1997
Hurricanes slowly passed by the southern Japanese shores. In its leave the population of Japan found themselves surrounded in white droplets of snow moving in from a roundabout course. Winds blowing from Mie prefecture kindly brushed against the hairs of people looking at the empty roads leading northeast. Arms on the bridge's railings, the brown-haired girl looked at where the vast dark sky and the line of grey road converged at. On the sidewalks were shops and signs adorning the peaceful mid-day life of the normal Aichi prefecture.
Holding an unlit cigarette between her teeth, the girl stood up straight with her eyes closed tight. She pulled out a lighter from her white coat, held its pipe below the cigarette and clicked the trigger. Feeling something was wrong she peeked with one eye and found the cigarette unlit. She clicked the trigger a few more times, and to her disappointment the cigarette remained unlit.
Shaking her head she walked to the western end of the crossing platform and head down. The first alley she saw she went inside and searched the horribly lit street for a cheap eating place. She didn't care what it was, as long as she could get someone to get her cigarette lit. Past the disposed crates of beer bottles she found herself a small shop's backdoor at the end of the back alley. Across the end of the alley were shops lined up, but dirtier than what were presented in the main roads.
Thinking about it, she had heard about this street before. But the name escaped her.
What made her enter the third ramen store she saw was anyone's guess, but seeing it quietly unpopulated by its patron made her quite relieved. The four of them were young adults in age, all of them female except one whose gender she couldn't ascertain too well. His or her hair was cut short and bleached white. Green vest over white shirt with puffy shoulder seemed to be straight out of the fashion magazine. She didn't catch whether he or she wore pants over his or her crotch, but the wide-shape of her hips and legs was the line that blurred the sex inside her mind.
"What'll it be," a rude greeting from the server behind the counter, which was also the kitchen. He was the owner of a particularly small shop, but it was wide enough for the cook to feel himself comfortable in. Six tables on the side and back of the shop with a long sitting table across the counter. "Been getting a lot of people your age coming in lately. I don't know if business is booming or if I'm losing money from this."
The man's body was round, but it was not to the point that he was fat. He was handling his preparation in uniform rather well, washing the bowl and adjusting the temperature of the boiling pot. The noodles themselves weren't crudely treated, but its preparation were quite hastily done. What the girl understood was the effort that the cook gave to making his noodles, though his shop's cleanliness leaves a lot of things to be desired.
"Uncle, give me a lighter," said the now sitting girl as she wiggled the unlit cigarette hanging from her mouth.
"Sorry young miss. This is a non-smoking area. It ruins the taste of the broth."
The girl clicked her tongue. She placed the cigarette back inside the box and placed them in the right side of her coat's pocket. "Then just give me the cheapest lunch set."
"Sorry young miss. As much as I would like to smoke I just don't want to mess around with the broth's taste. I assure you my noodles are at the top of the class in taste." He adjusted his cooking cap before moving on to preparing his noodles. Afterward, a quick preparation began and as he pushed in the noodles to the cooking pot he prepared a wiped clean bowl and placed a few seasonings inside it. Timing his rhythm just right, he opened a pot full of hot and cooked water into the bowl, mix it with the seasoning, before picking the now cooked and hot noodles into the bowl with a gentle motion. Sprinkling a few onion leaves and a few bits of grated radish on the center of the bowl, the man handed the bowl of ramen toward the brown-haired girl. "We got hot green tea for the drink, but if you want I can give you water instead."
"Is it iced?"
The cook turned toward the girl with a raised eyebrow. "Do you want to have a cold, miss? At this weather you're best drinking something hot."
"I'm not much of a fan of hot water."
"Then hot tea it is. Green's fine with you, right?"
"Is it straight from the leaves? My stomach can't deal with pre-packaged tea."
"You're such a demanding customer, young miss." The cook sighed. "Thinking about it I've never seen you around these parts before. Are you new in Chiryu? Never seen you around these parts before at least."
"Mind your own business, Uncle."
"I am. Can't have some shady girl visiting my shop and the next day my store's becoming a hub for junkies can I?" The man placed the girl's tea beside the hot ramen. "Here's your tea. I made it quite hot so be careful."
"Are you a book person or a movie person, Uncle?"
The uncle scratched his chin as his mind wandered around the room. "Well, I'm not much of a reader as I am a watcher. Never seen that many movies though." He sat opposite of the girl, eyes looking straight at her. "Why do you ask?"
