Chapter 4
With the help of information from O'Neal, they're able to find the name of the Colombian who brought 'fairy' from that side to San Teresa.
Amazingly, O'Neal noted down the plate number of almost every cars that visited his club. When he filters through notable numbers from the list and checks it with his acquaintance from the Substation 7 he quickly finds the target Colombian's address.
Antonio Albanese, aged 24 with record of two prior arrests.
"5081 Mason Street, room number 603. Remember, now you own me one, Kei."
"Thanks, Roy"
Police Sergeant of Substation 7 on the other side of the phone — his classmate from the police academy years — answers back amicably. Matoba doesn't think much of this debt he's making, if he really wants this information there are other ways to obtain it. But checking with them like this is a way of politely informing the local station. It's merely one of the gestures of courtesy to maintain the delicate relationship between the central police department detectives and local detectives.
Matoba then contacts his boss, Roth.
"Got the information?"
"Somewhat."
Matoba gives his boss the address of the Colombian.
"Seems like Albanese was the one who brought the fairy to this city, those Filipinos just stole it from him. That Albanese guy is probably panicking over losing such an important cargo right about now. If he's not desperately trying to get the fairy back, he's probably fleeing from the city. Well, we will know it soon anyway."
"Need backup?"
His boss asks him whether he wants assault team likes SWAT prepared.
"Nah, I think it's fine. But if there's no contact after 30 minutes then you can start to worry about me."
"Understood. That Semanian—— Exedilika, how's she?"
"She's in the front passenger's seat. Do you want to hear her voice?"
Having said that, Matoba faces the phone's microphone toward Tilarna.
"Say hello."
"What?"
Tilarna makes a puzzled face, Roth then speaks from the phone.
"I heard it. Don't let her get hurt."
"Well, I will try."
"Don't go in yet, wait first."
"Why?"
"I will contact Substation 7 first, if they interfere in the middle of things it will get messy."
"I already contacted them, through Roy."
"It's not the same this time. You have a Semanian VIP with you. Better do it properly and contact the station chief."
Damn, it comes to this.
Matoba curses in his mind.
"...Understood. Please do it as fast as you can."
He stops his car on the street near the 'Seven Miles' residential area close to the alley with rows of one-storey buildings.
"We wait here."
Matoba stops the car engine and tells Tilarna so. Tilarna finally loosen her fingers from the sabre scabbard.
"So we are going to arrest that Colombian guy next right?"
"Well, yes. But boss said we have to wait for the go signal first."
Matoba leans back into his seat and let out a groans in low voice.
The sun has almost sunk beyond the skyline. Light can be seen from Albanese's room windows. Honestly, he wants to find something to eat, but that will have to wait until after he finishes this job. For a normal pair, one would keep their eyes on the target and the other one would go buy some food from the nearby store. But for Tilarna, he doesn't want to ask her to do anything at all.
When he turns the radio on, a Super Bowl match is airing.
But the match is being played in Atlanta, not San Teresa. In the last year, AFC Patriots won another landslide, his co-workers all complain 'What a dull season'. Matoba is not interested in football from the start, but he really loves watching baseball which has many amazing Japanese players.
"I don't get it."
Tilarna listens to the broadcast and complains.
"The voices coming from this radio, what are they talking about?"
"It's sport. Kinda Earthling proxy war."
".....?"
"Your country should also have it, shouldn't they? Or perhaps you have people fight to the death like Roman gladiators?"
"My world also has something like that."
Unexpectedly, Tilarna also knows word like gladiator.
"My country hasn't held one for over 200 years, but if it's wooden sword fencing in front of the lord we do hold it quite often."
"What a surprise. So you guys do value human lives."
"Of course, unlike you dorinies who wouldn't make releasing poison from workshops or killing an unborn baby a crime."
"Pollution and abortion huh? Those are also quite complex issues. You know what? Let's stop talking politics."
"Not politics, morals"
"Whatever."
They idly listen to the broadcast for about 15 minutes.
Both of them hardly exchange words with each other. Suddenly, Tilarna looks out the car window and says.
"Farbarnian"
"?"
"A Semanian Farbarnian just passed by there."
From the corner of Matoba's eyes he sees a man in black coat crosses the street and disappears around the nearby corner. He couldn't get a good look at the man face.
