This was the moment of truth. If what he was thinking of showed who Keiko most likely met with, they could indeed get out of the life or death situation they found themselves in.
"Everyone, I have a proposal," Naoko said.
"What is it, Naoko?" Eryu asked.
"Do you all remember what Haru did in the gymnasium yesterday?"
Haru grinned. "Oh yeah! I showed Hoshi his secret."
"You did so by taking Bankei's phone from her," Yori pointed out. "You're suggesting that we do something similar, correct?"
"That's exactly right," Naoko confirmed. "One at a time, we'll say whose secret we have. If nobody contradicts us, we'll hand our phone over to said person to confirm it. We'll repeat until everyone's secrets are accounted for."
"Ah, of course," Hoshi replied. "That sounds like the perfect solution. Very creative, Naoko."
"Alright!" Kimi said contentedly. "I have Mariko's. Anyone gonna challenge me?"
Nobody spoke up. Kimi happily walked over to Mariko's seat and handed her her phone.
"Here ya go," she said. "Be careful not to smudge the screen with your fat fingers."
"Hey!" Mariko replied, very much unhappy with said remark.
The trial continued for some time as this process was repeated for all the remaining students, with the sole exceptions being Naoko, Mine, Bankei, and Yori, who already revealed whose they had. The distribution of secrets were as follows:
-Michio had Mareo's secret.
-Yasuo had Bankei's secret.
-Ishi had Takeshi's secret.
-Eryu had Yori's secret.
-Haru claimed to have Keiko's secret, which went unchallenged.
-Takeshi had Kimi's secret.
-Mareo had Sasa's secret.
-Hoshi had Eryu's secret.
-Sasa had Yasuo's secret.
-Mariko had Haru's secret.
"Well, I think that's everyone," Naoko said as they finished.
"O-okay, but what does all that tell us?" Sasa asked.
"Yeah, I gotta admit, that was a pretty boring process," Ishi added. "Did you get what you needed, man?"
Naoko nodded. "Yes, I did. If everyone's been paying attention, you'll notice that one person's secret was not mentioned."
"You noticed it as well?" Bankei asked. "Good. Then who is it?"
Naoko took a deep breath. He had one person in mind. There was one name that was missing from the list they now had, and that missing name would surely point to the culprit.
"Michio, nobody has your secret. Do you have an explanation?"
"W-what?!" Michio exclaimed, looking petrified.
"Well, this guy's guilty," Ishi said confidently.
"Wait a minute!" Michio replied. "You're not seriously going to rush to a conclusion like that, are you?"
"I'm sorry, Michio," Yori said, "but this is where the evidence has pointed us to. If you're innocent, you should tell us why."
"Well, I am innocent!" Michio claimed. "You've been saying that the killer met up with her because she had their secret, but that's just an assumption!"
"Well, then why did Keiko's phone go missing?" Mareo countered.
"I don't know!" Michio shouted. "Maybe she just lost it. Have you not considered that?"
"We have," Yori replied. "We've looked everywhere we can think of. Nobody has found it. We've even searched people's belongings, including their phones. Keiko's is nowhere to be found."
"Seriously, man, where the hell did you hide it?" Haru asked. "I swear I looked everywhere. I even looked in all the lockers in the washroom."
"I didn't hide it!" Michio exclaimed. "Where would I have hidden it?"
Naoko thought about this point. If Michio killed Keiko, and took the phone to keep his secret under wraps, he'd need a way to keep it from being found again. What could he have done with it? That's when it hit him.
"You didn't hide the phone," Naoko began. "You destroyed it."
"H-huh?" Michio replied.
"Destroyed it?" Hoshi asked. "That's interesting. How would he have destroyed it, though? And even if he did destroy it, we still should've found it, correct? We'd have just found what remained of it."
"It's simple," Naoko answered. "Michio has access to an easy way to destroy most items. And that's through the incinerator in the trash room!"
"That's right!" Eryu agreed. "He has trash duty. He's the only one with the key to the incinerator."
"I keep it in my pocket," Michio countered. "Someone could've taken it! Besides, how do you know that's what the killer wanted to do by taking her phone? Maybe they did it to frame whoever's secret she had!"
