Hello loyal readers!
I think with the way my schedule looks this month, I'll be able to continue with the weekly chapter updates! Also, if my muse keeps up, I'm considering after this story is done, to do a series of short one-shot side stories in this AU. There are so many stories to tell (Kyoko's first mission, Yashiro's hacker days, Kyoko bonding with Ren as he's on his mission sick, etc), but sadly none of them fit into this story. Something I'll keep thinking about…
Anyhoo, this week we have Yashiro and Maria's reactions to the promise Sho weaseled out of Kyoko as well as the long-awaited interrogation of Reino!
Hope you all enjoy! Don't forget to add the follow/fave/review at the end if you like what you're reading! It really would mean the world to me. :)
CH13
"Tsuruga-san said that he is heading down from the dojo right now," reported Lory's dark-skinned aide as he bowed at the waist. His black, wavy hair fell gallantly across the patch covering one eye. "He said he would be here in five minutes."
"Good. Very good," mused President Takarada as he stroked his goatee. In his long, burgundy velvet coat and matching tri-corner hat with white feather plume, he seemed quite at odds with the stark, concrete room. Normally he would have been seated in an opulent, red velvet throne befitting a pirate king, but he was too fidgety to sit still.
It was unnerving to the point of the uncanny how well their enemy knew the LME unit. Meanwhile, Lory knew next to nothing about this enigmatic organization. It was a power-differential that would keep any master spy up at night. But here was the first step in the right direction, which is one of the reasons why he decided to keep the assassin, despite the trouble.
Lory hadn't had to deal with something messy like an interrogation in a long time. His eyes narrowed at the cause of his woes, who was currently sitting in the next room, facing a one-way mirror, which allowed Lory to watch him.
With his poisons, the assassin had made himself quite the clever nuisance. Hopefully, his promise to talk to Mogami-san would end all of this messiness.
Although, there was the added complication of whether or not to trust what came out of the man's mouth…
Lory's eyes narrowed further as he watched the self-afflicted poison expert draw a long, skeletal finger along the metal table in front of him, rubbing at the dust that clung to his fingertips. The man pointedly quirked a brow at the one-way mirror. Clearly, the assassin was not under the naïve impression that it was just a mirror.
'What is this man playing at?'
The door to the observation room creaked open, and Lory turned, surprised to see Yashiro and his granddaughter in heated conversation.
"I still say you should have let me rip out some of his hair," Maria huffed at the glasses-wearer. She marched across the room to cling to her grandfather's leg. "It would've made a much lovelier, stronger jinx! Isn't that right, Grandfather?"
Yashiro bowed politely to the President before raising his hands helplessly at his bewildered boss. Maria continued to ramble angrily.
"After all that scum did to Onee-sama, we shouldn't have just let him leave like that," she pouted as Lory knelt down to her level. At 8 years old, going on 9, Maria was no longer at the age where he could just pick her up and whisk her cares away with soothing words and chocolate.
"Now, Maria, what is the matter?"
"That punk, Fuwa Sho!" The loyal young girl burst out, frustrations spilling over into near tears as she described the unfair promise the hotel heir had weaseled out of her precious Onee-sama.
Through years of experience in subterfuge, Lory was able to hide the majority of his growing, thunderous anger. That impudent man had an uncanny tack for worming his way back into his Number One LoveMe girl's life. This was going to set his grand scheme back a few steps.
'But she was just voicing aloud the fears that were inside her anyhow,' Lory mused to himself. 'Those feelings were bound to hold her back, whether they were expressed verbally or not.'
"On the bright side, Maria-chan," Yashiro smiled and said reassuringly, "I doubt that Kyoko-chan will ever have to see Fuwa Sho ever again."
The young girl crossed her arms, digging her chin determinedly into her chest.
"Hmph! I'm still cursing him anyhow."
Somewhat satisfied, President Takarada turned his attention to Yashiro. "So, where is Mogami-kun?"
"Kyoko-chan is waiting outside in the hallway for Ren," said the tech support. "She said something about needing to get focused."
Then Yashiro snapped his fingers, and his eyes lit up. "I completely forgot! President, the main reason why I was coming down here was to give you an update about the Delta server hack."
Both Takaradas' heads snapped up, instantly at attention. The whole LME unit knew about the intelligence breakthrough that came via the Dark Moon virus.
Last year when Ren had first gone to the Fuwa mansion to protect Nanokura Mimori, and came back with Kyoko instead, he had managed to stick a tracker on the assailants before they retreated when the police showed up. The tracker had led the LME unit to Yamashita Sadao's property before going dark.
