May this promise last a lifetime

Chapter 56 - The guy in a bird costume

Wriothesley's POV

 About an hour and a half into my workday, there was a knock on the door of my office.

 Before I could even think about saying enter, the door opened and my colleague, Anton, walked in, looking incredibly annoyed as he held an icepack to his left eye, his glasses nowhere to be seen.

 "The Chief wants to see you." He spat out.

 "What-"

 "I brought back a rat from Beret. He wants you to help with the interrogation."

 "You actually managed to find someone from Beter?"

 Damn.

 Those guys are annoyingly secretive and hard to find.

 "Yeah. Kind of. He punched me in the face." Anton grumbled as he lowered the ice pack, revealing a badly swollen eye.

 That's weird. Anton wasn't one to pick a fight.

 "How did you get into a fight with someone from Beret?" I asked curiously.

 "I didn't. That idiot Childe did. My eye was collateral damage. That fool from Beret punched me instead when the harbinger dodged his hit."

 Ouch.

 But...

 Wasn't Childe with Neuvillette not too long ago?

 "How did Childe get into a fight with the guy?"

 "He was drunk, mumbling something about an idiot boyfriend. He bumped into the guy from Beret just as he was leaving. Some words were exchanged and before I knew it the two were at it."

 I suppose something went wrong at or after his meeting with Neuvillette.

 But Childe picking a fight is nothing new.

 On the contrary. If a week went by without one we had a reason to get suspicious.

 Speaking of which.

 "You brought back the guy from Beter, but what happened to Childe?"

 "Morax dragged him away. He picked him up, threw him over his shoulder, brought him outside, and tossed him into his car before driving off. I didn't even get a chance to process what was happening."

 ...

 I certainly hope that won't cause more trouble than it saved us from.

 Neuvillette sure has quite a problematic pair on his hands. And then there is still the Tsaritsa.

 I have one more question though.

 "How did you even know he was from Beret? I doubt you stripped him naked to look for a tattoo."

 That's the only surefire way to identify these guys.

 A rather stupid thing, if I must say.

 Why tattoo proof that you are part of a criminal organization on you?

 "I didn't need to strip him. Childe ripped his shirt during the fight and revealed the tattoo." Anton explained

 "Well, that's convenient."

 "It was. So much so, that I was thinking a conspiracy might be in the making, but the Fatui have no reason to help us, do they? And while they don't have anything against the Beret Society, they wouldn't work with them to scheme against us either. That would go against every single thing we know about the Tsaritsa. The only person she seems to dislike enough to team up against is Morax."