April 25

Courtroom No. 5

11:15 AM

Lily Shield

"I have more than a few questions about this whole situation," Prosecutor Lin declared. Shock was clearly written on her face, and I'm not going to lie, I felt bad for her. She had been living with Prosecutor Wood for ages and never noticed that this was going on. It must have been a serious reality check for her, and it made me feel horrible that she had to find out this way. I know I wouldn't have been happy to find out such personal information about somebody in my family in the middle of a courtroom of all places.

"Then ask me, Linny," Nevada replied. She leaned forward on the witness stand and looked up at Prosecutor Lin with a relaxed expression. "I don't bite."

"I think I would be terrified if she did bite," Yuri murmured, nudging me with one elbow. "Then again, wouldn't everyone?"

"How did you manage to hide this for so long? How long has this whole thing been going on?" Prosecutor Lin asked. "I've been living with you for ages, and I had no clue this was happening. It's so strange to me that you were able to bury this for so long."

"Hm... I don't know how long. A few years? I don't know. I think I was about twelve at the time. Don't quote me on that. I don't remember exactly. I just know that I'm not as old as the body I inhabit," Nevada replied.

"For someone who's supposedly only three, she's very well-spoken," I commented. "If anyone else told me that she was that young, I would have called them crazy, but coming from her, I guess it make sense... She would know herself best since nobody else knew she existed."

"What caused you to exist?" Robbie asked with a heavy frown. "If you came to be three years ago, something must have happened three years ago to spark your existence. You wouldn't just suddenly come out of nowhere."

"Hm... I don't know exactly what happened, but I think it had something to do with the disappearance of my cousin. Something happened before then. Afterwards, my cousin went missing, and I was caused by whatever made him want to leave. I don't know what it was. I wasn't around yet to know what it was, so it's a mystery even to me," Nevada replied. "You'd have to ask Niamh, but I can't swap out easily. I need to pass out, and I'm not that type. She might fall asleep at the drop of a hat, but I'm not quite so easily to put to sleep. For now, we'll just have to go on without an explanation."

"Wow... Well, I guess the cause isn't all that important in the grand scheme of things. We really want you to tell us about what you saw at the time of the crime. We believe that Prosecutor Wood was in charge of your body before passing out at the sight of a knife, which is when you came in. You were the one who came in and took control of your shared body at this time, and you did something to get away from the scene of the crime," Prosecutor Lin said. I could tell she was still shaken, but I didn't comment on it at all.

"Maybe I did. It's not something you can prove. I didn't do anything," Nevada rambled, ignoring what we were saying immediately. "How about we move on? What did the victim do? The victim is a bad guy, right?"

"We never said that the victim was bad while you were around. How did you know that he had been doing bad things?" I asked with a small smirk.

Nevada stared at me for a moment before shrugging. "Dumb luck, I guess," she said. "If you look at him, it's pretty easy to guess that he's shady. You would think he was bad if you saw his face too. Don't come for me when I was just letting my instincts guide me."

"Nevada, you know that you can trust us, right?" Prosecutor Lin questioned. "You weren't around during yesterday's trial... At least, I don't think you were. I believe the defense can give us a set timeline about what you did at the time of the crime. Plus, they can say when you were in control and when you weren't based on what they learned in the investigation yesterday. Is it okay if they explain that now?"

Nevada sighed and shrugged. "Okay, I guess... I mean, I suppose that it wouldn't hurt, so if you want to, then you can," she said, but I could tell she really didn't like this idea. She looked at me and Yuri with uncertainty, and I still got the feeling she didn't fully understand who we were or why she should trust us.

"We think that Prosecutor Wood was in control when she headed out to testify in the other trial the day of the murder. However, while she was leaving the Prosecutor's Office, she ran into the victim, who had a knife in one hand. She saw the sharp object and passed out, causing Nevada to take over. She did something unknown at this time before making her way upstairs and falling asleep on the bench on a higher floor. Well, she either fell asleep or passed out, but I think Nevada herself can explain this clearly. Yesterday, Prosecutor Wood was in control, and she passed out somehow at the Prosecutor's Office after the trial had ended. From there, Nevada took over once again, and she's been the one in charge ever since. We ran into her briefly during our investigation, and she told us that she didn't know anything. Nevada didn't seem to know who we were, so she was acting strangely. It was this odd behavior that led us to think that there was something going on involving Prosecutor Wood to begin with," I declared. "That sure was a meaty explanation."

