WEEK 5; TRIAL

[killerwaves]

TRIAL

Three dead, one vote. This might be a pit of a pickle, huh? Perhaps appropriately, the kittybots are serving pickles of all flavors today, along with food that might remind you of your childhood like ants on a log, gummy worm sundaes and adorable toast in sweet and savory profiles. To drink, are their best attempts at replicating the DD refreshers with a whole array of silly straws.

Off to the side in a booth of their own are the bodies as well as attendant kittybots (well two bodies and one arm); simply request which body you'd like to look at and the kitty bots will direct you appropriately, given the number of arms floating around. The kittybots continue to do their best.

(( OOC: Welcome to your third trial! You'll have 7 hours (8PM EST/5PM PST) to vote one (1) person guilty of murder. Since this is scapegoat style, finding the correct killer is not mandatory!

Please remember to vote before then unless you've spoken to a mod, as votes are our stand-in for AC. ))

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CATHERD

[idologue]

[ They'd been making steady progress for a while and now it seems like they've come to a standstill. Nobody is willing to point fingers and they are coming up empty for new conclusions. But Lacus can't allow them to idle around when the clock is ticking. ]

We have up to three culprits to find today, even if only one will need to be condemned. To achieve this, we will have to be thorough and quick. Please allow me to try and summarize the conclusions we have reached so far. If I am missing details or if I say something objectionable, please do point it out. Any contradiction could be important.

The relevant locations to Nona's murder appear to be the aviary, the arcade and the snow room. Someone took pheasants from the snow room, killed and bled them, and then dropped the bloody scalpel from those acts in the arcade. We have not yet discovered the purpose behind these actions.

What we have concluded with some level of clarity is that Nona met her killer in the arcade. Within it, she likely tried to defend herself with a tantrum scream - shattering the glass in the room and momentarily incapacitating her assailant. This gave her a chance to escape towards the rail, but the culprit eventually caught up and hit her head with a nailbat, likely killing her there. They then carried her to the snow room where they blanketed her with a coat and hid the nailbat in a snowman.

I consider it possible that both the coat and the gloves that were found with Nona's body were worn by the assailant first. The coat showed glass shards while we also have strange glass shards that were found in the aviary. Another point of interest is a mysterious water puddle left in the arcade. Was more snow or ice involved?

The relevant locations for Zelkov's murder appear to be the garden and the laboratory. Zelkov was attacked in the garden and the fight led to the lab. There is a crater in front of the garden, indicating powers were used in the battle. Interestingly, there is no notable amount of blood until we get to the laboratory.

The lab is where things get messy. Chemical bottles were knocked over and created poison gas. There is evidence of poisoning on Zelkov's body but on none of us, indicating that the culprit had healing abilities or was immune to poison gas. The option of them wearing a gas mask exists but is negligible because putting it on in the middle of battle would have been a hassle.

At some point in this fight Zelkov's arm was crushed and then cleanly removed - it was subsequently stored in the freezer, a place Zelkov tried to access while gravely injured. Whether he placed it there or tried to retrieve it remains unclear.

Further, we are looking for a suspect on the taller side as indicated by the footprints. Between healing ability and size, this case may have the clearest culprit profile out of the three.

Meanwhile Alice's murder seems to have taken place around the railway from Dodo to Sungem. Something, likely another power, caused a crater there which resulted in the destruction of both her riding crop and the device used to control her familiar, Athos. Our running theory is that Athos devoured her whole, leaving only her arm behind.

However, Athos himself also got into a fight and was injured, including claw and bitemarks. We have not yet figured out what may have caused these injuries and in what relation this fight stands to the murder. It might be that Alice was making Athos fight her killer before Athos was freed...?

[townmusician]

[Hm.]

The water at the arcade could be from someone who has powers that effect it in some way? I know Alice brought up having water magic herself, but I don't know about anyone else.

[The profiles are pretty vague...]

