"Of course I'm dangerous.  I'm police.  I can do terrible things to people with impunity."

That's the full quote, which doesn't fit as a thread title.

Here at the end, the last two moves of the game will be terrible things.  The next time Penelope isn't immune she is going to wind up as a unanimous vote, but the string of betrayal will be the worst because of my vote against her.  Without an immunity win of his own Hercule will either follow her, or he will lead the way for her.  No amount of talk throughout this merge about reaching final four together and amicably discussing our best options there will stay my hand.  I can only hope that he is true to his word of no hard feelings for what must be done.  We play to have fun.  We play to win.

Lucifer and Leon will both have advocates on the jury.  This is not so simple as getting to the end for an easy win.  The final tribal council will be a battle all its own.  But the basic calculus has not changed.  Facing them is my best option, it is how I give myself the strongest chance to claim overall victory.  To do anything else would be a disservice.  We don't play these games to enable our friends to beat us.  We're friends because we enjoy the same game.

These are my reads on the jurors...
Detective Pikachu: A vote that is mine to lose.  I must honestly present the fact that I could never have gone all the way with him, or even particularly deep in the merge.  Shedding the unbreakable pair image was the key to my success.  If this makes him sore, I could indeed lose him.  But if he respects it, he votes for me.
Scruff McGruff: The closest thing I have to a sure vote on this jury.  He will also respect Leon's game, but he explicitly told me he wished to be voted out in my stead because I had the better chance to recover my position.  That proved to be correct.  Ride or Die isn't just in the game, it's a jury vote too.
Grouch Cop: This will be either a vote for Lucifer or a vote for me.  This is a vote I very likely need to win to guarantee overall victory.  I can only hope to demonstrate that my gameplay and strategy was superior and deserving of his respect.
Jake Peralta: Probably Leon's biggest jury advocate, though it's certainly hard to be sure what Jake actually values as a juror.  He made a lot of hay during the merge about being betrayed by me and by everybody else, but in the end he was a unanimous vote so I am no more culpable than anyone else.  Not a vote I'm counting on getting.
Lennie Brisco: I certainly hope that Lennie is a vote I can get.  He doesn't seem like the type to cast his vote for the person he thought he was dragging to the end for an easy win after that person unceremoniously chucks him out the door.  I believe my pitch about strategy and awareness will be able to sway him.
Judy Hopps: Judy might be a vote completely up for grabs but I think she'll wind up voting for Lucifer
Penelope Garcia: As long as it's a unanimous vote against Penelope I think I'll wind up getting her jury vote, but if Lucifer doesn't vote against her that might be enough to get her in his camp.
Hercule Poirot: Like Lennie, a vote I need to win based on strategy and awareness.  More than anyone Hercule is going to be the person on the jury who informs other jurors of how deeply strategic I've been all through this merge.  His eventual elimination is as important for this purpose as it is to remove a strong FTC threat.

My winning number here is four votes, because I don't believe either Lucifer or Leon will sweep the other four and if they do I believe I can get both of their tiebreaker votes.  I think I can do that with Pikachu, Scruff, Lennie and Hercule even if don't carry anyone else.

I can see the winning formula.  Now I need to get there.

This is whole different game than it was two rounds ago.  I didn't play those two rounds very well, and I'm lucky that I'm still here.  The only thing that kept me alive is that I had people in front of me that were either more disruptive (Pika) or made bigger mistakes (Scruff).

Let's have a look at the current game state for old Rust.  Final nine.

Hercule - My work getting close to Hercule may be the thing that saved me from an untimely demise.  Since the merge I've been working an angle with Hercule about the two of us needing each other down the road.  After Pikachu went out I explained my tough position vis-a-vis my very public connection to him, and brought up the very similar connection between Hercule and Judy.  We talked about how a pairing that public is a ticking time bomb until people decide it has to be split up, and I assured him I would be his ace in the hole to get ahead of that moment and survive it.  Thus Hercule became the unexpected person in my corner while my name was on the block this round, and likely did quite a lot of work to make Scruff a viable alternative.
Grouch Cop - Keeping up good communication with Grouch throughout the round we were on opposite sides of the Cheddar vote is paying dividends.  We continue to communicate well, and he's actually the most reliable person for me when it comes to responding actively and informing me of what he knows.  He's not very well looped in to the core, but he's extremely valuable to me.  Tonight after the Scruff elimination I proposed a F2 alliance to him.  He's sleeping on it.  I believe he's in a position of needing me to advance his game, and I hope he sees us as evenly matched finale opponents.
Lucifer - We don't talk all that much, but he may not talk much to anyone.  We've been on the same page about things lately because we're both outside the power core.  He would be an ideal third if Grouch accepts my F2 offer, and as part of that offer I did ask him his thoughts on doing F3 with Lu.  High risk high reward, because if Grouch decides against it he has every reason to just air it out and throw me under the bus, but I think it's the right move for both of us and will be the right move for Lucifer as well.

