Gotei, Inc. Toyko Main Branch
My name is Kurosaki Ichigo and I am 23 years old. I was one of twenty university graduates selected last spring for one of the most prestigious companies in Japan, Gotei, Inc.. My dad wanted me to take over the family practice, but there was no way in hell I was gonna spend the next thirty to forty years of my life with that sappy old geezer. Besides, there was something about this company, something that seemed to be calling me, beckoning me like a light to a moth.
Anyway, back to the story, I was, I guess you could say recruited, though indirectly, at a job forum for the company by the PR department for this company. They had some interesting stuff to say and they went around talking to people, all of us in our pressed black suits eagerly exchanging business cards and information with each other. Of course everyone else also had black hair, but my hair as you can see is naturally orange which at the time, was a minor detail impeding my job hunting as everyone thought that I was a rebellious delinquent or a Yankee or something.
At the Gotei, Inc. job forum, I was just trying not to stand out so much, leaning against the back wall and thumbing through the pamphlets casually, when someone came up from behind me.
"Well, you certainly do not blend in with the crowd," the petite girl in a black suit commented. Spazzing out for a second, I fumbled with the pamphlet, clumsily dropping it in front of her. She picked it up for me and stared at me expectantly with her large amethyst eyes as she handed it back to me.
"Thanks," I mumbled.
"So why do you want to work for Gotei, Inc.?" she asked curiously, brushing a loose tendril of dark hair from her face.
"I don't know, I guess it seemed like an interesting company, with so many different facets because of the different industries they operate in. Plus, the fact that they have an international division, and I hear that they provide an extremely exciting and stimulating work environment, I think I would really like somewhere like that."
"I see. If you don't mind me asking, why is your hair orange?"
"It's my natural hair color."
"You didn't bother dying it?"
"It's not that I didn't bother, I figured everyone would find out anyway and therefore pointless to try and hide it. And, I don't really care what people think about me, because I'd rather them accept me wholly on the basis of who I am, rather than who I can pretend to be. Though to be honest, I've always kinda stood out no matter where I was."
I grinned and scratched the back of my head sheepishly.
"Do you mind if I ask your name?"
"Kurosaki. Kurosaki Ichigo. Keio University, Economics Department."
"Kurosaki Ichigo," she repeated slowly. "That's a rather cute name."
"It's not cute!" I said defensively. "My name doesn't mean 'strawberry'. It means 'to protect one thing'!"
"I see. I apologize then. You have a wonderful name, Kurosaki Ichigo-san. Here," she said, reaching into her pocket and handing me a business card. As she turned and faded into the crowd, she offered me those fateful words. "It was nice meeting you. Come down for an interview, Kurosaki Ichigo-san."
"Wait!" I shouted, running after her. But it was too late. I lost sight of her. I looked at the card she had handed to me. It had the company's information and a map on one side. I flipped it over. "Gotei, Inc. Tokyo Main Branch. Division 13: PR & Customer Service Division. PR Department, Head of Recruiting. Kuchiki Rukia."
I stared at that card for a long time. "Division 13…? What kind of company numbers its functional units like PR?"
And well, clearly, I passed the interview, survived the initial training and orientation. Which brings me back to the present. Kurosaki Ichigo, now of Gotei, Inc. Tokyo Main Branch, Division 7: Sales Division. Yes, I am in sales. I am an Economics major who has never sold a thing in my life aside from medicine to fill prescriptions. How the hell am I supposed to sell things with a high elasticity when I'm only used to selling goods with inelastic demands! Still, I am learning the motto of this division: 'Be able to sell anything to anyone.' Never mind that the Marketing Division does thorough research and generally has a target group of consumers, we as 'humble servants of the Japanese economy' must constantly strive to provide high quality goods and services to our loyal clientele whether they be the mass market or industrial consumers. I think the motto should be 'be able to sell whatever Marketing throws at you.'
"Kurosaki!" interrupted a booming voice across the office.
"Yes, Hasegawa-sempai?"
