October 24

Courtroom No. 6

10:40 AM

Victoria von Graye

Chrysalis approached the stand as she had been instructed, though anyone could see how unenthused she was about this arrangement. She still looked just as tired as she had the day before, and I could only assume that she had been kept at the scene of the crime late by the investigative team. She probably hadn't been given the chance to rest until after they were finished with all the preliminary questions, but because of how stunted the investigation had been, that had no doubt taken far longer than anyone would have liked. I could see it written on her face, and I made a mental note to force her to take a nap when all of this was over. Of course, Pieter was probably going to beat me to it given how defensive he was over his youngest sister, but I could still say at least something about it.

"Please state your name and occupation, witness," Prosecutor Cruz instructed as he crossed his arms.

Chrysalis nodded. Even with her exhaustion eating away at her patience, she never quite let her mask drop fully. She had been doing this for years as per the Oracle project, and I could see it. "My name is Chrysalis Starr. I work as a legal assistant at Morix Law Offices," she replied.

"And you were at the scene of the murder when the crime took place," Prosecutor Shield said next. "You were in the same building as the victim when she was killed."

"Something along those lines," Chrysalis answered with a loose shrug. "I don't know how much that counts for though considering the fact that I was in a completely different area. I didn't know the victim was dead until all of you did. The building is huge, and I had no idea there was anyone there to find in the first place."

"Either way, we need your testimony about what happened at the time of the body's discovery," Judge Diaphan instructed. "Please tell the court what you know about the crime."

"If you insist," Chrysalis agreed.

~ Witness Testimony ~

~ In the Council of Six Headquarters ~

-"I received a letter a few days before the night of the murder asking me to go and visit the headquarters for the Council of Six."

-"The one who had sent it was, supposedly, the judge of this very trial, but I've heard now that everyone knows that fact to be a lie."

-"I went to the crime scene not knowing this, and I was also unaware that there were any other people I was supposed to be meeting with as well."

-"I was alone for a long time, just wandering through the building in search of Judge Diaphan. Since she wasn't actually there, I never found her."

-"Eventually, something happened for me to end up unconscious. I don't know what happened specifically since my memory there is fuzzy, but it must have been bad."

-"When I came to, I realized that I had been out like a light for the last few hours. I knew there had to be some foul play at hand, so I called the police to come and investigate."

-"After that, they found the defendant with the body, and that was history. Now, we stand here today to figure out why it all happened."

"You had no idea about any of this as it was happening," Prosecutor Umber frowned. "You were just under the assumption that the party you were supposed to be meeting up with for the evening wasn't there yet, so you started to look around."

"The letter hadn't exactly given me a specific location to go to, so I just started to walk around and see if anything stuck out to me. I didn't expect there to be any other people I could talk to, so I didn't bother with asking about it. In all honesty, I didn't even realize how Judge Diaphan could have contacted me to begin with. I don't have her phone number, and I didn't realize she wanted to reach out at all. I suppose that should have been my first clue, but..." Chrysalis sighed and shook her head bitterly. "It doesn't matter now. We can all see how it ended, and there's no way we can change it all now."

"I never sent any of the letters found in the hands of this witness or the chief prosecutor," Judge Diaphan interjected. "I have no idea who did, but I was not the one behind them. Handwriting analysis will tell you that clear as can be."

"And it's because we didn't know what your handwriting looked like that the culprit was able to get away with tricking us," Chrysalis sighed. "If I had to guess, I would say that it worked on Niamh too... We still don't know where she is, and we're going on the second day of her being gone. The police don't seem to have any leads either."

"Do you know for sure if she showed up in the building at the time of the crime?" I asked even though I already knew what the answer was going to end up being. It didn't hurt to cover all our bases though, right?

"I have no idea. I never saw anybody else in that building, and if I did, I forgot about it," Chrysalis admitted. "There must be some other evidence of what happened in that building, but I haven't had the chance to go searching for it. When the police arrived, they had all sorts of questions for me, so I've been a bit busy with other matters."

"Then we'll just have to pick up the slack," Yuri concluded as she looked over to me, Lily, and Deirdre. "What are you guys thinking? Do we have anything that could push back against her testimony?"

