Azur Lane - Crackhead's Paradise

Week 26

First up is a confession.

Some of you are most likely thinking what I mean by this. Well, I will be completely honest: I have not been truthful.

Yes, I have been lying to you.

A REASSURING MESSAGE
Please be calm, despite that confession.
I meant no harm, nor wish to inflict it.
I'm but a humble person, wishing to right wrongs.

It felt as though a weight was lifted from my back. The numbness erased as immense relief coated me like snow. But it was not enough, for I have to confess again:

I have murdered two people.

I couldn't just leave them on the table. For now it wasn't such a problem, but very soon it would be when I had another patient to work on.

One mother and her daughter.

Two corpses.

The mother and the girl, they remained stubborn and silent.

"Well, I can't leave them like this," I said, glancing at their mutilated corpses. "I should burn them. Easy and clean, even if it stinks later on. Shame it came to this."

Earlier, I had made a foolish mistake. Mere words can't describe my immense disappointment. Originally, I'd done everything right as usual:

I studied the blinding, white-snow streets. I practically became one with it. I peered closer, becoming interested in one of the two victims. In the girl. Curiosity got the better of me and I resigned myself to stay longer than my schedule allowed. I watched them.

Two hours and fifty-two minutes later, when the operation began, the girl had laid dead on the table. I remember that my breath was heavy and I'm surprised that the mother didn't scream as I worked wonders on her little girl.

I stared down at the girl, the pale, empty-stomached girl was laying there frost-stricken. Her mouth jittered in agony.

Her cold arms were folded.

Her eyes gouged.

Her stomach and chest area mutilated and gutted out.

Inside laid a blue crystallized cube, stained in her own crimson paint.

They weren't who I was after. I had been searching for a man of perhaps twenty-four years of age. A man who I knew very well, quite frankly.

It was my doctor.

SOME OTHER SMALL FACTS
Sometimes I rush my operations.
I lose focus and my patients die
Too quickly for my taste.

I watched as a police officer arrived with cluttered breath and what appeared to be a duffel bag. He peered into the airplane, surveying the wreckage from within as his nose clogged with the smell of blood and charred corpses of men, women, and children alike.

He was stunned.

From the duffel bag, the man took out five body bags. Not a moment later, another officer arrived and followed in his footsteps.

He reached into the airplane and heaved a body out. His hands stained in crimson liquid while his breath labored.

"This isn't just a crash," he turned to his fellow officers, "I smell of a hijacking here."

"Until we get the blackbox, we won't know for sure," said the other officer.

Coincidentally, my doctor was on that plane.

Fate was my best friend.

As more of them arrived, things, of course, had changed. What I had expected to be a clean, silent approach to steal that blackbox has become a hassle now.

It was always the same with events as unfortunate as these:

- Authorities arrival
- Media swarm like pigeons
- Ruled off as natural cause
- Worst, hijack.

My disguise was clever, they didn't notice the error they've made letting me through. Each person stood and played how I wanted them to. It was a small concoction of loud conversations, and distorted, self-conscious movements.

When I glanced back at the plane, I saw the news reporters frowning in joy and expressing their sympathy.

Of course, I knew they were filled with empty emotions.

I remained shrouded in this disguise as I began my journey away. You see to me, for just a moment despite all of the colors that fill this world, I will often catch a moment where only one fills the room.

I've seen it millions of times.

I've seen more red than I care to remember.