i know that you know that i know what you know

[nicebluehat]

players: nicebluehat and whatwasntneeded
game: an american corporation that specializes in mind control? sounds like the perfect place to interview the branch manager unaccompanied!
warnings: none anticipated but i'll add if something super hideous comes up?

Comments

[whatwasntneeded]

Adelle hadn't been the branch manager of the Los Angeles dollhouse for long. Oh, she had plenty of experience with Rossum by now, or she'd never have been given such an important position. Not to say that it was prestigious--a great part of the work of the Dollhouse was remaining undercover. But every so often there were...complications. People who got perhaps a bit too close to the truth--or to a truth.

Other houses had such simple responses to that kind of thing. Two, to be exact. Either send an imprinted assassin and kill the person, or take them to be made into dolls themselves. It worked, although it lacked a certain subtlety. However, Adelle found it tended to loose certain loose ends, and it was so mafia-esque.

She'd known that the Shiroganes were investigating the location of Ichiro Amamiya (or Quebec, as he was known now). She'd suspected it was possible they might eventually track him here, although there was no proof, naturally. And as was protocol, she'd had thorough background checks run both on both the Shirogane. While she was slightly surprised that the younger Shirogane chose to pay her a visit alone, it wasn't entirely unexpected.

As the secretary let her know that Naoto was being shown in, she stood with a welcoming smile. Mr. Dominic scowled as the wannabe detective was showed inside.

"Shirogane-san, welcome." She bowed politely in the Japanese style. Mr. Dominic was much less polite, going to frisk her for weapons.

[nicebluehat]

Ms. DeWitt could meet him on his own ground, Naoto thought as he bowed back and returned the greeting. He wasn't sure whether to be impressed or unnerved. And her guard was thorough, though he hadn't made much of an effort to hide his gun. Not that he expected trouble here, but it made him feel more secure of himself: he could protect himself if necessary. He surrendered it with a little more irritation in his eyes than he should have shown. Didn't they trust him? Obviously not, and that pricked up suspicions he hadn't had before.

"I had told your secretary I was here on a personal matter," he opened after sitting down. The chair dwarfed him, anything with a back did, but he sat at his straightest and looked at her impassively.

[whatwasntneeded]

She smiled disarmingly. "Of course, I can't imagine what personal business we might have. After all, we've never met before." Her smile grew a few degrees. "But where are my manners?"

She stood and went to the cart by one side of her lush office. It was a well-stocked minibar, equipped not only with all kinds of alcoholic beverages (including her preferred sort of brandy), but with sodas, and hot water for various hot beverages. "Tea, Shirogane-san? We have an excellent gyokuro. Or perhaps you'd prefer something stronger?"

[nicebluehat]

He wasn't sure if the end of that offer was manners or mockery, and thought about refusing. But somewhere this opulent, she had to be telling the truth about at least one thing. "The gyokuro, if you please." Yakushiji had teased him about having to look for Japanese or Korean restaurants for their whole trip, but while Naoto admired a lot of what America had to offer... the cuisine wasn't part of that.

"It does sound strange, but I think we have a mutual acquaintance," he said as she started to prepare. It was true enough, even if he was stretching the truth to the snapping point. He'd never met Amamiya, but the man followed him the longer Naoto traced his footsteps: every detail revealed more and more of who the man was.

[whatwasntneeded]

She prepared the tea efficiently and gracefully. Adelle needed to be conversant in many different cultural traditions in order to impress clients from all over the world, and many Japanese businessmen found themselves working in Los Angeles at one time or another. It wasn't the ritualized forms of a true tea ceremony, but it would likely be evident that she was more than familiar with the proper way to prepare Japanese tea. For herself, she poured a glass of fine brandy and after handing him the tea, she took a seat herself and crossed her legs.

"Ah, that may be true. In my line of business, one does meet so many people." That was the truth both of her cover story and of her true business, of course. She smiled slightly in genuine amusement. Shirogane might be a brilliant detective someday, but she had a long way to go. It was quite elementary that when interrogating a suspect, one ought to go at things obliquely, put the suspect off his or her guard.

[nicebluehat]

The questions were only a formality. Naoto's methods were more traditional, at least for his particular style of solving crimes: weave together a flawless picture of the crime scene and present it to the suspect (though in Naoto's eyes, they were guilty by then). But he didn't have all of the evidence yet, and one of his weaknesses still was turning a conversation into an interrogation.

And he could tell she saw that as well, and that she thought it was amusing. He held the cup more tightly, ignoring the burning in the pads of his fingers, and tried to keep his face approachable. She wasn't going to see how much that irritated him. "I've had friends tell me about the excellent work Rossum does. They say you've offered thousands of people in despair a hope for their future."

The last phrase was taken straight from Amamiya-san himself. A letter sent to a friend, accompanied by some instructions about his personal possessions... it had been satisfying to finally learn where it had been sent from. It sounded generic enough to keep up the façade he knew the conversation needed to have.

[whatwasntneeded]

This time, her smile was sincere. Despite the need for secrecy, Adelle believed in the work Rossum was doing. Even in this case, they'd taken a wealthy young man with no purpose in life, who likely would have turned to self-destructive behaviors in a few years, and given him a place, a purpose. And when they finished, they'd agreed to leave him with a lingering sense of vocation, a desire to do work that would allow him to use his influence and wealth to goals he considered good. They had not only done a good thing for Amamiya, but who knew what good he'd do for the world after his term with the Dollhouse was complete?

