In the aftermath of Juliet's revelation, we all just stood in silence for a moment. Jane moved first; she casually shrugged, as if to say, "Yeah, fire would be a pretty effective way of teaching something," and headed off to the trial.

I tried to catch Lucina's gaze, but she just stared straight ahead. Katy touched her shoulder, and even Rocky, who had been glowing and muttering to himself just a second before, regarded her with forlorn helplessness. But ignoring us all, Lucina just let go of my hand and walked stiffly out of the elevator.

TRIAL ROOM

The trial room did not appear to have a new theme; instead, it looked like a cheap hotel convention room (admittedly, much larger than most), with blank off-white walls and dirty-looking carpets. Likewise, our circle of podiums just had two blank spaces. JP's slot continued the ghoulish pattern of featuring a black-and-white photo of his face (there were three Xs slapped on the picture) but Earl and Ashley's spots were just empty.

Monokuma waddled out onto his big central stage, a machine gun slung over his shoulder. He quivered a bit oddly. "All right, you lazy idiots!" he snapped as we found our spaces in the circle. "You know the rules!"

"Do you?" Bepi called back.

"I know rule number one, which is I get to shoot smartasses!" the bear snapped. "But don't worry, the execution or executions we'll be having later won't just come from the barrel of a gun! They're horrible and ironic, just like always! You'll..."

I tried to ignore his mind games and instead looked around the circle at my classmates. Lucina gripped her lectern tightly, staring down at the floor; Katy, one spot away from her, absent-mindedly grasped the locket around her neck. Rocky rubbed his hand against his head, seeming shell-shocked. Bepi just started ahead grimly; Barrett caught his gaze and gave him a grin. Nicole tapped a pencil against her chin and jotted something down in her sketchbook.

Juliet reached over to Rodrigo, in the space next to her, and held out a piece of paper. Rodrigo blinked cluelessly at her, and she pointed to the side of her neck. "Wipe yourself off, you got a little..."

Horrified, Rodrigo, grabbed the paper and furiously rubbed it against the dark smudge on his neck, then he tossed the stained paper to the floor as if it was poisonous.

"...and imbibed by the spirit of chaos!" Monokuma finished. "So, you'd better solve both these murders, or it's the guillotine for you!"

"Barrett did it!" Nicole yelled, pointing at him.

Barrett gaped at her in confusion. "What? No I didn't!"

"Dude, Earl exploded! You explode things! Done!"

"Hold on," Bepi interrupted. "Let's take ten big steps back before we start throwing accusations around, okay?"

"Okay, but Barrett fuckin' did it..." Nicole mumbled. Barrett just grunted and threw a two-finger salute in her direction.

"We'll see," Bepi said. "But for now, we've got some mixed messages on the timeline of things. Can we just get you to establish once and for all when each of them died?"

"Well, that's easy!" Monokuma bellowed. "They died at exactly the same moment! That's why you're investigating both murders!"

We all shared a look around the circle. "Hold on," I said. "That's impossible."

FACT 2: ASHLEY'S DEATH
Just before Earl exploded, Ashley fell off the roof of the science building. It looks like she must have fallen from right where Earl was standing.

"Ashley clearly must have died first, because we saw her fall off the building before we saw Earl explode."

"Oh god, you saw him explode?" Katy gurgled, looking sick.

"Boom," Barrett replied. Katy put a hand over her mouth.

Monokuma nodded. "Yes, just like I said! Earl Morale died before Ashley Coelho!"

"Ugh." Jane rolled her eyes. "The bear is going to be no help, obviously. So can we just assume that the little one died when she fell off the roof, and then a few moments later, the big one died when he exploded?"

"No," Bepi answered. "The bear told us earlier that Ashley died before she fell off the roof, but even without that, there's evidence she was at least attacked first."

FACT 9: ASHLEY'S BODY
Ashley died almost ten minutes before falling off the roof. She had a wound on her temple; she appears to have been hit with a blunt object. Unusually, her business jacket was unbuttoned.

Nicole frowned. "She was hit on the head? From the front? How'd someone do that? She could tell I had a knife, and I wasn't even coming at her."

"That's a very good question," I said. "But before we work on the how, let's just lay out what we know of the when. This was a pretty eventful night." I paused and sighed. "But... we have to be careful. Because at least two people with useful information are motivated to lie."

"The killers?" Katy asked.

"If it's two different killers, then we have THREE people motivated to lie," I said. "Because... I was also counting Juliet, and I don't think she did it this time."

Juliet nodded sagely. "I do lie a lot. It's best to just ignore everything I say."

I shook my head. "No, we shouldn't do that either. If she says something that's confirmed by someone else, we should consider it."

"This is confusing," Rocky muttered.

"Oh, you think play-doh is confusing," Jane growled.

"Well... there were two big things that were gonna happen tonight, right?" Katy said, thankfully not adding to the tension. "Barrett was going to try to burn down the ROTC, and Earl was going to try to start his tank and drive it off through the fence."

"The traitor!" Monokuma yelped, appalled. "There's no way he could get through my defenses anyway, but he wasn't supposed to use that tank to escape. He was supposed to use that tank to kill someone!"

"Barrett did burn down the ROTC," Nicole said.

