November 22

Defendant Lobby No. 6

12:30 PM

Victoria von Graye

The trip out to the defendant lobby felt agonizing, and when I sat down on the couch, I barely remembered how to speak. The world felt like it was crumbling around me, and that was the nice way of putting it. I waited for Deirdre, Yuri, and Lily to join me, and from there, we spent a few moments in silence before Felicity and Sky appeared. I knew that we weren't going to be able to discuss this in detail as long as the two of them were around. It was nothing against Felicity or Sky; they simply hadn't been let in on the agency's secrets, and that was probably for the best. This wasn't exactly the perfect moment to reveal such information, so none of us commented on it regardless of how concerned we were with the concept.

"So... The victim and the witness are the same person," Felicity commented with a nervous laugh as she scratched at the back of her neck. "I don't know how you managed to pin that down. The idea that Mr. Morix knew about it and sent in an anonymous tip about who the victim is... I don't like that. I guess that the idea about the victim being alive and simply gambling about how to get the culprit out of hiding wound up being correct at the very least. I don't think that's something to really be proud of right now, but... It's true."

"I didn't think that the truth would wind up being something like that," Sky murmured. "I was confident that there was something else going on behind the scenes given what we already heard about this case, but I don't think that any of us could have possibly seen that coming. The victim and the witness are one and the same... I don't understand."

"I mean, it's pretty easy to understand why she did all of that, but there's a lot about this case that we don't know," Yuri pointed out. "The culprit's identity is still unknown. All this time, we were staking the victim being able to identify the culprit at a first glance, and that would have made everything much easier for us. Instead, we don't know where to go from here. Even if she can identify the culprit from a lineup, I don't know if that's going to be able to truly save us."

"There has to be something that we aren't seeing behind this case. We've figured out why Mr. Morix was so anxious, and that's a good thing. He knew about the victim, and that was why he decided to spend so much of his time working alone. There are other facts that we don't yet understand... Chief Prosecutor Bespoke, Prosecutor Burke, and Prosecutor Lin's anxiety has been defined as well, I believe. We know now that they were probably anxious as a result of Mr. Morix's behavior," Deirdre explained. She was doing her best to say as much as possible without letting in the Amaya twins on the truth that she knew something more.

"I still don't get why Detective Umber's been acting so weird," Felicity remarked with a shrug. "I mean, you did mention that she's been behaving strangely, right? I don't know if she has anything to do with the case, but she did show up at the scene of the crime despite not being directly related with the attack. If you ask me, that's something that you should probably investigate when you get the chance."

"How would we even get her to open up about something like that?" I murmured with a shake of my head. "I don't know where to even start, if I'm being honest. I agree that this is probably the best place for us to start when it comes to things of this nature, but it's still strange to think about... If Detective Umber really is involved with this mess, then how could she tie in with it all?"

"I wish I had an answer for you on that," Lily said, sighing as she gazed down to the floor. "I don't know what to do. All of this is just happening so fast... It's not something that I expected at all. It feels like this case is just one punch to the stomach after another. Ms. Lesa is going to be under protection from here on out to make sure that she doesn't find herself in any significant trouble, but that's exactly what she was trying to prevent..."

I could tell based on her sudden distant behavior that she was fully aware of the truth behind Ms. Lesa and Ms. Liyle. No wonder she was so freaked out. All of this was happening quickly, I had to agree, but it was undoubtedly worse for her given that she was the defendant of this case. How could she cope with all of this when this had been thrown at her so suddenly? She was right when she said that the trial was one punch after another; we hadn't been given a way to prepare. The revelation of who Ms. Lesa really was simply dawned on us out of the blue, and it refused to allow us even a moment of peace no matter what we tried to do to fight back.

"I'm sure that she'll be fine. The detectives on this case are probably going to look after her to make sure that nobody hurts her," Felicity pointed out. "I mean, they're the ones who are most heavily involved with this case, and they would be able to protect her... I hope that she can trust them even if she fears that the rest of the world is going to try and get her."

