Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Kohane Azusawa sees ghosts.

She’s not very special in this regard. Most other people her age can also see ghosts. Some are better at hearing them. Kohane herself is a very good Listener—she’s not one to brag, she just doesn’t know how else to put it.

Since ghosts are dangerous, it’s up to the people who can see and hear and interact with them to dispose of them quickly before they can do much damage. This is what causes her problems—Kohane is not nearly as good at destroying ghosts as she is at simply acknowledging them.

Luckily, she’s not alone. For a few months now, she’s belonged to a very minor ghost-hunting agency, of which she is the fourth member. Her companions—An, Akito, and Toya—are all much more experienced than her, but it hasn’t presented any problems so far.

That is, until they accidentally burn down a woman’s house.

She doesn’t even really know how it happened. Well, she does, but when she thinks about the exact sequence of events that led up to the fire, she just marvels at how badly they had messed up.

“That was not our fault.” A loud voice jolts her out of her thoughts, and she rejoins the conversation her coworkers are holding.

“How? How is our client’s house being burned to the ground not our fault?” An snaps. “Now we probably have to pay a shit ton of money in damages. Money that we don’t have, Akito! If you had brought the proper equipment, this wouldn’t have happened!”

“Ex cuse me?” Akito leans forward. (After months, Kohane’s still a little intimidated by him, especially when he gets like this—but, on some occasions, she’s seen a kinder side to him that makes her curious.) “This ‘wouldn’t have happened’ if the client had given us an accurate description of her haunting! We went in there expecting an old man who fell down the stairs. Still a Type Two based off the description, but not a murder victim! If we had known we were dealing with the ghost of a murder victim, we would have been more cautious in the first place, and Kohane never would have had to use the flare!”

“Sorry,” Kohane mutters. “I—“

“No.” Akito cuts her off. “Stop apologizing. You didn’t do anything wrong. You did the best thing you could have done in that situation, and it saved all of our lives. Sure, a house burned down, but that’s on Mrs. Nakamura for not giving us a full account of the danger!” He slams his hands on the table.

“It’s not really on Mrs. Nakamura, though.” Toya speaks up for the first time. (Kohane has lived with him for months now, too, and she still finds him difficult to read.) “I tried to give you all a full account of the case with my findings, but you two”—he gestures to An and Akito—“insisted on going ahead. Had you listened to me, you would have known exactly what you were walking into. Because you know what I found?” He takes a folder from the table and opens it, revealing an old newspaper with a face that—

“That’s her,” Kohane breathes. “That’s the girl.”

—

Kohane watches as the ghost drifts closer. “Um, Shinonome,” she squeaks. “An?”

“Just a minute, Kohane,” they call back in unison. The ghost girl persists in her approach.

“It’s, ah, urgent.” She draws her rapier and backs away.

“So’s this. There’s another death-glow here, and An is getting something when she Touches the wall. Not Mr. Nakamura, for sure. We’re looking at two violent deaths in this household.”

“Are we now?” Kohane tries not to sound afraid as she moves back further. “That’s, uh, interesting. Do you want to come out here and see what I’ve found?” 

“The question is, if there is another ghost, where is—“ Akito walks out of a nearby bedroom and finally lays eyes on the girl. “Oh.”

“Please help,” Kohane says quickly. The ghost girl gets closer—if her Sight was better, she could probably make out more details, but as it is she can only make out minor things. Her hair is long and tangled. She looks malnourished, as all ghosts do, but not as badly as others she’s seen—this girl must have been well off during life. Her eyes are purple—most ghosts appear with a blue or green tint, but the girl’s eyes are really purple, and somehow their color is so strong it persists through death. 

And she’s whispering.

“Cold,” she keeps saying. Yes, Kohane supposes it would make sense for ghosts to be cold. Toya probably already knows that, what with how interested he is in the Problem, but it still seems like a bit of knowledge he’d be fascinated by. The reminder of him returns her to herself, providing her with a glimmer of hope and strength and she’s able to pull her emotions back into check—she’s faced worse ghosts than this. 

“What do you want me to do?” Akito asks, drawing his rapier.

“I—I don’t know,” she stammers. Hm— she’s cold now, too. Her teeth chatter, her fingers feel frozen— ah, it’s ghost-lock. 

“Can you move?” Akito draws closer, trying not to draw the ghost’s attention. 

“No.” She tries not to be disappointed because the ghost will feel it, but she can’t help it—she should be experienced enough to not let herself get ghost-locked.

“Okay. Stay calm. Don’t get angry or anything. It’ll move on you if it senses that.”

Kohane knows how ghosts work, but she opts not to say that, because she still doesn’t know quite where she stands with Akito and doesn’t want to disrespect him.

“An,” Akito whisper-yells. “If you don’t get your ass out here right this minute—“

The ghost girl turns around to face him.

“Right. Don’t get angry. I forgot.” He sighs and slices through the girl with his sword as she charges at him. She screams—

“Help,” she pleads.

Help.

The face of the girl returns to the front of Kohane’s mind—but her ability to move also returns, and the most important thing is to stay alive.

Still, when she moves to Akito’s side and slices through the girl a second time, her face stays in Kohane’s memory.

—

“Yes,” Toya confirms. “It is the girl. She was a famous actress. Shiori Ikeda.”

An blinks. “Are we supposed to know who that is?”

“No, it was the 50s. I didn’t even know who she was until I went to the Archives. But when I learned who she was, I also learned that that was her house when she was alive, and that she disappeared one night out of nowhere after being dropped off there by a colleague. So, yes, you didn’t have a full account of the case, but that’s not because Mrs. Nakamura lied about what happened to her husband.” He closes the folder, mouth set in a thin line. “It’s because you didn’t listen to me.”

A long moment of silence passes between them. Akito is the first to relent, letting out a sigh and finally speaking. “Sorry, Toya. It won’t happen again.”

“No, it won’t,” Toya agrees, “because this agency is getting shut down.”

Kohane blanches. “Pardon?”

Toya stands and pulls an envelope from a nearby drawer. “While the three of you were in the hospital and, in Akito’s case, being interrogated by DEPRAC… I received this.” He hands it to Kohane first.

Vivid BAD Company,

Due to the fire at the residence of Mrs. Nakamura, which was determined to have been caused by your team’s negligence, it is expected that you will pay ¥11.5 million in damages.

You have until September 29th to pay this fee. If you fail to do so, DEPRAC and Mrs. Nakamura will be taking legal action against your agency.

Signed,

Inspector Sakura

Department of Psychical Research and Control

Sept. 15, 20XX

Akito leans over her shoulder. “You have got to be fucking kidding me,” he mutters.

An scoffs. “I knew it,” she proclaims. “I knew this would happen.” She pauses for a moment—and then wheels on Akito. “ You knew it,” she accuses. “Sakura told you about this, didn’t he? When you were being interrogated. You knew, and you didn’t tell us. What the hell is wrong with you, Akito?”

“Well, excuse me for not wanting to talk about the fact that I’m going to lose my agency and my home immediately after I got back from the hospital!” He crosses his arms. “I was going to tell you, obviously. You all live here, same as me. But I was getting treated for ghost-touch, An. I didn’t exactly have the energy to have that conversation with you.”

Kohane shudders. She hasn’t told An, but she remembers seeing Akito’s form being dragged into the ambulance when they arrived—he was so swollen. So blue. She’s shocked he survived.

Her eyes land on the bandage he wears, where the adrenaline shot that saved his life was administered, and she winces.

An takes a moment to respond. “I’m… sorry,” she says carefully. “It’s been a hard week. Especially for you. But you still should have left a note on the Thinking Cloth, or—or something. ” She gestures wildly at the tablecloth—the Thinking Cloth, where all of the agency members write notes and reminders and requests and… anything else. Her gaze pointedly avoids a note scrawled in An’s handwriting that reads AKITO IS A DICK.

“Are you serious? Not telling you in person would have gone even worse. All three of you would have been banging on my door demanding to know what was going on, and then this exact same thing would have happened.” He looks at An, as if challenging her to deny it.

She can’t. “Fine,” she sighs. “But… but…” She glances at the letter again, picks it up, and crumples it, to immediate protests from everyone. She throws it across the room and groans. “What are we going to do?” she cries. “We live here! When they say they’re going to shut down the agency— this place is our headquarters! They’ll take it!”

