Morning dawned bright and gentle in Shinjuku, creeping through the front window of a small, tan Lady Bug. Inside, its spikey-haired brunette occupant twitched. He yanked a scratchy gray blanket over his eyes, trying to keep out the light.
His partner, a blonde with equally pointy-edged hair, squirmed. The gesture had pulled the blankets off of him, making him shiver. "Ban-chan always steals the blankets…" Ginji muttered in irritation.
He sat up, rubbing his eyes. Well, now that he was awake, he might as well get up. Looking out the window, he grabbed his partner and pointed in dread, shaking Ban. "Ban-chan, wake up!" he whispered in terror, pointing.
Ban sat up with a start, smacking his head on the roof. "What's going on? We're under attack!"" he asked, eyes wide in alarm.
"Worse, Ban-chan. Look!" Ginji said, pointing out the windshield. "A black cat is crossing our path!"
Ban blinked in confusion and stared at the small ball of black fuzz walking in front of the car. The cat paused, staring up at them with huge green eyes, then meowed enthusiastically before continuing on its way.
"You wake me up… for a kitten?" Ban asked, smashing his fist into Ginji's head.
"Ow, Ban-chan. Black cats are bad luck."
"Heh," Ban muttered, pulling the blankets over his head. "It isn't like you to believe in dumb superstitions." As he aid that, something came around the corner that Ban was terrified of- the parking law enforcer. He sat up quickly, slamming his keys in the ignition. "Time to find somewhere else to sleep," he commented as he started up the engine.
As Ginji squirmed into a sitting position, he discovered his blankets were tangled in something. Frowning, he tugged harder. Still caught. One good yank, Ginji thought to himself, ought to do it.
A few hours later, Ban stormed down the street with a bandaged Ginji in tow. "How was I supposed to know my blanket was caught in the control for the Nitro?" he muttered through the bandages.
"You made us speed right into the side of a cop car!"
"It was an accident," Ginji protested. "I told you the cat was bad luck…"
"It had nothing to do with the cat!" Ban screamed. "The cat didn't pull on the nitro control."
Ginji hung his head. "I said I was sorry… the cop seemed to understand that I didn't mean to."
"That didn't stop him from fining us, nor does it get my car out of the shop," Ban fumed, storming into the Honky Tonk. "We're going to have to take temp jobs to pay this one off."
"Ban-san, Ginji-san," Natsumi said as they entered, smiling. "Welcome. Oh, Ginji-san, I took a picture of the cutest little black kitten on my way into work. Want to see?" she asked, flipping open her pink cell phone.
Ginji's blood turned to ice. "Na-Natsumi-chan, did that cat cross your path?"
"Stop it with the superstitious nonsense," Ban grunted.
"I'd think someone with an Evil Eye would believe in back luck," Paul commented. Ban bristled up like an angry porcupine. Natsumi, meanwhile, vanished into the back to avoid a potential fight. "So, what happened to make you so prickly today?" Paul asked.
"Ask Ginji," Ban snapped.
"Master, a black cat crossed out path and then-"
There was a loud noise from the back, followed by the high pitched scream of a young woman. The three men looked up, and then rushed to the back to check on little Natsumi. The poor girl sat on the ground, surrounded by broken plate bits, holding her bleeding arm.
"Natsumi, what happened?" Paul asked in concern, wrapping a towel around the bleeding.
"I tried to get a knife out of the cabinet and it fell on me. When I tried to get out of the way I knocked over the plates." Her pretty eyes were welling up with big, fat tears. "I felt bad for Ginji-san and Ban-san. I only wanted to cut them some cake. I'm sorry about the plates, Master…"
"Nevermind the plates, Natsumi. Plates can be replaced. What matters is that you're okay." He pressed tighter on the towel, which was beginning to show red splotches. He stood the weeping girl up. "I'm taking her to the hospital for stitches. You'll have to leave so I can close this place up while I'm gone."
Ban and Ginji wandered the streets, now broke, hungry, worried and upset for Natsumi's sake. After an awkward silence, Ginji dared speak up. "Ban-chan, Natsumi-chan saw the same cat…"
"It was just a bizarre coincidence," Ban insisted, hands shoved into his pockets. It was obvious that he was in deep thought, despite his insistence that the cat had nothing to do with it.
Both young men suddenly froze in mid-step. There it was, right in front of them. That horrible cat. Ginji gripped Ban's shoulder. "Let's turn around, quickly," he whimpered. The cat seemed to smirk at them, sitting there and meowing.
Behind the cat, a bus pulled up to the curb. To Ginji's surprise, Kazuki stepped out of the back door of the bus. "Ah, Ginji-san! I was just looking for you!"
