Impact.

Haruka's fist rocked the man's cheek. He stumbled back into a wall, grasping at the brickwork behind him for support.

"I thought I made myself clear," Haruka growled. "Stop. Following. Me."

The yakuza for his part didn't have much of a response, at least not past his terrified expression.

Haruka sighed, then hit him with a hook to the face that sent him to the ground.

So much for not getting into any fights.

Out in the cityscape, the sun had already sunk below the towering buildings and was making its way past the horizon for the night. Purgatory would be open soon.

Haruka was uneasy. She didn't expect Takeshi to skip town, but she couldn't shake the feeling that he might anyways. Without him the trail went cold. Given this morning's events, maybe she should've just stayed and gotten the information anyways.

Nothing to do about it now, though. Haruka entered Millennium Tower through the back entrance again, took the elevator up to the 60th floor, and stepped into Purgatory. Everything was exactly as it had been last night, obscenely wealthy businessmen gambled their hearts out, partygoers talked loud and drank louder, men brutalized each other in the ring just outside, and Takeshi was nowhere to be found.

However, the bartender from last night had told her that he usually showed up late, she would just have to wait it out before knowing anything. In the meantime, she ordered something from the bar. She'd need a drink or two in her before she was ready to deal with Takeshi either way.

Twenty-two minutes passed, twenty-two minutes that Haruka spent in silence, staring into her shot glass. And then a side door was violently kicked open, so she hopped off her stool.

"What's up bitches!? How the fuck y'all enjoying ya' boy Takeshi's entertainment for the night, huh?" It was then that he noticed Haruka stalking towards him. "Ah shit."

"Hey Takeshi," Haruka said. "You don't look happy to see me. Did you think I might bleed out on the street?"

Takeshi responded with a shaky hand gesture and an unsure noise. "Kinda hoping, can't lie. But nah, it's cool, it's a'ight, ya' boy always follows through on his deals, that's how you do motherfucking business in this city feel me? And if there's one thing ya' boy can do, it's business."

"The Florist, Takeshi. Where can I find him?"

"I fucking know bitch, just give me a second a'ight. Okay yo," he began calling out to a crowd that did not appear to be listening to him. "The real shit's gon'a start a little later than usual tonight, I got to do some business with this ho-" Takeshi caught the glare Haruka was shooting him. "-angry customer right quick, then we'll get onto it. Hate to do this to y'all, you know that. Matter fact, tell ya' what, next round's on me, to make it up to y'all, how's that sound."

An appreciative whoop met him in return from most everybody in the room. That was a surprise to say the least.

"Now," he continued. "If you will join me in my office."

Takeshi lead Haruka behind the bar and through a door between two shelves of high-end vodka.

Takeshi's "office" was pretty barren. A single desk in the center of the room, with a cheap office chair behind it and a couple equally cheap chairs sitting in front. Outside of that, the room wasn't furnished in the slightest. The paint on the walls was bland and generic, the carpet looked musty and old. Haruka got the feeling he didn't spend a lot of time in here.

There were also two women in the room. One sat in the office chair, she had blonde dyed hair, the other sat on the desk, she didn't. Both wore heavy makeup and very loose-fitting traditional robes.

"-and then he told me, like," said the one in the chair. "That he doesn't eat out, that that's not what 'the man' does."

"Ha ha!" The one on the desk nearly snorted. "Man fuck that guy."

"Fucking know, right? I was like, 'listen bitch, if you can't stick your neck out to do the most basic thing, then no way in hell you're going to-' Oh, hi daddy."

"Don't fucking 'hi daddy' me," Takeshi said. "Fuck y'all doing in here? Y'all know you ain't supposed to be in the office."

The two women exchanged a glance.

"Since when?" asked the one on the desk.

"Bitch since always."

"But you always want to do the desk thing. Like, always always."

"Not when I'm trying to do business! Now scram, pigeons."

The woman in the chair gave a huff and a "Whatever." Both of them hopped to their feet and took their leave. Haruka heard them continue to talk as they went.

"I think Taira and Kiyomi get off soon, want to get a poker game set up?"

"Sure, could always use some more of your money."

"Tch, you bitch."

The door closed behind them and, all of a sudden, the noise from outside was gone. Haruka took a moment to appreciate the quiet before it could leave again.

"Bitches, right?" Takeshi asked.

"Why are you looking at me?"

