“M… Mister Kondo! Come in, sir, please!”

Amaya Uyehara tossed aside the remote control for the small television on her credenza with a loud clatter, rocketing out of her battered brown leather office chair. She bowed low as the elderly man entered her office, remaining bent at the waist with her nose mere centimeters from her desktop until he gave her a slight bow in return.

“I… wasn't expecting you,” she stammered, scanning the desk area to make sure she’d remembered to throw away the takeout container from the dim sum she’d ordered for lunch.

The elder executive nodded, strolling around the spacious office with his hands folded behind his back. “I had a few minutes between meetings, and I thought I'd come check in on our top artist relations rep. The reports I get upstairs are so dry sometimes, and there's no substitute for coming down from the top floor once in a while and just talking with people.”

“Of course, sir,” Amaya said with a nervous chuckle. The CEO just popped by my office for a chat? That hasn't happened in four years of me working here! What the heck is this about?

She stepped around her desk, watching his every move. “Sh… should I ask Sachiko to get you some tea, sir?”

The old man waved her off with a perfunctory smile, his eyes taking in the Phoenix Rising album art poster on the officer's west wall next to the whiteboard. “Oh, no need for all that. Be at ease, Uyehara. Besides, I won't be here long. Just a quick visit.”

“Then… what can I do for you, sir?” Amaya’s eyes darted around the room, an almost guilty expression on her face. I feel like I'm back in my mother's apartment in high school, hoping she doesn't find my weed, the young executive thought as she squirmed in her yellow patent leather heels.

Atsushi Kondo shook his head gently, lowering himself to the leather couch with a groan. He was slow and deliberate as he descended, thirty years of sixty-hour weeks in an office chair having wreaked havoc on his lower back. “I swear, forget the long hours, the worst thing about being in charge is that everybody holds their breath when I walk in the room. It's exhausting, Uyehara.”

“I… I'm sorry, sir.” Amaya bowed low again, this time at least unbuttoning her yellow blazer so she could do so more comfortably.

“Amaya… you're doing it again. Please, just sit down, before you give yourself a stroke or something?” The old man motioned to the chair across from his seat on the couch. “Honestly, the amount of paperwork when an employee gets taken out of here in an ambulance is staggering.” He gave a disarming smile, but Amaya wasn't entirely certain he was joking when he indicated that was his primary reason for concern, especially given the implication that he’d actually had it happen before.

Amaya nodded. “Are you sure I can’t get you something? If not tea, I think there’s a bottle of sake in the break room left over from Miwa’s retirement party…”

Mr. Kondo groaned, clapping his hand on his knee. “I can’t, unfortunately. My doctor says I shouldn’t drink when I take my back pills. There’s some concern about the combination of the two actually making my back stop hurting for a minute, I think.” He laughed a little at his own joke. “But, please, Amaya, stop fretting and sit down. You’re starting to make me nervous, and I own the place.”

Bobbing her head nervously, Amaya took the chair across from the couch, crossing her ankles politely in her knee-length ivory pencil skirt.

Mr. Kondo flashed his young employee a reassuring grin. “Thank you. See? Was that so hard? Now… how are we coming along with the new recruits?”

“Sir, is there a problem with my monthly reports? I assure you, I’ve been meticulous in every detail, but if there’s something about the formatting…”

The old man raised his hand to hush her mid-sentence. “Amaya, please. I told you. Sometimes it’s just nice to get the story from a human being’s mouth rather than some soulless sheet of paper a computer spat out. We’re in the music business. It’s supposed to be about connecting with people, after all.”

Amaya sighed, looking down at her hands. Stop shaking, Amaya. The more I make this weird, the more he’s going to… “Well, sir, we’re looking really good. We’ve got the contracts in hand for the Martian Minotaurs, the Purple Oranges, and Heartplay, and I think I’ll probably have Zillionaire locked up next week sometime.” The blonde smiled, trying to will herself to stop fidgeting. Stressing about relaxing is really counterproductive, she thought. “We’re working on a few hangups on the merch angle; I guess his mom makes some sort of art deco posters for the group that they want exempted. Nothing we can’t handle, but it has to work its way through Legal.”

