A/N Hey guys, I know it's been a while but I'm back so without further ado, enjoy.
I sat in a chair next to Michiru's hospital bed, reading a book and trying to take my mind off of everything that had happened yesterday, which caused me to barely get any sleep at all after Michiru was taken to the medical center.
I was tired and drank coffee to keep myself awake for today but it didn't stop me from being all agitated and pissed at everything, wanting Hiroshi to pay dearly for going after Michiru just to get to me so if he's smart, he'll flee Anima City and run for as long as he can because he was a dead man for what he did.
The others were worried about me since I was mostly quiet this morning but I just evaded their questions by talking about something else to change the subject, though I knew they wouldn't give up that easily and I had to admit that I did appreciate them for being very concerned about my state of mind after what happened.
Still, I wasn't up for talking about it so I merely went to the medical center to see Michiru since she was cleared for visitation after the swelling had been taken down so I found myself staring at the female tanuki for a few minutes and seeing her in such a state, just covered in bandages and gauze made me feel so helpless and guilty at the fact that wasn't able to stop this from happening.
Shirou and the others had also paid a visit and while the immortal wolf beastman didn't show it on his face, his body language told a different story so I knew he was infuriated by what happened to Michiru and I had a feeling that once he got his hands on Hiroshi, the suffering Shirou will put him through is going to make hell seem like paradise.
When the others left after chatting with me for a while, I eventually went to get a crime novel and now I'm reading it to pass the time and to take my mind off of everything but it wasn't really working all that well so I sighed and gently rubbed my eyes, just as I heard a quiet groan coming from Michiru and my head shot up to see her stirring until the female tanuki slowly opened her eyes and she moved her head before spotting me.
"Doug...is that you?" Michiru asked slowly and weakly as I started smiling, putting the book down on a table nearby and I went to take her hand in mine.
"Hey kid, welcome back to the land of the living," I remarked and Michiru sent me a small smile while her expression looked woozy.
"Why do I...feel so weak?" Michru inquired and I chuckled.
"It's probably because you're hopped up on all those painkillers right now so it's no surprise you are still a little out of it," I replied as Michiru slowly started looking around and looked confused.
"Where...am I?" Michiru wondered and my smile went away as I recalled what happened yesterday.
"You're in the medical center, an ambulance brought you here last night after someone found you badly injured in the park and called for help," I said grimly and Michiru grimaced.
"Oh...how bad was I?" Michiru asked.
"I'm not going to lie, someone appeared to have beaten you pretty badly and if somebody hadn't found you last night, then you wouldn't be here speaking to me right now...Michiru, are you able to tell me what happened last night?
You don't have to tell me if you don't want to since you are recovering so I don't want to aggravate your head injury by stressing you out if I can help it," I pointed out, though Michiru looked like she was trying to remember what happened last night when she went to look at me.
"Uh...I don't remember much, just that I was heading home when I was jumped by a group of men in suits and that's the last thing I remember," Michiru told me with an apologetic look and I shook my head.
"It's okay, you have a head injury so it's no surprise that you don't remember most of it, though I'm going to call Shirou and let him know you're awake so I'll be right back," I said as I removed my hand from Michiru's, standing up from my seat and leaving the room until I was out in the hall and took out my phone to call Shirou and waited for him to pick up when he answered.
"Doug, how's Michiru?" Shirou asked and I sighed.
"She's awake, still a bit groggy from the drugs that are in her system but she's fine," I replied and heard Shirou let out a breath of relief.
"That's good to hear, though I have an update on my investigation into Yuki's father," Shirou said and that got my attention as my eyes hardened.
"What did you find out?" I inquired with a scowl.
"Now, it hasn't been confirmed yet, but I've been doing some digging and it's possible he is involved with the humans who are trying to cripple Anima City," Shirou informed me and I was pissed to hear that.
"That motherfucker, it wouldn't surprise me if he was involved in this," I growled quietly through clenched teeth as they started growing sharp.
"I agree, but what I've found out is flimsy at best and not enough for the police to charge him with so we need to find rock-solid evidence to take him down because his team of lawyers will just have the case thrown out if he's arrested on flimsy and circumstantial evidence," Shirou pointed out and I sighed in frustration.
"Okay, see if you can keep digging because we need to find something to nail him with so I'll try to find anything out on my end," I said tiredly.
"Alright, will do," Shirou replied until he hung up and I put my phone away.
I wasn't happy that there was nothing to nail Hiroshi on but it wasn't all that surprising since the guy was pretty careful and killing his wife probably wasn't the only thing he got away with over the years, though I recall one of Michiru's attackers that was locked up in a secure location by Marie and decided to start there by getting information out of him.
After heading back into Michiru's room and letting her know that I had some business to take care of, I left the medical center and started making my way to where Marie had one of Michiru's attackers locked up, having the dark urge to make the bastard suffer for what he and his friends did.
I put it aside for now since I couldn't let my emotions get in the way of gathering intel from the only source of information I'm going to interrogate since I knew physical torture is not known to be reliable and would just make the person say anything to make it stop.
With that in mind, I had to scare him into talking so a little intimidation combined with threats of bodily harm to the subject mostly works, and if it doesn't, then bluffing gets them to fold by using a form of psychological torture against them.
