March 11

Blackgate Ice Center

11:45 AM

Cotoli Morix

The journey to the backstage area was much more straightforward than I had been anticipating, and much to my own surprise, we weren't stopped at all on the way through the area. There were a few police officers clustered around one person, something that I noticed as we entered the deepest part of the backstage space, and I assumed that this figure in particular had to be the witness from before.

Upon closer examination, I became sure of it. She had the same bold blue hair that we had seen when the body was first discovered. I glanced down to Chrysalis, who gave me a nod to show that she was sure that we had found the right person. We began to move closer after that, and with some determination, we were able to weave through a few members of the crowd of police officers.

The witness in question glanced up at me as soon as she saw that I was in the area, and a frown appeared on her face as she tilted her head to the side. I opened my mouth to explain, but the crowd's general buzzing cut me off from being able to do so. I winced at the noise, and Chrysalis gestured for the girl to come closer to us. After some brief hesitation, she did so, and by a secondary stroke of a miracle, she managed to slip away without being spotted by any of the officers.

"Hey... I remember you two!" the girl cried out. "You showed up when I first found Aes' body... I... I'm sorry that you had to see that... She shouldn't have died at all, and yet, there she was..."

"You don't need to apologize," Chrysalis said firmly. "It's not as if you were the one to kill her, so you don't need to be the one saying sorry for anything." I saw her hand drift up to the Magatama hanging from a small chain around her neck, a sign that she was checking to ensure that the girl was telling the truth when the matter of her innocence inevitably came up next.

"Of course not!" she exclaimed. "I would never do anything like that to her... I don't know why anybody would try. It's awful to imagine... Nobody deserves to leave this world like that... Murdered..."

"My name is Cotoli Morix, and this is my sister, Chrysalis. We're going to be finding out the truth behind this case as investigators," I explained. "What's your name? We would love to hear about anything that you happened to see at the time."

"Fiora Leteir," the girl replied, bowing her head before righting herself. "Well... I was going to see if I could find an extra costume from the closet where we store them. I accidentally ripped my costume shortly before the show would have started, you see. I wanted to try and get the backup since going out with such a large tear wouldn't have been good for anyone." She gestured to the right side of her skirt, and I could see that there was sure enough a large gash in the fabric.

"How did the fabric tear in the first place?" Chrysalis questioned, a frown on her face. "I doubt that something like that would happen simply by accident."

Fiora faltered, and her face fell as she looked down. "I... I slipped and fell," she confessed. "I was backstage walking around, and I heard something really noisy. It startled me, and I lost my balance."

I looked down at the ground beneath us, and all of the pieces came together almost immediately. "I understand... The backstage area is carpeted so that you and the rest of the performers are able to walk around with their skates," I murmured. "When you fell, your skate must have caused that large rip, am I correct?"

Fiora nodded. "Yeah. I tripped, and when I noticed what had happened, there was a giant tear down the side of my dress. I decided to go and get a new costume as soon as I had the ability to do so," she replied. "That was when I found the body..."

"What noise was it that startled you to such an extent? Did you do anything between hearing the sound and coming to the costume closet?" Chrysalis questioned, getting to the heart of the issue immediately.

Fiora seemed to flinch in the face of Chrysalis' unmoving gaze. "I... I don't know what the noise was, but it sounded like something had fallen over. I wasn't sure about it was because it sounded so much larger than anything that I had seen backstage. I feel like I would have noticed it if there was a prop that would have been so noisy when it fell over," she explained. "After I heard the sound... If I'm being honest, I was a bit rattled, so I stayed where I was for a long time. I was in one of the deepest rooms backstage, and nobody came in while I was there."

"I see," Chrysalis murmured. She didn't say anything else, instead simply glancing up to me, patiently waiting for me to offer my input on the matter.

I cleared my throat before starting to speak. "We've heard that there was an argument between the victim and the defendant before the crime took place. Do you happen to know anything about that?" I asked.

"I... Sort of?" Fiora finally answered after what felt like an eternity of silence. "It's a bit complicated, if I'm being honest... I couldn't hear exactly what they were saying, but I knew that they were fighting about something. I'm sure that the truth is going to come out about it sooner or later, but... I don't know what it could have been about."

