Infiltration, day two, was about as entertaining as the day before.

Omi rested his head on the computer keyboard, taking an immature amount of pleasure at the nine-page repetition of the letter ‘d’ that was flooding his document in Word. Sleeping in his cubicle wasn’t the most productive way to spend his time, however he could only check his email so many times in the span of an hour, and he refused to resort to throwing sharpened pencils at the drywall ceiling for amusement.

He wondered what Ken was doing and if the brunette was nearly as bored as he. Senior Specialist Hidaka was somewhere else in the building, having been whisked away by Nakamura upon arrival that morning. He was pretty sure Ken could handle whatever task he was assigned, but Omi wished he had been able to go over a few more things. Not that it really mattered; their job was a joke.

Omi had cleared the first few firewalls in Saoshin’s network, an easy thing to do since he had the passwords right there in the training manual. After his nap and then lunch, he’d get to work on digging a little deeper.

It was safe to assume that the information about Saoshin’s partner in MITI was hidden very far down in the file server, if it was there at all. Saoshin had two separate servers. Omi worked one while Ken had the other.

Ken’s position as the senior member would allow him access to passwords that Omi didn’t, thus making his job a little easier. Omi was fairly confident that they could crack the system in the next few days. They would have to in order to keep the mission time frame on schedule.

At his elbow, the little black phone began to ring.

"Hello, Tech Support.

How may I help you?"

"So sorry to bother you, Tsukiyono-san, but we are having some problems with the network hook up for the digital cameras. They don’t seem to be feeding into the FX computers. Could you come down here and take a look at them?"

Omi’s heart began to pound. *Cameras* meant *studio.* He knew what type of filming they were doing in the studio.

"Sssure, I’ll be right down." He said, trying to keep his voice as level as possible.

Hanging up the phone, he stared at it for a moment before pushing his chair out and getting to his feet, sliding on his suit jacket, making sure the pager on his belt was hidden behind the black fabric. Anyone who looked at it from a distance would have no trouble believing it was a simply a pager. Closer examination would make the small wires that ran underneath his shirt and down his left arm to his wrist. The wire connected to his watch, or rather, to the small transceiver placed in the face of the watch.

If he was ever asked to tell time, he would be horribly wrong, since the analog hands never left seven-oh-four. The fake watch’s signal was boosted by the fake pager’s hidden power pack. The wireless headsets Weiß normally used, besides being conspicuous, only had a limited range. In order to make sure the panic button’s signal reached Yohji and Aya at least four miles away, they needed a stronger transceiver, which required the use of a separate power source.

He stepped into the elevator and began the agonizing descent to the basement.

~*~

Ken watched his department head leave and inclined his head until the older man passed. Slowly, the cubicles around him emptied out, until he was the only one left. His last co-worker gave him a large smile and told him how much he respected Ken for staying so late. An exceptional worker, so new and yet such a dedicated asset to the company, how he wished he could be like Ken. Ken endured the man’s praise until he was out of sight, and then turned back to his computer.

Pulling up the network folder, he accessed the admin network drive and began to poke around in the folders. He was surprised that he had been able to get into the administration’s section of the network so quickly; he had expected more security, or at least harder passwords. Of course, Saoshin considered themselves basically immune to prosecution because of their friend in MITI, and they had a hawk-eyed old bat in Kawamura Karen, the Vice-President, so they had no real reason to be concerned.Ken’s lips quirked up in a sardonic grin as he cleared one more level of folders with a password he was almost sad it had been so simple.

Nakamura was a huge sumo fan; it had taken two names before being successful with ‘Onokuni.’ He had spent his incredibly boring day researching information related to Nakamura and Kawamura that might have proved useful later on and he was relieved the time had not been wasted.

He searched the files in Nakamura’s folder and found nothing except for tax information and company spending charts. Nothing even remotely mentioning MITI, even as a government office. Gnawing on his lower lip and tapping an impatient finger against the mouse, Ken decided that Nakamura was not as predictable as he seemed. Pulling up the properties of the folder, he checked for hidden files and was rewarded with nothing.

Damn. The files were all useless to Weiß’s mission.

The black phone resting on the desk beside him rang, shattering the silence and Ken jumped out of his seat. Checking the clock, he blinked owlishly at the happy red numbers indicating that he had been sniffing around Nakamura’s files for nearly an hour and a half.

Picking up the phone, he cradled it between his shoulder and ear as he began to cover his tracks in the system, clearing any trace of his intrusion.

"Hello, Tech Support. How can I help you?" He knew who it was, but it did not hurt to be cautious.

"Hidaka-san? So sorry, I dialed the wrong extension! I was attempting to reach Ishiguro-san’s office."

Ken smiled against the receiver’s mouthpiece at Omi’s surprised voice. The boy’s typical politeness had been turned up a notch, in case anyone was listening. "I would have thought you had gone home already."

"Not yet, Tsukiyono-kun. There were still some things I needed to look at." Ken shut down his PC and turned off the monitor. "You’re working late as well, Tsukiyono-kun. Trying to look good for the boss?"

Omi laughed.

"Not at all, Hidaka-san. I was just getting ready to leave."

"Well, I won’t keep you then. See you back at the house."

"Ja ne, Hidaka-san."