“Akito already said that,” Toya puts in.

“I know! But—“ An looks around, eyes landing on Akito, then Toya, then on Kohane for a little bit longer than the other two—and then at the piece of paper on the floor. “Where are all of you going to go if that happens?” she whispers.

Kohane… hadn’t thought about that. “Home, I guess,” she mumbles. Back to her hometown. The place that had practically run her off. Even her own parents hadn’t defended her.

…She can't go back there. When she looks up at Toya, she senses he’s thinking the same thing—mutual agreement seems to pass between them when their eyes meet. This is how most of their conversations go—with no actual words spoken.

And Akito—

She looks up at Akito next. His expression is dark.

“I’m not losing my house,” he says quietly. “I grew up here. I refuse to let some stuck-up DEPRAC officers take it from me.” He walks over to the crumpled letter, picks it up, straightens it out, and sticks it to the refrigerator with a magnet. “So we’re going to get that money. Because we’re the best agency in Shibuya.”

“And how are we going to do that?” Toya asks. “We have three cases. I wouldn’t be surprised if they cancel, what with the news coverage of the fire.”

“Like I said. We’re the best agency in Shibuya. You all know it.” Akito slams his hands on the table again and looks up at Kohane, An, and Toya. “If anyone can get that money, we can.”

…Kohane has to admit, his determination is infectious.

“We’ll do whatever we can,” she affirms. 

“Yeah. I can’t go back to my dad a failure,” An adds.

“Not a very helpful bit of information, but okay.” Akito looks to Toya. “Partner?”

He nods. “You didn’t even have to ask, you know.”

Akito smiles. “Okay,” he says. “Let’s do this. Starting tomorrow. Because right now I’m beginning to think that the hospital staff were right and I should have stayed in bed.”

“Why? Are you okay? What’s wrong?” An rushes to his side and looks over him. (Her and Akito argue a lot, a side effect of living together for so long, but they really do care about each other—it’s obvious.)

“Because I’m about to pass out.” As if on cue, Akito falls backwards, barely caught by a squealing An.

“Not again,” Toya says, at the same time that An mutters “Fucking dumbass.”

Kohane blinks. “I’m sorry, again? ” 

—

(She still thinks about her first job as an agent often.)

“Your mother tells us you’re very Talented. An exceptionally good Listener.”

“Yes, sir.” Kohane straightens her back and clears her throat. “I’ve been—“

“I didn’t need additional commentary.” Her boss—she can’t remember his first name, but she’s fairly certain his last name is Imamura, which is all she really needs to know—simply looks over her, never making eye contact or seeming truly interested in her at all. “We’ll see whether or not she was telling the truth soon enough.”

Kohane doesn’t respond. That’s not the kind of remark that needs one.

He looks up and calls to another kid in the room. “Hanasato.”

“Y-Yes!”

“Watch over Azusawa. Make sure she doesn’t get herself killed too quickly.”

“Yes, sir!” The girl, Hanasato, salutes and sits back down. Snickering is heard throughout the room—something she’d done clearly hadn’t been normal.

Kohane doesn’t really care. This, like all other places, hadn’t been somewhere she expected to fit in. It tracks that a girl with a similarly anxious demeanor to her would be outcasted.

She takes her seat next to Hanasato as Imamura begins to drone on about Type Ones and Type Twos.

—

It’s been two weeks. Kohane feels like she can now safely say she was wrong about Hanasato—or Minori, as she insists Kohane should call her. She’s not anxious or scared at all. She’s eager. Extroverted. Bright. 

And, for some reason, she really likes Kohane. So much so that she’d introduced her to another friend she’d made in the agency before Kohane arrived.

Shiho Hinomori is… also not similar to Kohane, but she’s a bit more like her than Minori. She’s quiet. Doesn’t seem to find it easy to talk to others. Lets Minori do most of the speaking. That’s where the similarities end, though—when she does speak, Shiho is blunt, maybe even brutally honest. She won’t prioritize your feelings over the truth, and she won’t allow you to lie to yourself if she catches you doing it.

Kohane feels like she has a lot to learn from both of them. (She’d never say this out loud, but probably more than she does from Imamura. How to dispel ghosts. Everyone knows that! Find and cover the Source. What is ghost-lock? A phenomenon caused by the power of a spirit that can root you to the spot before you’ve even noticed it. What’s the difference between a Type One and a Type Two? Type Ones are generally not very powerful and may not have a specific purpose when they return to the world of the living. Type Twos have a very particular goal and a lot more power to help them achieve it. When should you use a flare? Only when outside, or inside in a large, controlled environment. Almost always as a last resort. Well, last resort isn’t really right—in Kohane’s opinion, if you know you need to use a flare to get out of a situation, you should do that before doing anything else and risking loss of life—but she’d never try to correct a teacher.)

She’s earned most of her qualifications in record time. Soon, she’ll be fighting actual ghosts. With Shiho and Minori. The thought scares her, of course. Who wouldn’t be afraid? Death isn’t just possible, it’s likely. But… she’ll be much less afraid, maybe even a little excited, with friends at her side.

Friends. Minori and Shiho are her first.

She’ll treasure them forever.

—

Almost a year later, Kohane is doing well.

She’s just a few weeks away from obtaining her Grade Four certificate, which will officially make her a fully qualified agent. If she ever wants to move when she gets older, or if her family does, she’ll be able to apply for positions at big agencies that pay really good money.

She finally feels like she’s making something of herself. She’s… happy. How strange.

She smiles as she walks out the door of her house. She’s got an important job tonight taking care of a ghost at a mill, and she’ll take any chance she can get to prove herself.

(Maybe, if she’s lucky, she’ll get to go out for food with Minori and Shiho afterwards.)

—

“Something is wrong,” Kohane repeats, for what must be the eighteenth time. “I’m telling you. We don’t have the full picture here. This ghost… is not normal.”

“We don’t have time to go back. We have to get this done tonight.” Their squad’s leader—Kohane thinks her name is Momoi?—continues navigating down the dark hallways, lifting her lantern and craning her neck around corners for better views.

“It’s not worth it. We can’t get paid if we all die,” Kohane argues. 

“Momoi, has she ever been wrong about something like this before?” Shiho speaks up—Kohane sends her a grateful look, but it’s so dark she couldn’t possibly have seen it. She settles for reaching out and squeezing the other girl’s hand. She jumps, as if thinking she’d been ghost-touched—probably not the smartest move on Kohane’s part—but she quickly calms down and squeezes back. “Kohane’s our best Listener. If she’s telling you she thinks something’s off, you should listen.”

“Right!” Minori affirms. (Kohane squeezes her hand, too.) “Kohane’s proven herself again and again. I… don’t think we should keep moving through here if she doesn’t.”

Momoi sighs and turns around, illuminating them all. “Okay, fine. Azusawa, if you really think something is that wrong, then… go let Imamura know, and let us know what he says. If he agrees that we should pull out, we’ll do it.” She hesitates a bit before saying the last part—Kohane feels bad, because she knows she needs the money for her family, but she’s also fairly sure her family would rather have her alive.

“What about you all?”

“We’ll stay here, keep looking, see what’s going on. Just in case you’re wrong.” She looks to the side nervously. “For what it’s worth, I really don’t think you are, but if we all run out, Imamura will just call us lazy.”

“I’ll go with Kohane,” Shiho offers. 

“No, you won’t, because you’re the best with a rapier.”

“Then I will,” Minori cuts in.

“You also won’t, because we need your Sight. Azusawa, hurry and go.” Momoi hesitates one last time before muttering “Good luck,” and turning around. Shiho and Minori wave apologetically before turning around to follow her.

Now Kohane is in the center of a haunted mill alone. She curses—Shiho is really rubbing off on her—and moves as quickly as she can without attracting attention.

Soon enough, the exit comes into view.

“Mr. Imamura—“

“Ack!” Her supervisor stands, drawing his sword with remarkable speed. It takes him a moment to process that she’s not a Visitor, but when he does, he sighs and slumps back into his seat. “You scared the life out of me, kid.”

“I’m sorry, sir. I just came out here to tell you that… something is wrong with this ghost.”

He raises an eyebrow. “How do you mean?”

“Well, it’s just this feeling I have, but—“

“A feeling?” Imamura scoffs. “We don’t make decisions based on feelings. And if we don’t get this done tonight, we don’t get paid. Just do your job. You’ve faced worse spirits than this.”

