“Actually,” Daisuke said, looking warily at the two girls. “Akane has doubts.”
“You read her mind?” Sayuri guessed. “You know you shouldn't do that.”
“I didn't mean to,” Daisuke said, “and I'm not going to pick up any feminine habits from her, am I?”
Yuka scowled. “Just because she-”
“It's still a bad idea,” Hiroshi said quickly. “What did you learn?”
Daisuke nodded. “Akane wants Kuno's head, so she's going along with things for now, but she was also thinking about trying to find stuff out about us in secret.”
“We'll head her off,” Sayuri said, glancing at Hiroshi. “Anything else.”
“Only the obvious. She can't stand Kuno. She's not happy with her looks, but she doesn't want to look easy either. She fancies wearing some vermilion make-up, but she's worried about Ranma's reaction. She-”
“Vermillion?” Yuka said, smiling impishly. “That her word for it, or yours.”
Daisuke started to reply, then stared down at the floor. “I ... I don't know.”
“Just watch it,” Sayuri said gently.
Hiroshi looked sympathetically at his friend, unsure what to say.
Daisuke looked up, a forced smile on his lips. “Anyway, what are we hanging around here for. Let's go spy on Kuno.”
“Not a good idea,” Hiroshi said. “We'd be going in blind.”
Sayuri frowned. “Who do you think is controlling him?”
“Too many suspects,” Hiroshi said. “Starting with half the people who've had to spend five minutes with him.”
“That can't be right,” Yuka said. “He got most of the boys to-”
“Name someone pompous, likes throwing his weight around,” Hiroshi challenged.
“Kuno, but-”
“That's reason enough to pick him. It's a classic revenge fantasy; humiliating the person who used to push you around.”
Daisuke nodded. “You think you're tough, but if I snap my fingers, you'll do whatever I want. I have the power now, ha, ha ha!”
Sayuri looked sideway at him. “That what you were thinking when you got the Master PC?”
“No,” Daisuke said. “I read stop stories.”
“Well, at least we know it's not a girl,” Yuka said. “No girl would let anyone use Ranma as a plaything.”
“Maybe,” Hiroshi said doubtfully. Most girls might not, but using the Master PC clearly brought out the worst in people. “We don't know whether Kuno's master had already taken control of Noboru, or if we got there first. We've got lots of loose ends piling up.”
“Then lets start tying them off,” Sayuri said. “What else is there?”
“There are a few dozen other people under some form of mind control,” Hiroshi said, “and there's the whole true love thing.”
Yuka smiled. “Oh, yes. We need to get between Ukyo and her father.”
Hiroshi nodded, a plan forming. “Two of us can go to Ucchan's and do the groundwork, while the others can go back to the brothel, see what they can find, and work out how we're going to get Noboru's victims out.”
Sayuri smiled at Hiroshi. “Us two again.”
“Luck of the draw,” he replied. After arguing in circles over who should do what, they'd ended up picking at random, not that he minded. Both girls were equally pretty, but they'd spent enough time together since getting the Master PC to make it clear that Sayuri had that indefinable something extra.
Hiroshi smiled. Investigating that should be fun, a chance to get something good out of this whole debacle.
“Just don't get any ideas,” Sayuri said, then looked round. “This the right building? Looks different in daylight.”
Hiroshi nodded, pushing open the door, then followed Sayuri in.
“The whole building's frozen in time,” he reminded her, “but be careful anyway. Kuno's Master might have paid a visit too.”
“You've already explained that, three times,” Sayuri said, then glanced through the reception hatch. “His mother was in the office, right? How many other people are here?”
“In the office doorway, actually,” Hiroshi said. “There were seventeen girls here, on staff, and nine clients.”
Sayuri frowned. “What are we going to do about them?”
Hiroshi shrugged. “Leave them in the street, set to wake up on a time delay. Do you really care about people who'd use a place like this?”
“Not really,” Sayuri said, after a moment, “but I think our priest friend might.“
“True,” Hiroshi said, then hesitated. “We might need to get all the girls to him.”
“And?”
“If they were, you know, with the clients, how are we going to separate them?”
Sayuri stopped and looked at him.
“We'll have to use the Master PC,” she said, after a long moment. “We do need to avoid using it, except in a good cause, but I think that qualifies – and we're definitely not going to do it manually.”
“OK,” Hiroshi said.
“And we're not going to look in those rooms now, either,” Sayuri said firmly. “I don't care what else you might learn in them; that's not something we ought to see.”
“Wouldn't dream of it,” Hiroshi lied.
“So where are we going then?”
Hiroshi pointed to a plain door, painted to blend into the wall. “The girls didn't live in the rooms where they, um, did business. They lived downstairs, in the basement.”
“Isn't that against the earthquake code?”
“Noboru installed it, with the Master PC. I don't think he was much bothered about earthquakes by then. Shall we see what else he put down there?”
See other episodes by Stibbons
(Posted Mon, 31 Jan 2011 19:29)
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