(Anastasia) A Dream Come True

I’ve solved many, many cases within my lifetime as a detective.

But there is one case that haunts me to this day. I still have not found him, the survivor. I still have not rectified my most fatal mistake.

You see, this was not just any case. This was the most important case in my entire lifetime. It involved the unlawful murder of my entire family. My mother, my father, my three elder sisters - even my younger brother Alexei, who was always a frail child, and was not even able to run away.

What crime did they commit? What did they do so wrong that they must answer with death? Why did the higher forces only think to spare me? Why must I have been so weak, unable to do anything to save them?

So at the very least, I decided that I must avenge their deaths.

I trained for years in order to build up my strength, agility and resourcefulness. I familiarized myself with military combat and a plethora of martial arts disciplines.

6 years later, I was able to get my revenge. For two months, I gathered intel on the man who killed my family. He was an agent.

I tracked him down, all the way to his family home, and shot him and every one of his family members. Well, all but one.

The one I let escape in a moment of weakness.

I had foolishly hesitated in those crucial seconds and could not bring myself to murder the young boy who so closely resembled Alexei. My brother who had been taken away from me by that very child's father. It is my greatest regret.

Never again will I make such a mistake. It’s been 18 years since that day, and now the survivor is 24. I have no such hesitation left. I will find him. I will kill him. I must, because-

“MS. ANASTASIAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!”

My thoughts were interrupted by a yell from behind. I turned around. The sound had come from the young boy who resembled Alexei. What a coincidence.

He approached my table.

“Hello Ms. Anastasia!” He whispered.

“Why, hello young Maruto. It’s nice to see you. And who is this young lady with you today?”

“This is my big sister Dunadée,” he whispered in reply, “Today she will help me on my mission!”

“Ah, I see. Pleasure to meet you Ms. Dunadée. How are you today?”

“Fine, thank you, “ Ms. Dunadée laughed, “but call me Daisy. That’s my real name.”

Ah yes, now that I think about it, I recognize this young lady from a music event which happened a few days prior.

“Certainly, Ms. Daisy. And young Maruto, if I may ask - why are you whispering?” I gave him a curious look, “Is your mission a secret mission?”

The child shook his head, “No! It’s because I know you like “peece and kuwaiette” Ms. Anastasia, so I am using my indoor voice now! Sorry for yelling before, we were looking for you so I got excited when I saw you sitting here!”

“You can talk a bit louder than that, though,” his older sister reassured him.

I nodded, chuckling, “Yes, no need to whisper. And why were you looking for me? Will I have the honour of assisting you on your mission?”

“No! Actually, today, Dunadée has her own mission! She needs your help!!!”

“Shhh!! You’re raising your voice again! And actually, I do something to ask you Ms. Anastasia, is that okay?”

“Of course, it would be my pleasure.”

“Thank you so much! I’ll be right back in a sec,” Ms. Daisy took her brother by the shoulders and directed him towards the other end of the café, saying something about a “proposal.”

A half-cup of coffee later, Ms. Daisy came back by herself and seated herself across from me.

“Mark- I mean, Maruto...is getting help from Ms. Lucky with his very important and official proposition.” she explained, giggling, “I think Mr. Scanta will grant his request anyway, but I needed to distract him so he doesn’t interrupt us every few seconds.”

“I see,” I smiled, “I’m looking forward to finding out what this proposition is all about,” I said, looking over at young Maruto, who was jumping around Ms. Lucky as she wrote something down.

When I turned my gaze back to Ms. Daisy, she wore a serious expression. “Anyway, about my question…”

“Yes, please go ahead.”

“This is going to sound a bit crazy, but...just hear me out, I’ll explain later.”

I gave her a nod to proceed.

“Your name is Anastasia Nikolaevna, and your parents are named Nikolai and Alexandra. You have three older sisters named Olga, Tatiana and Maria, and a younger brother named Alexei. When you were 10 years old, your entire family was assassinated, excluding you. When you turned 16, you got revenge on the man who murdered your family by killing his entire family, aside from his 6-year-old son, is that correct?” she finished, taking a breath.