"There are no Semanian around here right?"
"There aren't many, but not like there are none at all."
Matoba answers with disinterested. Tilarna narrows her eyes toward corner the man disappeared behind and looks intently. After not saying anything for about 30 seconds, she speaks again.
"I can smell it."
"That's so? Well, you aliens are stinking country bumpkins all the same."
"Idiot. It's lartena. I'm saying it's the same smell from that dead body."
"Uuu...."
Matoba sits himself back up from the deeply leaned against seat and turns his eyes toward corner the man disappeared to. He can't see him any more, but the direction the man disappeared to is the direction of the entrance to the suspect Colombian, Albanese, apartment.
Don't tell me....
He hesitates for a moment. There's still no go signal from his boss.
Nothing he can do about that.
"This is bad."
Matoba immediately decides, he opens the door and leaps out of the car. He unholsters automatic pistol from behind his waist while starts running toward Albanese's apartment.
"So we're going in?"
Tilarna follows him like a matter of course. Matoba stops and glares at her.
"No, you waits here."
"That will not do."
"Don't be ridiculous! What good can you do? Just obediently stay...."
This is hopeless. He doesn't have time to be arguing with her.
"Damn it! Do as you please."
Matoba clicks his tongue and runs. He passes through the walkway and kicks down the entrance fence gate. He passes by in front of a mailbox—— the elevator is no use, it's now on sixth floor—— he runs to the stair inside. Albanese's room is on the sixth floor. He runs up the stair three steps at a time like a speeding bullet. With such force the girl shouldn't be able to catch up, but he can hear Tilarna's breaths and footsteps right behind him.
He's amazed, she can keep up with him.
Even as he's silently amazed, he's frantically climbing the dimly lit staircase without looking back. Dirty wall and rusting handrail pass through his vision.
At that moment a light flashes behind him. Probably an almost broken fluorescent lamp blinking—— Matoba who is in a hurry thinks so to himself.
Third floor, fourth floor, fifth floor. Finally, sixth floor.
As expected, he's out of breath. Quite a difference from the time of hellish training in the Self-Defence Forces, he mocks himself.
He gets to the sixth floor hallway. What he's looking for is room 603.
"What the hell!"
As he thought. The room 603 door is partially opened, it's been broken in from the outside.
Maybe it's still not too late, Matoba hangs onto a thread of his hope and rushes into the room 603 without caring about room clearing procedures he's been taught from the police academy or army Killing House, relying on only his senses, experience and reflex.
The interior is tastefully decorated in monotone theme.
He passes through the entrance. Left and right of the hallway are bedroom and bathroom, there's no one there. He walks in while scanning the living room with his sharp eyes. On the wine-red sofa in front of a 30-inch television screen, there're two men there.
The dark skin man is a Colombian, he's now lying face up on the sofa gushing up blood from his mouth. The other one is a Semanian in black coat holding a curved blade knife in his hand, looking down at the dying man.
"Freeze! Police!"
Matoba shouts and holds the 9mm pistol straight with both his hands.
The man looks this way. His right hand holding the knife moves.
Flash. The knife cut through the air spinning toward Matoba's face. The knife barely grazes his cheek and lodges itself on the door behind him.
No, simply saying lodges itself does not do justice to it. That knife completely penetrate to the other side of the door, the whole blade up to the hilt stuck in the wall. The hinges that were holding the door are completely warped, the door makes a clamorous sound as it fall off from its frame to the floor.
That was an incredible strength. Not something an ordinary person could do.
There's no time to be panicking. Matoba immediately prepares to fire back. Almost at the same time, he is pushed from the side. Tilarna shoves him away, the bullet misses from the disrupted aim. Tilarna moves to pursue the man turning around to escape. Her sabre draws an arc through the air, but the man nimbly jump back, causing her sabre tip to just grazes the man nose.
The man's movement is inhuman.
He makes a somersault in the air and lands in front of a window. The man looks back over his shoulder and pulls a pistol — No, not a pistol but a machine pistol, an Israeli Micro Uzi — out.
Fire blazes from the gun muzzle.
He fires a sweeping barrage in full auto. A series of high-pitch cracks reverberates through the air.
