Chapters of Holly's Journal

## Journal

#### August 1, Monday

Holly gives a brief description of who she is and explains how she always wanted to learn from Professor Wilson Wiseton but these dreams were shattered when he was accused of murder and disappeared the very year she was accepted into Yen Sid University. Soon afterwards another professor at the university named Dr. Oddswell was accused of experimenting on students and kicked out of the university. Holly hadn't thought much of it until the B-Bros, who she did not recognize at the time apart from some rumors, came up to her asking how to find the doctor. A mixture of her own guilt and the sincerity of the brothers causes her to give them the doctor's old address despite the fact she isn't supposed to. Still, she resolves to start doing her own research into the matter as well.

#### August 6, Saturday

A reporter from the Toon Town Times named Jeremy Fairfax comes to the university asking about the B-Bros and leaves his card with Holly's coworkers to pass along to her after hearing she spoke with them. She is unsure about whether she should talk to him but ultimately decides to since she hasn't found much information through her own research and he may be a good source to actually learn more about those brothers.

#### August 8, Saturday

Holly meets with Fairfax at a café and at first, he makes a relatively good impression as he even allows her to ask many of her own questions about the brothers without getting upset about it. However, when he starts asking her questions her impression starts to sour as it seems like Fairfax is trying to get her to say that the B-Bros are bad people. Following her instincts, Holly tells Fairfax that she doesn't want her name in his article or any quotes before she leaves the café. She comforts herself by saying she probably won't ever have to see him again.

#### August 10, Wednesday

Now that things have calmed down slightly, Holly relays the incident that happened the day before. Fairfax appeared at her work, asking her more questions about the B-Bros and accusing her of protecting wanted murderers. Holly lost her temper and shouted that she trusted the Runes of Peace a lot more then some reporter, which could sound to an outsider like she actually was protecting the B-Bros. With no other option and the potential for legal trouble on the horizon Holly doubles down on her research.

#### August 11, Thursday

Fairfax has continued stalking Holly, badgering her in all aspects of her life and spreading nasty rumors about her around campus. The constant harassment is beginning to make her very angry but she doesn't have many options on how to deal with him since he's charming enough to talk his way out of trouble if she brought the police into it and could even turn the police against her if he brought up her connection with the B-Bros. Later in the day, Fairfax sees her writing in her journal and clearly wants to get his hands on it.

#### August 12, Friday

On the recommendation of her roommate Shelly, Holly buys pepper spray as a safety measure against Fairfax. She has begun writing her journal at home since she worries Fairfax will try to steal it if she brings it to school again. She also wards both her journal and the drawer she keeps it in with runes just in case.

#### August 19, Friday

Holly just barely got her journal back after a theft attempt and feels like an idiot.

#### August 20, Saturday (About August 12, Friday)

Holly begins this entry by stating that she made a big decision today that could put her in danger but she doesn't have anything left to lose now that she was expelled from school and lost her job. She backtracks to begin explaining what has happened over the past week. After finishing writing in her journal last Wednesday, Holly put away her journal and activated the protective runes on it. On the way to school she spotted a newspaper that gave her more information on Dr. Oddwell and his assistant Ms. Red Riding Hood. After reading the article Holly decides that she should go visit either Oddswell or Red herself to try to get answers. After school, she went to the hospital where Red was being treated but came up on an issue when guards were posted on her door. She uses her runes to distract the guards and slip through the door only to run face first into Fanny. Fanny calls the guards back and Holly makes a run for it, managing to make it back home without being arrested. But, when she got back to her room the runed drawer with her journal in it was open and empty without any signs that there had been any issues taking it.

#### August 21, Sunday (About August 13-26, Saturday - Tuesday)

After finding her journal gone Holly begins to panic and her roommate tries to comfort her as best she can. Saturday morning Fairfax's article is published labelling her as an ally of the B-Bros and implying she has mob ties. By Saturday afternoon the school was calling her and by Monday afternoon she had been expelled from the school and fired from her job. After wallowing for a bit Holly decided to begin stalking Fairfax Tuesday morning, now furious at the fact that he caused her to be expelled. She also explains everything to Shelly after she got storm drain water thrown in her face meant for Holly. After taking care of some errands, Holly notices that much of the info on the B-Bros is written by Fairfax which means it could all be just as fake as what he wrote about her. With that in mind, she disguises herself and heads to the Toon Town Times building to wait for Fairfax. When he eventually comes out Holly follows him to a fancy apartment building, watching from across the street as he heads in and then comes back out a little while later to take off somewhere in his fancy car. While she's disappointed about not being able to follow him she realizes that it's highly likely that he hid her journal somewhere in his apartment. With that in mind, Holly became determined to get into Fairfax's apartment.

