(Rex, he wasn't saying the riddle out loud, he was thinking it. Might want to edit that.) Aima looked over at the retina scanner curiously. "Right, I hadn't imagined that possibility. I'm still used to thinking of my prosthetic as a biological implant rather than one entirely of machine." She scrunched up her face in thought "As Shield said, even our saboteur has motivation of his own. Let's just sit down and talk about unrelated topics until contradictions arise I guess."
(thanks) *thinks for a moment* "hmm maybe he doesn't though, he did call this a game maybe he is just doing this for fun with no real motivation. you got a good idea random unrelated topics, it will be easy to catch the spy in the lie that way cause he wouldn't have time to make up a good story.
hmmmm...... yes Rex your guess might be correct they could be doing it for a laugh and they might be thinking im to slick to get caught by anyone but thats where there misunderstandings would get the better of them
"Well thanks Cal, I would like to solve this and when you don't have evidence you gotta rely on pointing out lies to expose a culprit. hmmm... but first I'd like to know how suspicious I am to you all?
well just because you didn't know where a city was i can let it fly but i do have a little suspicion but don't worry about it Comrade we'll probably get out of here soon if we find the betrayer
Aima turned to Rex and raised an eyebrow "I pains me to say this but inquiring such things would only prove counter productive. I'll keep my suspicions to myself given the situation, though I will share that playing the bafoon only raises attention to one's self."
*shakes his head* "I have to say I disagree Aima. Such an inquiry now would be quite productive. Don't keep anything to yourself now."
"You've obviously misunderstood me. That inquiry would indeed only prove counterproductive because by asking on the current thoughts about one's self, the individual only raises suspicion on their own person. In a way I have answered your question but at the same time I truly haven't as my opinion of you is identical to that of the remainder of the group. A bit of small talk won't be enough to sway an opinion I'm afraid because that's precisely what our saboteur wishes and may even hold the prowess of doing so with ease. Keep in mind that while we know nothing of him or her, they have the advantage of previous observation." Aima looked down at the ground and kicked her hooves softly against the barren metal floor. "Im afraid I don't trust any of you in the slightest and I expect a similar fashion from the lot of you. While I would love the acceptance and trust of you all, I find myself sitting here grasping at the nothingness which is anything that might prove my innocence. Once we find ourselves out of this conspiracy however, I do look forward to further meeting with those of you who I can learn to place trust in, after all it's hardship such as this that forges the everlasting bonds of friendship." (With this new avatar it makes whispering anything I post highly entertaining.)
"Oh so our saboteur might be a 'her' I didnt even think of that" *stomps his hoof down* "I say it is productive, I know what i'm doing. I ain't worried about raising my suspicion, I know I'm Innocent... and honestly I actually trust you"
Shield, who had been thinking for the duration of the ongoing conversation, tapped his hoof. "Wait a minute..." he said to himself. He walked up to Aima. "Have you noticed that our full number has not joined the conversation?" he asked, gesturing to the ponies who appeared to be sitting around doing nothing. "Some of them haven't even introduced themselves. For all we know, everypony who has talked so far could be innocent." Shield agreed fully with Aima's statement on trust, as he felt the same way. However much he wanted to trust everypony, he couldn't here. Everypony was suspicious, including himself. If only there was some way they could prove their innocence...some mind game they could play to counter this mind game...oh, why hadn't he taken Advanced Psycology instead of that Calculus course? He sighed. He would just have to keep racking his brain.
(This raises an excellent point. If some people don't post for a while can we just assume they died or something? It would make things significantly more streamlined instead of having to interrogate mute ponies.)
(why do they have to be so boring one of them better not be the spy) "Hey don't say that Shieldy, I trust you 100% i know your not the spy"
(Well, one of them might be the spy any they're just laying low and watching, or one of them might be the spy and they haven't posted in a really long time, or perhaps none of them are the spy, and the spy is still among us five who are actually posting. I would guess that we could rule the second option out, but maybe Dodo can tell us.)
(Can we poke them with sticks before we sweep them under the rug? Also, sorry. I'd have posted earlier but I was distracted by one of the threads.) Teddy covered his ears with his hooves, closing in eyes and visualising two doors. Tall, red, wooden. The paint was scratched off in the same places with exactly the same handles, glinting in identical light. Two guards that might have been separated at birth, standing to attention in front of each door. They share the authoritative stare as the Astra-Teddy approaches. You can't tell apart from these two doors or the guards...Only that one of them is lying and one is completely honest. They both stand in brilliant white coats and golden armour. Both tower over the Theoretical Teddy while he massage his temple with a hoof... Err....One question for both...One question to each guard. You can't ask directly, they'll refer to their own doors. Only the one that tells to truth is trust worthy and that could be either... All right! For the sake of argument...The left is telling the truth and the right is lying. Left is hell and Right is... Wait! He opens his eyes, finding that he'd managed to lie on the floor, on his stomach...some how...He looks up and around at the other ponies standing in the grey walls. This might not work, he thought. There's no way of finding the truthful person. The liar is here but....Who's truthful? "Hey, Rex!" Teddy said, still on the floor. "If you asked Shield if he thought you were the spy, what would he say?" Wait...The Guards know which door is which, allowing them to be honest/a liar. This won't work. No-one except the spy knows which door is which....
"But how could you? The only person you should trust 100% right now is yourself, since no one has been proved innocent or guilty yet..." This got Shield's mind working, and he drifted back into thought. He hated to jump to conclusions, assume, or otherwise overlook information - goodness knows he'd done that far too much since he'd woken up - but the inherently suspicious side of him thought, How could he trust us 100%? I'll tell you. It's because he's the spy!! Shield shoved those thoughts away; they were merely a result of the stress that this situation was putting on him. He wanted to escape, and the only way to escape was to find the spy, so naturally he wanted to start accusing. But that was both immoral and illogical, so he did not. Logically, if Rex was the spy, he probably wouldn't have made such a blatantly suspicious comment, he thought. But what if I'm the only one who thinks it's suspicious? Then again, what if it IS suspicious, but he's saying those sorts of things because they're exactly what we wouldn't expect him to say?... Ugh, I know nothing about any of these ponies, how can I judge them based on that?!?
"It's pretty obvious what he would say, and thats why I trust him" "Simple, It's that exact thought that I know who I can trust. You're a smart pony I am sure you can figure out what i'm doing"
"Now Now Comrades quit jumping to conclusions we must come up with a way to trick the spy into doing something out of character like doing or saying something they've never done before"
Aima shook her head softly "Deception won't suffice in our current premise. The traitor among us might not only be composing the schemes himself, but may also have training to prove such attempts futile." She walked up to Rex "I think we'd make more headway if we were to simply converse with one another. So Rex, tell me, what kinds of things did you do as a child?"
"Regular kid stuff you say...?" Aima latched onto this phrase and thought for a moment. "Would you mind elaborating on that for me? In my youth 'regular kid stuff' included fiddling with circuitry and machinery to discover their functions. It's how I learned of my passion as a surgeon honestly. When there's somebody under the knife I don't see them as a live individual anymore but rather as a set of pipes and gears to be fixed. Call it heartless, but it's the mechanics in the body that inspire me."