"You heard the argument, but you couldn't quite catch what they were saying," Chrysalis concluded, and Fiora responded with a nod as Chrysalis went on. "I see... The police seem to believe that Venus killed the victim over what happened during that argument. Do you know of any previous bad blood between them? Was there a reason for them to not get along?"

"I don't think so," Fiora responded after a brief pause. "I mean, Venus didn't really talk to her all that much. Aes never really saw a reason to get too close to her because of their differences in age. There wasn't ever really a problem between them since... If I'm being honest, they never really spoke to one another extensively in the first place. It's kind of hard for them to not get along if they don't even talk."

"I'm inclined to agree," I said with a nod. This was certainly something strange that I was going to have to keep in mind. It sounded like this argument was at the heart of determining the supposed motive, and when we got the chance to, we were going to have to ask Venus about it. She would have the answers that we were searching for, and if all went well, that would give us the hole that we needed to blow this mess wide open.

"Did anybody else have a reason to not like the victim?" Chrysalis asked, crossing her arms. She looked over to me, and I knew what she was thinking about. Her mind was on the piece of fabric that had been uncovered in the hand of the victim. That seemed to be our primary clue to figuring out who had done this, and we had to use it for everything that it was worth if we wanted to find the truth behind the murder.

"I'm not sure," Fiora confessed. "Aes mostly kept to herself, but... I think that was because she felt like she was better than a lot of us. I don't think that she wanted to be seen associating with us unless she absolutely had to."

"In other words, the victim had a less than optimal attitude," Chrysalis said softly. "That's certainly something for us to keep in mind... How about the scene of the crime?"

"Ah, that," Fiora muttered. "The ice skate... The ice skate that was used to kill Aes was one of Venus' skates. She said that the pair went missing a few days ago, so the pair that she's been using since then has been her backup set. It's important that we have backups in case of emergency since this show is so intense. We've had a few skates break before, but... They haven't outright gone missing before now."

"What I'm hearing is that this crime could have been premeditated," I told Chrysalis. "If the culprit was the one who took the skates, then that means that they could have been planning on doing something with them. We'll just have to see when this case goes to court if that was actually true, but for now, it's something for us to keep in mind." She nodded her agreement.

"You... You're going to be helping Venus out, aren't you?" Fiora questioned. When I nodded, she let out a heavy sigh. "I don't think that she did this... I can't imagine that she would have wanted to harm people this way. Venus has always been so nice and kind to others, and... I don't think that she's capable of killing anybody. Even if the murder weapon was her ice skate... Even if the victim was killed after the two of them got into an argument... I don't think that she did it. I just can't see that happening."

"It's nice to know that you believe in her. I'm sure that she'll appreciate hearing that when we go to speak to her," I smiled to Fiora.

"You're going to talk to her?" Fiora squeaked, and I nodded in response. "Um... Tell her that I'm hoping for the best... I've been asked to testify in the trial tomorrow, but I still don't think that she did it. I guess that I have to say what happened no matter what I believe in personally though..."

"Has anybody else come by to talk to you?" Chrysalis questioned, perking up at the words of confirmation regarding Fiora taking her testimony to court. I could tell by the glimmer in her eye that she was planning to try and find out more information about something much grander, and I was pretty sure that I would be able to guess what it was specifically that she was trying to find out if I was given the chance to do so.

"A few people... There was that detective... He was nice," Fiora replied with a gentle smile. "There was another man who came by here a little while ago too... I think that he said he was the prosecutor on the case... What was his name again...?"

Chrysalis nudged me with her elbow, and I nodded in her direction. Her inquisition had certainly paid off. I was curious about who the prosecutor was going to be as well, and I hoped that this would give us at least a little bit of information about the person that we were going to be facing off against.

If I was being honest, there were a few names that I was hoping to hear. It would have been incredible if Fiora told us that we were set to be facing off against my sister, first and foremost. Sora had been a prosecutor for a short while by this point, and I knew that she would cooperate to figure out the truth with us if she was given the chance to do so. She was a kind person, and I had full faith in her abilities. The other person in question was Prosecutor Tora Yin, Sora's mentor and caretaker of a few years. Despite being a somewhat stony woman, I trusted her to be able to handle these matters with dignity and grace, and her assistance would certainly be appreciated.