#### August 22, Monday (About August 17-19, Wednesday - Friday)

Continuing her surveillance of Fairfax Holly begins working to figure out a way into his apartment by observing how the building itself is run. When she sees a mailman walking into the building to deliver a large package she gets the idea to mail herself to the apartment, though she quickly realizes this plan has a million different potential ways of going wrong. She also notes that the doorman knows everyone who goes in and out by name. When she get's home to see her door defaced with various cruel messages she becomes angry once more at the realization that, with her gone all the time, it is her roommate Shelly who has been bearing the brunt of the harassment. After scrubbing the messages off the door as best she can Holly walks into the apartment to find Shelly sitting at the kitchen table. Shelly asks how Holly is doing and, though she is disappointed to hear Holly isn't looking for a new job, tells her it's alright and even offers to help in a job search. The conversation leaves Holly feeling guilty and questioning her priorities. She decides that she should give up on Fairfax and move on with her life while commenting to the reader about how ironic it is that she's writing that in her journal. The next morning Shelly and Holly talk about where she could apply for jobs over breakfast and Holly heads out to start applying at stores. Unfortunately, every store she tries to apply at tells her that there isn't a space for her there.

After a disastrous job search Holly sits down in a park for a break only to realize her purse has been stolen. After searching around for awhile with no luck Holly heads to the police station to make a report. The receptionist sends her further into the station to retrieve the report she needs to fill out and it is while she is walking through the halls that she hears Fairfax's voice talking about a hitman. Holly listens in as Fairfax and the commissioner argue about an attempted hit against Dr. Oddswell gone wrong that the commissioner is blaming Fairfax for. They also discuss their mutual connection to the Sykes brothers, which is who Fairfax is working under. Once their conversation is over Holly hides while they exit the room, finds and fills out the form she was originally sent for before leaving the station. Holly gets back home and begins thinking about her next move and eventually goes through with her original plan to mail herself to Fairfax's apartment.

Holly packs herself, as well as some cake, into a medium and large box which she then leaves a note asking her roommate to ship for her. She then spends the next day or so in the box before being delivered to Fairfax's apartment on Friday afternoon. Holly escapes the box and begins looking around the apartment. After spending hours looking around Fairfax’s apartment Holly removes any trace she had been there as best she could, goes back to her home and lies to Shelly about where she had been. She then lists what she found at Fairfax’s apartment- her journal, his planner, a mysterious envelope full of money with a delivery date, a train schedule ticket for the train the B-Bros took to Toon Town and a book about diseases with Wilson’s name written inside the cover.

#### August 23, Tuesday

Holly continues following Fairfax but, on the day he was meant to delivery that mysterious envelope of money, Holly is confronted by Shelly early in the morning. Shelly says she wants to go job hunting with Holly since she has the day off work and can afford to skip school. It's clear that Shelly doesn't believe Holly has been job hunting but Holly can't tell Shelly what she's really been doing. Holly spends much of the rest of the day applying at cafe's with Shelly, as well as the Sheba's bookstore where Sheba gave her a free copy of one of Felix's books as a consolation for the available position already being filled. The girls head home in the evening for dinner and Holly heads out later to try to see if she can catch Fairfax making the delivery but she finds nothing. While Shelly feels better after spending the day together Holly only worries more about Dr. Oddswell.

#### August 24, Wednesday

Through her surveillance Holly notes that it seems like Fairfax is interviewing a lot of small business owners, seemingly searching for something. Still, she doesn't get much else o she heads to the library to do some research on the Sykes brothers. She finds over sixty articles about Bill Sykes, who has been accused of a laundry list of crimes and is even a suspected mob member. Holly is getting worried about how serious all of this is getting but with someone's life on the line she just can't leave it be. Still, she knows she has to stay under the radar if she wants to stay safe. Holly also notes that all the articles about Bill Sykes seem to just stop five or six years ago. She also finds that a Robert Sykes seems to be a writer for the Toon Town Times, though she can't find much more about him.

