week 7 - trial; day 2

[vicedirector]

seven vices case 7 trial, day 2 ♫ sunday At 9AM, every television will go off, loud enough to wake anyone sleeping. The calm, apathetic voice will advise everyone to gather in the chapel for the trial. Static will continue to blare in the head of anyone dillydallying. Once all of the guests have gathered in the chapel, the doors will lock. Most of the pews have been moved aside to allow for more space, and a few tables have been set up on the altar. On the first, there is an additional copy of the rulebook, and the information cards of the victim and suspects laid out, with space for the suspects to provide their whereabouts, as well as an autopsy report. There is also a large wheeled chalkboard upon which you may write theories. On the second table is a pitcher of water and some glasses, as well as very simple sandwiches and pastries. The door behind the altar has finally been unlocked. It's a rather plain room with an area set off by a folding screen. Inside, you will find a table on which the victim's body has been laid out. Next to the table, two black and white photographs have been hung on the screen. they are close ups of the victim's body, as it was found when the body discovery announcement chimed. A few sticks of incense burn in the corner to avoid any smells. At 6PM, the trial will adjourn, after which everyone is expected to have cast their votes. >Discuss? victims suspects VOTING cast setting rulebook

Comments

Autopsy Reports

[vicedirector]

On the table, the following has been laid out carefully next to the rulebook:

Autopsy Report - Alisha Diphda

Cause of Death - Appears to be drowning

Body Discovery - Approximately 6:30AM

Time of Death - Estimated between 4:00AM and 6:00AM

Condition of Body - Body covered in severe burns and blisters, shoeless.

Condition of Scene - Victim found in the pool, tied to Gilbert Nightray and weighted down. Pool light shattered, mannequin floating in the water.


Autopsy Report - Gilbert Nightray

Cause of Death - Appears to be decapitation

Body Discovery - Approximately 6:30AM

Time of Death - Estimated between 4:00AM and 6:00AM

Condition of Body - Decapitated, head found in record store. Head and neck severely bruised and beaten, teeth missing and found in various locations. Right hand cut off, found in lobby.

Condition of Scene - Victim found in the pool, tied to Alisha Diphda and weighted down. Pool light shattered, mannequin floating in the water.

Suspects

[vicedirector]

On the table next to the autopsy report, the information cards of all suspects have been laid out. Below the cards is a blank sheet of paper, labeled:

Whereabouts - Thursday Evening to Friday Morning, Week 7

Previous alibis here

Findings

[vicedirector]

The rest of the table is empty. There are boxes labeled Exhibit A through Exhibit J, and pens and paper for writing.

All evidence and other information found during the course of investigation should be listed here.

Previous evidence here

Undyne's Room

[dhaosu]

Done by myself and Ranulf.

A bit of a mess with some glitter strung everywhere. Nothing out of the ordinary as far as I can tell.

- Dhaos

Rhys' Room

[okuri]

Nothing important, but there was an electrical weapon in his safe.

-Yoite

hinata's room

[dereban]

[ In her usual neat handwriting: ]

Urashima and myself searched the room; we found hairs confirming the slumber party that occurred on Thursday. Nothing else unusual found.

- Inaba Himeko

Alisha's Room

[billarious]

Ranulf and I searched Alisha's room. There wasn't a whole lot to really note though. Her spear was in there, leaning against the closet door, and in the bathroom we found a washcloth hanging over the faucet and a nightgown folded on the toilet seat.

She had a notepad in her bedside table that had some notes about some of us, and a checklist of things to do. Not sure if this is evidence so I left it in her room.

There were also letters in her safe and paper flowers on her dresser and bedside table.

-Bill

astrid's room

[muties]

[ in roxy's scrawl ]

me n bill checked it, stormfly helped
defensive knife under her pillow which tbh not weird lbr here
her motive as u can see here was the least murdery thing ever

[ With the description is Astrid's motive envelope containing the card that says "Astrid Hofferson is in love with Hiccup Haddock". ]

nothin else suspicious

- roxy

Gilbert's Room

[sobowtor]

Did you guys know Gilbert was an artist? And a master origami-ist? And wrote really meaningful letters?

Although the last one makes sense. He had a really way with words that I was jealous of.

[That's what Poland found out from Gilbert's room.]