Fiora let out a gasp as she clapped her hands together. "Ah, that's what it was! He said his name was Bespoke," she told us. "I can't remember his first name quite yet, but... I'm sure that it will come out soon enough. I hope that's enough to help you out."

I nodded. I hadn't heard the name before, but I figured that it didn't matter if I was familiar with who our opposition was bound to be. We had to take care of the trial either way, and if it meant facing off against somebody who we hadn't met before, then so be it. I just knew that Venus needed us, and we had to do what we could to ensure that she didn't fall into the wrong hands.

"Thank you for telling us all of this," Chrysalis told Fiora. "I suppose that we should leave you to go back to what you were doing previously. Thank you once again for stepping away so that we could speak to you."

"I'm happy that I could help... I hope that you're able to help Venus out too," Fiora said softly. She pivoted after that and gave us a brief wave before retreating into the crowd.

After she was gone, I looked down to Chrysalis. "It sounds to me like we're going to have to investigate this loud noise and the events that transpired when the victim got into an argument with Venus," I told her. "We can ask Venus about both of those events when we go down to the detention center."

"I somehow doubt that she's going to know anything about the noise. Fiora was the closest one to the scene, and she didn't even seem to have an explanation for it," Chrysalis murmured. "If there were other witnesses who had heard that sound, then they probably would have already come up in our investigation. I'm confident that there's something going on with that noise, and if we can figure out what it is..."

"Then we'll be one step closer to figuring out the case as a whole," I finished. "We should try and blast a hole through the supposed motive first of all. The murder weapon is going to be much harder to work around. After all, we know fully well that Venus' fingerprints are all over the skate because she was the owner of the skate in the first place. If we propose that in court, then it isn't going to be enough to fully clear her name of any suspicion."

"That's a good point," Chrysalis sighed. "Well, we might as well go on and talk to her now. The sooner that we can do that, the better. We've still got a lot about this case that needs to be figured out."

"You also want to go to the detention center so that you can talk to her more," I remarked, raising an eyebrow in her direction. "I saw the way that you were looking at her."

"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear you say that," Chrysalis huffed, and I laughed to myself. She snorted before joining in. "Alright. Let's get going."

March 11

Detention Center

1:00 PM

Chrysalis Starr

By some miracle or lucky break from the universe, Venus was already in the visiting room by the time that we had arrived. She seemed to have lost all of her shine from that morning, suddenly seeming depressed and saggy by comparison. I couldn't blame her in the slightest for the shift, fully aware of how brutal the detention center had the potential to be. In all honesty, it just sort of made me feel nauseous. This whole situation was brutal, and I was going to do everything in my power to keep things from getting any worse.

Venus let out a gasp as soon as she saw us, and her eyes went wide with shock. "Hey! I remember you two from this morning!" she cried out. Her gaze flickered back and forth between myself and Cotoli before settling somewhere in between us. "What... What is it that brings you here, if you don't mind my asking...?"

"We were at the ice rink up until a short while ago," Cotoli explained. "While we were there, we heard that you were being arrested on suspicion of murder. We figured that we might as well come down here and see how you were doing... On top of that though, we have a question for you regarding logistics."

"Logistics?" Venus echoed, her head tilting slightly to the side. "I'm afraid that I don't know what you're talking about... Is there something going on here that I'm not picking up on?"

"It's about your defense," I continued. "You're the suspect of this murder, and we want to help you get out of this situation. Cotoli here has recently passed the bar exam and is thus qualified to defend you in court. We came by here to see if you were alright with us helping you out, though... If I'm being honest, we've already done a bit of investigating for ourselves since we couldn't ask you directly until after you were finished being questioned on the subject of what happened at the time of the crime."

Venus let out a gasp, and her shoulders released all of the tension that they had been building up before that point. "You'd really do that for me...? Thank you so much, both of you," she told us, looking down at her feet with a smile that was hardly comforting given the circumstances. I could practically feel her nerves from my place on the other side of the glass. "Is... Is there anything else that you want to know? I don't know if I'll be able to answer all of your questions, but I can at least give it a shot."

Cotoli nodded as he and I both settled down into chairs facing the glass. Since we had finally gotten confirmation that we were going to be able to defend Venus, we might as well get comfortable and all of that. "Can you give us a rundown of what you did this morning? Any and all details that you have to share will be helpful," he said.