#### August 25, Thursday

Once again, Holly follows Fairfax before heading to the library to research. She tries to find more information on Bill Sykes but it's all just speculation so she instead asks the librarian where she could go to look at public records. The librarian recommends city hall, the courthouse and county clerk’s office so Holly makes plans to visit them.

#### August 26, Friday

Holly talks about how she needs to learn who the shady characters in the city are so she can recognize them if she comes across them and which police officers she could possibly trust in the future. She also relays how she looked into those public records and discovered that Robert Sykes in the editor-in-chief for the Toon Town Times. She makes the connection that Robert become editor-in-chief right around the same time the articles about his brother suddenly stopped, meaning it was probably him scrubbing his brothers name from the news. However, Holly questions how such an obviously shady character ever got hired at the Toon Town Times in the first place.

#### August 27, Saturday

Upon realizing just how soon rent is coming due Holly cuts her surveillance of Fairfax short to check back with all the cafes she applied at but each one has filled the position. Holly believes that the main reason she isn't getting hired is because of Fairfax's article since most of the places she applies at are staffed by college students who recognize her and inform their managers about her bad reputation. With no luck in the job department she continues to follow Fairfax for awhile longer before heading to the county clerks office to go through more public records. While there she discovers that Bill Sykes runs a shipping company down by the docks.

#### August 28, Sunday

With the due date for rent drawing closer Holly decides to fully put her investigative efforts on hold until she is able to find a job.

### September

#### September 1, Thursday

As the rent due date approaches Holly gets more nervous since if the full rent isn't paid or is late both she and Shelly will be kicked out of the apartment by their landlady. Holly also realized that today was the day Fairfax was supposed to have a shady meeting of some kind down at the docks which she missed due to her job hunt.

#### September 2, Friday

Holly is consumed by anxiety, both at her lack of a job in the face of the threat of impending homelessness for herself and Shelly and also because she has no proof concerning the conspiracy to kill Oddswell. She feels like a complete failure.

#### September 3, Saturday

After wandering around town for hours Holly sits nervously in her apartment waiting for her terrifying landlady to knock on the door to ask about rent. When the landlady fails to appear Holly heads down to her office to ask what's happening. The landlady is confused when Holly says she doesn't have enough to pay for rent since they already paid in full the day before and sends Holly away again so she can get to her gambling parlor. When Shelly comes home she explains that she paid the rent since she's been picking up extra shifts since Holly lost her job and was able to scrounge up enough to pay for everything. Shelly tells Holly she can pay her back when she has a job and Holly is touched by what a good friend she has.

#### September 4, Sunday

Holly follows Fairfax around again, applying to various jobs as she goes. She begins applying for more difficult jobs such as night shifts that other people don't want. Holly is determined to get a job again and pay rent next month.

#### September 5, Monday

Holly heads to the county clerk's office to start investigating once more, looking to gather enough evidence so she can go to the mayor about this issue. She soon finds that in the early years, right after Bill Sykes took over as CEO of the shipping business from his father, he made some bad investments that caused the company profits to take a nose dive. But then, out of nowhere, the companies profits started to shoot up again and their competition began to mysteriously go out of business. All the businesses going out of business had strange excuses from dirty secrets getting revealed to one of them even winning the lottery and quitting but it all seemed to profit Bill's company. Many newspapers at the time put up a fuss about it until Robert Sykes got ahold of the Toon Town Times and they all went quiet.

#### September 6, Tuesday

Holly followed Fairfax, went to the library and didn't find anything of value.

#### September 7, Wednesday

Another visit to the public records office only brings about more dead ends so Holly gets back to following Fairfax. She begins recognizing some of his regular contacts which include a couple of weasels, a shady-looking rat man and a mustached man she later learns is a lawyer.

#### September 8, Thursday

She spent another day following Fairfax and job hunting. Holly also begins trying to discern which members of the police she could trust to send an anonymous warning to about the assassination attempts on Oddswell. Unfortunately, she's not sure how to figure out something like that.

