-The Watchers at the Window-
Shinohara thudded along the hallway, halting only whenever he encountered one of the hydraulic doors he had come to curse at. The building plans had been been nothing like this. The approved and stamped blueprint was for a simple tunnel with climate controlled rooms for storage, not this damned labyrinth built by liars. He had seen the imperial seal on a few of the doors, which would date at least some of what was here to...the thirties? Maybe the forties? Perhaps he should have paid more attention to history class in the Academy.
From behind, there was a yelp followed by a hiss and creak announced another door closing in his wake, locking him into his path and nearly separating him from one of other investigators in tow. Troubling. He had told the two to follow him closely, and apparently they had not followed his instructions. Or had this been an attempt to split them up.
In any case, they had made it this far without any confrontations, winding up in what was definitely refrigerated cold storage. The only other door was on the opposite side of the room, and that was clearly sealed, so for the moment they would be going no further.
Shinohara had seen this kind of fridge before; when working an extermination that ended in the back part of a classy restaurant. Floor to ceiling, heavy duty, dutifully humming away. The other one he knew what was inside...this one, however...
Everything was standing in for something else; restaurant refrigerators, stainless steel countertops set up as tables up in a row, lamps like he had seen in dentist's offices.
This room was almost certainly a morgue.
"Shinohara?" One of the men asked, "Are you hearing what's on the intercom?"
Jolted back out of nostalgia, Shinohara realized that he was sorely tempted to grab the handle and see what was inside, and that an educated voice was talking about history in the scratchy tone only a dusty intercom could produce.
"It's a history lesson of some kind." Shinohara shrugged, turning back to face his junior agents. "Not very important to the problem at hand, unless Doctor Kanou has a couple screws loose."
"Sounds like he's got more than a few loose in that case."
"Eccentric, maybe; lots of the docs in the labs are like that." Trying to tune out the lecture, Shinohara tried the door at the far end of the room and was unsurprised when it refused to budge. "Getting a doctorate in anything requires one's head to be screwed on tight, not to mention he worked for the CCG and the GFG. So no, I don't think he's lost his mind."
What Shinohara did not admit was that he had no idea what was meant by the rambling history lesson being piped in. He was certain that it was Kanou—he had listened to his dictated autopsy notes as part of his own due diligence—but why he would be talking about history would get answered once he was in CCG custody. And what a list of questions they would have. The presence of the RC wall in the basement of the house, where he had sourced his equipment from: there were a lot of contenders of what they would ask first.
On the other side of the room, something hit the door he had tried to open, hard enough to make the metal hum, prompting one of the agents to note that it might be a good thing that the door to the next room was locked.
The universe gave Shinohara a solid thirty seconds to note that statement was tempting fate before several somethings began to at doors of the refrigerator units.
None of the agents had noticed the electronic eye tucked away in the least obtrusive corner of the room keeping a silent watch on their goings on. Not that the trio needed to be concerned about prying eyes however, as there were far more interesting camera feeds being picked up and wired through the bunker.
At the terminus of the camera cables, Kanou couldn't help but feel a little spoiled for choice; nearly every camera feed had displayed at least a few moments of activity from the moment Kaneki had arrived. The boy was truly unique. Not only a medical miracle, but seemingly able to find his lab with a handful of help, whereas the CCG had needed a dedicated and well supplied team. A pity something appeared to have mentally cracked during his adaptation to the requirements of ghoul life. And equally vying for his attention was the other medical miracle, the quinque-wielding American foreigner. He hadn't even needed the implications from his new patron to identify him; the pattern of quinque was clearly foreign—meaning not only was he a medical miracle in parallel to his own work, he was a sanctioned miracle. How desperate must the Americans in the BGA be to use something like him, and how short sighted it had been to send him so very far from their cage. Even the arrival of the young CCG prodigy Kotaru Amon had been little more than a blip to draw his attention.
Would that he had an hour and the proper tools to compare the workmanship. Would that the screens the two medical miracles were visible on were just a little closer together.
