Real Recognition

“You better listen to me! Or else I’ll show you what Kyoha can really do!”

“What the hell is up with the shotgun?! Are you crazy, woman?”

I was currently doing a job that I wasn’t proud of. But what was I supposed to do? The charity wanted me to pay reparations for the damaged stuffed animal in that warehouse. I thought it would be fine, but apparently those toys cost like a million dollars and I was in the pit.

Miharu, for some reason, didn’t seem to understand my perspective. I’m not about to go broke just to pay off a bear, so I needed some quick and easy money, no matter how shady.

“This very much doesn’t seem like heroism or justice at all!” Miharu complained in my mind.

“Look. Plagiarism is a moral crime, so we’re really still being heroes here.”

“Wouldn’t a true hero negotiate the problem?”

“I’m negotiating!”

I said, with my shotgun pointed at the fat shopkeeper. The man was immediately surrendering, with his hands up. He was a Chalyce, so I wasn’t worried about being pushed against. That species wasn’t good at magic, but they could take quite a beating because of their flexible steel skin. Luckily, this guy also seemed to be quite the coward.

“Look. All I need is those potions to be taken down from your display tomorrow, and for you to never sell anything like that again. Then my client, the person who really made those potions, will be happy and you can go back to normal.”

“I’m telling you, I came up with those potions myself!”

“You are the ONLY person that knows that witch’s secret recipe, and suddenly you come up with something just like it? Likely story.”

“Nngh-”

The guy was sweating out of his steel skin. I was too. This kind of negotiation was not what I had in mind when starting this agency. When I’m not broke, I'll never accept this kind of job again.

“Fine! I’ll take down the damn potions! Just put your gun down!” the shopkeeper said.

“Thank you, I’m glad we could come to an agreement. I’ll check back tomorrow,” I said, finally thankful that this was over with. Holstering my gun, I turned my back on the keeper and began to walk out of the shop.

Tomorrow, I should be able to pay off my debt with the money that I got from this job. I had to charge extra for it, for the mental toll it took on me. Even still, Miharu seemed to disapprove. It was like she could never be happy.

“See. We’re done. No skin off my back and we saved a shopkeeper’s business.” I tried to defend my position.

“Uh-huh. I’m still not convinced of your heroism here.” Miharu responded. “I don’t want our agency to be used for these.”

“I won’t. I promise. I just needed to, believe me,” I responded mentally, finally leaving the store. “Look, if we just keep it on the down-low, we can maintain our squeaky clean reputation. Nobody needs to find out-”

As I left, I felt a hand touch my shoulder. A single word sent chills down my spine.

“Akina.”

Turning my head, I saw a man in a police uniform. A familiar face that I had met not too long ago. Horse ears, and a tail, standing quite a bit over me.

“Uh, hey, officer Junpei…”

***

“I told you this was a bad idea!” Miharu complained to me as we sat in the back of the police car.

“And? I don’t see you doing anything about the debt. It was our best option!” I responded.

“No. It was our easiest option, that we shouldn’t have done. We could’ve made more money on more heroic deeds,” Miharu shot back. “How am I supposed to have a reputation as a hero when this is the kind of work we do? And we get put into jail!”

“Relax, I’m not putting you two into jail,” Junpei said. “I might have if the shotgun was real but it’s a toy. You really shouldn’t be pointing that at people still, though.”

“Well, it’s not a toy when I-”

“Yes, yes, it’s a toy! Sorry, I got it from my dad and I thought it would do the job for intimidation. Please forgive us.”

I had to prevent Miharu from making this situation worse for us. Not like I was lying anyways, even if Miharu seemed to disapprove of my only partial truth telling.

“Regardless. There was another reason I was bringing you guys along,” Junpei sighed and continued to speak. “You recently took a job from that influencer faena, right? Shiori?”

“Huh, yes? What about her?” I asked.

“Good. So you do have experience with this then.”

Soon after, the car took a harsh turn and pulled over at a construction site. There didn’t seem to be much construction people, but instead a lot of other police cars surrounding the area. Junpei got out of the car, with Kyoha in his hand.

“You can have your toy back.” Junpei opened up the back door and tossed Kyoha into my lap. “And follow me.” He began to walk into the construction site with a casual demeanor. Figuring that this was important, I stood up and began to follow him.

There were a lot of cops and people in suits around the site. I was feeling a little bit out of place, more so than I usually did. It just felt weird being surrounded by actual professionals with various abnormalities talking like nothing was weird at all.

I shook off the feeling as I followed the officer to the unfinished building that was on site. There seemed to be a large amount of police tape blocking off any entry. Junpei stepped over it, and I did too, assuming that I was allowed to.

We walked into the dark building, and I saw another officer approach us. They seemed to be some kind of slime-man. Humanoid in shape, but his arms and face were completely gelatinous.

“Oi, Junpei!” the man said. “You finally got the girl you were looking for?”

“Yeah, here she is,” Junpei introduced me to him. The slime-man seemed to size me up with an unimpressed look on his face.

“She’s the solution to our problems? She doesn’t look very impressive.” He turned to Junpei.

“Hey, hey, hey, don’t underestimate me!” I said, beckoning for Miharu to possess me once again. She did so, giving me my dashing red cloak. “We’re two halves of the Yamiyami Solve Everything Agency. The premier problem solving agency in the city!”

