It was a cold late autumn night when the leaves had shriveled up and trees were bare. Light snow fell from the sky, covering the sidewalks in a thin white blanket.

The hobos of Edo sat around a firepit at the back of an alley. The warmed their grimy hands over the flames and told stories to pass the night, despite the stench of burning garbage.

Mushashi, a small old man with messy white hair, sat in front of the flames with the flickering orange light reflected in his swirly glasses.

"The Paperbag Man'll wear a paper bag when he lookin' for prey an' if he find ya, he eat ya," Mushashi started his fireside tale.

Madao sat on the opposite side of the firepit, listening to the story.

"He eats people," Mushashi continued. "Favorite food is madao. Got a friend who went missin'. Poor guy, ne'er saw him again. Sucks 'em dry 'til they shrivel up. Only garlic can stop 'im. Yes, only garlic..."

"So he's a vampire?" Madao concluded.

"Vampire? Ne'er said that! Ya not been listenin'?! He might come after you t'night!"

Madao shrugged. He never believed in urban legends. They were only there to scare people.

A group of hobos started singing campfire songs like drunk men in a pub, loud and completely off-tune. Madao stood up and left the alley. He couldn't sleep with all that noise.

He walked down the dark empty streets, shivering from the chilly air. The wind blew right through his thin shirt.

He walked past another alley. At the back of the alley, there sat an old mattress and a portable heater. It was almost as if inviting him to lay down and sleep for the night.

He stepped into the darkness. The bed probably belonged to another hobo. They wouldn't be happy if they saw him on it.

Madao shook his head. Now wasn't the time to worry about that. He found it, so it was his now.

He flopped down and laid staring at the silver moon through his sunglasses. The mattress stank of sweat and sewers, but he wasn't picky. This was softer than the park benches where he usually slept and so warm.

It had been such a long time since he last slept in a bed. His eyelids became heavy and before he knew it, he drifted off into a deep sleep, dreaming that he was home with his wife by his side.

***

When Madao woke up, he wasn't in the alley anymore. He laid on a metal table squinting into the ceiling lights.

It was a small cell with stark white walls and a bolted metal door, no windows, only cold ceramic tiles from floor to ceiling. Someone dressed him in a surgical frock while he was asleep. At least he still had his sunglasses, the only thing he owned that was still worth something.

He had no idea where he was or how he got there. He wondered if he had a lapse in memory, but he was sure the last thing he did was lay down on a mattress in the back of an alley.

It dawned upon him that he could have been kidnapped. The bed was a trap. It wouldn't make sense to find a heater sitting in some random alley on a cold night. Such good things didn't happen to madaos.

Madao felt his abdomen to make sure his kidneys were still there.

He went to the door and tried pushing it open. He slammed his body against it with a loud thump, but it didn't budge, so he started pounding against the metal hoping someone would hear him. Finally, he gave up and curled in a corner in despair.

He didn't know how much time had passed. Once in a while, he'd hear screams of agony coming from outside the cell, muffled by the thick walls.

***

Hijikata stood in front of a bulletin board that covered the entire wall of a Shinsengumi office room. The title on top said Missing Persons and it was filled with photos of people who had disappeared without leaving behind even a corpse. Most of them were cold cases, unsolved for months or even years without any leads.

A photo of Yamazaki was pinned in the corner, half-covered by some other photos. Nobume's poster was pinned somewhere else in this pile of paper.

Hijikata added one more photo to the board, a madao with expensive sunglasses. His wife had reported him missing when he didn't call her for three days.

"It's really filling up, huh?" Kondo stepped into the office.

"Nothing we can do about it. People disappear all the time." Hijikata shrugged. "They're all madaos or criminals anyway."

Kondo looked up at a photo of a young man with short brown hair. His name written on the bottom was Hayasaki Ichiro. "His sister came again this morning. We still haven't found him?"

"The Goldfish Girl? Her brother's probably dead by now."

Someone in the Shinsengumi probably killed him, Hijikata thought. That guy was a known member of the Kiheitai.

"Now now Toshi, we can't say he's dead until we find a corpse. Isn't that how it works? If you didn't actually see a character die, then they're still alive, and even when you did see it, they might still come back to life."

"That doesn't apply to mob characters like him!"

"Oh... Well, here's another missing mob character." Kondo handed him a poster.

Hijikata took it without really looking. Another homeless person.

"He used to own a factory, but he lost everything when it went bankrupt," Kondo explained. "I think it was a mayo factory."

"Mayo?!" Hijikata turned to Kondo, suddenly interested.

"People are going missing more often these days. We gotta focus on our jobs as policemen—"

An officer barged suddenly in, out of breath. "Commander! Emergency! We spotted Shimura-san getting asked out by an Amanto at Snack Smile!"

Kondo eyes opened wide in horror. He dropped everything and ran out the door. "Otae-chan!!!! I'm coming to save you!!!"

Hijikata remained silent and still as Kondo left the room. His gaze remained fixated on the photo.

