A/N: Here's Chapter Two Deadly Life Part Seven. This chapter's AO3 counterpart will have an art commission, so feel free to check it out over there tomorrow. Please read, review, and enjoy!
Danganronpa 4: Next Generation Killing!
Chapter Two: A Thin Line Divides Heaven and Hell!
Deadly Life Part Seven: Who's the Culprit?!
"Well…now that we've had this little pep talk…maybe we can get back on track?" Seven suggested.
"The elephant man's right, we're back to square one." Lotus admitted.
"Well, Shuichi?" Clover stared expectantly at the blue-haired boy. "You're the resident detective here, so do your part and give us a nudge in the right direction if you're not gonna solve this case."
Clover, that's not really fair-
"Well…I think it might be a good idea to focus on the culprit's motive." Kiki blinked, her thought cut off as Shuichi explained, "Maybe if we can determine why the culprit targeted Snake, we can work backwards and find out who they are."
"You think so?" Ace asked curiously. "Do you really think we can determine the culprit's identity by analyzing their motive?"
"Well, it's better than nothing." Seven argued.
"Very well, let us discuss the culprit's motive for killing Snake." Keebo agreed.
Why did the culprit kill Snake? Kiki pondered. I don't know the answer to that yet…but we need to figure it out now or we're all done for! Kiki narrowed her eyes in determination as Gonta began the debate.
"Why did the culprit kill Snake?"
"Maybe one of us had a vendetta against him or something." Lotus suggested.
"No way!" Clover shook her head vehemently. "My brother never did anything to anybody!"
"Besides, none of us knew each other when we first arrived here." Tsumugi pointed out.
"Well, one thing's for certain…" Ryoma concluded "The culprit obviously planned Snake's death in advance."
Kiki barely withheld her gasp as Ryoma's final words echoed in her mind. She raised her finger and pointed at him.
"No that's wrong! I'm not sure that Snake was meant to be the victim here."
"W-why not?" Teruaki stammered. "There's n-no way a murder this i-intricate is set up as a s-spur of the m-moment!"
"Remember that I was the one who prepared the murder scene, not the culprit." Kirumi gently interjected.
"Preparations aside, there's something bothering me about how we found Snake's body before it was devoured." Kiki admitted.
"What do you mean by that?" Ace asked curiously.
"I mean that the pajamas he was wearing weren't his own."
"Weren't his own?!" Ace exclaimed in shock. Kiki nodded before Ace demanded, "But where did he get them?"
"During the investigation, Teruaki told me that the night before the murder, Snake stopped by asking to try on a pair of his pajamas."
"Is this true, Teruaki?" Keebo asked curiously.
"Well, y-yes. I let him change in my ba-bathroom, and then he l-left. I didn't see him a-again until the ma-magic show!" Teruaki stammered.
"So Snake left Teruaki's room wearing different pajamas…" Gonta mused. "But why would pajamas be a motive for murder?"
"They must have been one special set of pajamas, if the culprit was willing to kill over them." Lotus commented.
"I…don't think the pajamas themselves were the motive for murder." Shuichi sweatdropped, smiling awkwardly. "Still…they could give us a clue as to the culprit's motive, if we approach it from the right angle."
"Right…angle…?" Gonta wondered, crossing his arms over his chest as he pondered Shuichi's comment.
The right angle…if I approach this from the right angle…I should be able to figure out how the pajamas Snake borrowed factor into the incident! Kiki realized.
She closed her eyes and concentrated, feeling the buzz of the courtroom fade away as she retreated into the recesses of her mind.
Kiki Kart!
"Huh?" Kiki wondered as she opened her eyes and glanced around, seeing the other survivors around her. "Shuichi? Kirumi? Lotus? Why are you all…riding…go-karts?"
Her brow furrowed as they seemed to ignore her. Even waving her hand towards them had no effect. For all intents and purposes, it was like she was completely invisible and inaudible.
This is weird…why are they all ignoring me? It's like they're NPCs in some video game…She looked down as her eyes widened in shock. "Why am I driving a go-kart?! Where are we, anyway?"
She looked ahead and saw a black and white checkered strip on the pavement ahead of her. Her brow furrowed, completely confused by her unfamiliar environment.
"Is this…a racetrack? Am I in a race? But…what happened to the trial? Aren't we supposed to figure out who killed Snake?"
