There's burnt metal scraps, charred asphalt, and blood everywhere.  I wave smoke out of my face, and I hear Iris cough from next to me.  Still, though, there is no sign of Caim himself.  My heartrate is spiking as I frantically scan the area for a short stature, green eyes, freckles... and yet there's nothing.  Where is he?

Somewhere within the demolished airport building, though, I hear a surviving loudspeaker crackle to life, Monokumace's voice distorted by the damage done to the speaker as it echoes around the ruined area.

"A-a b-body ha-a-as been d-discovered-d!"

We discovered Caim's body.  But where?  Deep inside me, I start to understand where.  ...everywhere.

"Oh my god." Iris pulls on his hair anxiously as his lavender eyes scan the area wildly. "Oh my god..."

"What the hell happened?" a voice calls out.  I don't turn around as I hear Will approach, a second set of footsteps following- Zeben's, most likely.

"Holy sh*t," comes Dana's voice as well, and I finally look to see her and Evangeline hurrying over as well.

I feel my handbook buzz in my pocket.  I have to look.  I have to look.  I don't want to, but I have to.  I pull my digital handbook out, take a deep breath, and power it on.

Case Report:

Name of Victim: Cooper Fields

Talent: Ultimate Steampunk Engineer

Time of Death: 1:17 PM

Cause of Death: Explosion

"So that's it, then?  Any evidence is just gone?" Will mumbles, his gaze sweeping over the scene. "What now?  There's nothing to analyze."

"I... I just can't believe this," Evangeline whispers.

"There has to be something, some evidence as to what happened," Zeben insists, taking a step in front of me towards the runway wreckage.

"Everything's destroyed.  No way any cameras survived all that," Dana tells him.

"This... this is all just a big accident, right?" I whisper.

No, that's wrong.  And I know it.

"It wasn't an accident," I say louder, mainly to myself. "Caim would never have made this big of a mistake.  He was the Ultimate Steampunk Engineer."

"So did he do it on purpose... or did someone else sabotage the plane he was working on?" Evangeline questions.

"If only the god damn cameras could tell us," Will grumbles.  He's shaking.

"Boo-hoo!  The cameras broke.  What a shame!" Monokumace suddenly pops out of the remains of the airport.

"Are you here to taunt us?" Dana snaps, narrowing her eyes.

"Nope!  But I could if you want.  It would take longer for me to tell you the big news I have, though," they reply.

"What news?" half of us ask in unison.

The headmaster snickers. "Well, all the camera footage was ruined in the explosion, but the audio saved!"

"Play the damn thing, then!" Will shouts, narrowing his amber eyes and taking a step towards them.

"Calm down," I hear Zeben mutter to him. "Before you get hurt."

Monokumace's head turns vaguely towards the direction of the two, but they don't say anything.  I do see the corners of their mouth twitch even further upwards slightly. 

"Anywho, how's about we go somewhere with better quality loudspeakers?" they suggest. "The marketplace is close by."

They don't wait for an answer before beginning to walk off, leaving the rest of us no choice but to follow.  The image of the bloody splatter, the only surviving remnants of Caim, is still burned into my brain.  I wonder if it was over quickly.  I hope it was, for his sake.  He's not someone I'd ever want to suffer.

"Ahh, the nice feeling of air conditioning on a warm, tropical day!" Monokumace says overenthusiastically as we walk into Rocketpunch Mart. 

"Play it," Will spits through gritted teeth.

"Whoa there, tiger, I'm going!" the dragon-creature snickers as they pull out a small tablet and press a button.

The loudspeakers erupt with sound again, but for once it's not the headmaster's voice.

"Oh, hey!  Could you help me out for a second? I can't really let go of this, otherwise I'll have to completely reposition it again!"

Caim.  It's Caim, saying his last words.  I swallow the lump in my throat but continue listening.

"I just need you to re-connect the wires in the open panel on the side of the plane.  Easy as that!  It'll save me some time."

He wanted help.  Oh my god, he just wanted help.  And then the worst part. 

"Thank you so much!  That really makes my life so much easier right now.  See you around!"

Caim wouldn't live to see them around, whoever they were.

"Hey, it sounds like the audio was cut," Iris points out. "I could hear where it skipped."

"You and your ear for music are right," Monokumace confirms. "I couldn't just give it away though, could I?"

"So it wasn't an accident, then," Dana says quietly. "Whoever that was- whoever Caim asked to fix the wires- sabotaged it, and so when Caim went to test it out..."

"Isn't it funny how one itsy-bitsy mistake could be so deadly?" Monokumace giggles.

"But why would someone purposefully do that to Caim?" Zeben asks.

Nobody responds for a long moment.  Zeben's right; Caim has been the bright spark of light since when we all first woke up on this island.  He's been the enthusiastic one, the one who never got upset with anybody, the one who trusted everyone because he thought of everyone as his friends.  And that got him nowhere but here.  Exploded into microscopic bits.  God, I'd give anything for him to suddenly pop out from behind one of these marketplace shelves and tell us that he's okay and there's nothing to worry about.  Hell, I'd give anything for any of the people we've lost to do that.

...The feeling of despair is so freakin' real right now.

"Well, looks like we're at a dead end!  How's about I give you all five minutes and then we start the trial?" Monokumace doesn't wait for an answer before continuing, "Well, sounds like a plan, then!  See you in five!"

