Karasu no Tengoku

Chapter Six: Noctis Labyrinthus.

(The café was quite different from its nocturnal view; Hideki came inside, his hands on his pockets, one of them toying with the card’s edges, a little bell rang and the door closed soon after, he went straight to the bar and sat on the stool, the bar-tender walked to him, Hideki turned a bit to scan the place for anyone known or the so-called ’Gin’ as he sat upon a stool, he didn’t saw the bar-tender, but the voice was somewhat familiar)
“Hello, how may I help you?”
“Uh…I’ll have some coffee please…express, oh and…”
(Hideki turned and suddenly faced the bar-tender, and recognized him)
“Yes?”
“And…uh…um, I have some…”
“Oh…I get it now…I’ll bring your coffee in a moment…”
“Ok…”
(The bar-tender came back with the tiny cup of coffee and placed it upon a napkin in front of him, undid the pony-tail he’d been wearing, quickly getting out from behind the bar, sitting on another stool next to Hideki)
“Wha…wait! Can you do that??”
“Yes…and don’t ask why because it still isn’t your business…”
“Ok…you’re weird, that’s final…and, isn’t here a bit too public to talk about…stuff??”
“No, I’m sure no one would care about it…so, you said you had questions, what might those be??”
“Oh…first of all, I’d like to know, if you’ve seen him, lately??...”
“Haha…I knew you’ll ask about that, Hikari! Give me a lemon tea-cup, but no, I haven’t seen him for as long as everyone else has seen him…”
“Everyone else?”
(Gin turned to look at him, the creepy smile just in place)
“The other shinigami…that merchant…I believe the only one who’s still with him is his pawn…a little English vampire girl that was transformed by one of his acquaintances…”
(The waitress brought Gin the cup of tea)
“Oh…but now, may I know why vampires suddenly appear in here?”
“Oh…I haven’t told you, the merchant was a vampire…but I suppose you know the Elemental Family legend, do you not?”
“I do…ah, now I remember that part of the legend…so, if you haven’t seen him recently, why do you still think you could be useful?”
“I think…I’ve spotted him…recently…”
“Oh…”
“I suppose you want to know where…”
“That’ll be nice…”
“Well then…I saw him and the vampire girl near Sendai, though I could have confused him, but I’m pretty sure it was him…”
“Ok…so I have to go to Sendai…”
“Not necessarily, I think that’ll actually be too risky, he might actually know by now you’re trying to find him…”
“Damn…so, I’m back where I began, ain’t I?”
“I wouldn’t say that…now, if you don’t mind, I have to go, I hope my information has been of any use to you…”
“Yeah…thanks…”
(Gin stood and left the café, the cup of tea half-finished, no one really paid attention to him, and Hideki was still confused by his behaviour, the waitress who he remembered Gin had called Hikari picked up the two cups and watched Hideki as if analysing him, Hideki didn’t notice this, since he wasn’t facing her, so, he left some money and left, he was going to look for Kaito)

