The four of them had made a very telling discovery not long into their latest investigation. Both Haru and Hoshi had died from being sliced and stabbed, and both of them also had knives on them. That in itself had some very concerning implications regarding the incident. Would it be enough to put the case to rest?

Well, no, obviously. As Yori herself put it, "It wouldn't be wise to jump to conclusions while our lives are on the line". Like they'd done before, they'd need to be thorough, and that meant that they couldn't just take things at face value. Thus, the investigation would have to continue, starting with a thorough look at the crime scene itself.

While Mareo continued to look over Haru and Hoshi's bodies, Eryu, Naoko and Yori looked over the rest of the room. Funny thing was, though, at first glance, not much appeared to be amiss in the room aside from the two bodies, which, admittedly, seemed like a bit of an odd statement to Naoko when he thought it himself. The thing was, though, it was kind of true. There were only so many things in the room that they could investigate, as it was a fairly wide-open space. The storage shelf and its contents were seemingly untouched since Naoko last saw them, and so were the rack of weights, which looked like they'd barely been touched, if at all. No luck on that side of the room. Then there were the mats, quite a few of which had been rolled up and placed off to the sides, and funnily enough, it looked like none of them had been stained with blood. It was actually kind of odd. The only thing that really piqued their interest, though, were the lockers on the north side of the room.

From the outset, they were simply three metal lockers lined up side by side, with nothing on the outset indicating what they were actually supposed to be used for. Naoko opened them up, only to see that their contents, much like their exterior, were mundane. They just had a mirror and a shelf at the top that held neatly-folded gym clothes. The only thing particularly odd about them was the design of the lockers themselves, as Naoko was pretty sure large lockers like them normally had more shelves, or something like that.

"Something about these lockers feels weird to me," Naoko said out loud.

"Are you saying that in regards to its contents, or how it's built?" Yori asked.

"The latter," Naoko replied.

"That seems fair," Eryu said. "Most of it is taken up by a single compartment. With a design like this, a person could fit inside."

Yori seemed in deep thought for a moment, looking like she was legitimately considering the idea. "That's an interesting premise, albeit not a perfect one. After all, if we were to use either victim in this case as a frame of reference, I suppose Hoshi might've been able to fit inside, but Haru certainly couldn't have."

"Does that mean you think that Hoshi might've climbed into one of these?" Naoko asked. "Why would he do that?"

"Oh, I'm not sure if he did or not, or why he would've for that matter," Yori explained. "I'm simply considering the possibility, since Eryu brought it up."

"That wasn't my intent when I said that," Eryu clarified. "Still, I gotta admit, with these lockers, it looks like it could actually happen. They have slats for ventilation, a simple sliding lock that sticks out on the other side of the door…Someone could probably hide themselves in one of these."

"Well, if we're bringing up the possibility, then is there any evidence that he might've?" Naoko asked. "They both look pretty empty to me."

"They do indeed," Yori replied. "Give me a moment. Perhaps there's something we're missing."

Yori began to meticulously search each locker for any possible sign of having been somehow occupied. She checked the walls, the door, the bottom, and even the clothes on top of the shelf of each one, and was very clearly taking her time with it. Considering the fact that she was looking for something that they had yet to see from a cursory view, perhaps it only made sense, but it was still a fairly slow process. Eryu actually stepped back partway through, apparently uninterested in waiting for her to finish, and went over to help Mareo with his own investigation. All that being said, after Yori was done, she simply looked back at Naoko, looking less than enthused.

"No luck. The interiors seem to be spotless. No prints, no hairs, nothing."

"So, I guess we'll have to check back with Mareo to see what he's found," Naoko supposed.

"That seems to be the case," Yori agreed. "It's unfortunate, but we still don't have much to piece together what might have happened here."

"I wouldn't say that's entirely true," Mareo said. Naoko turned and noticed that he and Eryu were in the process of moving towards them at that very moment. "We've managed to acquire some interesting discoveries ourselves."

"Well, that's great," Naoko replied. "What'd you both find?"

"Well, first off, I have some items we found on them," Eryu explained. "On Haru, we found this." He reached into a pocket on his jacket and produced a key with a numbered tag on it.

"That's his cell key," Naoko said, perplexed. "How could he have gotten it?"

"He couldn't have gotten it himself, that's for sure," Eryu responded. "Those keys are kept in that little box in the holding cell room, and that would have to have been outside of his reach while he was in his cell."

"So unless he was given either the key, or the box it was contained in, he couldn't have gotten out on his own," Yori deduced.

"It wouldn't have moved on its own, so yes," Eryu replied. "Anyway, aside from that, and the knife that was next to him, he doesn't have anything else all that noteworthy on him."

