4/30/20: Minor edits

5

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The first time Higashino met her, she was quiet Yasuko Hanaoka from apartment 412.

2007, Hiroshima. It was about five years ago when he'd been assigned to hunt her down. The photo of his target was expectantly different from the woman who now peacefully lived there. The Obake, as the yakuza called her, had a reputation of altering her appearance and taking names. A meticulous precaution, one would say, but he thought it to be an exceptional skill of hers; changing identities, adapting in a new environment, being able to resist capture from the Baisotei-Ise-gumi for such a long time. A feat in itself was commendable.

He was surprised that she's even alive. That she's still wanted alive for her ability, despite the body count; an important mandate dictated by the Kumicho.

Her Right-Hand, Agawa liked to call it Masaoka's obsessive habits, and in turn, it mustered a conclusion that capturing the Obake hadn't only stemmed from a small vendetta from the past, but of a long-withstanding power game between the government and the yakuza. Legally claiming her or illegally forging the claim, it didn't matter to him. He was just a footman in the chessboard and he did his job well enough.

She'd been last sighted somewhere along the outskirts of Osaka, caught waiting for a train in the Yamatoji Line by security cameras. The issue was it'd been vaguely about three or four years prior since it was last brought up again and further accounts about her were severely lacking, whether she'd still been occupying the area or have left for good.

However, a clue that had struck him was her age. He added the timelines together from the yakuza's records, and hence concluded that she must have been a child when the Kobayashi Towers Incident in 1997 happened several years back; that fateful event where everything began.

Higashino deduced she was a teenager from the footage found in Osaka. Seemingly without a guardian at that point. Disguised and experienced with dealing with crooks, sure. Though still an adolescent in mind; a runaway, he thought, but he knew this wasn't an average runaway child that gradually returned back to her parents after rebelling for about a week or so. He was a dealing with a more independent teenager that had gotten used to frequently moving from place to place.

Still, age mattered. While her ability gave her an easy advantage, there were more pressing matters like a part-time job, housing, and financial support that could get her in a tough spot without the proper legal documents to back her up with. Whether she did acquire these documents, living under the guise of a new identity required tact and time for adjustment, especially if the intention was to keep a low profile from both the yakuza and the government.

She couldn't just leave that simply.

It got him surmising that this teenager must have had an adult figure to fall back to for a period of time until she could support herself. Someone she could trust—or control—that provided shelter and enough of a reason to make her pass up as their relative. Child welfare laws were particularly lax when privacy in family households were valued. It made sense for her to hide under someone else's roof, if it quelled all suspicions of her living by herself which could get her reported.

His findings had eventually led him to Yamatokōriyama city in Nara, where an underground counterfeiter was taken into custody for forging illegal identity documents. Pretending to be a private investigator, he'd gotten a tip from a low-ranking officer for a name list of the counterfeiter's customers; realizing that the interview with the counterfeiter himself was useless when he had no memory of a girl anymore—perhaps, a woman now. Able to sustain herself in a different prefecture.

Or another country, if his hunch served him right.

Interestingly, a customer signed under the name Yasuko Hanaoka had requested for a fake passport and several traveling documents about ten months ago. She'd been the youngest, aged nineteen. A Japanese native at that. Where he was able to get an actual lead from her was in Tennoji, having found a similar name registered in a female-only capsule hotel; then finally tailing after her all the way here in the bustling street of Aioi in Hiroshima.

They became neighbors. Parallel to each other, but never quite meeting. It wasn't required to integrate himself in the lives of his targets. It was a more impractical maneuver to initiate contact with them for more than what's necessary. Their mornings and late evenings were routine greetings and head nods, and that was fine.

But Hanaoka, the woman in knitted sweaters and skirts, was keen to pick on things, suspicious in a lot of them. Another troubling matter was her ability. Mind-control. A unique spectrum in the telepathic and psychic manipulation ability types. Limits were uncertain than what he had taken notes about her, though if she could erase her files just as simply as she could remove her memory from a person, then he needed to have a more tactical approach than his predecessors, slate-clean from memory wipe or dead in their attempts.

Though the memory of her smoking in the rain seemed to come back to him like an apparition.

Hey, I didn't quite catch your name, she told him, her lips fading to gossamer smoke.

"Inoue Shunpei," Higashino reached to shake the detective's hand. "It's nice to meet you, Kunikida-san."

