Thana was alive, all was good. Now if they could just get done what had to be done with this trial for the day, he could get back to doing a mixture of nothing and everything with her while the rest of the world just kept spinning around them. The fact that there was a trial was a great sign for the civility of this settlement. The fact that it seemed more or less fair was a boon, too, when one thought about how things could go down outside of the walls like that. Ash was okay with these things. He was even more okay when they called for a break. True, he could go for a meal, stretch his legs, do whatever came naturally, but the fact that he had someone to do these things with could not be overstated.

So it was with a heavy heart that he did not see Thana as he glanced up at the balcony. He was hoping they might have their evening meal together. The trudge up the aisle, still walking with respectful precision as he had for the Court Martial so far, seemed to take longer than it might otherwise until he was almost out of the building. His heart lightened considerably at the sight of Thana waiting by the front door. It was a little touching. She waited for him. It seemed in this day and age that few people did that, and he counted himself as blessed for having someone willing to stick around for his company. Ash offered her his arm and, whether taken or not (as he understood that she might be considered On Duty at the time), went with her the distance to the Mess Hall with a smile that, not too long ago, was a lot rarer. "Hey, missed you down there," he said, a little playfully.

Feeling the need for greenery, Ash selected the rather spicy vegetable soup. He wasn't sure why, exactly. Spicy food wasn't the easiest to get hold of for him for a while, and despite not being someone who overly ran for the capsicum, it was something a little different. Different was good sometimes.

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Thalia Carmichael Location: Education Center (M) -> Mess Hall (C) Skills: N/A

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Testimony was an ongoing thing, and while learning as much as possible about Camp Mexico Beach and the way they did things here was a priority, she was pretty sure at this time that she had learned all that she could at this point in the trial. Maybe more would be revealed at sentencing. Or verdict, whichever came first, though Thalia was pretty sure she knew which way this was going to go. It reminded her of Alice in Wonderland, when the Queen found out that someone was painting her roses red and so put on a trial to make sure "justice" was met. The sentence was already established, as was the verdict, and they had difficulties figuring out which was supposed to come first. Except with this, it was fairly obvious that Hunter was guilty, whatever that meant, of offenses which ranged from the insubordinate to the merely foolish. Until everything had gone through its proper course, Thalia would just hang out and wait, maybe get called on and pretend to be content to be there.

Except that the last part was obviously a lie. It was hard for her to pretend to be anything but what she was, which mostly involved being mildly irritated on the day-to-day.

Oh, but Thalia did notice Shears with growing interest. He was the next stop on her ongoing hunt for whatever the hell she was supposed to be hunting for. That, and she could do with a shorter haircut, so long as she was thinking about it. So she waited until it seemed like a good point to approach, and then moved to do so with quiet, grace, and surreptitiousness.

Except that she had all the quiet, grace, and surreptitiousness of a yodeling chainsaw giving birth to triplets. Coming up behind Shears as he filed away and toward the door was more of an exercise in Thalia misjudging the distance to him and getting caught up in a push of people, prompting her to band her metal hand on the back of a nearby chair and having to get out, "excuse, um, yeah, pardon, damnit, need to, grr, ...fuck." When she finally prodded her way up to the man, Thalia blew out a breath and said very bluntly, "You know you'ah the next on my list, Shears." She cracked the barest of smiles. "What'cha got for me? She continued on her way to the Mess Hall, glancing over with a pause to provide conversational incentive, "Oh, and tell me on the way. If I don't eat something soon I'm gonna really bitch out." More to reality, Thalia was more likely to grow quieter and even less sociable until that need was sated, probably with the action of foraging or the application of a pointed stick. In any case, wherever Thana had gotten of to, she must be having the time of her life with this.

In the Mess Hall, Thalia selected the seafood chowder. It was meat, which was always a plus, and it was chowder. What self-respecting New Englander, even one who was raised during some pretty formative years in Mexico, was going to pass up the niftiness of chowder? Thalia found a mostly relatively quietish place to sit, held up her spoon with her one fully working hand and poised to attack the bowled up fishiness, whispering the single-word battle cry of every hungry Bostonian: "...nnnchowdah..."

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Hank Wright Location: Education Center (M) -> Mess Hall (C) Skills: N/A

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There was a general lack of regard on Hank's behalf as to what everyone else was doing, beginning the very moment that the Professor called for a recess. It was not really a hard and fast matter of the erstwhile Sheriff's overriding interest in whatever was for supper, nor his massive, gnawing hunger. Not to say that Hank couldn't go for a burger, or whatever, just then. He was frightfully bored with the whole trial; the repetition, the mind-numbing sameness or every piece of testimony that kept pointing in the same direction over and over, was rubbing his nerves roughly. If he had the benefit of a six-pack to numb things up, that would have made it more tolerable. But this? Nah, not his scene. Hank had been in several courtrooms in his pre-apocalypse career. Civilian courtrooms. Events where, for the sake of expediency, one side concedes certain things as fact based on overwhelming certainty and they move on to attack or argue their point in a different fashion. This had none of that. Of course, this mindset came from a man who also had no problem drinking lots of beer and watching the same WWII documentary three times in a row. The things which bored him were fickle sometimes.