"The culprit was after her even though the two of them had never met. That's enough of a reason for her to be suspicious of most people if you ask me," Yuri said. "I'm not sure about what can even be said at this point. We have to find the truth behind this case, I suppose. There's nothing more that we can do at this point. All we can do is wait for the next session of the trial and see what happens then... Maybe the prosecution will have a few ideas about what would help most in the next step of our investigation."

"The judge did say that it would be for the best if they decided to gather a list of pictures of people who would fit the physical description of the culprit. That's a nice first step to take, and we can see where everything goes from there when the time comes," Sky suggested. "For now, I think that it would be best to find a way to talk to both Mr. Morix and Ms. Lesa outside of the courtroom environment. It's not like Mr. Morix has a reason to avoid you at this point. We've figured out how he's tied in with this case, and that should make it easier for you to pin him down and get him to talk about what's been happening."

"I still think it's weird to imagine that he was so involved with this case despite not seeming that way on the surface... I mean, we always had an inkling that there was something there, but it's still intriguing, I guess," Lily commented. "Everything about this case just feels strange. I wonder how this could possibly all come together. There has to be a reason behind it, you know?"

"Detective Umber is another person that we need to talk to... I don't know if we'll have the chance to today given that we don't really have a way of knowing for sure where she's going to be, but... I'm sure that she's going to crack soon and tell us about everything that's been happening," I said. "That's what I'm hoping for, at the very least. As far as I can tell, she's been under a lot of pressure between this case and the previous one that we were involved with."

"I agree," Deirdre nodded. "The strain of keeping some massive secret must be getting to her now, and I believe that whatever it is that's weighing on her will come out soon enough. I can't say for sure if it's involved with this case or not, but given that she came to the scene of the crime despite her lack of direct connection... I have to wonder if something is going on there."

"I'm positive that there is," Yuri declared confidently. "If you ask me, she seemed almost guilty about something whenever she went to the scene of the crime. I mean, that's a weird way to say it, and I don't know what she could have possibly felt so bad about, but... I feel like there was something that she regretted despite the fact that she didn't say it out in the open. Maybe I'm just reading it the wrong way, but... Did you guys get the same sort of vibe from her too?"

I frowned to myself at her words and tried to remember back to the conversations that we had shared with Detective Umber between the current case and the previous one. When I thought about it in detail, I had to confess that Yuri had a point. It wasn't something that I could easily describe. In all honesty, it was probably something to do with the nervous sheen of her eyes and how hesitant she was to make eye contact with anyone. Still, it certainly made her seem as if she felt guilty about something, but the fact remained that I didn't have the slightest clue as to what that thing could have been. It wasn't as if she had offered us any hints to base our suspicions off in the past, so we couldn't dig any deeper than we already had, at least not quite yet.

"If you ask me, I think that we should go on and get ready for our next duty," Sky suggested. "Maybe you three could go and make sure that you can talk with Mr. Morix about what you've figured out thanks to the trial. Felicity and I will go back to the detention center with Lily. If we happen to receive any visitors, we'll be sure to tell you about it as soon as possible. Maybe Detective Umber will drop by if she's really as tied in with this case as she seems to be."

"We'll be counting on you two to make sure that everything is alright," I told them. Felicity shot me a grin and a thumbs-up, and both she and Sky rose to their feet. Lily did the same, and I watched as they disappeared into the crowd. I had to confess that I hadn't realized how full the room had become until that moment. There were so many more people than I expected, though I supposed that came with the territory of what had taken place during the trial. There had been quite a few people in the gallery, and I imagined that there would only be more during the next session of court. I was sure that the case of the victim who pretended to be a witness was going to earn quite a bit of attention, and those who were curious were bound to wander into the courtroom to see what they could find. The idea didn't exactly sit well with me, but I didn't have a way of influencing it, so I bit my tongue and chose to ignore it to the best of my ability.

As soon as Felicity, Sky, and Lily were out of our line of sight, Deirdre, Yuri, and I all turned to each other and watched one another cautiously. A lot had happened all at once, and the next step of the case was bound to be something difficult for all of us. Talking to Mr. Morix was going to reveal the other details behind the case that couldn't be discussed in the courtroom. From there, our objective would be to see what information we could get out of Ms. Lesa herself, though that was undoubtedly going to be easier said than done. I somehow doubted that she was going to be open about what had taken place regardless of how hard we tried to push her. The added fact of many people being around her was only going to make it harder to talk to her.

