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| First row from top - C-Team: Akane, Carlos, Junpei Middle row - Q-Team: Eric, Q, Mira Bottom row - D-Team: Sigma, Akane, Phi |
As some of the confined people start to think of the child with a large creepy mask might be the mastermind behind the situation, another person dressed up in a long jacket and a mask with a long nose appears to talk about the world going extinct. It seems clear that this person locked the group in. The creepy guy tells the group of people that have been locked in multiple confinement rooms that he requires all of them to join a game with the fate of his, theirs and the entire human race being on the balance.
The creepy kidnapper takes a coin with a blue and a red side on it and flips it. He tells the group to guess which side is up and that they have only one chance - if they guess it right, they get freedom. However, if their guess is wrong, they have to stay in the game until at least six (6) of them are dead.
The group starts to hesitate. Some of them decide not to answer because they don't want to play into the mastermind's hands. The mastermind tells one of the people in the group named Carlos that he is the leader of the group and that he will take Carlos's decision as the group's final answer - did the coin drop on the red, or the blue?
Red side choice on the coin flip
You chose the red side to have come on top. Some of the group decides that it's red, some that it's blue, some tell you not to choose. You play as Carlos, one of the main characters, and choose red side for the coin flip this time around.
When the masked person lifts his foot, he reveals the coin to have flipped to the ground on the red side. He is a fair person so he decides to release the group, but before that everyone is forced to fall asleep and they forget everything that has happened in the confinement chambers. Carlos says out loud that he knows something, and possibly even the identity of the masked kidnapper.
The group wakes up and they wonder what they are doing outside in a desert... Some of the group wonder if they had something on their wrists and some remember a coin flipping. They remember that they met a bet with someone but nothing comes into mind. Did they all forget what happened - and who is that one kid with a creepy round mask on his face?
Blue side choice on the coin flip
You chose blue. As the foot is lifted by the mastermind, he shows the red coin lying under his feet. He tells the group that now the game shall begin and continue until at least six people are dead. It's possible that even more may die.
The person tells that they will now sleep and forget everything that happened in the room. Then they all drop down and fall asleep and the game begins with an intro, showing the creators of Zero Time Dilemma.
The group wakes up in a building with no windows. Everyone looks at the bracelets on their wrists, and have forgot what happened. Then the TV in the room starts playing and the masked mastermind person appears on it, telling the group that he is Zero - rather, the second Zero, and that he can't answer questions as it is a recording.
Zero starts to tell the group a story that he wants to tell before getting to the nitty and gritty:
"Seventeen years ago, on a rainy morning, a woman went jogging in a large park. Her usual route led her to a fork in the road.
Normally she'd run down the right path. But for some reason, this day she chose the left.
Along the way, she bumped into a senior citizen she saw every day. Surprised to see her, they asked, "Why did you come this way today?"
This was her reply. "Because there was a snail."
Her body was discovered a few hours later. Murdered.
They found her in some bushes along the left path.
Sometimes life is simply unfair.
Don't you think?"
Zero explains that the story goes the same for all of the group. The pull of an unjust fate carried them along to this moment. Zero explains that the group is actually inside a bomb shelter, 50 meters below ground.
The bomb shelter is divided into three sections: Ward C, Ward D and Ward Q. The group of people have been split in the three Wards.
Ward C group, or the "C-Team"
- Carlos - the Leader of C-Team, a firefighter.
- Akane - the girl from the first Zero Escape game "999".
- Junpei - the main character from the first Zero Escape game "999".
Ward D group, or the "D-Team"
- Diana - the Leader of D-Team.
- Phi - a character from the second Zero Escape game "VLR", capable of jumping through time.
- Sigma - the main character from the second Zero Escape game "VLR", with the mind of an old man.
Ward Q group, or the "Q-Team"
- Q - the Leader of Q-Team, unknown young child with a mask and an amnesia.
- Mira - a lecherous and dangerous woman.
- Eric - a man who follows Mira like a parasite.
Zero tells the group that they can wander around as much as they want as long as they remain in their respective wards. However, there is a time limit to wandering: 90 minutes. Once the time limit is reached, an injector in their bracelets will activate and an anesthetic and an agent to erase their memories will be administered.
As a result from the injection, the people will fall into a deep sleep. After waking you will forget everything that occurred within those past 90 minutes.
Furthermore, the bracelet has a watch-function. Pressing the buttons on each side simultaneously will display the time. At this moment the time is 12.10, December 31st. New Year's Eve and the year will turn over in less than half a day.
Zero continues his story and tells the group that unfortunately, very few of them will find themselves able to welcome a new 2029.
He tells the group to look at the door that has been marked with an X. It will take them to an elevator. Raisin the elevator up will take them above the ground. There's no other way out. Luckily the door is very easy to open. All you have to do is obtain the X-Passes and enter them into the input device beside the door. Six X-Passes are needed for the door to unlock. One X-Pass will be announced every time someone dies. What this means is that if at least six people out of the nine in the group die, the rest will gain all of the passwords, and will be able to open the X-Door. Once the X-Door opens, it will stay open for only 30 seconds. Once the time limit for the opening has passed, it will automatically close and never open again.
Zero asks the groups that they must be wondering how they can kill 6 people. By majority vote Zero gives the groups opportunity to execute one group (3 people).
There is a computer in the rooms. The team names of the other teams can be found displayed on the monitor. The game is about choosing the team that you want to execute. For our main character who we play as, Carlos, the leader of C-Team, we can choose to eliminate either the Q-Team or the D-Team. Each team gets one vote, the leader must submit the vote and the deadline is 13:30. Any team that hasn't voted before the time limit will be penalized two votes. The group with two or more votes will lose. Every member of the team will be executed.
This is the decision game. The game of fate. The lives of Zero, the group and the human race hang in the balance.
The C-Ward
Residents: Carlos, Junpei, Akane
Prep Room, Decontamination Room, Control Room, Power Room, Infirmary Room, Pantry Room, and lastly, the Recording Room. After that there are Ventilations (2 of them) and the elevator (locked) are in the C-Ward. There is truly no way to get out unless you open the X-Door.
Carlos asks the others in C-Ward - Junpei and Akane - whether this whole thing is part of Dcom's psychological test experiment. Junpei tells that Zero must be ready to kill for real. The group thinks about getting in touch with others in other Wards in order to make sure that everyone spreads out the votes. On the wall of the Prep Room the C-Team notices a mark made with red paint or blood saying: "Let the game end where I treat two." The meaning behind this marking is a mystery. Aside from that there are characters ready to use a Morphogenetic Field (known from earlier games) as well as a mystery box with a keyboard in the rooms. The mystery box is named Force Quit Box and it is theorized to make one jump through time (Japanese Folklore inspired by Urashima Taro).
Akane and Junpei bring up that a year ago the Original Zero had put a bracelet like the current one on their wrist and forced them to play. Akane and Junpei however believe that the current Zero has nothing to do with the current Zero.
Akane and Carlos talk about the Reverie syndrome. The world is facing an unprecedented crisis that everyone already affected by the syndrome can feel.
Gab - a dog from Dcom facility - arrives to the underground facility all of a sudden. It seems it arrived down via a vent; it must've come from another ward.
Carlos decides to use Gab's medication box (that hangs on the dogs neck) to send a message to the other Wards.
The plan is: C-Team will vote for D-Team so D-Team should vote for Q-Team and Q-Team for C-Team. That way no one would have to get eliminated. It's just a mystery if Gab can take the message to the other teams through the vent.
The Q-Ward
Residents: Q, Mira, Eric
The Q-Ward (where the boy with a round helmet, Q, is the leader) is different than the C-Ward. It consists of Decontamination Room, large Lounge, QCD-Room, Biolab Room, Pod Room and and an unnamed room along with the halls, the elevator and the two vents.
In the Q-Ward there is also a message just like in the C-Ward. It's written in red paint or blood and says "Let's inhibit the virus!"
In the Q-Ward the group; Q, Mira and Eric talk about the Heart Ripper. A serial killer that's been on the news who had killed 18 people in the past few years. The group theorizes that Zero might be the Heart Ripper.
Q, the boy with the round mask who claims he has an amnesia, tells the two adults that in March 15, 2026 the body of a young female was found in a park in Roseville. The victim's name was Virginia Bailey, 28. The chest was ripped open and the heart entirely removed.
It happened again on May 22, 2026 when the body of a male was found in a trash can near a residence in Sacramento. The victim's name was Jeffery Foret, age 37. Foret's heard was gouged out just like Bailey's. Two months later the killings continued.
Q tells Mira and Eric that he doesn't remember how he knows this. Mira and Eric tell Q that everyone in the C, D and Q teams were together in the Dcom shelter (where they experimented if the people could survive on Mars) and that everyone in the C, D and Q team along with an old dog named Gab were in the Dcom shelter except the boy/girl "Q".
The Dcom experiment was a psychological experiment.
Force Quit Box is also in the Q-Ward. The workings of this box is unknown.
Gab the dog arrives at Ward Q with the notification. The Q-Team will then send it to D-Team, the only team who hadn't gotten the message for the spread of votes yet.
The D-Ward
Residents: Diana, Phi, Sigma
Ward D consists of a Healing Room, Manufacturing Room, Transporter Room, Locker Room, Trash Disposal Room, a large Lounge (prep room), a Decontamination Room and the two vents & the locked elevator.
In the Q-Ward there is also a message on the wall, written in red paint or blood. The message says: "When a curious hate oozes calamity."
A moment when hate becomes calamity. Meaning unknown. These could not have a meaning but they may be an anagram instead (Phi remembers the anagram from the earlier games). Sigma finds a Force Quit Box in the D-Ward as well. The box reads: "Use this keyboard to input a password and force something to stop."
In the Q-Ward we saw the kid Q lift the Force Quit Box effortlessly, but in the D-Ward it's noticeable that Sigma and Phi can barely even budge box. It must be something made from a special material.
Phi, Sigma and Diana talk together. Phi brings out the fact that Zero's speech was pre-recorded. This means that there is a possibility that Zero can't talk to the group in real-time, and there are two possibilities of why that might be: 1) Zero has already died, or 2) Zero is one among them.
Diana notices that Sigma talks a bit different and remembers that back at Dcom shelter Sigma had said that his consciousness had come back from the year 2074. Phi tells the two that there's no way help is coming because the Dcom experiment is simulating a real life on the moon, so there is no signal.
Rebecca then starts to talk about how she hates that she came to the Dcom shelter, how she shouldn't have listened to a person named Rebecca, a head nurse at a hospital where Diana worked. Rebecca had suggested Dcom experiment to Diana as they were searching for a nurse who needed to participate. However, there is another reason why she did decide to join than just a suggestion...
