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“It’s already so long,” Aya mumbled and a long sigh escaped her mouth without her noticing. She was looking outside from her position at the window for about ten minutes by now and didn’t move a centimeter away.
“Here.”
It wasn’t hard for her to make a connection from the steps and voice behind her. It was her mentor and friend Kunikida Doppo. He was holding a steaming cup in each of his hands and reached the light pink one towards her. “Thank you.” She accepted the cup carefully and took a sip of the freshly brewed coffee.
“The storm is not clearing up for the next few hours,” Kunikida explained to her and with raised eyebrows, Aya looked at him.
That wasn’t what she meant with her deep sigh, not even close to the truth. “I didn’t mean the storm,” she answered him and took another sip before shifting her position a little and leaning against the windowsill. “I was thinking about how long I’m already here.”
“Oh, right,” Kyouka jumped into the conversation and reached a plate with self-made cookies towards Aya. “In two months is the tenth anniversary of your entrance exam, right?” After she placed the plate on the desk across the window, she stepped next to Aya and watched the rain outside while eating one of her cookies.
Aya nodded as an answer and dipped the cookie into the coffee before eating it. Her eyes weren’t focusing anything anymore when she talked again. “I remember that day as it was yesterday.”
-
“Good Morning!”
With all the energy she had for the day, Aya opened the door to the office rooms of her new workplace. After she was allowed to join the ADA yesterday, she wasn’t able to sleep for a very long time yet her body was full of unused energy. Aya was looking forward to getting to know and work with everyone.
However, when she looked around in the office room, nobody except for Kunikida was here. A wave of disappointment washed through her body because she genuinely wanted to introduce herself to her new coworkers. She still only knew Kunikida and Yosano from the incident in the subway tunnel.
Other than those two she got to know Dazai as he was present yesterday when she had gained permission to join the ADA from Fukuzawa, the chef of the organization. His glare was intimidating but she had no plan of chickening out so close to her goal of having a place where she was able to help people.
Kunikida looked up from his work on the computer and greeted her with a slight nod with his head and a plain “Good Morning.”
While she was walking into the office to see what kind of work she was supposed to do on her very first day, all kinds of things ran through her mind. Should she solve a murder case? Tail someone, who cheated on their partner? Finding a missed person or item?
Though before she was even able to form a word with her mouth, the door behind her got crashed open and someone loudly entered the room. “Morning!”, he said and looked confused at Aya in front of him, standing lost in the middle of the room staring right back at the black-haired man wearing a cliché detective outfit. To be honest, she had thought about getting one, too, only in more stylish. “Who’s that tiny girl?”
“Oi, I’m not tiny!!” Aya stemmed her hands into her waist and puffed up her cheeks. Why was everyone reducing her to her height only? She would kick anyone’s butt when necessary that was for sure.
Nevertheless, before she could make a bigger tantrum in the middle of the office, the man had shoved her aside, making Aya gasp indignantly. “Hey-!” Though the man didn’t give her any attention and only stopped in front of Kunikida.
“You need to help me out.”
Who is this impolite weirdo?, Aya thought and squeezed her eyes at the stranger. Was he a client? Or a coworker? In any case, it was pretty rude to just shove her away like that. After she stepped next to Kunikida’s desk, she tried to follow the conversation to find answers.
Kunikida barely looked up at the other man who stood in front of his desk, adjusting his glasses a little bit. “Good Morning, Ranpo.”
The black-haired man, obviously named Ranpo, raised a leather briefcase to the desk and with a muffled clunk, it hit the wood. “I have to deliver this to one of our clients.”
For a brief moment, Aya flinched back before she was able to shake those dark and cold feelings off her body. Hopefully, they hadn’t noticed her reaction after seeing the briefcase on the desk because she hated the fact, she couldn’t shake off the nightmares about that day fully.
Now, Kunikida raised an eyebrow at him. “And what should I do?” He typed a few more words and Aya looked forth and back between them. “I have no time to spare. I need to finish this report within the next 17 minutes before sending it to the mayor.”
Aya’s eyes wandered from Kunikida to the other man to see his reaction. “But I need to take the bus and then the train,” he said like it would explain everything in this situation. Aya’s confusion just grew more and more the longer it went on. When it was only the problem of taking public transport it wasn’t a big deal for her. “I can help!”
