~Surreptitious~
Chapter One
Disclaimer: This will only be mentioned once throughout the course of this story, because I am never going to own Gakuen Alice, and this fact is not going to change :) Also it should be important to note that this story will reference many aspects of the manga/anime. I also apologise in advance if I eventually make any of the characters 'out of character'.
Word Count: 3599
A bilious look etched the features of the young brunette as the view of artificial greenery, minuscule-sized mechanical bugs and a well constructed artificial waterfall came to her view. Mikan exhaled in, gave out an exasperated sigh before she secured her slender fingers on the handle of the corpulent suitcase she was instructed to bring.
Her honey-brown orbs scanned all nearby areas cautiously, allowing herself to confirm her thoughts. The lack of any bodily presence, with the exception of herself, assured Mikan that a potential ambush was extremely unlikely.
Acknowledging this, Mikan proceeded forward without hesitation.
When she arrived at her destination, she halted.
Mikan had to admit, Luminous Revival was a pretty interesting organization, to say the least. She was recently informed by her colleagues that her commander was rather persistent in wanting to remodel the exterior of their base at headquarters, enough that it had led to a permanent change in their base location after a few quarrels.
Apparently, the commander had argued that the change of scenery would have had convenience written all over it. He had explained that the change to a remote setting would've made the organization more low-profile. This ultimately would've allowed them a degree of security since the new base would've been tremendously difficult to perpetrate. And most important of all, their actions wouldn't have been traced back with ease.
Besides, who in their right minds would end up tracking their location back to a prospering wildflower garden anyway?
The whole idea of reconstructing their base certainly deserved praise; however, it clearly wasn't a plan without its flaws. One of the main criticisms of the reconstruction resided in the fact that there was now an unnecessarily long procedure for signing into Luminous Revival.
It wasn't Mikan's cup of tea nor was it a delightful process for anyone checking in.
Before starting the procedure for signing in, Mikan once again examined her surroundings before plopping herself to the ground. She swiftly took the position of a squat and refrained from shamelessly trampling dozens of flowers in the process. A satisfied smile plastered her mouth when she had successfully located the most significant flower out of the bunch; the one that would let her into Luminous Revival.
The Euphorbia. It was indeed a bland flower since it didn't possess any striking traits that would catch the eyes of an onlooker unlike the other flowers situated there. Its long green stalk covered in tiny specs of white flowers served one purpose only and that was to enhance the beauty of the other plants that radiated in colour. Roses, sunflowers, and daffodils were a good example of this.
If anyone was to accidentally stumble into the area and by chance wanted to pluck a selection of flowers for a bouquet, there was a high chance that the individual would only take the flowers that allured the eyes. Obviously, the Eurphorbia would have been discarded due to its lack of beauty and of course, that was exactly what headquarters wanted.
A flower that looked ever so tedious wouldn't bring any sort of attention towards Luminous Revival.
A brilliant tactic, indeed.
Recalling the pattern that would let her get into headquarters, Mikan lightly tapped onto the highest little flower in the Euphorbia and swiftly dragged her invisible line to other sections of the plant until she successfully formed the main logo of Luminous Revival, a star.
Suddenly, the once non-existent line became visible to the eye, and Mikan was enveloped in a bright beam of light that shot out of the logo.
Once the blinding light had simmered down, Mikan was automatically transported to another destination. Unconsciously, Mikan had to give a roll of her eyes. Their check-in system sure was lengthy but she was glad that only two easy steps awaited her.
When the transportation system had set her down, Mikan found herself in an all too familiar place. The opaque windows, the white tiles with little silver glittery specs adorned onto them and the bizarre decoration pieces led Mikan to the conclusion that she was in the enclosed entrance of Luminous Revival, the headquarters of Japan.
Without wasting further moments, Mikan hastily strode forwards and only stopped inches away from the security door. She quickly came to the realisation that she didn't have her identification card hanging leisurely around her neck as she usually did, so unzipped the first compartment of her suitcase in hopes of finding it in the midst of every other miniature travel necessity.
When her hand felt the familiar fabric of the lanyard, Mikan carelessly pulled it out only to realise that it was tangled into a small hair comb. Once she unraveled her ID card, Mikan cringed upon encountering her ever-so-lovely picture.
On the corner of the white plastic card, there was her picture. It was as clear as day that Mikan was in the process of sneezing as her eyes were closed, her eyebrows were furrowed together, and her lips were partially open exposing a few pearly-white teeth. It had to be the most horrific picture she had taken but unfortunately for her, it was the only one she was allowed to use.
Regardless of that, Mikan did herself a good deed and flipped her card over when she was in the presence of her superiors.