"Fucking anyways, alright." Takeshi plopped down into the office chair and let it spin around a few times before stopping himself. "Here's the shit, I'll tell you where the Florist is, but you absolutely cannot let it come back to me. This the one place on earth he ain't got eyes and ears, so we need to give you a story. Maybe, uh, you got this friend see, does some work on the side delivering for the Florist, got in deep in some debt and you was showing up to help him out but then you overhear him selling the information on the Florist to the people he owe money to, yeah, and then-"

"Just tell me where he is, Takeshi."

"Yeah yeah, bitch, I'm getting to it." He reached down into his desk, pulled out a couple large rolls of paper, and spread them out over the desk. City planning maps and construction blueprints from the look of things. "Y'all know Kamurocho Hills, yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah. So shits is usually all closed up at night, that area's all day shopping and offices, yeah? And you know, they got them little ponds about the place, got them koi fish and turtles and shit. Find the one… here." He pressed a finger down on the largest map. Then paused. "No, here." His finger moved and pressed down on a spot a couple inches away. "Yeah. So in the middle of the pond here there's this kind of circley spot in the middle where you can stand, so you got to stand there, yeah? And then there's a rock nearby that's got some bumps in it, and the code is 8918. You got all that?"

Haruka took an extra moment to memorize where he was pointing to and where that would be in the Hills.

"Yeah, got it."

"In that case," he rolled all the papers back up. "Our business is done."

"By the way, would you know any way to get there without having to take the streets?"

"Fuck kind of trouble you in girl? Damn. Aye, nah, don't worry about it, I get that question a lot. Take the elevator down to B10. There's a maintenance hatch that leads to the sewers down there."

"You don't need an ID card or anything?"

"Fuck nah, they don't need to cause everyone thinks that you do so no one tries it. Smart shit right?"

"Alright." Haruka gave that sentence a moment's attempt at translation then turned to leave. "Thanks for your help, Takeshi."

"Hey hey hold up what about your story?"

"Right, my story." She pushed the door open. "My story is that the idiot in charge of Purgatory sold out the Florist to a nobody off the street in exchange for a single night in his fight ring."

"Wha- Wait. You motherfu-" And then the door closed behind her.

Haruka used her phone's flashlight to light her way down the spacious sewer catwalks. Most of Uncle Kaz's friends were forced to come down here at some point, for some reason, and now Haruka's only question was how they could handle the smell.

Perhaps she should have expected an entire city's raw sewage to smell bad, but she couldn't have expected anything to smell this bad.

Her mental map of Kamurocho was the only thing she had to go on as she wandered deeper into the system of tunnels, but she was familiar enough with the city to be confident in its accuracy. Only real issue was keeping concentrated while choking on the stench.

As the one place in the city where the homeless people hadn't been chased out, she spotted the occasional camp in a corner or cubby, but most of the men down here were either already asleep or keeping to themselves, and anyone who wasn't was probably begging topside. Haruka drew in a few curious glances, but she did her best to ignore them and move on.

Up ahead she saw a ladder and a manhole in the ceiling. She should be close to Kamurocho Hills now, so that must be her exit.

It took a fair bit of effort to move the manhole cover while keeping her balance on the rungs, but as soon as she got it out of the way, letting in the harsh, artificial light from outside, she poked her head out and checked her surroundings.

This was… the parking lot on Shichifuko Street. Perfect. Kamurocho Hills was only a block north.

Haruka warily ran up to the wall surrounding the Hills, keeping an eye out on anyone who might notice her. All the entrances were currently closed up with rolling overhead doors. Convenient that Takeshi hadn't mentioned this, but she may have been beyond going back to ask.

Haruka crept up to the nearest one. There was a small handle at the bottom. She gave it a jimmy. Of course, it was locked.

Haruka took in a deep breath. What she was about to do was probably very stupid.

She gave the handle a forceful yank. The lock inside the door broke.

Haruka took a moment, looking around, ears perked for the faintest sound of an alarm of siren.

Nothing happened. Haruka let her breath go. She lifted the door up slightly and slipped inside.

Walking through the pathways of Kamurocho Hills while everything was closed gave Haruka an eerie sensation in the back of her brain. She'd been here a couple times. For the most part anything she could buy was way too high-end for her to afford, but Natsuko sent her through on errands a couple of times. Enough times to recognize the place at least, but without the bustling crowd of people, it felt like a ghost town. Like the apocalypse had happened while she was underground or something.

