Thank you to all those whom reviewed! Special thanks goes out to tullem and AwakenAndAlive whom reviewed on the very first day that this story came out :)

Again I should like to note that

Chapter 2: The Missing Girl

Professor Oliver Davis, thank you very much, was very, very annoyed. Why was he annoyed you ask? Because six months had gone by and yet he was still looking for his idiotic, clumsy assistant! Upon arriving in Japan again a year after his departure, Oliver had sought out his team from SPR immediately. And, in drips and drags, they came back.

Masako had of course, come back immediately. It was very clear that the girl was hoping for a renewed chance at winning his affections now that Mai had been rather obviously been turned down. Oliver took a peculiar type of pleasure in dismissing that hope. She had after all, used her knowledge of his true identity to blackmail him. While he was appreciative of the creative use of cunning to achieve one's own ends, his appreciation to a rather downward turn when the skill was used upon him. The only one he could stand to be manipulated by was his former assistant, whom obviously did not have it in her to manipulate someone for a negative purpose.

The second to return was, most peculiarly, Ayako. Ayako was very privately considered by Oliver to be a hugely important acquisition for his team. While her skills as a miko were often not of any real use, she was rather good at charms and it with the cases Oliver tended to take it was imperiative to have a fully trained doctor, albeit a bossy, hospital princess, on call. Next to come back were John and Yasuhara. John, despite choosing to leave the priesthood, was still a fully trained exorcist and Yasuhara, despite his eccentricities, was one of the best researchers Oliver had ever met. It was through Yasuhara that SPR's resident buddhist monk had been persuaded to return.

Takigawa, or "Monk" as Mai had referred to him had come back reluctantly. Oliver knowing that the man was also a struggling musician had come back to find that Takigawa had opted to continue his training as a monk in a nearby temple. Upon discussing with the monk he found that he had decided to do so a few months after he left, in order to try and take adopt Mai. All was going well until Takigawa's plans had hit a small snag.

Mai was missing.

Her apartment manager had no idea where she had gone, only that she had chosen not to renew the lease on her small, but well kept apartment. Nor did her school know. After she had graduated, Mai had seemingly taken off. It was seemingly impossible to find her. Nor did any of SPR's other former staff seem to know where she was. Masako said only that she had caled her once and Ayako said they had met up for a cup of tea at a shop nearby shortly before she had graduated. Oliver was in a quandry to explain the whereabouts of his former assistant. However Takigawa came back, as with Oliver there, though he still called him "Naru", he seemed to think that there was a chance Mai would find them on her own.

It had been more than a year since then and Oliver was perturbed that Mai had not contacted him. At all. Surely he meant more to her than this? The girl HAD "confessed" to him hadn't she? Never mind that she had obviously confused him with his brother, he thought with a small stab of pain. It was irrelevant in the schema of things. He would have still expected her to have called to say hello. He would have invited her to have a cup of tea at a nearby cafe and he would have persuaded her to come back to her old job. None of that had occurred. And it was killing him.

Three months after Takigawa returned he began to actively look for her. He didn't tell Lin or the others at SPR but he began spreading subtle feelers out, began looking for clues. He had questioned her friends from high school, whom not only disliked him but were actively hostile. He was used to it. After all so were the others. Even Lin seemed hostile to him these days. After finding out the full story from Takigawa and Ayako, many of his workers disliked him and often seemed insubordinate. If he was the head, Mai was the heart of the SPR team, and without her it was dying.

However Mai remained missing.

It had been over a year and Oliver was tasked with a job which he hated doing: hiring a new assistant. He was after all extremely resistant to the idea, but finally he convinced himself that it was necessary to have someone else take over the paperwork in order to have more time to search for Mai. So he went about the process of interviewing applicants.

Most of his applicants he refused within minutes of the interview. He was not interested in becoming their boyfriend, or boytoy in one case of an obviously frustrated older woman. He looked for males to fill the position, but was unfortunately met by the same issue or by disinterest once they realised his personality type. He was on his last interview now, a young woman who was looking for part-time employment.

"come in" he ordered. The girl entered the room, a determined smile on her face. Interestingly the smile seemed to drop a bit as she saw him, then a moment later was present again, even more determination filling her eyes.

Interesting.

He invited her to sit and she did so nervously, though seemingly determined to hide that fact. He looked at her. The girl was rather pretty with a a determined chin and dark eyes, however the effect was somewhat spoiled by her bright purple hair. "good afternoon, miss?" he greeted.

"Toshida" she quickly filled in for him. "good afternoon to you as well".

"we shall see" he replied not yet convinced.

After going through some basic questions about her capabilities, he asked her one last question;

"why is it that you applied for this job miss Toshida?" she looked at him as if she was surprised. "honestly? Because it seems a little bit crazy" she said and immediately looked ashamed of her bad manners. He cocked an eyebrow and she explained further. "I did a little bit of research on you prior to the interview and honestly I would like to write a paper on you all for my thesis" that's right she was doing, he cast a glance back to her resume, an honours thesis in psychology? Even more interesting. A psychologist could be useful to the team and useful in the field, however...

"not that I would do so if you have anything against me doing so of course" ah, that was it. Oliver smiled. "Miss Toshida, thank you for coming in today. When can you start?"

Toshida has been hired! Bwahaha! For those of you who are wondering, Miss Toshida has absolutely nothing to do with myself whatsoever. This is not, by any means, a self insertion. I swear it is not. But miss Toshida is central to the plot of this story I'm afraid. Btw, I do realise that I'm being unclear about the time lapses in this story, however I believe that it would take a reasonable length of time to reassemble the old SPR team. I know that most stories have Naru come back around a month following, however I am of the opinion that it would take a great deal of time before his parents and the British SPR would have let him return to Japan. Also in regards to his use of the name "Oliver", as opposed to "Naru" I believe him to identify with that name a great deal more and the chapter is from his perspective.