[person] Help! Help!
[breathing heavily]
[growling]
Get away from me. Leave me alone.
- [grunting] - [distorted voice] Watch where you going.
[gasps]
[bystander 1] Are you okay?
- Hey, are you okay? - He's trying to kill me.
[whimpering]
- [tires screeching] - [horns honking]
[sirens blaring]
[♪ pop song plays]
- Adam. - Lucia.
[chuckles]
- Wow. - Yeah, uh, it's been a minute.
How are you? I heard you moved.
Uh, a few times actually.
Uh, last stop was Santa Fe.
Santa Fe? I've never been.
I liked it. There's no skyscrapers.
- Lots of weirdos. - [chuckles]
I heard you met a guy. Sounded serious.
- You stalking me? - No, I just--
[chuckles] I'm just kidding. It's...
- Nick and Natalie told you, right? - Yeah.
- You know, they say things now and then. - Yeah.
I ask them about you sometimes, too.
And, uh, the guy didn't stick. So...
- Oh. I'm sorry. - I'm not.
- You still with the LAPD? - Yeah, yeah, they keep me busy.
Yeah, I remember.
Anyway, next project's here in LA.
You moved back?
For now.
Well, uh, welcome back.
[both chuckle]
Listen, I-I got a couple minutes. Do you wanna, like, sit down, catch up?
- Uh, I am... [chuckles] - Oh. Oh, right. Sorry.
Your shift's about to start. You have to get to work.
I can be a little late.
[radio chatter]
[camera shutter clicking]
Good morning.
- You're late. - Ah. Lost track of time. Not a big deal.
- What happened? - Well, uh, let's see.
"I" is a first-person pronoun.
"Lose" means to misplace or fail to keep sight of.
Very cute. Thank you, Ms. Rachel.
What I mean is, how does someone like you lose track of time?
You got one of those mugs that says, "If you're on time, you're late."
- No, I don't. - Huh.
- Well, you're about to. - Don't. Don't do that.
Instead of drilling into my personal life, how about we concentrate on this case?
- Pretty sure I can do both. - Mm-hmm.
Pedestrian v. car. Driver is cooperating.
Sounds like the guy just ran into the middle of the street.
No wallet, no ID, and wherever he came from,
he didn't even stop to put on shoes.
The couple over there talked to him briefly.
Said he was disoriented, possibly drunk.
He acted like someone was chasing after him.
He yelled, "He's trying to kill me" right before this happened.
- Did they see anyone chasing after him? - They made it clear they did not.
Hmm. Yeah, so maybe he was hallucinating.
You're still thinking about why I was late, aren't you?
- Yeah. - Hmm.
You know that thing you said about bugging me and working the case?
I have been. He was hallucinating. Because he was poisoned.
Um, and you're sure about that how?
The vomit.
What vomit would that be?
- [Daphne] Ugh. - [Morgan] Okay,
so none of you have ever had a baby puke directly into your mouth. Got it.
I saw it on my way in.
- You sure this is from the victim? - Well, he had some of it on his shirt.
So, unless he found somebody else's barf that he wanted to dribble on himself,
- that is my guess, yeah. - Why is it black?
[sniffs, gags]
Oh, God. That smells like rotten eggs.
Yeah, that's because it's activated charcoal.
And when charcoal interacts with gut bacteria,
it releases hydrogen sulfide, which smells like rotten eggs.
And the only reason to take that much activated charcoal
is if you've ingested something toxic.
Which would explain why he was hallucinating.
So either he swallowed something accidentally or maybe he was poisoned.
Next question is where did he come from?
Well, the victim's feet were cut up.
- Looks like he left a trail. - Right.
Morgan and I will follow the blood. You guys head back to the intersection,
see if there's any traffic cams we can pull.
And make sure forensics gets some samples of, um, that.
You gonna tell me why you were late, or are you gonna force me to be annoying?
[sighs] I ran into Lucia.
Lucia, the ex-fiancée who painted you that rose that you still have on your wall?
That's the one.
This is huge. You guys haven't seen each other in five years, right?
It's not huge, Morgan. It was just coffee.
Uh, yeah, I've had that kind of coffee.
And this, I'm guessing, was where our victim came from.
- We're not done here. - Morgan, I don't wanna talk about it.
Well, then you shouldn't have said anything.
