The Last Shift at Pier Nine

The letters sat in a shoebox for three decades because his daughter couldn't stand to read them sooner. Eastmoor, summer of '94: a lifeguard finishes his shift, walks down to the water after dark, and doesn't come home. The coroner wrote accident and moved on. Everyone else did too. Now the daughter's a nurse with tired eyes and a question she can't put down — the last thing her father ever wrote was a name. Ask Rosalind about the boat. We don't know who Rosalind is yet. We don't know whose boat. What we know is that a young man who spent his nights watching the lake saw something out there he wasn't supposed to see, and Port Merrow's got a long memory for the things it decides not to remember. The archive room is cold. The witnesses are old now. Somebody's still protecting somebody.

★★★ — 3-star case: a longer trail with two gates and a riddle or two.

Cold case. The crime is years old; the investigation is present-day Port Merrow. The evidence is what survived — yellowed files, old notebooks, witnesses who were young then — and the trail is colder than a fresh one at the same star rating.

One purchase, three attempts. A started team is an attempt. Only your first attempt lands on the leaderboard.

Team size sets the difficulty. Pick 1–4 detectives; it locks when the case starts. Bigger teams get more branches, another gate and extra questions.

Teammates need no account. Share the join code or the link; up to three guests can sit at the table. Only the leader starts, pauses and submits.

Score. Right answers first, then fewer rides, then time. Going back to a place you have seen is free; a wrong gate code costs a ride.