Entangled Souls

Chapter 3

Peter left his apartment half an hour later in the best possible mood. His skull was still throbbing, but a cold shower was able to dull the hammering in his head slightly. Still, he was in good spirits and was not going to let a little headache - which he accredited to himself - ruining his fun. After the first few steps outside his door, he heard a loud bang followed by a heavy thud. Peter stopped in his tracks. The unusual sounds seemed to come directly from his floor. Did something explode in his apartment? Certainly he had shut the gas oven off, and even so he was only bustling in the bathroom the whole morning. Nevertheless, these strange noises unsettled him and he had to investigate. He went back and inspected his apartment. A few minutes wouldn't make a difference anyway. But there was nothing there. The loud bang did not come from his apartment after all. Then his neighbor had to have been the source. Peter was not especially close with the young man across the hall; actually they barely knew each other. The gentleman next-door was always fairly reserved and seldom greeted Peter. Whenever he did open his mouth, he did not dare to look Peter in the eyes. A strange guy, but Peter still wanted to be sure that everything was all right. Before knocking, he listened through the door, but everything was as quiet as a church mouse.

"Everything okay in there, dude?" he shouted through the door. He was never one for formalities, and as a rule he addressed others as such. No response. The sounds must have just been a trick of the ear, but considering the after pains from the previous night's events which he was still struggling with, this was no surprise. He still wanted to check once more, however, and so bent down and peeked through the keyhole, of which there were still many in this old building. It was hard to make much out, but he believed that something or someone was lying on the floor. The outlines pointed to a human shape, but he could not say this with certainty. But he had to do something. This time he knocked harder on the door.

"Do you need help?" he spoke again, but again there was no answer. He bent down and peered once more through the keyhole. The position of the object lying on the floor had not changed. If only he knew what that was on the floor. Perhaps it was just a used washcloth or something. He had no idea, so the only option remaining to him was to press further. Peter ran determinedly to the first floor and rang on the landlord's door. With his master key, he would be able to open the apartment door. Peter wanted to be sure that everything was okay and then calmly make his way to the tennis court. Back on the fourth floor, the landlord pulled out his key and opened Peter's neighbor’s door, whose name he was not familiar with. Peter spied cautiously into the apartment, like he was a robber on the prowl. It was dark in the hallway, so he was not able to recognize much immediately due to the various lighting conditions. Blinking, he stepped forward and there he lay, his neighbor, in a pool of blood. Peter, without thinking about leaving possible traces on his neighbor’s body, fell over the young man. He checked for his pulse. In this moment he was happy to have passed the First-Aid course offered annually by the university.

"He's alive! Call an ambulance, right away," he excitedly called to the landlord. Only now did he notice that he was standing with his shoes in the middle of his entire neighbor’s blood. A metallic, unusual odor crept into his nose. Uncertain about what to do next, he cast a look back to the landlord who was currently explaining everything to the emergency responder.

"They are on the way," he called hopefully to Peter.

"Cool, at least it's something. What do I do now?" Peter thought to himself. Then the gun lying next to the motionless body caught his eye. He was a second away from reaching down for it, but then he remembered that he had likely left enough traces already.

"Call the police too, please," Peter said to the landlord. "Something really bad has happened here."

He nodded and dialed the short number for the police. Peter's phone then started ringing. He quickly picked up.

"Dude, where are you? I've been waiting forever," he heard his friend say through the receiver. He sounded pissed.

"I'm standing in the middle of a pool of blood in my neighbor’s flat," Peter briskly answered.

"You smartass. If you don't have any better excuses..." he responded to Peter's comment, annoyed. Peter was not remotely in the mood to listen to his friend's anger any further and simply hung up.

Finally Peter heard the sirens getting louder, and before he could do anything, the EMTs tore up the steps to the fourth floor and entered the room. They roughly pushed him aside and ordered him to leave the room. Peter did as he was instructed and walked through the hallway in his blood-smeared shoes to the front door. He could still hear as one of the EMTs said, "What kind of foul play is this?"

The police were already waiting outside. They were talking with the landlord, who was nervously pointing in Peter's direction. One of the officers broke from the small group and walked up to Peter.

"It was you who found him?" he asked.

Peter nodded and described as thoroughly as possible what had happened in the past hour. The officer listened attentively, writing down the pertinent facts in his notepad. At long last, he asked Peter to come down to the station today and sign the report of his statement. After his severely injured neighbor had been taken out of his room and carried off in a stretcher, the forensics team set to work. Peter sneakily stole a glance into the apartment and observed the busy activity at the crime scene. Never before had he been able to witness police work so up close and personally before. But they did not allow him this experience for long. A few moments later, one of the officers shut the door on Peter with a grim expression and made it quite clear that there was nothing to see here.