We each took our respective seats around the Courtroom table to discuss Sayaka's fate, and who was to blame.
Chihiro was tending to Kaede, who still looked a little dazed from her concussion. Everyone else seemed to be alright, as we awaited Monorakun's announcement to start these proceedings.
Sure enough, Monorakun scurried up to his little seat, up above us, and started his little speech.
"Alright, students! Sayaka hit the mosh pit, and the mosh pit won. Now it's up to you to figure out what happened, and whodunit. Did Sayaka join the 27 Club too early? You tell me!"
Kaede started to say something, but stopped, grabbing the back of her head and groaning.
Kaito looked over at her. "Hey, is she gonna be alright for this?"
Mukuro shrugged. "Grade 2 Concussion. Temporary loss of consciousness, likely less than five minutes. She's as OK as she's gonna be."
Kenchikka glanced over at Kaede mournfully. "Concussions suck. Hopefully, Kaede recover soon."
Meanwhile, Celeste resumed the trial.
"So, Theo overheard several loud thuds coming from the Jam Room. Entering, Theo discovered Sayaka deceased near a broken speaker, and Kaede unconscious, with a broken bass guitar near her unconscious body. Then, from what I have gathered, Mukuro and Bera happened upon the scene, independently of each other. This triggered the announcement."
Celeste glances around at the rest of us. "Have I missed anything thus far?"
Theo shakes his head. "You have the right of it, Celeste. Do proceed."
Celeste nods. "Very well. As I was saying, the rest of us arrived afterwards, followed afterwards by Monorakun."
Kaito piped up. "Yeah! Mukuro was over by Kaede, and Bera was near Sayaka."
"And we discovered that Sayaka received the Game Over," Chiaki added.
"Man, this sucks," Leon complained.
"Yeah, I agree. Sayaka was cool," I lament. "But we still have to get to the bottom of this."
Celeste tilts her head at me. "Which brings me to my next question. I couldn't help but notice you up above the stage, searching about. Mind sharing with us what you discovered up there?"
I nodded. "Quite a bit, actually. For starters, it looks like there is an emergency release for the harness. I noticed it on the strap connected to the pulley. It looks like, if you got stuck, you could press a button on the back of the harness, and it would release the harness, allowing one to escape."
"An emergency release, you say?" Theo asked.
I nodded. "Yeah. Looks like it was designed to let the harness's wearer disconnect from the tether, without having to take off the harness."
"Yeah, well, someone definitely let her go," Makoto commented. "Sayaka was still wearing the harness when she died, so it's likely someone released her from it."
"Unless someone killed her and then put her in the harness," Mukuro commented.
Kenchikka considered this proposal. "Hmmm. You suggest someone kill Sayaka, then put her in harness and release her? Interesting setup, if true, but one problem. How did Sayaka die, then?"
"Sayaka fell... the speaker..." Kaede muttered. She was still dazed, so none of us really caught everything she said.
Makoto and Celeste both looked at Kaede.
"Did you say Sayaka fell on the speaker?" Makoto asked.
Kaede nodded. "I... She fell..."
It was Kaito's turn to pop a question. "Wait a minute. You said you saw Sayaka fall, and hit her head on the speaker?"
Kaede nodded slowly, responding after several seconds. "Accident. Not suicide."
Celeste pounced on this information. "So according to you, Sayaka had an accident, and fell to her death?"
Kaede slowly nodded again. "Who triggered the...the ummm... alert?"
Theo responded, "I would presume it was Kenchikka, Bera, and myself."
Kenchikka nodded. "Can confirm. Heard screams, loud sounds from Jam Room. Went to Music Room, Jam Room door was open. Odd, because Jam Room door makes room soundproof from outside. Unsure why open. Anyway, went into Jam Room, saw Sayaka, saw broken speaker. Looked around, found Kaede. Bass guitar under Kaede's head, smashed in."
"Wait, you found the bass guitar under Kaede's head when you entered the Jam Room?" Makoto asked Kenchikka.
Kenchikka nodded. "Yep. Although, hit with it? Fell on it? Hard to say."
Kaede tried to speak again, but it was mostly incoherent. Something about the guitar, but I didn't understand what.
Chihiro looked at Kaede. "Hmmm? You said you were struck by it?"
Kaede nodded.
Mukuro looked skeptical, but Celeste and Theo decided to explore this avenue.
"So, Kaede claims to have been hit by the bass guitar. Did you happen to see your attacker?" I asked.
Kaede shook her head.
