Sundancer / Marissa Newland

 

Week 7. Team Dazzle lost. In Marissa’s opinion that was once again Jack being sour grapes, instead of there truly being any flaws in their efforts. Some would say it’s a lack of taking responsibility, but she didn’t really care. She still was pretty upset Jack had disregarded the teams’ efforts weeks ago. The announcement that came didn’t make her feel any warmer towards the so-called ‘teacher’.

The reward for the winning team? Getting a bit of their powers back, just enough to remind them what they had lost by getting nerfed. Those who didn’t have a power in the first place instead got Hyperion-brand items a little bit too useful for murderous purposes. The penalty for the losing team? To get a bit of their powers back, but losing some control over them. Those who didn’t have powers or special abilities didn’t even get that much.

No wonder some people had suspicions Jack aimed his motives at specific people.

When Marissa heard her power would be back and she’d lose control over it she immediately got worried. So far all she had was a small light she could create and move at will – nothing that could be called a sun. What if...? Running away to the pool Marissa opened her hands, focusing her power to create a sun.

All she got was the usual little light. Okay! No sun meant no danger. Ten minutes after the motive things weren’t so bad. With some luck it’d stay that way.

It didn’t.

-oooooo-

“You look quite red, Ms Newland”

Columbo had noticed something was up with Marissa’s health, just a few hours after the murder. Her face was reddened, her brow had some sweat. Marissa absent-mindedly brushed the back of her head on her forehead, nodding with some concern.

“It’s a fever. My power includes temperature getting normalized near me, so I guess Jack’s way of making me lose control over is ruining my body temperature. I dunno.” Alright. If all it did on Marissa was mess with her temperature then perhaps it wasn’t too threatening of a motive for her.

“What about your sun?”

To prove how little the motive was affecting her, Marissa flicked a hand, making the ridiculous light appear. “As useless as usual”

“Careful, Ms. Newland. It could get worse at any moment”

He wasn’t wrong, really. It could happen. Marissa nodded, although she wasn’t really too sure she’d go tell Columbo if anything happened. It was her power, after all. She could handle it.

-ooooo-

On Wednesday everyone in the station starting noticing something was up. As usual, Emma went to take a look at her newlyfound friends in the petting zoo, ready to toss some food at them like she did every once in a while. Humming to herself, she opened the door to the biodome. The many environments available were such a welcome change of scenery compared to most of the rooms in the space station. She had gotten used to seeing greenery every time she opened the doors, following the pathways until she reached the beach.

That was why, when instead of greenery what she saw was a thick fog, she wondered if maybe the Friday tragedies had started earlier than usual. Emma stepped back while the fog billowed out, floating up to the ceiling and starting to spread into the halls. For a couple minutes Emma waited, expecting the fog to get thinner, but no such things happened. More and more of it kept coming out, like there was an infinite source of fog somewhere in the biodome.

Nothing that’d stop her from reaching the petting zoo, she thought. A little concerned but without letting that hold her back, Emma stepped into the biodome, ready to face whatever was happening now.

It was like a sauna in there! The fog was way too warm, and it was so thick she couldn’t see much. Emma extended an arm and slowly moved, unsure if she remembered correctly where was what. Oh! A tree! The tree felt warm too. “Why is it so hot in here...?” Emma murmured, coughing when a blast of hot steam hit her face.

This was it. No way she could keep walking without getting roasted! Emma turned around and ran out of the biodome, closing the door behind her. What had just happened?! Panting and glad about the cooler ambience of the rest of the space station Emma leaned on the wall, finding she was completely soaked in sweat. No, wait, that wasn’t it...her hair, her clothes, everything was wet now! It was as if she had taken a plunge into the pool or something – her clothes were so damp moving felt like a chore.

Oh. That wasn’t fog, was it.

It was steam.

Before long everyone knew there was a severe malfunction going on in the biodome. A pipe burst somewhere in there, probably. Thankfully, the ventilation system wasn’t pouring steam everywhere in the station. It filtered the steam out of the air, ensuring only the floor with the biodome was full of steam. It was so thick, so warm, finding the exact source of the steam was impossible, no matter how hard some tried.

Nobody said it aloud, but everyone expected a body to appear in the biodome on Friday.

-ooooo-

Thursday had anomalies as well. It wasn’t in the form of steam filling the place, but what happened wasn’t much better. It all started with a loud crack while Rex was walking in direction of the bowling alley. Looking up, Rex saw the ceiling at the far end of the passageway bulge, swelling until, with a loud crack, it split open, unleashing a torrent of hot water. “Aw, shit!” Rex turned heel and ran away, not wanting to get caught in any of that scalding liquid coming.

Luckily for everyone who wanted to be on that floor, Jack repaired the leak quickly. The floor was salty for a long while even after drying it up, though: it had been ocean water.

The word of this structural failure spread like wildfire. It didn’t help that, in the biodome, the steam kept filling it all and Jack didn’t seem to have much interest in doing anything about it. The obvious conclusion was that, since it pissed everyone off, he had no intention in helping. No surprise there.

-ooooo-

By now the Friday routine everyone had was simple: go search for a corpse, investigate, catch a culprit. Straightforward enough. Rex ran out of Libra’s room, hitting the door to his own room to try to wake up its inhabitants. Without even waiting to see if they come out, Rex went to start searching, ready to go over the whole space station if necessary--! Oh, fuck, there’s a dead body there in the gym.

Or at least he was pretty sure it was a dead body. What else was he supposed to think when he saw someone hanging from their wrists from a rope, as if it was a human-shaped punching bag. The victim’s head tilted forward, the arms were stretched painfully upwards, the rest of the body hung limply and without any reaction when Rex arrived.

Even though he couldn’t see the face, the suit was unmistakable. There was exactly one person in the whole station that had a black armored costume emblazoned with red suns.

“Mare...? Mare!”

Marissa, it had to be Marissa! Rex stepped shakily towards the corpse, part of him hoping she was merely unconscious, that it wasn’t too late! But he couldn’t see a thing, the suit covered every inch of her, hiding anything that could be of use. On the mat right under the body there were some drops of blood, staining it with a strangely fresh bloodstain – an indication it most likely was too late. Still, he didn’t hesitate to untie the rope around her wrists, lying her down on the mattress and trying to take the helmet off, anything to try to resurrect her!

But the helmet didn’t come off. Oh. Of course Sundancer wouldn’t want someone to be able to take her costume off easily in the midst of a battle or something. Why had she been wearing her costume on A Thursday night, though...?

