Slam Dunk is so not mine…sigh.
Chapter 4: The Beginning Of A Fruitless Search
"What the hell was that?" asked Fujima shaking. All the others were white with shock. They just turned to Yoshiko for an explanation to what had happened. The air was tight with fear and shock. They were all huddled in the brightly lighted living room of Sendoh's house. In fact, all the lights in the house had been switched on. His parents had gone overseas to attend to important business matters.
Mitsui shuddered thinking of the scene in Yoshiko's house. The burnt body. The smell or burning, rotting flesh. Burning in evil flames that could not be seen nor felt. He could feel the fear slicing into his heart and numbing his brain. It was confusing his beliefs and his mind. His thoughts came out distorted and unclear, all cracked with terror and disbelief.
"That was a soul of the dead," said Yoshiko quietly. "A soul of someone who once lived in this world."
"What?" said Mitsui shakily. "A soul of the dead? How could it be? What happened just now?"
"My mother. She unsealed the doorway to the spirit world. Something went wrong, and she accidentally released a soul from the spirit world. The doorway was closed before it could go back."
There was a silence at this. Mitsui could not believe what he was hearing. This had to be a fairytale. Or rather a horror story. Spirit worlds? Supernatural? Souls of the dead? It had to be part of a nightmare, right? He hoped that he would awaken from this dream soon.
"Impossible," he muttered slowly and disbelievingly. "It can't be, there's no such thing."
"You don't know. The spirit world really and truly exists. It's not just a figment of imagination people write about in horror stories," said Yoshiko. "It's real out there."
"What – what do we do now?" he demanded.
"We have to send it back to where it belongs. If not, it will wreak havoc and plague its evil here in Kanagawa."
"And how are we going to accomplish that? Repeat the same feat your mother did?" said Miyagi harshly. "We might end up setting another soul free!"
"These souls are mostly harmless, but there are some evil ones. Those evil ones belong to people who have led evil lives during their time in this world. This soul that we released is one of them."
Mitsui said nothing. He just stared blankly at her. In such a short span of time, she had changed completely. She was a totally different person. She was no longer the nervous girl he had first met on the way to class. She was not the quiet, blank girl walking home a few hours ago. There was something different in her. In fact, there was something different in all of them. Where was Sendoh's everlasting smile? Where was Ayako's sturdy determination in situations like this? Even the emotionless Rukawa looked badly shaken up by what had happened. Even the cool Shoyo captain Fujima was pale and not his normal self.
"You still have not told us how we are going to send it back," said Miyagi to Yoshiko.
"We have to send the soul back through the way it first entered the spirit world," Yoshiko said, breathing deeply. "That's the only way to make it go back. It can escape the spirit world by anyway, but it can only enter by one."
"And that is?" questioned Rukawa with narrowed eyes.
She met his intense gaze unflinchingly and replied, "When a person dies and is buried, its soul goes straight to the spirit world. Its grave is its one and only entrance to the spirit world. We have to find that creature's grave."
"Nani?" exclaimed Sendoh. "That – that thing could have been buried anywhere! And we don't even know its name!"
"I'm sure it was buried somewhere in Kanagawa," said Yoshiko frowning deeply. "Souls cannot escape the spirit world too far from the place that the person who once possessed them was buried. We don't need to know its name to find the grave. We only need the crystals."
"What crystals?" asked Jin.
"The crystals used to either summon spirits or drive them away. They can also be used to find open entrances to the spirit world, though. They are supposed to light up when the grave is near."
"Open entrances?"
"When a soul escapes, the entrance it came in through opens automatically to receive it back. All we have to do is to find its grave and send it back."
"Sounds easy enough," said Sendoh sounding relieved.
"Don't be too sure," Kogure warned.
* * *
Mitsui had not slept well at all. He kept waking up in the middle of the night feeling uneasy. They were all sleeping on mattresses laid on the floor in Sendoh's house. Somehow, no one had felt like walking home alone in the dark of those streets.
The dark was not safe anymore. Something evil had come and contaminated it. Fear had haunted his sleep. They were all going to go grave hunting tomorrow in the daylight. They had to find that creature's grave, and send it back. Until then, he could not sleep in peace.
The next morning, the boys awakened. The horror of last night's events was still fresh in their memories. Red glaring eyes and a dark shadowy shape taunting them from the shadows… Ayako and Yoshiko had breakfast prepared. Yawning, Sendoh turned on the television. The news report came on.
"Several bodies or people believed to have been murdered last night were found this morning in the streets of Kanagawa. The bodies were found in several different parts of Kanagawa, but the police believed those brutal murders to have been committed by the same hands.
"Saechou Toyama, 42, was found dead in his delivery van this morning. His body was brought to the hospital where doctors found out the cause of his death. The inside of his head including his skull and brains were burnt badly. The odd thing was, not one bit of his outer skin was damaged.
