Warnings: None
Lucky Child
Chapter 83:
"The Eel's Eye Wharf Pleasure Cruises & Private Parties"
As my fist collided with the bag's smooth leather surface, the chain above it rattled; Minato made a face, blue eyes narrowing in consternation with every blow. I ignored him even when one of my swings went wide and veered dangerously close to his hand. "Easy," he muttered, and I corralled my stance and tried to slow my erratic breathing.
Kagome, a few yards away, was doing stretches with some of Hideki's other students. She flipped up onto her hands with a giggle and walked on them in a circle, coaxing a laugh from the milling crowd of maybe eight young fighters. More students had joined Hideki's class as of late, the warehouse dojo livelier than ever.
I ignored them as best I could. I threw another punch. Minato made another face.
"So you leave tomorrow," Minato said.
I tore my eyes from Kagome and swung my hand at the punching bag before spinning into a low kick. "That's right," I grunted as my knee struck the bag's heavy center.
Minato rocked a little in place, absorbing my strike and holding the bag steady. "What time?"
"Night." Another kick. A feint. A punch. "Botan says the boats only leave at night."
"I see."
Movement flickered in my periphery. "Man, I sure am glad she knew how to get you to—um. To where you're going, that's for sure," said Kagome as she walked up. She carefully avoiding naming the place outright, eyes flickering warily toward our classmates.
"Well…" I hesitated; it was best not to get into the particulars with so many uninitiated ears about. I breathed deeply and just smiled, lobbing my fist at the punching bag again. "Me, too."
"I'm gonna miss you, though." She moved to stand over Minato's shoulder, arms crossed and smile rakish. "And so will Minato."
But Minato's eyebrow merely rose. "She'll only be gone a week, Kagome."
"Yeah, a whole entire week! And it's spring break!" Kagome protested. "Think of all the waterparks we could be hitting up!" Her eyes rolled. "But no-oh. You gotta go to the Tournament, dontcha, Eeyore. Bah!"
I grinned. "You could always stow away in my suitcase, if you think you'll miss me that much."
"Sorry, girl. I only fly first class."
Minato ignored our antics, pinning me in place with a hard stare. "You'll be careful, of course."
"Oh. Natch." My swing went wide again, a trickle of sweat sluicing down my temple. "But I'll be honest. It'll be tough without you both." I delivered a flurry of punches before backing off, hands hanging limp at my sides. "I'd've gone crazy these past few weeks without our get-togethers to see me through."
The pair of them smiled, each a bit ruefully (though Minato hid his emotions better than Kagome, mostly because the latter didn't bother to hide hers at all). They knew they had kept me sane these past few weeks, and that without them, I'd be a raving ball of manic worry. Yusuke's accusations, the letter, the conspicuous absence of any phone calls berating me for hiding the truth—I'd been in knots over it, and they had been the ones to hold my hand and make sure I didn't chew off my fingernails during that long wait.
That's why they had met me at my house and walked me to aikido practice, after all.
The boys had left that morning, and both of them knew my anxiety would have reached critical mass in the hours that followed.
I went through the motions of the night's lessons with half a heart, I confess. When I wasn't on the mat myself to demonstrate to the newbies some of Hideki's lessons, I watched Minato and Kagome with what was probably unsettling intensity—though I wasn't trying to be a creeper, I swear. I watched them and appreciated them and memorized their faces as they sparred and joked and socialized, committing to memory the friends I wouldn't see for at least a week. Something told me the memory of their faces would keep me afloat during the Tournament. Sure, I could always call them to vent (depending on the phone situation and the absence of eavesdroppers), but…
But what if I didn't make it home again?
No. Stop it. Don't be dramatic, girl. It was preposterous to think I'd get myself killed at the Tournament. Of course I'd make it home again.
Unless a demon murdered me or I fucked up and got myself killed or was trampled when the stadium started to collapse—
"Stop that," I muttered to myself, and I pinched my own thigh tightly between my fingers. Kagome would tell me to stop being so fatalistic. Minato would tell me to ignore the voices in my head and carry on. So that's what I'd do, I told myself. The memory of them would keep me sane in the week to come, so I might as well start listening to their advice now.
Might as well do that, and might as well savor every last second of the night's activities while I still could.
I pushed the worries to the back of my head and tried not to let my mind wander. It was tough, but I succeeded, and in doing so the lesson passed much quicker than I would've liked. Soon Hideki was telling us to gather our things, saying that he'd see us next week, and calling out the problems with our forms and stances he'd observed as we fought. Kagome rolled her eyes at his criticisms of her ("Stop giggling so much, dammit!") as we wiped the sweat off our faces and grabbed our bags from the pile in the corner, and when he called my name, I braced myself for the worst.
But the worst never came. He just called me name again, and when I turned to face him, he gestured for me to follow him across the warehouse.
It was never any use arguing with Hideki-sensei, so I didn't waste my energy and try. I just dogged his steps as he led the way to the cluster of broken and cracked practice dummies in the corner near the warehouse's main door. I gulped a bit when I realized that was where he wanted to go; it was where he always took me, or any of his students, when he wanted to say a word to them in private. So either my form tonight had been especially bad and he didn't want to embarrass me and berate me in public, or…
I honestly wasn't sure, so I kept it casual and grinned when we came to a stop on the center of the cluster of dummies. "Sup, sensei?" I said.
He spared no time for pleasantries. "I have a message from a certain mutual friend of ours."
"Cutting to the chase. I like it." We only had one friend in common, so I didn't bother asking for her name. "What'd she have to say?"
His glare was as hard as flint and nearly the same color. "That if she doesn't see you at a certain Tournament, it was nice knowing you."
I stared at him.
He stared at me.
I swallowed. "That's… Um."
"Morbid?" Hideki shrugged. "Given where she's headed, I'm not surprised she'd call for a goodbye—even one as terse as that."
And he was right, of course. That kind of farewell was very much Genkai's style and her destination was indeed perilous… but it was even more perilous that Hideki assumed, and not because she was headed to the Dark Tournament itself. It was Toguro, not the Tournament, who presented Genkai the truer danger—but also, hey. Wait a second. Hideki knew about the Tournament?