Any further ponderings were cut off as a disembodied voice echoed in her ears. "Three, Two, One, GO!"
"WAAAAAHHHHH!"
Kiki's foot suddenly pressed on the gas pedal, sending her zooming forward along with the others. She frantically gripped at the wheel and turned it, causing her kart to skid uncontrollably on the racetrack.
"How do you drive this thing?!"
Kiki screamed as she swerved out of Ace's way, zooming ahead of him. She sighed in relief once she passed the other racers.
"Okay…at least now I won't have to worry about hitting anyone…" A golden sparkle on the horizon caught Kiki's attention. "Are those…coins?" Her eyes widened as she got close and closer to it. "What the…it's huge! I can't hit that thing, I'll crash! Get outta the way, outta the way, outta the way…huh?"
Before she knew it, she was already colliding with the coin. To her surprise, the moment the gold currency touched her front bumper, it disappeared.
"Huh, guess these coins can't hurt me…it's almost like I'm in one of those racing video games…hey, there's more coins!"
Without any indicator of what to do, and with a firmer grasp on her steering wheel, she began to steer her kart towards the trail of coins. One by one, they vanished into thin air, clearing the obstruction from the racetrack.
"Okay, the coins are nice, I guess, but what am I even supposed to be doing…" She pondered as she collected the last coin.
As if on cue, the disembodied voice rang out once more in her ears. "Time to put on your thinking caps!"
"Thinking caps? What do you me-HEY!"
Kiki's eyes widened as a pink cap fell atop her head. "What's the big ide…huh…?"
Once the cap was firmly on her head, she saw a string of disembodied text float in the air above her, forming a sentence.
"Who was the victim?" Kiki's brow furrowed in confusion. "Victim of what? What happened on this racetrack that would create a victim?!"
As she pondered the question, two more stings of disembodied text appeared in her line of sight. To her left was the word Snake, and to her right was the word Ryoma.
"Wait…" She realized "It's asking me who the victim of the murder was…it's Snake! Is it telling me to be on the left side of the racetrack?"
Kiki gently turned her wheel, passing into the leftmost lane before the racetrack began to diverge, causing Kiki to travel down the left path.
"It was a fork in the road!" Kiki realized as the cap on her head disappeared in a puff of white smoke. "The answer to the question was indicative of the correct path to take in the race! But why would a racetrack have forks in the road…?"
Before she could ponder further, the other karts zoomed past her, causing her skirt to ripple in the wind. "Hey, no fair!" Kiki narrowed her eyes as she pressed down on the gas pedal, zooming forward to catch up to her quarry. "Alright, I've almost caught up to them. Now I just gotta…whoa!"
Kiki swerved out of the way, briefly skidding before she regained control. She snuck a brief glance over her shoulder at the hazard behind her that she just barely avoided.
"Is that a banana peel?! Seriously! Who throws banana peels during a race! Agh, there's more!"
Kiki carefully swerved into the different lanes, avoiding the banana peels in her path. Once she passed Lotus, she sighed in relief.
"There, I shouldn't have to worry about any more banana peels…hey, more coins!"
Seeing the trail of glistening currency, Kiki maneuvered into their path and collected the coins, relaxing as no more obstacles blocked her route.
"Time to put on your thinking caps!" The disembodied voice instructed again once she collected the last coin, causing the pink cap to fall on her head again.
"Whose clothes was Snake wearing?" She read as two disembodied words floated on either side of her.
The one on her left read Snake's and the one on her right read Teruaki's. "Snake…he was wearing Teruaki's clothes when we found him!"
Kiki turned her wheel to the right as the road began to split once more, this time taking the right path instead of the left. She sighed in relief as the cap vanished from her head, though her relief was short lived as the other racers zoomed ahead of her once more.
"Oh no you don't!" Kiki narrowed her eyes in determination as she zoomed ahead, quickly catching up to her competition. "Doesn't look like they had any banana peels to throw behind me this time." She realized as she passed Shuichi. "At least now I can just worry about collecting the…AH!"
Kiki swerved to one side, just in time to avoid running over a banana peel. She glanced over her shoulder, her eyes widening incredulously at the group of karts behind her.
"Now they're throwing banana peels ahead of me?! How is that fair?!" Kiki took a deep breath, calming down as she collected the first coin. "Calm down, Kiki. All you have to do now is collect the coins…"
Kiki did just that, collecting the coins she could while avoiding the occasional banana peel that was thrown ahead of her. Eventually, the trail of coins disappeared, and the disembodied voice spoke one last time.
