Nalda eventually managed to fall asleep. For some strange reason however, instead of dreaming like a normal person, she was lucid dreaming.
"Ah, I'm going to pull my hair out." While lucid dreaming was fun at times, today Nalda genuinely needed the rest that came from sleeping and dreaming without having any control.
Normally lucid dreaming wouldn't be that much different from just sleeping but Nalda was confident that this wasn't just any lucid dream. She felt just like she was awake and naturally that meant that the mental fatigue of the day would only increase instead of decrease.
She was sitting on the ground, hugging her knees, rocking back and forth. "I'm really going to pull my hair out and go to a bald competition and win it. I'll go bald now so I won't be able to do it again in the future."
She genuinely felt exhausted. Everything that happened today had drained her. School, dead person, letters, her death in a month, superpowers, tricking her big sister and being stuck in a cell.
Some events were more mentally draining than the others but that didn't matter. Usually she was already tired after having a whole week of school so this wasn't just pushing it, this was way beyond what she usually could handle.
Funnily enough thought, this helped her discover a few new sides of herself. First of all, her appetite could never be quenched and second of all, she was very good at ignoring things until they all came crashing down on her at once. That probably wasn't a good thing.
It didn't help that she was in a white void. The fact that there was nothing made her go even crazier. She couldn't imagine staying in that white void for hours.
Then suddenly those weird letters from earlier showed up again from the ground in front of her.
'Watch what is happening while you are asleep. The one who came to take a look at your memory is here.'
Nalda blinked at those words and was about to ask where but then the letters changed again.
'Turn around.'
Nalda turned around and saw that a part of the white void was faded into black. It kind of reminded her of a screen in the cinema.
Then suddenly the black turned into various colours and eventually she saw the inside of the police station. She saw a messy office and two women were talking in there.
She recognised one of them as the female officer. The other woman was new.
This woman gave off a very off putting vibe. Just seeing her felt like she wasn't supposed to be there.
"So what is it this time?" The strange woman asked the female officer. "Which one of your messes do I need to clean up this time?" She sounded very rude.
The female officer didn't react at all at the rude tone. Instead she just stared at the woman for a few seconds before she started to chuckle. Only after she stopped did she actually start talking. "If you hate it then don't come. Why did you come here if you were going to say such things?"
The other woman rolled her eyes. "You know just as well as me that if I don't show up that the blame will be put on me if you don't find that murderer."
"Whoa…" Nalda stared in bewilderment. She wasn't sure if she was surprised by being able to watch this or by that woman's rudeness. Maybe it was the combination of all of that? Add that off putting feeling to the mix.
She glanced around to see if the letters showed up again but they didn't. She decided to just continue watching. The reason why she was watching will probably be revealed eventually.
She turned her attention back to the scene in front of her.
The female officer raised an eyebrow but didn't mention anything as she turned around and picked up a paper from the desk. She handed it to the other woman with a very calm expression.
The weird woman seemed confused by this and hesitantly started to read it. However a few seconds afterwards her eyes widened and looked at the female officer. "Please tell me that this is a coincidence." When the female officer shook her head the strange woman turned pale and groaned. "Do I really have to put up with this? If I lose an arm I'm making you and that little assistant of yours pay for my new arm."
The female officer shrugged but didn't respond.
"Lose an arm? To whom?" Nalda was genuinely confused. She had no clue what was on the document but it looked bad from how they reacted.
She looked around to see if the letters would answer but she didn't see anything so she turned back to the scene.
The two left the office after that and the scene changed. It changed to the hallway right in front of the cell where Nalda is sleeping. The inside of the cell could be seen and currently it was completely empty. In the cell Nalda was asleep.
Nalda shivered at that. It was a little strange to see her sleeping self. Actually, not just a little strange but very strange.
After a few seconds of silence, the sound of footsteps could be heard. As they got closer, the sound became louder.
Then eventually the female officer and the weird woman came into the view. They were walking towards where Nalda was sleeping. The moment the weird woman saw the sleeping Nalda she sighed in relief.
"Hah… at least she's asleep."
The female officer said nothing as she opened the cell door. The strange woman didn't say anything and just entered. She walked towards the sleeping Nalda and stopped a little further from the bed.
Then she placed her hand on Nalda's head and closed her eyes.
Nalda blinked at what she was seeing. She wasn't sure how to feel about this. It was quite weird to do that to a sleeping person but then again, in Nalda's current situation she wasn't just a sleeping person.