I suppose the question showed on my face, because he nodded, a lock of greying hair falling onto his swarthy forehead. "Never seen the fights, myself. But I keep my ear to the ground." A brittle smile crossed his mouth, teeth bared and gleaming. "The rumor mill churns, even among stoic martial artists."
"I'll bet." It didn't escape my notice that he, too, avoided naming the Tournament outright. "Well. Thank you."
But he didn't turn to leave, nor did he wave me off like he normally would. He just stared, slouched with hands deep in his pockets, waiting until I started to fidget before speaking. "Yukimura."
I fidgeted some more. "Hmm?"
Another long stare—and then his lips gave the barest of quirks. "She also made sure to mention she has every intention of seeing you at the fights—mostly because you're a nosey brat if she's ever seen one, and she doesn't think you'll have the self-control to stay out of the fray for long." He held up his hands when my mouth fell open. "Her words, not mine."
It was all I could do to sputter an incensed, "I'll bet they were."
Hideki gave a dry chuckle, but he sobered quickly. "You gonna disappoint her?" he said, eyeing me over critically.
There was something in his look that gave me pause. My feet squared and my shoulders straightened on reflex. "You gonna try and stop me if I say no?" I said, eye contact bold and challenging.
We found ourselves in another staring match, at that point. It lasted a good, long time, moment bleeding into moment until it felt like a few minutes had passed—and judging by the way my unblinking eyes burned, I'm guessing the elongated time-sense wasn't entirely inaccurate. But soon Hideki harrumphed, and turned from me, and took a few brisk steps away into the dark.
I thought I'd won the staring contest (and the right to go to the dangerous Tournament without a lecture about my safety) but he returned from the dark just as quickly as he'd entered it. Upon his return he carried a big box in his hands, a plastic storage container with a clasp on the lid; this he set at my feet and opened without a word. I didn't have time to glance at its contents before he lifted something out of it and passed it my way. I took the object on reflex, staring at it with jaw slack as Hideki rummaged in the crate for something else.
He'd handed me a bandolier of throwing knives—a match for the one he'd gifted me months previous.
I started to thank him, but he shook his head before I could push the words free. He handed me another object (a roll of more knives) and then another (a shoulder holster with, you guessed it, more knives), and when once again I tried to speak, he shook his head again. I slung the belts and holsters over my shoulder as he handed me a jointed bo staff, and then a garrote, and then a set of brass knuckles I was pretty sure were illegal in Japan. Following that came yet another belt of backup knives and a pair of goddamn nun chucks I had no earthly clue how to wield, but Hideki didn't seem to care. He just survey me up and down—my hands precariously full of weapons, shoulders draped in armaments—before nodding once, motion as sharp as the blades in my grip.
"Uh," I said as he stood up. "Thank you?"
He didn't waste time on a 'you're welcome.' "Don't get killed," was all he said, and then his eyes glittered. "Oh. And take photos, would ya?" Another small smile, crooked and impish. "Always have wanted to see that contest for myself."
I saluted, nearly dropping the nun chucks in the process. "Roger that, sensei."
He harrumphed yet again, bending to grab the weapon cache off the ground and return it to its hiding place in the shadows. I pivoted on my heel to go, walking with care because I could feel the brass knuckles slipping through my sweating hands as I walked out of the crowd of practice dummies and back toward my friends—
Something collided with my shoulder. I staggered back with a small cry, startled, but it was only Ezakiya standing at the edge of the knot of dummies, hands outstretched as he caught one of the brass knuckles when it fell from my grasp. "Sorry, Eza," I said as I tried to heft the weapons higher in my arms. "Didn't see you there."
He gently placed the weapon atop the others with a small smile, brown eyes large and reticent. "Oh. Yeah. I suppose you didn't." He craned his neck to the side, looking around me and into the shadows beyond. "Sensei, do you have a minute?"
Hideki didn't reply. Eza frowned and walked around me, heading into the dummy-crowd with another call of our teacher's name—and since their business did not belong to me, I left them behind and headed back toward my friends.
It was time to savor their company for one last night, before we were separated and I was forced to run the full gauntlet of fate on Hanging Neck Island.
And let me tell you, we made the most of it. We got dinner, and ice cream afterward, and when we had our fill of food and laughs, we went back to my place. Minato and Kagome helped me pack for the week ahead, Kagome handling my wardrobe while Minato (who had very specific ideas about how to pack weaponry) handled the sordid and sundry rest. Most nights I wouldn't have enjoyed them micromanaging my suitcase like this, but that night, I was just grateful for their company. Every time I delved into my suitcase in the coming week, I would see a little bit of them in the folds of my shirts and the secretive placement of weapons throughout my bag.
When it came to comfort in the face of potential dismemberment and death, I'd take whatever little things I could get.
Ayame's deep eyes swept over the breadth of my report like a spill of ink, liquid and dark. For a moment she did not speak. When she did finally deign to talk, her eyes didn't lift from the folder of papers in her hands. "You'll be bored this week," she murmured.
Standing across the clearing from her, I frowned and shifted from foot to foot. "Hmm?"
"Without the Detective. I imagine you won't have much to do in his absence." She closed the folder of my reports with a snap and tucked it beneath her arm, eyes now sweeping critically over me, instead. "Well. Allow me to amend that statement, as you've been without the Detective for some time. What I mean is, the others are gone now, too. Without all of them to occupy your time in the coming week…"
She trailed off in that way people trail off when they knew you knew exactly what it was they weren't saying—that meaningful, slow lapse into silence (accompanied by sustained eye contact) that said as much as it withheld. I rubbed my upper lip with a finger and sniffed, teeth clenching together tight. I'd met with Ayame many times since Yusuke left, our usual meetings not stopping even with the threat of the Tournament looming. No rest for the weary, even in times of crisis. How very governmental of Spirit World to keep sending her to collect my reports, thin as they'd become in the absence of Yusuke and his cases as Spirit Detective. And now that all the boys had left to attend the Tournament, that report in her hand was quite slender indeed.
When Ayame didn't say anything else, just looked at me expectantly, I shrugged. "Nah. Them being gone'll be like a vacation, as far as I'm concerned."
"Indeed." A smile ghosted across her red mouth. "Perhaps I should let you take off our weekly meeting, in that case." She rapped the folder with the back of her hand. "You won't have much to report, parted from them as you'll be."
