No Rest For The Old Policeman

February 25

The lights of the sirens could be seen throughout the place, several patrols piled up along the street were their origin. The police had closed the park due to a call to the emergency service, the body of a person had turned up. But despite the various officers and detectives at the scene, they couldn't see what they were seeing, so they called their boss to help them. The poor Inspector Yamamoto had not stopped having a horrendous month, because they had not stopped passing one thing after another without stopping, without adding the eternal worry of his granddaughter. But when he got to the crime scene, he had no choice but to put all his worries in a bag and keep it in his car until he came back to pick it up when finished. 

When he finally got to the scene, he quickly took a look at the scene. There were several policemen guarding the perimeter of the place, there was an ambulance, but seeing that the paramedics were gathering their things to leave means that someone must have died, people approached the yellow tape to try to observe; all that was typical of this type of situation. What was not typical was the state in which the corpse was. It was completely destroyed and torn, what was there does not seem to be a person, it was something horrible to see. And what was worse was trying to understand the poetry of such brutal means. 

"What do you have so far?" asked the old man.

"Not much the truth"
"She was found at sunset, just as he was"
"It was found by a neighbor who thought it strange that they dumped garbage here"
"We think it could have about two hours"
"From what remains of the bottom we know that she is a woman, but other than that there is not much else" Answered another of the detectives.
"We don't have any identification."

"This is not something an assassin would do."
"The victim is too devastated and it appears that she was eaten by a large animal, something like a bear"
"But something like that in the middle of Tokyo, in a place like this and without people reporting something like a large animal on the loose?"
"Her pants are from the uniform of a minimarket"
"According to the normal shift of those places, she would probably be leaving work somewhere close enough, most likely her house, so she did not change her clothes" The inspector put on his gloves and began to go through the girl's pockets.
"A receipt for the purchase of a drink, the address could possibly be the place of your work."
"Ask in this place, if not then look in other places of the same chain."
"It also seems that it was a card purchase, that could also help identify who she is."
"Checking the objects of the victims in their pockets is something basic in an investigation"
"That they don't teach you anything at the academy?"

"Sorry Inspector, I thought it had already been reviewed before."

"And that is noted in the notebook?"

"aaahhh"
"nope"

"Then it didn't happen"
"Look we are detectives, we have to find the culprit of what happened."
"But unlike movies we can't just go and stop people, we have to follow a procedure, okay"
"If we do not carry out this procedure in the correct way, the prosecution cannot do anything."
"And if they can't do anything, our work won't be worth anything either"
"Do you understand !?"

"Yes sir"

"Unfortunately I can't ignore this"
"I will have to report this fault in the procedure in the report"
"If you don't want to be fired for the next month, try to do your job correctly"
"Understand?"

"Yes sir"

Back at the station, the inspector decided to closely monitor the case to prevent another mistake from being made. The victim's name was Yuji Kondo, an employee of a minimarket, single, without debt. She seems like she lived just a few blocks from where she had died. She did not seem to have connections to organized crime people and she seemed to be an honest person, which made the case more complicated.  This seemed to be a very different case from the normal ones, so the inspector offered to help his partner in the investigation. In the morning they would go to their parent's house to give them the bad news and try to gather more information about the victim. 

When his work for the day finished, the inspector went to the White Moon coffee shop and bought several cups of coffee to take away, as he would work at home until late due to all the accumulated work of these days. When he arrived I waited for him the smile of his beloved granddaughter, with which he was filled with motivation to finish his work as soon as possible so that he could have a little free time with his granddaughter. When Haru saw her grandfather arrive with the coffee cups and several of the folders, she immediately realized what her grandfather would spend doing at night. 

"Again working at home late at night?"
"Grandpa, this is not good for your health."
"You must rest when you leave work."

"I know but it is that something complicated appeared again and the young people do not stop making mistakes."
"But they seem to be learning fast and this will probably finish quickly."
"When this is over I will have the free time to rest again"
"Maybe I can even take you to that amusement park you wanted to go to on my next day off."

"Seriously!?"
"That would be great!"
"I'm going to tell Yukiko tomorrow to see if she wants to go too!"

"Yukiko?"

"Yes, tomorrow I'm going to her house"
"I told you yesterday, remember?"

"Yes it is, it is true!"
"Tomorrow, as soon as I get off work, I'm going to pick you up to go shopping at the supermarket, we are almost out of food."

"Okay, I'll wait for you then!"

And once again the poor old man spent several more hours working putting together the information of the cases that had happened in the last few days. But no matter how many cups of coffee he had had, the dream caught up with him in his own office at his house. When he woke up it was daylight, he had a blanket placed over him, the recognition that it was the gesture of her granddaughter that she gave it to him before going to the house of her friend. Yamamoto quickly got ready and went back to work again.

Once again he had to give the bad news to a couple of parents who were waiting for news about their daughter. And although this time he was not as ugly as breaking the news to the parents of one of his granddaughter's classmates, the truth is that it is always something ugly which the police never want to be the bearer of bad news. Arm himself with strength for what was coming, he went with his partner to the home of the parents of Yuji Kondo, the girl who had died the day before in such a horrible way. The parents' response to listening to him was what you could imagine, tears, cries of anguish, despair, and the helplessness that the inspector felt for not having been able to do anything to prevent it. But unfortunately, there was not much that could be done now apart from finding and catching the person responsible for the tragedy. The old man once taking the role of an immutable person skillfully asked about the situation in which his daughter lived. But to his surprise, the parents seemed to have a clear idea of who could have been the suspense of such an act. 

