Akira buys some very normal, totally innocent ebooks
Akira called Touka's cell phone that evening.
It took three tries for the ghoul to finally pick up. "Who the hell is this?! Leave me alone!"
"It's Akira. Are you free to talk?"
"Oh—How do you even know my number? No, nevermind. Yes, I'm free to talk."
Akira sat on her couch and sipped at the glass of nigori sake she'd poured herself in a futile attempt to unwind. "Good. I want to know more about that man with the tattoos. I know he was a ghoul and he saw my face. Will he target me somehow?"
Touka sighed on the other end. "I don't think so. Uta's always up to shady shit, but he's been a friend of my family for ages. Although his brand of friendship is a little unconventional…"
"You're not making a strong case for why I shouldn't exterminate him as fast as possible."
"I don't know if I can explain so it makes sense to you. He runs with a sketchy crowd, and I don't like a lot of what he's involved in but on a personal level he's an okay guy."
The exhausted blonde took another swig of her drink. "Why would an 'okay guy' be associating with a bad crowd?"
There was a long pause from the other side. "When you feel like an outcast and someone offers you a place to belong, sometimes feeling like you're a part of something is more important than whether you're a part of something good or bad. But I think that must be difficult for you to grasp. You don't seem like someone who got left out a lot."
"You're doing a bad job of easing my concerns, Kirishima."
"I know," she groaned. "The problem is that his friends can cause a lot of trouble for both of us if they see the chance to cause chaos. It's better not to provoke them."
"I'm seriously questioning my stance on not pressing you for information."
Touka was silent for a moment. "Please believe me when I say it's best to leave it alone. Uta just wanted to ask about whether I was dating Haise. I didn't give him any information one way or the other. But I'll have to tell Yomo I'm married and pregnant eventually. And once Yomo knows, it won't be long until Uta knows, and he'll tell Itori, which means that knowledge will go to the highest bidder. It's gonna be such a mess."
Akira rolled her eyes at her empty apartment. Without knowing anyone's code names, Touka's gossip was useless to her. "So this may blow up sooner than you thought."
"Only on the ghoul side of things, which I always expected. It's not like that news will get back to the CCG anytime soon, unless you start talking. If you just…don't remind Uta you exist, I think it'll be okay."
"You understand that I'll be making the final call on that front."
There was a long pause on the other end. "Can I talk to you later? I think I hear Haise in the hall."
"Yes. I'll be in touch within a few days."
They quickly hung up, and Akira was left in her quiet living room. Maris Stella strutted in from the kitchen and hopped up on her lap. Akira always did her best thinking while petting her beloved cat.
He has powerful friends who want to cause chaos…hmm. If I had to guess, I'd say the Clowns. Dangerous and unpredictable. She finished off her nigori and leaned back, staring at the ceiling. Perhaps Touka is correct and it's best to stay under his radar. At least in terms of casual encounters like today.
She scratched behind Maris Stella's ears, enjoying the cat's purring.
Can I get Touka to tell me who he is to the CCG? Maybe if I have that information to use against him, it'll keep me somewhat safe. But if he's a high-priority target, how could I just let him go?
She almost got out the bottle of alcohol to start on a second glass but resisted the urge.
She took out her tablet instead. After much deliberation, she finally hit "buy" on an ebook. It was a historical nonfiction, covering espionage during the Cold War. Nothing too suspicious about having that in her purchase history. After a moment of deliberation, she added in some pop science books on genetics.
Then, just to round things out and because she needed a treat, she begrudgingly got that stupid Junji Ito book about the cats everyone kept recommending to her.
"Maris Stella," she said to her own disinterested cat. "I don't know how much deeper I can dig myself before I either get killed or lose my soul."
Early the next morning, Akira decided to do some recon of her own. She'd given the hands-off method a chance. It was clear to her the clock on that approach was running out fast.
In sunglasses and a seldom-used silk scarf to cover her hair, Akira headed to a hotel restaurant down the street from Café :re. She was going to eat breakfast by the window and watch the café.