"That's true."
She studied me a moment, eyes going hooded and even darker for that shade. "So you'd like the time off?" she asked, voice characteristically delicate.
"Well. Yeah?" I shifted from foot to foot again and this time rubbed at the back of my sweating neck. Springtime sun beat down from above, sun unobscured by cloud. "Of course I would. Getting up this damn early on a Saturday isn't my idea of a good time…"
Ayame studied me another moment—and then her chin ducked, a light, pretty chuckle building in her throat. "And to think," she said with the smallest of smiles, "I assumed you'd try to follow them into the mouth of the lion's den. You've surprised me, Keiko."
My heart jumped when she said that, of course, not to mention when she trained her depthless eyes on my face once more—and this time something new edged her gaze, a razor blade of intention that belied her casual smile. She watched me without blinking as I forced a smile of my own. As always, I needed to be very careful regarding my reaction here. A traditional Japanese beauty Ayame most certainly was, but imperceptive? Don't make me laugh.
I kept it neutral and opted for a joke. "Gotta keep you on your toes, I guess," I said. And as for my reply, well. Less is more. Deny too much and I'd look guilty as hell.
And Ayame seemed to buy my dispassion. "I suppose you do," she said, voice thoughtful and mild. She tucked the reports under her arm again and bowed; when she rose again, her smile was warm. "I see no reason to extend this meeting, I believe you'll be relieved to hear. Enjoy your holiday. On behalf of Spirit World, I grant you a week's vacation time."
I grinned back and turned to leave. "Thanks." I lifted a hand. "See ya round, Ayame."
She hummed, noncommittal but affirming, as I walked through the clearing's tall grass toward the edge of the forest—but just as I lifted a hand and placed it on the bark of the nearest tree, preparing to wade through the brush, her voice called out to me over the springtime wind.
"Be careful, Keiko," said Ayame, voice as soft as dandelion down. "Please."
I looked at her over my shoulder—and strangely, my heart didn't kick up a fuss at what those words implied. It beat on at its stolid pace as usual, even when my eye met hers and I saw that the pretense had vanished from her face. Worry clouded her vision, cast thin lines over her powdered brow, made a thin line of her normally voluptuous mouth. It wasn't like her to be so raw.
What that said about her thoughts on this dire situation, I didn't quite want to think about.
So, I didn't. I just gave her a deep nod of farewell, and I forced a smile, and I hoped that those things would be enough for ease her troubled mind before I let myself vanish into the woods beyond the clearing.
Shizuru picked me up from my house late that afternoon, as we'd arranged ahead of time. I had packed a duffle and a backpack, and I wore my hiking boots and a flannel shirt to really sell my alibi to my parents. Shizuru, however, made no such efforts, wearing her normal tailored menswear and shined dress shoes as was her custom. Dad lifted a brow at that when she appeared at our back door bearing a duffle of her own, scanning her from bottom to top once and then twice over.
"You're gonna go hiking in that?" he asked.
"What can I say?" Shizuru tossed her hair. "These clothes just suit me. Ready?"
She's said that last part to me specifically, and in response I hefted my bag a little higher. "Yeah. I am."
"Now, you be careful, dear." Mom came out from behind Dad and clasped my shoulders. "It's odd that you're leaving so late in the day, but I guess since the goal is good stargazing, it can't be helped. Call us if you need anything and we'll come get you."
"All right, Mom."
"Thank you for agreeing to chaperone the camping trip, Shizuru." Dad elbowed her arm with a conspiratorial smile and whispered, "Let me know if you need a break from the brats though, eh?"
"Heh." Her mouth curled. "Now you're speaking my language."
"And tell your father hello from us next time you see him," Mom told her.
"Will do." She gave them a nod and turned on her heel, marching smartly off down the length of the alley. "C'mon, Keiko. Train'll leave soon."
"Right!" I gave my parents each a swift hug before trotting after Shizuru. "Bye Mom! Bye Dad!"
Mom waved her hand back and forth over her head like she was directing air traffic. "Be careful, honey!"
"We'll miss you!" Dad added, and then I rounded the corner of the restaurant and lost sight of them completely.
I tried not to let it show on my face that the thought of never seeing them again had crossed my mind as they vanished. I fear I did a bad job—but Shizuru still had her back to me, walking a few feet ahead down the sidewalk, and she didn't see me wipe at my swelling eyes. In fact, she didn't turn to look at me until we were several blocks away. She pulled a cigarette from her pocket and lit up, exhaling a plume of grey smoke into the afternoon air. "They bought it hook, like, and sinker, huh?" she said. "That bullshit about a camping trip in the mountains for spring break?"
I gave a grim smile as I fell into step beside her. "Years of being a good girl finally paid off."
"Seems that way." She looked at me askance. "You remember the address? I can dig it out of my bag if…"
"Nah. I remember."
I'd burned the spot, and the route to get to it, into my brain over the past few days, committing every turn to memory so we wouldn't risk getting lost. We walked through the city streets on sure feet as we made our way to the train station, and then onto a certain train line, which we rode out of Sarayashiki and into Tokyo without saying much. A few line changes followed, diverting us around the heart of Tokyo and then southeast down the line to Yokohama and the coast. We rode mostly in silence—but just as we passed the Tokyo Aquarium, its light visible from the window we stood near, her voice murmured close to my ear.
"Calm down," she said. "It'll be fine."
I shook myself. "I'm calm, I'm calm."
She snorted. "Calm, my ass. You're about to gnaw your own lip off."
And so I was. My lower lip burned, chapped from chewing and the dry air of the train car. I kept my eyes locked on my reflection in the window and tried not to fidget (or start babbling out of nerves) as we neared our stop. Eventually we disembarked at a station located in the middle of an industrial district full of warehouses and dingy office buildings. The scent of cool, salted air greeted us the minute we stepped onto the station's platform; the scent grew stronger as we walked down the street, past gutted old shopping centers and boarded-up businesses. The address Botan had given us was through here, through this dingy bit of Yokohama, the smell of lingering garbage, rotting fish and motor oil not quite drowned out by the scent of the nearby sea. I hated cigarette smoke most days, but Shizuru's bad habit at least helped dull the scent a little, and I stuck close to her elbow as we reached the coast.
