Paradise

Peko then returned to where she stashed her things, put her glasses and sword case back on, and walked directly to her favorite Sex Shop in town, Paradise.

“Hello, Angel,” Peko greeted the Polynesian woman behind the front counter as she walked into the store. “It’s nice to finally see a familiar face again.”

“Hello, my friend! It is so good to see you again!” Angie greeted joyfully, clapping her hands together. “What brings you to our neck of the jungle? Did you accidentally melt one of your toys again? Or perhaps one of your lovers needs something special to get off? Because if so, I have something special for your ‘Master’ that I guarantee will milk him dry!”

“I’m afraid I’m here just for myself this time,” Peko said, resting her head in her hands as she leaned dramatically against the counter. “I do not wish to talk about it, but suffice to say that I was jerked around a lot today, and I need something to calm myself down with. Do you think you can give me something to make me orgasm until I forget my own name?”

“Hmm… I believe I have something that will suit the Ultimate Swordswoman just fine!” Angie reached underneath the counter and pulled out a brown box about the size of her arm labeled XXXL. “Normally, I would not give this out to just anyone, but I know that you of all people will be able to use it wisely~.”

“Thanks, Angel.” Peko handed over the money for the sex toy and put the box under her arm. “Is it okay if I leave out the back, through the women’s shelter?”

“Go right ahead, my dear; just be careful not to frighten anyone!” Angie replied.

“Very funny, Angel.” Peko straightened her glasses and turned toward the back door. “I’ll see you around.”

Peko opened the door and headed down the short hallway to the shelter, where once again almost every bed in the place was filled with women. Though, as she walked, Peko noticed that it looked like they had recently gotten a lot of new mattresses and bedsheets - apparently, they had come into a large donation recently.

She didn’t pay it too much mind, though, and was about to leave out the front door and call for someone to pick her up. But then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw something in the reflection of the glass on the door that made her stop dead in her tracks.

It was the face of the man she’d been looking for.

“Gaah!?” Struck with uncharacteristic panic, Peko dropped her new sex toy, took out her katana from its sheath, and prepared to fight to the **** as she spun around. However, when she finally got a good look at what was behind her, she didn’t see any men in the room; only some perplexed women… and a small stone statue of what she mistook for her target.

“Uh… sorry, everyone. I’ve just been a little… on edge today.” Peko resheathed her sword and bowed deeply in apology. “Please, carry on as you were.”

There were a few worried mumbles among the crowd but eventually, they did as they were told and tried their best to pretend that they didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Peko then sighed and approached the statue in the middle of the room carefully.

“Shuichi Saihara,” she read off the base of the statue. “Strange… this wasn’t here the last time I visited the shelter. Who is this man?”

“Oh, that? That’s the Ultimate John, Shuichi,” one of Angie’s followers with red hair and a white robe answered as she passed by, carrying a small food box. “He stopped by a week or so ago and gave us the biggest donation from a single person that our shelter has ever seen! Our leader, Angel, saw it fit to reward him for such generosity by carving this statue of him so that everyone can know what a good thing he did and be inspired to do the same!”

“The single biggest donation in the shelter’s history!?” Peko thought to herself in shock. “Does this mean that this man is some sort of Robin Hood figure who steals from the rich to give to the poor? Or, perhaps he’s already heavily involved in organized crime, which is one way he disposes of excess income?”

Peko rubbed her chin curiously as she stared into the gaumless, innocent look on the statue's face, trying to read a mind that wasn’t there.

“Well… at least I finally got his name,” Peko sighed as she turned back towards the exit. “Now, start looking through public registries and see if I can’t track this man down before it’s too late.”

Back at CO Inc., Shuichi had returned from his lunch with his friends and had begun working at his desk once more. Although he had to split his attention between his work and the presentation and continuing to worry about his finances and what to do with the cash in his car trunk, eating with his friends had done quite a lot to help calm him down. Now, instead of watching the minutes tick by worrying about how things could soon go wrong, he was actually looking to the future with a sense of hope. After all, even if he didn’t have much money on him right now, he still had his job, and he could scrape by until his next paycheck. After that, he’d have to rebuild his finances one yen at a time, and he’d be back to stability in no time.

