Warmest salutations dear friends. I have a tale for you all today. A tale of greed, corruption and a dark mystery that wraps itself around the very heart of our fine city. A plot that lead to unmeasurable suffering and the death of one not-so-innocent man. This will be a long thread, with a lot of speculation. But, with the evidence uncovered in my investigation, I believe I unearthed a truly horrifying spectre of Paralake's past.
Chapter One - The Surface
We must first examine the history of Paralake as presented to us by the Government. If one takes a stroll on the boardwalk, they will find signs explaining our city's past.
There is much fluff in this image, but there are two important things to note. One, the mentions of a terrible flood at an unspecified point in 1936. This devastated the city, causing major damage to many areas and leading to the boardwalk being closed for decades.
The second thing to note is the mention of a mayor who was sued for mismanagement of city funds. This mayor is a major figure in the events that unfolded, a truly corrupt man.
On the surface, while tragic, this storm was a completely natural disaster, but not all is as it seems dear reader. This brings us to our next chapter.
Chapter 2 - StrucTech
Recently, a structural engineer was sent to Paralake to assess the city's infastructure, and to order any repairs as needed. This engineer is as of yet unnamed, but leaves notes at the places they visit.
Nothing of note is said in this note, except perhaps the comment the engineer makes about the volume of rain in the city. The only thing to do is to follow the trail to Stalburg Pumping Station, where we find:
The engineer finds it to be slightly dilapidated, but otherwise mostly functional. An interesting note is made here about the runoff valve being stuck. A flood with the station in this state could lead to great structural damage to the city, according to this engineer. Keep this in mind for later. After this, off we go to the storm drain to search for their next note:
A cave-in has blocked the storm drain. This is clearly bad for Paralake, as there would be no way for water to easily escape during a flood, greatly increasing any damage suffered. The note also mentions a giant locked door, which is now reachable via a step-ladder presumably placed by the engineer. They say that they're going to check city hall for records of inspection, which we'll touch on later, but for now, let's follow this inspector to the city bridge:
Huh, the bridge is pretty fine, that's good to know! Nothing much of note here, I have searched both motels and have been unable to find another note.
We have seen that Paralake's flood prevention measures are in dire need of repair. But how did they get into such a state? Well, to answer that, we need to turn the clock back....
Chapter 3 - City Hall
With the engineer's notes leading to a dead end, I followed the only other lead I could find in their notes... That they went to city hall to check the archives. There, in the library, I found a single chair out of place and documents strewn across the table. The two of note are:
Take note of the names here, Mayor Wakefield and Arthur Haines. They will be pivotal characters in the story to come. We see here that the city has struck a deal with the local business "Paralake Foundry", wherein it gives them sole access to Paralake's natural mineral resources in exchange for payments to the city as well as them taking over maintainence of all infastructure.
I was confused, I had not heard of the Morko Estates before, but it did strike me as odd for two reasons. One, why did the city demolish the homes of around 4000 people? Two, more importantly, why was a civil engineer looking at these documents? They seem entirely unrelated to the job they were send here to do. Upon exploring city hall, however, I realised that this might go deeper than either of us could have imagined:
We have here an objection from the Arthur, the man who orchestrated the Paralake Foundry deal. We learn he lives in the Morko estate, and is completely against it's demolition. He threatens the mayor to take his opinion to the public.
In the second letter, we see Mayor Wakefield issuing instruction to remove Arthur from his position, and to discredit him entirely. He mentions that "With the stuff he knows, he could bring down this Government," suggesting both that the deals struck betwen Mayor Wakefield and these companies may have been less than legal, and that Arthur was, up until now, complicit in them. Keep a note of the dates here. 1935, awfully close to the great storm.
I could not find more in city hall, though my appetite for truth soon drove me to the old abadoned Paralake Foundry building to see what I could uncover.
Chapter 4 - Paralake Foundry
I had arrived at Paralake Foundry hopeful to uncover more of what had happened. Something wasn't right, and I suspect the civil engineer had thought this too. When I got there, I rummaged through old binders and dusty documents until a picture started to form. A most horrible picture indeed.
The first thing I found of note was a letter, evidently written after the meeting between the city and the company, describing the deal they had struck:
On the surface, this letter provides us with no new information. However, the second paragraph struck me as awfully insidious. Should they find a mineral deposit under occupied land, what lengths would they go to to secure it? With their money and power, and their unlimited access to the city's infastructure, surely only morals prevented them from doing something despicable? Well, dear reader, it turns out that when money is involved, morals are a very flimsy barrier indeed....
The Storm of '36 - The Great Paralake Conspiracy - Continued
Chapter 4 - Paralake Foundry - Cont. I scoured the old foundry building for longer than I care to admit. After my first discovery, I found some other documents. One, which I shall omit for brevity, is simply in prelude to the meeting held between the foundry and the city to discuss the aforementioned agreement.
Atop the rickety walkway I found one document that piqued my interest perhaps more than any other so far:
In these two documents, spaced a few weeks apart, it is disclosed that a mineral deposit had been uncovered. A very valuable mineral deposit, worth 6.8 million dollars. I crunched the numbers, and in today's currency that would be worth over $165,000,000. That's enough money to buy a fully upgraded bugatti for an entire zerg.
These documents also hold a new feature to them, redaction. The name of the Estate in question has been scrubbed out. However, given that soon after these letters were dated, the city handed over full building rights of the Morko Estate to the foundry, it would not take a detective as wisened as I to draw the conclusion that the Morko Estate is the location under which this mineral deposit was found.
