April 16th, 2016: Saturday

While Akira moved through the crowded streets of Yongen-Jaya, he glanced over his shoulder to see Morgana sticking his head out and focusing ahead. He had mentioned the two had some "business" to attend to in their meeting with Ann and Ryuji.

Akira had an inkling as to what he meant, but whenever he asked about it, the not-a-cat remained tight-lipped.

"Okay, I've been patient," Akira said, stopping before the turn to LeBlanc. "What's the deal here?"

"Do you remember the customer at LeBlanc last night?"

Akira frowned. The only customer he could think of was—

A lightbulb went off over his head. "That doctor…"

Morgana beamed at him. "Exactly! I knew you'd catch on eventually, Akira. If we need to patch ourselves up, who better than a doctor who prescribes medication after a quick examination?"

"You know that's just a rumor, right?" Akira told him. He reached up and played with a bit of his hair. "If Boss is right, then she already gets enough flack for it."

"I know, but what other choice do we have? If she's the kind of doctor who gets sketchy rumors like that, maybe she'll help us out."

Akira pursed his lips and returned his to his pocket. It seemed a little far-fetched. If that woman owned an entire clinic, then she probably wouldn't want to risk that or her doctorate for some kid looks for drugs. Not to mention all the jail time.

But Morgana did have a point. They weren't really overflowing with any other options at the moment. He let out a sigh and said, "Fine, but if she calls the cops, I'm pointing the finger at you."

Morgana snickered before proclaiming, "She's gotta be somewhere in the neighborhood. Take me to her."

"Oh, so you'll be doing the talking?"

"You're not funny."

Part of him was expecting something a lot weirder when he stepped into the waiting room of the Takemi Medical Clinic. Based on the rumors, he imagined some dimly lit torture room, complete with hooks, chains and Iron Maidens, stuff that would come straight out of a gothic nightmare.

Instead, it looked pretty average from what he's experienced. There were some health pamphlets, a couple benches, a pinboard, and even an eye chart. The floor actually looked recently waxed, too. Perhaps the strangest thing in the room was a poster beneath the receptionist window of a bear with needles sticking out of it.

Behind the window sat the woman he had met last night. She was dressed differently today, trading out her blue dress for a simple green one and wearing a normal lab coat. The choker was still around her neck though.

His heart pounded in his chest as he stepped up to the window. If you had asked him that he would need to lie to a doctor to get questionable drugs not even a week ago, he'd have called you a liar. She didn't even take note of his presence at first, continuing to type away at a computer.

He stood there for a moment, waiting for something to happen before he cleared his throat.

The woman's eyes flicked towards him. She raised her brow and asked him without actually asking him what the hell he was doing here.

Akira nearly leapt back from the interrogative gaze, but he stood his ground and greeted her. "Uh, hi?"

He couldn't help but wave and shoot what was undoubtedly an awkward smile.

Real smooth, Joker, he thought to himself in his head.

The woman looked him up and down before she turned back to the computer. Instead of blowing him off completely though, she asked, "Is this your first visit?"

"Y-Yes," he stammered out. He cleared his throat again. "Yes."

She gave him another look, but a flash of recognition crossed her face. She pursed her lips and leaned forward. "You look familiar. Have we met before?"

Akira pointed with his thumb towards the door. "Yes, I saw you at LeBlanc last night. Boss—I mean, Sakura-san told me you ran a clinic. My name's Akira Kurusu."

She leaned back and gave him another once over, but shrugged and began typing again. "Whatever. What are you here for today?"

"Um, my body feels… lethargic."

He wasn't sure how convincing he was. He and Morgana hadn't really discussed what to say to the doctor when they were walking into the clinic, so they both agreed to wing it. Based on the doctor's face, he wasn't doing a good job.

So it surprised him when she rolled her eyes and got to her feet. "Fine. Head back to the exam room."

As she left the receptionist window, Morgana poked his head out of the bag and smiled over at Akira. "See? I told you it would work."

Akira threw a sideways look at him before stepping into the blue door off to the side.

