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Chapter 5 - The Sky at the Center of Everything
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At this point it becomes necessary for us to pull back from the story in which
we have become involved. Five distinct threads are winding their way through Sumaru City, twisting and knotting together as
they spiral in towards... what? Some overwhelming force that ties them to each
other, perhaps, or maybe a false order purported by simple coincidence. Either
way, they are coming full circle despite themselves, and it isn't going to be
long before poor dear history is forced to shuffle the cards and show us her
trick one more time.
For you see, the color of the sky over Seven Sisters High School is the color
of the sky at the center of everything.
* * *
By the time Maya and Ulala pulled up to the high school, the rain had stopped
and the sky had already started to clear. Sunlight poked through dark clouds
and turned the air a warm shade of yellow, and as they approached the doors
they made hushed reverent small talk about the sudden change in the weather.
"It's a little eerie, don't you think?" said Ulala after they were
safely inside. "Beautiful one moment, rainy the next, then beautiful again
with rainbows and butterflies. The harmless, non-immortal kind," she added
hastily after Maya shot her a look.
"I'm not too worried about it," said Maya as she handed her press
papers to the secretary in the front office. "I'm sure it's just the
changing season."
The secretary looked the paperwork over and handed it back. "Here you go.
The teacher's lounge is right down that hallway and up the stairs. Please be
respectful and try not to disturb the students." Maya took the papers and
gave the woman an odd look before turning to usher Ulala out of the office.
"She certainly seemed nonchalant about whatever happened here," she
said under her breath as they climbed the stairs. "Maybe it was nothing
serious after all."
"Knowing you?" said Ulala. "I'd say the chances of that are slim
to none."
Of course, she was right.
* * *
Katsuya had gotten the call earlier that day. He'd been wrestling with
paperwork all morning and his fingers were sticky with correction fluid when he
picked up the phone. "Yeah, Suou here," he said gruffly, wedging it
between his shoulder and his ear.
It was the new captain, a rough middle-aged man by the name of Michel.
"Suou? I need you to head out to Sevens this afternoon. A couple kids got
into a fight and got beat up pretty bad."
He suppressed an exasperated sigh. "Sir? Isn't that police work?"
"Everyone's a cop these days, Suou. Someone's gotta check it out, make
sure there's not something more sinister going on. Today, that person is you.
Got that?"
Katsuya nodded, trying to pick up a piece of paper without using his fingers.
"Yessir, I'll take a look," he said, and let the phone slide down his
arm to the receiver.
He finished up the stack of reports he was working on and set them aside
gratefully. At least it's an excuse to get out of the station, he told
himself as he pulled on his jacket.
Still, I always get the dull assignments.
* * *
Tatsuya was trapped in history class.
Yesterday, for what he could only assume was a lapse in sanity, he'd returned
to live with his brother again. They'd come to an understanding that he could
accompany Katsuya on basic assignments as long as he agreed to go to school
three days a week, and it had seemed like a pretty okay deal at the time. Today was only
his first day back, and he was already starting to regret the whole affair.
He'd never taken school as seriously as most kids his age, but he used to at
least show up most of the time. He shifted in his seat and glanced around at
the host of faces around him, some attentive, some dazed, all unfamiliar. This
uniform doesn't fit me anymore, he thought simply. Maybe he was supposed to
be here, but he certainly didn't belong here.
Where do you belong, Tatsuya Suou?
He frowned and brushed the thought away as the history teacher scraped a list
of dates onto the board. He turned to look out the window at the patchwork
clouded sky, a dull restlessness weighing in his stomach.
After a long moment he looked back down at his notebook, returning to a doodle
of a tall, many-branched tree covered in little leaves.
* * *
Baofu sat cross-legged on the roof of the school, his fingers steepled as he
looked thoughtfully at a bloodstain on the pavement. Warning tape that had been
strung half-heartedly around the area flapped in the wind, and the new sunlight
threw long shadows across the ground.
Amazing, he thought sardonically. I thought I'd find something at the
school, and here it is.
He reached down and touched another mark on the pavement, a very faint
charcoal-gray line that curved away from the tape and the bloodstains. His long
fingers traced the shape, barely visible even in the wash of post-rain
sunlight, until he had to stand to follow it. It ran straight for a while, then
turned back to the scene in a large, bumpy circle.
