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"Mystery is not my usual thing," Shouta said as he is brought into a room that has the marks of a crime scene thats been very well documented already. There is numbers scattered all around and markings for bodies that are no longer there, and the smell of violence has gone stale. "Underground Heroes are more a preventative measure than reactionary."
"Yes, but you're familiar with this crime syndicate," the cop who brought Shouta in says as they both look around the room. "We would be grateful for any insight you might have into what could have happened here. I won't lie. Theres not a lot for us to go on so we're really just grasping at straws here."
Shouta was silent for a moment before speaking up. "It's likely a gang fight over territory or drugs," he finally said after careful consideration and weighing out his words. "Gangs do tend to get violent when they can't agree on how things should be run and this one has always been very disagreeable."
The cop looked surprised at Eraserhead's reply, which made him think twice about whether that was the right answer. He had known Shouta for many years now and knew he wasn't someone prone to giving elaborate answers. But there just wasn't much to see here and Shouta knew it. The place had been roughed up and ransacked. He counts four different spots with dried blood where bodies fell, and has already been told the gang's store of drugs has been taken. What more was there for him to say here?
"Just keep an eye out for anyone selling new drugs or more drugs than they usually do," Shouta said with a sigh as he put eyedrops into his eyes. He feels tired suddenly. "I don't know what else to tell you. If it's not drugs or money then I don't see what else it could be. These criminals didn't have anything else going for them."
The cop nods before turning around and walking out of the room. Shouta looks around once more before following.
***
Eri smiles as she eats her icecream. Her eyes wide and bright with amazement that makes Shouta's chest ache with sadness over how deprived the little girl has been her whole life. She never knew the meaning of happiness before and it breaks his heart. Shouta sits on the roof of the building next door to the shop with Eri in his lap. It takes some finagling to make sure he doesn't fall off the ledge, but they managed to do it somehow. Its less crowded up here and the breeze is not blocked by all the close buildings allowing them to enjoy the little cold treat in peace.
"Do you like your ice cream?" Eri asks shyly as she glances back at Shouta.
"It's fine," Shouta says as he places another spoon of chocolate into his mouth. He'd ordered two flavors and allowed the girl to try each before choosing which she wanted. The strawberry had won in the end probably because it came with actual chunks of berries in it unlike the chocolate which was unusually chalky tasting. Something that the little girl obviously picks up on with a little frown.
"Why did you buy me ice cream if you didn't like it?" Eri asked curiously.
"Because you were sad earlier and I thought something sweet would cheer you up," Shouta said as he shrugs. The sad spells are common and her therapist told him to expect them often. That they were not precisely bad as much as an expected response to the severe neglect and abuse the girl experienced before Shouta adopted her. Finding ways to deal with them was important. Both for her and him, and Shouta thinks giving Eri a little bit of icecream is one very good way of doing so.
"Oh," Eri says in that little voice that always makes his heart hurt even more, but it disappearance under another spoon of icecream. Eri smiles around the spoon at him. That wide, awkward smile she had to be taught was a good thing before. "Thank you! I feel happier now."
Shouta blinks in surprise at how easily the spell worked as he looks down into her empty container. "You just ate it all?"
Eri giggles and nods her head. "Yes!"
"There's still some left," Shouta says as he tilts his own down towards her. The chocolate had not met with approvals from her so much as it had just been declared not as good as strawberry. A fact proven when the child eagerly digs into the half melted stuff he had not already eaten. Chocolate soon smears around her mouth a little, blending with the strawberry as Eri finishes off the icecream in a few bites.
"Mmhmm! Mmmm-yummy!" Eri declares happily as she scrapes up the last bits. "I want more!"
"Maybe after dinner." Shouta laughs at her joyous expression. He lets the containers drop into the garbage bin below them before standing up, holding the child in one arm as he gathers his capture weapon with the other. "Hold on tight, it's time to go home."
Eri nods excitedly as she looks up at him. "Okay!" She exclaims and wraps her arms around his neck.
"Let's go," Shouta says as he drops down towards the alley way they used to get on top of the building. Eri's arms squeeze tight as she laughs in delight at the sudden drop, and Shouta really does think this was the best idea he's had in a while.
***
The eyes of his students jump to him when Shouta wakes up and climbs out of his sleeping bag. Each one of them turning in their desks to face him. Some with eyes bright in eagerness and others....less bright but more understandable to him. Iida's left the paper of the quiz he just have them neatly piled up on the desk, edges perfectly aligned and square. "Good enough for today. Mid terms are next week so don't let me catch any of you slacking."
On the academic side of things is what he means. He's fairly confident than any of his class can handle the practicals just fine by now. In fact it's been getting harder for him to come up with stuff to challenge them all with lately. Something that Principle Nedzu has been happily bringing up more and more often.
"You have your homework, get out of here," Shouta says as he reaches over for the folder he had set aside for himself earlier. He opens it and begins to read through the sheets inside as the class empties with its usual speed. Most of the students are gone in seconds with only the more sociable ones lingering behind to slowly pack up and discuss study plans. He ignores them unless they have a question they need to ask.
