ご の しかく:
Five Assassins
Bright blue and neon red cut across her strapping face. Tires slick over the pavement narrowingly missing a few heaps of trash while the car slides through a back alley and stops. Four cars rumble, sitting still, mostly empty. Two men guard the entrance, standing under a halogenic light placed above the door. Always ready. Eyes open, their acute senses cut through the bustle of the big city. Music thumps beneath them, the honking, the yelling, the lingering, the gazing, sadness, seeping down from darkened apartment windows and rising up from the dull and unblinking subway systems. Apathetic until their interests are in danger. Apathetic until their source of survival is threatened. She cracks her knuckles first, her neck second, and stretches the jitters from her chest. Deep breath and—
Suzuki exits, solo. They do not acknowledge her. A door painted black opens, she phases through the frame silently, ghastly. It closes. Suzuki enters.
Everyone is armed. Whether one could see it or not, there are weapons everywhere. Tucked, sheathed, tied, strapped, wrapped, and or exposed for the entire room to witness.
The mint lights clash with the maple walls and reflect a hint of teal onto the pale faces of the guests. The mint glow pours over an entire display of bonsai trees. From a row of pink, to yellow, red, and then green. An arranged display of life in a place so bereft of it. Light floods onto the polished floors, spotless. The bartender goes back and forth with guests, filling, talking, then taking yen. Some sit, some stand. Chatter fills up the Izakaya, a few laugh, others cheer, someone claps. Sake is exchanged, smooth. Sips from each other’s lips. Cigarette smoke forms tendrils that phase across the surface of every table.
Tanaka Kaito inhales it all, and he sticks out his tongue in elation. He wears a white yukata and a purple hachimaki that keeps his blonde hair from his blue eyes. His wakizashi replaces his foodplate and takes up his entire portion of the rectangular table. Bejeweled with red rubies that line the tsuba, the handle is wrapped in purple velvet, and the saya is black. Its surface matted and scratched from extensive use. “Do we really have to wait for all of us to arrive?” He sighs and looks towards the stars stitched in the ceiling.
Itoo Daisuke replies, his voice blunt and deadly as a kanabō, “Yes, Tanaka.” A fitted pitch black haori shrouds him like shadow. His dull metallic voice adds, “As always.” Itoo opens his eyes, they appear black, abyssal. Nothing budges out of place when he shifts his weight, all of him is in control. Not even his top knot resembling a ginkgo leaf shakes when the man sways his head from side to side in Kaito’s response.
“Waiting on this woman as always, she ought—”
“Yamashita gives us the entire night. Stop fussing. We are a busy people.” Kitamori Amaya retorts with a sly smile carving into her wrinkled cheek. Her yellow silk and sky blue kimono reflects the mint green lighting well. Her aura is brilliance and like Kaito, she lets the appearance of her sword signify her status. A tachi that is wrapped up along her waist; it matches the colors of her outfit, and from the butt end of the handle hangs a withered ema that rests on her hips.
Kaito blows a raspberry and looks down at his bare feet. His soles are pink as he wiggles his toe playfully for only him to see, “Sure. But when have we ever—”
“Tanaka talking as always,” Suzuki Amaya voices her ghostly arrival. She smirks at the rest of the table. Donning an all black three piece suit, it shines under the soft lighting of the Izakaya. Collar open, she wears a Kaiki Shoho Coin suspended on a simple leather cord. The seventh out of thirty two to be precise. Rare—mint. One hand is on her sword, swung around her shoulder, unwrapped: Midnight’s Beckoning. Pitch black, except for a crescent moon styled tsuba.
Suzuki is business ready.
Kaito bends his head back like a snake to gaze at her with a gleaming grin, “Gah! We can get this show on the road now.” His eyes sharpen, dialing in on Suzuki’s demeanor, “Busy night?”
“Always,” she looks away, “Where is—”
“Kitamori! Tanaka! Itoo! Suzuki! Up here,” Yamashita’s voice booms and shatters the small talks, conspiracy talks, and risque conversations bubbling up in his absence.
The group excuses themselves and walk up to the private chamber, cut off from the rest of the Izakaya by a shoji. It slides shut behind them with a whoosh and a clasp.