Baofu let it go and straightened up, a sudden premonition raising the hairs on
his neck. He ran to the side and hunted for a sharp rock, eventually settling
for a lump of talc that he found by the door. He returned and bent down to
follow the line again, this time tracing it with the chalky white rock. After
half an hour of squinting and scraping, he threw the rock aside and stood up to
look at the markings.
The shape burned faintly into the pavement was unmistakable. Baofu looked at it for a long
time before turning away, genuine fear singing in his heart.
What happened here? he thought, and it was all he could bring himself to
think.
What happened here?
* * *
This is the story so far. It was 2:47 when Ulala and Miss Amano
encountered Katsuya on the second story stairwell. They exchanged surprised
greetings for two minutes, and approximately six minutes later they passed by
Tatsuya's classroom door, where by some quirk of fortune they paused to compare
notes on the incident that had occurred earlier in the day. Precisely five
minutes after that, a tinkling melody over the speaker system hailed the end of
the school day, to which Tatsuya responded with great enthusiasm. After three
and a half minutes of bundling his things, he threw himself out the room and,
naturally, ran headfirst into Maya, who grabbed onto Ulala, who in turn
stumbled into Katsuya, and the whole crew went down without so much as a
whimper.
From 3:03 to 3:05, there was much apologizing and
extracting of tangled arms and legs, followed by five minutes of nervous
glances and awkward introductions. At 3:10 the boys and girls separated to
consult each other on plans of action, and at 3:12 they regrouped and Katsuya
announced that he was bringing his little brother along to investigate the
scene. The girls agreed after no small amount of elbowing and shushing, and it
took them three minutes to make their way up to the roof. As fate would have
it, for fate has a rather sick sense of humor, the minute hand on every clock
in Sumaru City struck the quarter hour when they
slammed open the door and tramped noisily into a very rumpled-looking Baofu.
Whatever god of destiny that brought these five people within inches of each
other once again was having a good laugh wherever he was, for not only had he
done it; he'd done it in record time.
For about ten long seconds they stood in stunned silence before Ulala pushed
her way to the front. "Hey Bao," she said with an awkward smile.
"I brought some friends."
Baofu looked at her, then at Tatsuya. "Nice to meet you," he said
dully. "But this is no place for kids." He turned back to his
outlines.
Tatsuya stepped forward with a wounded expression. "Now wait just a
-"
"Baofu," Katsuya interrupted, "this is my brother, Tatsuya. I
said he could come along. He wants to see me work." He couldn't hide the
proud note in his voice.
Baofu turned and looked at the detective with an upraised eyebrow. After a
moment he said slowly, "I suppose that's your prerogative, Suou." I
hope you know what you're doing, he added silently, glancing sideways at
Maya. And who you're hurting with your stubborn pride.
Tatsuya looked from Baofu to Katsuya and back. "Er, big brother," he
said, "what exactly are we supposed to be looking at?"
Maya, who had been hesitating by the door, stepped forward. "There was a
fight," she said in a professional voice, flipping open her notepad.
"Two male students, both seniors, were involved. They both suffered bad
injuries, were treated at the emergency room, and are now resting at
home." She looked up. "That's all we know."
Ulala nodded. "No one could tell us what happened, just that the janitor
found the two kids on the roof, unconscious and all bloody, and called an
ambulance."
"Oh," said Tatsuya simply, then added sheepishly, "I didn't know
them."
Their conversation was interrupted by a sharp noise from Katsuya, who had moved
to stand next to Baofu. He turned around with a somber expression on his face.
"Miss Amano, Miss Serizawa, you should see this."
They stepped forward and stood at the edge of the scene, the warning tape
fluttering across the toes of their shoes. The sun hung lazily in the sky and
two crows hopped and chattered along the roof. The five of them stood in
silence for a long while as they stared at Baofu's faintly chalked outlines.
"They're people," Ulala finally said, her voice laced with fear.
"Shapes of people."
"They're human shadows," Baofu said grimly, taking a cigarette out of
his coat pocket. "Burned right into the pavement." He lit up and took
a long drag before looking over at Katsuya. "Needless to say, I don't
think this was just a simple fight."