#### September 13, Tuesday

Holly is more exhausted the ever but continues her efforts. When researching the police for trustworthy officers she immediately discounts any police officers she's seen meeting with Fairfax before as being untrustworthy.

#### September 14, Wednesday

Since she is hitting a wall following Fairfax Holly considers following Robert Sykes instead. She plans to follow Fairfax to his shady dock meeting the next day and then afterwards decide if it's worth the risk to start following Robert.

#### September 15, Thursday

While waiting for Fairfax outside of his apartment that morning, Holly notices a diner she previously applied at and heads inside to ask once more about a job. There she finds the manager at one of the tables working on the books who tells her that they can't hire her since they don't have enough money to do so. Luckily, after looking at the paperwork while talking to him Holly notices that the person doing the ledger is actually stealing from the business and, after helping the manager correct the books, walks out of the diner with a job.

Holly then spends the day following Fairfax as he goes through his usual routine until he heads down to the docks for his meeting. When Fairfax enters one of the warehouses there Holly sneaks around to find a side window that she stacks some crates under so she can climb up and listen in on the conversation. The meeting is between the Sykes brothers, Fairfax, Ratigan and the commissioner. They discuss how they've had trouble killing Oddswell in prison so they are going to hire a police officer to do this and mention that they don't want this to be a repeat of their screw-up with Wilson Wiseton. Holly is confused at the mention of Cup assassins handling Wilson but assumes it's code and continues listening. The men also talk about how the Cups are now handling the B-Bros while they are starting to have problems working around the female detectives and Chief Club. Wanting to get a look inside, Holly tries to lift herself higher using a rope tied to a heavy crate. Unfortunately. the mechanism yanks her up fast, allowing only a glimpse inside before she falls back down into a loud heap outside. The men, now aware that someone was outside, start to come outside so Holly takes off with the help of a speed rune. She races all the way back to the diner and, after assuring the manager that she is fine, hides in a tree outside of Robert Sykes's house to wait for him to come home since if he's home that means he's not out looking for her.

#### September 16, Friday

Holly stays in the tree all night, barely sleeping, but Robert doesn't come home. It s only at noon when Holly finally notices the time that she comes down out of the tree to run to the diner since she is extremely late for her new job. Her manager is initially furious at her but she makes up a story about getting into an accident that morning, using the injuries she got from falling from the rope the night before as proof. Her manager calms down. helping her clean up before sending her to work in the kitchen and serving customers until ten that night. Exhausted from work, Holly only briefly stops by Fairfax's apartment to confirm he's there before heading back home.

#### September 17, Saturday

Early the next morning Holly walks around town until she finds a phone booth near the police station. From the booth, she makes an anonymous call to the detectives, which is picked up by Ringtail, and warns them that a police officer is going to make an attempt on Oddswell soon. Before she can get much more information out another toon bangs on the booth, shouting about how they need to use the phone, causing her to hang up. She then spends the rest of the day working at the diner before heading back home. Once home, she tells Shelly that she has gotten a job. Shelly is thrilled since if Holly had missed rent again she would have had to start looking for other roommates. With her life starting to get back on track and now more than a little intimidated by the Sykes brothers Holly decides it's about time she hands over her information to the mayor and move on with her life. Before she does though she wants to do a bit of research on Ratigan since he's the only one she has no information about.

#### September 18, Sunday

Since the diner and the public offices are closed and she's too scared to follow any of the men from the meeting Holly spends the day reading in her apartment. She reads through Felix's book before looking through one of her rune books to find more defensive magic. She explains how she's been using the Fade rune while following Fairfax for the last month and a half, which is probably why he hasn't noticed her. However, after the scare of the meeting, she wants to get some more magical protection.

#### September 19- 25, Monday-Sunday

Holly spends the week working at the diner and attempting to research who Ratigan is. She discovers that Ratigan is a dangerous criminal who was thought to have died in London after an altercation with Basil, who happens to be another professor at Yen Sid University. Even though she is still trying to uncover Ratigan's current alias Holly still calls the mayor's office to set up a meeting for Monday. She decides it might be best t ask the mayor's office to find Ratigan's alias since, even though she has an idea of where she could find the information, she can't it.

