News of the Tri-Surgeon's death didn’t take time to reach Edward's ears. Many at the station felt rejoiced and thrilled that the vicious killer met his fate. Even though it had only been two hours since he died, Edward already heard whispers telling that Caedes tried to pull a gun at the officers who came to arrest him, which inevitably forced them to retaliate. However, Edward knew the truth, as Forseti already told him what actually happened. Archell Sherwood is probably already preparing his statement to the press, Edward figured. He wondered how Dillard was feeling about Caedes's death. The old Chief of Police has been completely missing from the station ever since his wife was injured, spending all of his time with her instead.
When Edward learned from Forseti how the quarrel with Caedes finally ended, he knew there was only one loose tie left he had to wrap up. He made a deal with Charles Blackburn. A deal in which he promised to give up the Justicars' apartment and let him know as soon as Forseti and his team were in it. For that reason, he asked Forseti and his team to meet him in their apartment. He promised, Edward reminded himself. He promised he would hand Caedes over to APD for a fair trial. He promised.
Standing across from the apartment building in which Forseti's apartment was, Edward picked up his SmartWrist and dialed the number Blackburn gave him when they made the deal. One of Blackburn's soldiers answered. Edward let him know that the apartment was ready to be attacked.
While he waited for Code Sanguinary to show up, he received a call. It was Trisslin. "Congratulations," she said once he picked up the call. He felt as if he deserved no such words. "I heard our killer is finally dead."
"Our killer should've been in prison," he said with a sigh.
"Yeah, well, at least the case is closed." That's what they all think about. Just closing the case. She doesn’t even care about how it turned out. To her… to all of them, a dead killer as the same as a locked up killer. They don’t know what justice is. They only know the kind that runs red.
"Right, I guess so," he didn’t wish to open an argument with her, especially knowing that it would be pointless. "But I don’t know if a guy as hated in the station as me is going to be getting such warm the rest of them."
"Yeah, I'm don’t think so too," her honesty hit him hard and painfully.
"Trisslin," he hesitated for a moment before going on, yet eventually, he did. "Lady Dread's men were present when Caedes was found. They were trying to take him with them. That means that someone leaked his whereabouts to them."
"I see," her voice grew quieter.
"The thing is… I only told you about it at first. The rest learned about it only a while later, and when you consider the timing in which Lady Dread appeared there—"
"Edward," she interrupted him. "What do you want?"
The question bounced around his head. What did he want? It was a question not even he could answer. He wanted justice. He wanted the corruption to be gone. He wanted people like Trisslin to understand that Lady Dread were the enemy, not an ally. But there could be none of that in Alataria. By now, he had seen how his idea of justice was being crushed at every turn he made, and the more he pushed on, relentlessly, to fulfill his father's dream, the more he realized that perhaps his father was wrong all along. 'Rotten,' he used to call them. 'Rotten to the ground.' And you can't have true justice when those who are supposed to inflict it are rotten. "If I ever catch you doing that again," he finally spoke. "If I ever catch you doing ANYTHING that helps the crime syndicates… I will fucking kill you," he hissed, sounded as decisive and fierce as if he was calling war on the entire police force.
"Edward—" he hung up before she could finish her response. The cold chill greeted him as the silence around enveloped him. He didn’t regret doing that. For the first time in a long while, he went with his gut feeling, instead of swallowing his pride.
It wasn’t much longer before the soldiers of Code Sanguinary showed up at the apartment building. A big van stopped at the side of the road, and 8 soldiers, all dressed with the green-grey camouflaged Elastics, poured out of it, armed with military-grade assault rifles and knives holstered at their waists. Edward stood by from afar, watching them, hidden from their sight. He noticed their stance and the way they gripped their weapons. They were trained soldiers, no doubt. Blackburn always held his men to the highest standards, arming them with the deadliest weapons available in the country and training them in ways that even the Alatarian Army never did. Yet even a trained soldier is no match for a bullet that's heading towards his back.
As the soldiers formed around the entrance to the apartment building, ready and eager to charge in, Forseti and his teammates opened fire at them from behind, getting cover in the building across the street. The soldiers never expected them so they couldn’t hold much resistance against them. The Justicars wielded submachine-guns, as they usually do, with only one of them making the exception by using a sniper rifle. Edward figured that it was probably the same one who took Caedes down. The soldiers had no place to find cover behind, and most of them fell instantly while a few tried firing back. But without cover and outnumbered it didn’t take long for them to get hit as well. In the end, it was over within a minute. The 8 bodies of the soldiers lay dead at the doorsteps of the apartment building. Edward looked at them with a blank expression. This is for Roycen and his wife. Usually, he would prefer those soldiers to find themselves in prison, yet their lifeless bodies seemed to serve him as a good outcome nonetheless. His father might have never approved of it, yet Edward was a man of his own.
At the beginning, he wasn’t sure if he should go forth with his deal with Blackburn and let him have Forseti and his team or go against him. Eventually, he made that decision naturally, as he started reminding himself of how Blackburn's men took down Roycen and his wife, not to mention that they sent an assassin to kill him in his own apartment. Edward refused to work with a man as vile as Blackburn, and despite knowing what grave consequences might await him, he knew that it was the right thing to do.
He heard the footsteps behind him. He turned and saw Forseti climbing down from his vantage point at one of the upper floors of the building. With his face masked, Edward could only guess what grin must be hiding beneath it.
"Did you suffer any casualties?" Edward asked.
"No, we're all fine," Forseti replied. "Look, Edward, I know that doing this must not have been easy after Caedes—"
"Shut up," Edward said, calmly. "That was the second time you broke your promise to me. You promised Soleina wouldn’t get hurt and then you promised you would bring Caedes to custody."
"Edward, I—" Forseti stopped talking once the pistol was aimed at him. Edward's eyes were cold as he held it, fearless.
"The only reason I let you know of my deal with Blackburn instead of letting those soldiers rip you and your friends to shreds, is because I actually despise Code Sanguinary far more than I despise the Justicars. But now I see no reason why you shouldn’t meet your well-deserving end."
"Edward, we had no choice. It was going to be a few of us against both Lady Dread and those officers you sent. We were severely outnumbered and outgunned. It was either that or Caedes would’ve fallen into Lady Dread's hands." Edward didn’t care for his words and claims. His gun remained aimed at Forseti. The cold breeze seemed appropriate. "Besides," Forseti said. "I wouldn’t do this if I were you."
"And why is that?" Edward's voice was slow and piercing.
"Because I've taken some precautions. That apartment where we came up with the plan to catch the Tri-Surgeon, the one where you suggested we use Soleina Dillard…" Edward could already figure out where he was going with it even before he heard it. "We bugged that apartment with hidden cameras. We have footage of you not only working with Justicars but also setting up the very plan that sent Dillard to his current state of grief." Edward looked down at disbelief. "You know what's going to happen if you kill me, don’t you? I wouldn’t want to be you if that footage leaked out somewhere. I guess Dillard's rage wouldn’t be your only problem if that happens."
Edward lowered his gun and holstered it back, knowing that the White Knight had outsmarted him. "You know what's funny?" he asked Forseti. "Those dead men over there," he pointed at the 8 corpses that lay across the street. "You see that as justice, don’t you?"
"Yeah," Forseti said, without hesitation. "But I guess you don’t."
"Actually…" Edward stared at the bodies. "I think I'm starting to get your point." He showed the hint of a smile. "We're done, Forseti, aren’t we?" he asked him.
"Yeah, I think we're done." With that said, Edward buttoned up his jacket and walked away, leaving the Justicar behind.