"Well... Can you prove any of this? What makes you so sure that I did any of this stuff?" Nevada asked, going on the defensive immediately. "Without proof, you can't say that I did it. You need to be able to show without a shadow of a doubt that I did something in order for it to be accepted. You're a lawyer. You're supposed to know how court works."

I looked over to Yuri for a moment. "We haven't accused you of anything. I'm afraid I don't understand what has you so defensive all of a sudden," I told Nevada with a small frown. I kept myself from saying that we hadn't accused her of anything 'yet', as this was sure to freak her out, and we didn't need her getting nervous when she already didn't want to tell us anything.

Nevada sighed. "How about we take this from the top? What's going on? What do you think I did?" she asked. "I don't want to deal with any games here, so be honest with me from the start."

I shared yet another glance with Yuri. I didn't know how I was going to explain this, to be perfectly honest. We needed to tell her about our suspecting her of the murder, but we didn't want her to get defensive when we were on her good side. That would just cause a huge mess that I knew I didn't want to deal with.

"I think we should first tell you about what has been going on with the killer and the deductions we have made," Prosecutor Cruz cut in, effortlessly changing the topic. I'm not going to lie, his sudden intervention sent relief all through my body. After all, Nevada would react better if we told her that the killer had done a good thing (which was the truth) than just randomly accusing her of the murder. I found it odd that we were doing this with someone we suspected was a killer, but I guess there was nothing we could do about it.

"Okay..." Nevada said with a small frown. I could tell she was sensing we were doing something, but she couldn't quite tell what it was.

"So, we believe that the killer saved lives by committing this crime. The victim had to die if many other lives were going to be saved," I began. "You see, we found out that somebody had attempted to plant a bomb in the lobby of the Prosecutor's Office, and yesterday, we deduced that said person was the victim. His fingerprints were all over the bomb, and he had the remote to detonate it. We found further proof later in testimony from a witness who declared he had been doing bad things for quite some time."

"The killer ended the victim's life to keep him from setting off the bomb. The killer then destroyed the bomb by cutting the wires from the inside, meaning the bomb was unable to be detonated. In doing so, the killer saved all the people who were in the building. If the killer hadn't defeated the victim, the bomb would have gone off and destroyed the building, which would have ended the lives of everyone who was inside at the time. We owe a lot to the culprit," Yuri continued.

"The culprit likely wouldn't face criminal charges due to what they did to help out the people in the building," Prosecutor Lin said. "After all, they saved all sorts of people... Myself included. I'm incredibly happy that they defeated the victim."

Nevada stared at us, her eyes wide in shock. She swallowed nervously, refusing to meet any of our gazes. "Well... Wow," she murmured. "I didn't expect you to say that. Normally, people involved in the legal system say that all killers are bad. I didn't realize there were exceptions. You could have fooled me, if I'm being honest."

"Well, I'm just happy you know the truth now. After all, we wouldn't want you to go into this with the wrong assumption. Everyone involved with this case needs to know as much as possible to ensure the verdict is fair," Prosecutor Lin told her with a small smile. She was doing a great job at keeping Nevada calm, and for that, I had to commend her. I know for sure that I would struggle with keeping Nevada relaxed in such a situation. I would be focused on keeping myself calm first, making it much harder to relax others.

Nevada frowned for a moment and let out a small sigh. "You know, you people are way too nice. I feel like this is going to get you in trouble one day, but maybe I'm incorrect. I guess only time will tell," she said, grumbling the words softly.

"I don't think it'll hurt us in the end. I mean, we're all cautious, so we won't let anything bad happen," I smiled, trying to reassure her that everything would be okay. Maybe she would try to open up to us if she realized that we were good people that had no intentions of hurting her. It wasn't certain, but I was willing to try and make an attempt at the very least. It was the least we could try to do if we wanted to find the truth behind this case.

Nevada shook her head. "I don't know. You seem so sure, but I wouldn't be so confident. The world will always find a way to shatter that confidence. I'm not even speaking from experience there. It's just what I think happens from my limited knowledge of the world," she shrugged. "I guess you can take that how you wish. I can't make you listen to me, even if I think you should."

"I think that regardless of if our kindness gets taken advantage of, it's something that we can kindly offer in this situation. After all, the culprit saved countless lives by killing the victim," I said. "With that said, I would like to ask you, Nevada... What were you doing at the time of the crime?"

