The Takeover

Chapter Eighteen

When they arrived in the Mind Place they were all standing in the middle of Hosu City. It was almost like an anime scene. Flower petals were swirling through the air, it smelled nice. Everything was perfect. They had a job to do, though. There was nothing going to stop them from achieving their goal. Nothing. 

They agreed they needed to search together at first, and once they got a lead split up from there. But first, they needed a lead. They needed technology as well. Hitoshi came up with the idea of theft seeing as how it was all fake, and no one was hurt. 

So, now they had high quality laptops and were hiding from the cops. (Aizawa made sure that the tracker was turned off on all of the laptops first). They checked everything they could on Himiko Toga, and their family. 

Apparently, their remains had been fished out of a river. Toga was nowhere to be found. 

Hitoshi sat in the corner quietly. They wanted to ask him how he was but figured that he was still a bit off from what had happened, and needed some time to work alone. 

In reality, he was looking through the people found tortured and killed throughout Japan. Sure enough, there was a string of people. He followed the string of people and then hacked into the most recent persons information, and found the phone number. (Then tracking his traveling habits). 

He found out where he went and when. He seemed to go to a business building every night from one to three a.m. He had a feeling that was where Toga would be. Now to trick the other people of the group that he found a lead without making them realize that Toga TORTURED AND KILLED MULTIPLE PEOPLE. No big deal. 

He continued to work for a while after he got his lead, trying to figure out how to play it off. He came up with something. Was it going to work? Maybe. Did he have high hopes? Not really. 

"I got something." A wave of relief rolled over him. Aizawa had found something. 

"There was a string of killings in Musutafu. She believes that she killed us, right?" Hitoshi nodded. "She's probably going after whoever did it to make up for what she had done. We should head there and see if we can find out some more." Everyone nodded in agreement. 

"I could look for any enemies of the people that were killed," Nemuri offered.

"And I could look at the coroners reports." Hizashi leaned back against Aizawa's shoulder. They had been sitting next to each other the entire time. 

"I could look at the crime scenes..." Hitoshi tried to seem less eager than he actually was. After all, he had thought that he killed Toga, so the sooner that he could see her, the better. 

"You'd have to go late at night," Aizawa seemed more hesitant about Hitoshi doing something than he was about the others. That made sense, though. Hitoshi- who was only 13 years old- had been through more than many people go through in a lifetime. He was mature enough to do this. 

"I know." 

"Okay, I'll continue looking through the different crimes and see if there is any correlation between the killings and anything else." They packed up their things and started to head through the alleyways and dark corners so that no one sees them. They didn't want to risk being recognized. 

After arriving in Musutafu, they immediately split up. They didn't want to draw too much attention to themselves, so they all pretended to be working people. It was around the time that people would be in coffee shops and libraries either studying, doing homework, or finishing up work that was assigned to them. 

Hitoshi headed to the library, Aizawa going to a cat cafe. Hizashi headed to a Starbucks, and Nemuri went to a local park that had free Wi-Fi. Boy did she love free wi-fi. 

Hitoshi looked more into the building that the man kept going in and out of and found out that the owners of the building had been charged multiple times with several different felonies, but they were all dropped. 

Hours of searching later, he got an anonymous message saying to meet back up at the local Starbucks where the open Mic night was being held. 

Hitoshi was the last one to show up, and they had already ordered their stuff. (Life was so much easier when you could pickpocket.)

In an empty seat was a black coffee. Hitoshi sat down there, and took a sip. 

"Well, turns out that our victims all had one thing in common. They worked at a place called AFO Accounting, except I looked it up, and there was nothing. There were no buildings under that name. It's definitely a cover for something." Nemuri started off. 

Kinda gore-y?

"Well the coroners reports all say that they were all brutally tortured. Nails and skin removed, shapes carved into the body, the whole shibang. Either they were tortured for information, or someone had a really big grudge." 

You good.

"There weren't any other related crimes. It was as if someone showed up randomly and started to kill people."

Yeah, Toga, your daughter. 

Hitoshi decided to keep that part to himself. 

So, then they rented a motel to stay at. (Which they should have done in the first place, but that's not really the point). Once they had all settled in, Hitoshi immediately left, and headed to the crime scene, took pictures, then headed to the building that the man frequently went to.

He stayed in the shadows, and anyone who saw him was brainwashed to forget it. He was doing good when it came to the stealth department, so all he needed to do was find Toga, which was going to be difficult, seeing as how she also had training when it came to stealth.

He had to make a subtle sign that only Toga would see. Either that or figure out where Toga was going. This is going to be a long night. 

-------------------------

Jin was tired. He was tired of having to wear his mask. He was the stupid walls that he was stuck staring at. No matter which side of him you asked they would both agree that they hated being stuck there. 

He was walking through the halls again, trying to find any difference, and arguing with himself. It was better when he wore his mask. It was more having a conversation with himself than anything. So, he talked. 

"What's that?  There's no point in asking, there's no one to answer you. I was simply voicing my thoughts. No one cares."

Jin walked up to the door, that he was sure was not there previously, and watched it open up. 

"Those doors are very fancy.  They are stupid, why would you need a self-opening door. You have arms! It's faster. It's stupider."

He took a step inside to see three people strapped to chairs and a child soaked in the purple liquid. There were five more pods in the room. 

Jin had known there were some strange things going on, but had never questioned them. Now he needed to know. What is going on around here?

Sorry if I messed up Twice. Twice is a difficult character to write and I have been pushing it off for this exact reason. If there are any notes you have please let me know. All constructive criticism is welcomed. :)