Mastermind: Strategist For Hire

Eri-chan

"Is this her?"

Tsukauchi looked through the glass at the girl Nighteye had brought in, who he'd said was named Eri. Officers had already taken samples of the blood covering her, but they hadn't had time to clean her off yet, so most of it had already dried to a dirty brown and was starting to flake. Recovery Girl was on her way to take a look at her, since they didn't know if Eri would be safe in a hospital because of her ties to the Yakuza.

As soon as Eri had mentioned that Overhaul and all of his men were killed by Mastermind, Nighteye had sent his sidekicks and a whole team of police officers to investigate the base, only to find a bloodbath. There hadn't been a single person left alive, with the exception of Eri, and Overhaul himself had obviously been tortured to death, Mastermind's signature M carved into his body over a hundred times. The police were still in the process of taking pictures of the scene before they could remove the bodies and they had already had to set up a perimeter to keep out the media, who had flocked to the compound as if they'd smelled the blood.

Tsukauchi sighed and walked into the interrogation room, Nighteye and Nedzu right behind him. He hated that they had to interrogate this little girl who had obviously been through too much in the last 24 hours, but anything they could find on Mastermind put them one step closer to discovering his identity, which was essential to resolving the high stakes hostage situation he had set up.

"Hello, Eri." He spoke softly, sitting down across from her and putting his files for both Mastermind and Overhaul down on the table. "My name is Detective Tsukauchi, this is Nedzu and you already know Sir Nighteye. Is it alright if we ask you a few questions about how you ended up on Nighteye's roof this morning?"

Eri nodded, her wide eyes scanning the room in a clear display of hypervigilance. Seriously, Tsukauchi knew that Mastermind was depraved, but traumatizing a child? That was a new low.

"Who left you on the roof, Eri?" He asked.

"He, um, said his name was Mastermind."

True

"What did he look like?"

"He was short and, um, he had pretty green eyes. He smiled a lot too, I think. He had a mask covering his mouth, but, um, his eyes were smiling."

True

Tsukauchi looked at Nedzu and Nighteye who returned his glance and nodded. It matched what they knew of him, so it probably really was Mastermind, but why would a villain, especially one as powerful as Mastermind, drop a little girl off at a hero agency when he could have just kept her for himself or sold her off?

"Do you know why Mastermind kidnapped you?' Nighteye asked with a frown.

Eri looked confused, "He, um, didn't kidnap me. Mastermind-sama saved me."

True

Nighteye's eyes widened and Tsukauchi knew that he looked much the same.

Nedzu seemed to be the one who maintained the most composure in light of this new revelation, "What did he save you from?"

"Um, Overhaul...he was a bad man. He told me I was sick and that's why he hurt me."

True

Eri was starting to tremble and Tsukauchi realized that she was more terrified of Overhaul than she was of Mastermind. The child was obviously traumatized, but the question now was who was responsible for that.

Nedzu hummed, "Do you know why he saved you?"

Eri nodded, "Mastermind-sama, um, he said that he wasn't trying to save me. Um, he'd already killed all the, um, the bad men by the time he found me."