Then a crash can be heard as Gab falls from a ventilation. Gab carries a medicinal bottle bag on its neck that Diana opens. Inside the bottle there's a letter that reads:
"Hello. Carlos here.
C-Team is voting for D-Team, so D-Team should vote for Q-Team, and Q-Team for C-team."
and
"Q-Team--Got it".
The spread of votes has reached all teams now. This way no one has to die. However things might not go so easily...
Deadline for the vote
C-Team:
Junpei tries to manipulate Carlos to vote for the Q-Team in order to get kills so that the group can escape the bomb shelter. This would betray the others but would help them escape.
Q-Team:
Mira manipulates the others to vote for C-Team instead because the message from C-Team might be a trap.
D-Team:
The D-Team thinks that C-Team might betray the D-Team. Because the Q-Team had sent the dog, Gab, to them via the vent, that meant that the Q-Team should vote for C-Team.
C-Team votes for Q-Team instead of D-Team
Zero appears on television screen and tells that the memory erasing drug won't be injected on three of them. The groups will all fall asleep and one of the group will have to die.
The groups fall asleep. One of the three groups will die. One of the three groups will remember what happened.
Q-Team wakes up with a collar on their necks. Zero says that the team who got two votes, enough votes to be eliminated, is the Q-Team. Zero tells them to rest in peace and the collars start to turn red as they explode. Blood splatters everywhere.
Q-Team votes for D-Team instead of C-Team
Zero appears and tells the same thing as earlier to Q-Team. They won't forget about the choice they made once they wake up. The Q-Team wonders how they will never be able to explain why they chose what they chose no matter what excuse they can come up with, even if the letter for the spread of votes was a trap from C-Team.
The D-Team wakes up. Phi, Diana and Sigma, in a room with a collar on their necks. Zero must've put them on the three of them. Zero tells that the team who got the two votes was the D-Team. Phi tells Sigma to "jump" (as in jump in time) before the collars explode and the three of them fall down dead.
D-Team votes for C-Team instead of Q-Team
Diana votes for C-Team. Sigma wonders why, but Diana tells that she has no idea why she did so. Phi wonders about this. Zero tells the D-Team that they will fall asleep but remember what happened.
C-Team wakes up in a very dark room with collars on their necks. The team who received two votes is the C-Team, and as such, according to the rules, the team that will die is the C-Team. The room gets filled with blood as the collars explode.
ALL TEAMS VOTE AS PLANNED
C-Team votes for D-Team as planned
Zero appears on TV for C-Team (tells about how the memory injection drug won't be injected for "the three of them" because they've followed his orders) and the C-Team falls asleep.
Q-Team votes for C-Team as planned
Zero appears on TV for Q-Team (tells the same thing as always) and the Q-Team falls asleep.
D-Team votes for Q-Team as planned
Zero appears on TV for D-Team and tells that the memory loss drug won't be injected on them because they all followed his orders.
After the votings
Akane asks Junpei why he would say to vote against what was planned - if Carlos had voted that way it would've killed the Q-Team. [Junpei is our main character from the first Zero Escape game, and Q-Team has our main character from the second.] Junpei tells Akane and Carlos that he's seen so many deaths that he must've become numb by now. After the first Zero Escape game a year prior, Junpei had quit school and joined a detective firm. Junpei tells them that he's seen human trafficking where organs were traded like cookies, and how his co-worker was pushed off a roof. The reason why Junpei joined a detective firm was to find Akane who had disappeared.
Every day Junpei would drink himself to sleep. Then a month prior Junpei had heard that Akane was joining the Dcom experiment, which was what motivated him to join it as well. Junpei had threatened those in charge and forced his way in.
Junpei tells that he and Seven (detective from the 999 Zero Escape game) had destroyed the Free the Souls religious cult that tried to create the New World. The Free the Souls had kidnapped Akane's brother in the past .
The boss of Free the Souls was known as Brother. The Zero the 2nd might have something to do with this case.
Akane tries to tell them that she has nothing to do with Zero the 2nd (the reason why she tells this is a spoiler for the 1st game). Akane tells that she joined Dcom to change the future because Free the Souls is attempting to do something bad. That way Free the Souls or their boss "Brother" has something to do with Zero as well.
Zero announces that the votes have been spread so that all three groups are now left alive. What this means is that none of them have grasped the essence of the game; no one will, ever, leave the shelter 50 meters deep in the ground, until at least six people have died and they have collected the keys from all dead people.
Zero tells them that he will give them one more chance to escape. There is a yellow button in each of the shelters. Pressing the button will make the rooms rain down a solution of hydrogen fluoride. Acidic enough to melt a body, glass, iron... That yellow button is a way to freedom. "The early bird gets the worm" and there is a time limit of three minutes. That means that six will die once the button is pushed.
The Acid Rain
-C-Team: Junpei tries to push the button but Carlos and Akane stop the attempt. Carlos thinks about pressing the button in order to survive for his younger sister.
-Q-Team: Eric jokes that Dcom must've put a murderer in the group to help with the experiment. Mira looks suspicious. Zero calls in and tells them that they are in the decontamination room of their ward (like the C and D groups). There is a yellow button on the wall which will kill the other groups. Eric tries to press the button and attacks Q, but gets knocked out by Mira. Mira tells Q to handle the situation - press the button or not. It's up to Q.
-D-Team: Phi notices that she and/or Sigma have jumped through time and there have been multiple votes. They remember Diana voting for both Q- and C-Teams to die. Sigma and Phi along with Akane infiltrated Dcom (all three part of an organization called Crash Keys that was created to save the world) in order to figure out where the virus that destroys humanity comes from in order to stop the end of the world. Phi tells them that she thinks that the drug doesn't originate from Dcom but instead from the shelter they are in right now.
Zero announces that no one was eliminated but offers the yellow button option acid rain now to kill the remaining in order to escape the shelter.
Time to decide - Choice: Pushing the yellow button for Acid Rain
In C-Team you, as Carlos, decide to push the button. Carlos panics and says it wasn't him. Someone controlled him. It's 19:29 and Zero forces the three of them to die. The memory injection drug will not be injected on the remaining team, C-Team.
Team D and Team Q wake up and think about being in the room before. The drugs, bracelets, everything, have been forgotten by the two teams. Then all of a sudden acid starts to pour from the roof and they all die anticlimatically.
An announcer reveals the deaths of teams D and Q. The announcer reveals six X-Passes for the deaths of the two teams:
X-Passes: "SELF", "RIP", "LAKE", "BIRD", "TWIN", "OLD".
Carlos rages about killing the teams. Akane and Carlos ponder about being controlled by a human-controlling parasite as Carlos has spent his past life to save people, not murder them, and now he all of a sudden murdered them uncharacteristically.
The group puts the passwords in and the door opens. Akane and Junpei leave. Carlos tells the two that he can't leave - he'd made a promise in another history that he'll save Akane and Junpei.
Carlos is left behind. . .
In Q-Team you, as Q, decide to press he acid button. Eric starts to blame Q for killing the two teams, he panics. Zero announces that Q-Team will not forget what they did as they fall asleep. D- and C-Teams wake up with their memory having been erased. D- and C-Teams get acid poured on them and they die.
Q-Team wakes up and the announcer announced six X-Passes from the deaths of D- and C-Teams.
X-Passes: "DREAM", "KEY", "QUARK", "MOM", "DEAR", "ARM".
Q-Team goes to find the dog to see it being chained from its leg, unable to escape. Very mean by Zero. As they try to get the leg bracelet off, they talk about the Sleeping Beauty Problem experiment (as they ponder if they are constantly put to sleep and wake up to make the same choices).
Sleeping Beauty Problem:
The Subject is put to sleep, and then a coin is flipped. If it's heads, the subject is woken up on Monday, asked a question, and put to sleep again. That's all they do for heads.
If it's tails, the subject is woken up on Monday, asked a question, and put to sleep. Afterwards the subject's memories are erased and they are then asked the same question again on Tuesday.
The question being: "What was the probability it was heads?" That's it.
In the end they couldn't take out the bracelet from the dog and have to leave it behind. After putting in the passwords the door opens. Mira and Eric leave but Q decides to stay behind. He can't leave the dog. He doesn't have any memories. He will stay behind for all eternity...
In D-Team you, as Diana, press the button on the wall for the acid rain. Diana tells that she has no idea why - like in the previous choice. Everything else is the same.
An announcer reveals the Six X-Passes for the deaths of C- and Q-Teams.
X-Passes: "SHIFT", "SIX", "RING", "HEART", "LOVE".
Phi then starts to talk about Diana. It's possible that she has hit her head and her left and right side are antithesis of each other: she says one thing but with another side of her does another thing (like someone who tries to stop their left arm from strangling themselves with their right arm).
After putting in the passwords on the lock, the C-Team along with Gab the dog decide to head out, but at the elevator Diana starts to shake and runs quickly back to the room. Inside the Lounge Zero through a TV screen tells Diana that she has multiple personalities and wanted to kill the others to make it easier for herself. According to Zero Diana was merely acting when she was saying that someone is controlling her. As she knows Phi will bring a rescue team to the shelter this might be her best way out of the situation. Diana tells Zero that it's not true and the story ends.
Choosing to not push the yellow button for Acid Rain
You choose not to press the acid rain button with all teams and then everyone is put to sleep.
Everyone forgets their memories from the past 90 minutes.
Team C - The Game of Poison
It's 18:10. The C-Team wakes up in the infirmary this time. Zero makes an announcement for the next game but before that he tells the group a story:
"17 years ago a woman was killed. One day about a month later, a male suspect was located and arrested for her death.
He claimed innocence, but the jury found him guilty.
The verdict could not be overturned, and thus the man was executed.
In her grief, the man's wife took her own life.
Two young children were left behind...
We move to several years later.
New DNA analysis results proved that the man's claims were true.
He was falsely convicted.
The true culprit remains at large, their identity still unknown.
Life is simply unfair."
The next game is about six people falling asleep only to never wake up again. Everyone has been poisoned. There is antidote inside the room, and everyone has to find it. Junpei holds a wedding ring and tells them that he didn't come this far to die. They have to do everything to survive.
In this game you, as Carlos, Junpei and Akane, have to investigate the infirmary room to find the antidote. It's more investigative in 3D around the room than what the game has been up to this point so far.
After a long investigation with tricks and puzzles the C.-Team finally finds the antidote for the poison coursing in their veins. Zero announces that if they drink 100cc of the antidote that they found. There are 8 containers that they found, and only one of them contains the antidote. The remaining 7 are dummies.
By pressing a red button in the center, the lock to that container will disengage. Only one container out of 8 can be opened, however.