Tatsuya swallowed dryly. "Then what did happen?" he asked. He
couldn't take his eyes off of the two faint shadows on the ground. They seemed
to twist and stretch in the fading sun, the taller one with its arms thrown
over its head in... what? Pain? Fear? He ran his fingers through his hair and
suppressed a shudder.
Katsuya bent to inspect the bloodstains more closely. "This is odd,"
he said. "Baofu, did you notice the pattern in the blood here? These
marks," he pointed to three small puddles, "are clearly drips, as
from a cut. But these," he motioned to an arc that curved away from them.
"These are from a scuffle. It's in a streak, see? Like someone fell and
scraped their knee or hand across the pavement."
"Why is it so long, then?" asked Maya. "Wouldn't a scrape like
that be short? You wouldn't drag yourself over the pavement."
Baofu looked straight ahead, as though he were watching something that no one
else could see. "This one was crawling," he said, without looking
down. "He was pulling himself away."
Ulala hugged herself. "Then what was the other one doing?" she asked
slowly.
Baofu squinted. "The other one was kneeling where those puddles are."
He turned towards her. "Look at how perfect they are. The blood dripped
from about a foot above the ground, not far enough to splash."
Her eyes widened in sudden understanding. "One was crouched, nursing a
wound, and the other was struggling to get away," she said. "They
weren't fighting each other, were they?" Baofu simply looked away and
inhaled deeply from his cigarette.
Katsuya was silent a moment, then straightened up. "I'm calling the
station," he said resolutely. "I want to get somebody up here to
analyze these marks. If there was a third party involved," he set his jaw.
"Then these boys were victims."
Tatsuya spoke up and said what they were all thinking. "Victims of
what?"
No one, not even Baofu, had an answer to that. Katsuya took out his phone and
wandered off to the side to make his calls as Ulala and Maya spoke with each
other in hushed tones. Baofu walked to the edge of the roof, looking out over
the city as he finished off his cigarette, and Tatsuya just stood where he was.
My brother sure is friends with some weird people, he thought as he
looked around at the four of them. He sighed and shrugged out of his jacket,
slumping against the door to the stairwell. I just can't wait to get home.
He loosened his collar and rubbed his neck. It never occurred to me that this
might be hard work, he thought woefully and closed his eyes.
Less than two meters away, Maya was slowly breaking down. "Ulala..."
she pleaded quietly. Ulala cooed and stroked her back, leading her away from
the three men.
"Come on, let's go over here," she said helpfully. "Breathe in,
out... that's right. Remember what you told me earlier! Think of him as an old
shoe."
Maya nodded bravely. "Right, just a shoe." She glanced at him over
her shoulder and her eyes softened. "Just a shoe... a gorgeous, young,
virile..."
"Ma-ya!" Ulala turned her roommate's head back towards her. "Not
that kind of shoe. Think old, smelly shoe." She fanned Maya's face with
her hand. "Think shoe that reminds you of an ex-boyfriend you hate."
Maya gave her a blank look. Ulala rolled her eyes. "I suppose you've never
had the benefit of that experience. Remind me to tell you I hate you when
you're feeling less vulnerable."
"Miss Amano, Miss Serizawa!" Katsuya called from behind them. They turned
to see him collecting Tatsuya. "The forensics team is coming, so I'm going
to take Tatsuya home." He waggled his phone in the air and mouthed 'call
me'. Ulala nodded and they waved goodbye.
After the brothers had disappeared down the stairs, Baofu wandered over to
where they were standing. They all stood in silence for a moment, then he
turned to Maya and asked, "Are you okay?"
Startled, the two girls looked at each other, then back to Baofu.
"Yeah," Maya said with a smile. "I'm going to be fine, thank
you."
Ulala patted her shoulder proudly. "That's my girl!" she said.
"Come on, I'll take you home."
Maya turned to her. "Actually," she said hastily. "I need to go
back to Kismet tonight. You know what a slave driver my boss is! I'll just see
you at home later, okay?" She gave Ulala a knowing grin and disappeared
through the door, waving cheerily to them both.
Ulala numbly watched the door close behind her roommate. A few crickets chirped
through the silence, and finally she turned to Baofu.
"So," she said with a nervous laugh. "Wanna get a drink?"