Kunikida was a rigid man and his rigidity ushered out through his reception. He could bleed cement for all Higashino knew, though what he needed was someone malleable and this one didn't seem like the sort to bend over his principles for a fat wad of cash.

"I'm told you know something about Hishou," Kunikida said, adjusting himself on his chair.

"I do," he admitted, gratefully accepting a hospitable teacup offered by a one of the clerks—an intern, surely. The boy still seemed to be studying in high school; his dark hair barely dyed a rebellious red at the tips. Bright carmine faded to a darker color. Red-brown, that deep shade of rum. It never ceased to haunt him. He blew on the steam, careful not to spill a drop on his gloves. "I used to work there."

Ideals. His notebook was a massive giveaway. "I see. Well then before we proceed, I want to know how this concerns you," his eyes were severe towards him, but they were too simple, too earnest, in his intentions, "and why you came here, specifically."

Honestly. Higashino wasn't sure what to make of Hanaoka's decision staying in Yokohama of all places. While clandestine in its ends, Tokyo was open arms to take in ability-user-related associations to a certain point where they're controlled. Yokohama was aggressively territorial in comparison.

Higashino weighed on her options, surmising them from the mouth of his teacup. On one hand, the yakuza's limited influence over the city could protect her, considering the Port Mafia's belligerent, bordering terroristic, control of its underworld. A disruption of power from an outside force might work to her advantage. It might even spark a war.

Then the other: the government's scope of power here was established but weak, overshadowed by the Armed Detective Agency. While taken in their employ, the Agency came across as too independent and self-serving to be fully under the government's thumb; the dynamic between the two even held tension, often counteracting the other.

Higashino was aware that the Agency was sympathetic to ability-users. However, it all depended on the matter whether the Agency would be willing to help her or put her into custody. That's why he's here to push them on the latter.

"I'm the anonymous sender," he drily confessed.

The surprise on his face was predictable though Higashino would rather focus on the finer details; it's a portrait of a detective, all sharp eyes and long mooting expressions, and he could almost hear how his mind was winding up to gear, a mechanism of deductions.

Kunikida wasn't bought into it yet. He's still scraping for clues, sensing for a lie underneath like a litmus test. Higashino wondered what color he saw when he opened his mouth, lips jolting up into an offhanded smile: "Is it hard to take in, detective? I know I don't look like much, but I'm not lying." For the most part.

Kunikida only threw him a hardball question. "Why did you decide to reveal yourself here now?"

"I wanted to do it before, but, really, after the news about the boss's suicide, I sort of chickened out. Then I decided to resign. I guess it's the guilt that talked me out of it," Higashino went for the sympathy card, hinting on a redeemable character underneath when there wasn't any. "I've been swabbing Hishou's dirt for five years, and let me tell ya, all of it is full shit . . . no one has the balls to call authorities. It's a hive mind thing to us regulars, you know? We do our job, we get out paychecks," then he took a pause, "and we ignore what we saw."

That shut him up about his intentions before retracting back to the case. "And what do you think you saw, Inoue-san?" Kunikida said sternly, and when he sensed reluctance in Higashino's end, he then added, as to instill a mutual trust: "You're safe here."

Hook, line, sinker. Higashino nodded. "They're smuggling weapons. I saw guns on crates. Thousands of 'em. Heck, I didn't even know there'd be so many when no one's allowed to own a gun. Thought it might've been, you know, the Mafia. But once I saw the shrink masks, I was so sure it must've been the Kurogo-kai. Been hearing about that gang for awhile now."

Kunikida was jotting something down his notebook. "And the gunshot you heard. Where were you when it happened?"

Hideyoshi was executed at about one-thirty in the morning. Suwei did her part to shoot him at the side of his head, dressing it all up to appear like a suicide. He would give her credit, though. For a neurotic, she worked clean. No trace, no fingerprints, no video footage.

"I went in overtime. I was taking out the trash, and after that I was about to clean up and leave," Higashino repeated Inoue's routine. "That's when I heard the gunshot. I thought about those gangsters close by . . . and, well, I just scrammed."

"You think it could have been Hideyoshi?"

"Not at first, but when his face popped up in the news, I thought it was crazy. The boss killing himself," Higashino shook his head in disbelief. "I just didn't think it was true. I know the rumors out there can be a bit out of hand, but Hideyoshi-san didn't seem like the kind of man who'd off himself, especially when he's usually busying himself with a woman."

Kunikida mulled over that specific detail. "Hm, a woman . . . you mean, his secretary, right?"