Venus looked up to us again a moment later, and she let out a small sigh. "I got there early this morning so that we could practice for the show. We were running a few problematic spots so that we didn't have a fallout during the show itself. After that was done, I went backstage, and... Well..." She fell silent, and I already had a sneaking suspicion that I knew where this was going.

"This was when you got into an argument with the victim," Cotoli remarked, and Venus responded with a nod. "What was it that you two were arguing about, if you don't mind my asking? The police seem to think that your argument with the victim was what sparked all of this in the first place."

"I... Um..." Venus sighed, seeming to understand that there wasn't a reason to hide the truth from us. "Aes has always had a bit of an ego. She's the lead skater in our show, and she wants everybody to know that she's incredible. Many people considered her a prodigy when she was growing up, and I guess that she projects all of that onto the rest of us. She wants us to reach her impossibly high standards, and... I got a tad annoyed with that."

"You were the one who started the argument?" I questioned, raising one eyebrow in surprise. That was something I certainly hadn't seen coming given the circumstances.

Venus hesitantly nodded. "You could say that... I didn't do it intentionally, of course. Aes just started being snarky, and I muttered under my breath that I wanted her to shut up and leave me alone. Aes took that as a personal attack since everything is a personal attack to her, and... That was when the yelling started. She told me that I was being a brat and that I needed to learn my place. I didn't really care about what she had to say about me. After all, people can think what they wish about me, but... I do draw the line when people start to pick on those that I care about," she declared firmly.

After a brief pause, Venus went on. "Aes started talking about one of my younger sisters, Cassidy. You see, Cassidy came by the rehearsal space yesterday to pick me up after practice. Well, she didn't pick me up herself since she can't drive, but she was there with our mother who did want to pick me up so that I could come back home. Cassidy came inside to find me, and Aes just started hurling insults. It... It really started to annoy me, so I started yelling back. I don't care what people think of me, but my younger sisters... Cassidy's always been shy, and I don't want people like Aes thinking that it's okay to stomp all over others just because they have talent enough to get away with it."

If I was being honest, that last sentence hit me like a truck, and I nodded profusely in agreement. "Yeah," I said simply. I didn't trust myself to meet eyes with Venus without betraying my internal monologue in some fashion or another, so I just didn't say anything. That was probably the best decision for everyone.

"This argument truly doesn't sound significant enough to turn to murder over," Cotoli remarked, and Venus shook her head to show that she agreed. "Even if the victim had a bit of an ego that irritated those around her, I doubt that anyone would turn to murder to keep her quiet. A potential motive would have to be stronger than that."

Venus snorted and shook her head. "The police seem to think that I'm lying about the contents of my argument with Aes. Nobody else actually heard what we were saying, just the fact that we were yelling, so nobody can back it up," she explained. "They're convinced that it was much more serious than I'm letting on, and they're very intent on pushing me to reveal the truth behind our argument. I already told them what it was, and that's the fact of the matter. They might not want to believe me, but that's their problem, not mine... I wish that was actually the case though. Instead, here I am, arrested on suspicion of a murder that I would never dream of committing."

"We don't think that you committed the crime either," I assured her. "It's not as if you would have a strong reason to do so... But there is one other thing that I think we're going to need to hear about before we go any further into the investigation."

"The murder weapon was an ice skate of yours, was it not?" Cotoli questioned.

Venus let out a hiss from between her teeth as she nodded. "Yeah... It was. That was my main pair of skates, you see. Both of the skates went missing a few days ago, and I couldn't find them no matter how hard I looked. I was really starting to get annoyed that they were gone. I had left them on a bench for a short while, and when I got up to talk with somebody else... They just disappeared while I was gone," she explained. "I'm still not sure about why anybody would want to steal the skates in the first place."

"I'm willing to assume that the police think that you're lying about that..." I murmured. "They probably believe that the story of the skates being stolen is a coverup to keep you from falling under suspicion on that subject. I swear, the lack of competency sometimes..." I trailed off and kept myself from continuing by covering my words with a cough, not wanting to show my full animosity towards the police department on my first day of meeting Venus. That seemed more like a second or third meeting sort of deal.