Mostly, Hank really wanted a change of scenery. So, this lack of regard for what everyone else was doing translated in him springing up right along with Wayne and heading along with his hetero lifemate in a determined and direct pace to the Mess Hall. His lack of desire to engage in unnecessary conversation was a bit of a boon for him in this instance, as he made good time arriving and scuttled into line readily. He settled on vegetable soup and rolls for his repast. Being a steak guy, and having no shortage of fish as of late, he was comparatively in the mood for something that might have been pulled out of a garden. And bread. Fresh bread made the tragic loss of 99.7% of humanity more bearable. "Hey there, Maldonado. How's about we pick a good spot to quietly make fun of people like those two old guys from The Muppet Show, huh? Need something to break the bland we've just been dragged through."

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Amelia Payne Location:Education Center(M)(L6)→ Mess Hall(C)(M2) Skills: N/A

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Once more Amelia made her way over to where she had to be to testify. They brought up the point at the medical examinations. Alright, she was honestly aware now that she might not have been at the best of moods and states of mind at the time between all the stress, fatigue and hunger. That and the news that they were either going to keep her very separate from the others for the slow clean up of the lice or shaved completely didn’t really help it at the time.” Not… it was about the same as what Panama recounted.” She confirmed, but decided to be a bit more detailed.

“He tried making small talk, asking what I had and what my name was. I think he was making a joke that it was fine if I had a number instead of a name, but I wasn’t up for speaking much at the time, so I just told him my name and kept quiet otherwise.” She recounted her tale of their brief exchange in the medical examination. Afterwards she went back to her seat to listen to the rest of the events from the different people’s point of views. All in all he sounded awkward around others, though she wasn’t one to talk really. She herself was extremely awkward around most people that she didn’t know.

Finally after what had seemed like an eternity they were allowed to leave for dinner. She took Riley’s hand and figured that finding Chase would be the first thing to do. She had arrived to the center with Chase, the woman had accompanied her after all. Because of that Amelia wouldn’t just leave without. Finding the woman at the exit shoudn’t be too hard since everybody had to leave from there.” Hey, Chase, want to walk together to Mess Hall?” She asked as soon as the woman appeared in view. Waiting for a reply, she and Riley headed off afterwards.

Luckily the rain had stopped during the eternity at the trial so the trek to the Mess Hall was pretty comfortable… if one didn’t count the humidity in the air anyways. At the foodplace, Amelia took the spicy veggie soup. She wanted something different from the usual.

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Lisa Mason Location: Hospital(B)(J4) Skills: N/a

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“The prince naturally arrived safely to the king’s palace where the guests were already arriving! Guests from far and wide, from the kingdom and beyond were all arriving on elegant carriages and dressed in fine bright and colorful silken clothes. The prince made his way to the grand table where the rest of his family sat, his brothers began throwing veiled insults and mockeries at him right away, asking where his frog was and why he didn’t bring her with him. The king spoke nothing, but looked with thoughtful eyes. He was not a full, he had long since understood that the frog was not ordinary. After all even if talking frogs were not something unheard of, what talking frog could make those fine bread and carpet?” Lisa spoke eagerly with happy voice.

“The prince was not deterred, he knew what the frog had told him and had decided to trust her on this. Finally as all the guests had assembled and the festivities began, thunderous sound echoed across the skies, the ground trembled and rumbled. As the guests panicked that it could be an earthquake and the palace could come crashing down, the prince stood up and spoke.’ Worry not, honored guests, this is just my frog, arriving in her matchbox.’ With that everything froze and moments later everybody rushed to the windows and the gates to see the spoken about frog. And once they saw it, they were left marveled! In the distance, grand escort could be seen! Thousands of thousands of knights in bright elegant uniforms, riding massive steeds. Their hooves sending the tremors for miles. And in the midst of it all, a grand golden and white chariot. As it stopped by the palace and the doors opened up, from it left Vasilisa the Wise. Fairest and most beautiful of all, so much so that you can neither describe her in spoken words or in text. Dressed in equally as unearthly dress, Prince Ivan hurried to go and accept her and lead her inside where she too her place by his side.” She tried to make her voice sound as marveled as possible to add to the tale.

