Chapter 1 - Espionage

This chapter is dedicated to fathiha731 for being one of my awesome readers! Happy reading! :)

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Izumi pov: (name means fountain or spring)

"Order up! Two cappuccinos and one iced tea!" I called out from behind the service counter and placed a tray with beverages on it to be taken away.

One of the three customers seated at one of the tables in the cafe got up with a smile and came to the counter to take the tray with the drinks they had ordered. He thanked me, which I returned with a smile, and walked back to his table. I turned around to the cappuccino machine and leaned forward a bit with my hands on the counter.

"Hey Obachan, how much longer am I supposed to work here? Is the person in question even going to come here?" I asked in a low voice to make sure that no one in the cafe heard me.

"What are you complaining for? You're the one who accepted the job saying that the pay was good." Obachan, a rather short tempered woman in her early thirties named Murasaki Rumiko, spoke from the other side through the tiny ear piece I had in my left ear.

"I know I said that but how long am I supposed to work at this cafe? It's so boring here, unlike how it is with Shuta san, and the pay is terrible! I've been here a week but the person the client wants us to find out about hasn't turned up even once! I'm starting to wonder if he's even going to come here. Besides....this wig is really starting to make my head itch." I said annoyed and scratched the side of my head where the wig I was wearing really prickled.

"Stop your whining, you mutt." Obachan muttered. "We're been paid for this by the client and the company so don't you dare think of giving up half way! And the wig, contacts and glasses for covering up your real identity was your idea. So stop whining about it like a baby!"

"How nice of you to nag me for my choices, ya old hag." I muttered only to wince and tug the ear piece out of my ear upon hearing a really loud screech from Obachan.

"Ah, this old woman is seriously annoying at times....I wonder how I manage being her partner so often." I mumbled while glaring at the ear piece.

Obachan really hated it when anyone called her an old hag and she always retaliated with screaming at us. It was really bad when we were communicating through wireless though. Being super sensitive so it can receive even the softest of sounds, the ear piece often screeched along with her voice and really hurt my ear. And yes, it was very often that she called us on-site gofers by mildly insulting names when we complained about the client or the mission we were on. Of the four hackers we have in our company, Obachan was the best but also the most difficult to work with.

I put the ear piece back into my ear and sighed. I shook my head, no longer having the will to argue with Obachan. I didn't get the chance to either because a couple of customers called out to me as they stood on the other side of the counter. Putting on a business smile, I turned around and walked to the cash register to take note of their order and get busy making their beverages. However, when I saw the people, I twitched and resisted from breaking out into a smirk.

"Welcome to Coffee and Cake Cafe! What would you like to order, sirs?" I asked with a beaming smile.

I reached up with a my right hand to pretend to adjust the rather dorky looking round glasses I had on but lightly pressed one of the small buttons on the side to take a picture of the group of guys standing in front of me. One of them was the guy our current client was looking for – I recognized him easily because I had seen the picture of him that the client had sent to us when he requested us to take on this mission. He was with two other guys, one of which who looked rather rowdy-ish.

"One cheese cake, one iced coffee and one coffee latte. Take out." The rowdy guy demanded and I tapped the order into the computer.

"That will be nine thousand five hundred Yen, sir."

"Keep the change, girly." He grunted while handing me a ten thousand Yen bill.

I smiled, more so out of amuse, and accepted the money without a fuss. I then proceeded to prepare their order with the machines behind me.

"Obachan, that guy is Hanaka Kojiro, right? Who are the other two?" I asked in a low voice while working.

"Yeah, that's the man our client asked for us to find – his business rival's secretary. As for the other two...." She mumbled and took a few seconds to find information on them. "The guy who ordered is Minoru Takahashi, though goes mostly by the name Eagle. He's one of the most feared subordinates of the reigning yakuza boss. Always carries guns, doesn't hesitate to open fire at anyone who stands in his way and has a really short temper. The other guy is apparently a high school delinquent who dropped out of school to join the yakuza. He's a new recruit but it seems he has some pretty decent fighting skills, enough to tag along on this job and become a member on the police's wanted list."