"I thought about that, too," Yori admitted. "Still, I think that that's less likely to be the case than it is that the killer wanted to protect their secret."
"Not unless she was meeting up with someone else!" Michio argued. "Maybe someone who had her secret! Haru, you said you have hers, remember?"
"You bastard!" Haru cursed. "You're pinning this on me, now?!"
"Of course," Michio replied, putting on a nervous smile. "And hey, you're a strong guy. You could've punched her out, I bet."
"So could you!" Haru pointed out.
"But you still are!" Michio reiterated angrily. "And hey, you probably wouldn't even need the incinerator key. You could probably snap that factory-made phone into pieces and flush it down the toilet."
"As much as that sounds like something I'd do," Haru admitted, "I didn't do that!"
"I'm sorry, Michio," Naoko cut in, "but what you're suggesting doesn't sound right to me at all."
"Well," Michio replied, "that doesn't matter, because I have a solid alibi, and he doesn't. So who are you going to believe?"
"Your alibi is that you were taking out the trash, right?" Takeshi asked.
"Right," Michio said. "I took out the trash, and when I finished, Mine saw me, and we both went to our rooms together. Did anyone see Haru go to his room?"
"Naoko saw me head to the dorms!" Haru argued.
"You could've wrapped around and entered the storage room!" Michio argued back.
Okay, Naoko thought, this was going in an entirely different direction than he was expecting. Michio was deflecting blame onto Haru, and Naoko had a hard time refuting him. He had a point, really. It seemed unlikely that Michio would have the time to meet up with and kill Keiko while taking out the trash, but the same couldn't be said for Haru. If their understanding of the time of death was correct, Michio probably couldn't have killed her. After all, would he have even been in the storage room after the announcement played? Probably not.
Still, he couldn't shake the feeling that Michio was hiding something. He was sure that Michio, out of everyone, had the most reason to kill Keiko. But how could he have done so? Figuring that out would require some careful logic.
The murder occurred after 10. It had to have, considering the fact that the IMONO file said. However, if Michio met up with Keiko, it would have had to be some time before 10. After all, he had an alibi for after 10, and it seemed difficult to challenge. Clearly, there was a discrepancy between those two times. What would explain it, then?
"...I just remembered something," Naoko said, an idea popping into his head.
"What is it?" Mariko asked.
"It's something interesting that we noticed while investigating. We mentioned it at the beginning of the trial. For some reason, the killer left the knife in Keiko's neck."
"What's so weird about that?" Michio asked.
"If you wanted to slice someone's throat, why would you leave the knife in the throat? Wouldn't you just slice across the length of the neck, then leave the knife by the body?"
"That's true," Mareo agreed. "There's also the fact that blood loss occurs faster once the weapon is removed from the wound. Hell, the wound wasn't even all that deep."
"What if…," Naoko began, "the killer wasn't in the storage room when the killing blow was dealt?"
"...Huh?" Yasuo said, confused.
"Yeah, I don't get it," Mine added. "How would that even work?"
"Well, if the victim was struck," Naoko explained, "it's possible she was knocked unconscious. If so, that would allow the killer to...set something up."
"What could they set up?" Eryu asked. "There wasn't much in the room other than what was being stored in there."
"Well, the room was full of boxes," Naoko pointed out. "Many of them were stacked atop one another. In fact, there was a rather tall stack of boxes next to Keiko's body. Let's say the killer wanted to give themselves an alibi, by delaying the time of death, so they decided to use the stack of boxes to their advantage."
"You're kidding," Kimi replied. "Are you really saying he…?"
"That's right," Naoko said, knowing exactly what she was thinking. "In order to produce a delayed death, the killer needed only three things: the stack of boxes, the knife, and gravity."
"Y-y-you're saying he…?" Sasa began.
"He balanced the knife over the edge of the stack of boxes next to Keiko's unconscious body, and allowed the knife to fall," Naoko finished.
"Alright, I'm going to stop you right there," Eryu interjected. "Naoko, you're a smart guy, and I get you're trying to help, but that logic is a bit too unrealistic for me. In order to get that to work, the killer would need to know exactly how the knife would fall. That would require ludicrous precision when it came to how they placed the knife."