There on the coast of Tokyo Bay lay a network of warehouses and docks, crumbling and rusted and partially abandoned for the newer sections of developed coastline to the north. The border between land and sea had been shored up in a series of concrete walls, a tangle of piers and jetties jutting off the barrier and into the dark, choppy water beyond like a basket of spilled yarn. Some of the docks crumbled away into the sea, falling to pieces in disrepair. Boats with dingy, patchwork hulls bobbed on the waves; only some of them looked seaworthy, I noticed, but lights burned in a few of their round portholes like perhaps vagrants had taken up residence inside. As we looked north and south down the line of the coast, standing near the metal railing that kept us from a stark drop into black water, I reminded myself to watch my step. I had no idea what lurked in the water below, and even though my past-life phobia of dark water hadn't followed me into this life with its former intensity, the thought of a shark brushing against my thigh as I fell into cold, deep saltwater—
Shizuru made a sound of warning in her throat (and a good thing, too, because that horrifying mental image of teeth sinking into flesh and water rushing into screaming lungs had grabbed hold of me tight). Yanked from my dire daydream, I looked at her in time to see her nod south down the length of the seawall.
Three men, old as my father but with smiles far more predatory, eyed us from the mouth of a dilapidated old fishery.
My heart jumped into my throat. Shizuru, however, did not appear perturbed. She stalked away and muttered at me to follow, and when we came abreast of the men, she delivered unto them the single coldest and sharpest glare I'd ever seen grace a human face.
At her look the men blanched, turned, and vanished into the depths of the fishery in comically timed unison.
Shizuru and I walked down the length of the seawall for a time after that, passing piles of empty shipping crates, barrels of collected rainwater, a small mountain of torn fishing net, and a pile of gutted fish carcasses and bones that stank too much for Shizuru to mask with her smoking. We edged past that with hands over our mouths and noses until the seawall came to an end, dropping off sharply into the brine without so much as a warning sign. There was no rail there, either, and the concrete was slick with the spray of the nearby waves. I held back from the edge as we came to a stop, heart beating a little faster as the waves picked up and came close to the top of the wall itself.
Shizuru flicked her cigarette butt toward the water. Twilight had fallen during our travels, the butt a thin red ember streaking through the gloom before it vanished into the quenching waves. Even the sunset looked muted on this dock, casting only the vaguest of pink streaks across the sooty clouds above. "This the place?" she said as she reached into her pocket for another cigarette.
Distracted as I'd been by the reeking fish and the leering men and the threat of cold, dark water, I had to take a minute and look around to be sure. Hanging like an afterthought off the edge of the seawall not too far from us was a small, rickety pier made of rotted wood; over the entrance to the pier stood a rudimentary arch, comprising two metal poles with a wooden board connecting them at the top. "The Eel's Eye Wharf" a sign hanging from that horizontal slat proclaimed in peeling letters. Beyond that archway at the end of the precarious pier stood a wooden hut that had been painted white, once, but now looked the same color as the smoky clouds overhead. An old tugboat had been moored alongside the shack, smokestack lacquered an oddly vivid purple amidst the rest of the gloom. A few people loitered near the hut, standing around what looked like a barrel, maybe. Tough to tell from a distance what they were up to, though.
"Yeah. We're here." I lifted a finger toward the sign. "That's what Botan called the place, anyway."
Shizuru eyed the hut, the sign, the people loitering in the distance. "So what now?"
"We wait, I think." I looked around, but no handy benches or places to sit availed themselves. We stood in the weak yellow illumination cast by a single floodlight on a pole beside the pier; there was little else to speak. "Botan said she'd be here—"
"Keiko! Shizuru!"
We both turned to find Botan jogging toward us down the seawall from the north, one arm waving frantically above her head. I called a greeting as she skidded to a halt in front of us, heels sliding perilously across the slick pavement. Shizuru's brow lifted as Botan bent at the waist and braced her hands on her knees, breathing hard like she'd been running for quite some time. Blue hair matted to her forehead with sweat, actually. Maybe she had been running a bit, after all.
"Hey, Botan," Shizuru said. "Where's the fire?"
Botan straightened with a gasp and cast a look over her shoulder. "Oh, it's behind me!" She danced from foot to foot and wrung her hands, face pulled taut with worry. "I'm so very sorry, girls, but I couldn't help it and she heard everything and she insisted she should come along and you know how she gets, I couldn't stop her so you really can't blame me, and—"
"Slow the hell down," Shizuru said. "Who insisted she should come along?"
"That'd be me," said a voice. "Hello, ladies."
We had gathered near a small collection of buildings, like some old fishing businesses and the wharf's leasing office, all now empty and disused. In the shadows between two of the buildings I saw movement, but as I clenched my fists and moved into a defensive stance, Botan heaved a wordless groan of frustration. I shot her a look, but I needn't have. A moment later the shadows moved again, and then from between the buildings appeared a figure I knew very well indeed. She grinned as she strolled into the light, her mouth curled in a rakish grin. On reflex I put my fingers to my temples, closing my eyes with a long sigh.
"Hi, Atsuko," I said. "What brings you here?"
I opened my eyes when I heard her feet move across the pavement. She stood with hip cocked, arms crossed defiantly across her chest. "What, you really think I'm gonna let my precious son run off to fight in some demon-infested Tournament without his mother to cheer him on?" she said with a toss of her long black hair. Her grin widened, arms uncrossing so she could punch one hand into the other with a smack. "My baby boy's gonna kick demon ass, and you can bet your ass I'll be watching every second!"
Shizuru rounded on Botan and gave her a stare that promised utter annihilation, looking more like a grim reaper than Botan ever had (barring that one time during the Saint Beast incident, but that's not the point). Botan hung her head and muttered something about how she tried to warn us, but Shizuru was having none of it. With another glare she growled, "You mean told Atsuko about—?"
"Nah. You all told me," Atsuko cut in. "That night you came by to organize the Girl Squad? Yeah, totally wasn't asleep." She chortled as I face-palmed. "I can fake-snore so good, I deserve an Emmy."
Shizuru's glare abated, a look of dry resignation taking its place. "So it would seem," she muttered after a long, slow drag on her cigarette.
