week 2 - trial

[productions]

week two trial



[At 9 AM precisely, the old grandfather clock chimes once again, and the doors to the drawing room are opened. They will remain open until everyone has come inside, after which they will shut behind them. It is not possible to leave on your own, although perhaps if you have a specific purpose the hostess will allow you to go, as long as you are accompanied by a partner.

The room is set up comfortably, with several tables by the fireplace set out to assist with the trial. The Hostess will also remain in a seat near the fireplace, next to the scales on the mantle. At lunch, the doors will open to bring in a large meal on an automatically rolling buffet, and at 3 PM, tea and finger sandwiches will be served. You'll be able to enjoy the trial in comfort, of course, but the information cards set out on tables will not allow you to forget your true purpose here.

At 7 PM, the trial will adjourn for the day. Players will be escorted by the Hostess to the ballroom, where dinner and wine will be served until 10 PM, at which point players will be required to return to their wings in groups with their wingmates and will be locked in their bedrooms until 8:30 AM the following morning.]

victim



suspects



Character Statuses
Setting
Manor Rules
Cheat Sheet
Voting

Comments

[speakveryclearly]

Since we're running out of time, I'd like to testify to the best of my ability. because at this point we're nowhere near a consensus, and it would be just hypocritical to let the flip of a coin send Annie onto the chopping block when you all got so emotional about the injustice of a defenseless teenaged girl dying last week.

Though we've talked some about the motive in selecting Minatsuki, what we've neglected is why someone would kill at all in the first place. Not only would someone be completely free to not put down their secret or put down a false one [says the girl who didn't put down her secret, but she barges on], that's not the only motive somebody would have in committing a murder either. Even the memory incentive isn't the only one. We've completely neglected the overarching motive here.

No matter what, rankings aside, anyone who murders a player may be granted permanent immunity. If this game goes on as briefly as four weeks - that's how long one earth month lasts, isn't it? That's an extremely optimistic estimate for the length of this game. Four victims and four executions makes a total of eight deaths, and that's assuming nobody takes advantage of the rule allowing up to two kills in one week. Eight out of thirty is a worse chance of dying than one in four.

And maybe someone who couldn't risk the effects of their death would refrain from engaging at all. Maybe. [Her eyes settle in a space deliberately not quite on Spain while clearly in that general direction.]

Or, just possibly, such a person would have everything to gain from gaining that immunity and preventing the odds from falling in their disfavor. If there were an entire coven of other rainbow drinkers with me alleging that we can't enter rooms uninvited, would you believe me if someone's respiteblock contained signs of forced entry and a body cut in half with a chainsaw?

There is one suspect on our list who resides in the sapphire wing, whose alibi from six to seven o'clock is much thinner than paper, and whom we know for certain to be armed in a manner that would prevent proof of close physical contact with the body.

That person is Ukraine.

This isn't an allegation I make lightly as the only other resident of the sapphire wing up for execution. There is nothing in her alibi that contradicts the conjecture she left her room early in the morning, waited for Minatsuki to emerge in the garden, introduced her to her friend the pitchfork, and then climbed up to the sapphire bathroom window to wash up and sneak back into her room before anyone else was even awake. Even the dirt remaining on the windowsill can be explained by the imperative for speed - which, unlike some other suspects including myself, is not listed as a particular aptitude of hers on her card.

I will be happy to change my vote if any exonerating evidence emerges, and this is no personal judgment or even a particularly strong condemnation of your alleged actions. I'm not going to pretend there's never a good reason to commit murder. We were all selected in advance; there is nobody in this game who wouldn't be pressured to take a life under any circumstance, and I'm including myself in that number.

If you execute me for my forcefulness, or continued suspicion on account of my sapphire wing residence, [some cracks are starting to show in her facade but she tries to press on] that's the conclusion you've come to and I won't begrudge that either, as long as you don't begrudge my own honest interpretation of events.

[motheringnation]

[Just....shakes her head.]

I'm...sorry. But I didn't do it. I know that's stupid to say because you have no reason to trust me. But I didn't.

