stuff will start soon I promise

The one good thing about touring with Iori Yagami, was that you flew first class everywhere. Shermie guessed that it was mostly a selfish decision, since their lead wasn't a small man by most standards. Sure, he looked positively scrawny next to the likes of Yashiro or Tizoc, but in the end, even he wouldn't tolerate economy size seats.

He's not bad, that Yagami…

So Shermie was appreciative - especially because First Class brought her whatever drinks she wanted. They had just boarded, and hadn't yet taken air - but she had already polished off an entire bottle of rum. The stewardesses were watching her as if expecting her to keel over any moment. Shermie relished the attention. There were certain pros to not being...alive.

She waved a stewardess over, handed her Yagami's credit card, and bought more hard liquor. It took a great deal of alcohol for Shermie to feel the buzz. She guessed it had to do with her liver being actually dead. Neither did her blood circulate - so naturally it took a lot for the rum to hit her brain. At this point, she wasn't even slurring!

"Right here, mademoiselle. Babe, you want anything?"

"...Mmm?"

"Babe?"

Yashiro pulled out his earbuds and pulled his eyes away from his car show to look at her. He looked a bit annoyed that she had disturbed him, so Shermie rolled her eyes and dismissed him. If he wanted something, he could get it on his own. Yashiro hadn't been as enthusiastic as she was about 'Operation Mafia' but after some coaxing, he lent his full support. He had agreed to keep Iori occupied while Shermie and her Triad contacts nabbed Rock, lured Whip away, and zapped the girl into a black smear on some warehouse floor.

Seirah flies in tomorrow afternoon - if Rocky can be believed. Gives Kam plenty of time to run the operation tomorrow…

Shermie stretched, put her liquor down, and glanced across the aisle. The miserable idol and her miserable boyfriend (who was looking especially depressed today) were busy looking sad and ignoring each other. Shermie wasn't exactly sure what had caused the schism between Athena and her dog, and franky she didn't care much. She was just happy that they were upset. Athena seemed to have noticed her, and made a face. Shermie couldn't contain her giggles.

Oohh~ She's glaring at me. Hehe.

The other star of the show was sitting directly behind Yashiro, and was seriously going over basic music theory with his prodigy student. Unlike usual, where he popped his sleeping pills and passed out immediately, he was very much awake, and counting beats with an unwilling Rock Howard.

"Alright, What note is that?"

"Boss, come on. I know how to sightread."

"F - A - C, so that's a D. One-and, two-..."

Rock had been more upset than normal this morning. The last couple of days, he had distanced himself from everyone save Yashiro and the IKARI bitch girlfriend. Apparently he and Yagami had had a bit of a talk last night. Shermie had feared the relationship would be repaired - but her fears were for naught. She had no idea what they spoke about, but Rock seemed no better off than yesterday.

Well, Iori will be busy tomorrow anyways… he'll be running around all day. I just need Yashiro to keep him from getting suspicious… he's an idiot anyways, shouldn't be too hard.

From the look on Rock Howard's face, it looked like he would rather be in the cargo hold, rather than boxed between the airplane hull and his serial killer boss. Iori had demanded Rock - who had desperately begged everyone on the team to swap seats with him - spend the next four hours reviewing every last semiquaver in Athena's sheet music under his tutelage, and wasn't taking no for an answer.

"I know it's a D, I know the entire thing, okay? Look - Bb, D, F. major chord. We don't need to do the whole thing."

"No, Major seventh." Iori vocalized a Bb, which by itself was a terrible representation of the chord. It was obvious he didn't really know how to teach this sort of thing - not that Rock needed it. "Okay, next, stanza 112. "

"Ugh! Seriously? This is a waste of time."

"Dead serious. What's D? Sing it. Are you in tune? Last time I checked, you had perfect pitch."

"I know what a D is, boss… I'm not singing, come on! I'll do better next time, I promise."

"You damn right are gonna do better next time, and I'm gonna make sure of it. So stop bitching. Give me D."

"... Ugh, okay okay… can you not talk so loud?"

Shermie heard the passengers sitting across from the on-flight-music-lesson snicker. Sure, if you had a shit sense of humor and didn't know your music theory, you might find all this talk about 'D' mildly amusing. Rock seemed to realize it, and quickly obliged so they could move on to F#, and stop getting looks from the stewardesses.

"Your D's on point. Good. Do you know the fingering?"

"Boss!... You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?

"What do you mean? You don't know D fingering?"

"You-... Ugh. Nevermind."

Over the past twenty minutes, Rock had gotten too annoyed to be afraid, and was dishing out that low quality snark. Iori was being unexpectedly patient and hadn't yet resorted to hollering his head off. Shermie found that a little bit concerning. She was hoping Iori would cut Rock out even further to minimize the chances that he showed up to that fancy warehouse Kam had sectioned off. Sure, the Triad wanted him - but they had only seen the Yakuza heir battle in tournaments. There, he was a performer - fighting for entertainment. If Iori actually showed up to save a hostage - something he probably had done for IKARI before - then there was a snowball's chance in hell the Triad would come out intact. If that man could be crushed by numbers, he would have died a thousand times already.

But right now, the hellhound was trying to make Rock read sheet music. It was a good idea too - since the duckling was fucking terrible during yesterday's performance. He was so off pitch, that Shermie swore he was just playing random notes. It was so bad, it was even throwing her off. By the end of the performance, Shermie, who never felt embarrassment, was even feeling shame.

Thank God the audience is tone deaf - because they didn't seem to mind… feel bad for that Yagami though… I heard Athena chewed him to bits last night.

Shermie was well aware that their little conversation was most likely the reason Rock was all sorts of distracted. Sure, she wanted to split that duo up, but only so she could get at Whip. She had nothing against the duckling, but then again, she wasn't really for him either. He was just collateral damage. Nothing more, nothing less.

Still, she wasn't appreciating this aspect of the fallout of her influence, but wasn't conscientious enough not to complain about it. Shermie knew that Athena had already given Iori an earful because of Rock's performance, so she decided she definitely was going to pile on too. Maybe it'd make Rock's benefactor a little less 'bene-ficial'.

"Boss I'll play it during rehearsal. I promise I know it."

"No, shut up, Howard. I'm paying for you, so you do what I say. Read. What's that?"

"F#"

"Right, good. The Bb is a broken chord, so hold your D so it leads into the next stanza. Afterwards, we've got two beats where you can rest. Then stanza 114."

When your boss compliments ur D

Thanks yag

Jk, he has no idea.