Blood Trail Notes

[fourleafcleaver]

We probably all saw how much blood was all over the lobby. There was a really scattered, splattery trail of it going outside, too, and I followed that the other day. The record store was absolutely covered in blood, too. The trail went to the entrances of the general store and the clothing store. I saw the inside of the general store and it was clean, and I think Poland told me the coat was the only thing inside the clothing store that was bloody so the rest of it was probably clean, too.

[Clover has accompanied the notes with her usual four-leaf clover drawing signature and a map doodle, and by Clover I mean Eski, thanks Eski.]

Charlotte's Room (aka Sadie's Room)

[herbgrace]

Searched by Urashima and myself. We found nothing of note, though the room was a mess and did suggest she had done quite a lot of drinking (please be careful, Charlotte!) There was a note to be opened in case of her death that we did not open--there was nothing but paper in the envelope and we did not open it. Her motive seems to match what she explained, and also matches one of the women shown in the video motive a few weeks ago.

- Lithuania

Bodies

[vicedirector]

Behind a discrete folding screen, in the room behind the altar, Alisha's and Gilbert's bodies have been laid out on two simple white tables. Their bodies are covered with white sheets, but the sheets can be removed. Other than the position and the sheet (and replacing Gilbert's head and hand), the bodies have not been changed from how they were found.

Near the bodies are four black and white photographs of the scene as it was when the body discovery chimes rang yesterday morning. The photographs are close ups - they portray Alisha's and Gilbert's bodies, but no more of the scene than is necessary to do so. Still, if you want to check their positions, it makes it fairly easy.

(You may thread in this subheading to investigate the bodies)

Previous investigations here

[crazily]

[ So last night since it was hella late when it happened, Break and Rhys got Undyne's spear to check it against a few things! How did they match up? ]

Talk to Miata

[vicedirector]

[ etc etc ]

[herbgrace]

[Hi again, Miata.] If someone broke the curfew rule regarding the pools but died the same day, would we be informed that the rule was broken?

summary time

[crazily]

[ So here we are at day two! Break still looks like shit, but this is probably what you'd expect, all things considered. But once everyone is gathered, he'll just sum up the previous day's events for everyone's benefit. There's really not even a preamble this time around, since he's just calm and definitely tired. ]

So, our murders this week were Alisha and Gilbert. We have two quite different murders for each, since Alisha's cause of death was stated to be drowning, and she was shocked quite severely. As for Gilbert, he was found decapitated and beaten, but only in his face*. Their estimated times of death were between 4AM and 6AM, but we can narrow this down further. I know that Gilbert didn't leave Rhys and I until about 5:30AM, and Alisha seems to have left her room at a similar time*. Since the bodies weren't discovered until about 6:30AM, this gives our killer a very short time frame to work in. It is an hour at the most, but I would assume even less than this.

As such, we effectively seem to have two separate murders based on the disparity between the two deaths. Whether it's a single killer or one is something we'll need to discuss, but I do think it's only one, which I'll explain later. However, for more factual portions, Rhys explained how the electricity may have factored into the kill. One of the pool lights was shattered, which would seem to be where the electricity came from. Considering the mannequin in the pool, I think it's reasonable to guess that the mannequin was placed in the pool effectively as "bait" for someone. It's our natural instinct at this point to investigate on a Friday morning, and seeing something that looked like a body floating in the pool, I think Alisha was the one to try and fish the mannequin out and was shocked in the process, hence why she has her wounds, but Gilbert does not bear the same ones. This would have been enough to knock out the lights according to Rhys, and I assume that's true? I don't actually know much about electricity, so I'm only repeating what he's said in that case.

Our order of events is still up for discussion, but I personally believe that Alisha was likely shocked first, and whether a commotion or simply losing the electricity, Gilbert left the kitchen quickly to investigate, since there were eggs left on the stove. He encountered our killer at this point and potentially surprised them, which is why his scene was so widespread. Based on the trails of blood, Gilbert definitely seems to have tried to run away from the killer, which is why we found blood, teeth, and his hand in such a wide variety of places. After losing his hand, he would have been bleeding heavily, hence the trail we have. It seems that the murder actually took place in the record store based on the amount of blood there as compared to everywhere else.

