***
By lunchtime the next day, Eiichi decided to find a different place out of sight of the other students, where that stubborn photo girl wouldn’t find him.
He was just on his way out, trudging through the mundane thoughts of the day.
“There you are!”
“Ah!”
She had managed to sneak up on him from out of the crowd. A couple of students stared, noticing he was being approached by someone who wasn’t a sensei, or hall monitor, or even angry with him.
“I thought I might find you here.”
And just as well, there was Noda with her perky attitude.
“Find me here? Are you clairvoyant or something?” It wouldn’t be so strange to him if she said yes.
“I told you, I’m a photographer, so I know this school in and out like the back of my hand. You can’t escape from me.” She ended this with a devious grin.
He faced her lackadaisically. “Ah yeah, fly on the wall and all that.”
“Ya know...I’m starting to get the feeling you don’t like me too much.”
“I don’t like anyone.”
He was kind of surprised she could be so light hearted, considering her mood. She was emitting an aura of excitement, but there was concern as well.
“Hm...So anyhoo, I went back to the place where you stomped that guy out.”
Now he was a little worried. “And why did you do that?”
“Take a look at these.”
Just like the day before, Noda had her camera on her. She presented the screen on the back and began flipping through a set of images by the clicking of a rotator switch.
She had definitely gone back to the spot, but what was different about it from the day before was that it was now more populated than she had explained.
“Is this the door you were talking about?” Eiichi asked.
“Yes it is, I took it while hiding in the trees just inside the fence. See how they’re all grouped around it like that?”
The image was of the back of the technology building that was adjacent to the main building. The building was a rough gray color and there was a pair of gray metal doors. In the image, there were three male figures, all wearing Aki Guro uniforms, and one of them was the one who attacked Noda. He could see the bruising on the guy’s face from when he worked him over.
“So you took a picture of three guys standing around a door. I don’t think they have an award for that.”
Noda gave him a dull glance before continuing. “They were like that for hours. I waited.”
“Wow, you’re pretty dedicated. Well, now that I look at it, they don’t seem like the type of guys that stand around doors often, maybe they’re training for an event. Standing around doors has been getting pretty popular.”
Noda lowered the camera. “Alright, could you stop the wise ass act for like five minutes and hear me out? This could be serious.”
“Okay, fine! But I don’t know what you’re on about with this. Get to the point.”
“What I’m saying is, I think they’re hiding something. Look, that’s the guy you beat up.”
“You think they’re hiding something in that room?”
“Yeah, the entire time none of them left. And then see here?”
She flipped through the images to several of a fourth student appearing and joining the three. He had a purple beanie and was the only one toting a backpack.
“Yeah?”
“That guy with the backpack showed up with a key. He went inside with one of them. They came back out ten minutes later, and then they all walked off.”
Eiichi peered closer at the photos.
“Now that is suspicious...” he muttered.
Noda continued in her wary excitement, “If one of them hadn’t attacked me, I wouldn’t have thought much of it, but this is just too bizarre.”
Eiichi leaned back, “Alright, well, you did a good job there photo girl, now all you have to do is report it to the school.”
“Actually, I was thinking we should check it out.”
“Ha! Why bother? The school can sort it out, it’s their problem.” With the wave of a hand, he began walking away.
Noda padded up next to him. “Oh come on, I thought you were a tough guy. These images aren’t enough to catch someone’s attention, they look like they’re just running an errand or something. We need to take a closer look.”
“Hey, if it’s something happening on school campus, they should be able to handle it.”
“Come on, where’s you sense of adventure? You’re not seriously going to wimp out on me.”
“You can say whatever you want about me, I couldn’t give a damn.”
“I’m just asking you to come take a look.”
“Call the cops or something. Just leave me out of it.”
Noda stopped following, and let him continue ahead.
“Fine, I’ll just go alone.”
This got him to stop.
She was just looking for trouble! He almost suspected her of egging that guy on to attack her!
‘Hey fatso! Yeah you! I can’t take any pictures with your lard ass in the way!…Ah! Help! Somebody save me~!’
But he knew better.
Eiichi could hold his own in a conflict, but he wasn’t the type to go walking down dark alleys waiting to get mugged, and he definitely wasn’t about to let her do it.
He turned around and walked right up to her. “Oh, oh no you’re not.”
Noda looked right back at him with a straight expression that was just a little too troublesome for his liking. “What, are you gonna’ stop me?”
