At The Crossroads 2 - Chaser.

The operation had gone well, and all suspects had been arrested. They had been questioned as a new day began, their belongings had been taken away, and the first reports had been written by the various members of the police force.

So... why had the situation taken this turn?

"What do you mean by that, chief?!" Kaede exclaimed, a bandage covering her left cheek.

"It is what it is, Ogata. We have to let them all go, except for that guy with the knife," said Chief Inspector Ryusaki Mabuchi, head of Criminal Division Team 3.

"We caught them red-handed, sir! So why, all of a sudden..." Kaede protested.

The chief inspector slammed his fist on his desk, causing the other desks next to his to shake.

"I'm just as upset about it as you are, but I'm asking you to calm down." He scolded her. "In all the stuff that was seized, there were neither ledgers, nor drugs. Without any concrete evidence, we can't keep them. Even if we prolonged their custody, it would be useless."

"Sir, if you extend their custody, we could find evidence in the meantime," Jun offered.

"We could have done that, except that the section chief was very clear on this: everyone out by 6:00 p.m., except the guy with the knife." Sighed Chief Inspector Ryusaki.

If the order came from a superior, they couldn't go against it. Hence, it was a lose-lose situation to argue with the chief inspector.

"I don't like it as much as you do," added the chief inspector. "But we can't do anything in this situation without risking a rebuke..."

Kaede clenched her fist slightly. This whole operation had been for nothing.

However, something intrigued her.

"You say there was not a trace of drugs, sir?" She asked.

"None," he replied, shaking his head.

"In that case, what did those guys have in the bags they brought in?" She added.

There was a slight awkward silence, before the chief inspector answered her.

"According to the lab, Hokkaido flour..." He said, running his hand through his hair.

"F... Flour?" Jun repeated, dazed.

Meanwhile, the chief inspector had leaned on his desk, resting his cheek in his hand.

"What utter nonsense..." Said Ryusaki.

"If the section chief wants to release everyone, it's to quickly bury this embarrassing case, right?" Kaede guessed.

The chief inspector did not have to answer for the young woman to get confirmation. It was a matter of public image.

Upset, the young woman excused herself to get some fresh air in the parking lot outside, under the sympathetic eyes of her two colleagues.

She hated that their efforts were in vain, and that was something they could understand.

However, even as the day continued to pass, soon reaching its end, something continued to plague the young woman.

She probably wasn't the only one thinking this, but it was far too obvious for her to let it go.

Why hadn't there been any drugs?

Their information was more than reliable though, and it was obvious that an exchange was going to happen that day.

So how... had this all turned out to be a seizure of flour bags?

That was far too suspicious a last-minute turnaround. What if... someone had tipped them off about the upcoming police operation?

That would explain the confident behavior of the two suspects she and Jun had arrested. They knew that they would have nothing to fear, even if they were to address disrespectfully two public officials.

But then, who could have warned them?

Were they working with a police officer? And if so, was he from their department, or from the drug department?

It was still too early to say, but the attitude of the suspects confirmed to Kaede that the direction her thoughts had taken was the right one.

Therefore, she quickly made a decision: she needed an outsider's view on this case.

She got into her car and drove to her friend's house, getting into the heavy traffic to reach the apartment buildings located half an hour away.

She had known Prosecutor Sagawa since college, and she knew he would surely have something to say about this case. Perhaps he would have an idea on how to proceed with the investigation, despite the suspects being free again.

He was, after all, the kind of man who always did everything by the book and followed instructions and manuals to a T. Therefore, she was sure that the situation would upset him as much as it did her.

As she parked on the street in front of the building, she saw that the lights of the fifth floor apartment were on. He was indeed home.

She quickly went upstairs to find herself in front of the door of his apartment, and very quickly, she realized that she had forgotten to warn him of her arrival.

Would he be disturbed by her sudden arrival? What if he was with someone?

No, she was pretty sure he didn't have a girlfriend. But that wasn't an excusable reason for inviting herself into someone else's home either.

She was about to ring the doorbell, when she heard a muffled noise coming from inside the apartment.

Had he dropped something?

It was rather strange, because the noise had not been that of a rigid object, but rather that of something soft and heavy.

However, something else happened. She heard the sound of someone fighting. It was faint, but she knew the sound of two people fighting. She had learned to identify it, from the time she was a simple police officer, to the detective position she was now in. It was something she could always recognize.

Then, nothing.

What was going on in this apartment?

She quickly rang the apartment doorbell, while calling the owner.

"Hide? Are you there?" She asked loudly so that the person - or persons- inside could hear her.

No answer.

Her instincts told her that something was wrong, and urged her to call the police to get backup on the scene.

She continued to ring the doorbell, which brought out Prosecutor Sagawa's neighbors into the hallway.

"What are you doing at this hour?" Asked a neighbor quite disturbed by the insistent ringing.

"Madam, call the janitor right away to open this door," ordered Kaede.

"Excuse me?"

"Now!" She ordered again, waving her police badge at the older woman.

The neighbor wasted no time and rushed inside her apartment, surely to call the janitor on the intercom in her hallway.

Kaede looked anxiously at the door: it had been a while since she heard any sound coming from the apartment, which made her very uncomfortable.

Fortunately, she did not have to wait too long, because already, a middle-aged man was coming from the elevator, a bunch of master keys in his hand.

"Are you the one who needs to open the door? Do you have a warrant?" He asked suspiciously.

"It's a matter of life and death, sir!" Kaede retorted.

The man was taken a little short by the urgent tone of the young woman, but finally complied, under the curious eyes of several neighbors who had since left their apartments.

And when he finally opened the door wide, what was waiting for them shocked them to the point of momentarily stopping them in their tracks.

A man was hanging at the end of the hallway, near the kitchen, with part of his body sticking out of the corner of the left wall.

"Hurry up and get him down from there!" cried the janitor.

Immediately, several people rushed into the apartment after him and the young policewoman, already supporting the young man's legs to allow him to breathe while someone found scissors or a knife to cut the strange rope that surrounded his neck.

But Kaede was not fooled.

She quickly observed the surroundings, and immediately spotting that the bay window leading to the balcony was partly open, she rushed to it.

Soon she was leaning against the metal railing and looking down at the street below.

The killer had probably fled that way by the time they opened the door. And too little time had passed, so chances were he hadn't had time to get very far.

She scanned the street for a very long time, the cars arriving and leaving, the few passers-by walking without suspecting what could have happened a few meters away.

Nothing stood out to her.

Could it be that this guy was already far away?

"Detective!" called someone inside.

She turned around and saw that a group of people were surrounding the young prosecutor now lying on the ground.

"I called for help, but he's not waking up!" Cried the janitor, panicked.

"You think he's dead?" Asked one of the neighbors, concerned.

No. Everything but that.

Hide couldn't die like that.

Rushing to kneel beside him, she quickly checked his breathing and heart rate.

He was still alive, but for how long?