Umeko: Yep. You'll know more about her in the following chaps.
Mask Rider Roy: Thank you for your reviews. I haven't finished Tsubasa Chronicles or XXXHolic yet so I'll take a rain check. Sorry. And I tried to make it a bit longer, but failed. I can't write long chapters without making it boring. XP
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Chapter Three: Dead End
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The call came in when he was in the shower.
Ryu stares at the foggy mirror, sees the droplets scattered across his face and imagines them turning red, imagines his hair getting darker as crimson seeps away from a large uneven gash on his forehead, and he is mad and anxious and afraid and why is there even a mirror under the shower anyway? He wants to cry and shout and tell the world to screw themselves over but he does nothing and the phone is ringing.
Ryu realizes he is breathing too hard, too fast and turns the knob with a shaky hand to receive the water full blast.
--
She moves carefully around her room. She knows he had been here, knows that he would find out eventually, but she still despises him for it.
Adrenaline courses through her veins. He had come in here, like some god after walking out those years ago. He was a damn fool, he was, if he thinks he could escape and then prance in like he owns the goddamn place.
She walks over her dresser, imagines seeing her reflection at the mirror that used to be there but now isn't. She hates mirrors, hates seeing herself in them, because she always looks distorted and wrong.
Her muddy boots thud pleasantly against the floorboards as she turns and walks towards her closet. Her clothes are disarranged, as always, and she sees him seeing her clothes. Imagines him dragging his hand through her drawers and thinking her a slob and jots that in the mental notepad people like him seem to have.
He should have died, she thinks. He should have stayed in that fucking boat and died.
Her desk is mussed, her pencils scattered where he had knocked them over when he was in a hurry to leave. Rude boy. Her desk was the only thing she cleaned and Yurie used to jibe her on it.
But Yurie's dead.
She drops the empty box of crackers on the floor. Surveillance cameras are dandy sometimes, she thinks, brushing some crumbs from her loafers. He had been here and she had been watching.
Trespassing… stealing. She could put him to jail.
She brushes her fingers over her desk and imagines him as he does the same only minutes before. Putting him to jail would be too kind, and he would make it out after one night, she is sure, he is insufferable like that.
She picks up her pencils and then places them in a neat line on the edge of her desk. Then she takes out a piece of paper, because that despicable person had taken her sketch pad, and she begins to draw.
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Ryu double checks himself before calling Kazuma back.
"Where the hell were you?" Kazuma answers. He hears him typing on the other line.
Ryu apologizes. "I was in the shower; didn't hear the phone ring."
Kazuma snorts and Ryu remembers the time when this boy was curt and polite with him. "Whatever. I didn't get a match. I tried hacking other databases… still nothing. Either he's a god or he just didn't have a reason to log in his prints anywhere."
Ryu is disappointed but not surprised. Few Pluto members have established records.
"She" Ryu corrects with half a mind.
"Huh?"
"She. A girl."
"…whatever."
Ryu contemplates whether it would be too rude to just hand up. Deciding on good manners, he opens his mouth to speak. "Thank you for the assistance, Kazuma."
He hears a chair scraping on the other end and imagines Kazuma leaning back, phone cradled between his chin and his shoulder. "Eh, Ryu. If you don't mind me asking, what is this case you're working on alone?"
I do mind you asking. "It's not a case." Ryu replies easily, because that much is true. "Just a mind bender. A little mystery."
Shuffling. "…if you say so. Best of luck then, whatever it is."
"Thank you. Good night."
"Night"
Ryu drops the phone on his lap before wiping his face with his right hand.
Dead end.
He feels tired all of a sudden. His limbs felt heavy. He lets himself fall until he feels his back hit the mattress, closes his eyes then finally succumbs to sleep.
