Apartment-
Despite telling himself numerous times to sleep Chase could bring himself to sleep while knowing his music skills were lacking. It was already hard for him to overcome JJ's rejection for his second song. But he accepted it cause it was JJ a music director, not some random guy who didn't know anything about music.
Chase complained about it 43 rd time, before finally getting up and finding a novel from the bookshelf. The novel didn't quite fit with the other books on the bookshelf which were mostly books related to music or computers.
It was already midnight, but Chase didn't care about the time. He started reading the novel with his complete focus.
It was an adult novel, a story about a single mother abandoned by her husband. It was told from her 4-year-old son's perspective. The era they lived in wasn't kind towards woman resulting in rumours spreading about the mother.
The small four-year-old was unable to understand things that were happening around him. Resulting in him growing up with a grudge against society. The haters became more prominent in his life after his mother's death.
Chase read the line of mother's death with a complex expression. Chase flipped the pages to see the synopsis of the story once again but apparently, the story was really about the mother. He had finished only some pages of the novel but the mother evidently died.
After that, the whole story only revolved around the guy winning at everything but not being able to have romantic feelings for women. Despite that, the novel totally had adult content every two pages.
In the morning Obi waited at the table for certain someone alone. Bai had already left at 6 am for his shift. But Chase not only showed up late, but he also had bloodshot eyes. He couldn't stop yawning the entire time at the table.
"Did you not get enough sleep?" Obi asked the question fully knowing the answer. He was going to inform the silver-haired guy about a situation that happened on the internet. Now, it felt like he shouldn't.
"No, I was reading." Chase put the bread in his mouth. He didn't seem optimistic while addressing the movie he was making music for.
Obi had an 'oh' moment. From his point of view had Chase read the matter online. "Don't worry...I will talk to Dir. JJ and Mark about it."
"Wait." Chase raised his one eyebrows while putting the coffee down. "Why would you talk to Dir. JJ about the trash?"
"Why are you calling Charles Zimin trash? I can understand your feeling...but it's too much for a single comment." Chase felt more confused after Obi's statement. Only one thing became clear to him, both of them weren't on the same page.
After having a deep long conversation...
"So apparently people are speculating that Charles is having a grudge against me as I used a backdoor to enter the movie his company is financing." Chase smiled while sipping the coffee, but Obi could guess he wasn't particularly in a great mood. Chase's eyes weren't smiling at all.
"They are crazy while Charles Zimin is trash." Did Chase put the coffee cup down with a clinking sound? He had already guessed the comment wasn't going to go unnoticed but this was too much. The novel had put Chase in a terrible mood, the online scandal only increased the frequency from terrible to horrible.
Such a perfect time to write the second song. Chase decided to visit the recording room director JJ lent him to produce some quality content.
________
JJ had a bad hangover from last night party he had to attend. His head was spinning but his phone didn't stop ringing. He ignored it few times, but the ringing didn't stop.
He slid the icon expecting his father but instead it was his best buddy.
"Whaa?" James mumbled exactly like the intoxicated person he was.
"Wash your face and listen to me. I made a mistake." Charles went straight to the point and waited for James to wash his face on the line.
As soon as James once again came out of the bathroom Charles bombarded him with the whole narrative of the episode with Chase.
"Do you got a fetish of acting immature every once in a while?" James clenched his fist, he had known Charles for years. And Charles was always the mature one in the group until he took questionable decisions occasionally. "Will the board of directors say anything about it?"
It suddenly drew to James his friend existed as the current face of the Galactica group. His online presence wasn't only his.
"No, they won't. It can be considered as my personal opinion." Hearing it James finally felt relieved but then 'Why was Charles calling him so early in the morning?'
"If it's okay with you, can you tell the guy in my instead, I am apologetic?"
"No." James stiffened, he didn't want to apologise instead of Charles that wasn't fair to the other guy and him. "I think you can do it yourself if you are remorseful. Just say it on any occasion you met him. And please just post something and stop those guys on the internet I am working on a project with him too."
James prefered artists under him not to get in any scandal, he didn't want his studio's image to get tainted. This type of scandals never affected any celebs but the project they were working on at that time.
________
Crime branch-
Today, Grekov precisely went to the crime branch headquarters ahead. He needed to check the information he got from Kira and the information they had at their office.
But on the entrance, he met with a sight of an elderly couple. It wasn't new to see people coming to register a complaint. What was odd about the couple, that they didn't look native but rather foreign.
Grekov asked his junior while getting in his office about the elderly people.
"They are here from country T." On the mention of the country, Grekov directly remembered Z is from country T. He clicked his tongue dwelling, 'Was he thinking too much about work?'
"They are here to report their son missing, he made game videos for a living..." The junior was confused about how to explain things to his superior.
"He was a streamer or a professional gamer. Just get them to register the complaint and have they gone to the country T's embassy, yet?"
Grekov didn't wait for an answer from the junior but directly approached the couple for information.
The information he got from the couple shocked him. Their son was named Jason White a 21-year-old streamer who came to country A four months ago to make travel vlogs. But the couple couldn't contact him for the last 2 months.