#### September 26, Monday

After getting her manager to give her a couple of hours off for the meeting Holly sits outside the mayor's office waiting to be let in. Though she feels a mix of emotions Holly is relieved this whole ordeal will be over soon since this has become far more dangerous than she can handle. She's even excited to be working at the diner and researching on her own time since at least she'll be able to choose what she learns. Unfortunately, later that evening she writes that she has lost faith in there being good people in the world and claims she doesn't want to discuss what has happened right now.

#### September 27, Tuesday

Holly recounts what happened the previous day. She was waiting to go see the mayor in her most expensive clothing with all her research and journal with her. Eventually, she is called into the office by the secretary and happily greeted by Mayor Medusa. She begins telling the Mayor about how her purse was stolen, which led to her overhearing a disturbing conversation at the police station but as she's talking she notices an envelope identical to one that Fairfax had previously received. She realizes the mayor is in on the conspiracy. Holly pulls herself together after the shock, turning back to the mayor as her mind races to come up with a lie for why else she might be there other than the truth. She pulls out the article Fairfax wrote about her and claims that the police treated her poorly because they believed the lies he wrote about her. Mayor Medusa seems very interested in the fact that Holly met the B-Bros yet wasn't questioned by the police, promising to make sure they do their job properly. He even promises to try to help clean up Holly's reputation, though at this point Holly doesn't trust his charming façade at all. Holly says goodbye to the mayor and is so shaken from the ordeal that, after forcing herself to walk the first three blocks, Holly runs the rest of the way to the diner. When she arrives at the diner she slips into the washroom and begins crying on the floor.

#### September 28, Wednesday

After the ordeal at the mayor's office, Holly steels her nerves and decides that whatever happens from here on out she will face it with determination. Later that day Holly is shocked when Fairfax happens to come into the diner. Once he recovers from his surprise Fairfax get's that look of hungry interest in his eyes again, Holly takes his order and, once she has returned with his coffee, he begins questioning her about what she's doing there. Holly has no patience for his fake charm, telling him that she knows he broke into her apartment. He mentions what a coincidence it is that she's accusing him of breaking into her apartment when he recently discovered his apartment got broken into as well. Holly brushes off his insinuations, telling him to either return her journal or not talk to her at all the next time they see each other. Fairfax asks how he could possibly not talk to her the next time "fate" makes their paths cross before telling her to stay out of trouble, paying for his coffee and leaving. Once he's gone Holly rushes to hide in the bathroom and writes in her journal about what happened. She says that she's going to have to be extra careful with her journal now so Fairfax doesn't see it and that she will probably have to stop writing in it entirely for a while. Still, she is determined not to give up on this even in the face of such dangerous opponents and resolves to make a new game plan going forward.

### October

#### October 3, Monday

Holly eventually ends up quitting her job due to constant harassment from Fairfax and the chance that he may involve others in their feud such as her boss or Shelly. She also finds a new roommate for Shelly, grabs her essentials and moves out of their apartment with no plan on what her next move will be.

#### October 9, Sunday

With no home, Holly ends up sleeping in the park for the next few days. Homelessness is difficult with limited funds and no experience but Holly doesn't want to risk going to a halfway house for fear of how far the Sykes network might reach. She uses her rune magic, most notably a handmade rune bracelet with the Fade rune on it, in order to stay safe during this time. She also visits Dr. Oddswell's house out of curiosity. After knocking on the door she comes face-to-face with Granny and she introduces herself as a former student of the doctor's who is looking for some answers. Granny invites her in to talk over lunch where she meets Avery and Steven. As they eat they explain Ink Illness to Holly and when the topic of the B-Bros comes up Holly reveals she was the one who gave them the house address in the first place. The house members explain that the B-Bros were sent by Wilson and that Bendy is among the sick, though his case is rather odd. The discussion then turns to the issues discovering a cure and the hope for success in the B-Bros Ink Machine quest. Believing she can be of no help to the quest Holly leaves and heads back to the park where she spends the rest of the night trying to think of what she can do.

#### October 10, Saturday

The next day Holly has an idea and heads back to the house to talk with Granny. However, a block away she becomes frozen in shock at the sight of a weeping Granny and Avery dressed all in black making their way away from the house. Holly follows them to a graveyard where a tiny coffin is waiting for them. Horrified and feeling sick from the sight Holly leaves the graveyard, now absolutely convinced that Ink Illness is real.

