Review Responses:
MagicxMusicxMelody: Alice is cooking real, physical food, so that's why the food she prepared for Shun is edible! I'm sorry I forgot to mention that! Hmm...I guess you'll have to read to find out whether or not Kato is willing to meet with them...｛・ω-*}
Guest: Thank you so much! (=^-ω-^=)
Sugar Spice Rush: Alice is confined to the apartment in the way that she's not at peace with the mysteriousness surrounding her murder, hence why she is unable to move on! ╥﹏╥
Innocent-Diamond: Haha, it's not a bad thing to think ahead, although Shun will have to ask Alice at some point! Well, let's see how much Kato can legally provide! (*ﾟ∀ﾟ*)
cherry-tree-of-life: Small spoiler alert - Shun and Masquerade/Matthew are meeting Kato in this chapter~! (￣ω￣)
Chapter 6: Kato
"Hey Alice, do you know who Detective Kato is?" Shun asked, cautiously. It was Friday night and he and Alice were doing the dishes together. Even though the spirit had insisted that she could handle it by herself, he still felt guilty; she had already done so much for him and he felt like he was imposing if he didn't at least do something to help her. Which explained why he and a floating sponge were drying and washing the dishes.
"Oh, Mr. Kato!" Alice beamed at the name, a few soap suds flinging in midair at her excitement. "Yes, I know him; he is Grandfather's friend. Grandfather and I met him when he was visiting Russia - wait, how do you know about him?" She questioned, furrowing her eyebrows. A gasp escaped before the raven-haired male could respond. "Did you - you met him?"
"My friend and I ran into a guy that's interning at the Wardington Police Station. He mentioned that he and Detective Kato are interested in reinvestigating your case and my friend and I are planning on meeting him sometime on Saturday."
For the longest time, the ghost said nothing and her face seemed to be void of any sign of emotion. Shun worried internally that something was going on with her before what felt like a gust of cold air wrapped around his entire body. A further look showed that it was actually Alice hugging him, or at least, tried to. Ghosts don't have physical bodies, after all.
"Thank you - Thank you so much." She whispered as what Shun could only assume was her hugging him tighter - he wasn't totally sure, although he did know that the cold air around him seemed to be getting even colder. "I don't - I can't - how can I ever repay you?" The ghost stammered out as she let go of him. Her eyes looked teary and for a moment, the raven-haired male wanted so badly to wipe away her tears before realizing that he couldn't.
"Don't thank me yet, Alice. I haven't even met him yet." He forced out a smile, trying to act casual. "You've done so much for me - heck, without you, I'd still be eating instant noodle packets." He added, teasingly.
She let out a breathy laugh. "I...I suppose." There was a brief moment of silence before she spoke up. "But, really, Shun - thank you." She smiled brilliantly and he couldn't help but let out a small smile as well.
"Anything for you, Alice. Anything for you."
xoxo
"I think we're here." Matthew stated, plainly as he parked in front of a pristine white house. The lawn was lush with beautifully green grass and a variety of colorful potted tulips decorated the window sill. The house looked like that of an idyllic house of a fictional town. "I got to admit, his house looks a lot better than my grandfather's." The psychology major added as they got out of the car and made their way towards the front door.
"You should see my grandfather's." The raven-haired male teased to which the blond male scoffed.
"Should we knock or ring the doorbell?" Matthew asked as they stood at the front door, a hand in midair, waiting for his friend's response.
"Knock." Shun decided. "If that doesn't work, we'll ring the doorbell."
"Hmm." The blond grunted as he knocked on the faded mahogany door. Nothing happened. "Do you think he knows we were coming?"
"He should." The computer science major furrowed his eyebrows. "Joe said that he told him." While they had originally planned to come with Joe, the brunet male was called in at the last minute at the police station, although the intern did mention that the elderly gentleman was already informed of the situation via text message. Before Matthew could reply, the front door creaked open, revealing an elderly gentleman.
"Are you Detective Kato?" Matthew asked rather straightforwardly.
"Indeed I am." The man grinned. "And you two must be Shun and Matthew! Joe's told me all about you! Come in, come in!" An elderly gentleman ushered at the two college students to enter his house. Once inside, the computer science major found himself looking around. The living room seemed to be decorated rather simply, as there were few pictures or paintings hung on the wall with very few decorations around the house as well. The only huge thing in the living room was a pristine, black piano. "Sit down, sit down." The detective pointed down at a weathered leather couch to which the two college students obeyed.
"Well, we'd first like to thank you for taking the time to come and meet us, sir." Shun spoke as Kato settled himself into the piano seat where he faced the two younger males.