I struck a cool pose, before spinning Kyoha around to make myself look even cooler. The both of them looked at me for a second, in what was presumably shock and awe.

“Why is she carrying around a shotgun?”

“It’s just a model. Let her have it.”

My pose immediately deflated as soon as I heard that exchange. So much so that Miharu straight up just left my body without me even telling her to. My first impressions weren’t THAT bad, right?

“Regardless,” the slime man responded. “If these two are what’s going to fix this as you say, then I’ll believe you.”

“Trust me. They’ve dealt with this kind of problem before, they know how to handle it,” Junpei said. I was at least happy he was giving me some reassurance. With an order for us to continue following him, the four of us walked through the empty, in-progress building to a site with multiple cops standing around an interesting sight.

A rift in space. I had seen this before! The exact same thing was at Shiori’s mansion!

“Oh, is that the problem?” Akina asked.

“Yes,” Junpei responded. “It’s constantly spawning apparitions and no construction has been able to get done. We’ve dealt with apparitions before, and we’ve dealt with spirits before, but this one is a blind spot for us.”

“Exorcising or destroying the apparitions is only a temporary solution,” the slime-man said. “We’re looking for something a bit more permanent.”

“And that’s why I think you’re the lady for the job,” Junpei continued. “You have a ghost bound to your soul, but apparently we’ve heard reports of a similar incident at Shiori’s new house. Perhaps you could do something?”

A newfound determination filled my heart. This was a perfect moment to prove my worth and knowledge in front of all of these cops. I nodded. “I have this handled, don’t worry.”

I pushed past the cops and stood in front of the portal. Miharu floated behind me as I looked at it like an old friend. “Ah… I remember you from my very first case. You caused me a lot of trouble, didn’t you? And now you’re back.”

“Uh, Akina?” Miharu spoke.

“Well, now I get to put you down again. Aren’t you happy about that? Twice now, you will have faltered to Akina Fudo.”

“Akina? It’s a portal, I don’t think it has feelings.”

“And now, the police shall remember our name as the Yamiyami Solve Everything Agency advances to a new level! As one of the saviors of the city, to shut you down- AAAGH-!”

My cool speech was interrupted by something coming out of the portal and grabbing my arm. An apparition with sharp nails began tearing at my skin before I could even finish the sentence! Instinctively, I used my other hand to grab Kyoha and begin firing at the creature!

CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK.

Nothing came out. I kept on clicking until Miharu entered my body and suddenly a blast came out of the gun, completely destroying both the apparition and my eardrums. I was knocked flat on my ass from the recoil and away from the portal. With a few repairs to my hearing, I heard chatter that was too loud in the back.

“I thought you said that was a model!” The voice of the slime-man spoke out.

“It was when I looked at it. I assume the ghost must have done something to the gun to make it shoot like that,” Junpei responded. The cops around me were all chattering about my failure and what just happened.

“Look. Can you just stop messing around and do something about the portal? Like we did back at the mansion,” Miharu said mentally. “Just… do what you did before.”

“Fine. I just thought it would be better for branding.”

“Not everything needs to be about branding!”

I closed my eyes and began to focus. Starting from the bottom, I once again imagined zipping up a spiritual hole in reality. Energy flowed out from my hand and into the rift, as I slowly sealed it off. With caution and precision, the energy in the portal felt like it was being sent back to where it was originally coming from, and soon I opened my eyes to a closed hole in space.

I turned back to Junpei, crossing my arms. “There. I did it.”

***

“Thanks for the help, despite the mishaps,” Junpei said as he drove me home in the police car. “I knew I could count on you.”

“No, we thank you for asking for our help!” Miharu responded with a cheerful smile. “It’s always a service to protect this city.”

“Heh, that’s both of our jobs, isn’t it? Just in different ways,” Junpei said. “I wasn’t expecting the shotgun to work like that. It probably would’ve been better for you to let me bail you out with my fire magic. Less explanation.”

“Yeah, well. Kyoha is what keeps me safe,” I responded. “I can always count on her.”

“Just remember your gun safety. That stuff is dangerous.”

“Yeah…”

I was quite tired from today’s jobs. It would be great if I could just collapse into bed and then sleep for a hundred hours. But, there was still one thing I had to negotiate. “Payment.”

“Hm?” Junpei asked, eyes still on the road.

“I charge a fee for my services, if you didn’t know. This was a job, so I need some money, especially with a certain incident I’m in…”

“Ah. Yeah, that makes sense. I’ll write you a check,” Junpei said, while pulling over. I looked out the window, I was home. “And I expect I’ll be writing you more in the future.”

I got out of the car and looked at him. The man was scribbling something down on a small piece of paper, presumably my check, and then handed it to me.

“What do you mean by that?” Akina asked.

“You and your ghost are the only people we know with the power to seal those rifts. We’re gonna be using your services a lot more, I’d think.”

I looked at Miharu, and she looked at me. Our eyes lit up at this.

““We’ll be at your service, sir!””

We both said at the same time, bowing. More jobs like this, means a more stable income for me. How could I turn down the opportunity?

“We’ll do our best to help the citizens of Yamiyami in any way we can! I’d love to take on more real, helpful jobs for everyone,” Miharu said. “Just call us at any time!”

“I will, just keep a look out,” Junpei responded, before driving off. I could now head back to my apartment satisfied, another great day for the Yamiyami Solve Everything Agency.