Let The Trial Commence!

A few minutes after Eric left the room, Ulrich felt a colourless gas fill the room. The same one from back in the hotel.

"Wait, what's happening?" Micah asked, holding his breath.

"Congratulations to the brave soul who killed victim number 4 in this game!" Leonie's voice screeched out from Ulrich's watch. "Now, you all may be noticing a gas seeping into your rooms. Do not panic, just let it run its course, and I'll be with you shortly."

Aurora covered what remained of Amber's eye before Amber dropped. Micah dropped next, and then Ulrich.

When Ulrich came to, He was staring at a ceiling with white tiles, with three lights going down vertically.

"Doing this again, huh?" He asked nobody in particular, his voice sounding really numb.

He stood up, still woozy, with a few people still asleep. Micah, Silvia, and Wendy were still passed out, while everyone else was up and discussing. It was just an empty room with blue walls, with a giant wooden circle in the middle.

"Oh hey, Devil's up." Eric yelled out.

"Yeah." Ulrich whispered. "So, who died?"

"Well, we know Gemma's dead." Eric replied. "And Goth and Meat aren't here."

"Wait, what happened to Andrei?" Ulrich asked.

"No idea. When we saw him, he was barely holding on, and vomiting."

"Wait a minute." Ulrich replied, checking his watch. All the deceased contestants were presented in greyscale, but Andrei and Amber were still in colour.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure they're alive." Ulrich nodded.

"Well, that's something." Eric nodded.

Just as the conversation came to a close, the doors to the room opened.

"Hello, everybody!" Leonie yelled, gliding aside to let Andrei and Amber in.

"You doing okay?" Andrei whispered.

"Could be better." Amber muttered back.

"Amber, babe! How ya doing?" Aurora yelled, walking up to her and moving the hair covering her eye, only to see a black eyepatch underneath.

"Babe, your eye…"

"Got taken out, now let's get this shit over with." Amber replied, agitated.

"Obliged." Kalea said from behind them, pressing on her watch a couple of times. The floor opened up before them, revealing a set of sixteen wooden podiums with gold plates on the surfaces.

"The sixteen of you will stand on the podium with your name written on it. Once that's done, I'll explain the rest."

Amber did as instructed. Luckily for her, her name was closest to the door, and Andrei got next to her.

"Hey Ulrich, your names here." She exclaimed. Looking down, she was standing on what looked to be tempered glass, with some kind of light underneath it. As everyone was getting into place, the middle light on the ceiling was being taken away, replaced with a black metal stick, which slowly unfolded into a sniper rifle.

"Okay, everybody comfortable? Doing well?" Leonie asked, whistling to herself afterward. "Now, as much as I want to explain the rules, I feel a certain co-host needs to earn all those drinks she's been getting."

"Got it." Kalea sighed, moving her hair to the side. "As you all know, your challenge was to successfully take the life of another contestant. One of you succeeded, and Gemma Honeycutt has placed seventeenth. Your goal is now to figure out who amongst you pulled the kill off."

"And what's that thing above them, Kalea?" Leonie asked, giggling to herself.

"Oh right, that." Kalea sighed, as deadpan as usual. "This is a prototype high impact rifle, produced by Seeing Static police manufacturers. They're hoping to attach a mere few to the ceilings of each level to assist in apprehending criminals."

"You forget anything?" Leonie whispered.

"Did I?" Kalea sighed. "Work away, I guess."

"These bad boys are capable of piercing metal from three hundred feet away, with a firing speed just a small bit faster than sound! Rest assured, everybody, your safety is their top priority! And we are honoured to be the first show to demonstrate this to the public!"

The rifle moved across the room in all angles, not even feeling robotic, just looking like some kind of armoured alien, pointing it's eye at various contestants.

"Hey Vanessa, check this out." Leonie let out a soft chuckle as she said it, and a gunshot rang through the room. Vanessa started hyperventilating, a few insects falling off her skin, all of which were shot down as soon as they hit the floor. The noise of the gunshot was bad, but the sound of Leonie's laughter was probably worse.

"Would you please act professional?" Kalea snapped, plunging an elbow into her midriff.

"Oh I'm sorry miss professional, mind explaining the last thing?" Leonie replied, looking like she was ready to kill. Kalea pressed some buttons on her watch, and everyone was bathed in a neon yellow light.

"This represents your innocence." Kalea started flatly. "Yellow means it's a possibility you did it, blue means it's unlikely, green means it was impossible for you to do it, and red means it was likely you did it. During the voting period, only people in red can be voted for."

"And if we don't have any other questions, we can get this challenge started!" Leonie yelled, shaking in excitement.

"Do we not get to investigate the crime?" Ulrich yelled anxiously.

"It's more fun this way." Leonie replied with a hand wave.

"I have a question." Andrei piped in.

