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Dinner with Cassette Man - Chapter 2
Making their way through the entrance hall, a refuge of slate, silver and black unraveled before Shiho's eyes. Not counting the Kudou household, it was the first time Shuichi had ever invited her into his territory, and as much as she would hate to admit, she was actually intrigued with what she saw. Her eyes roamed around on instinct while Shuichi cut ahead of her and drew her attention towards his kitchen where he unpacked his groceries. The fridge was built into a recess in a cabinet wall facing the edge of a marble bar counter top. A double oven was embedded to its right side, but looked like it didn't have a lot of mileage on it. Behind the bar was the cooktop and work area that seemed spacious enough for two cooks to bustle about. A modest assortment of iron pans hung along the edge of the cupboards and glimmered vividly as though they'd only been bought recently to decorate this facade of an apartment. A microwave and a coffee grinder, presumably the workhorses of his kitchen, rested at the far end beside an unplugged rice cooker. Hanging above the bar was a two-story shelf where he stocked his liquor.
"Want anything to drink? I've got anything you could possibly want…"
"Hmm...Tap water, then."
Shuichi promptly grabbed a glass. "How's your flight?" he asked.
"An uneventful eighteen hours." Shiho's sounded all but bored when she answered. She'd gotten so used to worrying about people trying to hijack the whole ride or passengers forgetting to leave their dirty laundry with then and ending up dead in the restroom at some point that she couldn't appreciate a safe trip until after she'd landed. "But that's supposed to be a good thing, right?"
Shuichi nodded.
Taking that as her cue, Shiho fired back with her own inquiry. "So…. Any leads regarding this mysterious case you were dealing with earlier?"
The federal agent fell silent, pondering whether to bore her further with details of yet another incident. Sensing blue daggers being thrown at him for his thoughtful gesture, Shuichi ultimately gave in. "I'm not officially involved yet so there's not a lot to tell…. It's under cybercrime, but the people running the show wanted me to look into a person-of-interest whom I've dealt with before. Went straight to a Walmart after that."
Shiho looked at him skeptically. "You think it'll turn ugly?"
"We always hope it won't but..." Shuichi's voice trailed off as he ran some scenarios in his head.
Observing a foreboding crease curling between his eyebrows, Shiho finished it off for him. "….The possibility isn't zero."
"It never is, especially when it falls under our jurisdiction." At last, Shuichi turned the tap off, walked towards the counter and served the drink. "Best we can do is make sure it doesn't end up like that."
"Right." Grabbing her requested beverage, Shiho wandered over to the living space where two steel-framed leather couches flanked a low concrete table, one with its backrest turned against sage-green blinds that obscured the balcony doors, while the other faced a 75-inch television. The TV was surrounded by shelves, the the two highest levels lined with Shuichi's plaques earned from his service in the FBI, and a few trophies he'd won from various shooting competitions. "Not a layer of dust or mold here either," Shiho commented. She wouldn't doubt if the Kudous didn't have a hand in this. Shuichi had always been scrupulous.
"I try to clean up when I find the time," Shuichi said in between the rips of shrink wraps being torn.
"Good. I was expecting to see a claustrophobic frat boy heap," Shiho quipped.
"Oh… So your opinion of me hasn't improved one bit." The federal agent effected a dejected tone. "I better step up then."
"Just don't get in over your head." In contrary, her objective opinion of Shuichi had always been great, bordering the threshold of what an average man could go into whenever his switch is flipped. The various sniping trophies behind her practically justifies it. If he'd never gotten involved with the Organization, his talents probably would've found a much better audience than the other codenames who couldn't for the life of them take a clean loss. Heck, it wouldn't be hard to envision him as an Olympic sniper, decorating this wall with more gold instead of putting all manner of scum in their place. But… would he still be a police officer in that alternate world? Or would he have pursued engineering like Subaru Okiya and leave shooting guns as an uncharacteristic hobby?
How about her, for that matter? Would her life be as quaint as her days as Ai Haibara? Or perhaps something more idyllic, like devoting herself into earning a Nobel Prize? Could she have settled down with a terrible man in an apartment like this?
