Hanano Choubi

"Hanano Choubi" (華野超美) (real name unknown), also known as the ITEM Liaison or Woman on the Phone (電話の女), is a mysterious figure that hands out and gives out orders to ITEM, making her the de facto leader of the organization, like the GROUP liaison is for GROUP, one of the controllers or liaisons of Academy City underworld organizations. She contacts them via a ether phone to for general reports through Mugino Shizuri telecommunication terminal for group debriefings.

Appearance
She is a short woman and without any of her removable disguise parts, her base face is smooth like an incomplete doll, without hair, eyebrows or eyelashes. Her original appearance, which can be reapplied through a premade set, is of a woman in her mid-20s with shoulder-length flaxen hair.

While in disguise as "Hanano Choubi", she appeared as a young girl of around 15, with a doglike vibe and an impression of a wet chihuahua. She had long black hair, split into three and only tied at the very ends. She also wore a short-sleeved black sailor uniform with white and green trimming.

Personality
She is coolheaded and analytical while going over her group's missions. She also seems to find enjoyment in the failures of her rival liaisons. She has the habit of using the phrase "It’s always like this with you."

Sisters Arc
ITEM is briefed about their mission by their liaison, who chooses to communicate them only through voice. Here, she explains that the target is an esper who uses electricity, and adds that the client may have already determined the culprit behind the attacks behind research labs across Academy City. Kinuhata Saiai suggests going for a sneak but all-out attack on the target, but the informant prefers to attack the target only when it chooses to attack another facility. She then points out that she had to comply with certain circumstances that the client wants, so they cannot just do what they like on the target.

Daihasei Festival Arc
The ITEM liaison contacted Mugino Shizuri via phone regarding the ongoing negotiations to bring the seven Level 5s to the spotlight for the upcoming Daihaseisai. Mugino, who was enjoying a bath in ITEM's private pool, was irritated by the idea that a person involved with the Dark Side would participate in an event to be broadcast all over the world and refused.

Battle Royale Arc
On October 9th, as the ITEM liaison was walking down a street while holding five helium-filled balloons and a cell phone in the other, she chatted with her counterpart from BLOCK. They talked on the subject of her hiding information on their whereabouts from him, making it impossible for him to bring them under control. She then informed him that they couldn’t cause any more trouble as GROUP had just taken out the last of BLOCK in the juvenile hall. He then became nervous at his loss of position as well as the repercussions he would have to face for their actions under his watch. The ITEM liaison had lost interest by this time so she hung up and started walking through the crowd again while wondering about the status of SCHOOL's controller.

DRAGON Arc
ITEM's backer realized that ITEM could not function with only Saiai left in fighting condition and decided to remake a team using the few surviving members from BLOCK, MEMBER, SCHOOL and ITEM. Though the first thing that Measure Heart does is restrain her new teammate Kinuhata Saiai while the former Hound Dogs proceeded to track down Shiage under the order of General Superintendent Aleister to eliminate him, as he was supposed to end up dead during the battle royale between the five organizations. It is unknown if she had any knowledge of the Superintendent's plans or not.

World War III Arc
The helmeted woman who confronted Mugino Shizuri, Hamazura Shiage, and Takitsubo Rikou in Russia near the end of World War III, appearing together with ten armed men in Russia with orders to eliminate Hamazura and bring Takitsubo back to Academy City, mentioned likely following the same chain-of-command as ITEM, saying the liaison's catchphrase to confirm.

Enemy Item Arc
One year prior to the main story, following the emergence of another group using the name Item, as part of the plan to pit the two groups against one another and eliminate the upstarts, the liaison personally infiltrated Item as a prospective new recruit, preparing a cover story and identity as "Hanano Choubi".

On July 1st, Hanano arrived at Item's hideout, just as one of her decoys as the liaison was arguing with Mugino Shizuri over the phone, with the Enemy Item having preemptively caused Item's bank account to be locked, preventing them from receiving payment for their previous job cleaning up the Dark May Project (where they also picked up Kinuhata Saiai as their fourth member). As Item was hired to deal with the Colosseum, Hanano accompanied the group during their subsequent abduction of the insurance company manager who had hired them but kept information from them, including a clash with Kouzaku Mitori.

On July 7th, having had a week to prepare, Hanano infiltrated the insurance company as the manager to access information on the company's server on Item's behalf. Later that day, she accompanied them in their infiltration of the Colosseum and triggered their confrontation with the Enemy Item, getting captured in the process as part of her plan, while enemy team leader Ibotanokikouji Kaede intended to forcibly make her their replacement for Hanayama Kamitsu who had been killed by Mugino during the raid.

On July 14th, having not been turned, with the window created by the dark side's corpse disposal infrastructure going down (due to Kouzaku's attack on the Windowless Building depriving it of necessary personnel) being closed, and with Item's rescue attempt having been misdirected, Aiyose Hiyoko and Inoue Laspezia prepared to kill the captive Hanano. However, she turned the tables on her captors, killing them and faking her own death by using some explosives borrowed from Frenda to set off an explosion, intending for Item to take out the Enemy Item in vengeance.

On July 28th, a week after Ibotanokikouji Kaede's death, a funeral for Hanano was held, with a number of fake mourners in attendance. The same day, Mugino tracked down and killed one of the decoys acting in the liaison's place in revenge for orchestrating the circumstances leading to Hanano's death, only later discovering that Hanano's death was faked. On July 31st, "Hanano" returned to her hideout in District 3 and resumed her role as a voice on the phone, making a report to Aleister Crowley.

Abilities
She is an expert in disguise and infiltration, capable of a variety of highly convincing guises and impersonations through skill, equipment and technology.

The quality of her impersonations depends on the amount of data she has on a subject. In the case of the insurance manager, having had a week to study him and gather information, she was confident she could replicate his fingerprints, teeth shape, eyes, blood type and scent, enough to fool his parents or a police dog. Factors she took into account included age, sex, the color and condition of the hair and skin, eyes, weight and body type, symptoms of physical conditions (e.g. dry eyes, neck and shoulder stiffness), posture, voice, language, behavioral traits and idiosyncrasies, and handwriting.

For some of her infiltrations, she has a secondary disguise which she can switch to in an emergency. As she can only prepare one costume change in advance, she usually goes with a security guard or firefighter depending on her infiltration target. In the case of the insurance company infiltration, she switched from the elderly general manager to a young security man in seconds, flipping the luxury suit inside out like a stage magician's handkerchief and rearranging her facial makeup by wiping her face with her hands.

At a non-extensive level, she can easily slip in color contacts to deal with eye scanners and spray special powder on her palm to bypass a palm reader. As part of the foundation of her disguises, she has removed much of her original appearance, and set things up so she can easily remove her hair, eyebrows and eyelashes in preparation for applying a new disguise. Besides changing her voice by herself, she also has voice changers which she uses in her position over the phone.

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Agente de ITEM