Chapter 4: Investigation

Trigger Warnings: None

WITH OST

Paintbrush looked down at the items fan had just handed them. They sighed and put the accessories on. "Couldn't hurt to play the part a bit more accurately," They said.

"Exactly!" Fan cheered. "So, who should we ask first?"

"Well, probably the people who were closest to them. Maybe we could ask Bot first?" Paintbrush suggested.

"Yeah, they might have some idea!" Fan agreed.

The two walked around the hotel for a bit, looking for Bot. They eventually found them down in the lobby, hanging out with Goo.

"Hey, Bot! can we talk to you for a minute?" Fan called out.

Bot looked over at them. "Oh- sure!" They turned back to Goo "Hold on I'll be right back."

Bot walked over to Fan and Paintbrush. "What's with the funny hats?" They asked.

"We're doing an investigation." Fan responded.

"Why, is someone missing?" They questioned further, half-joking.

"Well, we don't wanna jump to conclusions quite yet.." Paintbrush began. "But we think so."

Bot suddenly looked surprised. "OH- really??"

Fan nodded. "Test Tube, Lightbulb, and Baseball." He said, counting them on his fingers.

"We were wondering if you knew anything about it." Paintbrush finished.

"When did they go missing?" Bot asked.

"Just this morning." Fan answered. "Or maybe last night, I'm not sure."

Bot thought for a moment. "Hm... I don't think I've seen any of them all day either..."

"Have you noticed anything suspicious regarding any of them recently?" Paintbrush questioned.

".....No, everything's seemed pretty normal with them." Bot responded.

Paintbrush wrote something down on their notepad, then flipped to a previous page and crossed something out. "Damn. well, let us know if you see anything!" They started to walk off with Fan.

"Well- wait! Can I help you guys out on the investigation?" Bot requested.

Fan and Paintbrush stopped walking and turned back around.

"Of course!" Fan replied. 

"We could use the extra help." Paintbrush added.

"Great!" Bot cheered. Fan grabbed another set of the items he gave Paintbrush out of literally nowhere and handed them to Bot. "I'm gonna go help Fan and Paintbrush with an investigation!" They called out to Goo. "Alright!" He called back.

Bot put on the items and followed the other two as they walked off to find someone else to question. 

"We should probably ask Nickel or Suitcase next," Paintbrush suggested. "They might've found out something on their search."

"Sounds good!" Fan responded.

"Nobody I've asked has any leads," Nickel stated. "It's like he just vanished."

"Have you found out anything?" Fan asked.

"Nope. And I don't think Suitcase has, either." Nickel responded.

"Nothing seemed out of the ordinary this morning?" Bot pressed.

Nickel shook his head. "He was just... gone." He answered sadly.

"Thank you for your time, Nickel." Paintbrush said. "We'll let you know if we find out anything."

"Okay." Nickel watched the trio exit his room, leaving him with his thoughts. He couldn't think of anything that could've happened, which just made the situation even more frustrating. 'Maybe you're just overreacting.' he thought. 'Yeah, he's gonna come back to the hotel later and say he just went out for a while, and his phone died or something. It's fine.' He glanced at his bedside table 'Wait... His phone!' He got off of his bed and looked through the drawers, finding Baseball's phone in one of them.

"Bingo!" He turned it on and started looking for anything that could hint at where he went. He searched for a few minutes but couldn't find anything. 'Maybe this could still be a clue? I should tell the others it's still here just in case.' Nickel tossed the phone onto his head and left the room, looking for where Bot, Fan and Paintbrush went. He found them and ran up to them.

"Hey, guys! Uh- I don't know how helpful this would be, but I found Baseball's phone in our room." Fan took the phone and turned it on as Nickel continued explaining. "He usually wouldn't just leave it, and it looked pretty much untouched. I looked through it and couldn't find anything though."

"Well, maybe we can." Fan said as he began searching through the phone, Bot and Paintbrush watching over his shoulders. He looked through it for a few minutes but couldn't find anything either.

"Hm... doesn't look like there's any evidence on here. I'll keep this on me for a while just in case we find something later, though. Thanks Nickel!"

