Hierarchy

Migraine

The letter was defiantly not something to be taken as a joke. Jisung found that out the moment he had pressed his hands against the warm blood painted on the parchment. It wasn't too hard to decipher that. Despite the constant doubts and questions that usually circle around in his head. He knew for sure that this was a letter made with intention. A real, serious intention.
No one was going to go as far as bleeding onto a letter just to throw the dancer off his normal day. No sane person would actually go this far for the sake of simply getting revenge on him for something he never did. It was an illogical decision. Which only meant that the person writing the letter had been someone dangerous. Perhaps more dangerous then Jisung would've liked to think. As he had inspected the letter more over lunch, the sixteen year old had started to put pieces together.
The paper was written in a hurried manner. Grooves indenting the page were obvious. This person was desperate. A person was desperate was probably a better way to put it. And that person may or may not have made it out alive. Perhaps a victim of a violent act of sorts. A hostage maybe? Someone who needed to be saved, desperately. It didn't matter to an extreme extent. Not if that was their blood on the letter. Which could easily mean that they were long gone now. That they were killed. That they were the next victim. If his thinking was stable and logical enough; then this letter was delivered by the serial killer them self.
    At first it was an odd thought. Something a paranoid person would spew out. Yet the idea was perfectly clear in his head. He knew his aggressors, the people who would bully him. Psychological torture was anything but their forte. If anything it was the one subject they had yet to master. It was both a relieving and a chilling thing to hear. This was a far greater threat then simple school bullies.
    Which lead him to more questions. What did this mean to him? Was he the next victim? How did this person find his locker? Could it really by the serial killer trying to connect with him? It there a kind of communication being put through? Was it good or bad? Was the person writing a hostage? A victim? Who delivered the letter to him? How did they know which locker was his?
    His head spun countless times. Jisung had to force himself to step back and think about it later. And here he was, later, sitting at the cafe. Having already alerting Taeyong about it, the orange haired boy was able to hang around the coffee shop till around five. It gave him enough time to become settled in the corner of the cozy little shop; pull out his laptop and notebook; and start searching up more about these murders.
    The music playing in his AirPods started to fade away as his brown eyes scanned the websites hungrily. The pen in his hands scribbled notes across his notebook. It spread the ink around in messy writing as Jisung recorded as much as he could from wherever he could. Saving pictures, copying links down, checking his sources to be sure. He pulled up other references to serial killers to find patterns and wrote those down too. Biting his lip, the dancer was on his tenth page before throwing his pen back on the desk.
    He let out a large breath, rubbing his eyes a bit and scratching his cheek. Flipping through the notes, the repeated accounts of the three current murder scenes were written down in the same blue ink. The list of weapons found, the sticky notes, pictures of the spray painted V in the recent crime. And the same list of victims and their connections to others. Whether it be family or not. The small footnotes about what Jisung knew about them previously. It all was repeated.
    'At this point I'll be going no where....' Frowning, the teen pulled out the envelope. He turned it in his hands a couple of times before deflating unto the keyboard of his computer. The orange strands crossed his vision as he stared lifelessly at the words strung out on the lined paper. There were no connections between any of the victims as of what Jisung knew and the evidence was lacking. So much so that all he could deduce from it was that the serial killer was arrogant enough to purposely leave evidence around. Which wasn't much of a lead considering a lot of people here were arrogant.
    "Maybe I'll print things when I get home....." Jisung muttered, pulling out one AirPod. "Make a board or whatever to try and connect these things together easier....."
    "Connect what things easier?"
    With a yelp, the student jolted up and stared at the person addressing him with wide eyes. However it only transferred back to a half lidded, tired expression as he recognized who it was. "Oh. Hi Taeil."
    The barista's lips quirked up in a funny smile before his eyes darted to the work. Giving a hum of interest, the dark haired man pulled out a chair across from the younger and sat down. It must've been his break.
    "How was your day today?"
    The boy in question was silent for a moment, nearly glaring at the table. You couldn't really outright tell someone that you had just gotten a letter filled with warm blood, nor say that it could've easily been the serial killer who sent it. So instead he simply shrugged.
    "You know, some old thing. Go to school, everything is boring, the kids target me for something I never did."
    With a click of his tongue, Taeil nodded a bit. His visage was scrunched just slightly with pity for the student. But instead of going into it, he glanced back at the mess that was Jisung's occupied table. "What are you doing?"
    Looking down, the student sighed again. He only spun his computer around to show the articles bookmarked. Really the easiest thing to do at this point.
    Taeil leaned forward and squinted his eyes at the screen, mumbling slightly. His face brightened almost instantaneously with when his eyes reached the end of the page and he looked at Jisung. "You're being a sleuth today huh?"
"Not just today....."  The orange haired teen scoffed. "I'm going to find out who the serial killer is for real. Even if it takes me more than one day."
The barista chuckled a bit before sliding the notebook over to himself. He took a few seconds to scan through all ten pages. Something that the dancer couldn't even imagine to be possible. But then again, Taeil was a bit of an odd guy. "This must be the reason why you wanted to make a board huh?"
    "Yeah, you could say that."