"Ok. So, let's see who has alibis, so we can narrow down who it could have been." Makoto continued. "Bera and Chihiro have alibis, as they were together at the time. I was with Mukuro. Theo, you said you were with Kaito when the alert went off?"
Kaito nodded. "Yeah! We were discussing things in the Dining Hall."
"Kenchikka was found near Kaede, which doesn't eliminate her as a suspect." Makoto noted.
Kenchikka said nothing, just stared at Makoto.
"And Chiaki informed me she was in her room, playing video games. No solid alibi for her, either," Celeste commented, as well. "As for me, I was taking poor Leon to task in the Game Room. Poor boy doesn't know when to quit."
"Pain in the ass," Leon grumbled to himself.
Theo spoke up next. "So that leaves Chiaki, Kenchikka, and... well, Kaede herself with no alibi, I suppose. Let's explore each of them in turn, starting with Chiaki."
Mukuro quickly spoke up. "We can eliminate her as a suspect for this."
Kenchikka cocked her head. "How so?"
Mukuro responded, "She's not strong enough to do this. For that matter, neither are you, Kenchikka."
Theo considered Mukuro's words. "Clearly, Kaede did not do this to herself, either. So, must I ask, where does this leave us?"
"Dead end," Kenchikka quickly replied. "Kaede lied about being hit."
"Perjury will get you nowhere, dear lass," Theo disapprovingly chided.
We looked over at Kaede, who was nodding to herself.
"I was... still hit. I guess not by... by you. So, what happened with the... ummmmm... guitar?" She was very much concussed; this much was obvious.
"We're getting to that," Kaito acknowledged. "Whoever hit you, they MUST be the Blackened!"
"But who was it?" Makoto asked. "We need to figure that out."
"Perhaps it would help to start at the beginning?" Theo suggested. "This could help us determine whodunit."
We all agreed, even Kaede, and we proceeded.
"Ok, so first off, we can presume that Kaede and Sayaka were together in the Jam Room at some point before Sayaka's death. We need to determine who was there with those two, if anyone."
"Allow me to resolve this mystery for you," Theo spoke up. "I was."
All eyes went to Theo. Wait, he was there? Does that mean... ?
"But I did not end poor Sayaka's life. I give my word on that," Theo continued.
"We'll have to prove that," Mukuro responded back, with little emotion in her voice.
"As you say," Theo parried back. "Let's prove my innocence, shall we?"
Kaito looked excited, to my surprise. "Alright, let's do this!"
Theo cleared his throat. "I was with Kaede and Sayaka in the Jam Room, true. But I was not the first one there. As Kenchikka mentioned, she had already arrived when I came upon the scene. Upon seeing Sayaka in her unfortunate state, I immediately left to get the others downstairs. I had not noticed Bera or Chihiro in the Exercise Room, but it seems they overheard anyway."
Leon added, "Before that, he was with me and Bera in the Costume Room."
I nodded, confirming Leon's claim.
Kenchikka spoke next. "Guitar already smashed when Theo enter. Theo enters, sees Sayaka. Looks over, sees me. Theo leaves, announces in doorway that Sayaka and Kaede are hurt. Few minutes later, Bera and Chihiro show up. Alert goes off, Asshole Raccoon's face on screen, announces to come to Jam Room."
Chiaki takes this all in, then asks a question. "All this brings me to one question, I think. Did someone hit Kaede with the guitar after Sayaka's death? Or did Kaede fall and land her head on the guitar?"
Suddenly, this became a very important question. What's the connection between Kaede and the guitar?
Kaede, who had her eyes closed for a while, opened them again. "I fell."
"Ok, but where did you..." The question hung on my lips as I realized what she just admitted to.
Kaito spoke up. "Wait. You fell? From where?"
"Only one place one can fall, damage guitar like this. Above stage."
Leon scratched his goatee. "But that's where Sayaka was, right?"
An awkward silence fell among us. Was this true? Was Kaede where Sayaka was? But... what did this mean?
Celeste broke the silence. "So, Kaede fell from the top of the stage. Sayaka, too, appears to have fallen from the top of the stage. Kaede landed on a guitar and became concussed, and Sayaka hit a speaker and died."
"Ok, but how does it all fit together? It's like a comic strip with several panels missing," Makoto pondered aloud.
Kaede looked over at Makoto. "Sayaka fell. I climbed up to save her."
"What are you talking about? Sayaka died when she fell, and you got knocked out!" Kaito seemed like he wasn't having this.
