Perestroika: Act 2
Higan's gate was a meeting point for most friend groups who didn't already walk to school together, and the Tovarichi weren't an exception. Most of the other members of the Census had stopped associating themselves with Alyona after news started to spread that she got caught in a huge scheme against the school. The dreaded Census Club was gone and everyone wanted their turn at revenge. Archie stared down some boys from the baseball club who clutched their bats, daring them to make a move and give him a reason to beat their asses while Renka catches some girls trying to knock her bag out of her hands.
"I see only pain in your futures" she says as her grip tightens on her hefty bag, loaded down with mystical knick-knacks over school supplies. The girls choose to leave instead of find out what she meant by any of that.
"Where is she? I'm owed a look at her math homework" Archie says, squinting to try and see blonde twintails in the crowd.
"She would not miss a day of her dream: Shall we investigate?" Renka asks
Archie nods as they make their way to the office, borrowing the secretaries phone and dialing Alyona's number.
ring....
ring.....
ring.....
"Hello! This is the Rodionova Residence: Nobody is available at the moment, so please leave a message!" says Alyona's cheerful voice over the answering machine. Renka takes the phone and clears her throat:
"Your aura among our ranks is dearly missed: please elucidate the reason behind your absence as soon as possible" The cyclops girls says before hanging up.
"She's probably just sick, give her a rest" Archie says
"Alyona would drag herself to school even if she had to a wear a hazmat suit: this does not sit right" Renka says as the secretary stops her from lighting some kind of incense in the office, pointing to a no smoking sign. The two start walking outside.
"Just let her rest, okay? I know you think you've got a psychic connection with' her but if she feels like shit from all the community service work she deserves to sleep it off instead of dragging her ass to school like nothins' wrong"
Renka is quiet, looking up at Archie with a furrowed brow as she sets a small ceramic bowl onto the ground in a clearing behind the school and takes a meditative posture.
"I will attempt to commune with her Aura: even if she is sleeping I should be able judge her health from such an act"
"Whatever, gonna go rush through this bloody algebra then...." Archie says as he walks away. Renka's witch shit didn't really scare him more than it made him frustrated at having to figure out what was a useless ritual and what was real magic. The fact that her explanations of her own work were always incredibly vague and loaded spiritualist nonsense he was figuring out from a second language made him more confused at the why and how of it all.
The Tovarichi sit in the usual detention room, down one member that never came to school. Renka was jumpy toward every sound that didn't come from her book while Archie stared at the ceiling: anything to not think abut more Algebra. Of course, it was only a matter of time before Momo came around to collect the girls. Right on queue, she enters the room and seems to immediately notice Alyona's absense.
"Where is Rodionova-san?" the delinquent girl asks in a rough tone.
The teacher in charge of them answers, an older woman with short black air and a skirt suit to match: "Absent for the day"
"Cho-san, where is she?" Momo says, as she steps right in front of the mystic girls desk.
"I don't know: but her aura was in a state of disarray. I was dragged to this room to serve my sentence while Alyona-" Renka starts only for Momo's deep sigh to interrupt her.
"Renka, you, you're coming with me" Momo says with a point toward Archie, looking back to the teacher as if daring her to tell her no.
The woman looks away from the scene: Okomoto's orders were to let them do "community service" for Momofuku. Archie and Renka eagerly pack their things away and follow Momo off of school grounds, walking towards the Fujiwara Ward.
"So what's really going on? Is that brat planning something?" Momo asks aggressively.
"She's sick for a day: you want someone with a flu or somethin' coughin' on your stuff?" Archie answers bluntly
"That is not known for sure, Archibald" Renka says, giving him a glare.
"My seal on her Death Mark may weaken if her health declines and let Fushihara take her in such a weakened state. It is vital we find her as soon as possible"
Momo was trying to hide it, but she was starting to panic as she stands still: "Why didn't you say something sooner!? Where does she live?! Were seeing her NOW!"
Renka starts heading toward the school at a fork in the road, getting a bewildered look from Archie and Momo: "Where the hell are you going!?" they say in unison.
"To seek her by my own means: do not stop your own work on my behalf, Momofuu-Ki" she says with a bow before going on her way.
Archie had never been alone with Momo. He knew her more from rumors and stories than anything else, besides the time she beat the shit out of them with the Student Council's help. She was a girl on the taller side, with raven black hair which added to a menacing aura. He shakes his head he catches himself thinking like Renka: last thing he needed was to start sacrificing goats in his backyard or whatever else she does. The two catch sight of Alyona's mansion and stop when they can see some broken windows and no cops around. The two look at each other.
"Your gang didn't...." Archie starts
"NO!!" Momo shouts as she grits her teeth and marches right up to the gate, a Russian man in khakis and a leather jacket smoking with a partner on guard.