He still had been struggling to take the helmet off when other two people entered, finding the body as well: Simon and Ruby, who apparently had been running around as well. At the sight of the dead body they both stopped, watching Rex struggle with the costume. “Hey! Stop standing around and help me already! This thing’s tighter than...” he couldn’t bring himself to finish talking. Making one of his usual remarks felt so crass when it was about a good friend’s dead body.

“Wait, that’s a body?” Ruby seemed confused, for some reason Rex really couldn’t believe. Of course it was a dead body! Did she think Marissa liked to take ‘hang out’ in the most literal definition?!

“This thing isn’t coming off! We have to help Mare, maybe it’s not too late--!”

“Calm down!” Ruby advised while Simon crouched beside the corpse. Of course both of them were alarmed, but there was something odd about their demeanor. “What if it’s a mannequin?”

“A manne—what the actual fuck?” the idea it may not be a dead body didn’t cross Rex’s mind at all! The blood proved it was a dead body, didn’t it?! This was Marissa’s--

“Columbo found Marissa at the kitchenette” Simon informed, trying to get the helmet off too.

“Wait what?” Rex was at a loss for words, unable to understand right away what Simon had said. Ruby grabbed the helmet and pulled. Either she didn’t see the blood spilled, or she really thought this was a fake body of some sort. It just refused to budge! The helmet stayed attached, covering the face of whatever was there.

“She got attacked and knocked out!” Ruby informed. “She’s at the infirmary right now”

“Then what’s...this...?”

The question of if this is a corpse or not was answered by the most unwelcome person to do such a thing:

“Alright, kiddos, hurry up and take the helmet off that stiff. I prepared the reveal line for a while so get that done, now”

Jack. Jack said it was a dead body. Did that...mean...

...

They should start investigating. While Ruby and Simon tried to get the helmet and costume off the mystery dead body, Rex looked around for any proof that could be useful.

The drops of blood on the mat really were fresh. He didn’t stick his fingers into the blood or anything, he could just see it was fresh and liquid. The costume didn’t seem to have any cuts on it, though...

“Hey, stab wounds?” Rex asked. Ruby was currently twisting the helmet as carefully yet forcefully as she could, so Simon was the one to answer – by giving Rex a flat stare that outright said ‘I’m not checking’. Didn’t seem like there were any, though.

...now that he took a look, though, the feet seemed a little odd. Frowning, Rex moved the with a foot, finding out that they weren’t filled in. In fact, the feet were floppy and empty! Whoever was in the costume was shorter than Marissa.

“Over there” Simon pointed at an object lying near the mats: a baseball bat, stained with fresh blood too. Seemed like a common bat that could be found in the sports arena, nothing to write home about. Checking it all over didn’t show anything worthwhile. Did this mean that, under that helmet, there was a bashed head? Why to hide it with Marissa’s costume, though...?

Keep looking, keep looking. More proof somewhere...those two kept searching for the way to take off the costume, since the one person who could do it with ease was currently in the infirmary, unconscious, Rex searched the whole gym for any other proof that could be useful. Why was there so little blood, though? This had to be the crime scene, right?

Yeah! There! Among the towels, there was a towel with a lot of blood. Blood covered the towel, dyeing it with red, the material having absorbed so much it was pretty much unusable. Rex didn’t take it – where to even grab it? But what he could see, though, was that there was something off about the blood.

It was fresh, no doubt, but it was a tad darker than the blood on the bat or the drops on the mat. A result of this being on a towel, perhaps? Hmmmm...

Well, regardless, it probably had been used to soak blood off the mat. Why were those drops on the mat undisturbed, though? Nothing showed there was a cleaning attempt on them. What was more, did the killer bludgeon the victim and then put the costume on them? What?

Something didn’t make sense about all this, Rex could see that much. For now, though, it seemed most of the potential proof in this crime scene was currently underneath the costume. It all depended on Ruby and Simon.

-ooooo-

Libra and Columbo had found Marissa prone on the floor, in front of the counter, unconscious. It wasn’t hard to guess where exactly she had been at: probably among the cups on the floor, spilling its contents everywhere. Curious things, though: they were intact. That was what had Columbo’s attention right now, he was looking at the cups with an inquisitive stare.

“It’s tea” he determined. Well, more like an educated guess, but still.

“I have seen Marissa trying to brew tea for people” Libra said. “There are two cups: one of the killer and one for herself”

Columbo nodded. He had a frown on his face, but whatever was passing through his head wasn’t clear. “And over here there’s a taser. Marissa had marks on her arm”

So she got tased on the arm, alright...so far the evidence did indicate she had been attacked while she had been serving tea. Columbo had been the first to get there, by the time Libra arrived he had already lifted Marissa off the floor. So far it all made sense. In that case did Marissa see the killer? They had left Casey and Parker taking care of her in the infirmary, waiting for the injured to wake up. It shouldn’t be long, they had guessed.

Other than the cups what else was there to find? A search of the room did show a couple other oddities, enough to get their attention. Hard not to notice the blood! A shapeless bloodstain on the floor, some distance away from where Marissa had been at. Odd, though...even though it wasn’t smeared or anything like that, the bloodstain still looked strange. Looked more like traces, not like someone had bled right there.

Perhaps even more significant, though, was the weapon found nearby: a scalpel, with the tip covered with blood! Only the tip, though, the rest of the scalpel was completely spotless. The scalpel had been discarded near the wall, almost out of sight. Had the killer dropped it by accident, maybe? Did the victim die from getting stabbed with that scalpel?

Last clue was on the counter: a pair of wet stains on the counter, most likely left by the cups of tea. It seemed the cups had been on the counter for a while, enough to leave marks on the surface. Huh.

“Why did the killer attack her instead of killing her?” Libra wondered. It just...was a bit of an oddity.

Something to ponder in the trial, he supposed.

-ooooo-

It was raining in the biodome.

Emma had gotten there, intending to check the petting zoo and surrounding areas. For the second time that week she was caught offguard by a strange weather phenomenon in the biodome! Looking upwards she didn’t see any clouds or anything like that – could the space station even do that? – yet droplets of water kept falling all over the place; a rain covering every plant in the jungle area with dew, making the sand on the beach wet.

Emma stood on the beach, looking into the distance – or as far as the wall on the other end was, at least. She wasn’t sure how related this was to the murder in the gym, yet there was something very strange here in the biodome other than the rain: the wall far away beyond the sea had scorch marks on it. It was as if the outer covering of the wall melted, revealing the materials inside, metal warped, wires turned into slag, blackened covers both above and possibly under the surface of the water. Had there been a fire in here? Perhaps that’s what caused all the steam, meaning somewhere in all that burned stuff there was a pipe or something that filled the biodome with hot steam?