But then, just as the day was starting to wrap up, he noticed something unusual. There was some commotion by the elevators, and Shuichi could see almost everyone in the office gathered around them for some reason. Curiosity getting the better of him, Shuichi headed over to see what was going on, and he was greeted by what, at first, didn’t seem all that noteworthy. The company vice president, Annie, was giving a tour of the offices to what appeared to be another female executive. She was wearing an expensive white blouse underneath a black business coat, a matching black pencil skirt that reached down to just past her knees, translucent black stockings with short black high-heels, a long black tie, and a pair of silver-rimmed reading glasses that sat in front of her cold, blue eyes. She also had lighter skin and brownish blonde hair, but it was still clear by her features that she was at least half Japanese.

“I see… and what is this floor responsible for?” the woman asked Annie as she examined some cubicles.

“This floor handles finances, engineering, and contracting,” Annie answered, her head constantly in a respectful bow. “Here, some of the best products in the industry are designed, paid for, and advertised. You could almost call it the heart of the company.”

“Given by the look of it, I’d say it’s more like the gallbladder… disgusting, and only partly necessary,” the blonde woman replied, adjusting her glasses. “But, it would be unwise even for me to rush to judgment so quickly. Please, continue the tour.”

“Uh… why is everyone staring?” Shuichi whispered to Kaito. “Isn’t that just another new executive on the board of directors or something? It feels like there’s a new one walking around every other month.”

“Huh? You mean, you don’t recognize her? She’s in the news almost constantly!” Kaito asked, staring at his coworker in shock. “That’s Byakuya Togami, current president and CEO of the Togami Conglomerate.”

“W-what!?” Shuichi felt all the color drain out of his face. “That’s her!?”

“Yeah, I know - you’d expect someone old or crusty, but apparently she was put in charge of things just a few years ago. The youngest CEO and president in company history. No one is quite sure what convinced her dad to choose her so early,” Kaito explained. “She’s been effective, though; growing the company faster and wider than anyone else. They have a finger in just about every pot now.”

“Yeah… and if she’s here, then that means she wants a finger in our pot too,” Kazuichi said next to Shuichi. “Which means the merger is actually going to happen, and all our jobs…”

“... are on the chopping block,” Makoto, standing next to Kazuichi, finished for him.

“Excuse me,” an authoritative voice suddenly cut in over the sounds of paranoid whispering and the tour. It was Kirumi, walking across to the crowd from the other side of the room with a frustrated look on her face. “Ms. Togami; what a pleasant surprise to see you here. I don’t remember authorizing a tour for you today.”

“Yes – but I also don’t need your permission, do I?” Byakuya turned to Kirumi and straightened her glasses again. “The board of directors invited me personally to view this office building in order to ‘improve relations between our two companies’. I must say, though, that this tour has only worked to lessen my confidence in you. From just the last four floors I’ve seen alone, you could potentially be boosting your profits by at least 300%.”

“Yes, there are ways we could theoretically improve our margins, but that isn’t as big of a concern to us at CO Inc,” Kirumi answered. “Instead, we focus on being sustainable, creating a company that can profit for decades to come, instead of just a few years.”

“Pft! Sustainable?” Byakuya scoffed so hard it was almost as if she wanted to spit that word from her mouth. “If you really want to stay mediocre instead of exceptional, you could have just said that. And besides… what’s so ‘sustainable’ about having so many redundant workers?”

“It’s quite simple, actually; having extra means that we are never short-staffed, and never have to worry about hiring in a pinch,” Kirumi explained. “It also creates an environment that allows everyone to easily train new employees together without ever burdening one person too much.”

“Ah, so you’re one of those nuts who value ‘employee retention’. Duly noted.” Byakuya walked up to Kirumi and stared her right in the eye for a few moments. When the woman refused to flinch, she instead directed her gaze to the employees who had gathered around them. Eventually, her eyes landed on Shuichi who tried, in vain, to avoid eye-contact with her. “You, there… your name is… Shuichi Saihara. Is that right?”

“M-me!?” Shuichi swallowed nervously and tried to stop his feet from shaking too much. “You know my name?”