"Not right now," Lily frowned. "We might be able to poke a hole in something if we knew more about what happened, but as things currently stand, we have no reason to not believe that this is exactly what happened. I do have a few questions about the one thing of note that happened last night though... I'm sure you all do too."

"Then we'll simply have to push the subject," I said. I turned my attention back to Chrysalis and gestured for her to repeat her testimony. She already knew what was coming next, so she nodded. Chrysalis took in a grounding breath and forced it out through gritted teeth before she began to speak once again.

~ Cross-Examination ~

~ In the Council of Six Headquarters ~

-"I received a letter a few days before the night of the murder asking me to go and visit the headquarters for the Council of Six."

-"The one who had sent it was, supposedly, the judge of this very trial, but I've heard now that everyone knows that fact to be a lie."

-"I went to the crime scene not knowing this, and I was also unaware that there were any other people I was supposed to be meeting with as well."

-"I was alone for a long time, just wandering through the building in search of Judge Diaphan. Since she wasn't actually there, I never found her."

-"Eventually, something happened for me to end up unconscious. I don't know what happened specifically since my memory there is fuzzy, but it must have been bad."

"Hold it!"

"What are your memories around this event specifically?" I asked. "You say that your memory is hazy and that you can't quite pick out what happened for sure, but you must have at least a few lingering details left behind from the specific event."

Chrysalis thought about it for a moment, pressing her cheek against her hand. "If I'm being honest, the only thing I know is that one minute, I was awake, and the next, I must have been asleep," she confessed. "I don't know if I ran into anybody or if I was attacked. I have no idea. It's just... Gone. Everything about the night of the crime was a blur because I had no way of saying for sure what was going on around me."

"You didn't have anyone there to help you keep track of everything as it was happening," Deirdre said with a nod. "It makes sense that you wouldn't be able to figure out the truth. You were alone in a place you didn't know, and that would be enough to disorient anyone."

"I'm sure that the criminal behind this case wanted me there for some reason or another, but I have no idea what it would be," Chrysalis frowned. "And I can also say right now that Pieter wasn't the one behind it. I know that he was arrested due to being with the victim when the crime scene was discovered, but that all feels rather flimsy to me. He wasn't the one who killed the victim. I know that he wouldn't have done something like this, and I wish everyone else knew it too."

"Do you think you would have known it if the defendant was there with you at the time of your arrival?" Lily asked. "He claimed that he showed up at the scene of the crime later in the night, and you can probably back that up or deny it."

"I can say that he wasn't there at the time. If he was, then he would have received a letter like me, but that wasn't what happened," Chrysalis replied. "He was there later in the night, I'm sure, but I don't think he was there at the start of it."

"You can say that, but you barely know what happened that night," Prosecutor Umber pointed out. "He could have been in the area with you just unaware of the truth."

Chrysalis resisted the urge to shoot him a glare, calming herself before her temper could spiral out of her control. "If he had received a letter, then I have no doubt that he would have told me about it. After all, I know why I got the letter."

"And why is that?" Prosecutor Cruz asked, somewhat taken aback by her confidence.

"I was conducting an investigation, and I thought that Judge Diaphan would be able to help me," Chrysalis explained. "If I had to guess, the criminal knew that and was trying to use it against me. I don't know why they did it specifically, but it doesn't matter much now. The point is that I went to the scene of the crime, and the rest is history."

"But you don't remember anything about what happened after you arrived," I concluded. "You got there, and everything became a hazy blur."

Chrysalis nodded. "Unfortunately, yes."

-"When I came to, I realized that I had been out like a light for the last few hours. I knew there had to be some foul play at hand, so I called the police to come and investigate."

"Hold it!"

"How did you know how much time had gone by?" I asked.

"I checked my phone," Chrysalis replied. "Apparently, I had missed a bunch of phone calls from my older brothers, but I didn't even notice. I wasn't just asleep at the time. I was completely unconscious, and nothing could have woken me up at all. When I realized just how much time was missing from my memory, I panicked. I wanted to go and investigate, but if somebody had attacked me to cause that gap in my memory, then I didn't want to go at it alone."

"I agree that you probably made the right call there," Lily murmured. "Even if the criminal was likely long gone by the time that you woke up. I mean, that probably would have been hours after the crime took place, so they had probably left ages beforehand."