"Yeah, thought someone was gonna be stupid and try to stop me, but they didn't," Barrett confirmed. "Went off smooth as fuckin' cream."

"I know Earl was worried someone would try to stop him," Nicole pointed out. "He was creepy as shit about it, too."

She pointed at Ashley, looking more irritated by this point than anything else. "Her stupid boyfriend spooked the shit out of me. Like an hour ago he went and found me and like..." She shuddered. "He was like, 'A poor leader rules through fear, so please forgive me if tomorrow night I have to be a poor leader.'"

I felt myself tensing involuntarily. "That is... really ominous."

"I know, right?!" Nicole threw her arms up in frustration. "What the fuck does it even mean?!"

"It means he's going to get us all out of here," Ashley replied pedantically. "He's almost done with his tank, and he doesn't want you or Bomberman to fuck it up."

Juliet tilted her head at Nicole. "Well, he was right, wasn't he? You did try to stop him. Don't you remember what you told us in the locker room?"

Nicole stared in confusion for a moment, then held up a finger. "Oh! Right."

"Earl spooked me with his whole 'rule through fear' bullshit, but y'know, I don't think he had killer in him. He was a hypocrite and an idiot, but... I dunno, I wanted to try to get through to him at least once before he drove off and got exploded by Monokuma's defenses."

"But I wasn't gonna attack him or anything, I just didn't want the fool to get himself killed."

"Let's not get sidetracked from the time line," Jane interrupted, annoyed. "The important thing is, by this morning, pretty much everyone knew Earl and Barrett planned their little events for tonight. Even I knew, and I give less than a shit about any of this."

"There's nothing subtle about what I do," Barrett said. "I got my fire fuel from the chem lab this morning, I set it all out in the army building, and I lit it."

"When was that?" I asked.

He shrugged. "Dunno... went in a little before 10:00 maybe? Lit it ten or fifteen minutes later."

I nodded. "OK, that does line up with some Juliet testimony."

FACT 6: JULIET'S TESTIMONY
Juliet says that a half-hour before Earl exploded, she saw Barrett go into the ROTC. Soon after, she saw Ashley leave the ROTC and go into the science building.

Katy squinted in confusion. "What was Ashley doing in the ROTC?"

"I think I know," I replied. "But... it's kind of unexpected."

FACT 20: HANDGUN (revised)
There was a handgun on the roof, covered with remains from the explosion. There were no bullets in it. Ashley is the one who took it from the arsenal.

"Ashley?!" Barrett shouted, looking absolutely perplexed. "Holy shit, I didn't think she had it in her."

"But no one was shot, right?" Bepi asked.

"There weren't even any bullets," Juliet replied. "And the gun hasn't ever even been fired."

Bepi glanced at me. I nodded.

"Why the hell would Ashley get a gun without any bullets?" Nicole wondered. "She was nuts, but I never thought she was dumb."

Katy held up a finger. "Where did you find that gun? On the roof?"

I raised an eyebrow at her. "Yeah."

"Was there anything else up there? Like... objects?"

"Um. Out in the open? No... just the computer terminal."

She just said "hm" and nodded. I wasn't sure why, but I found it very distracting.

"Let's keep focusing on the timeline, so we can be sure of things," Bepi said. "Ashley got a gun from the armory, then went into the science center because she arranged a meeting with Earl. They were going to meet before Earl tried using his tank."

FACT 26: MEETING BETWEEN EARL AND ASHLEY
Nicole says she and Barrett overheard that Ashley and Earl planned a meeting in the science center at 10:00.

I nodded. "All right. So, it's 10:00. Barrett is in the ROTC. Ashley and Earl are on the roof of the science building. Juliet was in the east quad."

"I was in the chemistry lab," Jane volunteered.

"Lucina and I were in the dorm," Katy piped up. "Bepi came in around then. We tried to knock on people's doors, but Saya was the only one who answered."

"I was in my dorm room," Rocky muttered. "Wearing headphones."

"So was I!" Nicole said. "But I was in total scarf-mode, so I'm not surprised I didn't hear you."

Rodrigo cringed slightly. "I was in the cafeteria."

I narrowed my eyes slightly in thought. That was... a lot of lies just now.

"After Earl and Ashley began their meeting, the roof of the science building was inaccessible," Juliet said. "I attempted to follow Ashley, but I was unable to open the trapdoor at the top of the ladder on the fifth floor."

Barrett snorted. "Oh, helpful girl. Why should we believe this shit?"

"We shouldn't, necessarily," I said. "But Juliet's not the only one who said this same thing."

FACT 7: TRAPDOOR TO ROOF (revised)
Juliet says she tried to go to the roof of the science building, but she couldn't open the trapdoor at the top of the ladder. Jane says she also tried to go to the roof just after Earl's death, and she independently also said she couldn't open the hatch. Rodrigo also says he was not able to open the trapdoor, and he tried just before we arrived.

"Jane tried to go up right after she heard Earl explode, and Rodrigo tried just after her."

"And we tried just after Rodrigo," Juliet added.

"So no one could get to the roof?" Nicole asked. "Shit, how're we gonna solve this if no one could even get to the crime scene?"

"No, we could get to the roof," I said. "The trapdoor opened fine for us."

