Ch 24
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Chapter Twenty Five
The Profligate
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“You are, without the slightest doubt, the youngest to ever join their ranks.”
The subject of discussion, a scrappy youth with a powdery mop of hair, looked over his shoulder with a wrench in his mouth. “Thir, I don’t think ih’d he a gooh iyea koo pheak ow of cork.”
“You’re going to have to repeat that without the sucker.” The old fellow chuckled. “I may have pretty good ears, but it’s no help to me when it comes to interpreting whatever you just said.”
The youth spat the wrench out on the ground. “I said, sir, I don’t think it’d be a good idea to speak out of court. I haven’t been properly initiated yet, and I’m technically not supposed to know what you’re talking about, either.” He wiped his hands off with a rag and tucked the rag back into his shirt pocket.
“Yeah, yeah.” A cigarette was finally located and raised to the old fellow’s lips, but after a moment of hesitation he returned it to the inner pocket of his black jacket. “We’re out of time. You finished yet?”
“Just done, sir.” The hood of the vehicle was closed, and the young man threw a coat on. “I hope you won’t have any more starter issues with this car; she’s a real pain to work on, especially in this kind of weather.”
“It usually doesn’t snow this badly in Japan.” The old man sighed, staring up at the heavy clouds above him. “I can’t believe we’re having to do this tonight, but… Well, the Master must be obeyed. Let’s go.”
“Tell me, mister Kahn, sir.” The young man inquired as he entered through the passenger side door. “What happens if the eye looks upon me unfavorably?”
“Oh, then you die.” The old man smiled, turning the key in the ignition. “But I have high hopes for you, son. I think you’re going to change the world.”
–
“Does it always involve foreigners?”
“Always.” The heavy-set man growled. “Master Rikuto, he insists on every member of this little organization being from outside Japan. Some of the work we do, it could make current residents uncomfortable, make them reconsider when it comes to striking at their own nation. That’s not the way of the Serows.”
“Yeah, about that…” The broad-shouldered young man scratched at his eyebrow, looking up at the larger fellow from under his hoodie. The fat man’s country of origin was difficult to place, but undoubtedly close to the equator, and despite his obesity he carried a ferocious presence. Unbecomingly, he wore almost all white, and the mask he held in his hand was carved from whale bone, several jagged points arcing off the center and extending far from the edge of the mask itself. “Don’t you think naming your group after a… goat, I think… was maybe not a great idea?”
“Are you sure critiquing our organization is wise?” A woman’s voice chimed in, equal parts smooth and poisonous. “Master Rikuto was adamant about your inclusion, so I’d hate to see him change his mind just because you criticized his tastes.”
“Oh, I’m not, believe me.” The young man smirked, pulling his gaze away from the woman. She was above six feet in height, although her hair covered more than half that distance. Her attire was almost entirely indigo, save for a few decorative splashes of silver, which served no practical function whatsoever… Not that her slim dress was extremely practical to work in, anyway. Her fingers lightly held a theater mask which matched the rest of her attire.
“What’s takin’ the boss so long?” A third voice grumbled. “We’ve been standin’ around here for over an hour waitin’ for college boy to arrive, and now that he’s here there’s still no sign of old man Kumagai.”
“Watch your tongue, Feague.” The woman snapped, turning her sharp eyes on the unseen figure in the shadows. “Master Rikuto arrives exactly when he intends to. It is not our position to question his intent.”
The figure lurched out of the darkness, roughly the same age as the young man in the hoodie, albeit year or two younger. “That’s no fair, Effete.” He groaned, removing his silvery wolf-like mask as he spoke. “Rikuto gets a nice fancy chair all to himself, and we have to stand around like pack animals.”
"Hold on, Feague?" The young man stared in amazement. “Are you actually serious right now? He’s calling you FEAGUE?? Not a joke, that’s your actual title?”
“What?” Feague looked about with obvious concern. “What’s wrong with it? Is there something- Did you two know about this?” His gaze snapped between Effete and the unnamed man with the bone mask. “I swear, if this means some kind of like, rodent, I’m gonna grab Rikuto by the ear and-”
“FEAGUE!!” Effete snarled, prompting the smallest member of the Serows to cower away in terror. "We wait for Master Rikuto to arrive. That is all." She looked up at the night sky, her own impatience showing through. “Are the others going to be here on time?”
“They better.” The larger man stepped forwards, crossing his arms with a huff. “This better not be a repeat of last time. Wild barging in right after Master Rikuto ended the ceremony was utterly inexcusable.”
“Sorry I’m late.” Looking upwards, the group could make out the figure of a man standing atop the highest stack of shipping containers at the docks. “That the new member?”
“Wild.” The man in white growled, stepping one foot forward defiantly. “Has Master Rikuto decided? Do we move forward with the initiation?”