"I bet you think of things like this too… Being surrounded by the memories you've held onto."
It was pointless mulling over possibilities now that they've reached the end of the dark tunnel they'd been treading for so long, but Shiho couldn't resist the nostalgia she was basking on.
"….Anything wrong?" Shuichi asked.
"Nothing… Other than you being a closet narcissist," Shiho teased.
"It fills the space. That's all there is to it," was his coy defense, followed shortly by the clang of a metal tray being pulled out. "What were you expecting to see?"
"Hmm…. A gun collection, perhaps?" She looked at him from across the room, but he was busy gathering the things he needed while allowing the meat to sit still. His movements all looked purposeful, like someone who really knew what taste he wanted his dish to have and how to evoke that taste. He didn't scramble for ingredients like some haphazard amateur, and settled only for a basic assortment including the two staple seasonings, a clove of garlic, some rosemary and a container that likely contained butter.
Once he'd assembled everything, he turned to her direction and answered. "They don't really make for good conversation pieces, do they…? Or are you suggesting I take you to my gun room now?"
"If you let me handle one, sure. I'd love to pump a shotgun sometime."
"I do have a pump-action shotgun, but that won't be a very good idea."
"Why? Are you the kind of guy who hates it when a girl paws your toys?" Shiho shot a devilish grin at him. "Or are you just afraid of what I might do to you when I get my hands on it?"
"Putting aside the fact that it'll do you no good if you can't take the recoil," the agent countered with a smug look of his own. "You've never gotten the drop on me."
"….I suppose not." The former scientist rolled her eyes and sighed in concession. "Oh well… You'd probably still be more dangerous with those little knives you have other there than I am with a gun anyway."
"Maybe… But I wouldn't count a woman's scorn out. If you wanted to draw blood, there's enough stuff on that shelf you could throw at me right now." Shuichi turned away from her and grabbed a paper towel to dry out the beef, deliberately showing her the bullseye at the back of his head in doing so.
Of course, Shiho knew better than to try. Even with his back turned, Shuichi was still a very dangerous man. She'd never put money against him in a fight. "Hmph… While I'm glad you understand that much, I'd seen enough people get bludgeoned to death by the very thing that celebrated their legacy. At this point, it already lost its novelty."
Shiho moseyed over the rest of what was on the shelves. The lower shelf was a little more disparate, hallmarked by a highly-detailed model kit of a giant red robot with its display base book-ending a small collection of DVDs and a few paperbacks. Shuichi's taste in books was decent, if somewhat dogmatic compared to the library he had the honor of curating for a few months. Chandler, Cain, Grady, Clancy, Harris... They were all represented in there, projecting his grittier approach to criminality and injustice. Some of the newer books - works by the likes of Higashino and Nakamura, to name a few, were untranslated editions he probably picked up back in Japan.
Oddly, she found a sidearm on this level as well: a silver-on-black Walther pistol complete with a sight, silencer, and stock sat on a dedicated rack. She didn't need to handle it like she said she would to figure out it was a replica, but it looked dangerously close to a real one that it must've been imported long before the government embargoed realistic model guns. Parked in front of the glimmering German pistol were a few miniature cars: a white Porsche 935 with racing stripes, a Nissan Fairlady Z police car, a red Lamborghini Countach, a black pickup truck, and a green military jeep. Save for the truck, the patina on the cars implied they were vintage, but there wasn't a speck of dirt or heavy discoloration on any of them. The cars also had some unusual seams and cuts, suggesting they were…. more than what they appeared to be. Beside it was a handy box containing pieces of a blue Formula 1 racer that looked in-scale with the rest of the cars. Shiho surmised he was probably attempting to put it back together in his downtime.
"Mitsuhiko-kun and Genta-kun would love to see these. May I take a picture?" she asked.
Shuichi gave his permission without having to look over his shoulder to see what she wanted to capture. At this point he'd begun sprinkling some salt and pepper on the tray. "You can move them if you need a better shot."
Obliging on his advice, Shiho moved the cars gingerly, spacing them out evenly without being too obsessive about it.
Zooming into the cars until she was able to properly focus on all of them, she hurled another question at him. "Are these from your childhood?"