"We need to talk."

Speaking of the man himself, Mr. Morix approached us slowly. His expression was pinched, and he refused to meet any of our gazes. I couldn't tell if it was because he was ashamed or concerned about what we were going to think, but in the end, I decided that it was probably a blend of both. Everything about him was unreadable, but his shoulders were unmistakably tense. If that wasn't a sign that he was worried, then I didn't know what was.

"Where are we going?" Yuri asked as she looked up at him. "It's not as if we can go to the agency. There are going to be all sorts of people there, and that's not going to make it easy for us to discuss what's been happening. We don't want anybody listening in on our conversations, and that's a possibility if we go back o the agency because it's the scene of the crime."

"I have something else in mind," Mr. Morix told her with a loose yet heavy shrug. "I think that you'll recognize the destination when we get to it. Meet me at the front of the prison in half an hour. From there, I'll take us to the location of our upcoming conversation."

After saying that, Mr. Morix turned on his heel and walked away, and I watched his figure until I couldn't see his outline anymore. With that said and done, I turned to Deirdre and Yuri. Both of them seemed to be just as confused as I was, and I believed that we had all come to the same conclusion. We were going to listen to his directions and simply trust that he knew what he was doing when he said that we had to go to the prison. Whatever he was thinking, he was confident that it was going to work. If he had chosen this location, then we had to trust that it was for the best.

We didn't say anything to each other as we walked out of the lobby. In my eyes, we were all too wrapped up in our own thoughts to put any specific attention to speaking. The case had changed so rapidly, and I didn't know what I was even meant to say. This was all a mess, but if all went well, we would be able to figure it out soon. That was what I was hoping for above all else.

November 22

Blackgate Prison

1:15 PM

Deirdre Brigit

Mr. Morix was already waiting for us outside the prison by the time that we arrived, and I could see him standing in the shadow of a building with a somber expression. As soon as he noticed that we were present, Mr. Morix started to walk towards the door. The silent expectation was that we were meant to follow, so I did just that. Yuri and Victoria followed my lead as well, and the four of us began to make our way through the prison.

I could tell that this was a familiar path, and my mind was cast back to the murder at the prison from the year prior. I could remember looking around the prison as a whole after the murder of Alphonse Clarence, and one of the notable locations back then had been found at the heart of the prison. It was an isolated space that very few people were aware of, and I supposed that it was why Mr. Morix had chosen this spot in particular. I hadn't been sure of why he wanted to come here at first, but it was starting to become increasingly clear.

Sure enough, we found our way to the evidence room, and Mr. Morix glanced over at Yuri. She walked closer when she realized what he was trying to say, and she leaned towards a particular spot of the wall after pulling her hair away from her eye when he gestured for her to do so. I watched the area with a frown, and the door slid into view. Mr. Morix walked inside, and the rest of us trailed in after him. The door shut behind us, and Mr. Morix's fingers closed around a string connected to a single light switch at the center of the room.

"The evidence room..." Yuri whispered with her eyes wide as could be. "That's right. We heard from a certain somebody a year ago that you need a scar about the same size and shape as hers in order to get in. 'Ms. Anderson had it on her hand', and I have a similar one on my eye that lets me sneak in without issues."

"I thought that it would be the perfect place for us to get together and discuss what has taken place. After all, I take it that you have a lot of questions about what has happened," Mr. Morix said. His gaze hardened, and I could see the strain hiding just beneath the surface. He shook his head soon afterwards. "Where should we start?"

"What have you been doing this entire time?" Yuri questioned, her expression painted with something that looked like grief. "We were wondering what you've been up to, but I guess now it makes sense... You were trying to make sure that everything went smoothly involving Oracle. After all, everything was on the verge of coming out, and that's not something that we can exactly afford."