That was where the Hongo family had made its first appearance, contacting Sadao for accounting purposes. After all, he had a reputation for being willing to handle money that was not entirely ethically obtained.
Despite it being her first mission and very soon after being unwittingly 'drafted' into the LME unit, Kyoko had demonstrated a remarkable talent for espionage work. Afterward, Lory had offered her a permanent position. Bent on unearthing some unsavory tidbit of info on Fuwa Sho, Kyoko had accepted.
"So Ren was able to sneak away to stick the 'rubber ducky' USB into Yamashita's computer, which downloaded the Dark Moon virus," summarized Yashiro as he pushed up on the bridge of his glasses, "allowing me to set up multiple points of entry into the computer and internet connection."
Yashiro took a pause and the Takarada duo leaned forward, anticipating. But the tech support continued, oblivious. "Which is much easier than it looks. Setting up an MITM program to intercept outgoing data, then using that information to breech the connected servers was almost a walk in the park. But Delta must have some pretty good people on their tech squad, because dodging security undetected has been getting harder and harder–"
"Yashiro-san," Maria tried not to groan. "While we're young…"
"Ah. Sorry. I get carried away sometimes."
"White Hat," barked Lory, using the tech support's old hacktivist moniker. This caught the man's attention.
Yashiro cleared his throat. "Right. So we've only been able to get the stray, less-encrypted messages sent out via Delta's servers, until now. Hence, guarding Representative Takemura's son, and Ren's Yokohama missions. We aren't at full penetration quite yet; but we are now getting through the tougher encryptions. Apparently, this guy –" Yashiro jerked his thumb at the glass, pointing to the man on the other side "—is the real deal. His tag is 'Rho.'"
"Like the Greek letter?"
"It would seem from their communications that all their operatives take code names from the Greek alphabet. The operative captured on the second kidnapping attempt on Nanokura-san – the one who almost blew up Kijima-san and Momose-san – was named 'Upsilon.'"
The President paused, pensive. "We still have no confirmation on what their goal is?"
Yashiro merely shook his head.
"Not yet, at least," Maria said confidently, small fists cocked on hips.
At that moment, Lory's aide opened the door again, bowed crisply, and stated, "Tsuruga-san is here. I've given him the earpieces."
Nodding curtly, the President turned to face the window. "Yashiro-san, Maria-chan, if you'd please."
Maria knew better than to argue, even though everyone could tell she wanted to stay for her Onee-sama. However, no one knew how this interrogation was going to be conducted. It was an unprecedented event. So both Maria let Yukihito lead her by the hand, and the two left, shutting the door quietly behind them.
Now alone with his assistant, Lory murmured thoughtfully to himself. "Their goal is uncertain, but… I have some ideas. Time to weed out a few."
He called out to his aide, "Send in Ren and Mogami-kun."
-x-
Kyoko raised her hand and slapped Reino soundly across the face. The pale, silver-haired man fell back, stunned. Agent T leaned against the door, completely nonchalant.
"And THAT'S what you get for drugging me, you stupid Beagle!" Kyoko crowed, victorious as Reino whimpered on the floor. "Now answer the question! Or else…"
"Mogami-san…"
Reino scrambled to his knees, pleading. "B-b-but I don't even know what Delta is! Please–!"
"Mogami-san…?"
Grinning fiercely, Kyoko raised her hand again. This time it held a small blue rock. "Wrong answer, Beagle! I warned you—!"
"MOGAMI-SAN!"
Startled from her daydream, Kyoko blinked rapidly. "What?"
A tall man stared down at her, a bemused smile on his face. The stark hallway lights backlit his head, giving the illusion of a golden halo of hair.
"Corn?"
Then the illusion was gone. The fairy prince took a quick step back, and the light shifted, revealing the shocked face of Kyoko's dark-haired senpai. He was wearing a soft navy blue button up shirt tucked into dark slacks. His hair held a wet sheen, which indicated that he had just recently showered and hadn't had time to properly dry his hair.
'Probably just got back from the dojo,' Kyoko noted from a far corner of her mind. Unbidden, her stomach performed a small flip-flop.
"C…Corn?" Ren repeated hesitantly with a growing, glittery smile. His polite, gentleman's mask was out full-force. "Mogami-san, do you mean to say that I look like your rock?"
Kyoko blinked before an embarrassed flush swept over her face. Wanting to quickly appease the man, she held her hands up and gesticulated wildly. "Tsuruga-san, I certainly did not mistake you for a rock. There was a boy I once knew who was named Corn. My rock is named after him. And I was thinking about the rock, and then you showed up…!"