Zero decides to give them a hint however: beneath each button is a sample of the liquid that's stored in their respective containers, only 1cc. The real antidote has an effect in which three minutes after drinking it, the tip of ones tongue becomes numb. However the problem is that the three of them in C-Team only have five more minutes remaining before the poison kills them.
Akane, Junpei and Carlos decide to test 7 out of 8 of the containers, everyone except A. As none of them felt anything and Akane falls to the poison for her resistance, it's time for Carlos to pick the antidote.
Picking the wrong antidote: The poison kills Akane, Junpei and Carlos and simply gives Game Over.
Picking the right antidote: You chose antidote A. As no one felt any numbness on their tongue, A must've been the real antidote. However there are six antidotes in the container, three too many. Why would that be?
After surviving the announcer all of a sudden announces that Q-Team: Q, Mira and Eric, have deceased. The announcer reveals the X-Passes.
X-Passes: "EYE", "KILL", "FOOL".
Akane tells Carlos and Junpei that D-Team must be the one poisoned again. Akane sends the three other poisons to D-Team via the dog. That means that three would be survived and the teams can't escape.
Zero appears on the screen and tells that the three of them will now have to fall asleep. Once they wake, there will not be any memories of the past 90 minutes.
Team D - The Inferno of the Trash Disposal Room
Phi is gone. Sigma and are in the Trash Disposal Room. Phi is inside an incinerator, locked up. The incinerator door is locked electronically.
Announcer announces that the incinerator will start in 30 minutes. It's time to hurry - seek a way out and save Phi from the incinerator room by investigating your surroundings.
After investigating the place, getting Sigma to sit on a chair that locks his position, and opening a hatch that locks the incineration room from working, Zero once again makes an announcement and tells the group a story about a woman who died 17 years ago.
The story goes as follows:
"Seventeen years ago, a woman was killed.
As a result, after a falsely accused man was sentenced to death, his wife took her own life.
A taxi driver died in an accident along with his passenger, a surgeon.
The child who awaited a critical operation also perished.
Six people all together...
Why did these six die?
Because of a snail. A single, solitary snail took the lives of six people.
No, not just six, but six billion.
Six billion lost their life because of one lone snail.
Life is simply unfair. Don't you think?"
Now, Zero explains the rules of what is going on in the "game" at the moment:
There is a revolver that is set up beside the chair where Sigma is sitting right now. It contains six rounds. Three are live, and three are blank, though they are randomized within the chamber. Pull the trigger, and the odds a round will fire from the gun are six to three, or 50%.
And the door to the incinerator automatically opens the moment it detects the sound of the revolver's discharge, live round, or blank, it doesn't matter.
Three minutes remaining until the incinerator starts and kills Phi.
Diana has to choose to save both Phi and Sigma. Shoot the gun and kill Phi but save Sigma, or shoot the bullet and save Phi and have 50% chance to save Sigma?
If you choose not to shoot - Phi tells the two of them - Sigma and Diana - to keep living as the incinerator starts. Diana and Sigma go into the incinerator room to see Phi's ashes. Diana picks up a pendant and Diana reminisces back to two days ago ago.
In the flashback, Phi tells Diana that it's been three days after Phi arrived at Dcom, but nothing had changed. The pendant Phi holds is a pendant that her mother left Phi. It's a brooch that was left to Phi by her mother who died on childbirth.
The brooch reads: "Not even Jupiter can find a lost opportunity." Phi wonders if this message holds a hidden meaning.
Phi asks Diana to give Phi a hug which she does. They hug for a long while.
Back to the present, Diana holds Phi's pendant and cries as Sigma stands next to Phi's ashes.
The announcer announces the casualties: D-Team: Phi, Q-Team: Q, Mira, Eric.
Revealed X-Passes: "FUTURE", "EYE", "KILL", "FOOL".
Sigma thinks that the Q-Team was killed by C-Team backstabbing them during the first game of choice (they don't have memories of what happened post-game).
Zero then appears and tells them that they will fall asleep. The next they wake, they will have no memory of the past 90 minutes.
If you choose to shoot Sigma
*BANG*
The door to incinerator room opens and Phi runs out. There is blood on the wall and Sigma appears dead. Diana picks up the gun and shoots herself in regret for killing Sigma.
Game over.
If you choose to shoot Sigma #2
*BANG*
The door to incinerator room opens and Phi runs out. Sigma and Phi are both saved.
The announcer announces the current casualties: the entire Q-Team; Mira, Q, Eric. They also announce the same X-Passes.
Diana, Phi and Sigma drop down, barely able to move. They were poisoned while they were asleep.
Gab the dog arrives through a door to bring the medicine to them. They get a message from Akane about the antidote as well:
"These are the antidote. Please Drink them.
-Akane."
Drinking 100cc of the antidote, which is the amount per bottle, is enough to help. The D-Team thinks that C-Team killed Q-Team by choosing differently than planned. Phi tells Diana to choose: Will they drink the poison antidote, or not?
Choose Not to drink the antidote
Diana chose not to drink the poison antidote and she breaks the antidote vials. Diana thinks that they won't die and the antidotes are meant to poison them instead.
They die, though.
Game over.
Choose to drink the antidote
The D-Team lives but they don't understand what's going on. Why did C-Team save them? Q-Team is dead.
Zero appears on TV screen in the lounge and tells the group that it's time to sleep and wake up in dark future.
Pleasant dreams...
NEXT UP
C-Team's lounge room. 00:10. It seems year has passed. Lounge door is locked. Junpei, Akane and Carlos talk about the past. Carlos lost his father and mother in a fire where he saved his sister from.
Next up, the C-Team has to find a way to escape the lounge by using all the different gambling mechanisms found in the room.
After figuring out a way to escape by putting 5 coins inside a gambling machine, the suit of armor in the room opens up and shows a machine gun coming from inside.
Everyone is shocked as the announcer tells that there will be a Decision Game next. The game utilizes three dice that were located during the room search.
To begin the game, each player must take one die and roll them together on the dice table. If all dice show a "1" on the side facing up, all players win. The door will then unlock and all players will be able to escape the room. However, if even a single die does not display a "1", everyone in the room will be gunned down by the machine gun.
Junpei shouts and tells that OMG.. this isn't even a f*ckin game! ...Hilarious.
The announcer tells lastly that the time limit is one minute. If all of the dice are not rolled by then, everyone will be gunned down. Good luck to everyone.
The chance that everyone gets a "1" is 1/216, so about 0.46%, according to Akane...
Only one gets 1 and the machine gun starts to shoot in the room. Everyone jumps behind the counter and the room is filled with smoke.
The announcer announces casualties:
Q-Team: Q, Mira, Eric are all dead
D-Team: Diana, Sigma are dead.
C-Team: Carlos, Junpei, Akane are dead.
This means that only one lives; Diana from D-Team.
Game over.
Roll the Dice #2
Everyone gets "1". The machine gun goes back in, the locked door opens.
The C-Team goes to the lounge.
The team spends a long time talking about probabilities of getting all 1 in a dice throw and multiple universe theories and stuff like that...
Then the announcer announces the casualties:
All of Q-Team: Q, Eric, Mira
D-Team: Diana, Sigma (so this is the timeline with Diana killing Sigma and doing suicide).
As a result the announcer reveals five X-Passes.
The X-Passes: "EYE", "KILL", "FOOL", "MOON", "FATE".
SUSPICION - THE GORIEST PART OF THE ZERO ESCAPE SERIES
C-Team is now locked-up in the pantry, not knowing what happened. Junpei is gone. Carlos and Akane talk about Junpei and general love topics before trying to make their way out. This time you, the player, have to escape out of the pantry room filled with mutilated body parts that look real.
Once you manage to wiggle your way through the puzzles so that a door opens, the door will take Akane and Carlos to a freezer. Akane runs out, screaming. Inside the freezer there is a cut-off head, frozen. The head of Junpei from C-Team. What this means is that the mutilated "doll" body parts around the pantry were Junpei's.
The announcer once again announced the X-Passes and the death of the entire Q-Team as well as Junpei.
X-Passes: "BLUE", "RED", "MILK", "JUMP".
Carlos picks up an axe and tries to cut a wooden door. Akane goes to the freezer to pick a bloody chainsaw instead. With the chainsaw, Akane manages to break through the wooden door and they escape to the lounge.
In the lounge, Akane and Carlos are horrified. We get to see Carlos's flashback to why he wants 500k $ from the Dcom project; it appears that Carlos's sister has been affected by the Reverie Syndrome, familiar from Virtue's Last Reward.
Reverie Syndrome (told by a doctor in the game):
To explain what Reverie Syndrome is, as an example, say there's a PC with basic, low-end components.
If we played a number of videos all at once on it, what would happen?
The processing speed would slow down, of course.
It's not much better than if the computer had froze.
What's happening with the people with Reverie Syndrome is similar.
Akane and Carlos get into a fight about who killed Junpei - Akane with the chainsaw and Carlos with the axe. Akane runs away for some reason.
At the moment in the game, the group voted at 13:30, then they were hit with the memory-erasing anesthetic which erases memories from 90 minutes usually. The group woke up in the pantry after 18:00.That means there are four hours of time not accounted for. Carlos ponders if he'd really actually killed Junpei but the lights go out and Akane starts to come back with the chainsaw.
Carlos has to make a choice - Who killed Junpei?
Choose Carlos as the person who killed Junpei
Akane comes back to the room. Carlos cuts his throat with the axe and blood pours all over the place. Akane holds Carlos as he dies.
Game over.
Choose Akane as the person who killed Junpei
Akane comes from behind Carlos with the chainsaw. She swings it again and cuts off Carlos's arm. Carlos swings the axe and kills Akane.
Akane dies saying sorry to Junpei for not being able to avenge him.
Carlos is left alone in the blood of Akane and his own missing arm as the story switches to Q-Ward.
Finally learning more about the Q-Team (they have died in all timelines for some reason)
Eric is searching the rooms while Q and Mira are at the bar in the Q-Ward.
Eric screams as he found a hidden room - room with books, some kind of study that's a library. Someone seems to have been in the room just recently. That means that the study might be Zero's study.
It's time to find a clue to Zero in the library. Investigation time, begin.
After collecting items you collect pieces and put together a large key. The Q-Team opens a safe, which contains a letter and reads "kill one".
A TV screen turns on, showing Junpei's head in the freezer, and Carlos killing himself.
The announcer announces deaths:
C-Team: Carlos, Junpei.
D-Team: Diana, Phi, Sigma.
These five are now deceased. As a result five X-Passes are revealed.
X-Passes: "FIGHT", "JUMP", "BLUE", "RED", "MILK".