“As such the feast began in real, everybody was completely taken by the unearthly beauty of Prince Ivan’s wife. The wives of his older brothers and the older brothers were filled with envy for her beauty and the beauty of her dress. Yet Vasilisa took no heed to them. She ate and drank with a happy smile on her face. What she didn’t drink completely in her left sleeve she poured and what she didn’t eat completely in her right sleeve she put. Confused her sisters in law decided to copy her, after all she was the most beautiful of them all and she had to know her manners right?” The pharmacist asked with a smirk.” When it finally came time for the dance to start, first to dance were Ivan and Vasilisa. To the center of the hall they went and she waved her left hand and a beautiful lake formed. She waved her right and marvelous swans began swimming in it. With that they began to dance. So beautiful the sight of them was that the writer recounting the tale couldn’t put it into words and when it was over, the lake and the swans vanished as they had appeared! Then went the older brothers and their wives. They did the same, swinging their left arms and poured their unfinished wines onto the guests! Swinging their right arms and covering them in their nibbled bones from the feast. Needless to say the king was furious and threw his older sons and their wives out the palace!”

“Now that the feast could continue in peace, Ivan made an excuse and rushed back to his own palace. Ran like the wind he did, arrived home and began searching. Finally finding his wife’s frog skin and tossing it into the fireplace. It burst in flames that nearly singed him and he sat down and waited for Vasilisa to return home. When she did, she began furiously searching for her frog skin yet found it nowhere!” Lisa spoke with ‘horrified voice’.” In mixture of fury and pain by the seeming betrayal from her husband, she looked at him.’ WHAT HAVE YOU DONE, IVAN!? Why couldn’t you trust me! Had you waited for just 3 more nights, I would have been forever yours! NOW ALL IS RUINED!’ She shouted at him at the betrayal of trust and in pain.’ Know that I loved you and if you ever want to find me, 3 sets of iron shoes you will have to wear out and 3 iron breads you will have to eat through before you find me. Farewell...’ And with that she turned into a majestic swan and flew into the night’s sky, vanishing from the palace and leaving Ivan with the full gravity of the mistake he made.”

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Alexander Polawski Location: Education Center: Auditorium (M) -> Mess Hall (C) Skills: N/A

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Time rolled on with its inevitable tides, and more questions were asked of the following things that happened that first day. Alexander sat in deep silence as two of the medical staff of CMB, Doc and Mary were called up, the latter who Alexander remembered he needed to ask where in Chicago she worked way back. That reminder fell in line once Panama was called up to testify, speaking off Hunter's unusual way of talking once again. Unusual was an understatement, even for a man who fought through a war where every soldier had a dry, dark comment about everything.

Alexander didn't raise his hand when it was called for, instead crossing his arms and giving the young soldier, Hunter, a wondering look. What was going on through his mind, both back on the first day of a meeting of fate, and now? He couldn't help but wonder if they were the same - traumatized. Maybe, a shiver shooting through his entire frame at the thought resonating with him. It kept his mind occupied whilst barber spoke. Well perhaps spewed or bantered about the young soldier who acted…well, stupid. Brash, like the type of recruit trying to 'cool' his way through bootcamp. It didn't end to well…none of these testimonies ended well.

When Thana was mentioned, Alexander's posture changed significantly. His back straightened up and his face brightened up with his peaked attention as he listened to what Aeron had to say. The memory of it, the sharp sense of the hope being severed from his heart and him fighting back his tears, was a bad memory. One being escaped from by a cup of coffee, and not healed until Thana returned. From MIA, to KIA and finally returned. Perhaps there was some justice in the world after all.

Then dinner was called. Thank God.

Alexander felt a sudden rumble in his belly, sending shockwaves like an distant bombing run somewhere beyond the line of sight. For more than one reason, he was glad it was time to eat. Alexander got back up on his foot and metal leg, slowly shuffling his way past chairs and a tightly packed corridor as he slowly made his way over to the Mess Hall. He was in no rush to get there, the rain having stopped and leaving the air muggy…like himself. Mugsy chuckled to himself as he found his way to get some much-needed dinner.

Sometimes the world was indeed a funny place.

For today's first dish the choice became seafood chowder, reminding Alexander of the fish meals he'd cook himself back in the day of Bahamas-trips and fishing. It tasted just as good as he imagined, only leaving him sitting alone in a much-enjoyed peace and quiet. Not that he sought solitude, but he enjoyed it.

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Nigel Cooper Location: Auditorium (M) -> Mess Hall (C) Skills: N/A

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Nigel couldn't remember Hunter's comments during their needed appointment under Shear's shears, keeping his hand firmly placed in his lap as the testimony Panama, Shears, Doc and Mary went on. At this point of the quarantine, Nigel had been preoccupied with being sheared like a Napolitanian sheep and talking with Erica about how he looked. Still he had not gotten his hair wholly back, though in the Roman Army he would have been told his hair was long enough as it was. Running his fingers through, or rather across his stubby hairs, his attention was slowly drifting away from the testimonies. Except for a reaffirmed sense of Hunter's diplomatic blunders, nothing new was added.

Not that it was needed, as deep a hole as Hunter had dug himself into already.