"Time to put on your thinking caps!"
Once the cap landed on her head once more, the final question came into view.
"Who was the culprit's intended victim?" Kiki watched as the name Ryoma appeared on her left, and the name Teruaki floated on her right. "Let's see…Ryoma was Kirumi's victim, and she's not the culprit…so it must have been Teruaki!"
Kiki steered towards the right, taking the rightmost path as her front bumper cut through the pink ribbon tied between the goalposts.
"I did it! I won!" Kiki cheered "I got all the questions right! I got…all the questions…right…that's right!" Her eyes widened in realization. "The victim was Snake, he was wearing Teruaki's clothes, so the intended victim must have been Teruaki! It's all connected!"
As if right on cue, the racetrack seems to shatter, fading away as Kiki's vision turned to black.
As her eyes fluttered open, the fuzzy blur of colors sharpened back into the courtroom. I'm…back at the trial… Kiki realized as her eyes fluttered and she glanced around, seeing the other survivors at their podiums. Why was I daydreaming about racing go-karts…but that's not important! Kiki shook her head, clearing her mind before she said, "The pajamas prove that Snake wasn't the intended target."
"Wait, are you saying my brother was killed by accident?" Clover asked incredulously.
"Well, sort of." Shuichi answered. "The culprit definitely intended to kill, but I think it's possible the culprit attacked the wrong target."
"The…wrong target?" Gonta asked, a hint of dread creeping into his voice.
"But if not Snake, who was the culprit's intended target?" Keebo pondered.
Kiki tilted her head down, pausing as she struggled to force the words out of her mouth. "The culprit's intended victim…was Teruaki." Kiki sighed, looking up as Teruaki's eyes widened, his breath quickening.
"M-ME?!" He grasped the sides of his head, his fingernails digging into his scalp as he tried to come to terms with the revelation. "The culprit…tried to kill…MEEEE?! But…why?! I didn't do a-anything?! Why would anybody want me dead?!"
Kiki's eyes softened as she took pity on the panicking man. Teruaki…
"But how do we know that Teruaki was the intended target?" Ace questioned skeptically. "Can we really make such an important deduction based solely on the pajamas Snake was wearing?"
"Teruaki told me that Snake left his room right after changing in the bathroom." Kiki reminded him.
"When you consider the proximity to Teruaki's room, and the fact that Snake was wearing Teruaki's clothes…" Shuichi offered "…I don't think there's reasonable room to doubt that Teruaki was the intended target."
"Okay, but why would the culprit make that mistake?" Seven asked.
"Yeah, they don't even look alike!" Clover agreed emphatically.
"Yeah…it just seems impossible to mistake one for the other…" Tsumugi reluctantly concurred.
"The culprit could easily make that mistake…if you take into account that the crime occurred at nighttime." Shuichi pointed out.
"I see…" Lotus realized. "And you think it would have been too dark in the hallways for the culprit to see?"
Shuichi nodded. "The culprit might not have been able to see their victim's face, so they may have relied on other clues to identify their target."
"Other clues?" Kiki wondered "What other clues could they have used if not his face?"
"Could the culprit have used Snake's clothes to identify him?" Keebo pondered. "Is that why they mistakenly thought he was Teruaki?"
"It's possible…" Shuichi contemplated the matter, resting a finger just above his chin. "Although…I imagine the culprit must have been surprised when they saw Teruaki was still alive…"
"Yeah, they must have been wondering who they actually killed." Seven muttered.
"In that case, they'd have been as surprised as the rest of us when we saw Snake's corpse." Lotus commented.
"Yeah, that would certainly add to their confusion at seeing Teruaki still alive…" Tsumugi mused.
Confusion…
Kiki barely withheld a gasp, the gears finally turning in her mind as she pieced together the incident. Her eyes widened in horrified shock, the color starting to drain from her complexion.
I…know…I know who killed Snake!
"…Kiki?" Kiki shook the thought from her head, glancing around until she spotted Shuichi's worried gaze. "Are…you okay? You looked like you were spacing out for a moment."
"…Yeah…" Kiki grimaced as she nodded and returned her attention to the other participants. "I just…what you said just now…made me realize…I know who did it."
"What?!" Seven exclaimed in shock.