I found the last sentence of the rightmost letter quite chilling. "The rest I leave in your capable hands." Something's as fishy as a sweatervest at Poisson's.
I also stumbled across this note in my search:
Darn, another hurdle. Where was this administrative building? I was worried my ferverent search had ran me into another brick wall. Luckily, this was not the case. I also found another note, which shed some light on this mysterious location:
2-4 Mill Street... Wait a minute... That's the old rundown office building down the road! What was it called again... Oh, the Southgate Center! I quickly finished my search and made haste for the old admin building, where supposedly all of the answers I was seeking would be found...
Chapter 5 - The Administrative Building I quickly made my way to the southgate center. Upon arriving, I was greeted with a drab, dreary little office with not much more to say for itself than "I exist." A place where gray folks resigned to their lot in life toiled away amidst the sound of keyboard clacks and printer beeps. It was in this place I would find the most shocking evidence yet...
The first letter I found was damning enough on it's own:
The Paralake Foundry clearly managed to influence Mayor Wakefield to give them control over the whole area of land. I believe the shops which are referred to here are perhaps the shops that were cut into the stone on the boardwalk (as mentioned on the info board,) or, given the content of the report of the vote held on the matter, the Morko Estate was located where Bazaar and the business district now stand. The location of the Estate is less important to me than it's fate.
The second paragraph shows what the Foundry get out of it. The minerals they discovered and so dearly coveted. They sought to keep this a secret, lest the true reason for the demolition become known to the public. I'm sure that would have caused quite a lot of unrest indeed....
The third paragraph is the most damning. It clearly suggests in plain text that there was financial incentive offered to the City (ergo, Mayor Wakefield, as he was later sued for "mismanagement" of city funds,) to cooperate with them on this matter. I was shocked. This was clear as day evidence of corruption at the heart of Paralake. This provided some of the answers I was looking for. This revelation was like a dagger through my chest, but what happened next would twist the blade beyond any hope of suturing the wound:
This message was both so vague yet so definitive in the elucidiation of the theories that had been threatening to burst out of my skull. My theory is that Arthur Haines managed to push back against the city to the point where they were unable to cede the land as they planned, which left the Paralake Foundry searching for another way to access the valuable mineral deposists they had found. The sentence "I hav an idea on how we could get the site into a state where the government agrees to let us take it over." Is clear indication that their intentions here were not good. They intended to sabotage the boardwalk and bring it into a state of disrepair so complete that the city would have to let them take over. At this time they had complete control over every single bit of Paralake's infastructure. They could do anything. But what they did, was horrifying.
I found one more note in the old office. The final note that I have found so far in this investigation:
The Parlake Foundry did indeed close in 1983, and with the company's dissolution, they sought to hide the evidence of the crimes that they had committed. The trail went cold here. I have no leads on the location of this safe, if it even still exists, or it's contents. I shall continue my search in the coming days. But for now, know this. The Paralake Foundry was an insidious force in Paralake, and the company committed terrible crimes against it's citizenry.
Chapter 6 - The Fate of Arthur Haines This chapter will be mostly speculation, I have no solid evidence of what happened to the man who sought to stop the Paralake Foundry from destroying the Morko Estate. However, deep in a room cut into the rock of the wall of the boardwalk, one can find a tunnel. A tunnel with a strange green light at the end. Get too close, and it dissappears, but the unnaturally cold air still feels like sharp needles against your skin. At the end of this tunnel, I found a body. I do not know who's.
I do not know what the significance of this mask is. I currently suspect this is either Arthur himself, or the engineer that preceeded me in this investigation. The corpse looks notably bloated, like it had been sitting in a body of water for some time.
On the walls, a scrawling text warns of the silent rage that infests this place:
The writing suggests that Arthur is the figure that haunts these tunnels. Perhaps it is just the scrawlings of a mad man, but I feel compelled to believe that there is some truth here. The Great Storm, it says, 1 casualty. Was that Arthur?
Alongside this, there lies the final piece of the puzzle that I could find:
The writing is faint and difficult to make out, it reads "I AM IN ROOM 12." I have my suspicions that this was written by the engineer, who wrote about staying at the motel. I must rest soon, but another day I shall return to find this "Room 12" and hopefully the ultimate answers to this macabre riddle.
Part 7 - The Theory So Far
Given every piece of evidence combined, I put forward a theory. I have not the evidence to make a case in court, all I can do it post my findings and let the people be my judge.
I believe that, upon finding the mineral deposit, the Paralake Foundry bribed Mayor Wakefield to allow them to take over the Morko Estate, to tear it down and build a new shopping center (I suspect this to be bazaar.) But, in the interlude, they would be able to extract the millions worth of precious metals that lay dormant under the earth. Upon hearing about this, Arthur Haines rebelled against his corrupt regime, threatening to go public with his knowledge of Wakefield's affairs. Wakefield then had him sent down into the tunnel, for whatever reason, during the night of the great storm. He then drowned when the storm overtook the boundaries of the sea and wrought havoc on the city.
I believe the conspiracy goes deeper still. The Paralake Foundry clearly used or damaged the city infasctructure that they had access to in order to damage the Boardwalk beyond repair. Both of these things in conjunction lead to the death of Arthur Haines. I believe his spirit is still with us, confused and angry at the betrayal of his government. Perhaps, even, there was no storm at all.
I must soon rest, as today has been long and eventful. I trust the people will consider my findings. Everyone in this story is likely long dead, or not far off, but we can still honour the memory of those affected by the city's grave deeds.