“You went back there alone and managed to keep out of sight because you knew there was a threat. Now you want to go back there again? What will you do if you get caught, again?”
“That’s why I asked you to come. If there are any guys there, I have you as my muscle.”
His face grew a dull look. “I’m flattered...”
“Come on, we’re just going to take another quick look and see if we can sniff out anything.”
And with that, Noda was off, coaxing him along to the beat of her own drum.
With a roll of his eyes, and feeling rather tired, Eiichi proceeded forward. “Fine...”
They took a peek around first, to make sure the area was clear. Seeing no one, Noda and Eiichi stepped out into the open and up to the back door.
It was a plain, old pair of metal doors, with a concrete foot pad at its base, and other than that, there wasn’t much else to be seen. The remaining area was also concrete sidewalk, with a nearby recycle dumpster. Eiichi figured Noda wanted to scope it out first, just in case there had been something she missed.
“Not really much to see,” she admitted, echoing his very thoughts.
Eiichi stood by, hands in his pockets. “Nope, just the empty backside of a school. Satisfied?”
Noda craned her head and looked near the roof.
“No security cameras.”
The back of the school wasn’t known for having heavy surveillance, another reason why Eiichi chose it for his smoke breaks.
Noda placed her hands on both knobs and gave them a jiggle and then a tug.
“It’s locked. And this is a faculty only exit, it’s used mainly by maintenance.”
“So, they’re stealing cleaning supplies. Not much of a crime if you ask me. Although, they can be used to make a lot of things...” He could remember watching a documentary on what was needed to cook certain illegal substances.
“Let’s head to the front and see if we can get inside.”
Just then, he could feel a particular kind of conniving mentality slowly approaching them from behind.
Eiichi muttered a warning to Noda. “We’ve got company...”
“Hey there, Kozuka,” a booming voice sounded from behind them.
“Ah shit...” Eiichi snarled.
Noda looked around frantically for a moment, “Wait, who’s Kozuka!?”
Noda and Eiic
hi turned to find three thuggish looking types standing roughly eight feet from them. Two of them had been featured in Noda’s photos, and all three had a baseball bat in hand.
The largest one, the one who had spoken, stood between the other two, his bat slung over his shoulder. “My boy here tells me you roughed him up pretty good defending your girlfriend there.”
The punk from earlier stood next to the leader, sporting the shiner and bruised jawline Eiichi had administered.
Eiichi could feel Noda’s unease giving him a slight throbbing, and she looked to him.
“Who are they?”
Eiichi spoke, not caring if the other three heard what he had to say. “That’s Okanaya Mito. A brainless, back stabbing, jackass son of a deadbeat father if I ever knew one. He was busted as a strong arm for a small time gambling ring somewhere uptown about a year ago. He did half a year in a juvenile pin. I gotta’ say, I didn’t miss ‘em.”
And then he raised his voice to Okanaya. “Yeah, that looks like my handiwork. What of it?”
“Well the whole situation sounds pretty backwards if you ask me. He was only sayin’ hello. Maybe you oughta’ apologize to ‘em. Send the girl over and all is forgiven.”
Eiichi could sense this really sent shivers through Noda’s frame.
“Okanaya, you’re about as dumb as you look. I wouldn’t believe half a word from your butt buddies over there, even if I had to risk everything I hold dear.”
Noda hissed at Eiichi, “Don’t make them angry!”
“It’s a little late for that…”
‘Though they are emitting a lot of cautiousness. They are hiding something. Their conniving is so invasive, suddenly I feel like I need a shower.’
“If that’s how you feel, then I guess this isn’t gonna’ end well for you,” Okanaya said.
Eiichi felt both Noda and himself grow tense. This was exactly the kind of trouble he wanted to avoid, but nooo~, she wanted to play sleuth.
Noda fidgeted. “Well then, do your thing.”
Eiichi heaved a sigh and stepped forward. He took his stance and raised his half curled fists before his face.
Then, before the other three could move, he whipped around, grabbed Noda’s wrist, and bolted off in the direction they came, hoping she wouldn’t trip over herself.
“Run!”
“What!?” Noda shrieked.
He heard Okanaya shout from behind, “Get back here!”
