Gosick Fanfiction - Epitome of Mysteries

Case 1 - Epitome of Mystery

There was a country. A little state of land adjacent to the boundary lines of France, Italy and Switzerland. It had a port that was its front door to the Ligurian Sea, with the alps being its rocky backdoor. Having this, the nation was an elongated strip of land, extending from the sea to the alps. It was small compared to its neighbouring nation giants, but it had a vast population consisting of townspeople originating from allied countries all over the world from a global catastrophe that had been recently subsided.

In one of its cities...

The air was busy, carriages and coaches trotted all over the bustling, branching streets. It was a monochrome painting, most of the men and women milling about wore attire suiting to a black theme. The sun was shining in the sky, but it got obfuscated by the choking clouds, leaving only a spot of its pale glow among the dry clouds. It felt like night in the late afternoon.

People who decided to wear colour were the ones that stood out, they looked like droplets of spilled colour on the black and white canvas. They were traces of 'paradise' from an aerial point of view, an instant recognition of exotic tinges amidst the drab and listless crowd of the population. One of these 'paradises' was a young girl. She walked in a questionably composed fashion by the side-pathing of the rattling road. She could be identified by the blond hair that draped off her tiny head, like a turban come undone.

She appeared to attract the attention of the unenthused crowd, catching a swarming mass of eyes as she passed the many passersby. No, not her clothes – they were just as black as the slick oil used to light lamps or grease newfound machines; it was her golden fairy-like hair that was unusually captivating. At the same time, the girl paid no attention to the passionate stares and the aweing sighs of these boring people. She pressed on towards her destination.

Along the way, a man in a crumpled rounded plug hat and a rag-patched suit walked up to her, holding out a fresh and warm newspaper from some oven in the capital city's press. The rest of his colourless stacks of paper were clamped tightly under the armpit of his other arm.

"Good evening Madame." He spoke through his bushy moustache to start off with a polite greeting.

She did not respond and walked on, ignoring the man and his words.

He caught up with her and pleaded, "Please. Would you like a copy of the latest issued headline?"

The man shoved the inky paper into her face. It read – Unsafe Streets, Thieves at Doorsteps – 1927.

The blonde stopped on her tracks, not looking at the man's face – staring far off into the distance of the pathway – and announced, "I have already read and reread that copy four times, I need something else to relieve my boredom."

He gave up trying to sell the paper to her, not having any chance to show off his lacklustre persuading skills. It was her voice that had the most disheartening impact. Despite the fact that she looked like a child that resembled a live porcelain doll, her voice was husky, but resonant – a voice that belonged to a much older and matured woman.

Her dainty figure then progressed to cross the street. During that time of the day, carriages and horse would flood the roads and disallow anyone to get across without gambling to get trampled. This time, surprisingly, all of the carriage manners were so humbly generous to stall their motions solely to let only her small figure slip past. A beauty like her walking over the modernised tar roads aired the nostalgic feel of the Great War.

What was in attendance to greet her on the other side of the carriage lanes were a cluster of block buildings. A beat-up and worn building stood obviously near the centre of the row of shops and stalls, boasting its hard endurance and survival from the recent war. Most of the rusty-brown spots riddled on the building had been repainted, reinforced and revived from its senile construct, but the repairs were too conspicuous. A section of the summit of the brick structure was a dilapidated ruination, any attempts in mending was to no avail. Next to the old wreck was a much younger pharmaceutical store, coloured in spectrums of lively yellow and orange motifs. It had its business booming as a long queue of sombre people had built up along the side of the store. At the other end of the old building existed a flower shop, its florist had just given away some roses to a desperate customer.