Botan starting hopping from foot to foot again. "Oh, I told her it was a bad idea to come along, but she just wouldn't listen! She's been lying low and hiding that she knew everything for weeks now, because she knew we'd try to leave without her if she said something and tipped us off! But last night she saw me packing my bags and then this morning she was sitting in front of the front door, blocking my way out!"
"And good thing, too, because this little devil was trying to sneak away!" Atsuko said with another loud laugh. "But nobody gets the jump on ol' Atsuko, that's for sure."
Botan groaned. "Atsuko, please…"
"Listen, Atsuko." Shizuru tossed her cigarette (burned down to the filter since she'd been puffing on it in the last two minutes) into the water with a grimace. "I get you wanna cheer on Yusuke. But this Tournament is dangerous, and—"
"Let her come," I said.
Shizuru stopped talking. She and Botan both rounded on me, mouths parted in shock. I just shrugged, though, as Atsuko looked on with a frown.
"I'm a regular human. So's she," I said. "So if you're gonna tell her it's too dangerous for her to come along, you should be telling me the same thing." I shrugged again, giving them a rakish smile of my own. "And anyway, Atsuko will just pitch a fit and steal a boat and chase after us if we leave her behind. Best avoid a grand theft marina charge, eh?"
Atsuko threw her head back and laughed. "Damn straight, that's what I'd do!"
Botan did not look convinced, however. "But, Keiko…"
I shook my head. "We're already here. No sense turning back now."
Botan bit her lip, expression uncertain. She tried to look at Shizuru for backup, but Shizuru just shook her head and sighed before lighting up again. Botan sighed, too, defeat evident in every last line of her face. In Atsuko's face, however, there was only triumph. She marched up and clapped me on the back, grinning so hard her eyes turned to thin crescents in her face.
"Keiko, you're a pal," she said. "I knew you'd have my back!"
I smiled and shrugged. She gave me too much credit. Atsuko had gone to the Tournament in the YYH manga, so there was canon precedence for her presence in this timeline—which meant I didn't feel unduly worried that she would be joining us this time around. It was canon; where was the problem? And to be completely honest, I was far more worried about bringing Shizuru to the Tournament, but now was not the time to dwell upon the reasons why.
"Yup, you're definitely my best girl," Atsuko was saying. She flexed, familial resemblance to Yusuke never more apparent than when she kissed her own bicep. "Now let's get this Girl Squad show on the road and kick some slimy, smelly demon ass!"
Right on cue, a shadow fell across us, and a gravelly voice groused: "Who you callin' smelly, you pitiful human wench?"
I think everyone in our little band gave a small scream of surprise (except for Shizuru, who grunted in alarm) before wheeling around to face the enormous, hulking figure that had emerged from the shadows of the abandoned leasing office. He stood only a few feet away from us, and this proximity made him appear even larger than he already was—and let me tell you, he was fucking gargantuan. Well over six feet, maybe even pushing seven, he wore a threadbare shirt and a pair of holey jeans, shoes tattered with laces untied, milky skin almost luminescent in the flickering floodlight above. He was bald and had a neck like the trunk of a tree, one that blended nearly seamlessly with his jawline. It gave him the look of a muscular seal that had traded its tail for thick legs and its flippers for biceps like hams.
The man also had glittering black eyes set under a hooded brow and on either side of a squashed, misshapen nose. These eyes swept over us without blinking, and then he sneered and gave a short, hard laugh like the bark of a displeased dog. Botan shrank back, nearly curling herself around my elbow as she slipped her hand in mine. Atsuko and Shizuru, meanwhile, stepped in front of us with a click of shoe against concrete, the pair of them staring the man down like bullfighters in the face of a charging steer.
The man laughed again, but he did not smile. "Well, well, well. So the humans have teeth as well as insults. I'd take offense if I wasn't in such a good mood." He leered at us one by one. "Now get outta my way. I've got a ticket to purchase."
And with that, he shouldered through our group and kept walking, passing beneath the Warf's signage and onto the decaying dock beyond. We watched him walk away in silence; his footsteps made little sound, like he weighed less than someone of that size in all fairness should. And what was it he'd called us two separate times?
It wasn't hard to pick up the pieces and fit them together. I looked at Shizuru and muttered, "Was that man a…?"
"A demon." She dropped her cigarette and ground the butt beneath her heel. Yeah."
"Really?" Atsuko looked as surprised as she sounded. "He looked human t' me."
"Botan and I can see things you normal humans can't," Shizuru said. "Like the horns sprouting out of that guy's misshapen skull, for instance."
Botan shuddered. "Not to mention the teeth. And his aura, it was absolutely foul!"
Atsuko looked after the man with wide eyes. "Maybe we should have a code word or something?" she said. "Like, you say 'swordfish' and that means whoever we're looking at is somebody to watch out for?"
Shizuru harrumphed, but she admitted, "Not a bad idea."
"See?" Atsuko's chest puffed out. "I'm paying my way along already."
"He mentioned tickets," I said.
Botan perked up at that. "Yes, he did!" she said. She ushered us to come closer and waved her hands through the air, gesticulating with every enthusiastic word. "Now, as you all know—well, maybe not you, Atsuko, so let me sum up. Over the past weeks I've been hunting for a way to reach Hanging Neck Island, the site of the Tournament. Normally only demons can make it there through small portals they set up between Human and Demon World, but there are some demons who've already made it here to Human World and are lurking among human populations. They're low-level, the type Yusuke sometimes has to hunt, but anyway. I knew there had to be a way for them to reach Hanging Neck from here, a way that uses mundane methods we could take advantage of—and, ta-dah!" Her hands spread, indicating the wharf at large. "Here we are!"
Atsuko looked impressed. "How'd you manage to track this place down, anyway?"
For a moment, Botan looked awkwardly at the ground—but then her mouth quirked and a devious giggle spilled past her lips. "I knocked more than a few heads and promised more than a few harmless demons my silence in exchange for information, if you must know. They might not know I'm not longer under Spirit World's employ, but that doesn't mean I can't use my old job to my advantage."
Now Shizuru looked impressed. "So threats and extortion, huh?"
Atsuko clapped Botan on the back. "Wow, girl! Didn't know you had it in you!"
"Yeah," I said. "Nice job, Botan."
"Thank you!" She preened and pointed at the boat bobbing next to the shack on the pier. "That boat there will take us to Hanging Neck Island tonight, provided we can get a ticket."
