Logan straightened up suddenly, giving Rei a sharp nudge as she did so. Rei felt her stomach drop when she realized that this was one of those faces she'd had them memorize on the way here: Chief Susumu Matsuzaki. "Sorry, sir," Logan said in a professional tone, giving the officer an apologetic bow.
He grunted in reply, remaining where he stood. The chief stared at her hard, his brow creasing more and more as he did so. The three girls covertly exchanged worried glances. Finally, the older man sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. "Sorry for the stared own, officer. That damn Ryuu's got my head spinning so much, I thought you were someone else."
"That's alright, Chief." She gave a small, understanding laugh as the three of them felt a collective wave of relief wash over them.
He chuckled, stepping past them. "Right. You just look a bit like a U.A. brat I interviewed, is all."
"Oh, do I?" Logan asked, feigning curiosity as Rei and Izumi inched towards the elevator.
"Yeah," Matsuzaki grunted. "Only a bit, though. Different hair and you've got that birthmark there." He lazily pointed towards her cheek, where the smudge of black eyeliner was still visible. Chuckling to himself, he turned to start down the hallway. "I'm just seeing things."
The three girls hurriedly filed into the elevator and pressed the button for the fourth floor. "Whew," Rei let out the breath she'd been holding since Matsuzaki appeared. "That was too close for comfort. We really should just turn back guys. Our luck is going to end up running out."
"Oh come on. We are in the elevator already," Logan pointed out, casually leaning against the railing on the wall. "We are basically over halfway there. All we need to do is get to the holding area and not run into anyone else. We will be fine babes. Besides, what's the worst that could happen?"
"You and I both know that if Etsuko was here she would be screaming 'foreshadowing'. Nobody says 'what's the worst that could happen?' and has everything turn out fine." Izumi stood close to the elevator doors, using them as a mirror to look more closely at her makeover. "By the way, Since the chief nearly recognized you, I'm gonna be the one asking questions. So text me what you want asked as we walk. I assume you were going to but it would be too unsafe if he describes you to any of the other officers."
"That's a smart point. I've only got three questions so let me send them over real fast." Logan stood up straight as the elevator started to slow. "There we go. Now let's get our game faces on ladies."
The doors slid open and they stepped out into the hall, trying to look natural as they peaked down either side of it. "Two rights, then a left," Rei reminded them quietly. The other two nodded, and they all started walking as one. This floor was a lot quieter than the ground floor, though there were still plenty of officers scrambling around. Besides a few disinterested waves they received as they passed, none of the officers acknowledged them.
"This station definitely isn't big enough for two whole departments working together," Izumi said as they turned their first corner.
"Oh, don't I know it!" A man in the hall chimed in. "Things have been quite hectic here with all of the officers from you department joining us but we sure are glad to have the help. Teamwork provides a solid foundation for success you know!" He flashed a friendly smile, looking at the three of them and stepping forward to give a small, polite bow. " I've been trying to learn the names of all our new colleagues from Quirk Crimes, but I guess you all have managed to slip through the cracks. My name is Ryuu, and you are?"
"Oh um. I'm Detective Johnson. This is Detective Tobe and Detective Tengan," Logan said, gesturing to each of her friends. They all stiffly returned his bow of introduction. "We actually aren't from Quirk Crimes. We are from a more specialized task force, I'm afraid I can't give you too many details, but we just need to speak to someone in holding. If you would excuse us, we don't have much time."
Ryuu nodded enthusiastically. "Oh, of course, I understand! Before you go though, let me just say how wonderful it is to have you working for this institution. We have quite the tendency to lack diversity, so having a foreigner and more women working for this sort of institution is invaluable. The different viewpoints we can all bring to the table are surely an asset to the Japanese police force as a whole."
"Yes, uh, thank you," Logan stammered, smiling politely. "We do need to get moving though, have to grab some information and get back before the end of our shift." She took a step forward, trying to slip past him.
"Well, I most certainly wouldn't want to keep you waiting," he replied, stepping to the side of the hallway to let them through. "You know keeping up with your mental health does require keeping your working hours managed and getting enough free time. Definitely don't want to end up working yourself to the extremes and getting a lack of rest because of it. Always strive for those seven hours."
The three girls quickly took advantage of the space, filing past him. "Yep," Logan said as they passed.
"Oh, also one last thing before you go, I've been trying to get a few more coworkers involved to help spread the word, but not many people are willing," He called after them. They paused, looking back at the man. I'm really trying to get our city involved with a one hour a day blackout to help curb carbon emissions. Basically, it would just require everyone to turn off all unnecessary lighting for an hour. If even half of the city gets involved, we could save massive amounts of energy and that one hour would greatly affect our cities overall carbon budget."
"Yeah, we will be sure to tell everyone we know," Izumi assured him.
Ryuu beamed. "Thank you so much!"
