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"Attack! There ya are!" Banhammer boomed upon seeing the trusty investigator enter his office. He motioned to the plush swivel chair in front of his tall walnut-oak desk, inviting her to take a seat so they could go over the details of Paintbrush's find. With a flash of light and a deep, grumbly meow, Serval, Attack's gear and trusty pet, also appeared in the room, sitting down on a cushion provided next to the chair and wrapping his tail neatly around his paws. Attack slid into the seat, both arms resting on the table as she looked up at the warden.
"So! What'cha call me in for, boss? Need me to sneak into Blackrock again? Want me to go on the hunt of another missing inphernals case? Just lost something and so called for backup?" It chattered. The warden, greatly amused, shook his head at all the hypotheses, his smile only widening as each got more outlandish than the last. With his usual dramatic flair, he slammed two objects down onto the glossy brown surface- a blurry photo taken at night of a hooded figure swinging from a building, and a torn scrap of neon green and black fabric.
"Lookat what the painter dragged in! A scrap from the scarf of our mysterious Silver Shadow pal! Said a civilian 'phernal brought it to 'er with the story they found it snagged on a flagpole." He informed her, tapping on the fabric, then the photo. He then laughed loudly, not noticing the startle that pulled from his detective and the ocelot beside it, the unnaturally large ocelot pulling his lips back in an almost hiss before a calming hand was held up by his wielder. He begrudgingly lowered his hackles and forced his spotted fur to lie smooth.
"Haha! We've got solid evidence! Been chasin' this case for MONTHS now! And we can finally burst it WIIIDE OPEN!" He boomed gleefully, pausing to wipe a tear from one of his eyes from laughing too hard. He looked back to the detective, now sporting a grandiose grin with the smallest hint of fondness for his employee. "And you, Attack, are the only one here with the qualified brains to crack the dang case. So, lemme hear ya kid! Will you take it?"
Attack's eyes sparkled from behind its yellow-tinted glasses. Finally, an opportunity to investigate into the shadow who'd rescued it only one year prior! She extended her hand for a firm shake, smiling wide as the gauntleted hand of her employer clasped around her smaller, fingerless gloved one and shook with much ferocity. Banhammer let go first, letting her shake off its hand and pushing the photo and scrap towards the detective. She took them and stored them in its pocket, giving the warden a wink before hopping off the chair and beckoning Serval to her side. The ocelot stood up and shook out its fur, gold and black poofing out like a furry firework as he followed her out the door.
With a glimmery ZWOOP! She was transported to the bustling city of Crossroads, the noise assaulting her almost immediately. But she gritted her teeth and pinned her big furry ears and marched on, all the way to the quieter outskirts where, evidently, she found a blue-walled cafe nestled in-between bigger, older buildings. The fancy cursive lettering over the door told it that it was looking at Thieves' Rest, a combo bakery and cat cafe. Its ears swiveled up with interest at the relative amount of bustle she could see through the front doors.
'Banhammer wouldn't appreciate it if I stopped for food while on an official investigation... but I could interview the staff! Ha! A tasty treat AND some actual detective work done!' It formulated in its head, before nodding to herself and stepping forward to open the door with a cheery tinkle of the bells hung above it, ushering herself to a booth where a curious calico cat was loafed on the table. It perked up when the unfamiliar inphernal sat down, wandering over to sniff the new person.
As she was looking through the menu, absentmindedly petting the kitty in-between its tiny ears occasionally, footsteps alerted her to the 5'7, pink and slim-horned inphernal who now stood in front of the table in one of the most ridiculous uniforms she'd ever seen in her 19 years of life. He must've caught her staring, because he sighed, crossing his arms and shaking his head in disappointment at the abysmal outfit.
"Yeah, it freaking sucks. Sling says it 'ties the colors of the establishment together'-" Supplied by air quotes, before he lowered his arms and continued on- "But I says it makes me look like a fuuuu-freeeaking dolt-dork tied up in a bow." He scowled, leaning on the table in a rebelliously casual way.
