A/N: Paragraphs started with ~ are notes. I know I could use italics or sth, but I'm lazy and my writing program of choice is minimalistic af and doesn't have italics and bolding, so yeah.

8. Library Holds Answers

Hojo was sitting in the library, writing in his brand new red notebook. He was a very solid, very organized person, using logic and deduction in his life.

Maybe his hair wasn't as long and extraordinary as some other guy's, but there was a good brain hidden under it. And Hojo knew how to use his brain to its fullest.

He looked down at his notebook and lowered his pencil.

~Name: Akita (?) Inuyasha
~Age: around 18
~Height: above 1.70
~Hair color: Black. He wears a white wig, but his eyebrows give him away
~Eye color: unknown, he wears yellow contact lenses.
~Built: Lean, but muscular.
~Way of dressing: A red old-fashioned kimono or tshirts and baggy jeans. Zori or no shoes. A bandana around his head.

The boy stopped writing for a while and looked at his notes. He had a really nice handwriting, easy to read and elegant. He resumed his work.

~Personality Traits: rude, impatient, violent, possessive, demanding, obsessive, controlling. Liar, bully. Disloyal.

He frowned. He listed all the things he had seen in Inuyasha, but now he realized he had to be wrong. Even the worst people had at least one good quality. He couldn't overlook it in Inuyasha, even if he despised the boy. He tapped his chin with the tip of his pencil, his gaze wandering around the room when he was thinking.

It was a typical library room - bookshelves under the walls, computer stands on one side of the room while tables for studying in nice rows under the wall with windows. There were a few people reading, writing like him or browsing the Web on the computers. A librarian - a short, dark-haired and dark-eyed young woman in an orange shirt, was fixing a bouquet of colorful flowers standing on her desk, just beside her computer. Her phone rang and she picked it.

"It's Lin... May I ask your last name and how many books you ordered? Hm... Yeah, it's already here, please, stop by to pick it up. Yes, I'll let you know when the sixth volume's back from the current reader," she said quietly, but loud enough to be clearly heard. She flashed Hojo a wide smile as she checked for a book someone had ordered to be brought to the reading room. Hojo smiled back, the same polite smile she had for him. Then he leaned over his notebook, deciding to add the positive thing to this part later. He couldn't find any. He bit his bottom lip, not really wanting to write the next line down. But he knew he had to be honest with himself and Yuka, Eri and Ayumi had confirmed this information to be true. As much as he hated it it was the fact. He promised himself it wouldn't be for long.

~Girlfriend: H. Kagome
~Family: Parents (dead), half-brother
~Friends: Miroku, Sango and Shippou (gang members)

He added all info he had from Higurashi's mother, describing each gang member in detail in this section.

He was working for a half of an hour before he wrote everything he knew about Inuyasha, his gang and his relationships with everyone - Higurashi family, Higurashi's friends, the gang members and himself. He listed all the crimes he knew about - mugging elderly women, robbery, trespassing... There was a lot of it.

Hojo put his pencil aside and flexed his wrist. Then he picked up his notebook and walked to an empty computer table where he could access the Web.

First he typed Inuyasha's name in a normal search, but it didn't show anything of importance. He went to a page managed by police, where commoners could look up the database of wanted criminals or gangsters. He knew about this page from his uncle and was really glad that the police was updating it frequently, so everyone could see if someone suspicious was in fact a criminal.

To his disappointment not only Inuyasha but also his gang friends weren't listed. He tried to search by physical features, but it was no use. The Inu gang wasn't in the database. Hojo closed his notebook and put it in his backpack when he realized he wasn't alone anymore.

The librarian came to stand beside him, smiling warmly at him. She was really short, but very pretty, even if a little too old for him.

"I saw on my screen you were browsing the Criminal Database," she said, explaining herself. He gave a nod - the security police of this reading room gave the librarian the right to see what people were typing in browsers on their computers. It was to prevent kids from browsing undesirable pages or download stuff they shouldn't. After all this reading room was for kids and teens to use, mostly for school-related purposes. The librarian's computer's screen had a program showing her which page each computer's user was visiting. Browsing the Criminal Database wasn't against the rules, but it certainly piqued the librarian's curiosity, and since she had nothing better to do she came to see why he had entered the page. She gave him a friendly smile and stole a glance at his screen. He didn't mind, after all she could probably read the same things from her own screen. He wasn't sure if she only knew he was on this page or knew what exactly he had been typing in the search section of the database.

"Yes, ma'am," Hojo looked to the ID badge on her chest, but her hair fell on it, covering it partially. He could read only her name and not her last name, and it would be rude to call a stranger by her first name. even adding a 'miss', so he settled on using 'ma'am'. "I was checking something."

"Inuyasha...?" she read the kanji and tilted her head to the side like a confused puppy. Hojo shook his head inwardly, it seemed the dog references were rubbing on him as well. "Such an unusual name. I know about only one Inuyasha."

Hojo's eyes flew up to her face, the librarian seemed to be lost in thought.

"R-really?" he breathed out. Could the librarian have some leads? Maybe she knew the gang boy? Oh, was it true that librarians were the best friends of every detective and held all the answers? He always thought it was a bit of a stretch that in many crime movies a librarian was the one to provide vital information to the detective, but maybe there was some truth to this cinematic motif?

"Yeah, there's an old legend about a youkai - a forest spirit - living in the forest which once grew in this area. The forest on Higurashi Shrine grounds is all that remains of that great forest now. His name was Inuyasha."

Hojo felt his heart beating faster. Could it be Inuyasha had chosen this name after learning this legend - probably from Higurashi. After all Souta had told him the gang boy used to live in the forest belonging to the Shrine.

"Could you tell me this legend, ma'am?" he almost didn't dare to ask.

"Oh, I don't remember the whole thing, it was a long one, a part of a myth collection book," she chuckled. "I can find it in our catalog and you can borrow it, if you want to?" she suggested with a smile. She flickered her hair behind her shoulder while waiting for him to decide if he wanted the book. He was happy she was willing to help him, even if he was pretty sure learning this legend wouldn't get him any closer to his goal.

Hojo's gaze rested on the badge on her chest.

The next second the boy was running out of the library, his backpack forgotten.

The woman's name was Akita Lin.

The librarian picked up the backpack the strange boy had left. She closed the browser and returned to her desk to spend the last hour of her shift - she had other library users to help. Then she took the strange boy's bag and walked out of the building. The same moment she walked down the steps from large double door to the sidewalk a black limo stopped right in front of her and a door was opened for her to enter. The librarian grinned happily when she jumped inside and flung her arms around the man sitting inside. The limo moved away from the library as soon as the door closed behind the petite woman and joined other cars on the street.

"Fuwafuwa! You're back in Tokyo!" she exclaimed happily and then swatted his shoulder. "You didn't tell me you were returning today!"

"I had to bring her," replied the man, gesturing with his chin to the woman sitting on the other side of the limo. The librarian sat more properly and bowed to the woman who was observing them with a small smile.

"Hello, treasured daughter."

"Noble Mother," the librarian greeted politely, happy sparks in her eyes.

A/N: I'm sticking to Japanese pet names, but don't worry, there will not be many of them, because I'm pretty sure Google Translator s a bad source of linguistic information. Anyway, if you want to know what 'fuwafuwa' means you need to go on a lil adventure.

Poor Hojo - he lost his notebook! And now it's in hands of some strange people! And the author has too much fun writing this story!