#i guess i'm taking a bit of an alternative pov journey right now

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Sheep

AN: For @sup-poki and @mintchocolateleaves‘s emogust, I went through several ideas but in the end, it’s a kind of prequel to my Psycho-Pass au. You don’t need to have read it to get it, it’s just in the same universe. Feat. Chikage

Chikage watched as Kaito pulled a coin from beneath the cup they had been playing with, contemplating its glint in the kitchen’s light as if by staring at it intently he could understand the trick. It was just a bait and switch, the usual grifter’s play that Toichi had used to woo her with but he’d never gotten to show it to him after all, so it fell to her instead. She’d gotten rusty in the intervening years, her hands slowing down until she’d had to practice a few times to get the rhythm back and even then it was several tries before her tears didn’t blur her vision anymore. 

But Kaito had taken to it like a fish to water, begging her to keep doing it until he figured out what she was doing. It was a work in progress, he didn’t quite grasp it yet however, just the fact that she’d gotten him to sit still and concentrate was enough for her. 

The front doorbell rang and she rose to answer it, tousling his hair as she passed. 

“Have you tried it with two coins yet?” 

“But that’s cheating, Mom!” he retorted, though by the way his eyes narrowed at the thought she could tell he was already giving it its due consideration. 

“Who said anything about a ‘no cheating’ rule? It’s what magicians live by!” She chucked him under the chin when his jaw dropped open from her declaration. She might’ve made a menace with that simple sentence, but she could see Toichi’s smile in him and if his spark was anything like her husband’s then he’d grow up just fine. 

The bell rang again, more insistently despite its uniform chimes, and she slid into her slippers while she pulled the front door open. The Public Safety Office uniforms made her blood run cold but she forced herself to smile. 

“What can I do for you?” Glancing down the apartment’s corridor, she couldn’t see any signs of alert and the usual warnings weren’t ringing from any speaker systems. Her hope for a routine public service announcement or even a murderer loose in the area shrank and she dreaded what the man and woman were going to say. 

“We’re here on the school system’s behalf. Your son is Kaito, correct?” The officer’s clipped tones offered no comfort or even any sign of emotion as he flipped through a folder without looking her in the eyes. The woman met them instead and her smile was even worse than the man’s uninterest. 

“Y-yes, Kaito. Why? What has he done?” She struggled to keep the fear from wriggling its way into her voice. 

“Nothing just yet.” The man took a step forward, head cocked to the side to look inside the apartment. “Is he here? We’d like to see him.”

“Why?” Chikage couldn’t ignore the trail of dread sliding through her mind and she wanted to slam the door in their faces and run. Scoop up Kaito and escape like how Toichi had always talked of doing, before it was too late. 

“We’re checking up on a bug in the system, just a routine check. Nothing to worry about.” 

Not an ounce of reassurance reached from his attempt to coat his words, but she had to hold out hope. There wasn’t much else she could do anyway, not unless she wanted her coefficient to shoot up through the threshold. 

She reluctantly stepped back, allowing the officers access to the living room and the kitchen beyond. Over the click of closing the front door, she heard Kaito’s excited shout from the other end of the apartment. 

“Look! I did it! I made it disappear!” 

She turned to find the two officers standing by the kitchen table while Kaito leaned over the top and scooted the cups around in jerking but confident motions. She saw the moment he slipped the quarter out and back in, and she also saw the officers’ eyes flicking past Kaito’s demonstration to the pictures lining the mantle and the top hat in its case over the fireplace. 

When Kaito finally finished his trick, she wanted to bolt across the room at the way the two agents focused on her little boy as if he were a piece of meat to be appraised. Kaito didn’t notice and gestured proudly to his three cups. 

“Which one has the quarter in it?”

The woman played along and picked the middle cup while the man’s hand twitched at his side as if he’d been about to pick one as well. Chikage would have smiled at any other time but the sight of the emptiness underneath the cup just made her heart sink. 

“Now that we’ve played your game, how about you play ours?” The woman leaned close. “Stay still and look at my partner here, we’re going to see how your levels are.”

Chikage came closer at the mention of levels and put a hand on Kaito’s shoulder, feeling his warmth and trying to ground herself to it while she felt like she was turning to insubstantial mist. 

“Mm, looks like they weren’t being buggy after all.” The man hummed thoughtfully as his eyes flickered, the Sybil system staring out of him at Kaito. 

“What is it?” Chikage didn’t keep the heat out of her voice now, pulling Kaito close like it would make a difference. 

“His levels are abnormally high, already over 200 and rising. Your son is a verified latent criminal.” 

“You can’t be serious, he’s only six! What could a cymatic scan possibly read—” 

“We’re sorry, ma’am, but we can’t ignore this kind of threat. Not to the safety of other children or other families.” Still smiling, the woman held out her hands as if that would placate her. 

“Think how you would feel if it were another kid. You’d want him to be safe, right? Right now, he’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing.” The man reached to his belt and unclipped his holster, but Chikage didn’t wait. 

Grabbing Kaito, she rounded the kitchen table at a sprint and ran for the front door. Her slippers didn’t find a grip on the waxed-wood floor and she’d only made it a yard or two before Kaito’s extra weight unbalanced her. Crashing into the corner of the wall, she heard the Dominator powering up and the memory of Toichi’s scream made her hesitate. Looking back over her shoulder for the briefest moment, she saw the Dominator shift into Lethal Mode as Kaito came back into view of the officers. 

“Don’t shoot!” she cried, curling around him again, anything to keep what happened to Toichi from happening to her precious boy. Kaito squirmed in her tight hold but she heard the Dominator shifting modes again, and breathed a sigh of relief as she got to her feet, thankful that her son was safe in her arms. 

The last thing she heard after the sound of the trigger being pulled was Kaito’s sharp yell as he was dropped from her numb hands and she lost sight of him as unconsciousness swallowed her up, her heart breaking for letting go.