Chapter One
Chapter One
"You know hon, it would be a shame to have to turn such a sweet girl like you out to the streets. You haven't managed to scare up a rent check yet, have you Asuka?" Akira Itoh said, annoyance just barely simmering under a controlled smile. Normally the spirited young woman was a favorite tenant of his; she had a burning determination to prove to everyone she encountered that despite being a young woman living alone in a large metropolis she was perfectly fine taking care of herself, thank you very much, and was therefore normally very reliable with her rent and even went above and beyond, helping her landlord do repairs for the shoddy apartment building. Itoh was getting on in years and needed all the help he could get.
"Oh Itoh-san, you wound me! You'd never turn me out on the street just for having a little bad luck, would you?"
"Bad luck dear?"
"Work is slow! As soon as I get my next job I'll give you your rent and a big far bundle of interest if you'd like-"
"Asuka, Asuka please, I'm an old man with bills of my own to pay. I can't do so on promises." Itoh mumbled.
"But you know I'm good for it!"
"I'm sorry." And he truly did look it. "But I have a potential tenant interested in an apartment who can pay me cash. If you don't have your rent by the end of the week then I'm going to have to rent to the young man."
Asuka's pretty face twisted into a sneer. "Of course! Give the apartment to the MAN, never mind the fact that I'm already living there and have been a model tenant for three years! I see how it is in this world, but I thought you'd be different Itoh-san!"
"Asuka please wait-"
But the angry woman stormed upstairs, ignoring her landlord's pleas. His only answer was to hear her apartment door slam.
Asuka threw herself on her bed, hands over her face. She already regretted yelling at Itoh. He was one of the few people who treated her well as a person, although she did tend to get short with him when he constantly suggested she find a nice young man to take care of her. No one seemed to understand she was fine with taking care of herself.
"Okay Asuka, enough self pitying. You have a problem and you need to solve it." She told herself. She sat up and started pacing the room.
What she'd told Itoh wasn't entirely true. There were jobs out there; the problem was most people weren't interested in hiring her as a private detective. She had an excellent case record, and a handful of very impressed repeat customers. But lately she got jobs through word of mouth recommendation or her regulars, and her regulars just didn't need any help.
Just the other day she'd gone to see one of her old clients, Ryouta Akinari. She wasn't proud of herself for seeking him out, it just felt like taking advantage of the poor man. He was a single middle aged man with a teenage son and he was particularly paranoid. He hired Asuka out for snoop jobs at least once a month, typically every time he was considering going out with a woman or every time he suspected his son of having a secret girlfriend. She tailed the poor, socially awkward and somewhat neurotic teen boy more often than she did laundry.
Ryouta did need the services of a private investigator, but for what he wouldn't say, he'd just insisted that Asuka wasn't right for this particular job. Annoyed, she decided to go see him and find out why.
"But you still haven't given me a reason Ryo!" Asuka insisted.
"It's just...just you're not right for it-"
"Well why the hell not?!" Asuka yelled. "You hire me all the time, you know I'm good!"
"I know Asuka, but there are some things you just...there are some things women just can't do..." Ryouta trailed off, realizing he'd said entirely the wrong thing. However instead of exploding Asuka went to the other extreme and had become eerily calm.
"Alright Ryouta darling, why don't you explain what it is a little helpless girl like me can't do that a big strong ma-a-a-an would be better at? Because you're a man and you're the one who hires me you stupid misogynistic son of a bitch!" Her voice had risen to screeching level.
"Wait a minute Asuka, it's not like that! Come on, you know me as well as I know you-I've never thought anything like that!" Ryouta insisted, on the verge of a panic.
"Well what is it then?" She asked, her tone still sharp.
"It's...it's Natsuhiko." Ryouta murmured, referring to his son. "He's in trouble."
"Trouble?" Asuka's expression finally softened. Ryouta sat down heavily on his sofa and Asuka joined him, perched on the arm of the couch. "What kind of trouble?"
"I don't know exactly...he started seeing these new kids, and I was so excited for him, to be invited to parties and having friends...you were busy with some other case so I hired Ubara-san to check them out instead-"
"Oh Ryo, Ryo, you know what a shoddy con-man Ubara is!" Asuka shook her head sadly.
"Well I know now! He charged double your rate and failed to discover Natsuhiko's friends are from a cult!" Ryouta exclaimed.