"You…you know who the culprit is?" Ace asked, genuinely surprised by her admission.
Kiki nodded. "Yeah…I know who the blackened is."
"Well, who is it?!" Clover demanded. "Who killed my brother?! Who killed Light?!"
Kiki took a deep breath as she glanced at the other participants. The one who tried to frame Kirumi and killed Snake…they also targeted Teruaki, and they were extremely confused when they saw Teruaki come to the Dining Hall the next morning. That person… Her eyes narrowed as they reached their intended target, watching as nervous sweat trickled down their face. It must be you!
"So who is it?!" Koto exclaimed impatiently.
"Yeah, who killed Snake?!" Kiri demanded.
"…It's obvious…" Mokubo muttered, causing his younger siblings to turn their heads and stare incredulously at him.
"…He's right." Kyoko nodded. "If you just think back to what was already said about the culprit being confused by Teruaki still being alive, then their identity should become clear."
"…Sorry, but it's been a while since I've had to play Junior Detective." Makoto admitted with a shaky laugh. "I feel like it's on the tip of my tongue, but I'm not quite sure who they are yet…"
Kyoko shook her head in amusement. "I imagine we're all a little rusty, but if you just think on it, the answer should become clear."
Makoto closed his eyes, pursing his lips in concentration as the gears turned in his head. Suddenly, his eyes opened, wide with shock.
"Oh, Kami…now I understand!"
"What?!" Koto and Kiri exclaimed. "What is it, Dad?!"
"Why don't we just let Kiki tell us?" Maki suggested, gesturing to the TV screen. "It looks like she's about to give her answer."
Nodding, the twins leaned their heads forward. Practically on the edges of their seats, they waited excitedly for their older sister to solve the mystery.
"The one who attacked Kirumi and Ryoma, the one who killed Snake by mistake and tried to frame Clover and Kirumi for the crime…it's you, isn't it, Ace?"
Ace flinched, barely suppressing the urge to stumble backwards as his eyes darted in a panic. "What?! Kiki, I can't believe that you would suspect me of the crime!" He exclaimed as his podium pulled towards the center.
"It…does sound kinda unbelievable…" Seven sighed. "The old man doesn't exactly seem like the threatening, violent type."
"I'm short, but I still killed a mafia with nothing but tennis balls." Ryoma pointed out. "Take my advice, don't judge a person's capabilities from their appearance."
"Is there even evidence tying Ace to the crime?" Keebo wondered.
"Yeah, there's no evidence tying me to the crime!" Ace insisted.
"Actually, there might be some evidence that could at the very least make Ace seem more suspicious." Shuichi commented.
"W-Well, then, out with it!" Ace stammered. "Sh-Show me this evidence that proves I'm suspicious!"
Evidence that proves Ace is suspicious… Kiki sifted through her memories, looking back on every piece of evidence she had uncovered, until her mind finally settled on her prior conversation with Shuichi. That's the one! "During the investigation, Kirumi and I left the gym to check on Shuichi and try to get him out of his room. Although we thought we were unsuccessful, we did acquire one important piece of information."
"Important piece of information?" Gonta questioned. "What's that?"
"Before I got to the Dining Hall, Teruaki came in. Everyone paid him no mind…except you, Ace. According to Shuichi, you seemed to be genuinely surprised to see Teruaki that morning."
"M…My eyes were playing tricks on me!" Ace defended. "They tend to do that in my old age; I get tired more easily, and I need to take naps more often than I did as a young man. I was planning to take one after the magic show, but we found Snake's body afterwards and I haven't had the chance to!"
"…Old man, my ass…" Lotus huffed. "I'm older than most of the others here too, but you don't see me playing the I'm tired card."
"Yeah, he's probably just fibbing!" Clover glared at the nervous man. "Tell us the truth, Ace!"
"I-I am telling the truth! Besides, even taking into account my confusion about Teruaki's presence at breakfast, there's still nothing physically tying me to Snake's murder!"
"So…Ace isn't the culprit…?" Gonta wondered.
"Do not dismiss his culpability just yet." Kirumi cautioned. "We have not yet litigated this possibility."
"Then let us discuss whether evidence exists tying Ace to the crime." Keebo suggested. "Only then will we be able to arrive at a logical conclusion."
"Fine, then. I'll prove to you that I'm not Snake's killer!" Ace vowed, causing Kiki to narrow her eyes at the older man.
