Chapter 13
<Twenty-Four Crew Members Brutally Murdered Overnight! The Work of an Evil Spirit or a Human Tragedy?>
<The Sole Survivor is Also the Sole Suspect: Uncovering Suspect An’s Motive>
<Latest News: Suspect An Released by Metropolitan Police Department—A New Perfect Crime of the Century is Born!>
“Front-page headlines. Easy as pie,” Fan An declared.
She didn’t quite understand Jirokichi Suzuki’s obsession with getting on the front page. Was it really that hard?
A stunning debut, effortlessly dominating the charts. Miss An’s future was immeasurable.
Fan An’s dream was to become a top star on the entertainment page. She had currently achieved half of that: a top star, but on the crime page.
“Hiro, you have no idea. I almost didn’t make it back today.”
Hiromitsu Morofushi, having fixed the apartment’s broken door, had waited longer than he expected before the girl finally came home.
“Take your time. There’s no rush.”
Hiromitsu handed An’an a peeled orange and took the newspaper she had brought back.
The bright red headline on the paper was stark, reflected in the suddenly constricted pupils of Scotch Whisky.
A chill spread through his body from the bottom up. The summer day felt like the dead of winter, bone-chillingly cold.
The sweet scent of citrus brought Hiromitsu back to his senses.
The girl, who had sat down beside him hugging a pillow, tilted her head and gently poked Hiromitsu. “What’s wrong? You look awful.”
“Is it because I’m hogging the orange and not sharing with you? Did that break your heart?” An’an thought, I’m such a terrible person.
She quickly tried to make amends, peeling off two perfectly separated orange segments and feeding them to the cat-eyed young man.
Hiromitsu was a little embarrassed, but the girl’s hand was already at his lips. He didn’t want to waste An’an’s kindness.
“…It’s pretty sweet,” Hiromitsu said, his cheek bulging slightly with the orange.
An’an thought the orange was sweet too. As she ate, she followed Hiromitsu’s gaze to the sensational report about the massacre.
“Was it them?” the girl asked out of the blue.
Afraid Hiromitsu wouldn’t know who she was talking about, An’an added, “Silver-Haired Model Bro and Sunglasses Bodyguard Bro from the day we first met.”
Hiromitsu choked on the orange juice. “Cough, cough, cough!”
The juice from two small orange segments managed to induce a world-shaking coughing fit.
Mentor Scotch’s reaction was a little too suspicious. The dark-haired girl’s eyes narrowed.
“Generally speaking, anyone seeing them for the first time would assume they were an idol and bodyguard duo.”
An’an said in a tone that brooked no argument, “At the very least, they’d guess they were a ‘Brainless and Unhappy’ manzai comedy duo.”
(T/N: “Manzai” is a traditional style of Japanese stand-up comedy involving a straight man and a funny man.)
Judging by their appearances alone, that was absolutely correct!
“My analogy is perfectly reasonable. There’s nothing funny about it.”
She pointed out sharply, “Hiro, your reaction is very strange.”
Like someone who heard a joke about an acquaintance, wanting to laugh but unable to, a complete failure of facial control.
Suspicious. Far too suspicious.
“I remember now. Mentor Scotch’s profile said—'[He once served a mysterious criminal organization.]'”
An’an’s mind raced, her words coming faster and faster, her deduction growing more and more fluent. “And you’re devastatingly handsome, on par with Silver-Haired Model Bro. On the day we first met, you first refused my request to open fire, but then, upon seeing that the target was Silver-Haired Model Bro, you immediately grabbed the gun and went to work. The contrast is obvious. It seems like a personal vendetta.”
“I get it now. I completely understand! The scheming frog keeps touching your belly—Hiro, did you and Silver-Haired Model Bro used to be signed to the same crooked entertainment company? In order to debut in a group, he tried to kill you, and now you’ve been reborn, vowing to take back everything that belongs to you?”
(T/N: A nonsensical internet meme phrase that sounds like “the truth is revealed” in Chinese.)
“Cough, cough, cough!”
Hiromitsu was about to choke to death on orange juice. He suspected he had developed asthma after his resurrection.
What a subarashii deduction!
The entire reasoning process was wrong, not a single logical sentence to be found, yet it had somehow, inexplicably, hit upon the truth, laying out the relationships between the characters with perfect clarity.
The sheer smoothness of her logic was beyond Hiromitsu’s imagination. The outstanding police academy graduate used every bit of his learning and still couldn’t find a single point to refute.
Hiromitsu’s mouth opened and closed, then opened and closed again.
“You can understand it that way if you want,” the cat-eyed young man said, with great difficulty and pain. “Those two are indeed my… former colleagues.”
Detective An is too powerful. Mouri Kogoro will never be able to hold his head high in front of her again.
“Silver-Haired Model Bro’s name is Gin. Sunglasses Bodyguard Bro’s name is Vodka,” Hiromitsu said earnestly. “Can we please refer to them in a more dignified manner? Okay?”
Fan An usually didn’t comment on other people’s names. Her own name was a joke that trumped all others.
“Why is Silver-Haired Model Bro called Gin?” the girl asked in a small voice. “He’s clearly prematurely gray. Why not call him ‘Lao Bai Gan’?”
(T/N: “Lao Bai Gan” is a strong, clear Chinese liquor, literally “Old White Dry.” The “white” refers to his hair.)
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if Sunglasses Bodyguard Bro followed suit and changed his name to ‘Er Guo Tou’?
(T/N: Another strong, clear Chinese liquor.)
The hope for their manzai comedy duo debut was rekindled. Trust me, she thought, their popularity would be off the charts.
Hiromitsu didn’t dare make a sound. He didn’t even dare let An’an know there were three whiskies—wouldn’t a three-member boy band be more promising than a two-man comedy act?