"Ever seen Star Wars?"
"No, what's that? Some foreign movie?"
"I'll come back here again," the girl shook her head as she turned toward her food. "Everyone deserves to watch Star Wars."
The Cook raised his eyebrow higher than before. "Okay? I appreciate it," the cook said as he whispered a soft 'weirdo' and pulled out a newspaper from one of the drawers below the counter. "We only have a single TV and it's not even that good over there," said the man as he pointed toward a lonely square-shaped television supported by a single sturdy metal support opposite of where a fan was busily whirring about. "I don't even have anything to play this "Star Wars" you're speaking off of."
"I got it all covered, don't worry."
The girl unwrapped the red scarf around her neck and placed it on her lap. She looked at the bowl of noodle before her, and found it quite the lackluster of presentations. The noodles were a little too baggy and the broth was too clear for something that smelled very seasoned. The placement of the side-toppings were haphazard and felt like a tacky add-on. Upon closer inspections the bowl was not cleanly wiped on the undersides and placing the chopsticks and the soup spoon on the bowl itself was either an innocent way to disrespect his customer or an underhanded effort to make her leave.
Then she looked on the tea, where a tiny dot of dead ant was floating about merrily.
"Uncle what the hell's this?" The girl picked the cup of tea and let its content be visible to the cook, reaching forward and behind the counter. "There's an ant in my tea and you're calling it a decent food service?"
"It's calcium. It's good for your boney-looking body, miss."
"Why I'd never—"grumbled the brown-haired girl as she scooped the ant with two of her fingers and flicked it toward the cook. "I picked the wrong restaurant again," and then she sighed with all her heart and soul placed into it. The girl then took a slight slurping of the noodles, and slammed the table in hastily decided anger. "This tastes like Nissin's instant noodles! What!?"
"Well what did you expect? This isn't exactly a first-class noodle shop," the cook glared at the visibly angry girl, though the mention of 'again' still lingered in his mind. "I'm not that much of a cook so all i did was learn the tastes from instant noodles. If you don't like the noodle just leave it there and I'll recommend you a good store three blocks away from here. How's that?"
"I don't have any money for that expensive stuff."
"Then shut your trap and eat."
"Where do you come from, cook?" the girl said as she ate her noodles. "South or North?"
"North," his face slowly turned into a portrait definition of anger. "What's it to you?"
"Surprising, is all," the girl said in a purposefully slow manner. "How can someone from the north make such a bad soup? The mind boggles on that question."
"Fine, I get it my noodles suck. I'll do better your next visit my generous queen."
"Good, otherwise my viewing of Star Wars will be explicitly ruined."
"You're still on about this "Star Wars" of yours. What the hell does that have anything to do with this? What even is a "Star Wars" anyway?"
"Well," the brown-haired female stopped, pondering what to say. Suddenly she picked up the bowl and savagely ate the rest of the noodles before slurping the soup and gulping it down her throat before refreshing her excited taste buds with the refreshing warmness of her green tea. After setting both helping apparatuses down, she let out a silent belch. "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away..."
Her green hair whiffed against the cold air blown by her desk's fan. The maiden sitting on the desk rested her back on the recliner, slowly mesmerizing herself in the deepest parts of her thoughts. Her body was warm enough with only having a white and thick coat for cover. She was mumbling a lot, though not quite sleep-talking. The back of her neck was slowly relaxing to the beat of the song coming out of the stereo from one of the open-windowed cabinet to the side of her drawing board filled to the edges with foreign symbols. Even the writer herself hardly knew the full meaning of.
The room she usually slept her afternoon away was neatly cleaned and everything was placed tidily. The desk before the girl contained a personal computer, a stack of documents, and a study-light beside the growingly-soothing fan. The desk had a few drawers attached below it, but those contained mostly snacks to refresh the ever-weary mind of said green-haired girl. But the stocks had been depleted for a short-while. She could just restock it tomorrow or tonight, and for the present she wanted a good afternoon breather.
Just as she was about to enter the state of great calm the door to her study was opened.
"We're closed for the day," the green-haired girl weakly mumbled.
The brown-haired girl let herself in anyway. Strutting in unannounced wearing a thick white coat with her neck wrapped around with a red scarf. Her blue jeans were finely making out the shape of her legs, and her sneakers made a distinct slight-squeak sound due to the condition of its soles. "Since when is your laboratory a shop, Nitori?"