[door opens]
Uh-huh. Our guy may have died in the street, but whatever happened to him,
it definitely happened here.
He's got a name. "Declan Harker, 31 years old."
I don't see any of the usual household poisons, meds, illegal drugs.
Doesn't look like he has any cleaning products.
There's plenty of stuff here that could have been spiked.
I'll have forensics collect it.
All this takeout. Kinda feels like Declan almost never left this room.
You think he had a job?
It does have a bit of an unemployed aesthetic, doesn't it?
But, nope. You see that chair?
That's a Thunder Throne V2.
Magnetic head pillow, four-way lumbar support
-and nanofoam seat cushions. - [audience] Oh!
And over here, we've got high-grip,
sweat-absorbent gloves and state-of-the-art headphones.
And then there's this.
Declan Harker was a professional gamer, an esport athlete.
- Video games are not a sport, Morgan. - Personally, I agree with you,
but, technically, pro gamers require heightened reaction time.
So, they might not seem like athletes, but they do train like them.
- Elliot? - Yeah.
If he's not playing video games, he's talking to me about them.
Well, if our guy was so into video games, where's his computer?
Exactly. It's not here.
- Maybe whoever poisoned him took it? - Hmm.
- Who are you? - LAPD. Who are you?
My name is Adity Shaw.
My ex-boyfriend lives here. Declan Harker?
Is he all right?
Sorry to inform you, but he's dead.
[gasps]
- I'm too late. - You're too late for what?
Declan left me a weird voicemail this morning,
and I came over as soon as I heard it.
Adity, you gotta help me. It's all my fault.
I killed him so many times.
I killed him over and over again, and now he's trying to kill me.
Any idea what "I killed him over and over again" means?
Is that more hallucinating?
Actually, we think he was talking about gaming.
Declan's a top player in an online game called Battle Dynasty.
Swords and sorcery, knights and dragons.
You kill someone in the game, they come back to life,
you kill them again, rinse and repeat.
So, we're thinking game violence spills over into real life.
The player he kept killing found him in the flesh and killed him for real.
Given Declan's voicemail, it sounds like he thought so.
We know what the toxin was that poisoned him?
The ME is still running tests. Hasn't ID'd it yet. But Oz is on top of it.
Forensics did find traces of blood
on one of the food containers in the apartment though.
Looks like somebody cut their finger on a staple.
They've tested it already. It's not Declan's.
Declan was using contact-free delivery.
According to the app, the food arrived about an hour before he died.
Maybe the killer got to the food while it was still outside the door.
Hopefully, when we find the guy, we'll have a DNA sample to match.
And what about the ex-girlfriend?
Conveniently shows up to discover him dead,
has her own keys.
- She also a gamer? - Yeah, she is.
She seems earnest though. Genuinely broken up.
Willing to do anything she can to help.
[scoffs]
- What? - Well, you're getting all soft on me.
Morgan mentioned you ran into Lucia this morning.
- I'm gonna legitimately kill her. - Well, don't do it yet.
I got her combing through everything we found in the apartment,
make sure there's nothing we missed.
In the meantime, I'll trust your instinct on the ex-girlfriend.
Double-check her alibi.
Okay.
Declan and I met in-game before we ever met in real life.
Battle Dynasty was our lives.
Neither of us really fit in anywhere else.
But then last year, he quit gaming.
And he ghosted me,
told me not to come by his place anymore, stopped returning my calls.
Well, that must have been awful. Any idea why?
[Adity] He wouldn't tell me.
But then, last month, he showed up back in the game.
Apologized to me, said he was a changed man.
[sighs] We were making plans to see each other again in the real world, but...
I'm sorry.
Declan's computer was missing from his apartment.
Any idea what happened to it?
He got rid of his whole rig when he quit gaming.
But you just said he started playing again. What was he playing on?
I think he had an old laptop that he'd use in a pinch.
- What? - You wanna find it
because you think whoever killed him took it.
We're considering the possibility.
You and Declan didn't just share house keys, did you?
We also shared a Find My Tech account.
Okay. [sighs]
So the laptop is somewhere in this lot.
All right, well, let's split up, look in car windows and see if we can find it.
Yeah, I'll start on this side.
[phone buzzes]
[Karadec chuckles]
You just find out about a sale on Tide sticks or did Lucia text you?