"Don't come any closer!" Ginji cried, waving his tare arms frantically. "Don't let that cat cross your path!"
"I can't hear you over the traffic noise! I'll come over there," Kazuki called back. He took a step forwards, the frightened cat taking off running. It ran right in front of poor Kazuki. At that same moment, the bus pulled away from the curb. Caught in the back door, however, was the end of Kazuki's long ponytail.
Later, Ban and Ginji clung to one another as the ambulance pulled away. "Ban-chan," Ginji whimpered, teeth chattering. "Our car, Natsumi-chan, Kazu-chan…"
"It has to be a coincidence," Ban answered, shaking slightly as well. "There is no way one kitten could cause all that bad luck."
Himiko frowned as she walked down the street. Why were Ban and Ginji huddled on a street corner, hugging and shaking, without a cup labeled "Hungry, please help." She meandered over to them. "What are you two doing?" she asked, staring at them.
"Himiko-chan, there was this horrible black cat, and it-"
Ban smacked Ginji. "I keep telling you, that black cat is superstitious nonsense!"
"Black cat?" Himiko asked, confused.
"Ginji thinks that this black cat we keep seeing has been causing us bad luck. That's just ridiculous, isn't it?" Ban asked, waving Ginji's concerns off. Ginji made a deep-throated angry growling noise.
"You'd think someone with the Evil Eye would believe in bad luck and superstitions," Himiko commented.
"Master said the same thing," Ginji pointed out, earning Ginji another painful bop on the head from Ban's fist.
Himiko laughed. "After knowing you, Ban, I have to say that I think you're the cause of most of the bad luck around here." With that, she turned around and walked away with her head held high.
Ban made a face at her back that involved childishly pulling down his lower eyelid. Ginji, in tare form, sighed at him. "Ban-chan, don't be silly."
"Who's being silly? Talking about black cats and lucky charms… next thing I know, you'll be seeing leprechauns."
Meanwhile, Himiko rounded the corner at the end of the street only to find an adorable ball of black fluff sitting there. "Aw," she said, smiling at the kitten. "Are you the big bad monster that's been scaring the big bad Midou Ban?" she asked, kneeling down and reaching out to pet it.
As she did, she heard a "tink" noise at her waist, and felt something moving against her leg. Turning her head around, she managed to look just in time to see one of her poison perfumes crashing to the ground, the glass container shattering into bits.
Now, a bit of a time out to explain how the corrosion scent works. It works on synthetic materials, breaking apart the man-made bonds that hold them together. That is why it must always be kept in a glass jar, topped with cork, and worn on a leather belt.
Unfortunately for Himiko, while her belt might have been leather, the rest of her outfit was nylon, and one cannot find a more synthetic material than nylon. Well, perhaps polyester, but Himiko would not be caught dead in polyester.
Ban and Ginji's heads rose when they heard another female scream tear through the air. "That sounded like…"
"Himiko!" Ban cried, immediately bolting in the direction of the sound.
The two turned the corner to find her huddled on the street, her arms clamped tightly over her chest, screaming and covering her breasts with her hands. For the corrosion perfume had made short work of everything except her leather belt and cotton panties.
Ban ran over to her and draped his, fortunately cotton, shirt over her. A crowd of disappointed male onlookers said "aw," and then dissipated away from the scene. "Himiko, what happened?" he asked, helping her to her feet.
"My corrosion perfume fell out of my belt! I've never had a perfume fall out of my belt before, even in the heat of battle," she said, holding Ban's shirt tighter over herself. "Never in years has one of my perfumes even started to come loose."
With a sound like an ominous dark cloud rolling through the sky, if a sound could be attributed to such a thing, a little meow came from the alley. Three heads turned, facing the ball of black fuzz that was staring at them. There was no question about it now. The cat was definitely smirking as the three edged nervously away from it.
Ban and Ginji escorted Himiko to her apartment. Fortunately, her metal apartment keys had not been corroded by the perfume. She made them wait until she changed into a new outfit, checking every single label to make sure she was wearing nothing but 100 cotton.
Eventually, she emerged from her bedroom and sat down in the living room with them. "Ban-chan," Ginji said, beginning the conversation. "Our car, Natsumi-chan, Kazu-chan, and now Himiko-chan…"
"I still believe it's anything more than a weird set of coincidences," Ban grunted, shaking his head vigorously to indicate his disbelief.
"Ban, if you lost four times to the same opponent, you wouldn't chalk that up to luck, would you?" Himiko asked, sitting on her knees on the rug.