Bepi glared down at his lectern in thought. "So... After Ashley goes up, Juliet, Jane, and Rodrigo all independently said they couldn't go up to the roof. But then Saya says she and Lucina were able to get up there."

"Why couldn't anyone get up there in the first place?" Katy asked. "I don't think it ever had a lock on it that I could see."

"It was blocked," Juliet said casually.

FACT 17: COMPUTER TERMINAL
There was a heavy computer terminal lying next to the trapdoor on the roof. It looks like it was taken from one of the nearby small rooms. It was heavy enough that not all of the students would be able to move it by themselves.

I nodded. "Yeah, that's what I think, too."

"So... our victims go to the roof," Jane said. "The door to the roof is blocked by the computer terminal. Both of the victims die. And then somehow after that, the computer terminal is moved away?" She raised an eyebrow. "Well, this can only mean one thing, can't it?"

"They weren't alone up there." Katy was pale. "Unless both Rodrigo and Jane are lying, someone had to move the terminal away after Earl died."

"Who was it?" Nicole asked, glancing around thoughtfully.

"Couldn't have been me!" Barrett bellowed. "I was settin' shit on fire and watching it burn!"

"And Bepi, Saya, and Lucina are out," Katy said. "I guess Juliet, too. We were all in the same place down in the quad when everything was happening."

I nodded. "And you can clear one more person, too, right?" I asked. "After you went to the main quad."

"Saya," she greeted as I neared. "Did you solve the crime? I ran into Rocky right after I came back, and we searched all around here, but we didn't find anything. Right, Rocky?" She glanced back.

Rocky nodded and mumbled, "Yeah."

"Oh yeah," Katy said. "I guess that's true. Rocky was just in the quad, and there wasn't time for him to get downstairs and over there." Rocky, for his part, just shrugged. "So... who's left? Who could have been there?"

From the way people were looking, I wouldn't even have to play any games to lead at least one or two people to the correct answer. But I wanted to set the context first, or we were in danger of going down a dangerous, wrong path.

"Hold on," I said. "I'm still confused about the timeline. Because there's something else that happened earlier tonight, and I still don't understand how it fits in."

"Oh?" Juliet asked, cocking an interested eyebrow. "What's that?"

"Well... you." I pointed at her. "Someone released Juliet from the freezer earlier this evening."

FACT 5: JULIET'S ESCAPE
Juliet says someone unlocked the freezer door, allowing her to escape. She claims to not know who did it. On her way out, she heard a scuffle, but she didn't see anyone.

"She is devilishly clever," Rodrigo said. "Perhaps she devised a way to escape on her own."

"I don't think so," Bepi said. "It's hard to have a secret door to a freezer; the cold air escapes. And the lock was just open, the key sticking right out of it. Someone had to deliberately let her out."

"That is a stupid, stupid thing to do," Juliet said, and she actually seemed legitimately angry about it. "I was safe in there. I'm not..." She took a deep breath. "Goddamn it, why would someone do this?!"

Bepi frowned in thought. "I don't know, but maybe that weird letter has something to do with it. It didn't make any sense, but it references 'Romeo,' so maybe it was trying to connect Juliet with the murders?"

FACT 3: "DEAR ROMEO" LETTER
Ashley was carrying a bizarre letter describing a night someone spent with someone else.

Nicole did a double-take at him. "Wait... Romeo?" She shared a glance with Barrett. "One of the alums of this program is named 'Romeo.' A real bigshot. Why would Ashley have something like that?"

"You're all so stupid," Juliet mumbled. "I'm supposed to be contained. It's not worth it to set me free just to frame me, or whatever you were going to do. You just..." she trailed off. "Unless..." she suddenly looked around at Bepi, oddly hopeful. "Was there any other evidence you found by the freezer?"

He regarded her suspiciously but said, "Yeah. Something pretty blatant."

He held up a silver object. I gasped when I realized what it was: a long, sharp icepick. And on the end, a dark stain that was clearly...

Juliet put a hand on her chest and exhaled slowly. "Oh. Okay. Thank god."

Rocky raised an eyebrow at her. "What do you mean, 'thank god?'"

"Well, there's only a handful of reasons someone might have let me out," she explained, smiling brightly. "They could want to frame me for a murder. They could just want chaos. Misplaced sympathy, christ forbid. But, that icepick points to another possibility: they didn't actually want to let me out."

I felt a hitching in my chest: I'm not sure if it was feigned or not. "They wanted to kill you."

"Wait, wait." Nicole said, putting a hand on her face. "We had two murders tonight... AND someone planned a THIRD?"

"There was a lot of tension building up," Katy said hesitantly. "I think those fairy tales Monokuma gave us made people think about stuff they didn't want to think about."

"But why didn't they go through with it?" Bepi asked. "And whose blood was that on the icepick?"

"Someone stopped 'em, obviously," Jane said. "That was the commotion Juliet heard. They got stabbed in the process."

"Juliet's a fuckin' liar," Barrett sneered. "Why should we trust she heard anything?"

"She is a liar," Bepi pointed out. "But that blood came from someone. Unless she..."

A loud zipping sound cut him off. Juliet undid her wool parka and tossed it away, then kicked off her ski pants. She stood there, naked as the day she was born. "Take a look," she said, stepping out from behind her lectern, . "No injury. Nothing."

