Chapter 51 - I Scratch Your Back, You Scratch Mine

The two stared at the animal now holding them at gunpoint. It was the purple-suited gazelle from the party, his bodyguards now curiously absent. He still wore his lion mask, however, as well as some dark gloves that were previously unnoticed.

The stranger pointed the gun down. "That a mask in your pants or are you happy to see me?"

Louis blinked. "I just had amazing sex at your lovely party."

The gazelle was unwavering. "You're welcome. That doesn't change the fact that you're working for Ichi's group! Now, I am surprised over the fact they provided you with your own carnivore to fuck..."

"They didn't provide me with anything. In fact, they forced me into their group or they'd kill him. Lower the gun."

Legosi held his large hands up, walking between the two. "It's true! They're threatening me to keep him in."

The other herbivore kept his gun trained on them. "Heh, a group of herbivores has a big carnivore like you running scared, huh? Those pests really have gotten out of hand..."

"Can you tell us why you're pointing that gun at us?" Louis asked with a head tilt.

"Ichi and his Branded goons are making work difficult for me and my boys. However, I caught on to his little scheme of sending new recruits here to get masks before they join. Figure I pull the sprout out now before it turns into a weed, eh?"

"Please...don't take my mask. They'll kill my husband if I don't obey them."

The gazelle chuckled. "Oooah, husband? Now that's not somethin' you see every day. Tell me this: why are they forcing you to join them? Hm? I had the inkling they didn't take kindly to herbivores mingling with carnivores."

"They don't like it at all. And...I don't know why they want me so badly," he lied, not sure if he could trust this masked animal or not.

"Really. Ichi didn't tell you? He just waltzed right into your abode and said 'come join my club!'? There's more to it than that. I smell it." The gazelle kept the gun up.

"What's with you two and smelling things that don't have smells?" Louis blinked. "Anyway, no, he first gave me a choice to join and then forced me."

"What's with you two and smelling things that don't have smells?" Louis blinked. "Anyway, no, he first gave me a choice to join and then forced me."

The gazelle grumbled, the noise progressively becoming a snarl, which caused Legosi's ears to perk. That...was not an herbivore noise. Feeling rather bold, he lowered his gaze to the mystery animal. "What...e you?"

The gunman gazed back through dark glass. "You tell me first. You're way bigger than a regular grey wolf, not to mention your eyes. It's pretty obvious."

Louis blinked. "Leave him alone."

"Leave him alooone," the stranger mocked. "Look, I'm not letting you two out of my sight, not until I get to the bottom of this, so what say we march back in there and talk in my office, yeah? Yeah."

"What do you want with us. We're not doing anything. You have tons of masks. Just let us go home."

"You gotta convince me better that you're not lying. Turn around, back inside. Move." He pointed the muzzle of the weapon toward the door.

Louis made a face and he gripped his mate's hand once more for comfort as they trudged back inside with a gun to their backs.

They walked through the mask return room and then through a door they hadn't seen upon entering. Through that door was a dark stairwell leading up. Having no choice, they marched up, entering the lone door at the top. Inside was a small room with a crude desk setup. The stranger ushered them inside before locking the door with a key from his pocket. He grabbed two folding chairs from the corner and set them up in front of the desk, which he promptly sat behind. "Have a seat, you two."

The couple sat down, their hands never becoming unconnected. Louis obviously didn't want to be there.

The two were scrutinized by the dark, glass eyepieces of their captor. "You two really together, huh?"

Legosi gripped Louis tighter. "Yes! We love each other!"

"Very much." He wiggled his hand with the wedding ring.

The stranger grumbled, returning his gun to a holster hidden on his person. "You guys can't get out without me unlocking it, so you'd better not try anything. Now, let's try this again; what's Ichi want from you?"

"He wants me to be a part of his group."

"Why? You don't look like you can fight," the supposed gazelle spat.

"I don't know," Louis repeated. "I can't really fight very well. Only use a gun."

The purple suited animal in front of them leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up on the desk, showing his spiked, leather shoes, which was a sure sign of any big wig from the black market. "Ahh, you know you need to train your dog better. His body language is giving away that you're hiding something."

Louis looked at his mate. "Legosi?"

The wolf drooped down, and the gazelle cackled. "Canines. You can read 'em like a book. His drooped ears and twitching, lowered tail becomes more overt every time you play dumb and say Ichi wants you to join cuz 'no reason'. Seriously, if you're telling the truth about being forced into it against your will, I can help. But I want to know what's really going on."

"He wants me because he thinks I have this ability to create something called an Imaginary Chimera. It's like...Well, I still don't know how to explain what it is," Louis shook his head.