It could be.

-ooooo-

It really seemed like all of the murder happened there on the lower floors of the space station, because in the middle of the Team Dazzle hallway he found an ID. It had been thrown on the floor, discarded near the door of the room that belonged to Marissa and Majima. Checking the ID indicated this was Marissa’s ID, spotless and without anything suspicious. That it was here was odd, though.

Connecting the dots was pretty easy. Taking the ID from the floor, Avenger used it to open the room of Marissa’s room. He half-expected to find it ransacked, or maybe there’d be evidence lying around. A quick check, though...

...it showed nothing was strange in this room. Everything was neat and ordered – Marissa liked to keep the room spick and span, it seemed! Somewhat disappointed this excursion had yielded no fruit, Avenger turned to leave, taking the ID with him. This was going to be proof for the trial.

Or...perhaps the reason why there was nothing to see was because the killer took it with them? Better check pockets once it’s trial time.

-ooooo-

At last! After a lot of trying and possibly ruining the poor victim’s neck, Simon and Ruby managed to take off the helmet and reveal the victim’s identity to the world!

“Eh. The moment passed, slowpokes”

Nobody had any doubt Jack really had come up with some sort of quirky, mocking line. Perhaps that the moment was gone was a small mercy.

Lala was dead.

Her face and hair were very bloodied, covering so much of it, even leaking from her mouth. Nasty-looking bruises covered her forehead and face. Thankfully her eyes were closed, but that did nothing to diminish how brutal it looked...! Simon looked away, momentarily disgusted by what had been unveiled when the helmet got removed. Now what...?

“You have one minute. That’s what you get for making me lose the chance”

One minute? They had to investigate the dead body in just one minute?! Rex and Ruby looked up with indignation, Rex already opening his mind to argue and probably throw an insult or two at Jack, only to be snapped at by Simon, of all people:

“Hey, snap out of it! You heard him, one minute!”

Oh. Right. Well, no time to waste! Not even time to try to take off the rest of the costume, they had to settle with examining the head! Rex, steeling himself for the unpleasant task of checking the head even if it’s only for one single minute – or less than that, they must have wasted like ten seconds already – looked to the body, finding Ruby already examining the face. She had even opened the mouth!

“No teeth got knocked out!” Ruby said. “But there’s so much blood...!”

“Like with poison?”

“I dunno!” Could you even figure out if someone got poisoned, just by checking the mouth? It wasn’t like anyone here was eager to examine any further! “Oh, wait...”

While Rex tilted the head to a side to check the neck, Ruby got her fingers into Lala’s mouth, taking out something that wasn’t a piece of tooth, or anything that belonged in there. It was...it was a small, transparent film, like a piece of the outer plastic covering of a sausage. It was just a piece, yet of course it stood out like a sore thumb!

Rex had other things to see, though: on the side of the neck, almost hidden by the costume once the helmet was taken off, there was a very small bandage. The sort you’d expect to see on someone’s face if they cut themselves shaving – just a small rectangle an inch long, plastered on the side of the neck. Clearly the tone of the bandage was different from Lala’s skin tone, but it still was odd to see it...

“Wait a second—“

“Time’s up, kiddos! Trial time, leave the kid corpse alone and get going!”

“She’s an adult!” Ruby shouted at the camera.

Time was up. Rex had no choice, he had to stop the investigation. He had to work with all he had seen, even if it wasn’t much. Still...he was...he wasn’t entirely sure, but he was pretty sure there had been a thin blood trail from the bandage, but...it was going towards the back of the head.

...right? He had been looking for just a couple seconds, maybe he was wrong. There had been so much blood on that head, perhaps he was mistaken.

No time to check further, though. Simon, Ruby and Rex left the gym. They weren’t ready for the trial yet, but they had no more time to prepare.

“Wait, what about Mare?” Rex asked right when they were about to enter the trial room. They couldn’t leave her in the infirmary! Without waiting for a response from anyone Rex turned around, already intending to run to the infirmary and carry her all the way to the trial room and lie her on her podium if he needed to! But it wasn’t necessary:

Marissa stepped forward weakly. “I’m...here” Marissa had her head down, looking anywhere except at the rest of the people.

“Are you okay?” Rex asked her immediately. He didn’t step away from Libra, but he asked Marissa that anyway.

Marissa nodded slowly. “I guess I am. Let’s get this done”

Apparently she didn’t want them to worry for her, because she tossed her long hair back and went on. Something about her really bothered Rex that there and then. He had seen her get better, she had been more open, even a little bit happier! But right now, looking at her, Rex had the impression she once again had her walls up, retreating into her shell.

Feeling betrayed over the attack, perhaps?

-ooooo-

Most of the evidence was presented. Avenger also brought something he mentioned he found in the library on one of the tables: a book of anatomy. Rin waved it effortlessly despite it being a thick tome. “The page it was open on had information about arteries,” he said.

All the information present, all the clues, it seemed like there were three different encompassing facts:

One: the killer attacked Lala brutally with that baseball bat until she died. The state of the body, the bat, and the blood on the mat proved that.

Two: the killer seemed to focus on arteries. The book and perhaps the scalpel proved that.

Three: the killer attacked Marissa. She being found with a mark that proved she was tased, as well as the costume Lala had on, proved it. Why was she attacked, though?

“I don’t know” Marissa said. She was leaning on her podium, using it to support her weight. Feeling weak for being unconscious?

“Would you have given your ID to anyone asking for it?” Rin asked.

“No! I mean, I’d have opened the door for anyone who needed to go into Team Dazzle territories, but I wouldn’t have lent the ID to anyone--”

Rex didn’t waste any time in connecting the dots. It wasn’t too difficult to guess: “You got knocked out so they could take your ID, obviously! They went and rummaged through your closet like some sort of thief”

“To take my costume and make Lala wear it?”

“Yeah, that!” Rex pointed at her with a finger, grateful she had completed his reasoning. “Look at that, it made us lose so much time trying to get it off her. Fuck, what if you also were taken out of the game so you couldn’t go and take the costume off?”

Emma nodded. “I guess that makes sense”

“Ms. Newland, did you see who attacked you?” Columbo inquired.

“Sorry, no” Marissa said. “I was caught by surprise”

“It’s okay, Mare. The culprit went and killed someone early in the morning. Can’t blame you for letting your guard down while you went have a pre-corpse tea or something” Rex reassured, only getting a weak nod from his friend.

“Enough of that. What actually killed her?” Avenger settled onto the first order of business. There were two different causes of death that could be it – either Lala was bludgeoned to death, or she was stabbed somewhere. Determining which one had done the job seemed like a very important first step to solving the murder.

