In the dim light of the laboratory underneath Isle Monroe, sat one Tomas Gaspar. He was sitting in a chair, head tilted up, eyes closed, arms hanging off the sides and legs spread open, like a prince on a throne.
On the floor besides him, was the dead body of Nikolai Nikolaoff, a bullet planted squarely in his forehead. The bullet itself was gone by now of course, due to its holographic nature.
It seemingly was the perfect crime.
At least it would be, had there not been a witness to it all.
Jet Vasquez, not in accordance with his late friend's wishes, had woken up, and followed him down to the lab. Not soon enough to do anything to save him, but definitely on time to witness the gruesome aftermath.
"Blood makes me sick. It stains my lab coats." Said Tomas, not opening his eyes.
"What happened in here, Gardner!?" Jet exclaimed marching up to the sitting chemist. He pulled the chair hard towards him, getting all up in his face.
"Don't call me that, simpleton!" Tomas smacked Jet away. The blue pistol appeared in his hand once more, pointing in between Jet's eyes.
"I will give you a choice. I don't wish to cover myself with any more blood. You will leave this island immediately, or you will die. Right here, right now. And you won't be missed. You're an insignificant cretin. Make your choice now, my trigger finger is itching." Tomas stated, gun steadily aiming at the delinquent's head.
Jet gulped.
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"General Starman! Wake up, immediately!" Liam Mason shook the elderly general away on the morning of the next day. "There's a corpse, sir! A corpse in the lab!"
"What!? How is this possible?" Starman exclaimed, hurriedly putting on his coat and heading outside.
"The janitor found it earlier today, sir. It's one of the cadets… What do we do?" Liam asked, panicked.
"Head to the communications room, and send an urgent alert to headquarters back home." Starman ordered, as the two of them run towards the console.
"I'm afraid that's impossible, General." Said Christian Lavender, who was already there. "Our communications system seems to be sabotaged. All we could find is this mobile transponder, but its range isn't far enough to reach the mainland."
"Well, send someone then! Take the emergency boat to the nearest island with communications and…" Starman barked another order, but the line of thought was interrupted by a message from the transponder
"Hello? C-can you hear me? This is Larry, I'm at the docks with the other transponder…" said Larry through the intercom. "It's the emergency boat, it's gone!"
"What?" Starman shouted.
"Yeah, seem like someone took it at night… The knot holding the thing in place is sewn in half!" Larry added.
"Hmm… this doesn't leave us with many choices, it seems. Quickly, send out an alert with the transponder! Hopefully any nearby ships find us, and we can get help." Starman ordered, and so it was. A message went out to all nearby ships, but unfortunately, no ship was around at the time.
There was however one island nearby, that did pick up on the alert, the sole denizen of which decided to quickly make his way to Isle Monroe.
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In the meantime though, the cadets began to wake up. The news that all exercises would be suspended until further notice was met pleasantly by most of them.
Not the occupants of room 221 however, as Jon was incredibly concerned by the news. Dex had not been in the room when the 3 of them woke up, and he was certain that could be no coincidence.
"You need to learn how to relax." Bryce tried to reassure his friend. "Let's head outside for now, I'm sure he'll turn up eventually."
"I pray you're right. He's been rather off these past few weeks." Jon commented.
"He's fine, I'm certain. He probably has a reason to be in hiding like this." Tomas proposed. Jon shrugged, and the three of them headed outside.
On a bench by the entrance of the dorm building was one other than Jason Ross, who was sitting cross-legged, gazing at the crowd outside. He quickly shot up when he noticed the three of them approach.
"Hey, Ross, right? You're bunking with Nikolaoff, yeah?" Jon asked.
"Oh, yeah… well, Nik and Jet weren't in my room when I woke up… I hope this break has nothing to do with them." Ross said.
"Hey, how about the four of us go around and figure out what happened? Maybe they're preparing a surprise for us!" Bryce proposed. Jon and Tomas agreed immediately, but Jason had his qualms about the whole thing.