Mr. Morix nodded. "You are correct... At first, I didn't know what had happened, but when I saw the identification card... I knew. That was a message. Candles have always been a quiet distress signal for us, you know. It's something that nobody would expect. If we're on the phone and think something is wrong, we bring it up. It was her way of saying that something had gone wrong, and I came here to meet with her as soon as I got the chance. The necklace being left was a sign that she was alive at the very least. It was left in a precise position that couldn't have been possible just by accident. I came here once that fact had been figured out, and then we talked about what the plan was," he began.

"The culprit was unknown. You didn't know who the one responsible was, and she didn't know either. That meant that you had to try and figure it out on your own, but that's difficult to do if the culprit isn't coming back for you to latch onto," Yuri murmured. She shook her head and sighed. "I didn't realize that our original suggestion would wind up being as correct as it was..."

"Chrysalis told me that the man with the white hair had attacked her. He didn't know that she was still alive since he was in a hurry to get out of there before anybody saw him. She pretended to be dead until he was gone, and then she planted the card and the necklace for me to find. From there, we met and began to plan what was next," Mr. Morix continued. "That was how we came to the conclusion that she was going to mask as a witness. Nobody had seen anything as far as she was aware, and she was correct in believing that. She was going to try and guide everyone in the right direction even if she didn't feel safe with saying out in the open that she had been attacked. The culprit would find a way to figure out that she was still alive if she told too many people, and then he would have returned to try and finish the job."

"Chrysalis has never had much faith in the legal system," I remarked with a shake of my head. "That was one of the primary reasons that the Oracle project was established to begin with. There were many problems with the legal system that made you and Chrysalis think that there was nothing you could do but take action for yourself."

"Exactly," Mr. Morix confirmed. "She didn't have confidence in the police force to protect her regardless of if she was an important witness or not. I have to admit that I felt much the same way. As soon as the plan was created, we decided to power through and make sure that we had a way of luring the culprit out into the open without revealing the truth that she had survived."

"Most of the time, culprits return to the scene of the crime as a way of covering their tracks. In case that didn't happen, there was a failsafe system, and that was why Ms. Lesa was created," Victoria realized. "We haven't seen any signs of the man with white hair since the investigation has begun, so I suppose that it was for the best that she decided to do something like this..."

"The lack of witnesses didn't help the situation in the slightest. Nobody saw anything, and nobody discovered that anything had happened at all until Lily arrived at the agency to open up for the day," Mr. Morix said softly. "We realized that we didn't have any other options if we wanted to lure the culprit out into the open. After all, the rest of the world wouldn't know that the witness hadn't actually been present. The culprit would be aware of such though, and if you ask me, he's out there even now."

"He has to be," Yuri agreed. "But I don't think that it completely worked... The culprit is still out there, and the one behind the false alias is in just as much danger as we feared from the beginning. That's a problem."

"The culprit will be able to be identified by the victim though, and that has to count for something," Victoria pointed out. "Plus, he's going to know things that he shouldn't be aware of, and that's something that we all need to be sharp about when the case goes back to court. I'm positive that we're going to find the clues that we're looking for as soon as we can drag him out of hiding... He has to be out there still, and I'm hoping that all of this won't have been for nothing."

"I'm hoping that this will go somewhere too," I confessed. "I can certainly understand why all of this was done. It's been convoluted thus far, but the point of it was to try and draw the culprit out of hiding with something that they would have known is blatantly wrong. The one who attacked the victim would know that there were no witnesses because he was present at the scene of the crime, but nobody else would be aware of that. If he mentioned something of that nature or otherwise showed signs of knowing something that he shouldn't have, then that would help your endeavors."

"Chrysalis still has no clues about who did this, by the way," Mr. Morix reminded us. "All that she knows is that he had white hair and pale skin. She can identify him based on a photo, that much she's confident of, but describing him otherwise... That's a bit more of a struggle for her. The culprit's motives are still unknown since the two of them, as far as I'm aware, had never met before. If they had met at some point, the encounter was so brief that Chrysalis forgot about it, and forgetting is not something that Chrysalis does often, let me tell you."

