Case - 3 : Resolved.

The table partner who was sitting right beside the man eating food from the same conveyor belt rushed to help but when he found the man wouldn't move even after he tried to do chest compressions and a simple bit of CPR he gave up looking disillusioned.

Before I'd even made up my mind to rush at him, he'd died.

Such was the speed of death.

It was clear to most present that this wasn't a normal death, but death due to poison.

Mothers hid away their children while the other adults began to whisper in silence to each other about the unfortunate incident, yet no one dared to make a move for fear of being next.

A few people even spat out what they were already eating for fear of being poisoned as the staff stood dumbfounded at what to do next.

No wonder everyone was mostly silent.

I quickly moved to the body causing people to grow alert and hopeful upon seeing me.

"I request everyone to maintain the silence they have been maintaining and treat this area as a crime scene." I requested, but like most of my requests to the public, this one had the opposite effect.

"How can we stay here?!! All of us need to rush to the hospitals to get our stomachs pumped in case we ingested the poison!" A man shouted from behind everyone causing the crowd to tense up and prepare to retaliate in response to my next words.

"I promise you, sir, if any of us were poisoned with the same substance as 'he' was, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now."

The crowd's anxiety diffused but their tension remained.

"I promise all of you the investigation will be much quicker and easier if all of us cooperate to find the truth."

"Why do I care what happened to him?!!? I want to find out what happened to me! I want to know if I was poisoned or not!"

"Isn't the fastest way of finding out directly asking the killer?" Seeing that reasoning wasn't working, I asked a question that sent the questioner's brain for a spin to calm the crowd's unpleasantness temporarily.

"Please, I request all of you to remain seated in your respective chairs. Keep your young ones safe and away from the crime scene and stay away from this man yourself. We don't want anyone else getting poisoned by eating the sushi that this man was now do we?"

I saw a few in the crowd nod as they all gathered around their chairs and made themselves as comfortable as they could get with a dead body in front of them.

The murder had happened in the center of the hall, right by the food train tracks.

I looked down at the body of the diseased and noticed the expression of shock and horror he had on his face.

An expression most people at the morgue had when they died.

Well at least at a police morgue that is.

*clap* *clap*

"Could I have the attention of all the servers and chefs inside the kitchen?!?" I asked clapping my hands to grab their focus.

The double doors opened as a chef who was busy cooking food just moments ago arrived outside.

"What happened? Why are you calling us-" The young man who questioned me stopped in his tracks as he spotted the body on the ground.

"Is he…" The man swallowed the rest of his words, a little too shocked for my taste but I guess each person would have their own reaction.

"Yes, he's dead if that's what you mean. Could you please call the others who are still inside?" I asked the young man.

"Yes Sir!" He saluted and left back inside to call out the remaining chefs.

I finally turned my attention to the man who was kneeling beside the corpse of his table mate and wondered what the relation was between the two of them for him to be affected to such an extent.

"Excuse me, sir. I can see you're greatly affected in this moment with a tragic loss. But could you please help with the investigation so we may find out what happened?"

The young man who hadn't looked up yet, finally looked up to reveal reddened eyes as he paid attention to me.

"...yes. I'm sorry. I- I just-"

"It's alright. I understand. Please sit back down on your seat." I said helping the man back into his place on the swivel chair he had been sitting in until recently.

"Could you tell me who the man is?"

"...owner."

"Pardon?" I asked, bending a little closer to the man.

"He is the Restaurant's Owner." The man spoke a little louder.

'That explains why the chef was so shocked earlier.' little Dave spoke inside my head.

*bam*

The double doors leading to the kitchen opened once again as there now stood five different chefs with two wearing distinctly different black coats while the rest wore normal whites.

I stood back up as they rushed closer and held out my hand to stop them before they scurried too close.

"Please stay where you are. This is a crime scene."

"But-"

"No buts, this is a crime scene and it shall be treated as su-" I attempted to speak but I was cut off when a chef with a particularly nasty gaze spoke before me.

"No need for your help on this one Sergeant Dave."

"I-"

"No Sergeant Dave, all we need to do for this is to reverse the conveyor belt to see which one of our stations the dish that Mr. Satoshi Nakamoto was eating came from! Clearly he has been poisoned by one of us!" The female chef spoke with such intensity that I was forced to give up.

"Yes! Do it! And we can all leave!" The same man from earlier shouted over the crowd of people once again.

Seeing that I wasn't allowed to speak, I waited for a better moment to intervene.

"Yes! Let's do this!" The female chef said as she looked particularly at the young male chef who had come out of the kitchen before everyone else.

The rest of the chefs all nodded and followed the female chef into the kitchen and left the door open for everyone watch.

The female chef then pressed the back button on the conveyor belt's controller causing it to move backward in motion as she began to call out the dish's name that was visible in its controller.