Matoba grabs Tilarna, who's blindly trying to stab the man, in the shoulder and pushes her down. One moment late and she would be Swiss cheese. Dozens of 9mm bullets fly over the prone pair's heads.
Countless number of bullet holes appear on the wall behind them, ripping up the decorating picture postcards. Furthermore, vases and lamps are shattered to small pieces and sent flying all over the place.
"Bastard!"
Broken pieces of glass and debris rain down on his head. Matoba yells in anger and fires back. He can't aim properly but he hopes to create a chance for them to move if that guy flinches only a little——.
The other side doesn't flinch at all.
As if not caring about his own life, the man retreats while mechanically laying down precise volleys. Matoba practically can't poke his head out of the cover. The gunfire momentary stops. His opponent is changing magazine. Now.
He gets up and fires a three-shot burst. It hits the man's torso.
The man does not fall down, but calmly cocking the gun handle, points the muzzle to him and violently continues firing. Matoba pushes Tilarna, who's trying to get up, down, and goes prone himself.
Firing until the magazine runs dry, the man breaks the room windows and escapes to outside balcony. He probably plans to run downstairs through the fire escape.
When Matoba and Tilarna get up, they shout in anger at the same time.
"Why did you get in my way!?"
Matoba got pushed when he was taking a shot, Tilarna got shoved down when she was about to slash the man. Truly a terrible cooperation. But when they shout in anger they instead do it at the same time, what a joke.
Let put the quarrel for later. Matoba irritatedly clicks his tongue and runs to the window.
"I'll follow him! You go ahead of him, go down the elevator and——"
Matoba stops mid-sentence and makes an annoyed face. There's no way he can trust this girl to execute a complicate pincer attack plan.
"——No, it's fine. You wait here, don't move."
"Not a chance, I will catch that man."
"I said it's fine, don't do anything!"
Even as he's trying to intimidate her by angrily shouting with all his voice, Tilarna starts pursuing the man, not caring about him. She passes by Matoba's side and climbs the broken window frame.
"Wait! He has a machine pistol, you know!?"
This is too reckless. After he said that, he finally notices a change in Tilarna.
Before he knows, Tilarna is in a suit of white armour.
The armour has a silvery sheen pattern, covering major parts of her small body. It's designed in such way that does not restrict movement. From its look it seems to be lightweight. It's clearly different from the Farbarnian style clothings that she wore not long ago.
Since when?
The time to change into that armour, from when they leaps out of their car to now, there shouldn't be even a second of that.
"Don't worry. This armour can defend against dorini's weapons."
She shows a face that not to the point of smiling, but is very relaxed. At that moment the childish appearance of Tilarna seems to resemble a veteran warrior. A professional soldier or police who knows what he can or cannot do will have an expression likes this in the face of danger. Tilarna at this moment is the same.
Tilarna goes after the assassin and disappears to the other side of the window. If it comes to this then he has no choice but to go ahead and set up an ambush. Matoba runs back to the hall way, plunges into the elevator that's still waiting on the sixth floor, and presses the button for the first floor.
While he's stuck in the elevator he keeps thinking. That assassin is the same as the Filipino guy who killed Rick, he's being controlled by a Semanian shaman. That absurd strength and that vitality. He also doesn't feel fear or pain. If he really is a puppet, even if they can catch him it would be hard to get any information out of him.
Even so, it's still strange. Why would the 'shaman' who controls that guy go to the lengths to arm his sacrificial pawn with a machine pistol and send him to confront them? Just killing that Colombian Albanese guy should be enough to silence his mouth, why would he need to run away? Why wouldn't he just commit suicide with the knife he was holding?
The elevator arrives at the first floor.
Matoba impatiently waits for the elevator's door to open and immediately leaps out. The balcony's fire escape is to the west of the apartment. When that assassin gets down from the fire escape he should be running to the north on the nearby footpath.
Matoba rushes to the backside alleyway, he sees the Semanian assassin right on the platform between the second and third floor of the fire escape. Tilarna, holding a drawn sabre in her hand, is charging down from the third floor. The man turns his gun muzzle, aiming at the girl.
"Get down——"
He fires in full auto. A torrent of bullets attacks Tilarna. She crosses her arms to protect the head area. The bullets hit her shoulder, chest, stomach, and thigh.