The two had known each other ever since Jisung was ten years old, when he used to be brought over by Taeyong. When he was younger, he had actually been quite scared of the cafe worker. There was just always something off by his nature. How calm he was in the toughest of situations and how easily he could handle even the meanest of customers. It was a bit amazing in a way. Yet Jisung had also known Taeil out of the cafe uniform- when he used to hang around with Taeyong. That was where the younger boy learned that the man was nothing less then weird. And it wasn't in a random words or awkward actions sort of way. No, it was like Taeil was in a constant drowsy state. With no return to the waking world as he walked around in a haze, always being only a sliver in touch with his surroundings. It was a miracle to think how well he had been living till this day considering that fact.
"It says the same thing after the first five pages...." The dark haired man seemed to be talking to himself as he flipped back and forth between the pages. "Is this all you've got?"
"I'm going to not take that as an insult and say yes." Jisung frowned, taking the notebook back from Taeil's grasp before slamming the notebook shut. "It's the only thing the police will let come out to the public. They're still trying to understand it all. As much as everyone else it."
Taeil nodded a bit before tapping against the table. There was silence for a couple of minutes as the kid stared at his work for a couple of moments. He groaned in exasperation and stretched out across the table again.
"Look at this shit. Nothings working out for me. I can't even write properly today its so fucking confusing."
"Language." The chastising tone in the barista's voice made Jisung grumble. But the smaller man ignored it. "Why did you even start searching?"
The churning frustration in his stomach suddenly froze into ice cold panic. His eyes flickered to the envelope in his lap and considered the pros and cons of telling Taeil quickly. However his instincts worked faster then his mind and before he knew it, he was speaking.
"Uh.... well... you see....." He cursed at himself for saying anything before he figured out a proper excuse. "I thought.... I thought that maybe it had something to do with the disappearances charged against me...."
"Oh."
Inwardly sighing, the dancer felt a bit of confidence return to his body. "Yeah, I thought that maybe it could wipe my name off of the suspect list. You know, clear my name and the little parol sentence put unto my name. Bring myself to justice and all."
"Just like a protagonist of a book." Taeil smiled, his eyes shining with something unrecognizable. Tapping his chin in thought, the employee hummed out. "But if you want any big leads, you could look at that victim list you got." His hand brushed over the notebook. "If you look closely the relatives are students in your high school."
'What?'
Flipping the notebook open once more, Jisung stared at the names he wrote down early. And just as Taeil had said, all the victims had at least one relative who was a relative to the school. The device shop worker, the woman, the drunkard in their late teens. All three had relatives that went to his school. He gawked at the revelation.
"This.... this is..." He looked up at his older friend and smiled a bit. "Thank you, this helps a lot."
The barista simply smiled back. "No worries. And if you need anymore suggestions then I suggest not using the internet."
"Really?"
"Yeah." Taeil shifted a bit in his seat. "If you want to solve the mystery then you're going to have to take action yourself. Like you said, the police only release what they want."
Jisung narrowed his eyes, there was a slight smirk forming on his lips. "Are you telling me... that I should..."
The other made eye contact and his dark orbs had said it all. Filled with tints of mischief and adventure. And most of all curiosity. "I'm as curious as you are in who the culprit is. I can't be the only one who missed the peaceful days where people weren't losing their lives or disappearing from the face of this town."
"Well you're right." Gathering his things, the orange haired boy started close his laptop. "I'll try my best to go and solve this problem out. Then maybe this can all pass."
There was only a nod in response as he continued to pack his things.
Thank God for Taeil. Without him, Jisung may have given up on this entire little adventure. Either that or stay stuck on the same pieces of evidence until the police gave out more information. Or until the serial killer targeted him next. That made him shiver. And just as he was about to head out to the door, the dark haired man stopped him.
"Hey one more thing." His stare was piercing. "If you need anymore help technology wise... I think you should stop by and get some gadgets to help you out with that. You know, some gear that could get you farther then some common devices found around town."
"What did you have in mind?" At this point, Jisung was up for anything.
"You should stop by Renjun's old place."
The words hit him like a cold block of ice. Left him gaping like a fish as he stared at Taeil in shock. The name. The name of one of his best friend's. It was odd to hear it come out of someone else's mouth. Someone who wasn't him dwelling on his friends during countless nights. Someone who wasn't Ten or Taeyong, trying to comfort him from all that had happened. The feeling was... not natural. It was almost against everything that Taeil even said that name, much less suggesting that Jisung go visit his friends house.
"Oh. Sorry. That was insensitive of me to bring up."
The orange haired boys mouth was dry and his throat started to ache. It was getting a bit hard to speak. To even comprehend the idea of going. There were parts of him that wanted to continue with this task. Because the suggestion made sense in the end, it really would help Jisung carry on with this investigation. But then again. Did he really want to go back now? To visit his friends house and see everything that had went untouched for months? It didn't seem right. To disturb the peace of leaving the room void of life. Yet the growing need to solve the mystery was eating up at him. Not only was his reasons of finding out reason behind the letter nagging him. But now the idea of being redeemed in the eyes of the city were up for grabs. And it was something he didn't think of passing up. Two bird with one stone.
"No...." It took a while for the sixteen year old to find his voice. He slung his bag over his shoulder, raising his head up high. "That's a good idea..." Starting to move to the door, Jisung turned back to bow slightly. "Thank you for the help Taeil, I promise I'll update you as I go."
Waving, the other only blinked a bit in response. And so the student pushed against the door and exited the coffee shop. Starting to plan out how he would go on with this plan.