[sighs] Well, text her back.
We're working. It can wait.
What, Morgan?
You guys broke up because you put work before her.
You want another shot at this, don't you think
you should show her it'll be different this time?
I never said we were going to give it another shot.
Yeah, well, you didn't have to. Your face did it for you.
- [sighs] It's more complicated than that. - Of course it's complicated.
Relationships are complicated, and it's okay to be scared, but--
I'm being cautious. Not the same.
And you know what? I really don't wanna talk about this now.
Fine, I'll back off.
Just don't want you to be so cautious that you blow it.
Again.
[Daphne] Hey, guys, over here.
- Did you find something inside here, Daph? - No, but look at these tires.
They're caked in asphalt.
Earlier when I was going around getting the traffic cam footage
near Declan's apartment, there was a street nearby getting repaved.
- This car could have been there. - [Karadec] Good eye.
I'll run the license plate and maybe we'll--
- [car alarm blaring] - Whoops.
[blaring continues]
Hey, I like your shirt. You work for Jubilee Games?
- Uh... - Okay, can you turn this off?
It's not my car.
You just like to run toward car alarms?
Can you do me a favor and click the button on your key fob?
See what happens?
[car alarm chirps]
- Thanks. - Would you mind opening the trunk as well?
Assuming we're correct, Declan Harker's laptop should be inside.
Look at that.
Can we talk somewhere private?
I'm a senior game developer.
My focus is analyzing player tactics.
Declan was one of the top players on our esports team when he was active.
So, you took Declan's laptop to analyze the data?
That's not why at all.
Then explain it to us, including how he ended up dead just after you took it.
Declan's dead?
Declan's neighbors said that they heard yelling at his apartment last night.
What were you two fighting about?
Hmm. Maybe something to do with the 100 grand in crypto he had?
All of his passwords to access it are on here.
That's 100,000 reasons to steal a laptop.
I'm guessing as a senior game developer,
you knew exactly how much he was making, right?
I took Declan's laptop to help him.
He wasn't just playing Battle Dynasty for the money or because he loved the game.
- He was addicted. - Addicted? To a video game?
- Absolutely. - [Morgan] Oh, yeah.
Games light up your dopamine receptors just like any other addiction.
And I saw it happening because I had access to his data.
His play had fallen off and become erratic.
- He wasn't himself. - So, you helped him quit?
I was hoping it would just be temporary, that he'd get better and come back.
But after seeing him in person, I could tell that he was suffering.
He had lost a lot of weight,
wasn't eating or sleeping, refused to leave his apartment.
I knew the folks at Gamers Anonymous, so I got him in.
That was a year ago?
That's when Declan got rid of his rig and ghosted Adity.
Well, that makes sense why you didn't wanna talk to us.
I doubt your bosses would love finding out you were helping a valuable player quit.
It's worse than that.
Declan had started helping other gamers quit.
If Declan was so committed to the cause, why did he start playing again?
'Cause that's what addicts do.
I was furious when I found out that he had relapsed.
That's why I went over there last night
and that's why I took his laptop, to stop him again.
- What time was this? - Around 2:00 a.m.
I was there for maybe an hour.
Well, that would have put you at his place before the food delivery.
Did the two of you have a physical altercation?
No, we just talked.
He was trying to convince me that he had a handle on things
and that he just needed to finish one mission.
What was the mission?
It's hard to say. There's thousands in the game.
Are there any that involve killing the same player over and over?
Why?
- Was he doing that? - According to Declan, he was.
And he thinks that's the person that showed up to kill him.
So, you have no idea who that player might be?
No.
But I can help you find out.
ME is still trying to ID the toxin.
They say it must be something pretty exotic.
[game character grunts]
Didn't realize I was the only one working.
You're not.
They were about to explain to me what they found.
The guy from Jubilee Games sent over Declan's play history from the last month.
Declan's the knight using the name Beast-Slayer.
And just like he said, he keeps killing the same orc over and over and over again.
Poor guy.
And we know it's always the same orc, how?
Well, players can customize their characters.
Their outfits, weapons, even their faces.
According to the chat, that orc is Drednog.
[Daphne] And he was pissed.
He sent a slew of messages telling Declan to stop spawn camping
and that he'd get payback.
He even threatened to come after him with a gun.
Declan wasn't killed with a gun. He was poisoned.