Now, as five have died, it makes sense why Zero would ask the Q-Team to kill one of them, to get the final X-Pass. Besides Q-Team, Akane is the only one left. If one more person dies... The Q-Team runs to the desk in the study and each pick up a weapon they'd found during the recent investigation. Q picks a crossbow and points at Mira, Mira picks a handgun and points at Eric, Eric picks a shotgun and points at Q.
Mira tries to get Eric to kill Q. Eric thinks Q will kill Mira, and Q points at Mira for trying pointing at Eric. Mira claims he's pointing at Eric to save Q but in reality she's trying to manipulate Eric to kill Q (and most likely kill Eric after). Mira calls Eric dumb, even, as Eric tells Mira that he loves her (easily manipulated guy).
Q chooses to shoot Mira
You as Q chose to kill Mira. Eric sees this and jumps in front of the crossbow arrow. Mira starts to panic and shout about Eric losing his heart to the shot - there is clearly an important reason at to why Eric's heart has to be saved. But Eric dies regardless.
Mira then looks at Q and shoots the child twice for trying to kill her with the crossbow.
C-Team: Carlos, Junpei.
Q-Team: Q, Eric.
D-Team: Diana, Phi, Sigma.
These seven are now deceased.
Game over as Mira walks away.
Q chooses to shoot Eric
Q points the crossbow at Eric and shoot him in the shoulder. Mira goes to the laying Eric and shoots him in the head. After Eric dies Mira takes the crossbow arrow and starts to hack and slash Eric's chest. Q asks what Mira is doing and Mira tells that she is going to touch Eric's heart.
The reason why Mira wants to touch his heart is because she doesn't have emotions - she wants to see what a heart is. Mira thinks she's the only one who doesn't know. There are no emotions. Mira has been killing people and taking their hearts. Mira is the serial killer mentioned before. She wanted to feel the warmth of a heart and that was her motivation for killing.
Mira rips out Eric's heart and says that Eric truly loved her. She is at bliss.
Announcement of deaths
C-Team: Carlos, Junpei.
Q-Team: Eric.
D-Team: Diana, Phi, Sigma.
These seven are now deceased.
Game over as Mira walks away.
X-Passes: "FIGHT", "JUMP", "POOR", "BLUE", "RED", "MILK".
Afterwards Q tells Mira that the red letters on the wall are an anagram. The letters read: "Let's inhibit the virus!"
The anagram is: "The truth is invisible!" Its true meaning unknown.
Q, Mira and Gab the dog put the X-Passes in and leave the place.
Q-END: 1
Q chooses to shoot 'DELTA'
This is a very weird ending: Q turns backwards, towards the screen and shoots the crossbow as he says "I'm really sorry." The screen turns white before returning.
Eric says "Sean, you..."
Mira: "Out of all your choices, you kill him..."
The mystery person who was shot: "Audentem Forsque Venusque iuvat... This is yet...another...destiny..."
Who is this 10th mystery person...?
Perceptive End
Q puts down the crossbow. Eric notices this and shoots the explosive from the shotgun.
Now Q is the one dead from Q-Team along with the same deceased from C- and D-Teams.
Eric and Mira go towards the elevator. Eric tells Mira that the both of them are going to leave the place and "build a happy home and wonderful future together!" Mira just answers "Y-yeah.."
Three days later Mira seems to kill Eric off-screen as they spend a happy time together. For heart and all that jazz.
NEW FUTURE - Q-Team
Things change up. All of a sudden Q and Eric wake up at the pod room, Mira nowhere in sight. Eric panics about Mira being gone, possibly hurt. Q tells Eric that he feels the same way. Eric tells Q that he's sorry about yelling at Q.
The two of them decide to work together to find a way to escape the pod room. The pod room is a weird place as it rotates when you hit it.
After opening a pod and clearing the investigation, Eric and Q find the body of Mira inside the pod. There are strangling marks on Mira's throat and an electronic key in her mouth.
Eric remembers back in time when his father was beating Eric and his brother Chris. Later on, Chris died. Eric starts to panic and say that he put Chris's body in a lake and tries to say sorry to his father who isn't even around.
Then a large screen shows Junpei's head in the freezer. Carlos killing Akane with the axe. Eric says that Carlos must've killed Junpei as well and the announcer makes the death announcements:
Deceased:
C-Team: Akane, Junpei.
Q-Team: Mira.
D-Team: Diana, Phi, Sigma.
X-Passes: "JUNE", "JUMP", "VIRGIN", "BLUE", "RED", "MILK".
Eric goes crazy and thinks that Q teamed up with Carlos. Eric believes that the entire D-Team died probably because of the vote at 13:30. That means that Q and Carlos planned for D-Team to die during the vote, while Carlos kills Akane and Junpei in the C-Ward, and Q kills Mira in the Q-Ward. That would bring the number to six, for the six X-Passes.
Eric starts to strangle Q but Q manages to - despite being a child - to throw Eric to the wall with superhuman strength. As Q goes to the elevator to put up X-Passes, Eric comes back with a shotgun - and shoots the machinery that you insert the X-Passes on.
Eric comes closer to Q and asks who killed Mira as Q says he wasn't the one. Eric gives Q 20 seconds to give an answer.
Who killed Mira?
Q says that Eric killed Mira
If you choose that Eric killed Mira, Eric immediately shouts and shoots Q.
Game over.
Q doesn't give an answer to who killed Mira
Q says that he doesn't know who did it and falls to the ground, crying.
Eric sits now at the lounge and tells Q how he really loved Mira and about his mother who Mira resembled.
Eric tells that he'd bought an engagement ring for Mira with all his money. Q tells that they have to find Mira's killer. They are trapped forever from now on after all.
C-TEAM; Escape from the Control Room
We finally cut back in time to Junpei whose body parts have been spread around the pantry and whose head can be found in the freezer.
Junpei is trying to open a door with Carlos and Akane in the Control Room, where transmissions with the outside world happen. Too bad connections have been cut off.
The clock is 00:10, 2029. It's time to find an escape out of the control room.
During the investigation a fire starts but the extinguisher later shuts the fire down. Carlos tells Junpei and Akane that the extinguisher brings its own problems. Carlos tells that carbon monoxide poisoning will cause them to faint at 7% concentration.
Announcer announces a decision game in the midst of carbon monoxide filling the room.
Ten lockers are beside the door in the control room. Within one of them... there is an oxygen mask. Which locker will you open?
Problem is that which locker is correct. The probability of this choice is 1 in 10. No hints. Only possibility is to go with your gut.
Carlos has to choose the locker between 1-10.
Carlos chooses locker 1
Lockers 2 and 4 to 10 open, leaving locker 1 and 3 closed. The mask is in one of them. Junpei believes that the probability just went from 1 to 10 into 50/50. Akane says that this isn't right but faints to the carbon monoxide before telling Junpei what she meant.
Carlos chose the first locker. As the locker opens, to the C-Team's horror, it's empty. Junpei faints over Akane and Carlos faints afterwards.
SIGMA AND DIANA LEAVE. The announcement had already been told, that the entire C-and Q-Teams along with Phi from D-Team have died. Sigma and Diana believe that everyone is still alive and that the announcement is nonsense. They will go get help.
Game over.
Carlos chooses locker 4
This time around lockers 1 and and 4 were left closed and rest out of the 10 lockers were left open. The locker, however, contains but one oxygen mask. Junpei and Carlos decide to give it to Akane. It's not possible to rotate the oxygen mask between the three of them as the time limit is 20 minutes, only enough oxygen for one out of three to survive.
AKANE LEAVES. The screen shows her hands (nothing on them, even though Junpei dropped the ring).
 |
| Artwork of C-Team in Zero Time Dilemma |
C-TEAM - Escape from the Power Room
It's 00:10, 2029. The C-Team; Akane, Junpei and Carlos are locked up in a power generator room. Akane tells happy new year to Junpei before the three of them seek a way out of the generator room.
After finding an escape route through the power room, Akane steps on electric water and faints, but doesn't die. The announcer announces the deaths of only the Q-Team (Q, Eric, Mira) this time around.
X-Passes: "EYE", "KILL", "FOOL".
The Q-Team's deaths must have been caused by the first vote...
The room the C-Team opened during their investigation brings them to an AB Game. Inside the room there are rules to an AB Game (Ally or Betray Game).
Rules of the AB Game in Zero Time Dilemma:
*Players: Carlos and Junpei
*Stand before the monitor and vote to either [A: Ally] or [B: Betray].
*You MUST vote at the same time.
*If the timing is off, everyone within the shelter will be executed.
*Both of you will start with 3 BP.
*This number will change based on the voting results.
How BP changes:
*If both choose [Ally], both will gain 3 BP.
*If both choose [Betray], all BP points remain the same.
*If Carlos chooses [Ally] and Junpei chooses [Betray], Carlos loses 3 BP while Junpei gains 6 BP and vice versa.
What to do:
*When either player's BP reaches 9, the exit door will unlock.
*If your BP drops to 0, you will be executed.
~Method of Execution~
*The bracelet will administer a muscle relaxant into your bloodstream.
*In this way, you will at least receive a peaceful death.
*BEWARE: Others will share the same fate as you.
-> If Carlos dies, Diana and Sigma will die as well.
-> If Junpei dies, Akane and Phi will die.
*Make your choice carefully.
Carlos tells Junpei to press ally twice so both of them gain 6 BP and reach 9. That way, no one will die. Both of them head to check up on Akane before making their choice.
Junpei's motivation is protecting Akane. Carlos's motivation is saving his sister from the incurable disease. Neither can afford to die now.
Carlos decides to Betray Junpei in the AB game
Junpei chose to ally but you as Carlos chose to kill. Junpei promises to get Carlos for that choice. As Carlos tries to leave, Akane attacks Carlos and starts to smash his head with a heavy object for a while. All three in C-Team die.
Game over.
Carlos decides to ally with Junpei in the AB game
Carlos chose Ally, but this time Junpei chose to betray. Carlos thinks about Junpei choosing "ally" the last time. Junpei wonders what he means because this should be the first time they played the AB game.
Game over.
D-TEAM - Transporter Room
Diana and Sigma wake up, Phi is one. Time is 0:04. It's after midnight and the year has turned over to year 2029. Diana says that her last memory is from 10 years ago, the vote happening at 13:30.
The group could have woken up several times between 13:30 and 0:04 however because the amnesia drug might have erased their memories. It's time for the D-Team to try to find Phi in the D-Ward.
As Sigma and Diana try to find Phi, the last room they search for is the Transporter Room. As the group is there, Zero's voice can be heard from an announcer. Zero tells Sigma and Phi that if they want to find what they are looking for, they need to follow his orders.