"Maybe so, but it was still a risk that I didn't want to take," Chrysalis said. "I had no idea that Pieter was there in the building. I hadn't checked any of my other text messages at the time when I decided to call the police since I was too paranoid about being attacked again."

"You seem awfully certain that the gap in your memory was caused by some kind of assault," Prosecutor Umber commented. "Do you have any proof or other testimony that this was the case?"

Chrysalis hesitated before shaking her head. "Not exactly. I just have a gut instinct that I know what was going on at the time," she replied. "I'm not entirely sure of it now, if I'm being honest, but at the time, my mind was racing, and I was sure that something bad must have happened if I had forgotten so much out of the blue like that. I'm not the person to suffer from regular bouts of amnesia, so something must have caused it."

"And we have no idea what that something is now," Prosecutor Cruz sighed. "What was your rout through the building while you were trying to investigate it?"

"I don't know. Every room in that place looks the same, especially when you don't know where you're going and everything is dark like that," Chrysalis answered. "Only half the lights were on, and while I mostly stayed in the lit rooms, I wound up going into a few dark rooms just to see if I could find anything of note. I didn't consciously realize it at the time, but... I think part of me knew that it was going to turn south like that sooner or later."

Judge Diaphan hummed to herself. "You were found on a different floor from the victim entirely... A lower floor, if I recall correctly," she said. "Is that true?"

"So it seems," Chrysalis shrugged. "If I was ever in the same area as the victim, I don't remember. My memory of that night is so hazy. It's like a switch was turned. One moment, I was wide awake and looking around to see if I could find anyone that would be able to help me out with my investigation. The next, I was sound asleep and leaning against the wall of some random room. After that, I was still out of sorts when I called for help."

Deirdre nodded gently as she took a small step forward, pressing her body against the defense bench. "You know... This sounds a lot like something did happen, but the memory was hidden from you for some reason," she suggested. "If bad things happen to people, then they tend to bury the memories deep down to ensure that they don't fall apart because of their knowledge. It's the brain's way of trying to protect itself, and that sounds like what happened here."

Chrysalis winced at that and began to fiddle with her gloves. "If it is what happened, then I have no idea what could have caused all of it," she confessed. "It's not like I would have a way of figuring it out easily even if I wanted to know. The night is just... A blur in my head."

"Dissociation is commonly paired with repressed memories," Deirdre chimed in. "Dissociation is affiliated with the inability to retrieve memories properly, and that certainly applies here. It sounds to me like this is what happened to you that night, and now, the memory is just barely out of reach."

"Perhaps we should try to take her around the building to see if we can get her to remember what happened that night," Prosecutor Umber suggested, a frown sinking his lips down at the corners. "At this point, her testimony is our best way of getting out of this, but we don't know how to do that right now. Getting her to remember feels like the only way that we're going to find anything of note."

"I agree that we may wish to consider that at a later point, but right now, I have a few other questions for the defense and prosecution," Judge Diaphan said. I could already tell by the way her expression was knit tightly with stress that it wasn't going to be anything good.

"Please go ahead, Your Honor," Lily nodded. She was trying her best to hold back her anxiety as well, but it wasn't working as well as she would have liked. She continued to toy around with the hem of her dress even as Judge Diaphan began to speak.

"The victim of this case has been perhaps the largest question throughout the course of this investigation," Judge Diaphan. "As of now, we know next to nothing about her. It seems that the victim was a woman who was stabbed a single time through the back and chest. She died instantly from the strike. The murder weapon is out of our reach as well. There's not much we can say that we understand about our victim here, so as long as everyone is here... I believe that I should ask the defense and prosecution what it is they think the victim could have been doing in that building."

"As of now, it looks like there was a total of six people in the Council of Six's headquarters on the night of the crime," Yuri started to herself. "We know for a fact that three of them were summoned by letter. Pieter was called there later on. The killer was in and out before anyone could say what was going on, and the victim was killed before anyone in the building realized they were there either. That makes this much harder for us to put together."

"If there were six people there but only three of them had letters, then I believe we can begin this by saying that there were at least a few people who came to the building for other reasons," Deirdre started. "If you ask me, this entire thing was premeditated rather far in advance. Sending letters days in advance and then running before anyone could speak to them... The culprit had this all planned out beforehand, and we're just watching their scheme play out in real time."