"Woah, woah, woah" one of them says: "Private property, no visitors" he says, that being his only known Japanese phrase.
They change their attitude as soon as they see Archie: "She's with me, what the hell happened?" he asks in English
"An attack by some pros, knew how to get into yard through the fucking sewers, then they grabbed Ludmilla. Alyona's orders were to keep the guns buried in the yard until the heat from the school blew over so we had fists and knives to work with" the guard whispers back in the same language.
"Amazing" Archie says in a dull, sarcastic tone.
"What?! What's going on?!" Momo demands loudly in Japanese
"Alyona's mother got kidnapped by some other criminals. She's probably out hunting whoever did it herself" Archie says as he switches back to Momo's mother tongue.
If the girl could manifest a background of hellfire, it would appear. Her hands clamp into fists and she looks up at Archie with a twitching eye: "So if we follow her trail we save both of them. You're coming with me incase I need a translator" she demands unflinchingly.
Archie simply nods and cracks his neck: this was going to be a long night.
Renka approaches the student council's room with a stoic look, opening the door to see Madoka lazing around while painting her nails while Yae reads a foreign mystery novel. She is immediately noticed by the latter girl: "Cho-san, something wrong?"
Renka rarely let herself be so easily read, but knowing all of her work keeping Alyona in the world of the living might be undone by her being pushed beyond her limits again meant making a humiliating request of Yae in particular.
"I require your assistance in tracking where Alyona-sama may have gone: her mansion has been vandalized, and I suspect it is related to her familial connections"
Yae closes her book dramatically, a smug look on her face as she looks at Renka: the girls face is furrowed in desperation. She wanted to solve this herself but needs something to latch onto for her techniques to work.
"I know some of the story: She's the only child of Taras Rodionova, a Bratva boss in Saint Petersburg who made it big after the Belezhev accords blew up the USSR. If someone wanted to harm him they wouldn't go for the house first since she lives in a fancy fortress, but instead try and ambush her on the road, either to kill her and deny Taras an heir or to kidnap her"
"Alyona might not be unfamiliar with getting kidnapped: a few of her teeth are dental implants"
Yae looks around, seeing Renka shake her head and Madoka staring wide-eyed at her.
"We need to call the police for this! Even if she's mega shady that doesn't mean they can't help!" Madoka says, cutting Renka off right as she tries to correct Yae about Alyona's ability to defend herself.
"She's a gangster by birth: it could get her deported if the cops snoop around too much. I wouldn't be shocked if she had armed guards given all the cars that pick her up have bulletproof glass" Yae warns, making Madoka hesitate.
"She is not helpless: far from it" Renka says as she steps forward.
"Her Magical Girl form might be strong but you have to remember that real life and-" Yae starts.
"Do not have a beginning or end: They are parts of a whole. The Idea world and the world we inhabit in our daily lives are knotted tree which is in constant competition with itself" Renka says as she runs a hand through her hair, looking right at Yae with her single eye.
Yae sighs: "Do you want help or not? I'm sure Mei-san would love to hear your taoist proverbs but my point to both of you is that Alyona is going to solve this like her father would solve it: Kill everyone in the organization which offended her as brutally as possible"
"A-Alyona-chan isn't like that, she just... has a cold side!" Madoka insists.
"...Alyona-sama has not yet stained her hands with blood: She is yet pure in the eyes of the gods" Renka says
"Ok, good, she might hesitate" Yae says as she gathers her bag.
"I'll call Shujinko and the others: I've put soooo much time into Alyona and I'm not going to make anyone tell Yaya her friend got deported"
Yae nods: "Theres a crime scene I've been meaning to look at anyways: a hit and run off of one of the highways"
Renka follows her with quiet intensity as Madoka fast-walks the other direction to get to the office.
"I can handle this myself" Yae says with a look over her shoulder.
"You won't find her in time using your own methods: our ways have intersected and neither of us will be stepping off of it" Renka states as she follows with no hesitation in her words.
"Wanna bet?" Yae says in the most cocky tone she can muster. Renka answers a simple nod and intense glare.
Belladonna drags herself over to her computer at the Fujiwara Senki's hideout, a dirty and barely walkable mess as Archie leans on a wall and Momo looks over her shoulder at her computer screen as she pulls up a spreadsheet of every criminal group in Kagoeka. The list is longer than Momo seemed to hope as Archie just waited for the boffin to finish giving them a target.
"Momofuu-ki, you can't seriously expect to beat down the door of every syndicate in the city just looking some leftover Bratva enforcers"
"I am: were not catching Alyona's trail any other way" Momo says as she reads closer to the screen
"Well... let me narrow down to just the one that have accessed international telecom lines...." the hacker says as she three entries get highlighted.
Archie looks over at the remaining results: The Che-Tong, The Kurobane Group, and the Inahashi Clan.
