"What is the first thing that comes to your mind, when you think of a high school or college girl?" A woman dressed in a police vest, asked as she bent down to refill her cup from the water tank. Her colleague Shimada Namikaze who wasn't exactly pleased to be following her, so answered stolidly.

"I don't know, Aizawa-san. Not dateable."

"As expected, gross." Chihiro Aizawa gave him a pitiable look, before pulling up her chair to repose herself. "Anyway, my point is ...this case doesn't make sense. The whole execution method was just too haphazard..."

"What is there to not make sense, Aizawa-san?" Namikaze sighed, puffing his cheeks out. "The matter is clear as day and night. The two girls were probably on bad foot with someone in college. That someone hired a mercenary and had them killed."

Chihiro's eyes blinked rapidly, unkempt curiosity teeming out. "Now that is a very interesting phrasing of word, Namikaze-kun. "

"Whatever do you m...ean." He asked, putting a hand over his mouth to hide his yawn. Even after six months of designated on night duty, he couldn't get used to it.

"Well, as per witness on the scene, the truck was about to hit Inana Kawashikaze from and that would have smoothly taken place, had Caizara Watasinabe not intervened and pushed her away. " Chihiro crossed her legs onto each other, as she explained, "Now Inana was the prime target since that man went out of his way to kill her upon her survival, but what about Caizara? What makes you think that she was also the prime target like Inana and didn't just end up as a mere collateral damage?"

A small smile etched Namikaze's face. It seems the new detective was as sharp with her ears as the rumours had spoken of. Still, she had much to learn both about her colleagues and the investigation.

"Disregarding the death of Caizara Watasinabe as mere collateral damage ,would be playing right into fiction set up by that mercenary. " He interlocked his fingers. "As per the witness testimonies and street cameras, it is quite clear that despite committing a murder in public, the man had taken enough precautions to ensure that let alone any person, not even cameras could record his face. Furthermore, the very moment chaos broke out, he vanished into thin air. Such a cautious man! Surely, you can't expect him to not know the consequences of his action. "

"Does that mean..." Chihiro's eyes rose up, considering the possibility in air.

"Yes." He nodded his head. "It is quite likely that he had always planned for Miss Kawashikaze to be saved by Miss Watasinabe, resulting in latter's death first. After all, how else do you explain the unnecessary shot he wasted on already dying Watasinabe. "

"But then why ..." Chihiro rubbed her temple softly, her eyes closing inwards with confusion. "Why did he try to make it seem like it was an unexpected accident?"

"Gee, I wonder what may have prompted our killer to spread a blatant lie before making his escape. " Namikaze sprawled himself, reclining back on the chair. "Surely, not to throw us onto a wrong rail track."

"Ugh. I get it already. "Chihiro sighed, understanding his concern, "Just don't talk in that pretentious tone again."

"Ha.! Well, no promises. Af..." He trailed off as a small man, dressed in white coat entered the room. Chihiro, being in charge, rose up from seat to greet the newcomer. By the looks of his badge, it was clear that he was from forensics department. For him to come all the way without so much a phone call, it must be something important.

"Good midnight..." The man bowed slightly.

"Just say good evening, Kanzaki..." Namikaze suggested, with a wink in his eye but stopped seeing the serious glare in his senior Aizawa's eyes.

"Please overlook my colleague's insolence, Mr. Kan..zaki." Aizawa hoped that she hadn't gotten his name wrong. "What brings you here?"

"I am used to it at this point, mam" Kanzaki placed his hands on the desk in a defeated fashion. "In our profession, we seldom come across such people. It is best to know how to keep your composure and keep moving forward. I would suggest the same to you, mam."

"I am right here" Namikaze mumbled but no one listened to him.

"But..." Kanzaki let out a whisk of air, as he prepared himself. "Never in my life, had I expected such a thing to come upon, as I did today."

"Oh..." Namikaze's ears perked up, half intrigued and half doubtful.

"You were supposed to check Watasinabe body today right. " Chihiro's heart beat rapidly, wondering if a new lead was in promise. "Did you find something atypical about the bullet?"

"No..." Kanzaki shook his head vigorously. "Had that been the case, I would have been hardly shocked. You see, the real cause of Miss Watasinabe's death was not the massive blood loss, but the lethal poison that was injected into her body at the time."

"You mean the bullet contained poison..." Namikaze raised his eyebrows.

"NO!" Kanzaki tapped the desk boisterously, his eyes enveloped with a dark tinge of fear. "You see, long before even last bullet of death was fired by the man, the poison was already there in her body. I found three alien elements, more accurately miniature projectiles in her body that couldn't be possibly from any of the debris in her surroundings."

"Wait a minute! " Chihiro's face wore an aghast look. "Are you saying that the killer not only planned the collision accident, knew that the Watasinabe would push off Inana but also fired a projectile containing poison in that short second?"

"My goodness..." Namikaze felt a sharp electric current running through hair on his arm. "Just what kind of a freak was that man? Maybe the witness testimonies about the killer having no shadow isn't just a cook-up tale after all."

"Probably." Kanzaki noted, holding his hands together. "What is worse, is that I can't analyze the poison at all. It is almost as if out of this world."