"Yeah, but there's this other one," Higashino only hummed in thought. "I'm not saying he's cheating on his wife or anything, but I thought I saw another woman with him in that office."

"Do you think she works in the company? Can you tell me what she looks like, Inoue-san?"

Higashino began to recall her appearance. "Ano, blond, I think. I saw a glimpse of her eyes," then he remembered the feel of them; the overwhelming power that resurged underneath those red-brown locks. "Light eyes. Kinda gray . . . or was it blue? Not sure if she works there. Lots of irregulars, you know."

"When did you last see her?"

"That night, actually. I saw her on my way out the building," then he feigned a look of realization, bumping his fist on his palm. "Oh, oh wait! You don't actually think she might've . . ."

Decidedly closing his notebook shut, Kunikida contemplated. "It's inconclusive. But, yes, she might be connected to his death."

"Thought she looked suspicious," Higashino shrugged. "But, eh, flings always look like that, don't they?"

Kunikida looked particularly blank in this area.

Haven't had a fling then, Kunikida-san?

"Hm. I suppose," he was about to inquire again until his phone interrupted their discussion and he reached for it from his pocket pants. "Excuse me," he muttered before glancing at the caller in indignation.

Mildly intrigued, Higashino nodded in understanding as Kunikida stomped his way out of the reception room in a fit of rage. "Where have you been, you useless—"

Higashino eavesdropped a bit on the tirade before settling his eyes on Kunikida's fountain pen. Pricey. Vintage. Very classy for a detective. Unfortunately, he still had half the mind to barrel out clutching on his notebook.

"This should do," Higashino whispered to himself, stripping off one of his gloves. Suspect X did its magic. The moment the pads of his fingers touched the stem of the pen, glimpses unraveled like a filmy B-roll in reverse. Kunikida ruminating on his desk. Kunikida buying goods from a convenience store. Kunikida on the train station. Kunikida greeting his co-workers. There's a partner, a slack-off.

Higashino couldn't ferret through more significant events than what he was doing now. His last forty-eight hours were up, and to his disappointment, he couldn't scrounge for something, knowing he hadn't been deep in the hole as of yet. He rewound back the detective's strict schedule for another once-over. The sequence proved to be more tedious than anything; not even a shred of deviance whatsoever. He's somewhat of a basic guy.

Scrabbling for his packet, Higashino idly plucked out a cigarette and placed it at the ruminating lilt of his lips, balancing it precariously. Before he could even fish for a lighter and call it a day, a muffled ring made his fingers twitch to a stop as his hand grabbed hold of his phone, opening the message sent by Shiga. On the screen, he felt as if a piece of his past returned to haunt him, this specter of a woman.

Red-brown hair, like dried blood on skin, paled into a ghostly shade on her head. Hanaoka was wearing brooding colors now. The dowdy softness of the neighbor he once knew died in apartment 412, it seemed. His eyes crinkled particularly from another familiar face next to her in the cafe. The missing partner only proved to be more interesting. When he scrolled down, he sighed at the bottom text. You're late.

Busy with something, Higashino simply texted back. Covert work demanded all the time in the world. Shiga may not take too lightly on the slack, but he's sure the others won't mind. They're the intimidating ones after all. He went back to the previous photo and forwarded it to another contact.

When Kunikida found himself back in the room, promptly apologizing for the disruption and for briefly putting their dissertation on a hold, Higashino had only done his part to reassure him. He looked like he was in a bit of a hurry, half upset, half tired of someone else's bullshit, as he tamped his glasses up the bride of his nose for the umpteenth time.

In the mood to share his smokes, Higashino gestured his packet to him, in which Kunikida regarded with slight aversion. "I don't smoke," he told him. "You can't smoke in here, Inoue-san."

"Sorry 'bout that," his lips curled up sheepishly, as he pulled out his cigarette from his mouth, tucking it behind his ear. "Do I come back or do I just wait for you here?"

"You can come back tomorrow," Kunikida said, terse and stiff as ever, but his tone was coming from a genuine place. "Inoue-san, I do deeply appreciate you coming to us for the case."

"Thank you for having me then," Higashino gave him a nod before furtively sliding his phone back to his coat pocket.

—

There was a time Ogai Mori looked up to Masaoka as a charismatic young man that had been the son of the most powerful crime lord in Ikebukuro. He was a medical student in Tokyo back then, having met the future Kumicho Tsunenori before the radical change, embodying the Baisotei-Ise-gumi's cuckoo itself as he claimed the throne, reborn as Shiki Masaoka; a woman of calculated elegance, swaddled in grandiose blue and crimson; deeper than red, darker than midnight.