"What about Hoshi?" Naoko asked.

"Well, aside from the knife he had, of course, he had two things on him at the time that piqued our curiosities," Mareo explained, taking out two different items. The first was a small notebook that Naoko recognized as being the one that he'd seen Hoshi use in the past. The second was a folded-up piece of paper.

"Hey, that's Hoshi's notebook," Naoko said, pointing at the former item. "I remember he had that ever since I first met him."

"Ah, so it's something he's had for quite some time, then," Mareo responded. "That would explain its appearance. I don't think there are any notebooks available to us that have unique symbols on their fronts. I'm honestly not entirely sure what this eight-pointed star is supposed to signify."

"What about its contents?" Yori inquired. "If it's something he wrote in frequently, then he could very well have left some sort of clue inside."

"We thought of that, too, so we checked the later parts of the notebook to see what he wrote," Eryu explained. "It looked like he was making something pretty interesting, but from what we could tell by looking through it, it doesn't have anything to do with this."

Naoko was disappointed upon hearing this. He imagined that they could've gotten some sort of clue from Hoshi that he left before he died, but it seemed that wasn't the case. Still, he was a bit curious about what Eryu said about Hoshi making something "pretty interesting". It felt very familiar to Naoko. Perhaps it was something they could look into once all was said and done.

"What about the piece of paper there? That has to do with this case somehow," Naoko said.

"Well, why don't you see for yourself?" Mareo suggested, handing it over to him.

Naoko unfolded it to see that it was a note. Right off the bat, he noticed that there was quite a bit written in it, and the handwriting itself was pretty rough. Still, he was able to read through the contents of the note, which were as follows:

"Hey there. Sorry if this note freaks you out, but you don't have to worry about anything. You see, it's pretty obvious at this point that you're not a big fan of Bankei, and I can sympathize with that. In fact, I have an idea as to what we could do to make sure she'll never bother any of us again. Meet me in the physical activity room tonight, and we can talk about it there. I think you'll be interested in how you can help me with it. I should be able to be there by 10:45, once everyone else is asleep, so make sure you get there around then. I know that's later than we're supposed to be walking around, but you're not really worried about that, are you?

Signed, H."

Naoko was legitimately surprised by what he had just read. Whoever wrote it was telling the recipient to meet them in the physical activity room, and within the timeframe of the murder, too. That in itself was a big clue. The problem was, who was the "H" that supposedly signed it? Well, Haru and Hoshi were both dead, and Hoshi had the note on him. With those facts in mind…it seemed that the note only added to the rather nasty implications left by the two knives.

"This should be useful in the upcoming trial," Yori commented. It was only then that Naoko looked over and realized that Yori had been reading over his shoulder.

"You're probably right," Naoko replied, looking back at Mareo and Eryu. "So, is this really all you were able to find on them?"

"It appears that that's all they had on them, yes," Mareo confirmed. "Well, aside from their phones and transceivers, of course, but they don't seem any different from the rest of ours, so there's not much to say about them."

"They both had their transceivers on them?" Naoko asked.

"They did, yeah," Eryu replied. "It doesn't seem like they used them, though."

"Why do you think that?" Yori questioned.

"If either of them did, they'd probably use theirs to call for help or something," Eryu reasoned. "Nobody's said anything about that thus far, though."

"A hasty conclusion…though I suppose it's not unreasonable," Mareo figured. "I didn't hear from either of them last night, I'm sure."

"Neither did I," Naoko added. "Maybe we should ask everyone else who's been using these transceivers if they heard anything from theirs last night."

"Who would that entail, exactly?" Yori asked. "Bankei and Mine?"

"Well, them, and also Takeshi," Naoko corrected her.

"I see," Yori said. "So, if there isn't anything else here worth discussing, we should get going."

"Actually, there's something I should bring to your attention," Mareo responded. "I examined both Haru and Hoshi's wounds, and I thought I should tell you what I found."

"Oh yeah, that's a good idea," Naoko said. "What'd you find?"

"Well, to start, Hoshi looks to have mainly been slashed at," Mareo began. "There are cuts mainly around his upper chest and parts of his neck, which have bled quite a bit. Still, it's likely that a single stab wound on the right side of his neck was what primarily led to his death. It looks as though it may have gone through the jugular vein, in fact."

"And Haru?" Yori asked.

"Oh, he's actually a tad different," Mareo explained. "You see, unlike Hoshi, Haru seems to have been mainly stabbed. There are several across his mid to upper torso, most of which seem fairly deep. Like Hoshi, it seems as though he was stabbed in at least one vital area."

"So they likely didn't have much opportunity to leave the room, or call for help," Yori ascertained.

