I: Gathering

My eyes open to an obscure scene. A scene I've never seen before. A train station. It's as though I've never seen such a concept before but should know exactly what's going on. I can't shake this feeling off. But I need to get somewhere. Somewhere on the other side of this train station I've never seen in my life. My gut feeling is the only thing guiding me through the mass crowds huddling around these, what I assume to be trains. Looking up, I see signs that I don't even understand.

Walking through the crowded station platform, I bump into people, hear people muttering noises, shoes clacking and tapping – distractions from the sensation of familiarity that I should be feeling. The constant droning sounds and foot-tapping… Dyl… Dylan…? L…Leah…? Wh-

Matsui-san, we've got 'em.

A nudge to my shoulder forced me to turn around. To my right, a rough-dressed man with a slightly slouched back and an eye-piercing thousand-mile poker face stare looks directly at me, demanding attention. This man… it's as though I know him. His stare and way of communication beckons that notion.

Bo…Botan. That was his name.

"Boss told us to meet you in front of the bus stop. But that'll take ages. Considering, well, y'know, the crowd."

Botan's mention of the bus stop in front of Hakata Station… so that's where my gut feeling was trying to guide me to. He is right – the crowds in Hakata station are going to do nothing but waste my time. Kitakyushu is quite a coin toss away from here and gas ain't exactly cheap in this receding corpse of an economy that is the Japanese economy. Heh, I act like I live here… yet I don't feel like I even belong here at all.

Walking through Hakata station, it's just as crowded as ever, comparable to a can of salted sardines. The only form of vision I realistically have is Botan, who shoves and pushes through the ocean of people. The bright, irradiating light of Neon, flickering schedule boards, and chandeliers illuminate the station's interior. The announcement jingles come every few minutes as both Botan and I frantically try to dash ourselves out of the maze.

NEXT TRAIN FROM HAKATA STATION TO KAGOSHIMA-CHUO STATION ARRIVES IN 15 MINUTES. STOPS ARE LISTED ABOVE. NEXT TRAIN FROM HAKATA STATION TO KAGOSHIMA-CHUO STATION ARRIVES IN 15 MINUTES. STOPS ARE LISTED ABOVE. THANK YOU.

After three more repetitions of the jingle and our fourth flickering schedule board, we manage to escape the labyrinth of Hakata station relatively unscathed. Walking down the stairway towards what I assume to be the bus stop, the chaotic sounds of the congested station filter out to the quiet, empty breeze of the fresh, open Fukuoka air. Cars honking. Buses revving their engines. Feint tapping of formal office shoes. Gusts of whispers. A functional, lived-in city if you will. One way more calming than the hectic Hakata station. Reaching the bus terminal, I am greeted by a moderately tall, well-dressed man with sunglasses on. "Matsui-san, we have 'em locked up somewhere. Nothing has been spilt from him yet" he says with a disappointed manner. He continues, "Big boss said that if push comes to shove and we don't find it, he's gonna pull a gang war in Fukuoka, and I'm not sure that'll bode well with the Fukuoka pigs here. We gotta make sure to push the Antis out of here, especially those damned Kudo-kai." He pauses and stares at me with a poker face, "We gotta defend Fukuoka like it's true Yamaguchi-gumi territory, or there won't be a bright future for us or anyone who works at the Kyushu branch." He bows down before gesturing towards the sedan and getting into the driver's seat. "Akihiko-san can be quite depressing to listen to, huh?" Botan mutters. "But…he's not wrong. Our lead suspect is the only way we can save ourselves and the Yamaguchi-gumi's legacy here." He walks toward the car, opening the car door and gestures towards the inside of the car whilst bowing. I go inside the car, sitting in the cushy seats of the sedan. Botan follows suit and closes the door. With everything done, Akihiko hits the pedal, accelerating us towards Fukuoka traffic.

Moving away from Hakata station, I get a final glimpse of that enormous, rectangular glass building. That second, getting out the train station, felt…like I was being birthed into this world, a world I don't know. It was like any past memory disappeared without a trace. Viewing and listening made me understand what information I had missed, but my eyes and ears only receive so much. My head has been looping two utterly bizarre names since my disembarkation from that Shinkansen – Dylan and Leah. Who? That's what I'm trying to figure out. Their names have absolutely no correlation with who and what I am associated with. Not even within a Japanese context. Rarely do I see Japanese with western first names. So…why? I feel like I know them though. Something about familial ties and an accident an-

