Chapter 21 – Threads in the Dark

The corridor echoed with the clicking of polished shoes.

Hiroshi walked slowly, each step deliberate, his coat brushing against the edges of the dimly lit office hall. The fluorescent lights above flickered, casting momentary shadows on the grey walls. Behind his calm exterior, his mind was a symphony of spiraling thoughts, each note a whisper, each rhythm a scream.

"Tick... tick... do you hear it, too?" he muttered to himself, lips curling into a smile no one else could see. "The second hand dances, and so do I."

As he turned the corner, he was met by Emiko Tanaka—again. The junior investigator had been hanging around him like static. Her eyes carried something between suspicion and concern, or maybe it was affection. He could never quite tell. Or maybe he didn't want to.

"You're here early," she said softly, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I didn’t expect you in until later.”

"Time is relative, Emiko," Hiroshi replied, voice low and oddly melodic. “To the living, it moves. To the dead… well, they don’t seem to mind.”

She blinked. “What?”

He tilted his head, then laughed—short and sharp. “Ignore me. I’ve been playing chess with insomnia lately. He’s a dirty cheater.”

Despite herself, Emiko smiled. She held out a file. “Another body. Abandoned apartment complex in Nerima.”

Hiroshi’s fingers hovered above the folder, then slowly closed around it.

The scene was grotesque.

A woman, mid-twenties, slumped against the peeling wall of a rundown hallway. Her arms were arranged to cradle a shattered music box. Blood trailed from her nose, her mouth, but not a drop touched the floor—carefully cleaned, as if by reverent hands. Her name was Aya Fukuhara.

"A performance," Hiroshi whispered to himself. “No… a requiem.”

He knelt beside the body, fingertips grazing the edge of the music box. It was playing a broken lullaby, endlessly looping the first few notes. His eyes glazed over, pupils dilating.

A flash—

A younger Hiroshi. A quiet apartment. Laughter. A sister?

"No," he growled quietly. "Not now."

“Did you say something?” Emiko asked from behind him.

He didn’t respond. Instead, he reached into his coat, pulled out a pair of gloves, and began examining the room. The crime scene was layered in contradictions—an artist's touch hidden beneath a murderer's mask.

On the wall above the victim’s head, written in lipstick, was a phrase:

"You can't unhear the melody."

Later that night, Hiroshi sat in his apartment, the file open before him. The woman's final expression lingered in his mind—not fear, not pain.

Acceptance.

He poured himself a glass of water, stared at it, and then tilted his head again as if hearing something.

"You saw her, didn’t you? The way she looked at you."

He stood abruptly. The voice was familiar. His own. But not quite.

"You liked it. Admit it. The stillness. The silence after the music stopped."

He slammed the glass down, water spilling across his papers.

“No one asked you,” he whispered.

The shadows in the room didn’t answer, but they shifted—or so it seemed.

At the precinct the next morning, Emiko cornered him again.

“Hiroshi,” she said, voice firmer than usual. “Are you okay?”

He looked at her, eyes gleaming like polished obsidian. “Of course. I’m always okay. Even when I’m not.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“I know.”

She reached out, touched his arm. “You’ve changed. Ever since—”

“The case with the mirrors?” he interrupted. “The one where the reflection moved before the man did?”

“That one… and others.”

He leaned in, voice dropping to a hush. “Maybe I’ve been staring too long into the abyss. Or maybe... the abyss started whispering first.”

She didn’t know what to say.

Neither did he.

Because deep down, under the layers of charisma, charm, and sharp wit… something was cracking.

And from within, something else was smiling.