Yori held her hand flat in front of her. "I'm sorry, Eryu, but I think that Naoko is on the right track."
"Seriously?" Eryu asked incredulously. "Did you not hear what I just said?"
"I did," she replied. "But tell me, what exactly is Michio's Ultimate talent?"
"He's the Ultimate Tree Fall-...Oh my god." Eryu was flabbergasted.
"Exactly," Naoko said, pointing towards Michio, who began sweating up a storm. "Michio's entire talent revolves around causing things to fall over in a specific way. He even told me himself he has an innate grasp of physics, that assists him in his line of work."
"But is that really enough?" Takeshi asked. "He'd still need to make sure it didn't fall right away, or fail to fall, for that matter."
"It would have to fall eventually," Naoko replied. "After all, there's something in that room, right behind that stack of boxes, that would allow the knife to tip over and fall."
"You mean the vent?" Yori asked.
"Exactly," Naoko replied. "You yourself mentioned that the vents in the facility provide heat by blowing hot air into the room. Every couple of hours, you said."
"Every two hours, if I'm correct," Yori confirmed. "If so, it should've blown hot air into the room shortly after the beginning of 10, if not exactly at 10. This would exert force onto one end of the knife, pushing it."
"That's...that's…" Michio looked like he was at a loss for words, before he suddenly exploded. "That's so STUPID!"
"Can you disprove it?" Naoko asked.
"Of course I can!" Michio claimed. "I wasn't even in the storage room at all yesterday!"
Now Michio was making some big claims to attempt to prove his innocence. Unfortunately for him, his anger was only incriminating him. Still, he was making an argument, and Naoko needed to disprove it.
"I never stepped foot in that place at all!" Michio shouted.
"Weren't you on trash duty?" Mareo pointed out. "You must've gone in there to empty the trash can inside."
"Why would the trash can even be close to full?" Michio asked rhetorically. "How many people have even used that trash can? It's a trash can in a storage room. There wasn't anything in the room that I could've taken!"
"No, that's wrong," Naoko interrupted. "You've made an interesting point. I doubt there would be much in the trash can after only 2 days of us being here. But I think you did take something. And I think it had something to do with your desire to give yourself an alibi."
"W-what?" Michio replied. "What could I have taken?"
"Well," Naoko began, "one of the boxes in the storage room contained paper, pens, pencils, and so on. When we first found it, it was full. Now, however, it's half-empty at most. I thought it was interesting, since we had only been using so much paper thus far. If you were in the storage room, you could've put some of the contents of the box into the trash bag in the trash can. Doing that, you could make it seem like you were just taking out the trash. In fact...when we talked in the hallway last night, I'd imagine that that trash bag you were holding was that very same trash bag!"
"If that's true," Mareo cut in, "what about the trash can itself? I saw it, and I'm positive it had a trash bag. How do you explain that?"
Naoko knew this, actually. Mareo may not have made privy to it, but he was given a specific piece of information that explained it, not too long ago.
"Actually, when we met last night," Naoko began, "Michio mentioned he kept trash bags on him. Apparently, it's to make his job easier. With one of those portable trash bags, he could've taken the trash bag from the trash can in the room, and replaced it with an empty one."
"That's stupid!" Michio repeated. "You have no evidence of that!"
"I'd say I do," Naoko countered. "Next to that same box, I found a small candy wrapper. I thought it was strange that it was there, of all places. After all, there was a trash can in the same room. But now, I think I know why it was there. It dropped out of the trash bag while you were filling it with the contents of that box!"
"Hang on, Naoko," Mariko cut in. "Was the candy wrapper for a chocolate candy? With a black wrapper?"
"Yeah, it was," Naoko replied.
"Then you're right!" she beamed. "That candy was mine. I found it in a box in the storage room. I remember I opened the wrapper right there, and tossed the wrapper into the trash can."
"Wait a minute," Kimi interrupted. "We have an entire box full of candy in the storage room? And nobody told me about it?!"
"Is that really important right now?" Yori pointed out.
"Well it's still ridiculous!" Michio argued. "Why would I fill up a trash bag with random stuff just to give myself an alibi?"
"Hmm…," Naoko began to think. "Just? I don't know. I think that doing so would actually serve two purposes."
