I awakened in a familiar place.
It took me a whole minute before I could remember what happened to me; that I had been poisoned.
'Shun, how are you feeling?' came Tsunan's soft voice beside me and my eyes shifted from the white ceiling of the clinic to onto the face of the doctor standing by the consultation bed onto which I was resting.
'Not too well,' I whispered, my throat sore, my muscles weak.
I tried to sit up but he put a hand up in front of my chest, causing me to lie back down.
'No. Don't get up,' he told me. 'There's no trace of poison in your organism anymore. The antidote has worked. Fortunately, you don't have any sequel. You only need to rest.'
'I see.'
I noticed Tsunan's expression only then, as he rested his palms down onto the edge of the consultation bed and he bowed his head, pressing his eyes shut. I could read shame and guilt on his face.
'Shun, I beg your forgiveness for what Katsuya has just made you endure. I should have known that sooner or later we'd arrive to such an extremity. I should have warned you.'
'Tsunan,' I breathed, my heart clenching at his tortured expression. Sitting up weakly, I lifted a trembling hand up to his face, my fingers only barely touching his cheek.
The doctor lifted his head just a bit but refused to look at me in the eyes yet.
'Please, don't apologize! I can understand,' I told him, sincerely, in a murmur. 'Katsuya is a member of the organization. If you had talked badly of him, it would have been, as if, you're putting Master Kagami's good judgment into doubt. I trust the master's good judgment too.'
'Shun...' he whispered, opening his eyes finally to lock gaze with me for a moment before Ayame came in the doorway of the consultation room.
'Ayame...' I said, lowering my hand slowly, and Tsunan turned to face the younger male.
The blond boy's expression wasn't good; he looked extremely depressed.
'Thank you for having saved my life,' I told him, as he drew closer. 'How-How did you know...'
Lowering his head, he mumbled, 'At first, I thought that it's Shizuka Noriasu who's Katsuya's target.'
'Shizuka Noriasu?'
He began telling us about his conversation with Katsuya during the treasure hunt on the island of Nagashima, which had caused him to fear that the ginger-haired male would attempt to the said-girl's life again, but he had been mistaken.
I realized that the person who had warned me to watch out for Katsuya was definitely none other than Shizuka Noriasu.
'I'll get back to Katsuya's apartment now to wait for him to come back. The master is there too.'
With this, Ayame left and I looked at Tsunan again.
'I find something very strange,' I told him, weakly. 'Katsuya is apparently someone fond of scheming. Until now, he has planned every one of his moves very cautiously and with intelligence. It doesn't resemble him to behave this rashly.'
A frown appeared on Tsunan's forehead and he acknowledged, 'Yes. You're right. That's what I find very strange too.'
***
The next day, in the evening...
I was in my bedroom when I heard the doorbell rang twice.
Making my way downstairs, I began to head for the genkan.
The doorbell rang several more times in an urgent way, causing me to accelerate my pace.
Sliding the front door open, I found Ayame standing there, panting hard, as though he had ran; his eyes filled with distress.
'Ayame, what is it?' I asked him, worriedly.
'It's Katsuya. He didn't come back to his apartment since yesterday. I've been looking for him around town for the entire day. He sent me a message on my cellphone just a while ago to inform me that he's leaving the organization and town, never to come back again. I understand perfectly that, after what he has done, you don't want to see him, but please, I beg of you, help me to keep him from leaving. If there's anyone he'd accept to listen to, it's probably you. You can punish him the way that you want after that. Just help me to stop him!'
'Alright!' I said, nodding.
Ayame gave me a half-astonished look.
'Katsuya is a member of the organization,' I told him in a murmur. 'It's out of the question that he leaves the organization because of me.'
Hurrying back inside, I jotted down a small note for Tsunan to inform him about where I was gone- in case, he'd come back home before me- and left the note on the low table in the living room under the ash tray.
***
In the meanwhile, at the Ametsuchi Bar…
'What?!'
Hatsu Sho almost choked on his drink.
'Don't you find it suspicious that that guy reappears just where she is?! Perhaps, he has followed her up to Toda from the beach! Perhaps, he's a psychopath! One of us should accompany her to return him his umbrella.'
The blond male gave the doctor a cocky grin then.
'But don't worry! I'll go in your place such that, in Shun's eyes, you don't pass for the jealous and possessive guy who takes himself for her boyfriend! Friends are made for that, yes?!'
Hatsu giggled, maliciously.
'Psychopath or not, it'll be a feast to see the face that little rascal will make when I'll show up with her!'
He went back drinking again, and Tsunan Hitachiin watched him cynically, saying, 'You'll never change, huh?!'
Taking a sip at his own saké, the doctor became thoughtful then.
"Don't you find it suspicious that that guy reappears just where she is?! Perhaps, he has followed her up to Toda from the beach! Perhaps, he's a psychopath!"
Hatsu's words made him jittery.
'It's me who'll go with her,' he asserted and getting to his feet, he cleared their bill and strode for the door, wishing to get back home and by Shun's side, without losing a minute.
Why am I having this ugly feeling all suddenly?
***
Tagging along with Ayame, I followed him to the train station to try to stop Katsuya from leaving.
'Let's split up!' the blond told me, as we reached the near desert station, and I gave him a nod, both of us going separate ways.
Katsuya cannot leave the organization. The family must not be disunited.
It'd hurt everyone too much, especially Ayame. The latter's admiration for Katsuya had no bounds; the blond boy would be completely shattered.
As I was searching for the ginger-haired male on my side, out of the blue, somebody covered my mouth and my nose from behind with a cloth and I breathed in a strong smell that burned my nose and went directly to my brain.
Even before I could understand what happened, my vision blurred.
