Disclaimer: In case you weren't aware of it, none of these characters belong to me.
Author's Notes: I need to stop thinking.
Dedication: To the gang.
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Close Your Eyes
by Kristen Elizabeth
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"Can we get you anything, Miss Peacecraft?"
"Dorlian."
"Excuse me?"
The prisoner seated at the interrogation table lifted her head. Dull blue eyes stared flatly at the detectives from behind dirty blond bangs. "I don't go by Peacecraft anymore. My name is Relena Dorlian."
The two men exchanged a glance. "All right. Miss Dorlian...can we get you anything? Coffee...water...soda?" one asked, politely.
"No." Relena paused. "Thank you."
The same detective, the older one, opened a file that he had in his hand. "All right. Let's get started then. Now, you understand that by waving your right to an attorney, anything you say can..."
"I know. The man who arrested me told me all of that." She looked down at her hands. There were still traces of blood on her skin. "I have nothing to hide. Not that I know of anyways."
"Ah yes..." The second detective, a man barely older than Relena herself, cleared his throat. "The alleged blackout."
"You can call it 'alleged'. It won't make me remember any more than I do, though."
After another look, the older Preventer detective pulled out a chair across from Relena and sat down. The wood creaked under his weight. "No one is disputing the fact that your memories are jarred, Miss Dorlian. We just need to walk you back over the facts. Perhaps doing so will bring some things back to you." He leaned forward. "But...this is still a murder investigation. If you knowingly withold any information..."
"Everything that I can remember, I will tell you," Relena assured him.
The detective nodded. "All right." He seemed fond of the phrase. "Why don't you start at the beginning?"
Relena didn't blink. "How far back are we going, detectives? My conception...my birth...my adoption? Grade school..."
Impatient, the younger detective held up his hand. "Why don't you just tell us about the part where you murdered..."
"What my partner means to say is...you pick the jumping off point. You tell us how everything started. We'll go from there."
"Fine." Relena wiped her hands on the drab slacks they had issued her upon her arrest. But the blood on her hands was dry and would not come off. "I suppose you could say it all started a week before my birthday. My 21st birthday. I've never really liked birthday parties....not since my 15th anyways, but my publicist said it wouldn't just lift my spirits, it would be a good political opportunity. Don't ask me how; that's her job to figure out, not mine."
The detectives watched her as she took a moment to collect her thoughts. She lifted her head and looked at them with those dead eyes. "Could I have some water?" The younger detective left the room and came back a few minutes later with a paper cup. Relena drank as though she hadn't for days. When she was finished, she continued. "I had no idea who to invite to the party. I have business acquaintances, but no real friends to speak of. I had made sure of that. It was around that time that I was on L2-175 for a treaty talk. I ran into someone I had known a long time ago, Duo..."
"Maxwell. Owner and operator of a salvage shop. Possible military background," the younger detective read off the file. "The first person at the scene of the crime."
Relena shrugged. "Anyways, we talked for a little while and he invited me back to his home where we talked some more with his girlfriend..."
"Hilde Schbeiker. His business partner and live-in girlfriend. Known military background with the OZ organization. Called in to Preventer headquarters when the body was discovered."
"Are you going to keep doing that?" Relena rubbed her temples.
The older detective shot his partner a stern look. "Go on, Miss Dorlian."
She sighed. "When I told Duo about the party, he invited himself and Hilde, which I certainly didn't mind. He said he would bring others, but he didn't say who. I really didn't care; I knew the one person who I wanted to come, wouldn't."
"And who would that have been?"
Relena ignored the question. "But I was wrong, because he came. I suppose I would have been disappointed if he had been predictable." The paper cup crumpled in her blood-stained hand.
"Why don't we move on to the night of the party?" the older detective suggested. "Unless anything important happened before it...?"
She shook her head; the long strands of her hair brushed her upper back. "Not that I remember, no." A shaky breath later, she went on. "The party was nice. I danced with Quatre...Winner, yes I know. CEO of Winner Industries and sole heir to the Winner fortune. You don't have to tell me that."
The younger detective smirked. "But can you remember that he was the one who found you in the garden with the gun in your hands?"
"No," Relena whispered. "I don't remember anything after...." She stopped.
"After what?" the older detective prodded.
Relena's chin wobbled. "I don't know....I can't remember..."
"It's all right. Take your time, try to reach way back. What happened at the party?"
"Why don't you tell me?" Relena cried. "You must have interviewed everyone there. Don't they remember??"
The older detective nodded. "We've interviewed most everyone there, except the ones closest to the actual events. We wanted to get a statement from you first. All the partygoers were able to tell us was that after the birthday cake was cut, you disappeared. The body was discovered awhile later and shortly after that, Quatre Winner found you in the garden. Do you remember any of this?"
Relena nodded. "The cake was vanilla with pink roses."
Frustrated, the younger detective slammed the thin manila folder onto the table in front of the Vice Foriegn Minister. "Do you think this is a joke?? A man died last night...and you're the only one who could have killed him! Drop this amnesia bit and tell us the truth. What happened at the goddamned party??"
She stood up, raising her five foot eight frame as tall as it would go and looked the detective straight in the eye. "I may not remember much, but I do know one thing." The detectives held their breath until she spoke again.
"I did not murder Heero Yuy."
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TBC
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