Ruby and Simon had told everyone that Lala’s body was severely beaten, and that there was a baseball that probably used to kill her. “We didn’t get to take a good look because someone—“ Ruby shot a glare at the screen from where Jack was watching. –“hurried us along, but it was horrible”

“So maybe she got a cracked skull or something?” Parker wondered.

“Most likely” Libra agreed. “Any of us can use that weapon” Narrowing it down by who can use  baseball bat was a lost cause.

“Did the bruises match?”

“I dunno. I couldn’t look at that; I was too busy counting teeth”

“And finding that piece of plastic. What was that, a pill?” Marissa wondered.

“Poison?” Columbo asked and enumerated a few of the signs of poisoning, in case they had observed any of them on Lala. Nothing fit, though! By all means it really seemed like she got her head cracked open and face beaten. Except...

“Oh, I get it” Ruby said, disgusted: “It must have been a sleeping something. They got her to take a sleeping pill”

“So that’s how the killer could tie her up and hang her from the wrists?” Libra thought about it. It could make sense – there was no doubt Lala was subdued somehow. It was an explanation!

Explanation that didn’t work, though: “Then that piece wouldn’t be in her mouth, she’d have swallowed it”

“Oh, right...” Ruby conceded. “Then...maybe she was hit on the head once, hard enough to knock her out”

“Where would she get hit, though?” Rex asked.

Ruby rolled her eyes. “On the head, Rex! I just said that!” she even pointed at her head.

“I meant where on the station!”

“Right there at the gym. There weren’t any bloody tracks anywhere” Parker said. Right, that meant Lala, who probably was unconscious and bleeding from a blow to the head, had to get attacked at the gym--

“No, I’m afraid not. I found blood at the kitchenette, hear where Ms. Newland was unconscious”

“So Lala was attacked there first?” Libra couldn’t disagree, he had seen the blood too.

“Or murdered at the kitchenette instead of the gym—“ Rex had started to say, only to get interrupted when Gwen, who had been watching Rex gesticulate, narrowed her eyes, getting off her podium and coming close to take a look at Rex’s hand.

“What’s this?” she grabbed Rex by the wrist and pressed, making him extend the fingers.

“What, what did I—wait...” now that he took a look at his hand...there was a bruise on his fingertips? Wait, no, not a bruise. Gwen rubbed the fingertips, examining the residue that got onto her fingers.

“This is makeup”

“Makeup? I’m not wearing makeup right now”

“I can tell you aren’t” Gwen said, as if it wasn’t obvious to anyone looking at Rex’s face that no, he wasn’t wearing any make-up, much less one that’d leave that sort of purple powder on his fingertips. “What have you been touching?”

“I was at the gym all the time”

“Don’t look at me, I got nothing” Simon extended his hands, separating the fingers to let everyone see that no, there wasn’t any residues on them. “The costume wasn’t dirty”

“What exactly did you touch at the gym, Rex?” Emma asked. At least he wasn’t getting blamed for the murder! For now, at least.

Feeling everyone’s stares, Rex tried to recount everything he did at the gym. “—the bat, and then once they got that helmet off I checked the body—“

“The body with all those bruises” Simon crossed his arms. It seemed he had figured out already what was up with that and was waiting for Rex to catch up, which he did after a moment. Closing his fist while realization dawned upon him, Rex shook his head.

“You kidding me? This is...”

“Those bruises probably are just make-up...!” Casey piped up. “Was Lala swollen at all?”

“No, I didn’t see anything like that”

“Then it was all fake. She didn’t get beaten up”

“Hold on, then what was all that blood? It must have come from somewhere! If it’s not Lala’s blood, then whose blood is it?” Parker asked. “It wasn’t from the infirmary, Casey and I checked that place”

“But that’s not the only place to get blood from – if you count fake blood too” Casey said. Fake blood? When asked to explain, she looked around, trying to locate a vent. “Have any of you gotten these funky blood capsules from the clown?”

“Blood capsules...?” Ruby’s eyes widened. “Then that piece I found in Lala’s mouth--!”

“The killer must have broken one in there and missed a piece. They’re trying really hard to make us think she got beaten up with that bat”

“Okay, we solved the big mystery!” Gwen extended her hands upwards, mimicking how they said Lala had been found. “The killer tied her up by the wrists, and then smeared all that make-up. And right after that they killed her!”

“Killed her how? Stabbing her with the scalpel?” oh, right! With how thin such a blade is you’d have to hit an artery to cause any significant damage, Casey said. Even more than that, she pointed out: “Rex said there was a band-aid on her neck, right where a main artery would be at!”

Ruby hit her open palm with her fist, following along: “The killer took their time and stabbed her right on the neck after stringing her up!”

“But the scalpel was at the kitchenette” Columbo pointed out.

“Then the killer dropped it when they went to attack Marissa”

“I also didn’t see that much blood at the gym. If it was an artery there’d be a lot—“

Columbo nodded. “That towel did it. You soak all the blood coming from the artery with that towel, keeping everything else more or less clean”

“But you know what? That seems a little too straightforward. The format of this extra case leaves room for twists and turns. Some sort of small hint that will lead us to the next phase of the plot”

Simon stared at Gwen in silence for a moment, groaned, and facepalmed. “Leaving aside the nonsense she just said, she’s right. Look, we’re all supposing she died while she was strung up at the gym”

“That’s how it’s got to be. You caught something that proves she didn’t die at the gym?” Rex asked. They were at the gym, maybe they saw something.

“We found blood at the kitchenette” Libra reminded them.

“I know you did, but it’s not enough. It could be more fake blood. Come on, something that could help with this, any ideas?” Simon insisted.

Silence. There had to be something, that was for sure. Had the three checking the body missed something? Or maybe they just hadn’t realized yet how to interpret the proof? Rex tried to remember, picturing the gym in his head, but...nothing came to mind. Fuck, try harder!

“Hey...Rex...” Emma turned her head towards him. “How was that neck wound like...?”

“I didn’t look at it, all I saw was the bandaid and the blood. I couldn’t even tell if it was fake blood”

“How did it look?” Casey asked. Maybe the local EMT could tell, just from hearing about it.

“I dunno. Red? Drippy? And—“ Rex thought for a moment and frowned. “Wait, no, there was something weird” he traced a finger from the side of his neck to the back of the head. “The blood was going like this. It was kinda dry, but I’m sure it was like this”

“That doesn’t make any sense. It’d be dripping down her neck and into the suit” Ruby said.

“Well, yeah, unless she wasn’t strung from the ceiling” Rex explained. “If she was lying down when she got stabbed in the neck then all the blood would go down like that”

“What if the killer had the towel right under Lala’s head, so all the blood would flow on it?” Casey proposed.

