Taro's room in the brothel was a little more furnished than the others. In addition to a small bed, he also had a wardrobe, a coffee table, and a couple of chairs. Haruka and Taro sat across from each other at the table. Taro was already cracking open his beer.

"What's that on your shirt?" he asked.

"Huh?" Haruka pulled her jacket down a little to look. "It's, uh, fish sailors."

"Oh." Taro took his first sip. "That's adorable."

"Yeah, I- Wait. Taro, please, what's going on here?"

"I don't know." He shrugged. "I have no idea how much you know or why you needed to track me down all the way here or what you're even looking to do now that you've found me. Honestly, you tell me, what is going on here?"

Haruka sighed.

"The Tojo Clan is after you. They see you setting up a securities business in their backyard an act of aggression, so they're trying to muscle you out. You… knew this somehow…"

"Like you said, I work in securities. That means I have a decent combination of underworld connections and people with a vested interest in keeping me alive. It happens."

"…and went into hiding. But before doing that, you went to the Anytime Fitness on Shichifuku Street, where you met me, and we had a few sparring matches. The Tojo saw this, apparently, and now think that we have some kind of connection. They've been pressuring me to give up where you disappeared to, which I don't know. Or, I didn't know until now."

"That would about cover it, yes. Except why you then tried to find me anyways."

"Because I didn't know what happened to you. I didn't know if you were in actual trouble or if the Tojo would find you while I wasn't looking or if you were already dead. I was worried about you."

"Haruka, you don't know me."

"But I know the Tojo Clan. And I know what they do to people like you. I needed to make sure you were safe, and maybe together we can fight them back."

"Fight them back? Are you crazy? You want to take on the entire Clan, just us two by ourselves? I dug myself into this tiny hole to stay alive, my only plan was to lie low for a bit until they found something else to be mad at, then go on with life as normal. And, I mean, well, I appreciate the effort you went through to get here, but you're kind of compromising my shit right now."

Haruka's brow furrowed. "I thought you liked fighting."

"Yeah, for the sport of it, not for my life."

"What were you even doing at the gym anyways?"

Taro scratched his head. "Is this a trick question?"

"After we left, you came straight here. You already knew you the Tojo were after you then, why a pit stop at the Anytime Fitness?"

Taro shrugged, taking the moment to gulp down more of his beer.

"You see any equipment in here? I've got a couple months of calisthenics ahead of me, maybe I wanted at least one proper sesh before that."

"But you didn't use any equipment. We just sparred. If my welcome was anything to go by, you've got plenty of sparring partners here too."

Taro leaned forward and massaged his forehead. "I don't know. I don't know what you want from me. I don't know why I went to the gym, you know, daily cycles get stuck in your head, I just – went there on accident, I guess? Maybe I didn't want to spend my last couple hours as a free man hanging around the office."

"Taro, I can't help you if you don't tell me what's going on."

"Well I didn't, like, ask you to help me. I was doing perfectly fine but now you're here and I've got a whole new set of factors to worry about. Honestly this all makes my situation a little worse."

Haruka let out a long sigh, like a deflating balloon, and slowly sank deeper into her chair. Her head fell back until she was staring straight up at the ceiling.

"What am I doing, Taro?"

"I'm still trying to figure that out myself."

"Everyone told me not to stick my nose in any of this. They thought I was crazy for pushing this far to try and find you. They told me you'd probably be better off if I just left you alone and told the Tojo what I told them from the beginning, that I had no idea who you were or where you went."

"Well, that isn't, uh, terrible advice."

"I just thought things would change when I finally found you. I figured if anyone could get where I was coming from, who got why I needed to fight the Tojo Clan more than anything else, it would be you."

"Well," Taro scratched the back of his neck and looked around. "You don't really know me."

"No, I guess I don't."

"But I mean, at the same time, you were the only one who actually cared enough to try and see where I'd gone."

Haruka sat back up to look at Taro.

"I don't, uh, really have any friends or family in the city. No one's really missing me, I'm sure the people at the office are more glad than anything to have me gone. You actually cared enough to make sure I was alright, even though we only met the once. That actually means a lot to me, despite everything else."

