“We're here to find Tanya Su and Eve Kim.” Mick answered: “Do you happen to know where they are?”

 

“Tanya Su and Eve Kim, huh?” The young man with green and blue hair nodded: “Yeah, I might’ve heard of them. What’s their info to you though? You seem too serious and by the book for a place like this. Things work - they work differently here, you know?” He spoke while gently rubbing his fingers.

 

“Get lost. We have no time for you.” Marcus narrowed his eyes and was about to push through the two young men.

 

“Woah woah woah. ” The young man with yellow and orange hair backed off, but still keeping his position, blocking the way of Marcus: “Why the rush, good sir? You know in this part of the building, being rushy and impatient can get you many things, dead being one of them.”

 

“Do you know where these two young women are or not?” Marcus shook his head, still putting some effort into maintaining his patience, while getting prepared to forcefully push these two annoying, slimy fellows to the side: “If not, step to the side we’re not interested in your help.”

 

“Hey, bro, you think we’d let some outsider talk to us like that?” The young man with green and blue hair looked at his friend with orange and yellow hair.

 

“Of course not.” The young man with orange and yellow hair exchanged looks with his friend, then started spinning his chained metal ball rigorously. And his friend started twirling his metal pipe and made a few gestures of swinging it at Marcus and Mick.

 

“Okay, do you know what you’re doing?” Mick’s hand on his holster held tighter, and he was about to pull it out any moment, the only thing stopping him from doing so right now was that Marcus still remained in his stance.

 

Marcus chuckled and almost laughed out loud: “What the heck, it’d be much easier for all of us if you’d just start with that. Now we’re talking.”

 

“Clap clap!” The two young men fell on their butts with red handprints on their faces. Marcus sent them onto the ground with two lightning fast slaps to their faces. Mick barely saw what Marcus did, all he saw was that Marcus’ hands became blurry for an extremely short moment.

 

“Now, will you help us, or will you stay out of our way?” Marcus clapped his hands as if he was cleaning up the dust from his palms: “And let’s not forget, we know where they live, so we don’t really need your help that much - ”

 

“Eve! Tanya! Run!” The young man with green and blue hair looked back and yelled.

 

“Fucking hell.” Marcus exchanged looks with Mick and rushed towards room 404.

 

Maybe it was the two young women trying to look out and see what was going on, or maybe it was them already going somewhere, or maybe it was because of some other reason but the door to 404 was actually not locked. And Marcus was able to just pull it open.

 

Inside this very small but tidy apartment, they saw two young women standing by the window and ready to climb out of it. One of them had fading dyed blonde hair and had a nose ring, the other had long straight black hair and was wearing a necklace. The entire apartment seemed to have a theme of red, with red threads and knots hung on the walls and ceiling, with some old looking paper talismans in the middle as well.

 

“Stop! Stop!” Mick immediately raised his voice: “We’re not here to hurt you! We’re not here to do anything do you! Please!”

 

“Who are you!? Why are you here!?” The young woman with long black straight hair was holding a long kitchen knife and pointing it at both Mick and Marcus.

 

“Okay, can we calm down a bit first?” Marcus raised both his hands and said: “Eve Kim, Tanya Su, right? We’re here to investigate the death of Lydia Mu, but - but we would rather not say who we are out loud right now.”

 

The two young women looked at each other, then the one with blonde hair and nose ring asked: “What did you do to them?”

 

“Who?”

 

“Our friends.”

 

“Just a quick slap on the face, nothing they can’t handle.” Marcus shook his head: “We thought they were just local punks, so we bypassed them to get to you. I didn’t know they were your friends, my apologies.”

 

“It’s true.” Just this moment, the two young men appeared right outside the door, holding their weapons while being alert: “This is a tough dude. But - what are you doing here? Are you cops? You’ve gotta be cops.”

 

“Yeah.” Marcus sighed and took out his badge and showed it to the four: “My name is Marcus Cai, I am a detective from the PCPD 17th District. This is Officer Mick Cramer, we’re here to look into the death of one Lydia Mu. We heard that you two used to work with her, so we’re here to ask you a few questions about her - nothing more.”