That's one of our questions when we find the guy.
But for now, strange as it is to say it, we have a suspect.
[game character growls]
Drednog the orc.
I sent Morgan home. We're not finding our orc tonight.
- You don't hear that every day. - [laughs]
Game company couldn't help, huh?
The user information on the account was fake.
Gamers do that so they can play under multiple names.
From the guy's in-game chats, it sounds like he plays at cybercafes.
So, we're running that down and we'll hit it fresh in the morning.
Hey, I'm okay if you're not on time tomorrow.
This again?
If by that you mean, do I want you to be happy? Then, yes.
Have you given it any more thought?
People act like I had a choice with Lucia.
Yes, I broke it off. Look what time I'm getting out of here.
Why would I restart something if the same problem's just gonna come up again?
You get out of here two hours earlier than you used to.
- Thanks, by the way, to your new partner. - [scoffs]
Plus, it's possible you're just different now.
So you agree with Morgan. I should risk hurting Lucia again.
You mean Lucia and yourself.
I get it.
I made the same mistakes with Hector when the girls were young.
You remember, after the divorce,
how it took years for them to even talk to me again?
You have a choice.
Plenty of cops make it work. I'm not saying it's gonna be easy.
I'm just saying that it's possible.
You have two people who care about you telling you the same thing.
Consider it.
- Good night. - Good night.
[sighs]
- [game music plays] - [roaring, shouting]
- Hey, what are you doing in here? - Nothing?
[scoffs]
Okay. For starters, you don't have to hide things from me, okay?
Whatever it is, the worst thing that happens is we talk about it, right?
Second of all, if you're gonna hide things from me, be better at it. Come on.
- You play Battle Dynasty? - Do you know it?
I'm familiar. How often do you play this?
Not too much. I see it as a mental sorbet.
A palate cleanse before bed.
Okay. Then why were you hiding it?
Bedtime is bedtime for a reason. I didn't wanna upset you.
Well, buddy, I'm gonna feel what I feel,
but it's gonna feel worse if I think you're hiding things from me.
- I'm sorry. - No, that's okay.
Just wanna make sure we can talk about stuff like this, you know?
You and I have brains that obsess over things.
So, certain video games can be kinda dangerous 'cause they sort of take over.
I know.
Okay. So, this guy with the staff, is that you?
Mm-hmm. I'm a wizard. I'm hiding from those goblins.
I cast a spell on them, and now they're trying to find me.
Mm-hmm. In the chat,
why is that person talking about planting you?
- Is that a threat? - It is, but not in the way you think.
He probably wrote, "Farm me," which does mean kill me, but only for my gold.
It's transactional, not personal.
Well, if he wrote "farm," then why did it say "plant"?
Right now, I'm playing against people all over the world
and the chats are automatically translated into English.
It's called localization, but sometimes the translation makes mistakes.
[Daphne] He even threatened to come after him with a gun.
Interesting.
Well, bedtime is bedtime for a reason. Get in there.
Hey.
- I love you. - I love you.
Can I have it back tomorrow?
Oh, shoot, I'm already outside your room, so I couldn't hear that. Good night.
Guys, it's teppo.
- Who's teppo? - No, what's teppo?
I figured something out. Actually, I figured a couple of things out.
Do you know that 12.6 million people play Battle Dynasty every single day?
Sadly, one of those people is my son, but because of that,
I learned that the game's chat translator isn't always that reliable.
Still not clear on what that is.
Teppo is a Japanese word that has two different meanings.
- I'm guessing one of them is "gun." - Mm-hmm.
That's right. But teppo can also translate to "puffer fish."
Okay. How is "gun" the same word as "puffer fish"?
That's a great question. It actually is a nickname for puffer fish.
Teppo ni ataru.
It means "poison cannon." And how adorable is that?
We should be calling them that from now on.
So, when the guy threatened Declan in the chat, he wasn't saying "gun."
- He was saying "puffer fish toxin." - That's right.
Which is why the lab had so much trouble identifying it.
I just came from the lab. I told them what to test for.
And sure enough, Declan Harker was poisoned with puffer fish toxin.
And it says here it's more potent than cyanide.
One drop causes hallucination, vomiting, paralysis, death.
Declan was a goner even without that car.
Can't believe people pay to eat that.
I have. It's safe.