I've got Ace running, and I'm not gonna let him get away! For Clover, and for Snake…I won't let you graduate!
"What evidence do you have tying me to the crime?" Ace demanded.
"Let's start by reviewing how Snake was killed." Shuichi suggested. "Before being drowned, he was drugged."
"The culprit would have had to make it themselves, correct?" Kirumi wondered.
"The Chem Lab was untouched." Ryoma confirmed.
"So the culprit would have to be a State Alchemist." Tsumugi commented.
"I think you mean chemist." Sokyu sighed.
"Exactly!" Ace agreed. "And I'm not a chemist! I don't know the first thing about medicine!"
Kiki zeroed in on Ace's defense and raised her hand, pointing accusingly at him and exclaiming, "No that's wrong! Ace, you said that you don't know the first thing about medicine…" Kiki glared at the man in the proverbial hot seat as she continued, "But that'd be pretty strange, for the head of a pharmaceutical company."
"Pharmaceutical company?!" Seven exclaimed in shock.
Kiki nodded. "The other day, I was helping Ace take inventory of the Chem Lab, when he told me that he was the head of a pharmaceutical company. Even if he's not a chemist himself…that's not the same thing as knowing nothing about medicine."
Ace's once gentle eyes seemed to suddenly darken at Kiki's accusation. If he had anything to say in response, Shuichi beat him to it.
"Now that I consider it…I did read that Soporil was made by a company called Cradle Pharmaceuticals. If he is the CEO of Cradle Pharmaceuticals, it would explain how he could create a batch of it."
"If I owned a company, I'd certainly pay attention to everything it does and makes." Lotus agreed. "You bet I'd be able to create one of its products."
"So you're saying that once he created the necessary Soporil from the plants in the Greenhouse…" Kirumi realized "He used it to drug me and Snake?!"
"H-Hold on!" With a noticeable reduction of pleasantness in his voice, Ace objected "Even if I am the CEO of Cradle Pharmaceuticals, even if I could create Soporil from scratch, there's still nothing that proves I entered the gym and threw Snake's body in the piranha tank!"
"Well, what do we do now?" Seven wondered.
"Let's review the crime scene one more time." Shuichi suggested. "If we look back on the investigation, we should be able to determine if Ace left behind any evidence at the scene of the crime."
One last piece of evidence…I need one last piece of evidence to prove that Ace is the culprit…and I'll find it! Kiki vowed as Ace began to debate for his life.
"I never entered the gym! All of this is circumstantial!"
"The culprit would need to be well-versed in Clover's magic trick." Kirumi mused.
"Did Ace play a big role in the show?" Tsumugi wondered.
"Nearly a-all of us h-helped…" Teruaki stammered.
"Exactly!" Ace argued "It's impossible to determine who's the culprit from that!"
"There must be a piece of evidence that the culprit left behind." Shuichi pondered.
"The only thing left behind was Kirumi's gloves." Keebo reminded them.
"So she must be the culprit after all!" Ace desperately argued. "She must have left them behind before she met up with Ryoma!"
"No that's wrong!" Kiki fiercely cried, shattering Ace's pitiful defense. "Ace, you just made a fatal mistake."
"A m-mistake?!"
Kiki nodded. "When I met up with Kirumi to talk to Shuichi, she told me everything that she did last night…and nowhere in her account did she say that she had lost her gloves before the incident."
"W-what?!"
"That is correct." Kirumi nodded. "When I woke up, my gloves were indeed missing…but I definitely had them when I attacked Ryoma."
"That means it was only possible for her to have lost her gloves after she lost consciousness!" Keebo exclaimed.
"If that's the case, it looks like the old man is guilty after all." Sokyu mused.
"Yep, looks that way." Seven agreed, rubbing the back of his head with a sigh. "He knocked Kirumi out, then knocked Snake out, drowned him, and carried his body back to the gym before he threw it in the piranha tank."
"Well, what do you have to say for yourself, Ace?" Lotus questioned, a hard edge in her voice.
"Yeah, a-apologize for t-trying to k-kill me!" Teruaki demanded.
"I'll never forgive you!" Clover seethed. "I'll never forgive you for taking my brother away from me!"
