Author's Note: I wrote another chapter today! That's almost three pages in one day, better than I've done in months, AND I did some dishes and a friend came to visit. It's been a very nice day. Maybe tomorrow I will do even more!
Second Story: Cognitive Silence
Summary: One-shot. While in the midst of a troublesome new missing person's case, Dojima and Nanako both have questions for Adachi.
In Tohru Adachi's high-security cell in the city, he was having fun watching a very uncomfortable security guard losing an argument with a twelve-year-old girl.
"Look," sighed the guard, "for the last time, Miss Dojima, you can't be here. You don't have authorization, and your father gave very specific orders to keep you out. How did you even get in here, anyway?"
"The other security guard – the NICE one – let me in," retorted Nanako, sweetly. "Adachi-san promised to help me with my homework, and I have to do my homework. Dad wants me to do well in school, right? So, he won't mind if I'm here. It'll be fine!"
"Ugh," muttered the guard, glaring at Adachi for, Adachi felt, no particular reason. People usually glared at him, even when he was sitting quietly and minding his own damn business. He supposed that might have something to do with the whole serial murder angle.
"What the hell kind of homework," the guard went on, "is a killer going to be able to help you with, huh?"
"Ah-ah-ah," murmured Adachi, waving an infuriating finger at the guard. "Language. She's just a kid."
The guard seethed.
"Aw, come on, forget it," muttered Adachi, finally starting to get bored with the whole thing. "Nanako'll be fine, seriously. She's perfectly safe; she's not even my type."
"Why, you-!" The guard, now purple in the face, took a step closer to Adachi, but then something attached to his belt began to buzz. He picked up his phone, glanced at it, and turned on his heel, reluctantly.
"Dojima-san," he said as he left the room, "will have something to say about this. You just wait."
Nanako waved cheerily at the guard. She and Adachi both watched him storm off.
"Temper, temper," sighed Adachi, shaking his head.
"So," asked Nanako, wide-eyed, "I'm not your type?"
"Huh?" Adachi blinked at her. "What are you-? Oh, look, that was just something I said to scare the guard away. I mean, no, obviously you're not my type. You're not, uh…I just meant that I'm not gonna hurt you, okay?"
"Why not?" Nanako smiled, appeared unfased.
Adachi rolled his eyes. "Because I don't feel like it. You said you've got homework?"
Nanako unzipped her backpack and pulled out what looked like a newspaper article that someone had printed off the internet. She waved it at Adachi, and he snatched it from her and took a look. The article read,
MAJOR PSYCHOLOGY BREAKTHROUGH
Recent developments in the notorious "Phantom Thieves" case has led to a major discovery! Research by respected scientist Wakaba Isshiki reveals the existence of a world inside the human mind, which experts have nicknamed "the cognitive world," full of things called "Palaces" that represent the degradation of the human heart. Is this the end of the world as we know it? Have humans finally gone too far?
Adachi snorted a derisive laugh.
"Where," he asked, "did you get this? Take it from a police detective; this doesn't come from a credible source. You can't believe everything you hear or read. This looks like garbage."
"It's not garbage," returned Nanako coolly, "I think it's the truth. I think you know all about it. Is this the world inside the TV where you threw those people so that the shadow monsters could kill them?"
For once, Adachi had no response. He gritted his teeth and didn't meet her eyes. This was not a conversation he'd expected to be having today.
"Look," he began, taking a deep breath.
"I remember what you said, all those times," Nanako went on. "I remember you said you killed them by throwing them into a magical world full of monsters in the TV, only the monsters made them kill themselves. Is this that world? Is it the cognitive world? Because if it is, then maybe Dad will finally believe you."
Adachi looked her straight in the eye at last.
"Your Dad," he told her, "is never going to believe any of that story; not my story, and not the one in this dumbass news article."
"Language," Nanako reminded him. Adachi ignored her.
"He's a detective," he went on, "and what's worse, he's actually a pretty good detective, although if you ever tell him I said, that, I'll never let you in here again, got it? He's not gonna believe a bunch of mumbo-jumbo from the internet, so let's just drop this right here. You said you had homework. What is it?"
"If Dad could believe you," Nanako insisted, "it would make him feel a lot better. I think it would make you feel a lot better, too."
Adachi sighed. "I feel just fine, thanks," he said. "Except, I'm starting to get a little annoyed with this 'let's-get-mommy-and-daddy-bacl-together' game. You're not a little kid anymore, Nanako, you know exactly how stupid this is."
Nanako was indignant. "It's not stupid! Tell me the truth!"
