TRIAL 1 [DAY 4]

[calloperators]

[The sound of rapidly approaching police sirens indicates that it's time to leave the crime scene.

When you reach the previously-defunct laundry room at the motel, you find that the door swings open easily. A wave of air carrying stench of rotting flesh immediately hits you in the face, accompanied the sound of flies buzzing incessantly, having finally being released from their disgusting prison. Two rotting corpses lay on the ground, both with gunshot wounds through their bodies. Curiously enough, these corpses are both wearing masks--one with a wolf mask, and another with a clown mask. From the general state of these corpses, their bodies appear to have been here for weeks. Some of you might feel a twinge of recognition at the sight of them, though you don't remember why.

Once you manage to look past the corpses, you'll find that there's an open door on the back wall with stairs leading down. Whatever washing machines that used to be here have been removed, leaving rusty impressions on the walls and floor. As you carefully make your way down the concrete steps, the air grows colder and mustier, and the sound of the radios fade. You eventually step into a dimly-lit chamber that only vaguely resembles a boiler room, as a series of pulpits have been arranged in rows, labeled by room number. Pyro's stand, of course, is conspicuously empty.

You realize that this has been the only time during your time here that you haven't heard any music at all.

Standing before all the pulpits at the front of the room, there's a CRT TV buzzing with static. As soon as everyone files in, the metal door swings shut with an abrupt CLANG and locks behind you. The static fills the silence for several minutes.

The screen flickers, and a face appears. His blonde hair is slicked back in an unnatural fashion, his plastic smile is almost permanently affixed to his face, and the suit he's wearing looks...far too shiny to be remotely real. His movements are jerky, occasionally changing completely in pose in view to the camera.

He opens his mouth and speaks in a stuttering, artificial tone, rising and falling with no sense of rhyme or reason.]

This IS M-M-Max HEADroom, and YOU are all ^{all all} HERE to catch a murderer! Your JOB is to find out who's g-g-g-g u i l t y, and I'm here to help move things along, in a sense. ense. ense. [A pause.] Then again, you're--all guilty of something, aren't you?

[And he throws back his head and laughs.]



< TRIAL START! >

Comments

[iote]

That's what I'm thinking.

What I don't understand is how the murder weapon ended up near Pyro's body. I don't see the purpose in bringing it out there, unless the murderer went after them, found them deceased and abandoned it.

[rangerslayer]

...I've actually been wondering something. You said Pyro used their pillowcase to carry things, right?

Did anyone ever see them using their pockets? Where some of the lighters were found? If someone tried to put them back, that's another sign that the culprit followed them.

[iote]

I knew that they kept matchbooks and lighters in their pockets; they gave me one once.

[rangerslayer]

Ah, well... That nips that. I didn't find any matchbooks on them. Did you, in your searching?

[iote]

I didn't, no.

[worldchampofmartialarts]

They tried giving me some gloves once back at the arcade- they pulled them out of their pockets then, I think? ...turned them down, though, and I'unno if they'd still have a pair on them when the killer struck.

[knifegf]

Could be that. Maybe they just didn't know where to put it? I thought before Pyro was the one who set off the fire, but maybe that's what the killer wants us to think.

[iote]

So the murderer followed them there, and set off the fire to...

[Hm.]

Were they trying to make it seem as though most of the fighting happened there and not near the inn?

[knifegf]

Possibly. Though a motel and McDonalds are both prime locations for violent crimes.

[rangerslayer]

The point of that, I'd think...would be to try and disguise the timeline of events. So maybe we should try putting those in order.

[knifegf]

Well I'd say burning down the McDonalds comes last. Not very subtle. How long the crime happened before that is the question.

[rangerslayer]

The explosion woke us up...but...

[ She takes a moment to think about it. ]

No rigor mortis had set in. The body was still warm. We're not talking about a long period of time here.

[knifegf]

Then it must have been right in the moment. [ she pushes back on her heels, rocking slow in her standing position. ] I think red-head has the right idea about a fight breaking out. Either Pyro snapped and was gonna burn shit down, or someone thought they were anyway.

But hm... that pillow case was used to carry stuff in. How many of us knew that before the murder? Sure not me.

[rangerslayer]

I didn't either. Do you think the person who killed them did?

[knifegf]

Could be. A pillow case on its own isn't a big deal. One that holds a shit ton of lighters, molotov and more? Could be someone thought Pyro was gonna blow us up.

[advancements]

I would imagine everything happened fairly quickly. Head injuries bleed a good amount, so Pyro would have died not long after they received that wound, correct?

[All of his experience is with fighting, not anything medical.]

Given the blood trail, it seems they were bleeding heavily, and that was the only injury they had, wasn't it?

[rangerslayer]

It was. No injuries, no cuts on the suit.

[advancements]

That's what I thought. After the injury, the rest must have happened fairly quickly. The explosion must have happened last, and obviously the fight moved from the inn to the McDonald's, but I'm still not entirely sure how to piece the rest together.

[rangerslayer]

...Are we operating under the assumption that the culprit set the explosion, or Pyro did? Maybe we should get that sorted.

[advancements]

I'm not sure. It could have gone either way. I'm not sure what purpose the culprit would have in setting it, however. Pyro's body wasn't close enough to be caught on fire, and the explosion woke us all up, so that seems like an incredibly bad idea for the killer. The only thing I can think of for why they might have done that was to burn evidence... Could the fibers have been a part of something bigger that was burned, maybe?

[rangerslayer]

It's possible. Something that would've incriminated them...like damaged clothing.

[advancements]

I didn't see any signs of anything beyond the fibers, so whatever it was would have had to catch fire very quickly. I'm not sure there was enough time for that, but I can't see what else the fibers could have been from.

[rangerslayer]

Neither can I...and they might be crucial in figuring this out. Something small, maybe?

[worldchampofmartialarts]

Yeah, but we went through checking for that already- none of us who stepped up to getting checked showed any sign of torn clothes- 'sides the eyepatch, but he says those were there to begin with.

...and longhair doesn't wanna cooperate for some reason.

[rangerslayer]

[ ...Michalis is being difficult, what else is new- ]

We checked for damage. What about clothing differences?