"Do you think maybe there were multiple people behind all of this?" I suggested, and everyone looked in my direction curiously. "It's not like I have any evidence to show for that, but it wouldn't surprise me if maybe the victim and culprit were collaborating to some extent when it happened."

"You mean to say that they were working together for whatever purpose summoned the letter recipients to the building, but in the end, one of them stabbed the other in the back quite literally," Prosecutor Shield concluded. "I would be lying if I said that theory didn't have some credibility to it. It would make sense given the circumstances... But at the same time, you're right when you say that there's no proof to make sure that this is the case."

I frowned and looked down at the ground. "If only we could just say for sure who the victim is... That would probably make this much easier for all of us," I muttered. As long as the victim remained such a large question mark in our investigation, we weren't going to be able to make any progress. There had to be some person out there who knew her or could explain why nobody else was aware of who she really was. All we had to do was figure out who that specific person was supposed to be. That was a vague idea, and I was fully aware of it, but what other options did we have at this point?

"If we say for a moment that the victim and culprit were working together to accomplish some sort of goal that we haven't yet put a finger on, then that begs the question... Why do all of this?" Prosecutor Cruz asked. "I agree that there's a chance that was what going on, but the fact of the matter is that we have no idea why this entire ruse was set up to begin with. There were three people asked to come to the building, and not even they know for sure why the letters were fabricated. It's a massive question mark that nobody has been able to fill out yet."

"Is it possible that maybe the people who received the letters were the true targets of all this?" Yuri questioned, and I turned to face her with wide eyes. "I know that might sound a bit ridiculous, but do you remember what Judge Diaphan said yesterday? There's a common thread that goes through everyone who was sent a letter and then wound up at the scene of the crime. They're all important to a specific group of people, and I think it's time for us to fully tackle the implications of what that means."

"What are you talking about?" Prosecutor Umber cut in, glaring at Yuri with a wild fear in his eyes. "What makes you believe that the people who received letters were targets?"

"Why else would they receive a summons to a building in the middle of the night?" Yuri countered. "I don't think there would be a better time to strike than the middle of the night when nobody would be there. The culprit must have known that it would have been easy to pick them all off. Besides, we know that one of them was hurt because of this. Niamh still hasn't been found, and she went missing after going into that building. Somebody who was there at the time of the murder must have wanted her for something. That's the only explanation I can think of for all of this."

We all fell silent and looked to one another at that. If the people who had received the letters really were targets, then perhaps that was where we had gone wrong with this from the start. I couldn't say for sure what we were supposed to do with it, but Judge Diaphan's words from the day before were starting to make a lot more sense. The people who had been sent the letters were, in fact, important legal figures. We couldn't exactly say that to everyone else in the courtroom for the sake of keeping up the Oracle secret, but the fact remained true at the end of the day.

"Let's say for a moment that the people behind all of this really are criminals and were trying to target those who were sent the letters," Prosecutor Cruz started. He was speaking slowly, almost like he was trying to hold off the conclusion for as long as he possibly could. "Why in the world would these people be targets? More importantly, who specifically would want to go after them?"

I hesitated as I looked over to Deirdre, Yuri, and Lily. I really didn't want to have to be the one to say this, but I knew I wasn't going to get much of a choice in the matter at this point. We were just going to have to charge right on with it. We had been fine in the past when we brought it up, even if it was stressful as could be, and we just had to believe that it would be okay this time around too.

"The Emsthorpe assassins have a grudge against one of the letter recipients," Deirdre started to say slowly. "The Wood family has fought against the Emsthorpe assassins for years by now, and if I had to guess, I would say that they're the ones behind this primarily because of what happened with the youngest of the three letter recipients. Those who work within the Emsthorpe family would have come to hold a grudge against her, and if anyone would have a reason to lash out at her, then it would be them."

"So you think that all of this was just another game that the Emsthorpe assassins came up with," Prosecutor Umber concluded with a frown. "You think that we've just been playing out everything that they wanted us to see. The victim of this case could have been just another pawn in it all, and as long as we're going around in circles, we're not finding out the truth. Maybe that's what they're counting on us doing."