The other animal was silent, considering what Louis said. "It's whatever the fuck he uses to wipe out entire gangs in the black market, I'm pretty sure. I haven't seen him in action yet, but I've seen what he leaves in his wake. And I don't think he's the only one in that group who can do something like that." He shifted his legs. "He tell you why you're special?"

"Because I'm one of the original four of us that was raised as livestock in the black market."

The other animal snapped. "There we go. That's the ticket." He took his legs down and stood up, peeling his gloves off slowly and then placing his hands splayed on the desk, revealing his oddly sharp claws. "I knew Ichi and his freaks had some sort of connection to the market, but I wasn't sure. That lines up, though. And now he's tracking down survivors to join his little club, no?"

"I...guess so. What does this have to do with me?"

A sigh came from behind the mask. "Well, you see, I'm the leader of an organization in the black market and, well, we're kind of targeted by him. It didn't seem like a big deal when he started out but lately it has become...a big deal. So, you saying you've been forced to join them...well that just gives me an idea." He reached up and clawed at his mask, getting a grip on it and literally ripping it off, revealing a face that was more feline than gazelle. His irises were small slits, he had leopard spots on his cheeks, and he smiled with a mouth full of sharp fangs. And yet, his gazelle horns remained, and his frame was definitely not that of a carnivore, and neither was his tail. Legosi gawked at him.

Louis blinked. "You're a...hybrid?"

The animal chuckled. "Observant. Yes, I'm a carniherbi hybrid. Feel free to mock and ridicule me."

"No!"

The two animals looked over to Legosi after his sudden outburst.

The wolf sat back down. "I-I mean, there's nothing wrong with you! You look fine! You're fine how you are!"

The hybrid cocked his head, staring down the wolf as he walked out from behind the desk and toward him.

Louis put a hand on Legosi's arm. "What he's saying is we think hybrids are beautiful."

Melon stopped in front of Legosi. He reached a palm out and extended it toward Louis to potentially keep him at bay while he used the other hand to run over the wolf's features. Legosi froze, but let the handling happen. The clawed hand ran up and down his muzzle, opened his eyes up wide, and gripped him by the chin to turn his head left and right, getting a look at him all over.

Louis felt uncomfortable with his husband being handled like that, but opted to keep his mouth shut.

"Hmm, so it seems I'm not the only hybrid here. You're a bit low content, though, meaning one of your parents is a halfsy like me." He let the wolf go so he could speak.

"Y-yeah. My mother. Half wolf, half komodo dragon.

The hybrid looked genuinely surprised. "Well, no shit! Wouldn't have guessed that. Conceiving a child between a warm blooded and cold blooded animal is quite rare, especially if one is poisonous. Your mom must have a rough life."

"I..." Legosi looked up in Melon's eyes and felt totally and utterly at ease. It was strange...but he felt no hesitation in telling him. "She killed herself when I was 12..."

Louis gripped his arm. "Legosi...you don't have to tell him anything."

"No, no, let him speak." The animal turned around and leaned on the desk, facing them. "It'll be the start of a good working relationship." He smiled, looking off kilter. He pointed a clawed hand at himself. "I'm Melon! Leader of the Shishigumi. What do I call you lot?"

"Legosi," the wolf immediately said.

Melon rolled his eyes. "Well, yes, that was obvious from him saying your name. But I don't remember catching yours..." his gaze moved over to the deer.

"Shi," Louis looked to the side, not wanting to let himself get into more trouble than he already was in. He wanted to pull Legosi's ear every time he spilled information.

Melon squinted, but then everything clicked in his mind. "Oh. Ohh, okay. I see. Your product ID numbers, and you never got named. That's why Ichi and his freaks all got number names. So, you're Shi, then? The number of death..."

"Unlucky me, I know," the deer shook his head.

"Raised by carnivores to be sold and eaten, yet you survive, and you spit in the face of your circumstances and fuck a wolf at an illegal club." Melon cackled to himself, his feet tapping rapidly on the ground. "Oh, you two just keep getting more and more interesting!"

"We're coming back to the next one. I'm rather excited. It made me forget about all of my problems. We got to be...us, for a night."

The hybrid smiled. "It's wonderful, isn't it? The masks of society are cast away once the physical masks go on, and the truest and deepest desires of the partygoers are revealed. They show that, for one night, they can stop being slaves to the arbitrary rules of society. They indulge in the instincts that schools are afraid to teach! They truly live!" Melon flourished as he said this, soon bringing his arms down and snickering. "Plus, I make a ton of profit from it so, hey, win win win."