Everyone waited with bated breath for the name of the dish the man was eating from.

"Rajma Chawal."

"Paneer Butter Masala."

"Omurice."

"Chicken Tikka Masala."

"Mango Slushie."

"Manchuria."

"Sushi."

"Sushi! That's it! The murderer has been found! It's Anirudh!! I was right to be suspicious of you!!"

"But I didn't do it!? I swear!!!" The young chef whom all the other chefs were suspicious about swore in front of everyone.

'He looks tense enough to me.' little Dave commented once again inside my mind, but I ignored him this time and asked Mom to conduct a little investigation of her own using the show that was happening as a cover.

'Don't want to alert the killer now do we.'

"What if there were multiple people who ordered sushi on the conveyor belt!? Maybe multiple of us made the dish! It could be someone else!" The young chef, Anirudh argued again.

"Ha! We can just be sure! I'm sure it was you, Anirudh! You were the most vocal against the promotion of Siddhartha after Tom retired!" the female chef spoke again as she began to reverse the belt further.

"Kulcha."

"Butter Naan."

"Lemon Pepper Fish!"

"Fish Tandori!"

"Prawns Curry!"

"S- sushi…" Suddenly the female chef's voice quietened as she announced another Sushi and then cursing her bad luck,

"Sushi…"

"Sushi…"

"Sushi…"

Announced it three more times.

I on the other hand used the sudden silence the lady caused to my advantage after Mom confirmed something for me.

"Greetings dear customers."

"As I was saying earlier, I know who the criminal is!" I announced, causing the room to become spellbound at my shocking revelation.

"Yo- You do!?" the lady in the kitchen asked back.

"Yes miss, I do, I was about to tell you, but you seemed a little more interested in proving your little theory, but you also helped me test out mine. So thank you anyway."

"How!?" The young chef named Anirudh asked.

"It's simple logic really. I find it hard to believe so many people here all missed out on it."

"Who's the murderer then!?"

"It's you!"

I pointed at the person least likely to be the suspect of anyone in the room emotionally, but logically he was the number one suspect in this.

"But- what!? How!?" The man asked looking at me bewildered. "Why are you accusing me without proof!?"

"That's impossible!" Anirudh was the one to reject the proposal this time.

"May I ask why?" I politely asked Anirudh wondering what reason they had to disturb my reasoning this time.

"Because although Lester works here, he works only as the cleaner. Not as a chef!"

"But that doesn't mean he couldn't have messed with his food, right?" I entertained this stream of thought even though it was wrong to lead them to help me find the murder weapon.

"Then he should currently have the container he used to contain the poison on him shouldn't he!?" Anirudh asked and I said, "Why don't you search for it then? Aren't you rightly equipped?" I asked pointing at the gloves he was wearing.

"I will!" Anirudh spoke in a resolute tone as he carefully examined Lester as though he held the launch button for a nuclear strike.

Patting down Lester throughly Anirudh turuned to me with a rueful look and said in a slightly disappointed tone, "It seems your are wrong this time Sergeant Dave."

"Or am I?" I asked him back as I walked ahead to gain a little space and spoke in a loud voice.

"Miss!? What's your name?!" I asked the young lady chef who had currently stopped the convey belt.

"Reshma! My name is Reshma!"

"Then Miss Reshma, could you return the conveyor belt to where it was?"

".... right." Reshma nodded as everyone watched the conveyor belt turn with shallow breaths wondering what I was going to reveal to them.

'Perhaps the hair of the criminal had fallen in the food when he tried to help the victim?'

'Or perhaps the criminal had left fingerprints on the plate used to handle the dish while dropping poison into it?'

But the dishes returned and everyone paid close attention to the dish of the Restaurant Owner but found nothing.

"Ha! You're just wasting our time!" Lester spoke to me with a sneer.

But I kept my calm and spoke words that caused the color to be drained right off his face.

"Or are we all just looking at the wrong dish?" I said pointing at Lester's plate which had a needle in it.

"You murdered Mr. Satoshi Nakamoto!"

"How!?" Anirudh asked in a shocked tone.

"The poison was never in the food itself, it was always in the needle that Lester used to stab Mr. Satoshi Natkamoto with."

"No one saw me stab him!" Lester argued back.

"Correct, but you still did."

"How!?" This time it was Reshma who asked from her spot behind the control station for the conveyor belt.

"He did it by using that!" I said pointing at the grandfather clock behind everyone in the room.

"He used the Cuckoo of the clock to launch a needle straight at Mr. Satoshi Nakamoto right as the clock struck twelve. It would've been easy to pull off since he was the only cleaner in this small restaurant now wouldn't it?"

I turned towards Lester as I ended my sentence to see his pale face as the sneer was long gone and replaced by worry.

"I wonder whose fingerprints are on the needle you so cleverly wanted to dispose of by moving the conveyor belts to clean the plates on it."