Nevada looked at me, her eyes suddenly much wider than they had been just a few seconds ago. "Why are you asking me all of a sudden? You can't mean to say that you think I did it," she told us. She was starting to talk faster already, adrenaline getting to her nearly immediately. "This is ridiculous. Why would I want to kill the victim? I barely know anybody at the Prosecutor's Office. I spend most of my time hiding away in Niamh's subconscious."

"I think that you're trying to hide one crucial fact from us here, and that fact will point to if you did it or not," I told her. "How much do you really know about the people at the Prosecutor's Office?"

Nevada stared at me, blinking a few times in confusion. "I'm sorry... What?" she asked. "I don't know what you're trying to get at here, but I don't think I like it one bit."

"This can't be the first time that you have ever shown up. I simply can't believe that. You have appeared before now as far as I can tell. You would have reacted with much more confusion if this was your first time showing up, and yet, you seemed to know what you were doing. If I had to guess, you came to be a lot closer with the other people in the Prosecutor's Office than you're letting on," I explained.

"You think that I killed the victim because I love the people in the Prosecutor's Office?" Nevada questioned, staring at me. She blinked another few times before letting out a small laugh. "Me? Care about people?! Ha! I don't have feelings, so I can't care about people!"

"Well, I think that there's something to prove that you do have feelings," Prosecutor Lin told her. "You haven't told us what you were doing at the time of the crime yet even if we've mentioned you probably killed the victim at this time. Why haven't you said what you were doing at the time? It could clear your name."

"I don't know what this has to do with me having feelings," Nevada frowned.

"If you hadn't committed the crime, you would have an alibi. You would have mentioned such. And yet, you haven't brought that up at all... Perhaps it's because you were killing the victim at the time. Perhaps you killed the victim because you cared so much about everyone else," Prosecutor Lin said with a small, serene smile. "You don't need to deny it. Feelings aren't bad."

"I'm not saying anything else. I have a right to not incriminate myself. Now, will you please leave me alone?" Nevada questioned impatiently. Despite her saying that she wanted to leave, I could tell that she was hiding her true feelings. I didn't need to be Deirdre to be able to tell. It was much clearer than Nevada seemed to think.

"You know, the culprit in this case is actually kind of a hero. We're not lying about that. Seriously. Without the culprit, the people inside that building would have been in a world of trouble, but since the culprit was present, everyone wound up safe. I can't even begin to express my thanks to that person... Are you sure you don't know who it is?" Robbie asked. He seemed to have come to the same conclusion everyone else in the courtroom had, but he wasn't going to try and openly get her to confess. "We aren't mad at all. How could we be mad when the culprit saved our lives?"

Nevada looked at him and let out a sigh. "Listen, I think you guys are just going off on tangents. You seem nice enough, but I don't see how any of this has to do with me having emotions. What does it matter? I don't feel happiness or anger. That's normal. Not everybody likes feeling things. I don't like feeling things. How about we drop this so that I can go home? It's not helping anyone here," she said.

I shook my head. "We actually happen to have someone here who can work as a psychologist. In fact, she has a degree, and she should be able to help us with this witness' mental state. Perhaps she can assist us in coming to a common conclusion," I suggested.

"If you don't mind my asking, who is it that can do such a thing?" Judge Frost asked, raising an eyebrow in my direction.

"It's actually someone from my agency. Her name is Deirdre Brigit. She should be able to help us through dealing with this witness' psychological state... If it's allowed, the defense would like to call her down to assist with finding the truth behind this case. She's sitting up in the gallery as we speak," I said.

Judge Frost looked over to the prosecution before returning her gaze to me. "It doesn't appear that the prosecution has any objections to such a proposal... Alright. If it isn't an issue, the defense may summon its assistant at this time," she declared.

I looked over to Yuri for a moment, a grin appearing on my face. "The defense would like to call Deirdre Brigit to the bench to examine the mental state of the current witness," I announced.

"Why are you letting her do this? For all you know, it's a scam! Therapy is fake, and we're all going to die one day," Nevada said with a deep frown. Her sudden jump into the existential was something I didn't expect, if I'm being perfectly honest.

"If it will help to figure out the truth behind this case, we'll have to take a chance on it. Besides, it's not like anyone else has proposed any other ideas... Unless you know what we should do instead, witness?" Judge Frost asked, frowning deeply to Nevada.