It would be discourteous of him to decline her invitation in one of her most prestigious teahouses in Chigasaki. It was a lavish room for two. The traditional interior had been one of opulence. Kakiochiba Saryō had boasted it for years as an old establishment, despite being owned by the yakuza. Awe, however, hadn't withheld his qualms of how much of a scenic trap it imposed around him.

"How long has it been since we last saw each other?" he started. On the black lacquer of the low table, there were two cups of green tea, prepared by the tea master; followed by a compliment of rice cakes in the shape of a plum blossom flower.

"After the Great War," spoke Masaoka, recollecting, as she thanked the tea master with an approving nod before he left them in privacy, "when Soseki hadn't disappeared and Shimazaki was still alive."

Her voice might have not changed in its welcoming lilt though the slight treble on Tōson Shimazaki was a matter that hadn't gone unnoticed. However, Mori was a patient man and he waited until the conversation tread on dangerous grounds.

"A passing of a friend is tragic," she said over her teacup; Kutani porcelain, expensive, embellished, like the coo in her words. "Though being the successor of the Port Mafia, you've shown to have surpassed him in many aspects than he could hardly achieve. Acquiring an Ability Business License is very impressive. Das Glück hilft dem Kühnen."

"Ihre Anerkennung ist eine Ehre," he returned back in fluent German, his smile sharp at the edges. "Ich hab doch von dir gelernt."

Masaoka chuckled at that. "Ist das so? Ho, Artz, hilf dir selber!"

"From what, indeed, I wonder?" he said vaguely, drinking his tea.

"Sentiment," she said. "Perhaps, the both of us should move on from it, no? Past sentiments are only curable in time after all."

"Perhaps," Mori placed his cup down. A waft rose up the rim, like a chill. "But sentiment, Masaoka-san? Oh, if I hadn't known any better, it seems as if being a woman has made you soft," he told her this; a bait wrapped in casual jest.

"I always knew I was woman," she admitted, appearing as though she was more comfortable in her skin. "But I would gladly argue that softness doesn't make a woman as much as callousness doesn't make a man," and she went on, her voice spider-silk delicate, as she weaved through her words, recited out like a poem, "when one treads the way I do, carrying the mantle of what my father left me, then there is no other face born for me than to be cruel."

The darkness laid underneath, Tsunenori's eyes; only partially hidden behind long feminine lashes. "This speaks for the both of us, you think so?"

Mori sighed. She always had a way with her words. Her eloquence unmatched, unchanging. "Perhaps. I suppose we lead more difficult paths than most. Ah, für leute wie uns, der weg zur Hölle ist mit guten Vorsätzen gepflastert."

"Guten Vorsätzen, eh? I suppose while intention does take a focal point in many aspects, Bandura would rather call our behavior of a criminal nature."

"Naturally, it's only our response; a vivid reaction to the world. Though there is a variable that shapes it that way, and one could come up with a quadruple of theories why we've become the way we are, but it's simple," then he stared at her, eyes civil but clinical, "knowing that we are the kind of people who have willingly stepped one foot in forbidden territory."

There was a gleam on her gaze. It shone in a similar way when one solved one of her riddles and he knew her well enough in the past to understand that she loved her riddles; the enigma crafted in a puzzle, long-winded and convoluted as they were. He always believed that she'd been too full of herself for it, though, perhaps, she wanted to stay true to her name.

The cuckoo coughs blood as it sings.

Her words were stained in red. "Ah, nothing escapes the Port Mafia," she said, taking a calm sip of tea, before muttering softly: "well, perhaps for one."

It hadn't been enough to provoke out a scalpel on his hand though the implication had its trail of needles strewn all over the sentence. He was cautious to not step on any, if not at all in this long game. "We do share a similar conundrum, Mori-san," she finally came through with an earnest face. "I sought you to negotiate about an important matter."

"Oh, what do you have in mind, Masaoka-san?"

"I understand how the Mafia could be protective of Yokohama so I have come to you, asking permission out of respect," she reasoned. "A little bird fled its cage a long time ago. Dare I say, the most persistent thing. I very much intend to finally capture it there."

"Then you intend to make Yokohama your hunting ground for this little bird," Mori clarified before laying out a curious detail that he'd nail on the question: "how difficult is this one against the yakuza?"