Haruka nodded slowly, her gaze going distant again.

"Hey," she eventually said. "Do you have a phone down here?"

"I got a burner."

Haruka dug an old receipt out of her pocket and started writing her number on it. "Give me a call if you're ever in trouble. Maybe it was a mistake to come down here, but I'm in this now and I've got your back."

"Yeah, sure."

"I think I'm going to head home now." She rubbed at her eye. "It's been a long night."

"Alright." Taro waved her off. "Stay safe. Thanks again for caring."

He leaned back in his chair and polished off the last of his beer as she stood up and walked out.

Haruka was barely paying attention as she made her way out of the brothel and around the Millennium Tower and back towards Bohemia.

Taro seemed a little less than she expected. He had made such an impression when inviting her to spar, he had that charismatic spark of passion, almost the same as Kiryu whenever he found something to set his mind to. And then she'd been so caught up the mystery of it all, getting this far, she hadn't really stopped to think about what would happen if this kind of thing happened. If she got all the way to Taro only to find nothing, then – Well, it was probably Haruka's fault for expecting so much.

Haruka glanced up, still stuck in her thoughts, and spotted something odd. Several of the city lights she had long since grown accustomed to seeing in the distance were out. No, they weren't out, something was blocking them. A cloud of black hovering in the air, its edges lapping at the light around it.

As she moved closer, she began to notice more. The cloud was lit from underneath, a dull orange glow flickered along the walls just below it. She coughed as she got closer, breathing in a sharp, dry scent. Haruka's eyes began to widen as she realized what she was looking at.

The Champion District was on fire.

Haruka broke out into a sprint and bolted forward. Several people were already huddled around the district's exits, many of them with faces and suits covered in ash. She shoved through the crowd as quickly as possible and entered the district proper.

The fire clung to the huddled buildings, leaving the pathways accessible but just barely. The heat was smothering Haruka, and she felt like she could barely breath through all the smoke. She took a corner and saw Bohemia, Natsuko standing just out front. She was wearing a jacket over her otherwise normal bartender dress, ineffectually tossing a splash of water from a tin bucket at the inferno.

"Natsuko!" Haruka called out.

She turned to face the voice. Haruka could see, even from this distance, Natsuko's face crumpling under the fear and anguish she was feeling, mixed with a new bought of confusion upon seeing Haruka.

"Natsuko, we've got to get out of here come on!"

Haruka ran forward and grabbed Natsuko by the wrist, not losing any momentum as she continued running forward. Natsuko dug in her heels and dragged her to a stop.

Haruka didn't question it. She didn't have time. She moved back, grabbed Natsuko around the midsection, and hauled her onto her shoulder, then turned and ran.

Natsuko pounded against her back, only through sheer adrenaline to Haruka keep from buckling under her.

"Put me down!" she yelled. "I have to- My bar-"

Haruka didn't respond, she just turned the corner and moved as quickly as she could towards the exit.

"Sawamura!" A deep, brass voice made itself heard from behind her.

Haruka skid to a stop and turned back. Standing in the middle of the blaze, his navy suit looking pitch black under the orange light of the fire, the skunk stripe still standing out against his slick, black hair, was Sho Aikawa.

It began to dawn on Haruka what exactly was happening here.

"You did this!" Haruka yelled at him.

"I'll do much fucking worse if you don't start talking," he called back. "Where's Kitamura?"

Haruka placed Natsuko back on the ground and turned to face her.

"Go," she breathed. Natsuko didn't move. "Run!"

Natsuko's eyes shifted between Haruka and Aikawa, then she spun on her heels and ran towards the district's exit.

Haruka was breathing heavily. The air was beginning to feel thin, but the anger bubbling inside her overrode the need for breath. She ripped her jacket off with a quick yank and threw it to the side, her ponytail twisting and writhing down to the small of her back, like a dragon in flight.

Aikawa gave a small, half-cocked smile, then tore off his own shirt and jacket. On his back was the image of a tiger and dragon. Each's fangs dug into the other, locking them together in combat as they endlessly circled.

