𝓒𝓱𝓸𝓲𝓬𝓮 {𝙲𝚑𝚞𝚞𝚢𝚊𝚡𝚁𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚎𝚛}

Chapter 53

I woke up and started getting dressed.

Finch was in the kitchen walking on the counter.

"F-finch?" I looked at him confused.

He was putting Cheeto Puffs in the blender. He noticed me, "Oh...Y/n.. you're up early." He looked at me with a surprised expression on his face.

"What are you doing..?" I looked at him confused.

".....Making a Cheeto smoothie."

"What?! No! That sounds disgusting! Why would you do that?!"

"They motivate me in the morning.."

"How long have you been doing this?"

"....."

"Finch?" I raised a brow.

"I-I can't remember."

I sighed and pushed my glasses up. "No. Not happening, get the Cheeto Puffs out of the blender before you drink that."

"But it's so good!"

"Finch, the thought of that makes me want to gag. I can taste it in my mouth.."

"You mean the delicious taste of the liquidy blend of the Cheetos-"

"Ew! Gross! Quit that!"

"Fine.." He mumbled.

~Time Skip~
I walked down the hallway with Finch on my shoulder.

"Another day of boring work." Finch groaned.

"It's not like you're the one doing the work most of the time. You're always playing with Kenji." I looked at Finch on my shoulder.

"Not true! I do stuff!"

"Like what?" I asked him.

"I do your work whenever you give me Cheeto Puffs."

"That's because you'd do anything for Cheeto Puffs."

"I still do the work!"

"Because you get something in return."

"Don't you get paid for this job?"

He caught me off guard.

"....Fair point." I looked ahead.

I walked inside the Agency to see only Kunikida inside.

"Where's everyone else?" I asked him.

"We're about to have a meeting. Go to the conference room." He looked at me while picking up some papers from his desk.

"Oh.. Alright." I said.

~Time Skip~
I was sitting at the conference room in between Yosano and Junichiro. Finch was on my left shoulder.

Kunikida had a small remote in his hands, the screen was on, "This is footage from a security camera located in Taipei, Taiwan. The city was engulfed with fog in a matter of minutes. That subsided soon after, but this was more than just a weather anomaly."

Wait.. This is familiar.

Kunikida pressed a button. The screen changed to an image of police and citizens circling around something, "A burnt corpse was found after the fog lifted." He pressed another button and it showed us a closer image of the corpse everyone was circling around, "Here's a close up."

"That's horrible.." I heard Atsushi say.

Ranpo was eating potato chips, "Kunikida."

"Yes?" Kunikida looked at him.

Ranpo ate another chip, "That person was an ability user, yeah?"

"You are correct as always, Ranpo." Kunikida pressed a button and it showed a picture of a man, "That individual was known locally as a fire wielder." He pressed another button, "This was in Singapore a year ago. The fog was sighted here as well. Similarly, a body was found." He pressed a button and it showed the picture of a corpse, "He was a card wielding gifted, and highly skilled assassin." He pressed another button, "This took place in Detroit six months ago. Another body was found after the fog." He pressed a button to show a woman being impaled my icicles, "As you can no doubt guess, she was an ice wielding gifted."

"So it seems after the fog, a gifted die due to their own ability." Fukuzawa said. "We're still gathering info."

"Do you think these deaths are connected to the fog somehow?" Kenji asked.

"There are too much for it to be a coincidence." Kunikida pressed a button to show pictures of all the countries, red dots were in some of the countries. "There are currently 128 cases with similar events. And the resulting death roll has surpassed more than 500." Kunikida pushed up his glasses, "The Special Gifted Operations have a name for this event. They're calling it The Serial Gifted Suicide Outbreak. Now that we're on the subject, where is Dazai anyway?"

Atsushi looked at Kunikida nervously. "He said he wanted to try a suicide method.. So he had to pass-"

"WHAT?!" Kunikida shouted. "I'M GONNA WRING HIS SCRAWNY NECK!"

"...Interesting." Ranpo grabbed a small safe and began stuffing his snacks in it.

"What are you doing, Ranpo? You're acting weird." Kenji looked at him.

"That's my little secret." Ranpo closed the safe.

"This fog makes me nervous." Junichiro said, "Apparently anyone who touches it kills themselves-"

"Don't worry, I won't ever let you do that!" Naomi wrapped her arms around his neck and squeezed him close to her.

"So, you didn't bring us in just to talk about this." Yosano said as Naomi kept hugging Junichiro. "Obviously we all have powers and we need to keep our guard. But I'm assuming there's more to it."

"We've been asked to investigate the matter." Kunikida explained. "We've received information about a man believed to be involved in the serial suicides and is here in Yokohama. Our orders are to capture him alive." Kunikida pressed a button, "This is our suspect."

It showed an image of Tatsuhiko Shibusawa.

My eyes had been wide ever since Kunikida finished showing us the bodies.

Holy shit, I'm in the Dead Apple movie.

"Tatsuhiko Shibusawa. 29 years in age." Kunikida told us, "The only information that we have so far is that he's gifted, and is known as the collector."

The light turned on.

"This is a case worthy of our Agency." Fukuzawa said. "Our fellow gifted are in direct danger. It is also important to protect the lives of those here, and as a slave to the people, I'm afraid the public is at grave risk. I hearby declare that this mission is in full effect!"

Everyone stood up from their seats.