It was easy to tell when something was about to happen, when a fight between two yakuza was brewing. Tensions in the air always started to grow thick first. Certain areas of a city or town street were oddly quiet. Not many people lingered around when a group of nicely dressed men walked down the street. It wasn’t the way they were dressed either, but the way they carried themselves, the deadly aura surrounding each and every one of them that sent civilians hurrying in the other direction. At least, that was what most people did, anyone with any intuition or gut feeling anyway.
“Brought a lot of men.”
The one who spoke was standing to the left of me, arms crossed as he watched the group strode down the street. He shot a weary look to me as he shifted from one foot to the other, “Sure this was a good idea, Kazuo?”
“He has simply shown me that he is a coward, not brave enough to come and settle this by himself, Masao.”
“He wants to kill you,” Masao said, eyeing the group with a frown.
I let out a very short laugh, “He can try.”
I flicked the lighter in my hand, clicking the flame into existence. The smell of burning tobacco filled my nose as I lit the cigarette. Taking a step out from the side street, I turned my head just enough to see the group pausing in their advance. It looked like I had startled them, that notion made me grin. Despite taking only one slow drag off the cigarette, I threw it down and crushed it beneath the heel of my dress shoe.
“Jin, pleasure to see you again,” I said, turning slowly to face him and the other six men that he had with him.
The one in question narrowed his dark eyes at me, “I doubt this is a pleasure, Mister Hasakeno.”
“Kazuo is fine. No need to be so formal.”
Jin snorted in response, “Please, formalities are just fancy words for insults. Why did you call me here?”
Arching an eyebrow at him, I stood silently for a long while. One hand hung loosely at my side while the other hooked into the pocket of my black pants. I made him wait a while longer before I answered him, a smirk playing at the corner of my lips.
“I called because you’re not playing by my rules, Jin. Tawano is my town. These are my streets. They,” I gestured to a few people who still lingered, far from us though and across the street, “Are my people. Which means that anything bad that happens to them, is exactly like something bad happening to me, directly.”
I eyed him for a while, watching with satisfaction as he visibly swallowed. Tugging at his necktie he grimaced as he looked around, “Look, Kazuo, I haven’t done anything. I keep you supplied, keep you running a business and that is all I do.”
“Ah, yes. So why the contingent of men, Jin? We were only going to talk. And if you are as innocent as you claim to be, certainly there was no need for all of them,” I paused, a grin growing, “And certainly not for the weapons.”
Jin’s lips pulled into a deep frown, his teeth just barely showing as he clenched his fists tightly, “What did you expect? You called me so suddenly, and without reason. It’s bound to raise suspicion.”
“I see. Do you still wish to kill me? Like you did to the other three women who resided in my town?”
Jin sputtered, his face turning red as he opened and closed his mouth repeatedly like a fish struggling out of water. After a minute, he finally resorted to grinding his teeth rather hard. Taking two steps back was his first mistake as it alerted me to his plan, “Damn you, Kazuo!”
“Didn’t think I would find out? How terribly naive you are,” I commented, my hand easing toward the gun tucked in its holster beneath my dress shirt.
“You wouldn’t listen no matter what! What choice do I have.”
“Many choices, Jin. This one isn’t the right one,” I answered, watching carefully and with a bit of curiosity at his choice of words.
“Kill him!” Jin shouted, almost in a frenzy of fear.
I clicked my tongue in annoyance. Drawing my weapon, I took out the first two who were closest to me. Masao’s weapon discharged rapidly and took two more as Jin retreated quickly. Slamming into one of the remaining two body guards that Jin brought, I twisted him around and wrenched his arm back hard enough to dislocate it. When he crumpled to the ground, I fired a round into his back, a single sharp cry of pain hitting the air afterward.
Looking up, I spotted Jin a little ways down the street from me. Yet it wasn’t the distance of fifteen or twenty feet that had me worried. It was what he had held in his grip. A human shield, the cowardly bastard. A knife to the poor boys throat for added measure too. I frowned at Jin, taking a step forward. Jin raised the knife harder against the kids neck. I paused, my finger tightening on the trigger of my handgun.
“Your town, right, Kazuo? Your people. You gonna risk a kid?”
I turned my head down a little, another annoyed click of my tongue hitting the air. Damn that kid for getting himself mixed up in places he shouldn’t have been in. I gave the boy a rather irritated glare before I looked back to Jin, “Let him go. Don’t be stupid about this.”
Jin laughed, hysterically. It made me think he’d lost his mind. Or that he was afraid of something and I wasn’t too sure he was afraid of just me.