Black Phantom
Chapter 4:
As soon as the order of "Mai, tea" left Naru's mouth, the female officer was up and running before he could make any snide comments about her speed. She had suggested getting a kettle for the task force office, but the narcissistic Inspector had vetoed that immediately, claiming that she needed the exercise.
The moment Mai had left the room Lin paused typing and walked over to Naru's desk. The signal for a private conversation had become Naru ordering Mai to make tea.
"You have found something?"
"Yes. Using the Police database I looked up one of the names of the high ranking members and the only likely address belonging to someone of that name is this one," he pointed to a line of text on his computer screen. "It does not appear on any satellite images leading me to suspect that it is the one."
Lin frowned, he preferred to have more concrete evidence before he aided and abetted Kuro Kaitou. Naru caught his glance.
"After I have sent the warning note to the Police, we, as the Kuro Kaitou task force will have to survey the house, then we will know how we are going to plan the heist. However, when we as the Police make a preliminary visit, you will have to go in my place as we cannot afford to lose everything by someone recognising me as Eugene Davis' brother."
The Chinese man sighed deeply. Life certainly never dull when you worked for Oliver Davis, but it could get dangerous.
The door was kicked open by Mai who was carrying two teacups. She passed one to Naru without even glancing at him and handed the other to Lin.
"I thought I would make you some, Lin-san as you must get stressed working for the narcissist."
Lin gave her a small smile, her warmth beginning to melt his cold personality. It was undeniable that she was a bright person to be around.
"Thank you, Taniyama-san."
"Did you hear that, Naru? Even Lin-san says "thank you"."
Her taunt did not receive reply from Naru who was busy inhaling the fumes of tea as he drank it. Maybe, when everything was over, he would hire Mai to be his personal tea maker... He shook his head. He should be thinking of his brother and not the girl that he had kissed... why did he do that?
He glanced over Mai's witness statement from the night before with slight amusement. The brunette had neglected to mention the kiss, claiming that she had been intent on arresting Kuro Kaitou when he had incapacitated her by "unknown means". He smirked.
His attention was brought back to the present by the sound of the office door opening. Naru looked up to see Mai about to leave.
"Mai, where are you going?"
"To see Bou-san and Ayako, unless you actually have something for me to do," she answered.
He opened his mouth to say yes, then he realised that he didn't have anything to keep her in the office with him.
"Fine. You can go, but you have to be back within an hour."
"Of course," Mai answered and left the room.
Lin raised his eyebrows. As unlikely as it seemed, Noll was growing fond of Mai Taniyama, possibly for the tea that she made. Or rather, he hoped it was the tea, anything further was not wise. If Noll showed any signs of being fond of her for more than her tea, he would have to take steps against her.
A shrill ring permeated Lin's internal monologue. Both men recognised the ring tone. It was for one of Naru's mobile phones, the Oliver Davis one. Naru dug around in his briefcase.
"It's Dad," he said before looking up at the clock to calculate the time difference between Japan and England. "He is up very early."
"It's about two in the morning in England- he probably never went to bed," Lin pointed out as his charge took the call.
"Good morning Dad," Naru greeted. "Why are you calling now? You know it's not safe to talk to me until I am off work."
"I know, I'm sorry Noll. I just got excited. The item that you asked for has been made to your specifications and I'm shipping it out to you along with a spare for emergencies. I have also included a box of smoke bombs and other surprises for you to use," his father informed him enthusiastically.
"Thank you Dad. I suspect that we may be closer to Them so any help is appreciated."
"Let me know if anything happens and be careful. Your mother sends her love."
"I will be careful and I have Lin with me," Naru answered before hanging up.
"Is that item ready?" Lin enquired interestedly. "I wonder if it will work like it does in fiction."
"It is ready and I have made some additions to the basic design so if it does not work we can still use it in another way. Dad is also sending me some smoke bombs."
"Now we are delving further into the depths of Kaitou manga," the older man commented wryly.
"If it works, it works. Our current position was the result of strenuous planning and was evaluated as being the safest effective route of investigation. I do not particularly want to be fed to a cherry blossom tree which was what would have if we had gone with Mum or Dad's suggestion."
"There is no saying that it will not eventually happen Noll. You must give me some credit- it was thanks to me that we even know about the Sakurazukamori," Lin reminded him.