"Take these and go find out what's going on in the Marketing Division!" he ordered, handing me a stack of reports. "I thought the refillable soap packages were supposed to be green this year to go with the new 'Tokyo Midori-fication Campaign.'"
"What's wrong with them now?" I muttered, opening the file. "Oh…."
"As you can see, Kurosaki, someone in the Marketing Division made them PINK with little sparkly letters! We can't be selling soap in PINK packages if they're supposed to be for the campaign that is for the beautification of Tokyo by planting more trees and bushes!"
"Yes, sempai!" I said standing up. "I'll go find out right away!"
This is how it usually is here in the Sales Division. We usually have a myriad of problems to deal with and since I'm the most junior member of the division, I usually get sent out on the gopher work like this. Not that I mind or anything. I've been able to see many different parts of the company as a result.
I walked down the hall and took the elevator.
"5th floor: Division 5: Marketing Division," announced the elevator girl, as she held the door open for me. I walked out to find the office space in utter chaos, well more so than usual.
"Good morning, Kurosaki-kun," waved a cheerful girl poking up from underneath a huge pile of color samples.
"'Morning, Inoue."
Inoue Orihime, supposedly top of her class in her department at Waseda University. She entered the same spring as I did. She's a little scatterbrained, but with very big…a very big personality. Ahem. Well, she's sweet enough, but not really my type.
"Inoue, do you know anything about this pink packaging for the Mirage soap line?" I said, showing her the sample that had been attached to the report.
"Wow, it's a really cute color!" she exclaimed.
"Yeah, except it's supposed to be green for the Tokyo Midori-fication Campaign."
"Oh. Hmm…let me ask my sempai. Hold on."
Moments later, Orihime brought a guy wearing a purple feather boa and a hot pink suit.
"Sempai, what should we do? The packaging was the wrong color…"
"Kurosaki-kun," he said, putting a large file on the counter between us and staring at me for several moments. "How nice to see you again!"
Was he checking me out?! Dude, I am NOT gay! Why must he always look at me like that whenever I come here…?!
"Yeah, you too, Tenjou-sempai. Um, about the packaging—"
"Oh yes!" he exclaimed, shuffling through the massive binder. "Let's see. I think Marketing Team B was in charge of that one. But they put mint green for the color and I told them to change it to a more grassy green. And then that stupid Yumichika came waltzing in and told them that forest green was better. Which is totally not the right color because the letters are off white. Therefore it clearly makes more sense for it to be grassy green and oh, here's my seal here….okay….this went to there and oh here, Hinamori-fukubuchou wrote…the wrong…color code…Kurosaki-kun, here's the problem. The color code for grassy green is 83261-49. But our fukubuchou wrote the wrong color when she was filling out the final paperwork. She put 83261-47 or flamingo pink, but personally I think that 81, bubble gum pink is a far more summery color…And well, things have been hard for our fukubuchou. The poor thing. After Aizen-buchou suddenly left the company, she was just so broken up--"
"That's nice, but I need her to issue the right color," I cut in, trying to get the fruitcake to shut up about the colors.
"She's not in right now, so I'll just make the adjustment," he said, pulling out a form from underneath the counter and his sparkly white pen with the feathers from his jacket to fill out the form. Pressing his seal into the box at the bottom of the page, he handed the form to me. "You may need to go to Accounting and Finance to get it cleared for production though. I'll write them a memo to explain the situation just in case."
"Thanks. I'll see you later, Inoue. Tenjou-sempai."
So I went back to Hasegawa-sempai, who, as Tenjou-sempai said, told me to go to Accounting and Finance.
"Kurosaki, I swear that woman is out to get me," he said, clenching his fist, turning rather red in the face.
"Who? Hinamori-fukubuchou?"
