Around Tokyo -- Weds Afternoon/Evening -- 14 October

[dojima_hime]

It had started out like any other Wednesday morning at the STN:J, complete with a missing Dōjima, who hadn't even bothered to show up for last night's Hunt. Sakaki was still sulking, much to Karasuma's amusement and frustration, and morale around the office was decidedly low, Kate's absence hanging over them like a shadow.

The sun was high in the late morning sky by the time a familiar shadow crossed the gatekeeper's booth...

	"Ohaiyo." "Ohaiyo?'" The gatekeeper turned around from the young guest he'd been observing, a look of horror crossing his face as he realized who the drooping figure was. "Miss Dōjima! Do you have any idea what time it is?" "Who's that?" Dōjima clearly couldn't care less what time it was, she was busy staring blearily over his shoulder. "Eh?" He glanced over his shoulder at the girl he'd been speaking with moments ago. "Oh, she's here to see Amon, When you go up could you tell him she's here?" "So, that's the kind of girl Amon goes for..." she drawled, a spark of mischief entering her face. She knew it wasn't true -- most likely, since Tōko would kill him -- but still, Dōjima had a reputation for salacious gossip to maintain, and this kid fit the bill. "WHAT are you talking about?" The Gatekeeper was clearly torn; get Dōjima out of here before she traumatized the kid, or stay with the girl? In the end, shoving Dōjima towards the elevator won out. "Come on, if you don't hurry up, the Chief will get mad at you again!" "I know, I know, stop rushing me!" she whined, batting him away before waving at the intrigued teen. "Nice to meet you! Don't make Amon make you wait too long, nā?"
	Stepping out of the elevator, however, she got another surprise. "Dōjima, the Chief is in a foul mood!" Haruto warned with a wink as he brushed past her, black coat billowing behind behind him "You never learn!" Karasuma chimed in, shaking her head at Dōjima. Both Hunters were clearly on their way out on a mission, the tell-tale shape of an Orbo gun visible under their Hunter greatcoats. "Go do your best!" she cheered, spinning about and giving them a cheery wave. "Dōjima!" Dōjima winced, not bothering to turn around at the yelling. "Do you have any idea what time -- Hattori, phone!" "Oh, that's the gatekeeper calling up about Amon's girlfriend. I bet she's so obsessed with him she followed him here... poor kid," she sighed, grinning internally as the two men boggled at her. "She's been waiting downstairs, all morning, you know. It's so cruel of him to treat her like this..." Sometimes, being an undercover spygirl was just plain fun. Usually when it involved gossip.
	Dōjima had been tormenting Michael. It was a time-honored past-time when she was in the office; sneaking up on the boy and seeing if she could startle him. One of these days, she'd make him spit coffee out his nose. In fact, she was mid-torment when there was a stern 'ahem' from above them, and the Hunter and the Prisoner looked up to see their boss practically twitching at them. "What do you two think you're doing? The new Hunter went missing at the airport! At hectic times like this -- " "-- Why do Hunters cause nothing but trouble?" Dōjima recited, perfectly in-time with the Chief's rant, laying her head on her hands. Kosaka's forehead twitched. "For crying out loud, only someone without a lick of sense would wander off without waiting to be picked up! The thought of getting another one of THOSE -- " and the look he shot Dōjima was pointed -- "really makes me depressed. Don't you think so, Hattori?" "Well, yes, but I'm sure she had a reason..." "She's only fifteen! What reason could she possibly have?!" Kosaka exploded, and Dojima actually opened an eye in interest. "A girl who's barely out of her diapers is going to be hanging around here!" "A girl?" Dōjima waited for him to make the connection. Michael looked at her. Hattori looked at her, then the Chief. The Chief got a slow look of horror on his face before turning and running out of the room. Oh, today was turning out just fantastic.
	"Yes. I see. Thank you." Zaizen hung up the phone, looking at Kosaka with a mixture of amusement and annoyance. "It would appear that the girl who was here was the one we're looking for." "I'm terribly sorry about the mix-up, sir. I'll have Dōjima go look for her at once "NANI?" The glare Yurika leveled Kosaka had been known to wilt lesser men. "Why me?" "This all started when -- " "-- No, we know where she is. I'll go pick her up," Zaizen interrupted. "Not at all, sir. I wouldn't dream of wasting your time, Administrator. I'll send Dōjima. In the first place, all she does is loaf around the office with nothing to do - " "HEY!" "Yes, you have a point." Zaizen's smile was chilly, and Yurika was torn between joy at being able to spy on him directly, and utter terror of the man. "I'll take Dōjima with me."
	They stood outside the warehouse, and Dōjima watched as the girl -- Robin -- stopped, looking down at the ground. "An Ogham Wheel," she said, and Yurika recognized the markings from Garrett-sensei's classes, her heart sinking as she read the meaning in it at the same time Robin did. "The runes of Hagal's Eight...but it's not right." Robin bent to sniff the ward, and Dōjima started towards her. "Hey," she called, "What -- " Zaizen's hand descended to Dōjima's shoulder, and Yurika turned in surprise, looking at her boss. "Why don't we let her show us how a real Craft Master works in her element; how they do it back in their homeland."
	The warehouse was burning. The small girl had simply narrowed her eyes, and fire had bloomed forth, her Craft singing out to stop the Witch and save Amon. It had taken all of Yurika's willpower not to join the other Hunters with her Orbo gun drawn, but that wasn't something that Dōjima would do unless ordered. So she had hung back, guarding Zaizen, as much as it had rankled her to do so. Karasuma was busy bonding with their new recruit, even as the Factory moved in to extinguish the fire and secure the Witch, so it left Dōjima at loose ends. Wandering the grounds and thinking. Something was bothering Yurika about the whole thing, although she couldn't quite put her finger on it. Zaizen had to have known that a replacement Hunter was arriving. The man had sources to rival Father Juliano's network, and Headquarters wouldn't send one of their own without all due pomp and circumstance. Especially not a powerful Craft user like Robin Sena that was rumored to have been trained by Father Juliano himself. That meant there were two possibilities in play here: Yurika was being watched, and the Sena girl was holding the other end of the leash. Or elements of Headquarters that supported Zaizen were moving against the good Father and the Intelligence Division, and were getting his apprentices out of the way before they made their move. Things were definately about to get interesting. About damn time.

