Tantei wa Mou, Shindeiru - Volume 7 - Chapter 2.6

 Mission Start

Soon after that, the car reached our destination.

I parted from Noel, walked into the hotel she’d reserved for us, and took the elevator up.

It was a luxury resort hotel, the kind we’d never have been able to stay at as a rule. When I knocked on the door of a room on the thirty-fifth floor, Siesta opened it. “Oh, you’re finally here.”

“…You’re a heartless fiend.”

“I am not. I just believed that no matter what trouble you got into, you were bound to come out victorious, so I went on ahead to the hotel.”

Geez. It’s all in how you phrase things, isn’t it?

I went inside, dragging my suitcase. Our room turned out to be a suite, with a living room that was separate from the bedroom. The detectives had been having their afternoon tea in there: Snacks and a teapot were set out on the table.

“Huh? Are you staying here, too, Kimihiko?”

When she saw me wearily grab a chair and sit down, Nagisa blinked at me.

“Yeah. I told Noel it was fine to put us all in the same room.”

“Gosh, I feel threatened.”

“Don’t squirm when you say that.”

“I didn’t!”

As we were having that fun conversation, Siesta brought me a cup. “You’re having tea, too, aren’t you, Kimi?”

“Oh… Nah, water’s fine.” I picked up a plastic bottle of mineral water that was already sitting there.

“…I see.” For some reason, Siesta looked a little disappointed. She sat down next to me. “Kimi, have you been drinking? You smell like liquor.”

“I just had a glass in the car on the way here. Noel offered.”

“And you always tell me not to drink.”

That’s her own fault. After all, drinking has helped this detective blow it before.

“Wait, you saw Noel? Does that mean you talked about the Bruno thing?” Nagisa asked, tossing a chocolate into her mouth.

“Yeah. She said he’s still planning to go to the ceremony.”

“…I see. Then we really will have to make thorough preparations before the Ritual of Sacred Return.”

“That’s probably the whole reason Noel came to us about this. It sounds like they haven’t been able to contact most of the other Tuners.”

As Siesta said, at this point, the Ace Detective was the only former Tuner who specialized in combat. And even that was only true of Siesta, not Nagisa.

“Hm? What?” Siesta noticed my gaze and tilted her head.

“I just sort of wished we at least had Charlie here.”

“She’s on a different mission right now.”

A week ago, Charlie had been on the fence about attending the Ritual of Sacred Return, and she’d ultimately decided not to come. Her reasons hadn’t been pessimistic, though: The agent had picked up another important mission.

“What’s she up to now? Even you don’t know, do you, Siesta?”

“Right, but that’s how it should be with Charlie,” Siesta said, gazing into the distance. I sensed a little pride in her profile.

Exactly. Charlotte wasn’t just an agent who tagged along after the detective anymore.

“I wonder if Yui’s running around getting ready for her overseas performance,” Nagisa murmured, checking her phone. Come to think of it, the concert was the day after tomorrow.

“By the way, I just sent her a text asking ‘What are you doing now?’, and she replied with ‘Please don’t act like you’re my boyfriend.’”

“Geez, Yui. Ouch.”

After we’d talked about that for a while…

“So, Siesta. What are we going to do now? Either way, I think we should talk to Bruno a bit more.”

“At this stage, we should probably set up safeguards to minimize the damage in case there really is an attack during the Ritual of Sacred Return.” Gazing at her smartphone, Siesta started to go over our course of action.

“Huh? Wait, we haven’t filled our assistant in on this maneuver yet, have we?”

“I have one other piece of insurance. Or maybe I should say I’m working on something, but…I guess it doesn’t have to be now.”

“Hey, you two. Quit messing around with your phones and let me in on this.”

Granted, there had been one very recent incident where everything had worked out much better because the whole team wasn’t on the same page, but…

“Well, if it comes to that, I’ve got an ace up my sleeve, too.”

“Oh, yay. I’m happy for you.”

Siesta, it actually hurts kind of a lot when you dodge the subject like that.

“But listen, we may need to designate someone to call the shots,” Nagisa said.

True—no matter how we strategized and planned, it would be pointless if we couldn’t make prompt decisions when it counted.

“Why not our assistant?” Siesta suggested unexpectedly.

Both Nagisa and I weren’t sure what she was getting at.

“Nagisa, you and I were the ones who decided to reclaim our authority as Tuners, attend the Ritual of Sacred Return, and take on the unknown crisis. That means it’s Kimi’s turn. We’ll let him have the right to make the final decisions and give the orders,” Siesta said, poking my cheek with her fingertip several times.

“This is proof that you trust me, right?” I said. “You’re not just shoving all the responsibility onto me, are you?”

As I tried to smile, several texts came in on my phone.

“…Oh, I see.”

For a brief moment, I made eye contact with each detective.

The mission was already underway.