Akumu, Ch. 6-2
Akumu, Ch. 1 through 5
Ch. 6-1
They spend the entire day in the storm drain listening to the (unsuccessful) sweep for bugs, change of rooms, and the continuing investigation (computer search canceled, contacting of MIT graduates from three to six years ago still under consideration, witness statements still being taken and compiled). Then -- exhausted, but not bedraggled or smelly, after a good bout of fresh costuming and deodorants -- they return to the Beika apartment.
Heiji drags himself out of bed some twelve hours after that, with dim morning light streaming in through a rainy day, so it's good they're out of the runoff system at least.
"--kay, okay, we will totally owe you one, Baachan," Amari's saying, as Heiji lurches towards the coffeemaker. "No. One. One, Baachan. Yes I know it's a lot of yearbooks, but... Campari's doing the research, so it's mostly a matter of jetsetting and a bit of B&E, it's practically a vacation." He pauses, making faces at the phone, then puts on his best puppy eyes and goes, "Pleeeeeeease? We wuv oo Baachan."
Heiji can't help but cringe. "Cut it out, that shit is disturbing," he mutters.
Amari sticks his tongue out at him. "See, who else can make you laugh like that? So you'll help out?" He pauses. "All right, all right, Bachan," he laughs, switching the honorific down a generation in age. "Maybe in a few years we'll even go for Neechan, wouldn't that be flattering?" Another pause. "Biting's Campari's job, you know that. I'll have him email you the details, okay? Thanks. Love you Bachan!"
"What was that all about?" Heiji asks, once Amari's hung up and dropped his phone on the table.
"Hm? Oh, didn't feel like taking you globetrotting, so we called in a specialist."
The mysterious Bachan. Or Baachan. "Would this be Zombie-baachan? Tender nubile young brains with a side of revenge?"
"Bingo!" Amari's grin shows all his teeth. "Quite the little memory you've got there. I rather thought you were paying more attention to the knots."
"Backatcha," Heiji says, because he'd actually had reason to be on paranoid flashback-vivid-recording memory when the twins had their tickle fight and obliquely plotted the systematic murder of most of their associates. He wonders just how close to eiditic their memories are. "Zombie?"
Amari waggles one finger at him. "A secret makes a woman, a woman," he purrs. "And keeps a twin considerably more breathing than bleeding."
Huh, that almost sounds like there's someone out there the twins actually respect. And fear a little bit, but without the need to murder all threats in play. Someone alpha to them.
... Okay Heiji's just scared himself. He buries his nose in his coffee and hopes that Amari didn't notice.
Amari's grin widens (dammit, he totally noticed), but instead of commenting, he drops a key and a slip of paper next to Heiji's elbow. "Hamamatsu Station, coin lockers near the Yamanote Line. Don't peek."
Heiji eyes the innocuous key suspiciously. "What favor's this one?"
Amari's grin goes impossibly wide, and he doesn't answer.
-0-0-0
The next day, Saguru has school. There's something a little unreal about it, something almost surreal: this weekend he let a little boy die in his arms (suicide for the second time, reality phasing out under Saguru's fingertips), watched another vanish in smoke to return to his captors, met a woman who'd died as a child before his eyes...
And now it's all good morning sensei and turn in your homework and open your books to page three-hundred-and-ninety-four. Quiet, orderly, and hollow.
He escapes the emptiness at lunch, skirting the beautiful girl holding court under a tree. There's an alcove near one of the fire exits, where a vent hums noisily as it blasts stifling hot air up out of the pavement. No one except Saguru ever bothers with the spot; the girls have their modesty to think about, and the rest of the boys are either determined to watch girls or smoke during breaks. The venting is no good for safely lighting a cigarette or keeping it lit.
Saguru, though, wants neither. He pulls his phone from his pocket and checks his police account. It's limited, damn his age, but there's a few files uploaded. Witness statement summaries, an auditorium seating chart (both audience and stage)... a video clip.
It's only thirty seconds long, from a camera watching the table where they'd checked tickets, and even though it should show the person at the head of the line perfectly... it doesn't. The girl's head is ducked, looking slightly to one side as she signs in, but the low ponytails and dark-toned dress are unmistakeable even in Saguru's tiny screen. It's Hattori Heiji, in his Reika disguise.
Saguru can't see what Heiji's looking at. The table and his skirt are in the way, but from the body language, the way his lips move but his attention clearly isn't on the attendant...
Is there a child with him?!
Saguru's out of his police account and on Google before he can think. It could've been a guest, just some innocent kid he'd struck up a conversation with in line, just a way to naturally keep his face hidden from the camera, and surely--
Miyano Shiho does not, in fact, have an unlisted number.
Bzz bzz. Bzz bzz.
Click.
"Moshi moshi. Miyano-hakase? It's Hakuba Saguru."
Her voice, when it comes, is hard. "I've told you what I could, Hakuba-san."
"Perhaps. Miyano-hakase, is there a..." Hm, how to phrase this? "... possibility that Kid Homage could've sent a child someplace in the company of Hattori Heiji?"
"I will call you back." She hangs up without another word.
Saguru pulls his phone away from his ear and stares at it. That was not a 'no'.
Kid Homage has access to a child. There is a child... what, complicit in all this? An unwitting hostage to Heiji's good behavior? It would certainly add dimension to Heiji's determination to return to captivity.
A child. Good god.
... But wait. That doesn't make sense. Children may be of considerable interest to most neurotypes, between biological and cultural imperatives, but Kid Homage is distinctly atypical. Why would he tolerate minding a child? Or, more likely, tolerate the division of Heiji's attention if he were to delegate the task to Heiji?
Saguru pulls up the clip again, and eventually gets a half-clear view of the girl. She's perhaps six to eight years of age, with too strong a resemblence to Heiji's disguise for it to not be deliberate.
... She looks greatly like the little girl Kid Game Over'd first, actually. The one who hadn't had a chance to give Saguru her name. Damn it all.
Bzz bzz.
"Moshi moshi, Hakuba Saguru." Miyano's audibly biting back amusement this time, and Saguru's stomach clenches. He suddenly has the sinking feeling that he doesn't want Kid's answer. Miyano doesn't give him a chance to say so, though. "He says that you won't believe whatever he says, so think what you like, it's guaranteed to be wrong anyway."
"He... what?" That's... frighteningly accurate, come to think of it. Saguru wouldn't have believed a word of it if Kid had denied the accusation. Or even if Miyano had, instead of hanging up on him.
"You're doing a very good job of entertaining him, Hakuba-tantei. My condolences." Click.
The flare of pure, unadulterated offense almost makes Saguru hit redial. But he chokes his temper back down, replacing the phone in his pocket with crisp, tight-muscled movements. After all, what good would it do? He's lucky Miyano's willing to be a point of contact between them at all.
Who knows how long that will last, either. As soon as Kid Homage's whims change...
He sighs and opens his bento.
There's a note inside.
Of course.
-0-0-0
When Heiji gets back, with the coin-locker's mysterious brown-wrapped parcel tucked in with his schoolbooks like it was nothing of any importance at all, Campari's got the big-screen playing "Hot Twink Fills Intellectual Gap" again. Looks like it's the Homage Task Force offices this time, which is at least slightly less creepy than Saguru's school. The screen's filled with men in suits slaving over piles of paper and scribbled-on whiteboards, Saguru's pale hair and brown coat clashing with all the salaryman blues around him.
