Chapter 13 – Familiar Face

(You know the disclaimer, right? Please r+r!)

And more days passed, and I tried to forget I was a mother. It worked. In the end. Sort of.

I was lucky. Something happened to take my mind off it. Something big.

We were eating, when there was a blast on a whistle, and a guard called, "Right, you lot, we have some new arrivals today!"

We stopped and turned to look. New guys were hardly ever announced publicly like this. That in itself held my interest.

Standing nervously in the middle of the dining hall were four rudies. Their uniforms were grey. No one had grey uniforms. I scanned their faces. Two guys I didn't recognise.

The other guy I did.

Akina's brother. They'd taken his goggles, and he was wearing a shirt for probably the first time in his life, but it was him. It had to be. The muddy skin. The height. Heck, the face. It was him.

And the girl…

The world pulsed with rage. And something else.

Her dark hair, missing its clip, fell in jagged lines over her face. Her lips were no longer blue, just the dull pink most people's are, and her face, though still pale, wasn't half as deathly as it had been when I'd last seen her. She stood, arms folded, eyes narrowed, tense all over, and even as the rage caught in my throat I thought how good she was to look at.

But this had to be fate. Cube, in jail with me. As the girl herself might have said: Sweet.

"You'll notice that these four are in grey, which I don't believe is a colour you've had before. This is because their gang have never ended up here before. So we had to design a new uniform, all for them. Say hi to the GGs!"

Several people gasped. And then nasty smiles spread across their faces.

Oh, dear, I thought. Seems like I'm not the only one who hates you guys.

Looked like I wouldn't have to do anything myself. Across the hall I could see Dash's eyes narrowing, and a smirk rising on Shar's face. Those two wouldn't play nice.

Still, that didn't mean I couldn't knock Cube about a bit myself.

I wondered what it would be like to kiss her. Then I bit down on my lip and tried to snap myself out of it.

What was wrong with me? Why couldn't I make up my mind about whether I preferred guys or girls?

Oh, well. At the moment, there was one girl I was interested in.

Yes, the day had suddenly got a lot more potential.

At first I just watched. I saw the four GGs get hassled by practically every inmate in the prison. I heard how there were four other GGs in the other block, how there were only two left outside now. I couldn't believe it! It was just my luck that it was only after I was off the streets that the GGs finally lost, big time.

Rumours were flying about how they had lost. I'd lost my gossip source – Tasha had been moved to the other block after she'd gone too far in her eavesdropping and someone had tried to knife her. But you didn't need to be a spy to hear the news. Everyone was talking about it.

"That dark-haired girl helped the GG leader two-time his girl…"

"They fell through a building together."

"She was fired and she went back to Grind City…"

"And I heard they came after her. The GGs, I mean."

"And Onishima came after them."

"They nabbed the leader because he was too busy thinking about girls, can you believe it?"

"And they brought them back to Tokyo. Now that's the sort of justice I like!"

I kept my mouth shut. Watched, and waited.

Two days after they arrived I cornered Garam. I didn't know what to say to him. But I wanted to talk to him anyway.

"Hey, GG!"

He carried on walking.

I hurried closer. "Look, I'm not out to get you. I want to talk to you."

"And I don't want to talk to you, Love Shocker." He used the mention of my gang like a brick on my skull. I tried to ignore it.

"Do you remember me?" I said.

"What, did I chase you out of the bus terminal or something?"

"I knew you before I was a Love Shocker."

He stopped walking then, turned to face me. "Oh, yeah? Who were you?"

"I was the girl who loved Akina," I said.

His eyes widened, and I could practically see him running a movie reel of memories past his brain. "You – you were the one I talked to in Benten-cho? In Main Street?"

"That's me."

"Well, why are you talking to me now? I've left all that shit. If you're gonna get to me for what happened to Akina, don't bother. I've done that myself."

I studied his face. The smug, jack-the-lad look he'd worn when I'd first seen him had gone now. In place of it was a sharper, harder edge to him, like someone had cut down all the spare flesh on his profile.

"Your sisters drove you out, didn't they," I said. I realised now – this was why I was talking to him. To find out how the story of this family ended.