“Sir—“

“ Do your job, Azusawa.”

She bites the inside of her cheek, nods curtly, and sprints back into the mill.

She knows something has gone wrong immediately.

—

When she’s sitting in the courtroom, she can still hear them screaming. It almost— almost— drowns out the sound of Imamura blaming her for all their deaths. She can barely hear it when he says that if she had come to him with a proper assessment of the situation, poor young lives could have been saved, and it really was a pity she wasn’t more forthright.

She doesn’t even have the energy to defend herself. Not with the memories of Shiho’s swollen body and Minori’s shrieks as she fell to the ground still so fresh in her mind.

Their families are given some money from the Azuma Fund for the Bereaved, Kohane is released from Imamura’s agency, and her team’s passing is ruled “death by misadventure.”

That night, she cuts all her hair off, throws some important things into a backpack, climbs out her window, and gets on the fastest train to Tokyo.

—

Kohane lies back on her bed, frustrated.

She can’t lose her team again. She can’t let Akito have his home taken from him. She can’t be the reason her friends lose their lives a second time.

…But she doesn’t know what to do.

They can’t pursue new cases until Akito is back on his feet—An and Toya are supervising (scolding) him at the moment, making sure he doesn’t get out of bed and push himself too hard before he’s ready. But if that ends up taking a while, the agency could be closed before he’s even well again.

The thought makes her sick.

—

(Memories of her old team also tend to bring back memories of meeting her new one.)

Kohane is exhausted.

She’s been walking all over the city for days. She’s barely slept. She’s sure she looks terrible.

Without her Grade Four, she’s not properly qualified for a position at any real agency. Imamura’s operation in her small hometown hadn’t counted—qualifications hardly matter when you have so few agents as it is. But in Tokyo? No one will take her.

She’s begged receptionists to hear her out, pleaded with passing agents to advocate for her, done everything she can think of to get them to take her.

Nothing.

So this is it, then. This is how she dies. On the streets, starved, with a stupid uneven haircut and glasses with cracked lenses and—and—

She chokes back a sob. No. She won’t die here. That’s not what Minori and Shiho would want. They wouldn’t allow it.

She stands up from the bench she’d been sitting on, dusts herself off, straightens her glasses, and makes for a nearby cafe.

—

“Welcome.” An older man looks up from the counter when she enters, at first thinking nothing of it—but then he looks back up, as if surprised. “Haven’t seen you around here before.”

“Oh, I, um—I’ve never been here before, I, uh—“

“No need to be so nervous.” He laughs. “You don’t have to explain anything to me. But, hey”—as Kohane sits down, he leans in—“we have showers upstairs. I don’t know what you’ve been through, but it looks like you’d benefit from one.”

Kohane doesn’t know how to respond to that.

“I’m not trying to be rude,” the man clarifies. “Just that you look tired, and a good shower helps that.”

She knows she also looks dirty, and that’s part of why the man is suggesting what he is, but she can’t help but feel touched. “I don’t want to impose—“

“Please! Doesn’t matter to me, I swear. Let me take your order, then go up and wash off. It’ll be nice and hot when you get back down.”

…Kohane is skeptical, to say the least—who invites a dirty stranger to take a shower in their shop? Actually, who has showers in their cafe?—but she can’t deny the allure of a hot shower and hot food. She eventually accepts, hoping it comes across just how grateful she is, and heads up to take a shower, praying no one up there is waiting to kidnap her or something.

No. Everything is normal. Kohane takes a shower—she almost passes out after, because she’s barely eaten anything in the last few days and she ran the water too hot—and nothing else happens. Maybe she was being filmed? No, no cameras anywhere… She still doesn’t trust this, especially now that she’s thinking more clearly.

When she gets back down the stairs, though, and a huge stack of waffles is waiting for her, she caves.

“So.” The man speaks to her as he’s washing some dishes. “What brings you here?”

“I was hungry.”

“I meant to Shibuya,” he laughs. “But I can tell.”

“Well…” Kohane bites her lip, uncertain of whether or not to trust this man with her story. She ultimately decides it won’t matter—she’ll just leave this cafe when she’s done eating and never see him again, so what’s the harm?

When she finishes divulging the important details of the last few years of her life, the man whistles and hands her a steaming mug of hot chocolate, which she doesn’t remember ordering. “Must’ve been rough.”

“Still is. I tried all the big places. Azuma, Shimizu, all that. They won’t take me. Tried some smaller ones, too, but they don’t want me, either. I—I can’t go back home, but…”

“You dead set on being an agent?”

The question catches her by surprise. “What?”

“I mean, I’d offer you a job here ‘cause you seem dependable and honest enough, but the way you talked about it, you seem to actually really like fighting ghosts.”

“I don’t know if I would say I like it. It’s scary. But…” Something in her steels, and her resolve is renewed. “It is what I want to do. For as long as I can. Until my Talent fades.” 

The man hums, rummages around in some papers under the counter, and hands her a small cutout.

“Um… what’s this?” Kohane can’t read too well at the moment—she’d knocked her glasses to the ground while showering earlier, and the lenses had popped out.

“It’s an agency. Vivid BAD Company. My daughter’s there. Trying to make a name for herself. Always hated ghosts, even more than most people, but I think it’s pretty admirable of her to face her fear like that.” The man takes a sip of coffee—when had he made that?—and nods to Kohane. “You should go. I think they’ll take you, Grade Four or no Grade Four.”

“That’s… illegal here, isn’t it?”

The man laughs. “Well, the kid who runs that agency isn’t exactly concerned with that, I’ll tell you that much.”

Kohane can’t deny that she’s fascinated. What kind of people could this agency be run by? Someone with disregard for the law? This man’s daughter? What would she be like?

She bites her lip nervously again. (Now that she thinks about it, that might be a habit she picked up from Minori.

If she joins Vivid BAD Company, will she pick up mannerisms from its members, too? Will they overwrite Minori’s and Shiho’s?)

She studies the small cutout.

“Would you mind rewriting this for me on a bigger piece of paper?” She grins sheepishly and hands it back to the man. “Sorry. I know I’ve asked a lot.”

“No worries.” The man takes it back, grabs a bigger paper, and begins writing in permanent marker.

For some reason, Kohane’s heart swells with hope for what feels like the first time.

—

Kohane takes a deep breath, knocking on the door one, two, three times. She hopes she looks okay. She’s at least presentable after her shower, but her hair is still uneven. She doesn’t even really know what possessed her to cut it.

Well. It’s too late to do anything about it now.

Shuffling comes from behind the door. A girl’s voice yells “Just a second,” followed shortly after by the sound of something falling. There’s a yelp.

Kohane has the urge to back away and run, but that might just be the social anxiety.

The door swings open, and Kohane gets her first look at the girl. She has long black hair that fades into a deep blue at the end, adorned with countless star-shaped hairclips that catch the fading sunlight and seem to glimmer like actual stars. Her eyes are wide and honey-orange, partially hidden under her bangs—they must have gotten messed up in her rush to open the door. She’s wearing a teal jacket, sleeves rolled up to her elbows and unzipped to reveal her plain black crop top, paired with ripped skinny jeans that have keychains hanging from the belt loops. Her shoes match her jacket—teal with white accents. The shoelaces have been tied into stars.

She is… not even remotely who Kohane expected to be behind the door.

“Um,” she squeaks. “I—“

“I’ve never seen you before,” the girl marvels. “Are you a new hire?”

“A what?”

“For the convenience store down the street? We get so many snacks from there, and we’ve solved a couple hauntings for them, so they bring us stuff directly here now if we pay a little extra. It’s actually a really convenient arrangement—“ She cuts herself off. “You don’t have snacks, though.”

Kohane flushes and looks down. “No. I’m sorry. I—I can go get some? If that’s—”

“No, no, no! We have snacks. But if you’re not from the store…”

The girl gasps, and a smile blooms on her face. Kohane swears the sun comes back up, just a little bit, to accommodate for how bright the world should be with that smile as part of it. “You’re here for the job.” A hand flies to her mouth as if to contain a squeal. Kohane mourns the loss of her grin.

“Yes,” she manages. “I’m, um… Yes. I'm here for the job. Is that okay?”