"I-I-I-I-I…Give me a break!" All charades of pleasantry were officially out the window as Ace scowled at everyone from his podium at the center. "This is a lie! I didn't drug Kirumi, and I didn't kill Snake! Even if I wanted to kill Teruaki, I wouldn't have been so stupid as to mistake Snake for him! I don't care if it was dark; I wouldn't have confused one for the other! So unless you can tell me, right there, right now, how I could have possibly mistaken Snake for Teruaki, you can't prove I'm the culprit!"
"I hate to admit it, but he's got a point." Seven sighed. "How're we gonna prove that he mistook one for the other?"
"Look at his face, you idiots!" Clover argued, slamming her hands on the podium. "The guy's totally guilty!"
I know I've got Ace cornered…he's got nowhere left to run, so he's doing everything he can to avoid the truth of his actions…but I know how he mistook Snake for Teruaki. And if he won't accept it…then I'll just have to make him accept it! Kiki vowed as she locked gazes with Ace's angry, panicked stare.
Argument Armament: Ace!
"It's all a lie!" Ace shouted, only for Kiki to refute him without missing a beat.
"No, it's not a lie."
"I wasn't even awake at nighttime!"
"Any of us can make that claim."
"Kirumi and Ryoma are the only ones who admitted to being awake at nighttime!"
"They wouldn't have admitted it if either of them were the culprits!"
"One of them must have been the one to kill Snake!"
"Ryoma was knocked out and Kirumi was drugged with Soporil!"
Ace flinched, gritting his teeth as Kiki's argument momentarily stunned him. However, he quickly regained his momentum and argued, "Whoever the culprit is…"
"The culprit is you, Ace." Kiki interjected with a hard edge in her voice.
"They had to have known how Clover's magic trick worked!"
"No, the culprit didn't need to know how the trick worked."
"I didn't do more than move a few items to the gym…"
"That still puts you in close proximity to the gym."
"So I can't be the culprit!"
"Just because you didn't help prepare the stage itself, doesn't mean you're not the culprit!"
Ace grunted, gripping the rim of his podium in frustration. Anger flared in his eyes as he forced down the nervous bulge in his throat.
"Are you seriously suggesting I concocted Soporil…"
"Your professional background makes it perfectly plausible."
"And drugged Kirumi?"
"It's the only explanation for her alibi."
"By your logic, I then went to Teruaki's room…"
"How else would Snake have vanished so soon after leaving his room?"
"Knocked him out thinking he was Teruaki…"
"He was wearing Teruaki's clothes."
"Then drowned him in the pool?"
"Snake's metal arm proves he was drowned in the pool."
"So I then carried him back to the gym…"
"You were freely able to move around during nighttime."
"And threw him into the piranha tank?"
"All you needed was the ladder to reach the piranha tank."
"There's nothing that proves I was even after Teruaki!"
"You seemed pretty surprised to see him the next morning."
Ace growled, his eyes darkening as he glared at Kiki, on the verge of hyperventilating. "How would I have even mistaken Snake for Teruaki?"
"YOU HAVE PROSOPAGNOSIA! IT'S ALL OVER, ACE!"
Ace gasped, as if he was just sucker punched in the gut. Robbed of all words, he slightly bowed his head, defeated by Kiki's counter.
"When I met up with Lotus in the library, she showed me something that turned out to be the key to solving this mystery." Kiki paused for a split second before she uttered a single word. "Prosopagnosia."
"Proso…pag…nosia…?" Gonta asked curiously.
Lotus nodded, explaining, "It's the inability to distinguish between human faces. People with prosopagnosia have to differentiate people by other means, like clothes, hair, you get the gist."
"So you're saying that Ace has prosopagnosia?" Keebo asked.
"Yeah." Kiki nodded. "If Ace really does have prosopagnosia, it would explain how he mistook Snake for Teruaki, especially if he wore different clothes that night."
Shuichi nodded. "When we found Snake, he was wearing a different set of pajamas than he was during our slumber party. Ace probably memorized all of our pajamas by comparing them with our hairstyles. But in the dark…he might not have been able to make out his victim's hair…"
"Oh, I see!" Clover's eyes brightened in realization. "Ace would have only been able to see their face and pajamas, and if everyone's face looked the same to him…"
"That would mean he could only rely on their pajamas for identification." Ryoma finished.
"Which is why he attacked Snake, thinking he was Teruaki." Kirumi concluded.
