Back to the Kagome angst! This is so evil but I really do have a lot of fun writing these…and I also really enjoy keeping identities secret. It's a crime mystery, after all.
As usual, many thanks to Sassybratt!
He fucked up big time.
It's not as if he was some amateur—that was the second biggest thing that bothered him the most. He'd done loads of missions in and out of the city before, of all kinds, depending on what the boss needed. This was supposed to have been one of the easier ones. All he had to do was slip in, find anything useful, take pictures, and leave. If he didn't find anything, then he'd come back later to plant something and then use that as "evidence". It was impossible to mess up.
Except life decided to throw a wrench in his face by having one of the homeowners stay in sick instead of at work. How could he have possibly known? They all had the couple's schedules memorised beforehand: both left the house at exactly 7 AM, with the woman returning at 2:30 PM and the man at 4:30. They had plenty of time to scout out the area behind the complex and plan things out. He was chosen for being the nimblest of them all, and because he had previous experience in breaking and entering. And it was going so well, too. The apartment's tiny and cramped layout meant his job was sped up immensely.
But then he heard the shōji scrape open…and turned around to find the woman staring back at him.
What he hadn't counted on was for the little bitch to raise absolute hell. She lunged and tore into him with a ferocity he didn't think was possible in a sick woman. She spat and scratched and punched and kicked and screamed. God, did she scream. Just remembering it made him want to puke. And he hated having a woman touch him, nevermind the fact that she caught him in the middle of extremely shady business in her apartment. So he panicked and did the first thing that came to mind: he reached for his knife and stabbed her.
At first he was relieved, since it immediately stopped her screaming. But then he realised just what he'd done. What used to be a simple reconnaissance job turned into a shitshow as he watched her bleed all over the floor and crawl to the telephone.
Stabbing her was his first mistake, but he certainly didn't do himself any favours by deciding to wrestle with her over the phone. So what if she'd tried to call the police? He could've taken the opportunity to jump out the window and make his escape. The van was right there waiting for him! But, like the fucking dumbass that he was, he committed a second mistake, playing some twisted game of telephone tug-o'-war. Then the bitch smashed a fucking vase into his face and pushed him over the table, breaking it, and throwing herself over to keep on struggling with him.
Then she ripped his medical mask off. That's when he knew he was triply fucked. Not only had he been caught red-handed, but he stabbed her, which let her know that he wasn't just some petty thief; it was illegal for anyone who wasn't a policeman or soldier to carry weapons.
And now she'd seen his face.
There was only one thing left to do at that point, really. He dug his fingers deep into her wound and kicked her, finally getting her off him. He remembered breathing hard and fast as he stood over her pitiful, curled form on the floor, tempted to spit on her for giving him such trouble. He tried to haul her up but the bitch wouldn't go without a fight. She clawed him some more and made a run for it. Oh, but he was far faster, and her stupid antics made him very angry indeed. He caught up to her easily, grabbed her long hair, and pulled back hard, using her momentum to slam her tramp face into the wall.
Finally. She was quiet and still. He took the time to clean up part of the scene to avoid leaving behind more evidence—with all the noise they made, there was no way the neighbours hadn't heard them and called the police by now. It was difficult jumping down to the street with human deadweight on his back, but he'd managed it (albeit by knocking down some stupid potted plants) and jumped into the van like a bat out of hell.
"What the fuck did you do?!" he remembered being yelled at.
"Just drive!" he'd panted back.
That was two days ago. They'd patched the woman up and left her tied to a chair in the basement. They still had no clue what to do with her…or what to tell the boss in the first place.
But the thing that bothered him the most, the worst part of it all, was how angry everyone was at him. Especially nii-san.
He'd been subjected to the collective cold shoulder for a good part of those days. The silence and tension was killing him. He knew he botched the whole thing—it'd be incredibly idiotic of him to argue otherwise—and endangered their plans. He knew that the boss would most likely punish him for his transgression, and he was ready to accept whatever lay in store for him: being fired, cutting off a finger, anything as long as everyone talked to him again.
He stared at the clock ticking away from where he sat. Biting his lip, he tried to speak. "I—"
"Save it," was the snarled response. "We don't need to hear any more excuses."
"I'm not making excuses. I know I screwed up. I just—" he protested.
"'Screwed up?' 'Screwed up?' You were specifically told that this was just a scouting job, you managed to ruin it by getting spotted and turning it into a kidnapping situation, and you call this 'SCREWING UP'?!"
Silence reigned once more after that outburst. He hung his head low, ashamed. Everyone was right.
A low, exasperated sigh rang out in the sparsely furnished room. "Look. I'm gonna make the call whether everyone else likes it or not. Stay put. Especially you."
He started biting his hangnail as he watched nii-san go out the door, enveloping them all in that awful, tense quiet again. He resisted biting some more when he remembered that he'd ruin his nails just like he did last time; he didn't want to be nagged over spending his money at the nail bar, but then again, it was infinitely more preferable to this.
Nii-san returned after a full hour had passed. "Congrats. We all get to keep our heads this time."
A collective sigh of relief took the ten-ton weight off everyone's shoulders.
"So we're off the hook?"
"What'll happen to our resident dumbass, then?"
"What do we do now?"
Nii-san called for silence. "The boss said to give it time. They'll think of something. And it doesn't mean the job is off—just changed is all." Nii-san fixed him with a cold glare. "But the boss wants to have a meeting with us in the morning. You'll go first."
Some notes:
Japan has very strict laws regarding gun and knife ownership. This stretches back to certain bushidō codes on who was entitled to own swords and whatnot, but the main law that discusses the use of knives and swords today is the Swords and Firearms Possession Control law, created in 1958, and amended several times later in 1993, 1995, 2008, and 2018. An article by Cezary Jan Struciewicz for Tokyo Weekender summarises its approach to knives:
"[…] owning a knife with a fixed blade longer than 15 cm requires permission from the prefectural public safety commission, but only for home ownership. Pocket blades on the other hand, including Swiss Army knives etc. are legal to carry around as long as the blade is shorter than 6 cm. Anything longer and you will need the same kind of permission from the prefectural public safety commission…UNLESS the blade exceeds 8 cm in length, in which case it is banned outright. However, exceptions can be made for utility blades like kitchen knives or, in some cases, knives used for fishing or hunting. Still though, the possession of an illegal blade is not a felony in Japan and will probably not land you in jail. But it can still get you in a lot of trouble."
The cases that result in detentions are often due to American servicemen bringing large Swiss Army knives with them to Japan, but Japan has still dealt with few but deadly knife related attacks, such as the Akihabara Massacre. Despite some arguing that the government is taking a heavy-handed approach, many people believe it is necessary to prevent future attacks. Often their point of reference is countries with a far more lax attitude to weapons ownership, such as the United States.
In short, the first clue: the owner of the knife used in the crime is someone who wants to avoid being detected by the police.