#### October 11, Tuesday

While she was originally planning to attempt to use runes to find pain medication for the Ink Illness victims Holly decides against this since seeing the symptoms of the disease would make it all too easy to imagine what happened to Steven. Instead, Holly plans to use her research abilities to try to hunt down others with Ink Illness and direct them to help. She is also more determined than ever to get in contact with the female detectives so the information she does have can be put to good use.

#### October 12, Wednesday

Holly starts her search with the newspapers but quickly realizes she won't find anything in the larger newspapers thanks to Robert Sykes so she begins looking in the smaller, less reputable papers. Immediately, she begins finding news stories of people mysteriously disappearing into black puddles. Holly tracks down the family of the disappeared toons, talks with them about the little she knows and then gives them the address for Dr. Oddswell's house. She is also still homeless and sleeping in the park.

#### October 13, Thursday

Holly spends much of the day sleeping and helping out the local soup kitchen lady with her chores along with a group of homeless people. As she heads back towards the park she spots a discarded newspaper that says the B-Bros have been spotted in Toon Town. Holly reads the article, although it gives her little insight into what's happening, and decides to visit Granny at the house the next day.

#### October 14, Friday

That morning, police officers combing the park for any signs of the B-Bros force Holly to leave the area earlier than expected. She tries going to the house but nobody answers the door when she knocks so she instead jumps back into her research. She is able to find two more cases of Ink Illness from the papers, bringing the total number of toons she's found with confirmed Ink Illness up to five.

#### October 15, Saturday

As Holly walks to Dr. Oddswell's house in another attempt to meet with Granny she notices a suspicious black car watching the house. Holly tries to sneak a look into the car but can only make out a dark silhouette in what appears to be a hoodie. She is about to give up after an hour of unsuccessful watching but then Avery comes out of the house and the car begins following him. Holly follows the car as it stalks Avery through his errands but all three of them end up back at the house an hour later with nothing of note happening. Holly gives up for the day and heads to get some food. Also, after looking through more articles she finds one about the sudden death of Ortensia Rabbit, wife of Oswald Rabbit. The sudden death makes Holly suspicious, although there is no obvious link to Ink Illness.

#### October 16th, Sunday

Ink Illness has made it onto the front page of the newspaper and Holly is thrilled. Holly visits the street where the house is, easily spotting the same black car watching as a mob of reporters surround the house. Anyone who comes close to the house is at risk of getting ambushed by the reporters and Holly just barely manages to get away herself even though she was nearly two blocks away. She's aso happy to hear that the mayor will be talking about Ink Illness that day as well.

#### October 17, Monday

Holly heads back to Granny’s. There aren’t as many reporters there as the day before and the house looks empty. The black car is still parked outside. Holly spends a few hours outside the house and watches the area before heading back to the park in the evening. While walking toward her usual sleeping spot, Holly spots a well-dressed fox sitting on a park bench. She eventually approaches him, and he knows her name upon seeing her. The fox introduces himself as Xedo Tiptail, a former journalist from the Toon Town Times, and the writer of the Ink Illness article. Xedo tells Holly that he was sent by ‘two individuals", the B-Bros, who wanted to apologize for the loss of her schooling and job. Holly accepts the apology, although she wishes to see the brothers in person. Xedo denies the request, stating they’re staying hidden for their safety. Holly is understanding, yet decides to follow Xedo back to his apartment to find the B-Bros for herself.

Holly waits for Xedo to head inside, then knocks on the door. A smaller fox answers the door. Holly states that she’s there to see Bendy and Boris, which spurs some panic between the smaller fox and Xedo, who appears from the back room. She ends up letting herself in and finds Bendy and Boris hiding in the kitchen. After some convincing, they agree to speak with her, and Holly tells them that she wants to help the Ink Illness cause. The brothers decide to tell her about the quest and how they got to where they are now. They talk about Wilson and the illness, and the brothers show her the journal page and the map. Boris explains the map’s angelic origins to Holly, earning some skepticism and confusion from her. After hearing the troubles the B-Bros are having with translating the page, Holly offers to help do it for them. Boris asks if she can help with the map, too. After having Bendy write out the runes seen on it for her, she agrees to give it a shot. The group thanks her and she heads out again, this time going toward the library to research more on Micco runes.