"You…you've got it all wrong…I'm not the culprit…" Ace objected weakly. "We don't even know how it all played out…"
"Fine, you want me to spell it out for you?" Kiki cut him off, glaring intensely at the nearly broken man. "I'll tell everyone exactly what happened. I'll prove how you murdered Snake, and how you tried to frame Kirumi for your crime."
Kiki closed her eyes, taking a deep breath as she visualized the murder in her head. Once all the pieces were arranged in one, cohesive narrative, she opened her eyes and began to speak.
"HERE'S THE TRUTH OF THIS CASE! The victim's body was found this morning, during Clover's Underwater Escape Act. When we saw the piranhas in the tank, we thought that Clover's escape failed. Of course, it was all part of the act. Clover's escape went perfectly. But when Lotus opened the curtain in front of the tank…we saw Snake, with piranhas swarming around him!"
"Before any of us could react, the piranhas devoured Snake's body. And all that was left were his bones and the handcuffs he was wearing. That horrifying sight was the finishing touch on the culprit's own twisted magic trick. The culprit obfuscated the time and place of the murder, implicating Clover in the process."
"In truth, the crime began last night. While preparing for the show in the gym, Kirumi had a chance to be alone. It was then that she used the ladder to reach the piranha tank…and removed the glass lid to put inside the tank. She used it as a partition to force the piranhas to one side of the tank. Once she finished the preparation for her elaborate plan, she left the gym. But what she didn't know, was that someone else, the real culprit, had observed her preparations, and planned to take advantage of them."
"While Kirumi was searching for a target, she ran into Ryoma at the 4th Floor Storage Room. All the pieces were in place. Kirumi was ready to murder. Kirumi knocked Ryoma out, striking him from behind with the metal rod. Then, she took out a pair of handcuffs, intending to put them on Ryoma's wrists."
"It was then, though, that the culprit made their move. Using a vial of soporil, they drugged Kirumi, knocking her unconscious. He then took the handcuffs, her handcuffs, and the metal rod she had used. Once the culprit had everything they needed, they took off to find their target…Teruaki."
At some point while staking out Teruaki's room, they saw Snake leaving, wearing different pajamas. Convinced that it was Teruaki, they struck. "The culprit tried to strike Snake from behind, but he heard them coming, and fought back. He parried the metal rod with his metallic left arm, denting the rod."
"The culprit must have realized that they were in over their head; they couldn't win a fair fight against Snake. So in desperation, they took out a handkerchief, doused it with some Soporil, and held it against Snake's face. Once under the sedative's influence, Snake lost consciousness. The culprit then handcuffed Snake's wrists and carried him to the pool."
"Once they arrived at the pool area, they shoved his head into the swimming pool! From the water and the pain of drowning, Snake should've woken up and struggled. The culprit anticipated his resistance, which is why Snake was handcuffed. The struggle left scrapes on the cuffs and pool, but in the end, Snake succumbed. Snake was dead…but the culprit's plan had only just begun."
"Under the cover of night, they carried Snake's corpse back to the gym. Just like Kirumi, they used the ladder to reach the piranha tank, and threw Snake's body in the piranha tank. With their preparations complete, they dropped Kirumi's gloves behind the stage and brought the metal rod back to the storage room."
"An impressive premeditated murder, but the culprit made three crucial mistakes. First, when they used the same metal rod that Kirumi used, they attacked Snake with the opposite end that Kirumi had attacked Ryoma with. That allowed Snake to damage the end that wasn't covered in blood, indicating that the weapon had been used on two separate victims."
"Second, the culprit left Kirumi's gloves behind to implicate her, in case Clover was proven innocent. But they failed to plant them in a way that would be consistent with Kirumi's meticulous nature. She'd never just leave behind such blatant evidence, which helped clear our suspicion towards Kirumi."
"And third…was the victim themselves. Since Snake was never the intended target, it left the culprit quite surprised when Teruaki showed up the next morning for breakfast. They were probably wondering who they had actually killed last night, which left them just as surprised as we were when we saw Snake's body in the piranha tank. As a result, they were unable to prepare an alibi that would hide the fact that they have prosopagnosia…and their inability to discern human faces, proves that they were the one who killed Snake."
Kiki rested her left pointer and index fingers against her forehead as she held up her right hand, palm facing toward the ceiling. Ace meanwhile scowled at her, clasping his hands tightly together in nervous anger as his eyes narrowed in an intense glare.
"And that's the whole story. Am I wrong, Ace? No…am I wrong, Gentarou Hongou?!"