"Out of this world." Chihiro repeated, as she slumped back in her chair. She closed her eyes as several new questions brew fast in her mind.

If Namikaze's theory was correct, then the primary target would appear to be Watasinabe? If Namikaze's theory was wrong and witness testimonies weren't just fed-up lies by the killer, then it didn't make sense as to why he had used lethal projectile for Watasinabe?

In all theories, there were two certain immutable truth: Two college girls had been shot to death in public space and the poisonous projectile had been fired at time of accident into Caizara Watasinabe.

But then who was the primary target? If Inana Kawashikaze was primary target, then why was poison not directed at her? Surely, a man as capable of firing in that small fraction of second could have seen Watasinabe pushing off Inana?

If he couldn't and it was all a simple accident, then why did he not shoot them from same hiding spot only? What was the reason for such method of killing? No shadow and untraceable poison. Just what the hell was going on in Hokkaido?

Maybe the only saving grace was the fact that both girls would likely be at peace now or so Chihiro Aizawa hoped.

.................

Somewhere Far Away, Outside Natural Realm

It was so cold

It was so terribly cold!

When she wandered around in home, without wearing her warm slippers, she often used to hear her mother bemoan, her voice always burning with conviction that she would fall ill due to cold.

But the cold had always been pleasant for Inana Kawashikaze. Even the chilliest of winters, that could freeze one's skin used to leave a sweet memory for her, when others used to complain and endure. A single speck of sun rays was a heaven's boon for people tittering under cold but for Inana, it was an unnecessary reminder of old enemy whose burnt she had to face in full glory each summer.

But now as she found herself body less, sense less, suspended still in these lifeless ocean of dark, where there seemed no beginning or end, no bottom or the surface, her heart trembled in flight.

It didn't make sense.

After all, she had no body to lose, no life to fear being ripped apart, no ambitions to pursue, and no body to even carry vacant residue of her emotions and yet she felt as if her heart was more alive than ever before, consciousness beating, refuting to capitulate into this endless void, by trying to bring both faintest and deepest of her desires to surface.

So though she had no body to feel cold, her heart could imagine better than when it was in vessel of life, just how frightening the waters could be, in all their coldness. Yes, they had to be cold. She was convinced without knowing why.

But this was a dead end. There was no ship to navigate between Scylla and Chymbadis here, or obstacle to overcome. She was now a mere filament of her self writhing in agony she could only imagine unbearable for a person alive but soon that desire and longing for survival would surely wane.

It would end just like her body and mind, wouldn't? She felt as if she closed her eyes though in this utter company of darkness, all remained unchanged.

But then, something happened. Something that felt far too real to simply disregard as traces of her imagination. Her eyes seemed to wake up, as heat started to spread throughout her body. First, the veins, second the heart, third the brain and so on through the spine till the end of toes until she no longer had to simply crave for finding out whether these waters were cold.

The cold currents seemed to strike against her abdomen like ice daggers with strength of steel, yet the pressure was so great that it felt like water itself was guise for collection of these miniature daggers to plunge her spirit along with body deeper and deeper.

As if losing her life one time wasn't enough, then she felt like her soul ripping away, her consciousness fading to numbness, all over again.

Yet, unlike the memories that had burned so brightly in her parting moments the first time, nothing came to front this time. A small smile unconsciously spread across her lips, as her eyes prepared to shut the final time.

.....

"Stop it already." A voice thundered aloud, jolting her back to senses, so quickly that she didn't even realize when the void disappeared, the waters disappearing from her sight like sheets of ice crumbling away.

"But mother..." The voice complained but stopped short for some reason. Inana's vision was too cloudy to find the source, but even through that lingering white fog before her iris, she could feel the dazzling golden brightness of the room.

Inana wanted to speak something but feeling the tension in the room, her hesitation was natural. The fear of vexing an unknown entity was far greater than the fear of being rendered ignorant and helpless.

As the footsteps seemed to reach closer, her heart beat anxiously. By reflex, the eyes which were already so longing to remain open, were closed once again.

"My sweet child..." Inana found herself nonplussed at the gentleness of sound. A voice so gentle and soothing that even the nightangle's voice felt poor in comparison. The unknown entity caressed her hair from above softly, her unusually soft fingers kneading her cheeks tenderly. "Please open your eyes."

Inana obeyed at once, drawn to command like she always had been following it. Her vision was clear, more than ever before, the brightness overwhelming her at once. But that felt pale as her eyes fell on woman beside her.

A silver crown rested on her head, her long black hair running past her shoulders, occasionally mixed with golden strands like mythical serpents of fables and silver –bluish eyes seemed to enclose the ocean themselves. Yet despite all that, her face bore such a warmth that Inana felt at ease, her arms reaching out to the woman at once with an unknown expectation.

"There, there." The woman gave a small smile, as she patted Inana's head gently. "All will be okay now. Nothing to harm you..."

"R-really. C-can you protect me?" Inana's red eyes shone brightly against her blues, as if fading sunset kissing the seas, wrapping her arms around the woman instinctively. Her eyes still bore traces of tears and fatigue, as if they could come out at any moment.

"Of course, my child." A faint smile appeared on the woman's face, as she run her fingers over Inana's face briefly, washing away her exhaustion and sadness. 

"After all, I am God."