"I don't know guys, are we sure this is a good idea?" Jason whimpered, awkwardly scratching the back of his head.
"Is there an issue, Jason?" Tomas asked him, his piercing gaze meeting Jason's avoidant eyes.
"Ah… I guess not. I'll tag along." Jason stood down and began following the pack around.
Their first stop was the docks, where General Starman and Larry were hanging around. The former was pacing back and forth, anxiously chewing away at his fingernails.
"What's going on, sir? You seem distraught." Jon said to the General, who was snapped out of his trance. He couldn't muster a response, mumbling over his words for a few seconds, before a head emerged from the water, interrupting the group's conversation.
"Have you kids got no awareness? There's been a murder on this island!" It said with a distinct Australian accent, before climbing out of the water and onto the dock.
The man was dressed in a green coat and cap, and was holding a smoking pipe filled to the brim with water.
"Detective AJ Melan is on the case! I picked up on your distress call, Mr. Stahman, and I'm here to fix everything!"
"Excuse me, a murder?" Bryce questioned. Starman sighed.
"It's true. I didn't want this to go public, but it's true. We found a body in the lab this morning." Starman explained. The cadets around were in shock!
"Someone died!? Who? Can we help?" Bryce started bombarding the general with questions.
"Some people are missing from the dorms, does this mean they are dead?" Jon added.
"Does that mean there's a murderer on the loose?" Tomas followed up. Jason panicked, and didn't ask anything, but it's clear these questions were also on his mind.
"None of yer business, ya kooks! Let the detective handle this, and stay outta my way!" AJ scolded them, then himself, Starman and Larry headed to the crime scene.
"We follow them. But discreetly." Tomas proposed. The other 3 had no objections.
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"This is certainly a tricky case on out hands, aye? A clear bullet wound, but no bullet, and no gun! The body is clearly fresh I'll say. And it's evident the bloke had an instantaneous death, at least. Oh, examining bodies. Never gets easier…" AJ gave his analysis.
"So, did you pick up on anything, detective?" Starman asked.
"Not particularly. The killer left no evidence behind whatsoever; it's like this murder didn't even happen. You said the emergency boat is gone, right? I suspect the killer took the boat and left after the crime, plus those kids earlier mentioned some people were gone… Did you do a headcount, general?" AJ asked.
"No, I must admit it eluded me… I didn't think any more cadets would be gone." Starman admitted.
"Well, it must be one of them! Unless we find any evidence, we'll have to conclude it's one of the missing people." AJ concluded. Suddenly, a chair on wheels sped right by the crime scene, and collided with the detective.
"What in the- Who threw this chair at me!" AJ started yelling, shaking his fist in the air.
"Wait, Detective, look on this chair! There's a bloodied cloth here." Starman pointed out.
"You're right, this is a sweater, and it's covered with blood. We must assume it's the victim's blood, and was worn by the killer, but what's it doing here? If the killer left with the boat, then he could have taken it with him and destroyed it…" AJ though out loud, pacing around the room in an exaggerated fashion. He took a puff out of his (empty) pipe.
"Clearly this sweater is a red herring, fabricated by the culprit to confuse us! He left on the boat, and left this here so we'd think he didn't!" He finally concluded.
"Woah, is that Nikolaoff on the ground there? Gnarly…" Bryce commented from the door as the group arrived to the lab, blowing their cover. The two men inside turned to face the cadets.
"Oi! Didn't I tell you four to scram!" AJ yelled.
"How could you hide this information from us, General! One of us died right under your nose!" Jon exclaimed, pointing his finger at the General.
"I couldn't alert the killer, had he been one of you…" Starman tried to explain, but Tomas wasn't having it.
"Or perhaps, you're covering your own tracks." He pointed out, arms crossed.
"I hope you're not accusing me, Gardner." Starman said, furrowing his brow.
"Oh enough of this riff-raff! Get outta here, all of ya!" AJ exclaimed again, marching up to the door and slamming it in the cadet's faces. "Take me to the communications room, I want to investigate it, next."
