Cop Craft Volume 5 Chapter 1 Part 2
「Are you for real?」
「Yeah. Don’t believe anything this bastard says. He knew I would blow his cover, so he decided to make me out to be the fucking detective. Don’t underestimate him, you bastard. Did you think Bernardo would fall for such a cheap trick?」
「Hey, I’m not….」
Bernardo looked troubled.
「Watch your mouth! You’re the one trying to make me out to be a cop!」
Rodriguez was shouting
「I’m getting a little confused….」
Tilarna was actually confused about what her position was in all of this.
「That’s complete bullshit! He’s the cop!」
「No! You’re the cop!」
「You’re the cop!」
「You fucking pig!」
They kept arguing back and forth. It was pure, angry chaos. Guns and blades were being pointed all over the place. The only one who hadn’t drawn his gun yet was Matoba.
There was nothing to do about it. At this point the only way to save the undercover mission was to start all over again. Matoba cleared his throat once, scratched the back of his head three times, and then cleared his throat again. It was a cue they had agreed with the observation team.
Tony McBee and Alex Godunov, both from the Vice department just like him, were observing the entire situation from the roof of the switchyard. As soon as they saw the cue, they would surely inform all patrols nearby to spring into action.
Rodriguez pointed his gun directly at Matoba
「Hey, Manobe or whatever, I warned you! Don’t you fucking dare to even yawn, you bastard! Got it?!」
「Yeah, yeah…. I got it. Look, why don’t we just calm down and close this deal already?」
「A deal?! With a cop?! Eat shit!」
「I’m telling you I’m not a—」
Tony and the others had made their move much quicker than Matoba expected.
「Freeze! Police!」
Bright searchlight beams were being aimed directly at them. Red and blue emergency lights were flashing from behind them. If there was one escape route, it was to Matoba’s right.
「Shit! It’s the cops. You sold us?!」
Rodriguez started blindly firing his gun. He managed to hit no one, but one bullet did scrape off against one of the patrols behind Matoba making a piercing metallic noise.
At that moment, Matoba started taking the same route as the two men fleeing. Tilarna was left standing there. Tony, Godunov and the other officers noticed she was in fact an ally as they caught up to her.
「You bastard!」
Bernardo tried shooting at Matoba. Tilarna prevented it by grappling with him.
All the other officers opened fire as soon as they heard the gunshots. Although they weren’t really aiming at anything in particular. Their gunshots were all fake. But they still sounded like real guns. Matoba ran away in the middle of the fake friendly fire, raising a cloud of dust on his way. He passed between the train’s wagons, and headed outside of the switchyard.
He was trying to pretend to be running away, however he noticed Rodriguez also running away on his right. He had somehow managed to find the correct way to run in the middle of the chaos, and was running at full speed.
He was surprisingly well built.
Was he going to let Rodriguez run away?
No, that’s not possible. He was the guy that literally shouted “He’s a cop” at the top of his lungs after seeing me. I can’t just let him go around town like this.
「Stop!」
Matoba pulled out his gun and shouted. He intentionally didn’t identify himself as the police.
As expected, Rodriguez didn’t stop running. He started climbing a 7 ft. fence, and swiftly jumped over it like a professional athlete. He was also very quick on his feet. Matoba climbed the fence as well and chased after him.
There was a construction site beyond the fence. It was going to be a new highway. All sorts of building materials were piled up, and there were forklifts and cranes all over the place. It was hard to see. He lost sight of Rodriguez several times, but eventually managed to find, and chase after him by the sound of his footsteps.
「Rodriguez! Stop!」
He ran around a mountain of something that looked like cement, and aimed his gun. Rodriguez didn’t shoot back, however. Instead, in an attempt to speed up his pace, he had tripped on something and lost his balance. He fell on the floor, and immediately stood up to start running again. However, in that small frame of time, Matoba had gained almost 10 meters on him, and was getting closer
「Take this…!」
An iron pipe was lying on his way. He picked it up while still running, and threw it at him. He wasn’t expecting any great results from doing that, but unexpectedly, Rodriguez lost his footing as the pipe hit him, and fell flat on his face. Matoba started running at full speed directly at him, who was trying to stand up, clearly upset at the situation. He was both taller and heavier. Rodriguez didn’t even get to mutter a single word before Matoba came flying in and smashed him against the gravel of the construction.
