Rising Sun
Chapter 1: Research
"I'm not finding anything." The little girl mumbles, frustrated as she pushes the book in its proper place.
"Well, you're not going to find it if you're just sitting there and complaining." A noncholant voice shot back from the other side of the library. "Plus, it would help if you looking in the… I don't know… resources area."
The girl looks at the sign above her and as clear as day, it read 'Fiction'. She hopped of the moving ladder that she was using as a chair and made her way toward the resources area. There, she saw her friend, her head tilted sideways as she read the book titles.
"You could have said something Starlight. I was in the fiction area for 2 hours!" The little girl complained.
"Ji, I'm looking through books. I just happened to glance up and see you at the fiction area." The girl named Starlight replied, stressfully combing her snow white hair. "This is taking a lot longer than it should. I'll try using the lacrima over there." She says as she walked over to the lacrima.
"This is going to help us how?" Ji asked looking over Starlight's shoulder.
"You can look up the location of a book using this." She replied as she typed in the phrase 'Toven Village People'.
As soon as she hit the enter key, few results popped up.
"Check for books with the numbers 177.5 to 179." She ordered.
'Why are we looking for a book of names if we don't have the man's name?' She asked herself, watching her friend make her way to the shelf containing the books.
As they looked on the shelves, majority of the books were biographies and autobiographies. They kept searching until they both found an old book. It was a brown, clean book, as if people rarely used it.
"Toven Village Inhabitants" Ji read the spine of the book.
As Starlight scanned through the alphabetical list, a certain event that happened just a few days ago comes to mind.
Starlight and Ji just entered a small village after receiving information about a person that could help them. However, all the informant knew was that the person was a man in his early 20s and that he lived here.
"It's getting dark." She deadpanned, secretly regretting coming here with very little information.
"Oh… Ok. Let's look for an inn." The smaller girl replied.
After several minutes of retracing their steps and eventually being forced to ask for directions, they made it to the inn. It was a small, well kept inn. After they successfully rented out a room, Ji placed her backpack, filled with pens, paper, and water bottles, on her bed and Starlight leaned the fishing pole she had against the nearest corner. Afterwards, they decided to play a game of war in the lobby where the table was larger. As they played, they could feel the owner staring at them.
"Umm… Would you like to join us?" Ji asks weakly, feeling uncomfortable with the lady's stare.
The lady nodded and pulled up a chair to the end of the table. That way, Starlight, who was in her exceed-like form, and Ji were both on the opposite sides of the table and the lady was at one end. As Starlight gathered and shuffled the cards, Ji could feel the lady staring at her again.
"Are you okay miss?" She asked.
"Oh! Yes, yes. I am fine, t-thank you. I-I mean, sorry for staring. I must have made you feel really uncomfortable" She stammered, feeling embarrassed about the staring. "It's just, you just remind me of little Christy." She smiled before turning to Starlight.
"And you, you look a lot the cat she had. What was her name… Ah yes! It was Starlight. I remember because it wasn't a regular name like Sally or Shayla." Starlight's eyes widened as she her name but she didn't say anything. "However, both have been missing for several years now." She said sadly, looking at the ground.
"Were they kidnapped?" Ji asked, looking up at Starlight rather than the lady.
"No… We don't think that's what happened to them." The lady muttered more to herself than to Ji.
Oddly enough, no one in the town had such a name.
'It must be a nickname. Christy sounds a lot like Christina when I think about it.' She combed through her hair as she looked for people with the name Christina Keys. It didn't take her long to find it. She flips to the specified page. Sure enough, there was one page dedicated to the said name and on the page was a picture. A picture of a very familiar person, only slightly younger.
"Ji?"
Author's Note:
And here starts the sequel of my last story ^.^ I hope it's been interesting so far.
11/13/16 I made several edits to it, which makes me so happy because I can hardly read through my stories without cringing (even if it's good).
Review, favorite, follow
Sparrow-senpai out~