Sorry it took me so long to update! I just started nursing school and it's really intense. Please review- all your feedback inspires me to getting my schoolwork done so I can write faster! :)
Takumi groaned, shifting slightly.
He was stopped from moving any further by a hand on his bare chest. "Stay still."
After a moment of fighting with himself, he found himself looking through the darkness into the serious face of Kai.
"Kai…?"
"They shot you. I managed to get the bleeding to stop an hour ago with the bedsheets, but I don't want you to re-open it. So lay still."
Takumi nodded, settling back down to be still on his bed, only too happy to comply with the older teen's order. As his mind became more awake, he was becoming more and more aware of how much of him hurt….
Slowly, the memories were trickling back. Crashing the GTR, being thrown in the trunk of the Supra, being struck, the eerie swinging of the single light bulb in the garage, the sight of Kai half-conscious on the cement floor, his own screaming as he was shot….
The past four- no, five, today was the fifth day he'd spent here- seemed worlds away from the life he'd lived at the Tofu shop with his father. He felt a pang and pushed the memories and homesickness away, for now.
"A-are you alright?" Takumi managed shakily, trying to push himself up on his elbows to get a better look at Kai but failing miserably.
Kai nodded, running a hand through his dark hair. "Yeah, I'm fine." There was a large, dark bruise running along Kai's jaw, and dried blood was crusted on the teen's face. Takumi looked at him skeptically.
Kai sighed. "Look, what they did to me was a walk in the park compared to you. I'll deal with patching myself up later."
Takumi nodded, fingers gingerly reaching up to peel back the bedsheet he was wrapped in. "So… they really shot me?"
Kai swatted his hand away anxiously. "Yes! Now don't touch it! I'm pretty sure it's superficial, I mean, you probably would've died by now if they hit anything vital, but I'm no doctor. So don't touch!" Kai snapped.
Takumi blinked, surprised, and Kai rolled his eyes, sitting down heavily on his own bed, wincing slightly as he did so. He, too, had been beaten pretty badly. "I mean honestly, you get shot and then expect me not to be worried."
Takumi went to shrug but was stopped by his injured shoulder. He let out a hiss of pain from between clenched teeth, taking a moment to get control over the hurt before he opened his eyes, turning his head to look over at Kai.
"So… what do we do now?"
Kai stared at him, eyes wide. "What do you mean 'what do we do?'. We sit here and do what they tell us, that's what we do!" Kai said seriously, looking shocked. "I mean- they shot you."
"I'm still here, though."
"Yeah, but they threatened our families! Even if we do escape, and they don't kill us, we'll have to worry about them getting caught in the crossfire. We have no options- we do as they say." Kai said, sounding increasingly worried as he spoke.
"I mean, I don't know about you, but after what they just did to us, I don't want those guys going near our families. They'd hurt my Dad, and my mom and sister…." Kai shuddered, crossing his arms. "I don't want to think what they'd do to them."
Takumi lowered his eyes, realizing Kai was right. They were backed into a corner- the only option they had was to comply.
"The police must still be looking for us." Takumi said, trying to ease the heavy air that'd settled in the room.
Kai forced a smile on his face. "Yeah- yeah, I guess you're right." He said, though it sounded as though he didn't believe a word of what he was saying.
"We just have to hang on until they get here." If they even find us. It's been five days already- I don't know how much more we can take.
"Anything?" Ryosuke asked his brother cautiously as Keisuke trooped into the house again late that night.
Keisuke shook his head, pulling off his coat and throwing it onto a nearby chair. "No. Only thing I heard was that the new Yakuza offshoot- the one that everyone was so up in arms about- scored big in a bank robbery in Ishikawa. That's it."
Keisuke sunk heavily into a chair of the dining room table, sighing. "It's like they just disappeared off the face of the Earth, Aniki."
"Don't lose hope. They're out there somewhere." Ryosuke said simply, sighing.
The door to the room swung open early that morning, and Kai looked up from where he'd been sitting in bed, unable to sleep.
Saiko-komon stood in the doorway, looking over at Takumi quizzically.
"He's sleeping. I'll do whatever assignment you have, aniki." Kai lowered his eyes- he was disgusted to himself for giving into the gangster's ways and doing whatever they asked of him, but really, what choice did they have?
Saiko-komon simply nodded, motioning for Kai to get up and follow him.
Kai followed his superior to the garage, finding the Supra waiting for him. The GTR was up on jacks, with several men working on it to repair the damage.
A man clad in a black hoodie- Kai recognized him as one of the men who'd beaten him last night- sat in the passenger seat.
Stiffly, Kai slid into the driver's seat, trying not to aggravate his sore body. Once he'd situated himself, he turned the key, starting the car and staring blankly ahead of himself.
"Where would you like me to take you, aniki?"
The gangster pulled back his upper lip in a grin, before he was swiftly giving directions.
