Morix: Web of Mistrust

Turnabout Masquerade, Part 6

November 21

Courtroom No. 6

10:30 AM

Victoria von Graye

It didn't take too long for Ms. Lesa to take her place behind the witness stand, but she looked just as distant and impossible to read as she had the day before. In fact, everything about her was difficult to understand. Her eyes had gone glassy, and I could tell that she was struggling to keep herself grounded in the chaos of the courtroom. The various eyes on her from the gallery seemed to make her nervous, and she couldn't stop fidgeting with the hem of her clothing as soon as she had started. 

The most curious part about her general appearance was how her hood remained up. Even in the formal environment, she managed to find a way to keep the upper half of her face hidden. I couldn't help but wonder what her motives behind such could have been, but I figured that it was best for me to not question it. She must have had a reason, and I wasn't going to poke the bear too hard to try and figure out what was going on. 

"Please state your name and occupation for the court," Judge Diaphan instructed. She seemed to notice that there was something off about Ms. Lesa the same way that I had, though I doubted that she was able to place it. There was simply something strange about Ms. Lesa that seemed to have all of us feeling like something was off, but even if we couldn't quite identify the source, the sensation was more than enough to leave us curious about what to do next. 

"I'm Razi Lesa... That's what I've been going by for now, anyways," Ms. Lesa remarked, shrugging to herself. She didn't seem to mind that she sounded so detached and uncaring. In fact, there was almost something deliberate about the way that she was speaking. "I don't know what my job is. I don't know much of anything about myself, as a matter of fact. I'm here now though, so... I guess that means something."

"What are you talking about?" Judge Diaphan questioned. She didn't look at Ms. Lesa when she posed the question, instead choosing to direct it towards the prosecution. She waited expectantly for an answer. 

Luckily for her, Prosecutor Burke was more than happy to provide it. "We found out yesterday that the witness is currently suffering from amnesia," she explained. "We don't know for sure what could have happened to her, but she has severe memory loss and doesn't remember anything that took place up until the time before the crime. It's unfortunate, but there's not much that we can do to work around it."

"Razi Lesa is simply the placeholder name I've been using until I can figure out who I actually am," Ms. Lesa explained. She gave a small shrug of her shoulders, but the motion was jerky and unfocused. "I don't know if I'll ever find the answers that I'm looking for, but that doesn't matter much right now."

"She's going to testify for the court about what she saw regardless of if she remembers the past or not," Chief Prosecutor Bespoke continued. "Even if there are doubts about the past, she's going to do her best to tell us about the case in question. She doesn't seem to have many questions about what could have happened involving the crime, and we don't have any other witnesses to listen to about what happened the day of the crime. We're going to do what we can to factor in her words to our current explanation of events. Believe me when I say that we've already measured the risks of having her testify, and we think that it's certainly for the best that we at least hear her out regarding what she believes to have seen."

Judge Diaphan hesitated before nodding. "I understand," she said after a long pause that seemed to hang in the air for a thousand years. "If you were truly present at the scene of the crime, then please explain to us what could have happened at the time of the crime as far as you are aware."