Yeah, it can be safe as long as your sushi chef
isn't actively trying to kill you.
[Morgan] The two-year training is rigorous.
Before you ever hold a knife, you must master the knowledge.
Know where the poison hides. Only then can you learn to remove it.
After that, you face the test.
A live performance of your skills before an expert.
The cuts have to be precise, the plating impeccable.
If even a speck of blood remains,
you fail, and you have to start all over again.
Until you finally get it just right, and you pass the test.
If the certification is that hard,
must only be a handful of chefs in town who serve it.
Are you inviting me out to sushi?
[Karadec] Excuse me.
[chef] Do you have questions?
Yes, uh, we're looking for something pretty rare.
For a special occasion?
Yes. As a matter of fact, it's our anniversary.
Nope. We saw online that you serve something called puffer fish.
[chuckles] Very special.
Only a dozen chefs in the US are licensed to serve it.
That's right. Would you believe three of them are right here in Los Angeles?
Which is why we came to you.
A man was recently murdered using puffer fish toxin after being threatened online.
The person said their dad had puffer fish he could use.
And those three chefs in LA?
One place is closed for renovation,
one's a childless 80-year-old man, and then there's you.
Any chance you have a kid who has access to your fish, sir?
I have two sons, but what you're suggesting is impossible.
Because?
Because there is a very careful process for handling the toxin.
All the parts that I cut away, the liver, the ovaries, the skin,
I keep in a locked container until it's disposed of.
This is the law, and I follow it to the letter.
Hmm. Mind showing us?
Of course.
Only I have the key, and I take this matter very seriously.
Even on the chance that someone gets sick, I keep remedies on hand.
Is that your son?
One of them. Jin, my apprentice.
Do you recognize that kid?
There's a poster of that kid up at the video game company.
He's wearing different clothes and he had shorter hair,
but that's definitely him.
What do you mean, video games?
The threats we mentioned were made in a video game chat.
My other son, Ryo, plays the video games.
But I still say he couldn't have gotten the toxin.
They're twins.
I swear to you, he didn't do what you said.
Please. Help him.
I brought Ryo and Jin here from Osaka
when they were young, after their mother and I divorced.
Jin has always been good in school and sports.
He works hard and takes an interest in the family business.
It has always been harder with Ryo.
He doesn't listen.
Only cares about his games.
I feel like... [sighs] ...I lost him to them years ago.
That's gotta be really hard.
[sighs] But I love both my boys.
And I have always tried to do what's best for them.
We're sure that's true.
But we still have to consider the possibility
that Ryo got his hands on some toxin and used it to harm Declan Harker.
We'll do everything we can to bring him in safely,
but for that to happen, he has to cooperate.
- We're gonna need your help. - Do you know where he is?
[speaking Japanese]
[speaks Japanese]
Jin, these people are from the police. They need to speak to Ryo.
Do you know where he is?
Uh, he doesn't tell me anything.
Um, probably gaming somewhere?
What about two nights ago? Do you know where he was then?
It's all right. They want to help.
I don't know. I think he went out.
[sighs] I'm sorry.
It's okay. Thank you.
[speaks Japanese]
[Jin speaks Japanese]
- Excuse me. - [Karadec] Mm-hmm.
I'll let you know if I hear from Ryo.
Raising two teenage boys with no mom?
- That can't be easy. - Mm-hmm.
Was it just me, or did that photo album look like Dad has a favorite son?
His hand on Jin's shoulder, looks like he's proud of him.
Ryo, not so much.
Yeah, or Ryo's a moody teenager who doesn't wanna take pictures with his dad.
[phone buzzing]
Who you getting a text from?
I'm getting a text from our lieutenant.
It says she wants to show us something on Declan's laptop.
I'll have Daphne and Oz look for Ryo. We know the cafés he logs in from.
And we know exactly what he looks like.
[video game music plays]
[Oz] It's 2:30 on a Wednesday.
- Shouldn't these kids be at school? - [Daphne scoffs] Okay, Dad.
I'm just saying it's hard to imagine
throwing your whole life away for a video game.
I don't know. I sunk many hours into NBA Jam, and I turned out okay.
Mmm. Jury's still out on that.
[Oz chuckles]
Hey.
- [Daphne] Uh, excuse me, Ryo? - Mm-hmm.
[keyboard clicking]
Hey. Drednog.