Nevada seemed to understand that she was outnumbered, and she let out a heavy sigh. "This isn't going to go well... I know it won't go well. Therapy is still fake," she grumbled. I got the feeling she was saying the whole 'therapy is fake' thing because she had never been. After all, if she had, we would have known about the dissociative identity thing before now, but since it had remained a secret, the only explanation was that she hadn't ever been pushed to go into therapy.

Deirdre made her way down from the gallery to the main level of the courtroom, and she stepped next to Yuri to stand behind the defense bench. "I'm glad you decided to call me down here," Deirdre said with a small smile. "I got the feeling something was going on, and I wanted the chance to try and figure out what was happening."

"In that case, I'm glad we called you down too," I smiled. "Deirdre here has experience in psychology, and she should be able to help us calm the witness down enough to get a decent testimony out of her."

"Calm me down? I am calm!" Nevada snapped. I never expected such a booming voice to come out of such a relatively small body. Even if she was taller than me, she looked so fragile at a first glance, and yet, Nevada had no qualms about screaming at the top of her lungs apparently.

"That's exactly what I thought you would say... You see, I think something is going on with you at the moment that has you upset or stressed. Being in court is enough to make anyone upset, but this seems to go past the regular nerves of being in the courtroom. I have to wonder... Is there something else that could have frightened you?" Deirdre asked, remaining surprisingly relaxed in the face of the angry, screaming child before her.

"Maybe because you're trying to, I don't know, accuse me of murder?!" Nevada asked with a loud, angry sigh. "Of course I'm upset! Who wouldn't be upset at getting up to testify and immediately being told that you probably committed a crime?!"

"We've said before that the killer didn't do anything wrong in this case. It was an incident that had to be taken care of immediately. There wouldn't have been time to call for police assistance given how immediate the consequences would have been. You are unaccounted for at the time of the crime. You are the most likely suspect, but this isn't a bad thing at all. You saved lives. This would be considered justified self-defense since you killed the victim knowing that your own life was in danger," Deirdre went on. Her voice sounded like a lullaby when compared to Nevada's noisy screeches.

"You don't need to accuse me of the murder though! A lot of people were unaccounted for at the time of the crime. I'm sure you don't have a watertight alibi!" Nevada exclaimed, pointing accusingly at Deirdre.

Deirdre didn't seem bothered by such, shrugging it off and shaking her head. "I do, but this isn't about me at the moment. Your lack of an alibi is only one thing that we believe could point you to the time of the crime... But that's not what we're talking about now. I want to know more about what has you so upset. Even if they were accused of murder, most people wouldn't get this upset this quickly. I'm not trying to be harsh on you or anything like that. I just want to know the truth," she said.

"Why can't you just leave me alone? I haven't done anything to you, but you're still insisting on making me confess to a crime that I didn't commit. I didn't even have a motive! I'm a little baby! I don't know anything about killing people!" Nevada cried out.

"You don't have a motive... That's what you claim. However, I believe that this statement is false as can be. I think that you do have a motive, and it's what has you so stressed now. You haven't said anything about this being your first time out and about," Deirdre remarked.

"Why would I bring that up? Is that even important?" Nevada asked. "Honestly, I don't think it is. It's only relevant to me, and last I heard, I wasn't relevant to everything else in this case. Of course, you seem to want to say that I am involved with everything in this case, but that's because you're acting ridiculous."

"You acted like the defense was unfamiliar, but you haven't showed anything like that towards the prosecution. How would you know them if it was your first time out?" Deirdre questioned.

"Uh... I share knowledge with my other side. If she knows of them, then I know of them too," Nevada replied. "We don't have the same memories, but basic knowledge is something we share. She's met them, and that basic knowledge carries over to me whenever I take control of the body. Is that enough of an explanation for you?"

"It seems to run a lot deeper than that... If you ask me, I would say that this isn't the first time that you've acted like Prosecutor Wood. If I had to wager a guess, I would say that you have pretended multiple times in the past, and it was while you were hiding under her name that you were able to meet the other people in the Prosecutor's Office," Deirdre went on. "I believe that you have met with them multiple times and have grown to care about them over time, and it is because you care that you involved yourself with this case... And it's because you care that you're being caused so much stress by what has happened."

"How about you explain what you're talking about instead of dancing around the answer? I'm a baby, and a stupid baby at that. I need you to tell me what's going on," Nevada frowned.

