And I'd promise you anything for another shot at life [W3, post-investigation]

[zerotohiro]

[Maybe it's by sheer circumstance that he stumbles to the oasis. Maybe it's not. The point is that the murder's done this week and he's not afraid to wander alone through the jungle. His hood's pulled up and zipped up tight around his frame, shivering even with the tropical climate in play.

It takes time, but he gets to the oasis and spots his target seated near the edge away from everything, and he carefully steps over to him before having a seat.

The waterfall's louder than he remembers and he doesn't quite look at him...but he's also sort of shifting to lean against him and his one good arm.]

I'm...[That's all he has to say at first, because "I'm sorry" might come off wrong. He's sorry for a few reasons, but.] ...hey.

Comments

[alienated]

[At least, now that there aren't so many people crowding in on him at once, he doesn't flinch away from Hiro leaning into his space. Instead, he just kind of curls into himself, one knee pressed against his chest while the other lays outstretched before him. He desperately wants to go home to the castle ship, back to where Shiro and the team are waiting for him, but... that seems light years away right now.

Carefully as if not to further aggravate his neck (like that's going to matter), he looks at Hiro.]

... Hey.

[zerotohiro]

...we still have a trial tomorrow. Maybe if we figure everything out, we can stop this. We can fix it. [There are a lot of things on his mind that he thinks Keith should hear, but that's the first and foremost. How do you comfort someone who knows they're going to die? Maybe this is worse than just dying.]

We have some time.

[alienated]

... Yeah.

[Stop this, fix this... That would be nice. He doesn't want to die, not really, but. At the same time, his life isn't that valuable. He's not more important than a cause, and someone can always replace him. Hayner — he doesn't deserve to die, either, he knows that.]

Don't lose focus of tomorrow's trial, Hiro. Remember we only have nine hours to make a choice.

[zerotohiro]

I'm not going to. I already know where I'm going to start tomorrow and if nobody argues maybe that'll help us get closer to solving this. [He frowns lightly.]

But you can't give up yet either. Okay? Don't be like what happened last week.

[alienated]

I'm not giving up. [There it is; that will to fight he's had for the past three weeks.] But I'm not letting this be like the last week. There are more important matters at hand. What'll happen to me can't take time away from finding the killers.

[If they could still vote for the deceased partner he would 100% offer himself up, but... that's no longer on the table.]

Tell me your plan. Where are you going to start off tomorrow?

[zerotohiro]

[There's a solid nod.] Good. We'll get you out of this somehow.

[There's a little pause before:] I'm asking the Chiefs what role Lelouch might have had that painted the target on his back in the first place. And from there, we start narrowing down who he might have spoken to one on one.

[alienated]

["Don't be too disappointed if you can't," is on the tip of his tongue. He wonders if it counts as giving up if it's for the sake of sparing someone else's feelings? Optimism is nice and all, but every mission comes a chance of failure.]

You think Lelouch had a role? [He did not. Actually consider that.] I thought he might have gotten targeted for being one of the suspects last week.

[Some people pushed hard for him last week... but then again, Lelouch seemed pretty paranoid when he last spoke to him. Did he already suspect he would be killed?]

[zerotohiro]

["Can't" isn't really a word in his vocabulary anyway.]

It's a theory I'm working with, yeah. I...there are some things maybe you should know. [He's shifting so he can face Keith better and he doesn't have to turn his head so much.]

I don't know what role he might have had, but even if it wasn't an official role or anything, I think Lelouch was looking for the people responsible for the murders on his own. He approached Yona about it a little while ago, Yona approached me. Said that Lelouch had an easier time reading her than reading me.

When I talked to Lelouch yesterday, he seemed...pretty confident about some things. Clearing some people. He backed stuff with fact and pointing out that a lot of people suddenly would need an accomplice to finish the job, but now I wonder if maybe there was something else.

Either way. Even if it wasn't official...I kind of wonder if someone knew what he was doing and killed him to get him out of the way. If he was really onto something by weeding people out.

[alienated]

So that's why you want to know who he spoke to one on one.

[It's just their luck that someone would shank the one person who may have been onto something. All they've really done is take no steps forward, and a dozen back.]

Only problem with that is people will lie. Either about talking to him, or about what they talked about. We could take a look at the ones who say they didn't talk to him, but that doesn't account for them being just honest enough to not look suspicious.

[zerotohiro]

Yes. Even if he didn't have a role, I want to know who else knew he was looking into stuff. It would give us the best place to start for suspects.

I know people are going to lie, but how do you get people to tell you the truth? How can we read people enough to know when they're being honest and when they're saving their own skin? That's the huge problem and challenge with the game. "Trust." You can't trust most people here.