Was gender the theme this time around? Identity politics can be pretty thorny, not the kind of thing for a greenhorn to get involved in.
“I put it on you while you were asleep. Oh, um, your clothes were covered in other people’s blood, so I had no choice. I definitely wasn’t thinking about getting you involved in anything else at that point.”
“I never thought you were. But, um, this look is pretty embarrassing for a nineteen-year-old guy…”
“What’re you talking about? Disguising yourself in women’s clothing is one of the fundamentals of sleuthing. It’s an indispensable element, you might say, the standard to end all mystery novel standards. The renowned Holmes himself wore women’s clothing on a regular basis.”
“Who?”
“Mugen Mamiya dresses as a girl, what, a third of the time? In the action-adventure series, anyway.”
“I prefer the weird tales series, so…”
“Even that spiritual detective wore a skirt when he was investigating a girls’ school.”
“We’re borrowing a page from that?”
“Even Jojo wore women’s clothing in Part 2 when he was infiltrating the Nazis.”
“We’re borrowing a page from that?!”
“Even MacArthur had to wear a skirt when he was a kid, they say.”
“Please don’t resort to referencing great historical figures…”
“And Yamato Takeru no Mikoto─”
“Now you’re going to dust off mythology?”
“Zerozaki was also saying that he liked to wear women’s clothing.”
“Please don’t tell me such plausible lies.”
“I hear Hikari is into guys who wear women’s clothing.”
“Please don’t tell me such implausible lies!”
The white alligator seemed to be closing in…
That is, Aikawa seemed to be a little too into boys’ manga.
“What can you do. It’s a girls’ school. A guy can’t get in there looking like a guy.”
“I’m sure that’s true, but…”
Or wait, was that “true”? I had a feeling that something crucial was fundamentally wrong at a more elemental level.
“Enough already. Quit your griping,” Aikawa finally turned threatening. “A minute ago you swore you’d do anything I said. Well? Were you lying to me?”
I vehemently did not recall promising to go so far as to give up the last shreds of my human dignity, but Aikawa was right, I couldn’t be such an ingrate. I understand, I nodded. It was certainly true that even she would have a tough time infiltrating a girls’ school. Schools tend to maintain outlandishly tight borders, never mind Sumiyuri Academy. There were serious difficulties inherent in putting Aikawa in that uniform and sending her in (though I couldn’t deny a certain personal curiosity), and I myself could never get inside a place like that in my regular clothes. It was a mystery why she had picked me for the task, but I’d cooperate to the best of my ability. Not like I had anything better to do.
“Okay, here’s your forged student ID. You’ll need it for the checkpoint at the main gate.”
“Thanks.” The ID had my picture affixed to it. Such meticulous preparation, almost as if this situation had been arranged from the start. “Um…you said something about getting some student out of there. In other words, your job this time is a search and rescue?”
Jun Aikawa’s job─she was a contractor. Not exactly an occupation based in high-minded morals. Basically, she would take on any task regardless of difficulty as long as the price was right, be it solving a locked-room murder, collecting information, trafficking illegal goods, taking down a serial killer, or a search and rescue. But who would someone want to locate badly enough to employ a front-liner like Aikawa, the world’s strongest contractor?
“It’s not quite a search and rescue, but yeah, something like that. Sumiyuri Academy is a one-hundred-percent residential boarding school, and security is tight. Getting even a single person out of there is a big job. There are ways to do it if violence is on the table, but this time around we’re shooting to keep things as quiet as possible.”
Keeping things quiet─is definitely not Aikawa’s strong suit. She operates on the premise that “punching is faster than thinking,” so in her hands even a logical locked-room murder case ends up turning into an action movie.
“Anyway, the job this time around is to spring Ichihime… That’s the girl’s name, Ichihime Yukariki.”
“Spring her, huh… That makes it sound like the school is holding her captive.”
“Close enough. Schools are basically facilities for incarcerating students, aren’t they? Though the jailers call it education.”
That was all Aikawa would tell me, nothing in the way of a more detailed briefing. Not that that was anything new; without bringing professional ethics or anything into it, she simply didn’t care for things like explanations or exposition.
“It is what it is”─that sort of simplicity seemed to be at the root of Aikawa’s being. It was an enlightened ground that I, irrationally bound by theoretical rules and logical tools as I am, could never reach.
“Well, I won’t ask about the particulars. I’m not all that interested, to be honest. You just want me to locate this student─what was it, Yukariki?─keep her safe, and get her out of there, right?”
“That’s my perceptive Iitan. But you don’t need to worry about the ‘locate’ part. Since she’ll be waiting for you. Here, take this.”
On top of my forged student ID she placed a map, presumably of the Sumiyuri Academy campus. There was a single red mark on the small scrap of paper. Seemingly this was the place where the girl would be waiting. Next to it was written “Year 2, Class A.”
“As for how to get her out, I’ll leave that up to you. Ichihime herself can give you the details… I’m pretty sure that kid will be able to give you a proper explanation.”
I sensed Aikawa’s peculiar brand of intimacy in the phrase that kid. It seemed she had some connection to the girl. Were they, friends? If so, perhaps this job was only half professional, and the other half was personal.
“And lastly, this…a visual of the target.” Aikawa placed a photograph on top of the map. “That picture was taken when Yukariki was twelve, though, so try and imagine what she’d look like five years down the line.”
“Five years at that age means she will’ve grown a lot. Won’t she look like a totally different person?”
I stared at the photo uneasily. It showed the innocent smile of a girl barely into her teens. No hint of irony or purity or mirth, just a genuine smile. Men of a certain persuasion wouldn’t be able to contain themselves. Trying to picture her that way five years along─as a high school second-year, I guess─I could say with confidence that she’d be quite the beauty.
“Why’re you staring at it like that? She your type, Iitan? Keep yer hands off her.”
“No way. I’m not much for younger girls.” I turned the picture upside down and dropped it on top of the map. “If she was older than me, it wouldn’t be out of the question.”
“Your sexual proclivities are so simple they’re complicated… Anyway, I’ll leave it to you. We’ve still got some time, so get some shuteye if you want.”
“Right… Oh, can I ask one more thing?”
“What?”
“Can I keep this uniform when the job is done? I’m sure Kunagisa would love to have it.”
Aikawa chuckled cynically and said, “Suit yourself,” then began to concentrate on driving. Which meant that up until then she hadn’t been concentrating on driving, despite the fact that we were on a highway, which was vaguely terrifying. Trying to massage away the lingering pain in my abdomen, I flipped the photograph back over and took another look at Ichihime Yukariki’s face.
Hmm. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but…
Something about it roused my interest, just a little.
Yeah, this girl’s aura was─
“Something I might enjoy, no nonsense…” I muttered too low for Aikawa to hear, before tucking the photo away in my breast pocket.