"That's Professor Nitori to you, Shrine Maiden," the girl adjusted her cap like she would a ten gallon hat. "Now unless you have a good reason to interrupt my resting time I have to ask you to leave at once."
"Oh shut up, I brought you a bunch of cucumbers," and that definitely earned the brown-haired girl Nitori's full attention. She sighed as she placed a box of cucumbers wrapped in plastic on top of the professor's desk. After letting Nitori pick one of the cucumbers she brought the brown-haired girl looked closely toward the drawing board. "What are you researching anyway? The only thing I can understand out of this is you need a lot of energies for it."
"I didn't know a Shrine Maiden is familiar with scientific symbols."
"Zip it, kappa. As much as I like to pray to Gods and Goddesses dwelling all over Japan I'd rather fix my problems without relying on them. Most people do anyway." She scanned the drawing boards a bit more and looked at the equations produced from the prime formula at the top-left. "No matter how much I looked at your work it never cease to amaze me. Why aren't you scouted by some firms by now is totally beyond me."
"I'm content with just being a chem whiz," said Nitori as she bit a chunk off of a freshly washed cucumber. "Managing an apothecary is already a rewarding job."
'Well, I'll get straight to the point," the Shrine Maiden placed a fully-filled small bag onto the professor's desk. "I need some help regarding this little package of mine, doc. Maybe you can help me do something about it?"
Nitori looked at the small bag before her. It was leopard-patterned and hued like a live-skinned fur. Her small fingers opened the bag inside slightly as she mumbled sarcastically, "This better not be some sort of illegal substances you're forking off of me."
"Trust me," the girl placed her red scarf on the empty hanger beside the door. "It will surely be worth your while."
"Hey, Ms. Konpaku," a blonde-haired and tanned girl shifted her sight to the friend on her right. "Did you bleach your hair? How did you manage to make it look so natural? My blonde hair can't ever feel like something that suits me right at all!"
"Because these strands of hairs are natural."
The white-haired girl responded, before taking a sip from her instant-brand coffee. She loved these instant brands of coffees and how nice they feel as they move down her throat. Even without focusing that much on the flavor, she knew what the brand of this coffee was. "And call me Youmu. Calling me with any other name would be unbearably awkward for friends, don't you think so?"
"Well now that you mention it, I think so too," the girl replied with a big grin. "In that case, how about this? I can call you Youmu and you can call me Sa-chan."
"Don't you have a better nickname for yourself, Sa-chan?" Said the girl sitting opposite of her across the table.
"Yeah, yeah, shut up why dont you?" the blonde-girl sassily replied to her goading. It was then they started snorting before the both of them laughed out loud. "But I can't believe you'd recommend us to this dinky ramen shop, Youmu." Sa-chan continued. "It kinda doesn't really fit well with your whole trendy but serious image, y'know?"
"Oh yeah I totally agree with you, Sa-chan. I'd figure she'd take us to somewhere more high-classed. Like McDonalds or something. Don't you think so too Ran?" The girl's light brown hair and red windbreaker was her key-defining feature. But above them was her eternally happy grin. She was asking the girl beside her, who really didn't what to answer with. "It's surprising, right Ran?"
"Whatever," Ran brushed her wavy-blue hair aside. Half uncaring, half stumped for answers. "It doesn't matter where Ms. Konpaku took us to. I'll trust her judgements." Contrasting the demeanor and clothing of the girl that called her name, she wore blue bomber jacket and blue-purple striped shirt underneath it. "You want to go to McDon's or something, Ririka?"
"Well, not really but you know, right?"
"No?"
"Mou, just call me Youmu, Ran," the white-haired girl suddenly cut in, sensing something awkward was incoming. "Besides, I heard this ramen store was a really good hang out place. At least that's what the landlady managing my flat said so." Youmu explained as she bashfully smiled. "She's a sweet aunt, that woman."
"You live in a flat, Youmu?" Ririka's eyes twinkled as she yelled in pure excitement. "That's totes so cool! Mind if we crash into your place later?"
Youmu looked at the brown-eyed girl whose eyes matched her hair. She wasn't really planning on anyone visiting her place today, but she guessed it couldn't hurt to have someone visit once in a while. "I can't refuse you, can I Ririka?" From her small nose she sighed, but not out of frustration. Quite the opposite in-fact. "Fine, you can come to my flat tonight. But you're going to treat us to snacks!"