"Have you eaten yet?" Amari asks, the parcel already in his hands and twine unknotting itself under deft fingers. "I know there's a good curry place next to the lockers."
"No..." The brown paper falls away, and instead of a block of dried leaves or white powder (unlikely, but the twins have to be getting money somehow), or a bundle of sensitive documents (which is what Heiji was expecting), there's a glossy paperback inside. The Night Baron's familiar, ominous mask grins out from under the silver title.
"Hey, aniki! ARC copy!"
"Finally."
Heiji sputters. "A book? All that-- I begged you for a freaking week not to poison the kids-- and you sent me to fetch a book? Is it even illegal?"
"Nope." Then he tears his gaze away from the pages. "Aw, did you want to be an accessory?" He ruffles Heiji's hair, ignoring Heiji's horrified stuttering. "Maybe next time."
"I hate you both."
Amari slings an arm around Heiji's shoulders and drags him to the living room, nose already back in the book, then shoves him onto the couch and flops down half on top of him. "Nice pillow. Watch tv."
Campari ghosts out of the kitchen with popcorn and cuddles up on Heiji's other side, a notepad and pen at the ready.
"Do I at least get to see what they're working on?" Heiji grumbles. Primetime crime drama this is not.
One scribbling and a torn-out page later, Heiji has his answer.
North of that picturesque prisoner, pacified and ever ours,
That golden observer from afar rises above the heated tempests of this floating world.
"Another heist? Already?" But Heiji's mind is already chewing through the notice. Prisoner is obvious, his name's gonna be somewhere in the answer. Picturesque, though? Pacified?
Golden observer from afar is Hakuba Saguru, most likely. Floating world implies Edo-period entertainment districts, though, geisha and theaters and brothels, and none of those fit Saguru at ALL.
Argh, what else works-- picturesque. Picture. Ukiyo-e. But how does that tie in to Saguru?
It doesn't. Okay. Pictures don't go with Saguru, pictures go with Heiji. E-Heiji. And pacified goes with Heiji, too, and that kanji just happens to be ei, so... ei-Heiji? Eiheiji? ... No. Eihei-ji. Eihei's temple in Fukui Prefecture.
North of Eihei-ji in Fukui, that golden observer blahblah. What's north of Fukui? Ocean north of the west half, but north of the east half is... Ishikawa. Kanazawa, that gaudy Iron Chef host, gold leaf, traditional shit, Kenroku gardens, hot springs.
Hot springs would fit the heat and floating stuff. Since when has Saguru had jack shit to do with...
Heiji groans and bonks his head against the nearest semi-firm surface, which happens to be Amari's shoulder. "This is the fucking hot spring episode, isn't it."
"Chaos, confusion, and fanservice," Amari agrees cheerfully. "Got the target yet?"
"No." What the hell does he know about hot springs? He can't even remember the name of the big resort town up there that's got a ton of 'em.
Amari flicks his nose and turns his attention to the screen, where Hakuba is fiddling with a laptop and a projector. "Think diamonds. Think devout business tycoons. Think--"
The projector fires up, a flickering, faded image of a statue outlined against sky.
"-- the giant golden Kannon at Kaga," Amari choruses with an unwitting Saguru. The projector flicks to a close-up of the statue's face, and a red-circled mark right between her carved brows.
"-- and the Bindi Diamond, a gemstone of uncertain provenance, weighing in at approximately 273 carats," Saguru continues, voice tinny over the speakers. "It's widely believed to be synthetic at best, if not dramatized cubic zirconia or even glass; the tourist brochures tend to claim the latter, which may or may not be true."
"It isn't," Amari murmurs.
"The claims are as likely to be a matter of security as anything else, and frankly the composition of the stone has little bearing upon the fact that Kid Homage has targeted it."
"Bingo! Give the pretty boy a prize."
"Amari, shut up, this isn't MST3K."
Amari grabs a handful of popcorn and stuffs it into his mouth, chewing loudly in a way that doesn't fool anyone a bit.
Silence reigns for several minutes, save for the Task Force's briefing on the tv.
Then, Saguru inclines his head, and finishes a statement with, "I, of course, will not be accompanying you to Ishikawa."
"And in an amazing plot twist," Amari mutters sarcastically.
"You are not gonna kidnap him," Heiji growls.
Amari waves that off with an airy, "Of course not."
Still, Heiji doesn't entirely trust that. He jabs Amari's arm with one sharp little finger. "Because I don't need the company," he presses.
Amari snatches his hand up, squeezing just this side of painful. "You have no imagination, Hei-kun," he says, and smirks.
"... So what are you gonna do?"
-0-0-0
Saguru wakes with a pounding headache, weak sunshine painting the backs of his eyelids a searing red, and the seat under him thrumming.
Seat?
He gasps fully awake and nearly knocks himself right back out on the window he's propped up against. "Ow," he mutters. Outside, snowy fields surrounding clusters of farmhouses race past. He cannot possibly be anywhere in the environs of Tokyo. Judging by the angle of the sun, the train is heading in a northerly direction; assuming it's afternoon, he's probably going north-northeast. Judging from the scenery, he can eliminate a number of train lines from consideration...
Or he could read the red kana scrolling across the LED board at the front of the car. JR Shirasagi (he knows that line, where is it again?) service to... Toyama?!
Saguru stares, automatically reaching for his phone. Now he remembers. This is the way to Kaga and Kanazawa. The Shirasagi travels from Nagoya to Toyama via Maibara, skirting Lake Biwa before it heads north. He's not even in the same half of the country anymore. How is this possible? There's no direct line from Tokyo, much less from his house. Between ticketing and station transfers and his own unconsciousness, how did he get onto this train at all?
Saguru's fingers brush against paper, wrapped around his phone in his pocket. What the--? He pulls it out, unwinds the origami loops, then tugs at the folds until it comes apart in his hands.
Kannon is not the only golden observer being honored at this party, as you should have noticed in the invitation. This is your first strike, Tantei-san. I will not be so forbearing about requesting the pleasure of your company a second time. As for a third...
Well. Perhaps a third refusal will see you keeping company with our mutual acquaintance.
Kid Homage
Saguru swallows thickly. He slowly, carefully thumbs out the number, nearly missing the buttons when his hand twitches violently. "Moshi moshi, Nakamori-keibu. It would seem that Kid does not care to have his invitations declined." Outside, gold glints on a head the size of a house, rising slowly over the snowy hills ahead. "I should be arriving at Kagaonsen station within twenty minutes."
He only half-listens to Nakamori's response -- the man is mostly shouting orders away from the phone anyway -- as he glances around the compartment. There's his suitcase on the rack above. (Who'd packed it? Kid? Or Baaya under the impression the orders were from Saguru?) The car itself is more deserted than not, and the occupants mostly not interacting with each other. Saguru makes note of them all; six are under five foot three, and a pair of tourists in the back are well over six feet tall, so that's eight people who can't be Kid. There are also two families, who sadly cannot be eliminated from consideration; one is a couple with a sleeping infant in a massive stroller, and the other is a set of grandparents with a little boy between them. None of them look at all like Hattori.
He wishes he could eliminate them from consideration. But who says Kid can't have a different child along?
