Rating: T
Disclaimer: Characters and universe in this fic belong to Natsume, Marvelous Entertainment, etc.
.
.
Alicia had been told to stay inside the car as Silver implied he had a private matter to discuss with his driver outside. Further down the splitting path, concealed between bushes, a cab was waiting. Silver had arranged this rendezvous beforehand, unbeknownst to Lucky.
"Lucky.." Alicia blinked a couple of times, still recovering from a bolt from the blue.
She could have been wrong, but during the one time her tired eyes were able to squeeze and focus towards the two men, a very shocking detail struck her.
Even back then Alicia had found it curious how Silver's never-seen driver would speak in such a juvenile voice, how he'd yelp and panic over every little bump in the road. To be so jumpy, yet to be a driver carrying out shootouts... something hadn't been adding up.
The blonde driver, timidly holding his beret between his hands, was nothing more than a teenage boy, roughly sixteen years old. Not only way younger than Silver, but younger than her as well. If she recalled correctly, Silver did once call him such... But she'd have never guessed how Lucky was in fact, literally...
A boy.
Chapter 21. The Pinky Promise: Part 4 - The perfect dress
.
.
"Lucky..."
On that day, in the middle of a forked road...
"...This is where we..."
Silver and Lucky would...
...
.
.
"—part ways?!" Lucky had flinched at Silver's last phrase, "Boss, is this some kind of—...!"
Cutting his question short Silver's arm threw a heavy briefcase at Lucky, who stumbled backwards.
"W-What is this..!?"
"All that you've earned with your hard work."
Lucky looked at Silver's resolute posture, then at the briefcase in his arms, then at Silver again.
"Boss.. Why are you giving me... —I don't understand..!"
The ache for an honest answer creased his eyes of amber. Lucky understood well what was inside that briefcase. What he couldn't understand was why his boss was suddenly casting him off like that.
Making a roof over Lucky's justified bitterness Silver began to lumber... and lumber... until they were standing shoulder to shoulder, yet in opposite directions.
"I.." He was looking up into the sky, "..I made a vow the other day.."
"Vow..?" Lucky's head reacted a little.
"..That in the unlikelyhood we didn't bite the big one today, I would see you off."
"...Un..likely..hood...?"
He gave it a frown, but Lucky trusted he was just imagining things.
"Pft.." He snorted all worries away, "So you want me out because you want to look after me?"
What a silly reason to stress over, his boss was just having a sentimental moment. Sure, it could happen sometimes. Truth be told, today they had gotten away with quite the close shave.
"Boss, you're sweating it too much."
His foot pivoted, ready to stand shoulder to shoulder with this man the way it should be, sharing a common view of the sunset.
"Remember, I'm your lucky driv—"
"Even LUCK runs out!"
Lucky had been thwarted midway turning, cradling an ambushed stare towards Silver's unjoking expression.
"..and when it eventually does, it will already be too late for you to realize how brittle luck alone can be.."
An irritable vigor began swelling inside the boy's eyes after hearing all that crazy doomsaying out of the blue.
"So what?" The briefcase fell as his arms asked wide. "If push comes to shove I know how to—"
"No. You don't."
Silver's absolute gaze put chains on Lucky's rebellious mouth, he could tell what the boy was thinking.
"You don't know how it feels to hold the weight of a gun.. or how pointing at someone behind the gun looks like.. you don't even know what pulling the trigger means."
"Gun-this, gun-that, GUN-THIS, GUN-THAT!..." Lucky was growing frustrated, all this lecture about guns felt like Silver belittling him for never getting to know what a gun was like.
"Do you want to know why, you don't know any of this?"
"...Cause you never let me." He grudgingly recalled.
"It's because not once did it cross my mind to put a gun in your hand. I'd rather put a bullet under my chin than allow a child to smell the stench I smell."
"..." Lucky was sweeping at pebbles, this was getting nowhere. His boss was just going on about this 'stench' spiel again.
Because even if Silver said so, Lucky could more or less guess what that infamous stench was. Blood was smelling like copper and corpses were smelling of decay.. You could well stumble on one of those inside a dumpster. Big deal.
Of course, what Lucky had failed to grasp, was that Silver was speaking of a different kind of stench. Someone like Lucky, who didn't have it in him to hurt an ant, much less kill an actual person, would never know of what Silver meant.
It was their eyes.
A futile cry for help, flaring inside your victim's stares as you slowly raise a gun in their face.. and then a spite... Towards you, who's pulling the trigger, and will forever and irreversibly take everything away from them. Their fear and spite, forever reflected back in your eyes, forever becoming your own fear and spite. That single image of a cornered and scared human being, trying to fight back with spite alone, was the stench Silver was talking about.