Holly makes it to the library but gets caught up in nostalgia and accidentally falls asleep in one of the chairs. When she wakes up, it’s nearly time for the library to close. Holly rushes to try and complete her research in time but soon realizes she won’t be able to make it. Not wanting to waste time walking an hour back to the park, she decides to hide out and stay overnight to do her research alone instead. She uses runes to hide, waits for everyone to leave, and then begins reading. Holly spends a few hours searching through books, but can’t find the in-depth information she needs. She knows the library’s archive room would have what she’s looking for, but it’s locked. She could use runes to break in or wait until morning and ask for access then. However, there’s a chance they could see her library card is invalid. Despite the risk, Holly decides against breaking in and instead goes back to her chair to sleep until morning when she can properly ask for access.

#### October 18, Tuesday

Holly wakes up in the library, which has become very busy while she’s slept. She makes her way back to the archive but stops when she recognizes Shelly as the girl behind the desk. Holly moves forward nervously and tries asking if she can look at some books, but the question only seems to upset Shelly. Shelly scolds Holly for disappearing and making herself homeless, explaining that she had worried for Holly in her absence, and had thought she might have been dead. She expresses worry for Holly and demands she tell her what’s going on, or she won’t let her into the archives. Holly, feeling guilty, explains as much as she can, but stays vague for Shelly’s safety. Shelly still seems upset, but eventually agrees to let her look at the books she needs. She lists out several books and goes to sit down at a table in the archive room.

Holly reflects on what Shelly said to her, what she was doing, and the people she is involved with before she starts to study again. She spends a few hours learning as much as she can and eventually decides to start her first map tests. She decides to begin by finding out more about the Bbros’ map, and comes to the conclusion that she’ll need to find the angel that gave it to them. Holly makes her way to the park and finds a secluded area to begin testing runes on a storebought map. She tests a few more runes, experiencing different, strange results such as a warped tree in the centre of the testing area. It begins to get dark, so she decides to do one final test. However, when she activates the new runes, she blacks out and wakes up next to the warped tree. Her other tests are gone, and it’s light out again. Upon asking someone nearby for the time, she discovers that it’s now five o’clock, and she’s travelled back in time. A bit scared by the results of that experiment, she decides to pack up and leave for Xedo’s apartment again.

When she gets there, a woman greets her at the door. She introduces herself as Alice and lets her inside. After some antics with Alice and the younger fox, Wiston, Holly sits down with Xedo and updates him on her research for the maps, then asks where the B-Bros are. Xedo tells her that Bendy took Boris out to see the circus in town, and they should be back soon. After some time, they hear a knock at the door, which they assume is the B-Bros, but it turns out to be the detectives Holly spoke with before. The detectives begin interviewing Xedo while Holly tries to plan on sneaking out to warn the B-Bros of the danger. The crow detective begins asking questions about the article, talking about the allegations of theft surrounding Wilson, and the brothers’ involvement in his death. They finish up with their questions and begin to make their way out when the door opens, and Bendy and Boris arrive back from the circus. They’re spotted by the detectives and are cornered.

The detectives begin placing the B-Bros under arrest, however, they do reassure the group that they think they’ll have enough evidence to clear them, as well as Dr. Oddswell. They mention that there are several dirty cops and politicians pinning the B-Bros as scapegoats and that many attempts have recently been made on Oddswell’s life. The brothers quickly try to run, but the detectives stop and handcuff them both. Holly realizes that the two won’t be safe in jail, and she needs to tell them what she knows. With some difficulty, she releases her knowledge of the commissioner, Fairfax, and their involvement with the mob, as well as her endeavours with following Fairfax around and the Sykes brothers’ part in the situation. The detectives are outraged. Holly gets lost in her thoughts, and before she knows it, the B-Bros are being taken away. Holly panics and tries to find some way to stop them from leaving, including testifying at the trial and finding more evidence. Ultimately, she’s told to leave it to the detectives, and the B-Bros are taken away.

## Links and References

* TBA

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