"Well, they may have," Mareo replied. "It's possible that they, at the very least, may have tried to do either, but given what little we know of this case thus far, I can't speak for what actually occurred."

"Then it sounds like we need more to go off of," Naoko said. "We should check out Haru's cell. I don't think I looked it over very well before this investigation started. There should be something there that could help us figure all this out."

"Oh, I'm sure there is," Eryu agreed. "How about you and Yori go check the place out? Mareo and I can make sure everyone else is under control."

"Sure," Naoko replied. "I think we could handle that together."

"Compared to what we've just been doing, that sounds fairly desirable," Mareo said. "Though, perhaps you should…" Mareo looked like he was thinking of saying something, but stopped himself. "You know what? It's not particularly important."

"Well, alright then," Eryu said warily.

"If there really are no objections, then we should get going now," Yori advised. "It would certainly be better than staying here, where there doesn't seem to be much else to find. That would just be a waste of time."

Yori wasn't exactly wrong when she said what she said. They weren't on an explicit time limit, but they didn't need to push their luck when it came to just how much time they'd be given before they were expected to piece everything together. So, as the four left the physical activity room, Naoko and Yori made their way to the holding cells, while Eryu and Mareo went elsewhere.

There wasn't anything amiss in the rest of the room, so Haru's cell was the main focus of their search. Opening it up and stepping inside, the two of them began to examine the cell itself.

"This cell doesn't appear to be particularly large," Yori pointed out. "Chances are, there can't be all that many places for clues to be hidden."

Naoko looked around the room and what was in it, and just by doing so, he realized that she was probably right. Within the mere few days that Haru had spent in the cell, there wasn't much more in it than there was originally. There was a bed, a sink, a toilet, and a shelf. Among those four, the only one that stood out was the shelf, as there were a few items on top of it. Still, even then, they didn't seem like much on the surface. There were only a couple of books and a used dinner plate.

"Let's just try to be thorough, then," Naoko suggested. "It's not like there's a lot of ground to cover in here."

"That's a good idea," Yori replied. "Perhaps we should take a look on what's out in the open, first. On the shelf, it looks like there are a few items, so that should be the logical place to start."

And so that's exactly what they did. Again, though, they didn't seem like much initially. In regards to the books, there were three of them, which seemed odd to Naoko, considering the fact that it'd only been two days since Haru asked for his first book and he hadn't given the other two to him. Takeshi must have really had Haru's needs covered, and perhaps more notably, Haru really wasn't exaggerating about how quickly one can read through an entire book.

Unfortunately, Naoko didn't recognize the second or third books. One was a nonfiction book about early Japanese historical periods, and the other was some form of fiction, with an image of a man on horseback plastered on its front and spine. The books in general seemed quite interesting to Yori.

"Did Haru ask for these three books specifically?" she asked.

"He didn't ask for anything specific the first time," Naoko replied. "He said he'd be more specific after I gave the first book to him, so maybe he asked for these other two."

"Then perhaps you should ask Takeshi about it if you don't know," Yori suggested.

"That sounds like a good idea," Naoko agreed. "For now, though, do you want to take a more in-depth look at them?"

"In a moment," Yori said. "First I want to address the other item on the shelf."

"You mean his dinner plate?" Naoko asked. "What about it?"

"Well," Yori began, "I noticed that there's not much left on it other than some dried stains and a fork."

"Not even a knife?" Naoko asked.

"Exactly," Yori responded. "Surely, though, Hoshi gave him a knife to eat with. Just considering what he ate, him not having one would just be strange."

"What do you mean by that?" Naoko asked. "Looking at the plate, I don't see much that'd tell us what exactly he ate."

"I never made you aware of it, did I?" Yori said to herself. "I'm sorry. You see, yesterday, I remember I gave Hoshi some specific instructions for Haru's dinner that night. You had mentioned earlier that Haru had been on good behavior. Remembering something I had considered days prior, I asked if he could prepare a steak for him."

"Oh," Naoko replied. With this new information in mind, he looked at the plate again. "Well, now that I think about it, that makes sense. So, these stains came from a steak, and…" He squinted, noticing some white flecks that didn't match up with what one would expect from a steak. "...mashed potatoes, maybe?"

"Quite possibly," Yori responded. "What's important is that he certainly would've been given a knife. Given that there isn't one here, and we found a knife in Haru's possession…"

"Then he must've taken the knife he was given with him to the scene of the murder," Naoko finished for her. "But wait a minute. Why would he feel the need to bring a knife with him at all?"

"That's a hard question to answer, considering the fact that we still don't know how he managed to leave his cell in the first place," Yori pointed out. "Perhaps the answer to that question is in here somewhere."