In This World So Cruel

Chapter 9

Akira woke up with a slight headache. “What happened?” she asked herself out loud. Secretly she was hoping that she didn’t have a hangover because if she did today was gonna suck. Remembering last night she blushed. Arima had been somewhat comforting her because of….She immediately felt saddened remembering what she had been told last night. “Sasaki deserved none of that” she mumbled to herself as she got out of bed realizing she had to feed her cat. After she got up she felt woozy and dizzy. ‘I might not want to go to work today’ thought Akira. All these thoughts were giving her a headache and just walking around she felt sick. ‘Must have been sitting in the cold yesterday’ she thought while feeding her cat. Petting her softly she thought about who to call. She first thought of Sasaki but then she remembered he was still in the hospital meaning her only option was Arima. Not realizing what time it was she picked up her phone and called Arima. On the third call he finally answered. “What do you need Akira?” asked Arima in a tired voice. Akira had to hold in her laughter hearing the almighty reaper with such a tired and groggy voice. After she calmed down she responded. “ I need you to tell my squad that I’m sick today and can’t come to work.”

On the other side of the line Arima pinched the bridge of his nose. “You could have texted me or done something other than call me at this ungodly hour!” said a frustrated Arima. He rarely got time to get a good night’s sleep and this was one of those days so when he heard his ring tone (remember it’s rolling girl by Hatsune Miku it will be important later on) he let it ring until it annoyed him enough for him to pick it up. “What do you mean at this ungodly hour?” asked Akira “isn’t it like 6am or so?”. Arima sighed ‘she really has no idea what time it is’. He responded back in a more gentle voice “Akira, please check the clock and then tell me what time it is” Akira looked back to check her alarm clock. Her eyes widened as she saw it. “Sorry Arima” she said with sincerity “I had no idea it was 3am”. “Don’t worry about it just…. Check the clock next time please” responded Arima sleepily. He hung up and trudged back to bed to get another three hours of sleep.

At the Quinx apartment the poor teenagers were all up wondering why their mentor was in the hospital and they were given no information. Normally when Sasaki was in the hospital the Quinx were the first to be told why he was there and when he would get out, but with this case they weren’t told anything not even when he would get out. The Quinx had assume that their mentor would come home like any other day when Arima had popped in to ask them some questions. Realizing that Sasaki was not going to be home that night they ordered take-out and had tried to go to bed. By 2am the had all come down to the kitchen realizing that their mentor was not home and had not told them where he was they assumed he had gotten hurt and was at the hospital. After they assumed that he was in the hospital they realized they had no been told anything and started panicking. Saiko sighed it had been hard to calm Mutsuki down but now they had no idea what to do. “how about we search social media for any rumors of what happened to him” suggested Urie with a blank face. Even though you couldn’t read his emotions through his face anyone could tell by his tone that he was as curious as the rest of the Quinx. “ That’s a good idea Urie” said Mutsuki “ but I don’t think any of us have any social media accounts.” At this comment Saiko cleared her throat. “I think I can help with that”

“Saiko I know that you’re a major gamer” said Shizaru with awe “but how do you have a twitter, instagram, facebook, snapchat, oovoo, pintrest, flikr, youtube, and tumblr account and be able to keep track of each one and be popular on each one?” “I dunno I just play on my phone a lot” responded Saiko with a bored look on her face as she searched through facebook status updates. “Here it is” said Saiko as she started to look at the thread. As everybody crowded around Saiko Mutsuki exclaimed “That was fast and why are CCG members giving out private information on facebook?” Saiko took a second to look up at him with a bored look and said “Anything said on facebook by a CCG member can only be viewed by another CCG member and this conversation about Sasaki is one of the longest threads on facebook so it’s on the front page.” Seeing that everybody understood how she found the information she started reading aloud. “’Did you hear about the spar today?’ ‘Yeah I heard it was between Sasaki and Juuzou’ ‘Those monsters?! I bet they destroyed the whole sparring area’” All of the Quinx squad scoffed and a few wanted to find out the names of those investigators and punch them in the face. Saiko realized what they were thinking and quickly said “These people don’t know Sasaki or Juuzou personally, they might just be going off rumors.” Seeing that a few weren’t going to buy it she decided to continue reading.

As she continued reading through the thread she realized that almost none of these comments were nice. While the Quinx squad didn’t train and meet with Juuzou regularly they knew that he was somewhat kind and not like what everyone else says. Although were pissed that they were spreading bad rumors about Juuzou they were more pissed at what they had been saying about Sasaki. With Juuzou’s comments there were some truth to them, he may have had a past like that but they had no right to say anything about Sasaki. What they had been saying was not only wrong, but the exact opposite of how Sasaki acted. Sasaki was kind, gentle, patient, and loving. These people were saying he was a cruel worthless monster who deserved to be killed. Shaking her head she decided to give the basis of the information to the rest of the squad. “What’s taking so long?” asked Urie. The members of the Quinx squad were starting to get impatient. Saiko ha been reading for five minutes and not giving them any information on a topic they needed to know about. “Well for your information princess Urie” teased Saiko “If I gave you that actual comments you’d go and murder most of the people in the CCG.” Mutsuki quickly realized what she had hidden in that comment. “That bad?” asked Mutsuki. When Saiko had commented she said it so that if you actually took what she said into consideration you would realize that it would make the person who cared least for Sasaki go on a rampage for what they were saying. “Yeah it’s bad. They are saying the exact opposite of what Sasaki is like and insulting with every chance they get.” Responded Saiko with a grim look. What they were saying was horrible but they would never admit to saying it in real life and would accuse the Quinx of snooping. Sighing to herself she started to give out the information she had gotten.

“From what I see Juuzou and Sasaki sparred and…..something…….happened…….and Sasaki and Juuzou were both put into the hospital. Sasaki for an overdose of RC supressents and Juuzou for intensive injuries.” Said Saiko. Everybody tensed up at the information. One person who was human had taken intensive injuries while the other, a half-ghoul, had a RC suppressant overdose. “Hey guys look” said Saiko with surprise “Another person commented!” At this all the quinx quickly turned around and started reading the comment. “Yeah the fight was fine until Sasaki got his index finger cut off by Juuzou’s quinque……” The quinx immediately had a lead. ‘Since a quinque is made from a ghoul maybe the ghoul made from the quinque had something to do with Sasaki’s past’ thought all of the quinx. As they were deep in thought trying to remember if Juuzou had told them what ghoul his quinque had been made out of Shizaru had an idea. “TO THE ARCHIVES” yelled Shizaru snapping all the quinx out of their thoughts. Even after having their thought rudely interrupted all the quinx agreed they needed answers to their questions and they were all in the archives.