She stopped waving her hands as Ren's smile traveled to his eyes, and he hid a chuckle. Kyoko felt relieved, but also wary. She never could tell what caused all of this man's vast mood swings…
"Please don't be worried, Mogami-san. I understand," Ren said with a small wave of his hand and a warm smile.
Thoroughly reassured, Kyoko smiled back, a warmth filling her with… relief, surely. Definitely relief… because her senpai wasn't angry with her.
"Are you ready?" Agent T asked, and offered her an earpiece while screwing his own into one ear. The earpiece was a small, flesh-colored piece of opaque plastic with electronics embedded. Though similar to her comm-link, the earpiece was smaller and probably had fewer features, most likely only good for short-range communication. Kyoko knew that the President would be in the next room to give question prompts and orders if necessary.
"You've never conducted an interrogation before, right?"
The auburn-haired woman stuck the piece into her ear, ensuring it was firmly fixed by giving her head a slight shake. "No. Have you?"
She glanced up when Ren took a heartbeat too long to answer. Kyoko was just in time to see him clear a frown from his face.
Her senpai looked down at her and quirked a very even, calculated smile. "Well… Let's just see how it goes."
Ren, Kyoko noted thoughtfully as her senpai reached for the doorknob, never answered her question.
-x-
No matter how much Kyoko had mentally prepared, nothing went quite as she had anticipated.
Ren opened the creaky door to the disused room, and Agent M took in the spartan décor – one brushed aluminum table with matching metallic chairs sat across from a wide, room-length one-way mirror. Kyoko couldn't see them, but she knew the room was mic'ed, so the President could hear from the other room. As soon as the two agents entered, the man occupying the chair facing the mirror spoke.
"So, you came after all, Kyoko?" the silver-haired assassin said. His monotone fell awkwardly flat on the concrete walls of the interrogation chamber. The man was lounging as best he could in handcuffs, shackles, and the small metal chair. "Oh, and you brought a friend. How quaint."
At his first sentence, Kyoko bristled, too unnerved to take the seat across from him. "How do you know–?"
"Your name?" Reino finished, a self-satisfied smirk on his face. "The moment I touched you at the Prime Minister's party, I knew all about you."
"Creepy demon-spawn from Hell!" Instantly on guard, Kyoko retorted, "You had better behave–!"
Ren loudly cleared his throat, catching his partner's attention. She shrunk back, annoyed that she had risen to the assassin's bait.
"I believe we have a time limit before you expire, Reino." Ren stated as he strode toward the table and sank gracefully into one of the chairs across from the silver-haired man. "So if you want to live, let's cut to the chase. What is Delta?"
While Reino made a big show of glaring at Ren, Kyoko followed her senpai's lead and also sat down at the table.
"I'm not afraid of dying," drawled Reino in a bored tone, examining his pointed fingernails. "I think I'd rather enjoy it. So you can stuff your empty threats."
They were going to get nowhere. Even a newbie like Kyoko could tell the man's attitude was anything but helpful.
"Why did you want to speak to me, then?" she asked, suspicious. "If you don't intend to tell us anything of use, what's the point?"
The thin smile on Reino's lips widened by a fraction. "Why, of course, to see how you were faring, dear Kyoko. I haven't been able to forget your deliciously dark aura since our last meeting."
He reached a long-fingered hand out to catch a wisp of her auburn hair. Kyoko jerked back in her seat as the fear on her face swiftly turned to anger.
"That's it! I warned you to behave, Beagle!" A malicious, Mio-like smirk formed on Kyoko's lips, as she pulled her secret weapon from her pocket, thrusting it in the assassin's face. "Hah! Behold! The ultimate destroyer of evil – and despair!"
"What is this?" Reino plucked the blue stone from Kyoko's hand. "It's just a rock…"
While Kyoko sat, eye still twitching at the swift failure of her ultimate weapon, Reino froze. His gasp wrenched Kyoko from her paralysis of disbelief as she and Ren watched the assassin's eyes lose focus. Slowly, trembling, the silver-haired man looked down at the palm of his hand in horror.
Clatter.
"Hey!" Kyoko yelped indignantly as she leapt forward in her seat to reclaim her treasure off the metal table. "Don't drop it!"
"No!" Reino performed a small dance of anxiety, reaching forward to snatch the rock back, but he hastily changed his mind and retreated, clearly unwilling to touch it again. "You need to throw that away!"
"What? No!" Kyoko snapped, continuing to check Corn for cracks. "It was given to me by a fairy prince!"
