Urban Legend Detectives Case 2: Solitary Hide and Seek

By Kyosuke Tsumiki

Eerie stuffed dolls swathed in red threads have been found one after another at several suicide sites. What is the relationship between the cases and a strange ritual named ‘solitary hide and seek'? What are appearing in front of university students shooting a documentary film about ‘solitary hide and seek' at an abolished school in the dead of the night?

Detective Kobayashi and Detective Sarutobi start investigating the case as ‘Urban Legend Detectives'. Then, they again encounter the mysterious man known as ‘that guy' or ‘Friend of a Friend', whom even criminals dread and fear ...

This work was exclusively written for The BBB: Breakthrough Bandwagon Books.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Nov 3, 2014
• ISBN: 9781312649699

Book preview

Urban Legend Detectives Case 2: Solitary Hide and Seek

Urban Legend Detectives Case 2: Solitary Hide and Seek

Originally written in Japanese by Kyosuke Tsumiki

Translated by Ryusui Seiryoin

Cover illustration by Maki Takeuchi

Cover design by Maki Takeuchi

Copyright © 2014 Kyosuke Tsumiki / The BBB: Breakthrough Bandwagon Books

All rights reserved.

ISBN978-1-312-64969-9

-0.5-

You said hallucination?! Black Friend’s voice echoed in a stark room, in which there were two chairs set across a big double-pedestal desk. Do you mean that the horrible murder was just my hallucination or imagination?!

Black Friend was dressed all in white; a white shirt, white cotton pants, a white parka, and white shoes. He put the white hood so low that his face was hidden.

You’re right, said White Friend wearing a black mask with no holes for the eyes, nose, or mouth. Everything exists only in your brain. In other words, it is no more than a story of ‘another world’. White Friend was dressed all in black; black shoes, black pants, and a black open-neck shirt under a black long coat.

Black Friend could not help but ask another question. Can it be said for my another self?!

White Friend cut him off, by saying, Imagination can murder someone only in the imagination, that is, only in the brain.

Black Friend tried to ask something, but White Friend spoke first. Don’t you want to know? Exactly when do you become the person that you are not?

Black Friend couldn’t say anything, and White Friend continued, First, I cut off your index finger. Then, you say, ‘I and my finger’. Next, I cut off your right arm. Then, you say, ‘I and my right arm’. Next, I cut your abdomen and chest with a knife and pick out your organ ... I mean, I might as well extract your heart. Then, you say, ‘I and my heart’. Do you understand so far? White Friend paused a little and continued, Finally, I cut off your head. Then, what do you say? Do you say, ‘I and my head’ or, ‘I and my body’?

A short silence pervaded the room.

Don’t you think they are interesting questions? Actually, they are dialogues you can find in my favorite movie, White Friend said so, and stopped the speech.

Once again, silence dominated the room, as if it was pressuring Black Friend into saying something. He replied a bit bluntly, I think ... I should say ‘I and ... my body’.

White Friend nodded satisfactorily, with a faint smile on the lips hidden behind the black mask.

Do you know this experiment using eggs of a chicken and a quail three or four days after fertilization? White Friend asked. In the experiment, the experimenter exchanged a part of their embryos which had just started cell divisions. Of course, by the hand of an experimenter. You know, by human hand.

White Friend stressed the part, ‘by human hand’.

First, the experimenter exchanged the parts which were bound to become the chicken’s wings with the parts that were bound to become the quail’s wings. Then, a white baby chick with black quail’s wings was born. The wings were not fake. They were authentic, real wings, of course.

It’s a blasphemous experiment. You should not toy with life, Black Friend spat out in disgust, but White Friend didn’t seem to mind.

But in fact, something strange happened three weeks after its birth. First, its wings got paralyzed. It could not even walk and eat food. The paralysis gradually spread across the whole body and it died of debilitation. White Friend paused, and then continued, Do you know why this happened?

It must be a rejection response, Black Friend answered immediately, as if in saying that the answer was too obvious.