Kaito and Itoo are close together, chests facing their Sensee. Kitamori is already sitting on her knees at the round table in the middle of the white room, bowing her head. Suzuki faces the window, looking into the skyline. Stars are blotted out with smokestacks and floating embers. They fall on top of the Pale Shade Forest in the distance, it glows too. She sighs, to herself. Her heart is thrumming into her weapon.
Yamashita signals for the members to sit down with only his fingers. Everyone complies. Kaito takes his sweet time. Suzuki sits opposite Yamashita. She puts her sword in her left hand, parallel to her legs.
Battle ready.
Their Sensee is outfitted in a silk-white Obi, accented with gold dragons. Around his waist is a light brown Hakama, pulled together with black straps across his back and hips. He stays standing, staring down at his disciples. The few gray hairs he has look more apparent tonight, some of them are reaching for the ceiling. Suzuki’s known him her entire life. She still sees him as he was then, strong, capable beyond belief.
They wait, all eyes on him, except for Suzuki’s gaze. It’s situated on her right hand. Fingertips feel like icicles. Did not matter. It couldn’t. Not anymore.
Yamashita speaks anyways, the sake loosens up his usually stony facade: “I want to begin by outlining my appreciation for you all. This has been on the horizon for some time, and yet it has arrived faster than even—I expected. I hope you all have prepared as much as I have, and in many ways, find yourself feeling a bit aloof—excluding Young Kaito of course.” The young clan member grins. Yamashita keeps saying, “You all deserve the world, I promise you, but things do not work like that. Especially here.” He clears his throat, “Enough. I understand what you are all here for, waiting for, yearning for, in some cases.” Suzuki looks up at him. “Things won’t change—much—but they will change nonetheless. I must go, while another takes my place as head of this Five-Headed-Dragon.” Yamashita’s eyes fall on Suzuki. “And so, before I welcome them to the head of the table, know I am steadfast in my decision—”
“Wait,” Suzuki stands, she points her shoulder at Itoo. He can’t see her sword. Suzuki adds, nearly too low for anyone to truly hear, “I cannot accept.” She looks at her Sensee.
Yamashita balls his fists and his eyes widen. Everything snaps into place. He can hear it. Body recoiling back from the silent sound of his mind shifting gears. Kitamori understands too. The energy shifts, crackles, and splits.
With the softest click and the sound of paper being cut clean Suzuki’s sword is swinging down into Itoo’s head cleaving it into two pieces. Blood and brain matter pulls out his skull busts and leaks onto the table dead before anyone can blink. Suzuki jumps back towards the window to gain extra momentum. Her sword is already pointed at Kaito. She charges. Kitamori throws two knives from the sleeves of her Kimono as she stands then leaps towards Yamashita who is sliding out of the shoji door. Suzuki must stop to dodge the first laser pointed throw and she blocks the slower second throw with her blade. By then Kaito has his sword and saya in each hand. A sickening look of glee in his whet blue eyes as he holds his ground. He is ready—BOOM! Deafening them both—bullets shatter the toji paper and they hit the floor to narrowly miss the pellets flying in. More gunfire erupts from downstairs. An ambush. Yamashita is yelling at the top of his lungs, “NO! NO! NOOOOO!”
Kaito growls, “YOU BITCH.” He gets up and charges Suzuki. She sucks on her teeth and raises her sword above her head. Her silent confidence makes him angrier. Kaito hated being angry. He roars while swinging both arms. She cuts both in one swing. His sword arm she chops clean through. Bone, sinew, blood, and tendons spurting all onto himself. The other, she cuts a flab of muscle off his forearm while Kaito tries to swerve away. Too late. The one-armed-Kaito screams aloud. He had misjudged the distance of Midnight terribly. He is still alive, blood pooling around his feet. He cannot avoid the springing tears of pain that blur his vision. The shock of it all leaves him in a sunken daze while he holds up his bleeding stump up to his face. Suzuki walks past him and enters into the chaos of the Izakaya.
No time to say goodbye. Consciousness is useless in a fight like this.
Gunshots go silent. Men and women line the blood soaked floor while others fight in hand-to-hand combat. It’s dirty, rough, and sad. Blood paints the wall of bonsai trees. They are all maple red now.