'She will be viewing your memories, prepare yourself.'
Nalda jumped back in surprise with a scream. "Hey! You can't just not show up when I ask something and show up when I let my guard do-"
Without letting her finish her sentence, the world around her faded out and suddenly she was back in the classroom she was in earlier that day. Her mouth fell open in surprise as she looked around and saw her classmates around her.
Her best friend was beside her, she was focused on figuring out an exercise. She then looked at Nalda and showed her her paper. Just when she opened her mouth, the world changed again and now Nalda was walking home again.
'Huh? Is- is this how memories get reviewed? It's really disorientating… I can't even control my own body. I really can't do anything if it wasn't something that I originally did in the memory.'
Nalda recognised when this was. It was just before she found the crime scene. A few seconds later she tripped again. She felt embarrassed because now she knew that someone was watching her trip over a tiny astronaut keychain.
She tried her best not to look at the body from earlier but it was no use as her body moved on its own. However at that moment she remembered something.
'The letters! I said that I didn't see anything! If that strange woman sees the letters then I'll get in trouble for lying!'
Her worries turned out to be for nothing because the letters didn't show up at all. No matter how long time went by, the letters never appeared.
Instead she saw something that she hadn't noticed earlier. Something else moved in the alleyway and it went towards her. When it got close enough it engraved '1 M' on her wrist and then Nalda felt pressure.
'The murderer! The murderer is invisible! Why didn't I think of that? Superpowers are a thing after all!'
The pressure only disappeared just before the police officers came.
Then suddenly the scene changed again but this wasn't a scene from her memory. Instead she was sitting in an office and the strange woman in front of her was drinking coffee. She looked extremely pissed off as she started at Nalda.
"Did you notice anything strange?" Her glaring intensified after asking the question. "Don't even try lying, you're connected to a lie detector."
Nalda looked down to see that she was indeed connected to a machine. That didn't stop her from trying anyways.
To be fair, Nalda felt a little dazed from all the changes in the environment without warning. If the letters hadn't warned her earlier to prepare herself, Nalda probably would've just answered with whatever came to mind.
"Uhm… no?" When the strange woman's glare intensified even more, Nalda decided to say what she actually discovered. "Okay, okay, I think I saw something move in the alleyway and- and then whatever it was came to me!"
The woman's glare lessened and as soon as she opened her mouth, the environment changed again and Nalda was in the white void again. It seemed that the memory viewing had finished.
"Is it over…?" She looked around and just then the letters popped up again.
'The viewing has finished. As mentioned, nothing related to this is visible to others.'
Nalda nodded along to the letters. "I could tell at least that much. I'm not stupid and you made me watch this to find out that the murderer is able to turn invisible, didn't you?"
'It was to change your mind set. You still look at things in an ordinary way. If you want to find the murderer you must change your mindset.'
That made Nalda pause. As much as she wanted to argue, the letters were right. She didn't even consider that the murderer used some sort of superpower for their crime.
Then the scene outside the cell appeared before her again. The strange woman had stepped out of the cell by now and was talking with the female officer.
"The murderer can turn invisible. I can't tell if it's a gift or a curse though. You'll have to figure that out on yourselfs." After she spoke she glanced at the sleeping Nalda. "And it doesn't look like she knows anything about gifts and curses. I think that is intentional so don't say anything unnecessary."
After she said that she walked past the female officer and left. The female officer looked at the strange woman leaving and sighed before she left the hallway as well.
The scene then turned black and soon the black faded back into white.
Nalda stared at what she just saw, not sure what she was supposed to get out of this. The letters seemed to only show and say things intentionally to lead her towards making a certain conclusion but she didn't get any information out of what she just watched.
The letters appeared again.
'Think again.'
Nalda blinked and tried to figure out what it wanted her to think about.
"Is it about how far their investigation is?" She waited for a few moments but she didn't receive an answer. It looked like it wanted her to figure it out on her own.
She decided to stop thinking for now because she clearly didn't have enough clues, despite what the letters said. She had a bigger issue after all, she needed to get some proper sleep if she wanted to maintain her sanity.
Nalda stared intensively into the white void for a while but when nothing changed she hugged her knees and started rocking back and forth again.
"I'm going bald! Bald! Bald!"
After a while of doing that while pulling her hair out, she yelled into the void. "Let me sleep! Let me out!"
After a few minutes passed she was finally released from the white void and she fell into a nice dream.