“Ersatz, Effete, Feague.” Wild’s voice was deathly serious. “You are aware of my position on killing. You know I will never take a life unless there is no other option available, if there is no way to prevent it.”
“You know Master Rikuto insists upon the death of those whom the eye rejects.” Ersatz replied, placing the bone mask over his face. “Why are you telling us this? Has the eye rejected him?”
"I have rejected you." Wild glared down from the bottom of his eyes at the party. “You will hand over your masks and abandon the Kumagai clan. You will disband the Serows and never come back, or I will kill you all and break your masks.”
“You have five seconds.” The oni mask was placed atop his features.
“What a shame.” Effete sighed, placing the theater mask on the bridge of her nose. “Master Rikuto will be so disappointed when he hears this new recruit was the reason we’ve got your head on a spike.”
“He’ll be surprised, for sure.” Wild crossed his arms. “Did none of you ever consider for a moment how peculiar it was that Rikuto directed you to await the initiation at the shipyard instead of one of his hideouts? That there would be no guards, no procedure, and that he would be running late?”
“We do not question Master Rikuto’s wisdom.” Ersatz snarled, reaching towards his face for a moment. The bone mask split open like a flower, revealing an amber eyeball in place of Ersatz’s face, motionlessly staring forwards. “If you had more faith in Master Rikuto, perhaps you would have considered our dedication to his cause.”
“Yes, I know.” Wild stepped off the shipping container, falling towards the ground and landing upright. The asphalt cracked and splintered all around him as the force of his drop was redirected into the ground. “If you have any other words to mention, I’d recommend you say them now.”
“I’d hate for those to be your last.”
–
“Step forward.”
Out of the gloom he approached - he, and no one else, much to his surprise. A glance back revealed the mister Kahn that had escorted him was nowhere to be seen.
“FORWARD!!” The old man at the other end of the room barked. “The eyes of the Demon do not have the patience to put up with your attention span!”
The young man hurriedly obliged, stumbling forward and glancing at the number of strangers surrounding the ornate pile of pillows which held the old man aloft. On the one side was a fat man in white attire, his skin heavily tanned by the sun, a craggy set of teeth in his puffy mouth, which he bared like an angry dog as the young man’s eyes made contact with his. To his side stood a woman, very tall, rather slender, with a surprisingly youthful face which bore no kindness as she glared down at him. Dressed in indigo and silver, she had her rather long hair partially held aloft by a silver contraption of some sort, although he could not for the life of him guess what fashion statement it was meant to make.
On the other side was a tall bald fellow, athletically built with ivory skin, and he grinned as the young man made eye contact with him. He was adorned with black clothing reminiscent of a gi, but with several flame-like extensions of fabric with gold trim along each, as if they could flap out like actual flames when he moved. However, almost teetering in front of him, a horrible old corpse stood, his skin a pale green, wearing a dark cloak with a bit of fur around the collar like some decrepit vulture. His face was terribly thin and long, drooping with sunken cheeks and shut eyes, and silver hair extended past his chin in matted lines, seemingly weighing him down. His labored breathing and occasional swaying made it look like he would drop dead at any moment, and his bony hands clutched at the air in front of him.
“I have found our Serow.” The old man leaned forwards, one hand clutched tightly into a fist. “You are called Wild by the eye of the Demon. We will see if you can attain his favor, or if you will die like the rest.”
With a wave, a small sphere arced out of his palm with an impressive amount of force. The young man ducked, expecting it to collide with him, but when he opened his eyes he saw it had landed in his fingertips. It was a small resin eye, with a pupil that seemed to extend inwards far deeper than the eye was physically capable of. As he stared at it, the rest of the world seemed to seep down inside it until there was nothing else left but his consciousness… And the eye.
“Don’t.” The old man motioned for the ivory-skinned man to stay back, halting his approaching to intervene. The rest of the assembled figures watched with some interest, sans the wretched gasping figure, who continued in his miserable noises.
The young man’s eyes were glazed over, clouded by an orange mist, which glowed brighter and brighter. The eye held in his fingertips also glowed, the pupil letting forth a bright light which threatened to overtake the one atop his eyes. There was darkness beyond the eye and darkness within it; both seemed endless, both inescapable.
Unless, somehow, he could find the strength to hold on. To overcome this infinite nothingness drawing him in. To push back against the very concept of infinity. And as those in the room held their collective breath, white curls of steam rolled off of his body as he bent forwards, his muscles tightening as they fought back against the eye.
Suddenly, he reeled back and swung the eye downwards, smashing it into the wooden mask now held in front of him. There was a hissing screech which emanated out from the mask, as the golden eye making contact with the wooden mask produced thick trails of orange smoke. However, after a moment, he could feel his eyes begin to clear, and the room slowly came back into view.