Now that I had a plan, it was time to implement it so I kept moving across rooftops for a while when I noticed that I was starting to enter the city docks and I spotted a few warehouses until I found my destination, which was one warehouse that seemed empty but Marie was waiting at the front entrance and I approached her.
"Hello Douglas, nice to see you decided to join us since our friend in there is feeling a little lonely," Marie told me wryly and I glared at her.
"I'm not in the fucking mood for your jokes, now where is he?" I questioned darkly and Marie held her hands up in surrender.
"Geez, someone's touchy so follow me," Marie said before going to open the service door and we went inside.
The inside of the warehouse looked empty as we started heading to a storage room but I wasn't concerned about that while we kept walking and soon arrived at the door to the storage room, going inside and I saw the person I was going to question as I recognized him as one of Hiroshi's men that I dealt with after being kidnapped so Marie stood by the door and I walked over to him, studying him after stopping.
The man was currently tied up in a chair with chains restraining him as he had bruises and cuts on his face with his hair and suit being slightly messy, which told me that he got the shit kicked out of him and I felt a dark satisfaction seeing the fear in his eyes as there was no doubt that the man knew he was fucked if his body language and expression told me anything.
"Hello there, I hear you're one of the men who attacked Michiru Kagemori last night so here's how this is going to go, I'm going to ask you a series of questions and you are going to give me the absolute fucking truth, or I will show you what your left nut tastes like.
Now, I know Hiroshi sent you and your little friends after Michiru just to hurt me personally by nearly putting her into a coma but one thing I've been wondering is why he is so desperate to get his daughter back so want to elaborate on that?" I questioned coldly and the man's face paled significantly at my threat to castrate him and force-feed him his left testicle.
"Oh shit...okay, all I know is that Mr. Katame wants his daughter back because he is in a lot of debt and the only way to get out of it is by giving her over to someone by the name of Tsume," the man whimpered and I narrowed my eyes.
"And what can you tell me about this Tsume person?" I asked and the man shook his head.
"I've never personally met the man so I don't know much about him, but what I do know is that he has Mr. Katame terrified of him so Tsume must be a really intimidating person if he is able to put the fear of god in Mr. Katame," the man replied and I furrowed my brows.
"You're acting pretty cooperative, any reason for that?" I questioned and the man winced.
"I'm not stupid, I know what'll happen if I were to lie to you since you would torture me if you did, not to mention I just started working for Mr. Katame as his personal security so I never wanted any of this to happen," the man told me and I got into his face with a low growl.
"If you didn't want this to happen, then why the fuck did you let your little friends put a friend of mine in the fucking hospital?" I hissed lividly and the man started letting out frightened gasps.
"I was terrified, okay?! Mr. Katame is out of his mind and wouldn't hesitate to kill me or target those I care about if I were to cross him! I heard about what he did to his wife, how he killed her before having one of his well-connected friends in the Japanese government hack up her body and dumped pieces of her throughout the country of Japan so I didn't want that to happen to me or anyone I cared about!
Look, I can help you since I know his schedule, his travel route, and where he lives so you can take care of him and he wouldn't come after me and those I care about because my family and I are dead because I talked to you," the man offered and I backed away from the man with a frown.
He made a good offer and I was sorely tempted to take it but chances are Hiroshi had already figured out about him being captured so he most likely changed his schedule and travel route while holing up somewhere else considering how paranoid he was, which is why I had to think about this for now so I kept silent for a while until I turned and walked over to Marie.
"Move him somewhere else and keep him on ice for now until I figure out what to do with him later," I said while taking out my wallet, handing Marie the appropriate amount of money and she smirked.
"Don't worry, I have a feeling our friend is going to enjoy his new home since I have the perfect place in mind for him," Marie said while the man quickly looked at her and me.
"Are you going to take my offer?" the man asked and he flinched when I sent him a cold glare.
"Don't misunderstand the situation, I have half a mind to kill you for what you and your friends did but if you have information that can help me get to your employer faster, then I'll get it out of you one way or the other so it's up to you if you want to make it easy on yourself or not," I stated menacingly and the man gulped.
With that said, I left the storage room and started making my way to the exit while I was deep in thought about how Shirou and I might potentially have a way to get to Hiroshi but only time will tell as I left the warehouse and called Shirou.
"Did you uncover anything, Doug?" Shirou asked and I frowned.
"Possibly, though it's too early to tell right now so did you find out anything else during your investigation?" I questioned.
"No luck so far but I wanted to let you know that Yuki has been placed into protective custody so she's safe for now," Shirou informed me and I let out a sigh of relief.
"Good, we can't let that bastard get his hands on her so I'll meet up with you later and we can discuss what we've uncovered during our separate investigations into Hiroshi," I said and Shirou agreed until he hung up and I started making my way back to the medical center, being lost in thought after that.
A/N Well guys, Doug and Shirou possibly have a way of getting to Hiroshi but only time will tell if it'll be a success since the guy had gotten away with plenty of things before because of his connections to powerful people so let's hope they make him regret ever hurting Yuki and Michiru.
Anyway, let me know what you think and stay tuned.