"Ahh..." I mused. "So the client's so called enemy not only has his personal secretary handling this matter but also the yakuza? I knew this request wasn't something simple, especially when he mentioned how much the ransom money was."

"It doesn't matter whether the job is simple or not. We're being paid for it so we do it. That's all there is to it, isn't there?" Obachan said and I gave a roll of my eyes.

"Yeah yeah." I muttered and turned around to hand over the order I had received moments ago.

"Order up! One cheese cake, one iced coffee and one coffee latte for take-out." I said with a smile and handed the beverages to them in a small take-out box. Unlike other customers, they expressed no gratitude and walked out of the shop haughtily.

"Oi Izumi, get your butt moving. We can't lose them." Obachan said when they were out of the shop.

"On my way." I said with a chuckle and walked to the change room behind the cafe not really concerned that there wasn't anyone to attend to customers that came in once I left.

Taking off the itchy wig, the dorky glasses and the uniform I was wearing, I got into slim fit black pants, our organization's signature dark maroon full sleeves shirt and a black jacket. I tried my black hair in a high ponytail and put on a different pair of glasses over my brown eyes. I put on a pair of gloves, a black cap with our company's emblem printed in maroon on it as well as a mask to cover the lower half of my face. Only my eyes were visible now so no one would be able to recognize me when I took everything off. I also made sure I had all the accessories I usually carried on my missions – my cell phone, USB cable, a pocket knife and pepper spray for emergency.

"Alright! Let's get this job done." I said with a smirk and jumped out of the window onto the empty service road behind the cafe.

I climbed up onto the roof of the cafe using the service pipes and jutting masonry and walked to the front. I pressed one of the tiny buttons on the side of my glasses to zoom in on the three targets that were getting into an SUV car while glancing around to make sure they weren't being followed. I smirked and huffed out a laugh as they all got in and pulled out of the parking lot and onto the road unaware of me watching their every move.

I ran on the rooftops of the building alongside the route they followed but got down to the ground when I was close to where I had parked my bike. I buckled up my helmet as I got on the bike and turned the key in the keyhole of the bike causing the engine to rev to life. I accelerated, driving onto the main road quickly so I wouldn't lose sight of the people I was following. I spotted them easily and followed them at a safe distance – far enough to make sure they didn't find me suspicious.

They drove for about fifteen minutes towards downtown before stopping in front of a huge fenced land with a dense cover of trees and wild vegetation surrounding a rundown mansion. There were a couple of men guarding the gates and they checked the car before letting it in. I knew that there was no way I would be allowed to get in so I pretended not to even bother about the mansion and I drove past it, taking a left at the very next intersection. When I was a good distance away, I got off my bike and took off my helmet. Shaking my head a bit to settle my slightly messy hair and leaving the bike behind, I made my way to the mansion, taking a long route to get to an unguarded side of the fencing so I could sneak in.

My name is Yukihara Izumi – your not-so-normal eighteen year old girl. I'm not like others of my age who've graduated from school, got into college to get a degree and settled their lives with a handsomely paying job. In fact, I think the last time I was in school was when I was in fifth grade, when I was ten years old. As far as I remember, I was abandoned on the streets when I was just three or four years old and a kind old lady adopted me. Granny was a really sweet woman who took care of me and schooled me for a couple of years – she was the only family I had. When she passed away from old age and other possible complications I didn't understand then, I was adopted by a rather spunky middle aged woman.

She didn't send me to school like I expected her to and instead had home tutors take care of my education along with my training in martial arts. I wasn't trained in martial arts in the way anyone would have trained in it as a hobby – I was trained in it like my life depended on it. It wasn't just having a teacher teach me how to defend myself and learn how to be inconspicuous, stealthy, precise and have an eagle's eye for detail; I was sent out on training missions with all kinds of scenarios created by Juri san herself. Of course, she had several buildings under her administration to use as mission sites and a lot of subordinates who helped her pull off training missions like really life operations. And these training missions included taking objects without being noticed, hacking into servers to gain access to and download important information, spying on people to track their movements, the people they met up with and possibly the suspicious things they did, as well as making deliveries of such information without anyone being able to figure out who did it and when it happened.