His Kaneki was still engaged in single combat with the ghoul marked on CCG posters as 'Orca' in the ventilation hub. There had been some conversation between the two, although the coherency of said conversation seemed to have a varying grip on reality.
The American had left the surgical suite—where his patron had disabled the camera, to his annoyance—and was currently liquidating the supply of failed and partially completed tests in the main atrium with what he would call surgical eagerness. The BGA had truly been more adventurous than he in their selection; his kagune was reminiscent of a sawfish snout, though with much longer spikes.
A line from his time overseas drew itself between a pair of old stories and he couldn't help but disguise a chuckle as a cough. Truly, the belt of a Maxim gun was something fearsome.
"Something amusing, good doctor?"
"I couldn't help but be surprised by my fortune. Kaneki and the American foreigner both ending up here; the same product made in parallel. Were I superstitious, such an event would feel...providential."
"His name is Allen Grissom." Whatever the thoughts of his new benefactor, it was well hidden beneath her bothered tone and bandage mask. "I thought you had read the dossier I had procured at your request, hmm?"
"It hardly matters. I would have expected him to have a very French name had I seen him before reading your notes." In any case, talk of the foreigner as such was hardly the most pressing matter. "I see your people have followed through on their end of my request. Everything looks to be flowing nicely."
One of the screens was displaying the dropping fill levels of the holding tanks, most of which were located in the very same room where Nashiro and Kurona were fighting with a boy of roughly their age. Perhaps they had known each other at the CCG academy? Still, he had expected the tanks to drain a slightly more swiftly than the current rate, but it couldn't be helped. They were, after all, draining into pipes and a cistern the better part of a century old.
"What do you expect will happen?"
"When the tanks empty? Hmmm." Eto idly swung her legs as she sat on the table. "Whatever happens, it will probably be dramatic. Ah! Sixteen!"
Peeling his eyes from the goings-on elsewhere, Kanou glanced back to review the gristly spectacle unfolding in the central chamber. He had to give credit to the Americans; they certainly knew to choose an unusual kagune; the placement on his back indicated a koukaku, but the long spikes skewering several of the bodies clearly indicated the biological mechanisms of an ukaku. Fascinating. Familiar. He would have to think long and hard to recall his GFG days.
"I can certainly agree, the Americans certainly know how to train their men as well as they select unusual kagunes to implant into them."
Eto tittered. "Is that a tinge of envy I detect?"
"I lack the ego to be so selfish. My work is done in rather ramshackle conditions, compared to what was likely done in by the Americans." Without looking away from the bank of screens, Kanou gestured vaguely at the room. "One would assume a well supplied operation would be able to push the boundaries and produce a, ah, flashier product."
"And yet, wrapped in a much closer cage, you still produced a fully functional product."
Even though he could not see it, Kanou knew that his patron—he was certain that her name was not 'Eto'—was very probably smiling from behind the mask. While their goals certainly appeared to be aligned, Kanou was aware that the 'why' of her goal was very different from his. He had to admit however, that her person of interest was being much more eye catching than his at the moment. Kaneki and the ghoul twice his size had slowed their fight in favor of fighting with words, and the CCG agents were doing their best to not die in the morgue. If only the cameras were wired for sound.
"It is done." Stooping to get through the doorway, Eto's second in command had approached quietly enough to be barely noticed. "The tanks have emptied and the route is secure."
Kanou understood the message; the show was over, and it was time to make an exit while the bunker was still in a semblance of order. No preparation was needed on his part. Eto had seen that all his specialized equipment had already been removed, his notes were in the briefcase beside his chair, and the hard drives for the security system were cooking in the microwave in the next room. It was time, as Eto had said, to start writing his next chapter. A vague vibration in the soles of his shoes only underlined the sentiment.
"I understand." Kanou felt the handle of his briefcase, just to make sure it was still there. "I assume you'll be leaving after I do—to see how your person of interest ends up?"
Already at the control board, Eto punctuated her sentences with metallic clacks. "Was there ever any doubt? I wrote the chapter, so I see it through to the end."