“Okay?” the girl exclaims. “It’s better than okay! Oh, God, you have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for another girl to show up! I mean, Toya is sweet, but Akito—“ She stops again. She seems to have a tendency to ramble, realize she’s doing it, and cut herself off. Kohane wishes she would keep talking. “What am I doing? You’ll know what I mean in a second. Come on!”

The girl grasps Kohane’s wrist and pulls her into the house, barely remembering to slam the door shut behind them as she drags them both towards the sound of more voices.

“…And can you tell us about this?”

“…Holy shit! What the actual—You people are insane!” Kohane hears someone scramble to stand up and, sure enough, a boy comes barreling out of the room the girl had been about to drag her into. He doesn’t even meet her eyes—just keeps running and practically throws himself out the door.

“Huh,” the girl remarks. “I forgot that guy was here.”

Kohane is just about to ask what made him bolt like that when the girl pulls her into the very room he ran from. This is fine, she reasons. I’m sure there’s nothing sketchy going on here. This was the recommendation the man at the cafe had given her, and for some reason, she trusted his judgment.

“Akito~!” the girl sings. “I come bearing interview candidates!”

“Uh… no, you don’t.” An orange-haired boy with his back to the door is the one to reply. “That was the last one. Toya, wasn’t that the last one?”

From a soft-looking armchair, a boy with split-colored hair and piercing gray eyes looks up at Kohane. He has a beauty mark under his right eye—she thinks her gaze lingers on it for longer than it should. He wears a black jacket and black sweatpants—odd in the context of a job interview, but maybe he just doesn’t like jeans. Kohane wouldn’t blame him. She herself can’t stand the way they feel on her legs. Only slightly visible from where she’s standing and from under the jacket, he also seems to be wearing a graphic T-shirt with some cute, popular characters she wouldn’t have expected a guy like him to enjoy. A book rests in his lap. There’s something about his stare that both makes her feel safe and fills her with the urge to hide.

“I did say that,” he responds. “It seems I was wrong, though.”

Finally, the orange-headed boy turns around. Kohane’s breath hitches.

Her first thought is that he looks… nice. There’s a yellow streak in his hair that she couldn’t see before, and he has olive-green eyes that widen in shock when they meet hers. He’s wearing a hoodie that can’t seem to decide whether it’s orange or red, paired with a jean jacket that’s just covered in buttons and pins. He’s gone similarly overboard with ear piercings. He’s got ripped jeans like the girl, but his are black and baggy. He also only has one keychain hanging from his belt loops, as opposed to the girl’s several. (Kohane doesn’t know what the fashion rules are when it comes to pairing a jean jacket with jeans, but this boy is pulling everything off so well that she doesn’t question it.) His shoes are red, orange, and yellow with black accents and detailing. They remind her of a fireplace, giving her the strangest sense of being home— no, actually, it’s more than the shoes; that effect seems to be coming from the boy himself. 

Her second thought is that absolutely none of these people are dressed for a job interview. It makes her feel significantly better about her own clothing.

“Well.” He shakes his head. “I’m very sorry, but I’m afraid we’re out of time for interviews today.” He offers an apologetic smile, and everything about him is so starkly different from how he behaved and sounded just a moment ago that it nearly gives Kohane whiplash.

“No!” The girl who met Kohane at the door lets go of her hand in favor of grabbing her shoulders and defensively pulling her close. “What do you have to do after this that’s so important, anyway?! We have time for one more!”

The orange-headed boy considers for a moment before sighing and gesturing for Kohane to sit in one of the two empty chairs nearby. He himself takes a seat on a long sofa with a table in front of it. Kohane takes her seat, and the girl settles in the other.

“Alright. Sorry, that was rude of me.” He straightens up. “My name’s Akito Shinonome. This”—he points at the split-haired boy with his thumb—“is Toya Aoyagi. The girl that just hugged you like a stuffed animal is An Shiraishi.”

She takes a moment to look at all of them again. An Shiraishi. Akito Shinonome. Toya Aoyagi. Fitting names all around. They all match with their owner’s energy perfectly.

It takes her a minute to realize they’re waiting for her to offer her own name.

“Um,” she says intelligently. “I’m Kohane Azusawa. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“The pleasure’s ours,” Akito replies smoothly. “We hadn’t expected to get any more candidates today, and everyone else has been… disappointing, if you don’t mind my saying so.” He leans back. “Are you going to disappoint us, too?”

“Akito,” An scolds. “I swear, half the candidates run out on us ‘cause of your attitude.”

The last boy—Toya—says nothing, only observes. He’s pretending to be reading to try and mask the fact that he’s watching, but Kohane can feel his eyes on her.

“I have a great attitude,” Akito defends. “Okay, Azusawa. Let’s see what—“

“Here’s my résumé,” she blurts out, practically throwing the paper at him.

He blinks. “Uh… yes. Okay. Sure. I mean, I might as well read it if you’re giving it to me. Alright, let’s see.” He looks it over while Kohane contemplates the feasibility of escaping out the window. “Wow. You’ve come a long way to get here.”

“Yes,” she confirms. “My hometown, is, uh… Oh! Have you heard of the Limbless Factory Disaster?”

“Rings a bell.”

“That’s us.”

“Oh.” Akito’s eyes go wide again. “Pretty intense haunting for such a small place.”

“Yes, no one had any idea what was going on. Azuma agents had to come up and help dispel them, because we only had this one local agency, and there just weren’t enough of them. They lost a lot of people, too, so Visitations got more dangerous there for a couple of years.”

Something she said clearly caught Toya’s attention, because he’s lowered his book a few inches, but he still says nothing.

“I see.” Akito looks back down at the paper. “But… well, I’m assuming you weren’t of much help during that incident, considering you would have been five at the time.”

“Right. I’m sorry, I never meant to imply that I was. It’s just that that haunting is how I first discovered my Talent.”

Akito sets the paper down. “Oh?”

“My home was over in that direction. Still far, but not too far. I could hear them at night, sometimes as early as when the sun first started going down.”

“Ah.” Akito grins. It feels more natural, less practiced than his previous smiles, and makes Kohane feel… considered in a way she hadn’t up until now. “So you’re a Listener.”

“Yes, primarily. I hear them nearly everywhere I go when it’s dark.” She shudders with the weight of the memories. “But I also get fairly clear impressions from Touch, and that sometimes blends with what I hear? I guess like all psychic phenomena, it’s a bit difficult to explain. My Sight is, ah, not great,” she admits. “But I’ve been told it’s passable .”

“An can do a little of what you described, so I think I get what you mean. Sounds like you’re better at it than her, though.” He smirks.

“I’m going to hit you soon,” An warns. “I just don’t want to do it in front of Kohane.”

“It wouldn’t hurt. Anyway, Sight isn’t a field you have to worry about too much. Mine is excellent, if I do say so myself. Okay, what else is on here…”

While Akito reads over the rest of the paper, An taps on Kohane’s shoulder and tries to make faces to get her to laugh. It works a few times, and she feels much less tense. 

“‘Kay.” Akito folds up Kohane’s paper and pushes it aside. “Says here you worked with a local operative, Imamura. I’m assuming that’s the same one you mentioned earlier, the one that struggled after the factory hauntings.”

“That’s correct.”

“You worked under him for several years?”

“Also correct.”

“So you’ll have obtained your Grades One through Four.”

Kohane forces a smile onto her face. “Yes,” she lies. “All four of them.”

“You don’t seem to have any certificates with you. Or a letter of recommendation. Which is weird, because, y’know, you worked with him for so long. You’d think he’d at least give you a few pieces of paper for being such a dedicated agent.”

“Well.” Kohane swallows and looks down. “My tenure with him ended, um… rather abruptly.”

Akito raises an eyebrow.

“I can tell you the full story if you’d like,” she offers. “It’s just… I don’t really like to think about it.”

Her heart beats wildly in her chest. This was about when all the other interviews had ended—with failure to provide her certificates and explanation of her circumstances with Imamura. She has no reason to expect this will go any differently, but for some reason she’s feverish with something like hope.

Akito studies her for a moment before waving a hand dismissively. “Not an issue. I have more faith in my own judgment than I do some letter written by some old guy from the middle of nowhere, and you seem trustworthy enough to me.”

Relief floods through Kohane like a broken dam, and while she hopes the full extent of her relief doesn’t show on her face, she would like it if her gratitude did. “Thank you. I appreciate that.”