Garam shrugged. "I guess so. I think I would have gone anyway."

"You hear what happened to the elder one?"

"No."

"She got stabbed in Park Street."

His eyes widened. "What?"

"I ended up challenging her to a fight, and I won."

"You killed my sister?"

"Garam, she was nuts!"

"You still didn't have any right to kill her!" he said. "So what if she's nuts? They've always been like that! Both of them!"

"They drove you out of your home!" I yelled back at him. "How can you not hate them?"

"Because I deserved it. I should've left ages ago. You're right, I was a rat to Akina. Are you satisfied? I wanted to forget it all, and I didn't want you going around doing some stupid grudge killing!"

He turned and ran off down the corridor, soles of his shoes slapping on the concrete floor.

I stood there, hardening my heart to stop myself feeling hurt. I was right. I knew I was right. Maybe some of the other stuff I did wasn't, but Akina's sister had been nothing but evil and I was willing to bet no-one missed her.

Would anyone miss you?

I shivered and walked away from the thought.

So that was one GG crossed off my list. Now for the other one.

My chance came a week after they'd arrived.

I was walking down the corridor to breakfast when I heard familiar voices up ahead.

"She's crying! I don't believe it," Shar was saying. "Some rudie she is. Guess Nose Guy was good after all."

"Then let's give her a makeover for him," Dash said.

I heard the sound of punches, someone gasped. I stepped round the corner, and saw Shar and Dash holding Cube against the wall. They were both hitting her. Her eyes were closed. She doubled over as one of them punched her stomach, and I decided it had gone far enough.

"Hey, leave her alone!"

Both Love Shockers turned, and looked puzzled when they saw it was me.

"Aw, come on, Kell, she's a GG," Dash said, surreptitiously kicking Cube on the ankle. "Give us a break!"

"You got breakfast to go to." I met their eyes. "Give it up."

For a moment there was tension, then Shar bolted, and dragged Dash with her.

Cube was still leaning against the wall, ribs rising and falling. Her lip was bleeding, vicious on her pale skin.

"If you're gonna beat me up, could you get it over with?" she said. "I've got a full schedule today."

I smiled and kept the bitterness out of my voice. "I'm not gonna hurt you."

"Then why'd you call off your goons?" she retorted.

"I wanted to talk to you."

"Why?" She pushed herself off the wall. I could see her staggering, but she'd clenched her fists. Did she never put down her guard?

I shrugged and decided to wing it. "The way I see it, if you've managed to take over two other territories, saved the city from a demon, not been ground to a pulp by Onishima, and survived falling through a building, you ain't the type of girl to start crying because of a couple of bitchy remarks." I could see she had been doing that. Her eyes were too damp.

"I don't cry," Cube said.

"Sure. Back then you just had something in your eye."

Cube gave me a nasty look.

"Come on, spill the beans," I said. I needed to know as much as I could about her. Who was it said knowledge equalled power?

"Look," Cube said, dark eyes narrowing, "I'm a GG. You're supposed to hate me. Everyone else does. Now leave me alone!"

"Why should I hate you?" I managed to get that out without sounding sarcastic. "In here we need to stick together. Let's get to breakfast."

I began to walk, and she followed.

"So you gonna say why you cried?" I asked as we reached the dining hall.

"No."

"Sure, honey. Let's go."

First contact.

That night I lay there and tried to plan.

The trouble was, I was being pulled in half by two separate urges. There was the one that said 'snog her senseless,' and the one that said 'pound her senseless,' and I didn't know which one to choose. Great. I would have to wreck my revenge by getting smitten with the person I was supposed to hurt.

I closed my eyes and pictured Coin dropping me, taking her, and my hands shook with rage and I wanted to slice that black and white face and introduce red into the picture.

But secretly part of my brain was making me wonder what it would be like to touch her a different way, stroke her hair, be gentle.

Was it any wonder I was a little confused?

Well, as far as I knew Cube was straight, so there'd be no chance of her going with me. So you can forget that second choice right now, Kellaani.

But I didn't want to…

Could I like her? Was my hatred only because of Coin? If we'd met in another time would we have been friends? I didn't know.

