It was a dark night, brilliantly set alight by the dazzling moon. The time was 2:17 and Excalibur nonchalantly walked down the empty streets while fiddling with his long white cane. He had stopped by a party at the house of a local girl, Margaret Baker, knowing the scene would surely be filled with all sorts of interesting people to share his tales with. You see it was her 21st birthday and she was known to be an incredibly shy person. Many people were anxious to see how she changes with a little alcohol in her system, mainly her closest friend, Peter, who had visited Excalibur before in search of his power and ultimately turned him down to become 's partner. He believed her to be the most incredible weapon he had ever seen, a simple, yet beautifully-crafted iron sword.
Excalibur was late leaving the party, he had woken up on the living room couch and took to walking himself home. He took an unprecedented amount of Tylenol before walking out to clear his raging headache.
Feeling much better, he strolled along the rugged streets of Death City and soon got quite lost. The Holy Sword, though powerful it may be, had a terrible sense of direction. Though unknown to most, this little problem cause him to frequently find himself in bad areas of town and get involved in complicated situations, this is the main cause for the majority of his stories. At this point during the night, he became quite weary and sat down in an alley for a spell.
The next morning he awoke to hear sirens going off all around him. He had somehow gotten back to the corner of the street Margaret lived on and the police were frantically storming into her apartment. Confused and maybe a bit hung over, Excalibur stumbled into the building only to find a police officer telling him to leave, saying that he wasn't authorized to be here and then quickly escorting him off the premises. Feeling the world around him was a bit distorted, he looked to his right to see Peter in tears, a panicked look of shock worn on his face as a police woman with long, red hair comforted him. He walked over to ask what had happened.
"Excuse me Ma'am, what is wrong with this boy?" He said politely to the police woman.
"A murder occurred during a party he attended last night. To be honest, I'm quite upset about the whole ordeal myself. Margaret was a friend of mine back in high school. They sent me to calm him down because I was the only one here who knew the victim..." she finished, letting her voice become quiet.
Suddenly awoken from his daze, Excalibur's eyes widened when he realized what had happened. One of the guests at the party was a murderer. A small tear tugged at his right eye as he ran off. Being in a state of shock he just kept running until he made it all the way to the top of the city, at the front doors to the academy. He stood for a moment, considering what to do. That's it! He thought to himself I'll solve this case myself, I'm clearly the only one who attended the party smart enough to solve a case like this. He rushed into the school.
He hurried to the school library, hoping to do background checks on all the suspects to find any sort of motive. He sat down at one of the school's high-tech computers and began his work. He could easily narrow it down to a small few people, certain that some of the idiotic drunks at the party that had passed out by 10:30 were nowhere near smart enough or coordinated enough to pull of a murder.
An hour later he narrowed it down to three people. Peter Van Trimmer, Janice Lockwood, and Doug Arnold. Peter had gotten into a heated argument with Margaret about their partnership than spanned throughout the night, he knew her and her house well, and has no alibi for the time of the murder because he was in the house when it happened. Janice was the police girl he saw earlier who said she had been friends with Margaret in high school, in fact they were in the same class all four years. Both had been at the top of their class, but Janice was always second after Margaret. Doug was one of the party goers who had no clear motive but was an extremely violent drunk and tried to start fights with three people in the duration of the night.
First things first, He had to look at the body and find the cause of death. He walked back to the apartment complex, each stride getting longer as he neared the building. He walked right into the building and into Margaret's apartment. He simply acted as the chief of police and began ordering people around and demanding they answer his every question. Looking closer at the body, he saw, clear as day, what the cause of death was. She was shot, and by the looks of it, it was from close range, with a very powerful gun, for the hole through her chest was quite wide for a normal bullet wound. The police had not yet been able to find said bullet, though.
Next, he must interview the suspects, starting with Peter. He walked out to the spot where Peter had been before. He was still sitting there, but Janice was gone. After a long discussion he decided to take Peter off the suspect list. He was far too heartbroken to have been the murderer. Next he asked where Janice had gone to and he said she went back to the police station. So there he headed.
He walked up to the front desk and asked for Janice saying it was urgent. He was guided to her office where he sat down in the seat in front of her to begin his interrogation. He couldn't quite knock her off the suspect list just yet, because even though she was a cop and her motive was far fetched, she was the only suspect who wasn't under the influence at the time and had experience with guns, being a police officer and all. Time to look for Doug. Since he knew Doug's home address he could find him just as easily as he found Peter.
He arrived at the small, blue house and knocked on the door only to find that it was already open. He walked inside and called for Doug. Not getting a response, he wandered through the house to find Doug, or even better, find house was a mess, no place for a true gentleman to reside. he found Doug's bedroom, though Doug was not in it, and he walked out without a second thought, and went into the bathroom. There was Doug, passed out on the floor with an empty bottle of pills in his right hand and a sloppily written note on his lap. In a few words, at least we can say it prove his innocence, saying that secretly he had loved Margaret with such a passion that when he heard she was dead, he simply could not live any longer without her. He had overdosed and taken his own life. Excalibur took off his hat and lay it against his chest in order to honor the man before him. He turned to walk away and put on his top hat, uttering a faint "Fool," under his breath. He left to tell the police that he believed Janice to be the killer.
When he arrived he told the police everything and they were too shocked for words. They insisted upon questioning her first and left the scene sadly to take her into custody. He walked out of the building and Peter pointed at him and said, "Hey, I just realized something, you don't have you're cane anymore, what happened?"
Confused and shocked, Excalibur looked in both his hands to find that the statement was indeed true. He tried to remember where he last had it. A sudden burst of realization hit him and he frantically ran to the alleyway where he had fallen asleep to look for his cane, he was so caught up in the investigation he didn't realize it was missing. He went to the spot where he had slept and noticed the absence of his cane. He looked about the rest of the alley in sure panic. Then, he found his cane, and all the memories of the previous night flooded back into his mind. The cane was doused in blood at the base, and was stashed behind a dumpster. He finally remembered the events that took place.
He thought until now that he had fallen asleep in that alley, but now he knew it was not the truth. He had gone back to the house because he left forgot his cuff links on the dining room table. When he got back he saw Peter and Margaret asleep, holding each other and thought to himself, He's such a fool, choosing that petty blade over the holy sword, if she weren't here I could finally have a meister. Yes, it's true, I believe I hate this girl. With his current drunken state, and anger towards the girl, he thrust the cane straight through her chest and left feeling happy and relieved, and without a second thought, he ran back to the alley he was in before and stashed the murder weapon. The rest of his night was spent wandering the streets aimlessly until he found comfort on the corner of the street Margaret lived on. He saw now why the gunshot hadn't woken anyone up that night. It wasn't a gun at all. It was him, he had killed a good friend of his, on their birthday too. He didn't know why he had forgotten just that one part of the night when he remembered everything else.
An enormous migraine hit him and he pulled the Tylenol back out and took a couple. Then, seen in clear writing on the back of the box was the reason for all this madness. Do not take more pills than instructed. Side effect may include drowsiness, fatigue, sweating, memory loss,...