After this, I believe the murderer took Gilbert's body back to the pool. I believe that they made a stop at this point to grab the chains, since having the trail of blood there would be a bit odd otherwise. Because of her cause of death, we do know that Alisha drowned rather than being shocked to death. So at this point, Alisha was either already dead, or our killer found that she was still alive and knew they had to finish their work, essentially. I believe the two bodies were chained together as a weight, and with that, we have what we found, I believe.

We also have the coat, which from my understanding would have fit Gilbert, Undyne, and Rhys with few problems, but the rest of our suspects were too short for it to be a proper fit. Similarly, there are also the letters that we found in the pool house: "RI", which is either an attempt to point to the killer by our victims or it is a frame by the killer themselves.

[ Which, also to clarify OOC, the letters are sans serif. They look more like "R|" than "RI" ]

So I believe our major topic for discussion today should center around just what was used to cut off Gilbert's head as well as examining alibis, so long as the room searches did not turn up anything particularly incriminating. Because we did not find a weapon in our searches, I believe examining and considering just what could be used to cut off his head will be the most helpful, since this is not something that could be done easily, even if they seemed to have had some difficulty doing so, as it was not as clean a cut as the hand.

[hopefragment]

This might be obvious, but... if no one broke the rules on Friday, that means neither the killer nor Alisha could have entered the pool room until 6AM, right? Meaning they've really only got the span of half an hour to work with, instead of a full hour like we'd thought.

[Hinata with his rulebook in hand, ready to rules-lawyer!]

Timeline or something

[dhaosu]

[ There was a lot that occurred tonight, so guess what's been written on the chalkboard? ]

Possible Timeline of Events (To be Updated)

- Around ????? someone broke a pool light and electrified the pool in doing so.
- Around ????? the killer grabbed the winter coat to cover the bloodstains because they would not have time to wash themselves clean due to the timeline of the murder.

Alisha's murder

- Alisha rose at 5:30AM.
- She took a shower (?).
- She headed downstairs.
- She met up with Gilbert at this point.
- Alisha was lured into the pool area where she was duped into believing there was someone in distress, the mannequin used as bait. She was knocked out purposely with the electricity when she leapt into the water. She drowned due to being unconscious. This happened around 6 AM.

Gilbert's murder

- Gilbert left his room around 5:30AM.
- Around this time Gilbert met up with Alisha.
- He began to make food, but became distracted, likely worrying about Alisha, and left the burnt food on the stove.
- After Alisha had gone into the pool area, Gilbert encountered the killer (or second culprit).
- A chase begins.
- His hand was cut off at the lobby, Gilbert ran into the general store, and then into the record store, which is likely where he met his demise. He was then decapitated.
- The killer set the musical object on to a tune and placed Gilbert's head upon it so it'd be spinning.
- The killer went to the general store to grab the chains.
- The killer took Gilbert's dead body out to where Alisha's was. It was still around 6:00 AM.
- The killer drew a bloody message on the pool wall with Gilbert's blood.
- The killer wrapped Gilbert and Alisha's dead bodies together and threw them into the pool.
- Around here the killer put back the winter coat.
- The killer (or killers) exit(s) and go(es) back to their own room(s).
- The bodies are discovered at around 6:30 AM. ]

...We generally seem to have an idea of what occurred thanks to conversation from yesterday and Break's summary. If I have missed something or there is something that could be said, let me know.

[aumygoddess]

If Nightray-san left the hotel evading the killer...how did all of his teeth scatter?

The blood could be from his hand, yes, but, knocking out his teeth in various places seems a bit odd.

[hopefragment]

Um... I know this is a long shot, but... for the suspects, what did you guys get as your "gift"? On Wednesday, I mean. We know Rhys got Dumpy, and I got a box of kusamochi, but... what about the rest of you? Do you have it with you?

[earie]

Clothes. I wore them yesterday.

[dhaosu]

... Let's look at this again.

We're looking at someone who is physically capable and most definitely someone who could have cared less about who they murdered.

We are also looking at the murder weapon being larger than a knife and likely a large blade, sword, spear or what-not.

Let's look at two of our suspects. Undyne and Astrid have an axe and a spear. Those are large, bladed weapons. Who else in the suspect pool would possess weapons of such nature?

[ No one, right? ]

[herbgrace]

I suppose you could say Hinata had access to a sword, theoretically. [She doesn't really believe he could sneak out and steal a sword, but for completion's sake.]