Because a little bird to that degree should ought to be regarded as a threat.

"An exceptional one," she said simply, refusing to elaborate further, which he suspected held an undercurrent of possessiveness. Now, the mystery about such a thing, kept so enshrouded from him, had only stirred his thoughts to what grave importance it must have held to her. To what gain it could greatly serve the Port Mafia in this ordeal.

However, she was keen to ascertain his interest of the matter. "I ask that the Port Mafia don't interfere in our affairs, and in return, we won't interfere with yours. I'd also like to bargain you one more thing for your cooperation," then she slid a strung envelop to him from across the table.

Masaoka smiled. "Aren't you curious on what Shimazaki's boy is up to after he disappeared?"

—

"You've been here, all this time?"

Dazai smiled that wide unabashed smile of his. Both of his wrists were cuffed to the headboard of the bed. How the man had even managed to call him with a phone clutched on one hand despite his predicament still bewildered Kunikida. His casual state of dress was another telling matter. He refused to question where his missing belt had gone. How he wound up in a love hotel in the first place.

"What happened to you?" Kunikida clicked his tongue, replicating a key for the handcuffs. It wasted a page on his notebook.

"Got into a bit of a fix. I must say, she packs quite a punch," Dazai told him with that infuriatingly mirthful tone of his.

"She? A woman did this to you?"

"Not just any woman. You remember the one we met in the wake?"

"So you upset her," Kunikida deadpanned, careful to not let the key touch his skin.

When the cuffs fell loose above him, his hands circled over his bandaged wrists. There was laughter in his eyes. The man never failed to regard humor in every little thing he did, though there was a hint of wistfulness in them when he decided to speak: "Yes, got her all bristled. It was nice for awhile when we'd been fooling around. Well, anyway, that's Natsuo Kirino . . . or at least, was."

Then Kunikida stopped, registering his words. "You mean, the sister?"

"Yup."

"And now, after all this time, you're telling me you've been doing god-knows-what with Kirino's sister, you waste of bandages? We're solving a case here and coercing with a potential culprit is simply unprofessional!"

"Well, I suppose I've been rather unprofessional about it," Dazai swayed a little, amusing himself in his thoughts. "But I can't help it. She plays dirty," and then he smirks knowingly at him, "not in the way you're thinking."

Kunikida hated the bastard's wording. He made it seem so tastelessly bawdy. "And you couldn't have told me about this sooner? This might've been prevented."

He was his partner after all. But Dazai being Dazai never learned to respect that with his own private sleuthing. "This time, I want you to be honest with me. How much do you know about her?"

Dazai chuckled. "Oh, how I wish I knew everything," he said, glancing down on his hand; open and empty. "Best I could say is that she has a consistent pattern of assuming different identities. I've only discovered two so far, one of which belonging to a deceased woman in Tokyo. She had training. A formal one? I'm not sure, but I can tell she had learned from someone."

Then he sighed, deep and musing and troubled. "Her past still eludes me though another issue here is that she has ties with the Baisotei-Ise-gumi. I can't say for certain what exactly is her relationship with them, but apparently, she's a wanted woman and an ability-user that can use mind-control."

"And you withheld all that important information," Kunikida chastised, rubbing his fingers on his temples. "An ability-user . . ."

Dazai still had the audacity to shrug, wagging his finger. "Give me some credit here, Kunikida-kun. It took me awhile to amass all that information about her without me losing her for a time."

Natsuo Kirino was a suspicious woman, but not in the manner that involved the case. Her records stated they were half-siblings. That she studied for a scholarship in an American university and was allegedly reported to have been missing before her sister's disappearance. Rumors circulated that she dropped out and eloped with another student in the country though he couldn't say for certain how much of it was true at the time.

Now, she was the woman from the wake. Blond hair and gray eyes, like her sister's; matching the same descriptions as Inoue had professed. He put two and two together and saw how it all meshed seamlessly together.

"Did you know she killed both Hideyoshi and Suwei?" asked Kunikida, refraining himself from cussing. She could've killed you, you idiot. And yet.

"I had my suspicions about it at first," Dazai admitted bleakly. It lacked the unusual confidence that jumped out of his sentences.

"I learned that she'd been intimate with Hideyoshi. If what you're saying is true, that would mean she's acting against the yakuza and the Kurogo-kai. Though as of now, she's a primary suspect in the case," Kunikida concluded, but it didn't feel as final as it should. Something still tangled in the complicated seams of this case. Something that had yet to unravel. "But it all somehow falls back to Yuriko Kirino."