The old man laughs, and leans over to poke at something on the boy's tablet. Dancing colors reflect faintly off the child's dark face. "Cut it out," the boy snaps, shoving his grandfather's hand away.
"Kaga Onsen. This train will be arriving at Kaga Onsen in two minutes. Please gather your belongings and prepare for arrival. This train will be stopped at the platform for ninety seconds. Please move swiftly as you exit the train. This train will be arriving at Kaga Onsen in ninety seconds." The announcement changes to English, repeating itself and counting down, and Saguru stands and pulls his suitcase down from the rack.
The two families and five of the car's occupants -- two of the too-short adults, and three of those within Kid's phenotypic range -- stand and begin gathering belongings, and heading towards either end of the car.
Saguru follows.
The platform is milling with people, despite the weekday timing, and behind that is a line of police. Said line is funneling people right to the stairs, where the side marked for going down is jammed. Two of the station's conductor girls have baskets over their arms and polite smiles on their faces. "Please wipe the back of your hand with the towelette," they rattle off, handing out cheap pre-packaged wipes. "Wipe thoroughly and show the officer to your right. Please wipe the back of your hand with the towelette..."
Saguru takes the towelette, rips it open and rubs as requested, then displays his lemon-scented hand to the nearest officer. "No makeup, you're good to go," the officer says, then does a double take. "Hakuba-kun!" He ushers Hakuba quickly past him, tapping someone to take his place.
"I take it this is a Kid Homage checkpoint?" Saguru asks quietly, so the crowd cannot hear over their own low din.
The officer nods. "We're hoping that Kid is travelling with Hattori-kun, and that he would've chosen to make their complexions match rather than be more memorable."
"Hence a makeup check. I see." It would only work if Kid was travelling with Heiji, but given that he would've likely chosen to use a makeup soluble in the cheap towelette's alcohol rather than soap and water... it was a start, at least. "Have you been at this all day?"
"Everybody since yesterday, sir."
"Good man. Now, where might I locate Nakamori-keibu? And lodgings," Saguru adds ruefully.
"We've a car waiting for you at the exit." The officer smiles, then reaches up with one hand. "Just one last thing, if I may?"
Oh. "Of course," Saguru says, and endures having the man attempt to rip off his face.
That done, he returns the favor, then permits the officer to lead him downstairs and to the waiting car. It's not a police car, but someone's personal vehicle, and Nakamori-keibu is fuming in the passenger seat.
"Hakuba-kun! Get in, get in, what did he do to you?!" Nakamori looks ready to bite the Kid should he get in range, which makes something tiny and prickly-soft set up residence somewhere between Saguru's lungs. It's very, very tiny, though, under the blanket of perfectly reasonable vague offense that...
Well. Saguru can't really argue his ability to protect himself, now can he. He was at home, in the Commissioner-General's highly secured house. "As far as I can ascertain," he replies neutrally, buckling in, "he did nothing beyond whatever was necessary to place me upon that train."
He, fortunately, doesn't feel any aches that can be attributed to something more unsavory than sitting improperly in a train seat for several unconscious hours.
It doesn't make Nakamori-keibu any less growly. "We've taken over about half that hotel," he grumbles, jerking a thumb at it as they drive by. "We'll get you settled in later."
Gold gleams, and Saguru looks out the window at the towering statue fast approaching. "Crime scene first?"
"Crime scene first."
When they arrive, the complex resembles the proverbial kicked-over anthill. The buildings surrounding the statue's feet are still in good condition, but boarded up and unused; it had once been a sort of religious theme park, not any actual temple, and only the Kannon is still open for use.
The police have opened up the buildings anyway, tearing painted plywood down and vetting a veritable army of local housewives, professional maids, and building inspectors to scour the place.
Nakamori bulls right through the site, Saguru trailing in his wake, and leads him to a man built like a wall. Taller and broader than Saguru, the man's neck is thicker than his head and his hands can probably cup a newborn in the palm of each. His suit has stitches visible inside the straining seams.
Saguru is gripped by the sudden urge to just poke the man, to see if the muscles trying to rip his jacket apart actually aren't ludicrous fakes.
"This is Nurikabe-san, from the mayor's office," Nakamori says. "Nurikabe-san, Hakuba-kun."
"No one's allowed up to the stone without me," Nurikabe informs him primly, adding a fussy, "Contract law. The city's subject to heavy fines if we remove the stone from its compartment."
Saguru blinks. No wonder the diamond is still in place, despite the rest of the site going to ruin. "And Kid?"
"We're not liable should the stone be stolen."
Lovely. God save him from lawyers and accountants.
"Well." Saguru turns his best slightly-humble look upon the man. "May we go up, then?"
The interior of the Kannon statue is dark and gloomy, with a clattering metal scaffold-and-stair setup of the kind of industrial diamond-grid slats that eat shoe soles, and tiny platform cages cantilevered out so as to allow single-person access to the occasional viewport. The cages are currently staffed with construction workers, showering sparks as they weld chains threaded through the interior handles of each viewport.
Saguru finds himself terrified for the life of his beloved Inverness, not to mention his hair, but they make it through the incendiary showers without any conflagration, and reach a single empty platform some three-quarters of the way up the staircase.
There's a safe welded into the wall here, a basic key-and-dial setup which Nurikabe unlocks easily. It would've been about as secure as a paper screen to the previous Kid 1412, according to what Saguru's been able to glean from the files on the legend, however it may or may not stymie the Kid Homage.
Within the case, a clear faceted stone the size of an orange sits in a wire cage, culet aimed at them and oval crown facing straight out in a bubble of what Saguru deeply hopes is bulletproof and welded-in glass.
"I suppose I know what to keep an eye out for now," Saguru muses. "Thank you, Nurikabe-san."
"My pleasure."
Later that afternoon, after a quick discussion with the hotel owners ("This is Hakuba-kun, he's a police consultant," "Circumstances have colluded to leave me without lodgings, Nakamori-keibu has been generous and offered me space in his room," "We apologize for the last-minute mix-up."), Saguru changes into the hotel-provided yukata and slips downstairs for an early bath. Lord knows he'll not likely be energetic enough for one after the heist.
The men's bath is nearly deserted, only a pair of twins Saguru's age soaking in the tub as a dark little boy -- holding a towel to his front and sitting on the large tub's rim -- splashes at them. They've clearly chosen their own bathing time to allow the child to play without bothering other guests.
"Don't mind me," Saguru says, smiling at them a little. "It'll be nice to have some good cheer around."
There's very little of said cheer, though, as he picks out a stool and faucet and sets to. The boy's gone silent, and although Saguru is politely not looking at any of them, he can sense they aren't providing the same courtesy.
He's halfway through washing, rinsing shampoo from his hair, when the nagging itch of being watched gets to be too much. He glances over his shoulder and raises his eyebrow at the child.
One of the twins splashes a bit of hot water at the boy's posterior. "Don't stare."
The child doesn't so much as blink, just tilting his head a little. "His hair's the same color as me," he protests.
That gets bright laughter. "Not quite, buddy. C'mon, let him bathe."
"I don't mind," Saguru replies quickly. He doesn't, really. If it were the twins staring, that'd be one thing -- lavicious or objectifying, neither of which Saguru appreciates one whit -- but it's just a little kid.