At first, I had no idea why I was being made to train like crazy. But it wasn't long before I was informed of who I was to become once I turned fifteen – an age bar requirement for becoming a member of the PDST or Professional Detective Service Team.

The PDST is an organization consisting of just a handful of top notch people, including myself of course, run by our CEO Juri san. The top notch people include just five hackers and six gofers. Our base of operations is located right under the cafe run by Shuta san where I work on a daily basis as a regular teenager when I'm not out on undercover missions. Shuta san himself is an ex-PDST member and mediates between Juri san and the members currently working in the organization. As a result, he's the one to usually inform me when I'm being summoned by Juri san for any mission and I get to leave the cafe without finishing my shift. Shuta san usually covers it up by saying that he needs me to run his personal errands so none of the other employees working at the cafe get suspicious.

The real missions that the PDST take on are just like the training missions I did when I was younger. But instead of being given missions by Juri san, we are given missions by clients we don't know, have never met before and have no direct contact with. They send in requests to our organization's email address and we errand runners are selected based on the difficulty rating of the mission. As a part of the job, it is a rule that the members of the PDST who run the errands by being physically present at the site have to make sure that their identities aren't known. We have our faces almost completely covered at all times as well as wear gloves so that no one can recognize us by our fingerprints.

I'm one of those six gofers who gets jobs done by physically going to different locations while my partner sits in the main control room at a computer and takes care of covering me. Not to gloat, but Juri san says that I'm one of their best recruits since she started the PDST and every mission I take up is always a sparkling clean success. Anyway, coming back to the main topic, our partners handle hacking into surveillance cameras and gathering information on anything we need for our missions to become a success. They also work with the information and pictures which we gofers send them through our smart glasses, phones and of course verbal descriptions.

Most of the clients who come to us are rich people and pay us handsome sums of money for what we do. Well, our job is dangerous so they should be paying us a lot for the risks we take. Out of the money offered for our services, sixty percent is put into the organizations fund – they need the money to maintain and constantly upgrade all the stuff we use for our missions – and the remaining forty percent is divided between the gofer and the hacker. Twenty percent each is still quite a lot of money and I've been saving up as much as I can from my missions as well as my salary for working at the cafe so I can buy my own cozy house in the near future with beautiful minimalistic interiors – the kind I've always dreamed of living in. After I have my own house set up, I could concentrate on my next wish to travel the world and leave not one place on the earth untouched and unseen.

Well, not that the place I was living in right now wasn't good enough. In fact, it was pretty good – it was a complex of studio apartments with good water and electricity supply, decent maintenance and pretty nice neighbors. Besides, the rent was less than what other places had in the same locality and the overall surroundings were pleasant. But I've wanted to have a place of my own which I earned from my effort. For that to happen in the near future, I had to work on more missions, be successful in them and earn more money.

"Oi Izumi, what are doing? You already have the information on where the client's kid is being held hostage so why are you trying to sneak in?" Obachan asked as I landed inside the compound of the mansions garden.

"Obachan, just because the thugs came here, it doesn't mean the kidnapped kid is here. I have to see the kid to confirm it. Besides, you know how I am when it comes to kids. The client said that his son is just five years old....he must be really scared so I just thought I should check on him before reporting in." I said with a shrug.

"That's not necessary so get out of there before I scream into your ear again." She scolded making me roll my eyes.

"Oh put a cork in it, would you? You know sneaking into any place is easy for me. This place probably doesn't even have surveillance cameras so there isn't going to be any problem." I muttered and got into the mansion through an open window.

I was sure I wasn't going to hear the end of it from Obachan or Juri san when I reported back but I still went ahead with searching for the kid in the mansion. I never bothered about anyone because what happened to them wasn't really any of my business. But when it came to kids, especially those younger than ten years, I had a soft spot for them. Rather than Juri san, Obachan always scolded me that it was a weakness that I shouldn't have in the kind of lifestyle and job I had. Her words were true and honestly, I didn't actually care about even kids if they were merely fussing and fretting over something trivial because there would be someone to take care of their needs and tantrums. But I just couldn't ignore them if they were in a life threatening situation so I always went out of my way to help them. And this time was no exception.

