melodiesoflife | Event || Cluedo

Event || Cluedo

Characters: Investigators and their witnesses.
Where: Aqures Ixen.
When: 15th June - 30th June.
Summary: Catch-all log for the Cluedo Event. If you would like to pursue investigations and play out the fall-out of the Cluedo events, this is the post for you. Please refer to the second OOC Post for the setting and what there is to be played. Another Log will be posted at a later date to play the murders.
Warning: Investigation and murders.

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Kidd's eyes followed Sephiroth as he moved about the room. This wasn't a game of cat and mouse. This was a game of cat and also cat. She wanted answers as much as he did and intimidation wasn't going to be a tactic that would work on the pirate, especially considering she was sure of what she saw and what she did. Still, she was impressed with how he was carrying himself even at this late hour.

As he took a seat she read his body language and relaxed a bit herself, leaning forward in her chair now, not as much as he was, but meeting him closer to the middle.

"Aye. There's always a choice. That's why those choices matter. After Ace...did the deed he seemed to be convinced that I did it. I have a lot of experience seeing a man when he's lying, and if I didn't know better I'd say he was telling the truth. I swear to you I didn't kill the girl, but it seems like he will swear it even stronger and mean it." She frowned and her voice lowered to an angry whisper, "Somethin's toyin' with us again. Makin' us puppets."

Three or four days so far with very little, if any, sleep. Sephiroth's mind was far too active with the various threads of the murder investigation going on to allow his body to get much more than that. He showed significantly less tiredness and fatigue than some of the others involved and was glad enough for the mechanics that granted him clarity of awareness still, even though it would undoubtedly come around soon.

Intimidation however, was something that always often slipped into his mannerisms when there was an answer right before him, and his intuition told him it was just out of his grasp even though he couldn't see it. As Kidd relaxed in response to his own attempt at a more open-type of body language, Sephiroth flexed both of his hands --not quite balling them into fists and then opening them-- before sitting back to also be more reclined on his chair.

"I don't disagree with you; though others might not be so understanding." He spoke lowly, not quiet enough to be completely private, but about as close as he might be able to chance being. Mind control was still very much on the table, yet for reasons possibly also obvious to Kidd, he didn't want to run too hard with that growing theory.

"What you mean to say, is that potentially either or both of you could have been controlled into believing it was the other that committed the crime. A diversionary tactic of the mastermind, perhaps..." Sephiroth pondered out loud.

-which might well mean they'd managed to get close.

Forcing back control of the here and now, Sephiroth met with Kidd's eyes again after a brief pause and sat up a little more in his seat. No one, not even him, could make themselves look taller by sitting on a chair across from a table to her but the rising to his shoulders certainly seemed to try to give that impression. Perhaps it was time he asserted some authority-

"Then help me to catch them. Tell me what you do remember."

Above all other things, these murders were highly public. While the prospect of mind control might help to explain the differences between the murders and the fact that as she'd noticed that there may have been different murderers, it wasn't going to be an answer that satisfied any of the people of the city. In fact, if the Heroes were so vulnerable to such effects, how could they possibly trust them to keep them safe. This she understood very well, but it was still a prospect she had to put on the table.

"It's entirely possible, loathe as I am to admit it. But I know what I remember." She shifted in her seat. Best to go back to the other murders while they were here. "I know that a few probably suspect me because I was at the other cases. I believe the murderer in those cases were two different people. One of them had ears unlike those of a human's. We have some who mach that desciption in our company. And there was the freezing effect around the wound."

She watched his eyes for a moment before continuing. "At the second, the attacker was using the rooftops, but no such blade or spell as in the first case. This one ran with a limp. I'm shamed I was not able to catch them but they had a lead on me." She frowned heavily as she thought of the third case.

"I wasn't present for the murders of Malik or Reno, and if mind control is not behind this I can't say for what I may do to their murderer if I did find them." She knew full well what she was threatening, but it was better to be honest in this situation than to pretend that their deaths didn't strike a more personal chord.

She leaned back and looked at the ceiling with a sigh, chewing over the most recent incident and what she had seen, "Mister Ace....I saw him running down Alice in the street and he killed her. I did not quite see how he did it, nor am I aware of what happened to Rikku this past evening. I just know that I saw him bring her down and then he began to accuse me of the deed with all of the belief of an innocent man." Looking back at Sephiroth she spread her fingers, flashing her empty palms at him. Her sleeves and cuffs were absent of the evidence of her hidden blades, having handed the weapons over at her arrival at the station, trusting in Saori to keep them from falling into the wrong hands.

"And so that's where we are. My word against his, but if you wish to check my blades for blood you won't find any."

A certain susceptibility that Heroes of Light had, to being manipulated or otherwise controlled by a third party had been a recurring problem which never really went away for very long. Even though the Heroes as group had become more knowledgeable of the mechanics of the same, with regard to the how it worked, it hadn't granted them any breakthroughs in discovering how to anul those effects that invariably ended up turning them on each other.

It just seemed to be their Achilles heel, and all things considered the populace of Crystallis had been more than understanding up til now. More of a reason why the real mastermind behind all of the murders needed to be caught, as a matter of urgency. There were more eyes on them now, than ever before, given the advance of the Calamity.