"Anyways, welcome to Thieves' Rest! My name is Shuriken, and I'll be taking care of ya." He introduced with a newfound snappy flair, straightening up and striking a pose, looking extremely smug as he did so. He then immediately went back into the familiar tired stand of a young inphernal unfortunate enough to be trapped in the nightmare that was customer service.
"Does anything interest you?" He asked not all that interestedly, watching as she pointed to some random pastry that caught its eye. Shuriken nodded and noted it all down on a notepad he manifested from thin air. Or something. Where did he get that?
“Alright, got that down for ya. I’ll give it to Sling and it’ll be out in about 10 minutes.” He scurried away, dodging cats who lay thoughtlessly sprawled out across the blue and white checkered floor. It sighed in amusement, going back to reviewing the evidence it had as well as petting the little calico, who’d settled comfortably beside the detective.
It had only been 9 minutes since she ordered that Shuriken came back with her food- an absolutely glorious looking chocolate muffin with fruit on the side and a soda. He set the tray down on the table with a small thump.
“Just bring the tray to that stack over there when you’re done.” He said, pointing to a table near the entrance with a sizable amount of trays already piled high on it.
“Thank you!” She smiled gratefully, taking the muffin and biting into it. It was amazing- the warm baked good supplemented the warm gooey-melty chocolate so well it thought it could cry.
She pocketed a few watermelon bits for Serval to munch on later, and easily devoured the rest of the fruit by the time Shuriken came back around to collect his pay.
“Wait!” She called to him as he walked away with her bux, just now remembering she needed to question people. He hummed confusedly and walked back, leaning on the table. She pushed the plates and tray aside, before shifting to sit on her knees in the booth. She fixed her gaze on him.
“What do you know about Crossroads’s local vigilante, The Silver Shadow?” She studied his now part shocked, part nervous face- a clue!
“Uh.. i well.. I don’t know much about hi- them! But I bet they’re so cool and strong and handsome…” He swooned, doing that thing where you put your hands together and held them to the side of your head like a lovestruck cartoon character.
She smiled at the shenanigan before dramatically whipping the blurry photo out and slapping it onto the table. His face noticeably fell into moderate shock at the figure grappling through the maze of buildings.
“Well, your horns look remarkably similar to Silver Shadow’s. Why are you so nervous about it?” She pushed, watching the server sweat. He said something about inphernals having similar horns- a valid point.
“And do you by any chance.. know about this?!” With the same level of drama as the photo, she slammed down the scrap of scarf, watching the other’s face go from I’m mildly screwed to oh crud.
“Oh.. oh that’s suuuuper unfortunate! I feel sooo bad for them because they’re gonna have to spend time patching that up!!! Oh that just stiiinks!” He sing-songed again.
“So you’re saying you don’t possibly know their secret identity?”
“Nope! None-zo! Nothing at all, investigator!”
“..alright. Thank you for your time.”
——————-
The cool night air blew in harshly from the sea that bordered the concrete docks, not at all buffeted by the rusted, left to rot cargo containers or the giant metallic warehouse that looked like a flimsy tin can. The detective leaned against a green container, fully aware that its plan to plant itself in one of the seediest parts of Crossroads to get hassled by a bunch of thugs was basically suicide if the one the bait was set for didn’t show up to kick butt and take names.
Serval sat by its side, shrunk down to a normal respectable size one would expect an ocelot to be at. He flicked his tail, before nudging the Inphernal’s hand and motioning with a paw to the three shady figures now emerging from the warehouse. The tallest smirked from under a ratty baseball cap, stepping close to the detective and using a metal pipe to tilt up her chin.
“What’s a little kid like yourself doin’ on our territory? Gotchaself a death wish? Or just wanna join us?” He asked, jabbing the pole upwards to dig into the other’s skin- not enough to draw blood, but enough to discomfort. His cronies snickered behind him. Attack met the leader’s gaze cooly, but kept quiet.
“Oh, staying silent?” He sighed, letting the pipe drop before spinning it like a baton and SLAMMING it down an inch from one of the ocelot’s paws. The serval leapt up and growled, but settled back down.
He raised it again, meeting Attack Ocelot’s eye with a sudden cold bloodlust. But before he could swing down and bash the investigator’s head in, a throwing star streaked through the air, settling with a sickening THWIP into his hand.