"A fairy-? More like a devil! That rock is basically a curse. Its former owner has imbued it with so much sorrow and hatred. You could almost say that the former owner himself was cursed! Cursed to be trapped as a helpless, useless shadow. A walking embodiment of misfortune for all whom he loved–"
A flesh-colored blur cut swiftly through the air. Kyoko jolted back on instinct as Ren's hand shot forward.
The normally composed agent fisted the front of Reino's crumpled dress shirt so tightly that the collar of the shirt gathered together to choke the assassin. Kyoko watched in alarm as Ren's knuckles whitened along with Reino's already pale face.
"T-T-san!" She yelped in a panic.
"Enough." Ren's voice was hard, laced with anger. His eyes narrowed. Fueling Kyoko's growing fright, she noticed that he didn't bother to hide his emotions. Was this an act?
'This man… Who is he now?'
The earpiece crackled to life in Kyoko's ear.
"Ren!" The President shouted, "What the hell are you doing?"
At this reprimanding, Ren blinked in realization, his grip slackening. Kyoko worriedly glanced at her senpai's face. This wasn't an act.
On his half, the assassin was struggling to bring his manacled hand up to tug away the agent's grip. However, once Reino touched Ren's skin, the assassin's eyes went wide, and he froze, paralyzed. Then he jerked his hand back, as if burned by a red-hot poker, and let out a panicked yelp. He looked wildly between the two agents.
"But you! You're—!"
"Reino-san. I think we have gotten very far off topic…" Ren interrupted, the calm in his voice growing with each word. However, instinctively, Kyoko leaned away. While a normal person might have considered Ren's sparkling façade polite and self-possessed, she could sense a tense, almost aggressive undertone to his voice and body language, even as he relaxed his hold.
"What is Delta?"
Reino winced away from Ren. "Fine! Fine. I can handle the cold embrace of Death, but I have no wish to be mauled and dismembered by a Lion!"
"Ren," barked the President via earpiece. "Let him go. This is not how the LME unit conducts its business. Mogami-kun will take over for now."
Ignoring Kyoko's confusion and concern, Ren avoided her eyes as he let go of Reino's shirtfront. Although Agent T attempted to hide it, Kyoko's sharp eyes noted that her partner's hand was trembling slightly. He stood from the chair and retreated to a back corner of the room.
With one last worried glance at her senpai, Kyoko switched seats to directly face Reino. The man was gingerly rubbing his chaffed neck.
Kyoko cleared her throat. "Reino-san, please answer Agent T's question. What is Delta?"
"Mu is going to kill me," Reino muttered, shooting Ren a disgruntled glower. He paused a moment as he hung his head, thinking.
Kyoko was just about to prompt him again when he spoke.
"Delta is not so much a 'what' as a 'who.' The leader. No one really knows who he is – just a handful of stories. Most of us were just going about our daily lives when we got an invitation to join him."
"'We?'"
Reino shrugged, gradually regaining his disinterested affect. "Just your average rag-tag band of mercenaries, smugglers, assassins, hackers – the usual. Maybe 30 or maybe 300. We hardly ever get to meet or team up with the others. I have no idea how many other people he has."
At a prompt from the President, Kyoko asked, "What does he want?"
Reino paused, thinking. "Why do you think the boss's tag is 'delta'? It's not alpha or even beta. The symbol for delta–" He traced a triangle on the metal table in front of him. "—is often used in chemistry for 'change'. And that's what he wants."
"Change…" mused Kyoko.
"If you haven't noticed yet, my dear Kyoko, this world is rotten," Reino intoned flippantly with a small wave of his hand. "The evil prosper and the good, innocent people get trampled underfoot."
The image of an infuriating blonde man flashed through Kyoko's mind. She grit her teeth.
"You're not exactly an angel yourself, Vie Ghoul," Agent T called from across the room as he leaned against the wall, arms crossed.
Reino held his hands up, in mock defense. "I never said I was on board with the boss's philosophy."
"Then why are you helping him?"
"It was something to do," the assassin said simply with a careless wave of his hand. "And because drenching the world even deeper into blackness appeals to me."
Agent M's eyes narrowed. "You're sick."
"Oh? Am I really more evil than that little snot who bought drugs from me so he could incapacitate and take advantage of a female classmate?"
"Takemura Ryuji," Kyoko noted grimly. "So you were the one selling him drugs out of that love hotel."
"He recognized me at the party while I was on another assignment," Reino said with another gesture of innocence. "What was I supposed to do?"
"Why did you do it?"
"Which? Tranq the brat or sell him drugs?"
Kyoko's mouth was set in a grim line. "Let's start with the drugs."