"I feel like we can put together at least something about the motive," Yuri sighed. "I mean, it can't be a coincidence that Oracle was the one who was attacked. I feel like the culprit knows something... Well, a little something. I don't think that the culprit is aware of who she is specifically, but he thinks that Ms. Liyle is involved, hence why she was attacked. Chrysalis has probably been left out of his suspicions up to this point, but it's still something for us to keep in mind as we move into the next stage of this investigation."

"As much as I hate to admit it, I think that Yuri is right on that," I agreed. "I bet that the culprit is at least somewhat aware of who Oracle is, and that's why she was attacked. Why else would the culprit go after her without having any previous encounters with her? If that isn't the motive, then there has to be something else that we aren't aware of, but this is at least a start... It's going to be impressively difficult to keep something like this a secret if that is the motive though."

"We have to try," Mr. Morix said firmly without a beat of hesitation. "I didn't want to say right off the bat that I knew what was going on with this case because there was still a lot that we had to work out in order to make sure that everything ran smoothly, but... I guess there's no way of hiding it now. Eileen Liyle was an experimental alias, and she hasn't been in circulation for a long time. Chrysalis hasn't seen much of a need to make use of her up to this point, so we only told the people who absolutely had to be aware of what she was up to. That's why Ghastly, Polly, and Sora were aware of the truth. They were anxious throughout the case because they weren't sure of what had happened. Chrysalis and I were doing so much scrambling to try and cover our tracks that we couldn't be open about it yet, but we were always planning on saying something at some point."

"I see... That makes a lot of sense in hindsight," I murmured. "The four of you were involved with the establishment of the project all those years ago, so it makes sense that they would be the first ones to hear about major decisions like this. I know that you were planning on opening up about it later down the line, so I'm not going to ask you to justify yourself on that front."

Mr. Morix nodded his confirmation. "If we were going to have this plan work without any issues, we had a lot of effort to put in. It was important that we set up something that would hopefully lure the culprit or anybody who knew the culprit out of hiding, and we thought that something so openly false would be the best way to do that... I suppose that we were wrong in our assumptions, and our gambit fell through when the culprit didn't return to see what the cause of the contradiction was," he sighed.

"If you're still as clueless about the culprit as you are, then I think that we've got quite the uphill battle ahead of us," Victoria commented as she rubbed nervously at her lower arm. "I don't know howe we're supposed to figure this out if not even the victim is aware of who could have attacked her. The culprit must have had a motive that would work even without the two of them ever crossing paths, but I don't know what that would even consist of aside from the Oracle project."

"And that barely makes sense when you think about it!" Yuri cried out as she made a dramatic show of throwing her hands into the air above her head. "It's not like just anybody would be able to find out something like this. In fact, it would be nearly impossible for a regular person to hear about this sort of thing... The only people who ever figured out the truth were either led to it or were told explicitly."

"We were led to the truth two years ago during the Interpol case and the trials that led up to it, for example," I recalled, and Yuri nodded her agreement. "If there was really so little interaction between the victim and culprit, then that makes it hard for us to pin down a motive. In fact, we don't even have a way of saying for sure how much he even knows about Oracle. For all we know, this is a completely obsolete line of reasoning since the motive was completely unrelated to this."

"If you want my opinion, we should focus our attention on making sure that we're able to speak with the victim as soon as possible," Victoria pointed out. "Regardless of the name that she goes by, she should be able to do at least a little something to help us as far as the progression of the case is concerned."

"I agree," Yuri nodded. "Where is she now, Mr. Morix? I have to say that I find it rather suspicious that the two of you aren't together given that you've been the ones trying to make sure that all of this runs smoothly behind the scenes..."

"She's at the hospital getting the injury on her leg checked out," Mr. Morix explained. "I have to say that I'm glad she's finally having that examined. I was worried about it from the start, but she was right in saying that it had to stay quiet until after the culprit had been exposed."

"Then let's get to it," I declared. The others nodded, and we began to make our way out of the evidence room and then the prison as a whole. This case had taken a turn for the unexpected, but that wasn't going to stop us from finding the truth.

This case hardcore slaps

-Digital