“Excellent! I heard one of the singles from Heartplay the other day; the post-production people said it’s almost wrapped. It was pretty good!” Mr. Kondo grinned proudly. “It’s finally happening for us, Uyehara. Yokai’s finally starting to make an impact out there. We’re on our way now, and your efforts have a lot to do with that. Don’t think we’ll forget it when it comes time for annual bonuses.”

With a deep blush, Amaya leaned forward, trying to affect a bow without actually standing from the seat she’d been ordered to take. “Thank you, sir! My team and I are one hundred percent committed to finding the best talent in Japan for Yokai Records!” And then watching the other departments go behind us and screw it all up, she thought, swallowing back her frustration.

The old man adjusted his posture on the couch, loosening his narrow green necktie around his collar. “It shows! Your work over the last year and a half has been exemplary, Uyehara.” He groaned, stretching his back with his arms extended upward as far as his tan suit coat would allow. “Trust me on this, Amaya. Don’t get old. It sucks.”

The young woman managed a nervous chuckle. “I’ll see what I can do, sir.”

“How’s the live performance side of the house? Any updates there?” Mr. Kondo swiveled in his seat, pushing against his right knee with his left elbow and twisting his lower back.

Amaya stood, walking to the calendar hanging on the wall opposite the Phoenix Rising poster and gesturing to it. “On the twentieth, we’ve got a sold-out performance for Joystick Attack at Goji’s Garage. It’s a smaller venue in the Asakusa district, only about five hundred, but for a first show for them, we’ll take it.” Her hand dragged down to the following week on the July calendar. “On the twenty-eighth, Four for Friday is doing the after-game concert for the Yomiuri Giants at the Tokyo Dome.”

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She dragged her hand to the last box on the calendar’s last row, which had a grayed-out numeral one in the upper right hand corner. “And, of course, on the first of August, we have the kickoff show for the second leg of the Ranko and the Dapper Dragons tour in Manila.”

“Excellent! I heard that show sold out, too?” Mr. Kondo twisted his back to the other side, moaning quietly in relief as a loud pop was coaxed from his lumbar spine.

Amaya nodded. “Both of them, and the Jakarta show on the seventh, as well. With Bandung, we didn’t quite get there, but we had to book a little bit of a bigger venue than we wanted, so we sort of expected that one. There are still a few tickets left for Medan, but I’ll be surprised if that one’s not full by curtain, sir.”

The elderly executive smiled, clapping his knee with his hand again. “Fan-tastic! I’ve gotta tell you, Uyehara, finding that girl was just masterful work on your part. I know I took a little convincing, but that little fireball has really paid off for us! I’m telling you, she’s gonna be Yokai’s ticket to the top! I can just feel it.”

Then maybe we ought to stop pissing her off, boss, Amaya thought with a grimace that she hid behind her hand. “I hope so, sir.”

“Let’s see… what else did we need to cover… Oh! Where are we on the code of conduct addenda? I really want to get that project put to bed.” Mr. Kondo swiveled back to his right, and a series of two more pops rose from his lower back. He groaned, his shoulders seeming to relax a little. “Oh, yeah. There it went.”

Amaya winced, her eyes taking another nervous tour of her office. “Well, sir, of twenty-six acts, we’ve gotten signed contracts from twenty-five of them.”

The Yokai CEO nodded, beaming at his young employee. “Stellar work as usual, Uyehara! And who’s our last holdout?”

“Take a wild guess,” Amaya said, rolling her eyes. “...Sir.”

“Tendo,” the elder executive said, sighing quietly. “It’s always the ones with real talent that prove to be a handful.”

Amaya nodded. “Sir, is all of this really necessary? We’ve worked with her for over a year, and there’s been no major problems. Why do we need to rock the boat like this with her?”

Mr. Kondo chuckled, shaking his head. “I’ve got a lawsuit sitting on my desk right now from a former producer saying she shot at him with a freaking bow and arrow, Amaya. She’s always been a loose cannon, and we’ve got to try and get her under control before she gets even more emboldened by her success.”