Penelope - Quite important to me in the short term.  We talk a lot, because no one else talks that much to us.  Well, she could be more looped in than I know, but regardless I believe she feels she needs me around as a backstop against getting totally sidelined.  She's also a big challenge threat which makes her a decent shield, because any round she isn't immune I can hope she would be the name on the block instead of me if people try to push the easy push against a member of the 12th.
Leon - So much more cutthroat than I gave him credit for.  He's going to try to apologize and rebuild something, or he's at least going to pretend that until he can vote me out, but I won't be trusting him again.
Jake - Absolute madlad.  Overplays like crazy.  Reminds me of my own earlier games honestly.  Unreliable as hell.
Lennie - Someone I haven't had a good connection with yet, but the most important person for me to build up a connection with quickly.  I'm airing out a lot of Jake's old stuff from the last two rounds with him now as a way to make that happen quickly.
Judy - We've agreed that we're both too busy and so rarely online at the same time that we should completely drop the smalltalk and just talk strategy as necessary.  Unfortunately, she still ignores me, so she must not find me strategically necessary.

In terms of a path to the end, it's still going to be a rough road.  Grouch and Lucifer would be pretty ideal endgame partners but it's not entirely likely we can all make it there.  I also need to pay attention to how perceptions of Grouch change because if he is seen to be playing well from here to the end he could build a resume that would beat me.  I don't have a specific boot order.  I want Jake and Leon to go away, I want Hercule to use me to stab Judy and then I want to let him be my shield in the 6/5/4 area until he gets got.  I want Penelope to take a fall for me somewhere in here for her challenge threat status.  I'm hoping I can leverage the position of being the last of the 12th to be a swing vote some time.  I think Scruff and Pikachu will be jury votes for me if I get there, but I don't think there are too many other people left in this thing who will go to the jury with a particular inclination to vote for me so I really need strong threats out before they can make the finale.  If I do make it I'm going to have an uphill battle and will need a really good FTC performance.  I want to win for myself of course, but I also want to make some hay to give Scruff some satisfaction after he took such a hard fall this round in a way that saved my sorry ass.  I hope people don't know that Scruff will be strongly in my corner as a juror, and they don't see me as having a strong case to win.

I'll continue with my episode numbering even though I'm way off the pace of the game eliminations now, just so this confessional reads in some sort of sensible order when this thing is all over.  Which, incidentally, it might be for me this very round.  I still feel very likely safe right now, but there's a decent chance I'm going to have votes at this Tribal Council which is never a good thing.

At present the vote remains on Cheddar, and we should have four votes locked in on that with only Grouch Cop not committing while he looks for alternatives - of which I am apparently his preference.  I would rather not have the minority vote on me, but the only alternative may be to claim I'm willing to let Pika go which could come back to bite me if they forward Pika anything I say like that.

Grouch Cop is trying to run the show here, he's going to be able to dictate Cheddar's vote and it looks like his goal is to turn Pikachu and I against each other.  Pika being somewhat enamored with Grouch I suspect it was starting to work, but Grouch also got a bit overconfident and said some pretty negative things about Pikachu to me which I was then able to send to Pika.  So for now it looks like I've nipped that in the bud and Pika is agreeing with me and Scruff that Grouch is not to be trusted in the long term.

Scruff McGruff is my main alliance.  The next layer is Rust/Scruff/Pika and Rust/Scruff/Leon.  Leon and Pika are now burying the hatchet after an awkward start and both thinking along the lines of a Rust/Scruff/Leon/Pika alliance.  Because of the onion-like nature of this setup I'm confident Scruff and I survive even in a scenario where this phase lasts four rounds and we lose out.  If that happened, we'd probably end up sticking with Leon.

If the merge doesn't immediately follow this elimination it would be best for us to go to Tribal Council again so we can eliminate Grouch pre merge.

I'll coordinate via Discord for a good starting time

This tribe is in trouble when we hit a swap.  That's the downside of winning so much immunity.  None of these bonds are forged in fire yet, and the rest of the game will be out for our blood.  Someone will wind up under a bus.  I have to be ready to make sure that person isn't me.

Penelope is trying to create an alliance between myself, her and Kate.  She played coy when bringing it up with me, but she told Kate she asked me about an alliance.  I'm already involved with Fox + Hound + Chan and Fox + Hound + Pikachu.  I can't be in competing alliances with this entire tribe.  I told Penelope I currently prefer keeping a trusting relationship with Kate without making anything explicit, and I told Kate I trust her a lot more than I trust Penelope.  I'm not going to sign on to any official agreement of a group there.

To Heiji's question about my performance in challenge 3:

There were a few categories which I thought lined up well with character choices, moreso than player personalities.  There was no particular method to my madness.  That score was quite lucky.

To Heiji's question about comparing Chan and Pikachu:

Chan is a poor communicator.  He would be the first boot from this tribe without the group.  He's going to struggle to make new friends after swaps, meaning he's more likely to stay loyal and he's an easy out if that's my only play to survive a round.  He's also the only person on this tribe I see as a good endgame matchup at this point.

Pikachu is strictly an ally of convenience and circumstance right now.  I'm firmly attached to Nick's coattails, so when Pika and Nick formed an alliance I was onboard by default.  If Pika and I wind up on a new tribe away from Nick and/or Chase I'm going to look elsewhere for new friends.  I still don't see him as someone who benefits me in the long term.

For my abject failures

"Of course I've always taken a lot of notes. I mean you never know what the thing's gonna be, do you? A little detail somewhere way down the line makes you say: ah!
...breaks the case."

In this thread I will compile my notes on individual players, alliances, items, advantages and any other clues relevant to my journey in the game.