I tried hard not to look directly at her, knowing it would serve as an unneeded distraction. I failed... but my reaction surprised me. Her body was astoundingly attractive to the point of being surrealist, but in my current mindset, it was just the shape of someone dangerous, someone probably too smart for me to fool. I idly wondered if this reaction should worry me.

I was one of the few who didn't seem absolutely stunned (Rodrigo and Katy, in particular, both looked like they were about to keel over and die) so I said out loud, "She's right. She doesn't have any wounds." She smirked at me and my face heated; I let my clinical mindset slip for a moment. "Please put your clothes back on." Thankfully, she complied, but she left the parka halfway unzipped. I figured that was the best we were going to get.

"F...friends," Rodrigo said, still looking pretty shell-shocked, "Does this aspect of the evening even matter? I too wish to know all whose hearts are dark enough to want to kill, but we must focus on Friend Earl and Friend Ashley, yes?"

"I think what happened in the frat house is connected to the murders," I said. "And honestly, I'm not very interested in the person who intended to use the icepick. I'm..."

"No," Katy said, softly but firmly. "No... I don't know what you're doing, Saya, but I don't think it's okay to just move past someone trying to commit murder." She looked around at everyone. "I know who was planning to kill Juliet."

FACT 25: RECEIPT
According to the receipt Katy gave me, Rocky bought an icepick from the student stores earlier today.

Everyone looked at Rocky, who gripped his lectern tightly and stared down at the floor. He made no attempt to defend himself.

"The receipt is iffy, remember?" Nicole said. "Someone could have stolen his tablet, or..."

"It was just Juliet," Rocky said.

There was a silence.

"She fucked everything up for everyone," he continued. "No one shoulda minded."

"Uh... I'm not sure we would have had a very difficult time cracking that case," Jane pointed out. "You're not exactly Professor Moriarty."

"Fine!" Rocky shouted. "So you woulda caught me! Do I look like I care? Everyone just... look, I'm dumb, but I'm smart enough to know people gotta die to open up the campus. So let's get it over with! Just let me be an idiot and get myself killed! Who gives a shit?" He sighed grumblingly. "Luce, don't look at me like that."

Lucina was indeed giving him a very forlorn look. I found myself wishing we had Earl or Ashley there to chide Rocky, because no one presently in the room seemed to have the heart. Jane looked disgusted with him, but that was the closest we came.

"Okay, whatever, but someone obviously didn't agree with you," Nicole said. "And... got stabbed in the process, hm?"

Rocky just stared downward. "I'm not saying anything. They were stupid for stopping me, but Saya thinks they were involved in the murders, and I don't snitch on people who try to help me. Even if they shouldn't have."

"Are you kidding me?!" Nicole yelped. "It ain't like the cops are cruising the neighborhood, here, this is some fucked-up murder game!"

But Rocky just glowered at the floor. "Nuh-uh. I always fuck everything up by losing my shit. The only reason it's not worse is because people step in. I'm not screwing someone over who does that. Not even if everyone gets killed from it."

"Well, then, does our little hero want to speak up?" Jane asked, peering around the room. No one moved. "Curious." She glanced over at me. "Well, please continue, then, darling. Explain why you care about this whole thing."

I nodded. "Well, it's something we found on the roof of the science center. Evidence that makes me suspect the person who tried to stop Rocky was up there at some point tonight."

FACT 20: BANDAGES
There were two wadded piles of bandages in the telescope dome. One looked to have been used on a wound and had circular stains of blood. The other was dirty, as if it had been used to wipe something off.

"Circular stains?" Bepi said. "Hm. A puncture wound... like an icepick would make."

"And these particular bandages aren't new," I added.

It was the same kind of bandages that I'd found in JP's dresser: the ones Juliet had used when torturing Emily.

"It's exactly the same bandages that were in the frat house. They were right there, where the fight happened."

"Uh... okay, let me see if I got this," Nicole said. "Someone is at the frat house when Rocky opened up the freezer, stopped him from killing Juliet, and got stabbed in the process? Then they took the bandages from the last murder and... went to the roof of the science building?"

Katy looked forlornly at Rocky. "Even if you don't want to say who it is, could you say what happened? At least the stuff you did? That's not snitching on them, right?" She clutched her chest pleadingly. "You don't want anyone to die, right? I can tell that, at least."

Rocky looked solidly at her (keeping his eyes from traveling anywhere else in the circle, probably for fear he'd give something away). "Fine," he said. "I opened up the freezer and hid in the secret passage. Juliet came out, and I was about to run out and stab her, but... someone... grabbed my arm from behind."

He looked down at his hand with something close to contempt. "I just flailed out, you know? Just stupid and unthinking like always. But they held my arms until I calmed down, even with the blood all over." He clenched his fist and sighed. "They made me promise I wouldn't try to hurt anyone again, even Juliet. I got the bandages for 'em, and then... I dunno, they just let me go."

What a saint," Nicole said sarcastically. "Y'know, they didn't do it out of the kindness of their heart. They planned to kill Earlshly, and they had to stop you because if you killed Juliet, their murder wouldn't count for the game."

Barrett chortled. "Bet you feel stupid now, whoever you are. Didn't think I'd fuck up the bear like I did!"

