mykah.

ilomilo.

OMNISCIENT.

six months later

The cell he sat in was cold. In a maximum security prison, Caleb sat alone and afraid. He'd be lying if he said he was fine because he wasn't. Caleb wasn't scared for himself, but Mykah. For the six months or so he'd been locked up and awaiting his jury trial, she's all he could think about.

Due to his mostly calm disposition and his allegations, most people left him alone, but he did manage to make friends with his block mates. They respected his seemingly cool laid back demeanour, as that day changed his loud exterior, but they recognized he wasn't a punk.

Far outside the prison walls, his former band mates were distraught but they didn't know what to believe. The fans didn't make the time easier, some calling him a murderer, some claiming his innocence, and some lusting after his charge.

Although the four remaining asked for respect and the upmost privacy, they got quite the opposite as paparazzi and questioning bystanders swarmed and flocked them at any given moment as if they knew all the answers, as well as the groups families. In a way, the public felt they were being selfish and began to hate them, but if they thought about it, Zion was the selfish one.

For the six months he never broke his silence, and not a soul could find Mykah to ask her, her side. Once she was discharged from the hospital and the police ruled her out, due to Zion's silence and her extensive injury list, she was gone.

With the main factor dead, and his two counterparts silent, the case was not at all easy. They couldn't prove Zion was guilty and they couldn't prove that he wasn't either.

With the way the crime scene was set, all the crucial evidence was in one place. From a few walk throughs you could tell there was a struggle in the bedroom due to a dent in the wall about the same size as Mykah's head, and there was damage to her cranium. Along with the dent there were smears of blood on the floor in the bedroom and hallway.

There were broken objects on the floor, the chair she used to pull herself up was on the floor, and there were things in places they shouldn't have been. Further investigation lead them to footage of Zion leaving the food outside of someone else's door and running down the hall when he heard Mykah scream, but that was the only surveillance they could find, which at most could give them a leadway to a manslaughter case due to their forensic evidence.

Their forensic testing on the blood smears showed that it was actually Mykah's blood, not Derek only proving that she was the one struggling. The police found that Derek's blood was only found in the vicinity of where he was fatally shot, meaning blood spatters on both suspects, even though Mykah was ruled out, and on the walls and close furniture.

What really detured the case was the fact that the gun primarily had Derek's fingerprints on it, concluding that it was his own gun, but there was an unidentifiable somewhat smeared fingerprint that didn't match Derek's.

From Derek's autopsy, thin strands of Mykah's hair, which was proved to be her hair from the follicle and evidence taken from her hair products and brushes, was laced in the cuff of his jacket and a few small strands of the same color resided in a nick in his growing finger nails. It also showed that his Adam's apple was definitely cracked, but wasn't broken meaning it wasn't the thing that killed him. He had bruises and a few scratches around his face and his hands, and a broken nose. Finally Mykah's blood was on his boots, proving that he was Mykah's aggressor.

Finally, from an overview of Mykah's  extensive injuries, she had two broken ankles, a fractured foot, and a turning purple bruise on her left heel the size of Derek's adam's apple. Her neck was covered in one big bruise in the shape of a hand print, that was compared and proven to be Derek's, as well as a badly cut and bruised pelvis. Her nurses also found some of Derek's skin under her nails.

With no substantial evidence against him, they couldn't necessarily blame Caleb, but they didn't have any other true suspects and their whole precinct knew it. They had more evidence to name Derek the killer than his own.

Only person they could pin as a possible killer, without the video placing Zion in Mykah's apartments general area, and police seeing him in the home, was Mykah but there was no evidence she did any harm to him besides the scratches on his hands,  which could be said were evidence she attempted to free herself.

The prosecution kept asking for extensions to try and find some other evidence but the judge grew tired of the wait and finally set the trial for a week away.

Zion wasn't scared, but he was a little nervous. He couldn't stay silent forever, and if he went to prison he couldn't blame it on anyone else but himself. What he was nervous for was what the evidence brought forth, even though he didn't know they didn't have a real case.

Would Mykah end up taking his place? That was his only fear, he was hell bent on making sure she didn't have to pay for someone else torturing her. Zion was tempted to tell his defense but in all honesty he didn't trust them, but in his defense black people don't have much luck in the system anyways.

It was eating him alive not saying what really happened, he knew in the media it he was made out to be a monster, due to the Los Angeles Police Department not making any statements in any favor.

He knew everything that happened outside due to visits with the boys and his siblings. Zion's parents didn't want anything to do with him so they cut disowned him, and they disowned his siblings forcing them to move in with the boys, and with open arms.

Zion wanted so badly to clear his name, but he realized that it would only incriminate Mykah. At night sometimes he couldn't sleep, he'd hear her voice circle his mind, and he'd day dream about all their happy times before he hears her screams and she says "come save me," over and over making him feel guiltier. He couldn't clear himself, he just couldn't even though he wanted it all to go away.
He was proving he would go to the limit for her, and she knew it.

AALIYAH

y'all, this is almost over. 😔
& them people at the pizza,
and the wings.