"So who's the toughest?" he asks.
"Kurobane: they have private security ranging from mall cops to PMC's" Belladonna says as she some sleep out of her eye.
"Istuki can help get us in to settle things if we need it" Momo says
"The Che-Tong run an underground casino on the western edge of town, and the Inahashi clan has their patriarch set up in the Hoshimi district on the eastern part of the city" Dawn continues.
"So we hit the two clans then get your mate to let us in to have talk with Mr. Kurobane?" Archie asks
"Yeah, sound good" Momo says, simply eager to get going.
"Wait! You two don't want backup?! Fumiko can-" Belladonna starts as turns around in her chair to see the massive boy and her boss leaving.
"Don't bother, were just gonna make ourselves heard until we have what we want" Momo says as the two make their way across town.
Yae and Renka look over the wreck of a car that had been slammed on its left passenger door and knocked into a vacant lot, flipped once and landed on its side. The scene itself is poorly preserved, as it was quickly deemed an accident and the wreckage having yet to be pulled out and sent to a scrapyard. It wasn't a surprising state of affairs given the area was a forbidden zone,
Renka's eye goes the ruined clothes with are strewn about the area: "Alyona had bought some new blouses and skirts from a boutique which opened it doors recently: were in the correct place"
Yae nods: "Then we can place her at the scene definitively as a victim" she says as she sketches out how a large car probably knocked her vehicle into the vacant lot.
"But who did the ramming is the next question" Yae says to an audience of non, Renka having drifted off to looking for something in the back seats.
"Don't taint the crime scene, please" The teenage detective says with a frustrated sigh.
"I require an object of value with some connection to Alyona, I was accompanying her shopping and she had purchased a 30000 Yen bottle of perfume that would make for a superb offering to the gods, spirits, and shen"
"Its insanely unlikely something like that would survive the crash, and the morning dew would dissipated any trace of the perfume itself. The broken bottle is all you're going to-"
Renka wiggles her way out of the mess of sharp glass and metal, surprisingly adept at contorting her body around its hazards as she held a prize in her hand. The bottle was merely chipped and wet, even the tag was still on it.
"The chances of that are so low..." Yae says with wonder as Renka's lips curl into an impish smile.
"Cho-san, I want to see your way of solving this" Yae says with wide, suddenly interested eyes.
"Of course, Zannami-san. I have all the needed elements to perform a seance with my ancestor's spirits" Renka says as she starts walking toward sidewalk.
Amazing, Yae thought. She was either going to see some incredible magic, a pathetic attempt to trick her with sleight of hand and special effects, or a schizophrenic episode.
The walk over to her cluttered mess of a house was long. The whole building looked more like a Chinese herbal remedy shop than a house, a small and barely visible staircase behind a bead curtain leading upstairs. Renka saw her own room as ordered chaos, a collection of the things that mattered most to her alongside the things she needed to keep her mortal body running. Yae saw the room as a chaotic collection of assorted idols, art, and devices randomly strewn about while clothes were stored in a filing cabinet or on a hanging rack which had a bunch of fancy costumes on it: a maid outfit, a red and purple qipao, a shrine maiden's outfit, and an orange Buddhist robe among many other outfits for niche occasions.
Yae keeps an eye on Renka and sits on her bed while she opens up a closet she had converted into an alter to three types of spirits. The Shinto side on the right was a home shrine where the Japanese ancestors of her family had their pictures laid in remembrance with a mirror, sword, and seemingly real gemstone laid at the alter to channel as much power from Amaterasu as possible. The middle was taken up by a collection of Chinese mystical artifacts like Bagua mirrors and a jeweled sword with the pictures of her Chinese ancestors placed upward in reverence. The left side of the closest was taken up by a resting Buddha statue below which are pictures of the two women in her family which must have been devout Buddhist nuns, surrounded by the smaller statues of a few bodhisattvas Yae couldn't pin down the names of in the moment.
Renka lights the incense, and hits a mini gong before entering a posture of prayer, holding the perfume bottle toward the alter.
"Spirits from beyond the mortal veil, I humbly offer a treasure of the world of man, and wish only for its owner to be tracked and located, and to know that location before giving it up" she says in a reverent and intense tone.
Yae watches on in amazement as pictures of Renka's ancestors begin to move their faces and sniff at a puff of the perfume. The Japanese are enamored, the Chinese are scheming quietly, and the Buddhists quirk their heads oddly. The perfume bottle is placed on a fine velvet pillow in the center of the closet as Renka maintains her prayer and her ancestral spirits bicker.
"Such a thing belongs to our branch! Its beauty must be appreciated by true connoisseurs!" The portrait of an old Onmyoji says to the agreement of the rest of his branch.
"Its secrets must be unveiled: such a smell is evident of advanced alchemy" The portrait of an heavily mustached soldier in blue armor says.