"Yuriko Kirino, the spare," Dazai muttered in contemplation.

His brows furrowed. "What?"

"Hm, I just find it strange. The legitimacy of how these two are actually related to each other. Did they know each other, I wonder? She appeared rather protective of sharing anything about her sister. As for Yuriko Kirino, all I found is an upright character. Her records seemed spotless enough. Hadn't gotten herself into any trouble in the past. She earned herself a degree in Criminology, eventually graduated in a police academy, and even performed well as an officer that she'd been promoted to an inspector after the Shibuya case."

"Though that's the thing. After I did some digging, everything before she entered college was obscure. Word went around that she'd been homeschooled. Apparently, she didn't make much of a big impression. Not a lot of people knew her as much as they think they do," Dazai concluded.

"Didn't you question her parents?" asked Kunikida.

"Her father died from old age four years ago."

"Well, didn't she have any close friends then? There should be someone she must've talked to."

"From what I've heard, she'd been a private person. She didn't make much of an effort to meet up with her college peers and such. However, no matter what they say, her life still feels fabricated, somehow. And if it actually is, is it a wise choice working in law enforcement with the risk of getting caught for possibly faking your identity," Dazai gave in to a momentary pause, thinking aloud: "as well as having relations to someone who is connected to the yakuza?"

Kunikida found himself wandering back to the Kurogo-kai, and then the Baisotei-Ise-gumi that lurked behind everything. Then that specific event that started it all. "The Shibuya case she'd been tasked to work on . . . wasn't that the one we couldn't get more details on?"

"Yes. Odd, isn't it?" Dazai said, tilting his head to the side. "One of the officers in her precinct said the full report had gone missing."

"The Shibuya case also involved the yakuza. If the timeline is about right, all of this began in the same year, yes? The case was about seven months prior to her disappearance. Somewhere along the lines, she must've have done something to catch their attention somehow—"

His eyes pulsed wide in realization.

"That would be Natsuo Kirino," Dazai finished, nodding. "I thought so, too."

However, something about the Shibuya case remained to perplex him upon knowing it was purposely hidden. It involved a human trafficking racket. Kunikida scrounged for whatever newspaper article he could find about the matter and it still wasn't enough. He could go about and apprehend Natsuo Kirino for answers though another thing came to mind when he suddenly recalled another shadowed figure that might as well be relative to the case.

Kunikida flipped through his notebook, searching for a name. "Akimitsu Takagi," he whispered under his breath. The partner who died in the crossfire.

—

Masuji Ibuse almost forgot himself.

The taste of coffee was to blame for that; the scent potent in the air. A dark Italian roast always had that nice burnt smell. Something gritty and viscous, just at the edge of charring. He liked it black, glistening with a similar oily sheen that the nose of a pistol had.

Then there was the scrape of a chair; a shadow piercing through a cloud of fresh steam. He didn't understand how something felt like it's slipping away, but he slightly raised his voice, asking anyway: "hey, excuse me, I think you got it wrong. I don't recall ordering another cigaló."

The waitress was a skittish little thing. He was so sure she'd squeak out her reply. "C-cigaló, sir?"

Ibuse always had that effect on people because he had one of those thuggish faces; the kind that no one wanted to involve themselves with and certainly one that never belonged inside a small family-owned café. However, Caffè Perla Nera was the only coffee shop in Yokohama that had served up real Italian flavors and that taste of authenticity really did come few and far between in other places.

Again, he realized he forgot himself, correcting his words. "I meant this caffè corretto," his tongue stumbled a bit on the foreign syllables. It'd always been a simple cigaló to him.

"U-umm, but sir, you did. This is y-your second order," stammered the waitress, reluctantly taking a step close. "But if there's a mix-up, I could—"

He sighed, making up his mind. It didn't really bother him that much if he had another cup. "Just leave it. It's fine," he said, proceeding to pour down the shot of sambuca on his expresso. He always preferred hard brandy over anisette. It always made the coffee sweeter, but it didn't fully take him out of the taste. "I'll pay for it."

There was little to no fuss on the waitress's end. She'd been keener on avoiding him than anything.

Ibuse shrugged, downing his coffee while it was scalding hot. He wasn't the sort to savor his time over one thing, never minding the aftermath of a burn that numbed his tongue from feeling. He rose up from the chair, leaving a thousand yen bill on the table without waiting for his change. No one greeted him out.