With everyone but Ririka throwing in a cheer, Ririka was suddenly placed into a bad spot. "But I'm quite broke this month! Oh me and my big mouth!"
"No takebacks, right Youmu?" Sa-chan happily teased as she jokingly elbowed Youmu's arm. "I'm excited to see Youmu's room!"
"Don't get too hyped up, okay?" Youmu couldn't help but grin.
And as the quad-squad finished their discussion, the cook went out of the counter carrying a big white tray. On it were four bowls of noodles and a few smaller bowls for the side-toppings they ordered. Placing each bowls perfectly matching the one that ordered them, he then turned to the counter to pick up a tray of cups and a big pitcher filled with green tea. As the man said "Enjoy the food", the girls greeted back by praying for a good meal. Satisfied, the cook returned to the kitchen with a smile.
1989
Scarlet colored mist appeared before the confused woman walking home from a hard day of work. This confused her, but most of all she was afraid. Cursing her luck, she shuddered to the materialization of a young girl from out of the red curtain. It would be absolutely the time for her to bolt back the way she came if she wasn't fully mesmerized in the otherworldly appearance's absolute charisma.
"You," the apparition pointed her lanky index finger toward her, images of a farmer pointing toward a cattle came to the poor girl's mind. "Would you mind donating your blood for a good cause?"
The girl stood tall, but her body was like a child. She was as tall as Ibuki's chest, a little over the average height of a japanese woman. Yet her demeanor was like someone that had lived for a long, long time. Her wardrobe consisted of a white Victorian dress that had a lot of pink frills laced onto each possible ends of the dress's limbs. Her shoes were thick red heels that clacked rather loudly from the girl's walking force. A frilly night-cap adorned the girl's midnight shoulder-length hair, and it was as if each strands of hair was alive and conscious.
But nothing sent warnings upon warnings than the foreign-looking girl's crimson red eyes that stared deeply into the woman's soul.
The office worker was hesitant on answering, but her lips forced out a reply against her better judgement. "For what cause?"
Section manager Ibuki just couldn't believe her luck. The usually fortunate and resourceful Kaneko Ibuki was supposed to be living her life in a perpetual and long-lasting peace. She hadn't married yet, for she had worked her whole life through the corporate ladder. Ibuki had always dreamed her endgame to marry in the tail-end of her career to die in a peaceful serenity in her own home surrounded by people who cared the most for her, her kids, and her grandkids too. But she might as well say her goodbyes and write a will this instant, because she knew that she won't be coming out of this situation alive.
Especially not when a doll-like creepy child with western-looking clothing were to greet her during this late hours of the night.
"Now, now, don't be afraid. I'm sure Mother Mary would be proud of your benevolent offerings."
Ibuki couldn't help but instantly clutch onto the Rosario inside her suit's pocket. The mere mention of her religious upbringing made her realize she was dealing with what the bible called "the devil". Though her tempting word framed her as something that only heavens could ever produce, she must not be nothing more than a snake. And Ibuki firmly believed so.
She had nothing to lose.
So she pulled what was in her pocket and sprung it forward before the ghastly little girl before her. In an instant, the girl before the section manager clutched her chest and her eyes shot wide awake. Her mouth was wide open, as if she was trying to scream something from her lung but couldn't manage to do so. In pain, the girl fell on her knees and slowly turned into the same scarlet mist that she had formerly appeared from.
"I... I can't believe that works," Ibuki laughed a little as she kissed the golden Rosario softly. Afterward, she placed it inside her suit's pocket and made her merry way across the back alley. The end of the alley was just before her, where the lights of cars passing by were moving in their own pace. Her home would be just two blocks away from here, and after a nice hot shower she could forget this had ever happened to her.
Stepping out of the alleyway with her right fist, she found herself back to the place where she met the odd-looking girl. The grime on the walls and the littered grounds were exactly the same as she remembered it to be. It was then that she noticed what she was seeing and feeling before was an illusion, and even if she pull out her religious item the second time it will not work again.
"I'm hurt, you know? The instant someone see me they always say I'm a she-devil."
Ibuki turned around, found herself face-to-face with the same girl from before, and cried out in desperation. "Stay away from me you monster!"