"Well, it's a win win for all of us because we loved it. We just left to get Legosi...cleaned up," Louis blushed.

Melon leaned back and sighed. "Ah, to be young and have instincts to guide you. It's quite romantic, be it sexual, love, or hunger."

Legosi's ear twitched. "You don't look that old, Melon-san."

The hybrid hummed. "Hmm, indeed, I may have only lived 24 years but some days it feels like a century."

"I know that feeling," Louis chuckled. "All too well..."

Melon clapped his hands together. "So! Can we all here agree that we want Ichi and his group gone?"

"...I can't say anything. I'm afraid of them doing anything to Legosi..."

"Well, in any case, I think we can work together on this. Be my man on the inside, Shi, and I can guarantee the Shishigumi can wipe them out if you give me the right information. You're free and not one fur on Legosi's body is harmed! Although, I gotta say he sorta looks like he's already been through a woodchipper with all of those scars...you guys gotta settle down on the rough play."

"That's not us. It's things like this that make that happen. Please, don't hurt him. I don't know if you're planning something or not, but please if you're going to do anything, do it to me." The herbivore was rarely this vulnerable and almost to the point of begging, but he was so scared of losing his soulmate.

Melon blinked. "Oh, is this about the gun still? I mean, surely you understood why I did that. And hey, I don't blame you for being wary, considering you were raised as meat in the black market, but you two don't want to destroy my organization and can, in fact, help me destroy and organization I despise! Therefore..." He held his long, skinny arms out in a welcoming gesture. "Allies!" He looked between the two, trying to gauge a reaction.

Legosi just looked at him with a quiet curiosity, his tail waving idly.

"This is a dangerous game..." Louis mumbled.

"Did you have a plan before this?"

"To follow Ichi's orders and see what happens so my sweet wolf can keep living." He reached over and rubbed Legosi's head.

"Alright, well, now you follow his orders and act as unsuspicious as possible while also feeding me information. Now, what are the parameters that determine Legosi's murder? What sets Ichi off?"

"If I disobey Ichi, Ni and Go kill him themselves. If he finds out I told anyone anything, Legosi dies. If I try and escape, Legosi dies. Everything leads to him...dying. I can't take it."

"Hmm, so me talking to you like this might be bad. Well, you now have the Shishigumi on your side in case that happens."

Legosi's ears perked. "Ah, Shishigumi! Of course!" He looked over at Louis excitedly while Melon looked at him like he was crazy.

But Louis had barely listened as when he was saying his last words, he had teared up and buried his face in his hands. This was all just so unfair...Did Legosi die no matter what?

The canine's ears folded. "O-oh, Lou, hon." He reached over and easily scooped him up, cradling him in his arms. "It's okay, Lou, it's okay. I'll be fine. Melon-san is going to help us, and we already have some connection to the Shishigumi."

Melon cocked his head. "Eh? How so?"

Legosi looked up. "W-well, um..." The wolf realized telling Melon about Oguma would breach the amount of information Louis was clearly willing to share. "We...bought a gun from you."

The Shishigumi leader nodded. "Ah, I see. Yes, firearm sales are running smoothly for us."

Louis wanted to thank him, but he just buried his face in Legosi's chest. From sex to this. Of course.

"I see now is probably not the best time to continue this discussion," Melon concluded. "Let's exchange contact info and keep in touch. I think we'll do each other wonders."

Louis wiped his eyes. "I apologize. It's just hard. You don't understand."

Melon shrugged. "Yeah, I don't understand. Love holds no meaning to me."

Legosi looked up with sad eyes. "Melon-san...that's sad."

Melon grunted in annoyance. "Save the pity. Now, let's exchange contacts so you two can be on your way without suspicion. Keep the mask, naturally."

"Thank you," Louis stood up, bowing, giving him the info. "And please remember, if you're planning anything nefarious, spare my husband."

"Why would I want to hurt a fellow hybrid?" Melon asked innocently. He turned to said fellow hybrid. "You get that boy home and give him a good man's touch, yeah? He's gonna need it for what he's going through, and will go through."

Legosi cocked his head at the eccentric hybrid, but couldn't help smiling. Seeing him made his chest hurt and soar at the same time. "Thank you, Melon-san!" He reached out his hand to shake one of his.

As soon as contact was made, Melon leaped back. "Ahh ahh! No touching! Do not touch!"

Legosi pulled back. "Uh, oh...sorry."

"Just...go home. I'll be in touch."

Louis looked to Legosi. "Let's go before anything or anyone else bothers us. Please."

"Yeah, let's go home."