“Well, don’t thank me just yet. We still have to see if my judgment is right.” He disappears under the table and brings up a few items, covered by cloth. “Let the tests begin.”

“You’ve got this,” An whispers, which does not exactly make Kohane feel like she’s got this.

“Um… what exactly do these tests consist of?”

“Like I said, letters and things like that, the opinions of other people—those don’t matter too much to me. I want to see your Talent for myself.” There’s an unidentifiable glint in his eye as he leans forward. “Of course, if you’re not okay with that, you could always go.”

“No!” Kohane says quickly. “No, I can do it. What do you need?”

Akito leans even further forward, and his voice takes on a dramatic tone. “Well, first, we need…”

Kohane stops breathing.

“…Tea. Toya, would you be willing to make us some?”

Toya nods and stands, leaving his book open on the arm of his chair. Kohane exhales.

“You scared her!” An chides. “You are so dense.”

“Are you sure candidates don’t run out on us because of your attitude?” Akito retorts. “Azusawa, while Toya makes the tea, I’m gonna give you a rundown of how things work around here. Sound good?”

Kohane nods, but Akito has already launched into his explanation.

“This is a pretty new agency. Been around three months and I got my license last year. We’re accredited with DEPRAC, but not on their payroll like any of those big players. You know, Azuma, Shimizu, the like. We're independent. We take on the jobs that interest us and turn down the others. All our clients are private customers and they call on us to sort out their Visitors quickly and quietly. They pay us well in return. Are you following?”

“Yes. Er—Actually, what of your supervisors? Are they around?” She surveys the room as if one of them is just going to pop out from behind a plant.

“Hah! Supervisors. We don’t have those—this is my company. I’m in charge. Toya is deputy. An just goes here.”

“Rude,” An scoffs, pulling out one of her star hairclips and throwing it at him.

“Accurate,” Akito corrects, catching it and tossing it back. “Anyway. If you have a problem with our set-up, you may as well go and leave us to our tea. Unless it doesn’t bother you?”

Kohane has the sense she’s being tested, but to be honest, the lack of adults somehow makes her feel safer. Probably something to do with what happened at Imamura’s. “Oh, it doesn’t,” she replies truthfully. “I like the sound of that, actually. I did want to know one more thing—are there really only three of you? It… seems a bit small for a registered agency, if you don’t mind me saying…”

“We have an assistant join us sometimes. Three’s good for most Visitors, though.”

“Is your assistant here now?”

“Ah…” Akito grimaces. “Well, he doesn’t work here anymore.”

“Left for another job?”

He snorts. “Left for the Other Side, more like. Oh! That was quick, Toya.”

“I wanted to hurry, since Azusawa looked excited when you mentioned tea. There are snacks, too.” Toya sets two trays down on the table, well out of the way of the objects for Akito’s “tests.” Kohane’s pretty sure she looked more afraid than excited, but appreciates Toya’s attention to detail all the same… and she really wouldn’t mind tea.

“That’s really thoughtful of you, Aoyagi. Thank you.” She gives him her best smile, and he returns it with a wave. Actually, has his expression changed even once since she’s been here?

“Alright.” Akito clasps his hands together. “Let’s go.”

He pulls the cloth off the first object with no small amount of speed. Left behind is a jar, sealed with a red plug at the top. On either side of the plug are handles, presumably for carrying the thing around—it is quite large, and would be difficult to move otherwise. Something yellowish moves inside the jar, ever-so-slowly and almost imperceptibly—it almost looks like smoke or fog. Behind it, perhaps sitting in the very center of the jar, is something large and solid.

“Tell me what this is,” Akito says simply.

Kohane leans forward. The closer she looks, the more safety features she can spot. On the side of the glass, there’s a small symbol—a sun that looks like an eye.

“The jar is silver-glass,” Kohane comments. “Sunrise Corporation-made. I’m assuming that means there’s something in here that needs to be contained…?”

Akito nods and taps the side of the glass. The fog clears, and Kohane realizes the object in the jar is a human skull. Then the fog reshapes itself into a face, almost perfectly aligned with the skull underneath it. Kohane flinches away and gives a squeak—the face disappears in tendrils of smoke.

“Well,” she says once regaining her composure, “definitely a ghost-jar. The Source is the skull. I don’t know what kind of Visitor it is… could be a Phantasm or a Specter. Not a Type One.”

Akito regards her carefully. It’s then that Kohane realizes this thing must be what made the boy from before run out in such a panic… and that he had been expecting her to do the same.

Something like embarrassment but with more anger behind it sparks to life in her chest. She won’t run. She’s not scared of some ghost in a jar. She takes a bit of offense to the fact that he expected her to be. Did Toya think she’d run, too? Did An? She forces herself to lean back in her chair, feigning normalcy. She was not affected by that. She refuses to be scared. You will take me seriously.

“Seemed a little afraid there, Azusawa,” Akito notes. “Feeling okay?”

“I’m quite alright,” she replies. She won’t let him shake her—won’t give him the satisfaction. “Where did this thing come from? You’d think only agencies like Shimizu and Azuma would have stuff like this.”

“I already gave you time to ask questions,” Akito dismisses. He removes the cloth from atop another item. “Can you pick this up and tell me what kind of psychic resonance you get?”

It’s a mug, deep blue and faded or chipped in places from usage over time. On the side, there are some English letters— AS, TA, and AS again. She reaches for the handle and takes the thing gently into her hands.

…

Nothing. She tries turning it over, running her fingers along the sides—no matter what she does, she gets nothing. Even trying to block out all distractions from around her (Toya’s stare, Akito’s appraisal, An’s encouragement) she isn’t sensing anything.

After a while, she gives up and places it back on the table, defeated.

“I can’t get anything,” she admits. “Sorry.”

“Well, I’d hope not,” Akito says with a grin. “That’s Toya’s favorite mug. He’d be devastated if it was haunted.” He reaches for it and hands it to Toya, who takes it gratefully and examines it himself, as if he needs to check that it’s safe as well. “Okay, next.”

Enough. Kohane stands. “If you just intend to ridicule me, I think it’s in my best interest to leave.” Her voice is shaking, but it doesn’t matter. “Would you like me to exit through the front door, or is there another way out?”

“No, no, no!” An exclaims. “Kohane, that’s not—“

Akito raises a hand. “Hold it, Azusawa.”

“What?” she snaps. She’d never ordinarily act so rude, but everything from the past few days and now this? She’s too exhausted to be polite. “Do you have another joke you want to make before I go? Another prank to pull?”

Akito blinks. Slowly, his features pull into a smile. “Oh, good,” he says. “Didn’t think I was wrong, but I was starting to get worried you really were just a pushover. This is what I wanted to see.”

Kohane’s eyes widen. “You just wanted to get a reaction out of me? What kind of agency is this?”

“Look. I’m sorry for making you feel like we were making fun of you—“

An and Toya cut in simultaneously. “We?”

Akito sighs. “I’m sorry for making you feel like I was making fun of you,” he amends. “But that was a real test. And you passed it, for the record. Every other interview candidate today has made up some stupid story after not being able to sense anything, trying to make themselves look better. I mean, it’d be the most haunted mug in Japan if even the mildest of their stories was true. I won’t stop you from leaving if you really want to, but I don’t think you do. And if I’m right, you have more tests to get through.” He grins again.

Reluctantly, Kohane sits back down—she has to admit, that’s a good strategy and a clever idea for a test. She’s not so annoyed now. At least she knows they weren’t trying to embarrass her—she did a good enough job of that herself by acting out, but she’ll apologize later. If she gets the chance.

Akito tears away the last cloth, and three items lie on the table—a gold-plated watch, a penknife, and a small strand of ribbon. Kohane reaches for them one by one, tests them each three times, then exhales when she’s done.

Akito and An had been watching her the whole time—Toya has his nose buried in a book again, but this time she gets the sense he’s actually reading it. “Has anyone gotten this right?” she asks.

Akito smiles. “Have you?”

“Well, it was hard to pull all the individual resonances apart from each other, but I guess that was intentional. A test of its own, right?”

He doesn’t respond, but he keeps smiling, which Kohane takes to mean she was correct. “Okay,” she continues. “Which one do you want first, then?”

“Start with the knife.”