...and the stench, Lucky, who would always avert his eyes from, had stayed clear of.
If possible, Silver wanted Lucky to remain forever clear of this horrible stench.
However, for Lucky..
"But all those guys you've put down... They were bad guys.. Gun smugglers, drug dealers, slave traders, murderers, kidnappers... rapists too.." He reluctantly looked to the side, "They all deserved what was coming for them..." He muttered.
"...Deserved?"
A quite tide of wrath drilled into the boy's ears.
But the boy... was already glaring at him, with a low head.
This was his unspoken disapproval.
"Then tell me this.. If murderers deserve to die, wouldn't you say I, deserve it the most?"
..His boss... deserving to die..~?
The suggestion had left Lucky gaping.
"N-NO! Of course not!" He was scared he might have sounded disrespectful, "Boss is nothing like those rotten bastards! They were all twisted and evil to the core! So someone had to—"
"True, someone had to. But, what exactly defines as evil..?"
Come on..! What was up with all these questions? They had been all this time together and they were suddenly beating one big dead horse. Silver was friggin' schooling him.
"That's... people who do bad.. wrong things, to others.. right?"
Silver closed his eyes as he finally nodded, "Indeed."
"PHEW..!" Lucky was out of breath, he was afraid this would go on forever.
...
"But..." Silver's sharp pupils had returned for round two, "..Does that give us the right to kill those who are in the wrong?"
"BUT WE ARE RIGHT!" Lucky's arms flared, desperate to open his eyes.
"No, Lucky.. We are not.."
Silver could clearly see how his statement had left a powerless expression on Lucky.. but he had to remind him.
"There is nothing righteous in someone who takes another's life, because there is no justice by taking another's life... To kill evil, does not make the law."
"Tch..!" Lucky despised that word, "It's because dirty cops and judges won't do their job that boss has to get his hands dirty! It's always been like this!"
"Even so, that is but a choice I made."
Lucky saw no regret in Silver's words, only the shell of a dead ambition as his boss turned towards a blood-stained sunset.
.
"I want you to remember, Lucky..
There is nothing good or righteous in stripping someone of their life,
no matter how twisted or evil they may be.
Once you pull the trigger to take a life..
There is only stench.
.
Lucky kept a barren look as he drew shapes on the ground dust with a twig, sitting on crouched knees. It was still a hard thing to realize his boss's wishes, but he had to look up and start thinking for himself.
"Well, I've always kinda wanted to travel west to America if chance knocked my door.." He looked high over his shoulder "Boss... What about you?"
"..Hrm.." He grunted, not really warmed up to the idea, "..I'm also thinking of.. turning over a new leaf."
"What about the 'White Tiger' clan?"
"..I'll have to make readjustments in that old business, I suppose.."
"Old? So you're planning to start fresh?"
Silver lazily bat his lids at the sunset, he hadn't really given it much thought. An hour ago he wouldn't have known if he'd come out in one piece.
"..I've been into the mob business for as long as I can remember.. Instead of burning things to the ground, I could.. start building, perhaps.. even expanding, I suppose.."
"Start expanding.. Got something in mind..?"
"...I.."
Silver slowly lifted his chin, wondering if he really had the right to wish for such things.
"..I want to build a place that will be able to provide for her.."
"...Her...?"
"..a place that will be fun for her.."
"...Who's 'her'...?"
"I'll need... a fun name, for a fun business.."
Silver was digging his cheek in awkward thought, he was not good at this.
After giving it a few seconds, his lip finally moved, as his new business already had a fun name.
"FunLand.
What do you think about it..?"
There were a few stalactites hanging from Lucky's merry approval.
[...]
Talking about their futures for a while longer, the two men finally saw each other off.
But, as Lucky was walking towards the cab...
...
"...Turning over a new leaf..?
..Readjust..?
..Build..?
..Expand..?
..Funland..?"
..
"Are you kidding me...?
..
...
ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME!?"
...
Lucky's once scared fingers had turned into a claw wide enough to seize the bad joke on his expression.
There was only one person to blame, the one who stole everything from him.
[Her]
...
"Alicia..."
...
She was so pretty.
Long silver hair, innocent green eyes,
even her colorless dress looked so beautiful on her,
and it had climbed to an even greater beauty when it was soaked in blood.
...
A shame it was not her own blood, for had it been hers,
then her dress would've ascended to true perfection.
...
...But...
What if it 'could be' her blood...
...
"Alicia... Alicia..."
Rings within rings were invading his maddened-yellow stare,
Wickedness oozing from the corners of a grinning mouth,
Only speaking of a lowly, bemused chuckle.
...
Lucky would have his revenge.
One day, he would make her wear a dress,
bathed in true perfection.
.
.
25.05.18
End of CH.21