"I mean… that dude said he was going to buy one." I shot the hut a wary look. "So I guess we just walk up to that house, and…?"
Silence followed. Glances were exchanged. Shizuru lit another cigarette.
"Why," I said, "does this seem entirely too easy?"
"Because it probably is." Shizuru took a long drag, stuck the cigarette between her lips, and thrust her hands into her pockets. "Well. If someone is about to spring a trap, there's no sense keeping them waiting. Let's go."
It was not a pleasant thought, that mayhap we were about to walk into some human trafficking situation or whatever other horror you can concoct, but… she was right. Standing around here only delayed the inevitable. We followed her beneath the wharf's signage and onto the pier, which creaked under our weight with every footfall. I skipped over some cracks between boards that were wider even than my feet, keeping careful footing as we approached the shack. The men I'd spotted from afar, the ones gathered around a barrel, looked up as we neared; they had been playing a game involving dice, I was finally able to see. One of them started to say something, mouth full of broken teeth, but Atsuko shot him a look befitting a mafia bruiser and he shut up, fast.
The shack had a sign over the door: "The Eel's Eye Wharf Pleasure Cruises & Private Parties." Shizuru snorted at the name, but she pushed open the rickety wood door beneath it and strode in without even a moment's hesitation. We had no choice but to do the same, bundling inside and standing by the door in a knot, blinking in the dimly lit shack until our eyes adjusted. When mine finally did, I couldn't help but stare. I'd been expecting… well, I don't know what I'd been expecting, but this wasn't it. We stood in a bare room with a bar across from the door, like maybe this had once been some kind of seaside retreat; behind the bar was an open door with a little string of rope stretched across it to keep people out (though what a rope would do against demons I couldn't exactly say). Near the edges of the room sat a few tables and chairs, one of them occupied by the thick-necked man (or demon, I suppose) we'd spoken to at the end of the pier. He snorted when we made eye contact, but he said nothing.
In front of the bar, meanwhile, stood a man we didn't know, and behind it sat another man we also hadn't seen before. The man in front of the bar slid a stack of cash bound in a rubber band across the counter; the man behind the bar took it with a quick lash of his hand, the exchange casual and made without eye contact. Mr. Behind-the-Bar then slid a single rectangle of cardstock across the counter—a ticket, probably, booking passage on the boat outside? One could only assume as such. The buyer certainly seemed to find that bit of paper precious. He stuffed it in the pocket of his coat with nimble fingers before stalking off to one of the nearby tables; he sat at this with his back to the wall, eyeing the room's occupants with open hostility.
The man behind the counter proceeded to do the same. When the ticket-buyer walked away, the man behind the counter finally noticed us. As soon as he caught sight of our group, he frowned in our direction with undisguised disgruntlement, arms crossing over his thin chest as his fingers tapped an irritated rhythm on his bicep. He had a shock of pure white hair over a craggy face the color of an old walnut, one eye milky white, the other a brilliant green visible even in the shadowy shack. A skinny and seemingly frail old man, but his fingers were wiry and long, gnarled and calloused and not to be underestimated. You can tell a lot about a person from their hands, my grandmother used to tell me. His hands spoke volumes indeed.
Botan grabbed my arm. "Well," she whispered in my ear. "Go over there!"
I did a double-take. "Me? Why me?"
"Well, I most certainly don't want to do it!" Botan said.
Atsuko grabbed my other arm. "Yeah, Keiko. Go talk to him!"
"But why me?!"
"Because you're good with people, that's why!"
Shizuru shook her head. "You're all pathetic. I'll go."
Brave Shizuru. Bless her. She strode up to the counter without another word and leaned an elbow on the counter, casual as you please, before reaching into her pocket and offering the ticket-seller a cigarette. He stared at her, wary and not bothering to hide it. She stared at him right back, expressionless and calm, hand steady around the pack of cigarettes—and then he relented, grudgingly accepting the proffered offering with a grunt I think was his version of thanks. Shizuru then held out and flicked the wheel of her lighter, letting him ignite the cigarette from her hand. I stared at this exchange with my mouth open, I will admit, because—wow. Cool. Shizuru was a very, very cool customer, wasn't she?
She was also a tactician, of a sort, because she waited for the man to take a long drag before saying, "Four tickets to Hanging Neck Island, please."
He blew out a plume of smoke. "Wuh-ell now." His eyes swept first over her, and then over us. "What do four little humans like—wait." He paused, eyes narrowing at Botan. "Make that three humans. I'm not sure what she is."
Botan's chin jutted upward. "None of your business, I assure you."
"Humph!" The noise sounded like both a laugh and a grunt at once. He took another drag and exhaled it at Shizuru, smoke billowing into her face. "Well, I ain't giving you tickets no matter what you are."
"And why the hell not?" Atsuko said.
His expression said he thought she was an idiot for even asking. "Cause you'll get yerselves killed, that's why." Another drag, longer than the others. "That place ain't no place for humans, I'll tell you what."
"Funny." Shizuru blew a plume of smoke at him, then. "I wouldn't think a demon would care about the lives of a gaggle of humans."
That earned her a grin, and a view of his very white teeth. "Aye, that's a fair point. But if Spirit World got wind of some humans dyin' because I took 'em somewhere dangerous on my boat, there'd be hell t' pay, and I'm not about t'—" He looked past us as the door creaked open, expression changing to one of familiar ease. "Welcome, friends."
I looked over my shoulder. Four men, looking like typical humans in windbreaks and jeans and t-shirts, had walked through the door. The one in front wore a baseball cap; he tipped this in the direction of the man with the white hair and blind eye, lips curling in a smile.
"Morrie," he said to the man behind the counter.
"Rat," Morrie replied. "Passage for you and your friends?"
"Of course." This man called Rat didn't spare our group even a glance; he just walked past us and slapped money on the counter. "I have money on Team Masho this year."
Morrie took the money and placed four of those cardstock slips on the bar in its place. "May the wind fly in your favor, in that case. We depart in an hour."
Rat nodded. "See you then."
Again, Rat spared us not even a glance; he and his three friends just left. Botan made a frustrated sound in her throat and went to stand with Shizuru at the counter, one hand coming down onto it with a slap.