With a displeased face, Ranpo eyed her. “I don’t want to go with a midget that barely reaches my chest.” He placed his hand on her head and patted it a few times before Aya was able to push his arm aside.
Though before she could say anything, Kunikida got up from his seat and walked around the desk towards them. “Ranpo that’s Koda Aya, our new member,” he pointed to her when he introduced her by name.
Aya had a little, triumphal feeling bubbling up in her body and she was only barely able to hold the urge to place her hands proudly on her waist. “And it will be her first job to escort you.”
Ranpo looked annoyed at Aya. “But she’s a child,” he complained again about the fact that he seemingly didn’t want to be escorted by her due to her age.
“I can do that!” Aya stepped in between Ranpo and Kunikida. She was young and maybe a little bit smaller than others in her age but she was able to help out with that job without any problems. “I always took the bus to school, so I know how it’s working.”
Only too late she noticed that would make her young and inexperienced again. Straight out of school always meant you could look down on someone. Adults were horrible with that.
With a knowing expression on his face, Kunikida looked towards Ranpo, his hands crossed in front of his chest. “You take her with you.” The level of his voice made it clear that there was no chance of Ranpo backing out of it. “The others are out the whole day so you’re the only one to make sure she will be able to learn something today.”
“Okay,” Ranpo agreed with a melodramatic sigh and he looked at Aya. “But she has to call me Ranpo-senpai.”
For a moment, Aya lost control over her facial expression.
Though before anyone could comment on it, Kunikida shoved them through the office out of the door after he had taken a critical look at his wristwatch. “You’re invading my schedule now go on, don’t let your client wait too long.” Only a moment later, he closed the door and shut them out of the office.
Aya looked up at Ranpo and squeezed her eyes a little. She wasn’t able to form an opinion on him. He had to be a trusted person of the agency, even more, when Kunikida was the one sending her with him but his character was exhausting.
Ranpo looked back at her, having a smirk on his face. “You know, a photo would last longer.” Before Aya was able to give him an answer, he already walked through the hall and hopped down the stairs, swinging the briefcase with each step.
This guy, Aya thought upset but also scolding herself for staring too long before she followed Ranpo downstairs and outside of the building. With each step she took, her excitement for the job grew even it was rather simple and unspectacular. Her thoughts were focused on the details she didn’t know. Who was that person paying the ADA to deliver a briefcase? Why was Ranpo the one who got the job? Also, why wasn’t he able to take public transport alone? “Where do we need to go?”, Aya asked and shielded her eyes from the sun upon the sky. She wouldn’t be able to help if not for knowing where the destination was.
“Oh right!” Ranpo rummaged around in the pockets of his pants and revealed a yellowish, crinkled paper. “That’s the address we got and a description of how to go there.”
Taking the paper from his hands with a frown on her face, Aya was even more confused. When he even had a detailed description, why would he need someone to join him? “Oh, I know that!” she said with confidence. It was a bit away from the ADA building though, they would take almost an hour to drive.
First, they would need to walk a few hundred meters to the bus stop. Followed by taking the bus for six stations and then switching to the subway for another eight stations.
Aya’s stomach made a loop after her brain gave her a flashback of her getting the briefcase with bombs inside and Kunikida throwing it out of the subway station. The mental image made her shiver but she tried to shake it away. That was in the past and had nothing to do with today besides that she wanted to help others.
As a Warrior of Justice, this was her job.
They had walked in silence next to each other for a few minutes now. Aya wasn’t sure what topic she could introduce and Ranpo looked around like an airhead. Only when her eyes fell onto the advertisement poster at the bus station, her eyes lit up and she couldn’t stop her words from spilling out of her mouth. “Ah! I didn’t know they publish another work already!” She rushed towards it and looked at it in awe.
“Don’t tell me you read them?” Ranpo asked her and took a closer look at the placat.
Due to her attention being not on Ranpo, Aya had missed his slightly incredulos expression and turned around with sparkling eyes. “Matsumoto-sensei’s works are great!”, she exclaimed happily and pointed at the cover of the new book they will publish. “I have all of his works and I can’t believe they do publish a new one already!!”
Only with Ranpo’s raised eyebrows and an expression of disbelief on his face, Aya was able to rein herself from babbling more. “What’s with that look?”, she asked and warily looked at the taller one. “Did you never read one of his novels?”
“I did,” Ranpo negated Aya’s question and adjusted his hat a little.