The atmosphere in an office down the hallway was a complete contrast. Mai and her unofficial aunt were giggling over a gossip magazine whilst her "uncle" was perusing the latest edition of a supernatural magazine. All were drinking coffee from the vending machine instead of hand poured Earl Grey like a certain narcissist.
Bou-san turned a page idly and frowned as he read an article.
"I'm never getting this magazine again. They have so many articles on shadowy organisations but never the Sakurazukamori- any reporter worth their salt would investigate them."
As Mai was in a happy mood she decided to humour him instead of rolling her eyes like she normally did.
"What is the Sakurazukamori?"
The monk straightened his posture and steepled his fingers. "Not much is known. They are a centuries old clan of Omnouji who act as assassins and according to rumour they feed their victims to cherry blossom trees. Apparently cherry blossom leaves are really white, but they suck the blood of the victim killed by the Sakurazukamori who is placed beneath the tree, turning the petals pink."
Mai shivered at the mental image of something beautiful like cherry blossoms being evil and Ayako threatened to hit her boyfriend for scaring her adorable niece.
"What's an Omnouji?" she questioned once Ayako's tirade was over.
Bou-san sighed dramatically. "Jou-chan has a monk and a priestess as her uncle and aunt and she doesn't even know what an Omnouji is."
"Just answer her question, you old man!" Ayako ordered him.
"Essentially it is a yin and yang master. Some have Shikigami in their possession which are creatures that are theirs to order."
"Have you ever met one?" his niece asked.
Ayako let out a guffaw. "Nope!" she answered for him. "Houshou may have all the experience of exorcising spirits, but he had never met an Omnouji."
The ponytailed monk glared at her before switching his attention back to his niece.
"Jou-chan, if you are interested, I have a book on Omnouji."
"Thank you, Bou-san. The narcissist never seems to do any work and I end up staring into space a lot of the time so I wouldn't mind having something educational to read."
This caused her "relations" to spit out their mouthfuls of coffee simultaneously.
"What do you mean, he never does any work!?" the redhead demanded disbelievingly.
"He is the head of the task force. He should be obsessively chasing clues, inputting data into spreadsheets to work out likely targets, not doing nothing," Bou-san said explosively.
Unconsciously Mai glanced around at the piles of glossy magazines littering Ayako's desk and the stack of supernatural books on top of Bou-san's. The cans in the wastepaper basket were also an indication of time spent socialising by the vending machine.
"It's not like you two do any work either," she muttered under her breath.
"Hey! We are only involved in cases involving shrines or temples and neither of us are an Inspector assigned with chasing a wanted thief, without success even after a year," the monk protested vehemently.
"I suppose so..."
"What does he spend his time doing?" Ayako probed. "And what does the Chinese beanpole spend his time doing?"
Mai considered the question thoughtfully. She could guess what they were doing right now. Lin was likely to be typing at an impossible speed whilst Naru was having caffeine withdrawal symptoms and glancing at his computer screen with a pensive look in his blue eyes.
"Naru is always on his computer, Lin-san is too, but he is always typing. The only time I ever witnessed them doing something resembling work was on my first day. They were talking about tracing explosives and I don't think either of them have actually done what they said they were going to."
Ayako gawped. "So they really don't do anything related to catching Kuro Kaitou...?"
"Nope."
A brief silence hung in the air before the monk and priestess exchanged looks. Then Bou-san handed Mai his stack of supernatural books.
"You can spend your time learning then. I still haven't forgotten the time you ruined my exorcism or when I had to get that child's spirit out of you."
Mai sighed in defeat. She might as well use her paid free time to do something productive and it would be good if she was actually useful during one of her relations' exorcism cases.
The moment she returned to the Kuro Kaitou task force office carrying the pile of books, Lin's eyes zeroed in on the one about Omnouji and Naru on the one that he had written when he was younger.
Naru corrected one of his earlier assumptions about Mai Taniyama.
She wasn't going to be just trouble, she was definitely trouble.
The blood of the dying body leaked into the soil of the cherry blossom tree in Ueno Park and the blossoms which were in full bloom despite the time of year, soaked a slightly darker pink and the body, now dead, was engulfed by its roots.
The killer calmly lit a cigarette which became blood splattered once his dominant hand touched it. The Sakurazukamori had killed again and this assassin had gained new abilities from the corpse who had once been a psychic medium, named Masako Hara.
Reply to anonymous review:
. I wonder though will you use all the cast of SPR in this story? Because so far you've only mentioned Bou-san and Ayako.
I will be using some other characters...
