Clive gulps harshly at the accusations levelled against him; "Seems a lynching is a good idea after all. And seems like you want it to be me...."
He looks over to Russes body sadly; "I'm certain he was a fine Scientist and that the methods in this dingy place are 100% accurate...." With a long pause; "A drink???" he asks softly.
Jimmy stares into his drink. "This will be like swinging at a piñata with a sansetukon. We'll be as likely to kill ourselves as them. But we've got no choice."
Well since he was a geneticist and we don't have any left I'd say we do now what we should have done before and start taking care of creatures. Still have no bleeding idea what the hell we were doing not trying to kill a creature last time around!
"Sure, if we, y'know, knew who they were, that would make sense. Otherwise, we're shooting in the dark and have a better chance of offing one of us than a monster. Of course, it'll come down to that soon. If they get to the point of even numbers, no reason for them not to turn on us."
"We have actionable intelligence now. Much as I hate to say it, the creatures have demonstrated no goodwill. If they get into the population... We have no choice. As for the other two, with Russ and Elora gone, I'm not sure how we find them."
"Well I'm no suspect. I realize you only have my word to go on but I can assure you it's the truth. Unless you have tentacles... In which case I may have just signed my own death certificate."
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"At this point, we have no other choice, I realize that Russ was a geneticist and who knows how clean of a sample and test he was able to perform, but as I said he risked his life to pass the information to us, so the only sensible thing is to vote based upon his suspicion."
Offers a drink to Clive
"Any chance you will tell us anything you might know before the votes get tallied?"
"So you think that by teasing Clive about Elora and cheese, Russ was actually trying to tell us that Clive is a monster? That seems pretty far fetched. It's so tenuous."
"If you've got any other leads you'd like to share, then be my guest. Cuz the way I see it, we can either go with what that 'far-fetched' cheese line, or you and I can get shocked like that lunatic wants." Alexander jabs a thumb in Robert's direction.
"I think Russ was able to run at least one test before he died, and he desperately wanted to live, making insinuations in the hopes that the creatures wouldn't catch on. Unfortunately, they did, and better than some humans. It's his last message to us and the closest thing we have to hard data. After this, we may as well draw straws."
He might as well been telling us that he tested Clive and Clive turned out to be human for all we know! We can't really ask him can we? Dash shouts.
"Well I know I'm human, I remember my childhood... the first time I had brie and a good Wensleydale. So I doubt I'm the monster, but I can see that you all want to lynch someone." Clive shakes his head sadly after having a sip of the alcohol.
"That didn't seem to do anything really. Anyway what we certainly have to do is ensure that we don't lynch anyone that knows each others identities..." He pauses; "From my mind map, that indicates that the anyone with combat training should probably protect the Duke." He looks to Alexander with a nod. "Unless it's this permutation....hmmm..."
"I am lost, I felt certain if we delayed it would give the geneticists time to do their work. How is it possible they were both targeted right at the start??? I was positive that was the correct strategy." With a downcast look Mike grabs a drink and lights a cigarette with shaking hands.
"That's what's bothering me too, Mike. It's like the monsters had inside information and I keep coming back to the personnel files and who had access."
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"Mike, I too believed in that strategy, to trust in our fellow man, but now we have neither geneticist and really only one solid choice to move forwards, as for the files or not Murphy's law establishes clearly that the least desirable outcome will happen at the worst possible time, and so it has come to pass."
"I am sorry then Clive if you are truly unaware that you are no longer yourself, if perhaps you and your fellows agreed to reveal yourselves?"
Scratching his head Mike asks in some confusion, "So we know Clive is bad because Russ said Elora's notes said something about cheese being bad?" Mike pauses for a few seconds as he works out the logic in his head before continuing, "I guess that makes sense to me.?.?"
Mike turns toward Clive and stares intensely for several minutes, "I see nothing that would indicate such a thing, no tentacles no nothing. I am truly sorry Clive." Turning away Mike suddenly stops, appears to make a decision and continues, "If we are wrong, I promise I will not sell all your cheese formulas I was able to get from your private files to Kraft like I was planning."
