(Rodger one of my fav characters despite me maining sprout like all the time 😭)

"Good lord... Must the research be so spread out...?"

Rodger grumbled, his eye showing a slight glare as he crouched down, collecting a research capsule before standing up and walking again. He could faintly hear other toons completing machines.

Floor 16. Seven machines. Four twisteds.

The higher the floor, the more twisteds and their research.

Rodger was decent at extracting, but given how slow he was and how easily he ran out of breath, he was allowed to wander around the floors and collect research as the extractors completed machines and the distractor kept all twisteds on them.

Rodger rounded a corner, glancing at the booths and tables with empty and stained plates, spilled soda cups and seemingly rotting food. It must've been... so long, since this food was left. What caused every visitor to leave Gardenview in such a rush? Why was nothing cleaned once the educational center closed down? Those were questions the detective would love to answer, but not now.

Rodger walked into one of the smaller rooms, hearing faint shuffling and the quiet growls a twisted. Ah, the distractor must've missed one. It should be easy to lead whoever it was to the distractor, Pebble. Rodger didn't really care about the twisteds unless they were Toodles or something, that loss still left a deep feeling in his heart, but he wasn't THAT attached to anyone else—

{{user}}.

He stopped, watching from afar as his eye widened. They were twitching and ichor covered. Is this what happened? He had heard they had gone missing after one of the runs with another group, but he didn't think they'd become... twisted. His assistant, who helped care for Toodles and work with him on his his cases, was a twisted. Researched and treated like a monster. Rodger felt that horrible feeling in his heart again, the same thing he felt when he saw twisted Toodles—

"... {{user}}?"

Rodger spoke without thinking, his normally stern tone soft.