Not relishing in further thoughts regarding her picture, Mikan pressed her card delicately against the security card reader and withdrew it once the vermillion light changed itself to an emerald colour.
With that confirmation, Mikan inputted her password besides the scanner with a little grin.
'1L0V3H0WA110N'
The thought of devouring the luxurious candy invaded her mind all of a sudden. It had been so long, precisely one month and three days since Mikan had been deprived of her favourite sweet. At that moment, Mikan had decided that after she had tended to business, she would pop down to one of the stores in headquarters for a quick bite. She certainly deserved it after all she had been through for her last mission.
The sound of the automated voice greeting her pulled Mikan out of her thoughts. Her casual expression instantly morphed to one of intimidation once the confined doors slowly opened revealing the setting.
Instantly, the scenery sprung to life as her honey-brown eyes witnessed the daily activities of her peers. The receptionist busied herself with typing away on her computer whilst simultaneously receiving the forthcoming call of the day; other members that came to the building headed out as consumers and stacked up on medicine, new equipment, and other items from specialised shops. There were a stray few that queued up at the leaderboards so they could pinpoint their location.
"Typical," Mikan muttered out, slightly amused.
She had completely forgotten just how effulgent Luminous Revival could be. Perhaps it was all due to her previous mission; specifically, her irksome client that had drained her soul dry of optimism.
Yami Ranashi, a client that had deserved all the ridicule in the world. Mikan's mission was to obtain Yami's secret dessert recipe back from a rival bakery who had forcefully invaded her home seeking the infamous dessert recipe. It was all going well. Negotiations were made and everything was going according to Mikan's plan, that was until Yani went out on the pretence of shopping and somehow ended up confronting the enemy, that too in their own territory.
Of course, that had led to Yami's capture.
Because of Yami's incredibly stupid act, Mikan's supposed one-week mission extended itself to a month. To top it off, when Mikan did complete the mission, victoriously bringing Yami and her recipe back to safety, all she received was a long string of curse words instead of praise, her salary was deducted because of her 'unsatisfactory' performance, and, Yami had looked just about anything but grateful.
But at least that havoc was over with.
All Mikan had to do today was report to a meeting.
"Hopefully that's all," Mikan muttered.
Luminous Revival just wasn't going to allow her the well-deserved break she desperately anticipated, were they? It had been barely two hours since her arrival in Japan, and already Mikan Sakura found that her meeting was cancelled but on the bright side, she had been summoned by her superiors.
Wait... that wasn't a good thing.
'I wonder what the situation is,' Mikan thought anxiously as she seated herself on a chair outside of the office she was told to stop by. With her hand feeling the burden of carrying a heavy suitcase to the fourth floor, Mikan opted to place it on the vacant chair next to her. She then proceeded to mover herself to a position that was comfortable for her before zoning off for the next few minutes.
"What's taking them so long? I'd have thought this was something urgent if they summoned me without letting me rest up," Mikan bitterly muttered with more than a tinge of annoyance present in her voice.
But instead of doing what she'd normally do and locate any members that were expected to be in the meeting, Mikan stayed put. She reckoned that she'd not only waste time wandering around the building aimlessly but she'd also tire herself out more in the process. It sure would have been hard to encounter any of her peers in such a busy environment.
It would have been better if they came to her for once.
'A few more minutes of waiting won't hurt,' she tried to reason, even though she felt uneasy about her current circumstance.
Exactly fifteen minutes later, Mikan had discarded any sort of optimism that she had struggled to maintain previously.
She was hungry.
She was agitated.
Mikan would surely punish someone relentless in her current state if this was all just misinformation.
Whilst she let her anger consume her, Mikan failed to notice the crimson light of her receiver desperately call out for her attention until the flicker had caught her eye in the transparent window.
Pursing her lips tightly together, Mikan pressed the button of her receiver down before seething out a "what?" to the target of her anger.
"I've tested your patience again, I see," an amused voice bellowed out through the other line. Although Mikan's anger continued to rise by his lack of remorse, she wasn't about to let a few petulant remarks loose.
She'd lose her mind and quite possibly her job if she was careless when speaking to her superior.
He cleared his throat.
Finally, it was time for business.
"I'm sorry for making you wait eighteen minutes. A sudden situation has cropped up and it seems that I am needed elsewhere for the next few weeks, so I've cancelled both meetings. I forgot to inform you, sorry again. But It's good things have turned out this way because I needed to summon you urgently for an entirely different matter," he paused before continuing, unsure of how the brunette would react to what was said next.
"It's complex," he said simply.
She outwardly groaned.
Anything but that.