“Do we, though? Mr. Kondo, sir, I can’t deny that Ranko has been a bottle-of-aspirin-a-day headache since the day we met her. But we can’t deny that what she’s doing is working. Sure, Heartplay isn’t half the pain in the butt that Ranko is. But I don’t see Heartplay selling out the Araneta Coliseum in Manila two nights in a row anytime soon, either. And if we push her away, and she goes somewhere else…”

Mr. Kondo stood, stretching again. “I understand your point, and I do sympathize, Amaya. You’re the one on the front lines dealing with the talent, so your opinion on these matters is valuable, but…” He sighed heavily. “We’re finally turning the corner, after twenty years of spinning our wheels, and I won’t have our good name tarnished because some no-name singer gets caught snorting coke off a hooker’s ass somewhere. Give it a week, and that’s all Yokai will be known for, and our run of luck will be over before it really begins.”

Amaya winced. Gonna make me say it, huh? “Maybe so, Mr. Kondo, but in the meantime, Yokai is finally starting to be known for actually having… good music. We can’t afford to run off our top talent over things like this. Perhaps we could make an exception for…”

The CEO held up his hand. “No. We’re not going down that road. If we give Tendo a pass on the rules, there’s no reason for anyone else to follow them, and we can’t exactly tell the other artists that Ranko and her friends don’t have to tow the company line because she’s more talented than they are.” He chuckled, walking to Amaya’s office window and peering out over the sidewalk below. “However true it may be.” He shielded his eyes and turned away from the window, the afternoon sun reflecting off the windshields of the parked cars below giving him a bit of a headache. “Besides, if she’s not willing to agree to the rules, chances are good it’s because she’s already breaking one of them, and if so, we definitely need to know before it gets out of hand.”

Amaya sighed heavily, saying nothing.

“I want this done, Amaya. I’m serious about this. I’m counting on you to make it happen for us. I know you won’t let me down.”

Amaya bowed deeply to the frail old man, praying that her staring at the floor hid the frustration and resentment evident in her eyes. “Yes, sir, Mr. Kondo!”

The executive bowed back, ever so slightly owing to his still-sore sciatic nerve. “Thank you, Uyehara. Your efforts are appreciated, as always.” He glanced down at the diamond-encrusted face of his wristwatch. “Oh, hell. I’ve gotta be up on the sixth floor in five minutes. It was excellent to see you as always, Amaya.”

“Have a nice rest of your day, Mr. Kondo,” Amaya offered, as cheerily as she could manage under the circumstances.

“You too,” he said as Amaya escorted him to the door to her office.

As soon as he had stepped out into the hallway, Amaya swung her door closed, turning the deadbolt with a loud clack.

Fudgebunnies, that was close.

She took off her blazer and threw it over the back of the couch, frowning at how uncomfortably damp her blouse had gotten with sweat born of anxiety. She slumped heavily back into her office chair, reaching for the black plastic remote control she’d discarded on her credenza when her boss’s boss had abruptly interrupted her.

Amaya pressed the red power button, and the little combination television and VCR lit up with a blue screen. She pressed the triangular play button, sitting back in her chair.

The blue screen flickered black, and the grainy video Amaya had been watching when Mr. Kondo interrupted her resumed playing. A series of pink laser lights darted this way and that behind a beautiful young woman in a short black dress printed with several large lavender orchids. She was preening like a peacock as she strode across the glossy black stage. A short brunette and a tall blonde, in matching maroon dresses, flanked her as the three danced to a relatively simplistic choreography routine. It was hard to watch given how frequently the handheld camera was jostled this way and that on the dance floor teeming with people - nearly all women - but the singer’s identity was unmistakable.

“Destiny, don’t you think you’re gonna challenge me, because I’ve spent so long dreaming, and finally made up my mind. Destiny, at last I’ve figured out what I’m supposed to be! I don’t care what else happens, as long as I’m hers and she’s mine!”

The vexed executive leaned over her desk with a heavy sigh, cradling her head in her hands and curling her fingers into fistfuls of her long blonde hair. Oh, Ranko, she thought with an exasperated groan.

When are you going to learn? I can’t keep covering for you like this forever!