"Not yet," Kaede shook her head, then staggered a bit.
"Not... yet?" I asked her. "What do you mean?"
Kaede's shoulders slumped. "Sayaka fell while practicing a stunt for another concert we have planned, and stopped about 7 or 8 feet from the floor. She was dangling from the harness, and I couldn't reach the button to release her, so I had to climb up to the pulley to pull her back up."
"Alright, so she had an accident during practice and couldn't release herself." Theo asked. "What happened next?"
"After that, I had to climb up to the top of the stage, to help her -"
"You just said that, I think," Chiaki interrupted.
"Oh. Sorry." Kaede took another deep breath. "I got to the pulley controls and hit the button to raise her back up."
I nodded, following along thus far.
"So, after I got to the pulley, I hit the button to raise her up. Sayaka gradually returned to the top of the stage, but she had trouble getting onto the platform."
"I presume that's the platform near the pulley system, correct," Theo asked.
Kaede nodded. "Yeah, that one. So I reached out to grab her harness and pull her backward."
I nodded. Chihiro seemed relieved, as well.
"So you grabbed her harness and pulled her onto the platform," Kaito responded. "What next?"
To my confusion, Kaede shook her head.
"No. No, I didn't. I..."
She grabbed the back of her head and closed her eyes, grimacing.
So, Sayaka fell off the platform and was dangling. Kaede went up to the top of the stage to rescue Sayaka. She gets her up to her, grabs her harness, but...
My eyes went wide open in terror.
"The emergency release button." I blurted it out. "You grabbed the harness, and when you pulled her back, you triggered the emergency release button before she could get onto the platform. This sent her plummeting, and you lost your balance and fell backwards, landing your head on the bass guitar and concussing yourself."
Makoto's eyes were wide open now. "You mean Kaede killed Sayaka, while trying to save her life?"
Kaede began softly crying. That was all the answer we needed.
I felt sick. Sick to my stomach. We would soon have to vote Kaede, who through no malice of her own, accidentally killed Sayaka. The two, who had just presented us with a concert, would be no more.
I didn't even hear Monorakun's announcement for the vote. I just noticed the screen changed at my podium.
With a heavy heart, I picked Kaede.
After everyone cast their votes, Monorakun's screen on his podium revealed the Monorakun dealer with his deck of cards. He turned them all over, revealing each of us. The dealer then picked up the cards and shuffled them up. Afterwards, the dealer placed the deck on the table before turning the top card over.
It was Kaede's card.
"The irony! The true irony!" Monorakun chuckled to himself. "The girl who tried to save Sayaka's life ended up killing her on accident. No matter, she still hit the release button and plummeted Sayaka to her doom. While it was sad to see happen, this execution should darken the mood even more! Let's get to it!"
The platform we stood on, along with the table, started rotating, until Kaede's back was to the doors to the Execution Room. The doors opened up, and a manacle shot out, grabbing Kaede by the back of her neck and dragging her backwards. We chased her back into the Execution Room, where the usual fence blocked us off.
Kaede was pulled head-first into a clear grand piano, which appeared to have modified internal workings. Kaede was pulled underneath the inner workings of the piano itself, where the hammers rested. However, each hammer also had a spike on the underside, which was now lowering, resting on top of, and along the length of, Kaede's legs, chest, and face.
A Monorakun, dressed as a orchestra conductor, descended from the ceiling, landing on its feet, and scurried over to the piano. He stopped to look over at us, bowed, then sat on the bench.
A sign descended. "Kaede Akamatsu's Execution: Kae-dead Lune"
The Monorakun conductor started playing Clair de Lune, and to our despair, we watched the hammers rose to strike the strings to play the song, then lower to drive their spikes into Kaede. The higher the notes, the higher up Kaede's body the spikes dug into her.
As the song continued, blood gradually began to drip from the bottom of the piano, as Kaede's body was pummeled with hammer-driven spikes to the music of Clair de Lune.
Unable to move within the clear case, Kaede could only lay there, grimacing in pain as she was pelted repeatedly with sharp spikes. Her chest, both legs, and face were bleeding, and her eyelids were looking heavy.
As the song reached its final notes, Kaede's eyes closed for good. The floor underneath the piano was covered in her blood, and the beauty of the song sharply contrasted with the horror of watching Kaede be slowly murdered before us.
After the song ended, the lights went out inside the Execution Room, and the sign changed to the words "Thank you for coming!"
We all exchanged glances. Three murders. Three executions. Ten of us left.
What was going to happen to us now?