"You are very welcome. I must say, I didn't think that anybody other than Joe would care so much about this case. Tell me, what made you interested?" The older male leaned forward slightly, interested.
The raven-haired male was silent for a few moments as he carefully formed his response. "I am currently living in apartment 86 and I ... I found the case to be tragic; justice wasn't served for her." He replied, slowly.
The detective nodded, mulling over his words. "I see. Well, I suppose you two are interested in what I saw during my time investing the case, no?" He questioned to which the two younger males nodded.
"She was stabbed to death. Of course, I suppose that, when stabbed to death, you would scream in pain. Alice, oddly enough, did not scream, as nobody heard anything from her apartment at the time of her death. The landlord, at time, found her when she was late to pay rent - he tried knocking on her door and when that didn't work, he got out the key to her apartment and opened the door. That's when he discovered her body and called the police. I was there at the scene. Not a pretty scene, especially if the person who was murdered was your friend's granddaughter."
"What did the coroner say?" Matthew spoke for the first time in a long time.
"As you can imagine, the technology that we had in the 70's isn't as advanced as it is today. DNA wasn't even discovered until nearly a decade after her death, so all the coroner could say at the time was the obvious; she died from stab wounds." The retired detective paused for a moment before continuing. "I have a feeling the next question would be 'Why not reopen the case now that DNA testing is available?' so I'll save you the effort - the rumors of her spirit got out of hand and no one at the time wanted anything to do with it anymore. We had been working on it for nearly five years."
"Her family - don't they want justice for her? Surely you must give them some sort of closure." Shun insisted, disgusted that the law enforcement would just give up so easily.
"Her family? She didn't have a lot of family members from what I remember. Her grandfather, Michael, died three years after Alice died. He had underlying problems with his heart ... well, at least that's what the doctors said. But I know better." At that, Kato took off his glasses as he ran the back of his hand over his eyes before he continued. "He died from a broken heart. He was already broken when his son and daughter-in-law died and his granddaughter's death was the straw that broke the camel's back. She was all he had left."
There was a moment of silence before Matthew spoke up.
"Her body - where is she buried?" The blond male pressed.
"She is buried in Moscow, Russia - Michael couldn't bear to allow her final resting place to be in the country she was murdered in." Kato responded.
"We have DNA testing now - if we could get her body and run some tests, we can determine her murderer." Shun piped in rather excitedly, hopeful that justice would be served for Alice.
A small smile crossed the elderly man's lips. "Now are you sure you two aren't criminal justice majors? You would make an excellent pair of detectives." He teased. "Yes, I suppose that could work. However, as you must know, it will cost a hefty amount of money to have her body flown over and I don't suppose you two have the money for it."
"It's in Russia, right?" The blond male repeated to which Kato nodded. "I am Russian, Detective. I'll be visiting my grandfather in Russia this Thanksgiving break - if possible, I can ask the police station in Moscow to perform an autopsy."
"Are you?" The gray-haired male seemed interested. "I suppose you are lucky then that you didn't end up in apartment 86 like Alice. Very well - go to the police station in Moscow and get them to do a autopsy and DNA testing on her body. Joe and I will continue to try to get them to reopen the case."
xoxo
"You're Russian?" Was the first thing that left Shun's lips as he and Matthew were walking towards the blond's car.
"I am offended, Shun Kazami. We have been friends this entire semester and you did not know about my ethnicity?" Matthew sounded offended, though his playful grin gave him away. "But yes, I am. It's a coincidence that her body's buried in Moscow - Grandfather and I could find out more information during break."
"Not that I don't trust you, but do you mind if I go along as well?" The raven-haired male asked as he tugged on the car door handle whilst Matthew unlocked the car door.
The psychology major let out a frustrated sigh. "God, I was hoping to catch a break from you." A cheeky grin betrayed his mock hurt. "Guess I'll tell my grandfather that we've got a visitor then." The blond male replied truthfully while Shun imagined just how exactly he would pay for a plane ticket to Russia.
End of Chapter 6.
Note: Yay, another chapter that didn't take a year to be updated, LOL. Anyways, yay, a wild Kato arrives! And...Alice's body is buried in Russia?! Because Alice is Russian, I felt that it was only fair that she should be buried back in her home country. In case anyone was curious, DNA testing was discovered in 1986 or so and Alice died in 1975, so at the time of her death, they couldn't use DNA testing to find fingerprints and whatnot. On that note, I found out that DNA still lingers on corpses, or at least genes do. I am not in the biology/medical field at all - clearly, LOL, as I didn't know about most of the information I just shared until quite recently - so if anything is wrong, do let me know. Please let me know what you thought of this chapter and I will see you in the next one! Au revoir! (´｡• ᵕ •｡`)