Hodogaya lacked the bursting liveliness of its neighboring ward Nishi, the Port Mafia's turf. He didn't mind the quiet bustle; roads narrow and streets distantly lined with rafts of manufacturing plants that cramped the area. It offered a sense of privacy. That everyone knew when to mind their own business.

Plunging his hands on his pockets, he walked along the path, where the Tōkaidō Shinkansen Line and the Katabira River intersected; the waters shone a vivid amber underneath, vaguely reminiscent of the Mediterranean evening sky. The dull rumble of a passing train drew him away and he tensed with a startle.

He felt eyes linger on him. Perhaps, behind the shadows of zelkova trees, something watched him. Something waited. Before he could reach for a gun, a crow rustled from the branches with an ugly screech. He dismissed it, clicking his tongue.

He kept his pace, stalking along the streets, until he found himself in front of a guarded factory warehouse; it was an old one, once owned by some glassware company that went bankrupt after the bubble economy broke in the '90s. His men recognized him with a nod when the gates opened and he returned to being the head of Kurogo-kai on his entrance.

Along the way, he spotted a sleek blue Camry on the parking lot and checked on his wristwatch. A quarter past five. He wasn't late and he didn't really give a damn if the yakuza had to wait for barging here too early. He sauntered to the upper-floor office-turned-meeting room.

Expendable assets. That's what he felt as a former soldier being deployed in Europe to fight in the Great War. Scapegoat was the other when they proceeded with the mission to plunder the city of Matera and kill its inhabitants under special orders; his colleagues and other allied forces taking the fall the Transcendentals should be accounted for.

Ibuse felt the same thing about the Baisotei-Ise-gumi's invitation in keeping the Kurogo-kai under their wing. Do the dirty work while the yakuza washed their blood-soaked hands. He wouldn't call himself a complacent man, but he knew when to make concessions, even aligning himself to those human pieces of shit that were ability-users. The thought only made the back of his neck cramp.

"Was it necessary killing the secretary?" asked Naoya Shiga, the yakuza's shateigashira in Yokohama. The man never really started with greetings; only questions, results.

"From what I gathered, she was the one that sent that anonymous tip to the Agency. Besides, she knew more than she should," Ibuse reasoned from his chair, keeping a steady eye on the suited pair flanked behind Shiga. "Going to introduce me to your new friends?"

Shiga nodded. "They're from Ikebukuro. This is Shohei Ooka," he referred to the man, who'd done nothing but play with a zippo lighter; his untamed hair and beard was a shock of crimson as if his face was ablaze, "and Raichō Hiratsuka," the other one was a woman; perhaps, the most hideous woman Ibuse had ever seen with her scowl and crooked nose. Something about her made his skin boil.

"You know how to use that, Hiratsuka," Ibuse patronized her katana, "or should I call you Thunderbird?"

Her eyes flared up with mutual contempt. Hiratsuka sneered at him, her thumb flicking up the hilt of her sword; the characters of the goddess Ametarasu engraved on the silver-gold steel. Garish thing. "Want a firsthand experience?"

Ibuse itched for his gun inside his canvas shirt jacket, going for a warning click.

"Now, now. Let's put this behind us, hm?" intervened Shiga, with the scolding tone of a parent. "We're all in the same side here."

Everyone may have tolerated each other for now, though Ibuse knew that tempers simmered and his ran deep from the blood under his skin.

Folding hands atop his crossed legs, Shiga started with a calm drawl. "The first order of business; we're staying out of the Mafia's affairs. We can't afford to start another conflict, and that goes for your men, Ibuse. Keep them under check."

"If I remember correctly, they're the ones nabbing at our shipments. Hideyoshi used to struggle a number of times for damage repairs and stolen artillery, even killing some of my men to prove a damn point." It often led to open fire, but the bloodbath that happened in Aoba was a memory he burned in his head with a grudge; some mutilated, sliced open by an aerokinetic-type ability user, while others were shot down with their jaws broken.

"That's because you're being too loud. It makes trouble. We can't make trouble here," Shiga reminded, eyes austere. "Especially, when the talks are done and there's an agreement we should upkeep. Though despite our Kumicho's efforts, that doesn't mean the Mafia's not aiming at us at gunpoint. If anything, they'd be waiting for the chance of a compromise. That's why Agawa's most trusted subordinates are here to ensure everything goes according to plan."

