08.
I was summoned to Inspector Ellis's office as usual.
I blinked, feeling a tingling sensation in the back of my head.
"...Did I hear wrong?"
Lieutenant Ellis turned back to me with a confused expression.
"The suspect got away."
"...Wow."
I'm too stunned to speak.
All of the Mephisto gang members we arrested on our last call escaped.
They were ambushed while traveling in a patrol car.
In the middle of the street, in broad daylight.
"What did the officers in the neighborhood do?"
I asked, dumbfounded by the question, and the answer I got was appalling.
"They said there were too many Mephisto gang members to intervene. Some of them had combat implants and heavy weapons."
"...So they just let the suspect go to save their own asses?"
"Well, they're claiming they had no choice, but... well, that's kind of the fountain of youth."
"Wow..."
I let out an exclamation for what might have been the second time today and grabbed the back of my neck.
This shit, Nova City police?
Actually, when you think about it, it's not so strange.
The perpetually underfunded and understaffed nature of the police force here means that a lot of weirdos wear the uniform.
As long as you don't have a felony on your record, the Nova City Police will accept any applicant.
It's no wonder that education and training are so poor.
But if you're asking if the officers are loyal to their jobs, well...
It's an organization that doesn't have a clue what it's doing, and it's being forced by corporate needs.
This is why the Nova City Police Department is called a bunch of assholes.
"So you're going to slap us around again?"
"Probably," I said, "as soon as the mobile patrols locate the suspect, we'll be on our way, so get everyone in gear and ready to go."
"Ha... Got it."
Once again, our SWAT team was on the back burner.
If it weren't for the pension, I'd resign a long time ago.
At this rate, I'm not going to die from being shot, I'm going to die from high blood pressure.
I walked out of the office, wondering if I should get some blood pressure medication.
.
.
. . .
. . .
. . . .
A dark, enclosed space.
An underground tavern reeking of cigarettes, alcohol, and the seedy odor of a decadent establishment.
Two men and a woman sat side by side, smoking cigarettes under the glare of a sticky neon sign.
"The goods?"
It was the man who spoke first.
He lifted his digital mask, the iconic symbol of the Mephisto gang, slightly and spat out a puff of smoke.
"It was taken."
Carmen, bandaged all over her body, rubbed her cigarette butt in the ashtray and extinguished it.
"It's not a lost harvest, though, because the data files I cloned from the implant carrier are still intact."
"Why?"
The man asked in a puzzled tone, and Carmen shrugged.
"Well, because those incompetent cops are more interested in my figure than the implants in my body."
"So you weren't stopped and frisked?"
"Nope. All my handheld weapons were taken away, and the electronic cuffs neutralized all my implants, so I guess I was caught off guard. I would have been taken to the station for a full pat-down, but you came to the rescue before that happened."
Carmen grinned mischievously and poked the man in the side.
But she quickly grew impatient with the man's unmoved reaction.
Regardless, he asked the question he'd been meaning to ask.
"What happened to the Harbor you were with? I didn't see any sign of him."
"...He's dead."
Carmen paused for a moment at the blunt question, then sighed and answered.
"You know how that asshole is."
"...So he was killed by the police."
"Well, technically, he was ambushed and killed by the Grim Reaper during a confrontation with the police, and those crazy freaks have machine guns on their arms."
With that, Carmen lifted her glass, shook it lightly, and took a long drink.
The man was still deep in thought.
"If it's the Grim Reaper... You must have touched a nerve with the Alpine Group."
"More like they're pissed that you're trying to get your hands on their goods, right?"
"..."
The man pondered, then drained his glass and pulled his mask back down.
Standing up, he patted Carmen on the shoulder and said.
"Well done. For the time being, the cops are going to be on your trail with a light in their eyes. You're going to hide out here until things calm down a bit."
"Huh?"
Carmen made a ballistic sound as she was suddenly imprisoned in an underground tavern.
"Why do I have to stay here? I hate this place, it's smelly and dirty. Besides, I can hear the customers fucking in their rooms!"