"That's different," Ban insisted. "An opponent has a definite set of skills to overcome, a defined fighting style, a physical presence. I refuse to believe that some ball of black fur could be causing all these problems."
"At any rate," Himiko said, "not to imagine that the cat has any sort of powers, it is a stray. We should try to catch it and take it to the animal shelter."
"Good idea," Ginji agreed. "It can't cross any more paths if it's in a cage."
Ban snorted. "This is ridiculous."
"You don't have to come with," Himiko said, putting on her coat. "Come on, Ginji. Let's go ask your friend Shido to help us catch this trouble making kitten."
"Okay, Himiko-chan," Ginji said, standing up.
Ban frowned, then got up and followed them. "I'd better go anyway. There's not telling how much trouble you two might get into, since you seem to believe this nonsense about a black cat causing back luck."
The three walked the long distance to Madoka's mansion, eventually managing to convince Shido to help them via much pleading from Ginji. Madoka, wanting to go out, put Mozart's harness on and followed them, humming to herself, as they walked to where Ban and Ginji had last seen the cat.
"If nothing else," Shido commented, "I want to see the cat that has caused the Snake Bastard so much trouble."
Ban rolled up a sleeve and made a fist. "You want some of this?" he asked. Somewhere out there, at that moment, a slash fan took the comment wrong and wrote a fanfic, but this is neither the time nor place to discuss that.
"Stop that, Ban-chan!" Ginji cried. "After all, Shido-kun did agree to help us…"
"There it is," Himiko said, pointing.
The ball of fluff looked up at them. "Mew?" it asked, big green eyes seemingly filled with innocence.
Shido took a step forward. "Hello there, little kitten," he said, extending a hand to it. "Don't be afraid of the Snake Bastard over here. Come say hello," he offered, opening his hand to reveal a fist full of kitty treats.
The cat's nose twitched, and it started taking a step forward. "That's right, kitty," Shido coaxed. "See? You have to have a gentle touch and a good soul for animals to trust you."
Right as Ban was about to come up with a witty retort, Mozart suddenly started growling. All his fur was standing straight up. "Mozart?" Madoka asked. She could hear the growling and it concerned her. "What's- AH!" she screamed as Mozart suddenly rocketed himself at the cat. Her wrist, trapped in the strap on the bar attached to Mozart's harness, was responsible for her falling and being dragged along behind her powerful collie.
"Help!" she shouted, unable to see what was going on as she was dragged down the street, cat in the lead and Mozart hot on its heels.
"Mozart!" Shido shouted, whistling a command. The dog ignored it, instead leaping and bounding after the cat. "That's odd, he's never disobeyed me before," Shido frowned, running after Madoka and the wayward dog.
Ban and Ginji looked hesitantly at one another, then decided they had better help rescue Madoka even if it meant chasing that demonic cat. The group ended up making a rather hysterical sight for passers by. First, a black kitten tore down the street. Then, a collie dragging a black-haired screaming girl by her wrist shot past. After that, a guy with spiked black hair wearing a deerskin vest shot past, also screaming. A moment later, two guys with equally odd hair and a girl with a star on her cheek ran past, the three running shoulder to shoulder.
"Strangest race I ever saw," one old woman commented as the group tore past her.
Madoka, still being dragged and unable to free herself, realized that she could hear something that terrified her. The sound of a rather large road. Sounded like at least four, maybe six lanes. "Mozart, stop!" she begged, trying to grab anything that might stop the frantic dog. Her hands found nothing except rocks as the determined beast dragged her down the street.
The sound of the cars grew louder. "Help me, someone, please! Shido!" she begged, fear filling her heart as the sounds grew louder, louder…
And then, she found herself no longer bouncing along. Instead, she was wrapped in someone's strong arms. From the feel of their chest they were male, but definitely not Shido. "Who are you?" she asked, alarmed.
Whoever it was set her down on her feet. "How insulting, Miss Madoka, that you would not remember me. We have met before."
Right then, Shido, Ban, Ginji, and Himiko arrived around the corner. Ginji immediately turned tare and clung to Ban in fear. "A-Akabane-san!" he cried.
"Great, just what we need. More bad luck," Ban grunted.
"Mozart!" Madoka cried then, breaking the mood and attempting to look around, even though her eyes could see nothing. "Where is Mozart? He didn't… he didn't run into traffic, did he?"
"He did, but he seems to have made it to the other side intact, and is still going at quite a good clip," Akabane commented, glancing in the direction of the dog's rear end vanishing into the distance.
"I'll catch him, Madoka," Shido insisted, dodging safely through traffic to pursue the wayward Mozart.