Ibuse scoffed out a gruff laugh. "You mean to tell me they're damage control?"

Shiga only pushed up his glasses. "More or less. Besides, we're still dealing with the Obake, considering you caught the wrong one two years ago."

"No one told me the Obake had a sister," Ibuse argued, recalling how that woman had been such a chip on his shoulder, despite being a non-ability-user; fighting her way out from his men and bolting for a messy escape. "A cop at that, for fuck's sake!"

Hiratsuka smirked at his outburst, like the bitch she was.

"And look at the cost of that small incident. If your men hadn't let her slip away, the damage done wouldn't have been traced back to Hishou."

Clenching his fists, Ibuse glared at him. "Don't just pin it on me, Shiga. Hideyoshi dug his own grave for yappin' because he couldn't take the pressure."

"Regardless, Yuriko Kirino is as much of a problem as the Obake. There's no news if the sisters have already met, though Kirino did make contact with the police awhile back. Apparently, an inspector in the Mafia's payroll. We're able to trace they're last conversation, but I can't guarantee who got to who first," there was a dip to his voice that implied it could've been the Mafia. "So far, nothing's come up about her after that."

Shiga went on, sighing deeply, "As for the Obake, she'd been sighted on Motomachi with a detective from the Agency. There's no report of an arrest, but it's only confirmed that the government is getting involved in this and we need to move faster."

With the motion of Shiga's fingers, the man named Ooka stepped forward and handed out a black vinyl binder. From a glance, Ibuse believed there was something profoundly wrong with the ability-user. Those dead eyes. He dared to stare back at the cloudiness of those white pupil-less irises that stuck out from his whorl of red hair.

Brushing the thought aside, Ibuse opened the binder to find a paper trail of leads; scarce photos clipped at the corner of the page. This kind of clean organization was expected from Shiga. "What's the plan then?"

"What we came to do here in the first place. Capture the Obake alive. As for Yuriko Kirino . . . dead or alive, it hardly matters. We need to find that woman before the real authorities catch up to her."

"And the Mafia's off limits. But what about the Agency?"

"The Kurogo-kai can wreak havoc as much as they like," Shiga waved a nonchalant hand; an approving gesture that appeared as if he swatted down an obnoxious fly. "Just spare that detective, the one in the photo. We still need information on the Obake's whereabouts."

A/N: A massive thank you for those who stuck around despite my long hiatus! Very long author's note below:

[1] Yes, I gave the former Port Mafia's boss an actual name because there's literally nothing out there. Yes, Masaoka's implication to Mori is exactly what you're thinking. Yes, everything just got more complicated. Yes, Kunikida is safe. For now. And finally, meet the yakuza. There's no great master plan. No one's in control of the situation here and everyone's scattered. Shit's going to hit the fan.

[2] I'm well aware the Kumicho of the yakuza traditionally has to be a man, and while I could go ahead and argue that Masaoka is born a man before transitioning into a woman, I'm just going with the whole this is a fictional superpowered yakuza and I could get away with it as much as how the manga gets away with unresolved plot threads. But. The deviance will definitely not go unnoticed (without its own consequences, of course).

[3] Artz, hilf dir selber means 'Physician, heal thyself.' It's a saying that's similar to 'the pot calling the kettle black.' The authors did know each other in real life. Mori speaking in German is just fun little easter egg.

[4] A tinsy bit of context here: Ibuse calling Hiratsuka Thunderbird didn't come out of nowhere. Her name Raichō literally means Thunderbird; a pseudonym the actual author called herself when she kickstarted her writing courier.

[5] On Yakuza hierarchy terms: Kumicho is the head of the yakuza. Shateigashira are the yakuza's Regional/Street Bosses. They command a region of the yakuza's turf and individual gangs and operations within the turf.

[6] I particularly enjoy writing Higashino's POV, but apologies for the massive info dump. Natsuo's former alias Yasuko Hanaoka is actually one of Higashino's characters in The Devotion of Suspect X while apartment 412 is another reference to Out.

[7] I am using dates because I can't work with timelines if there aren't any. BSD didn't specify what year the story starts, but I'm just going to use the date where it's published, 2012. So for confusion, the canon plot starts in 2012. This story, however, starts in 2011. The 90s and 2000s sort of made sense to me when Japan's recession period started in the 90s, which explained the slums in the series (of course, to a fictionally extreme degree). I'm still tweaking a bit of history here to make everything connect.