"Matsui-san, we have reached the location" Akihiko utters. The car grounds to an absolute halt. Getting out the car, a rundown, rusted warehouse appears in my vision. "He's just inside this…place. Your appearance is, I'm sure, enough to scare him into a confession. Especially with that Colt of yours." Akihiko leads the way to this person's location inside this decrepit, harrowing warehouse. Each step. Each move. Each utterance of anything from anyone. All this echoed throughout the hallways of the metal husk of a building. The place is dingy and screamed danger all-in-all. All sorts of greenery covered the rusting metal walls of this establishment. The pillars of the building don't hold up at all, like it's a relic of the golden age of the Fukuoka economy, of a greater former Japanese golden decade in the 80s to early 90s now left to rot, on the verge of collapse. The building, whilst looking painfully simple on the outside harboured complex turns and leads to the most random of rooms. Rooms that contain God knows what. Seems like the Kyushu branch had started using this since my temporary stay in Kitakyushu, or at least what remains of it. Peeking through these sketchy rooms on both paintless, crusty corridors, I could see what these rooms were used for and how they were used. Rooms filled with barrels and crates, rooms completely sealed off, a room filled with machinery and possible associates or full members, etc. Upon bumping onto members and associates, they greet us and express welcome to me whenever they see me and realize that I came back from Kitakyushu.

Akihiko stops in front of a rusted doorframe with its door fully open to the point where not a single speck of it is visible. The room was dark and had an utmost eerie feeling which quickly swallowed anyone who entered the room. Even I, as a person who isn't superstitious, felt a feeling of dread. A dread so harrowing. It wasn't helped by the noise of heavy breathing echoing across the room, most likely from our suspect they managed to capture. Akihiko storms into the room, flicking a light switch on and snatches a bucket filled with fresh ice and water. He walks up to the unconscious, blindfolded suspect, with legs bound to a cheap, wooden chair, and chucks everything inside straight to his face, with the ice cubes dealing a direct blow to his pale face. He immediately jolts up, breathing rapidly in an oscillating pattern from the pure shock the ice hitting his face had given him.

"I-I'LL NEVER SNITCH ON THEM! YOU'LL NEVER GET ME TO!" he screams, fighting his way out of the chair. A pathetic sight. Almost felt pity if it weren't for the fact that he's not part of us. As he keeps screaming and cursing at him, Akihiko looks around, disappears out the doorframe to come back with a long metal pipe and swings it directly at the suspect's face, sending him aback and almost tipping the chair over. "You will be soon." Akihiko looks at me from outside the dimly lit room and gestures to "finish the job". I walk in the room and reach inside the depths of my blazer's pocket. There, my hands meet with the cold, carbon steel grip of my Colt pistol. I pull it out and pull the Colt's slide with an upmost aggressiveness. The resulting sound that reverberates throughout the room startles the distressed suspect. He tries to leap and get out of his seat, pathetically trying to squirm out of the basically tight and unbreakable tape. A shred of hope and defiance against his current situation still lingers within him. Seeing as a confession from that is the only thing keeping my branch together, I find this hope troubling. I shot a shot in the air, piercing what remains of this hope, hoping to break his resolve. "W-WHAT IS THAT?" he screams to the top of his lungs, as if pleading for an explanation. His resolve is on the verge of finally toppling. "A passport to my answer…" I answer back. Not sure what to make of it, he starts to mouth the words "What do you mean?", but I don't want to let him. He needs to know his place in this interrogation.

BANG. BANG.

The suspect whimpers and moans in agony, searching any form of comfort from this. The newly formed wounds on both his knees form two identical craters of blood red, with a stream of blood trickling down both knees. The bullets shatter what little energy he has left to fight for his life. Without a second of hesitation, I grab his shirt. I look directly at him, threw away his blindfold, and slammed my head directly onto his head. I stare directly at his soul. His eyes become wide open, with his pupils dilating from the result of all the adrenaline rushing everywhere around his body. He capitulates.

"1-Choume-24 Togire, Nishi-ku… Near Hashimoto Station. Y-You can't miss it. Literally a walk away from the station. Please, please spare my life…"

That once resilient spirit is gone. Gone are the days of this person's loyalty to the Kudo-kai. To his family. His gang. Despite getting the exact address, I feel disgusted for even touching him. A loyalty faded away is something I'll always find disgusting. A plead for the sparing for one's life in exchange for a betrayal…he doesn't deserve my mercy.

"Shigeru." I call out. Without a second of delay, a lanky, well-dressed man with slicked-back hair enters this dimly lit room. He salutes me. He proceeds to yank the cigarette from his mouth and put it out after a few dampening stomps from his boots. "Yes, Matsui-san?" I gesture with my thumb, pointing at the weeping mess of a traitor. "Clean him up." With those three words uttered directly to him, he gets straight to work. I walk out of the dimly lit room, cleaning my blazer and refocusing my glasses. I wipe all the excess blood away from the maroon-tinted lenses. I turn around, staring with anticipation at the marching Shigeru as he takes his silencer out. He stops in front of the mess of a traitor, with his voice gone from all the needless screaming and begging. The air fills with a muddied silence, with the slurred whimpers and cries from the traitor being the only source feeding sound into the hollow room, interrupting said silence. Shigeru cocks the gun and points it directly in front of the traitor's face. Without a moment of hesitation-

BANG. BANG. BANG. BANG.

