Ninjago: Negative

7 - The Witness

"I was delivering my last order of sushi to someone in the building, so I went in, asked the receptionist where the room was. The woman there directed me to the floor just below the penthouse of the building, so I took the elevator to that floor-" 

The loud tapping of Nya taking notes on her laptop interrupted him. "--Oh - sorry. Carry on?" 

Hector cleared his throat and continued.

"When I got to the floor my delivery was on, I saw the guy; err...what's his name..?"

"Dr Xavier?" Zane piped in. 

"Yes - Dr Xavier. He was speaking with someone quite frantically on the phone, near the sofa by the elevator. He was talking about some sort of tech he was researching - an orb of...of something."

"Was he holding this...orb?" asked Nya, looking up from her laptop. 

"No, he was holding a pad of paper, and one had this weird drawing of four circles, arranged in a square," Hector answered, drawing the shape in the air with his hand. "I stood there for a while looking at him, but he didn't seem to notice. He was talking about how the...'orb' was acting up, and how he didn't want to return it yet...I dunno, it was a weird conversation." 

"Okay, but did anything else happen after that? Where did Dr Xavier go?" Lloyd asked impatiently. 

"He got in the elevator I was in a few moments later, but by then, I had already delivered the sushi to the lady in the apartment down the hall. Then, as I came down the elevator again, the authorities showed up ordering a complete evacuation; that Xavier guy was apparently dead in the penthouse." 

All seven of the ninja were quiet, taking in the information from Hector's story. Nya had stopped tapping at her laptop and was staring at the screen. 

"Okay, anyone else totally confused?" Kai burst out. "If no one was seen going into the Dr's apartment, who killed him then?" 

"Perhaps somebody was inside before?" The nindroid suggested. "Oh- but the Commissioner did say there were no traces of any other people in the room..."

Another silence fell over the hovering pirate ship. "Wait!" Cole suddenly exclaimed, pacing across the wooden floor.

"That four-circled symbol you were on about--I think I've seen it recently-- in that old factory we were searching a while ago. One of the machines had it engraved on it." The earth ninja clarified.

"Really? Because now that I think about it, I've seen it too-" Kai said. "Remember when we were cleaning out the scroll room this evening? And Nya had that box of drawings and stuff?" He pointed at his sister as he followed his trail of thought. "When I was looking in them and talking to Master Wu, I'm pretty sure one of them had a four-circled drawing on it."

"Ah-ha! Now we're getting somewhere!" Jay yelped, rubbing his hands together eagerly. 

"Then we should find out what this 'four-circled symbol' means. Maybe it'll tell us about what the Dr was researching." Jupiter suggested. 

"Right - Cole, Jupiter and Hector can head over to the factory again, and look into the symbol there. The rest of us can do our research from the Bounty. Maybe Master Wu can dig up that scroll Kai said he saw and give us some intel." Lloyd ordered. Everyone understood the plan and split ways.