Dual Disposition

**Grim Tales: Dual Disposition** is the twenty-third game in the *Grim Tales* series by Elephant Games.

## Plot

A woman who bears startling resemblance to Anna Gray trashes a local antique shop. Officer Chris Lewis, who has been friends with Anna ever since they worked together to thwart a serial killer, contacts her to warn her about the situation and urges her to come to the police station. She does, and because Chris trusts her, he allows her to go through the evidence; her fingerprints are not a match for those found at the scene. Needing more concrete proof, they go to the destroyed shop, where Anna is able to piece together camera footage that reveals her doppelganger cut her hand while wrecking the place, causing blood spatter on the floor. Anna's hands being completely uninjured proves that she had nothing to do with the case, and she is eliminated as a suspect. This being the case, Chris hands her a small purse with her own monogram, which the perpetrator dropped, and advises her to use it to go back in time to when the crime was committed. Much to Anna's surprise, however, she is unable to do so.

Anna's mother Anastasia appears to warn her daughter that the flow of magic is being disrupted, and their connection will be broken if Anna can't stop it. She gives Anna a ring with a floral sigil and urges her to find the broken compass that will guide her to where the magic can be fixed. After searching the shop for more clues, Anna finds a ledger which shows that recently, a strange woman came searching for a certain cup, and was livid at not being able to purchase it. She is able to locate the compass, and gets in her car to drive to the location the compass indicates.

Anna finds herself in a serene wooded area with a stone gazebo, and catches sight of a figure briefly appearing on the steps. She deduces that someone is attempting to come through a portal but can't get it to open, and begins looking for a way to help them. Using the ring from Anastasia, she opens a panel on the side of the gazebo, and after collecting fresh water and some magic crystals, she's able to open the portal. An elderly gentleman steps through and accosts Anna, mistakenly believing she's Lady A. Forced to run, Anna manages to escape, only to find Lady A herself, who has attacked the gentleman. Lady A then turns on Anna, asking if she has found the cup, but immediately determines that she hasn't; with an unpleasant laugh, she disappears. Anna goes to help the gentleman, who apologizes for having mistaken her for their shared adversary. He explains that he is the Keeper, the guardian of a pocket dimension which exists between all the worlds and protects the flow of magic between them. Lady A's recent actions are threatening the stream of magic, and he asks Anna to find what they need in order to return to his realm and pursue Lady A.

Once they reach this magical vortex, Anna speaks briefly with her mother, who is relieved at having their connection restored. She then begins exploring the rooms of the Keeper's storehouse, including throwing a ball of yarn for his feline companion, and looks for information that will help her reach Lady A's home dimension. After finding a picture of Lady A, she's able to use a pneumatic system to request the coordinates for her destination, and activates a device that will send her there.

Anna arrives in another woodland scene, very similar to the one in which she first met the Keeper and with its own stone gazebo. However, just after her arrival, the gazebo collapses. She starts searching for information about the reality in which she finds herself. Searching the area for clues, she finds a discarded cell phone and some pictures related to what look like the Middle Ages and Regency period from Anna's own world. She also finds a mention of the Evermoore Institute of Magic, at which she recalls her father Richard Gray was once a student. She locates a battery for the cell phone, and Anastasia appears once more; Anna tells her that judging by the pictures, they are in Lady A's home dimension, which is very much like their own except that everyone has red eyes. Anastasia agrees and suggests that maybe Lady A's home address is the same as Anna's. She gives Anna the phone number for a taxi company and a framed picture of Lady A, and Anna summons a cab to meet her at the edge of the forest. Following her mother's suggestion, she has the driver take her to what would be her own address, though the house looks quite different from her own; she enters the house to find everything is very dark. She cleans a mirror, which allows some light to reflect through the room, and places two more mirrors on the fireplace mantel, then takes the framed portrait of her father she finds there.

On another wall is a portrait of Lady A (identified as Anna) as a child with her grandmother, Margaret; Anna recalls that this was the name of her grandmother too, and wishes she'd been able to meet her. She takes the portraits she is carrying of Richard and Lady A and hangs them on the wall, which causes a hidden compartment to open. Inside is Lady A's diary, which says that she is searching for a special goblet to drive off the enemies who chase her when she travels between worlds. The goblet was destroyed in her own reality, and she was unable to retrieve the one she tried to buy from the shop in Anna's world; Lady A also wrote that Anna is pursuing her, but that Anna's unique abilities may prove useful to her. Behind the diary, Anna recovers a key and an empty atomizer. The key unlocks the nearby door, which leads into the attic. After exploring the attic, making a bottle of perfume, repairing a broken saucer, and opening a toy chest, Anna recovers a strange pair of gloves which she realizes will enable her to repair the broken goblet.