"Mayo, huh? Who would have known?" Hijikata reached into his coatpocket and took out a mayo bottle he kept close against his chest. "We gotta find the killer, Mayo-chan. Can't let him hurt any more mayo-addicts."

He sat down with his knees curled up to his chest in the same posture as L and stared at the wall of photos with unblinking dark-rimmed eyes. Perhaps sitting this way did make it easier to think. He could finally see the connections between the victims.

"It's a serial killer," Hijikata concluded. "All these missing madaos and assassins, they've been killed by the same guy. The assassins all had the same target. The madaos all visited the Shimura Dojo... just like that sadist."

"What, Mayo-chan? We can't prove it's him with just that?" Hijikata glanced down at his mayo bottle. "But that's enough to make him a suspect. If we could come up with more excuses— I mean reasons that he's guilty, we might finally send him to jail for good."

Hijikata's eyes gleamed at the thought of Sougo behind bars. And even if that failed, he didn't forget that the Tournament was still going on. A plan was forming in his head for stealing Sougo's Anime Item.

***

The peaceful afternoon at the Yorozuya office was interrupted by a loud knock on the door.

"Open the door! It's the Shinsengumi!"

Without waiting for anyone to open the door, Hijikata kicked it down. He stood at the doorway with a few officers behind him.

"Ahh! Don't arrest me! I'll pay my taxes!" Sakamoto jumped behind a couch.

"Okita Sougo! You're under arrest for a hundred counts of murder!!"

Shinpachi turned to Sougo with his mouth twisted and face twitching. "A- A hundred?!!"

"Only a hundred?" Sougo stepped out into the hallway to face Hijikata. "Stop underestimating me."

Kagura picked her nose as she watched from the living room. "Sadist, did your crimes catch up to you? You finally going to jail?"

"Of course not. I got friends~." Sougo laid his hand over the hilt of his sword as a slasher smile stretched across his face.

"Oi, if you wanna fight, don't do it in the house," Gintoki called out from his desk.

Sougo licked his lips, looking forward to having some fun. To his surprise, Kumanaku walked in.

Kumanaku bowed ninety degrees in front of Sougo with his gaze fixed on the floor. He held out a pair of handcuffs in his hands, offering them to Sougo as if expecting him to put it on himself.

"Leader! I'm sorry!"

Sougo stared at the handcuffs with hooded eyes. If it was only Hijikata trying to arrest him, he could just kill him, but to think Hijikata would do something as underhanded as taking advantage of Kumanaku's pureness...

"Kumaku-san~, you're the substitute First Squad Captain. You don't have to follow that asshole's orders."

"There's nothing to worry about, Leader. I know you're innocent. We'll sort this out, but you have to come with us for now, because the law applies to everyone, even ourselves, even Leader. Only then could we enforce the law on society."

"What are you doing in a place like the Shinsengumi?" Sougo shrugged and went along with them since he had nothing better to do for the rest of the day.

They led him into the police car waiting outside and drove away. It had been a while since he last visited the Headquarters. Maybe he should go say hi to Kondo.

***

"Hi Kondo-san~."

Sougo sat on a chair in the Shinsengumi interrogation room. Hijikata sat on the other side of the table and Kondo came in and sat down beside him. It was a typical interrogation room with harsh ceiling lights and gray walls.

"Sougo! I'm so sorry about this!" said Kondo with an apologetic smile. "We just have to go through some formalities so we could cross you off our list of suspects."

"There's no list," Hijikata corrected. "The murderer couldn't be anyone else."

"Hijikata-san, you're using the criminal justice system for your personal grudges. So corrupt..." Sougo shook his head in disappointment.

"Complain all you want in jail!"

Hijikata decided to not waste any more time. He took out ten photos of assassins who had gone missing in the last few days. "Any of them look familiar to you?"

Sougo glanced across the photos with an unconcerned look in his eyes. "They were assassins sent to kill me."

"Good, at least you're telling the truth. So you decided to kill them in 'self-defense'?" Hijikata glanced up at Sougo, anticipating his answer.

"My plot-armor did it, not me." Sougo shrugged. "He's got a mind of his own."

"You think I'd believe that, liar?!"

"Hijikata-san, do you only believe what you want to hear?"

"I know you did it! I just know! Doesn't matter if it wasn't you this time. It'll be you next time!"

"What's this? Are you accusing me of a crime before I commit it?"

Without warning, Hijikata took out an oversized gun from his coatpocket and stood up knocking over his chair with a clatter. By the time he pointed it at Sougo's head, Sougo already took out his own gun and pointed it at Hijikata. They weren't regular guns, but Dominators, which could only shoot people deemed a threat to society by the Sibyl System.

Sougo smirked. "Your Crime Coefficient isn't that much lower than mine, y'know?"

"Now now, let's not judge anyone by their Crime Coefficient." Kondo smiled nervously at the standoff as a bead of sweat dripped down his forehead. "There are plenty of good people with high coefficents."