Though he was dragged back into it at the mention of Thana being sought after by Ash. Back then Nigel hadn't been invested in the fate of a lost survivor, though with his new friendship with her, he was setting this tale in a new light. It was an enveloping story of searches for truth and lost love, but more importantly, a return of long lost companions. Like the epics of Homer, they were all finally reunited, but at what cost?

The proceedings were put on hold for a break and a highlight of the day; a meal. Nigel's belly rustled like a Carthegean war elephant at this point, a reminder that he and Volt hadn't had time to eat after their sparring and a good show by Thalia. Nigel stood up and started looking after her, only to see her sneaking rather unsuccessfully towards Shears for some reason. He decided to put his conversations with her for a later time, following the crowd and making his way to the Mess Hall for some delicious food.

Today's meal become a lighter vegetable soup, his battered body still feeling the slight aftershocks from the one-handed vulcano. Perhaps Thalia could recieve more than one name from him; Amazon and Vesuvius? Nigel grabbed a bowl of soup and looked for a seat to take. One person he avoided like the Justinian Plauge was Hank and Wayne, leaving him with a surprising choice left as he wandered calmly over to Thalia's isolated table and politely taking a seat. "Taken? If conversation is not what you're seeking, Thalia, I'll shut my mouth and eat. But do tell me, for I am curiously intriuged, how you have such proficiency with your weapons."

Idle conversation, but still something he wanted to know about.

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Emanuel "Manny" Newman Location: Education Center --> Mess Hall Skills: N/A

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Manny listened to the testimonies as they came. Though many seemed to point towards a mix of foolishness, and a severe lack of social skills. What did strike Manny as a concern was Hunter's probing of information. And the amateur nature of it at that. The last part concerned him the most though. It reminded him of when he was a bit younger then Hunter, his time in his "Gang". Manny wasn't sure the best word for it looking back. But it didn't change the concern he had when thinking about the situation at hand. How many, the right of passage to join, was to prove you would do anything for your new family. That there were no limits to what you could and would do. It normally wasn't too extreme, but most of the time it meant doing something stupid, and dangerous. Rob a liquor store, fight the biggest dude in the group, get close towards the enemy and learn his secretes so we can use that against him.

His thoughts were derailed a bit when the topic of Thana came up. Even with the request to keep things broad to avoid the conversation, Manny felt mislead about Thana's situation. It was a vague comment that implied a lot, while staying so little. Just because he knew the why, didn't change how he felt. In the moment he couldn't be sure he'd do better. But that didn't change his thoughts on the matter. Not much could be done about it now though.

Meal break was called. Manny debated a few thoughts in his head, the main being what to do with his theory. Did he see if he could talk to the boy directly, clear things up on his own? Between the armed guards and the fact Hunter was known to lash out rather easily trying to talk to him on guess work at best seemed like a bad idea. He wondered about going to camp leadership with his concern, but that brought up it's own list of problems. Including adding more suspicion to an already suspicious person. Suspicion that may be completely false. But if he was right, and Hunter was just some kid who had been roped into a scouting mission just because he was the new guy, or the bottom of the pecking order... It could be a disaster. Or, he was just some socially inept kid with no understanding of how to talk or interact with people.

Manny made his way to the mess hall with his thoughts as the humid air hit him. With the clouds out as thick as they were the day felt rather gloomy as he tried to think this through in his head. Dinner helped, with a nice seafood chowder he sat across from Alexander and ate his food. No comments about the trial, no questions, no out loud thoughts. He just needed a familiar face near him while he organized his thoughts, weighed the pros and the cons.

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Hunter Monroe Location: Auditorium --> Mess Hall Skills:N/A

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Hunter watched the trial as his blunders of information gathering went south. He remembered poking and prodding for information after arriving, trying to play it off as being friendly, and being rather bad at both. He had halfassed both things and fucked them both up. He remembered distinctly trying to gather the information assuming that the camp was likely still a potential threat to him, and he needed to know if fighting his way out was an option. If the guards were spread out enough, maybe he could have taken them on one at a time, two at a time if he felt ballsy. Create a distraction, and pull out where attention had been pulled away from. If asked, he'd be lying if he said those thoughts were not still in his mind. He still took turns eyeing the guards one at a time deciding which ones he could try to talk his way out of, which he could try to intimidate assuming he got a weapon, and which he would have to shoot no questions asked. There were those who were not guards too that he eyed from time to time. Though he had no intentions on acting on these thoughts, they were present none the less. He wondered if that was ever a habit he could get out of, or if it was just one he would have to learn to suppress better.

Some other stuff came up he felt he had little involvement with so he barely paid attention only taking note of the name Thana again. But soon enough, that thought was gone too. Under guard he was brought to the mess hall. He took a deep breath and made a big smile with his eyes closed on the way. It felt good to be outside again. He spent much of his time on his family's scrap yard outside, either playing with his siblings, pulling his little sister off a pile of stacked cars, or taking apart said cars. Post apocalypse he went a lot of places on foot. Especially after the first year when it started getting harder to find cars that were not only working but fueled up. Mostly starting up when he left the last Safe Zone he had been involved with. The one he left covered in bloody bandages limping his way out while being watched by the scope of a rifle. Involved was a loose worse though. He had been there twice, the time he left on foot where he spent a few days recovering from his injuries, and the first time he was there. The reason he left the second time with his torso covered in bandages and smelling of alcohol.