She is immediately transported to this world's version of the antique shop, where she begins looking for the broken pieces of the goblet. Anna thinks that if she can repair the goblet, it will induce Lady A to stop traveling between worlds because she can use it to throw off the enemies who are chasing her. Anastasia appears to say that she can sense the presence of the artifact, and gives Anna a Roman numeral four to put on the nearby clock. Exploring the shop, she finds a number of magical items, including an Artifactor's Table which will allow her to enchant the gloves. Finding a set of books and solving the puzzle on the nearby shelf summons the spirit of the Keeper's catbird, who opens the way to the shop's storeroom. In the storeroom she discovers the moment, frozen in time, in which the shopkeeper dropped a flower pot - the goblet, magically disguised. The time magic interferes with Anna's ability to take the pot, so she has to find five ritual candles in order to enchant the gloves so she can remove the pot before it breaks on the floor. Searching through the shop's two rooms, she repairs the clock and the safe, and finds the items she needs for the ritual. Using the gloves, she takes the pot, which removes the enchantment that disguised it.

Anna is transported back to the gazebo which will let her return to her own world, if she can fix it, but is astonished to find that the scene looks completely different; there are many items strewn across the landscape which were not there previously, and she wonders how much time has passed. She finds some planks to allow her to cross the muck and approaches the source of magical essence, where she encounters Lady A. Lady A explains that she is being pursued by enemies and the magical goblet is her only chance to protect herself, so she offers Anna a trade - she surrenders the bracelet she uses to travel between worlds, in exchange for the porcelain goblet filled with the essence. Anna agrees and sets to work. The essence fountain is blocked by a malevolent plant, so she has to first prepare an herbicide; this accomplished, she fills the goblet with essence and gives it to Lady A, who drinks.

Lady A mocks Anna, saying that her kindness has blinded her and she was using her the whole time just to get the goblet. The Keeper arrives, lamenting that he was too late and urging Anna to be ready for battle because they have to stop Lady A. Although they fight well, Lady A declares her intention to be rid of the Keeper for good, and strikes him with some devastating magic. He manages to retreat to his pocket dimension with Anna, where she finds instructions for creating healing crystals and is able to revive him. He tells her that the only way to stop Lady A for good, before she continues collecting power and destroys worlds in the process, is for Anna to restore the heart of the magical source in her own world. She repairs a runic sign above one of the portals and is able to return home. There, they discover that the sky has turned red and begun to crack, an indication that Lady A's power is already destroying Anna's world. Anna must assemble some magical symbols to open the library where all the knowledge of magic is stored; there, she collects representatives of the four elements as part of the ritual to open the door leading to the source's heart. Once there, Anastasia provides part of the crystal which must be healed in order to restore the source and save the world.

With the crystal restored, the world is saved, but the Keeper cautions that this is only temporary until Lady A strikes again. He gives Anna an artifact called the Staff of Absorption; he tells her that once she repairs it, she should travel to the past and use the staff to take away Lady A's magic powers. Once repaired, the staff takes Anna to the night that Lady A ransacked the antique shop, and Anna uses it to remove all of her enemy's magic. The Keeper arrives and sends Lady A to another realm where she will be imprisoned; he thanks Anna for helping him to defeat her at last, and congratulates her on having saved her own world and many others. As he departs back to his own dimension, Anna catches a brief glimpse of her father Richard smiling at her before the portal closes.

### Bonus Chapter

As the bonus chapter opens, an unidentified woman arrives at the fountain of magical essence on a motorcycle. She unstoppers a vial and pours a strange liquid into the fountain, turning the liquid essence green.

The scene then shifts to the Keeper's pocket dimension between worlds, where the map of realities needs to be reactivated. The Keeper himself is the player this time, and after he acquires the items needed to activate the map, he briefly reviews the events of the main game. He notes that Lady A learned a great deal from her father, Richard, and hopes that she will eventually mellow and stop trying to hurt people. But he quickly realizes that the flow of magic has been poisoned, so he travels to another room of his dimension to shut off the controls before the poisoned energy damages the mechanisms. He obtains a sample of the poisoned energy and starts working to figure out which reality is its point of origin.

