She was in a state that had me troubled where to look.
The pants she had been wearing were pulled down, putting her ribbon-adorned laced panties on full display—no, pulled down wasn't the proper term, it was more accurate to say her pants were broken.
The handmade western-style outfit she made on the spot for a disguise—come to think of it, she did way it might come apart if she moved too vigorously. Apparently, the seams tore apart while she was falling down the stairs.
Whatever happened, I rushed over to Kyouko-san. Pulling off my coat, I draped it over her lower body as I squatted down beside her.
Her eyes were closed, she seemed unconscious—but when I touched her neck I could feel a heat and a pulse. When I brought my ear close, I heard normal breathing. That's good, it looks like we avoided the worst of the worst of the truly worst scenario.
I arranged her into a comfortable posture—while I couldn't be as nimble as Kyouko-san, as someone who worked at a security company, I at least had the general process hammered into my head. While the landing couldn't be called vast, Kyouko-san had a smaller build after all, and I managed to lay out her legs. For a pillow, I bunched up the scattered fragments of broken pants, and put them to new use—I had learned by example, or rather, I would never say something of this degree could achieve Kyouko-san levels of DIY.
She had no external wounds or bleeding, no fractures I could glean just by looking—then there was nothing more I could do. More than that, I was better off not doing anything more. Judging by the sound, it did seem she had fallen quite showily, and if I moved her here without proper planning, there was a low chance of causing brain hemorrhaging. Her breath was calm, and just by appearances, one might think she was just asleep; I didn't think it was anything major…
But I didn't have time to rest, I looked at the upper level from the landing. At the end of the stairs: the door leading to Atelier House's eighteenth floor. Did Kyouko-san fall from around there—no.
She didn't fall.
Even if it was only for half a day, I had acted alongside Kyouko-san—I knew she would let her feet slip up, by any stretch of the imagination. Able to work on multiple tasks at once, one might think of her as a detective liable to distractions but—on the contrary, as she was capable of doing so much at once, even in the midst of doing something, she would never neglect to watch where she stepped.
Right.
Back then, I thought of the sound from an upper floor as 'something falling down stairs' or otherwise 'someone falling down stairs'—even that was amply reading too deeply into it, yet if I were Kyouko-san, I'm sure my thoughts would have been a step ahead.
Namely, the sound of 'someone being pushed down stairs' - looking at Kyouko-san's current state, that wasn't in any way reading too deeply, It was the natural and proper train of thought.
In the first place, I shouldn't have let Kyouko-san go off on her own. No matter what she said, instead of splitting up, I should have accompanied her. I mean, if her reasoning was correct, there was someone in Atelier House who had just stabbed someone.
What a blunder.
Was it because I had the preconception of Wakui trying to cover for them, that some part of me ended up thinking the culprit was a 'good person'—as if they were harmless?
Thinking about it normally, they stabbed someone—what's more, in a way where they would die if left be, where even now we couldn't be certain. Just how dangerous would it be to chase that person around? In my foolishness, I hadn't thought about it at all.
To identify the culprit, and urge them to turn themselves in.
While Kyouko-san's actions upon receiving Wakui's message may have been clad in a shroud of nobility, she had completely ignored the risk—confronting the culprit who brought about the crime face-to-face, thinking nothing would happen was a tad too optimistic.
Say the culprit was among those we interviewed when we were going around—even if they didn't outright say it like Hakui-kun, what if someone apart from Hakui-kun had seen through her lie?
It wouldn't be the least bit strange if that resident moved to inflict harm onto Kyouko-san, who was snooping around the incident. If they were under the impression they killed Wakui, one murder's the same as two, they might end up with some outrageous leap of logic—it was neither a rational or efficient decision, yet taking that action was what it meant to be human.
I really had nothing more to say than that I was stupid.
Not having investigatory rights simultaneously meant if something happened, we didn't have the means to protect ourselves—In such a position, conducting detective work that no one asked for, even if Kyouko-san was pushed down the stairs by someone, perhaps it could be said she got what was coming for her.
Perhaps there was no space to sympathize with her.
But I felt nothing but anger towards the culprit—she tried urging them to turn themselves in before the police got involved, and this is where it left her.
I didn't know what details were behind the culprit stabbing Wakui, and at the present point, their motive was unknown—in that regards, perhaps I wasn't standing where I could say anything. Whether an outsider to Atelier House like me had the qualifications to stick his mouth here and there was uncertain. But at the very least, there was no was the culprit of this case had any good reason to inflict harm unto Kyouko-san.
I wouldn't forgive them, I thought.
While it might go against old Wakui's will, and Kyouko-san's will as well, since it had come to that, I couldn't persist with soft ideals of covering for them or persuading them.
I immediately called 110, I phoned up the police—who cases of attempted murder. While Kyouko-san and I might get scolded severely for arbitrarily investigating, this wasn't a scene to hesitate.
If we ere considering possibilities, it wasn't like there was absolutely no chance Kyouko-san slipped, and even if she was pushed, perhaps there was no guarantee that was by the hand of this time's culprit—but if I didn't report it, the culprit might get away from Atelier House.
When it came to that, whatever the case, covert detective work would become impossible—while it seemed there was some of the time limit remaining, this was the time to give up.
I took out my phone—no, I tried to, but I couldn't find it in my pant pocket. Ah, did I end up leaving it in the basement?
No, that's wrong, I put it in the pocket of the coat I draped over Kyouko-san.
Noticing that, I reached my hand towards it—and it was precisely at that timing,
Kyouko-san quietly opened her eyes.
"Uu… uwah."
I hurriedly pulled back my hand. No way I would let her misunderstand I was trying to do something indecent while she was unconscious—while I failed to retrieve the phone, anyways, if Kyouko-san was up, that was cause for celebration.
"Kyouko-san, are you alright! Ah, you don't have to force yourself up, you're better off staying in that position."
If she got up like that, my coat would fall off, or so I wouldn't say, but following my orders, Kyouko-san viciously raced her eyes around as she remained sprawled out over the landing. She seemed pained to recognize the current situation, rather, expectedly confused—I wouldn't blame her, being thrust down the stairs, just remembering it would be a terrible fright.
No, wait?
Could it be when Kyouko-san was pushed, she saw the perpetrator?
Thinking about it time-wise, on the way back from dropping by Hakui-kun, for some reason she chose to go down by the stairs instead of the elevator, so it would be normal to assume she was pushed on the back—but if she tumbled down the stairs, perhaps her posture did change, and she fell face-up. Right before she clacked out, there was a high probability she saw who did it to her—in that case, we could solve the case here and now.
Exposing herself to danger, Kyouko-san had grasped the means to resolve it—that in my head,
"Kyouko-san, do you remember who did you in?"
I enthusiastically asked. One-sidedly concluding she remembered would be overeager, but still lying down, Kyouko-san shook her head and said this.
"Well about that, I don't even remember who you're supposed to be…"