"Except for the truck and the one in the box, yeah," he answered while laying both pieces of meat flat on the bed of seasoning he just made. "Didn't expect you to be familiar with them though."
"I've seen all the Hollywood movies, you know," she replied, her tone tinged with dread. "Aside from that, Professor Agasa said it was part of what got him into robotics. He also had one too, the one that looks like his Beetle. Unfortunately, he was one of those kids who didn't get the luxury of keeping all their toys now that their value has bloated beyond absurdity."
Recognizing the figure she was talking about, Shuichi replied, "I was just thinking of sending him a gift for all the help he'd given me during my time in Beika. Think I'll be able to track one down for a decent price."
Shiho tilted her head sideways and narrowed her eyes at him. "So you're offering Professor a sought-after collectible, but I get nothing for playing the fool in that ruse?"
"I don't remember you ever playing the fool at all," he mocked. "More like the princess who refused to sit down and let her subjects handle things."
The former chemist pouted. "Oh, you really don't play fair, do you…"
"I can get one for you too if that's what you want," was Shuichi's counter-offer.
"I appreciate the thought, but for the prices they go for these days, I'd rather have a new scarf," Shiho said, waving dismissively at his direction.
Deep down, Shiho felt relieved…. At first she thought things would be as awkward as it was when they were neighbors in Beika, but for him to actually abide by the terms they'd agreed upon for this dinner, it felt kind of nice. "Perhaps not everything was an act after all," she thought, reminded of how Dai used to oblige her whenever she needed and outlet for all the senseless thoughts that crept up in her mind during those dreary hours. He never really talked about himself then, contented himself with just going along with the waves she wanted to ride. For all she knew, all these things she's discovering about him now had all been there since the start and she would've known about them already had she mustered the will to ask.
Problem was, Shiho didn't. By not asking personal questions, she avoided the risk of him shooting them back at her. What about her old life was so interesting anyway? Unless someone else got a special permission on her behalf, she was always cooped up in her lab processing bits of data that wound up ruining other people's lives. Before that, her days went by like a well-oiled machine running a lap through the academy, the library and campus laboratory that formed a fork only to converge into a single road, and finally, home. She never got to touch an action figure or a video game controller until she'd gotten another go-around at childhood, so there wasn't anything she could add to this conversation that wasn't a secondhand experience from kids she'd surrounded herself with.
Shiho cast an envious stare at Shuichi… No matter how hard the past grated at him, he was still able to hold onto something that reminded him of a much simpler time.
A tad disgusted over her own pettiness, Shiho looked away from the federal agent as he unhooked a skillet from his assortment. She trained her eyes back on her phone to examine the photo she'd just taken. It wasn't until then that she noticed something peculiar in the image. Not a suspicious blur or some dubious lighting, but rather, another item hanging behind the parts box like it was too shy to mingle with the other mementos. She'd been too occupied with identifying what models the cars in front were to notice it earlier, but that only made her even more curious about it.
Putting her phone down to move the box away, Shiho discerned it as another figure, this time in the shape of a dark blue mini cassette player. A silver "Cassette Man" was emblazoned across the tape deck, practically defeating the purpose of its deception. Unlike the cars or the pistol though, the player's surface was covered with grime, its chrome sections either scuffed or have flaked off entirely, and has its stickers either dog-eared or noticeably missing. Frankly, the disassembled bits in the box looked pristine compared to it. Gently picking it up out of curiosity, Shiho skipped a beat when the battery cover dislodged from the player and spilled what looked to be its accessories unto the surface it was lifted from.
"How about this one here? Is this from your childhood too?" She held the player protectively with both hands to show him. Even then, she felt that some of its components have already loosened over time and were liable to falling off as well. "I'm guessing this was your favorite..."
As far as deductions went, it was a low-hanging fruit. After all, being someone's favorite was a curse so much as it was an honor. In this case, rough play, finger oils, and exposure to weather were telltale signs that he'd owned the cassette the longer than the rest.
What she didn't realize sooner however, was that by asking that very question, she'd inadvertently stepped into a landmine.
Chapter End.