***
On the other side…
The moment Tsunan Hitachiin reached home, he began to search for Shun in the house.
He was about to head upstairs to her bedroom when, his eyes fell onto the piece of paper resting under the ashtray in the living room.
Hurrying up to the low table, he picked up the note - recognizing Shun's handwriting instantly - which said:
I'm gone to the train station with Ayame
to try and stop Katsuya from leaving town.
I'll be back home before your return.
Shun.
The ugly feeling Tsunan was having, doubled in that instant.
Putting his shoes back on, the doctor began to head for the train station to find the red-haired girl. He felt the urgent and desperate need to see her.
He tried to contact her several times on her cellphone, but she answered none of his calls, which made him even more jittery.
At his arrival at the train station, he met with Ayame, but to his great confusion, he didn't find Shun with the blond boy.
'Ayame, where's Shun?' he demanded at the latter.
'I don't know. We've split up to search for Katsuya. But I can find neither of the two.'
Instantaneously, Tsunan tried to locate her through the GPS system on her cellphone.
Apparently, she was still at the train station, but when they cleared the distance between the signal of the red-haired girl's cellphone and them, what they found wasn't Shun, but only her cellphone, lying there on the ground.
Crouching down, Tsunan picked up the girl's cellphone, alarm bells going off in his head.
Shun!
***
Later…
The first thing that I became conscious of when I came back to myself was that I was blindfolded.
Automatically, I tried to reach up to remove the blindfold but that's when I became conscious of another fact that caused my heart to pick up speed; my hands were tied behind me and my ankles were equally roped!
I was sitting upright in what, evidently, was a chair.
And then, only then, did I remembered what happened.
I recalled the hand that had come over my mouth and my nose from behind at the train station and the scent of the chloroform that had filled in my nostrils and knocked me out.
Panic shot through my veins at that moment and I let out a startled yelp as I found myself drenched with water in all of a sudden.
I shivered, out of both cold and fear.
Who's there? Where am I?
I jumped as I heard the sound of a bucket hit the hard floor and I let out a small cry in fright as a hand seized my jaw painfully.
'How I'd like to read the terror in your eyes right now! But I can't take the risk of taking off this blindfold! I know about your ability,' muttered a low male voice.
My heart shook.
This voice… I have the impression that I've heard it before!
'Do you recognize my voice?' he asked.
This time, I did.
'Ha-Hazuki!' I gasped, a shrill running down my spine. What does this mean?
'And yes!' he exclaimed with exuberance, releasing my jaw.
He began circling around of me, his footfalls making echoes.
'Now, a small riddle: "What's going on?" I'll give you two clues: serial murder and hanging; does that tell you anything?'
Terror coursed through my body in that instant as the situation sank in completely.
Hazuki was none other than the serial killer of ex-convicts the police was searching for!
'That's the reaction that I love the most!'
He paused to caress my cheek and I shrank away from his touch, whimpering, my heart beating so fast that I thought it was going to explode.
'I love the expression that my victims make whenever they realize that I am the angel of death who has come for them and what's awaiting them before I allow them to join the Kingdom of the Dead.'
I could hear him circling around me again.
'You know, usually, I spot my victims and I simply kidnap them. But with you, I wanted to take my time. Till now, I have chastised people who have come out of prison because their crimes didn't cause them to be sentenced to life imprisonment. But you, the girl who has massacred a whole village- Shun Shutsuki, the mass murderer- you're my ultimate catch!'
'I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw you at the resort! I bumped into you in the lobby deliberately, you know? It was the very first time that I made direct contact with a victim in such a way. After that, I tried to scare you in the hotel corridor. And then, I saw Katsuya Hattori try to push you off a cliff. I became interested in him on the spot and so, I investigated on him and found things on his past. I decided to approach him; I believed that he'd make an excellent disciple for me.'
'I was really disappointed by his failure to kill you. He ran to me immediately after that for, there was no one else- other than me- with whom he could have talked about what happened. I told myself that, fortunately, I have already made contact with you.'
I remembered our encounter two days ago after my return of mission with Heihachi; it had been planned.
'But then, I decided that I didn't want to continue with this little game, especially since I feared that the story with Katsuya makes you cautious about me. Katsuya is here with us right now, you know?'
I was astounded.
'But I've had to imprison him in a cage for, he really looked horrified when I revealed to him that I'm the serial killer the police are looking for.'
'Let go of me!' came Katsuya's shouting voice, at that moment, in the distance.
'Don't make that face Katsuya! I've only killed monsters, just like you wanted to kill the monster that Shun Shutsuki is! Except that, you backed out at the last minute because of your brotherly feelings for the young Ayame. But now, you have no one and nothing. I'm going to show you how to chastise monsters like Shun Shutsuki and very soon, you'll take pleasure in doing it!'
There came no response from Katsuya, but only the sound of a shaking cage.
'Where was I?' said Hazuki, speaking to me again. 'Ah yes! It's me who sent Ayame Tsuge that text message from Katsuya's cellphone. Thanks to all the things that the latter has told me about you all, I knew exactly how the blond was going to react and that you'll accept to follow him to make yourself well seen by everyone. And so, here we are!'
He seized me by my jaw again and I held my breath, my stomach twisting with nausea.
'Don't worry! I'm not going to do anything to you tonight! Because this terror that you're feeling right now, it's going to keep on accentuating with every hour. And when it'll reach its culminating point and you won't be able to support it anymore, that's when your real hell on earth will begin! And it's not like anyone is going to search for you. Despite being monster-hunters, none of the members of Gushiken Paranormal Organization truly believes your possession story!'
His grip disappeared on my jaw and I heard his footsteps recede from me, before the sound of an opening tap followed.
The next fraction of a second, cold water was pouring down on me from above head.
Thank you for reading!