Sins

[sobowtor]

Did we do that thing where we theoretically decide which sin would be most likely to do this sort of thing or...?

[Here have a make shift list.

Astrid - Pride
Undyne - Pride
Hinata - Envy
Szarlotka - Sloth
Rhys - Greed

Gilbert - Envy
Alisha - Pride]

[billarious]

Szarlotka?

[This has nothing to do with the sin thing sorry. He's also butchering how that is probably supposed to be said.]

[mothercat]

[ Presumably after Papyrus retrieves Alisha's spear and washcloth. He looks to Papyrus and gives him a quick nod. ]

I just need to give these things a quick sniff to check for chlorine, right? I don't think I smelled any yesterday, but I could have missed it.

[ Ok, he gives both items a quick whiff! Any chlorine? ]

[vicedirector]

( Alisha's washcloth smells like regular water. Her spear smells like chlorine. )

THE MYSTERIOUS LETTERS!!!

[jackhole]

Hey, everyone. Here's something that hasn't been addressed yet, uh --

[ man, he so doesn't want to talk about this. ]

The letters at the pool? At least I think they're letters. It could be an "R" and an "I" which is... probably bad for either Astrid or me! Especially if you don't know how to spell my name...

[ actually, wait. ]

-- For the record, my name's Rhys. Like Reese. Not Rice.

[ SOME OF YOU (poland) have definitely not been saying it right. dagger eyes!! ]

... Aaaanyway, can we just have all the suspects write down the same letters on the chalkboard here? Just to see if the handwriting matches. I'm assuming it's from one of the victims but it could definitely be from the killer trying to frame someone. Use both your right and left hands, if you could.

[muties]

Like reese's peanut butter cups!

[herbgrace]

Alright--we know Alisha and Gilbert both left where they were sleeping at 5:30. The power went out right around six. If we assume that's the point Alisha ended up electrocuted, then that means nearly everything took place in a half an hour. Gilbert had to have been killed before then, since we were all starting our investigation at that point. The killer must have been running around fixing things up while we were looking around; they were really pushing it.

Which of our suspects were definitely investigating with the others or otherwise accounted for at that point?

[muties]

Hajime was with Faize the whole time. Astrid came to me about the lightswitch being borked around then, too.

[herbgrace]

[Lithuania gestures to Laima--it doesn't make much sense, and it's actually very hard to notice unless you're staring right at her.

Laima lets out an absolutely monstrous howl and charges, fangs bared, at Sadie. You might want to run.]

[earie]

[ Sadie blinks and screams, then turns around to run.

She manages some short strides that are very unathletic before she falls down and screams again, covering her earmuffs. She is panting pretty hard. ]

RUNNING THE MURDER GAUNTLET

[fourleafcleaver]

[Clover definitely complains and whines the entire time she's setting up for this but, like, mostly for the sake of complaining more than anything. It's not actually that big of a deal, don't be a drama queen, Clover. Also for the sake of dramatics, she does some improperly performed stretches at the pool before all of this, because that's how runners do things probably? She doesn't know anything about real stretches. The good news is that since Hinata's coming with her, that makes it a race and that makes it a challenge and that makes this exciting!! Presumably someone counts down, and Clover books it outta there. Up the stairs to Alisha's room, back down the stairs, to the record store—and then she bursts back into the chapel and collapses onto the nearest pew, panting.

A deep breath, and:] Uuuuuuuuuuugggghhhhhhh! [THIS LEVEL OF DRAMA IS UNNECESSARY IT WASN'T EVEN THAT BAD?? Aaand then a moment to actually catch her breath again.] ...How'd I do?

[Also she does all of this in her heels. They don't hinder her in the slightest.]

[vicedirector]

( From the pool, upstairs, to the pool again, to the record store, and back to the hotel the time is: 29 minutes, 31 seconds.

From the pool, upstairs, to the pool again, the record store, and the chapel, the time is:
29 minutes, 47 seconds.

From the pool to Alisha's room and back and then to the record store, the time is: 13 minutes and 20 seconds.

Heels and all.

note: Don't take these times right down to the second, okay. HAVE A MAP )

i choose you, sadie

[jackhole]

[ hello everyone, have a scream from dumpy to start us off and when he gets everyone's attention. ]

Okay so, I think it's Sadie. Or Charlotte. Honestly, I don't care? If she killed my friends, she can go fuck herself.