"... No problem…" Izumi muttered in reply, making the next right turn as quickly as she could. The confrontation with Ryuu had taken more time than they wanted to spend here, but otherwise, things were still going well. Besides the scare with Chief Matsuzaki, there'd been no sign of anyone suspecting them. Finally, they made the last left turn they needed to get to the holding area.
"Cam feed loop is online. Try to get this done within five minutes," Logan said, casually pushing Izumi towards the holding cells. "They shouldn't notice the feedback loop before that, but the faster the better."
"Hey Logan, have you considered just making a career in cybercrime?" Izumi asked.
Logan gave her another push. "No time for banter. Get in there."
"Okay, I've got this," Izumi said, straightening her tie. "I'm feeling confident as shit. Just watch me." She marched towards the holding cell, scanning her ID to get the door open. The man in the cell glared at her as she entered. "Mr. Kawamura, let's have a chat shall we?"
Confusion flashed over Kawamura's face. "Aren't you going to take me to an interrogation area?"
"No need. I'm here to make things fast," Izumi said, standing in front of him with her shoulders squared. "You are in quite a bit of trouble and I have the authority to get you out. My department's a little bit higher up than the local division and we have reason to believe you might have some valuable information. You tell me what I want to know. I get my people to drop the charges you face."
"Wait, but aren't you a bit young to be in such a high rank position?" He said quickly. He looked around for some sort of confirmation from another officer, but Izumi was the only one there. "How would someone like you have that sort of authority?"
Izumi shot him a glare. "I am young, but I'm also highly qualified. Let's just say I'm really good at my job and I always get my jobs done." She cleared her throat, pausing to let him consider the situation. "Now I've got some questions and you are going to answer, I don't have any more time to waste on useless introductions. What happened to your hand?"
"I got into an accident and I lost two of my fingers," he said flatly.
"I can see that. How did you lose them?"
The man crossed his arms. "It was an accident though my work."
"Oh really?" She asked, raising a brow. "Then why was there no reports filed from any of your previous jobs?"
Kawamura paused before he answered, "It was kept under the table."
"So you didn't choose to pursue any legal action?" Izumi asked, almost sounding amused by his excuses. "A company with that much to risk would have had to pay you handsomely to keep such an injury under wraps. It would be an understatement to say you live below those sorts of means. Where did all the money go."
"I don't know. I'm frugal. It was just an accident, why do you care so much?" He asked defensively.
"Because, Mr. Kawamaru, I'm very good at what I do. I know that you are lying to me," she said sternly, leaning forward to look at him eye-to-eye. "I think you had an interaction with a group that we are currently investigating. I want you to tell me the truth. Were those injuries a result of an organized crime group or not?"
Kawamura held his breath for a moment, staring at Izumi as he contemplated his answer. "Alright, yes, they were," he breathed. "I don't know why they did it though. I swear I didn't do anything to them. They weren't Yukaza or anything. They didn't give an organization name. They didn't even look to be Japanese Natives. They said I owed them but I've never interacted with them in my life."
"Have you ever loaned money from anyone?" Izumi asked quickly. "Perhaps to pay some bills or fund some sort of addiction? Gambling? Alcohol? Coke? Cigs? Whatever your preferred poison may be."
"I mean I've borrowed some money from some sketchy groups before, but they were more commonly known," he answered,
"Like who?"
He shrugged, looking away. "I don't know. There's been a few groups. Sometimes I've struck a few deals with shady bail bondsmen and a few times with some of the more known Yukaza groups." He nervously shifted in his seat. "They weren't the ones that did this, though. I'm telling you I don't know anything about this group. I don't have a lot of information to give you just please let me get out of here."
"What makes you think that we will get you out of here with that kind of information?" She scoffed. "I need to know more about the group. Make yourself useful. There has to be something distinguishing you remember. I know it had to have been at least a few months ago with how much you have healed. Come on and think."
"I.. Uh. I don't know. They uh…" He paused for a moment. "They were foreign is the most I can remember. Western. They had a lot of tattoos. Whole sleeves. Only one of them was able to speak Japanese, it sounded like the rest of them were English. I couldn't differentiate the specific dialect so they could be British or American." He nervously rubbed the back of his neck and shook his head, finally looking back at the officer with pleading eyes. "I don't know man. Just please get me out of here. I can't go to jail. I didn't even do anything that bad, I just needed food."
Izumi pulled out her phone and checked the time. "Well. I would like to say you've been helpful, but didn't provide that much. You did give us something though, so I'll talk to my people." She slipped her phone back in her pocket and looked at him with an indifferent expression. "They might get you out. They might reduce your sentence. How about you keep thinking about some other details and we will check back in later? This is a private investigation by the way, so you would do well not to mention it to any of these blubbering idiots at the lower division. If you want any hope at getting your sentence reduced, that is. Even if it was just food, using your quirk to
commit a robbery isn't the best idea buddy." She turned on her heel and started towards the door of the cell. Scanning her ID to open the door, she waved over her shoulder. "I've gotta go. You have a good day now."