"Yeah, the start of the school year has been pretty tough on me. What with the new city and everything, it's been a challenge to just make it through the day. I was actually late on my first day because I got lost in the subway."

As the woman – Takemi, that's what her name was – wrote down all the information Akira was giving her, he was somewhat surprised at how easily he was making all this up on the spot. Truth be told, it wasn't exactly wrong, he did get lost, and the start of this school year had been a hell of a time, but he could probably manage it without any medication.

Granted, he left out the whole "being arrested" thing. Let's not set off any more red flags than necessary.

"Mhm. And you say you're feeling sore?"

"Yeah. My body is kind of stiff whenever I wake up and it's hard to move in the morning."

She hummed and jotted down another note on the clipboard. "Based on your condition, I'd have to say you're suffering from stress. Makes sense, high school kids are really put through the ringer these days. So, I'll prescribe you some painkillers to help you get through the day. Wait, hold on…"

She kicked off the desk and wheeled her chair over to a medicine cabinet. As she opened it and began looking through, Akira began tapping his foot. The sooner he was out of here, the better he would feel. Lying to people, especially a doctor, was never really his forte. Part of him thought the only reason he was the one doing this was because Ryuji was an even worse liar.

Maybe he could ask Ann to be the one to put on a show next. He's sure she could probably be convincing enough.

He was taken from his own mental ponderings when Takemi rolled back into view. She tapped her pen on her clipboard and sighed. "I forgot to order more… Alright, we'll have to settle for sleeping pills, I suppose. Sleep is the best form of medicine, after all."

"Isn't medicine the best form of medicine?" Akira asked.

Takemi waved him off before jotting down the prescription. "I'm the doctor, I know what I'm talking about. And sleep is very crucial. You said you weren't getting decent sleep, so this should be enough to get you through until I can order more in if you feel you still need it."

Akira gripped his knee and his foot tapping started to get faster. For a brief second, the only sound in the room was the pen scratching on the paper. "Um, are you sure you don't have any painkillers now?"

The scratching stopped suddenly. Tae leveled a glare at Akira. He's pretty sure that the old adage "if looks could kill" had some merit to it after all. "Oh, yeah, let me just write up a year's worth of supplies for you. Would that be enough for you?"

"I didn't—"

"Don't play dumb with me," Takemi interrupted, tossing her clipboard onto her desk. She leaned forward and stared directly into Akira's soul. "You had me going for a second, but you're not really sick, are you? You just heard the rumors and thought I'd sell to some kid, is that it?"

Akira let his head hang in shame.

Takemi shook her head and scoffed. "Figures. It seems the only patients I get anymore are people with ulterior motives."

It was worse because she wasn't even wrong. That was exactly what he was coming for. He really should just leave, but he couldn't. He had people counting on him.

"I'm sorry."

She blinked and looked taken aback by the sudden apology.

Akira looked back up at her. He steeled his gaze and asked, "Please. I can't explain it, but… I need that medicine."

Takemi brought her pen to her lips. She gave a little chuckle. "My, that's a serious look in your eyes."

Akira flinched back and looked away, pushing up his glasses to hide behind them again.

"Fine." She picked up the clipboard and crossed out the previous prescription. "I'll prescribe you the medication."

"Really?" Akira asked, sitting up straight.

"But I'm only giving you a mild painkiller for now," she firmly stated, leveling her pen at him. "I know how stressful school can be, and to be honest, you look like you could really use a break."

Akira breathed a sigh of relief and felt his shoulders sag. "Thank you. Seriously."

Takemi smiled at him. It was a nice smile, Akira told himself. "You're a pretty weird kid, you know that?"

"Is that a compliment?"

She shrugged. "Take it however you want. Lucky for you, I have a license to make my own formulas, which means all of the medicine here is my own. I was running low, and I won't have the supplies to make any large batches for about the next week, so you'll need to make do with what I give you today. Think you can do that?"

"I'll try."

"Good. Now, let's see what I have left in stock."

As she wheeled back towards the cabinet, Akira raised an eyebrow. "Don't you want to know what I'm going to do with this stuff?"