"!"
Tilarna was struck. Her small body shakes multiple times from the bullets impact. She powerlessly collapses on her back and slowly slides down the stair.
The man climbs the handrail and jumps down from the fire escape.
"Freeze!"
Concern about Tilarna has to be put for later. He shouts an order out of ingrained police habit. Sure enough, the man points machine pistol his way. Matoba shoots him around his heart. Even so, the man's gun erupts flame. Hail of bullets flies everywhere. Some bullets hit and ricochet off the asphalt, others the building wall.
Matoba takes cover near a garbage can and clicks his tongue. His meagre 9mm rounds can't do a thing. He should've brought a shotgun from his car with him. Had he used a powerful slug round, even a zombie would be incapacitated in a single round.
(Well——)
This is not the time to be regretting that. Right now his cover is a paper-thin garbage can. If that guy keeps shooting, his life will be in danger. At this rate——.
Matoba's train of thought has to stop there.
Tilarna leaps down from the second floor of the fire escape, swiftly descends, and cut the assassin diagonally down from his back with her full force.
His left shoulder almost separates from his right flank in a single stroke.
There's absolutely no death throe. Without any expression, the man crumbles down in a fountain of blood.
From afar, patrol cars' sirens can be heard. At his feet is the assassin's dead body.
After an uncomfortable silence, Matoba yells at Tilarna.
"You just suddenly cut him in two!"
Despite being gunned down earlier, Tilarna doesn't seem to suffer any injury. Her armour protected her from the assassin's gunfires. The white metal plate has a little bit of soot sticks to it, but doesn't seem to have any dent.
After having just killed a person, Tilarna's breath is undisturbed. Like water in a tranquil lake, she gazes at the man. Her armour and face are dyed in crimson spots from the man's blood. If he has to berate her for anything, it's not for her not being sicken by blood, but for her seemingly unfeeling attitude.
Illuminated by street lamps, the girl's white visage and the spreading pool of blood at her feet seems to float amongst the thin veil of darkness. The glamour, the immatureness, the brutality, they all conjures up a startling paradox. A picturesque scene is created on accident. A gorgeous young lady holding a blood-stained sabre, like a scene straight out of your dream.
But he isn't in the least captivated by it.
The situation left them with no choice but to kill him. But that kind of thing should be 'left to the adult'. With this appearance—— this innocent young girl appearance, Tilarna ruthlessly did this sort of thing. Matoba feels exasperated at the incongruity.
"So this is the justice you spoke about? Act like Don Quixote? Catching this guy and arrest him, did you not even think about that? Did you intend to turn this guy into a sashimi?"
He knows what he's saying is unreasonable. He was trying to shoot this guy to death just a moment before. It doesn't matter whether he died by a gunshot wound or by a blade. If thing went badly he instead would probably be the one lying on the street bleeding to death right now.
Indeed, this is just him venting his anger.
"That man was controlled by arts. I don't think he will yield any information even if we interrogate him."
Finally, Tilarna opens her mouth.
"Then, why would that guy run away? If he really is an expendable puppet would there be a need for him to fight us? Now that he's dead we don't have any lead to go on."
The girl raises corners of her eyes and stares daggers at him.
"Because you were going to be killed, dorini. You don't have to be thankful, but you have no right to reproach me."
"Oh, me? You intended to help me?"
"As a knight of Mirvor, protecting the weak is my duty."
"That was none of your business. Also, I'm not weak. At least I can judge when to stop a thoughtlessly charging idiot."
"Are you speaking about me?"
"Seems like you alien bastards have at least some imagination. I'm relief. While we're at it, let me tell you something. I'm starting to feel like you're being sent here to hinder the investigation more than anything."
"What do you mean?"
"That was unintentional?"
Matoba puts on a pretentious smile and looks at Tilarna. His eyes are not smiling at all.
"I don't care what kind of big shot you are. Perhaps you got some pocket money from someone on that side, that's just my feeling."
"What are you trying to say?"
"Let's say, if it would be inconvenient for someone on that side in case the fairy gets rescued, and then there's this honourable knight that they bribed. So the honourable knight comes to this city and disrupt some investigation.... something like that. The previous scene was a bit too violent, so I'm starting to suspect something."
