Extra Dimensional

The sun shone brilliantly off puddles in the street left over from the rain the night before. There had been a fierce storm with lightening and thunder, which had ended as the sun rose signaling the promise of a new day. However, there was a certain young man hurrying to his office that did not see it as a good beginning.

Naru was late getting to his office, and since this never happened to him, he was irritable. Now the fact that a car had splashed him with puddle water up to his chest did not help matters. Back to the fact as to why he was late, the storm from the night before may have played the lightening and thunder beautifully, but it had kept him up till 2 a.m. and cut his electricity rendering his alarm clock useless. Naru had finally woken up when Lin had knocked on his door letting him know that they were already supposed to be at the office to which Naru had replied that Lin should go and Naru would catch-up at the office. This brings us to now, with a very irritated Naru soaked in puddle water; and since the authoress likes to torture him she will inform the reading audience that most puddle water includes some form of feces, Naru knows this so his irritation is not unfounded especially considering the color of the puddle.

Running across the street Naru had three cars honk their horns at him, a lesser man (or just one that shows emotions normally) would have made obscene gestures while cursing at the drivers who were almost running him over. Naru only allowed himself to glare at all the drivers, which shut them up as he pointed to his green light.

Finally getting into the office alive and in one piece, though all the substances still attached were not exactly in the good smelling corner since the puddle water was practically steaming off him, Naru wondered why he had even gotten out of bed. The power was out at the office too, which included the air conditioner, Naru could have groaned. Lin had already set-up his laptop and any other battery powered equipment they needed, including a kettle.

After cleaning up the puddle water, Naru went to his office, closed the door and opened the blinds so that he could do his reading. By noon he remembered that he usually left the blinds closed, so that he would not get sun-burnt, which his neck was by then, also he realized that the heat would be lessened if he had left them closed. Once again he wanted to groan, this time though he compared himself to Mai and how he always called her an idiot in his mind. Thinking of the devil, 12:15 on the dot, Mai called in saying that she was going to be late.

"Why?" Naru asked when he spoke with her on the phone.

"My electricity went out last night so my alarm didn't wake me… and I got detention."

"If you are always late for school you will never get any smarter"

"Whatever, I'll be there an hour after normal. Bye."

Naru stared at the phone a moment after Mai hung-up.

'That was unusual.' He thought and then replaced the receiver.

Naru remembered that there was an appointment scheduled for half an hour after Mai's shift was supposed to start. This time a groan almost made it out of our favorite narcissist. Not having Mai there would cause him to have to try to be nicer from the beginning and he found the interviews went better when she was present since clients seemed to warm-up instantly to the girl. Deciding there was nothing he could do about it he went to make tea.

:-:-:-:

Five minutes before the client was to arrive, Naru asked Lin to make some more tea. As the Chinese man did so, Naru looked over the file for the prospective client.

'Why doesn't it give the details of the strange activity, if there is any? Who is Ichihara Yuuko? Why is there just a name and phone number, and not even an address?' Naru thought to himself as he looked at the file, 'At least the power, and air, are back on…'

:-:-:-:

"Why are we in the Shibuya district?" Watanuki asked Yuuko.

"I have an appointment here in five minutes." Was the smug reply.

"With whom?"

"That is a SURPRISE!" Yuuko said while throwing her hands in the air and jumping. Monoka chanted "Surprise!" in the background.

"FINE! WHERE IS IT!" Watanuki screamed at the hyper duo. Yuuko pointed to a building across the street. Watanuki screamed, quite the girlish scream, when he saw where.

:-:-:-:

Naru thought he had heard a scream, but shrugged it off. When Lin came back in with the tea he said,

"I think Mai's friends are around."

Naru raised an eyebrow in response.

"My Shiki really like that strange, loud one."

As soon as the words had left Lin's mouth, the door opened to reveal a tall, thin woman with dark hair and amber eyes dressed in an outfit that Naru didn't think even models would try to wear for fear of exposing too much accidently. Following behind the strange woman, Naru saw the 'strange, loud one' aka Watanuki. He was still muttering under his breath about alcoholics, fat black pork buns, and something about how he never knew how sweet little Mai could have ever fallen for the 'poisonous evil fangs.'

When Naru's gaze fell on Watanuki it went glacier as he then said,

"Mai is not here. I would appreciate it if you did not disturb her when she is at work."

Watanuki started sputtering, "But I'm not here because I want to be! Trust me, being around Doumeki is better than being around you!" He added an emphatic finger pointed at Naru when he said 'you' just for the effect. Switching to pointing at Yuuko,

"She dragged me here, completely not of my free will!" He ended with a huff and crossed his arms.

Although Naru still did not like Watanuki, he still could not help the thought of Watanuki with cat ears coming to mind at the image the other boy presented. Shaking his head he turned to the woman, who was laughing.

"Watanuki, you need to learn to be quiet, but please do so for now. He is here" she turned to Naru, "because he is my employee and I heard of this great sake shop near here. So after my appointment with you that is where we are going and he is needed to carry it all home." The last part was said very cheerily, while Watanuki rolled his eyes keeping quiet as asked.

"Ichihara-san, it is a pleasure to meet you." Naru's eyes held no warmth as he said the words.

"May I ask what you need our services for?"

:-:-:-:

A/N: So this is where I've stopped for now... willing to take suggests, I wrote this out a while ago and lost the original ending so feed back would be muchly appreciated. Arigito and smiles