“That one’s a bit contradictory. I heard a man laughing, gunshots, maybe a few birds. There has to be a death attached to it or else I wouldn’t be getting any of this, but that death doesn’t seem to have been sad or violent or traumatic. It feels… gentle.”

“The ribbon.”

“There’s less sound attached to that one than there was to the knife. I could have heard someone crying, but it wasn’t very distinct. What’s really there is the emotion. I wanted to cry just touching it.”

“And now the watch.”

“The watch… the echoes are the weakest with it, so the owner is probably alive or at least didn’t die wearing it. But there is death attached to it. So… so much death. I heard raised voices, screams of pain, and—“ She winces. She’d been trying not to show any emotion when recounting all this, but the resonance attached to the watch was just so unpleasant. “It was horrible. I could only hold it for so long. I don’t know where you got it, but I don’t think you should have it.”

Silence blankets the room. Kohane suddenly remembers the snacks Toya had brought in earlier and examines the tray—there are some cookies left on it. She takes two and eats them to distract herself from her anxiety.

She expects the silence to stop, but it just stretches on and on and on. It gets to a point where it becomes physically painful. She stands, brushing crumbs off of her clothes. “I can go.”

“There’s a rule with those cookies,” Toya tells her.

“Pardon?”

“The rule. Akito, you know the rule.”

Akito turns to her, having been staring a hole in a spot on the table with his hands clasped together. “Each agency member can only have one cookie at a time. There’s a rotation, an order. It keeps things fair. You can’t just take two at once.”

“Each agency member?” Kohane tries to fight back the hope blooming in her chest. “Do you mean to say—“

“Yes, Kohane, you have the job. Welcome to Vivid BAD Company.”

—

It turns out that Vivid BAD Company’s headquarters is just Akito’s house. The upper levels are where An, Toya, and he live. There’s also a basement, which serves as the official “office” of the company—it’s really much too disorganized for that, though. When she’s receiving her tour, Toya swears to her that he’s been meaning to fix it, but they’ve had a lot of cases lately and he just hasn’t found the time. The basement also has floating dummies for everyone to practice rapier techniques with—Kohane wonders who makes the most use of those. She thinks it’s probably An.

Something about the atmosphere of the place makes her feel incredibly safe, and she can’t deny that she loves it. But it’s also strange. Akito hadn’t been lying—there really aren’t any adults anywhere. No supervisors, no parents, no DEPRAC officers… but the house seems so adult-like. And how would he have gotten a place like this by himself?

Akito leads her upstairs. “This is my childhood bedroom,” he explains. “No one’s used it for a long time.”

“…Okay.”

“You can have it, if you want. I already told you An and Toya both live here, and I’m assuming you don’t have anywhere else to go.”

Kohane doesn’t know whether or not that assumption should offend her, but she’s not about to turn down the offer, because he’s right. “That would be amazing. Thank you, Shinonome.”

“Mhm.” He turns around and moves to go back down the stairs, passing right by another door on the landing still unopened.

“Oh—wait,” she calls. “What’s this room?”

“Private,” Akito replies. “Come on. I’ve got more to show you.”

She hurries to follow him down, but can’t stop herself from sparing one more look at the door.

—

It’s hard to sleep that night. That morning, she hadn’t had a job. She hadn’t even had a shower in days. Then, all of a sudden, she’s presentable, employed, and not homeless. It all feels… fake.

She quietly leaves her room, intending to walk around—she just has to make sure this is all real, has to make sure she’s not going to wake up on the streets the next morning when she finally does get to sleep.

The door catches her attention again. She stands there staring at it, allowing herself to theorize about what might be behind it. Her hand drifts up from her side, hovers over the handle—

“Azusawa?”

She squeals and jumps back. “Aoyagi! You’re awake?”

“I have insomnia. I’m normally awake.”

“O-Oh, really? That’s—”

“Azusawa, I understand being curious, but I know Akito told you not to go in there.”

She looks anywhere but at Toya, scared to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me. And… well, it’s just that… he told me a whole lot about the agency, but not a lot about himself. That’s not an excuse,” she adds quickly. “I just… I wish he’d said more about his life.”

“If that’s what you’re hoping for from Akito, I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed.”

“Huh?”

“I’ve lived here for years, and I barely know anything about him.” Toya shrugs. “I know more than Shiraishi, but probably not much more.”

“Oh.” Kohane feels the flowers of connection in her chest wither. “That’s…”

“I’m just as curious as you, believe me. I don’t think it’d be unfair to say I’m more curious. But don’t violate his privacy like this.” He pauses. “I think that, one day, he’ll want us to know more about him. He won’t want to be alone forever. We just have to wait.” He turns around and begins to move to his own room, not too far from Kohane’s.

“Wait,” she whispers.

He turns around again. “Hm?”

“You’ve lived here longer than me. I was just wondering… the setup of the agency doesn’t bother me. Like, the no-adults setup. But it’s strange that there are no adults at all here, don’t you think?”

“What are you asking me, Azusawa?” 

“I’m…” She swallows. She thinks she knows the answer to her question before she asks it. “This house… Shinonome’s parents…”

“He never talks about them. I know he owns this house. I know his parents were travelers—researchers of a sort—and that most of the odd ghost-repellant decor here belonged to them. But I’ve never seen them. Akito was in care for some time with a relative before beginning training with a man… I don’t recall his name.”

“In care.” Kohane’s heart twists. “So, then…”

“Yes, Azusawa. In all likelihood, Akito’s parents are dead.” Toya enters his bedroom and closes the door behind him.

—

Kohane continues her walk, heading downstairs and keeping her thoughts far away from the door. Eventually, she notices warm light coming down one of the hallways—when she gets closer, she realizes the room it’s coming from is the makeshift library Akito showed her earlier. She tries to enter quietly, but she steps on a creaky floorboard almost immediately, and knows there’s no point in stealth anymore.

When she finds Akito behind a shelf, he’s already looking up from what he’d been reading.

“Evening, Kohane.” He smiles. “You’re up late.”

“It’s a bit difficult to sleep,” she sighs. Akito seems to snap to attention.

“Why? Is there something wrong with the room? If it’s anything I can fix, let me know and I’ll do it.”

“Oh!” Kohane waves her hands. “No, no, nothing like that.” She files away Akito’s eagerness to help her in her mind for later. It’s something she hadn’t expected from him. “It’s just nerves, I think.”

“You do seem pretty nervous, generally speaking,” Akito says. He relaxes and rests his chin on his hand.

“Yes. I’ve been told. Although I didn’t have to be. I figured it out on my own just fine.”

He laughs at that. It makes her smile. “Why’d you come down here?”

“Just… wanted water and saw light from this room. I was curious.” It’s not really the truth, but it doesn’t matter.

Akito hums in response and goes back to reading. Kohane sits in the chair across from his and leans over to get a good look. It seems to be some kind of magazine.

He notices her staring. “ Tokyo Society, ” he says drily. “Real interesting. At least it gives us an idea of what’s going on around here, though.”

“ Is something going on?”

“No. Just a bunch of parties.” He scoffs. “You know, I think it’s ridiculous. The Problem should make people consider their lives, but it should also make them consider the lives of others. Well, that’s not good phrasing, but you get it. Instead, rich people gather up in buildings like this and get all dressed up for a big night and get a thrill from the fact that there are probably Visitors outside. Those same Visitors are out there killing people. They have the money to invest in better protections, in research into the Problem, and they use it on shit like this.” 

Kohane knows what he means. Living in her small town, where ghost-touch was a common thing, she’d often resented the people in power who never seemed to care enough to help. They had their agencies, yes, but… well, it had always seemed to her that they saw running an agency as more of an economic venture than a mission to save people’s lives or make them better. “I’ve never heard anyone put it into words so well,” she says quietly. 

“Hah. I’d be worried you were just saying that to appease me, but that look on your face! You really do mean it.”

She doesn’t know how to respond to that, so she doesn’t. 

“Those pictures,” she says, pointing to a corner of the magazine. “Those are from the recent party DEPRAC had, no?”

Akito nods. “Most important heads of all the most important agencies showed up. At least it was less of a party than the other shit, like the Azuma Ball.” He cringes.

“So… were you there? I’d like to see your picture.” The idea of Akito in formal wear feels foreign to her, even though she’s only known him for a few hours—and yet the thought of it stirs something in her heart. She moves even closer to the magazine.

“No. So no.”

