Lurking.
Whenever Neji visits, they have a different kind of tea. Today, it’s powdered green tea.
Hiromi is quite methodical when it comes to– anything, actually. It’s always a little amusing to him, to watch her heat the filtered water, add exactly four drops of it in the matcha powder (never more or less, God forbid she even misses one droplet), and mix it diligently. Hiromi handles every aspect of life like it’s something to be cherished, or something that will blow up in her face if she isn’t careful enough– like a paper bomb, Neji muses.
After Hiromi has finished whisking it, she adds more hot water. She moves her spoon from side to side in the bowl until the green liquid becomes foamy, then pours it evenly in two cups. Neji leans over his mug and inhales the earthy aroma, peering at the emerald sea in his cup– emerald like Sakura’s eyes, perhaps, or the leaves of the sacred Hashirama trees. It’s weird that he thinks so fondly of people or places he hadn’t cared much for back then, but Neji imagines he had taken those things for granted at the time.
Perhaps death has made him sentimental, and isn’t that an odd thing to think.
“Have you heard about that incident at UA, Neji?” Hiromi cuts in his train of thoughts, picking up her own mug and slowly lowering herself on the couch. “Dreadful, I tell you.”
“Those people that call themselves the league of villains?” After his conversation with Nomad, he had made it a point to follow the news. He didn’t have a TV, nor a sustainable source of wifi, but stealing newspapers was simple enough (and putting them back when he’s done reading, of course, Neji still has some decency.)
“Grown men targeting children, I swear.” Hiromi shakes her head, “Where is the world going?” The old woman seems to be saying this a lot these days, he thinks.
“The League of villains,” Neji mutters under his breath, blowing out air softly on his tea, “they should have picked a better name.”
Hiromi shakes her head. “Their name is the least of your worries, Neji.”
“It is rather unoriginal, though.”
She looks up sharply. “I don’t think you should joke about these things, Neji.”
Neji hadn’t been joking. He keeps his eyes on his tea, swirling his spoon in it. “Sorry.”
Hiromi’s temper falters– she shakes her head again, “Don’t apologize if you don’t mean it. Tell me what you think.”
“I’m not thinking about anything.” Neji says, idly. When she gives him a flat look, he backtracks and answers instead: “I think they probably had a reason. One doesn’t just attack the top military institution of the country without a plan.” He hears Hiromi mutter ‘military institution’ disbelievingly under her breath, but doesn’t think much of it. He refuses to call it a ‘hero school’, because the name sounds very silly to him.
“Neji, I understand that you may or may not like heroes, but…” he blinks at her serious tone, “the things you say, honestly. You worry me.”
“Nevermind.” he deflects, rather (un)masterfully.
“No, no.” Hiromi sets her cup aside and turns her full body towards him, “Do tell. What do you mean?”
Neji shrugs one shoulder, “The number one… He’s at UA, so maybe they were trying to make a statement.” then pauses, “Or perhaps it was just mindless lashing-out after all, but I find that hard to believe.”
“The targets were children,” she defends, “just like you.”
Neji frowns, opens his mouth– “Don’t make that face.” Hiromi cuts in. “You’re seventeen. You are a boy. Don’t tell me you’re sympathizing with those villains!”
“Of course not.” he replies levelly, “I don’t even know what their goal is, or who they are...”
Hiromi raises both eyebrows. “Now that’s definitely worrying.”
“It’s not.” Neji replies solemnly, with something of a smile, “Don’t worry, I wouldn’t join a group that calls themselves ‘the League of villains’” the old woman lowers her head, a chuckle shaking a frame. Neji secretly relishes in the fact that he was able to make her laugh. She sighs then, chasing away the last of her outburst, then seemingly decides she’s had enough of this subject. A bout of silence passes, with both of them sipping their tea quietly.
“Rika wanted to be a hero, when she was little.” Hiromi says suddenly. She sounds a tad morose, a tad nostalgic. Neji has the feeling he is intruding on something intimate, perhaps a little too raw for his ears to hear, even though Hiromi is choosing to share this with him.
Hiromi’s granddaughter, for what shred of knowledge he has on the woman, hadn’t struck him as the ‘heroic type’, if such a thing even exists. “What changed?” he asks, for Hiromi’s sake.
She tugs at her sleeves, dragging them down over her frail wrists. “She grew up, I suppose.”
Neji pops his spoon in his mouth, feeling the warm metal on his tongue and the lingering taste of mocha, and hums around it. Hiromi doesn’t seem to mind his lack of feedback. It makes Neji feel a little bad, sometimes, that he doesn’t seem to be able to hold himself in any conversation if it doesn’t include backhanded slander or discussions of murder.
He entertains the following conversation with a few quips here and there, and excuses himself one hour later, when Hiromi has to go grocery shopping to the small market down the street.
-
Neji almost doesn’t recognize her, when he sees her. Nomad is sitting on a bench, wearing a simple blue dress and a black jacket. She’s smoking, and staring at someone walking their dog in the horizon. It’s a little unusual to see her wear anything but baggy clothes.
“Good morning.” Neji says, because it’s only nine in the morning. Nomad gives one long exhale of smoke, before dropping the cigarette at her feet and bringing her heel down on it. She looks the most relaxed Neji has ever seen her. “Good morning.” she greets back.
“I was able to get some leads from that phone number…” she tells him straight to the chase, then hands him a thin stack of files. Neji scans them briefly– there’s a map of Tokyo with red dots in several areas, and a list of buildings and wards with question marks.
“It’s not anything concrete, but…” Nomad mutters as he reads through them, “it’s a start.”
“This is more than enough.” Neji assures her– he would have found Okada some way or another, even without the phone tracking, but that might have taken more time than tolerable, given the deadline– July fifteenth. Before then, he has to stack all the odds on his side to make sure the mission is a success.