「Hey, Manobe! Wait….!」
Matoba completely ignored Rodriguez’s half finished sentence, and took his gun. It was a 9mm Beretta. He removed the cartridge, pushed the slide, and made sure it was completely empty.
Rodriguez wasn’t saying much, and instead just raising both his hands above his head in an almost comical manner, as he pleaded to Matoba
「Hey, Manobe! Why don’t we calm down a bit?」
「San Teresa Police Department. You’re under arrest」
「So you were a fucking cop?!」
He checked his ribs and his back thoroughly for another weapon. He actually had hidden a small revolver in his right leg. He emptied the other gun, and after throwing it away, Matoba showed his badge and ID at Rodriguez
「You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can be used against you in court. You have the right—」
「Ah yeah yeah! I get it! However, mister Detective Matoba. But before you finish spilling all that bullshit to your captive, how about you check my left pocket? I have an ID」
「Don’t move!」
「Here, I’ll move slowly… I don’t even have a gun on me anymore. Come on… open that notebook. And I want you to take a good look inside it…」
Rodriguez stifled a bitter laugh, and slowly pulled a small notebook from his jacket’s pocket.
「Could you open it please?」
「……」
He had probably taken Matoba’s silence as a “yes”. Matoba opened Rodriguez’s notebook, and looked at the ID inside it.
「… Holy shit!」
Matoba looked considerably annoyed by what he saw and he took a cold attitude towards him.
「I’m Jorge Escobar, DEA agent.」
Rodriguez said
「I can tell by looking」
「In that case, could you please stop pointing that gun at me?」
「If you hadn’t told me, we could’ve shot you to death back there」
Matoba returned his gun to its holster.
Out of the four supposed suspects that would be taking part in the drug trade, three of them were in fact undercover detectives.
It was no laughing matter that they had all been involved in such a completely moronic case to begin with. If Matoba for some reason ever ended up publishing a memoir about his time as a cop (not like that would ever happen in the first place), then tonight’s incident would probably be the very first thing he would avoid writing about. But even if, for some stupid reason, he decided to include it, then his editor would surely not allow him to include it just because of how stupid it all was. He would probably argue that “it doesn’t even feel real” or something like that.
「Well, it was an undercover mission, and I’m sure he was under a non-disclosure agreement or something. So it’s not surprising that something like that happened」
Said his coworker detective Godunov in a nonchalant tone. He had been the very first one to arrive at the scene from the switchyard, and also the one to laugh the longest about it when he found out.
They were at the Vice department’s offices after everything was over with.
There were about four to five people still working overtime. The lights from boss Zimmer’s booth, that could be seen through a glass pane, were completely out, but he was probably at the DEA offices at the moment exchanging harsh insults with Escobar’s boss.
「Besides, it’s true that you need to fool your friends in order to fool your enemies as well, so don’t be so grumpy about it」
「Godunov. You truly are a philanthropist. I can’t just let something like that go so easily」
Said Matoba, still annoyed. Tilarna opened her eyes wide
「Is that so? I think Godunov is right in this case, actually」
「No way. You should be able to tell that someone is your colleague just by looking at their face. Besides, if you notice the grounds for the entire operation were too vague to begin with, you should at least let your boss know. The guys at the top usually know when a fellow undercover officer will be there, and once you know that, you can get and receive advice, and put together a strategy for the mission. That’s how a proper system works」
There are several different organizations in San Teresa City capable of carrying out undercover operations. In order to protect their own mission and strategies, they don’t inform other units of their current operations normally. However, no organization is completely clean, so occasionally, information about one organization’s operations will be leaked to the others.
Of course, some of the big shots within the police system in the city were not too eager in letting lower ranking officers play informant and leaking out information however they pleased, so they tried to control the secrecy of each organization’s operations by keeping it centralized in HQ. However, that didn’t work too well.
The Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Finance and the Police Department frequently had different goals in mind, so which rights belonged where, and under which jurisdiction some stuff fell would be constantly pulled by one or the other. Besides, no department was willing to share much information on their own detectives that would often go on dangerous undercover missions. Sure enough, some information was leaked, and in the end the entire project was abandoned (although the leak’s damages were considerably minimal, there were rumors about a more conservative group of people who conspired to bring the entire project down).
Some attempts at unification are still being carried out to this day, however in the end, each organization will have the final word on what info they entrust to whom.
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