I tried to picture Coin. It was harder than I'd expected. It's difficult to remember a face – all I could get were stills that didn't look real.

But I could remember being told I was the loser.

Coin was dead now. I wondered how Cube felt about that.

I didn't know what to do. I'd see what opportunities arose. Maybe fate would help me get lucky for once.

Over the next few days I hung around with her, just playing nice, keeping the others off her back, being a good guy. It set my teeth on edge. Maybe I could have been friends with her in another dimension or something, but here – no way. I could like the way she looked and think about her that way when I was alone, but when we were actually talking all I could do was hate.

But both urges were rising. I had to do something before they made me shatter.

We were heading down towards breakfast when I made my move. Cube was still wary of me, I knew that, but not as wary as she should have been. That suited me.

"I'm really glad we met up, aren't you?" I said. I let one arm hang over her shoulders, my skin noting the curved shape of her shoulder blades.

"Yeah," she said. "Specially as you saved my butt."

"Aw, that's all right. What's the good of having power if you don't use it?" I stopped walking, and turned to face her. "You're a really good friend, Cube, you know that?"

"I am?" Puzzlement here.

"Yeah." And then my instincts hijacked my body, shoved Cube against the wall, and kissed her.

She shoved me off almost immediately. "Hey, knock it off, I'm not that sort of girl!"

"Do I care?" I could feel myself shaking. "While you're in here you gotta make sacrifices." I kissed her again. I could feel the other inmates watching us, but I didn't care. This was bliss, this was wrong, this was completely mad.

She slapped me.

And everything stopped.

I stood there, feeling my skin stinging. Cube was leaning against the wall, watching me like I was a tiger. Everyone else was staring at us, and some of the Love Shockers looked horrified.

"Is it too late to say sorry?"

The world started moving again as Cube spoke. As did the rage.

"Oh, yeah. It's too late for you, GG. Do you know what happened to the last bitch who hit me?"

"I'm guessing you didn't give her a hug and a box of chocolates." Cube didn't seem to move, but she suddenly looked ready to pounce. Or flee. Some sort of primal defence, I guess.

I kept my eyes on her as I called out, "Any guards coming?"

"No," someone answered. I hardly heard them.

I waited for the rage to reach its highest point. Grabbed onto it. And punched.

Cube dropped. I hit the wall, and cried out. She pushed at my feet, and I fell, and scratched at her face. I had been right. Red was her colour. We fought over and over and over, I punched her, and she fell back – I pinned her arms – with my working hand, I squeezed her throat.

"You are dead!"

I thought of Coin, thought of how I'd just been pushed off, and pressed down harder and harder. Cube choked, her face was contorting, I wondered if I could actually do this. I could! I could! I found myself laughing.

Then she dug her nails into my leg.

Without meaning to, I winced, and then she shoved me off and leapt to her feet. I turned to hit her. Sound of running. I felt a stab in my arm. I tried to reach Cube, but I was falling away from her into darkness.

Rats.

I struggled to open my eyes. They hurt. I felt drained all over.

Eventually I succeeded, and the light rushed in. I was lying on my bunk, and the cell was empty.

I sat up, groaned, and tried to pick up the pieces of my brain. The guards must have used tranquillisers on me. Damn. I shivered as I remembered the urge to kill. Yet it had felt good to be the one who wasn't beaten on for once.

I heard a click from the door, and then a clatter as it was unlocked. Two guards walked in.

"Well? What was all that about?"

I shrugged. "Rudie stuff."

"Just a grudge, huh?"

"If you like." It didn't feel like 'just' anything. But I was too tired to argue.

"We're moving her to Block B, then. Just so you don't get the urge to do any more rudie stuff. Oh, and you're in here for the rest of the day."

I lay back down as they walked out. The door banged shut. After nearly a year here I still hadn't got used to that sound.

I'd lost her. Damn it, damn it, damn.

I will get you, I told her. I will.

Hate and love are only two sides of the same coin. I sighed at the pun. Now where had I read that? I couldn't remember. I hated Cube. But I still found her attractive. And if you don't get that, well, wait till it happens to you.

Even in prison those damn GGs still got the better of me. Well, just wait. I could hurt them. I was good at hurting.

They'd soon see.