Using some of the devices in his dimension, the Keeper realizes that it was the source in Lady A's dimension which was poisoned. He opens the way there, but finds Lady A waiting for him; it was a trap, and she tells him to relax and watch as his "beloved realities crumble." Unable to use his magic to stop her, he can only watch while she opens another portal and escapes. He begins searching for clues as to what to do next. A book floats in the air, bound by an enchantment, and after drawing a spell of release he's able to access its contents using the data cube he created in his lab. What he finds shows him the location of Lady A's home, and he takes the motorcycle she abandoned in order to get there.

In Lady A's house, he finds a note she wrote in which she outlines her plan to get rid of the Keeper, so that he can't prevent her from restoring her powers. After repairing a mechanical wyvern and restoring the missing pieces of a castle model, the Keeper finds a journal written by Richard, talking about Lady A refusing to be stopped in her plan to defeat the Keeper. The journal mentions an essence of purity which can restore the source, and that it can be found in the antique shop. The Keeper repairs the nearby transference mirror and uses it to travel to the shop, where he acquires a bracelet that lets him remove the magical seals on the castle model. This grants him a ring that unlocks Richard's pouch, from which he acquires a gravity stone. Returning to the shop, he fixes some automatons and gets a picture of the essence of purity; this lets him unlock the chest where it is stored. He goes back to Lady A's house and takes the motorcycle to the grotto where the fountain of essence stands dying.

Lady A is not in evidence, so the Keeper gets to work nullifying her ritual and restoring the fountain. With this accomplished, he's able to use his magic again and returns to the world hub, only to find that Lady A has trashed the place. After using the gravity stone to move the cupboard blocking the way to the control room, he finds Lady A. She admits to being surprised that he escaped the trap but tells him that he's too late, and she doesn't care about the world she's going to destroy. The Keeper gathers some magical agents and enchants a monocle to allow him to see through the barrier she creates. This summons the catbird, who opens the way to the magical library, where the Keeper repairs the portal leading to a magical forge. There, he uses the blacksmith golem to forge an artifact that breaks Lady A's barrier. She erects a second one, but he breaks this too and then traps her inside the artifact. As the bonus chapter ends, the Keeper is enjoying some tea and a book while Lady A watches from inside the artifact on a nearby shelf. Some cracks form in the surface, suggesting she may find a way to escape.

## Characters

* Anna Gray: A time-traveling detective.
* Anastasia Grim: Anna's mother, who is a ghost. Anna communicates with her through her old cameo locket.
* Chris Lewis: A police officer and friend of Anna's, who doesn't believe she's responsible for the recent crime.
* Lady A: A woman from another dimension who looks almost exactly like Anna.
* The Keeper: The guardian of a magical storehouse which operates as a vortex between worlds. He needs Anna's help to stop Lady A from whatever she's trying to do.

## Connections

* Chris Lewis first appeared in *The Hunger*, and the first hidden object scene in this game revisits details about the case he and Anna solved together in that installment.
* In the first hidden object puzzle in Lady A's home dimension, Anna finds a mention of the Evermoore Institute and remembers that her father once studied there. During the events of the bonus chapter, the Keeper also finds an emblem from Evermoore. This is a reference to the events of the bonus chapter of *The White Lady*.
* Lady A's appearance, particularly her red eyes, suggests that she might actually be Dark Anna, a recurring antagonist from the *Detectives United* series. However, this is neither confirmed nor denied by anything else within the narrative.

## Trivia

* Anna recalls, while visiting Lady A's home, that her grandmother was named Margaret and that she never got to meet her. However, it's not made clear to the player whether this was the name of Richard's mother or Anastasia's.
* Anna's surname is misspelled as Grey during the puzzle which has her and the Keeper battling Lady A.
* According to the bonus chapter, Lady A's address (and therefore Anna's as well) is 30 Monroe Drive. The name of the town is not given.
* Lady A is voiced by Lori Caulfield, who also voices Anna.

## External Links

* *Dual Disposition* at Big Fish Games
* *Grim Tales* at TV Tropes
* Elephant Games on Facebook