Without any further ado, Hernandez signals me to follow him and we walk through the winding corridors that make up the bowels of ORPO HQ. I am about to protest not getting back my confiscated gear but Hernandez quickly silences me with a stern expression on his face. Trusting the Commander to at least know what he is doing, I hold my peace and keep pace beside him as we drift deeper and deeper into the building. Hernandez leads me back to the detention block but instead of taking me to the cells, he opens a locked door that leads downstairs. The stairs terminate at basement where the air is musty and smells faintly with the odor of stale sweat.

"Smart ass, wait here for a bit." Hernandez abruptly presses his hand against my chest just before we step out into the basement. Shrugging, I nod in silence and Hernandez slips out into the corridor, and raps his knuckles briefly on a closed door just ahead of us. I hear someone unlocking the door and I duck back into the stairwell just as Hernandez enters the room. Shortly after, Hernandez reemerges from the room he was in and urgently signals me to hurry up.

"What was that about?" I whisper to Hernandez as we stride onward through the basement.

"Can't risk taking you out of here in my personal car." the Commander explains, "You're still an official suspect. I registered your name as a detainee being transferred to the lockup at another station and got the keys for a patrol cruiser."

As I am digesting Hernandez's explanation, both of us emerge into an underground car pool where ORPO patrol cars are neatly parked in a row next to each other. As the two of us are making our way to the cop cars, several black lorries trundle into the parking lot and come to a stop before a large cargo elevator. Hernandez quickly pulls me behind a pillar and puts an index finger to his lips, the meaning clear.

The black lorries keep their engines idling and a few minutes later, the doors of the cargo elevator grind open on their overused gears. A bedraggled line of human men and women in orange jumpsuits and with their heads shaved are marched out of the elevator by ORPO officers. The line of prisoners trudge unenthusiastically forward, weighed down by heavy shackles that chain the inmates to one another. The ORPO officers impatiently direct the prisoners to board the lorries, occasionally pushing the line forward to get the inmates to get a move on.

"Black Marias?" I ask Hernandez, pointing at the lorries.

Hernandez nods, "Prisoners being moved to the island camps. Stay out of sight smart ass. Those guards know the prisoner transfer schedules. They'll be on to us lies flies on shit."

Both of us get down on all fours and crawl behind a vacant cop car, waiting for the lorries to leave with their cargo. After some grumbling and cursing, the ORPO officers finish with cramming all the prisoners into the lorries, stacking the bodies inside like sardines. Too many passengers, not enough space. Can't be very comfortable for those inmates. An officer bangs the back of one of the lorries, signaling the drivers that everyone has been loaded. With a roar of overtaxed engines, the lorries leave ORPO HQ in a cloud of exhaust and dust.

"Coast's clear." Hernandez whispers as he peeks over the car we are hiding behind. The Commander then checks the set of keys in his hand remotely unlocking the cop car at the opposite end of the parking garage. Wasting no further time, both of us dash to the waiting getaway vehicle. I slide into the passenger's seat as Hernandez starts up the car and in no time at all, we peel out off ORPO HQ towards freedom.

....

Hernandez drives as fast as he can while keeping within the speed limit, most likely to avoid any unwanted attention. He is clearly familiar with the roads of The City, expertly guiding the cop car down the messy web of side streets until we emerge at the junction leading to the inter-district highway. I suck my breath in as Hernandez drives towards the riot of red thread ahead of us and the Commander notices my loss of composure.

"What's your deal?" Hernandez questions in his hoarse voice, sweat running down his brow from the tension.

"Nothing. Keep driving." I reassure, but I can't help but grip the hand rest tightly.

The cop car drives straight into the red threads and the moment we are within the thicket of metaphysical crimson, the whole ensemble goes completely crazy, seething and flailing about in protest. I brace for the onslaught, but to my relief, nothing actually happens in meat space. Hernandez on his part keeps driving, completely unaware of what had just happened. The cop car hits the highway and Hernandez accelerates smoothly, causing the scenery outside to blur past us. I keep looking into the car's side mirror, half expecting a conga line of brainwashed retards to show up pursuing us, but nothing of that sort happens. No pursuers, nothing weird happening.

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"Relax." Hernandez says, "I signed the transfer papers myself just before we left. Even if someone spotted us on the highway, ORPO wouldn't send a squad to intercept a completely ordinary prisoner transfer in progress."