You can look at my pitchfork, there will be no blood on it. Even scrubbing wouldn't be able to wash away so much blood after a single day. I don't know what else to say, besides that if I were the killer, I would have made sure to have a much better alibi then the one I had.

...I suppose I spent so much time afraid I was going to be killed that I didn't think of trying to make sure people saw me at all times of the day and night.

[inthebones]

You can't just say that. You must give evidence that someone else could feasibly have performed the crime or else you'll be executed. Don't you understand?

This isn't the time to look hopeless and afraid - if anything, you and the rest of the suspects should have been working hardest of all to solve this crime throughout the entirety of the trial.

[speakveryclearly]

[YEAH SUSAN GET IT GIRL!!!]

Besides, with Minatsuki's hemophilia there would be less blood to get on the weapon than there was when the crime was discovered.

[inthebones]

I'm not saying this because I believe you fully, either.

[Susan snaps perhaps a bit more harshly than she ought.]

If she cares about her people, she should be fighting for her life. She's an anthropomorphic; there are duties and responsibilities we must attend to, it doesn't matter how we feel. You can't be afraid and withdrawn, not here, not now! None of us want to make this choice. Not like this. Convince us otherwise! If you don't, you'll be gone. Haven't you seen since this morning that you'd be the sacrifice? No one would want to choose to execute two young girls...

['we'?????]

[balzams]

[Forgive him, with the clock ticking and with his constant insistence that Ukraine can't be the culprit Latvia isn't exactly the most elloquent person right now]

Why... Why are you making the assumption that someone would immediately try and gain immunity through murder? There are much much safer ways! The popularity, right? Being useful in the trial. Those who were useful were rewarded. A-and even if you tried your best and didn't get it it's so much less riskier!

Miss Takami's body was slashed! Not stabbed! If there were stab wounds then the report would have been clear, or someone would have found them or something!

And why are you calling her secret into question when you didn't even provide one? Isn't that even more suspicious than making one up?

[speakveryclearly]

If you have to know I read Troll Twilight and I liked it. I don't care that it romanticizes codependency or borders on hemotically suspicious abuse. The writing is masterful and completely evocative of actual adolescent emotions.

I don't know how you can see competing for eight or so slots out of thirty as less risky than allowing a one-in-five chance for your own execution after which you would be guaranteed permanent immunity - not just popularity that could fluctuate from week to week. The complete guarantee that nothing here could come back to hurt your "citizens" or however that works. Nations go to war, don't they? Doesn't that carry a strong implication of being willing to take a life or two if it's for the sake of the country? [She's an alien she is really blurry on this whole Earth concept of countries]

[balzams]

[His expression darkens and he clenches his fists]

Don't talk about it like it's something we just decide on a whim! We are not our governments and if people weren't so consumed with power then maybe we wouldn't have to!

[Sigh]

I know I can't make you understand, you probably only have a few people you care for in comparison but surely you can grasp the concept of survival. It's just not fair to risk hurting people that aren't even involved.

I just... she wouldn't do it! She just wouldn't! And I know I can't explain to you why but I just I know...

You know you're just as suspicious as she is! You constantly go on about how you wouldn't be so foolish to use the same distractions as the last culprit but for someone who's special skills list 'bloodlust' you sure spent a lot of time in the garden failing to notice the slashed up body pooling in it's own blood!

[speakveryclearly]

[Unlike everyone else criticizing her conjecture, there's a little something in Kanaya that snaps when Latvia speaks, like maybe a small stick or something.]

Do you think, do you really think that only a nation could comprehend the weight of so many other people's lives, holding that in your hands? [Her right hand unconsciously clenches, into a fist, and stays round when it relaxes, like she's holding a ball.]

I gave my testimony on the topic of that discovery earlier - the obscuring of the scene. Believe it or don't as you choose - vote for me or don't as you choose, do you think I haven't acknowledged every single suspicious aspect of my actions? All I ask is the same courtesy for Ukraine.

