Rhapsody

Chapter X | Crisis.

'This is Denzle. M. P. Denzle. Unfortunately, due to the incompetence of the degree of accuracy built into DNA, I happen to be in the process of developing biotechnological softwares to prevent mutations in DNA replication, and will get back to you in probably 24 hours. Have a good day or night.' Click.

Joy groaned in frustration; it was already 9:30 in the morning, and according to Xavier, the man should've been awake for half an hour already. However, out of the six calls she'd attempted already, none were answered by the man himself but rather his DNA-replication voicemail.

'Xavier,' she said, turning towards her dark-haired boyfriend beside her, 'that bloody idiot is not answering any of my calls.'

'Oh? He usually wakes up at around 9:00, unless he went to sleep late yesterday or woke up really early, did something, and fell back asleep. Or maybe he's out.'

'You try. I've already memorised his entire voicemail. I'm done.' Taking the green four-leaved-clover phone out of Joy's slender fingers, Xavier dialed in Markel's number and tapped 'Call'.

'This is Denzle. M. P. Denzle. Unfortunately, due to the incompetence of the degree of accuracy built into DNA, I happen to be in the process of developing biotechnological softwares to prevent mutations in DNA replication, and will get back to you in probably 24 hours. Have a good day or night- Wait, actually, on second thought, hang on. I'm just about awake. Mind waiting for a few seconds while I stretch my sore muscles and avoid dying?'

Xavier's Cheshire grin could not have been more annoying to Joy than it already was. His low chuckle, even worse.

'See? I told you so.'

Thwack.

'Oww, all right, fine, I told you nothing and it was just a lucky try.'

'What lucky try?' asked a curious voice from the other end of the call.

'Ahhh... nothing you should concern yourself with, Markel. Just a bit of a mistake between Joy and I.'

'If this is a prank call, I will find both of you, and I will squirt Tabasco sauce into both of you guys' eyes until both of you get onto your knees and beg for forgiveness. I didn't need Somnus blasting full volume into my ear.' Audibly upset and irritated, Xavier could detect that his roommate was just on the verge of pressing the 'End Call' button right then and there, so he butted in.

'Joy wanted to talk to you about something.'

'Oh yeah? Tell me about it when I'm not deaf like Beethoven!'

'Hey, Mark, calm down.' Joy took her phone back from Xavier and pressed it to her ear.

'What do you want?'

'To talk. What transpired last night to have made you wake up so late today?'

'Not all people are morning people, Sicily.'

'That's because you're too lazy to wake up.' A low chuckle came from Markel's end of the line.

'Possibly. Anyways, what do you want?'

'Did you find anything?' Sicily's reply was too quick, and for a second she thought Markel would grow suspicious. But he didn't, instead replying, 'I just woke the bloody hell up. What did you expect, being Sherlock Holmes while sleeping?'

'You seem intelligent enough for it.'

'News flash: I'm not. Goodbye, and I'll initiate the call next time.' Click.

'Xavier, he just hung up on me again!'

Markel bustled around the kitchen, flipping pancakes to the sound of alternative rock. His coffee was growing cold on the counter next to the sink, and though on normal days he would've minded its temperature very much, today was one of the exceptions.

No, today he was too preoccupied.

C, D, B, E, B, E, C, A, C, A, B, G, B, G, FAC, BDF, GBD, ACE. Sounds about right... but how would this lead to 'additional clues'?

Though the fingerings I had seemed like they were for ridiculously small hands... or are they?

ABCDEFG... repeated sequences, and if I stuck them onto the rest of the alphabet...

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

ABCDEFGABCDEFGABCDEFGABCDE

After CD there appears to be a useless repetition like exons and introns.

Lost in thought, the man failed to notice the smoke coming up from his twelfth pancake- until he suddenly found himself on the tiled floor, lungs burning up with desperate coughs and wheezes for air.

'Rule number one of cooking: don't let your guard down.'

'Damnit,' Markel muttered, tentatively reaching out and snapping the stove to an OFF setting. 'Of course the son of the freakin' flag officer doesn't pay attention when his father's teaching him how to cook. God! I'm an idiot.'

Public Resources of the Federation of Islands, huh? If I remember my geography correctly... that means Crisis Island, Destiny Island, Future Island, Time Island, Fantasy Island, Ametrine Island, and Roam Island. Why would they know so much about the Rhapsodies' kindness and donations?

What would I do if I wanted to hide something?

As the smoke cleared out of his kitchen and the smoke alarm shut itself up, Markel had narrowed down the location of his next clue down to a single, small island near Europe.

Welcome to Crisis Island.

----------

'Okay, so we're going to Crisis Island. Where on Crisis Island, though? I'm looking at my Google Maps and I don't think it's exactly small.'

'About that... I'll get to you in a second.' As he hung up on the jade-eyed woman, Markel got ready to add up the finger numbers into coordinates.

A/N: How'd you lovelies like Markel's cooking? Kind of reminds me of all the times I've tried making pancakes myself :) which basically ends up with just 1 good pancake and the rest burnt to ashes.

But that's probably also because I multitask while cooking. Sorry.

Or maybe the two cups of maple syrup I always add makes pancakes burn faster? Hummmm....