Haruka pushed the thought out of her mind and did her best to recall and head towards where Takeshi had pointed to.

She walked up to a small, decorative pond. Koi fish drifted lazily around a central platform which ended just under the water's surface. A couple of sleeping turtles sat on top of it. As soon as Haruka stepped close, they woke up and dove into the water.

Haruka jumped over onto the platform. Around the pond was a ring of stones. She squatted down to look at them closer. In the low light, it was very hard to make out the surfaces. That she was looking for "bumps" on rocks certainly didn't help.

Haruka blinked. One of the stones stood out against the others. It wasn't anything relevant, it just happened to be a paler shade than the ones around it. But now that it had her attention, she peered a little bit closer.

On the stone's face were nine almost unnoticeable bumps, but arranged in a perfect 3x3 grid.

She reached out and pushed in on the bottom middle bump. It sank in under her touch.

A numpad. Exactly what she was looking for.

The password was… 8-9-1-8.

The ground underneath her rumbled. Haruka stood up and stumbled a little while trying to keep her balance. Very slowly, the platform began sinking down into the pond.

No, there was a tube around the platform that kept the pond where it was, Haruka was being taken underneath it, underneath the Hills themselves.

The platform lowered Haruka into darkness. The streets above had been dark already, but down here was pitch black. What little light had been up there was now casting a soft spotlight down around her.

When she finally reached the ground, there was a circle maybe a meter wide of visibility and absolutely nothing beyond that.

"Hello?" she called out into the darkness. "I'm looking for the Florist."

Haruka's ear twitched. Something rustled in the darkness. Haruka turned to face it, seeing nothing.

"Is someone there?"

The question hung in the air for a moment. No reply came.

Another sound. Haruka spun to face it and took her fighting stance. That one definitely sounded like footsteps.

"Are you the Florist? I'm not here to cause any trouble."

A sound drifted out from the darkness. There was no ambiguity about that one. Someone, somewhere down here, cackled madly in the dark.

A flash of movement caught in the corner of her eye, just along the edge of the light. By the time she turned to face it, it was gone.

Again. Haruka spun in time to completely miss the person. Someone was screwing with her. She turned slowly, terrified of the thought of showing this mystery person her back.

They shot from the darkness like a cannonball. Out of instinct, Haruka, leaned out of the way, dodging their whole body as they launched from one end of the circle of light to the other.

Haruka hadn't caught much. A blur of blue, a flash of silver, something black around their face. The details were slipping from her mind as soon as she realized they were there. And like that, she was back to following noises in the dark.

Haruka swallowed and steadied herself. She was tired of playing the mouse in this game. Only thing to do now was strike back.

The blur shot out of the dark again. Haruka pivoted her body to the side, avoiding their outstretched arm and the dagger being held in it, and with her front hand she thrust a palm forward, slamming into their chin and sending them to the ground well within the ring of light. He spun back to his feet before Haruka had even realized who she was looking at.

Her brow furrowed.

"Uncle Ma?"

He was a bit, well, older since she'd last seen him. His bowl cut was shaggier with streaks of grey, as was the beard that had inched itself a little farther around his face. His snakeskin jacket had been replaced by a much longer, yet equally open, blue velvet robe with golden peacocks embroidered on either side, though his eyepatch, leather pants, and steel-toed shoes largely looked the same.

And if one thing hadn't changed a bit, it was the sly smile that Goro Majima flashed as he slinked back into the darkness.

"Uncle Ma, it's me."

Haruka heard the ruffle of cloth behind her and spun on the spot in time to see Majima's dagger-wielding arm jut out from the darkness. Haruka pivoted on her toes, sidestepped the stab and grabbed Majima's arm, yanking him into the light. As he stumbled forward, she stomped down into the back of his knee, forcing him to kneel, then sent him flying back with a roundhouse to the head.

Majima touched ground with his hand and sprang back to his feet, skidding a little before stopping and then charging in again. He swung his dagger in a wide slash, Haruka sucked in her gut and leaned back, watching the blade pass in front of her stomach, then leaned back in and carried the momentum into a straight right at Majima's nose. He staggered back, and Haruka rocked his chin with an uppercut, then his stomach with her knee.