[pasodoble]

She wasn't the only one that was armed! It's true she arrived here with a possession from her world but everyone here received a knife!

And why would she attack Minatsuki? Everyone knew she had powers and that she was a dangerous target. Why not pick someone easier? Why risk getting yourself hurt when getting caught meant losing everything?

[speakveryclearly]

I don't know! Why would anyone choose Minatsuki? Because she was alone? The suspect nature of her choice as a victim applies to pretty much any culprit, doesn't it?

[pasodoble]

Because they knew they had the means to get away with it. They were strong enough to overpower her and fast enough to get away.

Maybe even as fast as a vampire!

( However fast that is but whatever! )

[speakveryclearly]

Spain. Considering a murder completed "as fast as a vampire" can would have taken less time, wouldn't I have had plenty of time to clean the dirt off the windowsill of my wing?

[vytis]

Your assumptions is as follows, then: Miss Ukraine either drops down from the wall or waits in the bushes for Miss Takami with her pitchfork and, incapacitating her in some way, proceeds to stab her to death with the pitchfork to avoid getting blood on her.

After this, she approaches this bloody corpse and, with a knife, cuts into all of the pitchfork wounds. This would involve turning the body over, of course. She does this without getting any blood on her. Yes?

[speakveryclearly]

...

...

Can't you slash someone with a pitchfork? If you move it in such a manner as--[she makes a strange stiff arm gesture implying the scoring of a line across skin with a pitchfork]

And couldn't you turn somebody's body over with a pitchfork? Isn't that what it's for, turning over hay?

[motheringnation]

They do not work that way!

[Ukraine is finally starting to lose her temper.]

You kill someone with a pitchfork by impaling them. It is a blunt instrument, it is not a knife.

[vytis]

It wouldn't make a clean cut like a blade would, and those wounds seemed to be from something like a blade. Even assuming she turned the body over with the pitchfork, she would have to approach the body to cut it up.

[pasodoble]

Then you would have a set of cuts and gashes that were parallel!

[speakveryclearly]

With so many cuts and gashes, how easy would such a pattern be to obscure?

[humanic]

A couple of problems.

One - I don't think Minatsuki was actually killed with a pitchfork. Cleaning it aside, since Ukraine's the only one that can attest to how easy it is to wash, it doesn't explain all of the stab wounds. She could have made them herself to hide the pitchfork marks, but then we're back to the problem as to how she got away without getting any blood on her or the bruises on her neck.

Two...okay, actually I don't have a second one. We can't say for sure she wouldn't kill someone for immunity or that she wasn't lying about her secret, so motivation doesn't come into play here. But that one is still a pretty big one. It doesn't make her less suspicious than you or Annie, since all of you would have equal opportunities to kill Minatsuki, but it doesn't make her more either.

[speakveryclearly]

...I guess there are some flaws in the theory the pitchfork was the weapon. Still, the sapphire placement makes her more suspicious than Leonhardt.

[humanic]

I dunno about that. If you can climb up to one window, you can probably climb to another.

Susan brought up a theory that I think might explain everything - the killer poisoned Minatsuki, which caused her to become disoriented enough that when she tried attacking them, she only wound up hurting herself. It could also explain the vomit and the eye dilation, and why our killer got away cleanly - they didn't need to wound her at all.

The question is...how do we prove who did it?

[speakveryclearly]

...

We don't. There's no fingerprinting kit and there are too many bottles of poison to check for prints in the time we have anyway.

[tsarcasm]

Stiles has a point about the window thing. I was thinking about this when I was investigating. The culprit could have left the dirt on the Sapphire bathroom window and climbed in to throw suspicion on someone living there. After all, it's not like you need a key to get out, only to get in though the door.

[throe]

[ Rapture truly loves this desperation in the final hours, it's a way better performance than she's witnessed (outside of The Stingers own, of course) in awhile that she's not going to ruin it. So, she settles herself in a neat little corner, rolling her crystal ball between her hands, and enjoys the rest of the show. ]