Morix: Web of Mistrust

Turnabout Live, Part 7

August 7

Lady Bird Studios

3:00 PM

Chrysalis Starr

In the grand scheme of the investigation, it really didn't take us all that long to track down Mr. Gassman. We found him lingering outside the building where the rest of the media-related personnel were, but he wasn't desperately trying to snap pictures of everything. Instead, he was simply rocking back and forth on his feet, waiting for something to pull him out of his trance. At first, he didn't even notice that I had arrived, and it took Felicity tapping him on the shoulder to snap him out of it. He nearly dropped his camera, and the bag on his back shook mightily as he attempted to catch his balance in the seconds that followed. His breathing was heavy in his moment of stress. 

"I didn't see you there!" Mr. Gassman declared in surprise, pressing one hand against his chest while the other held tightly to his camera. "You should have told me that you were coming!" 

"You weren't exactly going to listen to us even if we did say that we were going to talk to you," I pointed out simply. "You looked pretty lost in thought, and I don't know if I would have wanted to poke that bear when there was the danger of you losing it in surprise."

Mr. Gassman hesitated in an attempt to form a cohesive response, but he gave up a moment and let out a sigh. "You can be a bit prickly at times, you know that?" he questioned. I looked away with a frown. I hadn't thought that I was too rude when I approached him, but it seemed that I was wrong. 

"That isn't important right now," Felicity suddenly cut in, placing her hands on her hips. "We were hoping to ask you more about everything that's been happening as of late. We know that you were there when the body was discovered, so you must have seen something during the chaos. Plus, you were recording everything, and we'd like to have access to that video, if it's alright with you."

Mr. Gassman nodded slowly. "Yeah... I guess I was there," he muttered. "It was pretty stressful to see, I have to say. I never would have imagined that someone who seems so kind on television could be responsible for the death of somebody they cared about... He's a talented actor, you know. He could just be pretending that none of this was his fault when he actually shot the victim."

"How would a sixteen-year-old get his hands on a gun?" I asked. I knew that this wasn't helping my image as someone who was supposedly 'prickly', but I couldn't have cared less. He was the one blaming James, and if he was going to do that, then I thought I had full rights to get snippy after we had already shown in court that he likely wasn't the culprit. 

Mr. Gassman shrugged. "There are lots of ways to get a weapon these days," he pointed out. "Besides, think about it. This set is pretty big... Imagine if he hid the gun somewhere that he knew nobody was going to search through. That would allow him to get away with it all. I bet he's just using you to make sure that he doesn't get caught."

"What makes you so sure that James committed this crime?" Felicity inquired. "You seem to be jumping to a lot of conclusions right now..." 

Mr. Gassman raised his camera and took a picture of the nearby crowd. The flash was enough to temporarily blind me, and I stumbled backwards a foot or so before regaining my balance. I had no idea how James could deal with stuff like that all the time, because after just one photo, I thought I was going to never see again. "I'm part of the media industry. You have to know what makes for a good story in order to make it, and that's not even factoring in the juicy tidbits that you need to get. That's how you draw in your readers."