Takemi shook her head. "So long as it doesn't cause me any trouble, it's not my problem."

Akira laughed quietly to himself. If she only knew.

He placed the medicine in his backpack, careful to not hurt Morgana as he did so. He had to give the not-a-cat credit; he was very good at making sure he kept himself unnoticeable. He just clutched the medicine and gave Akira an approximation of a thumbs up.

Akira returned it.

"Are you giving your backpack a thumbs up?"

His head shot up like a deer caught in a pair of headlights. He stammered out, "Oh, it's just a little… thing I do, I guess."

Takemi shook her head and turned back to her computer. "Weird. Anyway, I hope those help with whatever is going on in your life. Come again if you need any medical attention."

"Yes, ma'am," Akira said, bowing at the waist slightly before moving out of the room…

…and also headfirst into a stone-faced man in a suit. Akira back stepped a little to avoid it, about to mutter out an apology, but the guy brushed past him without so much as a second thought.

As he closed the examination room door behind him, Morgana popped his head out of his bag. "Well, that was rude."

"Yeah, guy was a dick." Akira shook his head. "We got the medicine, that's what matters. Let's—"

"This stops here!"

Akira froze and looked back to the door. That wasn't Takemi's voice, so it had to have been the guy's voice. Both he and Morgana exchanged a look before stepping up to the door and pressing their ears against it.

"Hello to you too," Takemi's voice replied calmly. "Is there a reason for your visit? Cold? Flu? Athlete's foot? Erectile dysfunction? I may have some pills for that."

"Shut it! I know you're making that infernal drug here."

"I do make medicine, but it's mostly stuff like acetaminophen, ibuprofen, stuff like that. I wouldn't call any of those 'infernal drugs', but you call it what you will."

The man growled, "Don't play dumb with me. The rumors say it can give someone unlimited power!"

"How dramatic," Takemi drolled out. "Look, if you aren't here for a check up, I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

"The police may not be doing anything about it right now, but the second the press gets ahold of this? Oh, you're going down. You'll be an even greater disgrace to the medical community than you already are."

Akira frowned. She was a "disgraced" doctor? What type of scandal was she embroiled in?

"Oh, what's wrong?" The man sneered. "Don't like being reminded of the sins from your past? Dispose of that medicine now or else I'm going to drag you down further into the mud. The name 'Tae Takmei' will—"

It was at this moment the world conspired against Akira. As he was trying to listen to the conversation, his shoes slipped on the freshly waxed floor and made a truly wretched squeaking sound.

"Is someone there?!" the man shouted.

Without waiting for him to come storming out to give him the third degree, Akira turned and immediately bolted out of the clinic and back onto the streets of Yongen-Jaya.

He took a deep breath as he rounded the corner to head back to LeBlanc. That was close. Way too close.

Once again, Morgana popped his head out from behind him and said, "Yes! We got the medicine! That rotten teacher isn't going to know what hit him!"

Akira smiled, but it fell as he looked back towards the clinic. Whatever was happening between Takemi and that guy didn't sound good. Maybe he should go back and help. She was certainly odd, but she didn't deserve any of that.

"Hey, Akira, is everything alright?"

He looked down at his questioning companion and shook his head. Now wasn't the time for this. The last thing he needed was to get arrested for stepping in again when Morgana, Ann, and Ryuji needed him to take down Kamoshida.

"It's nothing. We got the medicine, that's what's important."

"Indeed we do! You know, I bet that lady has even stronger medicine hidden somewhere. Might come in handy, right Akira?"

"It might," Akira agreed. "I'll come back when we've run out of the stuff she's already given us."

"Sounds like a plan to me."

With the day over and curfew rapidly coming up, he walked back to LeBlanc. While Ryuji was texting him about some place that sells model guns, he couldn't help but get the interaction between that man in the suit with Takemi.

She needed help. He couldn't give it to her right now, but maybe someday.

And if that meant he needed to go see her again? Well, that was just one of those necessary evils, wasn't it?