[ but that aside, let's get to work. ]

Last night, before the pool closed someone -- who, like I said I think is Sadie -- broke the pool light and left it in the water for someone in the morning to check. Miata said if it was done Thursday night, it wouldn't be cleaned up. The moment the pool doors opened, whoever slipped inside and touched the water was out. It's the easiest way to murder someone, actually. Doesn't matter who the victim is, as long as they touch the water they're gone. I know not a lot of you know how electricity works, but if the pool was left electrified from ten to six, that's enough juice to knock out the power of the entire hotel, probably even the entire block if we're sharing power lines with our neighbors.

Alisha comes downstairs with her spear because she knows it's murder night in murder town, is prepared to defend herself and gets ready to find a body. Goes to the pool, sees the mannequin in there, touches the water, she's out. Entire body fried, done. Enter Gilbert. Gilbert comes downstairs, heads to the kitchen, gets to cooking because it's Gilbert and he does weird things when he's stressed like cook or smoke or be generally weird. Probably thought the murder already happened. Maybe he ran into Alisha first and she went to check while he went to the kitchen? I don't know. Either way, something makes him head over the pool.

Gilbert catches the killer in the act. This freaks out Sadie, our killer, because so far the murder has been simple -- just fish in a barrel. She doesn't have to actually attack someone but now? Shit's different. Sadie grabs the closest weapon, Alisha's spear, there's a struggle in the lobby where Gilbert loses his hand and his head and it's all a -- a mess.

[ a pause here and actually, he doesn't want to get too into the murder. everyone knows how it went down. ]

I'm singling Sadie out for multiple reasons. She's the only one with a shitty alibi. Are you guys saying someone can't do this all while drunk? Look at the path too the record store. She could've been swaying a little as she carried that head. Plus, there's the name change? My guess? She changed her name after killing some dude to honor her serial killer father. Like father like daughter, right? Alisha's murder ties into sloth, it makes sense. Gilbert's murder ties into being a secret freak who idolizes your serial killer dad. I know plenty about idolizing murderers, this kind of reeks of it if that's the case -- especially with the record store bullshit. It's all over the top and theatric, some shitty gift to someone and if it wasn't pride trying to honor their win, it was a girl trying to honor her dad.

[ and before he finally drops the mic, some more shit: ]

If you think she's too lazy to do this, you're a fucking idiot. Anyone can do anything if they have the right motivation. [ said like a guy who really knows it. ] For everyone else -- I thought it was Undyne at first because the evidence pointed at her, but it's also out of character for her along with the alibi. Undyne wouldn't kill anyone this dishonorably. If she got rid of her honor, maybe, yeah. But it's still... weird. Astrid has a shitty alibi too but she's the same as Undyne. If she was going to kill someone, it wouldn't have been like this. She has the means, the strength, the opportunity, but it's just not who Astrid is. A murder is always going to have a hint of someone's personality in it, this doesn't stink of Astrid at all. Hinata and I? We both have rock solid alibis and also, I'd be dead if it was Gilbert. Break has had so many chances to kill me since we found Gilbert, he just would've done it. Everyone's read the profiles, we know there's a sword in your cane, Break. Hinata, he could pull off something like Alisha's death but not Gilbert's. These wouldn't be his victims either.

[ FINALLY, HE'S DONE. ]

So, Sadie.

[crazily]

[ unsurprisingly break is here to +1 because it's not like the players here were working together on this sweats ]

I agree completely, and I'll point to the personality. We've all be focusing on Gilbert's murder and who could do that, but we perhaps should have focused on Alisha's earlier. We can't pick out a personality from that, it's true. But Alisha's? It suits Sadie far better, I think. We've been talking about her running around and whether it's possible, but just assume that it's either a lie or she was stressed about murdering someone. Then the pieces fit together quite neatly.

[ A pause, and then, ]

...And Rhys is right. I would have killed him if I thought he was the one to do it, if I'm completely honest.

[sobowtor]

I'm not voting for Szarlotka. She's not some unfeeling monster like some people would have you think.

She likes naps. And clothes. And girls. And ponies. And me. She likes me!

These are real things!

I don't know who exactly did it, but I know it couldn't be her!

[lastgirl]

...I'm sorry Poland.