A half an hour later, Kai pulled up alongside a bank, leaving the motor running.
As his companion puled on a mask and Kai popped the trunk, the gangster sneered at Kai. "Remember- if you try to leave, we'll have your family."
With that the man stood, leaving the car and sprinting into the bank.
Kai waited tensely for what seemed like hours but was really only two minutes, sprinting back to the car and slamming the trunk shut, diving into the passenger seat.
Kai didn't need to be told which direction to go, picking one at random that seemed to be the farthest from the sirens that were beginning to wail in the distance.
The police response time was faster now, Kai noted with some apprehension, as two police cars managed to trail him.
Even at his top speed, Kai couldn't shake them- he knew he could go faster, but he also knew that in doing so he'd risk losing control. A crash wasn't something he could afford right now.
His passenger rolled down the window, pulling a handgun from his waistband and leaning out the window to aim….
Kai felt his heartrate speed up, if that were even possible. At this point, he was literally sweating bullets, and for a moment, he was at a total loss as to what to do…. I don't want anyone to die today…. Was all he could think, before he jerked the wheel slightly, causing the gangster's aim to be off and his bullet to hit a nearby streetlamp instead of slamming through the windshield of the cruiser.
The gangster swore loudly, and Kai swung around the neck left sharply, the momentum of the move causing the gangster to fall back into his seat.
"Hold her steady, dammit!" the man shouted, agitated.
"Don't bother! I can lose these guys if you keep in the car!" was all Kai shouted, gunning the Supra down the hill in a near suicidal move.
There were several intersections along the way down the steep hill, and Kai silently prayed that no cars were coming as he blew through the red lights, the police cruisers slowing but not halting their pursuit of them.
Kai put the pedal to the floor, and the gangster beside him clung to the seat, horrified. "At this speed, you won't make that curve! Slow down or we're going to die, you suicidal bastard!"
Kai couldn't hear a thing besides the pounding blood in his ears.
Time slowed down as, as the base of the hill, he slammed on the brakes, pulling up the handbrake as he went and power sliding, the rear of the car sliding out, slowing the vehicle enough to make the curve. The scent of burning rubber filled the air, but Kai barely drifted out of his lane. The whole momentum of the car shifted, rolling on it's tires, and once he was at the right angle to keep driving, Kai slammed the emergency break back down and put the gas pedal to the floor, gunning through the outskirts of the city before disappearing onto the mountain pass.
For a long moment, Kai was silent, the only sound the purring of the Supra's engine as they drove.
"I thought drifting was the other guy's thing." The gangster finally managed hoarsely.
"It is. But just because I like driving grip, doesn't mean I can't drift." Kai said. But it was a lie. These gangsters were clueless as to what it meant to truly drift, since if he knew the first thing about driving theory, he'd have known it technically wasn't a drift- his utilization of the hand break had made it a power slide, a rather rookie way to mimic drifting.
Still, it'd done what he needed it to, and Kai let out a long breath, turning to look over at the gangster. "Which way do I go, aniki? I don't know the way back."
The gangster nodded dumbly, providing rather simple instructions to Kai to take them back to the rather large, lonely house.
Kai strode back into his room to find Takumi sitting up in bed, looking around.
He blinked, surprised, when Kai entered the room. "Where did you go?"
"Assignment." Kai said simply, sitting down heavily on his bed. "Another bank robbery." Was his answer to Takumi's inquisitive glance.
Takumi nodded, and Kai tossed him something. "I found that on the floor of the garage." He said simply.
Takumi looked down to find it was his dirty t-shirts and nodded, looking rather glad to have it back.
Kai looked hesitantly at Takumi's shoulder- the wound appeared to have clotted, but still, it should've been covered….
"I'd tie some cloth over that if I were you." Kai said simply, and Takumi nodded, tying some torn strips of fabric over the wound, grunting slightly, before he gingerly tugged his shirt back on, being especially careful of his wounded shoulder.
"Chh-" Kai grunted sharply as he laid down on his bed, feeling all the bruises from last night spring back to his awareness. "I'll be fine. Just sore." Kai said simply, in answer to Takumi's questioning gaze.
The younger teen nodded slightly, laying back on his own bed. "This is the third bank robbery we've pulled. They're bound to notice the pattern soon…."
Kai nodded, not even bothering to open his eyes or acknowledge the small spark of hope he felt.
"My god, they did it again." Keisuke said simply, looking up from where he was eating a sandwich. Ryosuke sat on the couch, working on his laptop, the nightly news playing in the background, and Keisuke stared at the screen, engrossed in the story. "Another bank robbery in Ishikawa. That's the third one that new group has pulled off in the past week."
Ryosuke nodded, not looking up from where he was typing away on a term paper. "Did they catch the perpetrators yet?" he asked idly.