Monokuma, for his part, just tilted his head in confusion. "'Earlshley?'"

"It saves time!" Nicole defended.

"Hold on... let's not jump to conclusions," Bepi said. "It seems strange to plan this big, sneaky murder... but leave the bandages just lying around to be found. And how did they know what Rocky planned? There's something confusing about all this."

Jane rolled her eyes. "Why don't we just ask? The individual in question is standing right here in this room, and surely no one is slow enough to not yet have figured out their identity." She glanced around with a knowing look, then frowned in dismay. "God, really? It isn't obvious?" She pointed an accusing finger... right at Rodrigo. "It's obviously man-meat here."

Rodrigo made a choking sound that sounded like it was trying to be a denial. He brought a hand up to his face and finally stammered some words, "Nay! It's not true!"

"It's uncouth to lie, dear," Jane said with severe condescension. "You were seen near the roof..."

FACT 12: RODRIGO'S TESTIMONY
Rodrigo says he came in from the main quad after the explosion and immediately tried to go to the roof of the science building. After discovering that the hatch was blocked, he came into the stairwell and has been there ever since.

"...and your story about that doesn't make sense. There wasn't time to for you to get up the stairs and back down without running into me."

FACT 7: TRAPDOOR TO ROOF (revised)
Juliet says she tried to go to the roof of the science building, but she couldn't open the trapdoor at the top of the ladder. Jane says she also tried to go to the roof just after Earl's death, and she independently also said she couldn't open the hatch. Rodrigo also says he was not able to open the trapdoor, and he tried just before we arrived.

I've been here since the early afternoon. I took a look outside when that awful fire alarm started, and I went upstairs to investigate about... five minutes ago when I heard an explosion. I just got back a minute ago."

Juliet cocked her head and looked at him like a cat. "You're also one of the few students capable of moving the computer terminal off the trapdoor by yourself."

FACT 17: COMPUTER TERMINAL
There was a heavy computer terminal lying next to the trapdoor on the roof. It looks like it was taken from one of the nearby small rooms. It was heavy enough that not all of the students would be able to move it by themselves.

"Oh yeah," Jane added, rolling her eyes again. You're also obviously fucking injured."

FACT 11: RODRIGO'S STATE
Rodrigo looks upset. He hugged his left arm to his body oddly, and he was standing off-balance.

Rodrigo stood as stiffly and straightly as he could, staring off at nothing. "I refuse to speak on this matter," he said.

Jane regarded him coolly, hand on her chin. "Show us your left arm, Rodrigo."

He didn't look like he even heard her. He just stood tall.

"Christ, what is this?" Nicole snapped. "Mr. Honorboy snaps? What the fuck is going on?"

Barrett grinned. "Well, that's it then, eh? Fucker might as well be confessing."

Jane nodded. "After the kaboom, he just oh-so-casually moves the terminal and comes down. On his way, he runs into the Three Investigators and tells them he very recently came to the building. Devious."

"Wait," I said. "We have to be really sure of our timeline, here. Jane, you said it was impossible for Rodrigo to have gone up to the roof without running into you. But that's not true."

"Ugh, what the hell are you saying now, Saya?" Jane asked contemptuously. "We both know there's only one way up and down."

FACT 12: LAYOUT OF SCIENCE CENTER
There is a single, central staircase in the science center, connecting the lobby on the ground floor with the big computer room on the fifth floor. The doors on all the middle floors are locked.

"Yeah, but there is one place you can be missed. The fifth floor."

The big computer room probably took up the entire top floor of the building, and there were big, wall-like computer modules everywhere that reached almost all the way up to the ceiling. It was very ominous to be in mazelike place on such a gruesome night, but luckily I remembered where the ladder was: there was a pretty clear, wide path, and even though dead-end paths branched off, it was pretty hard to get lost in here.

Bepi frowned in thought. "Huh. Yeah, someone could hide up there, but you'd pretty much have to do it on purpose, wouldn't you?"

"I just said it was possible," I replied, feeling defensive. "I never said it wasn't sketchy."

Lucina waved her hands to get everyone's attention. She held up a note written in large letters so we could all read it: I don't agree with the theory about Rodrigo's motivation.

She scribbled (she had gotten a large, black magic marker at some point) and held up a new message, He had a different reason to be following Rocky. It wasn't because he planned a murder later.

Lucina stepped forward, holding up a card.Help Rocky.

Rodrigo tilted his head. "Friend Rocky deserves protection, but no more than others."

She looked hesitant; I tried to give her an encouraging smile. I don't know how well it worked, but either way, she quickly scrawled out, He's at the end of his rope, and I don't know what to do. The rest of us can take care of ourselves, but Rocky's not able to be careful.

Rodrigo considered this in silence for a moment. "Very well," he said. "If he is vulnerable, I am bound to give him extra protection. Friend Lucina, I swear to you that I will keep him from harm!" He placed a fist over his chest and marched off.

Rocky groaned slightly and squeezed the bridge of his nose. "Luce..."

Katy nodded. "It probably counts as protection to keep someone from doing something they'd get executed for."

"Unless he's Machiavelli himself, I don't think Rodrigo could have tricked Lucina into doing that," I said. "So, there's no way he stopped Rocky because he planned a murder and wanted it to count for the game."