“Are most people aware their phone is traceable?” Neji inquires curiously once he has stuffed the papers in a worn backpack Hiromi lent him.
“I mean, yes.” the woman looks at him strangely, “Some apps require tracking, but usually people don’t care much about that. Or rather, they don’t mind.” she says this like it’s something obvious, and that irks some part of Neji. How could anyone willingly choose to carry such a safety hazard around with them? Are the people of this world suicidal, on top of being painfully obnoxious?
His musings remain voiceless and unanswered.
-
It takes him two days of careful scouting and restless nights to find Daichi Okada in the flesh. He had spent a whole day searching in Shibuya, but when Neji found nothing, he had headed to Shinjuku (taking trains coupled with his speed had made traveling a lot faster.) He had been relatively lucky to find him on his second try.
When he finds Daichi Okada, Neji is taking a break on the rooftop of a university: he sees him about twenty miles away, leading a group of men in a theater– he recognizes his face from the picture, with his big eyebrows, thin lips, and receding hairline. At the time he finally gets there, the men are already inside, so he resigns himself and waits for them to exit, hidden away in the shadows of a solar panel. He tenses every time someone walks under the roof he’s perched on, feels stupid about it when nothing happens, then tenses again when someone else does the same thing. It’s another three hours of agony before the men finally come out.
Neji stays tucked away on his roof until Okada and his companions start walking, babbling about something irrelevant. When, finally, all of their backs are turned, Neji eases out of his crouch, leans over the edge of the roof, and flips over the rail to land silently in the middle of the street. With a chameleon technique covering himself, he follows them in the city, steps silent as a cat’s. He can smell the men’s booze, can hear their drunked chatter– and wrinkles his nose, almost wishing he owned a facemask.
It’s a painfully slow and monotonous process, tailing them, but Neji handles the mission like any other mission, with rigor and professionalism.
Finally, Okada separates from his companions and goes into a– long car? Neji narrows his eyes at the machine, studying the black shiny plates, its elegant and unusual length. He climbs back onto the roofs as the car door slams shut, and follows it as it starts onto the road. Neji leaps off one roof and lands easily on the other, repeating the process with practiced speed. He feels his hair whip back with the wind, his chakra a comforting thrum in his belly. The car stops somewhere on the outskirts of Shinjuku, in front of a large and well-kept house.
The driver, a short man in a dark suit, steps outside to open the door for Okada, “Mister Okada.” he dips his head politely. Okada pays him no mind.
“Have a pleasant night, sire.” to which Okada answers with a stilted, “You can go.” Neji follows Okada with his eyes as he shuffles around in his pocket, then opens the front door and disappears behind it.
“Sloppy.” Neji comments to himself in a whisper, and invites himself in after Okada. His house feels even larger on the outside; the ceiling is high, the marbled floor spotless. There’s a leather couch, a low table made of glass, a huge black TV, and a chandelier hanging from the ceiling. With a quick scan of his surroundings, he confirms that Okada lives alone. Either the man has no family (and his files clearly say he has a wife, four daughters and two sons) or this isn’t the family house, which would explain the lack of pictures. Neji hears the creaking of a staircase as he checks the fridge, confirming that there’s nothing in it. In conclusion, this house is well-furnished, but barely lived in– Okada must not spend much time here.
His inspection done, Neji leaves the living room and takes the stairs, applying a thin layer of chakra under his feet to muffle the noise. Okada rounds the corner just as he sticks his feet to the ceiling, his blood rushing to his head. People often forget to check above them, he thinks with a half-smile.
The man walks right under him, humming a song Neji doesn’t recognize, and heads into the main bedroom. The teenager cringes when Okada starts undressing, but isn’t foolish enough to turn off his byakugan. He finds himself in the man’s study– there’s a huge wooden desk, a computer, and a series of shelves filled with books that look like they have never seen daylight. If Neji were to try to take one, they would probably be glued to each other with yellow pages and dust everywhere. He soundlessly closes the door behind him.
Neji starts with the most obvious course of action and searches the man’s desk. When he finds nothing worthwhile, he turns to the computer and mentally hypes himself up– Nomad did give him instructions, and Hiromi taught him sparsely how to use a computer, but technology isn’t, and will never be, his area of expertise. Imagining Nomad’s voice guiding him in his head, he bends over and peers under the desk, where he turns on the tower by pushing on the power button with his knuckle (as to not leave fingerprints). A few seconds later, the screen lights up with Okada's locked screen, and Neji pushes a USB key provided by Nomad into the tower. While he lets the magic work, the teen walks over to the shelves on either side of the room and examines each and every book as fast as possible.
Okada is still in his bedroom, none the wiser about the intruder in his house, but Neji doesn’t want to take any chances. As soon as the computer homepage is unlocked, he clicks on the file icon and browses through. Everything he deems interesting enough, he saves into his USB key. Neji turns off the computer and adjusts the keyboard and the mouse so it is exactly as he found it.
“Well.” he mutters, giving a final once-over to the room, and makes a bee-line for the door. In the corner of his vision, something light falls to the ground. Neji turns around and inspects it– it’s a slip of paper that has fallen out of the side pocket of Okada’s coat. He turns it around carefully between his fingers, the edges are uneven, like it’s been ripped, and the handwriting is rushed. In black ink, a series of ten digits– a phone number, Neji realizes. Of whom, remains the question, but it is a clue nonetheless. He puts it in his pocket.
After this, it’s a matter of days before Neji has , and a neat little map with Okada’s patterns marked in red to show for it. He still has no idea what Okada’s quirk is, but he’s been to missions with far worse odds, so it isn’t something he is particularly worried about. The next step will be the last.