 

“Lydia…” The girl with the blonde hair took at her friend holding the knife at Marcus and Mick: “Tanya, maybe we should tell them…”

 

“... why are you looking into it NOW?” Tanya, the girl with long black straight hair stared at Marcus and asked: “Why now? You guys didn’t care at all earlier.”

 

“We care now. And we’re trying to get to the bottom of it.” Marcus shook his head.

 

“And we will find her justice.” Mick nodded with a smile: “We will find out what happened.”

 

“You already have a conclusion, don’t you?” Tanya stared into Marcus’ eyes and said: “You’re just here to confirm it. If so, then let’s hear it. If you’re here just to put more dirt on the cover up, then there’s nothing we can tell you to change your mind.”

 

“We can’t really tell you that.” Mick frowned, then took a look at Marcus.

 

“He’s right, we can’t tell you that.” Marcus sighed and nodded: “Can you just tell us what you know? Whether we’re here to do some cover-up, fake interview or real investigation, what do you have to lose either way?”

 

The two young men squeezed through Marcus and Mick to stand between them and the two young women, still holding their weapons.

 

“I could appreciate the loyalty and heroism.” Marcus chuckled: “But it’s just some simple questions, so - ”

 

“It’s just some simple questions for you, but it could be dangerous for others, for us.” Tanya said, her eyes still staring at Marcus.

 

“... so you saw Carl Benson taking her away.” After a short moment of silence and staring back at Tanya, Marcus sighed and nodded.

 

The temperature in the room just dropped by a few degrees, and all four local residents of the apartment complex became instantly on high alert. The two young men, even though knowing that they were no match for Marcus, still held their weapons high pointing at them.

 

“And Rick Benson had his people harrassing you, didn't he?” Mick tried asking from another angle.

 

“He did. ” Eve nodded and answered with a shaking voice: “First is some kind of private investigator, then it’s people driving around watching us - ”

 

Tanya tried to stop her friend from speaking: “Eve…” 

 

“No! Tanya! I don’t see the point!” Eve raised her voice, her eyes turned red and her voice almost broke: “If they meant us harm, they wouldn’t even ask these questions! Maybe it’s time we tell someone about this - ”

 

“My silly girl … if they work for the Bensons, they could have killed us!” Eve sighed, shook her head then held the kitchen knife closer while watching for any potential movement from Marcus and Mick.

 

“So it is true. Carl Benson did take her away.” Marcus nodded: “And the Bensons’ sending their goons over would indicate their knowledge of what their son did. And you said there was a private investigator?”

 

“Yes!” It appeared Marcus’ statement provided the young women with some relief, and they answered at the same time.

 

“Is it this guy?” Marcus pulled up a picture of Brooklyn Payne, the private investigator said to be hired by the Bensons.

 

“Yes.” A sense of disgust and fear flashed through Tanya’s face: “He’s the leader of the goons. Following us, watching us and - ”

 

“We need to leave.” Marcus just realized that he and Mick’s entrance might have been noticed by the goons hired by the Bensons: “We should leave together, and then we can go for protective custody - ”

 

“Nonono, we can’t. ” Tanya shook her head: “We can’t. The Bensons have people in the system, we’d be in more danger.”

 

“I suspect they might have seen us when we came in. If they did, then you’ll be in greater danger.” Marcus insisted.

 

“No, no.” The young man with green and blue hair said: “They saw cops come here before. We’d be fine.”

 

“Plus. That private investigator is afraid to set foot in here.” The young man with orange and yellow hair snickered: “Who would have thought, a superstitious goon?”

 

“Please, we insist.” Mick said: “I know you have your concerns, we can assign someone we trust to keep an eye on your, or just transfer you to a safer place - ”

 

“No, we don’t feel safe anywhere else.” Eve shook her head.

 

“... okay, fine. We can check back here from time to time. We’ll keep in touch” Marcus relented and turned to Mick: “We’d better leave now and discretely.”