"Ellie had to be just a lucky guess. As for Russ, well, either the nunnlif geneticist figured out who he was, or his mention of Clive raised some flags."
With arms crossed, Alexander nods his head self-assuredly. He was pretty sure that Sven or someone else had already said something to that effect, but in his humble opinion, it sounded better coming out of his own mouth. "Either way, there's no point doing nothing anymore. I'll see you in hell, 'Clive.'"
"He was my friend, and if he said it, I believe it to be true."
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"Kraft!!! Kraft!!! Those bunch of cheese hacks don't know a good cheese from a whiffy one! I'd bet their mothers smell of elderberries!!" Clive is shocked at Mikes denunciation and takes another swig from the bottle of medicinal testing alcohol that he's found in the laboratory.
"Sorry, Clive. We're in desperate straits."
"Nor the resources. Everything was broken when whichever one of you murdered Curtis. Testing is not a possibility anymore and I just don't have the supplies to fix it, or the incinerator, or the console, or the situation. In fact, consider this my resignation. If I make it out of here alive you can be sure I'm never coming back to this continent."
Finally, we're getting something done. Not just sitting back and waiting for them to kill all of us. Dash exclaims.
"Dash, you sound gleeful."
Jimmy shakes his head.
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"We all hope that Russ was certain when he clued us in,perhaps and hopefully he had time to test not once but twice thus his certainty was warranted."
"Let us wait until after the execution is done and a monster revealed only then will I be temporarily relieved, for after that it is only luck that will save us."
"Even if Clive has been replaced by a nunnlif, it's still a sad occasion, because our friend Clive - the real Clive - is already dead. And if he hasn't, he's going to be at our hands. Poor Clive." Sven goes to the cooler and fills a festive plastic cup of tepid water, then raises it in salute. "To Clive: his dedication to the the art of caseiculture was second to none. Without Clive, I would have never known the difference between chechil and sulguni. I give you... Clive Chilcott."
He salutes with his cup and drinks it to the dregs.
Clive chugs the drink, the looks down at the cup confused.... "Hang On, I'm the real Clive. Just because you want to fry me and pretend I'm a nunliff and not a real person.... I suppose celebrating you guys trying to fry someone before you've done it is a trifle gauche. Nearly as much as sharing a room with a sanitary engineer, I suppose - but then posh people do that."
"Anyway about this frying of me, based up faulty science & vague assumptions.... it's complete poppy-cock." The drink seems to have made the cheese-head bold, where once he'd only post on the net.
"By the way, you do know I'm the only lead we've got? By killing me now it makes it easier for the nunlifs?" Clive declares with confirmation.
"If so then killing me now....would be silly, Sir. For if you're so sure.... either your a mutant geneticist (and I'm sure you're not that) or you want to give the nunliffs an advantage." Clive retorts, "For they are not so certain - thus maybe they will try to assassinate me, or try and work out my identity and thus we'd all save ourselves some time to try an calculate the real nunliffs by for whom they attack." He addresses the Duke directly.
"Over the next few hours you'd be 'certain' of my identity and once you've lynched some of the real nunliffs and some of us are assassinated the pool will dwindle and you can be assured to try an lynch my innocent self rather than a real nunliff; Dash!"
Alexander blinks at 'Clive.' "What the hell are you babbling on about? Dash? How would you even know that? This is all just some crazy talk you came up with to try to throw us off at the last minute!"
"Just make sure you protect the brightest and richest, Alex. Seems to be the way." Clive says having another long drink and starting to enjoy it even if his words are slurring slightly.
"I still cannot believe you guys think I'd be stupid enough to attack Russ after he pointed the finger of suspicion at me..." He slurs.
The other scientists wrestle Clive into the seat and strap on the electrodes, despite the cheese lover's protests.