"Do you dye it?" the boy asks, edging a little closer around the tub's rim.
"Nope." Saguru quirks a smile at him. "Do you dye yourself?"
"Noooooo!" the boy laughs.
"There you go, then."
With the attention span of a child, the boy flits to a new topic. "Are you here with all the big men?"
"Big men?"
"Uh huh. They're loud and lots of them showed up today." The boy pauses. "I think they all know each other?"
Ah. The Task Force. "Those are Tokyo police."
"All of them?" the boy asks.
At Saguru's nod, the more somber twin asks, "Is there a convention or something?"
"A thief."
"... This seems like a lot of effort for a thief," the other twin says. He glances pointedly at the oblivious child. "Should we be worried?"
"No, no, we just need the manpower to cover how large an area he'll probably be operating in." At the twin's mouthed 'we?', Saguru explains, "I consult with the division familiar with his crimes. We're here somewhat for our expertise, but mostly so that the local police aren't spread thin. You should be as safe tonight as any other evening you'd be out and about here."
"Ah, that's a relief. Thanks."
"You're welcome."
-0-0-0
When they leave the baths, drying off and tying robes on, Amari humming at a cheerfully high volume and the door firmly slid shut between them and Saguru, Heiji murmurs, "Believeable?"
Campari ruffles his hair. "Perfect."
Whew. That's Saguru safe for another few hours, at least.
"So now what?" Not that it isn't obvious.
"How does movies and snacks in our room sound?" Campari asks. It's not really a question.
Heiji just sighs. "I could eat."
They have convenience store bento in their room, as well as enough snacks to please a kendo team, and Amari takes the bento to the hotel's microwave as Campari puts on the news and taps into the Kannon's security feeds.
By the time Heiji is picking at the last bits of his okonomiyaki, the twins -- who ate lightly, sharing a carbonara pasta between them -- are already dressed and wriggling into black jogging suits.
"Be good, buddy," Amari says, dropping a granny kiss on Heiji's head because he's a jerk like that.
"You know how to work the feeds," Campari adds, as Amari pushes open the sliding screen and then the window. They're three stories up, but the next building over is very nearly in reach (well, very nearly in an adult's reach, Heiji would have to get on his knees on the sill and fall out like a plank to reach anything) (he's sort of horrified with himself that he hasn't even considered it), and no one has an uncovered window because of the lack of view. They can spider-climb their way down without being seen, and that's clearly what they intend to do.
"Just... don't make too much of a mess, okay?" Heiji asks.
They salute Heiji, matching smirks under matching black caps, then shimmy out the window one-two and into the night.
Three laptops and a pair of tablets, and something that's framed with the shell of an e-reader (not Saguru's) but is actually a very limited tablet of its own... Heiji lines them up on the low table, using their suitcases to lift the tablets to a second level above the laptops, turns down the lights, and curls himself around a pillow to watch the heist.
On the lower left-hand screen, Nakamori-keibu is brandishing handcuffs at Saguru. Now what's that all about...?
-0-0-0
Saguru eyes the proffered cuffs with what he hopes is a measuring rather than annoyed -- or, worse, half-panicked -- gaze. "That's... very paternal of you, sir," he finally decides to say. "If I may check that you're not disguised first...?"
Nakamori-keibu bristles, then goes a little bit pale. "Right, right," he mutters as he offers up his face. Saguru's fairly certain that Kid Homage cannot recreate the stubbly five-o-clock shadow under his palm, not if he wishes to also obtain a realistic human levelness to the skin underneath... and indeed, Nakamori's face pulls and stays attached as flesh properly should.
Though now Saguru's going to be calculating how to make prosthetics with the appropriate bearding and skin texture now, curse it all.
He permits Nakamori-keibu to cuff them together, then follows the man into the Kannon. Unlike earlier in the afternoon, it's all blazing floodlights inside now.
"We're certain he's going to make the attempt from the interior, then?" Saguru asks, as they spiral up past pairs of officers, all in body armor and mottled facial bruises. The air is getting noticeably hotter as they go, and Saguru spares a moment of worry for the policemen in the higher levels.
"More like how would we block him flying in to grab it," Nakamori-keibu mutters, chewing on the stub of an unlit cigar. "Hang men in harnesses off the top of the Kannon?"
Saguru considers the image a scarce moment, then winces. Kid Homage has been decidedly nonviolent, at least physically, however a man hung from a glorified rope some ten stories above the ground is little more than a sitting duck. Even if Kid didn't cut the rope, all it would take is one unfortunate entanglement, and you'd have a very effective tourniquet or noose.
"I see."
Higher and hotter, and Nurikabe-san is positioned at the safe door once again. "A final look, gentlemen," he decrees, opening the safe. The diamond -- or some reasonable facsimile of it -- remains in place.
Kid Homage is the type to leave the setting glaringly empty should he have already been and gone, therefore he's not yet made his attempt.
"Let's go, then," Nakamori-keibu says gruffly.
Saguru bites back his first, second, and third reaction. It's not insulting, stifling, or nice to watch an overprotective father in his natural habitat. Even if Saguru rather felt he should deal with Kid Homage on his own. He's the Wolf of Europe! Seventeen and very nearly a man in his own right!
... Kid is a sociopath and Saguru know better than most that anyone can be a target, regardless of weakness or lack thereof.
Clearly the stifling heat is getting to him. He can better cling to his cold logic in the fresh air, as disparate as water from the confines of the safe's environs, lapping in cool waves as they descend back into the base of the Kannon.
The staircase clatters one final time, as Saguru steps off of it, and that's when everything goes to pot.
Smoke bombs and confetti, glitter and screaming, and over it all a canned voice is chanting WHO LET DA DOGS OUT? and woofing in booming American English.
Nakamori's hand clamps over Saguru's wrist, the cuffs digging into his flesh, and they bolt.
Right, protect the underage sexual harassment target first. God damn the Kid Homage.
More chaos in the plaza outside, this time with additional life-size inflatables -- Kid Homage, Kid 1412, various Christmas and cartoon character displays -- and several of the solid-color fringed advertisement banners shaped vaguely like people, the kind that flap and billow disconcertingly on fanned updrafts.
Nakamori darts left, then right, then yanks them into a smallish outbuilding between the trees. There are still a few lingering booth walls set to the side, half-covering the high windows, but the place has been cleaned with a vengeance and these are just the pieces that remain intact.
Saguru swallows around a dry throat, catching his breath and watching Nakamori prowl around the storage space. No Kid behind the wall panels. No Kid peeking in through tiny windows. No Kid eeling in through the floorboard cracks barely large enough for mice.
"I believe we're relatively secure," Saguru murmurs. "... For the moment."
"Hrm." Nakamori's radio crackles, and he hits the off button with a vengeance.
"... Sir?" That's not proper procedure.
Which is when Nakamori turns a bright, sharp, all too familiar grin on Saguru. "You really should've checked my face after the smoke bombs as well, Tan-tei-san," he purrs, before dropping the disguise.
As Saguru stares, trying not to hyperventilate, Kid swallows, his lips and adam's apple moving oddly in perfect silence.
-0-0-0
"Goddammit, aniki, where are you?"
Campari smirks, and his subvocalization comes through the line loud and clear. "I'm going to be a bit late, love."