Ken hung up the phone and pulled on his jacket before leaving his cubicle. He was extremely disappointed in his work today. And after the meeting with the rest of Weiß later, he was sure everyone else would be as well. He could only hope Omi could offer something better.

~*~

"You WHAT?" Yohji’s exclamation rattled through the basement as Omi recounted his day.

Omi took a long breath and tried to shunt his growing irritation. He had made the fastest network repair in the history of the world in order to get the hell out of the studio before having to see any of the filming process and it had still taken him three hours to figure out what was wrong with the cameras.

Saoshin used digital cameras because it was easier to work the special effects in, or something to that idea. Omi found it sickeningly ironic. Within the Saoshin studios, the deaths were real, the explosions were not. Usually, it was the other way around.

"I saw the studio today during a repair job." He said again, this time through gritted teeth. He did not want Yohji’s mothering; he was too tired, and too annoyed to deal with it. Aya had already given Ken a thorough dressing down, letting him know exactly how displeased he was at their tardiness. They were still going at it upstairs in the empty flowershop.

If it had not been so ridiculous, Omi would have marveled at Aya’s sudden loquaciousness. For their leader to talk this much must have meant that the mission was particularly disturbing.

"God dammit, Aya!!" Ken’s furious voice filtered down through the door.

Both blondes turned to look up, even though they knew they would see nothing of the brunette or redhead.

"You have no skills and Omi can’t do it all by himself! If I don’t do it, it’s not getting done!! Christ, you do your job and let me do mine!"

The sound of heavy, hurried footsteps toward the basement door preceded its opening by mere seconds, and then a red-faced, bothered Ken descended the circular staircase, taking two steps at a time. Aya calmly followed, though looking no happier than the younger assassin.

Ken fell across the couch with a tired grunt, only moving when Yohji prodded him to sit up and make room for someone else.

"Okay, so what do we think?"

The older blonde asked, giving Omi a look that clearly said he was dropping their earlier conversation for now, but it was in no way forgotten. Omi rolled his eyes in Yohji’s direction, making a note to tell Yohji just how much he reminded him of a cranky old woman.

"My server has nothing." Ken said irritably. "I looked through every file and MITI isn’t even mentioned in passing."

Yohji nodded. "Okay. What about you, Omi?"

Omi sighed and rubbed at the back of his neck. He could feel the knots growing and all he wanted to do was sleep.

"I didn’t get a chance to do much with my server today. I got through the first few levels, but the call I got kept me away from my desk most of the afternoon." He favored Yohji a stern glare as the look in the green eyes showed distinct disapproval at the single call he’d received that day.

"And I managed to make it useful for us as well. I rerouted the feed so that it has to go through my computer first. I send it off to special effects." He grinned in what he hoped was a devious fashion. "FX is going to have some fun trying to figure out what type of movie they’re working on."

Ken snickered at the idea, Yohji snorted softly, trying to hide his smile. Aya’s face was impassive, back to his normal non-expression, violet eyes unrevealing.

"How long will it take you to go through the server, Omi?" He asked, voice as blank as the rest of him.

"Two days, even if I’m swamped with other work. Their security is pathetically easy, but I still have a ways to go before getting to any of the core files."

"I’ve got some password advice for you." Ken said, grinning tiredly. "Nakamura’s a sumo otaku and Kawamura is into Elvis bars."

Omi snorted. "Thanks Ken-kun. I just hope it’s there."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

e.n.d.p.a.r.t.2.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Notes:

1. I gave Omi my job. *snickers*

2. I know nothing about electronics, but this kid in my communications class did a presentation on pirate radio and he had a little transceiver that reached about 5 miles or something and he had to use a D-type battery, so I figured that Weiß's little thingies needed something similar. The wireless headsets the boys use in the series look like they have about enough space to store a watch battery, and since I'm using conventional technology [i know, silly me], I figured that they couldn't reach very far.

3. Some of you might have noticed that I like to use numbers that are multiples of four, seven and nine. A lame, unsubtle [even moreso now that I'm bringing it up] attempt to use foreshadowing. Four, seven and nine are unlucky numbers in Japan because their original names, "shi" "shichi" and "kyuu" all mean "death." They have different names now, "yon" "nana" and "ku," however many people tend to use the older words.

4. Japanese men often arrive early and leave work late in order to appear hard working and loyal to the company above all else. Some work during the overtime, some don't. The whole point is the appearence. It doesn't matter that you're sleeping in your cubicle at seven am, the whole point is that you got there before everyone else. Or that you leave last.

5. Onokuni Yasuhi was the 62nd Yokozuna. The Yokozuna is the highest ranked wrestler in sumo, with the most championships at the time. They usually retire three or four years after attaining the rank. The source I used for info on sumo only listed 63 Yokozuna, so I have no idea how many there are currently.

6. There are a lot of theme bars in Japan, where the whole layout of the place [including the karaoke ^_^] is devoted to a particular genre [cowboys], time period [the 50s] or person [Elvis]. They are extremely popular places.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Again, if I'm trying too hard with the culture stuff, let me know.

This part was fun to write ^_^ Yohji and Aya bein' all protective and stuff. :D They're cute when they're worrying. I hope Aya wasn't out of character, in all oh, 5 seconds he was mentioned.

Ooooh, sun's comin' up... better go to bed.... Oyasumi, minna!