Majima bent in the middle. Haruka wrapped an arm around his throat and jumped. She fell into the ground with her shoulder, dragged Majima along with her and he fell into her shoulder with his face. They hit the ground. Majima's head bounced up from the impact and he swayed for a second before falling onto his back, spread eagle.

Haruka approached him carefully. He was still breathing, so that was good.

She knelt at his side and whispered. "Uncle Ma?"

No response. She leaned in, studying his reaction ever more closely. He didn't look out. Not yet.

His eye flashed open and his mouth twitched into a wide grin. Haruka had just enough time to realize the trap before his head shot forward, slamming into her nose.

Haruka fell back on her ass and clutched her nose. Majima pushed with his hands and flipped back onto his feet, then sprang off the balls of his feet and launched himself through the air towards Haruka. A brutal scissor kick hit her in the face and sent her tumbling back, out of the ring of light and into the darkness.

Haruka came to a stop on her hands and knees. When she finally looked up, the circle of light was empty.

Haruka booked it. So long as she could see the spotlight, the path was clear, she just had to keep running.

A hand latched onto her ankle. She spilled to the ground.

Haruka twisted onto her back and began stomping at the hand around her leg. Eventually it conceded and withdrew, and when it did, she aimed one last kick at his body. She heard him grunt from the darkness and took the opportunity to climb to her feet and finish her mad dash back into the light.

As soon as she was able to catch her breath, she turned back around, readying herself. As she did, Majima lunged through the air and out of the shadows. He bent his legs back, then thrust them out, catching Haruka in the chest and sending her flying back out of the light again.

She landed on… something.

Office chair, she landed on an office chair, it rolled a little under her weight but Haruka brought it to a stop with her feet.

She looked up. Majima was out of the light again, hiding in the darkness. Haruka desperately searched the darkness, studied it for any kind of tell.

A glint caught her eye. A tiny speck of light along the ground. As it moved, Haruka realized what she was looking at. The steel tips of Majima's shoes inaudibly clacked along the ground. Polished to perfection, they managed to catch what little light was streaming in.

With them, Haruka was able to study Majima's movements. Darting about as he had been, Haruka was surprised to see him now. He was moving slow, like a confident predator. Haruka knew he was waiting for his chance, she just needed to be ready when he took it.

He walked slowly around her.

Then he ran forward.

And he jumped.

Haruka braced herself on the armrests and shoved her feet into the air. The glint of Majima's shoes disappeared back into the darkness, but she felt his weight land on her. She pushed up. He went flying over her head and crashed into something heavy behind her.

She spun in the chair and kicked off, rolling back into the ring of light.

Haruka stood on the office chair, shifting slightly to keep her balance, and watched Majima leap back into the light. Haruka leaped off the chair to meet him.

They flew through the air to meet each other. Haruka's time was limited. She couldn't look at his face, she had to study his body. How it was angled, where it was going. She had only a second left to take aim.

She leveraged her weight, twisted through the air, brought a fist high over her head then swung it down. The punch connected with the top of Majima's skull, and he shot to the ground, face-first.

Haruka watched as he hit the floor. His head hit the tiles hard enough to bounce back up off of it. He flopped in the air like a fish out of water before landing roughly on his back.

Haruka was now soaring through the air with no plan on how to land. She crashed onto her shoulder and tumbled for a bit before finally coming to a stop. For a minute, both her and Majima just lay apart from each other, on opposite ends of the ring of light, breathing heavily.

When the minute passed, Haruka slowly got to her feet. Majima stayed on the floor, eye wide open, and began letting out a cracked, wheezing laugh.

"Holy shit," he croaked out. "You really are Kazzy's kid, ain't you?"

"What - what are you talking about? What was that?"

"Come on. I've been locked up in here for a hot fucking minute. I haven't had a proper scrap in who knows how long. Give an old man this much at least."

"You could have just asked."

"Ah, but this is way more fun, isn't it? My entrance was cool right? Jumping out of the dark like that?"

Majima reached up and clapped his hands together twice. The lights came on with an electrical hum, and the platform in the middle started rising back up, leaving a pillar in the middle of the room.

The room itself was large, two stories tall and the size of a house but without any walls or dividers outside of the four main ones. In one corner was a bed and nightstand, in another was a toilet that offered no sense of privacy, and along the opposite wall was a desk that stretched from corner to corner, with a dozen monitors and a dozen keyboards along it, a couple of which had toppled over in the fight.