"So what?" Jane said dismissively. "So the fucker was lucky. He was planning a murder and just happened to be in position to stop another murder. People are morally complicated, blah blah blah."

"This is crazy," Katy said. "We have two options. His bandages show up on the roof where the murders happened, but he wasn't planning to kill anyone. Or, he was planning a murder, but by chance he happened to stop an unrelated murder that would have wrecked his plans. ...They both sound pretty unlikely to me."

"Uh, don't be stupid," Nicole snapped. "This is Churchy Monkington we're talking about. If he was innocent, he'd be telling us all about it." She glanced at him sideways. "But he's not. He's just all clammed up."

"She's right," Bepi said. "You gotta know it's not looking good for you, Rodrigo. I don't want to believe you could do this, but unless you give us something to work with..."

"Goddamn it!" Barrett suddenly shouted. "Talk, you fucker!"

Rodrigo didn't move a muscle.

I sighed. "He's not going to help." I tried one more time myself, with just an imploring look. He was entirely stoic.

I sighed. "Let's focus back on the timeline, okay? Ashley gets the gun and goes up to the roof, and Earl blocks the trapdoor. Rodrigo is up on the roof with them at this point. A few minutes later, Ashley is killed. A few minutes after that, she falls off the roof, and Earl is killed. Then Rodrigo moved the computer terminal out of the way and went down the ladder."

FACT 2: ASHLEY'S DEATH (revised)
Just before Earl exploded, Ashley fell off the roof of the science building. It looks like she must have fallen from right where Earl was standing. She was killed despite her ability to discern when she was alone with someone else who was armed.

"Hold on," Jane said. "How do you know Earl blocked the trapdoor? Maybe it was Rodrigo."

"I don't think so," I said. "The terminal was in place not long after Ashley went up. He'd have to do it right in front of them."

"Maybe they knew they were meeting Rodrigo," Bepi suggested.

"No, that doesn't make sense," Katy replied. "He was on the 'other team,' remember?"

"Oh right," Nicole mused. "Wait but... but this makes even less sense. They have a private meeting with him right there?"

"They didn't," I said. "Because we found the bandages inside the telescope dome where we had Emily's memorial. And there was something else about that place..."

FACT 18: DOOR TO TELESCOPE DOME
The door to the telescope dome was sealed from the outside with a chain and padlock. The key found on Ashley opened the padlock.

"Hmm," Bepi said. Locked with a padlock... the same way Juliet was locked in the freezer."

"Earl and Ashley are the ones who devised that little plan."

"And the key was on Ashley's body." Bepi frowned. "So... so they locked him in, didn't they?"

I nodded. "That's what makes sense to me. Either he was already in there, or they made him go in. And then they blocked the door from the outside. They really wanted privacy." I risked a glance over to Rodrigo. He wasn't moving or reacting at all.

Barrett chuckled darkly. "Stupid fucks. So they lock him in, and he just tricks 'em for the key and lets himself out."

"Wait, that can't be true," I said. The door was locked from the outside, remember? And we know he left the roof after Ashley was thrown off the roof, and Ashley had the key."

Jane hmphed thoughtfully. "So how did he get out?"

"We found that, too," Juliet replied.

FACT 19: LADDER
A ladder was set up inside the observatory dome, leading to the open shutter.

I nodded. "He climbed up to the open shutter and then just dropped down." I tilted my head slightly as I regarded him. "It's not short drop. Is that how you hurt your hip?"

FACT 11: RODRIGO'S STATE (revised)
Rodrigo looks upset. He hugged his left arm to his body oddly, and he was standing off-balance. He had a dark smear of something on his neck. His leg is hurt on the hip.

He just looked back at me, stoic.

"Jesus Christ," Nicole muttered. "All of a sudden everyone's some kind of mafioso?" She sneered at Rodrigo and Rocky. "If you didn't do this shit, then who the fuck are you protecting? None of us are family. You know that, right?" She shook her head in pure contempt. "No. Rodrigo did it. He had to. I refuse to believe two fucking people in here dumb enough to go this far for some fucking stranger."

"...We're not exactly strangers to each other," Katy said hesitantly.

"Uh, yeah. We are." Nicole gaze was almost never hard and undistracted, but it was right now. "You don't know me. I don't know you. The end."

"I don't think..."

"God, I knew you were naive, but this is fucking crazy."

"It's like she doesn't remember what happened to Emily," Juliet remarked. Katy inhaled to speak, but looked to think better of it. She just clenched her fists and glared down at her lectern.

"Can we get back on it?" Bepi asked, looking pretty annoyed by the sidetracking. "Because unless Rodrigo is going to tell us what happened, there's something I need to understand before we do any voting at all. How could someone have surprised Ashley?" He pressed his hand against his stomach as if anxious and angry at the same time. "You guys don't know how careful she was. She never let herself be in direct danger. So for her to be killed by being hit with something... and especially from the front! I don't get it."

"Rodrigo can be pretty charming when he wants to be," Jane said. "...In a naive, boyish way, of course."

Katy looked up, blinking in surprise. "Wait, Rodrigo?"

"Does it even fucking matter?" Barrett tossed his hands up casually. "He was up there and she died! That's enough for me. Burn the monk!"