As Kidd went on to explain her views on all of the murders thus far, Sephiroth seemed not to take his eyes off of her even to blink. Drinking up all the body language and pairing it with the statements she made; they didn't seem to be too divergent from the main threads of investigation that others within the law enforcement were pursuing. At least it all seemed to fit.

For the most part, Sephiroth remained as professional as ever while he listened to the pirate give her version of events. Occasionally his shoulders appeared to sag a little, but as soon as he realized they had, he immediately straightened them up again. Couldn't let that tiredness show, even for a flicker of a moment.

"That won't be necessary." Also, he's not sure if he wanted to spend the early hours of the morning inspecting edged weaponry for any flecks of blood that, even if there any had been any present, would probably have already been cleaned. Not only that, despite all he knew about Kidd...it just seemed a little too obvious for her to be set up as a suspect. An easy scapegoat.

Even if he trusted Ace's testimony with just as much worth.

"Going back to the second murder, I don't suppose you could try to recall any other details about this individual with the limp? In terms of a description?"

Even knowing that she was innocent in all of this, even as sure as she could be that she wasn't one of the killers, and especially with the imposing figure the tall man in front of her struck with his stern gaze, Kidd couldn't help but feel that she wasn't in the best of situations. All she could do was trust that the others trusted her more than the situation that they were in, and that there were more clues beyond what she could offer.

"I'm afraid not. All I can say is that they had enough training to take our resident wishful rooftop Hero by surprise and then was able to escape as such. Another Assassin is a likely suspect, but that's not an avenue I like to propose so easily. On the other hand, it's a job available to anyone. Me and mine don't get to decide who gets to use it."

She frowned. It was slightly offensive that the skills were bandied about so easily. On the other hand, given circumstances in this world, it was clear that this was all because there was a Hero in the past with these skills and then died. Frankly, that made all of this worse.

One fact was becoming increasingly obvious as the investigation went on turning up leads that didn't lead anywhere; trust no one. Sephiroth himself didn't like to regress to the way of thinking that had once not-so very long ago been his bread and butter. Until his stern facade had creaked open to the possibility of compassion, and allowed some light to brighten the dark cave inside. To think that he'd started to trust more than a handful of people -even not so far as with his life- and the circumstances were giving him reason to withdraw that trust.

Sephiroth shook his head, and hopefully those damnable thoughts away for a while. From within tiredness the last thing he needed was for his overactive imagination to take all reason from him when there were facts in front of him that needed combing through with all the due diligence he could muster.

"I'm starting to believe that it might not be so simple as the Jobs that our so-called 'culprits' are necessarily equipped with. For someone with such a gift at mind control, it's probable that anyone could be made to believe they had such skills even if -within their own mind- they might not."

He curled his arms up over his chest and seemed to retreat further into himself. No, it really wasn't comfortable talking about the extents that mind control may or may not go.

Kidd frowned, chewing the proposition over in her mind. "Possible, but there's still a limit. There's only so much the body can do. And then there's the prospect of magic. I imagine anyone who was forced beyond their body's normal limits would feel the muscle strain the next day. If your idea has merit, that would be the clue you'd have to look for."

She glanced back up to Sephiroth's eyes, opening her hands in an offering gesture. "But look around us. If the mastermind was controlling multiple Heroes for this then they'd certainly have a grand pool of abilities and powers to choose from." Her expression turned to a frown, "And don't think it's escaped me how many of my fellow Assassins have been involved in this one way or another."

"Regrettably, physical muscle strain or mental exhaustion are quite possibly two of the most common ailments that any well-meaning Hero of Light might suffer from in pursuit of gaining Job experience. Or even just keeping with a physical and/or mental fitness regime."

Crafty, so very crafty. There was also the fact that more than a handful of them were helping to keep up on the investigation, even Sephiroth himself wasn't at his best though he were doing an excellent job of hiding it. Thankfully he hadn't had any need to initiate his primary job, as doing so might well snap the exhaustion that was tight-roping him through the long hours spent between patrolling and re-examining clues.

"If that's true, then we need to try and establish a link between suspects-" Silver bangs fell forward as he inclined his head towards her in a nod. "-but the incidents thus far are about as dissimilar as they could possibly be. The only link is the obvious fact that each time it points at a Hero of Light-"

"-I don't need to reinforce how this might look, from the outside looking in."

"No, it's all quite clear. But that also means two possibilities in wanting to turn the opinion the people of the city have of us. First, is that they're tied in with the Cataclysm in some way. Likely an Avatar or one of their agents. Similarly, it's someone with misguided goals and understanding of the purpose we have here, which possibly points to the Cult. Either way, it all goes back to the Calamity and someone knowing how to manipulate us." It all went around in circles, but the likely results pointed at the same group of people in one way or another.

"More for the sake of our future than this case currently, we need to find a way to stop this from happening again. Or to turn their influence back on them. Though I expect we'll not have the answer as soon as we like it."

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Event || Cluedo

Because I'm a jerk who can't not make references

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We can wrap it here