CSIA:Crime Scene Investigation Agency

Special Chapter

CKRIS

You cannot call life a life, without knowing its purpose.

That's what the adults taught me, and as a child; naive and innocent, I lived for those words.

I grew up in the slums with my mother and a drunkard father. My father would wreck things in front of me and starts yelling endlessly. My mother would throw things at him and screams very loud until it hurts my ears. For such a young age, I never understood what they were arguing, but the emotions that I've been feeling always stays in my mind.

As young as I am, I look for things that gives me clues about my purpose. I started to go to the garbage dump and collect things and break them to find out what's inside; to find there purposes.
One time I got lucky and found a teddy bear. I was curious about its purpose and why people made such things. I stabbed it with my sharp knife and opened it to see what's inside. There, I saw white cottons, stuffed inside those fluffy tummy. I pulled it and felt its softness on my palms and I wonder what's its purpose. Is it to make a child entertained and happy? Or to mend a person with its fluffy and mushy self?

My curiosity about a life's purpose grew bigger and bigger. My mother bought a stray cat home and fed it with my food if I go home late from the dump. She would beat and scold me every time. "Bakit wala ka man lang magawa para sa 'kin?! Sana pinatay nalang kita, hayop ka! Sumasakit ang dibdib ko pagnakikita 'yang pagmumukha mo!"

I can only hear the ringing of my ears when she yells at me in the top of her lungs. I stared at her face and she looks so angry even though I didn't do anything to make her feel that way. There I was curious, what is my mother's purpose in life. Is it to scold, yell, and get angry at me? Or to feed me and make me feel warmth in her side?

On that night, I captured her cat and tied it on a pole. I touched its fur down to its toes, up to its nose. The cat is soft and mushy just like the teddy bear before. Is there more cottons inside its tummy?

I slashed its stomach and red thick liquids starts to splatter on the ground. I put my hands inside it and pulled something long and curly in its tummy. It was a weird cotton, some were long, some were thick. It was like a noodle thread I once ate with mother, sometimes with father. So what's the cat's purpose? Is it to make people happy and entertained with its fluffy fur? Or just something to take care off?

"Ano 'yang ginagawa mo?"

I turned my head and saw a kid behind me. She was looking at me and my mother's cat attached on the pole. Her eyes were looking for an explanation and it was full of curiosity just like mine.

"Hinahanap ko ang kahulugan n'ya." I answered with a smile.

She stepped closer and looked at it. Later, she touched and hold a grip on its body strongly until the cat's noodles goes gushing out to the slash I made on its tummy. She looked at me after what she did and smiled back too, "Magbigay ng ganda. Magbigay ng ganda ang kahulugan ng buhay n'ya gagaya nito," She washed her hands using the red liquids dripping from its wound, "Ang ganda." She said while looking at it.

"Khalline?"

The both of us turned our heads to the man approaching in our direction. He looks surprised and rushed towards us to drag the girl whom I was talking.

"Baliw ka bang bata ka?! Ha?!" The man yelled at her just like my father. 
"N-naglalaro lang po kami, itay." She answered.
"Anong klaseng laro 'yan?! Larong pangdemonyo!" He scolded her and pulled her hair.