"Luminous Revival keep a record of the power consumption that is used by Alice users, or what we call 'Synthesizers', all throughout the country. Our data has picked up on something quite disturbing. On the 13th August at 13:13PM a large source of power was detected at Alice Academy, and we're definite that it was caused by outsiders. We have our suspicions on what, or rather who, it's all caused by. The issue is that we need someone to investigate it. Normally we'd hand this over to the government so they can do as they please. However, we've kept quiet about this matter, and Luminous Revival doesn't intend to let anyone know of our findings," he said lowering his voice.
Mikan perked an eyebrow up upon hearing this. The information that was just leaked to her was practically a violation of the law! They, by any means, weren't allowed to keep secrets from the very government that had established Luminous Revival.
What was the commander thinking?
She knew it was a big risk, but she also knew her commander wasn't reckless. He obviously had a good reason for doing this.
"I can't explain the reasoning behind our actions just yet but I'll let you know that this ties into your next mission. You'll just have to wait for your file to arrive in 12 hours for further details. I guess that's all," he said.
"I understand," Mikan said and disconnected the call sensing that the conversation had ended.
"I still have so many questions that need answering but I'll wait for tomorrow. I guess I don't need to wait any longer for myHawalon," Mikan said happily before heading out to buy the snack she craved.
Aside from her role as the 'Protector of Order, in Luminous Revival which was also commonly referred to as 'headquarters' by the many that worked there, Mikan Sakura was a normal fifteen-year-old.
Stuffing her mouth with large quantities of food in one sitting, binge-watching TV serials, reading novels, cooking; these were all regular activities done by regular people and Mikan was no exception to this.
Normally when she was exempt from her duties, Mikan usually did one of the things that were listed above.
However, during the idle hours of 8PM, none of these options seemed particularly appealing to the teen. Instead of doing something productive, Mikan forcefully replayed her earlier conversation with the commander over and over again, trying to piece together the fragments of information she had just received.
There were so many scenarios that played in her mind but of course only one of them had to be correct.
"I'll leave it for tomorrow," Mikan decided, after all, that was when her mission officially started.
But somehow fifteen minutes later, curiosity got the best of Mikan. She wanted, no, rather needed to know more information. Her brain craved details and until Mikan retrieved the information she desired, she knew there was no way she'd be able to sleep that night.
If it was any other mission, Mikan would have let her questions take a back seat, but this wasn't just any odd mission. The thing that separated the ordinary mission from this one was the fact that she was given exclusive information prior to the task.
That never happened.
Immediately, Mikan left her bed and looked across the room to find her laptop lying around collecting dust. It surely had been a while since she last used the neglected device. The poor thing was rarely ever used so it was a shock to find out that it still had a bit of life thriving in it.
"Doing a bit of research is a good thing. I'll understand the mission a little better," she said, attempting to assure herself.
After accessing the web, Mikan searched up 'Alice Academy' in the search bar since it was the first keyword that came to mind. After all, it was the place where the power source was detected. Her eyebrows furrowed together when only seven results were shown on her screen. To her distaste, they were all articles. Opinion articles from investors regarding their annually held festival. Nothing more, nothing less.
No contact details, no pictures, no official website, no scandals, no headlines... absolutely nothing!
She narrowed her eyes at the screen.
Secretive, too secretive.
It was definitely suspicious.
"Whatever, I guess I actually have to wait for my file,"
Feeling as though there was nothing more she could possibly do in terms of research, Mikan shut her laptop down and gently pulled her screen down. Soon after that, the familiar feeling of fatigue started to take over her body.
Mikan decided that it was time to prepare for bed.
She proceeded with her sacred nighttime routine, after all was completed, Mikan plopped herself at the corner of her bed. She extended her hand forward to the first drawer of her bedside table and sought out one of the clear containers she kept safe.
Mikan checked the title that was printed on the clear tube and once she was certain it was the one she needed, Mikan took one of its contents out.
She swiftly popped the circular shaped white pill into her mouth, grabbed her water bottle, unscrewed its lid and dunked half of its contents into her mouth. After she had finished, Mikan glanced at her alarm clock from the corner of her eyes.
It was time to sleep.
She crawled into bed.
There was nothing more she could do for the day other than wait for the pill to take its effect. During the next thirty-five minutes that she was awake, Mikan's mind travelled to the endless labyrinth of memories she had unconsciously reserved for her 'late night thoughts' as she liked to call them. Her mind shifted from good memories to bad memories and everything else in between.
But most importantly, there was that one memory, the one she was unable to get rid of. It was impossible to somehow drown it out of her mind or maliciously murder it so Mikan would be at peace.
It looked like it was that exact memory that had decided to greet her tonight.