"Drug dealing's not usually my style. I'd much rather prefer–" the assassin slowly slid his thumb across his throat, eyes glinting.
Kyoko felt herself unconsciously swallow hard.
"But I have my reasons." Reino smiled a small, cruel smile. "Because the little shit was asking for it. And because his father has been pocketing campaign funds on the side for years. And because I do what I'm told."
"So it's vigilante justice," Ren pointed out as he walked back to the table. He hovered behind Kyoko's shoulder, arms folded over his chest. "That's not going to get Delta very far. What is he really after? What kind of 'change' is he looking for?"
Reino tipped his head to the side and stared blankly at the two – a pale imitation of innocence. "Does a puzzle piece know whether it depicts a rose or a grave?"
'Lions, puzzles, roses, graves – this Beagle guy is weird,' Kyoko thought to herself. 'And what twisted logic! Punishing wrong-doers by enabling them to further their misdeeds? How does that change anything?'
In her earpiece, the President was saying something.
Following his orders, Kyoko leaned forward and said authoritatively, "But you can tell us about your puzzle piece. Who was your next contact supposed to be?"
Up until this point, Reino had been surprisingly open with the LME agents. However, now he hesitated. Kyoko could sense his mind performing mental gymnastics, calculating risk and reward. The assassin glanced up at Ren.
Her senpai glared with uncharacteristically open hostility.
"Who's the next contact, Reino." This time, from Ren, it was not a question.
The enemy assassin paused for another moment, weighing his options. Just when Kyoko was certain that the man would not relinquish his secret, Reino sighed and muttered, "His name is Yamashita Sadao."
-x-
- A Rubber Ducky USB is a modified USB stick that a computer reads like a keyboard, which can be pre-programmed with certain commands to install malware, etc on people's computers. This is a terrible explanation, but a better layman's explanation can be found on the Game Theorist's YouTube channel. I think it was one of their Watch_Dogs episodes. Pretty interesting stuff!
- "White hat" is the slang term for an ethical computer hacker, usually used by companies to test the protection of websites and such from malicious hackers. Backstory for Yashiro: he wasn't quite a White Hat – he was more of a Gray Hat (using hacking abilities to find flaws in tech that can be sold to governments/interested parties, presumably for the public's greater good – ex: the San Bernardino terrorist's iPhone hacker).
- Also, I'm surprised that no one has noted yet the irony of Yashiro being a computers and technology expert. Lol
- As for Reino's backstory, he was at the PM's birthday gala gathering support for Delta when Ryuji recognized him. Delta is having Reino do fewer assassinations and more miscellaneous work, but that's just because Delta needs certain people alive… Again, the story was too crowded to fit that in, but hopefully that answers some questions!
-x-
MAILBAG
cleocat333 – THANK YOU SO MUCH! I think I read your review like three times, because I was so encouraged by it. It's such an honor as an author to hear such glowing praise from a reader. As for the title, I've been wondering if I should change it. I initially stuck with "Spy Beat" on a whim, and never bothered to think up a better title. Haha I'll probably think about it some more! Thank you again!
Shizuhoe – Hopefully you like the fluff chapters to come, then! It's so interesting to hear you say that you didn't like the Heel arc as much, because I typically hear the opposite! What about the arc turned you off? As for Delta, fufufu~! Not bad guesses! Ohhh, I'd have to be super evil (and a super masochist) to make Yashiro the secret bad guy. As for Ren's thoughts about Rick, all will be revealed in time! Thanks again for the review!
MWEH – I agree with you! I think the story line of Erika's "accident" still has yet to be cleared up, so the Momiji audition is bound to get more intense from now on. Also, Kanae has to show off her Chidori! I have to say that aside from the Ren and Kyoko scenes, my favorite parts of Skip Beat are where Kyoko is finding and polishing her characters. As for Delta, fufufu~! Not bad guesses! That'd be an awesome twist if it was actually Rick! Thanks as always for your review!
SilverInu93 – Hehehe, hopefully your question about Reino was answered! As for Saena, we shall see~! She's definitely not going to get off scott free, so don't worry. Thanks for the review! It's much appreciated!
JeremyVD – That's a good point! Maybe that's what Nakamura-sensei has up her sleeve to get Kyoko out of that promise to Sho. It also seems like the two are working more toward a friendly rivalry, instead of one based on hatred. But totes agree with you, that Sho has pushed Kyoko too far away for her to consider him romantically anymore. As for Saena, we shall see~! Maybe she has a good reason – or… at least a real reason – why she's doing what she's doing! Thanks as always for your review!
Guest – Thank you! Hope you liked the "more" ;)