“Little Jie, here you are.” right when Jason started his shift at the reception’s desk, and with his head still processing last night’s incident, Uncle Bu came into the inn.
“Uncle Bu, what brings you here? Aren’t you going to tour around with the rest of the family?” Jason was surprised, and he quickly pulled out a chair to ask Uncle Bu to sit down.
“Ah, the plan is cancelled, sure you can understand.” Uncle sat down and smiled, “And they wanted me to say thank you on their behalf. Everything just happened too fast and everyone’s in shock, and they did not get to say it to you before you came back.”
“Thank you. Uncle.” Jason went into the dinar and poured two cups of tea, “So what do you plan to do next? My shift just started, so I won’t be able to keep you company till late this afternoon.”
“No worries, your inn looked very clean and neat. I can just relax in the diner. Or I can rest in a room.”
“Here’s the key to my personnel room, it’s on the second floor. Go up from here, left turn and it’s the third one.” Jason handed the key to his room to Uncle Bu, “Feel free to rest there, jetlag should be hitting you soon so don’t forget to get some sleep.”
“No problem, I’ll need you to take me shopping afterwards. You know I don’t like to bring clothes with me on travel.” Uncle Bu took the keys and said, “And maybe you can get some with me as well. You know, some nice uncle-nephew pairing.”
“Hey, Jason, I want to talk to you about our meditation … Oh geez I’m sorry! ” when Uncle Bu stood up and was ready to head upstairs, Caroline came downstairs and almost bump into him.
“I’m sorry, I should have watched where I was going.” Uncle Bu took one step back and apologized in English with a warm smile and an extended hand: “My name is Buyi, Jason’s my nephew. ”
“Oh, so you’re Uncle Bu! ” Caroline gave Uncle a handshake: “I’ve heard so much about you!”
“Really? He must have complained a lot.”
“No, he said you’re great.” Caroline chuckled.
“Oh, thanks! Jason! Didn’t know you think so highly of me.” Uncle Bu waved his right hand with the Jason’s key between between fingers at both Jason and Caroline, “I’ll let you young people be, this old man needs rest.”
“Wait wait wait, Uncle.” Jason’s expression turned incredibly serious and rushed to Uncle Bu’s side, one hand grabbing unclue’s right arm, “Let me look at your hand.”
On Uncle Bu’s forearm, there was a light bruise, shaped like a hand.
“What? Anything wrong?” Uncle Bu appeared oblivious to the source of concern.
“This bruise, when did you get it? How long has it been here?” Jason asked anxiously.
“Bruise?” Uncle Bu looked closely at his right forearm, “What bruise? I don’t see it? Maybe I’m getting old.”
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This answer made both Jason and Caroline frown at the same time.
“You must be overly worried, it’s just some dark spots on the skin.” Caroline swooped in and helped Uncle Bu off from Jason’s grasp, “Don’t overthink it Jason, I think Uncle’s fine. no?”
Jason could tell that Caroline could also see the hand-shaped bruising, yet also understood what Caroline was trying to do from the way Caroline looked at him, so he backed off and chuckled a bit nervously: “Haha, looks like indeed dark spots, maybe from the clothes or food? Yeah, I might be overly sensitive and jumpy, because… you know what happened last night.”
“Yeah, don’t worry, let Uncle sleep! He’s definitely tired after the long flight.”
After sending Uncle Bu off upstairs, Caroline came over to the reception’s desk: “Hey, what was that?”
“Did you see it? The bruise?”
“Yeah I saw it, it felt kinda … no, really weird. You know something about it?”
“I don’t know what it is. But it seemed to be paranormal.” Jason then told Caroline all about the encounter he had last night at the Prime Royals Hotel, as well as the basic research on his way back - apparently, the Prime Royals Hotel had a history of weird and creepy suicides and deaths of unnatural and sometimes even unknown causes. The history was long and the incidents were mostly unexplained, so much so that it had become sort of an urban legend by itself.
“Indeed it sounded like the limbo.” Caroline started scratching his jaw, “Wait, is that the reason you called me at 3 am in the morning trying to find Boss?”
“Yeah. Your swearings were pretty intense though, almost as intense as that monster.” Jason laughed and then asked Caroline with a genuinely serious tone: “Caroline, I want to cash in on that favor.”
“Boy you can’t save up any favors huh? It’s not even a month.” Caroline laughed and gave Jason a halfway forceful punch in the shoulder.
“Yeah, and you are no better at this.” Jason sighed and started pacing: “I am worried about Uncle, if that kind of bruises are connected to the monster and the limbo, he might be possessed as well. Or who knows what’s gonna happen. My cousin and her husband are still in the hospital, and I don’t even know if they can recover or how many others are affected. I can’t just sit by.”
“Alright, understood, what do you want me to do?”
“You’re awfully willing, not even gonna ask to see the contract?”
“Limited time offer, one more word and you’re gonna lose it.”
“Alright, alright. I need backup when I go back to the hotel.” Jason’s look turned sharp and stern as he stated his decision, “Boss won’t be back for 4 days, I can’t wait that long. I need to strike now.”
“Strike where? The hotel?”
“Exactly.”