"Alright, but don't blame me if something happens." Obachan said with an annoyed scoff.

I didn't bother answering her because I was already inside the mansion, making my way through the dark and dusty hallways silently. Parts of the furnishing were still in place with sofas and tables propped up against the walls and framed portraits and pictures hung on the walls. I followed the hushed voices that I could hear in the distance and finally came across a room with one of its double doors slightly ajar.

I pressed my back against the wall next to the doors and narrowed my eyes as I looked in through the small opening. I saw the three men I had followed along with two other people – they were standing next to each other and looked like they were surrounding something.

"I can't believe one little brat is giving us so much trouble! When is Yoshida san going to pay us and say we can get rid of this brat?" The delinquent kid snapped annoyed.

"Keep it down, kid. Yoshida san said he will contact us today evening. Depending on what happened with the contract, he'll tell us whether to let the kid go or get rid of him." Takahashi said gruffly.

"Surely they wouldn't hurt a kid no matter how serious the matter is." I mumbled more to myself.

"That's how the world works, Izumi, and I'm sure you know this fact well considering your line of work. All those rich people with status, money and looks take things to the extreme. Although, there are exceptions too." Obachan said, obviously having heard my self-comment.

"Ka san! Tou san! Help me! Help me!" I heard a weak voice call out from behind the men.

"Shut up, brat! Your screaming is starting to get annoying! No one's going to hear you anyway!" Takahashi bellowed and the child whimpered.

"It's surprising how he's able to scream even though we've beaten him so much. He's got a lot of strength considering his cracked ribs." Another one of the men added.

"Cracked ribs?!" I gasped and lost the will to stay out of this matter like I should have. Kidnapping this kid was one thing but beating him till he had broken bones was another.

Turning on the shades of my glasses, I slammed the doors of the room open and launched myself at the men. They weren't expecting to be ambushed in their hideout so the first kicks and punches I landed on them sent them tumbling on the floor like bowling pins. They recovered quickly, as I expected them to, and faced me absolutely miffed.

"Who the heck are you?! And how dare you attack us!" Takahashi barked angrily.

I didn't bother answering them and bolted forward to fight them once again and make an opening for me to get to the kid. They weren't very fast, well not as fast as me anyway, and I was able to move around fluidly while dodging their sloppy punches and kicks and reward them with a few of my own. I also used the crates stacked in the room to my advantage, climbing on top of them and attacking from a higher level than that of the enemy. There were also some wooden sticks lying around which I picked up at hit the men with to inflict pain and make them motionless.

When they were all down and taking a few moments to regain some energy to get up and face me again, I hurried over to the kid. He flinched and whimpered in fear when I crouched in front of him but I placed a hand on his head to make him look at me. I'm sure I looked kind of intimidating after I had beaten up those guys especially since I was wearing dark glasses and a mask that made almost no part of my face visible. But I smiled behind the mask and placed a hand on his head gently. The kid seemed to relax just a tiny bit, understanding that I wasn't going to hurt him.

"I'm going to get you out of here so cooperate with me, okay kid?" I said still smiling and he just nodded shakily. "Alright then, get on my back. We're going to make a run for it."

I turned around and held my hands out behind me, coaxing him to get on my back. He did so with almost no hesitance and when he had his arms tapped around my neck securely, I stood up. By this time, the men were back on their feet and had surrounded us.

"Ah, this is such a bother. They're annoyingly persistent." I muttered. "Oi Obachan, isn't there any way our organization can get a shocking devices? It would be so much easier to put goons like these out of commission while I get the job done."

"I'm not the one who told you to step into this situation, you know? You're the one who doesn't know when to stay out of things that don't concern you." She replied, her voice muffled out and sounding like she was talking with her mouth full.

"Seriously, I can't believe you're eating when I'm working. It's dinner time and I'm hungry too. Be a little considerate and don't make it obvious that you're eating, will you?" I scolded her before bringing my attention to the kid I was carrying. "Hey kid, wrap your legs around me and hang on tight. I'm going to have to take care of these mean ol' ojisans before we get out of here."

The kid complied and wrapped his legs around my torso, hanging onto me for dear life. Looking ahead with a smirk, I held up my fists and went ahead with beating the guys into a pulp.