LAPD. We need to chat.
- Once I destroy this nexus. - Mm-hmm. Is this you?
A lot of people play as orcs.
Yeah, but Drednog is your username, right? Well, one of them.
Does the name Declan Harker mean anything?
Beast-Slayer?
Everyone knows him online.
Yeah, not as good as you, right?
Declan was trolling you, spawn camped you,
killed your character over and over.
Got under your skin so much that you threatened to kill him in real life.
Am I ringing any bells?
We'll refresh your memory at the station. Come on.
[Daphne] Let's go.
[speaking Japanese]
Mr. Yasuda. His son, Ryo. This is my boss, Lieutenant Soto.
We appreciate you cooperating with the investigation.
Of course.
We just want to clear all this up.
I still believe my son is innocent.
I didn't even know Declan in real life.
You said yourself there are other restaurants that serve puffer fish.
The man's death you described... [sighs] ...is terrible, but my son's right.
You have no real way to connect him to it.
Well, that may or may not be true.
Ryo, you mind if we take a look at your fingers, please?
Our team found blood at the scene we believe belongs to the killer.
That cut proves nothing. I own a restaurant.
My boys cut fingers all the time.
Maybe, but this is a court order compelling Ryo to provide a DNA sample.
Whether or not we can connect him to the murder remains to be seen.
But before we get to that, we can connect you to the victim.
That's how we got the court order.
Declan Harker had $100,000 of crypto on his computer.
Now, people think that crypto's anonymous, but they're wrong.
It's actually even more easily traceable than regular money
because it only exists as computer transactions.
And the crypto we found on Declan's computer
traced back to you.
- What are they talking about? - [speaks Japanese]
You see, Declan wasn't trolling you just for fun.
He was paid to kill you repeatedly.
By your father.
[Karadec] We're guessing because he was trying to get you to quit gaming.
If Declan made the experience miserable enough,
you might end up giving it up on your own.
You have to understand, I tried everything.
Now, that we believe.
We wrestled with how you met Declan,
but then we started thinking about Gamers Anonymous.
Yeah, maybe you were trying to get Ryo to go to a meeting.
Maybe he refused, but you ended up going to one anyway.
And that's how you met Declan about a month ago,
right before he started playing again.
Declan understood what I was seeing in Ryo.
How he wasn't sleeping.
He stopped going to school.
Some nights, Ryo didn't even come home.
I asked Declan to help.
[Karadec] But instead, it made things worse.
Ryo got fed up and he retaliated.
See, he knew from the in-game chats that Declan
typically took a food break around 4:00 a.m.
He even mentioned Teter's Tacos.
It's a popular joint with the late-night gaming crowd.
And we have a receipt from the night Declan died.
Maybe Ryo followed the delivery guy to Declan's apartment,
waited for him to leave
before slipping puffer fish poison into his burrito.
[sighs]
[both speaking Japanese]
Gentlemen, I think we're done here.
- [both breathing heavily] - [Selena] Just one more thing.
We're gonna need that DNA sample from you, Ryo.
Hey.
- Still waiting on Ryo's DNA test results? - Yeah. Lab's fast-tracking it.
We're letting the dad wait with him down in holding.
He's just a kid.
Can you imagine?
One of my kids killing someone? [scoffs]
This will sound worse than I mean, but I worry about it all the time.
Not because of my girls.
Just occupational hazard.
Yeah, I get it. This job gets in your head.
I'll throw you a tougher one.
What about what the dad did? You ever see yourself going that far?
For my kids? Have you met me?
[snickers]
Lab results.
- Is it what we expected? - Actually, no.
The blood on the scene wasn't Ryo's?
The lab said it's a very close familial match, as in 90% close.
Uh, it doesn't get much closer than twins.
Ryo didn't kill Declan.
Jin did.
BOLO's out for Jin.
We've got unis canvassing the neighborhood and posted at Union Station.
I sent Fogel and McNeil to the house with the dad.
They said Jin's not there and his bicycle's missing.
- We checked the dad's restaurant? - Unis are posted there.
- Jin hasn't shown up. - He's not at school.
[Selena] What about friends?
- [phone buzzing] - Guys, it's Jin.
All right, everybody, quiet. Hold the work.
Put it on speaker. We have to try and convince him to come in.