"You grew to care about everyone that works in the Prosecutor's Office since you were forced to spend so much time around them. After spending ages with the other people there, you found yourself starting to care... So, when you saw that they were being threatened by the bomb the victim had tried to place, you jumped into action and decided to take him out," Deirdre answered. "You did this because you cared about them so much... If you ask me, this explanation fits perfectly for multiple reasons."

Nevada didn't do much aside from stare at Deirdre in shock. She looked like she wanted to retort, but she was unable to find the words, so she just stayed quiet. When the words didn't come to her, she crossed her arms and looked down at her feet. I saw a pout appear on her face.

"You see, the killer would have come forward in most cases. After all, they wouldn't get in trouble due to the self-defense aspect of this crime. On top of that, they saved countless lives in the process because they killed the victim. Anybody else who worked in the Prosecutor's Office would be aware of such since they were experienced with the law. Even the police officers that were on duty investigating the previous crime at the Prosecutor's Office would know about such, and yet... The killer never came forward despite this undeniable truth," Deirdre began.

"What does this have to do with me? I'm just a baby. What would I know?" Nevada questioned.

"You wouldn't know about everything that has to do with a self-defense case. If I had to guess, I would say that your other side takes care of the work aspect of your shared life. You said it yourself a moment ago: you're a baby. You likely weren't trained properly on how to be a prosecutor, and that means that you have little ideas on how to handle cases that Prosecutor Wood gets. You know far less about the law, and because of that, you didn't realize at the time that this case would count as self-defense," Deirdre replied. "That would say why the culprit never came forward."

"That still doesn't mean I did it! For all you know, somebody else killed him! Where's your proof that I did it?" Nevada asked.

I raised my hand before starting to speak next. "I think I might have another thing that points to you doing it... The bomb. It was utterly destroyed from the inside out in an unprofessional job. No bomb squad was called until after the police had been called to see what was going on at the scene. A knife had been used to cut the wires inside the explosive, something few people in law enforcement would want to do. After all, if it went off, it could cause countless issues. Who else would think to cut the bomb's wires from the inside out?" I questioned.

"So? What does that have to do with me? You're basically just saying here that I had to be the killer since I'm stupid, but where's your actual proof of this? Feelings? Ha! Don't make me laugh. I'm not that dumb, you know. I feel like you're trying to manipulate me into confessing because you don't want to admit that you were wrong. You don't want to try and find the real killer, so you're trying to get off easy by making me say that I did it when I didn't," Nevada said. She was starting to ramble now, and the stress in her voice was easy to hear.

"Nevada, we aren't trying to manipulate you at all. If we were, we wouldn't be acting so nice about it," Deirdre assured her. "We want to find the truth behind this case. The killer won't be getting in trouble. If you did it, you should just say so to make it easier for yourself and everyone else involved. We wouldn't lie to you about something like this. We aren't heartless."

"Adults like you always lie about these things," Nevada grumbled. "Not trying to be mean or anything, but adults are horrible sometimes."

"That sounds pretty mean to me," Yuri murmured. "I mean, I assume that she has her reasons for saying something like that, but it still doesn't sound nice, but maybe I'm just missing something here..."

"Nevada, how about we all take a deep breath?" Prosecutor Lin asked, a small smile on her face. "I'm sorry if we've stressed you out... Would you go on and tell us about what you were doing at the time of the crime? Please? We want what's best for you regardless of what you're about to say to us."

Nevada looked back and forth between Prosecutor Lin and Deirdre. Judging by the look in her eyes, she was conflicted now, and she swallowed nervously. "I mean... Um... I guess it wouldn't hurt if I told you..." she said softly.

"I think we've found the one way to get her to talk to us... If she was hiding as Prosecutor Wood all this time, she would naturally be around Prosecutor Lin quite a bit. After all, Prosecutor Wood lives with Prosecutor Lin. It would happen eventually... Their meeting, I mean. It was inevitable," Yuri remarked. "If anyone can get her to open up to the court, it's going to be her."

"I suspected as such," Deirdre admitted. "It makes sense. She must have had some pretty strong emotions regarding the people in the Prosecutor's Office to act so suddenly when she realized they were in danger. That being said, Prosecutor Lin was probably the one to draw out those feelings as a motherly figure in Nevada's life."

"I just hope she's able to help us reach a full conclusion on this case," I said quietly before turning my full attention back to the discussion that awaited us.

Nev good

-Digital