Chapter 2

THE SAME DAY

“What?” asked the detective, seeing the look of abject surprise on her assistant’s face. “What is it? What did you find?” Satoshi didn’t respond for a moment, seemingly as he attempted to gather his faculties.

“Take a look for yourself,” he said, turning the locket towards the detective. As the detective’s eyes roved over the portrait within the locket, her arms nearly went slack, dropping the cat in the process. She swore viciously, partially in consternation at having nearly dropped the cat, but Satoshi assumed she swore mainly due to her recognition of one of the people pictured in the locket: Katsumi Hirabayashi, the girl who had been kidnapped.

“Damn it,” swore the detective, now starting the pace back and fourth. “What should be do?” As she paced and turned abruptly to retrace her steps, poor Taro, who had since calmed down somewhat, started to become agitated again as he swung haphazardly in the detective’s grasp.

“What should we do?” Satoshi echoed. “About the cat?”

“About Katsumi!” Detective Yamamoto clarified. “This is clearly a clue about her situation. We can’t just stand by and not do anything after finding this.”

“Well what about Taro? What about the job we’re in the middle of doing?” Satoshi asked. In truth he felt a little dirty to say such a thing when a poor girl had been kidnapped, but he also felt he had to advocate for their client. Detective Yamamoto grimaced and let out an exclamation of frustration, much to the discomfiture of Taro.

“Let me think,” she said tersely before returning to pacing. She turned on the spot, swinging the cat around with the abruptness of her turn. After a complete lap of pacing, Satoshi took a step closer to her.

“Do you mind if I hold Taro?” he asked.

“Not as long as you don’t let him go,” retorted the detective. She held the cat out with both hands. Satoshi grabbed the cat in a manner far more conducive to the animal and it looked up at him, seemingly with appreciation in its eyes. Detective Yamamoto, in the meantime, took to fidgeting with her hands restlessly as she thought and pondered their current predicament.

Minutes went by as the detective stalked back and fourth wordlessly while Satoshi stroked the cat’s back. Right as he was zoning out and ceasing to pay attention to the detective’s pacing and grumbling, she stopped and turned back to face him.

“Aha!” she declared. “I have an idea!”

“Good,” said Satoshi, still petting Taro. “Please share.” Detective Yamamoto shuffled up to Satoshi, close enough to whisper conspiratorially and began to gesture with her hands to the cat and the locket as she laid out her plan.

“Let’s suppose,” she began, “that this locket is pivotal to saving that poor kidnapped girl. Would that be a fair assumption?”

“Maybe,” replied Satoshi, unsure of where precisely this was going. “I could concede that.”

“Alright,” said the detective. “So wouldn’t it make sense to prioritize her slightly? She's been missing for a few days already by now.”

“Detective,” Satoshi groaned. “We have Taro in hand!”

“I know, assistant!” the detective hissed. “Taro found this locket! Maybe he could lead us to Katsumi if we let him go,” and the detective hastened to add “with us following him closely, ready to catch him again.”

Satoshi grumbled internally. He knew what he wanted to say about the detective’s idea, but she had seemingly thought ahead and neatly headed him off at the pass with her provision that they stand by ready to catch the cat. While he still wasn’t especially keen on that idea, he didn’t feel he could reasonably object.

“Alright,” he said, after a tense moment of silent internal debate. “If we go along with your plan, how long would we follow Taro around before we decide it’s pointless and take him back to his owner?” Detective Yamamoto frowned. It was a reasonable enough question from her assistant, but it was one she had hoped she wouldn’t have to answer.

“Oh,” she said, affecting an air of nonchalance. “A day or two, maybe?” Satoshi rolled his eyes.

“How about a day?” he suggested.

Aha, thought the detective. From here, she would be able to wrest back the moral high ground.

“A day?” she demanded. “A day? Poor Katsumi Hirabayashi is languishing in some dungeon, alone and afraid, and you’re willing to give up on her after only a day?” Her assistant’s look of bewilderment told Detective Yamamoto that her badgering was having the desired effect. At length, he sighed, defeated.

“I suppose you’re right,” he said. “We should do everything we can, but,” he hastened to add, “we can’t let Taro fall by the wayside. That wouldn’t be right either.”

“As you wish, assistant,” said the detective, feigning magnanimity. Satoshi shifted his grip on the cat and held him out with both hands in front of his body.

“Alright, detective,” he said seriously. “Before I do this, I just want to make something clear; the plan is that we’ll let Taro go and hope he leads us to Katsumi, right?”

“Actually,” scoffed the detective. “The plan is that Taro will lead us to Katsumi.” Satoshi, sighing but bending to the inevitable, bent at the waist, set Taro back on the ground, and removed his hands from the animal. For a brief moment Taro looked back up at Satoshi, as if silently asking why he was no longer being pet and why he had been released. After seemingly coming to the conclusion that he shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth, Taro took off sprinting.