Marissa sure had things to say about that: “Why bother, though? Seriously, why go through all the trouble of killing her with the scalpel, then stringing her up like that?”

“To make us all think she died by getting hit with the bat so many times”

“Why?” she insisted.

“Well...” Casey thought. Why, indeed. “They even put bruises all over her face. It’s like they tried to make it look like it was a way more violent death than it actually was”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. You bleed out easily once an artery is compromised. That’s a painless death – more than getting hit with a baseball bat”

“So the killer is someone who wouldn’t want to give their victim a violent death“ Ruby started. Sounded about right! But it wasn’t like anyone would come out and say they’d have killed Lala was more violently than a relatively peaceful death like that one.

“Casey didn’t do it” Rex declared. “She wouldn’t have to check a book to know where to poke her—“ Whatever Rex was trying to say got forgotten when Marissa suddenly let out a scream of realization, eyes wide open and hands covering her mouth. “Mars?”

“I remember! I remembered what happened!”

“Don’t force your memory. Calm down and tell us what you remember” Libra encouraged, hopeful that, thanks to Marissa’s testimony, the case could be closed right away.

It was pretty obvious she was trying very hard to come up with the right words to talk, because when she spoke she did it slowly, trying to get her ideas in order. “So...I was there at the kitchenette, making tea for myself. It was getting ready, and then I heard someone else come. Lala, Lala was there”

“Lala?” Rin didn’t seem like he had expected that name to pop up.

Marissa nodded. “Yeah, her. I asked if she wanted tea, so I served two cups. I grabbed them, and I turned around to give one to her, and she...she tased me!”

“You kidding? Lala attacked you?” Casey tried to confirm. Marissa couldn’t even bring herself to say anything else, she merely nodded. “So...what happened first was Marissa getting attacked, then Lala died? Why would Lala do that?”

“Lala may have been the one who took the costume from Marissa’s room” Rin said. “I don’t see why else anyone would try to get into Marissa’s room in the first place”

“Take a shower in someone else’s room?” Gwen said and shrugged. Once again Simon stared at her, not understanding what was up with the random-looking comment, shook his head, and asked everyone:

“Why would Lala want that old costume?”

“Consider she may not have wanted it for herself. It doesn’t fit her” Columbo pointed out.

“That’s true. In that case...how about a third party?” Rex proposed. “Someone got her to tase Mare and steal her costume, and then murdered Lala to keep her quiet—“

Libra gently interrupted him: “The blood points she died in the kitchenette. The culprit must have asked her to bring the costume, and then proceeded to kill her immediately”

“Right, that’s it” Parker agreed. “Once she was down the killer put the towel under her neck and stabbed her, and let her bleed out. Simple—“

A sudden knocking noise stopped all discussion on its tracks! Looking at the source of the sound, they saw Avenger, a fist having slammed onto the top of his podium. Having gotten everyone’s attention, he stood up straight, clearly starting to lose his patience. “I had enough of this nonsense”

“Count? Did you think of something?” Rin inquired. Avenger crossed his arms, pointing out a flaw in the reasoning everyone was working on:

“You all think Lala went to the room, stole the costume, and took it to the kitchenette, where she got killed”

“That’s pretty much it!” Emma reaffirmed.

“Then after the murder this third party dragged her to the gym and set her dead body there. Is that really your logic? Do you all seriously not realize how little sense it makes?”

“I’m...not sure what you mean, Count” Marissa said. Others did, though:

Parker stared at her nails for a moment, thinking it all over again. “...yeah, it’s weird. Why wouldn’t the killer tell Lala to bring the costume to the gym and then kill her there?”

“That’s true. It’d be easier to catch you if you spent so much time going back and forth” Libra agreed. “Lala did die shortly before we found her. We probably got part of the timeline wrong”

“Then what part--?”

“You” Avenger faced Marissa. “Have you told the truth?”

Marissa nodded immediately. “Obviously”

“I’m not convinced”

“What are you implying?” Rex asked immediately. This guy had the gall of implying Marissa was lying! As if it wasn’t enough she got attacked and her stuff stolen, now someone was insinuating she was a liar as well.

Rex wasn’t the only one who had objections about it, though. Parker had stuff to say as well. “Marissa wouldn’t kill anyone! Especially not someone like Lala”

It was useless to argue, though. Avenger had already chosen his target and wouldn’t let go until either he was proven right, or his argument got destroyed. Glaring at her like he was daring Marissa to lie to his face, he demanded to know: “Where do you keep your costume?”

“In my closet, obviously. I can’t have it anywhere else”

“So it’s not hidden at all”

“It’s not like it bothered me anymore Majima could see it. I wore it several times before...you know.” Before Majima died. He knew full well she was a supervillain. Who in this entire space station wasn’t aware of that?

“I find it rather strange your room was so orderly”

“Care to explain what you mean?” Columbo prompted, although...judging by his face, he already had a pretty good idea of what the Count’s point was.

Avenger grinned nastily. “Someone who had never been in Marissa’s room knew where exactly to find her costume? Without leaving even a single thing out of place?”

Marissa’s eyes widened when she realized what Avenger was implying: it was an outright accusation that no, it hadn’t been Lala who entered Marissa’s room to get the costume. “That...does make some sense” she conceded and, after a pause, dared to ask: “Then who was it? Her killer?”

“I don’t rule that out. Regardless of if you’re the killer or not, I think it’s more likely you were the one to get your costume”

“This is stupid. Why would Marissa go get her costume to give it to anyone?” Rex challenged. His immediate reaction wasn’t to suspect Marissa in the slightest, it was to challenge the accusation. Marissa herself frowned slowly with irritation, but didn’t look at Avenger when she replied.

“I think he’s implying I had shady reasons to do that”

“Shady like what?” Avenger asked, although judging by his tone there was only one thing it could be. Marissa said it bluntly:

“Shady like murder”

“You...you think she’s the killer?” Emma asked to confirm. The harsh stare Avenger kept directing at Marissa said it quite eloquently: his theory was that Marissa was being a dirty liar, trying to confuse them to get away with her crime. Marissa couldn’t hold the stare, though, she looked anywhere except at Avenger.

“I’m not”

“Wait, now that he mentions it, I was feeling something was off about all Marissa said there. You know, about getting attacked” Ruby said. When asked to give more details about what she meant, though, she seemed unable to put her finger on what it was. “I just dunno!”

“Marissa, just say everything again” Simon requested.

“If it’ll make this end...” Marissa sighed and started over again.

