The next morning, the four were sitting in one hotel room. Yuruko & Serena were sitting next to the whiteboard they had bought the night prior, along with their paper shredder & markers.
"Okay." said Serena. "Trying to tell you... something. Need to use this."
"This happened last night." said Yuruko.
Serena drew a bench and a stick figure with black hair. "Can you make this blue? I need to draw your hair."
Yuruko laughed, tapping the marker Ayanami Blue. Serena drew her.
"You were out last night?" said Mia.
"Coolio." winced Yuruko. "But then…"
Serena took a sticker out of the bag, drawing another stick figure on the board. "But then, someone showed up." She smacked the sticker on to the figure, and the sticker fell limp to the ground. "…oh, man." She showed it off: it read 'DUMBASS'. "I thought you said it'd stick."
"You fought a Revenant, then?" said Mia.
"But then…" Yuruko plugged in the paper shredder. "We asked questions, but…"
Serena put the dumbass in the shredder.
"You shredded him alive?" said Tuyuan, and Mia shook her head.
"…you can't speak because someone's…" She spoke slowly, making sure Serena or Yuruko could stop her between her syllables. "The host? It's contagious?" (Serena nodded.) "On death of a victim?" (Yuruko nodded.)
"Must be the man we're looking for." said Tuyuan. "Or woman."
Serena started her next drawing -
" - you didn't look up the symbol?!" sputtered Yuruko, the artist already one ball deep -
" - we were out shopping all night!"
"He only has one testicle? -oh." murmured Mia.
"I told you we'd need the whiteboard." chimed Serena, wiping the previous masterpieces off. She started setting up an eight-letter hangman. "Okay. Guess. Just in case."
"A." said Tuyuan, and Serena drew the head.
"E." said Mia.
_ _ _ E _ E _ _
"I." said Tuyuan, and Serena drew the torso.
"O." said Mia.
_ O _ E _ E _ _
"U." said Tuyuan, and Serena drew the right arm.
"He's dying." murmured Yuruko, ruefully.
"S." said Mia.
_ O _ E _ E S S
"R."
The left arm.
"P." said Mia.
The left leg.
"G."
The right leg, and Serena & Yuruko sighed.
"Now we have to do it over again." murmured Serena, wiping it clean.
+++
Three men were hanged before they reached 'HOMELESS', and the four visited a local homeless encampment: a mishmash of tents against a graffiti-stained mural. Cautious for if Schizoid was activated by heading his name, Mia told Serena & Yuruko to stay away as she questioned a few men.
"Has anyone come here recently?" said Mia. "Er, anyone new?"
The three men talked amongst themselves: mostly making references to people Mia couldn't understand. Eventually, they were distracted enough that she had to repeat her question.
"Well, there's that doctor who's been coming here a lot." offered one. "He's got that Jewish name, what was it?"
"Derschowitz?" said another.
"Rosenthal." said the first to Mia. "His name's Dr. Rosenthal, I don't know his first name. He's been coming here every few weeks and taking people back to his clinic, taking care of them and whatnot."
Mia's mouth went grim. "Do they ever come back?"
"To be honest withcha, I don't pay attention that closely. Why?"
"There's… been a few disappearances, recently. That's why we were investigating."
"Investigating?" said another. "You're not a cop, are you?"
"No, I'm a Urasaria student." Mia smiled. "I only deal with Revenants."
The first man shrugged. "Well, I can tell you I don't know anything about anybody disappearing. People leave whenever the hell they feel like it, so I wouldn't be no suspicious of it, either."
Hearing Serena talk, Mia glanced over her shoulder and saw her & Yuruko distributing Medicinal-cans filled with Blackburn-food & bottles of water. She turned back to the man. "Er, this doctor - is he local?"
"I would guess he is. I don't know of anybody else who's been around here."
"Is he that doctor that's getting some award soon? I read about it in the paper." said another. He started babbling and Mia smiled reassuringly.
"Er, I'm sure we'll find out for you."
"Probably our guy." yawned Tuyuan. "Let's get out of here."
Mia nodded and went over to Serena & Yuruko, who finished up filling a few boxes of food & water. As they were leaving the encampment and coming up to the street corner, Serena jolted a little when a police siren flashed behind them. Mia turned to see him stepping out of his squad car towards them.
"Excuse me, students." he said, cautiously walking up to them. "My name's Officer Tom. I just noticed you four coming out of that homeless encampment. Were you feeding them? With your… what's the word, your Revenants?"
Mia pressed Serena back a bit. "What does it matter?"
"It matters, because... look, I understand you're here to enforce your side of the law, just as I do mine, but there's a law against public food-sharing in this state. I can't very well fine or arrest you, but I'm going to need you to take back whatever you gave them. You can't hand out food without a permit."
In Mia's view, there were no good police officers: even the few moral ones were forced by the system to enforce laws like this, handing out useless tickets & covering for their corrupt coworkers. She despised that any of them would think to compare themselves to her. "I refuse."
"Miss -- Swarm, I really would prefer not to get your academy involved in this. I'm sure you have something about not being allowed to use your Revenants to give out things like that, either. It'll just take a minute."
Mia grimaced. Remembering a habit of Serena's, she told her to pull up a picture of their last kill, and she showed one particularly gruesome to non-hosts. "Do I need to tell you twice?"
He gulped and backed away from her. "I- suppose you don't, no."
She glared at him until he got in his car and pulled away, disappearing in to the end of noon. She felt this was why the law appeared like an alien entity over people: everyone could point out these foolish laws written by people hundreds of miles away from their enforcement. Angrily she turned and kept walking, the three following with her.
"He had a point, you know." said Tuyuan. "Feeding them is just going to make them depend on handouts. I don't see why you had to be such a dick to him."
"Then you can go fuck off with him." said Mia.
"Tuyuan, just go back to the hotel." winced Yuruko.
Tuyuan rolled his eyes and walked off.
"Um, I'm not gonna get in trouble for the food, right?" said Serena.
Mia shook her head. "It'll be alright, Serena. Even if he calls Urasaria, it'll go to Nuiko or Aimee."
"Yeah." said Yuruko. "They don't care unless you're selling stuff."
Her worry gone, Mia saw Serena smirking with her: just a little.
"…um." said Yuruko. "So, what did you find out about the… other thing…"
Mia glanced at something behind her, then put a finger to her lips to the two. "We'll question him in a few days. Not until then."