"Unfortunately, that is what they believe," Venus confirmed. "I'm not happy about it, though I feel like that's pretty obvious given the circumstances... I didn't kill Aes, but they just don't want to believe me."

"You know, there was a loud noise that one of the other skaters heard backstage earlier today. Would you happen to know anything about that?" Cotoli questioned.

"I'm afraid not," Venus replied. "After my argument with Aes, I... I was admittedly a touch annoyed. I was supposed to be giving Cassidy and Yuri a brief tour of the rink before the show started. Yuri was pretty excited about me being able to show her a few things that the rest of the world would be unaware of, but... I couldn't find them anywhere. I decided to take to the ice to let out my frustrations from the argument with Aes, and if all went well, Cassidy and Yuri would see me while I was skating."

"Instead of finding them though, you found us," I concluded, and Venus nodded. "I see... In other words, you came out to skate as soon as the argument with the victim was over. That means that if we can prove the victim was alive after your argument, then... Then that means that we can show that you didn't do this. After all, you've got a pretty strict watertight alibi from after that."

"I don't think that anybody saw Aes alive after that though... And that's where the problem seems to be coming from," Venus sighed with a shake of her head. "That's the impression that I've been getting up to this point at the very least. I feel like somebody would have mentioned it by now if a witness had seen Aes alive after our fight."

"That... That doesn't sound good at all," I murmured. I wasn't going to let it stop me, but this was certainly an inconvenience that I wasn't going to enjoy working around. I wished that there was something that we could use to say conclusively right off the bat that Venus didn't do it.

"They probably think that you running off to skate so soon after your argument is your way of trying to get an alibi retroactively," Cotoli pointed out, and I winced at the truth of his words. He was probably right, as much as I hated to admit it. This entire situation was a mess, and I couldn't wait for the police officers involved with this arrest to eat their words as soon as her defense was made clear in the courtroom.

"It really does suck that there isn't anything to imply somebody else did it. There's just not all that much evidence in the first place, and I don't think that it's helping my case in the slightest," Venus remarked.

Cotoli reached his hand into his back pocket, seeming to realize that there was something that would help us to figure out more about this case. He showed off the scrap of blue fabric that we had found in the victim's hand while examining the scene of the crime. "Do you happen to recognize this at all, Venus?" he questioned.

For a long moment, Venus simply stared at it, but when recognition dawned across her face, she snapped and pointed to the fabric. "As a matter of fact, I do! That's the uniform worn by the other workers of the ice rink! It's meant to match the color of the ice. I don't know why they went with that blue color instead of black that's much easier to find, but that does mean that it's pretty distinctive," she explained.

"In other words, we've found our piece of miracle evidence," I smirked to myself. "We're going to have to figure out how it's applicable to the case still, but for the time being, I'm willing to consider this as a win. It's not as if we've gotten this lucky in the past, so we should take full advantage of this gift that the universe has seen fit to give us."

"What do you think that it means?" Venus asked. "Do you think that Aes tore that off the clothing of her attacker when the two of them were fighting against one another?"

"It certainly seems that way," Cotoli confirmed. "I can't imagine that there would be another explanation, if I'm being honest. It's the most likely deduction for us to make... This really does raise the question of where the scene of the crime was though. After all, it seems pretty obvious now that the victim was placed in the costume closet after her death, but we still don't know where the murder actually took place..."

"I'm sure that you'll be able to figure that out soon enough," Venus told us with a gentle smile. "Thank you for all that you've done to help me so far... Do you really think that you're going to be able to prove that I didn't do it tomorrow?"

I nodded confidently, and Venus met my gaze once again. I could feel myself melting into little more than butter under her soft and incredibly memorable eyes, and I struggled to keep my composure so that she didn't see how flustered I was outwardly. "We'll make sure that you aren't found guilty of what happened," I assured her, not thinking that I would be able to say much else. Heaven above, why did she have to be so gorgeous?

"We're going to conclude our investigation here. We wish you good luck until tomorrow. We'll see you down at the courthouse when the time is right," Cotoli declared as he rose to his feet, and I followed suit. Venus gave us a simple nod, and I glanced up to my brother as she was escorted away. The pieces were starting to come together, and I could only hope that we would be pointed in the correct direction when push came to shove.

I love this story so much wow

-Digital