In the next instant, Tilarna brandishes her long sabre in a flash, its blade stops exactly on Matoba's neck.
"This will be my first and last warning, Kei Imatuba."
She speaks with seething, quivering voice, as if to repress a rage on the verge of exploding. Her small body seems to enlarge manyfold.
"If you use that kind of words to insult me a second time. I will cut you down. I'm serious."
"Hee. That's so?"
He looks at the gleaming naked blade with apathetic eyes and mutters.
"Did my low birth barbarian words hurt you that bad?"
"Silence!"
"Sure, sure."
Matoba shrugs his shoulders. His pistol in a hip firing position produces a click sound. It was a sound of him lowering the hammer[1]. At the same time as when Tilarna was unsheathing her sabre, he pointed his gun at the girl's delicate chin.
Perhaps just noticing the gun pointing at her from the hammer dropping sound, the girl seems to be surprised.
He put the gun back into its holster like nothing happened. He's already vented his anger, there's no point in continuing this dispute any further.
Matoba turns his back to the still standing Tilarna. He crouches down beside the assassin's dead body and starts examining the man's possessions.
"The gun is an unlicensed copy one, straight up rip-off from the genuine Israeli ones. Even so, obtaining this gun as a Semanian would be quite difficult. Other than the gun are.... ah— only some cash to use in the escape, no driving license, no working visa, and of course, not even a video rental store's point card."
He takes wrinkles bills and coins out of the man's pocket, heaves a sigh and puts it back into the pocket. He then looks over his shoulder to Tilarna and speaks in a soft tone.
"Hey, I just want to ask you one thing."
"What is it.....?"
"You really want to catch the culprit and take the fairy back right?"
"Of course."
Tilarna says so while awkwardly putting her sabre back into the scabbard.
"Me too. So, why do we have to shout at each other with weapons drawn in this filthy alley anyway?"
"......."
"Well, whatever. Let's get back to work. You wait here and keep watch on the dead body until the local unit arrives."
Matoba gets up and walks to the main street.
"Where are you going?"
"I'm going back to that Albanese guy's room earlier. I want to check on something."
Tilarna doesn't say 'I'm coming with you'. Seems like she plans to obediently wait there. Matoba once again gets on the elevator from the apartment's front entrance. He heads to the room 603, the other tenants are crowded the common hallway surrounding the room 603 from a distance. They whisper to each other about one thing or another with anxious faces.
"Move aside. Police."
He pushes his way through the crowd and enters the room.
The marks from the gunfight are still fresh. The body of that Colombian guy, Albanese, is still in the living room. In the bedroom there's a Boston bag left opened, clothes are scattered around it. Seems like he's in the middle of packing. Was he planning to run away?
He searches Albanese's dead body. There are wallet and a couple keys, but no mobile phone.
He searches bedroom for a landline phone, there's no sign of it even in places where it should be. Living room also doesn't have one. Even the cord got taken away.
"Damn it."
They got tricked. Now they can't check the call history, voice mail, or fax. After Matoba's team went after the assassin, someone came into this room and skilfully got rid of all potential evidences. This guy sure has some nerve.
The reason someone had that assassin — that puppet clashed with them and escaped, this is probably what they're aiming for, to lure Matoba and Tilarna out of the room.
Of course they can subpoena the phone provider for the call history, but that will require a court order and will take at least several hours to be approved. In that time the 'opponent' would have finished sweeping other evidences clean from the record. Now there's no way to know what Albanese talked with whom on his phone.
Matoba goes back to the hallway and asks other residents around about any suspicious person they saw. They answer none. Then Matoba continues to insistently search around the room, but doesn't find anything substantial. After this will be the forensics turn. Although he probably couldn't place his hope too high.
The enemy is quite shrewd. Very formidable.
Until now, he's treated this case as a drug gang related case. At most he thought it was a turf war between some shitty yakuzas with ties to high-purity narcotics.
But this isn't any of that.
Just the skilfulness of the perpetrator is a testament to the seriousness of this case. The fairy is much more important than he thought. That fairy wasn't just a simple VIP, perhaps the root of this situation is even deeper than this?
Then there is Tilarna.