He spun in circles as he walked the way a kid might with a short attention span taking in the view. Which was a rather accurate statement in his case. He enjoyed taking in the whole view at once, and his feet were well used to the rotation he took while walking as if practiced hundreds of times. It was something he did a ton while growing up, and he did even more when travailing the road to keep a constant eye in every direction, and be ready to open fire at a moment's notice. This time it served another involuntary purpose. He locked eyes with each of his guards as he walked. Deciding which were the biggest threats, those he could maybe talk his way out of getting into a shootout with, and if it came to it, who needed to go down first. Joaquin The Mirror, injured not dead. Dead would cause more problems then fix. Maybe Panama next, though Panama had no personal connection to Hunter, and would be almost as bad a wild card as Joaquin. Cage, maybe could be talked down if convinced that backing off was a better bet for his people than dealing with Hunter right then and there. Hunter shrugged his head, trying his best to not let his mind go down that way. That thought process had saved him in the past, but it was only useful in the worst of survival situations. Ones that here were just as likely to get him killed. And that was assuming things went to according to his instinctive thoughts.

When at the mess hall Hunter got a bowl of the spicy veggie stew. A break from fish and a good one at that. Hunter spent much of the middle years of the apocalypse dependent on hot sauce for flavor. Even before the end of the world he enjoyed spicy foods. He focused mostly on the bread instead of the soup though, but for once seemed semi focused on his meal at hand rather then his concerns or out of control thoughts. At some point he turned to look at Joaquin. The wild card who had sights on him the whole afternoon. "You seem like you got a story." Hunter tried to break the cycle of threat assessment and order of targets in his head. It was a stop gap solution, but it was something none the less. "Any of it you want ta share?" It was rather blunt, but Hunter had to work on one social problem at a time and right now it was paranoia's turn to take a chill pill.

☠ 𝚃𝚆𝙳: 𝚈𝚎𝚊𝚛 𝟻 𝙿𝚊𝚛𝚝 𝟺 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Location: Camp Mexico Beach Weather Forecast: Dawn at 5:53 A.M. - Dusk at 8:13 P.M. - High: 91F, Low: 80F - Winds SW at 4mph - Gusting to 14mph - Rain In The AM - Cloud Cover: 100% - Visibility: 9miles. Notes: Alright, lunch this round. Lunch will last this whole round. Next round we will move back to the actual Court Martial. I don't know how much longer it will last but hopefully not too much longer. Please be thinking now where you want your character to progress from here as we will be going through a good time jump after the Court Martial is over. This will come with a full update to character sheets - including personality shifts or settlings and points for your skills. Some characters will be getting new skills depending on what you want to do to progress your character. I will go ahead and suggest that since the next part of this RP is going to be COMBAT HEAVY that it will be more important to get your current scores boosted than to get new skills. I would suggest a minimal of 70 score in combat skills if you can swing it, 80-90 would be better. Also you will be able to shelve a character if you wish. Now I will allow new characters, we can talk about those LATER, but I will say this, you will need to be consistently posting on day 6 or less for me to even considering speaking about a new character, even if you are dropping one or both your current. New characters take a lot of time and need to be well thought out. Again, we can talk about that LATER, I currently do not have the time to help with new ones.

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Hospital (B): The story was more than anything that Lucy could have hoped for. She had been told many fairy tales as she sat in the hospital bed. She knew Cinderella and Snow White and so many others. Thumbelina had always been one of her most favorite but listening to this story she knew she would have a new one. She was tired and her body was fighting to try to sleep but she was so enraptured with the tale that she kept forcing her eyes to stay open as she lay there back against her pillows.

The story took her mind away from everything that was wrong and she sat there smiling from ear to ear hearing about the dance and how well Vasilisa seemed to handle everything. It was a true fairy tale and it looked like the two were going to live happily ever after. That was until Ivan did the unthinkable. "Oh no!" she gasped as Ivan burned the frog suit. She sniffled some as Vasilisa flew off. "Eat iron bread???? That's impossible!" she said in astonishment. "Is that it? Did he loose her? Did he actually do it? What did his father do?" she asked in earnest.