Yamashita is still alive, fighting too. Suzuki points Midnight at him, “Yamashita Sensee!” He is slicing through an opponent’s neck and tugging onto his spine. Their weapon and body fall with a clatter. Yamashita looks up at Suzuki. Bodies lying between them. He half-smiles, “It never ends. You should know that.” He points his own katana at Suzuki. All gold, all red, and a blade inlaid with bronze. A dragon takes shape around the grip-end of his katana, his signature tsuba,“Kitamori!”
She emerges from shadow at the top of the stairwell. Six knives gripped in her right fist. Kitamori throws three in one fell swoop. Suzuki jumps backwards, flipping over the handrail and onto her feet below. Each knife pierces into the wood with a—thunk thunk thunk.
Suzuki inhales sharply, she reaches inside the darkest part of herself and rings it up, “Come and fight me like you mean it Amaya. I didn’t kill your little fucktoy for no reason…we are all dying tonight.” Suzuki blocks two more knives, the third one slices her ear and whistles behind her. She shakes it off with a grunt.
Emotional turmoil must be used, not ignored.
“You whore,” Kitamori whispers to herself and hops over the bannister with one hand. The old woman is strong. Yamashita joins her from around the stairs, he is walking, nearly gliding past bodies with a calamity only obtained from an accepted death.
Suzuki raises Midnight again. Towards the tinted sky, cut off by giant glass panes, not a single star looks back, only reflections; the mess of all their worth. Suzuki seethes.
Kitamori unsheaths her tachi beautifully, it becomes an extension of her arm. Her left hand grips three more knives, all steel.
A rush. Yamashita closes the gap in a wide three steps and a fool’s stance. One knife flies in while Kitamori closes the gap. A solid deflect then a slash towards Yamashita. Her sword is parried upwards; she uses the momentum to thrust hard towards a gaining Kitamori. It misses flesh but pierces her swinging kimono. Suzuki doesn’t feel the two throwing knives bear into her thigh and hip. Suzuki feels nothing. Kitamori is stuck. Suzuki swings in a wide half moon, squatting and slicing the skin on Kitamori’s ribs then slamming Midnight into Yamashita’s piercing strike. Yamashita and Suzuki tumble into each other from his forward momentum. Suzuki kicks then thrusts herself out of distance. Midnight risen once more.
A hearty and tired laugh leaves Yamashita’s throat, “You were perfect…” trailing off. He enters a fool’s stance once again. The joy leaves him just as suddenly as his laugh stops. His face is dead. Kitamori drags herself into view, her Kimono tightened to its maximum effort to heed her bloodflow and in her hands: the tachi along with four more bites of steel.
Suzuki looks down at herself; blood leaks from the knives and soaks into her pants and leg, she can feel warmth pooling around her neck. Hear the small buzz of dying assassins around them.
Smell never mattered, smell was only a distraction, best used for hunting.
Suzuki inhaled, slowly this time. Copper aromas fill up her nose.
Only Yamashita charges. The knives follow him. Suzuki deflects two, parries one slash but cannot parry the second. Yamashita delays it. She is too early, a throwing knife slices her wrist and the dragon blade cuts into her back as she twists away.
Suzuki collides into the bar. She maintains her balance. Yamashita pushes up into Suzuki’s flying boot heel. He gets thrown back with a crimson imprint on his white obi.
Kitamori snarls, “Just kill her you fool!” Two more knives come for Suzuki. She ducks one and tries to catch the other, maybe—it slices across her palm. Blood leaks from the cut. The older assassins close the gap. No matter, Suzuki gains a better grip on her sword and puts pressure on the blood, soaking Midnight’s tsuka.
Forced to parry Yamashita’s blade first, Suzuki compels distance with a quick thrust of her chiselled point. Side step, Kitamori’s tachi swings and misses but she recovers fast. Blocks the oncoming arc from Midnight. The bouncing blade goes down and Suzuki spins into a waning arc towards Yamashita. The Sensee is smiling when he is forced to side step and block. Pure elation. Sparks fly. Swords grind to a halt.
Kitamori seizes the lack of momentum and stabs Suzuki in the kidney. She slides her tachi out and raises the blade for another stab. Blood streams. Suzuki tightens up from the blaring pain.