Zero's orders in the Transporter Room to find Phi
As the name suggests, this room contains a device called a "transporter". It was discovered roughly 140 years ago, in the year 1888. At the South Pole.
A German expedition was exploring the area.
At one point they became lost.
And subsequently stumbled upon it.
The device was carefully transported to their homeland and researched in secret.
What they eventually uncovered was the fact that the device was not made by man.
Perhaps it came from a distant planet, or some alternate world...
Regardless... they determined that the intelligence that created it far surpassed that of humans.
Despite not understanding how it worked, they figured out what it was used for.
This device is capable of transporting things through spacetime.
You use the whole device as follows:
First, place the material to be transferred into the input pod. We'll call it "X" to simplify matters.
Next, select the location of transfer on the pod console.
Pulling the lever will cause the input pod to begin scanning. This scan reads the exact placement of each atom that makes up object X.
The obtained data travels through spacetime directly to the transfer point's nucleus.
That nucleus will then analyze it.
It will send the necessary elements from the material tank to the export pod, and recreate object X's original form precisely.
Essentially it acts as an atomid level 3D printer.
A massive amount of energy is required to do a transfer.
Once a transportation has occurred, it takes roughly 10 months to recharge. The device cannot be used during that time.
A variety of objects can be placed in the same pod, however, in order to transfer a human, each pod must only hold one body within it. Two or more people cannot go into a single pod. It is very difficult to recreate individual brains and proteins.
History and special characteristics of the spacetime transporter
I obtained this machine back in 2009. It had been stored in a U.S. research facility. American troops had confiscated it after the German loss during WWII.
There is a special characteristic about this device as well: this transporter is not simply a device that allows you to teleport. What is transferred is only the atomic data. The object itself does not get transported. Furthermore, that data travels through spacetime. It does not just go to the past or present, but also to other histories.
Instructions from Zero
Currently, no power runs through the transporter nucleus. It is completely stopped. If you are able to restart it, you may obtain that which you desire.
With that in mind, you must 'seek a way out', or rather, start the transporter and find Phi. This machinery is clearly a key element in this whole ordeal with its ability to transport things to other histories.
After finding a way to activate the spacetime transporter, the announcer announces that Carlos and Junpei from C-Team and Q, Mira and Eric from Q-Team, and... Phi from D-Team have perished.
Meaning that Sigma and Akane had tried to find Phi all this time but only looked for her dead body.
Furthermore, the announcer tells that X-Door has been opened and closed and that Akane Kurashiki has successfully escaped.
Sigma refuses to believe that Phi has died and looks around the D-Ward for a while.
Diana then gets a headache and falls down as she remembers things from the previous timelines.
Now, Diana and Sigma are trapped 50 meters underground as Akane from C-Team had left alone.
Sigma ponders about the deaths of C-Team's Junpei and Carlos as well as the death of the entire Q-Team. Although they can't imagine how C-Team died, they can guess that the Q-Team died because of the vote at 13:30.
Diana (D-Team) did vote for Q-Team as planned. That means the real betrayer is Carlos who must've voted for Q-Team at 13:30.
It's now 01:25. Sigma and Diana head back to the transporter room. As the X-Door will never open again, meaning that Sigma plans to transport his being into a history where Phi exists.
[In my opinion, the problem with this part kind of undersells the importance of Virtue's Last Reward when they can produce pods to travel through time the same way Phi can.]
Now, you as Diana, have to decide to TRANSPORT, or NOT TO TRANSPORT.
Diana chooses Not to let Sigma to transport
Diana runs with a heavy object and destroys the transporter. Diana says that they can't do what Zero says.
All of a sudden the transporter starts to throw out electricity until it completely explodes.
It's 01:37. The decision game has been concluded so they haven't been affected by the drugs. Diana believes that Akane will come back, Sigma doesn't.
Game over.
Diana chooses to let Sigma to transport
Diana and Sigma both decide to go into the pods to transport their data into other timelines, doing exactly what Zero expected them to do.
After transporting, the pods open. Sigma wonders why they came out of the input pods instead of the export pods.
Sigma thinks about the whole thing and realizes that the transporter doesn't teleport objects, but data.
Later, at 02:33, Sigma, Diana and Gab the dog are in the lounge. Sigma tells that there is enough food for half a can a day for the next 10 months.
Sigma and Diana go to look at a machine that has changed. Then they spend time in the D-Ward, all locked up 50 meters under in the shelter.
Time passes and Sigma and Diana just live together. Sigma tells that it's been two weeks, he's been marking the days on the wall.
Diana tells him how peaceful it all is underground with nothing to worry about. She asks if Sigma knos of Maeterlinck's "The Blue Bird" as she holds a music box that uses it as a motif. Diana asks if Sigma won't disappear.
Month has passed now. Akane still hasn't come back with help. Diana is angry. No help is coming. She hates how nothing has changed, even though half a month ago she thought everything was alright.
Diana starts to blame the head nurse, Rebecca, for getting her to join Dcom experiment. Sigma tells that must not be it, Diana told once that she had another reason for joining.
Sigma tells Diana how she was married once before. Diana tells yes, but wonder how'd he know that. Sigma continues and tells that her husband resorted to beating her. Her husband was an alcoholic who screwed up at work, garnering a large debt. At least so Sigma recalls. In order to escape the abusing ex-husband, Diana decided to join the Dcom experiment to seclude herself. That was her true motive of joining the experiment, not just a suggestion from the head nurse Rebecca.
Sigma tells Diana that he'd heard of the story from Diana herself but she just slaps Sigma (because she doesn't know telling that).
1 and half a month later. Diana is drinking. She's sick of being in the shelter. Sigma isn't due to his experience being on the moon in similar conditions (Virtue's Last Reward).
Diana, drunk, asks Sigma if he wants to sleep with her. Sigma doesn't answer.
Diana asks if he hates her. Sigma tells that he doesn't. Diana asks him to sleep with her again. Sigma doesn't answer. Diana tells that he doesn't have the balls.
Then Diana asks him to kill her. This time around Sigma slaps her instead. Diana runs away to the transporter room. Sigma comes after her and hugs her, telling her that he's sorry. Sigma tells that he's a coward and a wimp. Diana tells him she's sorry as well and they kiss and then they sleep together in one of the transporter pods. Later on Sigma tells her how he's lived with her for three years in another timeline.
Three months later Diana tells Sigma that she may be pregnant.
 |
| Official artwork of the Russian roulette moment with Akane and Sigma in Zero Time Dilemma |
11/16/2029. A baby is crying. Diana gave birth in the shower room of the shelter. Sigma tells that the born baby is a baby boy. Diana tells that there's still another baby in her... a girl. Fraternal twins.
Sigma is the father of the twins and to keep Diana alive well, he's given his portion to Diana.
There is nothing more to give to Gab the dog either. Food is no more. End is nigh for all of them.
The transporter has turned on. It's been 10 months since the last one. Sigma decides to scan the two babies. Sigma sends the essence of the babies sometime before the year 2009, before Zero obtained the transporter.
Diana and Sigma had promised that if the baby were to be a boy, Diana would name it. If the baby were to be a girl, then Sigma would name it. Now that there are both, both of them will name them.
Diana names the boy Delta, which comes from greek letter like Sigma, furthermore, Delta's first letter 'D' comes from Diana.
Sigma thought of a greek letter for the girl as well: Phi. The girl will be named Phi.
Diana writes Delta to the boy's feet and Phi to the baby girl's feet. She gives Phi the original Phi's brooch and Delta the 'Blue Bird' music box.
Diana kisses the babies on their cheeks before activating the transporter together with Sigma.
D-END:2
[This part was very well written, I liked it a lot. They went much further with Sigma and Diana than I thought they would. This also explains the existence of 'Delta', who you could kill as Q before, at least somewhat.]
RADICAL-6 - Q-Team
18:10. 4½ hours after the Q-Team fell asleep, but they could've woken up multiple times before the current time, since their memories could have been erased. Mira, Q and Eric are in the Biolab, which is all locked up. There's bunch of biological objects in the biolab, even a dead pig in a large container. It's very likely a place that might have to do with a causing or preventing a global-scale pandemic, like a virus.
Then, a Notice appears on a TV screen saying: "Slash the pig's stomach."
But the problem is that to do that, they have to figure out a way to get to the pig as it's in a container. It's time to seek a way out by getting to slash the pig's stomach.
After getting the pig out and finding a sharp scalpel, Mira cuts the pig's stomach open and Zero makes his appearance on a screen, telling the Q-Team how the pig is an unfortunate creature. Zero continues on to his monologue stories:
"Seventeen years ago a woman died, her chest carved open with a sharp object.
Just like that pig there...
One difference: That woman was alive.
Her heart was still beating as the organ was crudely carved out of her.
A male suspect was quickly caught. He must've planned to escape via taxi, as he called one before his capture.
The police arrested him before he was able to utilize the waiting vehicle to flee the scene.
Instead, a genius surgeon climbed inside. He was heading to the hospital, a seriously ill patient awaiting his arrival for live-saving treatment.
However, the taxi got into an accident before reaching its destination. It collided with a large truck. The resulting wreck was horrendous.
Sadly, as a result of this accident, the driver and surgeon died, as well as the young boy waiting for surgery.
Life is truly unfair, don't you think?"
After telling that story, Zero tells the Q-Team the rules for the next game:
The pig's stomach Q-Team cut open contained three syringes. Each of them filled with a specific virus called Radical-6 (familiar from Virtue's Last Reward).
This virus is special. It awakens a desire to kill oneself, among other things. Once infected, symptoms appear as early as 10 minutes, or take up to 2 hours, and the host soon finds the urge to commit suicide irresistable.
The mortality rate of Radical-6 virus is 75%. Transmitted through liquids, it's highly contagious.
The Q-Team found the documents on another virus, the FBR - the Fanatic Bio R virus. The mortality rate of FBR is 100%. Infection of FBR results in blood erupting from one's body, then death.
Surprisingly enough there exists an antagonistic relationship with FBR and Radical-6 viruses. If you were to be infected by Radical-6, being infected with FBR would cancel the effect out. The opposite is also true: injecting Radical-6 into you after becoming infected with FBR will cause them to destroy each other, and leave no adverse effects.
So: a single virus is toxic, but using the other as a vaccination provides an antidote.
Zero tells the Q-Team that he's clairvoyant, or the one who knows the future. Zero explains that: "if all of you plan to inject yourselves with Radical-6, you already have FBR. If you are not going to inject yourselves, then you are not infected right now."
Before the screen goes out, Zero claims that he knows what their decisions are, but they should still think carefully.
The Q-Team ponders about what to do: inject or not to inject with Radical-6? Is Zero lying about it all being a simple conclusion?
