unknownseas | FIRST TRIAL

[ Eventually, time seems to run out. Davy Jones takes a lap around the boat, rather tersely instructing everyone to gather in the theatre.

Once everyone is inside, he herds all of you onto the stage, which has been cleared save for the controls to the elaborate pipe organ built into the room. ]

Step lively, passengers! There's a long ride ahead of ye!

[ And once everyone is on that stage, Davy Jones sits at his organ and begins to play. It's not a familiar song to any of you, and it doesn't sound kind, but it does sound wildly complicated. Or it would be, for someone who can't play with his many tentacles.

As the piece begins, the stage begins to descend. Well, at least the part you're all on, as well as where Jones sits at the organ. And it keeps descending, at least through a few floors before long. The elevator shaft is dark, the music echoing until it fades, the controls apparently too far from the pipe organ above before long. Jones sits in silence as the cramped ride continues. Dull bulbs set into the wall provide just enough illumination to tell where you all are, but the walls are thick steel.

You have to have descended several floors, you imagine, when light starts to creep in at the edges of the platform, along with voices. They sound distant and distorted, but the first thing you hear when the platform breaks into the trial room is men singing, rough and distant.

You can also see the... surprisingly somber room, considering where you are. The walls and floor are all made of glass, allowing you a view of the sea as the ship you now stand on the very lowest deck of pushes through the water. Lights illuminate enough to tell that it is indeed water out there, but the water is perhaps not the most interesting thing out there in the dark.

Below the ship, illuminated by a ghostly aura, sails (for lack of a more fitting word) The Flying Dutchman. If you look closely, sailors more monster than anything else man the deck, and seem to be the source of the song. Davy Jones casts the ship a sad look, then stops a foot on the floor and the song quiets. ]

Take your places, passengers. Ye have this chance alone to find the killer among yer number.

[ In the center of the room stands a circle of sturdy metal podiums. Carmen's seems to be almost... decades older than the rest, coated in rust and barnacles. In the center hangs a circle of screens, currently switched off. ]

If there are questions, I am going anywhere no sooner than the lot of you.

[ Jones moves to look out the window, leaving you all to talk amongst yourselves.

Welcome to your first trial. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Adeline takes her position quietly, nodding slightly at Freyja across from her in a general sense of acknowledgement.]

First of all, despite being found in the pool, Carmen didn't drown. Her neck was broken, and there was bruising on her chest that suggested she was struck with a blunt, rounded object of some sort. She also hadn't been in the pool for very long when I found her.

[ There are so many interesting things to explore, but business first. ]

How large was the bruising?

[In relation to her own hand, about how large was the bruise? That's the best way she has to compare right now.]

[ It's difficult to tell any kind of exact size, but around the width of a hand or so seems about right? ]

It was about the width of my own hand, I'd say. [She holds out her hand for consideration.]

Thank you for the clarification. [ I am assuming she has normal sized hands for a lady of her stature. ]

When we consider what made this bruise, it will be a useful measurement to compare against.

So...I guess she was hit with something before she got her neck broken. I don't really see the point of hitting someone who's already dead.

[Because he doesn't have the imagination to come up with a murder plan that'd require that, really]

As far as lethality goes, there is little point. However, this is not simply about the act of murder but also disguising it.

They could have hit her into or off of something, and the impact from that broke her neck.

[Sara is tense, looking around the room. And... also still carrying Emily around, despite the logistics of lugging a child-sized doll everywhere.]

You think-

[And that thought trails off as he sees Emily.]

Uh. Who's your friend.

Emily's my Mimic. I just got her back yesterday, and when the body announcement came, I didn't want to go put her back in the room.

[So doll friend's here, sorry.]

Is she- uh. Active?

["Alive" is probably the wrong word here, he hopes.]

Oh! That is Emily!

[You were looking for her when we showed up!]

I am so glad you were able to find her!

Any idea what actually broke her neck?

I'm not sure. I couldn't find any conclusive results from the injuries there.

Edge of the pool, maybe? That'd be pretty solid if you hit it right, even from just a normal fall.

Wouldn't that need you to be in some very...convoluted? Positions for her to break her neck on that?

[Like inside the pool, or standing near the edge at just the right distance, or...something]

Eh, not super convoluted?

[He wiggles a hand a little.]

If she was near the edge and slipped forward, she could've leaned back while she was going down, and- you know.

I dunno, if she had hit anywhere else except one exact spot then we wouldn't be here. That's not a very reliable plan.

[He's taking for granted that if it was an accident, they wouldn't have to come to find killers, so he's taking this as a most planned murder]

Mods?

sharddrive - 2021-02-06 17:35 (UTC) - Expand

It is one possible location. But the skin wasn't broken, so it'd be hard to find evidence of where she hit her neck exactly.

Edited 2021-02-06 17:24 (UTC)

H-uh. Was there anything she could've slipped on?

(no subject)

oceangirlfriend - 2021-02-06 17:33 (UTC) - Expand

What, like she was running about near the pool and slipped? We've got to put up a sign or something.

At the very least.

[She's been getting kind of distracted by the literal ghost ship hanging out with them, when they were talking about ghost ships she kind of forgot about other ships navigating(??) these waters(??). How is that thing even staying afloat.

There's a clearing of the throat as she refocuses. Right. She's somewhere between a duck and a murder place right now.]

Can't see how anyone'd break her neck directly without... you know, leaving some kinda trace... [morbid as that is, she manages to be a bit thoughtful if hesitant about it] Was there a lot of water splashed out of the pool or something?

oceangirlfriend - 2021-02-06 17:52 (UTC) - Expand

ignobel - 2021-02-06 18:27 (UTC) - Expand

conceivesfrenzy - 2021-02-06 18:29 (UTC) - Expand

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ignobel - 2021-02-06 18:34 (UTC) - Expand

[ Y'know now that they're on about hands. ]

Adeline, did Carmen have any damage to her hands? Specifically her fingernails, or any other debris underneath them.