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The communications room, or otherwise, the scene of the second crime that occurred the previous night, was a secluded room on the far side of the staff building. It was dimly lit, had no windows, and housed the communications console, an intricate piece of technology, able to send signals for miles away. When it hasn't been sabotaged, of course.
"Hm, the wires don't seem to be damaged or anything… Any chance we can get someone to fix this thing?" AJ asked, staring at the opened compartment at the front of the machine.
"The only people who know how to repair this are the scientists from the ministry. I only know how to operate it." Starman explained. AJ sighed. Suddenly, though, something clattered on the ground, from a bench behind them.
One of the two transponders was suddenly on the floor, having mysteriously fallen off the table.
"What in the- Someone's messin' with me! OI! WHO GOES THERE!" AJ started screaming at the void. Obviously, nobody replied, but he did kneel down to examine the transponder afterwards.
He pulled out a magnifying glass from his coat pocket, and started staring at the transponder from all sides.
"Why… there's blood on this thing!" He shouted. "And fingerprints!"
"Yeah, yours." Starman pointed out. "So what does this mean?"
"If my deductions are correct, then there was a second murder, in this very room! And the murder weapon was this very transponder!" AJ announced. "I must take this for analysis… Some of the fingerprints here must belong to the killer!"
And so it was. Detective AJ dashed out of the staff building, heading towards the docks. With the crucial evidence in hand, all that was left was to make it back to his island and analyse the fingerprints.
Unfortunately, his path was blocked by a potted plant flying out of the window of Room 221, and smashing into pieces right in front of his feet.
"Okay, that's it. Why do things keep falling? I'll catch whoever's messing with me!" He exclaimed, and turned around, running towards the dorm building.
A couple meters nearby, the four cadets on AJ's trail were watching everything unfold.
"With him in the dorms, we can finally investigate the communications room for ourselves. That stupid detective won't ever figure out what actually happened." Bryse proposed. Everyone else murmured in agreement.
"Jason and myself will follow the detective. I have a sneaking suspicion these falling items are related to the case at hand." Tomas added. Jason tried to object, but Tomas gave him a stern look, and he couldn't muster another word.
"Sounds good to me! Good luck you guys." Bryce finally said, and the two groups split up.
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The communications room was seemingly empty when the two of them arrived. Jon carried a candle they had taken from Lavender's office to light up the way without exposing their position.
"This seems rather dull. I don't know what we're supposed to find in here." Bryce commented, twiddling with his thumbs.
"Well, the killer must've been in here to sabotage the console, so who knows, ty might've left some clues." Jon explained. He moved the candle around, trying to examine the room for hints.
"Man, we'll never find them. That kooky detective said the killer must be on one of the missing people, so they're long gone by now. You uh, don't think it's Tuscan, do you?" Bryce asked, lowering his gaze to look at the ground.
"Of course it's not me, you idiot!" Dex said.
"Poor guy, that Tuscan. I can still hear his voice…" Bryce lamented.
"I'm right here you moron!" Dex scolded him, poking his head from behind the console.
"Tuscan!? You're here!" Bryce exclaimed, but Dex quickly put a hand over his mouth.
"Stay quiet! He could be listening…" He seethed, keeping his voice low. The two dudes took a better look at their friend. He had ditched his suit jacket and hat, and was running around with just a shirt and pants on. He was also red-faced and sweating, and his hair was rather unkempt. His hands were dirty and greasy.
"What are you talking about, Dex? Who could be listening" Jon questioned.
"The killer of course! I know who it is! I've been trying to give hints to that detective, but he's utterly incompetent, and his theories don't make sense… I'll just tell you the whole story." Dex explained, then began going into details about his exploits with Nikolaoff, and the events of the night before.
"So you're telling me that Thomas has been threatening Jason, and killed Nik. You expect us to believe that?" Jon asked, not completely trusting his friend's words. Jason grabbed his head.