"You honestly believe that finding out that his former partner really killed a bunch of people by pushing them into another universe that really exists is gonna make your Dad sleep better at night?" Adachi gave her a doubtful look. "It's been five years. I'm behaving myself; I'm off the radar. We're not talking about this, and if you don't get out of here, I'm gonna do some crazy shit to scare the crap out of that guard so that nobody ever lets you back in my cell again."
"No," said Nanako simply, "you aren't. You won't. You'd get lonely."
"You sure?" asked Adachi, half getting out of his chair and giving her his best, very slightly menacing smile.
"I'm sure." Nanako shrugged, then grabbed back the news article out of his fingers and shoved it into her backpack again. "Fine. If you won't tell me, I'll ask Big Bro…whenever he gets back."
For a moment, Nanako looked annoyed.
"He hasn't been back in weeks," she added, with a little sigh.
"He's busy saving the world with the power of friendship," explained Adachi sympathetically. "Kumbaya, and all that super-hero shit. Can't be helped."
Adachi gave Nanako a comforting little pat on the forearm, and she tried to suppress a smile, but didn't quite succeed.
There was the sound of the door unlocking behind them, and then Dojima stormed into the room.
"Adachi! Nanako? The guard told me you'd showed up. What are you doing here?" Dojima glared.
Nanako and Adachi looked at each other, and shrugged.
"Homework," they said together. Dojima's scowl only deepened.
Dojima looked tired, thought Adachi, but that wasn't unusual. He had huge dark circles under his eyes, and Adachi could hear him grinding his teeth.
"Working hard, huh?" Adachi shot him a half-sympathetic smile. Turning to Nanako, he added, winking at her, "I deduce, Watson, that our dear Holmes is working on a pretty tricky case!"
Nanako giggled.
Dojima ignored Adachi, and shot a stern look at Nanako.
"Nanako," he said, "go home. Adachi and I need to talk."
He obviously wasn't in the mood for jokes. Adachi let the smile drop off his face.
"But, Dad-!" began Nanako.
Dojima didn't even let her finish the sentence.
"Go home," he growled. "Now. I'll see you later."
Nanako, who'd lived with the pride of the Inaba police department for twelve long years, knew better than to argue with him when that tone was in his voice. Looking even more annoyed and a little worried, she pulled her backpack onto her shoulders and slunk from the room, glancing back once at Adachi before disappearing into the prison hall.
Adachi looked up at Dojima.
"Honestly, officer," he said, shrugging, "I'm innocent. I've got an alibi and everything." He pointed at the big lock on the prison door, raised an eyebrow.
Dojima was silent for a long moment. Then, he took a deep breath.
"My old senpai," he began quietly, "transferred to the city two years ago. He did me a few favors, back when he was still working in Inaba, and the other day he called me up to ask me if I could help him out with something. Seems there's a kid who's gone missing; Goro Akechi, a big-name boy detective who got pretty famous not long before those Shadow Thieves started making the news. You heard of him?"
"What's the deal with all these kid detectives, huh?" Adachi shook his head, waxed philosophical. "Is there something new in the school lunches these days, or what? Somehow, Japan keeps turning out baby prodigies, like that Naoto Shirogane, and now this…wait, what was his name?"
"Goro Akechi," repeated Dojima. "There's plenty of reason to believe that he was involved with Masayoshi Shido, who is being investigated for his alleged engineering of several murders, specifically that of Wakaba Isshiki, a gifted scientist who discovered something have to do with…" Here, Dojima paused, sighed under his breath, and began again. "The 'palaces' that exist within the 'cognitive world,' of the human mind."
"Oh." Adachi winced. "Come on…not you, too."
Dojima didn't look any happier than Adachi felt.
"It's all too bizarre to be true," Dojima was muttering, half to himself, half to Adachi. "It sounds like nothing more than a kid's comic, or bad dream, but…"
"Preaching to the choir," mumbled Adachi.
"Adachi." Unexpectedly, Dojima reached out and put a heavy hand on Adachi's shoulder. Startled, Adachi looked up and found Dojima fixing him with a very serious, very severe expression.
"Tell me everything," said Dojima, "again, from the very beginning. Tell me the whole story."
Adachi felt the earnestness of Dojima's gaze boring into the place where his soul would probably have been, if he had one, which he doubted.
"Nah," he said softly, shaking off Dojima's hand and smiling to himself. "Nah…Sorry, but I've got nothing new to say."
Author's End Note: Oh man, I haven't written Adachi in a long time. It never stops being fun.