(He eyed the Minagawa house for a bit, he’d not been there for a while now, nearly three weeks, and still he couldn’t understand how Kaito could live alone in such a huge place, well, at least he thought it was huge for a single person, it had been Minagawa property for nearly 7 generations, so it was a bit old and big, he opened the outer door, which was always unlocked, and knocked the inner door, after a little while, the door opened, a surprised Kaito standing there, and not only surprised, dishevelled and still in pyjamas…)
“Oh…you came back…”
“Mmm…”
“Come in…”
(All the computers, and things used for their investigations where in the uppermost floor of a building that Hideki’s father used to own and he had inherited when he passed away, said building’s other 99 floors were part of a quite big travel agency that Hideki’s father also owned, though that was inherited by his younger sister…apparently no one knew what happened at the top floor…they went to the living-room)
“Does this mean we have clues once again??”
“Something like that, a contact…”
“Now that’s much better…”
“He sent me a note about 10 days ago, he says, he knows the guy and the most important thing he’s told me up until now, he thinks he’s spotted him…”
“Where??”
“Sendai…”
“That’s pretty close…maybe we should go pay him a visit…”
“Wouldn’t that be too straightforward??”
“I suppose so, yes…”
“Besides, have you ever thought of the possibility that he might actually know already that we’re looking for him??”
“Not really…but now that you mention it…do you think it’s recent?? That he knows we’re looking for him, that is…”
“Maybe not…”
“Now that will be worrisome…”
“Yeah…so, what should we do?”
“Aaah…I guess we should try to track him down in Sendai, if that’s the place where this contact thought he’d spotted him, it wouldn’t hurt to take at least a short ride through Sendai, don’t you think?”
“Yeah I guess so, when are we going??...”
“Tomorrow, you don’t have anything important to do, do you??”
“Nope…”
“Good, ah, and I’m forgetting something interesting here, actually, something I should’ve told you before, though I completely forgot…”
“I suppose it’s important isn’t it??”
“Quite important…it’s about the merchant Makoto lived with, he was a vampire…”
“This story just gets creepier by the minute, doesn’t it??”
“Indeed, but that’s not all as always, recently, I remembered a part of the Elemental Family legend I’d completely forgotten, surely you remember I told you the Chaos God kidnapped the Fire God, don’t you?”
“Yes…”
“Well, when the deal between our shinigami and the Chaos God was over, he got rid of the Fire God, and the Council, the main authority in the All Souls’ Maze, which is supposed to be something like the netherworld, found our shinigami and kind of put him into trial with the charges of treason, influence dealing, neglecting his duty and leak of information, the sentence was, initially, to spend 100 years in home imprisonment, stripped of all powers and titles, just like a common soul, and the second part of the sentence was to be turned into a vampire when the 100 years of imprisonment were over, this last one wasn’t made public, there’s where Sakano Eiji comes into scene, he was the vampire selected by the Council, which in the background was controlled by the Chaos God, to ’punish’ our shinigami, that happened if I’m correct…in 1854…”
“The last time they were spotted, in London, obviously, was on 1867…not much time later…”
“Exactly, but, he was to be transformed into a vampire along with being exiled to the human world, which will obviously explain why they lived in London…”
“So, as far as I’ve understood all this, that’ll mean that our shinigami is also a vampire, and that HAS to be in this planet…”
“If he didn’t return undercover to the netherworld, which is highly probable…”
“So our possible locations for him are narrowed ’cough cough, cough cough’, sorry, to two worlds…”
“You’re sick??”
“Yep…”
”ah…then we should go to Sendai when you get better, it’s pretty cold there this time of the year…”
“No, no, I’ve no problem on going now…”
“If you say so…let me see…I feel like I’m forgetting to tell you something…”
“Hidekiii…I can hear your brain getting fried…”
“Shut up baka…ah yes! He also said, a girl was with him, she was also a vampire, and, if my conclusions were correct, she could be the one following us and telling our shinigami where we are and not necessarily himself…”
“Actually, it would be too risky for him to follow us in person…’cough cough’…”
“Yeah, so, we’ll go to Sendai in a week, you’ll be better by then, won’t you??”
“Yeah, I suppose…”
“Great…then I’m leaving…”
“Ok then…oh wait! I want to know something…”
“What??”
(They were already walking towards the entrance door)
“Who is that contact you met?...”
“…some weird guy…willing to give information, I’ll introduce him to you sometime…”
“Oh well, see ya then…”
(Kaito closed the door and after a bit of thought decided to close the outer door too then went to the kitchen, took the tea from where he left it inside the microwave so that it didn’t cool down and slowly took a sip, while he sank in thought…’Hideki, I hope you’re not getting us into more trouble that what we already are…’, then a cough fit hit him and he felt like dropping on his bed and getting some sleep, which he did…)