It was evening.
A rainy evening, to be precise.
Started pouring hard from the afternoon, and still pouring.
Airi was having some baked potato her mom made for her and having a sip occasionally on the large mug of hot chocolate.
"It's the best to have baked potato and hot chocolate on this beautiful rainy evening."
She slumped her body on the sofa comfortably when suddenly, her peaceful evening got interrupted by the ringing of her telephone.
"Who might be calling me now? Ugh!" Airi unwillingly got up and took the phone. It was from an unknown number, which she didn't recognize. Airi thought to not pick it up, so she left it to be ringing. "Can't let some unknown person ruin my evening."
But the phone of hers never stopped shouting out loud ever after she kept ignoring it, as the caller was persistent enough to dial continuously.
"Who is this, calling so many times? Are you dying or what! Don't you know the language of ignoring?" Airi was annoyed, and she didn't even try to hide it in her voice. But when the person from the other end started talking, her entire body froze.
"Airi, we are… Just a few houses... Can you..." and the other end got completely silent.
Wait for a second! Was that…
"Hello? Hello! You there? HELLO!"
Airi got panicked as she kept continuously saying 'hello' over her phone. But there was no response from the other end.
It's raining so bad… GOD!
"Maa, I am coming right back, " Air grabbed an umbrella and rushed out of the house.
"What happened, Airi?" Sara saw her panicking over the phone, but before she could ask anything, Airi was already gone.
Air ran straight ahead, crossing the houses behind her. If the person is the one she thinks to be, then it must be on the road towards the commercial area. She sprinted towards it. And surely, after crossing a couple of houses, there they were, lying on the road.
"Sam! Miss Celestine!" Airi rushed towards them. Reaching there, she found Sam half-conscious, but too weak to open his eyes or talk, even to move a muscle. He was bruised badly all over. So was Clara. She was injured, lying there fainted.
"What happened? How did you…" Airi wanted to ask about what happened, seeing them in this condition raised so many questions in her mind, but she thought to take them out of here before. "Okay, that can wait for later. Sam, can you walk on your own? Slowly? I will hold onto Miss Celestine. I will give you a hand, but as I already have to drag her, I can't drag you as well. Think you can manage?"
Samuel nodded lightly, so Airi helped him to stand up, giving a hand to him. "Just hold onto my shoulder tightly and try to move, okay?" Then she picked up Clara and started walking ahead. "Listen, Sam, I am taking both of you to my home right now, so don't deny. I can not possibly manage to take you to a hospital in this heavy rain." Samuel didn't deny it, only kept walking slowly behind Airi.
A long time had passed, but still, there was no sign of Airi's coming back. "She even left her cellphone here, where did she go in such a hurry, while it's pouring so hard?" Sara was nervously strolling around the living room, just then she heard the sound of the door unlocking and the wind chime clinking against it. Sara moved towards the door in hope of Airi's return, but her view was welcomed by a bloody mess of people, along with her.
"Airi, what happened to you, and who are…"
"Maa, I am fine. But they are certainly not. I will tell you everything later. Let them come in for now, and prepare some hot water and fresh towels." Airi slowly entered the living room, and laid Clara on the long sofa. She pointed to another one to Sam, "Sam, sit down there and relax. I will bring the first aid box." Airi rushed towards the cabinet where the medicines are kept, and fished out the first aid box.
Meanwhile, Sara brought some clean towels and handed them to her. Airi returned to them with those, only to find Samuel also losing his consciousness.
"Guess I need to do it myself. Maa, call Paa and check where he is and when he will come back home. Sam would need cleaning too. For now I just…" she unbuttoned his shirt and took that off, "let them not catch a cold for now. I'll take her to my room." Saying that, Airi slowly dragged Clara upstairs.
Airi let Clara lay down on her bed and started cleaning her wounds. Once done, she decided to change into one of Sara's clothes. Sara bought a dress of hers and handed it to her daughter. But when Airi removed Clara's wet clothes, they saw some more wounds covering almost all of her body. Sara gasped in shock, even Airi was surprised to see so many injuries on her, scraped skins here and there. "What in the world happened to them, Airi?"
Just then, Max returned home rushing, hearing about the injured persons Airi brought home. Upon seeing a man lying down injured in the living room, Max started shouting, "Sara! What's going on!"
Sara came running downstairs, "Max, he is badly injured, he… I don't know… Airi brought him…" all of these happenings were heaving down on her a lot, and she was feeling nervous enough to make out any words.
"That can wait, Sara. Bring me a fresh towel to clean, hurry!"
After Max was done with tending the bruises on Samuel, he carried him to his bedroom and laid him down. Airi also came down to the living room by then, and slumped against the sofa, tired.
"Airi, you are okay, right? You aren't hurt anywhere?" Sara asked her anxiously.
"No, Maa. I am perfectly alright. Is he okay?"
"Yes, I just laid him down after changing his clothes." Max also returned to the living room, taking a seat beside Airi. "What exactly happened to them, Airi? And who are those people?"
"They are my teachers. The man is our English literature teacher, Mr. Samuel Brown. And there is a lady up in my room. She is Miss Celestine, my homeroom teacher."
"Your homeroom teacher… Is that Miss Clara? I met her after a while when you left the office. She talked a lot about you too. Then what happened in this short while…" Max said with a clear complicated feeling in his mind.
"Oh, so she did meet you before. Sam dropped me home, while Miss Celestine went to meet your boss. She did tell me she would meet you… And if she did that before meeting Mr. Sinclair…" Airi pondered for a while to get the situation clearly in her mind. She had already suspected Mr. Sinclair, so there might be a possibility that he did something to her.
"Paa, did you see Miss Celestine leave Mr. Sinclair's room all okay?" Airi asked her father, to which he replied moving his head sideways. "No actually, I had to go to another branch for work just after that, so I never saw her coming out of there. That's why I am late home today also."
There was silence for a while until Max broke it with a question. "So, how did you find both of them like this?"
"Sam was supposed to go back to the office to pick her. So I think they have been together since then. And a while back, I got a call from him. He was sounding so weirdly sick and so I just ran to the place he told me. And after crossing a few houses, I found them lying on the street in this heavy rain."
"God! This is… what happened to them, did they tell you anything?"
"They weren't in any state to say anything, Paa. I found Miss Celestine totally unconscious for who knows how long, and Sam was too weak to move. So I just brought them home instead of going to a hospital.
"You did the right thing, Airi, " Sara spoke up. "The way they looked, their wounds needed to be looked at immediately. And if you tried to go to the hospital in this heavy rain, those injuries could get infected thanks to the rain."
Max agreed to her. "Yeah, let them wake up. We will know more about it later. Let us just take a bit of rest. Airi you better wash up too. Make sure your muscles don't hurt."
Airi nodded and went to take a bath. And all this time, she kept wondering what had happened to them. She was getting the feeling that this might be related to Mr. Sinclair, but to what extent, that was the question.
Guess that needs to wait until they wake up.