Q decides Not to inject with Radical-6
Q thinks that FBR is nonsense and not real. There must be a reason why Zero can't inject them with Radical-6 themselves.
The door opens all of a sudden. The Q-Team runs out but Mira decides to take a bottle of Radical-6 with her.
At the lounge, Q tells them that he/she knows more about Radical-6, somehow. Mira asks what it does: Aside from the suicidal impulses, Radical-6 causes the infected's thought process to reduce by 1/root 6. Therefore, when one second passes for them, the world has gone through root 6 seconds, or roughly 2.45 seconds. The name 'Radical' comes from radical root as well.
Since Radical-6 is highly infectuous, if someone infected were to travel outside, the entire mankind of 6 billion people would die.
The announcer announces that the C-Team: Akane, Junpei, Carlos, have perished.
X-Passes: "FIRE", "CRASH", "FIVE".
The Q-Team wonders how the C-Team has died. Mira tells them that it's obviously because of the vote at 13:30. Eric tries to talk with Gab the dog but nothing happens.
Zero appears on TV and tells them that it's time to sleep. It's 19:29. When the three of them next wake, they will have no memories of the next 90 minutes. Pleasant dreams.
Q decides To inject with Radical-6
Zero said that FBR has a 100% mortality rate while Radical-6 has the mortality rate of 75%. So they inject themselves with the virus as it doesn't seem to matter what they do (as Zero said they would be okay either way as he "can see the future" so he knows of their choices).
Eric remembers his mother's words and has a flashback about always smiling no matter how hard things get. Eric reminisces about his past and remembers it being like a normal family. When Eric's mother died, his and his brother's (Chris's) dad changed completely - from a loving father into a drunkard and violent, abusing father.
Eric didn't want to ever become like his father but after being trapped he had brought the worst out of him. Eric apologizes for "turning the mood dark" but Mira starts to laugh at Eric calling his story dark. Mira then apologizes for being clumsy and goes to hug Eric but with the scalpel with her. Then she stabs Eric, killing him.
Then Mira goes towards Q and stabs him as well.
Mira starts to laugh maniacally after killing both of them.
SUPPRESSION - Team D
18:05. Team D: Phi, Sigma, Diana, wakes up in the Healing Room. Last time they were up was during 13:30 vote. The door is locked. It's time to find a way to escape, investigation mode ON.
This investigation part with the C-Team is longer than normal and the room keeps transforming into a garden and a pace that seems as if it's floating.
After investigating the room, the D-Team can't unlock the door but they manage to find a button. Around the button there's a warning saying "Warning! Do not press this button!"
Phi thinks that it's a decision game: either you press the button with a warning, or you don't.
It's weird that there is a button like that out in the open, but Zero could also be manipulating them to push it.
Sigma votes, "Push the button."
Phi votes, "Not to push the button."
You choose as Diana, You have a bit over 60 seconds to choose.
Diana presses the blue button
After pressing the button, the Q-Team is quiet.
Then a massive explosion happens and the entire base gets destroyed, the explosion reaches all the way to the earth from 50 meters under. It's a massive explosion.
Game over.
Diana chooses not press the button
After waiting for over 60 seconds, the door just opens, it opened because D-Team did not press the button. Kind of funny, huh.
Later, Diana asks Sigma how old he is. He tells that his body is 22 but his mind is about 67 years of age.
Phi is the same. She came from the future, however, her mind's still young, about 20. Yet she's not born in 2050, but she was born in 2008. From April 2029 to January 2074 Phi's been sleeping in cold sleep inside a pod, keeping her young.
What makes it possible for Sigma and Phi to come back to 2028-2029 from 2074 is the SHIFT phenomenon, short for "Spacetime Human Internal Fluctuating Transfer." It's when human consciousness is send through time and space.
Two things are required for SHIFT to work: innate abilities and danger to one's life. When one with this ability faces life-threatening crisis, that's when SHIFT kicks in.
People with this ability SHIFT, to other histories.
It's 19:03. Phi is gone now all of a sudden. The announcer announces casualties:
C-Team: Carlos, Akane, Junpei.
Q-Team: Eric.
X-Passes: "FIRE", "CRASH", "FIVE", "ICE".
C-Team must've been executed because of the vote at 13:30. Diana says that she just knows. She must've voted for C-Team.
Eric is shown dead in the screen, bloodied up.
Lights go out. It doesn't seem like a blackout. Someone dressed fully in black robes hurries towards Diana but Sigma stops him, they are in the lounge. Sigma gets hurt in the process.
Diana finds Phi in the transporter room and tells her that Sigma is being attacked. After Phi and Diana go back to Sigma, they find him on the ground, bleeding to death.
Sigma says sorry to Diana and calls her "Luna" and how he from the past won't be coming back as his SHIFT connection's been cut. Now Luna won't be born in this world. Sigma also says that it's not just this Luna person, but also "Kyle, Lagomorph, the others..." but maybe it's better this way as history's been changed.
Diana suddenly thinks that Phi was the murderer and runs away.
Later Phi comes to the dark room where Diana is in, but all bloodied. She says that the killer attacked her. Then she dies while being hugged by Diana.
Who killed Sigma and Phi? Was it Zero? Or someone else?
Six out of nine have deceased according to the announcer:
C-Team: Carlos, Akane, Junpei.
Q-Team: Eric.
D-Team: Sigma, Phi.
X-Passes: "FIRE", "CRASH", "FIVE", "ICE", "DAD", "TIME".
Diana tries to escape from the shelter but as she puts the six X-Passes on the elevator keyboard, the person who murdered Sigma and Phi appears in black robes and kills Diana as well. The robed person escapes.
Game over.
OUTBREAK - D-Team
The D-Team looks at robots that seem to be out of power. It seems that Zero's manufacturing robots in the Manufacturing Room.
The manufacturing room is locked.
The clock is 18:10. Phi seems to realize how many times they've been trapped by now - it's time to find a way out! Investigate the manufacturing room!
After stopping a robot from activating a bomb, the D-Team gains access to leave through a door. After leaving the room, Phi notices that Gab the dog is missing. Phi goes to check up on it in the prep room if the dog would be coming through the air vent.
Diana asks Sigma why he'd become so weird after entering the manufacturing room. Sigma tells that he'd made robots in the past - the robots were vital for his plans back then, but in reality, he was just lonely and needed friends. Sigma spent several decades of his life alone.
After Sigma tells his story about creating a robot named Luna, Phi calls for them.
Phi asks what could be beyond the decontamination room. There could be a way out.
The D-Team makes an impressive plan: take a bomb and make it explode to destroy the door. The bomb they'll be using is the one in the manufacturing room.
After Sigma plants the bomb next to the door carefully and the team presses the button on it - it has a five minute time limit until explosion - the team run away to the lounge. While there, the announcer announces the casualties:
C-Team: Carlos, Akane, Junpei.
X-Passes: "FIRE", "CRASH", "FIVE".
Phi tells that Diana picked C-Team which caused their death. At that moment Zero appears on the TV screen, telling that the team is infracting the rules by planting the bomb, trying to escape. Zero tells that he's made the Q-Team sleep and put them behind the decontamination room's door. Zero is breaking the rules just as much as the rest.
The D-Team tries to get back to the bomb, but the way is blocked by a rain of hydrofluoric acid. In a drawer nearby there's a suit meant for going through acid waste and such, but there is not enough time to put the suit on and go take the bomb away anymore.
D-END: 1
TIME TO DECIDE: PUT THE SUIT ON AND DON'T RUN OR RUN AWAY
Diana chooses not to run away
Diana uses electric shock to take out Sigma and Phi and puts on the suit as she hurries to the bomb. The two balls fall down already and the bomb explodes, killing Diana.
Game over.
Diana chooses to run away with the D-Team
Diana and Phi run out, but Sigma is still in the room. He will go try to save the Q-Team alone and promises not to die.
But the bomb still explodes.
After the explosion, Sigma walks out with two missing arms and a piece of metal in his eye. Diana and Phi give him medical attention and they head to check up on Q-Team.
Beside the room there are the bodies of Q and Eric, Eric bleeding from the nose, as well as Mira almost dying on the ground. Mira tells Diana that Zero told her that Q-Team put up the bomb which killed them.
Mira stabs Phi with an injection and tells that it's Radical-6 virus.
Phi asks for Diana to kill her so that 6 billion people won't die. However Diana knocks Phi out and gets her and Sigma out of the shelter. Diana says to a radio that she will have killed the six billion people on Earth.
Sigma puts his hope on the next sigma who'll have come back from the future.
APOCALYPSE - C-Team
The C-Team - Junpei and Akane - is in the transportation room, with Carlos nowhere in sight.
Junpei runs out of the room to lounge to look for Carlos but realizes that the C-Team is actually somehow in Ward D. There are rocks blocking a door.
It seems that a bomb had gone off in the decontamination room.
It seems that D-Team had made a bomb go off. The ceiling must've fallen down after the D-Team escaped.
TV screen comes on and Zero makes his appearance.
Zero: "The history where I'm alive and you are dead... seems you found your way here safely. As promised, the important information:
First, Akane. The history where you'll find yourself in is that one."
Zero explains to Akane that the apocalypse is now unavoidable as the D-Team is heading for the hospital.
It seems that Free the Soul's plan is progressing smoothly, according to Zero. Which means that Zero the Second is in fact the Boss of Free the Souls - Brother.
Brother reveals that to stop a nuclear war which kills all of humanity - 8 billion people - Brother decided to kill 6 billion people to get have a 75% chance to kill the unknown leader who attempts to start the war.
Zero also reveals to Akane that her father was sentenced to death for a crime he didn't commit and his wife killed herself for that - the story about them dying in an accident was a lie. How Zero knows this, is still unknown.
On the bar counter, there are Free the Soul cult robes. Zero invites Akane and Junpei to join a ceremony on the evening of April 12, 2029. They should wear those robes and join, and there, Zero promises to tell the secrets of the world.
Akane says she won't go but Zero tells her otherwise - however, that is only if they manage to escape.
Junpei and Akane assume that Diane will bring back a help team, however they don't even know that C-Team is still alive.
Zero tells them that the shelter they are in right now is a sacred site where the birth of Brother, founder of Free the Soul, occurred. "The moment we were born, we were transferred to the past via the transporter. Back to April 1904."
Brother reveals that he had a brother but not related to him by blood, but the brother was the son of the people who adopted Zero the Second or "Brother" of Free the Soul.
Zero explains that the person who was sent to 1904 with him was actually his sister. It's obvious that Zero is the son of Sigma and Diana. Zero also tells the C-Team that they know his sister very well.
At the end Zero leaves Junpei and Akane with something very important: "A spell to open Pandora's Box. 'Vive hodie.' Remember these words well. It will come in handy someday. It's latin. Live for today."