“An’an, knowing too much isn’t a good thing for you.”
Hiromitsu sighed. If it weren’t for the fact that the girl was already embroiled in this, he wouldn’t have said anything.
Scotch Whisky spread the newspaper out. His gaze fell on the words “twenty-four people brutally murdered overnight,” his eyelashes lowering, casting a shadow over his face.
“They died because of me. The break-in at your home last night was also because of me.”
Hiromitsu said softly, “Gin… probably recognized my marksmanship.”
Even for an undercover agent who had been dead for four years, with just the slightest clue, Gin’s cold killing intent would spread without limit.
A rational person wouldn’t believe in resurrection, but a terminal case of paranoia like Gin wouldn’t let any possibility go.
Until the gunshot wound on his shoulder healed, the big brother of the distillery would continue to hate this world haunted by the ghosts of traitors.
This man suffered from severe traitor-PTSD. No matter where he was, if someone uttered the words “Akai Shuichi isn’t dead” or “Sherry is still alive,” Gin would swim across the Pacific to get there, brandishing his gun and looking around murderously, “Where is he?! Where is she?!”
Even the ghost of an undercover agent had to be found and killed. That was the caliber of the distillery’s number one workhorse.
Hiromitsu felt a sense of guilt. That day, he had fired without thinking, and in the end, it had cost innocent people their lives.
A cool, soft touch pressed against Hiromitsu’s lips, forcing its way between his teeth, releasing a sweet and sour juice.
“You said you were peeling this orange for me, but you ate most of it yourself.”
The dark-haired girl complained unhappily. She took another orange from the fruit bowl and, without another word, stuffed it into Hiromitsu’s hand. “Peel.”
Hiromitsu’s mouth was full of orange. He couldn’t even speak. His hands instinctively began to peel the new orange.
“See? Aren’t you being obedient?” An’an looked at him. “Just like the other day.”
“Did you forget, Hiro? You’re a product of my ability. I summoned you. I was the one who told you to shoot.”
The back of the girl’s hand pressed against Hiromitsu’s forehead, then against her own. She looked puzzled. “You’re not hot. Why do you keep talking nonsense?”
“Even if there is any responsibility, it’s my responsibility. Besides, there’s no responsibility at all,” she said with clarity.
“The moment the film crew arrived at the abandoned distillery, Gin and Vodka, who were conducting an illegal transaction there, would never have let us go.”
If it weren’t for Hiromitsu, the entire crew would have been wiped out that day.
Using Kudo Shinichi’s experience as an analogy, the entire crew would have been lined up in a row. Gin, holding a bat, would aim for the person at the front, raise his arm high, and with a mighty swing—BONK!
Vodka: A home run! As expected of Aniki! (clapping furiously.jpg)
“It’s not your fault, Hiro,” An’an said with conviction. “Someone else is to blame.”
“Director Matsuzaka—he deleted the footage right in front of me,” the dark-haired girl said, furiously punching the pillow in her lap. “Can deleted footage be recovered? Damn city people! Are you deliberately bullying us small-town folk for being ignorant?!”
An’an could rack her brains all she wanted, but it was no match for Director Matsuzaka’s flash of inspiration. Damn you! You might not want to live, but others do!
What was even more hateful was that An’an didn’t even have the chance to settle the score with Director Matsuzaka. She stubbornly called out her ability and frantically flipped through the 999 pages of the crime mentor pool, but couldn’t find Director Matsuzaka’s name.
Ability: This is the mentor pool, not a dumpster.
The girl continued to beat the pillow. Her strength was no joke. With one punch, feathers flew into the air, and the cotton stuffing made her sneeze uncontrollably. “Achoo! Achoo!”
Hiromitsu didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. He took the pillow from An’an’s arms and replaced it with the peeled orange.
I’ll help her sew it up later, Hiromitsu thought.
He was the older one, yet he was the one being comforted by the girl. How pathetic.
“Will they come looking for me again?” An’an asked worriedly, eating her orange. “Will Lao Bai Gan and Er Guo Tou come to silence me?”
Hiromitsu: If they hear those names, it’s highly likely.
“Not for a short while,” he said, opening the newspaper. The pages were filled with rampant rumors and speculation.
The media was sparing no effort in painting the sole survivor of the tragedy as the true culprit, exaggerating Suspect An’s perfect crime. Hiromitsu’s brow furrowed as he read.
The things they’re saying are too awful… These people don’t know anything.
If it were any other professional in the entertainment industry, they would have already started crisis PR. But An’an couldn’t do that.
She was too good a scapegoat, a heaven-sent fall guy. The Organization needed to keep her alive.
With the current state of public opinion, even if Gin stood up and held a sign that said “I AM THE KILLER,” the onlookers wouldn’t believe him.
Hiromitsu patiently explained this to An’an, preparing himself to comfort her.
To be suddenly pointed at and blamed by everyone… it must be very upsetting.
“They won’t try to silence me for now?” the girl confirmed one more time.
She let out a long sigh of relief. “Then it’s fine.”
She had worked so hard to find this apartment. She really didn’t want to move again so soon. If she had to move again, she might as well just move into the police dorms.
And thinking about the feng shui of the Metropolitan Police Department, there was no way it could be a nurturing place.
As for the Black Organization, with whom she had already made an enemy…
“I don’t care how they spy on me from the darkness,” the dark-haired, dark-eyed girl said, lifting her chin. “I will walk into the spotlight, onto a stage that the darkness cannot reach.”
“To a position where I am feared, respected, and cannot be underestimated.”
She held out her pinky finger and hooked it with Hiromitsu’s, shaking it seriously three times as she made a promise:
“When that time comes, I’ll be the one to protect you.”