In unison, Detective Yamamoto and Satoshi swore and began to sprint after the cat, initially in a stumbling fashion. As the chase extended past thirty seconds in length, Satoshi reflected that the stupid cat was really fast indeed, and in far better shape than he was. Taro hadn’t quite disappeared into the horizon, but he was making a valiant effort towards that end.

Eventually, Satoshi had to slow down, as the burning in his lungs became too great for him to continue at any pace faster than a brisk walk. The detective, now lurching beside him seemed worse off even than him, as she wheezed like a defective furnace.

Insofar as Satoshi was currently able to feel relieved, he did, as Taro, noticing that his pursuers were starting to back off, reduced his pace from a dead sprint to a moderate trot. Depressingly, the distance between the pair and the cat continued to increase, but at a lesser rate than before.

“Oh!” exclaimed the detective suddenly, drawing Satoshi’s attention over to her.

“What is it?” he asked, a note of concern entering her voice.

“We should let Hitomi know about this,” she said. “I should have called her before we let Taro go.” Satoshi rolled his eyes. It was true enough what the detective said, but it was also typical that she would forget such a thing. As they continued tailing Taro, who receded ever further into the distance, Detective Yamamoto fished her phone out of her jacket pocket. After dialing in Officer Ishioka’s personal number, she held the phone to her ear in silence as it rang and the call connected.

“What?” came the terse salutation from Officer Ishioka.

“Hello to you too, Hitomi,” Detective Yamamoto wheezed. “How are you today?”

“Why are you calling me?” Officer Ishioka demanded. “I’m busy.”

“Well,” said the detective, drawing out the syllable to an infuriating length. “I just wanted to call you and let you know that I found a locket belonging to that girl who’s being held for ransom.”

“You what?” Hitomi exclaimed, loud enough that even Satoshi could hear it.

“A cat I’m following for a case had it around his neck,” said Detective Yamamoto. Satoshi could almost picture Officer Ishioka slapping her face with the palm of her hand.

“Fantastic,” she said. “Let me know when you find something substantial.” Before Detective Yamamoto could reply or elaborate, Officer Ishioka hung up.

“Was she receptive?” Satoshi asked the detective, knowing the answer even before he asked the question. The detective gave a shrug.

“About as receptive as ever,” she replied. “But don’t worry, assistant. We’ll have the last laugh when we solve her case for her.” Satoshi gave a perfunctory nod. It seemed to be something of a tacit goal for Detective Yamamoto to show up her erstwhile classmate at every given opportunity. Frequently the detective was successful, but privately Satoshi hoped this rivalry would take a backseat to ensuring the safety of Katsumi.

Turning their attention back to the cat in front of them, Satoshi quickly noticed that Taro had vanished from his field of view. He and the detective stopped in their tracks, looking around wildly for any sign of the black and white cat.

“Where did he go?” Detective Yamamoto asked in a tone of voice that bordered on despair.

“Beats me,” replied Satoshi sullenly. “Guess we’ll have to start back from square one.” Detective Yamamoto’s groan of frustration neatly echoed his own sentiment.

~~~

Taro was having quite the odd day. By his reckoning, it had been three days since he had last been home, and normally he would be inclined to curl up for a long nap in one of his favorite sunny spots, but things had been far too interesting. The nice lady that always sat in a chair had given him something, the two scary men had frightened him, and then the flighty lady and her henchman had captured him and taken the trinket only to let him go.

It was the sort of exciting day that really called for a nice big meal. Perhaps he could return home for the guaranteed meal and shelter that it presented. Perhaps he would return to the nice fat man who was always cutting meat. Bafflingly, the man kept some of the meat he cut and put it into a shiny glass case, but other, perfectly good pieces of meat, he threw away! Maybe it was an act of charity to put the meat in a place so accessible to a critter like him, but Taro had seen the man chase others away, bellowing and shouting.

Just as Taro had come to the conclusion that a big piece of meat would do nicely, a little bird, blissfully unaware of its surroundings, landed in front of him, not ten paces away. Instinctively, Taro stopped and stooped, dropping down into a crouch. He might not be nearly as proficient a hunter as those of his kindred that have always lived outside, but he reckoned even he could catch a bird that would allow itself to be caught unaware like this.

Slowly, Taro padded forward, stalking ever closer to the bird until he was but five paces away. Even still, the bird hadn’t noticed him. He flexed his claws in preparation, feeling his back claws dig into the pavement as he prepared to pounce.

Suddenly, the bird flicked its head. Taro froze, but was gratified to see that the bird had not yet noticed him there. Flexing his claws once more for luck, Taro bounded forward letting loose a fearsome battle cry that would no doubt immobilize the bird with terror.

As his front paws stretched out ahead of him, claws extended, the bird flapped its wings and took off, deftly evading his grasp. Taro landed on the far side of where the bird had been and resumed walking casually as though nothing had happened.

The bird chattered overhead snidely in what was no doubt intended to be an expression of mockery, but Taro paid in no mind, in the same way that a concert pianist would ignore the advice and suggestions of a street busker with a busted, acoustic guitar that only had four of the requisite six strings.

His thoughts turned back to his future meal. Even if he couldn’t eat a bird – not that he wanted to, mind you – he could still find food elsewhere. Besides, catching and killing something was more work than he was willing to put in, and there was always the onerous business of deciding which parts of the thing were good to eat. Taro had, on a few occasions caught something less than palatable to his refined sense of taste.

Yes, Taro thought. I think a big piece of meat will do nicely.

With that in mind Taro stalked off in what he seemed to remember was the direction of the nearest such establishment.