You’re correct. The chicken’s body rejected the quail’s wings as foreign matters. However, it was not the end of the experiment. Rather, the subsequent part is more important. Before we talk about that ..., White Friend then asked Black Friend, Do you know ‘solitary hide and seek’?

-1-

Solitary Hide and Seek Live Thread

1. Name: White Balloon 00:10

I will start ‘solitary hide and seek’ here, starting at 3:00 a.m. Participants are accepted until 2:30 a.m.

2. Name: White Balloon 00:23

- Items to use -

• a stuffed doll with limbs

• rice for stuffing into the stuffed doll

• a few strands of your hair, or fragments of your nail cut with a nail clipper

• a sewing needle and a red thread

• a bladed tool (such as a kitchen knife or a box-cutter) or a sharp tool like an awl

• a glass of salt water

- Preparation -

• Name the stuffed doll. (Whatever you like, except for your own name.)

• Open the abdomen of the doll and take the stuffing out entirely.

• Put rice and strands of your hair (or fragments of your clipped nail) into it and sew it back together with a red thread. (This time I use my nail.)

• Wind the excess red thread around the doll and tie it up.

• Decide where you hide (in many cases, it’s a closet) and put a glass of salt water there.

3. Name: White Balloon 00:46

- Procedure -

• Exactly at 3 a.m., you have to follow the procedure as mentioned below.

• Say to the stuffed doll, I’m the first tagger, three times, and put the doll into the bathtub filled with water. (You can substitute a bath pail or a wash basin for the bathtub.)

• Turn off all the lights in your house and turn on a TV only, keeping the TV fuzz (with no broadcasting going on).

• Shut your eyes and count to ten.

• After counting to ten, bring the knife (or any sharp object you have prepared) to the bathroom, saying, I got you, (the doll’s name), and stab the doll with the sharp object.

• Say, Next, you are the tagger, and hide in the place where you have put the glass of salt water.

- How to end it -

• Sip a little salt water into your mouth. (Do not swallow it.) Get out of the hiding place, and look for the doll.

• Find the doll, pour the salt water remaining in the glass onto the doll, and then spray the salt water in your mouth onto the doll.

• Say, I win, three times.

You must follow the procedure and finish it in two hours or less. After that, you have to burn the doll completely, or dispose of it by the method with which the doll is burned completely.

That’s all.

Just faithfully follow the procedure mentioned above, without arranging it.

4. Name: No Name@Occultist 01:03

Wow, enter the Valiant!

5. Name: No Name@Occultist 01:35

I hope you carry through to the end! I am rooting for you, the Valiant!

6. Name: No Name@Occultist 01:42

By the way, isn’t there anyone who wants to join in?

7. Name: White Balloon 02:01

I will do it, even if I am alone.

Then, I would like to start the preparation. Before that, let me briefly explain my setting today.

The location: The residence of White Balloon (In Tokyo, one bedroom with a dining kitchen, bathroom, and toilet. No roommate.)

The place I set the doll: A wash basin filled with water

The place I hide in: A closet in my room

So, I will start my live report a little before 3 a.m.

8. Name: No Name@Occultist 02:08

You should go to the bathroom before starting it.

9. Name: No Name@Occultist 02:17

Yeah, that’s right. What can be more disastrous than hiding for too long and suffering from the urine urge?

Everyone would laugh at him and the thread would mess up bad.

One more thing. You will use your cell phone for the live report, right? Don’t forget to recharge the battery.

10. Name: No Name@Occultist 02:18

I am netsurfing, and I have just arrived here by accident.

What is ‘solitary hide and seek’?

11. Name: No Name@Occultist 02:31

>>10

Why don’t you just learn to shut up and watch, lowbie?

12. Name: White Balloon 02:42

>>8  >>9

Thank you for your valuable advice.

By the way, I am using a stuffed bear as large as I can hold in my hand.

I cannot tell you its name, though. Please understand that.