"Oh, you motherfu-what would that be?" Leonie smiled, through gritted teeth.

"Does the mole know who the killer is?"

An assortment of mumbles was echoed through the room at that statement.

"So, they are doing that this year." Amber whispered to herself.

"What's the mole, exactly?" Ulrich asked.

"One person is given incentive to disrupt the game and land their own kills. If they end up surviving, they get some ridiculous prizes out of it." Amber answered calmly.

"Woah now, you need to know if we're doing that this year!" Leonie chuckled. "Which we are! However, the mole doesn't know who landed the kill. Unless they were involved, in which case they do!"

"We don't give that information to moles if they don't know, is what she's trying to say." Kalea sighed.

"See, that one makes sense!" Micah yelled.

"And with that said, let's get this thing started, we have to condense this for primetime, people, so make the alibis quick!"

"Oh, certainly." Huang started. "Vanessa, if you could give us our alibis, please?"

"Oh, right." Vanessa nodded, the barrel of the gun still continuing it's one-sided staring contest. "We're assuming the murder took place at the Brasshead, due to the equipment challenge going on there at the time. However, me, Huang, Wendy, and Yun-Yeong never went into that building, so none of us could have done it."

"Can we confirm that the murder took place at the Brasshead?" Leonie asked.

"Wh-yes?" Eric replied, spluttering as he tried to comprehend that sentence. "We saw her body there, on the third floor of the building. While it was locked down. I'm pretty sure none of them could have done it."

"Sounds good to me." Kalea nodded, putting the four of them in the green.

"I'd like to mention that I wasn't in the building during the murder, either." Lloyd added calmly, with a raise of his hand.

"What?" Amber replied. "You were totally in the building!"

"Nah, I could see shit hitting the fan, so I left." Lloyd dismissed with a hand wave. "Gemma was up to something, didn't want to risk it."

"I think he's right." Seeta said quietly. "I mean, we spent all of night two looking for him, and we couldn't find anything."

"I feel the need to ask why you were trying to find me?" Lloyd asked.

"Shut the fuck up and let us work this out." Silvia interrupted. "So the announcement when the whole thing got shut down was that the building had nine people in it, right? So me, Seeta, Ulrich, Amber, Lloyd, Aurora, Gemma, Andrei, and one other person."

"That person would be Cyrus." Ulrich replied.

"But…I was also there." Odebode pointed out. "And I didn't even know he was in the building until now."

"See? Couldn't have happened." Lloyd scoffed, leaning on the podium. "Leonie, if you could green me, please?"

Lloyd was bathed in green, which he looked to the sky and gave a quick chuckle. "Much obliged, my dears."

"But anyway, let's get to Cyrus." Amber said. "Because it was him."

"Excuse me?" Valentina yelled. "What are you accusing him of?"

"Murder, lady." Amber replied. "You need to get your damn ears cleaned?"

"I did not make any attempt to kill Gemma." Cyrus responded coolly; his eyes being closed during the conversation.

"Okay, but how do we know that?" Ulrich asked. "You did try to kill Amber; I can confirm that."

"That I can confirm. I tried to kill Amber, but I had a reason. I had no reason to kill Gemma." Cyrus affirmed as his lights changed to red.

"Is that why you locked me in the cinema?" Valentina cried out, slamming her hands on the podium.

"Yes." Cyrus established, his face becoming slightly more stressed as he shut his eyes tighter.

"Why?" Valentina screamed. "Why are you trying to kill people?"

"Andrei, I'll need your help for this one." Cyrus finally opened his eyes, looking across to him. "Could you kindly inspect Amber's shoulder, please?"

Andrei did as expected, expecting Amber's exposed shoulder.

"There's nothing here." He said.

"Look under the other shoulder. Even if she tries to resist."

"Excuse me?" Amber asked, arms crossed. "Hosts, this is an invasion of privacy, and I won't allow it."

"Why? Hiding anything under there?" Leonie asked. "Andrei, you have the floor to get as frisky as you want."

Andrei walked behind Amber, exposing her other shoulder.

"A tattoo of a green triangle? Is that it?"

When that was said, a small symphony of shock was let out. Aurora gasped, Eric took a small step back, and Micah let out a confused scream, among other things being heard from the audience.

"No way." Micah chuckled nervously. "She ran a coffee shop on Deeten, I went there all the time! She probably just got that tattoo to look tough."

"That thinking is what allows her kind to flourish." Cyrus replied, looking directly into Micah's eyes. "Hosts, if you would allow me to expose Amber's crimes to the rest, would you affirm it?"

"Can do!" Leonie yelled, clapping. "Now, what was Amber's crime?"

Cyrus slammed his hands into the panel in front of him, his words echoing through the walls.

"Fellow competitors, Amber Monet is a member of the Rosethorns!"