The gunman doesn't notice. "Hello, Toichi."
Ch. 6-1
They spend the entire day in the storm drain listening to the (unsuccessful) sweep for bugs, change of rooms, and the continuing investigation (computer search canceled, contacting of MIT graduates from three to six years ago still under consideration, witness statements still being taken and compiled). Then -- exhausted, but not bedraggled or smelly, after a good bout of fresh costuming and deodorants -- they return to the Beika apartment.
Heiji drags himself out of bed some twelve hours after that, with dim morning light streaming in through a rainy day, so it's good they're out of the runoff system at least.
"--kay, okay, we will totally owe you one, Baachan," Amari's saying, as Heiji lurches towards the coffeemaker. "No. One. One, Baachan. Yes I know it's a lot of yearbooks, but... Campari's doing the research, so it's mostly a matter of jetsetting and a bit of B&E, it's practically a vacation." He pauses, making faces at the phone, then puts on his best puppy eyes and goes, "Pleeeeeeease? We wuv oo Baachan."
Heiji can't help but cringe. "Cut it out, that shit is disturbing," he mutters.
Amari sticks his tongue out at him. "See, who else can make you laugh like that? So you'll help out?" He pauses. "All right, all right, Bachan," he laughs, switching the honorific down a generation in age. "Maybe in a few years we'll even go for Neechan, wouldn't that be flattering?" Another pause. "Biting's Campari's job, you know that. I'll have him email you the details, okay? Thanks. Love you Bachan!"
"What was that all about?" Heiji asks, once Amari's hung up and dropped his phone on the table.
"Hm? Oh, didn't feel like taking you globetrotting, so we called in a specialist."
The mysterious Bachan. Or Baachan. "Would this be Zombie-baachan? Tender nubile young brains with a side of revenge?"
"Bingo!" Amari's grin shows all his teeth. "Quite the little memory you've got there. I rather thought you were paying more attention to the knots."
"Backatcha," Heiji says, because he'd actually had reason to be on paranoid flashback-vivid-recording memory when the twins had their tickle fight and obliquely plotted the systematic murder of most of their associates. He wonders just how close to eiditic their memories are. "Zombie?"
Amari waggles one finger at him. "A secret makes a woman, a woman," he purrs. "And keeps a twin considerably more breathing than bleeding."
Huh, that almost sounds like there's someone out there the twins actually respect. And fear a little bit, but without the need to murder all threats in play. Someone alpha to them.
... Okay Heiji's just scared himself. He buries his nose in his coffee and hopes that Amari didn't notice.
Amari's grin widens (dammit, he totally noticed), but instead of commenting, he drops a key and a slip of paper next to Heiji's elbow. "Hamamatsu Station, coin lockers near the Yamanote Line. Don't peek."
Heiji eyes the innocuous key suspiciously. "What favor's this one?"
Amari's grin goes impossibly wide, and he doesn't answer.
-0-0-0
The next day, Saguru has school. There's something a little unreal about it, something almost surreal: this weekend he let a little boy die in his arms (suicide for the second time, reality phasing out under Saguru's fingertips), watched another vanish in smoke to return to his captors, met a woman who'd died as a child before his eyes...
And now it's all good morning sensei and turn in your homework and open your books to page three-hundred-and-ninety-four. Quiet, orderly, and hollow.
He escapes the emptiness at lunch, skirting the beautiful girl holding court under a tree. There's an alcove near one of the fire exits, where a vent hums noisily as it blasts stifling hot air up out of the pavement. No one except Saguru ever bothers with the spot; the girls have their modesty to think about, and the rest of the boys are either determined to watch girls or smoke during breaks. The venting is no good for safely lighting a cigarette or keeping it lit.
Saguru, though, wants neither. He pulls his phone from his pocket and checks his police account. It's limited, damn his age, but there's a few files uploaded. Witness statement summaries, an auditorium seating chart (both audience and stage)... a video clip.
It's only thirty seconds long, from a camera watching the table where they'd checked tickets, and even though it should show the person at the head of the line perfectly... it doesn't. The girl's head is ducked, looking slightly to one side as she signs in, but the low ponytails and dark-toned dress are unmistakeable even in Saguru's tiny screen. It's Hattori Heiji, in his Reika disguise.
Saguru can't see what Heiji's looking at. The table and his skirt are in the way, but from the body language, the way his lips move but his attention clearly isn't on the attendant...
Is there a child with him?!
Saguru's out of his police account and on Google before he can think. It could've been a guest, just some innocent kid he'd struck up a conversation with in line, just a way to naturally keep his face hidden from the camera, and surely--
Miyano Shiho does not, in fact, have an unlisted number.
Bzz bzz. Bzz bzz.
Click.
"Moshi moshi. Miyano-hakase? It's Hakuba Saguru."
Her voice, when it comes, is hard. "I've told you what I could, Hakuba-san."
"Perhaps. Miyano-hakase, is there a..." Hm, how to phrase this? "... possibility that Kid Homage could've sent a child someplace in the company of Hattori Heiji?"
"I will call you back." She hangs up without another word.
Saguru pulls his phone away from his ear and stares at it. That was not a 'no'.
Kid Homage has access to a child. There is a child... what, complicit in all this? An unwitting hostage to Heiji's good behavior? It would certainly add dimension to Heiji's determination to return to captivity.
A child. Good god.
... But wait. That doesn't make sense. Children may be of considerable interest to most neurotypes, between biological and cultural imperatives, but Kid Homage is distinctly atypical. Why would he tolerate minding a child? Or, more likely, tolerate the division of Heiji's attention if he were to delegate the task to Heiji?
Saguru pulls up the clip again, and eventually gets a half-clear view of the girl. She's perhaps six to eight years of age, with too strong a resemblence to Heiji's disguise for it to not be deliberate.
... She looks greatly like the little girl Kid Game Over'd first, actually. The one who hadn't had a chance to give Saguru her name. Damn it all.
Bzz bzz.
"Moshi moshi, Hakuba Saguru." Miyano's audibly biting back amusement this time, and Saguru's stomach clenches. He suddenly has the sinking feeling that he doesn't want Kid's answer. Miyano doesn't give him a chance to say so, though. "He says that you won't believe whatever he says, so think what you like, it's guaranteed to be wrong anyway."
"He... what?" That's... frighteningly accurate, come to think of it. Saguru wouldn't have believed a word of it if Kid had denied the accusation. Or even if Miyano had, instead of hanging up on him.
"You're doing a very good job of entertaining him, Hakuba-tantei. My condolences." Click.
The flare of pure, unadulterated offense almost makes Saguru hit redial. But he chokes his temper back down, replacing the phone in his pocket with crisp, tight-muscled movements. After all, what good would it do? He's lucky Miyano's willing to be a point of contact between them at all.
Who knows how long that will last, either. As soon as Kid Homage's whims change...
He sighs and opens his bento.
There's a note inside.
Of course.
-0-0-0
When Heiji gets back, with the coin-locker's mysterious brown-wrapped parcel tucked in with his schoolbooks like it was nothing of any importance at all, Campari's got the big-screen playing "Hot Twink Fills Intellectual Gap" again. Looks like it's the Homage Task Force offices this time, which is at least slightly less creepy than Saguru's school. The screen's filled with men in suits slaving over piles of paper and scribbled-on whiteboards, Saguru's pale hair and brown coat clashing with all the salaryman blues around him.
