8.00 am: She goes out of her building and hurries over to the bus stop. Her long white flowing skirt moves about her legs. She’s wearing a blue lose blouse and leather strapped sandals. 

She has a high ponytail. She will look much better in the yellow dress and with her hair down like she's supposed to. The bus arrives and she gets on it.

8.50 am: She arrives at the studio, she has rehearsals today. It will take 4 hours. She hurries inside. Time for me to go to work too.

12.30 pm: She comes out of the building. She walks over to the park 3 blacks away. She's with another girl, one of the other dancers.

She's very pretty, but she wouldn't look good in any color. They take out their lunches and eat while talking. Every time she smiles I can see her dimples. Yes, she is the perfect new piece. 20 minutes later they put their lunches away, stand up and say goodbye. Yellow walks the 5 blocks to the dance school where she teaches. Today she has 3 classes, so it’ll take 4 hours and a half. She goes in. Time for me to go back to work.

Tonight, it will be tonight….

-Newscast-

"The Collector has struck again. Another girl went missing. It is presumed that she disappeared 3 nights ago after being seen in a local restaurant. She was reported to be seen speaking with a man on the next table but they did not leave together. Masuda-san left on her own at around 9.30 and was never seen again. Masuda Takara-san, a 25 year-old dancer, was reported missing yesterday when she didn’t show up for her job and nobody in her family could reach her.

The police reported that they found the letter just as in the other cases saying that Masuda-san would be fine and taken care of and asking her friends and relatives not to worry. This is the 7th girl to go missing. Let’s remember that at the beginning of last year, three women disappeared in 4 months and were never heard from again. Moriuchi Tami, a college student, was the first to go missing. Uchi Hiroko-san disappeared a month later and when the police found a second letter from the kidnapper, they suspected a serial killer. This was confirmed when the 3^rd woman went missing. Kusano Hiromi, the 23 year old model, disappeared 2 months later. However, the kidnapper seemed to stop for almost a year. Everybody thought that the kidnapper had either stopped or been put in jail for another crime. Unfortunately, Nishikido Rin-san disappeared and the much dreaded letter was found. The next to disappear was our own Koyama Keiko, who went missing after recording a section of this program. The kidnapper didn’t stop there. Five months later Kato Shigeko, an up and coming writer, was reported missing by her next of kin. Since no bodies were ever found, the media has been calling this individual “The Collector.” But is he really “collecting” these women? Or is it that the bodies have not been found yet? We have Mr. Migawa here with us, an expert in profiling to explain to us…”

“Break´s over.” Akane heard Mayu say. “Oh come on,” answered Hiroshi, “I want to hear the rest of it.” Mayu rolled her eyes and said, “You know the rest of it. The women are missing, nobody knows what happened to them and the only reason you care is because they are all hot.” Akane chuckled a little; they were really pretty, almost like real life size Barbies. She had seen Koyama Keiko on the news cast and Kusano Hiromi, the model, in ads and she had always thought they look like living dolls, waay too pretty to be real.

“Are you afraid you´re next, Mayu?” Hiroshi said jokingly, “What do you think Akane? Do you think Mayu here might be next?”

“Shut up, you jerk!” shouted Mayu. “or I´ll…”

“I think it´s time to go back to work and it’s time you shut up, Hiroshi.” Akane interrupted; if they got started they would never stop. And she really didn’t think Mayu would be next, she was pretty enough but she never thought of her as a doll. What was she thinking? She told her brain to shut up and she went back to work.

She made her way back to her desk. She had been working as a temp in the company for the last month, so she was a temp by day and an out of job clothe designer/maker by night. She was trying to save money so she could set up a little shop to sell her designs. She wasn’t anywhere near that yet, so she sat on her chair and that’s when she saw HIM. The best part of her job. He was wearing a black suit with a black shirt and a red tie and it look really good on him. He wore his dark straight hair short to the side and he had the darkest blue eyes. And well, better not get down to his body….

It was the best part of her job and the best part of the job of every other female in the office, few as they may be. And he was a rare sight since he usually worked from home; it wasn’t really common to see him more than 2, maybe 3, times a week. He came in saying hello to everybody. His walk was confident but not overly so. Akane sometimes thought that he may actually be a little shy. He was polite and even nice with everybody but he never seemed over confident with the women in the office, who, frankly, practically threw themselves at him.

He finally made it into his office and Akane was ever so thankful of glass walls. Out of the corner of her eye (she refused to be one of the women drooling openly over him) she saw him take off his black jacket and neatly put it on the hanger. He sat down his computer and got to work.

“Well you better do the same thing” thought Akane to herself.