Summary:

  Just as D is getting ready to close the shop for the night, a girl, Angelic, storms in demanding a rare, beautiful, expensive bird to show off and out do Janet and her cheeky parrot. She is the daughter of a very wealthy man, who feels neglected with her father's attention focused more on work and a mistress than his own daughter. D introduces Angelic to the Sterlizia, a angel-like bird in the shape of a boy, whom she ends up taking home so that he can adjust to the new court-sized green house that will be its cage and so that she can listen to its voice. After listening to the creature's voice, she is moved by its singing and is in turn deemed a suitable master, and signs the contract. (As payment, D requests ten fruit tarts from Mademe C's Shop. The 15 inch ones. The kind that are red on top and has green confectionery.)

  Angelic names her new Sterlizia "P-chan" and takes care of him, being the only one in the house allowed to feed him. Thanks to her maid's, Nana's, praises, her father becomes aware of how responsible Angelic has become, no longer going out late or spending carelessly, and taking care of a pet. He wonders at how grown up Angelic has become and decides to set an arranged marriage between her and the son of a competitor to benefit his company. Angelic immediately recoils at the intent of setting her up, but her father chastises her for being selfish.

  Upset, Angelic cries in the green house. P-chan wipes away her tears and attempts to comfort her. Touched by his compassion, his mirrored loneliness, and affected by her own circumstances, Angelic calls D the next day requesting another Sterlizia to breed the pair and provide P-chan with a love, wife and family. (Incidentally, unintentionally, mirroring her father's actions of arranging a relationship and pressing wants onto another without the other having a say.) D cautions that breeding Sterlizias is very difficult, but Angelic insists that P-chan was born that way, so it will be fine. D also insists that there are very few female Sterlizias, but Angelic weedles by offering 50 fruit tarts from Madame C's Shop and 100 moon cakes. After a little more resistance, she offers him a year's supply of peninsula chocolate, and D finally gives in. He obtains a female Sterlizia for Angelic, though laments that he was forced to cross a very dangerous bridge to obtain it.

  Angelic and D introduce the two birds to see if they are compatible and if the new Sterlizia can become P-chan's bride. The two are startled when they lay eyes on one another, but the first impression goes well. Angelic feels a type of way while observing the two, but waves it off as a mother's feeling when letting go of her child. She goes through with signing the contract for the new female Sterlizia, but feels uneasy being forced to stay away from the pair for a week. In response, D lends her Q-chan for the week as compensation for not being able to see the birds.

  Over the course of the week, Angelic hears P-chan singing at night and feels melancholic over the thought that song is no longer meant for her. She also spends time considering the mystery that is D, the young master of the Chinatown Pet Shop, further, including who he might be, his level of trustworthiness (she's racist about this), and what "D" could stand for. After five days, P-chan's singing stops. On day six, Angelic is worried over how hungry they must be after not eating for so long and finally breaks, going to the greenhouse to set a basket of fruit down for them, despite Q-chan's protests.

  When she goes, she finds P-chan laying on the ground, his corpse partially eaten and much of his intestines torn from his stomach and chest cavity. The female Sterliza is licking blood from her lips and claws, splattered everywhere with P-chan's blood. Enraged, Angelic hits the female, demanding to know why she would eat him, eat her mate. D shows up and stops her hand, explaining that cannibalism is part during the mating process, and had she waited the full seven days, she would have been spared seeing the gruesome sight because he would have been fully eaten. He also explains the cyclical nature of these birds and their life-and-death breeding process and that in a month the female will give birth to P-chan's child, who will go on to sing the same primeval song of love. Angelic still mourns for P-chan, grieving that he was still alive just yesterday. Surprised, D explains that the female must have started with P-chan's arms and legs while eating him, and with the breath left within him P-chan continued to sing his song of love for his master. Angelic cries hearing this, and their story comes to a close.

Number of pets sold: 3

The Pets:

???

A small creature with large pointy ears, small clawed fingers, and little fangs.

Associated rules:

1. Do not let it see light.
2. Do not let it touch water.
3. Do not give it food in the middle of the night.

Sold to a Mr. Glenn. When its rules are broken, specifically when it touches water, it begins multiplying rapidly, as well as acting out by getting...bitey.

Sterlizia

A delicate, fussy creature sensitive to new environments, this bird originates from a small southern Pacific island. Being nocturnal, it is active at night, at which its beautiful song can be heard. Under captivity, it will not sing if the chemistry between it and its master is not good. Its song, said to be a song of love, is described as gentle and sad, singing of a home it's never had, companions it's never met. This song is known to them innately, without having to be taught or passed by word of mouth from ancestor to ancestor.

"Legend says, as entertainment, the nobles of the island held duels between a viper and a bird. If the bird sang well, the viper would fall asleep listening to it. But if the melody was off even a little bit...The viper would bite its throat. Like this, the ones that survived passed on their beautiful voice."