[OOC: And so starts the televised canon, albeit a few months later than I planned. Sections of dialogue shamelessly cribbed from 1.01 Replacement. Totally open for phonecalls, texts, etc.]

Comments

[withoutverona]

At home, Romeo had gotten too frustrated with his accounting textbook to look at it for another second, and so was taking a much-deserved meta Mario Karts break.

This meant that when Dojima got home, she was greeted by a blue streak of archaic and Japanese profanity -- broken by a smile.

"Good e'en," Romeo said, breaking the smile to go back to the game. "How was your day?"

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"About the same as yours sounds like it's going," she teased, grin not quite reaching her eyes as she kicked off her shoes and padded towards the couch. "Interesting, that's for sure."

[withoutverona]

Romeo hesitated, but paused the game and turned toward her. Interesting from Yurika tended to mean something wasn't quite right.

"What happened?"

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"I ended up on a Hunt with Zaizen of all people, for one." The face Yurika made was distinctly disgruntled with this turn of events. "I couldn't even find an excuse to ditch him long enough to search his car!"

[withoutverona]

Romeo groaned. "Did he shout at you the entire time?"

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"No, he's got the Chief to do the yelling for him. I don't think I've ever seen Zaizen angry, honestly," she confessed. "Not even when Tōko and I were little. He'll get very cold and quiet, but he doesn't explode like other people do." It was what made the man so very dangerous.

"But you haven't even heard the best part yet. The reason I was out with him? We've got a new Hunter from Headquarters -- totally without warning, I mean -- and she'd wandered off."

[withoutverona]

"She wandered off?" Romeo echoed. "On her first day at a new job, no less."

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Well, no one knew she was coming, so she couldn't get past security, and she never said what she was there for! Apparently, she had just been told to ask for Amon, and never breathed a word to the gatekeeper that she was a Hunter. So she wandered off to get some lunch after sitting down there all morning."

"Poor kid," she sighed. "She's fifteen. She didn't know any better."

[withoutverona]

"Fifteen?" Romeo echoed. "I shouldn't be one to talk, but -- that seems absurdly young, for what you do. Poor girl."

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"She's a Craft-user. Pyromancer, actually, and surprisingly meek for having a fire power," Yurika laughed. "Kid dresses all in black, is probably skinner than Triela, and dresses like a nun."

"Not to mention quiet as a mouse, completely serious about everything, and confused as hell by the weirdos she's going to be working with at the STN:J."

[withoutverona]

"Pyromancer," Romeo echoed. "If I had to have a power, that would be one I'd pick. Is she completely at sea with all of it?"

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Not exactly." Yurika hesitated a moment, then; "She's from Headquarters, and is apparently highly respected by the Hunters there. She might be young, but she's good."

"And she's one of Father Juliano's Hunter protégés."

[withoutverona]

"And she still lacks sense enough to say, 'I know Father Juliano, let me upstairs,' " Romeo pointed out, but there was respect mixed with his skepticism.

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Maybe she has the sense to know that Headquarters and the Administrator do not always see eye-to-eye, and didn't want to start out on the wrong foot," Yurika mused. "Or maybe she's just fifteen, and too used to being a good little nun to think of something like that."

"Gothic Victorian nun with pigtails. No joke."

[withoutverona]

"She could be from Verona, then," Romeo decided. "Can I meet her, or would a Gaijin kobito be too much of a shock?"

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Maybe she's a secret Montague, she is from Italy and is kinda intense," Yurika teased. "Give her a few days to adjust to dealing with the rest of the clowns at the office, and maybe we take her out to dinner next week or something? She's living with Tōko for now, so it would be easy enough to abduct her for an evening."

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Maybe she's a secret Montague, she is from Italy and is kinda intense," Yurika teased.

"Give her a few days to adjust to dealing with the rest of the clowns at the office, and maybe we take her out to dinner next week or something? She's living with Tōko for now, so it would be easy enough to abduct her for an evening."

[withoutverona]

"I would like that," Romeo said. "She might be lonely. I would be, in her spot." He smiled. "Toko too?"

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Tōko too, if she promises not to bring Amon," she replied, making a face. "I don't get what she sees in him."

[withoutverona]

"He's handsome and doesn't say much," Romeo shrugged. "Though I don't care for him either. I don't know if he can smile; I've never seen it."