[buzzing continues]
[Jin breathing shakily]
Jin?
[breathing heavily] I messed up, Ryo.
I messed up real bad.
Jin, this is Lieutenant Soto with the police.
Everyone is looking for you.
Your dad and your brother are worried about you.
Why don't you tell us where you are and we can send a car to pick you up?
We wanna hear your side.
[Jin] It's my fault. [breathing shakily]
I left the poison.
Now that guy's dead because of me.
I thought that's what you wanted me to do.
Hey, it's all right, man. [chuckles]
The cops, they understand. They wanna help.
Jin, you're young. No one wants you to go away forever.
This can go easier if you tell us where you are.
I love you, Ryo.
Tell Dad to forgive me.
[line beeps]
Ryo, is there any place that you know Jin might go if he planned to hurt himself?
Uh...
Our dad, he was always tough on us.
When Jin and I needed to get away from him, we'd...
we'd go to the Hollywood Reservoir,
and we'd just sit on the walkway. Um...
He would threaten sometimes to... [sighs]
I'll radio nearest units to get out there.
Take Oz and Daphne with you.
- And have the dad meet you there. - Can I go?
- I can help. I can try to talk him down. - You know what?
Why don't you stay here with me and let the cops do their job, okay?
They'll bring your brother back.
[whirring, beeping]
[machine beeping]
[rattles, beeps]
I got it.
You just gotta be bossy.
Thanks.
They'll call with news soon.
- Hanging in there? - [breathes deeply] Yeah.
This is Jin's favorite.
He'd sneak it into the restaurant when Dad wasn't looking.
- You serious? - [chuckles]
Sounds like he wasn't a perfect son after all.
Let's go get you some real food.
Help yourself. Anything you want.
Can I ask you a question?
You and Jin looked really close in all those pictures I saw,
but it doesn't seem like you hang out at all anymore.
What happened?
We became two different people.
Jin was wrong about all this being his fault.
It's mine.
I told him what Declan was doing to me, and he saw how Battle Dynasty
was the only place where I felt like I belonged.
Like I could be myself.
I see.
That must have been upsetting when Declan was killing you over and over
in the game.
Yeah.
It felt real.
- I'm sorry. This sounds so stupid. - Oh.
- It's-It's okay. - Damn it.
- I'll just get some paper towels. - I'm so sorry.
It's all right. Listen, it's okay.
It's gonna be okay.
Morgan!
Give me a second, okay?
[Selena] It's Adam.
Morgan's here.
Did you find him?
Just his bike. His dad spotted it. Right in the center of the walkway.
Oh, no.
Oz and Daphne are down below with the divers, getting started.
Chances of finding him alive aren't good.
Where's Ryo?
Adam, we'll call you back.
Did anybody see where the kid I was just talking to went?
Okay, this is feeling like more than just a teenager wandering off.
Yeah. Why was he drinking almond milk?
Lactose intolerance, food allergies?
Food allergies. And I also saw a birthmark on his arm.
And this is important why?
I don't think we're gonna find Jin's body.
You think he staged his suicide, and Ryo's gone to meet him?
Mm-mmm. No, what I'm suggesting is way more out there. Just bear with me.
Okay, I learned about this in Mr. Cooper's ninth-grade bio class.
Sometimes, no one really knows how often, a pregnancy can start out as twins,
but then one embryo absorbs the other,
and only one baby makes it to term.
But since, in those early stages,
there were two separate embryos with two sets of DNA,
the baby that's born has both sets of DNA its whole life.
Mr. Cooper was boring as hell, but a two-in-one baby? Very cool.
It's called chimerism after the mythological beast, the chimera,
which is a mash-up of different animals.
Only in human chimeras, it's a mash-up of different people,
resulting in patches of skin being different from the rest,
sometimes two different eye colors,
food allergies because the body is constantly attacking itself.
And blood that's got different DNA than a cheek swab.
Right. I don't even think that Ryo and his dad knew about that one.
I bet they thought that we were about to match Ryo's DNA
with the crime scene, and they thought they caught a lucky break.
Morgan, this doesn't make sense.
You just brought back a photo album of both boys going back their whole lives.
- You've even met the two brothers. - Did I?
Have we seen Ryo and Jin in the same room at the same time?
Hold on. Are you saying...
We just got played by a desperate father and a son who are trying to pin a murder...