They both agreed that their daughter's ex-boyfriend was a troublesome person, he was obsequious and jealous. Jiro Iwasaki, Someone who although most of the time was a kind person, also had his moments of fury. The two had separated a couple of weeks ago. With this new information and back at the station, they got down to business to find this person. It seemed that he worked in construction until the company had an economic crisis and had to lay off personnel several months ago, he could not find another job after that. After that, it seems that he saw with the victim until recently, when the two ended her relationship and she made it from her house. The biggest problem is that since then this man, Jiro Iwasaki, had been missing since then, no one knew where he was. When he finished his workday, the inspector, remembering his promise with his granddaughter, refused to work overtime and went straight home. Another time he was carrying various documents to work at his house when he had brought Haru back. After calling her to know that he was already going to get the car to pick her up, he took the keys to open the door of his house, when he immediately noticed something out of place. 

The door of his house was open, and as old as the inspector was, the fear that Haru would be attacked has been so much that it was impossible for him not to check every day that he had locked his home well. Thinking of all the bad things that he could be going through right now inside, the old habits of the old man kicked in, and he took the gun from him and entered his house excitedly accepting the challenge that awaited him. The living room was in perfect condition and the furniture was in place, a jeweler was in plain sight on one of the pieces of furniture in the living room, it did not appear to be a robbery at his home. Which could only mean worse. Yamamoto put his documents on the table to have both hands free and just in case he grabbed a knife from the kitchen. Then he slowly climbed the stairs without making the slightest noise. He opened the door to Haru's room, there was nothing, even under his bed but there was nothing, then he checked his office, which was the next room in order of value. He opened the door silently as well and then he found it. 

Inspector Yamamoto couldn't believe what he was seeing with his eyes, inside his office there was a girl, but she didn't seem to be human in the least. Her monstrous claws that she had for her hands were not something natural, but even so, she was able to use them ably like anyone else, in addition to that in her head next to her white hair she had huge horns of the same color as the strange clothes she was wearing. , a black armor that looked more like part of it than something that is worn above the skin, skin which the little that could be seen was of a bluish and bright tone. What was in front of him was not human, of that there was no doubt. Thinking about the same thing, the Inspector remembered what some of the policemen in the repression had said, that apart from the white girl there was another equally strange appearance. And that although she looked a little different from what the reports said, it was likely that she was the same girl. 

She turned around while reading some of the documents the inspector had in his office and noticed the old man pointing a gun at her. Reacting quickly she pounced on him but he dodged her by simply retreating into the hallway. . The man fired quickly in defense of her. But then something strange happened, the girl began to move quickly and completely changed position in less than a blink of an eye. The shots failed to hit her, the old man thought that maybe his body was failing due to his age. With no time to lose and following his muscle memory, the old man reloaded his pistol at fast speed to attack again as soon as possible. The strange girl then takes out from somewhere in her dress a metal stake that she was preparing to raise against the Inspector. Reacting to what he saw that he was trying to do the girl he took off her scarf and throwing her managed to hold her hand before she managed to throw the stake. With one arm restrained and at a distance, the old man took advantage of his advantage and fired his pistol once more. But just like the first time, the girl moved in a strange way, and by the time the inspector noticed her she was now next to hers with the scarf cut off. But she did not attack immediately because suddenly her abdomen started to bleed for no reason, besides she started spitting blood despite not having received any damage yet. Even so, and despite the great pain that could be seen on the girl's face, she managed to push the old man down the stairs. Luckily for her old man, her fall had her luck not to hurt him. Taking advantage of it quickly, the inspector reloaded once more and pointed to the ladder to attack when she came down, which did not take long to happen. Suddenly the landline phone of the house begins to ring, there was an incoming call. Yamamoto, in an act of complete bravery or stupidity, did not hesitate to answer, because when he saw the number he realized that it was  Haru who was responsible for such an inopportune moment. 

"Hello, Haru?"
"Something happened?" he said while with one hand he held the phone and with the other his pistol pointed at the monster in front of him.

"It was just to know exactly how long it will take to come to pick me up because Yukiko's mother brought some food and she wants you to taste it."

"Don't worry, I won't be long, right now I'm at the house picking up the keys from the car, I'm almost on my way" As soon as he finished speaking, the demon lunged at him trying to hit him, he managed to dodge her again, but trying not to fall into the same thing twice, she held the old man's hand and the two fell to the ground.

"Grandpa?"
"You are ok?"
"I think I heard that something fell"

The old man dying of pain took a deep breath and spoke again.

"Yes I'm fine, I just turned on the TV to see if it a news but they are only showing one of those superhero movies"
"Give me 15 minutes and I'm there with you," He said as he hit the other girl in the face with his free hand.

"OK, I will wait for you."

"See you later!" The old man hung up the phone immediately, picked it up again, and began to surround the girl's neck with the telephone cable. He held her by the hands and with the cable began to strangle her.

But the girl once again did that strange way of moving again and the next moment she was free a couple of steps in front of the old man while he finished removing the now cut cable from the phone, but when he finished moving again, it started to bleed even more still. The inspector now knowing that every time she did that, her gunshot was hurt more than she was at where she was. The same action was repeated, the place where she was now was near the window of the house, she now had the folder that was on the table in the living room and ran away despite the clear pain that she had.

But despite the desire to chase after her, Yamamoto was not old enough to run all day, besides having little time to pick up his granddaughter. Giving up trying to chase her he decided better to stay and quickly clean the house. Well, even if he wanted to hide it, the old habits of him never forget them. How to remove blood stains from the floor, clean the carpet, hide the bullet holes in the walls with some pictures or photos, and put everything in his place including getting a phone that he kept in the attic. By the time he finished, it had only been about ten minutes, and her granddaughter probably wouldn't notice what happened there before her grandfather picked her up.