Pain is a device. A tool for momentum in the heat of battle. Paint must be nothing but an empowering moment.
Suzuki doesn’t let her get the chance. She rushes Kitamori and slams her entire body against her opponents. Overpowering her. Suzuki slams the butt end of Midnight onto Kitamori’s hysterical face. Blood squirts from her nose. Suzuki raises her leg to kick Yamashita once more. He is ready this time. Cutting into her ankle with a small back dash. Suzuki howls but she spins and hooks her other legs towards him mid air. It slams into his chest and they both fall. She rolls, best she can—away. But not far enough.
Suzuki is bleeding from every end of herself. She plants Midnight’s point into the marble floor, cracking it, to rise. Kitamori’s foot slams into Suzuki’s lower back. A sharp pang rushes up her spine and Suzuki falls onto her side. The knives are still embedded in her, making the wounds itch. The blood is sticky, but she maintains her grip on the katana. She is boiling from the inside.
“The dragon is forever…” Kitamori mutters. She holds onto her nose, eyes closed. It must sting.
Yamashita stands next to her, smiling, then kneeling. Blurring vision, the shock of it all.
“Go for the target first, and always first. When did it slip from your plan?” Gazing, in and out. Too much blood. “You couldn’t even touch me. Still a miracle you lasted this long. I knew I had chosen correctly. Shame.” The Sensee chuckles, like he wasn’t just fighting for his life. Like his life hadn’t just flipped over itself in under five minutes.
Suzuki spits out a wad of darkened blood. She smiles, red teeth, hand tightening around her sword, “Wrong…I kicked you.”
He smiles back.
She swipes at his ankles. He is too slow this time. The katana runs across the front of his left calf, white bone flies out with the bloody blade. The Sensee is bewildered as he falls, pain bloating his face.
“That was your last move, bitch.” Kitamori raised her throwing arm up, more bites of steel gripped in her fingers. She never gets her satisfaction, not in this life.
Gunshots. Three precise bullets tear through her breasts and neck and Kitamori dies with a frown. Knives still in her fist. She falls like a board. Yamashita laughs boisterously. Hopping twice on one leg, he hoists himself over the lip of the bar as more bullets come crashing into the bottle-wall behind him. Drops of blood follow in his wake. The man is unstoppable. A tour de force of violence, resilience, and self-imposed authority pushed him into near-divinity. An injured man never moved so fast. Even into retirement, the strength was there, tucked, never lost.
“Rin! RIN! COME ON!” He is still shooting, emptying one magazine and deftly loading another. Smooth like sticks of butter. He stays at the door, knowing closing the gap in this death-house would mean the worst. The floor is a lake of blood and it’s already reaching for his soles the longer he keeps the door open.
Suzuki takes one last look at the bar and sees his hazel eyes peeping over the top. The smile lines scrunches them up into squints. It is not over yet. But for now, it is. She grits her teeth. Fucker.
With a lowly grunt, Suzuki picks herself up. Blood follows her in a thin red line. Suzuki runs haphazardly. Everyone else lays dead, limp, and frozen. Rigamortus sets into most, some still writhing with missing limbs and pieces of flesh strewn about. Red. All red.
She throws herself into him. He sustains her without question, blood dotting his white shirt. He sends out the rest of his magazine as they retreat.
Music; bouncing bass and compounding thuds vibrates into her boots. The cool night air hits her face and she gasps. He helps lift her into the black car. A hazy image of two limp guards slumped on each side of the back door.
The car starts, rumbling. A soft crackling. Speeding. Away. Vision fades into darkness…
Special thanks to the legend Bradley Ramsey himself who has been hosting Flash Fic February all month. 28 days, 28 prompts. There’s still some time to join in. His day 9 prompt inspired this one to tumble out of me. Ten days of writing, research, writing, and editing. Definitely took liberties to say the least. Proud of this one, been wanting to capture this vibe for like months. Other projects not going too well, so it was a good break nonetheless. Find the prompt below. AND THANK YOU FOR READINGGGG. :)
A beautiful red whirlwind. Immersive and well-written violence. Super inspiring dude
Okay I've finally finished listening and holy cow!! That was amazing! Gosh i was so far overdue for a story of yours 😭