The Likely Suspects
Title: The Likely Suspects
Description: Kunzite deals with the culprits who instigated a diplomatic nightmare at Crystal Tokyo’s Christmas Eve party.
A/N: Day 14 of Advent Drabblender 2011.
Prompt: Someone spiked the eggnog.
He had the likely suspects lined up in a row before him. They didn’t look like criminal masterminds, but, as he knew from centuries of hard-earned experience, appearances could be deceiving. He wasn’t about to be fooled into complacency.
He let the silence drag out, hoping it would make his questioning all the more effective. If luck were on his side, they would crack, and the guilty party would be identified. But he knew it wouldn’t be easy. The culprits also had years of experience, and what they lacked in finesse they made up for in innovativeness. They were also a tightly-knit group, which worried him. It was going to be difficult to manipulate them into squealing on each another. But Kunzite did love a challenge.
The trick, as usual, was to convince them that he knew more than he really did. Secretly, he admired their efforts. When they put their minds to it, they certainly got results… which was going to make punishing them all the more challenging. But he knew his duty. These miscreants had made a laughingstock of several of the Crystal Tokyo elite and particularly the delegates from Parthenope, who had no tolerance for such things, and if Minako weren’t so good at her job, it was likely they would have been facing serious repercussions.
As it was, they were sure to have a media circus outside the Crystal Palace tomorrow morning, and not only because it was the Christmas season. Fortunately, he was going to fob off that duty on Zoisite. He had to hide his smile at the thought, knowing it would give the wrongdoers before him entirely the wrong idea. After all, the First General of Crystal Tokyo could not be perceived as approving of such misdeeds.
He cleared his throat, which had the desired effect: heads snapped up, shoulders straightened, hands disappeared behind backs. All except for the little one near the end, who was trying to hide a smirk and failing miserably. But Kunzite had expected it of her, the bold little chit.
The only way to get things done was to catch them off guard. He trained his gaze on the strawberry blond with the mild blue eyes at the far right.
“All right, Jason. I’ll admit it was a nice trick, getting past Jupiter’s security detail like that. But this doesn’t feel like something you’d come up with on your own. It was Selena’s idea, wasn’t it?”
He kept his ears trained for a muffled protest from someone who couldn’t restrain themselves from claiming the credit that was due to them, but he heard nothing of the sort.
“I really can’t say, sir,” the boy replied.
He sighed, even though he couldn’t help feeling a bit proud: admission of guilt without implicating his compatriots. And if he knew Jason, which he did, there would be no getting him to say anything else. “You can go, Jason. But I’ll be expecting you in the training courts at six sharp tomorrow.”
The boy nodded and left. It was no less than what he’d expected when he agreed to be part of this plot.
Kunzite glared down at the remaining suspects, zeroing in on his two likeliest candidates. He motioned the girl with smoky gray eyes forward first. “Well, Celia?”
Pertly, she asked, “What seems to be the problem, sir?”
“What seems to be the problem? I think the problem is that someone spiked the eggnog, and now we have the entire Parthenopean delegation attempting to dance with the Christmas trees, singing their planet’s most sacred songs - which, I should add, are not to be sung anywhere except the High Temple on Parthenope and the Crystal Palace most certainly does not fit that description - and hitting on my wife!”
A choked giggle echoed in the silence.
His head snapped around. “So, you find this situation funny, Leighanna?”
“Yes, sir.”
A fake cough came from somewhere down the line. He didn’t have to look to know it came from his own daughter.
“Well, I don’t think you’re going to find things as funny during our training session tomorrow.”
She looked down at her feet. “I expect not, sir. But such sacrifices must be made for the sake of tradition.”
“What tradition?” Kunzite demanded.
Neil grinned puckishly, the effect heightened by his untamed spikes of turquoise hair. “Oh, Uncle Jadeite told us recently about a certain incident in the Silver Millennium involving a young general on his first mission, a batch of eggnog, twelve roosters, and a catapult, and we thought-”
He held up his hand. “Say no more. ” He sighed, wondering whether his brothers-in-arms or their children would be the death of him. “What exactly did you put in the eggnog?”
Sensing capitulation on the part of the enemy, they attempted to speak up all at once, chiming in with their particular inventions and added touches of brilliance. Given the alcohol content of many of these items, Kunzite thought it was near impossible for anyone to have drunk any of the eggnog without noticing the fumes and revised his opinion of the delegates’ intelligence.
One ingredient in particular caught Kunzite’s attention. “You said you used the Neptunian sherry? The kind with the blue label that was locked in Endymion’s study?”
When Leigh nodded, he said, “One of you go and get Jadeite down from the piano before he makes a fool of himself.” As they made to obey his orders, he reconsidered. “Wait - I changed my mind. He deserves what he’s got coming to him.”
Smirks and snickers emerged all around, but before they could get too smug, Kunzite added, “Don’t think you’re getting out of that extra practice session. I still expect to see all of you there at six, and I hope you didn’t have any plans before noon.”
They made the obligatory sighs and complaints, but anyone could see that their real interest was getting back to the party so they could properly document the chaos they had produced. Kunzite thought about sending them all directly to bed, but he did want a permanent record of Jadeite’s humiliating performance and Jason hadn’t turned the security cameras back on yet, so he let them go. Also, it was high time he rescued his wife from the delegate’s nefarious clutches.
A/N: Who the kids belong to... Jason and Leigh are Ami & Zoi's, Celia is Kunzite's, Selena is Serenity & Endymion's, and Neil is Michiru & Haruka's. Many of these characters also appear in Dawn in Transition (up on FF.net), which also features the next generation.