THE KNIGHTS JUSTICE:
DIVINE PUNISHMENT PART 8
While the investigation churned near the console, Mouri Kogoro, Inspector Megure, and Conan scrutinized the digital recording once more.
"Nē... look! The owner is doing something!" Conan chirped, his thumb hovering over the rewind toggle.
"Kono gaki! Stop meddling with the evidence without authorization!" Mouri bellowed, his face flushing with irritation.
"Look! He's reacting to something before the assailant strikes!" Conan persisted, pointing a small finger at the screen, completely disregarding Mouri's impending wrath.
Before Mouri could deliver a disciplinary blow to the boy's head, his eyes caught the movement on the monitor. Megure leaned in as well. On the grainy display, the knight had just marched past Mr. Manaka. The owner, using a nearby table for equilibrium, pivoted his head toward the mahogany surface. His eyes locked onto a slip of paper resting there.
"Yes, that's it—he's realized something. Is that a card or a note?" Mouri muttered, watching as Manaka's hand shot out to snatch the parchment.
On the screen, Manaka appeared visibly jolted after reading the contents. With a frantic motion, he seized a pen that had been left atop the same desk.
"Look, he's grabbing the stylus!" Inspector Megure noted, his nose nearly touching the glass of the monitor.
The footage continued to roll, depicting a man in his final throes of desperation. Manaka began scrawling a message onto the paper, his teeth bared in a silent, agonizing grit as he labored to leave his final testament.
"He's writing! He's leaving a dying message!" Megure added, his voice rising in pitch.
Manaka's features on the screen twisted into a mask of pure, unadulterated fury. He hurled the pen away with a violent flick of his wrist.
"He discarded the pen? But what of the note?" Mouri questioned. They watched as Manaka crumpled the paper tightly within his fist, his eyes burning with a hateful glare directed at the knight's armored back.
But before Manaka could take another breath, the knight spun around with lethal precision. The blade carved through his shoulder and torso. The killer's gauntlet clamped onto his throat, the sword pierced his chest, and his body was hammered into the wall. Even as the light faded from Manaka's eyes and his silhouette went limp, his fingers remained fused around the crumpled scrap of paper.
Conan paused the frame. Mouri turned to Megure, his expression grim.
"Does that note signify what I suspect it does?" Mouri asked.
"It likely remains clutched in his hand," Megure replied, instantly grasping the detective's implication.
The group vacated the monitoring station, hurrying back to the gloom of the Hell Gallery where the remains still hung. Megure and Mouri led the vanguard, rushing toward the epicenter of the crime, followed closely by Ran, Conan, and the trembling museum staff.
Sonoko and Leon remained behind in the solitude of the monitoring room. Sonoko sank into the chair Mouri had recently vacated, her posture sagging with exhaustion. "Ugh... I'm far too drained to move another inch," she groaned, leaning her head back.
She watched as Leon dragged a second chair across the floor, positioning it beside her.
"Little Leon," Sonoko whispered, leaning close to his ear, her voice barely audible. "You knew who that knight was, didn't you?"
Leon offered a slow, deliberate nod.
"Then why didn't you speak up?" she breathed, her side-profile etched with curiosity.
"Because the Fallen Knight shall not elude the scales of justice," Leon whispered back into her ear, his voice a dry, spectral rasp.
"So... he will be apprehended?" Sonoko asked, pulling back slightly to search his veiled face. Leon nodded once more. The two siblings sat in a heavy silence, finding a momentary respite in the empty room.
Back in the Hell Gallery, the investigators had congregated around a massive white body bag laid upon the stone floor. A forensic officer unzipped the shroud, exposing the stiffened form of Mr. Manaka. The officer reached for the victim's right hand; rigor mortis had already begun to set in, making the fingers stubborn and rigid. With a firm effort, the officer pried the palm open, revealing a tightly balled piece of parchment.
"I've retrieved it, Inspector! It was indeed secured in the victim's grasp," the officer announced, handing the evidence to Megure.
Megure took the scrap with gloved hands. Beside him, Mouri watched with bated breath as the Inspector carefully unfurled the wrinkled mess.
"This is—!" they both exclaimed in unison.
The paper bore a single name, written in jagged, desperate Japanese characters: Kubota.
"W-WHY IS MY NAME ON THAT?!" Kubota shrieked, his voice cracking with terror. Beads of cold sweat began to roll down his triangular face, and his frame erupted into a violent tremor.
Every head in the room swiveled toward him the moment the name was uttered.
"It appears you donned the armor to mask your visage from the cameras, but the victim was not so easily deceived," Mouri declared, his gaze pinning Kubota to the spot.
Kubota recoiled, his eyes wide and frantic. "N-NO! IT WASN'T ME!" he screamed, his voice pitching higher in a desperate denial.
"In that case, provide us with an alibi. Where were you at 4:30 PM?" Megure demanded, closing the distance between them while brandishing the incriminating note.
"I-I was alone in the office! I was performing the tasks Mr. Ochiai assigned to me!" Kubota stammered, the words tumbling out in a panicked rush. His face was a mask of sheer fright as he pleaded his case.
"Yes, I did indeed delegate several administrative duties to him in the office," Manager Ochiai confirmed softly, his voice echoing in the dim hall.
"Which means no one can verify your whereabouts, can they?" Megure countered, looming over the quaking man.
"H-hold on! What possible motive would I have to slay the owner?" Kubota cried, his hands raised in a defensive gesture as he backed away from the encroaching Inspector.
"There is no use in attempting to talk your way out of this, Kubota-san," Iijima interjected, stepping forward with a fierce, accusatory glare. "The owner threatened to ruin you with a lawsuit for the damages you caused—because you were clandestinely selling the museum's exhibits behind his back!"
Kubota's eyes distended as the foundations of his secrecy crumbled. The revelation that the exhibits he had clandestinely sold were now being framed as a lethal motive struck him with the force of a physical blow. Perspiration cascaded down his pallid features, drenching his collar as the gravity of his predicament set in.
AM N. NOT.(っ－＿－)っ♤♤DRAFT♤♤