I was confounded.

“Have...have we met before, by any chance?”

“I’m not really sure myself,” she shook her head sadly, “But I’m assuming what I said is true?”

“It is. And how do you know this?”

Yes, how could she possibly...oh.

Well, I suppose I did divulge the details to a few close acquaintances.

Perhaps more than just a few.

More importantly, I do recall mentioning the matter to her younger brother. I did omit the names, however, I suppose it’s not impossible for her to have investigated further, especially considering there is an information broker who frequents this café.

Nonetheless, I awaited her explanation.

“You see, until today, we had never met, right? I’d only seen you from far away, and I didn’t even know your full name,” she began, “but somehow, I saw you in my dream…”

“In...your dream?”

“Yes. Starting from a few weeks ago, I’ve been having some weird nightmares. And not just me, my members - the members of my kpop group, that is - have been having the same exact dreams.”

I nodded slowly, “That’s odd. But not impossible.”

She nodded as well, “Yes, at first that’s what we thought too. We thought it was just because of our newest comeback. Our new concept is horror-themed, and at first the nightmares were just like our music video - escaping from a boarding school, running from monsters and creepy ringmasters…”

“Yes, then that makes sense. Your comeback is your shared experience, so perhaps that’s why the content of your dreams are similar.”

“Yes, but then it started deviating,” she began fidgeting in her seat, “It was becoming oddly familiar, and we started seeing people we recognized. Apparently dreams come from the subconscious, so that’s not that weird either, but, we started seeing things that we couldn’t possibly have known ourselves.”

“So you mean to say…”

“Yes. It sounds crazy, and I wouldn’t believe me either, but the reason I know about your past is because of my dream. In my dream, we went to a boarding school in a dystopian universe, and some of the people at the school were people we recognized from the café. You were one of the guards who made sure the students didn’t escape, and when we did, you were sent to look for us and bring us back…” she clenched her fist before continuing.

“When you found us, we had been captured by a necromancer. It turned out he was the son of the man who killed your family, you had accidentally let him escape 18 years ago when you got revenge on that man. After saving us, you finally killed him.”

I was silent.

Ms. Daisy had no reason to lie, did she? But none of this made any sense.

“Although some of it is the same, I am not a guard, nor am I chasing after a necromancer. And you, Ms. Daisy, do not attend a boarding school, do you?”

“That’s true, but there are too many coincidences!” she exclaimed, sounding desperate, “We saw Genu Tibia get run over by a carriage, and he told us he’s been hit by a car before. We saw Rika Park bribing our headmaster, and when we repeated what she said to him in our dream, she gave us hush money. We saw Tristan Smith stealing an important document from the headmaster’s office, and when we baited Tristan in real life, he told us he had stolen a USB from Mr. Scanta’s office- oh yes, that’s right!” she stood up abruptly.

“The headmaster in our dream looked just like Mr. Scanta!! Not even my subconscious would willingly picture Scanta!!!” she raised her voice.

I stared, processing what she had said.

She sat back down, embarrassed. “And me, Violet and Dandelion-chan, I mean, Dandelion...all saw all of these things…” she added in a quieter voice, “And now you saw that your past in real life also matches up with our dream…”

“I don’t know what to say, Ms. Daisy…” I really didn’t. I was speechless. Were Ms. Daisy and her colleagues somehow oracles perchance? Somehow it wasn’t too hard to accept. It was quite possible in the world we live in.

I paused.

“Ms. Daisy, did you recognize that necromancer?”

She tried to calm down a bit, “His...face you mean? I don’t think I recognize him...maybe you can ask Violet or Dandelion?”

I nodded, a little disappointed. Then I felt a little ashamed of myself. I was a detective, and trained in gathering intel. It was ridiculous of me to think of relying on dreams, prophetic or not.

I turned my attention back to Ms. Daisy. She still looked quite troubled. I truly didn’t know what I could say to comfort her.