"A cult?"
"Yes, and they've brainwashed him. He won't come home. He tells me his name is Satomi now and that the Clan-Father is his only family now. I've lost my son and the only way to bring him back is to have someone go in and get him, but, but he needs to be deprogrammed before leaving. Otherwise he'll just go back. I already hired Hiroyuki Akino to try-"
"Oh holy shit Ryouta, have you been calling every bargain basement PI special?"
"You're not hearing me Asuka! This cult is for teenage boys. They'd never let you inside. There's nothing you can do." Ryouta lamented. "And I'm finding out the hard way that none of the male private detectives in Tokyo are even half as competent as you. I'm spending a fortune, but I'd pay three fortunes to get Natsuhiko back."
'Three fortunes, eh?'
"Don't worry Ryouta, this is your lucky day!" Asuka said brightly. "If all you're worried about is a silly thing like gender, why, why I've just started working with a partner."
"You have?" Ryouta looked suspicious. Asuka nodded brightly for his benefit.
"Sure! A kid even, can't be more than seventeen years old. He's smart as a whip too!" She was a good enough actress not to squirm at that corny bit of phrasing. She made a mental note not to fall asleep with the Simpsons on again if it continued to make her talk like Grandpa Simpson. "So if you hire us you'll be getting his teenage-boy-ness, which will be perfect for infiltrating this cult, and my dependability and expertise!"
"Well...well okay. But I want to meet this new partner of yours myself. I need to ascertain whether he's worthy of my trust." Ryouta said slowly.
"Sure! Of course!" Asuka had a wide, pretty smile fixed on her face. "How about Friday?"
"Asuke my son is imprisoned in a cult! How about tomorrow over lunch?" Ryouta shot back. She'd never seen the nervous man so edgy before. Then again he'd never hired her for anything more serious than a snoop job before either.
"Lunch, lunch will be good! Yes-yes, tomorrow at lunch. I'll see you then Ryouta, and don't worry about Natsuhiko. We'll have him back before you know it, that's how good this kid is!"
"What's your partner's name Asuka?" Ryouta called after the briskly departing detective. She pretended not to hear him as she showed herself out of his home.
"Shit-shit-shit!" Asuka hissed as she banged her head against her steering wheel. "What the hell did you go and say that for you stupid bitch?" Her freak out only lasted half a minute, not being one to wallow in her problems, she started her car and drove to the nearest high school to look for a partner. She found herself parked on the curb a little ways up the street from Natsuhiko's school. Thanks to Ryouta's paranoid nature she was already quite familiar with the building and therefore it seemed as good a place as any to stalk a teenaged boy.
Her eyes roamed over the crowd of teens milling around the building. School had likely just been let out; some were rushing away or getting into cars, but the majority were lingering and chatting with each other. It was a nice day out, the kind you didn't want to rush through.
Asuka rolled down her window and put her sunglasses on. She had her hands behind her head so that it would look like she was catnapping if anyone cared to glance into her car. Some of the school kids' conversations reached her. Apparently there was a dance that weekend and many of the kids were attempting to make matches and find dates.
Asuka found her eyes drawn to a lanky boy who was at least a head taller than everyone around him. What kept her eyes there was his hair; unlike his peers this boy's yellow hair was natural. He was talking to a pretty little thing whose waist length hair was bleached an unhealthy shade of white blond. Her friend, with equally horribly bleached pigtails, was giggling harder and harder the more the boy spoke. Asuka couldn't hear a word of their conversation; the boy kept his voice low and the girls were twittering incomprehensibly like idiots. However when a second boy approached them he was speaking loud and clear.
"Don't tell me you're considering going out with the frog Megumi!"
"It's none of your business if she is Otoya!" The girl's friend screeched. Apparently when angered the schoolgirls suddenly learned how to speak Japanese properly and project their timid little voices. Asuka snorted.
"No one cares what an ugly little cling-on like you thinks Tomomi. I was talking to Megumi." The newer boy, Otoya, snapped. He came up to the blond boy's chin and looked about ten or twenty pounds heavier, but with muscle tone as opposed to fat. Asuka's money was on Otoya in a fight, not the pretty boy.
"And I'm sure insulting her best friend is sure to impress Megumi-chan greatly." The pretty boy spoke up. "She certainly looks enamored with you now, perhaps next you should offer to kick her cat."