"Have you eaten yet?" Amari asks, the parcel already in his hands and twine unknotting itself under deft fingers. "I know there's a good curry place next to the lockers."
"No..." The brown paper falls away, and instead of a block of dried leaves or white powder (unlikely, but the twins have to be getting money somehow), or a bundle of sensitive documents (which is what Heiji was expecting), there's a glossy paperback inside. The Night Baron's familiar, ominous mask grins out from under the silver title.
"Hey, aniki! ARC copy!"
"Finally."
Heiji sputters. "A book? All that-- I begged you for a freaking week not to poison the kids-- and you sent me to fetch a book? Is it even illegal?"
"Nope." Then he tears his gaze away from the pages. "Aw, did you want to be an accessory?" He ruffles Heiji's hair, ignoring Heiji's horrified stuttering. "Maybe next time."
"I hate you both."
Amari slings an arm around Heiji's shoulders and drags him to the living room, nose already back in the book, then shoves him onto the couch and flops down half on top of him. "Nice pillow. Watch tv."
Campari ghosts out of the kitchen with popcorn and cuddles up on Heiji's other side, a notepad and pen at the ready.
"Do I at least get to see what they're working on?" Heiji grumbles. Primetime crime drama this is not.
One scribbling and a torn-out page later, Heiji has his answer.
North of that picturesque prisoner, pacified and ever ours,
That golden observer from afar rises above the heated tempests of this floating world.
"Another heist? Already?" But Heiji's mind is already chewing through the notice. Prisoner is obvious, his name's gonna be somewhere in the answer. Picturesque, though? Pacified?
Golden observer from afar is Hakuba Saguru, most likely. Floating world implies Edo-period entertainment districts, though, geisha and theaters and brothels, and none of those fit Saguru at ALL.
Argh, what else works-- picturesque. Picture. Ukiyo-e. But how does that tie in to Saguru?
It doesn't. Okay. Pictures don't go with Saguru, pictures go with Heiji. E-Heiji. And pacified goes with Heiji, too, and that kanji just happens to be ei, so... ei-Heiji? Eiheiji? ... No. Eihei-ji. Eihei's temple in Fukui Prefecture.
North of Eihei-ji in Fukui, that golden observer blahblah. What's north of Fukui? Ocean north of the west half, but north of the east half is... Ishikawa. Kanazawa, that gaudy Iron Chef host, gold leaf, traditional shit, Kenroku gardens, hot springs.
Hot springs would fit the heat and floating stuff. Since when has Saguru had jack shit to do with...
Heiji groans and bonks his head against the nearest semi-firm surface, which happens to be Amari's shoulder. "This is the fucking hot spring episode, isn't it."
"Chaos, confusion, and fanservice," Amari agrees cheerfully. "Got the target yet?"
"No." What the hell does he know about hot springs? He can't even remember the name of the big resort town up there that's got a ton of 'em.
Amari flicks his nose and turns his attention to the screen, where Hakuba is fiddling with a laptop and a projector. "Think diamonds. Think devout business tycoons. Think--"
The projector fires up, a flickering, faded image of a statue outlined against sky.
"-- the giant golden Kannon at Kaga," Amari choruses with an unwitting Saguru. The projector flicks to a close-up of the statue's face, and a red-circled mark right between her carved brows.
"-- and the Bindi Diamond, a gemstone of uncertain provenance, weighing in at approximately 273 carats," Saguru continues, voice tinny over the speakers. "It's widely believed to be synthetic at best, if not dramatized cubic zirconia or even glass; the tourist brochures tend to claim the latter, which may or may not be true."
"It isn't," Amari murmurs.
"The claims are as likely to be a matter of security as anything else, and frankly the composition of the stone has little bearing upon the fact that Kid Homage has targeted it."
"Bingo! Give the pretty boy a prize."
"Amari, shut up, this isn't MST3K."
Amari grabs a handful of popcorn and stuffs it into his mouth, chewing loudly in a way that doesn't fool anyone a bit.
Silence reigns for several minutes, save for the Task Force's briefing on the tv.
Then, Saguru inclines his head, and finishes a statement with, "I, of course, will not be accompanying you to Ishikawa."
"And in an amazing plot twist," Amari mutters sarcastically.
"You are not gonna kidnap him," Heiji growls.
Amari waves that off with an airy, "Of course not."
Still, Heiji doesn't entirely trust that. He jabs Amari's arm with one sharp little finger. "Because I don't need the company," he presses.
Amari snatches his hand up, squeezing just this side of painful. "You have no imagination, Hei-kun," he says, and smirks.
"... So what are you gonna do?"
-0-0-0
Saguru wakes with a pounding headache, weak sunshine painting the backs of his eyelids a searing red, and the seat under him thrumming.
Seat?
He gasps fully awake and nearly knocks himself right back out on the window he's propped up against. "Ow," he mutters. Outside, snowy fields surrounding clusters of farmhouses race past. He cannot possibly be anywhere in the environs of Tokyo. Judging by the angle of the sun, the train is heading in a northerly direction; assuming it's afternoon, he's probably going north-northeast. Judging from the scenery, he can eliminate a number of train lines from consideration...
Or he could read the red kana scrolling across the LED board at the front of the car. JR Shirasagi (he knows that line, where is it again?) service to... Toyama?!
Saguru stares, automatically reaching for his phone. Now he remembers. This is the way to Kaga and Kanazawa. The Shirasagi travels from Nagoya to Toyama via Maibara, skirting Lake Biwa before it heads north. He's not even in the same half of the country anymore. How is this possible? There's no direct line from Tokyo, much less from his house. Between ticketing and station transfers and his own unconsciousness, how did he get onto this train at all?
Saguru's fingers brush against paper, wrapped around his phone in his pocket. What the--? He pulls it out, unwinds the origami loops, then tugs at the folds until it comes apart in his hands.
Kannon is not the only golden observer being honored at this party, as you should have noticed in the invitation. This is your first strike, Tantei-san. I will not be so forbearing about requesting the pleasure of your company a second time. As for a third...
Well. Perhaps a third refusal will see you keeping company with our mutual acquaintance.
Kid Homage
Saguru swallows thickly. He slowly, carefully thumbs out the number, nearly missing the buttons when his hand twitches violently. "Moshi moshi, Nakamori-keibu. It would seem that Kid does not care to have his invitations declined." Outside, gold glints on a head the size of a house, rising slowly over the snowy hills ahead. "I should be arriving at Kagaonsen station within twenty minutes."
He only half-listens to Nakamori's response -- the man is mostly shouting orders away from the phone anyway -- as he glances around the compartment. There's his suitcase on the rack above. (Who'd packed it? Kid? Or Baaya under the impression the orders were from Saguru?) The car itself is more deserted than not, and the occupants mostly not interacting with each other. Saguru makes note of them all; six are under five foot three, and a pair of tourists in the back are well over six feet tall, so that's eight people who can't be Kid. There are also two families, who sadly cannot be eliminated from consideration; one is a couple with a sleeping infant in a massive stroller, and the other is a set of grandparents with a little boy between them. None of them look at all like Hattori.
He wishes he could eliminate them from consideration. But who says Kid can't have a different child along?