“So?” Aya’s eyes sparked up again. It was the first time she got to know someone who also read at least one novel of Matsumoto Seichou, her favorite author. “Which one did you read? What’s your favorite one?”
However, before Ranpo was able to answer her, she interrupted him. “Oh, our bus is here!” The bus stopped in front of them and due to the time not being in the morning rush hour, it was rather empty. Only a few people were inside when she pulled Ranpo a bit through the bus and gave him the window seat before sitting down next to him. “So? Tell me, tell me!”, she tried to get back into the topic.
Ranpo leaned his elbow against the window and his head on his curled up fingers. “What makes you think I like his novels?”, he asked her and had not a single note of delicacy in his voice.
It took Aya a moment to connect and realize the meaning of his words in her brain. “Oh-” It was giving her a weird lump in the throat and she tried to swallow it down. Though maybe she could convince him to give it another chance if she knew what he disliked about them. “What makes you say that?”
Shrugging it off with his shoulders, he turned away from Aya and let his eyes wander around in the bus like he was searching for something that was out of Aya’s knowledge. “They are boring and predictable,” he answered eventually.
“Wha-” Aya’s words were stuck in her throat. Boring and predictable? What kind of gibberish was he talking about? Did they talk about the same author here? “What the heck are you talking about?”, she wanted to know from him, “did you even read his novels to the end?”
“Of course not,” Ranpo said, almost sounding scandalized. “I was able to determine the victim and culprit with knowing the characters, summary and cover artwork.”
Aya’s eyes grew wider with each word she heard from the other one. “What?” Did she hear that right? “But even you know that already! It’s about the way- ” only barely stopping herself from standing up from her place to sign her point, she took a deep breath. “the way how they get to the conclusion!”
Ranpo rolled his eyes. “Bo~ring.” When they stopped at the next bus station, Ranpo’s eyes wandered to the driver before he looked back at Aya. “I don’t care about those details. An author needs to catch you right away without spilling details about the outcome.”
The moment Aya wanted to give him a spiced up answer, a strident scream was audible and made her jump in fright. With a weird mix of feelings, she was looking around to determine where the scream came from. In only a brief moment, Aya could detect it origin was a girl in school uniform and long, dark hair, who pointed at a small girl with twin tails and holding a knife at the throat of a young man with a strange haircut.
Aya swallowed hard.
“Quiet,” the small girl demanded and everyone ended up in complete silence. “If anyone moves, I will slice his throat open.” Her eyes looked dead serious and her voice didn’t let any room for jokes either.
The sweat of fear was painfully visible on the face of the man and when he swallowed the lump in his throat down, the knife cut a scratch on his neck and a drop of blood ran down on his skin.
Not able to move even one millimeter, Aya was paralyzed on her seat, watching the scene in front of her with big eyes and a dry mouth while her mind was running miles without giving her anything coherent to do or say.
Not again.
“This can be over real quick and nobody gets harmed,” the girl continued and kicked the man into his knee pit, making him slump down onto the floor of the bus, making it easier for the girl to hold him hostage.
The few people inside the bus stayed quiet.
Tightening the grip on the knife and pressing it a little bit more against the man’s throat, the girl looked around with her dead blue eyes. “I only need the briefcase of that man.” She pointed with her head towards Ranpo and everyone, including Aya, looked at the man only casually leaning against the window.
Not again.
What was inside that briefcase? Her eyes wandered down to the floor where it was and then followed Ranpo grabbing and holding it against his chest. Then her eyes wandered back to the girl with the knife and her red traditional clothes. Her eyes looked dead but at the same time, they had a spark she couldn’t associate to anything while the young man clung onto her arm and tried to escape her knife but didn’t have a chance.
“What’s in that briefcase?” Aya asked with a low voice and slipped a little bit down on her seat. She was still frightened but her braver side came back more and more now. “Why does she want it?”
Ranpo looked at the girl with her hostage before he put his attention back on Aya. “I can’t tell you what’s inside,” he answered her and adjusted the grip around it. “But my client warned me from an ability user who wants it, too.”
An ability user? Aya looked to the girl. She probably was the same age as herself so what kind of connection did she have with Ranpo’s job? Was she doing it for someone else? Was she an enemy of the client and with that with the ADA? “Is she that ability user?”