“Help him.” The old man gestured, prompting the man with ivory skin to step forward and offer a hand, barely in time to catch the young fellow before he collapsed in exhaustion. “As you are well aware, there are only ever five Serows under my power, and this one makes six. However, now that he is appointed, it has become clear that this limiting rule must be enforced, for the sake of my honor, if nothing else.”
“What would you have us do, Master Rikuto?” Effete inquired.
Rikuto lifted up his arm, weighed down by the elaborate ceremonial robes he wore, and pointed at the man with ivory skin. “Kill him.”
–
“Of course.” Effete sighed, tapping her chin as Feague flew past her, kicked off a shipping container, and scrambled back towards Wild. “So you didn’t tell Shellac to ensure he would have no one to support him.”
“Clever,” Wild grunted, pulling himself out of the crater he had made in the shipping container now lying on its side. “Making me airborne to get around the Oni mask was resourceful. Got any more tricks up your sleeves?”
“I’m trying to compliment your plotting against us, if you don’t mind.” Effete sighed, rubbing the bridge of her nose as Ersatz reached into the massive eye inside the exposed mask and extracted an entire telephone pole with enough speed to send it smashing into Wild, who refused to budge even as it splintered into a thousand pieces. “But what about Hie? Surely he’d have gotten word by now.”
“Hie’s too much of an idiot to hear about this in time.” Feague grumbled, effortlessly dodging Wild’s attacks up close and getting several ineffective strikes in. “It’s better this way; we can rub it in his face after the fact, and maybe he’ll finally admit he’s just as pathetic as everyone says he is.” Flipping over Wild, he landed on the former Serow’s shoulders and reached for his mask.
“You were always a bit of a pest.” Hie mused, looking at the wolf-shaped mask now in his hands. “But I suspect you’ll be a lot more cooperative without this. I’ll break it before- hang on.”
Ersatz had drawn a handgun out from the eye and aimed it at Hie, but suddenly lacked the petal-like fragments of his mask. Unable to prevent the eye from drawing matter in, Ersatz barely had time to scream as the eye pulled his head, the arms that tried to fight against it, and the rest of his body inside before devouring itself out of existence.
“You… I’LL KILL YOU!!” Feague roared, vaulting off of the stunned Wild’s shoulders and aiming for Hie. He landed on the ground with all six pieces of the mask jammed inside his stomach.
“That one was avoidable.” Wild growled, stepping forward just before the world suddenly went white. Both Wild and Hie reeled suddenly, covering their eyes to no avail, as the light got increasingly brighter.
“You idiots helped clean up the competition fairly well.” Effete walked forwards, casually glancing at the pair from behind her theater mask while failing to notice the footsteps approaching from behind. “Now with only that doddering old man in the way, I’ll soon be the only option for Rikuto to bless with the mission to find the second eye. Which, of course, will be for me.”
“For someone with illusion powers,” The hoodied youth grunted as he wrapped his arms tightly around her waist. “I’m really surprised you didn’t see this coming.” With a growl, he lifted Effete up in the air and viciously suplexed her into the ground behind him.
–
“That all?”
The ivory-skinned figure glanced about from the deep sockets of his black skull-shaped mask. Ersatz was on the floor, trying desperately to get his bruised knees to cooperate with him, while Effete was unconscious, slumped against the wall. The gasping corpse was feeling about under his robe, seemingly unaware of what was going on.
“Shellac, I’d advise you to stay out of this one.” The ivory figure turned towards Rikuto, his eyes glowing. “It’s going to be unnecessarily messy, but… Ah, what the heck, I know I’m going to enjoy this.”
Ersats growled, tipping his head up to reveal the massive eye embedded in his face, out of which a hail of bullets flew. The ivory man danced about, the elaborate flaps on his attire turning him into some kind of parade performer, and when the storm of gunfire ended he extended his hand with a dramatic flourish, where a neat pyramid of still-smoking bullets laid. “In time with the universe, Ersatz. Which part is it you’re not getting?”
During this exchange, the young man, who had stayed out of the attempted murder up to this point, turned his frightened eyes towards the old Shellac, who slowly drew an old and rather dark katana from under his cloak. Placing the flat against his brow, the decrepit bag of bones struggled a breath of air into his frail lungs, and screamed with an unholy voice. It rattled the room like nothing else could, and the young man dropped to his knees with his hands over his ears, but the horror of what happened to its intended target overrode most of the pain he felt.
“Stop! STOP!!” The ivory man screamed, clutching his ears as tears ran down his face. Several things began going wrong - loud pops sounded from his body as fractures in his bones suddenly appeared, his elegant ivory skin was turning pitch black in spots as if frostbite was quickly spreading across his body, and the fabric of his fancy attire was starting to fray and come undone. Rikuto and Ersatz also reeled, but evidently were much less affected by comparison.