Within a week of eating various meals there, she had a cast of characters in her head. Touka, of course, who popped in at all hours of the day to check on things even when she wasn't working a full shift. The dangerous-looking light-haired man that was related to her—Yomo—who assisted her. A woman with shoulder-length black hair closer to her own age who often opened in the early morning, and a man who worked the midday shift. Both occasionally covered other shifts, as well. A tall sandy-haired boy, maybe in his early-to-mid twenties, who casually entered the shop on two of the days and chatted with both of them for a long time.
One of those mornings, he was handed a plain paper bag. Interesting.
A few other people passed through: students, office workers, and even a public servant or two. Some grabbed a drink and left as fast as possible, some stayed to read the newspaper. Some grabbed food, and none of them stayed to talk to the proprietors for very long. Likely human.
She noticed the odd customer who would go in, drink coffee, and chat with Touka or Yomo, then collect a discreet brown paper bag. Her suspicions about what was in those bags grew.
They all looked like people she would pass on the street without a second glance.
Akira pondered the results of her surveillance project. Now, how do I use what I know?
A waitress walked by, refocusing Akira on the restaurant she was in. She didn't appear to be in a hurry, so Akira waved her over.
"Yes? Did you need anything?"
"I've just noticed that coffeeshop across the street. Are they any good?"
They young woman smiled and nodded. "The best in this area, I think! You should definitely stop by sometime."
"With a glowing recommendation like that, how could I resist?"
"And they're all so kind, too! One of the chefs here was diagnosed with cancer last year and the manager sent him a little care package every time he went through a round of chemo. Us food service folks have to stick together, right?"
Akira looked through the windows at the manager in question. "What a positively heartwarming story."
The bubbly waitress was on a roll, by then. "In fact, if you mention to Touka that her favorite chef is still in remission, I bet it'll make her day and you might get a free drink out of it!"
"That's a good idea. Thank you."
Akira quickly finished her cup of tea and settled her bill. She had to get to work.
Later that day, Akira was wrapping up her current investigation. Employees of a midsized trading firm had been going missing on an infrequent basis. The CCG had been keeping tabs on the missing persons reports, but there had been no leads until now. Two office workers vying for the same promotion had called in tips that the other was a ghoul, and the CCG finally had a reason to head into the building on ghoul-hunting business.
Because the company was a significant donor to the CCG, Akira had been personally tapped to address the situation. It was child's play, really. The two ambitious employees snapping at each other's throats were clearly human. The receptionist on their floor, however, was always busy whenever Akira came by over the course of her investigation.
So the investigator phoned ahead and said she was heading up, and could someone please meet her when she got off the elevator. Then she breezed right past the bank of elevators, through a maintenance door, and waited at the base of the emergency stairwell.
Within a few minutes, she could hear the receptionist's heels clicking down the concrete stairs. As the target descended farther, the muffled whisper of "Shit, shit, shit" could be heard.
The ghoul rounded the last corner to see Akira waiting for her, quinque coiled by her side and at the ready.
For her part, Akira waited the split second she needed to verify the inhuman red eyes of her target and, with a flick of her wrist, cut the ghoul down.
Child's play. She couldn't have been more than B-rated, at best.
The dying ghoul gurgled and coughed, slumping against the wall and trying to hold together a huge gash across her chest. Blood bubbled out of the wound between her fingers. Any feeble regeneration would be far too slow. "But, why?"
"Because you killed your coworkers," Akira coldly pointed out.
Her quarry took another labored breath. "But I didn't want to…I just wanted to wear nice blouses…I'm sorry, please don't hurt me anymore, I just got so hungry, I'm sorry…"
"I don't care. You can save your breath."
A stream of tears ran down her blood-splattered face. "Who's going to feed my cat…" Then the ghoul tipped over, convulsed, and died.
Akira pulled out her cell phone, called in the kill to be cleaned up, and left the building by the service entrance.
"Dammit," she said as she walked to her car. She got in, pulled up the case file on her tablet, and looked up the ghoul's listed home address.
Looks like she was going to swing by there, and then the animal shelter.
A tiny little bit of action! I sometimes think it's kind of boring to read about a fight instead of watching it, so I don't try too hard to work them in…maybe that should be a New Year's resolution for me? Try writing more fun fight scenes? Happy New Year!