The old man laughs, and leans over to poke at something on the boy's tablet. Dancing colors reflect faintly off the child's dark face. "Cut it out," the boy snaps, shoving his grandfather's hand away.
"Kaga Onsen. This train will be arriving at Kaga Onsen in two minutes. Please gather your belongings and prepare for arrival. This train will be stopped at the platform for ninety seconds. Please move swiftly as you exit the train. This train will be arriving at Kaga Onsen in ninety seconds." The announcement changes to English, repeating itself and counting down, and Saguru stands and pulls his suitcase down from the rack.
The two families and five of the car's occupants -- two of the too-short adults, and three of those within Kid's phenotypic range -- stand and begin gathering belongings, and heading towards either end of the car.
Saguru follows.
The platform is milling with people, despite the weekday timing, and behind that is a line of police. Said line is funneling people right to the stairs, where the side marked for going down is jammed. Two of the station's conductor girls have baskets over their arms and polite smiles on their faces. "Please wipe the back of your hand with the towelette," they rattle off, handing out cheap pre-packaged wipes. "Wipe thoroughly and show the officer to your right. Please wipe the back of your hand with the towelette..."
Saguru takes the towelette, rips it open and rubs as requested, then displays his lemon-scented hand to the nearest officer. "No makeup, you're good to go," the officer says, then does a double take. "Hakuba-kun!" He ushers Hakuba quickly past him, tapping someone to take his place.
"I take it this is a Kid Homage checkpoint?" Saguru asks quietly, so the crowd cannot hear over their own low din.
The officer nods. "We're hoping that Kid is travelling with Hattori-kun, and that he would've chosen to make their complexions match rather than be more memorable."
"Hence a makeup check. I see." It would only work if Kid was travelling with Heiji, but given that he would've likely chosen to use a makeup soluble in the cheap towelette's alcohol rather than soap and water... it was a start, at least. "Have you been at this all day?"
"Everybody since yesterday, sir."
"Good man. Now, where might I locate Nakamori-keibu? And lodgings," Saguru adds ruefully.
"We've a car waiting for you at the exit." The officer smiles, then reaches up with one hand. "Just one last thing, if I may?"
Oh. "Of course," Saguru says, and endures having the man attempt to rip off his face.
That done, he returns the favor, then permits the officer to lead him downstairs and to the waiting car. It's not a police car, but someone's personal vehicle, and Nakamori-keibu is fuming in the passenger seat.
"Hakuba-kun! Get in, get in, what did he do to you?!" Nakamori looks ready to bite the Kid should he get in range, which makes something tiny and prickly-soft set up residence somewhere between Saguru's lungs. It's very, very tiny, though, under the blanket of perfectly reasonable vague offense that...
Well. Saguru can't really argue his ability to protect himself, now can he. He was at home, in the Commissioner-General's highly secured house. "As far as I can ascertain," he replies neutrally, buckling in, "he did nothing beyond whatever was necessary to place me upon that train."
He, fortunately, doesn't feel any aches that can be attributed to something more unsavory than sitting improperly in a train seat for several unconscious hours.
It doesn't make Nakamori-keibu any less growly. "We've taken over about half that hotel," he grumbles, jerking a thumb at it as they drive by. "We'll get you settled in later."
Gold gleams, and Saguru looks out the window at the towering statue fast approaching. "Crime scene first?"
"Crime scene first."
When they arrive, the complex resembles the proverbial kicked-over anthill. The buildings surrounding the statue's feet are still in good condition, but boarded up and unused; it had once been a sort of religious theme park, not any actual temple, and only the Kannon is still open for use.
The police have opened up the buildings anyway, tearing painted plywood down and vetting a veritable army of local housewives, professional maids, and building inspectors to scour the place.
Nakamori bulls right through the site, Saguru trailing in his wake, and leads him to a man built like a wall. Taller and broader than Saguru, the man's neck is thicker than his head and his hands can probably cup a newborn in the palm of each. His suit has stitches visible inside the straining seams.
Saguru is gripped by the sudden urge to just poke the man, to see if the muscles trying to rip his jacket apart actually aren't ludicrous fakes.
"This is Nurikabe-san, from the mayor's office," Nakamori says. "Nurikabe-san, Hakuba-kun."
"No one's allowed up to the stone without me," Nurikabe informs him primly, adding a fussy, "Contract law. The city's subject to heavy fines if we remove the stone from its compartment."
Saguru blinks. No wonder the diamond is still in place, despite the rest of the site going to ruin. "And Kid?"
"We're not liable should the stone be stolen."
Lovely. God save him from lawyers and accountants.
"Well." Saguru turns his best slightly-humble look upon the man. "May we go up, then?"
The interior of the Kannon statue is dark and gloomy, with a clattering metal scaffold-and-stair setup of the kind of industrial diamond-grid slats that eat shoe soles, and tiny platform cages cantilevered out so as to allow single-person access to the occasional viewport. The cages are currently staffed with construction workers, showering sparks as they weld chains threaded through the interior handles of each viewport.
Saguru finds himself terrified for the life of his beloved Inverness, not to mention his hair, but they make it through the incendiary showers without any conflagration, and reach a single empty platform some three-quarters of the way up the staircase.
There's a safe welded into the wall here, a basic key-and-dial setup which Nurikabe unlocks easily. It would've been about as secure as a paper screen to the previous Kid 1412, according to what Saguru's been able to glean from the files on the legend, however it may or may not stymie the Kid Homage.
Within the case, a clear faceted stone the size of an orange sits in a wire cage, culet aimed at them and oval crown facing straight out in a bubble of what Saguru deeply hopes is bulletproof and welded-in glass.
"I suppose I know what to keep an eye out for now," Saguru muses. "Thank you, Nurikabe-san."
"My pleasure."
Later that afternoon, after a quick discussion with the hotel owners ("This is Hakuba-kun, he's a police consultant," "Circumstances have colluded to leave me without lodgings, Nakamori-keibu has been generous and offered me space in his room," "We apologize for the last-minute mix-up."), Saguru changes into the hotel-provided yukata and slips downstairs for an early bath. Lord knows he'll not likely be energetic enough for one after the heist.
The men's bath is nearly deserted, only a pair of twins Saguru's age soaking in the tub as a dark little boy -- holding a towel to his front and sitting on the large tub's rim -- splashes at them. They've clearly chosen their own bathing time to allow the child to play without bothering other guests.
"Don't mind me," Saguru says, smiling at them a little. "It'll be nice to have some good cheer around."
There's very little of said cheer, though, as he picks out a stool and faucet and sets to. The boy's gone silent, and although Saguru is politely not looking at any of them, he can sense they aren't providing the same courtesy.
He's halfway through washing, rinsing shampoo from his hair, when the nagging itch of being watched gets to be too much. He glances over his shoulder and raises his eyebrow at the child.
One of the twins splashes a bit of hot water at the boy's posterior. "Don't stare."
The child doesn't so much as blink, just tilting his head a little. "His hair's the same color as me," he protests.
That gets bright laughter. "Not quite, buddy. C'mon, let him bathe."
"I don't mind," Saguru replies quickly. He doesn't, really. If it were the twins staring, that'd be one thing -- lavicious or objectifying, neither of which Saguru appreciates one whit -- but it's just a little kid.