Kohane hums. Well, maybe another time then. “The advertisement I saw for your interview called Vivid BAD Company a prestigious agency… I’m beginning to get the sense that’s not strictly true.”

“Just a little white lie. Gotta make yourself sound good if you want to get anywhere in this world.” He pauses, considering. “Kinda like you when you told me you had your Grade Four.”

Kohane freezes. “I—I don’t—“

“Relax,” Akito tells her. “I called the branch of DEPRAC up by your hometown. They told me. But after what I saw during your interview today?” He laughs. “I couldn’t care less. Stuff like that’s not what makes you a qualified or good agent. And you survived years in active hauntings even without your Grade Four. That tells me you’re good. And I own this place, so what I say goes. Meaning… you’re good.”

She exhales shakily, pressing a trembling hand to her chest. “Thank you,” she breathes. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Well, you can start by using all that skill of yours to help us out.” Kohane understands in that moment what’s been sticking in her head about his smile—it’s strangely wolf-like, like he’s always planning something or always about to say or do something he knows will hurt. His entire existence is much more calculated than it seems. “This is going to be one of the best agencies in Shibuya one day, you know.”

Kohane blinks. “I thought you said you couldn’t stand them. All those big names. That they don’t do enough.”

“Yeah. But we can. We will. Everywhere you go, you’ll hear us in conversation. The big three—Shimizu, Azuma, us. And we’ll know we’re the best because we’re actually doing shit to help people. They’ll all know.” He leans back in his chair, tossing away the magazine. “We’re going to get rid of every ghost in this city, then in this country. I know we can. The other agencies might have numbers, but they don’t have Toya. They don’t have An. They don’t have you.” He grins. “They don’t have me. We’re going to change the world, Kohane. Do you want to be part of it?”

Even though it takes her a minute to answer, she’s never been more sure of anything in her life.

“Yes,” she replies, voice taking on a new quality she can’t identify. “Yes, I do.”

—

She has an album, filled with memories from all her time with Akito and the others. She has a small note in the margins between two of her favorite photos that tells her she should “get the pancakes at Ken’s next time.” She has little drawings of flowers that always appear whenever An comes near the album. She has Toya’s favorite way to drink coffee written on the inside of the back cover so she won’t forget it. (Like she ever would, anyway.)

Life changes fast.

But, despite all the pain it’s taken to get here, all the strange things she’s had to endure… this has all been the good kind of change. Her teammates have been a good change.

They’re the only people that have ever made her feel truly loved. They brought her out of her shell, gave her the confidence with which she now makes every move. She isn’t ready to lose them.

She’s considering the merits of robbing a bank when Toya comes in.

“Azusawa.” He gently shuts the door behind him.

Kohane snaps her photo album shut. “Oh, Aoyagi. Shouldn’t you be watching Shinonome?”

“Shiraishi can handle it for now.” He sits down next to her on the bed. “I wanted to hear from you what happened that night.”

“From… me?”

Toya nods. “Shiraishi will blame Akito. Akito will blame the client. But you have a level head. If I have a real, objective account of what went down, it’ll make this whole thing a lot easier.”

“Um… okay.” Kohane replays the night’s events in her head for the millionth time.

“We went inside. Made tea. Went upstairs and started looking around. Nothing. Shinonome and An were investigating this one room when that actress girl appeared. Started making her way to me. We barricaded ourselves in the study because we thought that was where her Source was. Then…” She swallows. “Um.”

“Take your time.”

“When she came back for us, she disappeared by flying into the wall, so we figured, oh, her Source is inside the wall. And… well, it was.”

She’s seen her fair share of disgusting Sources. It comes with being an agent, especially since most Sources are bodily remains. But something about the ghost girl’s body just sticks in her memory and makes her feel sick.

For a moment, when she was ghost-locked, she almost felt like she knew the girl, like she was feeling her feelings and remembering her memories, and that was incredibly dangerous. Emotions are tricky when dealing with ghosts—you can’t risk giving it anything to feed off of. But Kohane still can’t shake the sympathy she feels for the girl—killed and sealed in the wall for who knows how many years.

Akito and An wouldn’t care. Akito would outright reprimand her if he heard what she was thinking. But she doesn’t get that sense from Toya.

“An tossed a silver chain net over it, but by then I’d already thrown the flare because I saw it looming over Shinonome and I just—panicked.”

Just like that day.

“Shiho, move!” Kohane screams.

The ghost floating above her reaches down and presses its hand to her chest.

Toya doesn’t know about that. Toya doesn’t need to know about that. Not yet, anyway. She trusts all of them, but it hasn’t been long enough yet for her to be able to get those words out of her mouth.

“Then the whole place was on fire, and… Shinonome had us jump out the window because it was already unsafe to go back through the door.” Kohane finishes, making absolutely sure to leave out the part where she went back at the last second to retrieve a necklace from the girl’s body.

She doesn’t know why she did it. Even now, if you asked her for a reason, she’d have nothing to say. But somehow, she couldn’t let all that was left of that girl go up in flames. She didn’t think it was fair that she’d been left in that wall for so long, forgotten. How wrong would it be for her to be forgotten again if her necklace burned away?

It rests in Kohane’s pocket with some leftover iron filings even now. (She hopes the girl knows someone cares.)

“Did anything happen after?” At some point, Toya had started taking notes—he has a lot of small qualities like that that endear her to him. Always so focused.

“I don’t really remember. I hit my head when we fell. When I woke up, they were, um… loading Shinonome into an ambulance for treatment. He had gotten ghost-touched, so he took priority over An and I. And… that’s it.”

“Okay.” Toya gently closes his notepad. “See? That’s much more helpful than what they would have given me. Thank you, Azusawa.”

He smiles. It makes Kohane smile, too, despite all the horrifying memories she’s just relived.

“You might still want to ask them, though. Just because they might remember some details I missed.” Kohane fidgets with the necklace in her pocket. It’s… abnormally cold. She chalks it up to the metal going untouched for so long.

“I probably will,” Toya sighs. “It’s late, though. I’ll… take care of it tomorrow.” He speaks like he can feel the weight of his tasks already.

Kohane doesn’t want him to bear that weight alone. “If you need help, let me know.”

He looks surprised. “I… will. Thank you, Azusawa.” Toya stands and starts to walk out. “Make sure you get lots of rest. Akito may have sustained the worst of the injuries, but you and Shiraishi were still hurt, too.”

Normally, Kohane would want to protest—to prove herself and stay up late into the night getting work done. Now, though, she’s so exhausted that she can’t bring herself to do anything but nod. “I will. And then we’ll work on getting that money.”

Determination sparks in Toya’s eyes. “Yes. We will.”

With that, he leaves. Kohane sighs, taking off her jacket and throwing it across the room. She hears the iron filings scatter over the floor—she’ll have to clean them tomorrow before anyone steps on them—but that’s not much of a concern for her right now.

Her eyes drift shut almost immediately, and she descends into sleep.

—

Kohane wakes up what she thinks is a few hours later, and she is freezing. Sure, her room gets cold sometimes, but this is not normal.

It’s a familiar kind of cold, but… No. No, that can’t be right… Akito’s house has an abundance of iron and silver and lavender and odd, pre-Problem spirit catchers from other cultures around the world (she still doesn’t know what the deal with those is.) There’s no way there’s a ghost here.

It’s not possible. And yet she can almost see frost creeping up her bedframe.

Cold. Cold, cold, cold, cold, cold. Kohane feels like she should be shivering, but she can’t move right.

…If she can’t move…

By the window, moonlight pierces through the faint, faint outline of a figure. Its violet eyes open, and they meet Kohane’s.

Ah.

It’s not just a ghost, either. It’s the ghost.

…Wait, how is that possible?!

The shock warms Kohane up, just a little, enough for her to take a handful of iron filings from the floor and toss them into the direction of the ghost. When it’s stunned, all the warmth and blood and life rushes back into her limbs, and she scrambles to escape the room.

“An!” she yells. “Aoyagi! Shinonome!”

No responses come as she practically jumps down the stairs, but she hears shuffling from somewhere. Maybe it’s the ghost. Maybe she’s right behind you. Kohane wishes she’d grabbed more iron filings. Don’t turn around. Is it just her, or is the staircase creaking louder, getting colder?

“Kohane?” someone’s voice calls. “Something wrong?”