"It's true, Rossum is doing quite ground-breaking work. Searching for new cures to diseases that have troubled mankind for thousands of years. Coming up with ways to regrow or regenerate organs, even prevent genetic defects." She leaned back slightly. "Of course, some of our work may be...controversial--hence, the need for careful security. For example, we've done quite ground breaking work in sex-reassignment surgery." On the last phrase, she looked quite directly at Shirogane, gauging her reaction.

[nicebluehat]

It took all of Naoto's power not to show any interest other than academic, and the flush faded quickly from his face as he answered her with a tone that was almost too disinterested. "Oh? A special interest of yours, or just a field of particular pride?" He'd already given it away, he knew - Adelle clearly knew people well enough that his persona might have been transparent - but he was damned if he'd admit it.

[whatwasntneeded]

Hm, that was interesting. She saw that interest quite clearly in Naoto's face, as well as the attempt to mask it. She considered her options before she answered. "One of many things I'm quite proud of." She leaned forward slightly with a glow of true passion in her eyes and in her voice. "The importance of allowing people to live their dreams, whatever they are, to take away the barriers that prevent them from fulfilling their potential--that's the core of the work we do here."

That was absolutely true, and Adelle truly believed it. Who was she to judge what those dreams were, after all? Wouldn't many people a thousand years ago consider things that were common today to be pure barbarism (and vice versa)? And no one was harmed by any of it, after all. They took good care of the Actives. She saw to that.

[nicebluehat]

Naoto nodded attentively, but his eyes were clear as he watched her over his tea. A year ago, Adelle would have had him without question. That speech was as good as if she’d offered him something he'd never been able to grasp on her own... or, to speak more accurately, what she could grasp.

Let me do it, she’d begged. It will make me who I’m supposed to be! And while Grandpa hadn’t said yes, which was rare enough, he hadn’t told her no, either, or even “When you’re older”, which always had an unspoken “you’ll have forgotten you wanted it”.

Who are you supposed to be? he’d asked instead. The question had stopped her pleading short, and even though she still didn’t have an answer to his question, she knew that no matter what she did to her body, she’d never really be male. Not where it mattered to her. The only way to become who she was supposed to be was to sit through a maddening wait that stung her every time someone called her “Naoto-kun”.

Unless Adelle had something to offer in that field. Not that she’d take it from this woman in this moment and in this place, or Adelle would even know to offer: it was much easier to hide that need, she thought, than to disguise her body.

It would be better to keep the conversation going, and if he could, turn it towards the people she served. “Do your patients come to you, or do you anticipate their needs? If patients is the right word,” he added a little too quickly.

[whatwasntneeded]

Hm...that was interesting. She was in the right area, but not the right subject yet. She'd have to keep probing. If it wasn't being male itself, perhaps it was something being male represented to Shirogane?

"It depends, of course. Of course, most of our treatments that are fully tested and on the market are administered through hospitals or doctors. For example, our newest cancer drug has just gotten its final FDA approval and is now in use at well over two hundred hospitals. Like any medical development company, of course, we often seek out people who wish to participate in experimental programs." Including the Dollhouse itself, in many ways.

"For some of those programs, we seek subjects through the traditional avenues: newspaper ads or the like. For others, where we have more specialized requirements, we often contact hospitals or doctors--for example, when seeking patients who may have exhausted all other options." Indeed, there was plenty of documentation for those claims. It wasn't even fully a lie. Rossum had plenty of medical research which had nothing to do with its neurological reprogramming programs.

[nicebluehat]

"So in your more difficult cases, you seek out certain profiles." His brows furrowed down. That certainly put a new bend in Amamiya's path across the ocean, one that worried Naoto more the more he considered it, but he didn't know what it meant yet. And in any case, the man had been healthy physically, at least.

His psychological profile, on the other hand... "Not to change the topic too far, but is your company only interested in physical health? Or do you also do psychiatric research here?"

[whatwasntneeded]

"Of course. That's quite common for research and development firms," she said. As Naoto asked the second question, she stood up with a smile.

"No, we do psychiatric research on a number of fronts." She pulled a file from her desk with a genuinely proud smile. "We've made great strides in the treatment of depression and anxiety disorders--as well as previously untreatable cases of schizophrenia." She handed Naoto the folder--a folder of newspaper clippings of some of the most important (public) discoveries Rossum had made.

[nicebluehat]

He flicked through the folder Adelle passed him and pretended to be interested, recognizing a little of the substance of a few of the articles. It was probably of little use, though: Amamiya wouldn't have disappeared as part of a research project the public was intended to know about. "I see." He furrowed his brow and made to look as if he genuinely missed something. "That's strange."

[whatwasntneeded]

"Oh?" she said, expecting Naoto to bring up Amamiya now. After all, they had been dancing around it for some time now.

[nicebluehat]

"That friend of mine told me about a psychiatric project he was enthused about." Fishing here, just fishing. "He'd mentioned it had some personal hope for him. I realize that medical data's more private over here, especially to outsiders-" he regretted that as soon as he said it, since the "ignorant foreigner" defense could have been useful "-but I'm not seeing anything that could have applied to him here.

"I was hoping to find him in a better condition than when I last saw him."