Monitors were also embedded in the wall, stacked on top of each other by the dozen and ringed around the whole room. One of the monitors, which was fixed just above the desk, sat in the middle of all the others, and was the size of about 9 put together. A minute after the lights came on, these too sprung to life, showing footage from around every corner of Kamurocho. The big one was just showing an empty back alley.

Majima held a hand up. Haruka took it and helped him onto his feet. He thanked her by ruffling her hair.

"So, how's it hanging Harry?"

Haruka had all but forgotten about that nickname.

"Shouldn't I be asking you that? What is this place, what are you doing here?"

"This," he gave a grand, sweeping gesture. "Is my home away from home. Back when I was building these Hills with my two bare hands, I made sure to install a safehouse for when I need to lay low. Pretty swanky, wouldn't you agree?"

Haruka's attention was brought back to the toilet.

"Looks like a prison cell."

"Ah-hah. She's perceptive and poetic."

"So, this all means that you – you're the Florist?"

"Certainly not a camgirl. Not yet at least."

Haruka clapped her hands together and smiled. "This is perfect, then!"

Majima crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow. "Is it now?"

"Uncle Ma, please, I need your help with this. It's something only you can do."

"And let me guess, you want to use, nay, dare I say, abuse our past friendship and my current position to get information without paying me my fair wage?"

Haruka squinted up at him. "The original plan was to beat the information out of you."

"I'd rather take a hundred beatings than devalue my work like this. If you think you can take me, that is."

Haruka's fist bunched at her side. She steadied her breathing and studied Majima's next actions.

His face was like a stone, cold, unfeeling, and unchanging.

And then it broke, and he began laughing at her.

"I'm fucking with you, Harry."

Haruka let her shoulders loosen and sighed.

"Did I scare you?" he asked.

"A little." she admitted.

"Nah, I know why you're here."

"You do?"

"Sure. The, uh – how'd you put it – 'the idiot in charge of Purgatory' hasn't realized that I left a couple cameras up there with him."

Majima sauntered over to the desk. He tapped at a few keys, and the big monitor's image changed from the empty alleyway to the office up in Purgatory. The two girls who had been hanging out in there earlier were now joined by two more friends in similar garb, all sitting around the desk. Cards and chips and bottles of booze were scattered about everywhere.

Majima picked his office chair off the ground, set it upright, gave it a spin, then collapsed into it.

"So what's the story morning glory? Who do you need to find bad enough to search out the Florist of all people, and why?"

"Do you know Taro Kitamura?"

"The securities guy? Not personally, but I heard he went missing a couple days ago."

"The Tojo Clan are after him. I need to find him before they do."

"Ah. Tojo shit. Don't say another word, I don't even want to know. Got a picture of the guy?"

Haruka pulled up the picture Date had sent her and tossed the phone to Majima. He didn't hesitate for a moment before typing away at it.

"When was the last time you saw this guy?"

"It was… two days ago. Around noon."

"Uh-huh." Haruka heard a message sending noise. "Alright. I'll call you first thing tomorrow morning."

"Tomorrow?"

"Yeah. Tomorrow." He tossed her the phone back, which she caught and slipped back into her pocket. "I'm not quite as good as the other guy yet. Haven't quite mastered the art of keeping my eye on everything going on at once, so we're going to have to rely on facial recognition for this one. Given the amount of footage the computer has to look through, it's going to take, by my estimate, a long fucking time. Couple hours at minimum, probably longer."

"I'd rather be here when you find out. I can wait."

"I'm sorry, did you not notice the toilet situation?"

Haruka had not considered the toilet situation.

"Take it from me kid, you do not want to hang out down here any longer than you have to. Go on. Get out of here. I call back, ask around. It's fine."

Haruka still hesitated.

"How about this. You head out now and let me do my shit, I promise after this is over I'll put on my public-walking disguise and we can catch up. I'll even pay."

Haruka huffed. "Alright. You call me the second you have the information, though. Whatever I'm doing, I'll drop it."

"You got yourself a deal." Majima spun his chair over to the desk and hit a few keys. The platform in the middle started lowering itself back down.

"Oh, wait," Majima turned around and pointed a serious finger towards Haruka. "While I've got you here, something real important I got to tell you."

Haruka was listening.

"Get some sleep, huh. You look like shit."

Haruka gave a tiny smirk and stepped onto the platform.

"See you later Uncle Ma."