"Now you listen here, sir!" Botan said. "I am an emissary of Spirit World, and I demand—"
"At least tell us what your price is," Shizuru cut in. "Maybe we can work out a—"
Morrie listened to their attempts at haggling without looking at them, leaning his back against the bar as he enjoyed his cigarette. Rather than watch this (more than likely doomed) exchange, I turned and stared at the shack's door. So that man. Uh. Demon? That guy named Rat, he'd just purchased how many tickets, exactly?
Atsuko's voice spoke softly in my ear. "Say, Keiko," she said. "You clock the number of those jerks?"
"Four of them." I dropped my voice low to add, "And four of us. You thinking what I'm thinking?"
She grinned. "Already there, kid. Follow me."
We left our backpacks and duffle bags quietly at Botan's feet and slipped out the door unnoticed, Botan and Shizuru too deep in conversation with Morrie to pay attention. Rat and his pack of cronies had only just reached the end of the pier as we stepped outside; they slipped into the shadows between the leasing office and a fishing operation center shortly thereafter. Atsuko and I trailed in their wake, and when we reached the mouth of that dark alley, we crouched down and peered around the corner into the depthless shadows. For a minute we saw no one, but then a familiar voice drifted to us through the gloom.
"Rumor has it they're strong," Rat was saying, "but no way are they beating Masho."
Atsuko smirked; she gave me a nod before slipping into the dark of the alley, and I followed using the walk Hideki had shown me once, where your steps fall quiet and your breathing turns slow and only the sharpest of ears can hear you. We stole toward the end of the alley and other corner, crouching low behind a stack of shipping crates draped in broken fishing net. Ahead, sitting on a ring of crates and passing a cigarette between them, were Rat and his small band.
"I dunno, Rat," said one of the others. He took a drag; the embers lit up his face, highlighting the crook of his long nose. "They're saying they took out the Demon Triad, and you know those are some tough customers."
Atsuko didn't react, but I felt my blood run a touch colder at those words. The Triad—Yusuke beat the Triad. So they were talking about—?
But Rat wasn't as impressed by this feat as his companion. He snatched the cigarette in a flurry of red sparks. "Pfft! The Triad ain't nothin' compared to the Shinobi," he said, punctuating each word with a jab of fire. "They're from the depths of Demon World, strong as hell and tough as nails. Not like us scrubs hiding out in Human World." He look a puff and grinned, face lit from below by unsteady and faint fire; even in my mundane eyes, he looked demonic just then. "No, they're powerful, all right. And they're gonna make me rich."
Much though I enjoyed eavesdropping (who knew what else they'd say about Yusuke, the Shinobi, Team Masho?) Atsuko was less interested. She caught my eye and delicately picked a dirty old beer can off the ground. She mimed throwing it; once I understood and gave a nod of confirmation, she chucked the can over the gathered demons' heads and into the shadows behind them. The effect was instantaneous: They bolted to their feet as one and turned, putting their back to us as they squinted into the dark from whence the sound had come. The cigarette dropped from Rat's hand and lay there, smoking and faintly glowing, on the ground.
"The hell was that?" Rat said.
"Who's there?" another called.
Atsuko grinned and bolted forward. "Your worst nightmare, of course!"
Only one of them managed to spin and see us coming, we each moved so fast—and honestly this fight wasn't fair at all and I kind of feel sorry for the poor guys. I swept the nearest's legs out from under him and got him in a choke, cutting off blood flow long enough to send him to a peaceful sleep. Atsuko punched another in the face, dropping him instantly, and then she jumped on a third; while she pummeled him with a series of wild whoops and howls of thrill, I went after Rat. He babbled something about paying us money, whatever we wanted, he was going to be rich soon, and he didn't even try to fight back as I knocked him on his ass with a palm-strike to the gut and then put him in the same hold I'd used on his buddy. Within a few seconds he was off to dreamland. He'd have a killer headache when he woke up next, but Hideki had been careful to show me a few types of chokes that wouldn't leave lasting damage. I wanted to steal this dude's tickets, not kill him, after all.
Atsuko went quiet shortly after I pilfered said tickets from the inside of Rat's coat. She brushed herself off and gave one of the downed demons a kick to the side while grinning; a scratch on her cheek said one had gotten in a good hit, though of course neither could match her rough-and-tumble attitude.
"Wow," I said with a low whistle of appreciation. "Didn't know you could scrap like that, Atsuko."
"Heh." She wiped at the scratch on her cheek, grin growing ever wider. "Who do you think taught Yusuke to throw a punch?" She laughed when I gave her a 'well, yeah, of course' look. "Get the tickets?"
I held them up. "Yeah."
"Can I see them?"
"Sure."
I handed them over. Atsuko beamed and gave them a little kiss before stuffing them into her cleavage. "Now c'mon, Keiko. Better beat it before these dumbasses wake up again."
Confidence colored our gait as we walked back to The Eel's Eye Wharf Pleasure Cruises & Private Parties shack. Atsuko whistled an off-key ditty, unable to keep the grin off her face, and when the men playing with dice by the shack stared at us with brows raised, she tipped an imaginary cap at them. Such a display of bravado scared them back to their game in short order; we went inside unimpeded and found the interior of the shack exactly as we'd left it. Botan and Shizuru were still trying to browbeat Morrie into giving us tickets, but when we walked through the door, Botan rounded on us and put her hands on her hips.
"There you are!" she said, glaring (though she likely didn't mean it and just stressed after dealing with Morrie's stubborn behind). "I was just telling our friend Morrie here—"
Atsuko flipped her hair. "Hang on a sec, doll. I got this."
Botan stopped talking as Atsuko skipped across the room and leaned against the counter. She batted her eyelashes at the confused Morrie, reached into the top of her shirt, and pulled forth a fluttering fistful of tickets. Botan's eyes bugged clean out of her head. So did Morrie's, in fact.
Shizuru, though? She just smirked, and rested and rested her elbow on the bar, watching the proceedings with a glint in her eye.
Atsuko fanned herself with the tickets. "So, Morrie. Where did you say the gangplank was?" she said in a voice like syrup. "Or the boardwalk? Or whatever it is you use to board a boat?" She winked.
"I'm ready to get going, ya see, and I have tickets for me and each of my friends here."