When I spotted an opening between the small scuffle, I used it to get out of the room. I bolted through the hallways and out the mansion only to come face to face with two other men who had been alerted of my intrusion. I skidded to a halt in the open grounds in front of the mansion and looked at all of them with a sigh. I had the shades of my shades on and it was night time already so I couldn't see the faces of the people around me but merely could only make out their silhouettes. I suppose that was enough for me to fight and defend myself.

"Who the hell do you think you are to barge into this place and take the kid?! Are you from the b******* side?! The boss's enemy?!" One of the men bellowed and took a step forward.

I sighed and shook my head to get a few strands of my hair out of my face. "This is why I hate getting involved with either side personally. But I couldn't help it this time since you rugged lot were being so brutal with just a kid. It's not right to hurt kids, you know that?"

"What did you say?! You b****! I'm going to kill you for getting in our way!" Another hollered and I rolled my eyes.

"That's what they always say but they only end up letting me escape. And that's just what's going to happen this time too." I said with a smirk.

"Oi you idiots! Don't fight her!" Takahashi's voice echoed from the mansion before he himself joined us in the open grounds a few moments later. "Hanaka san says we have to capture her alive. The boss wants to meet her and see her face....we can't have her bleeding and dead for that, can we?"

"Heh? Why does that old geezer want to see some stupid girl? Don't tell me he's a pedophile." One of the men commented with an amused chuckle that only caused the other ignorant fools around him to join in on his laughter.

"This is exactly why I always called you guys idiots!" Takahashi barked, making all of the stop laughing. "This b**** ain't any ordinary burglar. She's from the PDST, the special private organization that almost every police, detective and underground gang has been looking for! Their members, both in sneaking in and out of places unnoticed to get what they want as well as their hackers, are the best in the field. And not once, in all the twenty years that the organization has been functioning, has any member been caught. No one even knows where their base of operations is!"

"I'm impressed, Yakuza san. You're pretty well informed." I said cocking my head to the side with a smile behind my mask.

"My boss has been trying to find you rodents for a long long time now.... I ain't going to waste this chance, now that one of you has walked right into the tiger's den." Takahashi said smirking himself. "All of you surround her and catch her. She cannot get away from us and neither can the brat."

As the men including Takahashi closed in on me, I merely chuckled. I glanced at the kid who was now trembling as he stayed latched onto me like a baby monkey would to its mother. I could tell he was scared and I felt mildly sympathetic but this little brawl and escape was far from over.

"I'm afraid you're underestimating me, Yakuza san. You said you've heard about our organization and yet you think that you can catch one of its members so easily just because you have numbers. Numbers aren't always everything, you know?" I mocked.

"Shut your mouth, ya runt! Get her now!" He yelled irked by my words.

I merely chuckled and took to dodging the men who came at me while occasionally retaliating with martial arts myself and maneuvering thought the open grounds. To them, it seemed that I was just trying to avoid getting hit and hold out in this fight for as long as possible. What they didn't notice was that I was slowly slipping towards the side of the compound wall I had got in from. When I was right next to the compound wall, it was too late for them to do anything but watch with wide eyes as I climbed it and jumped over onto the road on the other side while supporting the kid on my back with one arm.

I didn't stall even for a moment and ran towards my bike that was parked a little away.

"Hey kid, are you okay?" I asked as I got into my bike while putting on my helmet.

The kid nodded and sufficed with a hum as a response and slowly slipped down so he was seated behind me on the seat of the bike with his arms wrapped securely around my torso. Taking that as a signal that we were good to go, I started the engine and sped off around the mansion, taking a longer route to get back into the main road.

"Obachan, give a call to the client and tell him that I've has saved his son and he should come pick him up." I said and took a turn to get into a slightly isolated residential area.

"Izumi, don't tell me you plan on showing your face to the client and handing over his son. You're not here to do social service and you know you can't let anyone see your face." Obachan scolded, sounding rather fierce on the other side.

"What do you take me for, Obachan? You really think I'll show my face and give myself away?? Ah seriously....just tell the client to come to the ninth street after taking a right at the Art Institute intersection and his son will be waiting for him in the small alley next to the fourth house."