Logan grinned at her as she approached. "Holy shit. I heard some of what you said in there and it sounded so bad ass, Ms. Detective."
"Yeah, now let's just get out of here before someone notices that the cams are looped," Rei suggested.
"Sounds good," Izumi replied. "Let's go. Don't run, just walk fast." The three of them started walking back in the direction of the elevator, reaching it without incident.
"Almost there," Rei sighed in relief as they reached the security checkpoint.
Izumi was the last to scan out of the building. The second she stepped through the doors, they slammed shut behind them, and the electronic lock slid into place. The sound of the alarm blaring was loud enough for them to hear, even over the usual noise of the city. "Well. We got out just in the Knick of time, it looks like," Logan said.
One of the officers standing beside the door attempted to flag them down, waving his arm in the air to get their attention. "Hey! Hey, wait! Stop. Nobody is allowed to leave during a lockdown."
As the officer started jogging towards them, the girls took a moment to look at each other. "Hey man. I'm so sorry about this," Logan called to him, then turned to her friends. "Go!" With that, the three of them started sprinting full-speed towards the street. "The mall is nearby, let's lose him there. As soon as we get into a dense enough crowd rip off your prosthetics and take the wigs off. It'll make us hard to track."
"Yeah. There are a bunch of officers locked in the station at the moment anyways," Izumi said as they ran. "We should be fine. Just have Reynolds be ready for us at the mall."
Even without their suits, sprinting the few blocks to the mall was easy enough for them. To his credit, the officer following them was actually able to keep up with them a lot longer than they expected, but as they approached the mall, he started to fall behind. The girls joined up with the crowd of shoppers that milled about in the courtyard of the mall, and immediately started ripping off their wigs and prosthetics. With no bags to stash them in, they didn't have much of a choice besides throwing it all into the garbage cans as they passed.
Rei groaned. "Man, those were expensive."
"Don't worry," Logan replied as she casually dropped her wig into the garbage. "I have plenty more just like them at home." The car pulled up to the curb just as they exited on the other side of the mall, and the girls quickly piled in. "Job well done, babes," Logan said, pausing to catch her breath. "Anyone else feel like scones?"
Rei smiled. "I'll text Etsuko."
"So, what was with that random emergency message today anyways?" Etsuko asked as she slid into the seat they'd saved for her. The other three had only just arrived at Akai Musu, but business was slow, so they'd already been served. They'd even ordered Etsuko's usual.
"Oh, yeah. That." Logan paused, looking up from her plate and flipping her hair over her shoulder. "It was nothing. I found a split end in my hair, but then I just realized I could cut it off myself."
Etsuko raised a brow. "Uh huh…"
The café wasn't very busy at this time of day, so their conversation carried a few tables over. The same was true for the conversations going on at other tables. "Privileged," they heard someone remark.
"Anyways, I'm exhausted," Logan said quickly, stretching her arms up above her head. "I can't wait to go home and go to bed after we eat. How was everyone's internship today by the way?"
Etsuko let out a heavy sigh and pulled out her phone. "Mine was alright. I still had nothing to do so I was just looking through files for the Pussy Cats. Dude some guy had a fucked up hand." She turned the screen towards them, showing off an image that was clearly marked as classified. "Look at this shit."
Rei winced. "Oh Jesus. Disgusting."
"Yeah. I sent it to Logan earlier today." Etsuko said, putting her phone away. "How about you Rei? Wait. Wait. Let me guess. It was the hardest you have ever had to work in your life."
"I have had the soul sucked out of my body," she groaned in reply.
"I wouldn't mind having the soul sucked out of my body tonight." Logan chuckled. "If you know what I mean."
Etsuko rolled her eyes. "In what world is that a sexual euphemism? That was such a reach, it borders on bad writing."
"Thank you for your understanding and support. Logan," Rei sarcastically stated.
"Izumi. How about you?" Etsuko asked, turning to the other girl. "Figured out how to nuke Jupiter or something?"
Izumi laughed a little. "No, of course not. I did get started working on those nuke planes though. Turns out I'm gonna have to go to some stupid meeting with a foreign ambassador a little while after internships are over." She groaned and leaned back in her chair. "Since we are the country's primary contractor they want me to give the explanation of how the plane's power source works and the benefits. The company wants to show off its ability to find the 'best and brightest' and for some stupid fucking reason the prime minister and secretary of defense thought it would be a great way to 'show the potential of Japanese youth'. I mean don't get me wrong I'm flattered they think I could represent our country's youth, but then I think about our country's youth. Not that flattering."
