Let's Steal an Alibi!

Posted on Thu Jul 22nd, 2021 @ 4:20am by Ensign Elegy Nascimento & Petty Officer, 3rd Class Callistus 'CJ' Jackson

Mission: Mission 4 - Eden
Location: Deck G - Temp Security Interview Room
Timeline: Day 166 20:00
1632 words - 3.3 OF Standard Post Measure

CJ was nervous. He had never done this type of thing before but with so many crew to work through and the limited time he had to put on his big girl pants and work through the list he had been given. If he had been organising it himself he would not have picked a senior officer for his first interview but there they were. Elegy Nascimento was his first interview of all people. "Come in Ensign!" He called to the man as the chime to the guest quarters he was using as an interview room rang out.

When the single-paneled door slid aside, Elegy released the contact between the pad of his fingertip and the door's companel. Lowering his arms to his sides, Ensign Elegy Nascimento took one step through the threshold, but he hesitated. His posture felt awkward, as if he were acting like a toy soldier. His breathing was shallow and his face was flush; he could practically feel a thrumming in his head from increased blood pressure.

Having been asked for an interview with the brig officer, Elegy felt like he was being watched in every moment. Observed. As if he was laying on a microscope slide. Elegy had felt this way only a few days earlier, when the Captain had invited him to an impromptu meeting. He tried to reassure himself of all the way that meeting had ended surprisingly well -- even though he'd shown up in the body stocking of an environmental suit. On this night, he was in his favourite uniform; the one that had worn down in the laundry to the perfect level of comfort. If he had managed to get a promotion in his underwear, surely he could walk away from a murder investigation, scott free, in his favourite uniform.

CJ just smiled orient as the man came in and eventually sat down. When nothing was said the petty officer indicated the chair and decided to just start talking himself. “Apologises for the shortness of the request but we have limited time. As my request stated was this is a formal interview as has been requested as the death of Lieutenant David has been ruled a homocide and is being treated at that despite our situation and distance from anyone who will review the files. Any questions from yourself before we continue?”

Padding into the compartment tentatively, Elegy lowered himself into the chair. "Am I...?" Elegy started to ask a question, but his voice went hoarse too quickly. Elegy cleared his throat and his shook his head briefly. His face blanched and he looked Jackson in the eye -- looked right at him. "Am I being charged with murder?" Elegy asked through a cringed expression.

”You are not being charged right this moment Sir.” The man assured quickly relieved that he had finally spoken. It would be an awful situation if it was on one way. “We have to go through some questions to make sure all the facts and routes are covered. So… How did you know the deceased?”

"We were..." Elegy started to say. The right word didn't tumble out and he took breath while he chose his words. Elegy stroked his beard and then he said, "We were acquaintances, I'd say. I've only been a department head long enough to see him at a couple of senior staff briefings and before that..." --Elegy shrugged helplessly-- "We worked different shifts. Sometimes we crossed paths in the mess hall."

“I see.” CJ wrote something down on his PADD. This was his first investigation and interview so he was being nothing but blunt around it. “Were you and the deceased on good terms?” He asked.

"Not... especially," Elegy said through a wince. He shook his head slowly for emphasis. "We were prone to... miscommunication. I had talked about wanting to find an instrument on the ship," Elegy said, "and I think he thought I was a thief. We never really spoke beyond small talk after that."

"A thief?" The Brig Officer wondered raising an eyebrow at that notion. Nothing had come across his desk about anyone onboard stealing.

Pursing his lips tightly, Elegy struggled to locate the right words to explain the broken game of telephone this half-remembered conversation had become. Elegy furrowed his brow as he shrugged at CJ helplessly. "Over drinks," Elegy said, "Of course, over drinks, I lamented none of my instruments making it aboard Atlanatis before launch. I alluded to a desire to pilfer through some personal quarters, perhaps those of our fallen crewmates, in search of a dusty, unused xylophone. It must have been overheard and become gossip-bait."

