September 21, 2003
by Lain Taylor (December 2022)
05:18
Chibi walked through a magical palace filled with butterflies and kittens roaming the territory, as he continued digging into the perfectly cooked medium-rare steak dinner floating in front of him.
“The only thing that would make this better is if my wife was here,” he said, gleefully stuffing his face with the best food he’d ever eaten in his entire life. Suddenly, a throne appeared in front of him, and sitting on it was his wife, wearing the outfit she wore that one time seven years ago that he really liked but she never wore again for whatever reason.
“Ah,” he sighed blissfully, “this is the li—“
BRRRRIIINGGG!
Chibi jolted awake to the sound of his cell phone ringing. His wife moaned lethargically, also awoken by the ringing, and covered her ears with her pillow as Chibi answered the phone.
“What is it?” he asked.
“We found a body,” Hakuchi’s voice rang out from the phone speaker. “It’s the guy who torched the mansion.”
“One second,” Chibi said, and quickly got out of bed and walked out of the bedroom, gently opening and closing the door as he made his way to the living room to plant himself on the couch.
“How do you know?” Chibi asked.
“Yumiko recognized him,” Hakuchi replied. “She said she remembered him covering her mouth and tried to suffocate her with a pillow.”
“But he didn’t?” Chibi asked.
“He got close,” Hakuchi answered. “She almost lost consciousness, but he stopped just short of killing her.”
“Why?” Chibi asked.
“I dunno!” Hakuchi replied, annoyed. “We found a body, jackass, just get over here already!”
Hakuchi hung up, and Chibi sighed, massaging his temples. Moron.
06:26
“Yeeesh.”
Chibi couldn’t help but cringe at the mangled state of the corpse in front of him.
“Yep,” Hakuchi said matter-of-factly. “They had a bunch of guys here lookin’ at him earlier, I thought you might get to meet ‘em yourself.
“They said that they’d have to take him in for an autopsy, but it looks like he got strangled.”
Chibi crouched down to get a better look.
“He’s got a lot of stab wounds in his legs, though,” Hakuchi continued. “So I think whoever did it tortured him, too.”
Chibi glanced at the man’s legs and noticed, indeed, that his legs were covered in punctures from a knife—or knives—and there were a couple in his stomach as well.
“They buried him here?” Chibi asked.
“Yeah,” Hakuchi said. “Yumiko said the Hasegawas had some money buried down here, which is why we checked it out.”
“So somebody took the money and left this guy here?” Chibi asked.
“Apparently, yeah.” Hakuchi replied. “So I guess it wasn’t just him.”
Chibi scoffed. “Fuck me.”
Hakuchi glanced at Chibi. “What?”
Chibi looked up at Hakuchi. “I was hoping this was gonna be easy.”
08:22
Osamu woke up screaming, drenched in sweat and tears. A man sitting next to him jolted awake, and promptly flicked him in the face with his finger.
“The fuck are you screaming about?” The man asked aggressively, his extremely slurred words complementing the sight of countless empty bottles surrounding him.
Osamu had just had a nightmare that both of his children and his wife died in a brutal accident, the same as the kind of terror that had haunted him every chance he had gotten to rest since his kidnapping. He decided not to mention it.
“Nothing,” Osamu said, exasperated and barely in control of his breath. “Is there any way you could bring me something to eat? I’m hungry.”
The drunk man rubbed his temples. “I don’t have to do shit for you,” he slowly replied between hiccups. “I fuckin’ got you here.”
“Were you the one that kidnapped me?” Osamu asked.
“We all did,” the man replied, launching into a coughing fit.
Osamu watched as the man coughed for what felt like ten minutes before washing down the coughs with more alcohol.
“I don’t even fuckin’ want to be doing this shit, man,” the drunken man said, his empty gaze piercing though Osamu’s eyes. “These assholes dragged me along. Fuck this stupid bullshit.”
Osamu saw an opportunity. “You could let me out,” he postulated. “They wouldn’t know a thing.”
The two men stared at each other for about three seconds, then the drunk man burst into laughter. “You’re so fuckin’ stupid, old man,” he yelled in between cackles. “They’re gonna give me soooo much money.” He took another swig of his drink, the label turned to where Osamu could see it was a German beer.
Osamu slumped against the wall. “You couldn’t get me, like, a sandwich or something?”
The drunk man chuckled. “Hey, Makoto!” he yelled through the hallway, prompting a scrawny, young man—couldn’t have been more than twenty years old—to storm into the hallway. “What the fuck did I tell you about using my name?!” Makoto yelled, slapping the drunk man in the face.
“I-I’m sorr—” the drunk man started, but was slapped in the face even harder.
“Do you want more beer? Huh?” Makoto yelled in the man’s face. “What the fuck was so important that you had to call my name at 8 o’clock in the morning?”
The drunk man hesitated. “The guy just wanted to eat somethin’ and—”
Makoto decked the man in the face and kicked Osamu in the rib.
“Go fuck yourself,” Makoto said, storming off. “I should’ve left you to starve.”
Osamu closed his eyes. I need to die, he thought to himself. Now.