Take Responsibility.

[kingmakereffect]

And once the allotted time for investigating comes to a close, those elevator doors at the end of the first-floor corridor open up; the ride down is fast, smooth, and understandably tense as far as atmosphere goes. You're down to less than half of your original number. The doors slide open and the podium circle comes into view, standing stark against the black-walled courtroom and encircling that pit in the center; Misa and Aqua have joined the ranks of the deceased, photographs in greyscale watching the proceedings from their podiums draped in black. Of course and as always, the deceased aren't the only ones watching; the Kingmaker will make his presence known once everyone has settled at their podium, his voice sounding out through the room for all to hear. "Resilient has been taken from you. Maybe this time the guilty party will actually succeed at fulfilling Rule Seven, seeing as this is the sixth try and all. Whether they manage it is up to the rest of you." Thirteen Survivors remain. However many will be down by the end of the day is up to you.

Comments

[amygdalae]

[LET'S TRY AND PIECE THIS TOGETHER...? I should not be doing this at 5AM, save me.]

You and Aqua were in the music room for some reason, and there a fight broke out between the both of you for some reason. You struck her left at some point so that she couldn't defend herself anymore. She tried to run after that, toppling and generally using the music instruments in the room in order to hinder you, but you caught up to her and stopped her from running by hurting her legs too - that's why there were bruises there. After that you ended her life; most likely with the wrench that Captain Eide found in the restroom.

Once she was down, you then went around using Aqua's blood to fabricate the other evidence - you're the only one among us that doesn't bleed, which is why there are so many items that have blood on them. It wasn't to hide the murder weapon, it was to throw off any suspicion on you. Once that was done then you wiped up the remaining blood with Aqua's clothes and changed her into the attire that we found.

Obviously, doing all of this would have stained you quite thoroughly with blood, which is where the peroxide comes into play - you used a liberal amount of it in order to get rid of it from you, and since you are made of metal physically, it wouldn't leave any trace on you.

...is there anything I'm missing in terms of the order of events?

[ratingspoint]

...Well, we could try the part where you're wrong about a lot of it?

[Dude.]

I mean, it was a really good attempt, don't get me wrong! I'd actually give you half-credit for that one, and the crowd would love it. But that's...not. No.

[amygdalae]

Care to fill me on which parts I'm wrong about?

[ratingspoint]

...Honey, if you're not expecting the answer of "I didn't do it in the first place so your whole premise is wrong," then I don't know what to tell you.

[METTATON, FOR FUCK'S SAKE.]

But let's say that I'll allow the part where we met in the music room last night. Everyone knows I spend time in there playing piano from time to time, because I don't sleep and I get bored. So fine. She came upstairs and met me.

What we ended up doing is the reason why I couldn't have pursued her, though.

[amygdalae]

What did you end up doing with her?

[ratingspoint]

Think about it for a moment - that toolkit was up there, wasn't it? Stan's seen me with them before; she was helping me with repairs. My ankle's been messed up for almost a full week now, I've been trying to specifically avoid impact injuries - and since neither of us really knew what we were doing, whatever she ended up repairing was just a temporary patch. Pursuing her, fighting her, all of that would have been a huge mistake and just made everything worse on that end, and I probably wouldn't be standing now.

[garudynamic]

...

You didn't like, fall on her or something, did you?

[ratingspoint]

[CHILD]

Oh my god, no.

[garudynamic]

[Well thank god for that]

[ratingspoint]

[RIGHT...]

[garudynamic]

ANYWAYS. So you didn't fight her, but SOMETHING happened to her?

[ratingspoint]

It certainly seems that way from here, doesn't it? Now can we get back to the rest of the trial and working out exactly who happened to her and why, given that it wasn't me? This has been a really nice intermission, but...

[garudynamic]

Well alright then if it WASN'T you then you can tell us everything that happened between you two. It might give us a clue about who DID attack her.

[amygdalae]

[...okay, repairs make sense, but.]

Why did you ask for Aqua's help, specifically? It seems like an odd choice of a person to ask.

[ratingspoint]

Because she was there.

[He shrugs at that.]

I guess she couldn't sleep? I didn't ask her why she was there, that was just where we ended up meeting. I was teaching her to sing, so maybe she heard me in there and decided to come in. We both found that pretty calming, and she seemed to like it enough.

[isafraid]

She was already there? In the music room?

[...]

Was she already wearing that dress?

[ratingspoint]

No, she wasn't. She was wearing what she always does.

[isafraid]

Then that doesn't make sense! What could drive her to wear that dress at night and end up dying in it?

[amygdalae]

[...]

What made you even suddenly decide to try repairs there in the first place? She was there, sure, but something must have happened that required you to suddenly ask for her assistance.

[ratingspoint]

Well, she came in while I was already in there. I was playing for a while, but again, my ankle hasn't been doing too well. So I had the toolkit in there in case it decided to seize up.

[amygdalae]

Would that kind of fix even work in the first place? As you've said before, your make up isn't exactly that of a normal robot. You're powered by your soul, after all, and you confirmed to me that the properties of your body is different because of the fact that you're bonded.

[pokexplorer]

[Colress is just kind of looking over in a moment of "if only I'd known about that, I could have easily assisted."

But obviously it's not relevant in the middle of a trial so he's not saying anything...]

[garudynamic]

What you ended up doing kept you from what, moving?

[ratingspoint]

Not exactly, but it would have been a really bad idea to be up to that level of activity right away.

[garudynamic]

Wanna elaborate?