He screamed and dropped the pipe, Serval immediately growing to about the size of a leopard so Attack could hop on and stride swiftly away as the Silver Shadow finally melted out from the corner they’d been hiding in. Their green horns reflected a nearby flickering streetlight almost sickly, the green, sunken eyes on the oni-inspired mask seeming to fix on the three thugs.
The vigilante raised one gloved hand, another throwing star manifesting in it. They then started to spray rapidly, jumping and grappling around to all angles like some sort of spider who wanted justice. It wasn’t long before the baddies were pinned to the wall by all the shurikens, struggling in vain against the weapons biting into their clothes, then chomping onto the supply crate and refusing to loosen their hold.
“Now. Play nice and turn yourselves in to local authorities, or keep being stubborn butts and I’ll do it for you.” The Silver Shadow rasped, Attack’s big ocelot ears swiveling to better hear the voice. Underneath the threatening rasp, there was an electronic hum- a voice changer. It leaned forward, narrowing its eyes and focusing on the green of the horns. The color was… almost.. hovering over the bone?
“Get closer, Serval.” She whispered. The ocelot growled in defiance, backing away from the scene instead. Attack hissed back, gently kicking her gear’s flank.
“Get. Me. Closer.” She commanded again. “Now.” The serval reluctantly obliged, stepping closer as silently as one super-sized ocelot could. But the vigilante’s shadow-sense or something must’ve gone off, as they turned to face the investigator, who panicked, and in its panic, fell off of and despawned her gear.
“Are you alright?” The other asked, reaching down a tattooed hand to help her up.
“Yes.. just got a little startled there, haha.” Attack admitted freely, before stepping closer. The vigilante leaned back instinctively.
“Thank you for the save, Silver Shadow. Or should I say… SHURIKEN?!” And it reached out and lifted the mask, revealing the shocked eyes of the server from earlier in the day underneath!
His hands shot up in surrender, before coming down to be clasped together pleadingly- not a cool and brave look for the usually stoic and serious vigilante.
“Ok ok, you got me! Just please, don’t turn me in! I-I-I have a reason for this!” He begged. Attack Ocelot crossed her hands over her chest, tail swaying impatiently behind her.
“Ok then, let’s hear it.”
“Ok, so… I was spawned in Thieves Den with my sister, Vinestaff. And we were brought into the Darkage Clan, right?”
“Yeah.”
“But..”
His voice got noticeably quieter and sadder, gaze dropping to the concrete ground they both stood on.
“…when they saw her wooden arm, the cursed one… they screamed and cursed and threw her into the jungle to die. I pled and begged them not to, but they dragged me away to get settled in like nothing had happened.” His voice shook when he said “die”, matching the detective he was confessing to’s horrified expression and drooped ears.
“Even..eventually, I met Slingshot and he.. he helped me through what I think was the lowest point of my life. I even.. we even snuck out to see Vinestaff every now and then. Then we left for Crossroads and the rest is history.”
——————
“So! Did ya find out who it was?” Banhammer asked excitedly, leaning forward on his desk. Attack Ocelot smiled back, taking a deep breath before starting to speak.
“I’ve figured out his identity. He’s Shuriken. Formerly a Thieves Den resident and Darkage Clan member, but left to be with his sister Vinestaff and adoptive sibling Slingshot in Crossroads, working as a server in Slingshot’s cafe Thieves Rest.”
“But!” The inphernal raised a hand to signal her boss to shut up and let her continue before he started laughing about hanging him over lava or practicing his skill at getting hole-in-ones with the unfortunate vigilante as the ball.
“He’s doing this to protect his loved ones and friends in Crossroads. So.. what if we… didn’t arrest him?? Just kept an eye on his behavior.” It proposed. The warden sat back in his chair to think about it, before sitting back up.
“..I’ll let ya. But! Just know if he tries to pull anything funny, I’ll haul his hind into a cell so fast he won’t know right from left and up from down.”
The detective’s eyes brightened.
“I won’t letcha down, boss! Thank you.”