She recounted everything she had said, starting with how she went to make herself some tea, heard Lala coming in, made a second cup for Lala, and offered it to her before Lala tased her and presumably stole the costume. It didn’t sound like anything was off, but Avenger’s expression still was full of suspicion, ready to pounce on anything that was even remotely suspicious! Among it all, though...Gwen was the one to catch onto a bit of an odd detail:

“Why would Lala leave the taser there?”

“That’s true” Rin seemed to be in agreement! “I don’t see why Lala would drop the taser right by Marissa after using it. It’d make more sense if we had found it on her”

Marissa shook her head. “How do you expect me to now? I fell unconscious right away—“

“You were passing her the tea?”

“How many times do I have to say it?” That was a yes: she had the cups in her hands when she was tased.

Libra nodded. “We did find her amidst the cups and the spilled tea”

“Did she break anything?” Gwen asked.

“No. Everything was intact, albeit spilled”

“The cups and cutlery in that kitchenette are quite mediocre. If you were to sell them the offers you’d get would be dismal” Columbo said. “I found odd neither of the cups was even chipped from the impact”

Parker blinked. She didn’t seem to want to consider it, but she said it anyway: Then what? Did someone just put the cups on the floor or something”

“But if that happened then it had to be Marissa!” Ruby exclaimed, looking at Marissa. She still insisted in not looking at anyone, this time choosing to stare at the floor like it was the most interesting thing ever!

“Fuck...fuck!” for a brief moment, just for a fleeting moment, Rex considered that maybe...maybe there was something odd about Marissa’s tale. He inhaled sharply through his teeth, clenching his jaws and trying to stay calm, to be accepting of the theories everyone was presenting even if they were accusing a friend of murdering someone! “What about she getting tased? You think she was faking it or what?!”

“She can’t have been faking it. I lifted her body myself” Columbo did say. Even though he clearly suspected Marissa of some sort of wrongdoing at least he wasn’t lying about the things he saw!

“Marissa got attacked with that taser. As long as that stands—“ Libra had started to say, arguing on Marissa’s behalf, but he didn’t finish saying his argument before Gwen interrupted him, already with a solution to that minor conundrum:

“What if she tased herself? The taser was near where she was unconscious”

“You really think she’d do that?” Parker also didn’t seem to want to consider such a possibility!

Rin nodded. “It’d get her out of trying to take the costume off the body. It’d also give her somewhat of an alibi if she managed to convince us she was unconscious before Lala died”

Marissa finally turned her head. Usually, although she’d distant, she was never hostile – but now she was looking at Rin like she wanted to burn him to cinders! “Come on! Why would I disguise Lala with my own costume? That’d be like hanging a sign from her neck saying I did it!”

“Fair point. Would you be stupid enough to try to disguise her without a good reason?” Avenger seemed to concede. If it brought Marissa any hope he was starting to change his mind those hopes were dashed when he clarified, defiantly strengthening his argument. “I can only conclude you did have a good reason. Why did you have to disguise her with your own costume?”

“You tell me!”

As much as he’d have preferred not to, Rex forced himself to admit, if only because he hoped that somehow, perhaps by some miracle, this would lead to Marissa getting proven innocent! “We almost didn’t manage to break through the costume. If we hadn’t we wouldn’t have been able to figure out a few things—“

“There you have it” Avenger said. “You used your costume because you wanted to lock up the dead body in something others wouldn’t be able to get through. Unfortunately for you and your murderous scheme, the costume was breached right in the nick of time, and valuable information was obtained! Your gambit almost worked!”

Parker also seemed to have some trouble getting the words out but she did it anyway: “So because she knew we’d wonder why the dead body had her costume she—“

“You think I set a scene where I could say someone came and was able to steal my costume“ Marissa concluded coldly, much to Avenger’s satisfaction. That was precisely what he had been about to say!

For a moment Marissa stood behind her podium with her arms crossed. Of course she was profoundly unhappy this argument was being brought! That they thought she was the culprit, and then tased herself! She, quite clearly considering what to say, chewed on the many thoughts she could use to counter it, finally settling on something, albeit reluctantly:

“Fine. I’ll concede one or two points seem a little off, but you know what? It’s all circumstantial”

“Circumstantial? Seriously?” Parker didn’t seem terribly convinced!

“You say I’m the one who got the costume out of my room and tossed the ID around. Can you prove Lala or literally anyone else didn’t take the ID while I was unconscious? Because I was truly unconscious, you all heard that already.” True. They had no hard proof of that. “You say I tased myself. Can you prove I did? Just because the taser was near where I was...can you prove it wasn’t placed there after I got tased?” Another thing they had no proof about. “You say the cups were too intact despite me dropping them when I got tased. Can you prove they wouldn’t have stayed intact? That’s conjecture” Certainly didn’t have proof about that either. “And all this implies I’m the one who attacked Lala, set her up like that in the gym, and then returned to the kitchen to prepare myself to be found. Is there literally anything about the murder that proves I was involved in any way?”

Silence. Marissa was right. There was just no proof at all! No proof she had any involvement in the murder! Every little bit of proof they could try to use against her was purely circumstantial, backed by a theory instead of by proof that’d lead to a real conviction. There wasn’t a shred of genuine, hard evidence they could use and say ‘this here shows you’re the killer!’

Without hard proof...they could vote for her, but there always was going to be the possibility they were wrong. They’d be staking their lives on a heap of circumstances!

“There” said Marissa. She took a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down. “You shouldn’t vote for me. I know things look suspicious, but all I have told is the truth. If you ignore it just because of this strange theory all that will happen is that we’ll all die! So let’s try to focus back on what we can do instead of trying to make things fit with me as the killer!”

They were at an impasse. Without proof, they could only make further suppositions, but they’d be unable to point the finger at Marissa – or at anyone – with certainty. Were they willing to stake their lives on this particular gamble? Was it even worth a try?

Amidst the tense atmosphere, one voice cut it like a knife:

“Ah, one more thing, Ms. Newland” said Columbo. “I have known you for a while but I think you’re not the sort of person that’d kill without a reason anyway. There’s suspicion on you, but none of it matters if you don’t have a motive. I just thought that was something we hadn’t discussed yet is all”

Simon looked at him with some confusion. “The motive? You mean losing control over your power?”

“That was Team Dazzle’s penalty. Is that really enough to make Marissa go murder anybody?”

Ironically, though, it seemed Columbo bringing that up did make a select few reconsider things once again from a new angle – at least that was what happened with Libra. “Marissa’s power is to create a sun. If that power went out of control we could all be in serious danger”

True! That was her power! Marissa was a little too quick to respond, and when she did it was only to try to stamp out such a theory: “I already told you I had high fever!” she said to Columbo.