After Zero disappears, Carlos is still missing. Gab the dog arrives. There is something in Gab's collar: "Anagram" written on a paper.
Junpei thinks about the red/bloody letters in the Ward C Lounge: "When a curious hate oozes calamity." written on the wall. Phrases that Akane made were: "Let the game end where I treat two." which was nonsense, and then another version of the anagram: "Together with me, we are ten." with five extra letters: L, D, E, A, T.
It might be read: "If you are with me, then there are ten of us."
Junpei runs away to check out the Deceased board.
Junpei wonders why there is no Q on the board.
Junpei ponders: "Q is still alive... we are ten..." then another explosion happens and a person in mask walks out. It was Carlos. He destroyed the door. Carlos had done a trick by spending sending his presence back and spending 10 months waiting for this time to come instead of stopping Zero's plan: causing the death of 6 billion people in this history.
Akane tells about her plan to go to the moon and call Sigma's and Phi's consciousness there. However Akane doesn't take this and hits him with the tranquilizer she took off. Akane wants Junpei to forget her. Akane swears to make the AB Project (VLR) a reality.
C-END: 1
REALITY - Q-Team
Q is alone in a room. Announcer announces the deceased:
C-Team: Junpei, Akane, Carlos
Q-Team: Eric
D-Team: Diana, Phi, Sigma
Only Q and Mira are alive. Mira has left and Q is left behind. The decision game has now ended.
Q doesn't understand why seven people have died. Then Q remembers C- and D-Teams somehow, despite being Q-Team, and doesn't understand why he's even alive despite Mira killing him.
Zero appears on the screen and asks if Q really wants to know. If that so be, Quantum Computer Dome room will contain the explanation for all of Q's questions.
When Q goes there, Zero is there personally. Zero tells Q that it should be easy for Q to kill him if he puts his mind to it. Gab the dog is there with Zero.
Q asks to know the truth. - Zero shows Q other "Q's" - you could call them Q's spare bodies. Q's bodies are used to move around the corpses around the room. The truth is that Q is not human. He is no child. Q's thought center is in the quantum computer center. There you output the commands that makes Q's body move. The reason why Q doesn't have any memories is because he'd come to existence just recently.
Q asks about the heart in his body. It is apparently the remnant of a boy. Named Sean, same age as Q, aged 10.
Q wonders why Zero gave him a personality, if he wanted an assistant, it'd been better if Q was simply a mindless robot. Zero answers that he wanted to see the world as the boy - Sean - did. Q asks what he means but Zero leaves as he has something he needs to do.
Zero asks Q to play the decision game - even though the game is already over, Q is an exception. The rules are:
There is a button. Press it or refuse to do so. If Q presses it, the quantum computer retains all the data that makes Q, uniquely who he is. Memory, personality, thoughts...
If Q chooses to press the button instead, all of the data will be duplicated and transferred to virtual space. There, a copy of Q will live for all reality in a happy life. In the real world Q will still stay, while in the virtual space there will be another exact copy of Q living in a perfect world.
If Q doesn't push it, all data pertaining to Q will be deleted - there will be no backup. Q's existence will be erased and he will face a complete death.
Q's Three Choices
1. Press the button and move to virtual space...
2. Press button and stay in the real world...
3. Refuse to press it and welcome real death.
There are however only two options, press it or don't.
Q gets ten seconds to decide.
Q doesn't press the button
You chose not to press. All data will be erased. Q just wants Zero to end it all. Q overheats and dies. All data deletion is complete.
Game over.
Q presses the button
You chose to press. Sean 729 is beginning to transfer to virtual space.
Sean wakes up at the hospital. His surgery was a success. His illness is completely gone now. His dad is there as well. Sean goes home and gets the game system he always wanted and gets all the books he always wanted to read. It's the perfect world.
Happy end.
Back to real world
Q wonders why he's still in the real world when a copy of him is living a perfect life in virtual space.
Zero has a story to tell to him, as he always does (unfair etc.):
"A senior citizen and a boy with an incurable disease met at a hospital.
The child was always reading books significantly above his level.
The majority of his young life was spend confined to a hospital bed.
So books were his only friends.
The boy had a special ability.
He was extraordinarily gifted.
His ability was highly regarded by his elder, so in exchange for new books every day, the boy would share his academic knowledge.
The boy was told that when his disease was cured, he was welcome to a job.
However...
Life was unfair.
The path to the child's future closed after a variety of coincidences piled up.
The boy just laughed.
He never laid blame. He simply, quietly accepted his fate.
He did not despair.
Giving up on his life did not mean giving up on his dreams.
Before he died, he shared them with his old friend.
And that dream is finally..."
Q wonder's what Zero is talking about and he explains that he's talking about the universe. The quantum computer in the room contains all of the infinite number of realities within space.
If there is someone who could operate that, they could traverse the universe.
Then Zero suddenly says:
"6140-4091." Q should remember the number as a time will come when it will become handy...
Q uses the code number on his mask to finally open the round mask - the mask opens, and falls to the ground. There is nothing in there, it's empty.
Game over.
C-TEAM WAKES & THE MULTIVERSE THEORIES
Carlos gets hit by a ball of light, and wonders if this is before the AB game. He's been there before. In another timeline. He remembers what Junpei said.
Junpei and Carlos have played the AB game twice before. Carlos has SHIFTED. No matter what he chose, he would end up betraying Junpei or vice versa.
Akane, Junpei and Carlos start to talk about the multiverse theory and Back to the Future film to explain the SHIFT in timelines.
The Two Theories on Multiverse
There are two overarching types of stories about time travel.
The first type states that "there is always only one history."
Meaning if someone changes the past, that previous past is subsequently erased.
The other type is where "multiple histories" exist.
This is the many-worlds interpretation, one of the more widely believed hypotheses on multiverse theory.
The world and universe split into branches as a result of one's decisions.
It's a setup where each branch is able to exist in some form.
There is a problem of consciousnesses switching with other timelines's selves is that it might be that the consciousnesses swap places. Carlos who switched now must have made this timeline's Carlos to switch to the dead Carlos's body...
The C-Team decides to SWITCH. But they will get the chance to jump to another timeline only under life-threatening circumstance.
For this, Akane turns the reactor into a massive bomb. However they need to plan how to jump and where.
Junpei tells that they will go to the history where they didn't get all "1's" on the dice rolls - they should jump right there. After the machine gun has finished shooting. But Junpei claims that he has a plan. - Carlos promises to kill Junpei if they die!
C-Team - In the timeline where the machinegun shoots
The C-Team trio's presence is back. Junpei's crazy plan goes as follows: Tank the bullets for Akane and die, let Akane hear the 7 X-Passes, and all of them should jump to the history where they all rolled 1's on the dices (the history they are in right now is when they didn't roll 1's so the machine gun went off).
Announced deaths:
Q-Team: Q, Mira, Eric.
D-Team: Diana, Sigma.
C-Team: Carlos, Junpei.
X-Passes: "EYE", "KILL", "FOOL", "MOON", "FATE", "SAVE", "DOLL".
After hearing those, Akane SHIFTs to the lucky world.
C-Team - In the timeline where the machinegun doesn't shoot (all 1's on dices)
After the ordeal of SWITCHing, Junpei decides to give Akane a wedding ring and put it on her left hand... but accidentally puts it on the right. Junpei decides to move it to the correct finger once they escape from the hellhole of Zero.
The team ponders about using the X-Passes from another timeline, but they stop to wonder why all of them have the ability to SWITCH.
Even though everyone joined Dcom experiment out of their free will... it may be that everyone has been playing to Zero's laps instead.
After putting in the last X-Pass, "SAVE", the computer gives a "FAIL". The team tries the seventh X-Pass "DOLL", but that fails as well. Why?
The announcer announces that X-Passes are set to their respective histories. X Passes from alternate timelines are not applicable. This shocks the C-Team.
Junpei tries to run away possibly to kill himself but a Q-clone appears, except this time with red eyes. The Q-clone announces that they are charged with a rule violation and must be punished via extermination.
One punch from Q-clone sends Junpei, Akane and Carlos flying. Carlos sees Q-Team dead, but how? There is some reason why everyone sees the other teams?
Carlos decides to SHIFT but not much happens, however the Q-clone hits its head right on the wall of the room, turning the room into an entirely different place. It's almost as if it's a digital world.
The C-Team runs to the Transporter Room. It seems that the three wards are overlapping with each other.
A hologram of Zero appears. Zero tells that he doesn't exist in the world anymore as in the current history he was executed by Carlos. Carlos wonders what he means.
Zero explains that he can't thus answer questions and suggests finding him where he is still alive. Unfortunately in that history the three of them would be dead and he's alive.
But Zero offers to give the C-Team vital information if they do come to that history to meet with him.
The team decides to transport using the pods. Carlos remember Diana somehow telling him how the transporters work, even though he's never been in the D-Ward. Q-clone appears and attacks Carlos again while Akane an Junpei transport. Transport can be used to go to worlds where SHIFT doesn't go to, like a world where one is dead.
The Transport room explodes and Carlos shifts to a timeline where he killed Akane.
In the future where Akane was killed by Carlos, Carlos decides to figure out Q's identity - he saw very special vision.
Carlos tells via Gab for Q-Team to examine the family portrait in the hallway. Behind the portrait there is a locked door. Under the door there reads "Twins' Birthday", however there is no input device.
Q and Eric decide to check Mira's body. There is no hints of anything that she'd have picked up but there is something - as Mira in this timeline was strangled, there are blood marks on her nails, meaning that she put up a fight with her killer before being strangled. This means she wasn't under the anesthetic when dying...
19:29. Zero appears on the screen and tells that they will now fall asleep and forget the past 90 minutes.
DOOR OF TRUTH - D-Team
The export pods open and Diana and Sigma walk out of them (they put themselves in the inpt pods). Sigma and Diana try to find Phi but they can't. There are blood on the walls - almost as if they've been killed there already. They're in a locker room with a closed door. It's investigation time to escape the room.
Behind the shower room door, there is a locked-up door, that only opens with a code with 8 digits. The door isn't marked on the map.
This is a code you learn from another timeline.
In the hallway Sigma and Diana open up pods.
- In the first pod there is Eric. Eric thinks they're in Ward Q.
- In the second pod, there's Q. The small child with a weird mask.
- Inside the third pod there's a corpse of Mira, possibly strangled.
- Inside the fourth pod there is Akane, bloodied up and dead.
- Inside the fifth pod there are mutilated corpse parts of Junpei.
- Inside the remaining pods there are the corpses of Phi, Sigma and Diana.