Haruka screamed violently as she charged towards him. He grinned wider and cocked a fist back, just waiting for her. As soon as Haruka was in range it launched, slamming into her forehead. Haruka's vision went black but she refused to flinch to the hit and swung a wild haymaker at Aikawa's head anyways, feeling the crumple of flesh as her fist connected with his face.

Vision was slowly fading back in, but Haruka didn't stop. She sent several underhanded swings towards his gut. The first whiffed but as soon as she found him again she became relentless. She could hear Aikawa wheezing underneath her punches, but he quickly regained his composure and retaliated. Just as soon as Haruka could see his face clearly, her cheek was rocked with a hook and her vision went dark again. Another hit on the opposite side, then another, then another, and finally the last one sent her off her feet. She rolled back a dozen feet before slowing to a stop, face up on her back.

Haruka laid there, breathing heavily. Lights danced in the distance. Her throat hurt. Her lungs hurt. Her body hurt. Everything hurt. The bright orange came a little closer. A dark blob appeared in the middle of it, moving up to meet Haruka. She could just make out the outline of a shoe hovering above her face.

Haruka rolled away and flipped to her knees as Aikawa stomped the ground where she had just been. She quickly shook the vision back into her head and was back in. Aikawa moved forward, giving her no room to recover, and launched a jumping roundhouse at her head. Haruka's arms both went up, blocking and stopping the hit. She countered by punching his knee and then his chest as he landed, then pushed him back with more gut punches. He swung another hook at her head. She ducked this one, grabbed him around the midsection, lifted, and slammed him into the ground.

She moved down with him, straddling his chest and pinning his arms with her knees, laying into his face with punch after punch, each one blowing Aikawa's head to the side and sending a spray of spittle and blood onto the street.

Then Aikawa's body twisted with more force than Haruka was prepared for. She was knocked to the side and in an instant, Aikawa had taken her place, now straddling her and laying into her face with blows.

Haruka tried to twist like Aikawa had, knock him to the ground and get back on top, but he was fierce and immovable, not letting up for a second. Haruka could barely breath between hits, each one knocking out what little wind she could keep in her lungs.

Aikawa hit her with another right hook and Haruka moved, reaching her head forward as the punch followed through past her and clamped her teeth down around his wrist. She tasted blood but had no idea if it was his or hers. Aikawa flinched back, clutching his arm, and it was just the distraction Haruka needed to wrench her hand out from under his knee and knock him to the side with a punch.

She came up to her knees and saw Aikawa doing the same, already throwing out another punch. It rocked Haruka's face and she instantly threw a counter that Aikawa dodged and countered with what part of an uppercut he could manage into Haruka's chin and followed up with a lunge that Haruka twisted her whole body to avoid and moved into and wrapped an arm around Aikawa and they both fell to the ground again.

Haruka was underneath Aikawa, trying desperately to choke him out with the arm pulled tight against his windpipe. Aikawa didn't make it easy, struggling on top of her and launching elbows into her gut and kicks into her shin. Haruka winced but didn't let up.

Slowly, however, he began pulling up. First, he sat up against Haruka's pulling, then he got to one knee, then he pulled himself up to his full height. Haruka's feet left the ground and she lost all her leverage, now only dangling off of Aikawa's neck, using her weight to keep the pressure up.

Then Aikawa fell back.

Haruka was crushed between Aikawa's body and the cement ground underneath her. It felt like her entire body cracked in half under the impact. She pushed her muscles to move but got nothing in response.

Aikawa, however, stood back up.

He reached down towards Haruka, wrapped a palm around her face and lifted her up off the ground. Haruka thought, for just a moment, that he would keep going until she was off of her feet, but he didn't. Just after the seat of her pants left the ground, he thrust his arm back down and slammed the back of her head into the concrete.

It took all of Haruka's willpower not to get lost to the darkness. She found a point of pain, split skin in the back of her skull pushing against a small pebble, and focused in on it. As soon as that pain faded away she would be out, so she let it surge into her and force her blood to keep pumping, her brain to start taking in sights and sounds.

Next came her muscles, which were far less cooperative. She rolled onto her side, tried to push herself back up onto her knees but her arms buckled and collapsed before making it anywhere.