"On the other hand, Fukuda Kiccho, 17, was believed to have fallen from a very high point. His body was discovered all broken and his skull was badly fractured. Another student from Shoyo High, Toru Hanagata, 18, was discovered in an alleyway with slashes and cuts all over his face and chest and his eyes were gouged out. The police believe that a very sharp knife caused the slash marks. Haruko Akagi, 16, a student from Shohoku High was discovered in a different alleyway. Her throat had been slashed and she had been repeatedly stabbed in the stomach and chest.
" 'It is obviously the work of a psycho murderer,' says Police Inspector Isata. People are advised to always remain cautious until the killer is caught. Who could have committed all these dastardly acts? Until the culprit is caught, the mystery remains unsolved."
"Hanagata!" Fujima gasped staring at the screen disbelievingly.
"Fukuda!" cried Sendoh.
"Haruko!" exclaimed Ayako in horror. "Who could have done all these?"
Yoshiko drew in her breath sharply. "It has already started its plague of evil."
Mitsui's mind was blank with shock. His brain was too surprised and unprepared at the sudden news to feel any grief for those victims. That thing had murdered them? He suddenly felt a wave of nausea and disgust at the sight of the horribly slashed bodies of Haruko and Hanagata, and Fukuda's broken up body.
So this is what Yoshiko meant by its plague of evil.
* * *
"All right, there are seven cemeteries in Kanagawa, one of which that thing must have been buried in, right?" said Maki.
Yoshiko nodded. "Lets start searching the biggest cemetery first. There's more chance that thing could have been buried there."
"That would have to be Kanagawa Cemetery," said Mitsui. "Not far from here, I believe."
"Are you sure this is going to work?" asked Kiyota for the hundredth time.
"Do you have a better idea?" Yoshiko snapped.
That shut Kiyota up. Then he muttered under his breath, "Number One Rookie just knows that this whole thing is not going to work."
They reached the graveyard and Yoshiko drew a small pouch from her pocket. It was similar to the one Soruko had reached her hand in and brought out the crystal fragments to summon the spirits. When she opened the pouch, it was filled with the same crystal fragments. Only now, they were glowing dimly and dully. Yoshiko brought the pouch under every gravestone hoping that they would light up brilliantly.
She repeated it many times, and by the time she had searched through half the graveyard, they had no luck and she was beginning to have a backache. Mitsui suggested that they should take turns. After a few hours, they still had no luck and the whole graveyard had been thoroughly searched.
Mitsui was beginning to feel sick of cemeteries and their eerie quiet. They were all making a racket in the silent burial grounds by just treading on dead leaves and twigs. He had an uneasy feeling that something was watching them, somewhere. Something hidden in the shadows and sneering maliciously at them and their fruitless attempt to search for a grave that could have been buried anywhere in Kanagawa. He felt a pang of relief when they left the graveyard.
"First search in Kanagawa cemetery, the result is nil," said Fujima gloomily.
"All we managed to gain were a few backaches and getting all hot and tired," added Miyagi sarcastically.
"Guys, we've only searched one cemetery in the whole of Kanagawa," Kogure said.
"Next time we should bring along flowers, don't you think?" said Sendoh cheerfully. "After all, we did visit all their graves."
"Sometimes you're being too cheerful for your own good, Sendoh," Maki muttered.
"Hn," mumbled Rukawa.
* * *
"Haruko-chan," came Sakuragi's voice in a barely audible whisper. Tears were streaming down his cheeks, trickling down the sides of his chin. His voice cracked with disbelief and grief. "Who would be so cruel to do this to her?"
Nobody answered him. Everyone in the Shohoku gym was too shocked to say anything. Akagi's imouto so brutally murdered. Her throat cut and her body all smeared with crimson blood, staining her light-coloured clothes with her brown hair fanned out lifelessly in the gutter. Everyone had watched the morning news, and had seen the horrific picture on the television screen. Akagi himself was not present in the gym today. But the odd thing was, Kogure, Mitsui, Miyagi, Rukawa and Ayako were not there either. There was nobody to comfort Sakuragi or to cheer the grim mood of everyone seated stonily in the gym.
Kakuta, Ishii, Sasaoka, Yasuda and Kuwata sitting on the bench did not say anything. They just sat staring blankly at the plain gym walls, each too busy in their own thoughts to care about what the other was doing. Questions buzzed through their minds. Questions that could not be answered.
Who could have committed such a crime? And why would anyone want Haruko murdered? And Fukuda and Hanagata as well? But most important of all, where was everybody? Where was the rest of the Shohoku basketball team? Even Ayako, the team manageress was not present. What was going on? What…?
Tbc.
Ahh!!!! Enjoying this chappie? I noe I noe, it IS kinda boring. What do you guys think about it? Pls R&R!!!!!! I AM IN DESPERATELY NEEDED UR HELP AND OPINIONS!!!!!!! REVIEW!!!!! REVIEW!!!! REVIEW!!!