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The Court Martial Of Hunter Monroe Location: Education Center: Auditorium (M) -> Mess Hall (C) Charges: Food Waste - 7.22.2012 | Drunken Disorderly - 7.22.2012 Failure To Report To Duty At Designated Time - 7.23.2012 | 10-886 Absence Without Leave - 7.23.2012 Failure To Administer Animal Sanitation - 7.23.2012 | Gross Insubordination - 7.23.2012

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As Ash came out of the auditorium and down the hallway towards the main foyer of the Education Center, Thana smiled a bit. She hadn't needed to be there, and starting to hear what went down while she was gone wasn't exactly a boost for her morale, but she was there for Ash. She smirked a bit as he offered his arm. It reminded her of stories from older folks when she was growing up about being courted. It was sweet and she accepted his arm even if it seemed very outdated. Then again, outdated didn't mean bad. Thana leaned into him a bit as she walked out of the building and towards the mess hall. "Yeah, I missed you too," she said and she meant it. Sure she could see him the whole time but there was a difference between seeing him and being next to him.

Shears glanced over at Thalia as she came over to him. He had looked back about the noise and chuckled and was still smiling as she spoke to him. He had a good idea to why she was there. "I do indeed, but food first," he said with a smirk as he waddled along.

Chase wasn't far behind and shook her head. "I gotta do afternoon checks real fast just in case," she said before turning as she left the Education Center and starting to jog towards the pier.

Walking into the Mess Hall, Thana glanced around before getting in line with Ash. She opted for the chowder. She still needed to heal and put on some weight. She enjoyed spice but meat and whatever they used to make it creamy probably had a lot more calories and protein than the other. Sitting down next to Ash she glanced over to him. "I wonder how much longer this is going to last," she mused to him before taking a bite. They were only in day one of quarantine and not done with it yet. This could take a while.

Shears decided to have a seat across from Thalia since he had something for her. Reaching into his front pocket he pulled out a card and slipped it over to her. "Here ya go Beantown," he said before tearing his roll apart and dunking it into the bowl of chowder he had gotten for himself. On it read ~They say many hands make for easy work, yet this one person would know this not to be true.~ He grinned over at Nigel as he sat there. "Yo," he said in passing before taking a large bite of the chowder soaked bread.

Tatiana and Jack came in, grabbing their trays and having a seat away from the others. They sat next to each other and kept whispering between themselves as they would every so often glance around and take stock of who was in the room. Everyone else from the Court Martial seemed to do similar. Nikki didn't come, she just stayed behind in the room wondering what was going to happen next. Those on the Council came in and sat down alone and away from others. A few nods but it seemed that people knew not to approach them right then, they were in the middle of a case. Atlas stood guard by the council. Things seemed calm for now and it looked like most just were glad for a few minutes of down time.

Hunters guards kept a close eye on him as they walked him from the Education Center and into the Mess Hall. Panama going, "kid you need serious therapy," as he spun around. Cage just shook his head. Joaquin said and did nothing, he just walked, his eyes on Hunter. Each of the guards got a tray and sat down, Joaquin across from Hunter, Cage next to him, Panama a few seats down and across. As Hunter asked Joaquin if he wanted to talk he didn't say anything. Panama did though. "Kid, don't go tryin' diggin' there, you're just gonna end up in a deep grave."

Cage let out a short breath. "You're in serious trouble, you really shouldn't be trying to pry more information," Cage warned. "Seriously, you are out there alone, someone poses a threat, you know what you would do. We are no different," he added before taking a bite of his food.

Joaquin had a tray but he hadn't made a move to take a bite. He just sat there watching Hunter. Then he actually spoke. "It fits when such a villain is a guest. I’ll not endure him."

Atticus was passing by at this moment, carrying his tray. He stopped behind Joaquin and looked down at the man. "He will be endured," Atticus said. The words made the slightest of smirks appear at the corner of Joaquins mouth as Atticus took a seat next to Joaquin and then glanced at Hunter. "He's a little intense when he's on the job," Atticus said in passing. "How you holding up kid?"

Wayne glanced around and motioned towards the stage. "If we're gonna put on a show might as well take center stage," he laughed before walking over, striding as he went. Spinning around he sat down on the edge of the stage and set his tray aside. "Well it is not looking good people, we are only at half time and it looks like Hunter has become the hunted."

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Ash Holloway Location: Mess Hall (C) Skills: N/A

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The overwhelming officialness of the last few hours was tilting Ash's demeanor to something more soldierly, and with that came certain traits. Some were more beneficial than others, such as his tendency to speak clearly and respectfully to people around him, befitting his more humble position in the community. Others were less beneficial, like his occasional propensity to horking back a meal like he was still in Basic. It was this impulse that Ash had to stifle. He could already feel himself leaning forward and picking up his spoon like a digging tool rather than an eating utensil before remembering that he was, more or less, a gentleman. More than that, he was taking his meal with Thana, who deserved a more refined dining companion. So he straightened himself, held his spoon like a mannered adult, and indulged in the spicy vegetable-y goodness in front of him. Between veggies and fresh bread, this was something he would have gone for even back Before.