"No, her secretary! She hates me; I just know it. Every time I try to get in touch with someone in Marketing, that crazy woman always transfers my call to Medical or Security or something! She does this to me on purpose! Always trying to make more work for the hardworking people in the Sales Division…"
"Sempai, I think Hinamori-fukubuchou just may have been stressed—"
"No matter, Kurosaki," he declared, ignoring me as usual. "Go up to Accounting and Finance and go get this cleared for production! That woman thinks she's outsmarted me, but ooh, just you wait! Tell them to put it on hot rush because I gotta call the Prime Minister back about the status of the production. Oh, and when you finish, bring that paper back and go talk to Logistics and the International Division regarding those reports and memos on your desk."
"Yes, sempai," I said, trudging to the elevator.
"What floor, Kurosaki-san?"
"8th floor," I mumbled as I entered the elevator, sighing loudly.
"Thank you. Please step back….8th floor: Division 8: Accounting and Finance Division."
Walking out, I strode towards a woman with her hair neatly pinned up in a fitted suit on the phone with her back to me.
"I don't care if your secretary was out of town on her honeymoon," responded the woman calmly, turning to face the calendar, pushing her glasses up in the process. "It was your job to hand in the budget for your division last week. I refuse to process the request to increase the budget for a person who consistently fails to complete their paperwork in a timely manner. You know the rules—Excuse me, is that a threat?"
"Nanao-chan, I can't find the staples—" called a faint voice across the room.
"You want to speak to my supervisor? He's not available. Besides, he doesn't make the call on the budget; the fukubuchou does. You want to speak to the fukubuchou? This is Division 8 Accounting and Finance Fukubuchou, Ise Nanao—"
What a formidable woman…That's another thing I've noticed about this company. This company, even for a 'progressive' Japanese firm, there is an unusually high number of high flying women in this company—not that I'm sexist or anything. It's just a comment, mind you. I just noticed that there are a lot of women in positions of power. On my first day here, I heard that the heads of Security and the Medical Divisions were both women, but this one is pretty feisty too.
"—you want to appeal?!"
"Nanao-chan, I can't find the staples," whined the scruffy older man with long curly hair slicked back as he loosened his pink necktie and sort of floated over to the woman on the phone. He looked like he was going to grope the unsuspecting woman's derriere, so I was about to warn her, but she simply pulled her fan out of thin air and whacked his suspicious wandering hands with a loud smack before chucking a pack of staples at him as she continued to yell over the phone. The man in the pink tie was unprepared, so he ended up receiving that pack of staples with his forehead. "You're too kind…"
"I am a very busy woman and I haven't got all day to argue with you. If you want to make an appeal, please put it in the form of a memo and attention it to me. I will review it later," she said slamming the phone down. "Kyouraku-buchou!"
"Nanao-chan, how are you this morning?" he said, opening the box of staples and as luck would have it, spilled them all over the floor.
"Buchou, you are three and a, almost four hours late," she said exasperatedly, picking up the staples off the floor and snatching the stapler off the desk, refilling it with one fluid motion. "Where were you this morning?!"
"I'm sorry, Nanao-chan, but I thought I'd be clever and take the express train this morning to save time and be only an hour late, but I fell asleep and somehow ended up somewhere in Saitama—"
"Saitama?" she said, smacking her forehead. "Wait—that still doesn't explain why you're almost four hours late—"
"Well, I had to get coffee—"
"There's a vending machine right there—"
"So there is, silly me—" he said goofily.
"Buchou! You were supposed to be at the buchou meeting this morning!"
"Aw, lighten up, Nanao-chan, Yama-jii will forgive me—"
"Um, excuse me," I said, shuffling over to the lovebirds. "Sorry to interrupt, but—"
"Who are you?" demanded Nanao.
"Sales Division, Kurosaki Ichigo. Uh, Hasegawa-sempai sent me up here to get this cleared for production," I said, handing the form I had been given to the Accounting and Finance fukubuchou.
"Didn't I already approve the production of 1 million units for the Mirage line Tokyo Midori-fication Project?" she asked, raising one eyebrow suspiciously.
Damn, this woman was good, considering it's just a request form. Impeccable memory!