"It should be shared as a meditative aid: Such blatant selfishness is unbecoming for such old spirits" The budhists chide.
"The offering will be freely given to those who can find its owners, whether they be in veiled world or unbound world" Renka states as the portraits go still. For a moment, Yae attempts to figure out how the trick worked and refuse to see it as magic before the bidding starts in earnest. They go from offering vague proverbs to speaking about more and more specific locations.
"Rodionova is in the pocket of a great jungle, a flooded zone of great danger as she seeks retribution on those who wronged her" The Shen state, the Onmyoji desperately keep searching for more specific information, while the Buddhists quietly resign the auction and go back to their still portraits.
The Chinese branch is granted the Perfume, and Renka offers a prayer to the other two branches. She looks up at Yae to see lost in racing thoughts and muttering to herself.
"...So that how she's going to outgun them... she knew where to take them so she'd have an advantage, but the hostage must be slowing her down..."
"Zennami-san: I believe we have our answer. How would you recommend proceeding given our revelation?" Renka asks as she stands
Yae looks at the ground for a moment, then back to Renka: "Were going to stop at a payphone and call the rest of the student council, and whoever else we can trust. There is more to this, something tells me Alyona was provoked to cause enough noise that we couldn't ignore her. We meet at the Fujiwara Senki hideout to plan our move."
Renka nods as she gathers her things, not skipping a beat.
"If I brought you case files to do this sort of thing to solve, would you?"
Renka looks back toward Yae with dissapointment in her eyes: "My practices are a not a tool to be worked as you please"
"Come on, I'm not disrepsecting it, I'm just trying to put it to its best use" Yae says in a diplomatic tone.
"I will not be your plastic oracle. This is all for Alyona-sama. When you irritate the spirits of the dead, you invite tragedy" Renka states conclusively to Yae. The detective merely sighs as she shifts her thinking away from the amount of cold cases her seance's could solve and back to the kidnapping at hand.
Momo winced as so many people tried to find places to sit in the cramped mess of a hideout she and her gang had, with the larger boys just leaning on walls while a tired-looking Yaya was given the best seat in the house on the middle coushion of a couch. Yae stood at the head of the group and looked them over:
Archie and Momo were both rumpled and scraped, but it was nothing out of the ordinary for the two delinquents.
Ran and Shu were both looking with nothing but concern, though with different reasons: Shu wanted to stop anyone from dying, while Ran wanted to avoid Alyona ruining her own life going after revenge.
Madoka was visibly concerned, nervous at whatever is really going on after having spent her night helping everyone get here.
Kaoru was dressed in her usual seifuku and ready to take notes: Yae wanted as many boots on the ground as possible, even if that abiding by the Scarlet Senshi's rules of engagement.
Renka stood near the back: she had already stated she was prepared to follow whatever plan the Student Council agreed to enact.
Shu speaks first: "Thank you Madoka, for getting everyone here on short notice"
The gyaru is quick to nod: "No problem~"
"Is... Is Alyona-chan really... really going to kill people?" Yaya says, trying not cry.
"Thats what were trying to stop" Yae says in a soothing voice.
"But we have to strike fast: she's in a flooding zone on the far southwest of Kagoeka which takes the form of a dense jungle. The only thing slowing her Idolon form down is likely the hostage the Bratva have in the form of her mother. I have it on good authority from Renka that Alyona won't accept her death and from Archie that the people who kidnapped her will follow through on the threat"
Yaya gulps and pulls a haori over shoulders, trying to calm down as she nods along.
Momo slams her foot on a low table: "Then why are we still here?! We need to get in there and rescue both of them!"
"Because I think this is a diversion, or a trap. Whichever it is, I think it will be wise to split our forces" Yae responds.
"Yaya, ran, and-"
"I-I want to save Alyona-can! Please! I...I can do it!" the littlest girl says tearfully.
"Yaya please-" Yae says before a look of such adorable determination disarms from Yaya disarms her.
"Let her, and I can manage my own patrols around the city" Kaoru says
"In that case, Ran and Madoka, I want you looking for any supernatural or physical threats that might be trying to take advantage of us moving on Alyona and delay them at least" Yae says.
"Incase their too strong, I suppose. Where are we meeting if were forced to run?" Ran asks stoicly.
"Back here" Momo says with a tone not inviting a debate.
"I'll get my gang to set up a perimeter: if we can repel the Bratva and their hired help once we can do it again"
"The rest of us are going in to find Alyona and her mom, right?" the Sukeban asks impatiently.
Yae nods
"Our goal when we get inside is to link up with Alyona and stop her from making the situation worse" Shu says
"And what if its already bad?" Yae asks with a quirked brow.
"We intervene."
The room is quiet for a moment as everyone readies themselves for a very long night.