“Yes; Ms. Scholten told me about you. You’re the auditor who is going to present those financial reports to the board of directors soon, aren’t you? Well, as a major investor in your company, I’ll naturally be there for the presentation.” The buttons on Buyukuya’s jacket clicked ominously together as she walked over to Shuichi. “Tell me; do you really believe that your job here is necessary? That you’re doing the company good by continuing to soak up valuable time, money, and resources from it?”

“I… I…” Shuichi’s mouth was more parched than the desert outside. “I believe so, yes. I come in and work hard every day to support this company, and… I wouldn’t give it up for anything in the world.”

“Anything, eh?” For the first time since she arrived at the building, Byakuya smiled to herself. “How admirable. I look forward to seeing your upcoming report; I do hope that it is worth waiting for.” She then turned to the rest of the employees and addressed them. “Well? Are you going to just keep staring at me like confused sheep, or are you going to actually do the jobs that you supposedly love so much?”

A chill ran through the crowd as they all hastily ran back to their cubicles. Even the ones who were about to go home did so as well, **** to at least look busy, lest the Togami Conglomerate actually buy out the company and deem them ‘unworthy’ of staying with them. All except for Shuichi and his friends, who kept staring at Byakuya in a mixture of shock and wide-eyed fear.

“Uh, shall I show the rest of this floor now, Ms. Togami?” Annie asked politely.

“No need. I’ve seen enough already.” Byakuya walked back to the elevator and stepped inside. “Now, I wish to see the division management offices to see if they really are as modern as I’ve heard.”

Kirumi and Annie both stepped in after Byakuya and the doors closed a moment later. As the elevator moved up, Annie began to sweat as she stood next to Kirumi, a little bit nervous that she might be angry at her for not telling her right away that Togami had arrived for a tour. But, if she felt any emotions at all, Kirumi was once again an expert at hiding it.

“You know, even if for some bizarre reason your company does resist our merger until the very end, you probably should get some new employees anyway,” Byakuya said over the soft hum of the moving elevator. “The lack of selective pressure has made them all weak and soft. That last one in particular seemed more worm than man.”

“If you are referring to Shuichi, then I am afraid I must correct you on that,” Kirumi countered without hesitation. “He is one of our most valued and loyal employees, and we are blessed to have him here.”

“Please - you saw the way he was whimpering. If I so much as looked at him funny, he would have gone running to the hills and never looked back,” scoffed Byakuya.

“Maybe he would have wanted to, but there is a difference between being scared and being a coward,” Kirumi said firmly.

“Really?” Byakuya smirked and placed a hand on her chin. “Well then, if you’re so confident in him, then surely you won’t mind making a little wager…”

Back in the office, Shuichi and his friends were still staring at the elevator, time passing but none of them seemed to notice. Until, finally, Makoto decided to break the silence.

“Wow… suddenly my own project really doesn’t seem like a big deal in comparison to yours, huh?” he said with an awkward chuckle. “Man, to think that you’re really going to present to our future boss…”

“Hey! You don’t know that! She was just here for a tour, after all, and there’s no way Kirumi would let the board sell to a tightwad like her!” Kaito interjected forcefully. “So I don’t want any of you to lose any sleep worrying about something that’s not gonna happen, got it?”

“R-right, of course not,” Kazuichi replied, though he couldn’t look Kaito in the eye. “I should, uh, double check to make sure that all my work was done for today. You know, for… thoroughness’s sake.”

“You can do that, but I’m going home. I’ve got some plans to unwind that I’m not putting off.” Kaito picked up his briefcase and slung it over his shoulder. “See you guys in the morning!”

“Yeah… see you in the morning…” Shuichi said nervously as he went back to his desk, ostensibly to pick up his things so he could go home. But when he looked at his computer, he could see that the document for his upcoming presentation was still up on the screen and, despite his urge to do otherwise, he couldn’t bring himself to close out of it.

“You know… it probably wouldn’t hurt if I were to stay and work on this a bit longer.” Shuichi thought to himself as he sat down and began typing. “I mean, what’s a few minutes now compared to months or years of unemployment, right? This presentation is going to need to be perfect, after all.”

Despite his words, though, ‘a few minutes’ soon stretched on to ‘a few more minutes’ and then yet ‘a few minutes more’ before minutes dragged into hours, and the sun began to set…