With his hand, Ranpo pulled Aya lower, hiding behind the seat, everyone still staring at them. “I only know that she’s an assassin of the Mafia. We have to fix this before anyone else gets in danger.” He looked past Aya to catch a few glimpses of the other passengers. “But all I can do is make them angrier and I need to protect the briefcase.”
So all Ranpo intended to say: It was on her. She had to do something against the assassin girl and saving everyone else present. Her thoughts were running through her mind and before she was able to form an actual plan in her head, Aya already had stood up from her seat next to Ranpo.
In only a matter of seconds, everyone’s attention was on her alone. Everyone was staring at her and it made her freeze on spot.
Could she do that?
“I killed 35 people and I won’t hesitate to kill you, too,” the assassin girl threatened Aya and grabbed the phone hanging down from her neck.
With a sudden moment of panic running through her body because she didn’t know what was up with that phone, she wanted to take a few steps back but crashed against something behind her. While swallowing down the lump in her throat, she turned her head slowly around and looked directly into the face of another man.
He grabbed Aya so she wasn’t able to flee from her spot and due to him being a lot taller, he was easily able to hold her tightly while looking over her towards the assassin. “I’m done with bombing the bus,” he said and held up a switch with a few buttons on it. “So if anyone dares to do move, I’ll bomb the whole bus up.”
The dark shadows on the guy’s face made Aya shiver and her whole body did shake in fear, not being able to use any of her martial art skills in that situation even less even able to move a finger.
Only a clicking sound kicked her back into reality and a look down on her body made her tremble even more. There was a belt around her waist that had a bomb attached with an already started timer, counting down from ten minutes.
She felt helpless.
Not again. Not again. Not again.
Her whole body felt as if she was standing next to it and would scream at it to move, to kick this guy, do anything but standing around like she already had lost the fight. Aya’s eyes wandered towards Ranpo but he didn’t seem like he was a big help either. It would be stupid to let the briefcase unsupervised, too.
For a brief moment, Aya closed her eyes and took in a deep breath, blending out her whole environment. Aya, you're a strong girl, she spoke to herself, it's up to you to save these people here. You can do it.
Yes, I can do it, she thought while opening her eyes again, having grabbed all her courage and it was visible on her face. A determined expression on her face was enough to make the assassin girl lose her expression for a moment.
"Don't let her-!" However, before she was able to finish her warning towards her partner, Aya already had kicked him between his legs and threw him over her shoulder onto the ground.
Hastily the little girl grabbed the switch for the bombs and in panic, she looked at it. Which button would disable the bombs? One of the little ones? The big red one? Or the blue one on the bottom of the device? The longer she stared at it the more panic spread throughout her body.
"Aya, calm down!"
Ranpo's voice kicked her back into reality and she threw the little device towards Ranpo without thinking a second time about it. "Take care of it!"
Before Ranpo could even think of an answer, he already had caught the thing and almost pushed all buttons at once by pressing it against the briefcase he almost had dropped too with that action.
Now to her, Aya thought and swallowed the lump in her throat down. She didn't know if and which ability that girl had while she had no ability to offer; all she could rely on was her fighting skill. She only needed to consider that her enemy was an assassin. Highly likely she could pull off some tricks without having to take care of the passenger’s well-being.
"What do you want with the briefcase?", Aya asked and while she took a step forward, the guy she had thrown over was grabbing her ankle to stop her. However, with a skilled spin of her foot and another kick, she knocked him out. "Jeez, don't touch me anymore you filthy pervert!"
Now!
The next thing Aya realized was throwing herself against the assassin girl, against the front of the bus and grabbing her knife in the process. However, she underestimated the distance and only managed to grab it on the blade, having her palm cut open now. The pain paralyzed her for a moment and she got pushed back by the girl. “Run!”, she screamed at the young man who was a hostage only a moment ago and was free now.
For a moment, he looked at her with a mixed look of confusion and surprise, holding his neck with one hand before he stumbled behind Aya to the backside of the bus.
Aya wasn’t able to follow the young man and trusted him on getting into a safe position for himself. “You met the wrong person to mess with!” Aya pointed at the girl with the knife in her hand, not moving from her position. “I’m a Warrior of Justice and I will make sure you get arrested!”
Without wasting another second, Aya used her martial art skills and with a fast movement, she knocked the knife out of the other girl’s hand and within the next moment, Aya held her down against the front side of the bus, her arm pressed high up against her back. “Ranpo! Call Kunikida and the police for help!”