Keisuke scoffed. "No. The police can't even touch these guys- they've gotten away every time…."
Ryosuke abruptly stopped typing.
"What did you say?" he asked.
Keisuke frowned. "I said the police can't even touch these guys. Outran them in a high speed chase…."
Ryosuke's eyes narrowed. "to get away from police three times, they'd have to be pretty good drivers, don't you think?"
Keisuke sucked in a breath. "You aren't saying what I think you're saying. Fujiwara is a straight-laced kid- he wouldn't do something like that. He's just a teenager, and I'm sure the same is true for Kogashiwa…."
"Ture. But if he were being forced to do it?" Ryosuke asked, arching an eyebrow.
Keisuke had paled.
Ryosuke closed his laptop and stood, grabbing the keys to his FD from his desk.
"Keisuke. I think we need to visit the police station."
"What do you mean you won't let us see the Lieutenant!?" Keisuke demanded, outraged, as they stood at the front desk of their police station.
"Listen, kid, there's enough crime in Gunma as it is. Right now, our force is working on getting the jump on a bunch of illegal street racing brats. The Lieutenant has more important things to do than listen to a conspiracy theory pieced together by a teenager…."
"This is bullshit!" Keisuke said, slamming his fist on the desk. "Real people could be in danger here…."
The officer narrowed his eyes. "Watch the attitude, kid, or I'll have you thrown in jail for the day…."
Keisuke opened his mouth to snap at the officer again, but was stopped by Ryosuke's hand on his upper arm.
"I'm sorry officer. You'll have to excuse my brother, he loves to play detective…."
"What!?" Keisuke shouted, shocked his brother was so quick to patronize him like this.
"Yeah, well I think it's best if you take him home." The officer said dryly, and Ryosuke nodded, quickly dragging his agitated brother from the station.
"Aniki, what the hell-"
Ryosuke cut off his brother's angry exclamation with a hand on his shoulder. "I'm sorry I had to patronize you like that, Keisuke, but saying it out loud, that detective was right- our plan is nothing more than a hunch."
"But it has to be true- Aniki, you know the only one capable of driving like that would be Fujiwara and Kogashiwa!" Keisuke protested.
"While I agree it's very likely to be the case, right now we have no evidence to confirm our theory. Just a hunch. Until we have evidence to support our claim, we'll just look like a bunch of amateur detectives with too much time on their hands."
Keisuke sighed, kicking the pavement despondently. "Alright. So what do we do?"
"Analyze data to support our theory." Ryosuke said calmly.
Keisuke nodded, before he perked up, "Should we contact Fujiwara-san? I mean, Takumi is his son, after all…."
Ryosuke shook his head. "I doubt that would be a good idea. There's no reason to make the man worry that is son might be being held by a gang- besides, we don't have enough evidence to substantiate anything yet. Best not to borrow trouble."
Keisuke nodded. "Right."
"And while we don't have evidence, there's nothing saying we can't contact the police tipline with our hunch." Ryosuke said smoothly.
Keisuke grinned. "That's what I like to hear, bro. Taking action."
There was something satisfying in the way his knuckles clicked when he drove his fist into someone's nose.
That was all that was running through Takumi's mind is he stood in a ragged stance, good fist up, and the fist on the side of his wounded shoulder trailing sluggishly behind.
He'd lost track of whether or not the blood on his knuckles belonged to him or his opponent- all around him, the crowd roared and jeered.
Something had ignited in Takumi's chest- maybe it was the fact he was trying to shield his wounded shoulder, or perhaps the rage that'd been mounting in his since the day he'd been captured.
People were shouting and screaming above the din, but all Takumi could register was how slick his skin was from sweat, and how much he wanted to go to bed tonight without any new bruises.
Takumi ducked a right hook from his opponent, missing his first swing before he was driving his elbow into his opponent's face….
The man wobbled and fell to his knees, blood dripping steadily from between his fingers, his nose a crimson faucet.
Saiko-komon stepped forward to break up the pair, looking slightly surprised at the outcome, and Takumi simply stood, chest heaving, in the familiar dim light of the single lightbulb in the garage.
"Who knew you had it in you, kid." Kumicho said with a grin.
His praise only agitated Takumi more, and he was tossed his shirt, which he eagerly pulled on.
He didn't know how he'd gotten roped into this- something about a proper gangster being able to fight. And with that, he and Kai had been thrown into the lion's den in some sort of gladiator fight, fighting while others cheered and jeered.
Kai himself was nursing a split lip and swelling eye, and he stumbled to his feet and clapped Takumi on the back shakily. "Way to hold your own, kid."
Takumi simply nodded- the gangster were dispersing, now, the spectacle for the night- his and Kai's 'lesson' in fighting over for the night. All that remained in the garage were empty beer cans and cigarette butts, and both boys sloughed upstairs and fell into bed, into a restless, pained sleep.
Please review! :)