"What... you're actually going to do it? Why? They were rubbish scientitsts! 75%... 75%... they are absolute hacks! REAL scientists work to 100%. Anything less is inconceivable! Thus they're no professional loss... not like they'd have change the world, unlike my super important Gruyere research, I was super close to a breakthrough..."
His last words are with a pleading look... "Look after my Red Leicester.."
The lights flicker violently, and at first it appears that Clive convulses a lot like Doctor Wilkens did, until his face splits into four segments and with an unnatural scream, a tentacle bursts out to try and grasp anyone else so that they may suffer the same fate. It tries to pull anything into his belly, which opens into a void of spinning teeth. The nunliff only succeeds in grabbing some of the lab equipment, grinding it down into dust. It takes longer for this creature to die than the human man before, but the tentacle blackens, the teeth stop moving, and it dies before your eyes.
Fearing the worst, however, that its friends took this opportunity to try and finish off some other scientists, you all take this opportunity to look around. But everyone else seems to be their shocked, disgusted, fascinated, frightened or otherwise living selves.
For the first time since this whole ordeal began, Avistan looks almost happy:
"Finally! A win for the good guys! Perhaps we are not as doomed as I have previously mentioned."
"And poor, clever Russ's sacrifice was not in vain." Sven looks nearly as horrified at "Clive's" demise as at Doctor Wilkins'. "I'm glad we got one of them, but really... he was so... so... Clive-like. Who else could have been taken over. And did he really not know? Surely not. After all, they've been killing us off. There's malicious intent there." Sven's muttering grows into normal speech as he looks around. "Hey, they didn't kill any of us! I wonder why not. Think somebody's watching out for us?"
"That's one for Russ and Elora. We're lucky he was shrewd enough to code that message, and luckier still that Sven was smart enough to decode it. "
Jimmy raises his glass to Sven.
" Unfortunately, unless Sven has another brilliant idea, we are reduced to merest chance. The monsters can kill at their leisure, but we can't afford to give them time."
Sven shakes his head. "The credit goes to Russ and his hint. Good thing we got rid of "Clive", he seemed far too sharp. Wouldn't be surprised if he figured out Russ's little hobby. So now there are two nunnlifs left out of Alexander, Tharp, Dash, the Duke, Jimmy, Mike, Red Robert, and myself. Random chance gives us a 25% shot at a creature. Not very good, and we don't really have much to go on." He lapses into thought.
"A whole lot of nothing is more like it," Alexander says gruffly, feeling only a smidgen of satisfaction. "But... I'm willing to bet that at least one of us that voted for Clive is another nunnlif. Voting off one of their own is a sensible survival tactic, after all. But then, sticking together is also a viable survival tactic. Speaking of, that might be why none of you got killed."
Mike watches in horror as the creature is revealed and fights against the machine delivering it's death. He moves forward uncertainly, thinking the creature will escape, then backs away quickly with a look of "and what exactly am I going to do against that?" look on his face.
"Oh my god," Mike stammers, "That was the most horrible thing I have ever seen!
With a deep breath Mike collects himself, looks around the room at the remaining members of the expedition and launches into a verbal barrage. "8 of us left, 5 humans and 2 nunliff, with no clue who is who. Well, no clue I am aware of at least. Since there was no nunliff attack this time around we have to assume the nunliffs instead spent the time finding each other. This creates a real challenge as they will be able to coordinate their actions. If that is the case then I fear we are even more screwed than Avistan previously mentioned. Of course, Sven may be correct and someone blocked an attack, but I think it would be foolish to proceed not thinking the worst."
Finished, Mike leans against the wall, lights a cigarette and thinks for a moment. "Has anyone noticed anything, or heard some slip of the tongue, that may point towards who should rightfully get hooked up to that monstrous machine next?" Mike asks. As he is speaking he moves to the dry erase board and creates 8 columns, a name of one of the survivors on top of each. Looking at the names he is lost in thought trying to remember any clue.
"Clive had one thing right. There's no scientific evidence that points to anyone. The whole game is psychological now. Duke. help me farther up the Ballmer curve will you?"
Jimmy holds out his glass.