"How long do we have?" I ask.

"A few hours probably." Hernandez replies, "These transfers can take quite some time to complete."

I raise an eyebrow at that outlandish statement, "The City is big, but not that big. How can transit time between stations be so long?"

"Oh right." Hernandez exclaims, "You don't know about the Tour."

"The, uh, Tour?" I repeat the unfamiliar term back at the Commander.

Hernandez smirks, "A trick we use to get suspects feeling in a more cooperative mood. ORPO is legally allowed to remand someone for up to twenty four hours only. Can't extract a confession from a hardened criminal in that time. Thing is, transit times are not counted as part of remand."

"I don't get it." I scratch my head, trying to grasp what Hernandez is hinting at.

"Suspects are put in a car and transferred to another station." Hernandez continues, "I can't help it if traffic conditions force me to keep driving in circles for several hours until the suspect starts pissing and shitting himself. And once we get to that other station, I can't help it either if that station doesn't have room in its lockup for a new inmate. So its back to HQ, and that will take another couple of hours on the road. And so on and on and on."

"I find it hard to believe being chauffeured around would make anyone confess to anything, other than out of boredom." I point out.

Hernandez snorts, "That's because you haven't experienced shitting and pissing yourself before. Let me tell you, it isn't pleasant. Also, all those hours on the road add up. That twenty four hour remand can easily be extended to days if I want to keep this up with a suspect. Days where a suspect is absent from work. The threat of losing your job usually makes them smarten up fast."

"So the station thinks I am being subject to your world tour treatment?" I ask.

"The Tour not world tour." Hernandez corrects, "And yeah, the other guys at HQ probably think I sent you for softening up right now. Getting you out this way was the best means of avoiding any suspicion falling on me."

"You are letting me go right?" I question, "How are you going to explain me going missing on your watch?"

"That's the smart part of the plan." Hernandez smiles as he taps his head with a finger, "I won't have to do any of that. I registered another officer's name in the transit records. That's why I didn't want anyone to see us together in the basement. As far as I am concerned, I escorted you to this other guy, he took custody of you and then poof, you disappeared. Man, that sap is going to get a total ass reaming from me later."

"That's a pretty shitty thing to do to one of your own men." I shoot back disapprovingly.

"He'll be fine." Hernandez says, "I'll shout at him in my office for a bit, that's all. Anyway, the last I checked, gatecrashing a wedding, beating down several people and beheading someone are all 'shitty things to do', but it doesn't seem to stop you from doing them anyway."

"Touche." I grunt in acknowledgement but something Hernandez said earlier has been bugging me. I am a legit suspect in this case despite the Hero failing to ID me properly. That means ORPO is holding me due to physical evidence or the other two witnesses that had correctly identified me in the ID parade.

The Voice had assured me all the weapons I had used in the wedding attack would be traced to the Legion. Knowing that The Voice has the power to spawn pretty much any object it wants, I have no doubt that the weapons it had prepared for me would be indistinguishable from the stuff from actual Legion arsenals. That's also not considering The Voice's ability to clean up the scenes where I had been active at. ORPO would not find anything that The Voice doesn't want them to find. So that means I am still under suspicion thanks to the witnesses.

"You said two witnesses identified me at the station." I query, "Mind telling who has been defaming my reputation?"

"Defaming. Yeah, right." Hernandez laughs, "Watch what you say though, one of the witnesses is the Prince of Europe himself."

"Gustav?" I muse. The Commander's revelation is not a surprise though. I had from the start figured that Celeste managed to get to Gustav and put him up to fingering me.

"The one and only." Hernandez confirms, "The other witness is someone you know though. Want to take a guess who?"

I frown at Hernandez's teasing. Unfortunately, the only people I know in this world are Hernandez, Alley and The Voice. I suppose you could count the Hero and the Heroines as acquaintances, but I doubt they were the ones that identified me, given The Voice's tight grip over them.

"Drawing a blank here." I say, admitting defeat.

"I was taken by surprise as well when our second witness showed up." Hernandez answers, "Still, he was pretty affirmative when it came down to the identification business."

"Stop keeping me in suspense." I grumble back at the Commander.

"Ken Matsui. Tensei's best friend. Small world, isn't it?"