Thana's question about how much longer it was going to take initially gave Ash some confusion. Then after a moment, he realized that she was talking about the Court Martial, specifically. He gave her a little nudge and a monosyllabic, "Ah," when it came to him fully, and responded thoughtfully. "Couldn't say. Not far in and they are belaboring some points." He shook his head and gave a little shrug. He had no idea either. "It's not like anyone's disputing anything as facts." Which they weren't, yet. "I'm betting that whatever Monroe says will make or break the trial. Only X factor. It'll be done right after he speaks, one way or another."

Ash gave the occasional glance in Hunter's general direction. His position was not enviable, but it was telegraphed by his actions alone. If anything though, it gave the rest of the new people (himself included) a look at CMB's way of handling things without having to go through it themselves. This could be a learning opportunity, even if it pulled away from time better spent elsewhere. "Hope it's soon. I'd love to spend more time with you than it takes to finish a bowl of soup." His accent, usually slight, was beginning to flare again. Thana had that effect on him sometimes, Ash realized.

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Thalia Carmichael Location: Mess Hall (C) Skills: N/A

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Thalia did not like having her plans postponed. Shears was being evasive, but did say that he would pass along what he needed to after food. This earned him two things: 1) A long, hard stare from Thalia, and, 2) a grudging amount of respect about prioritizing supper first. Fine. She had waited this long. While not an overly patient lady about most things social, Thalia had waited this long, and could for another half hour or so. So she went along ahead and got her meal, now sitting quietly by herself as to avoid social situations that might potentially annoy her.

Imagine then, dear readers, her surprise when two social situations sought her out, specifically. The first of the two came in the form of Nigel, the fellow with whom she had sparred earlier. The mostly casual way in which they had corresponded before was okay enough, but the look on her face might have tipped people off that she didn't want to be bothered. This was the price for living in civilization, Thalia supposed. She took in a breath and let it out slowly, then looked to the Roman-ish guy. Nigel wasn't causing any harm. She simply wasn't accustomed to his presence. It reminded her a little of that first meeting with Alexander. She didn't particularly give a rat's hindquarters about that guy, either. She had half a mind to ditch him after he entered one of the houses in search of coffee mugs. Things had a way of changing. This did not mean that she was going to welcome the guy into conversation with open arms (though there was some respect due to the earlier fisticuffs). So she went with her usual direct approach, when asked about her history with weapons. "Dad insisted." It wasn't much, and it was said around a mouthful of bread, but there it was. She might even feel better about the answer were it not for the fact that she pretty much got set back by ten years of training, thanks to having to re-learn around a false limb. Then, just to throw the man a bone, "Father Benicio Gonzalez. Priest outtah Monterrey." It wasn't anything he wouldn't have gotten by asking Atticus or Joaquin. Less, in fact. Thalia continued eating her chowder.

The second one, the barber, was semi-invited. Not expected that soon, granted. He had said something about food first. Apparently, he meant after he'd gotten his meal, not after he was through with it. It was probably a clarification that she should have inquired into. In any case, he had something she wanted. That dead stare loomed on her face again as she accepted the card, her eyes not leaving Shears's face until she flipped it over to inspect its lettering.

It had to be something about hands, didn't it? Thalia wasn't immediately sure what the note could have meant. She lay it face-up next to her on the table and got back to her meal, a slight scowl forming in the face of it all. Could it mean whomever is in charge of the boats? Hands being another word for personnel, and them being busy. Or maybe it was Tesla, the person who labored to make her metal hand. Of those two possibilities, she went for the latter more then the former, but in the end had no idea. A glove maker, maybe. In any case, she continued to hork back her meal, savoring that which could be savored in the relatively shorter amount of time it took her to insert food into her frame.

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Hank Wright Location: Mess Hall (C) Skills: N/A

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In the midst of a classic, quite Hank-ish mentality of why-the-hell-not-(?), our steely, middle-aged protagonist gave a shrug, made a face of exaggerated (if false) consideration, and followed Wayne over to the stage area. Being the ever astute observer of the human scene, this particular chow hall was a veritable library of multiple different personalities, all sitting and eating together in what he observed was relative peace and harmony. At least on the surface. It never ceased to amaze the ordinarily cynical man that circumstances had a way of throwing together people who might have otherwise truly despised one another in such a way as to inspire not only cooperation, but community. It was a way that humanity often marveled Hank. Not that he might ever let a word of this be breathed out loud and in front of people. It was a beautiful thing, though. The end of life as they knew it served to amalgamize those who remained into a single culture, whether they liked it or not. And as the next generation came up after them, humanity would see a tougher, more apt variation of human rise to claim the world around them.

Of course, this was also the beginning of humanity's second Dark Age, so all of the hearts and flowers could take a screaming vault into the back seat of leering pessimism. And with THAT in mind, Hank strode right along behind Wayne, plopped his happy ass down on the edge of the stage next to him, and took a couple of bites before giving his very good friend's words a heartbeat of consideration before returning his commentary with, "Yeah, I wonder how good he is at distance running. Hell, for that matter, I wonder how he's going to look with an apple in his mouth." What followed was, albeit a little forced, a chuckle that was reminiscent of one or the other of the puppet duo, Statler and Waldorf.

