"Anyways, I don't want any suspicion that I'm about to commit propaganda of the deed."

Terrence has to take a moment to process this entire situation. He is an academic. He has opinions about Herodotus. He has opinions about translation.

"Starting a fire at the venue might be easier," he suggests.

"A fire's a perfectly good first resort! I'm just not sure I want it to also be our last resort."

Oscar's ready to hear his argument in favor of arson. It's also frankly reassuring that Terrence is not dragging his feet or playing Devil's cultist's advocate.

"It's certainly good to have multiple plans of attack."

"Jumping back a topic-- Do we have any proof that Valentine didn't do it? Not that I don't believe you, I just-- want to know if other people will believe us."

"....I mean, she was straightjacketed at the time, the only evidence she did is that there was a knife found in her room, and a nurse was in on it."

"So the same as last time," he says ruefully.

"They might not still be blaming her for the murder once it turned out not to actually be Roby, the news correction didn't say. But I think it's pretty clearly not something she had anything to do with."

"It seems very likely she's a convenient stooge."

"And to convince people she didn't-- well, we'd have to convince them of magic at the same time, it sounds like."

"...no we don't? One of the nurses and Roby killed another nurse, made it look like Roby's body, and vanished. It's not like the other murders, it's quite obvious actually what the alternate explanation is."

"They still think she did the other murders, though. ...If anyone knows any way to teleport people with a magic ritual, now's the time to share, I'd say."

"Sounds wonderful, but no I don't."

"Proving Valentine's innocence is secondary to handling the Roby situation in general, which the asylum already wants to do because Roby escaping their care to run away to Scotland is also an issue in their eyes. Which we're already writing to them about."

Well, the letter hasn't been sent yet, they ought to decide whether to include the invite and if so find the invite, but it's in progress.

"At least her name is clear for that. --Alas, I still only know about animal control."

"...On that subject."

She's sort of hoping that now that Valentine's been blatantly framed for murder by a nurse it'll be slightly easier to convince people she didn't do the other ones either. But yeah it's definitely a project for later.

Has anyone told Jing Yi it's very creepy that his fiancée controls living things? Like just not the sort of power a decent person actively uses.

Well if nobody else is going to Sal will. With whatever level of tact he has available.

"Jing Yi, are you aware that your girlfriend can also mind-control people."

"--Did she do something while I was out to it?" That sounds out of character. And he's not thinking about how much she might be playing a character.

"She can?!"

"Sal confirmed she can control cats."

"Oh." Some pieces click together. "Oh."

Terrence looks worriedly at Jing Yi.

Jing Yi is deliberately not clicking some things together. "So we have no evidence that she has."