Cold Calling

Cold Calling - Prologue

ちょうしょはたんしょ

FLOOR 87, TELEKIT BUILDING, SHIBUYA, 23:55

A cigarette drapes out of time torn lips, sprinkling ash onto the cold concrete floor below. It singes, hisses and squeaks underfoot. All is dark but the illumination of a small patch of concrete, torched by the moon's hollow glow through a closed and murky window. There is no struggle for light. Wooden soles slowly tip and tap past a solitary chair, holding one passenger on four withered legs. The frame is scratched, marked, a Curse of Cain staining the corporate façade.

Hands were bound by rope and tape, yet they made no effort to elude, to erode, to escape the clutches of the beholder of wooden soled shoes. The tip-tapping stopped, and one last breath exhaled carbon up into the foggy atmosphere. Our benefactor stands alone, but surrounded by many, with the scent of cheap perfume and cigarette smoke looming on his standard issue suit. He is the pride of the business, and he cannot let it go to wreck and ruin.

A car passes, its lights suddenly bringing the room into a realm of complete brightness, before wrenching back down the blinds. The cigarette butt drops to the floor, it taps once, twice, three times on impact. The remaining embers dwindle and scatter foul snowflakes, but nothing a wooden sole can't exterminate. A slender finger adjusts a pair of glasses, courtesy of the company, up a nose which so many have seen from below, but nay many have seen from above. He adjusts his cuffs. His collar. Finally, his tie.

"Good evening, Mr Kiyo." Our benefactor speaks in rehearsed dialogue. He has been here once before. His suit is immaculate, his smile withdrawn. He's professional, impersonal, impenetrable. How bound hands, in plastic and twine wish to seize his throat, rip it from his mortal flesh and cascade crimson onto grey. It is useless.

"Good evening department manager." Squeak, squeak go the legs of withered wood.

"Comfortable?"

"Comfortable." Squeak, Scratch...useless. Bound, beaten, defiant in stature. Loyal in tone. Kiyo. Mr Kiyo. A tear runs down his cheek, yet his voice never falters, fails, or falls flat. If he was scared now, then what would he have to live for in the future? Fear, hate, anger, panic, stress, worry, sadness. Oh, how the mind wants to clutch onto what the heart locks away. Tip, tap, tip, tap. As wooden soles orchestrate an ever-rising symphony of dread, Mr Kiyo struggles relentlessly, but his fate is sealed. A shadowy hand guides his young, bony, unshaven chin for him to gaze up with his bright youthful eyes into the moonlight of the everlasting darkness. The glow catches his eye, and reflects on his dark irises.

"Will there be...any music?" the juvenile employee enquires, as his eyes transpire into oblivion.

"Not tonight, Mr Kiyo. Perhaps imagine a piece?"

"I--I don't listen to music outside of work."

"A pity." Our benefactor drops his hand from the young boy's chin, leaving his eyes to stare up in wonder and awe. Hello moon. Can you see me now? How many stories are we high, and will it hear? Will they hear. Sweet melodies, of which Kiyo has never heard, will never hear.

"Close your eyes Mr Kiyo. It won't last long." Says the slender hand, as it circles around his hair; boyish and melancholy to the touch. Oh how cursed it is. How cursed every fair hair on his head is. What will it be used for? For fuel of some automobile? To turn on the lights within the office? Perhaps. Our benefactor is precise, he knows where it will go. The slender hand amorously caresses his hair, his cheek, his chin, his neck. To Mr Kiyo, to shut his eyes and feel the connection of another empty carcass was enough. Enough to satisfy one's last moments. Crimson would spill, cascade, flow like a river onto the clean concrete below. He will hear the wooden soles tip-tap out into the void.