But to follow up, so long as they were entertaining themselves at the expense of others, "Whoa, hold on a sec there, buddy! It that Sportacus over there, trying to make time with one-armed chick? Oooh Sporty, you nut; got some ball-balls on that one, huh?" Hank made a cocky expression and nudged Wayne with his elbow. Then he looked to the soup. Yup, that bowl full of happy was going down quick.

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Emanuel "Manny" Newman Location: Mess Hall Skills: N/A

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Manny ate his food letting his thoughts disperse. At this point, he figured the counsel either had thought the same thing he did, or it was such a none issue right now that if he was really concerned he could bring it up later when there was less to worry about. If Hunter was kicked out, he would be sent far away to not be a threat to the community. And if he was some poor kid who was pressured into being a spy for joining a group, he was clearly a bad one who would be set so far away from then he would have to figure things out anew again anyways. And if he stayed, the place was locked down most of the time. It would take a long time for him to get a message out too, assuming he still had any interest too. Even assuming it was real. In that time when things calmed down, Manny figured he could bring up the concerns then when things were less tense. Plus, it was likely that someone deciding things has already had that thought or concern.

He set the thoughts aside, and enjoyed the nice bits of bread especially. He was never the cook in his marriages as the most he could do was go to the store to pick up things, and even then he remembered calling from time to time to clarify items on the grocery list to make sure he didn't get the wrong thing. There was apart of him that missed those days. Granted, who didn't miss the old days where you could walk from one side of town to the other without having to be well armed either do to the undead, bandits, or even scared and undisciplined people who panicked easily. Granted, despite being rather well armed when he was on the road by himself it did him little good when the the group from Eden decided they wanted another man to throw into a cage. Things could have been worse though, and even with what happened in mind he still felt more comfortable armed the way the world was now. Even with things inside the walls safe there was always concerns about what would happen if the walls ever fell, or if something happened to cause an outbreak within the walls. The place was big enough he figured he could figure something out. But it was still an unpleasant thought. But one he would have to work over anyways. Manny finished up his meal and took a good look around taking note of Wayne and Hank at the stage, Thalia with Nigel, Thana and Ashton sitting with each other, Hunter surrounded by a lot of guards, a few others from quarantine as well, and last, but surely not least Alexander. It was a really strange bunch of people, and he wondered how many of them would have had direct interaction, let alone be on a first name basis before all of this went down. The whole thing was a bit insane to think about, but if the apocalypse did anything it was bringing those that were left a lot closer together. For better, and in a few cases worse.

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Hunter Monroe Location: Mess Hall Skills:N/A

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The walk to the mess hall was something Hunter wasn't sure what to think of. There was clear disapproval of something, and he wondered if it was his constant rotation he did while walking, or if they suspected him of being up to something. He wasn't sure, and spent a decent portion of the remaining walk eyeing Panama in confusion as he walked after his comment. Hunter kept his mouth shut on it though, he wasn't sure what to ask to clarify the comment without making things worse, and without knowing the specifics there was nothing he could say to change their minds.

Lunch conversation went even less smooth. Joaquin didn't reply to Hunter's question, Panama did though. And so did Cage. Hunter sighed, even though he had a purpose in his mind of what he wanted to do he clearly wasn't getting things across. "I'm not trying to pry for information. I am trying to..." He paused for a moment trying to think of his specific intentions. "Actually.... no I think it would still be. But like, it's not for the reason you think." He was right though, in a reverse situation Hunter would have either avoided someone like himself, or prepared to shoot. "I am trying to be social." He let out a sigh again, expressing his intentions was something rather challenging for him and it didn't help things with the situation he was in. Joaquin made a comment and Hunter found himself at a loss of words for it. He had no idea what the man specifically meant, but he figured it was another he was still seen as a threat comment. Maybe he just didn't want to be social with him. But he was pretty sure he got the basic idea.

Atticus came by, followed up Joaquin's comment. And to Hunter's surprise, the man smiled. Atticus sat and continued on the conversation addressing Hunter directly. And out of all the questions Hunter was ready to be asked today, that was not one of them. Hunter was visibly perplexed as he tried to process an answer. "Fine I guess. Trying to break some habits. Adjusting slowly. Reminds me of highschool." He spoke quickly trying to answer the question as best he could, but clearly unsure of if they were good answers. One of those habits, was jumping to worst case scenario with every person he met. Even now, there was a thought running through his mind that the religious man before him was some kind of passive test to see how he acted without the main audience present. He pushed those thoughts down, even if it was a case like that this is a bad time to fuck that up too.

He tried to think of something to say to the man to keep things positive, social, and to try and show he had no hostile intentions. "So... What brings you to this here table?" Nailed it.