Shigeru lifts his hand down and effortlessly puts his silencer back into his blazer. He then kicks the chair, toppling it and sending the chair to a loud thud on the ground. Walking away from the scene, he stops and briefly bows in front of me, as if confirming that the deed had been done, before continuing and leaving the room.

The wind blows gently over my face. I stare down towards the vast midnight view of Hakata Bay as I back up on the guardrail. What a magnificent sight Hakata Bay is. Just a few centuries ago, this was the sight of a fight between a weakened, decentralized Japan and the supposedly superior Mongol fleet of Kublai Khan, a fight that the former won. That's information you'd expect least from a Yakuza crook like Botan, but I guess life is full of surprises. A conversation underneath the dimly lit moonlight had commenced between me and Botan as we shared a pack of cigs. As time passes, the conversation shifts from topic to topic – Local History. Local Cuisine. The future of our gang. Financial Security – All topics that were discussed and then some. The cigarette smoke gusts away slowly from the degrading cigarette sticks withering away, whose particles probably represent the relative amount of time passed. It feels relaxing to finally have an informal one-on-one conversation with someone else. Instead of threats and feelings of apathy or disgust, it's a feeling of familiarity that envelops you. The last time I felt this was back in my Kitakyushu stay, exchanging pasts with a local bartender I knew from the Kokura Kita ward.

"Matsui-san, we have disposed of him." Akihiko states as he walks back from the site some fifty meters away, Shigeru following suit. "Is it noticeable?" I question, with my tone reverting back to a coldness from the friendly façade I had whilst talking to Botan. "We initially thought dumping the body in the deep blue, but that would be suspicious." Akihiko answers. "We then buried him deep and put a few Salmon carcasses a few meters above." He shrugs. "How can you-" "Sometimes, the fate of the gang is more important than this morning's groceries." He silences my sentence, as if predicting it was going to happen. "The smell would throw off any sniffers they send. It's a proven strategy. I know cuz I got experience before joining this branch." From his professional history and his demeanor, I take his word.

"There's also a question I wanted to ask of you, Matsui-san." Akihiko walks a bit closer to me. "Why did we decide to, y'know, off this person? He could've been useful as a sort of decoy once we plan the raid." I pondered on that question for a few seconds. "You saw how he basically switched sides once we coerced him and snitched on his own gang. He would've done the same thing to us as well if things went south his way." I look toward the sea for a final time. "Besides, I find traitors disgusting. No matter how useful they are. No dignity for one's group, but only a self-interest for one's wellbeing. They deserve nothing but death." Akihiko, not sharing the same sentiment, sighs. He is quite different in terms of methodology. Whilst I work off of feeling and my experience, he's more calculating and pragmatic. He finds things like sentimentality to be nothing but distraction to his ambitions, which I respect. But, hey, nothing we can do now, considering he's dead.

Akihiko gestures to me and the rest and walks toward the car, hopping onto the driver's seat. Shigeru quickly follows, going in the front-seat passenger side. Before going into the car, I looked onto the dark, opaque forest ahead of me, opposite the translucent oceans of Hakata Bay, when I noticed something out of the ordinary from the forest: an oblong-shaped shadow on the edges of the border between what constituted the forest and the not-so-far-off road. Upon a further squint from my eyes, I make out a figure. A figure that is staring at the entire convoy. Or rather, me. I can feel as though this figure is piercing through my soul, and essentially telling me that my days are numbered. A weird, nauseous feeling swells in my head.

"Matsui-san!" Botan taps my shoulder. "Are you okay?" "We need to go somewhere. Somewhere far away. I feel like we're being watched." I mutter.

"Are you sur-"

 "Believe me. There is something there, or rather, someone there. And I'm not getting a good feeling out of this 'someone'." We both walk toward the car, with my eyes locked towards the figure, as it slowly follows me toward my car. Getting into the car, I felt a huge sense of relief, as the nauseous feelings faded away from my head. "Where to, Matsui-san?" Akihiko asks me as I get comfortable inside the car's cushy seat. "Go to a hotel, as long as it is approximately one hour away from this site." I say as I lean on the leather seat. "We being followed?" he asks with a concerned tone.

"Yeah. Make sure to dispose of this car as soon as we reach there."

Akihiko steps on the gas aggressively, propelling the car toward the street, making sure that whoever followed us doesn't have the ability to continue to do so.