They cut back into the spacing of buildings, the three armed thugs tailing just twenty feet behind. Eiichi pushed forward in a sprint, still hoping the force from him tugging on Noda wouldn’t make her trip, or else he’d have to go back for her and then they’d really be in trouble. Still, she picked up her legs and managed to keep up. He had to get them to a densely populated part of the school, there was no way Okanaya and his friends would follow after that.
He could hear Noda nagging from behind him as he continued to tug on her arm. “I thought you were a fighter! What about bravery and all that!?”
“Bravery doesn’t amount to much when you’ve been sent to the hospital by three guys with baseball bats!”
They cut around a building and Eiichi noticed a set of flower beds near an awning that were just high enough to shield them both.
“Here!”
A few moments later, footsteps could be heard in the area. They passed the flower beds, but stopped.
“Lost ‘em. Spread out! They couldn’t have gotten far!”
The footfalls continued forward and faded.
Noda and Eiichi were face to face, both hunched down over their knees, as low as they could get.
Eiichi focused hard on their general area, trying to act as a radar. Noda’s tension was causing him a headache as she was doing her best to keep her breathing silent, but he had to focus beyond that and make sure none of them stayed behind to search.
“Okay...I think they’re gone.”
Their heads popped up from behind the bed and scanned the area. Only two other students had been nearby to witness the chase, but they were far away, directly across the open area.
“What was that!?” Noda suddenly flared at him.
“Sh!”
She swung her fists above her head. “I thought you were going to pummel them!”
Eiichi pointed a finger. “Hey, I volunteered to be your guard, I didn’t say I was frickin’ Bruce Lee! I coulda’ been killed!”
Suddenly she lowered her arms, and her output, though still curious, became very cautious and afraid, her voice dimming to a mutter.
“Wait a minute...are you Eiichi Kozuka?” she pointed.
“What...”
“Kozuka, are you thee Eiichi Kozuka?”
“I figured people knew about me, but damn.”
“So that’s why you wouldn’t give me your name...”
“What is?”
She clammed up, averting her eyes while pressing her index fingers together, “Well...let’s just say some of the things I’ve heard about you haven’t been something you want to put on a resume...”
“I can only imagine...” Eiichi frowned.
“Like how you fake headaches, you’re a weirdo, you’re always trying to get pity from students, get money from the school...”
“Okay! You don’t have to list them out, I’ve heard it all before.”
She claimed to know a lot about the school, but how could she miss that he was the infamous ‘Hypochondriac of Aki Guro High’? She seemed to latch on to anything that had a story to it, what made her skip that one? Not that he was complaining...
Given the irate outbursts they had exchanged, Eiichi figured if Okanaya and his guys had still been in the area, they would have doubled back by now.
“Let’s find a place where there’s more people.”
They stood and Eiichi proceeded to lead, keeping an eye out in case their pursuers returned.
“What was that all about? They responded pretty extremely,” Noda asked.
“They definitely don’t want anyone going near that area. They’re hiding something alright.”
“Maybe we should alert the school.”
“Nah, these guys have a plan. Like I said, Okanaya isn’t very smart, but he works with people that are. They know we’ve been poking around now, so they’ve probably already started covering things up in case we did say anything. As far as I know, Okanaya doesn’t attend our school, and I don’t remember seeing any of those guys around. I wonder where they got those uniforms.”
That situation had been too close for comfort, and he could see now that whatever was going on was bigger than a simple dispute or a lie. Considering had they narrowly escaped certain agony, it could be possible whatever was going on would prove just as bad for anyone else who came across what Okanaya was trying to pull off.
Eiichi wasn’t one to get mixed up in other people’s business, but it just didn’t feel right for him to see someone’s life in danger and just let it slide. Okanaya knew him, and there was no telling what might happen to him or this girl, if he succeeded. Eiichi just hoped she’d be willing to go along with what he had in mind.
“So what do you think we should do?”
“We go with your original plan. We need to find out what’s so important about that room.”
Noda stepped closer, an uneasy humility in her voice. “Hey-hey, I know I might’ve given you a hard time about not wanting to come with, but you shouldn’t get all heroic on me now. This is really serious.”
“Yup, serious enough they were willing to give me a fractured skull over it, and do who knows what to you.”
“Don’t say it like that! It gives me the creeps!” Noda squealed, clutching her arms against her chest. “Do you really have to be so blunt!?”
“If it’s serious enough for them to chase us off like that, I don’t want them to be caught prematurely and wind up with just a slap on the wrist.”