"The fact that Niamh Wood specifically went missing troubles me," Lily nodded. "I can't think of anyone else who would want to go after her. Besides, we've seen a string of murders connected to the Emsthorpe assassins over the course of the last few months. This is the most active they've been in years. On top of all that, we know that they have a history of using this building specifically to carry out their crimes. They've done countless awful things in the Council of Six's headquarters in the past, and we can't forget how those tragedies must have played a part in what we see before us now."

"If we could just figure out the victim's identity, then all of this would be much easier," Prosecutor Cruz grumbled. "If the victim was one of those damn assassins, then I want to know about it as soon as possible. I've had enough with just dragging my feet and waiting for all of this to be over."

The doors to the courtroom slammed open a moment later, and practically everyone in the entire room winced. Judge Diaphan looked to the bailiff that stand at the center of the double doors, and I could tell she was glaring behind her mask. "Bailiff, I thought everyone made it clear that this is a private trial," she told him. Each word was a warning; she was just waiting to see if the bailiff decided to heed it or not.

"I come with new information about the case, ma'am!" the man exclaimed, saluting Judge Diaphan confidently despite the glares all locked on him. "We've received an anonymous tip about this case, and it's given us the chance to uncover the true identity of the victim!"

The gallery burst out into chatter immediately, and Judge Diaphan slammed her gavel down twice, the sounds sharp and irritated. "Order in the court!" she roared. "Don't waste a moment, bailiff! Tell me who the victim is!"

"The victim has been identified as a criminal who appeared recently under the name of Raelynn Clayton!" the bailiff went on. "More recently, she appeared as Matte Grange! Both of them were arrested for murder over the course of the last few months!"

"And they were also affiliated with the Emsthorpe assassins," Deirdre concluded, a small frown. "We never uncovered her true name, but we learned that she was one of the daughters of the Emsthorpe family."

"I have the true name of the victim with me as well!" the bailiff went on. "Her name is Raven Emsthorpe!"

Everyone in the gallery began to chatter at that, and all I could do was stare blankly ahead. I couldn't say I was surprised with this outcome, but it still caught me off guard. Raven Emsthorpe... After all this time of facing off against her in the courtroom, we hadn't known what her true name was. Pieter had identified her on multiple occasions, but it had never been by her actual name. She had hid it for so long, and now... The truth was out.

"So we were right," Yuri murmured. "The one behind all of this really was an Emsthorpe assassin."

"In other words, the letters were meant to be a trap. It was all a ruse to lure them into a vulnerable location where they could be killed," Lily concluded. "But if the victim behind this case was an Emsthorpe assassin, then what in the world could have happened for her to end up dead? She should have been the one behind the crime if she was the one who set this trap."

"The real culprit must have known that she was there," Prosecutor Cruz frowned. "There was somebody else in the building at the time, and they must have gotten in on the truth somehow before striking. Considering the fact that not even the victims knew what was going on, then the criminal must have been privy to some secret information."

"Bailiff, I need to hear something from you," Judge Diaphan cut in. "You said that you had uncovered the identity of the victim, but how did you do something like that? Nobody else had any ideas as to who the victim was, so how did the investigation team figure it out?"

The bailiff hesitated. "We received an anonymous tip that explains everything behind this case," he replied. "Someone claimed to know who the victim was, and after hearing them out, we realized that they were right. It all matches up perfectly."

"If you ask me, I think this anonymous tip is proof of something greater," I declared. "We know there was someone involved with this case who has been sending out phone calls to communicate information anonymously. The person who sent the phone call to the defendant knew something was going on long before anybody else did, and that has to be a point toward his innocence."

"So the criminal behind this case has been sending out anonymous tips... They're still involved even if they haven't come forward. It's like they want to do something to point us in the right direction despite being responsible. They don't want us to figure out who they are, but they're still helping us for some reason," Yuri murmured. "I don't understand any of this. The culprit wants us to find something, but we have no idea what they're trying to point us to."

"I believe this is proof that we have much more to investigate," Prosecutor Umber announced. "There are too many things about this case that we don't understand, and we need to fill in the gaps as soon as we possibly can. The prosecution would like to request more time to investigate the details of the case."

Judge Diaphan looked over to me and the rest of the defense team, and when she saw that we were not objecting, she nodded to herself. "Understood. The defense and prosecution will take the time they have been granted to investigate this case as much as possible. We will reconvene to discuss the case tomorrow," she instructed. "Court is adjourned!"

oooooooooh what a twist

-Digital