“You did. But that doesn’t mean that was the extent of Jack’s effect on you”

“The exte—what are you suggesting?”

“Wait...!” Emma remembered it: “The burn marks in the biodome! That wall was so burned! What if Marissa did that with a sun?”

“You really think I went to the biodome to try to burn a wall down or something?!” even though Marissa tried to sound like she was in disbelief a small tic on her eye hinted she was a little too on edge due to this whole sudden argument.

“No, not really, but if you lost control of a sun maybe you kept it up there and then...” Emma doubted her train of thought for just a second, but brought it to the station anyway: “...then you went to kill someone before the sun killed us all”

“Wait, then that’d mean Marissa’s motive was to keep her power from killing us all!” Simon realized. That did seem to fit Marissa’s temperament more! It was harder to picture her murdering someone for selfish reasons, but if she did so to save everybody’s lives then...that was far more plausible!

It didn’t change what the end result would be – execution – but it was a possibility they hadn’t considered!

“Were you trying to save us?” Rin asked bluntly. Marissa clutched her arms, her fingers digging into her skin. Even though she didn’t say a word it was obvious this enquiry was making her quite distressed!

“A drastic measure for a drastic situation. It’s not going to make anyone want to sacrifice all of our lives for yours, but it’d do you good to confess if this is accurate” Avenger suggested. Even though he had been pursuing the culprit with some ardor, now that there was a more solid line of enquiry – relatively speaking – he had softened his stance a little bit.

They waited. They waited to see if Marissa would confess, if she would accept that yeah, she perhaps had gone and committed murder to spare everybody from a horrible death in a sun. Marissa emitted a strange whine, terrified and conflicted, but when she spoke it was as certain as usual:

“I admit nothing”

“Marissa! That’s not a confession!” Gwen protested. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go!

“I didn’t kill Lala. I didn’t lose control of my power. Anything you think happened...it’s just conjecture. You have no proof”

“Even after all this you keep saying there’s nothing!” Rin sure seemed to start being on the verge of losing his patience!

Marissa, similarly on wits’ end, faced everyone, furious: “That’s because there’s nothing! Come on, are we going to throw all of our lives away like this?!”

It was pointless. Marissa simply refused to listen to anything that wasn’t solid, hard proof of some sort of action related to the murder. But maybe...just maybe...

...if they could prove that she had been involved in the murder, or that she had a motive – and therefore plausibly would be pushed to commit murder – then perhaps she’d give up?

“Marissa...when was the last time you went to the biodome?” Simon asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Just answer”

Marissa played with her hair for a moment, apparently thinking it for a bit before giving her answer: “When it opened. Why?”

Gwen gasped, pleased. “Ooooh, I get it! If the sun was in the biodome before and we can prove Marissa was there that could be enough to turn the case around!”

“That’s about right. How will we prove that?” Columbo asked. Did he already think of an answer? Still, once Gwen had said that, Marissa seemed to get even more tense, staring down at her podium with restrained fury.

Avenger sure seemed to be on the same wavelength than Columbo on this regard, at least! “The biodome is full of all sorts of plants, right at the entrance. Marissa, show us your shoes”

“My...my shoes...?” Marissa muttered.

“It’s a long chance, but if we find anything that could come from the biodome that’d prove you lied. And this time? It’d be hard proof”

“If she lied then it’d be proof she has something to hide. At a time like this...” Simon started, his thought completed by Ruby:

“...it probably is the murder”

Marissa didn’t comply. She froze, eyes hidden by her hair, probably trying to think of a way to get out of risking getting caught. Did she even know if there was proof on her shoes or not? Could it be she was trying to sneak surreptitious glances at her shoes?

“Mare. Marissa” Rex tried to get her attention. He was right on the line between demanding her to do it already and begging her to comply. Marissa looked up. “Just show your shoes. Please”

Marissa exhaled. A minute passed while she considered refusing further, or perhaps tried to figure out if there was anything on her shoe, but in the end there was no way to know unless she cooperated, no? Even her hesitation was making her look guilty. If she said no, they probably would take that as a sign she knew there was enough to indict her.

“...fine” Marissa, with surprising balance, managed to get her leg on the podium, showing the sole of her shoe to everyone. She could see anything – she didn’t know if there was proof on her shoes or not – but everybody else sure could:

Sand. There was wet sand caked on the crevices of her shoes. Only one place it could have come from: the beach in the biodome. Emma, seeing the sand, gasped and looked at her own shoe, confirming that yes, she had sand stuck on her shoe as well.

“I think it’s the same!”

“Mare, that sand should be dry by now. You shouldn’t even have some there. If you have some and it still is wet...” Rex hated having to admit it, but he had to. “...then you were there recently. It was raining in there”

“Unless you can suggest any other explanation?” Parker prompted. Her face was unforgiving, but maybe part of her hoped she’d be able to come up with a suitable explanation?

It didn’t come, though. Instead, Marissa lowered her foot, staring at the bits of sand that had fallen on the surface of her podium when she got her shoe up there.

“...fine. I...I admit it.” Marissa sighed. “I killed her”

“Marissa!”

“Were we right? Did you lose control over a sun?” Simon asked.

Marissa nodded slowly. “Yes. That’s exactly what happened. I just...

...it started on Tuesday”

-ooooo-

It really started as fever! For a while Marissa had hoped that was the whole thing, that it wouldn’t get any worse, but...it wasn’t fated to continue like that. Late on Tuesday, while she was out there, her power was officially out of control:

A sun popped up in front of her. Marissa had just been walking, woozy from her fever, when the sun appeared. As soon as it did she felt it: the heat, the way it illuminated the surroundings. She knew it was a genuine sun! And what was more...

If...if she wasn’t mistaken...it was growing, drawing from her power. Just a little bit, slow enough for her to not see the growth – not that she could see it. Looking at the sun was pretty painful! If it kept growing, if it turned large enough to damage the walls and break through it all...

...their lives would be in danger. Marissa tried to make the sun move, finding it was possible. Good! At least that part of her power was still working. At what rate was it growing?

...

...maybe...someone else would kill. Maybe she wouldn’t have to do it. But what to do with the sun in the meantime? She needed to extinguish the sun somehow, there had to be a way! The pool? No, wait, that’d...that could be dangerous. Besides, if the sun proved too intense then the level of water would go down way too quickly, people would figure out what was happening. She needed more water than that--!

The ocean. The ocean in the biodome.

Turns out she was right: the sun was growing. The more it grew, the more effects it had on the surroundings.