Otoya's mean little eyes fixed on the lanky youth. "No one's talking to you you disgusting half-breed, so keep your stupid mouth shut! Frog-boy!"
The teen laughed. "Otoya-san your wit cuts right to my heart!"
Asuka had to fight down the urge to warn the kid against provoking the more physically intimidating and short tempered teen, but was too intrigued to actually do anything. Maybe it was simply overconfidence, but the boy's cocky grin implied he had the situation well in hand. Asuka was convinced he couldn't possibly win in a fight and just as convinced Otoya wouldn't let the battle over Megumi remain a battle of wits, as he was going to lose the latter.
"Knock it off both of you! Who says I want to go to the dance with either of you dunces?" Megumi spoke up angrily.
Asuka didn't even attempt to suppress a grin at Megumi's sudden assertiveness. Maybe the little ditz wasn't a total loss after all.
"Now Megumi-chan, it's not very ladylike to go back on your word."
"Yohji Kudoh you self centered baka! I didn't say I was going with you!" Megumi screeched.
"You were plenty interested before Otoya called him a frog." Tomomi cut in. "And Otoya is twice the baka Kudoh is."
"No one's talking to you gnome girl! This is between me and Megumi. Come on, you gotta wanna go to the dance with a stud like me. It only makes sense, we're the best looking couple in the school. Everyone expects us to hook up." Otoya said with a self-satisfied grin.
Megumi snorted. "No one expects us to go out Otoya. And even before considering a date with you I'd have to teach you how to do your hair, which is more work than I'm interested in doing. Yohji at least can groom himself properly."
Ah. It wasn't feminism, she was just pitting them against each other. Oh well. Tomomi seemed to have a better head on her shoulders at least...'except you're not looking for a teenage female partner, you're looking for a male. Tomomi and Megumi don't matter, focus on the boys.' she reminded herself.
"So you're seriously considering dating a half-gaijin from who knows where over me, the heir to a successful shipping company? Over a half-breed? Come on Megumi-chan, I thought you had a brain in your head to go with that pretty face." Otoya said with a smirk.
Megumi glanced at the other boy, Yohji. "Well? What do you have to say to that?"
"There's nothing to say, everything Otoya-san said is true. It's so unfortunate that I cannot hide my French heritage as easily as he can hide being a Barakumin."
"What?"
That revelation had shaken things up. Asuka was impressed. Megumi and Tomomi had actually taken a compulsive step away from the other teen.
"I'm not a Barakumin! Take that back you froggy son of a bitch!" Otoya seethed.
"How could he be? They'd never let a Barakumin become head of a company. They're not smart enough to handle the pressure." Megumi commented.
"Well his father isn't a Barakumin, just his mother. Which is why they got a divorce. Otoya's father suspected something and hired a snoop detective to find out for sure-"
"You're lying!" Otoya growled.
"I am not. My father knows the detective. Like I said, you're really lucky you can hide it so easily. No one would ever know by looking at you that you're less than 100." Yohji said with mock-jealousy.
Otoya rushed forwards and grabbed Yohji roughly by the shirt collar. Both of the girls shrieked loudly, attracting the attention of other students who gathered around to watch the fight. They crowded in so quickly Asuka's view was blocked and she had to count on the comments of the teens to tell what was happening.
"Megumi-chan do something, your boyfriends are going to kill each other!"
"Those two freaks are NOT my boyfriends! Tomomi, do something!"
"Take it back you fucking frog!" Otoya's voice rang out over the crowd.
"I can't help what my father overheard." Yohji's answer was confident; Otoya however sounded like he'd been punched in the mouth.
"Fine! I'll let you live, but simply because it's beneath me to spend so much time with a disgusting gaijin!" Otoya's yell signaled the end of the fight, and as the crowd dispersed Asuka caught a glimpse of Yohji calmly straightening his shirt collar. From the looks of it Otoya hadn't landed a single hit. The Barakumin himself, however, was sporting a split lip.
Asuka was impressed. She made the decision then and there to tail this Kudoh kid home.
Author's Notes: The barakumin are a minority group in Japan, a perceived race that receives negative prejudicial treatment. The author does not in any shape way or form endorse a negative perception of the barakumin, just threw in the negative stereotypes out of interest.