"If it makes you feel any better, they definitely didn't choose you because you are a fair representation of our country's youth," Rei pointed out. "They chose you because you are smarter than most of our youth and you haven't gotten stuck on that weird scientist cult island that people never come back from."
"Oh yeah. I-island. What an odd place." Izumi suddenly shot forward in her seat, looking across the table at Logan with a mischievous grin. "Dude, Logan, you should totally take a look into that island with your binary magic powers and tell me the cool projects they have going on so that I can steal the ideas."
Logan smiled back at her. "Yeah, I thought about that once but I don't think I'm getting in there any time soon," she admitted. "Getting in wouldn't actually be the problem, I can get through any blockade they may throw my way. They have better processors than are available to even me though so I wont be able to outrun them tracking me. Whatever information I get won't matter if I'm in jail."
"You know," Etsuko suddenly chimed in. "My dad taught me this really great trade secret he picked up through his work. He calls it blackmail."
"Oh yeah. My family uses a lot of that as well as other shady business tactics. Like employing illegal immigrants and threatening them with deportation," Logan said casually.
Etsuko shifted uncomfortably in her chair. "Well, this story just got a lot more politically motivated than I saw coming. You might want to back off a bit though. Don't want to lose any readers with those kinds of polarizing statements." She laughed a little, trying to ease the tension. "I do suppose it is important to keep the masses aware of issues in big businesses, but like, maybe tone it down a bit. Let's just rerun that line."
"Um…. Okay. 'Oh yeah. My family uses a lot of that as well as other shady business tactics. Like paying people below the minimum wage?'." Logan said hesitantly.
Etsuko nodded in approval. "Yeah that is going to be much better to keep up our broad audience appeal. Though sometimes I sense a large liberal influence in this storyline radiating from that police station. Not the place I would expect."
"Dude! There is a police officer there who is like, the most politically correct man I have ever seen in my life." Izumi said suddenly. "Today he gave a full speech about the necessity of workplace diversity in both sex and nationality."
"Oh yeah." Etsuko nodded. "The writers probably killed off most of the right leaning audience then. I mean they did make most of the main characters canonically lesbian or bisexual, so I should have seen this coming."
"Wait. How did you know…?" Izumi asked, staring at her in bewilderment. "Man, I completely believe in your third wall shit now. That was a ride. Especially that police thing. What a coincidence."
"Yeah. Speaking of. Why were you talking to the police today?" She asked, whipping out her phone.
Etsuko: Was it because of your afterschool activities?
Izumi checked the message and then looked up at her, uneasy. "Uh… What do you mean?"
Etsuko: You know. The after school club. The squad. You know. The one that's had quite a bit of air time recently.
"We don't know what you are talking about," Rei said quickly. "You mean our airsoft club?"
"Do you seriously want me to spell it out for you?" Etsuko asked, raising an eyebrow.
Rei stared back at her, then looked at the other two, "Wait. How long have you known? Is this something with your power?"
"No," she said flatly. "You guys are just horrible fucking liars and completely obvious. I found out a while ago. I mean, I know each of your skills, all those random coincidences, it was obvious you were trying to hide some big secret." She folded her arms and leaned back in her chair. "I'm not dumb, you know. I've actually got something rather interesting I've been working on in my free time at the internship. Wanna head to the Pussycat agency with me? I have a key so I can go in whenever I feel like."
"This is a lot to process," Rei sighed, shaking her head. "Wait. Why didn't you tell anyone?"
Etsuko shrugged. "Dude, why would I tell anyone? I don't tell on my father, I won't tell on my friends. While I'm not into the whole hero schtick that you guys have going on, I'll back you up however I can whenever I can."
"God, I knew I liked you for some reason," Logan spoke up, grinning at Etsuko. "I take back what I said before, you can marry me for my family's money anytime."
"So. Am I part of the squad now?" Etsuko ventured.
"Why don't you show us whatever you said we need to see?" Izumi replied. "Then we will see if you've got what it takes."
Logan nudged Izumi with her elbow. "She's got what it takes. Definitely has what it takes. Remember when we trained for the sports festival and she beat our asses?"
"Yeah, but like the fighting definitely needs work still."
"Yeah, her room for growth is insane though because of all her advanced attributes," Logan pointed out.
Etsuko suddenly broke in. "Actually, I don't really vibe with the combatant role," she admitted. "I kinda just wanted to be the chick in the chair that tells you what to do and gets you out of bad situations. Like the backup. Not really the whole front lines thing. I like the mastermind role."
Izumi stared at her for a moment. "Oh, well then, sure."
"Good," Etsuko said, standing up from her chair. "Now, to show you how good of a mastermind I am. Let us head to the agency."
"Wait. Can I finish my scone first though?" Rei asked. "I also still need to pay."
Logan scoffed. "I always pay. Don't come for my brand."
"Yeah man, it's not cool to infringe on other characters."