The Kiss of Nature

**The Kiss of Nature** is the 12th case in The Origins and the 2nd case to occur in the Pacific Region.

## Summary

### Victims

* Whitney Bradford
* Andrew Shirley

## Plot

In hope of finding escaped JUSTICE member Andrew Shirley, Ursula Gemini and the player decide to go to Denali National Park, Alaska, where Ronda Warner's tracking device leads. Instead, we find a woman's dead body and Andrew in disguise near the crime scene. When we ask Andrew about the murder, he tells us he easily recognized the dead woman to be Whitney Bradford, a model and nature activist. We brought Andrew with us into custody. He said that there is another member of JUSTICE that will free him soon. We later find a broken cross necklace on the crime scene, belonging to Kieran Bartlett. When we ask Kieran about his broken necklace, he tells the team that he was exploring Denali National Park. He said that ever since his fight with Colonel Blackbourne in A Bucket of Luck, his necklace has been extremely loose and he was going to get it repaired after his visit. He said he noticed it fell but he didn't know where. We later also find a phone with a cracked screen. We give the phone to Imogen Caulfield and she manages not only identify that the owner of the phone is Amanda Middleman, but she fixed the phone as well. Before giving the phone to Amanda, Ronda, who was hanging out with Imogen while she was fixing the phone, told the team that Amanda is a high ranked member in her agency, and Ronda decided to go with Ursula and the player to introduce us to her. When we meet up with Amanda, Ronda properly introduces the team to her, and we tell her about Whitney's murder. Amanda tells us she's never heard of any Whitney, but she wished us luck on finding her killer. When we head back to base, Hunter Hondo tells the player that Andrew escaped their custody and that he escaped towards the Photoshoot area. Ursula and the player head there, only to find a broken camera and a damaged snow-speeder. We repair the broken camera and it belongs to Artie Choke. When we ask Artie about the camera, he said that he uses it to take pictures of Whitney, as he's her professional photographer. When we tell him that Whitney's dead, he starts to cry and runs away. We later repair the broken snow-speeder, and realize it's for model posing. This is when the snow-speeder's owner, Vivian Jacobs, starts yelling at us, saying that it's her snow-speeder and that we should scram. We ask her if she knows Whitney or Andrew. She tells us she does not know of any Andrew but that Whitney is her best friend. When we tell her about Whitney's death, she doesn't shed a tear, she rather looks extremely sad. She said that she doesn't know how she'll go on without her best friend, and that she hopes that the killer is found soon. We later find ripped clothes and a tiny puddle of blood in the photoshoot area. When the team puts the ripped clothing together, they find Kieran's company logo on it. When we ask Kieran about the ripped clothing, to which he said that he wanted to make a deal with Whitney, as she advertises many expensive clothing brands. When Kieran asked her to advertise his company, she got the dress he was going to give her, tore it into shreds, and walked off. After sending the blood we found to Sandra Davis, she said that most of the blood was the victim's, but that very few parts of the blood belonged to Amanda. When we ask Amanda about how she got into a fight with the victim, she told the team that since Whitney had Russian Heritage and acted rather mysterious, Amanda suspected that she was with the Russians. They got into a fight, with Whitney running off towards the crime scene where she was murdered. Amanda said that she tried to follow Whitney to apologize but saw a mysterious figure running off with a knife and Whitney dead. Amanda then took Whitney's phone, which she was holding in her hand, and sifted through it, trying to see if she had any contact with The Russians. When Amanda realized she wasn't a Russian, she panicked, went back to the crime scene, and dropped Whitney's phone, before running away. What she didn't realize, however, was that she left her phone with Whitney and that the victim's phone was still on her. She hands us the victim's phone and we send it to Imogen. While Imogen is analyzing the victim's phone, she says she got a recent notification from Andrew, saying that he has some important information about Whitney that may potentially solve the case. He tells us to meet at the Lake View, as he saw us investigating there. Ursula stays behind, as Jessica Charles goes with the player to meet up with Andrew. When we get there, we find Andrew dead, stabbed the same way Whitney was. We bring Andrew's body back so the coroner, Maria Caulfield, can do an autopsy to try and find more evidence. She tells us that the stab wounds are in the same place and that the weapon is the exact same size. Hence, this means that they were killed by the same person. While at the Lake View, we also pick up a broken mirror and a note saying "I'm not who you think I am!" We fix the mirror and send it to Sandra, who tells us that she found both Whitney's and Vivian's DNA on it, and that one of the two broke it. When we ask Vivian about the mirror, she says that she got into an argument with Whitney, as Vivian was jealous of all the fame Whitney was getting, when Vivian thought she looked better and should be getting all the fame. When she saw Whitney, she was looking at herself in that mirror. Vivian slapped it out of Whitney's hand, ultimately making it break. Whitney then stormed off towards the photoshoot area. After giving the message saying "I'm not who you think I am!" to the team's profiler, Aaron Hall, he told us that the letter had a faded part, and that the letter was written by a person that describes the victim perfectly. He told the player to uncover the faded text, while Ursula was debriefing Jessica on the case. The faded part turned out to be Artie's name. When we ask Artie about this, he tells us that Whitney was his long-lost sister. Whitney was sold away from Artie's family, and his parents told him about it a while back, as they couldn't afford to have a baby at that time. With the money they got from selling Whitney, they got a house and were able to take care of Artie. For years, Artie was trying to find Whitney, and when he finally found her, he got a job as her photographer. When he told her the truth moments before she was murdered, she said that he was crazy and was just trying to get fame from her. She then stormed off to the lake view.

## Killer And Motives

The killer turned out to be Kieran.

Upon admitting to the murder, Kieran said that he was sent by JUSTICE to kill Whitney, as she was a former member who escaped. They also told him to kill Andrew if he saw him, since it would mean bad news for them if Andrew was caught.

Judge Virgo sentenced Kieran to life in prison.

## Additional Investigation

After arresting Kieran, he admits he's a member of JUSTICE. Later, Amanda tells us that she's working with Ronda, and they need our help in finding the Russian's hideout, since they must have one in the U.S. If we can end their plans, we can focus on JUSTICE. We get a call about the murder of an important person in Vancouver, Washington, so we go there next.

## The Suspects

Andrew Shirley (Traits: 2, 3, 4, 5)Kieran Bartlett (Traits: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)Amanda Middleman (Traits: 1, 2, 3)Artie Choke (Traits: 1, 2, 3, 4)Vivian Jacobs (Traits: 1)