"I've heard those insults so many time before," the girl chuckled. "But it never got old. Not during the Crusade, not during Constantinople, and that one time during my visit to Gulag was just an unforgettable experience for everyone involved." But for this one, she absolutely belted out a huge and quaking laughter out of her tiny mouth. "You wouldn't know though, you had to be there to see it happen, or to put it nicely, see me happen."
Ibuki was shaking. Her sight became hazy with tears flowing down her cheek as her legs gave up. She fell on her bottom in the middle of the alley and froze. She was now below the eye-level of the Victorian-looking oddity before her, and if what she felt between her legs was what she thought it was it wouldn't be the cause of her death.
"Aww, don't be so scared." The girl was now before the fallen woman. She bent her body forward with one hand holding the woman's chin and pressing it with such force that the woman couldn't break away. The woman saw herself before the face of death; a little girl's face that stared at her with two of her canines sprouting out of her tiny lips. Those tiny lips that was the color of the pale moonlight continued with the flowery assurance, "It won't hurt a bit."
Ibuki instantly felt two holes being drilled to the side of her neck, and from then the vampire drew her late-night snack. At that point she was not a corporate executive, she was a meal ticket. She was dehumanized, nothing more than an object, but at that same instant she didn't care about what she was at all. The truth was pleasant for her. Almost as much as she felt from gaining a successful and productive day at work if not more.
After leaving her face with the biggest grin she had ever constructed out of emotional release, the woman fell to the ground. Not moving even one bit. Not even when the vampire pulled out her fangs out of the human livestock.
Wiping her mouth, the girl slowly turned her head like an owl toward the intersection of the dark alleyway. She had found herself a little girl peeking from one end of the corner, terrified and afraid. Judging from her anatomical structure, the girl was still in her young age of eight or nine.
This fact just made the vampire smile devilishly.
1998
"Another one?" The brown-haired girl furrowed her brows as she walked toward the crime scene. The unlit cigarette hanging on her lips was quietly lit up by one of her assistant. Puffing up a few smoke had always helped the girl calm her nerves, but the scene before her evoked a more mysterious feeling. "Damn it can't I catch a little break?"
The setting was an abandoned house in the middle of the sub-urban area near the ocean. The faint smell of the sea was nearly intoxicating for the brown-haired girl, and she tried her best not to smell too much of it. Inside the dining room of the abandoned house was laid a girl on the dining table with half of the blood inside her completely drained. The girl had been rushed into the hospital and was now in a vegetable-like state. Though she found it tasteless, the whole cases similar to these felt like a big joke toward the Aichi's Prefecture Police Force. All the cases that had been happening from three months ago felt like something a degenerate psychopath would do to spite everyone involved in those investigations.
"I wish I could just take a long and extended paid vacation."
"Now don't be like that, ace detective," a golden-haired woman walked from the inside of the crime scene, greeting her subordinate with her free time by tipping her gray beret. "This is your job, you know? The taxpayer paid you money so you can receive their paycheck."
The subordinate, however, felt insulted.
"Oh great you're already here anyway, chief. Why do I have to be the stand-in detective?"
"You are an ace detective transferred from Tokyo. I would expect you to act more professionally."
"Not when you're around, Fox."
"How rude," the woman in a nice get-up, black and golden set of thick coat like that of an elite agent with a colored tie that matched the woman's eyes, replied. "You make it sound like foxes are horrible and deceitful creatures. That's the job of the tanukis!"
The brown-haired girl stared toward her blonde-haired superior with a dead sarcastic set of gaze, before ignoring her as she checked the crime scene.
No sign of struggle as usual, as if the victim was involved in a shady cult. But there were no signs of anything resembling a shady cult present. If there was something that the brown-haired ace detective could get from all of these cult-like sets of incidents was the victims were at the very least placed into a set of hypnotic daze before the actions by the perpetrators were conducted.
The closest thing she could think of was the involvement of drugs. A new type that she had never seen or heard before.
She didn't like this feeling; the feeling of going into a difficult case unprepared.
The more she thought about it the more it didn't make any sense for her.
Just what exactly happened here?
A mysterious case had shocked one particular region of Japan. The victims were drained of half of their blood. With the police force placed in a state of confusion, what could possibly behind this abnormal cases of assaults? Find out the truth behind the shocking cases that had suddenly surfaced into public knowledge.
-Bunbunmaru News Flash. Written and Edited by Aya Shameimaru. 2nd of April, 1998.