[plunges]

Zelkov had something called "Torrential Roar", but it seems unlikely that he was in the arcade.

[townmusician]

[why can't y'all have powers with normal ass names that make sense!!!! torrential roar could be anything!!

but he also wasn't witness to zelkov in the hot xiao boss fight, so rip.]

He has no reason to go there, at least not last night.

[idologue]

Speaking of powers, I think we should take a look at the craters.

The crater in front of the garden may have been an impact crater, but the one in Alice's case was smooth. I wonder what kind of power it would take to create that?

[necrotiem]

... Clean like a sphere?

preliminary foot check results!!

[chrysaline]

[ She is hustling so much here. ]

So far, Crea, Beelzebub, Wang Lu, and Wei Wuxian are about the right height for the footprints I found. Probably one set was Zelkov's, wasn't it? So... um, around that height. [ Or someone wearing very large shoes. She's frowning a little. ] I really don't think any of them would have had a reason to fight Zelkov, though.

Re: preliminary foot check results!!

[idologue]

Out of these four, only Crea and Wang Lu also have healing abilities, which would put them into the culprit profile.

[ But what reason would either of them have to harm Zelkov? To cut off his arm like this? ]

Re: preliminary foot check results!!

[gravitys]

Crea wouldn't need to cut off Zelkov's arm to keep him from usin' his ring.

[dakicover]

I know none of you have any reason to believe me, but I have no reason to fight Zelkov. [ he sighs. ] He returned something to me that was really important to me a couple of weeks ago that I thought I wouldn't see again. I owe him for that.

[chrysaline]

I think Doctor Baizhu would be about the right height as well.

[ Since they're being thorough here. She hesitates, lacing her fingers together. ]

[chosenwang]

My healing doesn't really work like that. It only works if I break bones and it isn't instant. [ He does hold up both of his hands for her to look ]

[dupiety]

I must also restate that the snowman had a very large quantity of blood inside of it. I...suppose that is where the bird blood may have ended up, but the nailbat was inserted into the snowman and Beel only detected Nona's blood on it so I had doubts.

[solutionary]

Unless there was some requirement for which finger Zelkov's ring was worn on, I find it more likely he might have been trying to retrieve it. His assailant might have worn gloves to avoid leaving prints and that's why we didn't see any of their prints on the door, and it might be why their hands wouldn't show any kind of acid exposure. [We all have eyes right? No one is mysteriously Not wearing their usual gloves right now, right?]

[idologue]

That seems likely... The ring was his most powerful weapon.

[butcherspice]

Been puzzlin' over that crater for a while. Was more a depression in the ground than somethin' smashing into it like the others craters we've had.

[idologue]

There is one ability here that sounds like it might be able to achieve that, but I can't be certain.

[butcherspice]

Wouldn't happen to be gravity, would it? Goin' through all the things you lot can do, that was the one that stood out the most to me.

[dupiety]

Hmm. Such as a force being applied to it, rather than it being crashed into?

[butcherspice]

I'm thinkin' something like that, yeah.

[chrysaline]

[ Oh, hm! ]

There are the trees that were knocked over, too. There weren't any cuts or burns or anything, so... something just hit them really hard, maybe?

[idologue]

The trees were in Zelkov's path, weren't they? I don't know if they were necessarily caused by the same thing as the crater at Alice's crime scene...

[ But. Hm. ]

[chosenwang]

[ He's not going to bring up that the snowman feels like something Nona would have made... let's not derail this. ]

Nona had wood splinters in her mouth and slight gray staining to her teeth. Not sure if that means anything.

As for Zelkov's case... he or his assailant might have punched the cabinet to make the dent. That may also be where his arm was cut off.

[gluttoning]

...I'd like to check the gloves I found in the cold storage lockers to see who might be a match.

I don't think we'll rule everybody out. But we can rule out some, at least. I think.

[dakicover]

We can give it a shot.