"Atsuko!" Botan sputtered. "Where did you manage to find those?!"
Shizuru chuckled. "So that's where you went, huh? I'd been wondering."
Morrie took a bit longer than them to find his wits, but eventually he managed to shut his gaping mouth and speak, too. "Where the hell did ya get—?" he said, echoing Botan's question, but then he made like Shizuru and figured out the truth, too. His pointed chin ducked close to his chest; he stared at Atsuko for a minute in silence, looking between her, the tickets, and the door to the shack in turns. "Oh, I get it," he eventually grumbled. "Rat and his boys didn't stand a chance against you lot, did they?"
"Seems that way," Shizuru said. She leaned next to Atsuko on the counter, the pair of them staring at Morrie from only a foot away. "You said earlier you'd get in trouble if we got ourselves killed. But I don't see that happening, do you?"
"Yeah! Two little humans took out four demons. And you haven't even seen what trouble these two can cook up, either," Atsuko said, jerking her thumb at Shizuru and Botan. "Four of us together? Now there's a real party."
For a minute Morrie just looked at them, like he couldn't quite believe the sight of the tickets and their devious smiles—but soon he tipped back his head and laughed. Botan and Atsuko exchanged an uncertain glance, but Shizuru kept her eyes steady on him until he went quiet again. "Well, color me convinced," he said when his mirth (but not his smile) dissipated. "No, I ain't the type of demon who cares from which world you hale. If you can hold your own, you can hold your own, and your specie don't matter a lick. That's the way of Demon World, after all. The strong eat, and the weak are meat. And you four ain't no hocks o' ham, that's for sure." He dipped a low, flourishing bow from behind the bar. "For yer most demonic show of spunk, I'm giving you four the first class treatment."
Botan started. "You are?!"
"Indeed I am," Morrie said. Still grinning, still chuckling under his breath, he lifted a hinged portion of the bar away, creating a gap through which we could walk. "Now, you lot. Welcome aboard The Eel's Eye. Head through the door and up the gangway—and remember t' watch yer step, o' course."
Botan (having forgotten her beef with Morrie, apparently) spun an overjoyed pirouette in place and snatched her bag up off the ground. "Wonderful! Well, this seems to have worked itself out quite nicely, I think." She struck a pose and pointed toward the door behind the bar as Morrie took down the rope. "Well, Girl Squad. Onward ho and follow me!"
And so we did, Botan leading our cavalcade past Morrie and through the arch beyond like the grand marshal of a parade. Shizuru went next, and Atsuko went after her, leaving me to bring up the rear. Before I could make it through the doorway and out of the bar, however, Morrie moved to block my way. I stopped walking. He held up a single gnarled finger, both eyes—even the milky blind one—trained hard and unflinching on my face.
"A word o' warnin', girlie," Morrie said. "You'll be in the vast minority on this island, and not all the demons there are as congenial toward humans as myself. Some hate humans on principle, much though the practice rankles. Watch your step in all the ways you can."
"Thanks." It was no small thing, this word of warning he gave me, and I knew it. "You know, for a demon you're pretty nice."
He didn't react. At least, not at first. Soon, though, his lips curled back over his teeth—and suddenly he had too many of them, long and curved and wicked and white, far too big for any human's mouth.
"Aye," Morrie said, "Aye, human. I wouldn't be so sure."
And for a moment I couldn't move—but then he winked, and I got the sense he was just trying to make a joke. I laughed and winked back, gratified to see his teeth return to normal again, and I left the hut to join my friends outside.
We stood on the prow of Morrie's ship not long later, the four of us, our intrepid Girl Squad. We stood on the prow and watched the boat cut the waves, sailing off into the night with the chug and rumble of engines kept out of sight below the deck. Botan looked invigorated. Atsuko, jazzed. Shizuru, cool as usual while she smoked, flicking smoldering butts over the railing and into the darkness rushing past below.
Only once did I look back to the glittering lights of Tokyo, where home and safety waited. Shizuru saw me do it. She glanced at me sidelong and closed her hand around my elbow, leaning close to my ear to say, "You ready, kid?"
I swallowed. The cold salt air blew the hair from my face, drew the moisture from my eyes—but I refused to close them. I stared ahead unflinchingly, hands gripping the railing tight.
"A bit too late to be asking that, I think," I muttered.
And Shizuru replied, "Fair enough."
—and she replied as such because we were already here. Because it was too late to go home again. Because the time for training and second-guessing and questions of preparedness had passed, leaving room for only soldiering on ahead. It was pointless, therefore, to ask each other if we were ready, or to even court the notion of that we might not be as prepared as we might like.
Best not to think about such things. Best not to shed light on such anxious suspicions.
Better, instead, to look ahead, out into that vast and roaring dark, and keep one's head held high.
We had found passage on board The Eel's Eye, after all.
We were on our way, and there could be no turning back.
NOTES
We never see how the girls make it to Hanging Neck Island in the anime/manga. They just demand that Botan take them there, and then they show up at the Tournament like they teleported or something. Wanted to fill in that gap and take this opportunity to explore what canon did not.
Atsuko went with the girls in the manga. Since I often pull from both canons, I didn't feel right leaving her behind.
There's a countdown on my Tumblr profile, BTW. We're at 11 today. What'll happen when the countdown hits 0? There's a surprise coming, so keep an eye out.
Thanks to those who chimed in last time. Those who reached out in have a special place in my heart now. It was very, very hard to update last time given the grief I was experiencing, but those who reached out made the extreme effort worth it despite the funerary circumstances that shrouded my life: C S Stars, Yakiitori, Lady Ellesmere, No Idea What to Name This, tatewaki2000, xenocanaan, DeusVenenare, DiCuore Alissa, shen0, Marian, Miss Ideophobia, Anime Pleasegood, Blaze1662001, Kuramag33, ahyeon, Kaiya Azure, Deamachi, general zargon, SterlingBee, CityLightinNYC, In the Arms of a Thief, WaYaADisi1, Sweetfoxgirl13, KannaKyomu, Teacup Galaxy, kittenfood, Tequila Mockinbur, Dark Rose Charm, RedPanda923, indefinitexcess, Just 2 Dream of You, CitylightsinNYC, GuestStarringAs, TurtlekidtheWoolgatherer and guests.