"Hang in there, I'll buy you a present when things get cleaned up."
"..."
She reacted nervously, but when he soothed her, she didn't put up much of a fight, except to grumble and sob on the table.
Having gained her unspoken consent, he laughed lightly and patted her on the head.
"When I come back tomorrow, let me know if there's anything you want to eat, and I'll buy it for you with my money."
"...Just a krispy donut, with coffee."
"Isn't that a cop's favorite?"
"Shut up. They're delicious."
.
.
.
.
.
When the man stepped outside the bar, the sun had already set and the sky was dark.
He glanced around the ar entrance for a moment to make sure no one was watching him, then quickly adjusted his digital mask.
Beep-
He pressed a button on the side of the mask for a moment, and the color of the mask changed from white to black.
At the same time, the jumper he's wearing also changes to a darker color, erasing the horned skull, the symbol of the Mephisto Gang, from his back.
In a flash, he's finished with his camouflage and immediately calls his colleague, who is waiting nearby.
There's a brief ringing in his ear, and then he hears a familiar voice.
[Leader, how'd you hide Carmen?]
"Yeah, Burke. I've got the files, so let's get back to the shop. Make sure you're not being followed."
[Don't worry. How old am I to make such a childish mistake?]
"Just in case, I'm in front of the shop, so here..."
The man was about to tell Burke where he was, but he stopped when he felt eyes watching him out of the corner of his eye.
[What the hell, what's going on?]
"...Wait."
Burke felt uncomfortable and asked what was going on, but instead of answering, the man quickly scanned his surroundings.
In the distance, he saw a car parked on the opposite side of the road.
It was a cheap model, the sort of thing you'd expect to find parked in a dirty, seedy back alley, but something in the man's gut was sending up red flags.
[Leader? Do we need backup?]
"...No. Let's move separately. You take the kids and keep a perimeter around the store, and I'll walk back to the workshop."
[Are they Cops?]
Burke asked, realizing that things were getting suspicious, and the man gave a vague answer.
"It's possible they're undercover cops, but... I'm not sure, it could be some other gang or criminal, but I don't see why we should take any chances."
[Okay, but if anything happens, call me right away, I'll come running with the kids].
"Okay. Bye."
Beep.
Conscious of his behavior so as not to appear awkward, the man ended the call.
Shoving his hands into his jumper pockets, he glances back to see that the car is still parked in its spot.
The man quickly uses the camera on his mask to capture the license plate of the car and begins to casually walk down the street.
The car remained unmoved, as if there were no occupants inside.
Of course, behind the tinted windows, which were blurred so that no one could see in from the outside, a man and woman in black suits were watching the back of the Mephisto leader.
"Hey, lady. Can you identify the man in black who's walking away now?"
"You mean the man wearing the black digital mask?"
"Yeah, the asshole with the fucking broad shoulders. Looks like he just got out of a big bout with a girl at the bar."
"...Please refrain from such crude language."
"What, you have a problem with that? You shouldn't have hired me if you don't like it."
"..."
The woman in the suit frowned at the man's aggressive response.
For someone sent by a corporation, dealing with a bounty hunter who operated out of the back alleys was a bit of an embarrassment.
"Anyway, get that asshole ID'd asap. I don't want to lose sight of him."
"...Got it."
At the bounty hunter's urging, the woman sighed and tried to access the Mephisto leader's implant chip.
"...?"
Sure enough, it failed cleanly.
"Unable to access...? Network connection blocked...?"
"Ah, shit, he noticed."
While the woman was dumbfounded by this first-time experience, the bounty hunter clicked his tongue and started the car.
Boom-!
"What the...?"
To the temporarily stunned woman, the bounty hunter chuckled.
"Miss, hold on to your seatbelt. I'm not a safe driver, so I'm going to be a little rough!"
"...!"
Boom!
Hugo the Bounty Hunter, a legend in the back alleys of Nova City.
His old sedan roared to life with a rumbling exhaust note.