"What in the world were you doing?" Akabane asked, turning to the huddled and panting group. "It hardly seems safe for a blind girl to be exercising her dog like that."
"Akabane-san, that black cat that just ran through here is a demon!" Ginji cried, waving his arms.
"Ginji," Ban cried, trying to shut him up.
"No, Ban-chan! First it got our car, then it got Natsumi-chan, then it got Kazu-chan, and then Himiko-chan, and now Madoka-chan and Mozart!" He looked worriedly in the direction Shido had vanished. "I hope it won't get Shido-kun…"
"Oh my, a black cat torments the infamous Get Backers. How much amusement I find in that… unfortunately, I also have other things to do today, and can not stand around talking about the presence or absence of demonic forces." He released Madoka and tipped his hat at them. "Good evening," he smiled, walking off.
"It isn't evening," Himiko noted with a sigh as he vanished.
Akabane chuckled to himself. Oh, Ginji-kun, how you amuse me, he thought. So wrapped up in his laughter was he that he almost stepped into an open manhole cover. Freezing in place, he took a step backwards, smiling at he looked at it. "Really, now," he commented to no one in particular. "Bad luck would have to get up much earlier in the morning to pull that one over on me," he laughed, skirting around it. "That is all bad luck is, really. Inattentiveness to one's surroundings…"
Without any warning, a girl leaped out from a nearby alley. Akabane jumped, as he had not been paying attention to his surroundings as he had been waxing poetic about doing so. "LEATHER IS MURDER!" she screamed, throwing a bucket of red paint in his face.
He let out a cry of surprise, reaching up to try and get the paint out of his eyes. "When I can see again, the next red liquid to run in the streets will not be paint," he muttered angrily to himself, spitting up paint as he staggered, trying to find something to wipe his eyes on. So disoriented was he from the sudden experience, that he stepped backwards and fell right through the open manhole cover.
"Do you hear an ambulance siren?" Ginji asked, sitting on the street corner as they waited for Shido to return with Mozart.
"I do," Himiko commented. "I wonder what's going on."
"I'm bored, let's go find out," Ban said, standing up and stretching.
"Ban, don't. It isn't nice to stare at people in times of crisis," Himiko argued, but found herself following the others to check out the source of the siren anyway. Madoka clung to Ginji's arm for guidance.
They arrived at the scene just in time to see poor paint-splattered Akabane being loaded onto a stretcher. Ginji stepped forward, big brown eyes wider than usual in alarm. "Akabane-san, what happened to you?" Ginji asked.
Akabane winced slightly as the medic worked on stabilizing his obviously broken arm. "Ginji-kun, I believe…" he muttered before passing out from the pain killers they'd pumped into his system.
"Guy fell down an open manhole cover," the medic commented, pulling a blanket over Akabane. "Can you believe it? It's like something out a cartoon."
As the ambulance pulled away, Ginji turned to Ban. "That… that doesn't sound like Akabane-san," Ginji whimpered. "He wouldn't have just fallen into an open manhole cover."
Himiko was shaking where she stood. "Now do you believe, Ban?" she asked. "I hope Shido didn't catch that animal. I want it as far away from me as possible!"
"Speaking of Shido, we should go back and wait for him," Madoka insisted, tugging on Ginji's sleeve.
The group returned to the corner to find a bloody and bruised Shido lying in the street, with Mozart doing something… very interesting… to his back. Himiko turned green, Ginji turned red, and Ban turned white. "Shido-kun, what is Mozart doing?" Ginji asked in horror.
"I chased him into a dog show," Shido moaned. "A dog breeding show, to be specific. I managed to catch him only after he dragged me into a table displaying a new hormone treatment to encourage breeding. A new treatment designed for use on female dogs," Shido moaned as Ginji helped him stand. At that point, Mozart enthusiastically began clinging to Shido's leg.
"Let's… let's get you home and cleaned up," Ginji said as Ban helped drag Mozart away from Shido. It took his entire 200 kg grip to pull the very happy dog away.
Right then, Hevn appeared from the other side of the street. "What are all of you doing here?" she asked.
The group froze in place. In Hevn's arms, meowing happily, was a far too familiar ball of black fur. "What's wrong?" Hevn asked. "Isn't it cute? It came right up to me while I was eating at an outdoor café and rubbed against my leg…"
She looked up to realize the entire group she'd been talking too was quickly running away from her, Ginji carrying Shido on his back while Mozart enthusiastically chased them and Ban carrying Madoka on his back. The last she heard of them was a fading scream of "Get it away from us!"
