"Oh shit!" June said before letting my pants go and the man successfully dragged me into the attic.
It was pitch dark inside the space after the inclined ceiling fell off as we got on the top.
"That was a heavy pull," I heard a low whisper right behind my ears.
I immediately worked on my reflex and swung my hand towards his direction only to hit the empty air with a swoosh.
A moment later, the pitch-black attic turned bright as the man moved the shingles from a specific area.
I was surprised to find him a lot further than me without creating any sound.
"Catch me, beautiful," he said as I crawled towards him. Wait, that sounds weird.
He gave me a two-finger salute before leaping out to the open sky and I followed after him.
As soon as the man stepped his foot on the rooftop, an immediate gunshot was heard.
I noticed Orqle lifting the portable ceiling before I joined the man in his sprinting party.
In this case, I miss Gale. He was the fastest and most efficient runner the department had. If that bastard hadn't eaten those dairy products, he could have been helping us instead of filling the septic tank.
Nevertheless, it had become a bad habit of mine to push blame to others. Why is there the necessity of Gale when I am here?
A bit overconfident as it sounds, those were the words that kept my spirit and atomic courage to run on a rooftop and jump from building to building.
For the God's Sake, I was running with just one shoe and already followed the man to five buildings. Whereas Orqle has already stopped at the Import Office rooftop, he couldn't proceed further.
Since running with one shoe was difficult, I stopped my momentum for a second, took my shoe in my right hand and resumed my running.
It would not be wrong to call this man a ninja as his skills were too akin to one. He leapt from one building to another at an unhumanable pace. I being a moderate old-school policeman did nothing but follow his artwork and made impressive jumps with copied skills.
As I jumped through different columns of roofs, along with concrete bricks and shingles, I met humans.
I was clueless about how the man felt, but I felt very awkward when I had to pass through a rooftop balcony where a boy was leaning his head towards the girl to kiss and that abrupt moment, we came to disturb.
Firstly the man passed the couple.
"Who are you?" The boy asked in surprise. In answer, he got a swosh of wind which bent his perfect hair.
Secondly, I passed with a shoe in my hand.
"Who Are You?" this time, he dared to question me disrespectfully. In answer, I threw my shoe as a projectile towards his face where our police department symbol was drawn.
Now you know your answer!
The man was so close to me yet so far, his vest stripes flew back with his momentum and I could have grabbed those if my hands were a more longer.
We successfully jumped from the roof balcony and landed on a tin rooftop.
There was a satellite dish pole attached to a small pavement area in the tin roof. I thought of taking advantage of that pole, instead of going straight to the man I went for the pole and swung my body with rigorous force.
Successfully for the first time, my barefoot hit the man in his vest protected stomach.
The man, not for pain but for the sudden shock goes out of his balance and I took advantage of his situation.
I immediately jumped on top of him, bound his arms by my knees and restrained his body from movement.
"In the end, I caught you handsome." I took out the handcuff from my belt and with with hard trial cuffed his hands.
I took out my walkie-talkie and said, "Detective Venesa reporting, Hello?"
I tried to reach but the signal on the other end was bad, we went in a different direction, while June and Jake remained near about the Import Office Street.
Direct encounter was prohibited in the kingdom, hence I could only restrict the man.
"Venesa! Detective Venesa!" I heard a distant voice from my walkie-talkie.
"I have successfully restrained the criminal," I said hurriedly before the signal would go again.
"Where are you?" This time June's voice came a little clearer.
"East to the Import Office, on top of a building," I replied.
"Any significance?"
"There's a satellite dish hanging in a long iron pole beside me and the rooftop is made of a tin of red colour," I said pressing my body harder against the man as he wiggled to free himself.
"Alri..." The signal went bad again as she might have started running.
"Can you stop struggling?" I asked the disobedient man beneath me. I tapped around his body to search for any hidden weapon and to my surprise, found nothing on his body.
"Are you really a novice?" I asked. "You don't even have a spare weapon?"
To answer my question, he shook his head with a careless smile and relaxed his body underneath mine.
"I am just too skilled darling," he said before rolling himself in an abrupt second and trapping me with his knees.
He took out my knife from its holder, inserted the sharp point into the handcuff's hole and freed his bounded hands.
"Bye-bye again," he said as he instantly got up to run away but this time, I would not let him go.
I immediately got up from my position and held his hand from behind to push him back. He had my knife but I didn't care.
"You are a Ghost City member, right?" I didn't notice before but upon close inspection, he had a skeleton tattoo on his neck.
But before he could have given me an answer, our body seemed to be rolling at its own will on the tilted tin.
"Shit, shit, shit" I muttered as my body was going down with the stranger and the pole or anything was long away to help us from falling.
I expected to break some of my bones but nothing happened. Why? Because I was hanging in the air.
The man had somehow managed to balance both of us, as he grabbed the rainwater gutter with one hand and me with another.
And below me, horror awaits, the sewage gutter. The black water with pollutants rushed with an intense flow and the smell coming from it disgusted my guts.
By that time, June, Jake and other forces reached us with equipped arms and to my horror, he did what I thought he would.
As soon as the gunshot was fired, the man immediately let my shirt go, leapt as he did before and got lost in the bright sun.
Whereas I fell flat-faced in the sewage water as the man ran away with his crimes. My hard work was drained in this drain, I accepted defeat.
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