Naoko was wearing him down. Michio was trying to refute him, but all he was doing now was to dismiss his arguments as being "stupid". Yes, they were strange, but what he was saying still lined up with the evidence. Naoko just had to break down Michio's remaining defenses with one last deduction.
"What the hell would I need that trash bag for?!" Michio repeated.
The words clicked in Naoko's head: To dispose of the phone.
"You didn't just put the contents of that box into the trash bag," Naoko began. "You also put Keiko's phone into it. By hiding it in there, you were able to discreetly place it inside the incinerator and destroy it."
"That's...that's…" Michio had nothing else he could think to say.
"That's what happened, isn't it?" Naoko asked. "In fact, I think I know exactly what happened in this case."
Naoko took a deep breath and collected his thoughts, thinking back to the case as a whole. If he could piece things together and start from the beginning, he thought it could prompt a full confession, and put things to rest once and for all.
"This all began when Keiko suggested that the best way to deal with the secrets IMONO had given to each of us was to talk to each other about it privately. Intending to do so herself, she wrote a letter to the one whose secret she had. Unfortunately, that person ended up being her killer. Before 10, Keiko and the killer met in the storage room to talk. During their secret meeting, the killer took an opportunity to attack Keiko, striking her and knocking her unconscious. Why they did it exactly, I'm not sure, but they made sure to capitalize on the opportunity they had to make sure their secret never came to light.
"They took the knife that Keiko had secretly brought with her, and placed it above her, where it sat precariously on the edge of a stack of boxes next to the body. Behind that stack, there was a vent, which blew hot air into the room at regular intervals. The killer took advantage of this, making sure the time of death was later than the crime originally occurred. Of course, they'd need an alibi for the time of death, so they fell back on something that they had been tasked with since day one.
"They took the trash bag out of the trash can in the storage room, and replaced it with one of the trash bags they kept on their person. They filled the trash bag they had taken with some of the contents of a box in the storage room, that we had all recently been using the contents of. Certainly, people wouldn't miss a few stacks of paper, right? The killer also placed Keiko's phone inside the trash bag, making the filling of the trash bag serve two purposes. However, while they were filling the trash bag, a candy wrapper that was there beforehand fell out, leaving a piece of evidence behind that seemed like it had no reason to be there.
"Leaving the storage room, the killer found themselves face to face with another Ultimate, that being me. We spoke for a while, until the nighttime announcement played. Soon after, the vent's heating system went off, pushing the knife off of the box stack with a rush of hot air, sealing Keiko's fate. The killer and I parted ways, and they finished their work, turning on the incinerator, and thereby destroying the stolen evidence. And only one person could do all of this...that being Michio Hirano!"
There was a long pause as Naoko finished his prolonged speech. Michio looked terrified, and everyone else waited with bated breath to see what he would say next. Naoko half-expected him to continue to insult his deductions. But soon enough…
"...You're right," Michio finally said, hanging his head in shame. "That's all exactly what happened."
This confession triggered a wave of gasps from several other students.
"You...you're serious?" Eryu replied. "I didn't think it was possible, but…"
"Wow, Naoko," Mine said. "You were right all along. You'd make a good detective, you know that?"
"Thanks," Naoko replied. "But, well, I think there's something that we'll have to address now."
"THAT IS CORRECT. NOW THAT THIS TRIAL HAS REACHED A CONCLUSION, YOU WILL ALL BE ABLE TO VOTE. IT SHOULD ONLY BE A FORMALITY, HOWEVER, AS A CONFESSION HAS ALREADY BEEN MADE. NOW, LET US END THIS TRIAL."
A notification on everyone's phones popped up, prompting everyone to vote for one of the fifteen of them. After less than half a minute, everyone's votes were tallied, and another notification popped up.
"MICHIO HIRANO: GUILTY"
A/N: Yep. Michio killed Keiko by letting a knife drop on her. Well, I guess I did, but whatever.
Yeah, I was pretty iffy about having such an out-there idea for a first murder. Still, deciding to stick with my guns, I've officially signed Michio's death warrant. If you're curious as to more info regarding what happened, stay tuned for next chapter. I'll have some stuff explained there, and expect things to get a little bloody after that.