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saitoh_hajime) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
gumi_reloaded2012-04-16 03:12 pm
Explanations and Explorations
Time: Late Afternoon - Early Evening
Location: New Meiji Department of Justice (Police Wing, Armory, Shooting Range)
Characters, NPC, Saitoh, Tokio
“YOU HAVE ACCESSED THE NEW MEIJI POLICE DEPARTMENT ANSWERING SYSTEM. PLEASE LISTEN TO THE FOLLOWING OPTIONS BEFORE MAKING YOUR SELECTION.”
Saitoh took an impatient drag on his cigarette and listened.
“TO CHANGE YOUR PERSONAL GREETING, PLEASE PRESS 1. TO LISTEN TO YOUR PERSONAL GREETING, PLEASE PRESS 2. TO FORWARD CALLS, PLEASE PRESS 3. TO ACCEPT FORWARDED CALLS, PLEASE PRESS 4. TO FORWARD A CALL TO A FORWARDED NUMBER, PLEASE PRESS 5.”
Saitoh swore, and tried to resist the urge to throw his office phone out the window, wishing that they would stop changing the options every few weeks.
“TO CHANGE YOUR RINGTONE, PLEASE PRESS 6, TO LISTEN TO AVAILABLE RING TONES, PLEASE PRESS 7. TO REQUEST A CUSTOM RING TONE FOR ALL FORWARDED CALLS PLEASE PRESS 8”
Exhaling smoke out of his nostrils in a murderous sounding snort, Saitoh slammed the phone down onto the charger with enough force that his terminal and desk shook.
“Yorimoto!”
Saitoh’s new secretary jumped in his seat, knocked over a picture of his mother and her passel of pugs, and then tried to give his commanding officer a smart, manly sort of salute. “Yes, Saitoh-sama!” Newly promoted from the office accounting pool, Yorimoto Katsume was a twitchy little ferret of a man, one whom Saitoh suspected had an unholy fixation with fountain pens. “How may I provide you with assistance, Sir!”
(Holy freaking hell…) Saitoh gave his newest secretary a long measured look. “What is the prompt on the automated phone system so I can listen to my messages?”
“That’s easy, Sir! It’s option 18. Would you like me to assist you in button pressing, Saitoh-sama?” Yorimoto said hopefully, eager to prove his worth.
“No.” Saitoh pinched the bridge of his narrow nose and prayed for patience, since his preferred course of action, that being strangling his secretary and shoving the body where the sun didn’t shine was generally speaking, frowned upon.
“Oh,” Yorimoto’s face fell. “Well, if you have any trouble, please know that you can safely rely on me to provide you with timely assistance.”
Saitoh pinched harder, reminding himself that slaying evil instantly was not applicable to the mentally deficient, no matter how annoying they might be, “I will keep that in mind.”
“Oh, and if you are wondering about that voicemail you received fifteen minutes ago, the transcript is on your desk.”
Saitoh glanced down at his desk and saw that there was in fact, a memo near his cigarette ash covered keyboard. (Unlike most people, he preferred typing rather than relying on voice recognition software) He frowned (due mostly to the smiley face stamp that was by Yorimoto’s name) and began reading.
MEMO:
To: Captain H. Saitoh
From: Office Secretary K. Yorimoto (recently promoted)
Subject: Voicemail from O. Murakami, DOJ (13:35:05)
Dear Captain Saitoh-sama,
Here is the transcript of a voicemail you received from one O. Murakami. Please review and let me know if you need any further assistance in this, or any other matter.
With the most profound respect that you could ever imagine,
K. Yorimoto ^__^
Start Message
“Hello, this is a message for Captain Saitoh-san. This is Oharu Murakami. I’m not sure if you remember me, but I was the secretary to the late Fujita Hiroshi? Yes, well… I am now working for Takagi Tokio, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney. She asked me to call and let you know that she will be stopping by your office to return an item that you lent her the other day and that you should anticipate her arrival no later than 15:30….
Saitoh-san, I heard about your injuries sustained in the line of duty. I hope that you will make a speedy recovery and that your boys, bless their hearts, are safe and well. If you have any questions, or can’t speak with Takagi-san during this time, please call me directly or send an email so that I can reschedule.
Warmest Regards,
O. Murakami”
End Message.
.
no subject
“And this…whatever this ends up being…it is not madness.”
As soon as he touched her shoulder, she felt that same energy from yesterday, like a shock of static electricity that made you move forward, not jump back. Instinctively, she reached over with her other hand and brought it up to cover the one that he’d rested on her shoulder, giving it a little squeeze before dropping her hand down again. She hoped that he would leave his hand where it was, at least for a few moments more.
So he felt it too. She thought he might have from a few of his reactions yesterday at the diner. Now he was admitting it outright without hesitation.
“I would know the difference, because I have…because I know all too well what it is like to fall into such a state, and I give you my word, that I would tell you honestly if I thought ourselves compromised.”
Her eyes widened when he admitted to falling into madness. Her gut wrenched. Of course, it had to be when Yaso was killed so brutally. Her heart ached for him and she was sure that the emotion she felt was written on her face. A warm breeze on her back made her want to fold him into her arms, but she didn’t, because she had no right to do so, not yet.
After opening up to her like he did, he really deserved to know the truth. Somehow in the deep recesses of her mind she *knew* that this man did not take lightly to whom he would reveal his inner thoughts and feelings. ‘No’, she thought, ‘Hajime is a very private man, but not to me’. That thought shook her to her core. Her instincts were telling her that he *needed* to hear more from her.
She knew he’d said that if she was crazy, then he was, too. There was no way that she would doubt his sincerity, there was no way she *could* doubt his sincerity. ‘He had been nothing but sincere for almost 41 years’, something inside her echoed.
At first she tried not to look at him, at his strong face and gorgeous amber-eyes, but her own eyes, as her hands did the day before, moved of their own accord, looking directly at him. She knew she had ‘hope’ written all over her face. Hope that he would accept what she said, and help her to understand what it meant. She was so glad that he kept his hand on her shoulder, steadying her, giving her the support she needed right now.
“My hands,” she paused, “yesterday, they just…..moved by themselves…..there was no way I could control them, and frankly, at the time I didn’t want to.” There she’d said it. Laid bare the reality she found so confusing.
“When I touched you, I felt like I *knew* you; you felt so *familiar* to me, and I knew that I had never laid eyes on you before. The strangest thing was that I didn’t want to let you go. It was like I would not be able to stand the loss,” …again…she added to herself. Regardless of what he said, she was sure that *she* had to be going mad. What other explanation was there?
She paused, chewing on her lower lip slightly, not wanting to get her secretary in trouble for divulging so much, but she had started this, and she had the feeling that *he* would want her to finish.
“Murakami-san told me a little bit about what happened to your family, and she told me that you had little boys. In my heart I somehow knew that you had *three* of them, so I was very surprised when she said you only had two. I didn’t dare say anything to her at the time.” And I probably shouldn’t have told this to you, either. She hoped that he would give her some sort of sign that he did not think her outrageously out of line to divulge her thoughts and feelings to him. After all, she’d only first seen him about 24 hours ago, hadn’t she?