Aikawa gave her stomach a small kick, rolling her back onto her back. Haruka wheezed, she could barely breath.

"Kuroda was convinced of you, you know." Aikawa said. "He wasn't just ready to welcome you with open arms, he was ready to give you your own Family from the get go."

Haruka couldn't even lift her head anymore. She was stuck staring into the black sky.

"You ask me though, I think Kuroda's full of shit."

At the very least, she managed to loll her head to the side and see him pace around the burning street as he talked.

"You may be Kiryu's kid, but you ain't a fucking yakuza. A yakuza always gets up no matter how bad he's been knocked down. A yakuza wouldn't be lying down there like a little bitch after taking a few punches."

To accentuate his point, he stomped on Haruka's stomach. She barely had the energy to flinch anymore.

"You think you're hot shit just cause you kicked around some of Minami's boys? Huh? Bet this is a fucking first for you though, isn't it? Being down and out, ain't nothing you can do but sit there and take it, cause your daddy sure as hell ain't here to bail you out now. And maybe, if you can't fight his battles you should stop using his fucking name, right?"

The one thing Haruka absolutely refused to do at this moment was cry, but the tears were welling up in the corners of her eyes. She had no idea whether they were from the words, the pain, or the smoke in the air.

"You know what makes us yakuza? We come up from nothing, so we can become something. Gutter trash pulled off the street, given a nice suit and a fucking job and a chance to beat on all the motherfuckers who did us dirty. You don't know about any of that though, your daddy was Kazuma fucking Kiryu, so you could get whatever the fuck you wanted whenever the fuck you wanted. You probably thought you were fucking invincible, didn't you? You thought you could fuck with us, and that your daddy would smooth it all over from beyond the fucking grave, huh?"

Haruka's ear twitched. She thought she'd heard something.

"I got soldiers who take beatings like this once a week. They get them cause they're screw ups but they take them cause they're men. You ain't a yakuza, you ain't even a man. All you are is a worthless, spoiled, half-cocked piece of-"

Aikawa stopped. He heard it too now. The sound of approaching sirens.

"Shit."

Aikawa walked back, knelt down and reached into his jacket. When he turned back to face Haruka it was with a pistol pointed at her face.

"Now you're going to tell me where the fuck Kitamura is, or I put a bullet in your skull and let the fire handle the rest."

Haruka didn't have the air or energy to respond to him, least of all the desire.

"Fucking whatever," he huffed to himself. "Bitch has it coming."

Beyond the crackle of fire and the distant sirens, Haruka heard something else along the ground. She didn't believe it at first, she didn't want to believe it, it was probably the very last thing she wanted to hear at this moment.

Heels clacked along the pavement, running up to them fast. Natsuko appeared from behind a corner, grabbed a nearby flowerpot and smashed it into the back of Aikawa's head.

"Son of a-" Aikawa staggered forward and looked back to see this newcomer.

Natsuko's face was a picture of pure anger that didn't buckle in the slightest under Aikawa's glare. He moved his pistol to her, then back to Haruka, then back to Natsuko. He looked between them, brow furrowing more and more. The sirens were getting closer.

"Fuck!" he yelled. "If you think this is over Sawamura, you're out of your goddamn mind. This was just the declaration of war. You missed your chance for a quick and painless death, now if you don't want to die slow and painful you better think about what the fuck you're doing here."

He ran off, disappeared around a corner, and was gone.

Natsuko walked over and wordlessly pulled Haruka to her feet. Her legs shook, but she at least had the strength to stay up now.

"Thanks."

Natsuko slapped her across the face. Darkness inched around the edges of her vision before quickly retreating. Haruka lightly rubbed her cheek in confusion.

Looking back, Natsuko's expression hadn't softened an inch since Aikawa left.

"You're fired."

That hurt more than the slap.

"Wh- What?"

"You," she repeated between grit teeth. "Are fired. And evicted. Just- Just get out of my sight."

"Natsuko, I-"

"Now!"

Haruka looked at her, took in the rage and pain across her face, then slowly looked to her shoes and nodded.

"Alright," she muttered. Haruka turned away from Natsuko and limped out of the Champion District just as the fire truck pulled up next to it.