Hijikata narrowed his eyes at the infuriating smirk on Sougo's face. If he pulled the trigger that sadist won't hesitate to do the same. Plus, he had a point. Neither of their hands were clean. Dragging this stalemate longer won't help anyone.

Hijikata slumped down on his chair and crossed his arms. "Fine, even if you didn't kill the assassins, what do you have against madaos?"

"I dunno. What's wrong with madaos?" Sougo tilted his head.

"You think you can make a better world by wiping out all the madaos?"

"I think the world will be a better place if I wipe out Hijikata-san."

"Admit it!" Hijikata pointed his finger at Sougo. "You're Kira! You're the one killing all the madaos in this city!"

"Hijikata-san, how could you call me a serial killer?" Sougo looked hurt. "I haven't killed anyone for so many chapters that it just makes me really wanna kill someone."

"That sounds like exactly what a serial killer would say! You even look like one!"

"What do you mean? Serial killers look like normal people," said Sougo with the innocent eyes of a normal person.

"You—" Hijikata reached across the table to grab Sougo by his shirt, ready to punch that look off his face.

"That's enough, Toshi!" Kondo held him back. "There's no way it could be Sougo. He's our First Squad Captain."

"How's that got anything to do with this?!"

"Let's not dig into it any further, okay?" said Kondo with a pleading smile. "We shouldn't point fingers at one of our own. It won't do any good for the Shinsengumi if that gets out."

"Yeah, the truth doesn't matter." Sougo shrugged. "I'm just an innocent defender of justice~."

"Stop playing innocent! I know what you did! We couldn't find any corpses 'cause you wrote in your Death Note for them to die Naomi-style in a way that no one will find their bodies! How many people have you even killed with your Death Note?"

"No one."

"Yeah right!"

"Hijikata-san, how could you not understand something so basic? Killing people with a Death Note is a waste of valuable lives," said Sougo, staring into the distance with an aura of goodness. "It's better when it's up close and personal."

"What's wrong with you, dammit?! Is your moral compass completely crooked?!!"

"I'm a sadist~." Sougo grinned. "Using a Death Note just takes away all the fun~."

"So you say you never used it?" Hijikata held out his hand. "Prove it! Give me your Death Note."

"Hijikata-san, are you doing this to steal my Anime Item? You gave up on stealing it by force 'cause I'm too strong, so now you're trying to trick me into giving it to you? This whole setup is to steal my Anime Item, right? You went as far as arresting me to drag me here and corner me with your half-baked accusations, am I right?"

"Um... N-n-no... Of course not! You think I'm the type to do something so underhanded?!!"

Dammit! He saw right through it, Hijikata gritted his teeth.

"Here you go~." Sougo reached into the sleeve of his kimono and handed him the Death Note with a cheery smile.

Hijikata stared frozen in shock at the black notebook in his hands before he snapped out of it. His face twisted into a triumphant smirk.

"Ha! Eliminated!!" Hijikata did a victory dance. "I stole your Anime Item~! Can't believe you fell for that! OkiKagu eliminated!!!"

Sougo watched with calm eyes. "Hijikata-san, don't you know the rules? If I give it to you voluntarily, it doesn't count as stealing."

Hijikata froze. "What?! There no rule like that!"

"I didn't make it up. It's a new rule." Sougo held up his hands in innocence. "If you don't believe me, just check the end of the chapter to see if they announced my elimination."

"You— You can't just add new rules in the middle of a game to stop people from winning!"

"It's okay, it's just a game." Kondo patted Hijikata on the back even though it looked like he needed reassuring himself. "Losing the Tournament won't change anything. Yes, nothing at all. Otae-chan! Nothing will change my love for you!"

"It doesn't matter! It doesn't matter if it's a game! Every time I come close to winning, it just moves further away! Do I even have a chance?!" Hijikata threw his arms in the air, driven to insanity. "This whole fanfic's against me! It's not fair!! It's not fair everything revolves around that sadist! I don't care anymore! Y-You can't stop me now, haha! I-I'm taking you down! Haha! Hahahaha!"

Hijikata grabbed a pen and started writing in the Death Note, twitching like a mentally unstable person with a twisted smile on his face.

Sougo swiped the Death Note out of his hands. Kondo grabbed Hijikata just as he was about to charge at Sougo.

Hijikata struggled to free himself. "Let go of me! I'll kill him! I'll kill him!!!"

Sougo remained completely unfazed as he glanced down at what was written on the page: Okita Soug—

"Kondo-san~, you see this? That guy's a bigger danger to society than I am." Sougo grinned like that was something to be proud about.

"What's wrong?" Kondo stared at the page like a clueless gorilla. "He only tried to write your name."

Sougo glanced at the clock on the wall. "Oops, just realized it's time to end this chapter. Good luck finding the real killer~!"

He ran off and left Kondo to take care of the raging Hijikata.

***

Next time: The Shinsengumi's investigation sends them straight to the main villain's lair...