Hevn looked down at herself. "Did I step in something smelly?" she wondered, checking her shoes. She looked down at the adorable green eyes of the cat. "Do you know what's wrong with them?"
"Meow?" the cat asked.
Hevn hugged it tighter. "You're so cute. I wish I knew what had gotten into those guys…"
The cat suddenly scratched her hand, hard. She let out a cry and dropped it. "Why you little-" she cried, chasing after the cat. It meowed and took off, escaping before she even got close to it.
Hevn looked down at her cut and bleeding hand. "Damn it," she muttered, looking around for a fountain. "I have to clean this."
In a moment, however, a hunky man walked past her. As he passed, something tumbled out of his pocket. Hevn looked down. "Hey, you dropped your wallet!" she called, picking it up and waving it. As she did, she noticed what it was full of large bills.
"Oh, thanks! Such honesty!" he said with a smile. "Especially in a pretty girl. Would you like to have dinner with me?"
Hevn smiled. Yatta, she thought. What a lucky night! With that, she followed him, forgetting entirely about washing her cut.
Later that night, at the Honky Tonk, Ban got off the phone. "Hevn is in the hospital. She had a severe allergic reaction to something that got under her skin from a cat scratch."
The others in the room shuddered in unison. From left to right, there was Natsumi with an arm covered in stitches. Next to her was Paul, who was the only healthy one in the group. Next to Paul was Himiko, fuming because she'd just found photographs of herself labeled "Girls in Tokyo go wild" on a dirty webpage. Next to Himiko sat Madoka, still bruised from her earlier experiences, and a freshly washed Shido, similarly bruised in both body and pride from his earlier experiences. Next to Shido sat Akabane, his arm in a brightly colored sling. Next to Akabane stood a bandaged Ban, protecting a trembling and frightened Ginji from Akabane.
"What a sorry lot you guys are," Paul commented, serving them all cups of pity tea.
"I never want to see that cat again," Himiko grunted.
"I feel bad knowing it's out there, though. Who knows who it is cursing now…?" Ginji sighed. He looked around. "The only person the cat hasn't destroyed today that isn't here is Kazu-chan."
Right at that moment, a bandaged Kazuki was walking beside Juubei. "Thanks for walking with me to the Honky Tonk," he smiled weakly. "I want to ask Ginji what he was saying. It looked like it was really important."
"You know I will always be here when you need me," Juubei commented, then suddenly turned and walked very quickly away. "Except when I have to use the toilet. Where is the nearest one?"
Kazuki laughed slightly. "There's one the public can use in this restaurant," he said, guiding Juubei. Right as they were about to step inside, a little black cat shot in front of them and vanished into an alley. "Huh? I could have sworn I saw that cat earlier…"
Kazuki pointed Juubei towards the bathrooms, then stood and waited. A moment later, he heard screams an Juubei was violently ejected into the hallway, his back slamming against a wall. "Juubei!" he cried, running to his partner.
"PERVERT!" a woman shouted, running out of a door and hitting poor Juubei on the head with a purse. Kazuki looked up at the door.
"Juubei, you misread the Braille! That was the women's room!" Wait, hadn't Ginji shouted something sounding like 'don't let the cat cross your path,' earlier? Kazuki frowned. "We had better go to the Honky Tonk and figure out what's going on."
Thus, shortly, everyone whose day the cat had ruined was assembled at the Honky Tonk, drowning their woes over coffee. "I really, REALLY, never want to see that cat again," Himiko had insisted enthusiastically when the bandaged Kazuki and bruised Juubei had arrived and shared their tale of terror.
Right then, the door opened with the sound of a boom. The group jumped, staring in horror. There, right in the doorway, stood the black kitten. A massive scream went up, and even the most feared transporters fled to the other end of the Honky Tonk from it.
A second later, Emishi walked in behind the kitten. "Muffin!" he cried, picking up the kitten and snuggling it.
"Muffin?" the terrified group asked in confusion.
"My kitten. She got out when I was leaving this morning. I thought I'd never see her again. Imagine finding her at the… Honky… Tonk," Emishi said, his voice slowing as he looked at the group. They had suddenly all turned into black silhouettes, behind which the thousand fires of hell burned.
"That cat… belongs… to you?" Ban asked, his voice sounding more like a snake hiss than ever.
Emishi clung tightly to his kitten, trembling slightly in fear. "Yes?"
Still later that night, Emishi hung from a flag pole by nothing but his underwear. His little black cat sat on his head. "What did I do, Muffin?" he asked, tears in his eyes.
"Meow?" Muffin asked.
(A tip of the hat to Cyndy1, for Shido's bad luck.)
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