With that, they disappear behind a shelf of energy drinks and are gone, leaving us to stare after them.

"So we're just gonna have to wing it, huh?" Will asks, breaking the silence. I can hear the anxiety in his voice.

"If that's all the evidence we have, then we can only take a shot in the dark," Evangeline frowns. "This won't end well for the majority of us, in that case."

"I don't think it's even been going well for us in the first place," Dana remarks.

Iris is silent, his gaze unfocused as he stares off into the distance. No doubt that he's thinking about the imbalance of this disaster.

"I hate that this is still happening," Zeben says.  He looks sick to his stomach.

"Let's all walk it off, shall we?" Evangeline suggests. "We all split up and just take a walk.  Get fresh air, clear the mind, calm the nerves."

"We just saw the remains of a guy who was blown to smithereens!" Will argues. "What do you mean, 'calm the nerves'?!"

"My point has been proven," the herbologist says.

"Maybe she's right.  If we're really going to have to go into this trial blindly, then we're going to have to be super focused in order to get any idea of what could've happened.  Since there's no evidence to go off of, the only thing we have is our words," Dana explains. "So we should take some time now to collect our thoughts and calm down for the trial."

She's right.  I'll have my mental breakdown later, once the trial's over and there's no need to focus.  I mean, for all I know, I could be dead in an hour if we come to the wrong decision, but at least I won't have to have a mental breakdown.  A part of me wonders what kind of execution I'd have.  Of course, I never want to actually find out, but it's clear that each one is themed after the talent of the blackened.  And as a poet, I have no idea what the hell kind of situation I'd find myself in.  Would I get stabbed with a giant pencil or something?  

...maybe I shouldn't be thinking about my death this much.

I try to think about Caim as I set off down the brick path to take a lap around the island.  What he must've thought as the plane exploded.  If he realized he'd been betrayed by someone he trusted.  If it hurt him.  I'm sure it did.  Maybe even more than the explosion itself.  Exploding is over quickly, and relatively painless if it's immediate.  Betrayal, though... that's harder to recover from.  

I wish I could talk to him one last time.  I wish I could have convinced him to let me help him carry his supplies to the airplane.  And maybe he would've asked me to help with the wiring, and I would've made sure it was done properly.  Then none of this would've happened.  God, why didn't I just help him?  If I'd waited to go find Iris until after that, then I literally could've stopped the whole murder.  If I'd hung out with Sophie while we were all slowly starving to death, Flauros wouldn't have been able to catch her alone and cause the accident.  If I'd woken up and gone to investigate the fallen tree branch with Furfur and Marzy, it would've made Stolas's job harder and maybe we could've caught him in the act before he could actually kill anyone.  So many choices I could've made differently.

A part of me knows that there wasn't anything I could've done, that I couldn't have known that any of that was going to happen.  But I still can't help but feel guilty.  One different choice and maybe I could've saved someone.  ...does that mean I could've possibly died instead?  Like, if Furfur was too deep in sleep to hear the branch and I'd gone out instead, I would've been in her place?

Wow.  Fate and chance are... really weird topics.  No wonder I envy Shakespeare's ability to write them with ease- I wish I could understand it on his level.  For now, though, I guess all that's left to do is see what happens next.  Whether there is time in the future for me to explore the idea of fate.  Or maybe my lifeless body will be discarded within the execution room I'm sentenced to.  God, I'm sweating right now, and it's not just from wearing a thick black hoodie in ninety-degree weather.

So now we come to the question... what do I do?  What do I say?  And what do I choose to do?  I think long and hard for a moment.  I can hear Sophie's laugh in the back of my mind, the determination in her voice as she exposed culprit after culprit.  I then understand.

Sure, there wasn't anything I could've done to save her.

But maybe, with what little power I have, I can try to save everyone else before five innocent lives are destroyed.  

...you know what?  Screw the reference- that's way too much self-confidence for my liking.  

I'll do my best to help, I guess.

There.  That sounds much better.

I take a deep breath as I follow the curve of the path as I wind up at the rope bridge to the center island.  I approach it and reach out, feeling the rough ropes on my palms as I start to walk.  I feel the slight swing of each wooden board beneath my feet as I take step after step.  If this really is my last time outside before I die, if the culprit really does get away with it, then I want to make the most of it.  I want to appreciate one last time how fresh the smell of ocean air is.  I want to feel the breeze ruffling my hair as my sneakers move from wood to dirt and I step onto the central island.  

Well, here goes nothing.  

I approach the escalator up to the elevator and let myself enjoy it, because let's face it, escalators are pretty frickin' cool.  At the top, the elevator doors automatically open for me, and I step inside.  Nothing like the awkwardness of being inside of an elevator, even when you're by yourself.  I guess it's the little things in life, though.  This might be it.  I wish I could've made it to eighteen, but it's not like I didn't do anything worth cherishing.  I became the Ultimate Poet.  

"And that's one tardy for Mr. L'Olonnais!" Monokumace jeers as I enter the courtroom.

Of course, everyone else is already there.  They must've immediately walked over.  I take my place at my podium.

It's now or never.  And I think I'm finally ready for whatever the outcome may be.

***

(2089 words)

ok who did it --->