All three of them shot each other various degrees of confused glances.
"We literally have your food at the station…" Officer Tang paused as he realised something. "Lao Peng, all your takeaway meals use this container right?" He pointed to the stack of round containers with his stall logo on them.
"Of course!" He puffed up his chest. "This is good for publicity! I want everyone to know where the best noodles in this part of town come from."
The containers that had the food ingested by Lin Tao and Jianzhi were generic rectangle tupperwares, and had no stall logos.
"Do you ever use different containers for delivery orders?" Officer Tang asked.
"No, unless we ran out of such containers." Lao Peng shrugged, "then there's no choice, of course I would use the generic ones. You know, the plain rectangular ones."
"I see," Officer Tang said, frowning. It was highly likely that Lin Tao and Jianzhi were tired enough that they didn't realise the containers were different, or they simply assumed that Lao Peng ran out of his customary tupperware.
They didn't know that Lao Peng's store wasn't even open.
"Lao Peng, isn't your store normally open till 11pm? Why did it suddenly close early?" Officer Tang asked.
"I wasn't feeling too well," Lao Peng said quickly. "My nose was sniffling a lot, so I thought I might as well just close up early to get more rest. I can't cook food when I'm sick, so I left my stall after 8pm, and my part-timers helped me to close the stall."
"Can we talk to your part-timers?"
"Sure, they'll be coming in soon. Their shift is from late afternoon to night." Lao Peng said. "Officer, is there some problem? Did someone get diarrhoea after eating my food?"
If only it was something as minor as that.
"Not exactly. Do you have an alibi for yesterday night?"
"My wife was at home with me. But why do I need an alibi? Oh my god, did someone die?" He asked, panicked.
"Yes, someone did." Sun Tianwei said, because he wanted answers, and terrorising people often managed to deliver those. "If you don't cooperate with our investigation, I'll make sure you're charged too."
Lao Peng's mouth dropped open in horror. Lian Xingzi and Officer Tang both gave him equally exasperated looks. Sun Tianwei would have made the world's worst police officer.
"Stop scaring civilians," Xingzi scolded, and then she turned to smile sweetly at Lao Peng, who was sweating buckets at the thought of going to prison. "Can you give us the contact details of your part-timers? We need to contact them for more details."
"Sure!" Lao Peng eagerly handed them the contact details of the two part-timers that were supposed to be on duty.
Tianwei gave a satisfied smirk at the results, while Xingzi shot him a look of disgust. Officer Tang ignored them both in favour of doing more important things, like contacting their suspects.
Both numbers led straight to voicemail. He frowned.
"Lao Peng, give me a call when your part-timers arrive. They aren't picking up."
"Really? They are usually on their phones all the time," Lao Peng mentioned. "I usually have to remind them to pay more attention to the noodles or the customers."
"And you still hired them?" Tianwei interrupted. "How… understanding of you."
"They're just fresh out of high school and needed the money." Lao Peng said, shrugging. "And they were willing to work for half-pay and take night shifts, so of course I agreed!"
Officer Tang narrowed his eyes at the news. Young adults willingly taking a pay cut in this economy and taking night shifts without complaint or compensation? Suspicious.
"How long have they been working here for?" He asked.
"Just a few months ago!"
The timeline checked out then. Students graduated in June, and it was already August. They could be legitimate students looking for jobs, but he'll still need to interview them to confirm it.
"Can your hires cook? Even without you supervising?"
"...Yes, I taught them how to. Why?" Lao Peng asked.
"Nothing," Officer Tang said, sighing as a hypothesis formed in his mind. "Nothing at all."
=
After they've gotten what they came for, the three of them exited Lao Peng's noodle store.
"There's a high chance my clients are innocent," Lian Xingzi said, with no small amounts of smugness radiating from her. Sun Tianwei hated it.
"You've heard him, the stall was manned by two students fresh out of high school, and the containers used for the food weren't even the usual ones. The entire thing just smells of sabotage."
"...So instead of suspecting police officers that admitted to sleeping on the job, you choose to believe in the guilt of two students?" Tianwei scoffed. "So much for defending the weak and helpless individuals of society."
"Don't put words in my mouth! I defend my clients first and foremost! If the students are guilty, then they should suffer the consequences of their actions" Xingzi argued.
The both of them were close enough to kill each other. Officer Tang had half a mind to order them to hold hands and get along, but they'll probably just rip off each other's fingers instead.
"I'll be going back to the station first while waiting for news." Officer Tang said. "I'd advise the both of you to settle your own issues first." He turned and gave Tianwei a knowing look.
"Go and help your brother first. Without you, things might get worse."
"Yeah Tianwei, be a kind soul for once and help your brother," Xingzi added. "I've not seen Jingwei for so long; has he finally grown taller than you?"
"No," Tianwei said through gritted teeth. They were of the same height. "And don't tell me what to do."
The last time Xingzi saw Jingwei must have been in Jingwei's third year of high school, when he invited her over to his home. Jingwei was also very taken with her, and tried to hit on her with his usual boyish charm.
It made his stomach churn with jealousy when he saw her laugh at his antics then.
Strangely enough, he still had the same reaction when he thought about it now.
"If you're not going to help him then maybe I will," she said determinedly. "After all, I'm sure he'll need the expertise of a lawyer to get him out of this mess."
"Over my dead body!"
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