The sheets are coroner reports from the gang murder the other day. Four men are indeed dead but their cause of death is strange. Despite the scene looking like a mess each one of them had drowned on dry land. Their lungs full of water and their hearts had stopped beating soon after. There's no sign of any violence other than what they took when they fell down to the floor. The pictures that come with the case file are unhelpful as they are morbid. Shouta tosses the papers away as he stands up and stretches.
"Oi, Shouta! You got your stuff yet?" Mic says from the doorway, Kayama stands behind the blonde man with a smirk that spells trouble on her face. "It's time to paaaaartaaaaay!"
The two of them look at him expectantly. Shouta sighs and places his hands on his hips. He's not looking forward to this party tonight.
"Why must you be so loud?" Shouta says as he turns to face his two friends. "And I'm too busy to go anywhere tonight."
"Man, what are you busy with tonight?" Mic asks with a grin. "Cause I was thinking we could hang out together. Just the three of us. We haven't done that in a while."
"I'll pass. I've got work to do," Shouta replies flatly as he shakes his head. He taps at the folder on his desk. "The police are pretty convinced I can help them with this murder case they have going on."
"Murder?" Kayama walks past Mic to get closer. She picks up the file and starts to read it as she perches on the desk beside him. "Not an exciting way to die."
Shouta shrugs. "You don't sound very upset about it. Did you ever deal with this gang?"
"No. Never heard of them," Kayama says with a shake of her head. "The drugs they dealt with aren't the partying kind of drugs. I doubt they ever crossed my scene as much."
Kayama was good at dealing with crimes involving clubs and bars. Her rep as a sex focused hero allowed her into places that most heroes would only see if they went in extremely undercover. Shouta's not sure why but somehow people very easily forgot that she was a hero and not just another sex symbol with no morals. The number of times people would commit crimes right in front of her and be surprised when she arrested them was stupid. Even worse, some of them actually tried to argue it was okay and use her as a shield.
"No. This group was involved with selling a different type of drug," Shouta says quietly as he closes his eyes and remembers the details of what he saw on his few busts of them. "Opioids mostly, depressants. Some Quirk enhancers too. Nothing noteworthy enough to kill them for it though."
"Maybe it's not the drugs that got them killed then," Mic offers his opinion as he pointedly does not look at the pictures Kayama is still looking at. "Maybe it was something else. What about revenge? Think they might've sold a batch of bad drugs to someone who decided to clap back at it."
Shouta snorts. They weren't big time sellers, but the gang didn't sell low level drugs either. He doubts the addicts that bought from them would be capable of what he saw at the crime scene. "I highly doubt that. They'd have to know who poisoned them first, and I doubt the gang would even know if what they sold was bad or not."
"But if they were already selling drugs then it could have been them who sold the poison to begin with," Mic argues.
"What do you mean?" Kayama asks at the confusing argument.
"Well, it's not that they were selling poison exactly so much as they were adding things to the drugs to make it stretch farther," Mic explained. "They get more money for less drugs and they don't care if what they're putting in the stuff might hurt or kill the people buying it."
"And if someone g ets hurt or killed by the drugs, then who is to say that someone else might not go looking for revenge?" Kayama chimes in. "A friend or a family member."
"Grief," Shouta says as the facts slide around into a neat little derangement. "So it was a hit on the gang then."
"That seems like the most likely scenario," Mic agrees. "Especially since it's not like anyone else was found dead at the scene. It's all the members of one gang. And there hasn't been any other murder of whole gangs since."
It fits. It all fits the facts that he has and is very likely. There's not much more he can say about it without finding out more information. Especially considering he doesn't even know anything about who bought from the gang. It's not his place to know that stuff though. That's what cops were for after all.
"How about we get some food to eat in tonight?" Shouta asks his friends. "And we go easy on the drinking. It's a week night and Eri doesn't need to see her aunt and uncle passing out after they get drunk."
"Sounds good to me," Mic agrees. "Didn't you say you wanted to watch a movie sometime soon?"
"Yeah. Let's try to pick one that isn't too scary for Eri," Kayama says as she puts the file away for him. "Since you won't let me pick something that's even slightly risque to watch around here."
"She's six years old," Shouta says as they walk out of the classroom.
"There's nothing wrong with her seeing a bit of skin every once in a while!" Kayama protests playfully.
"No." Shouta says firmly ending the conversation there.
***
"Why even ask for my insight?" Shouta asks as he passes the case file back over to the detective. "You didn't need me to tell you to look for the revenge angle."
"Of course not," the cop replies with a smile. "But the deaths were too brutal for us to allow anything to slip by."
Drowning is a cruel way to die. It's not quick or easy, and Shouta thinks about the kind of person who can do that to someone. It's chilling. He then thinks about Eri, about the possibility of her becoming addicted and dying. From that angle he can see it, but it still chills him to the bone.
"You have the culprit then?"
"Yes, I'm afraid I can't share any further information at this time though," the cop says as Shouta gets up to leave. "Maybe after the trial."
"I don't think I want to know," Shouta leaves the precinct.
What a pointless waste of his time. All he did was give them an idea that they could have gotten on their own anyway. What's the point in having him around? He just wishes the police would stop wasting his time on stupid crap like this.