“Um, okay...When do you suppose we should do this...”
“They’
re probably only running the low end of their operations during the day. I suggest we wait until later tonight and come back for another look. That may be when things get the liveliest. I need you and your camera. If you can get pictures of that, that should be enough. What say you?”
“I suppose I can sneak out of my room once everyone’s asleep. Um...how is it that you know all this stuff?”
“Let’s just say I’m around their kind enough.”
They had a few minutes of lunchtime left, so they took advantage to grab what they could and find a nicely populated place to eat outside.
Eiichi was surprised at how Noda was holding up, for a girl that had been dangerously taken out of her normal day to day. This day as well had been rather eventful, but Eiichi was even more thrown off to find himself suddenly eating lunch with another person, and a girl of all things.
“Ya know, you’re not all that much like the rumors say.”
“Hm? How’s aht?” Eiichi spoke with a mouthful of the leftovers from Torio’s masterpiece the night before.
Noda looked at him, the tips of her hashi on her lips after taking a bite of salmon, “People keep saying you fake your headaches, but it doesn’t seem like you’ve faked anything since I’ve met you, except for your name. You’re actually brutally honest. Do you really get migraines sometimes?”
‘Her curiosity is getting ridiculous. She truly has that photographer mindset.’
Right here Eiichi realized, since meeting Noda, he hadn’t come under much mental turmoil around her. It was only that on occasion, her hyperactive brain waves could give him the spins, and that she had already put his life in danger once, which he supposed was some kind of turmoil. But as long as he didn’t insult her passion, he was mostly in the clear. She wasn’t of a depressed or angry spirit, and in fact, her general attitude had been a nice escape from the usual.
“That’s a personal matter. Lots of people get migraines all the time,” he said, poking his rice.
“Yeah, but I’ve heard that you’ve been to the infirmary so many times, everybody there knows you by name.”
“It happens. Could we stop making this about me?”
“Hm...okay. Um, so how do you know that Okanaya guy?”
“Back when I was in junior high, he used to run with a group of guys. They would come through my neighborhood and terrorize students on their way home, tag up some places, slash tires, just stupid kid stuff. I got into it with them a couple times.”
“Wow, so I guess you got to know each other in a way.”
“Yeah. He went to my school for a while, and then was expelled. I don’t think Okanaya ever really stayed in any one school, but I’m pretty sure in middle school he was a second year when I was a first year, which would make him old enough to be a third year now. He disappeared some time before I started high school, which must mean he got into some heavier stuff around that time.”
“Then this is a chance to see just what he’s gotten into. Wanna go over the plan again?”
“Sure.” Eiichi set his bento down. “So Okanaya has to be working with someone who’s set this whole thing up.”
“I looked up the school map on my phone. We may not have to check the room.” Noda removed her smartphone and presented the screen. “That building is the technology building, my clubs sometimes use it for editing the newspaper app and yearbook files. That door does lead to a maintenance room, but see these two rooms here, that’s the computer science room and the other one is a room for storing chemistry supplies. My best guess is that they’re stealing computers and equipment from there. The other day I thought I heard some sensei talking about a few boxes of brand new software going missing.”
“Nice job, if that’s the case, we can get pictures of them leaving with the stolen goods. If they’re selling it, they probably don’t want to split the profit too much. I’d imagine they have roughly less than ten guys working with them on this. You said there was a fourth guy that showed up, right?”
“Right.”
“So that might be all they’re working with during the day to keep a low profile. They’re probably just looking around and taking minor things during the day, and planning to steal the larger stuff at night.”
“We may not have much time then.” Noda pointed her hashi at him.
“What do you mean?”
“You said that they might back off because of the two times we’ve been caught.”
“Yeah?”
“Tonight could be the last night, if they are doing anything.”
“You could be right. If they’re looking to steal a lot of stuff from the school, they might have been working at it for a few days and waiting for the right time to move everything. Once it’s done, they’ll never be heard from again.”
Eiichi placed the lid back on his bento and stood. “Okay, let’s meet outside the burger place a block from here. I’ll send you a text when I’m ready to head out and you let me know when you’re ready to move as well.”
“Gotcha.”
Then he suddenly remembered something.
“And you...” He turned and pointed at Noda, causing her eyes to widen and fixate on his index with confusion.
“Wear something black.”
Eiichi P.I., Vol. 1 Page 6
