CedRic Lthues. Claret City

Chapter 0 -Prologue-

It was a good day to be alive. February 11, 2021. Any normal person would be spending the sunny afternoon relaxing either in their study or bedroom, doing either clean or dirty stuff. But I, Cedro Ricweard Lthues, weird name, I know, spent this jolly, hot and sunny afternoon chasing a criminal down the wet market. Why? Because I was the best damn detective in this city, my city, Viridescent City.
This case wasn't hard at all, but it was a serious robbery case. For months my team and I shed tears, blood and all of our liquids into finding this guy. He managed to steal from one of the richest families in this town! To be honest, I'm quite conflicted. The family he stole from always boasted about their cutting-edge security system, but he was smart enough to break through all their hi-tech systems—he's a genius. I fully admitted he was, but he was a criminal, a good one. Or so I thought. This genuis was found by one of my men walking around the wet market, the literal day after his scheme...what a dumbass. We galloped like tigers hunting for their prey towards a criminal sprinting through the wet market.
I was caught in the moment, I was in the zone. I could see nothing but my target. Every single joint in my legs was being pushed through their limits. The once warm and gentle heat of the sun now became a torrid and sultry beam of vicious heat beaming violently glaring over my body. Droplets of sweat flowed down my body to my suit as my legs scampered towards the mark.
This man may be an idiot, but he was quite quick on his feet. He was like a bunny, trampling over anything in its way in order to escape its hunters. The man was about to escape, the end of the market was on the horrizon, I mustn't let him get away! Impulsively I grabbed a wooden chopping board from one of the fish stalls and used all of my muscle strength to hurl the object into the air and straight to the man's head. And like a ragdoll, he was stunned upon impact and crashed to the wet concrete lifeless. We finally caught up to him and even though I knocked the life out of him, we still cuffed him just in case. The people cheered as we took the body and placed him into the cop car. My men yanked his body to the back of the car, I entered the driver's seat and drove to the hospital. As I drove away, the clapping and cheering slowly faded away, and I blushed.
When we arrived at the hospital, I and one of my men, who was in the car with me, lifted him inside. We handed the lifeless ragdoll to the nurses and allowed the professionals to take care of it. The thrill of the chase dissipated. The adrenaline turned into nonrepinephrine, the world was calm once again.
My men went back to the headquarters and contacted the relatives of the thief. As for me, I decided to stay in the hospital; I needed to tell that man the consqeunces of his actions. As cruel as it was, punishing a wounded man, it was the law. No one is exempted from the law. And besides, if he didn't want to get caught, he shouldn't have done anything criminal in the first place. Yes, I was blaming him. I was certain he knew the law, yet he chose to defy it. It was just karma doing its thing. I sat down in one of those metal hospital chairs that were sorta built together and waited for the man's body state to lighten. After quite some time, a nurse came to me and said, "He's ready."
He was frantic when he saw me, it was like he was a woman and I was a filthy cockroach, freaking out when I arrived. "It's okay, it's okay," I said calmly, "I won't hurt you now." Even after what I said, he almost blew a gasket. Suddenly, one of the two nurses in the room injected some medication straight through the man's veins, calming him down after a few minutes. I was no doctor, nurse, nor anything to that degree, but I skimmed the book of medicine once. The medication could either be Liquid Xanax or Liquid Klnopoin—two medications used to calm someone's nerves. The man was vulnerable and it was time to talk to him.
The nurses left the room quietly after I asked them to give me some time with the criminal. I sat down next to the patient in his bed and spoke calmly.
"Are you ready to talk now?" I asked. He merely nodded. "The family filed charges against you," I added. There was no reply. Maybe it was the side effect of the drug; I didn't know really. "I want to help you."
"Then you shouldn't have hit me with whatever you hit me with," he replied in his middle-aged tone, all the while rubbing the spot where the chopping board pummeled.
"Because you wouldn't stop running," I continued, "Had you never ran, I wouldn't have hit you."
"I was running because you were chasing me!"
"I was chasing you because you did something wrong."
"I didn't do anything wrong!" He raised his voice.
"Do you really believe that?" I asked with pity. Does this man have no sense of justice? Rights and wrongs?
"You don't understand," he replied, "That man is a criminal."
"What are you talking about?"
"You don't know this," he continued grimly, "But that man is the same as me, a criminal."
"What?" I cried in confusion.
"Ruby and Elliot Ytrri aren't innocent people either."
His words made me remember about an article I read before. It was about the Ytrris committing some sort of war crime, but I just wrote it off as some conspiracy some fat dude in a basement in his 30s made. Could it be actually true?
"Do you have any sort of proof? I asked.
"In my clothes, left pocket."
But he was in a hospital gown and his clothes from earlier were nowhere near. "I'll work on that later, but for now do you have a lawyer?" He merely shook his head. "The government will get you one," I continued, "For now, stay here and rest. I'll try to see what you were talking about."
"You have to believe me," he said in desperation.
"I'll see," I said and left the room.
To be honest, if he were any other dirty criminal, I wouldn't have believed anything he said. But something within me, a pinch in my guts, was telling me that there was a bit of truth within his message. Curious, I went to the front desk and asked for his clothing, to which the nurses gave to me thanks to my power. I grabbed the package and left the hospital. To my surprise, my guys didn't take the police car back to the station. It was still in the parking lot; guess they just ran back to the station. I entered, turned it on to have some AC, and opened the package. Within the brown box was a brown t-shirt, black thin coat, jeans and his crooked black shoes. I checked his jeans, the left pocket specifically, but there was nothing there. "Looks like he was just lying after all," I thought to myself. As my hand caressed out of the pocket, the back of my palms felt something. Intrigued, I took the whole pocket out and proved my thoughts wrong. Stitched to the lining of the pocket was a piece of paper with something written in it. I grabbed a pen, the closest sharp thing I got, and broke the stitches, allowing the paper to breathe. The small rectangular piece of paper unfolded into a quarter of an intermediate paper. There was writing upon it,
"Pay your debts now, Elliot Ytrri!"
The message looked like it was written with a paintbrush. The color of the words were pure red and every stroke felt like it was engraved with hatred. I gasped to myself upon realizing that he was telling the truth after all. I had to tell it quickly to the chief so I hurried to the station. It was urgent news, something that must be spread awareness of immediately. The adrenaline was rushing through my veins once again that I didn't even take a single glance at the road lights. I was pushing the car into full gear, breaking and surpassing the speed limit, but still cautious of the cars around me. With the help of my instincts, I watched out for anything that might cause a ferocious crash. It was a tedious task, yet I pushed through. With my foot fully pressed down on the pedal, my eyes perceived everything and anything dangerous. The station was only a few meters away when out of nowhere, like a horrible jumpscare, a speeding car crossed in front of me, without my eyes even seeing it, causing a terrible crash! It only happened for a second, I didn't know what to do. For the split second that I saw it drive in front of me, I realized that my fate was decided, and fate was a stubborn bitch. At that moment I knew that the only thing I could do was close my eyes and hope that my passage to heaven would be painless and quick. The last thing I heard was the loud horn of the speeding vehicle.
I felt cold, like I was scuba diving to the deep. I couldn't move even though I wanted to. My limbs were frozen shut, my eyes wouldn't open. It was torture. And yet...why did I feel comfortable? I heard a ringing in my ear, like a dog whistle, and felt this excruciating pain. With all of my might, I tried to move around, but to no avail—I couldn't even scream. I was in horrid pain and immeasurable fright.
My eyes finally opened