Introduction:    

It is midnight, September 21st, 1933. You stand outside the gates of Vane Hall, a regal estate of indeterminate age whose edifice, once stately and formal, has diminished into neglect and disrepair. The cruel shock of a mid-September frost has left the grounds even more bleak than usual; a recent lightning strike and subsequent fire the day before after consumed a portion of the gardens, blackening a portion of the mansion’s visage. No romantic charm to this autumnal transition; instead, a battery of unpredictable squalls bearing vicious hail and icy cold rain telegraphed by unreal cloud formations. As you weigh your options vis-a-vis accessing the grounds, you go over what you know:

In six hours, the entire estate of Dr Jackson Vane will become a public asset, as per his last wishes. But due to the lax fine print contained in his will, a legally gray “finders keepers” period will exist between midnight and 6 AM. Informally, word has gotten around that the Vane family, who long since abandoned the estate during the Doctor’s secretive convalescence, have declined involvement in protecting the estate and its assets in the interval.

(Anthropology, Archaeology, Biology, Geology, Medicine, Physics, Theology – Some years ago, Dr Jackson Vane, a preeminent pathologist, suddenly began exhibiting what seemed to be symptoms of severe neurological disease and in spite of his public battle to manage its deleterious effects for months after, he was presumed to have become convalescent. If he is dead, his scientific legacy is at stake.)

[Anthropology Spend] Dr Jackson Vane belongs to a strain of religious adherents who seek to reconcile humankind’s innate divinity with the natural world. Throughout history, these figures have consistently emerged as key sources of of revolutionary, disruptive transformations in all cultures. These black swans, in the 19th century, have been largely absent on the scale that they were in millennia prior and it’s very likely that Dr Jackson Vane was destined to become one.

[Archaeology Spend] When invoked in the esteemed halls of academia, Dr Jackson Vane’s Antarctic expedition elicits rebukes and aversion equally. Vane’s mission to “witness God at the end of the world” was not as proudly supported by his peers in the scientific community as it was by the church-affiliated financial backers. But a pair of young, ambitious archaeologists joined Vane's ill-fated endeavour regardless. While all who participated in the venture returned worse for wear, the archaeologists in question unceremoniously swore off the whole field of study to become missionaries, claiming to have actually encountered an sword-bearing angel who commanded them to warn the world of the coming battle between Satan and God. However, you distinctly recall the tools they brought with them coming back with clear indicators they'd been used for intensive excavation.

[Biology Spend] Around the time of Dr Vane's return from Antarctica, there was a mysterious rumor whispered lasciviously in the dimly-lit after-hours gatherings of biology students of all stripes. Someone had supposedly found evidence that "brain sand", the extremely fine organic crystals present in the pineal gland, were absent in primitive humans. Given the mysterious nature of the crystals, few who even felt inclined to engage with the provocative claim asked the nature of the source of the speculation, instead conspiring to craft a theory on how the crystals developed independently of the pineal gland itself. As you overheard the aforementioned intoxicated imaginings, you recall another neuroanatomist arguing that the pineal gland must be responsible for the regulation of sleep processes, an issue of great concern to chronic insomniac Dr Vane.

[Geology Spend] The Geological Society of London, like most of London's respected scholarly institutions, publicly deflected any questions about their involvement in Dr Vane's Antarctic expedition, never officially rejecting the opportunity or urging any associated geologists to do so themselves. Due to the immeasurable esteem of the Geological Society, any effort to tie them to the unidentified geologists who did go to Antarctica with Vane was futile, but the sophisticated sample extraction equipment that accompanied them was unmistakable. But the real mystery is the bizarre fixation that subsumed several prominent Society geologists in the wake of the Expedition, focusing on hunting specific, ultra-rare crystalline minerals.

[Medicine Spend] For a short period of time, the papers covered Dr Vane's neurological deterioration with typical zeal, documenting his outbursts, fits of inchoate vocalizing and insensible raving. The striking feature of his condition was how relatively innocuous it was: he frequently recognized and attempted to suppress his episodes, increasingly failing, but whatever syndrome was at work, it appeared limited almost entirely to higher functions. The symptoms were horrifying but not at all unheard of and certainly it was expected some kind of drug regimen would provide relief. The sequence of his disappearance and now death simply does not follow from the medical facts, at least based on what you've encountered.

[Physics Spend] Physics was never Dr Vane's friend. He was once quoted referring to the study of physics as "a poor substitute for honest procrastination". Imagine your surprise when you spotted Dr Vane at the Royal Observatory Greenwich, trying to surreptitiously listen in on a controversial presentation on chirality, parity conservation and "mirror matter". As the wildcard Danish lecturer Hob Petersen boldly proposed that Lord Kelvin's famous "dark matter" and his "mirror matter" were indistinguishable, Dr Vane turned his head and made direct eye contact with you as he pursed his lips to whistle soundlessly. A glass of water on the lectern then shattered explosively and, in the ensuing chaos, you lost sight of Dr Vane.

[Theology Spend] Dr Jackson Vane was once one a beloved and respected bastion of British Idealism, a philosophical movement of Hegelian Idealism that proposed an Absolute upon which the basis of all existence derives. Through his advocacy of Hegelian Idealism, Vane posited himself as a bridge between the Church and the scientific world. But the Antarctic expedition may have stretched his credibility too far when its inscrutable outcome was first subject to intense criticism then buried unceremoniously as Vane's disease progressed. The Church now seems to have forgotten Vane's existence and his theological ambitions, even going so far as to suggest that Vane's Antarctic expedition was a swindle.

(Accounting, Law, Cop Talk, Bureaucracy, Streetwise) - Dr Jackson Vane, once a high profile scientist and revered crusader of moral values, has almost certainly been in convalescent care for almost a year now but don't believe he is dead, or if he is, there's unethical machinations involved. The numbers don't add up.)

[Accounting Spend] Dr Jackson Vane most certainly is not dead. Based on the figures you've seen coming in and out of the Vane household since his convalescence, there's been no indication of serious health problems and certainly the upkeep of his care is not indicative of anyone suffering from anything requiring intensive medical treatment. Still, the numbers have been relatively flat and shrinking for quite some time; as absurd as it sounds, the explanation that process of elimination brought you to is that he is catatonic and his family has given up keeping his estate.

[Law Spend]