“Perhaps you are a clairvoyant. It would be my first time meeting someone with such a gift, but I am certain it is something to rejoice over, not something worthy of causing turmoil.”

She nodded. “Thank you Ms. Anastasia. You’re probably right,” She tried to give me a smile.

I tried to gather a few more words of reassurance, but before I could, the two of us were joined by Maruto, Ms. Lucky and an adolescent boy.

“Well hello again, Maruto. I see you have Ms. Lucky with you this time. And who is this? If I’m not mistaken, you are the new part-timer, correct?”

“I’m working full-time now, actually,” he corrected me. “My name is Rahim. You’ll be seeing me around a lot more now!” he smiled.

Ms. Lucky looked shocked. “Hold on. What about school? You have less than 2 months left until you graduate.”

The boy kept smiling, “I’m done with school. I won’t be graduating, I like it here a lot more.”

Ms. Lucky stopped.

“You dropped out of school?!”

Rahim laughed nervously. “Well, I guess that’s one way to put-”

“Does Maisha know? No, rather, do your parents know?”

Rahim was silent.

She took out her cellphone, “I am contacting your mother.”

The boy put up his hands in defense, “Wait! Not yet! I just need...Wait, you know my mom?”

Ms. Lucky shifted her glasses, “Of course I do. Don’t underestimate my auntie network.”

She walked away, with young Rahim frantically following suit.

“Uh, oh. He’s totally going to get a time-out!” Maruto giggled.

“He’s a big kid,” Ms. Daisy told Maruto, “He won’t get a get a time-out...he’ll get...dun dun dunnnnn...grounded!!”

Maruto gasped.

“So, are you done with your proposal?” Ms. Daisy asked.

“Yep! I’m done a super good ‘pra-pose-ul’! Mr. Rahim and Ms. Lucky helped me!” Maruto informed us.

Ms. Daisy laughed, “Let’s see it then.”

Maruto handed her the paper and began reciting aloud what was written on it.

“Dear Mr. Santa!!!

Because I am the winner of the first anewal Café Eris talent compatishun, I want to give back the prize I have right now and ask for a wish!!! My wish is to put ramen on the café menu!!! Here are the reasons why I think you should grant my wish:

1. Ramen is super duper delishus

2. I think everyone should try ramen

3. I think that putting ramen on the menu will make you more rich because everyone will want to come buy it

4. I really really want to eat ramen more but my mommy doesn’t want to drive me to the ramen restaurant every day.”

Ms. Daisy and I applauded his work.

“WAIT!!” He protested. “You didn’t let me finish! I have more!!”

“Okay, go ahead.”

“But I need the paper because I forgot!” He grabbed the paper from his sister and continued reading aloud.

“Here are some reasons why you might hezzatayt to grant my wish, and the way you can fix the problem:

1. This is a café

This first one is not a problem. If you think it is a problem, then it is only a problem with your head. Don’t be afraid to break the standurd!!! SHADOW MASTER MARUTO WILL GIVE YOU COURAGE!!! Café Eris will be the first café with ramen!!!

2. You don’t know how to make ramen

If you do not know how to make ramen, then there are two ways to fix this. You can either learn to make ramen, or hire someone who knows how. I am inclowzing the business card of my favourite ramen restaurant. You can ask them to teach you how to make ramen, or you can win over one of their employees by offering a...a…how do you read this?”

“Competitive advantage,” I said.

“Yeah! C’petative edvantege!!” he took a bow, “That’s the end! Now you can clap!!”

We applauded him once more.

“Good job, buddy!” said Ms. Daisy, “Let’s go bring this to Mr. Scanta. I think he might be in the kitchen.”

I watched as the pair made their way towards the counter. Ms. Daisy looked less troubled. I was glad. Looks like she has forgotten about our conversation for now.

But I had not.

If Ms. Daisy truly was an oracle, that meant one thing.

I would eventually kill the one that got away, just as I plan to.