"Do you dye it?" the boy asks, edging a little closer around the tub's rim.
"Nope." Saguru quirks a smile at him. "Do you dye yourself?"
"Noooooo!" the boy laughs.
"There you go, then."
With the attention span of a child, the boy flits to a new topic. "Are you here with all the big men?"
"Big men?"
"Uh huh. They're loud and lots of them showed up today." The boy pauses. "I think they all know each other?"
Ah. The Task Force. "Those are Tokyo police."
"All of them?" the boy asks.
At Saguru's nod, the more somber twin asks, "Is there a convention or something?"
"A thief."
"... This seems like a lot of effort for a thief," the other twin says. He glances pointedly at the oblivious child. "Should we be worried?"
"No, no, we just need the manpower to cover how large an area he'll probably be operating in." At the twin's mouthed 'we?', Saguru explains, "I consult with the division familiar with his crimes. We're here somewhat for our expertise, but mostly so that the local police aren't spread thin. You should be as safe tonight as any other evening you'd be out and about here."
"Ah, that's a relief. Thanks."
"You're welcome."
-0-0-0
When they leave the baths, drying off and tying robes on, Amari humming at a cheerfully high volume and the door firmly slid shut between them and Saguru, Heiji murmurs, "Believeable?"
Campari ruffles his hair. "Perfect."
Whew. That's Saguru safe for another few hours, at least.
"So now what?" Not that it isn't obvious.
"How does movies and snacks in our room sound?" Campari asks. It's not really a question.
Heiji just sighs. "I could eat."
They have convenience store bento in their room, as well as enough snacks to please a kendo team, and Amari takes the bento to the hotel's microwave as Campari puts on the news and taps into the Kannon's security feeds.
By the time Heiji is picking at the last bits of his okonomiyaki, the twins -- who ate lightly, sharing a carbonara pasta between them -- are already dressed and wriggling into black jogging suits.
"Be good, buddy," Amari says, dropping a granny kiss on Heiji's head because he's a jerk like that.
"You know how to work the feeds," Campari adds, as Amari pushes open the sliding screen and then the window. They're three stories up, but the next building over is very nearly in reach (well, very nearly in an adult's reach, Heiji would have to get on his knees on the sill and fall out like a plank to reach anything) (he's sort of horrified with himself that he hasn't even considered it), and no one has an uncovered window because of the lack of view. They can spider-climb their way down without being seen, and that's clearly what they intend to do.
"Just... don't make too much of a mess, okay?" Heiji asks.
They salute Heiji, matching smirks under matching black caps, then shimmy out the window one-two and into the night.
Three laptops and a pair of tablets, and something that's framed with the shell of an e-reader (not Saguru's) but is actually a very limited tablet of its own... Heiji lines them up on the low table, using their suitcases to lift the tablets to a second level above the laptops, turns down the lights, and curls himself around a pillow to watch the heist.
On the lower left-hand screen, Nakamori-keibu is brandishing handcuffs at Saguru. Now what's that all about...?
-0-0-0
Saguru eyes the proffered cuffs with what he hopes is a measuring rather than annoyed -- or, worse, half-panicked -- gaze. "That's... very paternal of you, sir," he finally decides to say. "If I may check that you're not disguised first...?"
Nakamori-keibu bristles, then goes a little bit pale. "Right, right," he mutters as he offers up his face. Saguru's fairly certain that Kid Homage cannot recreate the stubbly five-o-clock shadow under his palm, not if he wishes to also obtain a realistic human levelness to the skin underneath... and indeed, Nakamori's face pulls and stays attached as flesh properly should.
Though now Saguru's going to be calculating how to make prosthetics with the appropriate bearding and skin texture now, curse it all.
He permits Nakamori-keibu to cuff them together, then follows the man into the Kannon. Unlike earlier in the afternoon, it's all blazing floodlights inside now.
"We're certain he's going to make the attempt from the interior, then?" Saguru asks, as they spiral up past pairs of officers, all in body armor and mottled facial bruises. The air is getting noticeably hotter as they go, and Saguru spares a moment of worry for the policemen in the higher levels.
"More like how would we block him flying in to grab it," Nakamori-keibu mutters, chewing on the stub of an unlit cigar. "Hang men in harnesses off the top of the Kannon?"
Saguru considers the image a scarce moment, then winces. Kid Homage has been decidedly nonviolent, at least physically, however a man hung from a glorified rope some ten stories above the ground is little more than a sitting duck. Even if Kid didn't cut the rope, all it would take is one unfortunate entanglement, and you'd have a very effective tourniquet or noose.
"I see."
Higher and hotter, and Nurikabe-san is positioned at the safe door once again. "A final look, gentlemen," he decrees, opening the safe. The diamond -- or some reasonable facsimile of it -- remains in place.
Kid Homage is the type to leave the setting glaringly empty should he have already been and gone, therefore he's not yet made his attempt.
"Let's go, then," Nakamori-keibu says gruffly.
Saguru bites back his first, second, and third reaction. It's not insulting, stifling, or nice to watch an overprotective father in his natural habitat. Even if Saguru rather felt he should deal with Kid Homage on his own. He's the Wolf of Europe! Seventeen and very nearly a man in his own right!
... Kid is a sociopath and Saguru know better than most that anyone can be a target, regardless of weakness or lack thereof.
Clearly the stifling heat is getting to him. He can better cling to his cold logic in the fresh air, as disparate as water from the confines of the safe's environs, lapping in cool waves as they descend back into the base of the Kannon.
The staircase clatters one final time, as Saguru steps off of it, and that's when everything goes to pot.
Smoke bombs and confetti, glitter and screaming, and over it all a canned voice is chanting WHO LET DA DOGS OUT? and woofing in booming American English.
Nakamori's hand clamps over Saguru's wrist, the cuffs digging into his flesh, and they bolt.
Right, protect the underage sexual harassment target first. God damn the Kid Homage.
More chaos in the plaza outside, this time with additional life-size inflatables -- Kid Homage, Kid 1412, various Christmas and cartoon character displays -- and several of the solid-color fringed advertisement banners shaped vaguely like people, the kind that flap and billow disconcertingly on fanned updrafts.
Nakamori darts left, then right, then yanks them into a smallish outbuilding between the trees. There are still a few lingering booth walls set to the side, half-covering the high windows, but the place has been cleaned with a vengeance and these are just the pieces that remain intact.
Saguru swallows around a dry throat, catching his breath and watching Nakamori prowl around the storage space. No Kid behind the wall panels. No Kid peeking in through tiny windows. No Kid eeling in through the floorboard cracks barely large enough for mice.
"I believe we're relatively secure," Saguru murmurs. "... For the moment."
"Hrm." Nakamori's radio crackles, and he hits the off button with a vengeance.
"... Sir?" That's not proper procedure.
Which is when Nakamori turns a bright, sharp, all too familiar grin on Saguru. "You really should've checked my face after the smoke bombs as well, Tan-tei-san," he purrs, before dropping the disguise.
As Saguru stares, trying not to hyperventilate, Kid swallows, his lips and adam's apple moving oddly in perfect silence.
-0-0-0
"Goddammit, aniki, where are you?"
Campari smirks, and his subvocalization comes through the line loud and clear. "I'm going to be a bit late, love."
The gunman doesn't notice. "Hello, Toichi."