There are only a few existing members of this species in the world. Thanks to their elaborate dress and singing, males of the species are in much higher demand and more often sold as pets than females, who are plainer in comparison and do not sing, and whome are thusly hard to come by. When it comes to breeding between males and females, cannibalism is a key trait of their process. Within a week of mating, a female will devour, and eventually kill, the male to feed their unborn child and keep the species going. Afterwards, the gestation period for this species is a month.

Associated rules:

1. Feed him fresh fruit for every meal.
2. Do not show him to anyone.
3. You must be by his side when he sings. He will not stop singing until he sees his owner's face. He will keep singing even if his throat starts bleeding.

Addendum to rules, after acquiring two:

1. You cannot visit the birds for one week.
2. Do not give them any food during that time.

Purchased by Angelic Winston. Consequences for not following the added rules resulted in the master walking in on the half-eaten remains of her male Sterlizia.

Summary:

  Robin Hendrix, a previous child actor who had made his big break ten years ago in his debut role as an alien crown prince in Space Wars 3, is found dead in his home with no signs of burglary or blunt force trauma. The only suspicious aspects of the crime scene are signs of a recent guest, via the two glasses of wine, and a white lizard lying dead beside the body. Detective Leon Orcot is on the scene and takes special interest in the lizard. In the last few years, tehre have been an increase in mysterious deaths, all from different causes ranging from bodies torn to pieces to bodies being fully drained of blood, but they all had one thing in common: the victims had all customers of Count D's Pet Shop.

  Suspicious, Leon decides to visit the pet shop where he believes the victim acquired the lizard. Upon entering, D's first words to Leon are, "Welcome! What is it you desire?" In turn, Leon's first words to D are "I want a lizard. A poisonous one that can kill a human." D is put on guard and asserts he must be joking, and that the shop does not sell such dangerous species. Leon asks for his manager, and D informs him he is taking care of the shop while his grandfather is away. Leon asks if D was the one who sold a lizard to Robin Hendrix, and D expresses his sorrow that he saw the death on the news and it's a pity someone so young passed away. He had been one of the shop's regulars, having purchased some twenty different spcies of lizards.

  Leon shows D a picture of the suspicious lizard in question and D is shocked that the lizard was dead--more so than finding out that Hendrix was dead. D is dismayed that a member of such a valuable species with only a handful remaining in the wild was now dead. D asks that the lizard's body is brought back to the shop to her family. Leon is angry that D considers the death of a lizard more important than the death of a person. He says that the lizard is being tested, and threatens that if it's found to be poisonous, D won't be let off the hook so easily. In response, D plays up the theatrics and says "But...We sell love and dreams in this shop. Nothing to do with poison."--Succeeding in making Leon even more pissed, as he thinks "Love, huh? 'Love' my ass!" D suggests Leon buy a Java sparrow, and when an annoyed Leon exclaims he doesn't need a pet, D says he meant for him to crush up and eat its bones, because he's so irritable that he must be suffering from calcium deficiency.

  Back at the police station, Leon angrily thinks about D, calling him a brat and hating the stupid smirk on his face. (He's also racist about it.) Hendrix's autopsy comes back and reveals no trauma or drugs in his system. The cosmetics around his home belonged to his estranged wife, who has an alibi for the night of the murder, and besides that there's no reports of any rivals who might want him dead. The lizard in his possession had been found not to be poisonous, but also was an undocumented species they'd never come across before. It's mentioned that the pet shop is not violating the Washington Treaty via a loophole that the lizard isn't even listed in any books. Robert Hendrix's death is determined to be from a sudden heart attack.

  Despite this, Leon still believes that the pet shop has something to do with this death and the previous unsolved murders and is determined to get more information. Leon returns to the shop. D is put off, but Leon greets him with a ni-hao and tells him he's there to "return the young lady's body." He apologizes for having troubled him and thanks him, also giving him a box of Hotel de Mareseilles' champagne gateaux. D becomes excited, as they only sell 30 a day and one normally must stand in line before the shop opens to get one (something he's not able to do, since he can't get up early). He is immediately swayed, telling Leon he is a good person and that he'll tell him anything.

  Now on better terms, the two sit down for tea and sweets. In D's opinion, he beleives Robin had been killed by a spirit. Leon angrily dismisses this, saying that the police would go bankrupt if every murder culprit were a spirit. D is petulant that Leon is angry again, and expounds that he meant that even when he was alive, Robin had just been a ghost of himself. That after his hit debut, his career had went nowhere and that he realized his acting ability was not in the same league as his beauty, a one hit wonder. No matter what he did, that image as the beautiful young prince defined him, trapped him, haunted him.

[ * Dreizehn is the number thirteen (13) in German. ]