When the sun isn't out, the sea is an ugly, murky thing. Beside the gray waters is a village with a population of equally gray senior citizens who have devoted the entirety of their lives fishing and sailing. So they stick around until this day because they don't know how to live any other way, even when their children escape to the cities, even when their bodies are too worn for labor. They never forget the people who come and the people who leave.

"I remember his mother," the old man says in between whiskered breaths as he squints at the photograph. "Chinese, right? Real pretty. She worked at the tea room."

"Do you where she's at right now?"

The old man shakes his head.

"She left 4, 5 years ago. Year of the Olympics, I remember, because she was one of the few who had a TV, but we couldn't watch the games at her house because she had packed up for somewhere couple of weeks before."

"What about her son?" Chanyeol asks. "Huang Zitao."

"We never really saw him," the old man replies. "His mother didn't let him out of the house. She said he was too nuts to be going around."

Chanyeol furrows his eyebrows in response to the new information. Tao is mentally ill?

"The only time I got a good look at the lad was when he stormed out of here," the man continues. "He was crying like no tomorrow."

The old man pauses.

"He really did seem like a madman, then."

Chanyeol tries not to be so disturbed by the discovery that the person he's trying to track down is a lunatic. But he's angry, because a mental disability is only an advantage to the kidnappers and it complicates Chanyeol's job even more. He rings up Kris.

"Hello?"

"Huang Zitao is mentally unstable?"

"What?"

"You couldn't have just told me, oh, on top of the fact that he's not signed up on any public records anywhere, , he can't even help himself, so good luck--"

"Chanyeol, listen," Kris grimaces. "He's not like that. He's--" Kris sighs, "--he has hysterias from time to time, but not often. Only when something triggers him."

"Oh," Chanyeol runs a hand through his curls as he breathes in relief. "Okay."

There is a brief moment of silence and distant murmurs of ocean waves while Chanyeol's anger winds down. He thinks back to their meeting in the office, the way Kris's back tensed up at the mention of Tao's childhood.

"Kris," Chanyeol starts again, voice calmer. "Why are you so reluctant to tell me these things about Tao?"