“That won’t be necessary,” someone said after entering the bus and in surprise, Aya almost let go of the assassin girl in her hands.
“Kunikida!”, she exclaimed relieved and suddenly felt a new wave of feelings. Now everyone would be safe.
Kunikida switched position with Aya and was now the one holding the girl’s arm up against the back only with her being able to stand now. “It’s still Kunikida-san for you,” he scolded Aya as if this was his only concern right now.
From the backdoor of the bus, Yosano entered it. “You didn’t go easy on him,” she said while walking to the man she had knocked out on the floor, helping him up from the ground and holding him in a way, he wasn’t able to escape.
“Sensei!” She was so happy to see her again. Aya didn’t know much about her yet but back then with the case in the subway tunnels, she was amazed by her strong aura and the unbelieveable cool ability.
By now, Ranpo had joined them and he had a slight smile on his face. “We should bring them to the ADA for getting things clear,” he said while looking at Aya. He pressed a button on the switch and deactivated the bomb on Aya’s body.
Aya wanted to ask what was with the police and why they wouldn’t bring them there but then she remembered something Kunikida had told her the day she asked to work here. The ADA takes jobs, the police can’t solve. Was it wrong to feel proud now? She couldn’t stop herself from feeling that because she was able to get them down even her first job was something completely different.
However, these feelings were overwritten when they entered the ADA offices and Yosano helped the guy to sit down on the sofa carefully and Kunikida let go of the assassin girl, too. “What? What are you doing?”, she asked, a bit of panic in her voice.
“We are sorry, Aya-chan.”
Slightly startled by another voice suddenly appearing behind her, she turned around, ready to fight whoever was there before she let her arms fell against her body. It was the black-haired girl from the bus and she now casually walked towards the guy sitting on the sofa, plopping down next to him.
The assassin girl stretched her arms up and looked at the other guy who came with the girl. “I’m sorry, Atsushi,” she apologized to him and got her head gently patted as a response.
Ranpo stretched his arms and fingers in front of his body and opened the briefcase, he had with him for the job before he showed the inside to Aya. It was all filled with different kinds of sweet things like chocolate, marshmallows, ramune or other sugary things.
Aya’s confusion grew more and more and was visible on her face. “What-?”, she couldn’t even form a full question anymore. What was going on here?
“Now, now, someone here has to explain it,” Yosano demanded. She walked towards Aya and inspected the cut on her hand. “It’s not a deep cut but let me bandage it anyway for you,” she offered and did so after Aya had nodded, the only thing she could bring herself to do now. She had forgotten about the pain in her hand if she was honest.
Kunikida stepped out of the group and patted Aya’s head. It was a weird thing to look at to see such a soft action from this man but it felt good at that moment. “You did great in passing the test,” he said to her.
Surprised she looked up, heaving her head leaned back enough to see Kunikida’s face. “Test?” She never heard of having any test or when it even had started.
“Yeah. It’s important to see how far you would go,” Kunikida explained to her. “We needed to know if you could handle a sudden change in the situation with unknown aspects and information.” Then he turned towards Atsushi behind him.
Now the girl stepped next to her. “As a Warrior of Justice you were really cool,” she said with a smile. “I’m Kyouka. It’s nice to meet you.”
“I’m Naomi and this is my brother,” she pointed at the boy next to her. “You were pretty cool with beating him up but I won’t forgive you a second time of calling him a filthy pervert!”
Her brother rubbed the back of his head and sluggish looked at Aya. His head still felt a bit dizzy. “I’m Jun’ichiro, you have an amazing kick.”
“I’m sorry, Aya-chan,” Atsushi apologized to her. “We didn’t mean you evil. It’s just a thing to do with everyone here.”
Aya looked at everyone in the round. She couldn’t catch the right word to describe her feelings right now. Only when someone put an arm around her shoulders, she looked up at the person. “Dazai-”
“Welcome in the ADA, Aya-chan,” Dazai welcomed her with a movement of his arm showing the whole office and everyone who was here.
-
A few times Aya needed to blink before she was back in the present. The memories of that day were so clear like she had lived through it a second time.
“I’m so happy I found this place.”
She grabbed a cookie and ate it with the brightest smile she ever had while everyone around her, her beloved friends, was cheering for her.