first trial

[stagemanagers]

[Within a few minutes of the performers is finishing their investigations, the lights in every room flicker on and off several times. For those in or close to the lobby, they hear a faint rumbling. The gilded doors across from the heavy wooden front doors (which have always been there, the showrunners may have gotten to indicate them on the map) have opened.

Your intermission is ending. The show is about to begin.

The space behind them is lit; you're free to enter. It's a very short hallway, decorated in the same way as the lobby with the light walls and red carpet. There is one more set of doors to pass through and then you're all, finally, in the House. There's one grand chandelier above, glittering crystal, and the seats around you are made of fine, if dust-caked, red velvet. Those don't seem to be for you though - all the way down in front of the stage, where the orchestra might sit, there's a circle of wooden podiums. They're arranged so that everyone can face each other and are fixed into place. Each one bears a metal plaque with a cast member's name engraved on it. There's also a metal panel on top, with twenty ivory buttons paired to everyone's name.

Among these, only Jonny's podium is different - that one is draped in black crepe, with a larger grey-scale version of his headshot from the playbill framed and sitting at on top like a funerary portrait. Standing where he might have stood, a bare light bulb glows faintly atop a metal pole.

Right here, you're very close to the stage. But the curtain is closed, and it's a little too high to easily clamber up. You may not want to try. You've got more important business right now, after all.

As everyone is finding their places, the Phantom's voice suddenly sounds loud and clear throughout the space. If anyone is to look up, however, they'll see the dark suited figure of him and the whiteness of his mask peering over the edge of box 5.]

You must now determine who was responsible for the death of Jonny D'Ville. Submit your vote on the podiums when you are certain of your choice.

Comments

[justmeheere]

[Jeremy snaps out of the weird internal screaming he's doing and remembers the bucket.]

Oh, the dress! Someone was trying to wash a, uh. A white dress? Well, I'm pretty sure it was white. It's not. It's kinda pink now.

[etincelledefierte]

Do you think that maybe the murderer was wearing it during things, or whether they were using that to clean up and left the other things behind?

[justmeheere]

It's kinda hard to tell? The whole thing is just kinda pink now because it went through the wash.

[He points down at the bucket that's probably between them, containing a wet dress.]

mods?

[etincelledefierte]

So it could've been either way.

[She's just going to take the dress out of the bucket and hold it up, and with a grimace, take the bloody shirt out of the bag to compare. Are they around the same size? Also, any chance the dress is as bloody as the shirt?]

[stagemanagers]

[The dress and the shirt are different sizes. The only thing they really seem to have in common is their color, blood stains and being vaguely of the same aesthetic time period.

With the dress being washed it's difficult to tell but they seem to have/have had similar amounts of blood on them. The stain patterning on the dress though seems to imply it was scrunched up when it came into contact with the blood.]

[etincelledefierte]

[Hmm...]

Hey, everyone? Come take a look at this. The shirt I found in the costume room and the dress Jeremy found have about the same amount of blood on them, but the patterns are different. I think the dress got bunched up when it touched blood. So maybe someone wasn't wearing it, but used it for something else?

[37773972]

...for wiping blood?

[bloodycape]

Oh! Maybe they tried to clean it up. So maybe they did want to try and hide it...

[37773972]

Exactly.

[reassuranceandrevolution]

Trying to clean up the scene? But the body would have been found eventually, why bother?

[37773972]

On them? To make the scene look different? [Helpless shrug hedefk]

[reassuranceandrevolution]

Maybe to make us believe the closet was the scene of the crime.

[justmeheere]

More, uh. More importantly why just wash the dress if Claudine found other bloody clothes?

[reassuranceandrevolution]

Maybe they were in a hurry? Possibly someone who isn't use to cleaning up evidence.

[justmeheere]

[You watch a lot of crime dramas, you get weirdly obsessive about Cleaning Up Evidence.]

So, so maybe this was accidental?

[etincelledefierte]

...maybe, or maybe for something like holding over the...

[she shudders.]

...the stab wound while being carried?

[musacal]

Oh! Good catch, Clau-chan!

[etincelledefierte]

Thanks, Banana.

[A tiny flash of a smile.]

mods?

[garbageface]

Huh. What size was the dress, do you think?

[stagemanagers]

[There's no size tag but it looks to be about a medium to large, based on the eye hooks in the back. Adjusting sizes to different wearers is important!]

[justmeheere]

[He's just holding a wet dress now. It's just dripping all over everything.]

It's adjustable. Like, um. Like a range from about a medium to a large? Maybe extra large? Girls' sizing is weird so I don't really know.

[garbageface]

That's good to know.

[ Hmm. Santana eyes Sigyn and Nana, the two people that she would consider to be medium-to-large dress-wearers. ]

[musacal]

[ She feels herself being eyed... haha.... ha........ ]

That... that would also fit a lot of the guys, wouldn't it...?

[revelfree]

Is there anything to indicate that it was actually worn, and not simply used to clean up a mess?

[justmeheere]

I mean, uh. I don't really have the assets for a dress like this? [He Lacks The Curves.] But theoretically, sure.