A Grey Thin Line

5

      Tsukauchi Naomasa wasn't having a good night; first, he spent all of the previous night going over police reports, then his boss told him he had to do the midnight patrol through the city, which meant that he couldn't look after his friend, a certain blond haired idiot that didn't know how to take care of himself; and finally: he did not have enough goddamn coffee for this.

      The streets were eerily quiet as he rode down them in his police cruiser, not so much as a cat to be seen. Seemed like not even the animals wanted to be out in the chilly weather, The detective didn't really blame them; a warm bed and a hot drink was sounding awfully good to him as he tapped chilled fingers against the cold surface of the steering wheel.

      He perked up when the radio went off, "detective Naomasa, there's been an attempted 211, head to White Lotus bank."

      "Understood, en-route." He spoke into his own radio, stepping on the gas as he flicked his police lights on.

      The scene was almost comical when he pulled up; five would-be robbers were tied to a parking meter. His coworkers had already sealed the scene off, yellow caution tape glinting off of the red and blue lights. There was a hero standing to the side, talking to the police officers and looking a bit confused.

      His captain looked up when he stepped out of the car, "Naomasa, you're here, good." The chief said, "what do you think of this?" The older man gestured to the scene.

      "I'll have to ask what exactly you mean, sir." Naomasa said carefully, "This looks like work of a small time hero, someone that just debuted probably."

      The chief nodded, "And that's what it would be, normally; but these guys are telling us a different story, and we need you to figure out if it's true."

      The detective glanced at the criminals; they seemed resigned to their fate, not even struggling against the rope that tied them. "I'll see what I can do."

      The chief pat his back, "Good man, Naomasa."

      He made his way to the suspects, who barely acknowledged his revenue once he stood in front of them. The detective kneeled down and made eye contact with who he deduced to be the head thug "I am detective Naomasa, I'm here to ask you a few questions." He stated.

      The suspect, a balding man with a bright ginger goatee, sneered at him. "We already answered you damn questions, investigator."

      He didn't so much as blink, "Yes, but you never answered them with me. My quirk let's me tell if you're lying, and apparently what you've said doesn't make a lot of sense. Answer the questions willingly, and your sentence won't have a charge of refusing to cooperate with a police officer added to the list."

      The thug let out a string of curses under his breath, but eventually talked. "We was near the next bank we was gonna hit," he jerked his head to the bank, "when this...this blur just shows up outta nowhere and starts kickin' our asses.

      They weren't lying, Naomasa pressed a bit harder. "Can you remember your attacker? Any defining features?"

      "Last damn thing I can remember is a fox mask, a black fox mask." The thug spat out.

      Naomasa nodded and stood back up, walking over to his commanding officer. "They're not lying."

      The older man sighed, running a hand over his face. "I was actually hoping that wouldn't be the case. You remember four years ago, someone with the same mask started running around?"

      "What are you trying to say?"

      The man sighed, suddenly looking years older than he was. "It seems Kuroko isn't as dead as we thought he was."