"Yes, but I think Marketing was supposed to send over a memo—"
"Oops…That must be that thing that Tenjou handed me in the elevator on the way up here," murmured the older man, scratching his beard and pulling a crumpled piece of paper out of his pants pocket. "Oh, Nanao-chan, looky here. I have that memo—ouch…"
"Next time say so earlier!" she said after having thrown her fan at him and relieved him of the piece of paper. She quickly skimmed the memo and compared it to the request form. "Okay."
Nanao pressed her seal, which she had pulled from her coat pocket onto the form and handed it back to me. "Hot rush?"
"Please, if you wouldn't mind," I said, bowing deeply.
"All right, tell your sempai that it'll be cleared this afternoon. Also, remind him to turn in his receipts for reimbursement."
"I will. Thank you very much, Ise-fukubuchou. Kyouraku-buchou, good day to you both," I said walking back to the elevator. No sooner had the door opened, when the buchou came careening towards me and thrust an small package at me.
"Can you take that to Division 11? Please—"
"Buchou! Come back here!" called his fear-inducing fukubuchou.
"Thanks, kid," he said as the doors closed.
"What floor, Kurosaki-san?"
"11, I guess," I sighed.
Wait a minute, what was on the 11th floor? I didn't know there was a Division 11. What could be there? Logistics? No, Logistics is on the 3rd floor. Personnel was 6th…was it the International Division?
"11th floor: Division 11: Demolition Division."
Demolition? What does a company like Gotei, Inc. need with a Demolition Division? Are they secretly run by yakuza or something?!
"We demolished the wrong one?! Whadya mean we demolished the wrong one?!" demanded the man behind the largest desk near the window, his hair in gravity-defying spikes with little bells attached to them. He looked like he had walked out of Harajuku with his gothic/punk outfit with spikes and buckles hanging off the ragged black fabric. "Yumichika, what is the meaning of this?"
"Zaraki-buchou, well, we dispatched Ikkaku to demolish the old Hirahara building, but he got lost and ran into Kusajishi-fukubuchou on his way to the police station to ask directions."
"And what did Yachiru tell him?"
"She said she knew where the building was, but apparently she led him to the wrong building."
"Well, what building did she lead him to?"
"The old elementary school on Harahira-doori."
"Was anyone injured?"
"No, luckily, the entire school had gone on a day trip to the aquarium. What should we do?"
"Isn't it obvious?"
"Call the insurance company and the school?" offered the pretty subordinate.
"No! Get Ikkaku on the phone and tell him to get his ass in gear and go demolish the right one! That unreliable bastard!"
"Oh, right!" Yumichika said, walking to his desk and noticing me from the corner of his eye. Walking over he said, "Oh, hello, can I help you?"
"Yeah, I've got a package from Division 8 for your buchou."
"Oh, thank you. Buchou, it's from Kyouraku-buchou!"
"Whatever it is, I don't want it," the superior grumbled.
"But it's an package! Don't you wanna know what's in it?"
"I don't care. That guy always sends me weird shit. Whatever it is, you can have it—"
"But, buchou, it's not my style! I don't wear neckties," whined Yumichika. "They make me look fat!"
"I hate neckties!"
"But this one is so cute. It's sky blue with little duckies on it!"
"Give it to Yachiru…"
I got outta there as fast as I could. This division is crazy. God, what time is it? 11:54? After I give this to Hasegawa, it's lunch break. Thank god for lunch breaks. And then it's Logistics and International Division. Upper management must be nuts…
"What floor, Kurosaki-san?"
"Back the 7th…"
0-0-0-0-0
To be continued…?
0-0-0-0-0
A/N: Instead of "taichou", because taichou lead bantai, I have substituted "taichou" for "buchou" since there are no "bantai" in corporations. "Bu" is probably the equivalent of division or department within a company.
0-0-0-0-0
I'm sorry, my Chrysanthemums & Peaches is on a hiatus right now. I'm kinda stressed with school and everything. But I decided that writing might be good therapy right now. I don't know if I will continue it, but I just felt like I had to be 'productive' even if only for a couple of hours. Reviews are always welcome.
0-0-0-0-0