On a brother that doesn't exist.
[Karadec] We retrieved your photo album and had our techs analyze these photos.
They've all been digitally doctored.
One boy or another added to the photo after the fact.
The techs also had a sense of when these photos were doctored.
You've been doing this Ryo's whole life.
Having him dress as Jin, pose as Jin, be Jin to work at your restaurant.
[chuckles] That's absurd.
I cleaned up some photos.
But that doesn't mean what you say.
Why are you holding me?
I just lost my son.
I need to grieve.
It's true that you are grieving.
But you didn't just lose your son.
You've been grieving him for 17 years.
We spoke with your ex-wife in Osaka.
She told us how happy you were when you found out you were having twins
and how devastated you both were when one of them didn't make it.
And how that grief led to divorce, and how you blamed the son who survived.
Ryo's whole life,
every time he disappointed you, stepped out of line,
you reminded him that you wished he was Jin.
So, Ryo turned to gaming,
where he could be free of your criticism and your control and finally be himself.
That's why when you had Declan kill him over and over in the game,
he went crazy and he did something drastic.
Early yesterday morning,
you saw that someone had gotten into the puffer fish toxin,
and you knew right away who took it and why.
You said yourself you keep a remedy on hand.
You're the one who gave Declan the charcoal.
I didn't want my son to be a murderer.
Problem is, you were too late. Declan was already too far gone.
- Take it! - [groans]
[Karadec] He fought you.
In the ensuing scuffle, fell through the glass sliding door,
- cutting his feet. - [Yasuda] Declan!
You tried to catch him, but he ran into the street.
[tires screech]
- [gasps, pants] - [Karadec] You couldn't save him.
So you focused on saving your son.
You knew the police would identify the toxin,
and from there, we would get to Ryo.
Ryo.
So, after years of wishing that one son was the other,
you decided to make it official.
Ryo had to disappear. For good.
That's how we met you and Jin at your restaurant.
Then Ryo disobeyed you, went back to the cybercafe, where we picked him up.
That's when he found out that you betrayed him by hiring Declan.
When the DNA came back, you must have been just as surprised as we were
that it wasn't a match for Ryo, so now the plan changed.
Once we were looking for Jin, we couldn't keep eyes on you every second.
You had Ryo make a recording as Jin, you changed your own name to Jin in his phone
and made it seem like he was calling to confess
when really it was just you playing that recording on the other end.
Then you went looking for Jin with us,
hoping we'd buy that he'd taken his own life.
Ryo's and your phone records have confirmed this.
The one thing you had to have help with was planting the bike at the reservoir.
Your phone gave that away too.
You called your sous-chef from the station,
and he did it for you.
Sous-chef's already cooperating.
We picked up Ryo an hour ago, hiding in his basement.
All I ever wanted to do was...
what's best for my son.
We know that.
Ryo is a minor and the circumstances are extreme.
So if you both cooperate fully, he can still have a life.
[breathes deeply]
Right now, this is the best way you can help him.
Ryo...
[speaks Japanese]
[speaks Japanese, sniffles]
- [speaking Japanese, sobs] - [breathing shakily]
♪ I’d like to start off with I’m sorry ♪
♪ You were right, you often are ♪
♪ I was too afraid to face you ♪
♪ But I trust you know my heart ♪
[Karadec] The elf is Declan's ex, Adity.
She staged a funeral for him in game.
That's really sweet.
I guess we all grieve in our own ways.
Hey.
You okay?
Yeah, I'm just excited to get home to my kids.
Oh, speaking of exes...
Hi, I'm looking for Adam Karadec.
You know, I thought about what you and Selena said.
As usual, you were right.
I'm gonna give this another shot.
I have to show her it's gonna be different.
- Hi, I'm Morgan. I work with this guy. - Hey.
Hi, I'm Lucia.
But something tells me you already knew that.
Mm-hmm. I've done a little digging around.
- Oh. - You know, we have a dinner reservation.
I know, but I just have a couple of questions for Lucia.
- Yeah, but we can't be late. So... - He's never late.
Oh, yeah? He was late for you yesterday.
- And we're leaving. - Oh.
- It was really nice to meet you, Morgan. - Nice to meet you too.
Hey, Karadec.
Have fun.
♪ I can’t find myself until you’re gone ♪
[♪ song ends]