Katy waved her hands around. "Hold on. Rodrigo..."

"Unless he wants to speak up for himself," Bepi said, raising an eyebrow.

"Fuck 'im," Nicole sneered. "He..."

A sudden bang cut her off. I whipped my head over to see Katy, holding the shoe that still had the stiletto heel on it in her hand. She'd whacked it against her lectern, and she looked very surprised at her own behavior. "Uh, sorry," she said. "I didn't think that'd be that loud. Um... but wait, everyone, I thought we'd be talking about Earl. Why would you be talking about Rodrigo with Ashley's death?"

I crinkled my brow at her. "Why wouldn't we be?"

She blinked, completely bewildered. "Uh, because he couldn't have killed Ashley. I thought we all knew that."

No one said anything; we all just stared at her.

"Only one person could possibly have killed Ashley," Katy clarified.

Jane just snorted. No one else said anything.

Katy took a hesitant half-step back. "Oh... I guess I'm wrong. I thought we all were on the same page, but I must just be making stuff up."

"No," I said, as kindly as I could. "We're listening." Jane practically audibly rolled her eyes, but I ignored her. "What do you mean? Explain it to us."

"Uh." She looked very uncomfortable at everyone's looks, but she made quick eye contact with me and with Lucina and then she nodded. "Okay. It's not, like, detective work or anything. I'm not good with logic stuff, but I do know people."

She took an anxious breath. "So... so there's only one thing that could have been the murder weapon, right? She was hit with something on the roof, so there's only one thing the killer could have used."

FACT 20: HANDGUN (revised)
There was a handgun on the roof, covered with remains from the explosion. There were no bullets in it. Ashley is the one who took it from the arsenal.

Bepi grimaced. "You think she went and got the very gun that was later used to kill her?" He crossed his arms in thought. "Maybe. But maybe there was another weapon that got blown away in the explosion."

"Yeah, but... the gun makes sense for another reason. Because you keep saying how weird it is that she'd be in a position to be attacked with a weapon. So it had to be something that actually was dangerous, but she didn't think it was."

Bepi's mouth hung open. "It wasn't loaded."

Katy nodded. "And she knew it wasn't. So she just filed it away in her head as harmless. She didn't think that someone might use it just as a club."

Bepi pushed two fingers against his temple, sighing. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, it works. Ashley was smart and prepared, but she was never very creative, was she?"

"Okay," I said. "So, she was killed with the gun. But Katy, why do you think Rodrigo couldn't have done it?"

"Because her coat was unbuttoned," she answered, as if that explained everything in the world.

But Bepi held up a hand. "Wait," he said. "You couldn't possibly be suggesting..." He trailed off. "God. It couldn't be, could it?"

"What?" Barrett asked, annoyed he was out of the loop.

"Ashley's business coat was never unbuttoned," Katy explained. "I can't think of any reason the killer would open it, so she must have. And... like... I know I'm the romance writer, but I can't be the only person who can imagine why she'd be opening up her clothes on the roof tonight?" She looked around meaningfully. "In the meeting she made sure was very private? With..."

"With Earl," Bepi finished.

"Hold up," Nicole said. "Earl was a motherfucker, but would he really..."

"Because think about the gun," Katy said. "Why would Ashley get a gun without any bullets in it? What use would she think an empty gun has?"

I gasped. "Intimidation." I pointed over to Nicole. "And you know as well as anyone who was planning to intimidate people tonight."

She pointed at Ashley, looking more irritated by this point than anything else. "Her stupid boyfriend spooked the shit out of me. Like an hour ago he went and found me and like..." She shuddered. "He was like, 'A poor leader rules through fear, so please forgive me if tomorrow night I have to be a poor leader.'"

I felt myself tensing involuntarily. "That is... really ominous."

"I know, right?!" Nicole threw her arms up in frustration. "What the fuck does it even mean?!"

"It means he's going to get us all out of here," Ashley replied pedantically. "He's almost done with his tank, and he doesn't want you or Bomberman to fuck it up."

"He told her the gun was for scaring everyone away," Katy explained. "Who else would she give it to? He's the only one who'd want it, and he's also the only one she'd trust."

I found my mouth hanging open a bit as I listened to her. I reminded myself again, because the lesson obviously hadn't gotten through: Katy can surprise you.

"He manipulated her into meeting in secret, isolating herself off from any means of escape, and giving him the very weapon used to kill her." Juliet smirked. "And right in the middle of making out, he..."

"Hold on," Rocky interrupted, his confusion apparently overriding his promise to stay quiet. "I never really got Earl, I admit that. But this doesn't make sense. He wasn't that kind of dude. He was always all about honor and shit."

Katy nodded sadly. "I know. I think he was actually a good person. But... lots of good people have tragic romances."

"That's true," Juliet agreed.

"It was the fucking tank, wasn't it?" Barrett sneered. "It always boiled down to the tank for him."

Nicole tapped her pencil against her chin thoughtfully. "Maybe Ashley changed her mind and thought it was too dangerous for him to try to drive through the defenses. All of a sudden, she was in the way of his big plan." She shook her head suddenly, as if trying to fling something off it. "Wait, no. Because Rodrigo was there, right? We know he was there. Why did he go there? And why won't he tell us if he ain't guilty?"