The ocean hadn’t been enough to extinguish the sun. Instead, once it grew more, steam rose from the boiling water, filling the biodome with vapor. Still, it seemed her hunch had been right: the system kept filling the ocean to replace the water that evaporated, keeping a steady amount of water surrounding it. She wasn’t sure if it was enough to keep it all contained for a while, but it probably was helping!

She hoped so, at least.

On Thursday there was the sign it wasn’t: the heat of the sun, the strain of the very high temperature...it all destroyed the bottom of the ocean, breaking through until water seeped into the space between floors, pooling right on the ceiling of the floor below. More and more water flowed, several tons piling there, until the ceiling broke enough for some of the water to splash through. Marissa didn’t see it herself, but she sure heard about it. That night she went to sleep, hoping by the morning someone would be dead. It was horrible to wish for a death, but...if one didn’t happen, then everybody would die anyway!

All she got was an uneasy night of sleep. Marissa woke up early on Friday, about an hour before six AM. Morosely and fearful of what she’d find, Marissa moved to the elevator, finding Lala along the way.

“I guess we should get started and search for a dead body” Marissa had said. She had to make sure there was someone dead somewhere. Probably should go check the biodome, see if anything had changed. Having arranged with Lala the places to search, Marissa made way towards the biodome.

It was as she had feared. The sun was still there. She still couldn’t make it go away. Nobody had died! And it kept growing, it was starting to get way too large! By her calculations...it would be about a couple hours until there was a catastrophic failure! She was running out of time!

There was no choice anymore: she had to kill.

-oooooo-

“So I made tea. Once Lala finished checking the places we agreed to check I offered her tea. She was so happy nobody had died, and I think that’s what made her lower her guard. She must have though it meant we were all safe” Marissa had her elbows on her podium, resting her forehead on the palms of her hands. “I left the cups on the counter and...when she got careless even for a moment, I..I attacked her with the taser. I knocked her out”

“Then you killed her” Avenger said dryly.

“...yes. During the search for a body I passed by the library and the infirmary. I got the supplies from over there, and I went back to my room to get the fake blood capsules. When Lala got to the kitchenette I was already prepared to kill her, so I...I went ahead. I tased her, I hit with the scalpel right onto her neck and let her bleed out. And once I confirmed she was dead I just...” Marissa looked up. Her eyes looked so sad, so resigned. “...I ran back to the biodome. I got there and saw the sun was gone. The danger was completely gone”

“You left Lala’s body lying there in the kitchenette?”

“I did. I don’t know how long it was before I returned to get it, but I guess I was away for a bit too long.” It explained why the blood had seeped through the towel until it stained the floor over there, at least. “Everything else is as you all guessed it. The reasons, the way I did it...it really was like you guessed. Once I made sure Lala’s body was dressed with my costume I returned to the kitchenette, I left the cups on the floor and turned them over, and just...” she mimicked the motions to apply the taser on her own arm “I tased myself”

That was it. Turned out that their circumstantial proof had been correct after all. It still hadn’t been hard proof, but it had been accurate enough perhaps they could have staked their votes on it after all. Now there was no doubt: Marissa had finally confessed, accepted responsibility for her actions. All that remained...was to vote.

Well, no. “I don’t get it” Rex said.

“What don’t you get’” Avenger asked. In his opinion it was all as straightforward as it seemed! Rex got off his podium, starting to approach Marissa’s, looking at her like he hoped she’d suddenly say she had been joking or something!

“All that is because she wanted to save us! She killed someone so the sun wouldn’t! Then why...I don’t get it!” he got to the podium and shouted at her: “Why was all this bullshit what someone would do to try to get away with the murder?!”

Marissa looked up. “Because it’s what I was trying to do. I wanted to get away with it”

“Why?! Just say it straight, Marissa!”

The culprit tightened her fists, took a deep breath, and finally admitted the crux of her reasoning, the reason why she had tried to get away with murder:

“Because I gave up. Rex, you have been great, but I don’t think you...you’ll understand”

“Try me!”

Marissa looked right at everyone. “It’s my secret: I’m a survivor of the Simurgh. None of you know what it means, but...it means we’re doomed.

The Simurgh is a thing that can see far into the future. She turns the survivors of her attacks into timebombs! Into people that, in the future, will cause enough disgraces and horrors to bring destruction and death in even greater numbers! People have turned into serial killers because of her engineering, supervillains of international notoriety emerge, others kill heroes in pivotal moments that lead to widespread destruction! And...

...I’m a survivor of an attack by the Simurgh. I’m a walking timebomb”

She stared into the distance.

“I thought maybe it was all over when Noelle died. We, the Travelers, had brought so much death wherever we went. We fulfilled our roles as Simurgh thralls, even though we tried to avoid it as much as possible. It’s pointless, though...the Simurgh sees everything. She sees every possibility and sets you on the path she wants to.

That’s what I understood when I woke up today: this must be something the Simurgh foresaw”

“You think this Simurgh set you to kill us all here?” Rex asked, trying to understand as much as possible.

“Rex, this could only end in three ways:

I could do nothing. The sun my power caused would break the space station and we’d all die. My power would have brought the destruction, and...that’d fulfill the Simurgh’s plan for me. I’d have caused deaths, and there wasn’t even a guarantee the sun would go away. What if it kept growing and destroying? It could happen, right?

I could kill someone and get away with it. It’d mean I...I caused everyone’s deaths. I’d have fulfilled the Simurgh’s plan for me, destroying all of you and enabling Jack’s plan, whatever it is. I’d brought doom to everything...

...or I could kill and get caught. It’d mean...it’d mean I was wrong” for a moment Marissa’s composure broke, she forced herself to continue: “It’d mean the Simurgh’s plan for me ended back when I killed Noelle and...it’d mean...I’d die. I’d have a pointless death. My life would be over”

“Mare...”

“And that’s how this ends!” she suddenly shouted. “I’m going to die! I killed Lala to stop the sun, and...and now...I’m going to die because I had no other choice! How is this fair?! What did I do to deserve any of this?!” she messed with her hair, ranting and venting, fed up with botting it up inside:

“I didn’t ask to be a supervillain! I didn’t ask for some fucking messed up thing to pluck me out of my world and set me on this path! I didn’t ask to get involved in this killing game! Why?! Why did this have to happen to me?!”

That was all she wanted to know.

Instead all she got was a pointless death. Instead she was forced to betray everyone. Instead she gave up and surrendered to the Simurgh’s plans. Whatever happens, happens. She was going to fall headfirst into the Simurgh’s machinations and be whatever she had intended Sundancer to be.

But no. Instead she was going to die.

Such a pointless life.