"Yeah, yeah, anything to help out the case." Nickel walked back to his room, still feeling uncertain about things. He didn't know whether he should be taking it this seriously or not- After all, they hadn't even been gone for 24 hours. But he still felt like something was seriously wrong, and he didn't know what to do about it. He made it to his room and laid down on his bed, hoping a little nap could maybe help him clear his mind.

Paintbrush sighed. They had been asking people all day if they had any ideas where their friends went, but nobody had any good leads. Them and Fan had started the investigation at around 3PM, and it was now 6:34.

"Maybe we should tell OJ about this? He might be able to actually do more." Bot suggested.

"Th-" Paintbrush paused for a second. "That's actually a really good idea I don't know why we didn't think of that earlier."

They went down to OJ's office and knocked on the door. They heard a faint "Come in!" from the other side and entered the room.

"What're you guys cosplaying for?" OJ joked.

"We're conducting an investigation, and we need some help." Paintbrush explained.

"Oh- yeah, sure, what's going on?"

"3 of the hotel's residents have gone missing last night," Fan began, trying to sound more serious. "Test Tube, Lightbulb, and Baseball."

"We've been looking for leads all day," Bot continued. "But we haven't really found anything useful."

OJ listened closely as they explained the situation. "...And you need my help finding them?"

"It would be greatly appreciated." Paintbrush replied.

"Yeah, yeah, I can definitely help out. You said they went missing last night? Did anyone see them at all then?" OJ asked.

"No, everyone said they woke up and suddenly 3 people were gone. It's really strange." Bot answered.

"Okay.. oh- maybe the cameras outside caught something!" OJ suggested. "Here c'mon, let's go check them." OJ stood up and went to a side room in his office, the other three following him. He sat down at the chair, in front of a desk with dozens of monitors showing different areas of the hotel.

"Here-" He said, rewinding the footage to last night. "Okay, let's see if anything happens here." OJ sped up the footage and they all watched it closely for a few minutes. The footage reached the morning and they hadn't seen a thing on any of the outside cameras, so OJ did the same thing but with the cameras on the inside of the hotel. That took several run-throughs to see them all though, with how big the hotel is and how many cameras are needed in there. After looking through all of them, they still had no leads.

"Oh they actually just vanished didn't they" Fan said to himself.

Paintbrush was suddenly even more alarmed. "Well this just got a lot more serious.."

OJ looked at his watch. "How about we get some sleep and continue the search in the morning? It's getting kinda late."

"...Yeah, okay.." Bot agreed. They all went back to their rooms and tried to go to sleep.

Nickel woke up, still feeling pretty tired. He had a difficult time falling asleep last night with all that worrying he was doing. As expected, none of the others had returned to the hotel. He looked over at his clock, which read "1:52 PM".

"Oh shoot-" Nickel sat up. "I slept in again.."

He checked his phone, seeing he had a message from Balloon. 

'That was a while ago, he's probably back by now.' Nickel thought. He left his room to go get breakfast downstairs. As he sat at one of the tables eating his waffles, he heard a voice from behind him.

"Nickel?" Nickel turned around and saw Suitcase.

"Oh- uh.. hey, Suitcase. What's up?" He responded as Suitcase walked over to his side.

'Why do I still feel so tense around her this sucks.' He thought.

"Have you seen Balloon anywhere?" Suitcase asked him, looking very uneasy.

"He messaged me this morning and said he was going on a walk. Has he not come back yet?" Nickel responded.

Suitcase shook her head. Nickel froze.

"Uhhh okay let me message him real quick maybe he got caught up doing other stuff." Nickel suggested, pulling his phone out and texting Balloon.

"I already messaged him a little while ago, but he still hasn't responded.." Suitcase said.

Nickel stared at his phone nervously, waiting for a response. None came. He looked at Suitcase with dismay.

"Y... you don't think..."

Suitcase gulped. "Y-yeah... I think he's missing too..."

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big thanks to @8r3ad_Crum8s for the idea of balloon also going missing!

finally got the word count back up lol

(the section at the end takes place during the same day as chapter 3 btw)