Diana explains to Eric and Q that they have transferred their bodies through spacetime. Their own corpses were there. They traveled through spacetime to a future in which they have been killed.
The large TV screen in the pod room shows Carlos murdering Akane in cold blood. The casualties announcement is said now:
C-Team: Akane, Junpei.
Q-Team: Mira.
D-Team: Diana, Phi, Sigma.
X-Passes: "JUNE", "JUMP", "VIRGIN", "BLUE", "RED", "MILK".
The team - except Eric - runs to the lounge of what they believe to be Ward D in which Carlos, all bloodied with one arm, resides in.
Carlos throws the axe he killed Diana with away (he's not the same Carlos anyway, he's from another timeline), and the group tries to escape. Only to see Eric having shot the escape route from the Shelter to smithereens.
Eric plans to kill the one who killed Mira. Everyone wonders how they are all in the same ward now. Diana thinks about the answer. She asks Eric to shoot at the wall.
The entire wall collapses from the hit and transforms everything.
The wall, the ceiling, sofa and the tables, everything changed.
That means that everyone really was in the same ward always - no, it's more like there never were "wards" in the shelter.
The idea behind Zero's game is to play with time. Even though all the teams should have been at the lounge - which the same lounge in reality for all the participants - the reason why they never were there at the same time was interesting: the times were different for each team on the watches.
C-Team time: For Carlos from C-Ward, on the watch that's in his pocket (due to his arm being cut off), the time says 23:23.
Q-Team time: For Q and Eric, the time is 21:23.
D-Team time: For Sigma and Diana, it's 19:23.
The bracelets have hours of built-in time lag. By using the C-Team's time as a base would mean that Q-Team is two hours behind, and D-Team is four hours behind.
In other words, Q-Team didn't vote at 13:30 but at 15:30 instead.
And D-Team voted at 17:30.
The three teams never woke at the same time. When one team was awake, the other two were sleeping inside the pods. That's why none of the teams saw each other.
Due to the sleeping drug activating soon, the D-Team has a plan. The cards created by alien intelligence in the Transportation Room blocked the needles from the anesthetic from injecting Sigma and Diana.
GET BACK - C-, D-, Q-teams
Eric says that he doubts the team more than ever now. The time lags mean they have no alibis.
Eric thinks either Diana, Sigma or Carlos killed Mira. Carlos jumps as Eric shoots him for baiting him.
Q
Carlos is dead. Eric plans on killing everyone as he wants to get rid of the killer.
Q decides to take off his mask to show Eric the truth. The mask falls down... There is nothing inside. The blood of Q is white. Under Mira's nails there is red blood.
Eric thinks that a robot existence is suspicious and Q even confirms that he's there because of Zero - he even knows who Zero really is.
Zero's Real Name - Time To Decide
You as Q need to tell Zero's real name to Eric.
1. You enter multiple numeric codes that aren't right.
You don't know the answer.
Eric shoots Q.
Game over.
2. You enter the wrong name.
Eric shoots Q.
Eric decides to "screw it" and kill Diana and Sigma as well. After shooting the rest, he kills himself as he's going for Mira.
Game over.
3. You name Zero as DELTA.
"The real Zero is... you, Delta!" and Q points at the player screen.
Eric shouts:
"Would you stop yapping, Sean! This old man's name is Q!"
The person Q is pointing at is known as Q. He was known as Q in the Dcom facility and Mira called him Q always. His existence was hidden from the player for all this time.
At Dcom they explained that the real "Q" was an old man on a wheelchair, who can't see or hear. The real Q's - Delta's - eyeglasses are cameras. The camera the players have watched the game on was shown through the lenses of Delta the whole time.
Delta reveals that Mira murdered and cut Junpei to pieces. In another history Diana, Eric and Sigma are all killed by Mira in other histories.
At the control room the group forces Delta to give the password for Q to open the X-Door. However Delta controls Eric to forcefully shoot Sigma and Q and Eric himself. At the end Delta says that he has no use for this timeline, looks at Diana and says: "Mom..."
FORCE QUIT: C
Carlos, Junpei and Akane arrive at 00:03 via SHIFTing. There are surprisingly zero (0) casualties in this timeline.
The C-Team finally goes to the Force Quit Box since the beginning. It's a red box. Carlos remembers the password and they put it in: VIVEHODIE. Somehow he knows of it; Zero's words.
The Force Quit Box opens a button to operate a Force Quit Program. To operate the box one needs to reboot the system operator.
Carlos stops to think and then he spends an hour thinking. Then suddenly he attacks Junpei and tries to rape Akane. After Junpei punches him off Akane. It seems that Carlos can't control himself. Junpei spends his time beating up Carlos for a long while. The trio goes to drink at a bar to "clean the slate" but Carlos is so beaten up that the drink falls and he asks the two to help him clean it up. The whole thing smells suspicious.
Zero's announcement
FORCE QUIT: Q
Mira, Q and Eric wake up. Announcer tells that there are zero casualties. It's 00:03 (on the watch, which has the 2 hour time lag to C-Team).
The Force Quit Box has been opened. It says to execute the Force Quit Program, but the Central Computer has to be rebooted.
Q runs away after realizing the meaning behind the hint - the Q-Team runs all the way to the Quantum Computer Room.
Q remembers the number for the computer pod and his own head from another timeline. Q explains how he can use Quantum Computer to jump between different histories. Q explains that humans have Quantum Minds that can jump to other histories as well.
Q tells Eric and Mira that he will explain everything but he first takes control over the quantum computer. After arriving back at the lounge the Force Quit Box says that it is on standby, but it requires "Mother's mementos" to be activated. These have been shown already in the game.
FORCE QUIT: D
Phi, Diana and Sigma are at the lounge. It's 00:03 (4 hour time lag from C-Team, 2 hour time lag from Q-Team).
The team notices the Force Quit Box. It's open. There's text on the monitor: Force Quit Box on standby. To initiate, two key items must be set. Each is a mother's memento.
You have to, as Diana, name the two key items to insert:
1. BROOCH
2. BLUE BIRD
After you do that, Diana remembers everything clearly and hugs Phi and Sigma hugs them both as all three of them remember the past and the truth.
Sigma destroys the wall and the group realizes that they are in the same ward with all of them and there are no different wards at all.
C- and Q-Teams all run to the lounge as well. They all blocked the watches from injecting them with the cards in the Transporter room.
The team wonders why they know of other histories. The C- and D-Teams are SHIFTers. Delta/Zero/Q appears with a shotgun. Delta reveals that he, Mira and Eric do not have the power to SHIFT, however Delta has another power instead: the power to Mind Hack. Delta is capable of reading other people's minds, for example.
Delta knew that the three teams tried to trick him via mind hack. Delta learned of the parallel worlds via mind hack - and he was simply curious of them.
Delta reveals that Phi and him are children of Diana and Sigma. Delta and Sigma were both sent to 1904, and Delta is 124 at the time of Zero Time Dilemma. The German people sent Phi to 2008 from 1904 (or her data, not her). The reason why Phi is a SHIFTER and Delta is a Mind Hacker is because of the genetics being forced to a critical situation when the children were born.
Also, the red colored anagram-sentence on the wall for C-Team: "When a curious hate oozes calamity" rearranged gives: "What you choose can materialize us." -> The decision games were hold so that Phi and Delta would be born the way they are, with powers.
Phi plunges to Delta and before Delta shoots, she kicks him in the throat and he flies to the wall, shotgun off from his hands. Eric gets the shotgun and points at Delta.
Phi gives the brooch to Diana and Diana puts the Brooch and the Blue Bird into the Force Quit Program Box.
-> Executing the force quit program. Ten minutes until explosion.
They were wrong about the Force Quit Program. The groups worked so hard only to turn on the self-destructive mechanism. There is no way to prevent it.
Delta tells the teams two things
1. Delta suggest the teams to check behind the bar counter. Gab the dog has been murdered with the shotgun by Delta.
2. Delta tells that he doesn't just have the power to mind read, but also control the bodies of the people he mind hacks. He forces Eric to shoot. Delta is about to die, but before, he gives the C-, D- and Q-Teams one final Decision Game to clear...
The Final Decision Game
Delta tells the groups:
1. Stay in the shelter and wait to die as the self-destruction mechanism soon goes off.
2. The other is...........*Delta dies before telling what the other option is.*
There are five minutes left. The group decides to force everyone to SHIFT - even the non-SHIFTERS - to another history. The one choice to make is to SHIFT with the history that won the original coin toss. That way they will swap their consciousness with the ones who won the coin toss.
The groups realize what Delta truly meant:
1. The groups can stay at the shelter and wait for their deaths...
2. Or survive by sacrificing their other selves in another history...
That is the Final Decision Game.
Choose.
You choose NOT TO PICK SHIFT OR NOT TO SHIFT
The shelter blows up.
Game over.
You choose to SHIFT
Payoff 2 - Nevada Desert - Dcom
The groups think about calling the cops for murder but Zero - no, Delta - tells them that he hasn't killed anyone. There is no way to catch this psycho in this timeline.
Now, the humanity will die to the unknown nuclear bomber. Zero gave them the opporturnity to save 2 billion humans or make everyone perish in the future by not spreading Radical-6 Virus that would kill 75% of humanity...This makes Phi angry.
The groups swear to change the future. This just makes Delta laugh as none of them experienced what happened in the Shelter, yet they are all dead-set on changing the future.
There is one final decision game to be held. Delta takes a gun and throws it to Carlos. Either kill Delta here or let him go.
"The fates of you, me, and mankind are all on the line-- This is the Decision Game."
Credits roll begins as the game ends.
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| The ramifications of the true final decision game of the Zero Escape series will never be known... |
Reviews of the Zero Escape Trilogy
Wow, I just finished the game yesterday, this was pretty well written and I'm impressed you took the time to write all of this out. Thank you
ReplyDeleteI think this game's biggest forte was that it wasn't as long as VLR and how well the game utilized the swapping.
DeleteEven if fans wanted as grand-scale of a game as VLR to take down Brother, this was never built that way to begin with.
I would definitely agree. It was very focused and impactful. It redeemed the series for me - VLR was such a bad sequel to 999 in my experience.
DeleteMany people definitely think that VLR is the magnum opus of the series but it was fine for me, just too long.
DeleteThe most negative aspect about VLR was how monotonous it was and how you had to go through the same events constantly.
999 is the most atmospheric of the three to me, VLR is the grandest but at the same time also the most monotonous, and ZTD is just another game in the series but also very entertaining in its own right. ZTD has the best villain in the series but it's understandable that fans wouldn't like the game because it doesn't live up to the expectations of being a long game with a big finale. ZTD's story takes place between 999 and VLR anyway in the meta timeline.