((Sorry for taking so long to update! ;A; I'm sososososo SORRYYYYYYY. And I also deleted the previous chapter, because I re-read the story and realized it was just pretty stupid. Dx ))
As light slowly came back to him, he realized it was the all-too-sterile lighting of the hospital. It wasn't coming in through the window, but he could definitely make out the distant neon lights of the city. In one way, it seemed just like Los Angeles. But in another way… it was so foreign. It wasn't Los Angeles. It was supposed to be Tokyo. Was he there? Or was he still somehow in the hospital from the fire? His body was so sore… he certainly felt as though he had fallen all those flights again. Had he somehow been in a coma? Fingers twitched and he winced, groaning gently. He felt to be in such agonizing pain, and yet at the same time, it made him know that he was somehow alive. Whatever transpired before this moment… it hadn't killed him. Not yet. He still had a way to achieve something before he could finally tell the reaper that he was done.
Sitting up just slightly, his hand inched just a little away before it bumped into something hard and he realized it was the remote. Tenderly lifting it, his eyes flickered over it and thankfully it had only pictures. If he really was still in Japan, he wouldn't be able to understand a damn thing. Well… he could at least understand the neon-red button with the image of a nurse in any language. The other buttons, which were a calming shade of emerald, he wouldn't figure those out too easily without some toying. With a press of the button that looked like a television with those extinct 'rabbit ears' antennae, he smirked as the TV came to life and he could see that whoever it was on the television was asian. Well, that was a good sign. Looking back to the remote, it felt like ages before he figured out what the volume was - even though it was a universal image of a rounded triangle with curved lines - one with three, and the other with only one. Pressing the louder button a few times, he then pressed the remote's imbedded speaker to his ear to listen to the sound. It was definitely asian. He had absolutely no idea what the fuck was being said. He thought he heard 'Applejacks', but considering it was a news cast, he was fairly sure they weren't talking about cereal.
Unaware that by pressing his ear to the remote, he accidentally pressed the 'call nurse' button, Leon was shocked as suddenly two nurses and a doctor came barging into the room with wide-eyes and needles in their hands. "Wh-what the fuck!" He yelped, but as the trio realized there was no emergency, they frowned considerably. The doctor growled something at Leon in Asian-talk before he walked off, and one of the nurses followed before the other one just scowled at Leon. She looked rather familiar, and rather pissed off. Was she the one that had punched him? "Did you… punch me?" He asked finally, gently setting the remote back to the bed as he stared the woman down who then began to look over his charts, making sure he was okay before she checked a number of other things. "Orkotto-san… No, I did not." She murmured gently, her English struggled and definitely the voice didn't match. Leon then gave a small nod. He figured as much, anyways. If a nurse punched him, wouldn't she lose her job for attacking a patient, or something? But then again, in those weird Asian cartoons that Chris used to watch… it seemed like all those characters were pretty violent as a whole. "Then who the hell punched me?" He snapped, and the nurse looked back to Leon, gently biting her lip before she smiled. "A visitor." With that, Leon gave a sigh. "Male? Female? Dog?" She frowned at the last choice, obviously unsure of what in the world he meant.
"They are not here now." She added, and with that, hurried out of the room. Leon sighed heavily before he rubbed his face.
He was in Tokyo. The staff alone proved that… And there was some visitor who thought he was a pig and had the balls to punch him. There could be only one. With that, he gave a cheeky grin. He was so close… D was right in his grasp. He could practically taste those sweets and tea… and smell the incense… Incense? He sniffed the air. He could definitely smell it. Where the fuck was it coming from? With that, Leon suddenly sprang from the bed and gave a howl as the IV was tugged on. Holding back tears of agony, he reluctantly grabbed the machine he was leashed to and began dragging it with himself as he searched around the room, sniffing like a dog to find the source. Sadly, it was faint now, and in the end, he could only find a stupid plant sitting on the windowsill. He frowned considerably as he touched a tag hanging from the stem, noting that it only said 'Get Well'. At least it was in English, and it seemed to be the source of the smell. Limping back to the bed with the plant in hand, he set it gently on the table beside the bed and sat down again as the nurse returned with some paperwork that had been painstakingly translated for him - covered in post-it notes and scribbles. He filled out the paperwork as much as he could before he handed it back, and he was informed that he was free to leave as she carefully removed the IV from his arm and pointed out where his clothing was.
Within minutes Leon was out the door before he realized that his suitcase was gone. Maybe that silly sonuvabitch took it from him. If not… he would go on a massacre. Frowning, he took a taxi that was stationed outside and showed the man the address of the building he had nearly completed his mission in, and it wasn't long before he was storming through the doors and waiting in the elevator - filling it with a heavy and angry aura of determination. "I'll get you, you cowardly piece of shit." He growled ferociously under his breath, leaving a poor Japanese girl dressed in some weird doll-like fashion giving him a quite terrified glance as she even took a step closer to the wall, and further from him.
As soon as Leon got off the elevator, he hurried to the corner of the building where he knew D's shop to be, since he had only been there not too long ago. As he reached the doors once again, he unceremoniously shoved them open. In an instant, the animals were facing Leon and baring their fangs in defense, which almost immediately quelled his rage. As some of the animals recognized the human though, he noticed that some of them went scattering off. "H-Hey!" He growled at them, but they didn't answer, and several animals moved in front of Leon to make sure he didn't step inside any further. He refused to back down, and he could only sneer. The animals. God, how he hated them, and yet… right now they were a miracle to behold. He was so happy to see these hairy shits, that even seeing T-chan again would be entirely welcome. "Where the fuck is that sonuvabitch!" He snapped at the creatures, and they seemed to calm down a bit - almost all seeming to have peeved stares. …If animals could even have those, that is. He didn't care, though.
The one thing that confused Leon though, was the fact that he couldn't see their human forms again. He had seen them on the ship, why not now? And the shop was so quiet, that Leon had honestly been hoping that D would come hurrying out of whatever hole he was hiding in to try and shoo the officer away yet again. But, it seemed like the man wasn't even here at all, so the American found a spot on the sofa and took out a pack of cigarettes before he stared at them long and hard before he finally found enough motivation to put another one to his lips and light it. He was here, that was all that mattered. After traveling the world, just to find this one man… Leon could wait forever if he had to. D had to return to the shop sooner or later.
It felt like hours though as time slowly passed. Four cigarettes were crushed into the dirt of the plant from the hospital that was now scarified to be his ashtray, and Leon was starting to feel rather bored with all of the animals merely lingering around him and having gotten quite used to his presence. It was a good thing he wasn't allergic, either. The door finally opened again, but before a word could even be spoken - Leon's attention was grabbed as he heard the strange sound of something soft within cardboard hitting the ground, and most likely being destroyed. It was a hard sound to make out, but definitely strange enough that he looked up to see D standing in the doorway, completely frozen and seemingly unaware of the cake and the box having been smashed on the ground. "Long time no see." Leon said softly, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.