"I see," CJ smirked just slightly just imagining the scene. He coughed and indicated that he was going to move on at that bore no part of the investigations. “When did you last see the deceased?”

In telling the embarrassing story to CJ, Elegy's manner had been almost affable. That faded, just like all the colour in his face. "At the, uh..." Elegy started to say. When he trailed off, he looked at the overhead as he tried to picture Davis' face in his mind's eye. "In the launch bay," Elegy said, although his memory evoked a jumble of memories, seeing Davis in a number of locations over the past few days. "It must have been in the launch bay, before I boarded a shuttlepod."

CJ nodded. Everyone was telling the same story so far. Everyone interviewed so far had the last memory as the cargo bay or the shuttlepod. No one so far had seen him onboard thee The Caelestise. “Okay, Ensign ... Where were you at the time of the murder which was between 21:00 and 23:00?” He asked hoping that the man had a good alibi. He did not look like a killer but he had learnt recently that not everyone looked like they were inside.

Elegy's eyes narrowed upon CJ; the pale blue of his irises flashed like lightning. Breathlessly, desperately, Elegy wheezed out, "Twenty-one hundred... They just left him there...? For hours...?" He spat the words out distasteful. Unintentionally, his anger was directed at CJ, as if CJ had allowed this to happen. Almost as soon as he'd said it, Elegy looked away abashedly. He looked away and he shook his head in embarrassment, his right boot tapping against the deck nervously. Elegy breathed our heavily. "Around twenty-one hundred, I..." Elegy trailed off again, and this time he winced nervously. Elegy cleared his throat and he locked eyes with CJ, screwing up his courage to tell him what had happened. "If you must know, I was stealing a stasis unit from the Caelestis around twenty-one-hundred hours," Elegy said, and the irony was not lost on him. "I was with Crewman Jones and Narv, in the hydoponics bay, lugging a seed bank. By twenty-three hundred hours we can brought it back to Atlantis aboard shuttlepod two."

The young man winced and almost responded to the righteous anger before it faded from the man as he started to answer the question asked. CJ looked the man over and smirked a little. He put his PADD down in a way that the man could not see his notes and lent forward almost conspicuously and put his hand together. “So you really are a thief then?” He asked in a whisper.

When CJ leaned forward, Elegy pursed his lips even more tightly. Ever so slightly, Elegy shook his head and he leaned in too. "I'm an archaeologist, hun," Elegy said with an eyebrow raised. "On behalf of United Earth and the Sol System. I'm a state thief."

CJ laughed slightly just staring at the man for a long moment. The Brig Officer spent a few moments trying to work him out before he shook his head. Lexi was right the man was impossible. “Do you know anyone who wanted to kill the deceased?” He finally asked returning to his sensible nature despite the laugh the man had given him.

That question sobered Elegy. It reminded him what they were here for; made it harder for him to dive into nervous tittering. He could feel the question in the pit of his stomach. "I've been thinking about that a lot..." Elegy replied, somewhat vaguely. At first, Elegy could only shake his head at the senselessness of it all. "He appeared affable; he appeared well-liked. I can't know what went on between him and other members of the crew behind close doors... but it seems random to me. Utterly chaotic."

"It was." CJ agreed almost sadly. He did not believe this man was involved at all especially as he had fully owned that he was a thief who had been stealing at the time. He would needed to be checked but the man could not believe that someone would admit that when all it would involve was checking with other science officers or looking around one of the labs. "Is there anything you would like to add Ensign? Anything that you think is important?"

Elegy answered that question with a small shake of his head. The movement was a tight side-to-side in the negative, moving like his head felt heavy after all of that. Elegy shrugged helplessly, and he said, "Just find out what happened. Please."

“We are trying Sir.” CJ assured striking a line through someone on his PADD. “You are free to go Lieutenant.” He added staying in his seat for the next internet.

Offering a heavy nod in CJ's direction, Elegy found his footing and he shuffled to exit the compartment as if it were, mildly, on fire. With all sincerity, Elegy said over his shoulder, "Thank you for trying."