"There's still one murder to account for," Bepi pointed out darkly.

"Could he even have killed Earl?" I asked. "Rodrigo isn't exactly... up to date with modern technology. How would he blow someone up?"

"I am fucking appalled and offended," Barrett growled. "I go out of my way to make it as easy as possible, and you just forget?"

FACT 3: ROOFTOP EXPLOSION
According to Barrett, the explosion that killed Earl was destructive, but it didn't have a wide range. He says his explosives could create that kind of result.

"And all his chemicals were missing today," Jane said.

FACT 11: CHEM LAB
Jane says Barrett took the white substance used as fuel for fires. She also claims the rest of the chemicals were gone when she returned from lunch today.

"Oh my god," Nicole murmured. "I fuckin' get it. Rodrigo planted all three chemicals in different places, didn't he?" She looked over at me. "Yo, did you chicks find any of them planted where Earl woulda been stepping?"

I nodded grimly.

FACT 14: PUDDLE AT THE LADDER
A clear puddle of liquid was at the base of the ladder leading up to the science center's roof. Shards of glass were scattered through the puddle. The liquid smelled like chocolate.

"Something Nice was on the fifth floor, around the ladder. You had to step through it to get up there."

FACT 23: EARL'S EXTRA BOOTS
The boots in Earl's locker had a sweet, vanilla-smelling substance on the soles.

"And Earl's boots had Sugar on them."

"Wait," Bepi said. "The ones he wasn't wearing?"

"Yeah, but he had a couple of different pairs in there. If the killer didn't know which pair he'd put on, they'd have to coat all of them with the chemical if they wanted to be sure."

Barrett grinned. "An' someone just planted Spice right there where he was stepping. Kaboom."

"No," Katy said, "that doesn't make sense. How would they know he'd step right there? If they just dropped it all around randomly, then it's weird he'd step in it right then but not earlier."

"Ashley," Bepi said grimly. He fixed Rodrigo with a cold glare. "The paladin picks up Ashley's body and goes to the edge of the roof... right where he's planted the Spice. He taunts Earl with her body, and throws her over the side. Earl runs to that spot, looks over the edge, and... that's it."

"That's it," Barrett agreed, a downright vile expression on his face.

"So... that's it?" Monokuma ventured. "It's time to... do the thing we do in trials, which I totally know what it is so no one tell me?"

"I still don't like it," Katy said.

"Yo, me neither!" Rocky snapped. "Earl and Roddy? The two guys we can actually fucking trust? I can't believe it."

"Christ," Nicole snapped. "Maybe you all should just die here. Listen to me: you can't trust anyone who ain't family."

"It starts with a 'v,' right?" Monokuma said. "It's time to violin? It's time to velociraptor?"

"Oh shit, I hope it's time to velociraptor!" Nicole said, suddenly hopeful and childlike.

Another sudden bang startled everyone. Juliet stood behind her lectern, somehow holding Katy's high-heeled shoe. Katy herself looked just as baffled as everyone else about how she'd gotten it.

Juliet cleared her throat, relishing everyone's attention. "I have two problems with the idea that Rodrigo killed Earl," she announced. "It's fucking stupid, and fucking stupid people came up with it."

"Oi, fuck you," Barrett shouted. "No one wants to hear from you."

"I bet no one does," Juliet concurred, fixing another doll-like gaze upon him. "But is it riskier to listen to me, or is it riskier to ignore me? Maybe I have information you need. Or maybe I'm lying." She smirked. "Tough one, huh? You'll die if you make the wrong choice."

Everyone was indeed starting to look a little nervous. "Uh... christ, what do we do?" Rocky asked.

Bepi snorted at her. "And why would you speak up with your great insight now?"

Juliet just shrugged. "Maybe I just can't accept that the two manliest people locked in here would both turn out to be cowards. Or maybe I'm furious at them for sneaking around like a woman. Like I do."

Glancing around the circle, I saw a lot of confused, conflicted faces... but there was one exception. Lucina.

Her message had more big writing in black magic marker: There aren't any lies she could tell us that Saya couldn't pick apart.

I felt a little frozen then, unfamiliar emotion swirling into my chest. She... believed in me.

I knew she was trying to help, but... I couldn't take this feeling. I needed to be cold during a trial, but Lucina's supportive smile was draining that out of me. Lucina trusted me so implicitly? And she was so fucking beautiful, and I think I'm like super-gay, and Ashley and Earl were dead and I could have died, and Lucina could have died, and...

"Saya," Juliet grunted. I didn't reply, so she said again, "Saya!"

I looked over at her, feeling my heart pounding in my chest, face turning pale.

Juliet smiled an evil smile. "Oh yes, Saya the great detective. Tell me something, Miss Princess, how is the king of your kingdom doing these days? Did he ever recover from that... accident of his?"

It was like she punched me in the chest. No... it was like she slammed an ice pack into my chest.

Her grotesque expression filled my entire vision, and like a paper towel soaking up water, the emotionlessness just oozed down into my entire body. No more warmth, no more feeling. Just awareness.

I nodded at Juliet. "You know what? Lucina's right. Juliet should say what she has to say. If she's lying, I'll know."

Juliet's smile got strange for a second, and then she glanced around. Seeing no argument, she began to speak.