"Yes! I was listening to everything that happened through the transponder, and I've been hiding in here since. That idiot, Nikolaoff went and told Thomas –or whatever his name is- all about the interrogation I gave Jason. He's in danger too!" Dex explained.
"I can't believe it… I thought we were friends…" Jon muttered.
"Yeah, well, you're not. I've been suspicious of him ever since I realised he was the same guy working for my dad. I don't know what his motives are, but 'Thomas Gardner' is not and never was the real face of that maniac." Dex clarified. Jon sighed. He wasn't quite able to process everything that was unfolding.
"Hey, wait a sec… If Thomas is the killer, and Jason his target… We just left the two of them alone in the dorm building!" Bryce declared, panicked.
"I'll try to stay here and repair the console, you two, quickly go and find them! Good luck!" Dex told them, and the both of them began running as fast as their legs would take them, to the other side of the island.
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"That potted plant came from my room. So that's where we should head." Tomas told Jason, who awkwardly nodded along. "That's not where we're going now, though."
Tomas lunged at Jason, and pushed him into the nearby bathroom, the same one where he had confronted him 3 weeks earlier. Glowing blue string came out of the man's fingertips, enveloping Jason and bounding him to a nearby wall.
"You peasants, thinking you can trick me. I know you spoke to Nikolaoff, Jason. Bad move." Tomas told him, staring at him from above as he was hunched against the wall.
"What are you talking about, man? I didn't- I mean- I would never betray your trust!" Jason pointlessly tried to defend himself, bout Tomas punched him in the face, shutting him up.
"Oh yes, of course. Unluckily for you, Nikolaoff, in his last moments, made sure to let me know what happened between you." Tomas said. Jason was shocked.
"So that means you-" Jason tried to say, but Tomas cut him off.
"Yes. I killed Nikolai Nikolaoff. I sabotaged the communications system. I lured you in here – you poor sod, thinking I wouldn't have found out! That everything was fine—so I could kill you too, right under that stupid detective's nose." Tomas admitted to everything, right in that moment. Jason looked on in awe as Tomas exposed himself right before the eyes and ears of the moronic detective, who had come in after a fruitless search of room 221 to take a leak.
AJ punched Tomas in the cheek, and sent him towards a wall.
"Ah, detective, nice of you to join us!" Tomas tried to say, but AJ punched him again, and again, and again. In the jaw, the check, the stomach.
"So it's you, huh?" AJ asked, amidst the assault. Tomas generated a knife from his hand, and went on the attack, managing to block AJ's next blow, and stabbing his right arm.
"I can't believe it. I mean, we fought in the revolution together… Thomas Gardner, the traitor…" AJ muttered, panting and grasping his injured arm.
"Oh enough with that name!" Tomas exclaimed, and slapped AJ across the face, making him fall toward a wall. "Thomas Gardner fought in the revolution, and you should know by now, I'm not him."
Blue strings shot out of his palms, latching onto and pulling the bricks out of the back wall of the bathroom. The bricks floated around, surrounding the dark prince. AJ lunged at Tomas, swatting his forehead with his magnifying glass, as it cracked and blood splattered on its lens.
Tomas kicked AJ away, and he barely managed to hang on to the end of the room, where the bricks once were. Behind him was a big drop into the cold winter sea.
"Goodbye, detective." Tomas finally said, and with a flick of his wrist, the bricks started flying back into place, hitting AJ all over his body. Eventually, the kooky detective decided to take the plunge, falling into the water. He flailed and slashed all over the place, and unfortunately, in the struggle, the crucial piece of evidence, the bloodied transponder, was lost to the abyss.
Jason could nothing but watch this all unfold. Once AJ was gone, Tomas turned his attention back to his captive.
"D-did you just kill that guy?" Jason asked, shaking. Tomas didn't answer, and instead, put his gloved hand on top of Jason's mouth and nose, using his holographic technology to block his airways and suffocate him.
By the time Jon and Bryce arrived at the scene, Tomas was gone without a trace, Jason was lying there dead, and their only link to the outside world had vanished with no explanation.