“Ghost!” she shrieks. “There’s a ghost in my room! Please!”

Immediately she hears two doors swing open, banging against the walls. Akito and Toya emerge from the shadowed hallways—Akito with a sword in hand—and gape at the thing.

“I can help!” Kohane trips down one of the steps and swears. “I have to get my rapier! Can someone—“

“On it!” Akito, instead of taking the stairs (probably because Kohane is still on them), jumps over the railing and shoves her past him. He stands at the bottom of the staircase, seemingly intending to block the spirit from getting past him if it comes down the stairs.

Kohane finall y spares a glance back. The girl’s other-light is still lingering in the doorway of her room. Why isn’t it coming closer?

“Toya, get further away!” Akito orders. He obliges, dashing back into his room. He re-emerges with a small, palm-sized bag that probably contains lavender—both as a last resort protection if the thing gets past Akito, and also probably just because the smell calms Toya down. (Kohane can’t really blame him, since she associates lavender with safety from ghosts, and that’s always calming.)

When Toya gets to the bottom of the stairs, ushered past by Akito just as Kohane was, he grabs her hand and leads her to the rapier rack. 

“S-Sorry!” she manages. She hadn’t realized she’d stopped.

“Don’t be. You were looking out for me. And it’s only natural to be shocked when you wake up with a ghost hanging over you.” He offers her a sword and what she swears is a smile. Of all times, now. “I find it incredible you were able to get out here at all.”

Kohane hopes it’s dark enough to conceal her reddening face. “Thank you,” she squeaks. “Don’t we need to go back? Now?”

Toya nods, and they return to the staircase, where absolutely nothing has changed.

“It won’t leave Kohane’s room,” Akito calls back, somehow having sensed their re-entry. “Source has gotta be in there.”

“ How? ” Kohane cries. What would the Source even—

…

Oh. Oh, no.

The memory of the necklace in her pocket before she went to sleep, cold as ice, resurfaces in her memory with as much sharpness and clarity as the frosty feel of the metal.

Kohane’s made a mistake.

But that shouldn’t be possible—if the Source was the necklace, why wouldn’t the ghost have come out earlier? It had still been light out, but barely, and Kohane’s room is always relatively dark.

She curses. The filings. The ones the necklace had rested in her jacket pocket with. The ones that scattered all over her floor when she threw her jacket.

Is she stupid or something? How could she have done this?

When she comes back to herself, she’s standing next to Akito, who’s banging on An’s door while Toya stands guard and holds his rapier in the direction of the ghost. It seems to be trying to get closer, but for some reason can’t leave Kohane’s room.

Odd. It had been able to travel greater distances in the Nakamura house. Maybe the iron filings still in Kohane’s floor are limiting its power—if it was behaving like it did that time, they would most certainly all be dead by now.

Not a comforting thought.

“An Shiraishi! Open the fucking door!” Akito starts kicking An’s door in addition to banging on it with both fists.

“I’m up,” An groans from inside. “Is something wrong?”

“There’s a ghost in the house!”

It goes silent in An’s room. Despite being an agent, she’s always been afraid of ghosts more than most people—she probably considers this her safe place, so having a ghost be inside would probably not make her feel great. Kohane’s heart gives several pangs of guilt. This is her fault. If only she hadn’t taken the necklace—

The door swings open.

“I’m here,” she says, voice shaky.

“You are not that heavy of a sleeper,” Akito snaps. “Don’t hide in there when—“

“I was asleep! Honest! I’d never leave you guys to deal with this alone on purpose!” An’s gaze jumps back and forth between the group before landing on Kohane and staying there, searching her eyes for support. “You believe me, right, Kohane?”

Kohane’s about to say of course when Akito interrupts. “We don’t have time for this! We have to get the Source!”

“About that,” Kohane chimes in. All eyes turn to her, and her heart begins pounding with all the volume and intensity of a drum. “I, um, think I know what it is.”

An breathes a sigh of relief and Toya’s shoulders relax, but Akito isn’t so easily calmed—his eyes narrow and now he’s the one searching Kohane’s face, but instead for… she doesn’t know what. Guilt? Regret? A tell? “How would you know that?” he asks, voice too even.

Kohane swallows.

“Kohane, whatever it is, we’ll deal with it later. It’s okay,” An tells her, reaching for her hand. Still looking out at the ghost, Toya nods. 

Akito offers nothing.

“I…” Kohane swallows again. Her mouth is dry and she’s cold and she really wishes she wasn’t such an idiot. “It’s a necklace, I think.”

“Where would you have gotten a necklace with a ghost inside? It’s—“ Akito cuts himself off as he searches his memories and realizes the truth, and his eyes go as big as the moon. “Kohane,” he groans. “You didn’t.”

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I’ll do anything to make it up to you, please don’t kick me out, I can help and I’ll never—“

“We’re not kicking you out,” Akito says incredulously. “That’s ridiculous. Don’t even suggest that. It’s not something you should worry about. But we are going to talk about this later.” The look in his eyes bears the full weight of his promise as he turns around and gently pushes past Toya, seeing about getting into Kohane’s room.

(While An is more afraid of ghosts than the average person, Akito hates them more than the average person. Kohane can’t imagine he’s happy that there’s one in his home—in his childhood bedroom, no less. He let her take that room when he gave her this job, and she repaid him by bringing a ghost into his house.

She doesn’t know whether she wants to have the conversation about why she did it now or never. )

“Kohane,” An whispers.

“I’m sorry, An.”

“It’s okay. But Akito’s right. We have to talk about it.”

“Later,” Kohane concedes. Maybe if An says it’s okay, it’s okay.

“Toya,” Akito calls. He’s out of Kohane’s sight now, but Toya can almost certainly still see him. “The lavender.”

Toya tosses the pouch of lavender into the dark, and Kohane can tell from the sound that it lands perfectly in Akito’s hand. How do they communicate in so few words? How do they trust each other enough not to argue about it? She thinks the two of them would be a perfectly good agency on their own. (Well, they were, because that’s how it was before she and An came along, but still.)

There’s another noise, like something soft hitting a wall. The ghost makes an otherworldly sound—Kohane’s hands shoot up to cover her ears—as its other-light flashes brighter for a moment before dimming to become almost invisible. Then there’s the sound of something sliding across the floor and, after that, heavy footsteps that seem to be coming from inside Kohane’s room.

“How did he get in there?” An marvels. Kohane is similarly awed—Toya’s expression is grim more than anything. Huh.

“Okay!” Akito exhales so loudly the three of them can hear it. “The lavender’s on the ground, so you all can come in!”

“There’s still other-light,” An points out.

“That’s all that’s there! You’ll be good to walk through it! Get in here and help me find the Source.” The sound of something falling rings through the house. “ Fuck, that hurt.”

Kohane, driven by guilt, is the first to start dashing into the room. She looks for her jacket, finding it still in a lump on the floor, and kneels down next to it to search the area.

Something glints in the moonlight as she moves. She thinks it’s iron at first, but something compels her to check again.

The necklace. “Shinonome! Is there still lavender in the bag?”

“No, I used it all. Have to make sure the whole room smells like it for the protection to work.”

I know that, Kohane doesn’t say. Instead she calls out for An. “Please grab a can of iron filings for me!”

“On it.” She sees An’s shadow retreat.

“Shinonome, the bag.”

Akito meets Kohane’s eyes, brows raised so high they hide in his bangs. His eyes are almost wild.

“Please,” she adds hurriedly, and Akito nods and hands her the pouch. It’s awfully small.

An gets back with the filings just as the smell of lavender begins to thin out—Kohane dumps them into the pouch in a panic, drops the necklace inside, and pulls the strings to close it. The rapidly reforming ghost vanishes, taking with it its other-light—it leaves them all alone in the dark, illuminated only by the ominous moon and the lone flickering ghost-lamp outside the window.

(As it disappears, Kohane hears it loud and clear: again, it pleads for help. It sends a chill down her spine, more severe than even the cold she’d felt when she first woke up.

She forces herself to focus.)

They all breathe heavily for a moment. Toya and An, having been standing, sink to the floor; Akito simply leans back against Kohane’s bed, and Kohane herself drops fully to her knees.

Predictably, when the silence is loud enough that it needs to be broken, Akito is the first to speak.

“Okay,” he manages, still breathing hard. “Now that we’re all alive and well: what the fuck, Kohane?”