After a moment of terror, the sword was silently returned into its hidden sheath, and the ivory-skinned man was now mostly ebony. His eyes shook inside his skull as if they no longer fit. He didn’t seem to notice the young man, the aged Shellac, or any portion of the room. A last exhale serving as a death rattle, he dropped forwards with a wet crunch.
“Give our Wild his new mask.” Rikuto rubbed his ears for a moment. “Hie, hurry it up. I will have my men deal with this rubbish in the meantime. Our business here is concluded.” He smacked the topmost pillow beneath him twice, and the now titled Wild stood outside the room, shivering as Hie released him.
“Hey, you seem kinda cut up there.” Hie mumbled, feeling Wild’s quivering shoulder. “Good thing, too. It won’t be too long before I’m the one getting torn to pieces by those psychopaths. I’m younger than you, and I was barely out of high school when I started in this group. I’ve often wanted to quit, but what would I do? They could throw me in an illusion, or blow my skin off my body. There’s no escape from this.”
“Not even for you.” He set the oni mask in his hands. “I’m not sure what that mask does, but I popped in with it just in time for you to hit it with the eye, as I’ve done before. Trust me, friend; no matter what it’s capable of, it’ll never be enough to get you out of here.”
“We’re doomed.” He turned and stepped into the shadow of the hall, disappearing from view and leaving Wild alone with his mostly disturbed thoughts.
–
“I’m not sorry.” The hoodied youth grunted. “If I had known that mask of hers was just loose fabric, I wouldn’t have stomped on it… As much, anyway.” His eyes traveled down to the smudged piece of cloth now lying on the ground. “I didn’t think that’d be enough to break it. But I’m not sorry. Even if I didn’t mean to snap her neck with that move-”
“All. Life.” Wild glowered. “Don’t think this sadistic outlook is going to be tolerated, friend. Never take a life unless you have no other choice.” Sighing, he turned away from the rebellious glare of his new associate and towards the silver mask Hie held in his hands. “I’ve changed my mind. We’re keeping that one.”
“What for?” Hie mumbled, looking it over. “It’s just a reactionary mask. Better reflexes, combat skills, that sort of thing. It’s nowhere near as good as that skull one.”
“I know.” Wild glanced back at the hoodied fellow with something of a smirk dancing in his eyes. “We eliminate more of these freaks and monsters, Rikuto’ll just use the eye to summon more. And even if we take the eye, he’s got a whole plethora of masks hidden away somewhere. He could raise a serious hit squad if he wanted to bypass the ceremony a little.”
“He wouldn’t, but why are you saying this?” Hie looked concernedly at his superior. “Are you suggesting we try to use the masks to stop him?”
“I’m not content just to escape.” Wild folded his arms, his eyes shining with determination. “I only took this position with his wicked group to begin with because I thought we’d be destroying the other yakuza families in Japan, but instead we’re only enabling them. I want to rid the world of not just the yakuza, but these puppets of Rikuto as well, and if we can break those supposedly indestructible Demon eyes at the same time, all the better.”
His gaze shifted towards the shortest of the trio, who was very close to six feet tall but still felt his broad shoulders didn’t quite make up for his lack of height. “Son, you really showed promise tonight. I’m sorry this had to take you from your classes-”
"These people took my classes from me." The young man grunted, pocketing his hands as he spoke. “I’ve felt enough hands go cold for one lifetime.”
“Lost his father when the Kumagai and Katashi families got involved in a major feud.” Wild mumbled in the general direction of Hie. “I was ordered to clean it up. Rikuto didn’t like my sending the Katashi patriarchs to jail and dissolving the gang instead of killing all of them.”
“Listen.” Wild folded his arms as he eyed the subject of his remarks with a rebuking air, having caught an irreverent and bitter expression pass over his features. “I know you want a lot more than simple justice, but if you want my help you’ll have to play by my rules. We either have boundaries we never go past or we can excuse anything we do, regardless of how deep it goes.”
“What did you have in mind?” His tone was measured, still raw but much more refined. Wild gave a silent snort in reply; the fire hiding in his eyes showed great potential.
“We find people who have something to offer. We offer them a mask and a chance at our organization. We push back against the yakuza and Rikuto’s little pets until there’s nothing left. You’d get a mask too, of course, but only if you’re in.”
“So.” Wild’s eyes twinkled for a moment. “You want to help create a safer Japan? A world without the yakuza?”
“Yes, boss.” The hoodied youth grinned, eyeing the wolf mask with an undisguised air of mischief. “I’d like that very much.”
–
Ch 26
I’m the author and I know what I’m doing