Even if it seems like the Semanian knight really want to rescue the fairy back, she's still hiding something. The timing that the girl arrived at this city, and him being pushed into being a babysitter. If one thinks about it, the timing is too strange. It's been almost 10 years since the start of Earth-Semani relation. It wouldn't be strange if diplomats who have some understanding of this side's procedure were dispatched here.
Instead, the one who came is that girl. Is there something going on behind the scene?
(What in the world is happening?)
There are too many unanswered questions. Matoba shakes his head and clicks his tongue.
The main street is filled with noise. Finally, the local police unit arrives together with their patrol car's deafening siren sound. What a slow respond. Nowadays the respond has been slow, no matter which district it is. San Teresa's public order is worsening, but the funding and personnel are entirely inadequate.
Seeing a badge-less Tilarna who stands in front of a murder scene starts having an argument with the arriving officers, Matoba quickly leaves the apartment.
His boss Roth doesn't censure them for going in without his permission. He always respects Matoba and his teams' situational judgement. Then there's the fact that boss' good will ended up backfired, Had they gone in the moment they arrived Albanese might not have died.
"More importantly is the timing of the attack."
Boss Roth talks on the other side of the radio.
"If Albanese wasn't being watched then there's a leak."
It's as he says. The attack happened just before Matoba's team seizes Albanese. Hard to imagine it's merely a simple coincident. Perhaps their opponent knows that the police is investigating Albanese and decides to send someone to seal that guy's mouth. An astonishingly quick reaction, how did they get the information anyway?
"I don't know either. In any case, the possibilities are as many as stars in the sky."
"What about that information broker O'Neal?"
"That guy being the mole is also a possibility, or perhaps that guy's bouncer Kenny. Maybe it's from some guy in the Substation 7. Maybe it's you, maybe it's me. But at least we can exclude this gallant knight, at any rate this girl doesn't even know how to use a phone."
Tilarna who is sitting in the front passenger's seat frowned.
"I do know, you know?. I've read it from a book."
"Really? Amazing, there definitely must be nothing you don't know, mustn't it."
Matoba ignores Tilarna who is glaring at him with her forehead twitching and continue the discussion.
"....As we discussed, I will keep this report short. Although, If possible I want to speak with you face to face."
"That's fine with me. But be careful out there. We're definitely not dealing with an ordinary gang matter here."
"Roger that. .....Let's go."
Matoba hangs up the radio and accelerates his car.
"Where are we going?"
Tilarna asks. The girl is now back in her usual clothes. The armour from back then is now nowhere to be found.
"Several places. Just in case, we have to go check whether O'Neal is a mole or not, then try to get in contact with someone who knows Albanese, perhaps his Colombian brothers might have some clues. Then we need to question some boat captains, the one who can go back and forth between the 'gate' must be what carried Albanese and the fairy to this city."
"The smugglers aren't they? Do you already have a target in mind?"
"Just say my unit name."
"Special Vice Squad."
"As you just says."
The works Special Vice Squad responsible for are primarily drugs and firearms related, other than that they are also dealing with contraband and smuggling. They also do undercover operations. Naturally, they have a lot of information on smugglers, there also are some smugglers that they purposefully let go to keep an eye on.
"Other than business people—— maybe his woman? Although we don't know any specific woman he is related to."
"In that case will it work?"
"Well. Let's just see how it goes."
⛌⛌⛌⚖⚔⚖⚔⚖⛌⛌⛌
↑ 1. Matoba's service pistol seems to be SIG Sauer P226R.
Translator's Note
After some suggestions from people on the discord server, I decided to change the default tense to present. This should help to alleviate confusions in the translation.... or not(?). Tell me what you think and if I have time I will go and change the previous chapters to conform to the new tense style.
Also change 七分署 from Division 7 to Substation 7.
Hello! First, Sorry for the long hiatus. Past couple of months has been quite eventful to say the least, and I'm sure that's also true for all of you out there around the world. Uncertain schedule and plans that don't survive the week seem to be a new normal at this time. Well, thing has calm down quite a bit, at least in my country, and I hope yours will be the same soon. Let's return to some normalcy in a reasonable time. Good luck, wash your hands, and stay safe.
To Detective Masterclass on discord, sorry, I misclicked and reject your friend request. If you could somehow leave a comment in this chapter with discord tag for me to add you back or join my discord server that would be great.