~~~

“Where did that stupid cat go?” groused Detective Yamamoto. Satoshi sighed. She had been saying that phrase and variations of it, seemingly in the hope that it would somehow aid them in finding the cat.

“Maybe we should revisit some of the places we already searched,” suggested Satoshi, as much as he didn’t particularly like the idea.

“You might be right,” grumbled the detective, as she scanned the street for any sign of the cat. “I guess we could retrace our steps. I haven’t got any better ideas.” The two began to trudge back to some of the places they had stopped and searched before in hopes that Taro had decided to make things easy for them.

~~~

As miserable as Juro’s day had been so far, it had only gotten worse. He still had yet to find the stupid cat his hostage had affixed her locket to, and he suspected that he would likely never find the cat after this long a period of time. Worse yet, he feared that even if he did find the cat, someone else may have found it first and taken note of the locket. If such a thing had come to pass, then the whole ransom scheme would likely go up in smoke.

Viciously, he kicked a bit of litter in the alley. He would have liked to kick something more substantial, and something that would feel pain, but the only other options presently were metal dumpsters, which would cause him more pain than relief.

Juro had never been a particularly smart man, but he had taken to searching for the cat in a methodical way, hoping that he could narrow down the areas in which the cat might be, and thereby increase his chances of finding it in the future. While this method might have seemed sound, it hadn’t worked so far, much to his consternation.

Unbidden, his thoughts turned to the man and woman from earlier. There was something familiar about the woman, even if he couldn’t quite put a finger on how or why. He also felt put off by her curiosity. Sure, she may have just been a curious, good-natured person who was willing to offer help to a stranger, but frankly, those were the sorts of people he wanted to interact with least while in the midst of ransoming off a hostage.

As he pondered the motives of the man and woman, a little flicker of motion caught the corner of his eye. He turned to follow the movement and spied a black and white cat, walking casually as though it had not a care in the world.

“Oh ho,” said Juro out loud. “What have we here?” The cat looked up briefly at the sound and then returned to its business. Juro tugged at his pencil mustache as he noted the cat had green eyes in addition to the correct coloration.

Maybe it’s my luck day after all, he thought.

~~~

Detective Yamamoto trudged wearily, nearly on the verge of giving up for the day. Infuriatingly, Satoshi seemed to be no worse off for a whole day of walking and searching.

“Whaddaya say, assistant?” she asked, hoping he would want to call it for the day too and fishing for such a response. Satoshi opened his mouth to respond, but stopped. His head swiveled towards the mouth of a nearby alley.

“I said,” said the detective. “Whaddaya-”

“Shh!” Satoshi hissed, holding up a hand to forestall the detective. “Do you hear that?” he asked. Detective Yamamoto took note of the concern in her assistant’s voice.
“Hear what?” she asked quietly. Satoshi gestured over to the mouth of the alley. There was a voice coming from it, and an aggravated voice at that, but neither Detective Yamamoto nor Satoshi could quite make out what was being said.

Together, they cautiously stalked to the opening and peered around the corner. Satoshi’s eyes narrowed and Detective Yamamoto had to suppress a gasp of shock.

Standing about halfway down the alley was someone they had encountered earlier in the day: the man who had been suspiciously searching for his own missing cat. He held a cat that resembled Taro quite closely. In contrast to how Satoshi and the detective had done earlier, he held the cat at arms length in a way that was no doubt highly uncomfortable for the poor creature. What’s more he shook it periodically as he shouted at it.

“Damn it!” he shouted. “Damn it all! Where is it?!” Intrigued, Satoshi and Detective Yamamoto leaned slightly closer despite hearing him quite well now.

“You stupid cat!” the man continued. “If someone finds that locket, it’s all over!” Suddenly, even in Satoshi’s mind, the coined dropped, and a brief glance he shared with Detective Yamamoto informed him that she understood the significance of this exchange as well.

“That’s it!” snapped the man. “I’m taking you with me! You won’t get away again!” Sensing the end to the man’s rant, the detective and her assistant ducked back around the corner of the alley and scampered the make themselves scarce lest they be spotted.

The man plodded out of the alley, stomping angrily, and walked off away from where Satoshi and Detective Yamamoto had taken to hiding. As he passed, holding the cat firmly under one arm, Taro let out a mournful sound halfway between a meow and a howl. The man swatted the cat angrily, truncating the sound, and walked off.

Satoshi turned to face the detective, on the verge of asking ‘what now?’ but stopped himself. Detective Yamamoto, who had been tiring to the point of quitting for day, had been reinvigorated by what she had seen.

“New plan, assistant,” she whispered. “We’re going to follow that man, and we’re going to solve two cases at once.”