She inwardly gasped.
"Stay calm. Don't think about it," Mikan said in a strained voice.
When were her sleeping pills going to take effect?
She desperately needed them to do their magic.
Doing whatever she could to force slumber, Mikan resorted to counting sheep, lulling herself to sleep, thinking about funny moments; however, none seemed to aid her with her objective.
'Sleep, sleep, sleep,' she chanted inwardly hoping that her mantra would comply to her commands. But of course, that wasn't going to happen.
Not tonight anyway.
At that moment, an imaginary light bulb vigorously flashed above her head.
"The tape!" she almost yelled out as she willingly left the warmth of her bed to find the said item.
Mikan didn't really keep many materialistic items in her apartment. The primary reason for this was her fear of being robbed whilst she was away on her missions so instead, she chose to place duplicates of her essential items some of which included medicine, clothes, and toiletries.
Simple items as such had no real value, so it lightly relieved Mikan from her constant paranoia.
Sticking her hand under her bed, Mikan felt around until her fingers reached some material that was protected by a cardboard box. She carefully dragged the box forward by its edge and removed the article of material to reveal a cassette tape player and three tapes. All of them had two initials inked on to their white sticky label.
One read 'SS', another read 'HS', and the last 'OS'.
Mikan selected the tape with the initials 'SS', pulled out the cassette tape recorder, set the cover over the box yet again, and pushed it back.
"The things I do to get to sleep" she muttered rather distressed.
Plonking herself back to bed, Mikan pressed down on a button that caused a sequence of melodies to begin. As the minutes passed, Mikan solely concentrated on the sounds emitted from the cassette tape. It allowed her to loosen up her previously tense body, breathe at a normal pace, and, enabled her eyes to respond accordingly to the need for sleep.
The Sleep Subliminal. It was a marvelous thing indeed. Once Mikan had become accustomed to her missions, she found that it had gradually become harder and harder for her to sleep. The many situations she encountered and the things she had to do impacted her well being significantly. So when unnecessary memories invaded her mind when she attempted to sleep the reality away, Mikan had to find a remedy to the poison she had drowned herself in unconsciously.
Going to the extreme, Mikan utilized the 'Removal of Memories Alice' from headquarters, but her Nullification Alice had consistently rejected its effect to her dismay. Seeing Mikan's performance and health deteriorate because of the distress she faced, her commander sought to rid her of her struggle.
He called in for the best Alice users that could assist Mikan. And after many futile trials in the span of three months, one day when returning from a mission, a cassette tape player and a singular tape was delivered to her in the form of a boxed package.
Mikan had no idea as to what had been delivered to her. She was completely unaware of the extreme lengths that were taken by her commander in order to help her reach a point of successful recovery. But once she used the tape out and realised she had slept blissfully for the first time in five months, Mikan found that it was necessary to show her appreciation and she did so by transferring her recent mission reward to her commander.
Cash rewards weren't all too extraordinary considering her commander was one with a higher salary, so instead of giving him what he didn't need, Mikan had retrieved an everlasting 'open me up' flower that acquired the good memories of the user, and displayed them through a montage.
It was a very sentimental gift, but for some reason, the following day the gift was returned to her with a note.
'Although I appreciate your benevolence, I believe that this would rest better in your hands. - EA
Mikan rolled over to her side, smiling at the thought of that day, but as Mikan's mind-numbed down from the tape taking its toll on her, one final unintentional thought glided into her mind.
The mission.
The unauthorised information.
'Alice Academy'
Author's Note: I hope the first installment of 'Surreptitious' was of a satisfactory standard to anyone reading. I'd just like to comment on a few things. 1) Because I write in Standard English (well I hope I have) many of the words I've used will have different variations in regards to spelling. One example seen in the segment is the word 'colour' which is commonly used in the UK. So to clarify, I'm not spelling these sorts of words wrong. 2) I have probably bombarded you with extra information, and I must have gone off topic at some point, but I assure you, everything I've written down is necessary to know! 3) This story will probably use a lot of analepses (flashback) 4) If you've got any questions, feel free to PM me.
10/04/2018: It's been a while since I've written this, so I'd just like to tell anyone reading this that the updates will probably be slow up until the 15th June 2018. I really need to focus on my upcoming exams, but I really wanted to post this, and I simply couldn't wait. Yes, I know it's a stupid move, but I've been waiting to post this for a long time.
31/10/2018: Edited. After reading this chapter again, I understand where Rei was coming from. The use of unnecessary words really made my writing feel stiff. It didn't flow at all. Thank you for bringing it to my attention. Hopefully, I won't have to edit this again, but you never know. :)
Till Next Time :)