Obachan didn't respond but I could pick up the sounds of the computer keyboard she typed on so she could call the client. A few seconds passed and I heard the robotic voice of one of our machinery read out whatever was fed into it and inform the client about finding his son. We never spoke to any client or person in question during any job because we didn't want our voice to be recognized and in turn, our organization's members and locations traced. As a result, we had an instrument that would speak whatever was typed and fed into it. In the time the information was passed onto the client, I reached the place where I had decided to drop off the kid. We got off my bike when we stopped on one side of the road and I pushed the kid into the small alley before crouching in front of him. I lowered my mask and smiled though I didn't turn off the shades of my glasses.

"You're a brave kid, you know that? I'm surprised you didn't cry and shout with everything that was happening. But you don't have to worry anymore because everything is over – your papa will be here to pick you up in just a few minutes so stay here in the alley, okay?" I said.

Just before I could get up and leave, the kid took a hold of my sleeve and held me in place. He winced though as the sudden movement caused him pain and I was sure it was because his ribs were lightly fractured – that's what the thugs had said anyway. He looked nervous too so I decided to hear him out before I left.

"Don't leave me alone, Onee chan! What if those people come back? I'm scared." He said and I was mildly surprised that he even hugged my legs while trembling.

I smiled and held his shoulders to push him away from me. I ruffled his head as I crouched in front of him again and rubbed off the tear streaks on his cheeks with my thumbs.

"I'm afraid I can't really stay with you, kid. I'm not supposed to let anyone see me. But you don't have to worry. I'll stay somewhere close by watching you to make sure you're safe until your papa comes. So be a good boy and wait for a little bit, alright?"

"Do you promise?" He asked, his innocent eyes sparkling.

I chuckled and ruffled his head again before standing. "I promise. And I never go back on my word. Well, see you around, kid. Make sure you tell your papa to take you to a doctor to check up on your injuries before you head home alright? And don't trust and follow strangers easily from now on."

Giving him another smile, I got onto my bike and sped down the road. But just as I promised, I climbed up onto the roof of the building right next to the alley where the kid was to keep an eye on him, making sure he didn't run off anywhere on his own and that no one came to try and kidnap him again. While I waited, I pulled out an energy bar from my pocket and munched on it to quell my grumbling stomach until I got home and had some real dinner.

I guess I waited for a about fifteen minutes when a car pulled in at a distance and hurried footsteps were heard as two people made their way to the alley. I leaned forward a bit to get a look at who was coming and I saw a man and a woman, almost hysterical, making their way to that alley while calling out someone's name.

"Tou san!" The kid hollered in response to seeing the man first and I smiled as the man fell to his knees and embraced him. It was followed by an embrace from the lady who I assumed to be his mother.

I stayed watching the happy family reunion for a little while and even smiling to myself when the kid said how cool I was fighting all those bad guys, saving him from them and even said that when he grew up, he wanted to be just like me. I have to say, it felt good to be seen as a hero in the eyes of someone – it was one reason I sometimes felt that I had the best job in the world.

"Well, I suppose we can say that this is Mission Complete." Obachan grumbled. "We did more than what the client asked for us to do so I hope they'll pay us extra for the extra work."

"You're always so money minded, Obachan....sheesh." I muttered as I got up."But I do have the feeling that he will pay us extra out of gratitude. Not to boast but no one else would have done all this even if they were getting paid well. I'm just glad that the kid's safe."

I put on my mask again but turned off the shades of my glasses. I got a better look at the people in the alley walking away with the kid, relieved and happy that he was back with them. Giving my body a much needed stretch, I turned and heading back to my house while looking forward to a nice hot shower and a scrumptious meal.

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Say hello to your spunky sassy protagonist Yukihara Izumi!! *drum roll* XD

So! How was the first chapter? How did you like the action and the protagonist's personality? Yup, she's a fighter and definitely a cool person who's got a lot of awesomeness in her :P And as a plus point, she's got a soft spot for kids! Isn't that cute?

Hope this new story was worth the wait and hope ya'll enjoyed it!!

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