3. Search and Destroy
Kaz and Yusei pulled their bikes under a little tree and sat on them as they waited for someone to show up at the little bar.
Yusei laid a hand on Kaz' arm and said, "Jack will be OK, don't worry. He always comes through these things just fine. So, he's been missing since late last night, right?"
"More like early this morning, but it's still been hours. With his D-wheel still here … that concerns me."
"That isn't the best sign, but someone will show up soon and we can ask about it." Yusei smiled. "You're really worried about him, aren't you?"
"Well …" It was hard to deny it. "It's sort of my job to protect people. It's hard for me to accept this."
"You mean that someone wants to avenge you?"
"Well, I guess he could just be finishing what he started last night."
"No, he definitely is angry that this guy hurt you. That's why he ran after him in the middle of the night like that."
"You've known him a long time, huh?" Kaz observed, feeling a little envious. "So you know him really well?"
"Heh. As well as anyone, I guess. Jack … well, he's Jack. He … let's just say he doesn't really let people in."
"And he's always been like that?"
"More or less," Yusei said with a shrug. "A little more now, I guess, but even when we were little he didn't want people to think of him as being weak. For some reason, he's always equated feelings with weakness. Friendship too."
"Friendship?" Kaz was surprised. "But that's not weakness."
Yusei smiled. "When you've lost your parents, it can be tempting to feel that you're better off without emotional ties. It took a while to get him to let me in, but I finally did it, and then I got him to let Crow join us."
"You didn't make friends with someone easier?"
"I don't exactly remember what it was. He didn't seem exactly unhappy, really, but compared to the other kids, there just seemed to be something missing for him that I felt I needed to fix, even then. And Crow's persistent." Yusei took a drink and went on, "You don't know how hard it's been though, staying friends with him. He walked away from us once. I had to beat him in a duel to keep him from walking away from us the last time around, and you know how hard that is."
"Are you trying to warn me?"
"I don't know. Things were really hard in Satellite. You know we were in a duel gang, right?"
"Yes, Ushio told me. Team Satisfaction?"
"That's right." Yusei smiled ruefully. "Well, not to go into detail, I made a mistake and lost two of my best friends in the process. I've been lucky enough to get them back, but the thing is … Jack blames himself for a lot of things that I don't think he ever would have done if I'd been a better friend back then."
"What? Come on, Yusei. You can't blame yourself for other people's decisions."
"You're right, of course, and it's true. I found that out with Kiryu. I made the mistake of sticking with him to try to talk him out of his bad decisions and I think I just ended up making him think that I believed in him."
"So you reinforced his bad decisions?"
"Inadvertently. At the same time, though, I think Jack might have felt that he'd been abandoned and that his good decisions were unappreciated and valueless. So then he went on and made mistakes of his own. If I'd just—I don't know …"
"But you said yourself they were Jack's mistakes. You can't control that."
"No, it's not like that. I just think maybe, just maybe, he would have thought twice if I'd have been a better friend."
"Yusei, it's useless to dwell on things like that, isn't it? After all, didn't things work out all right?"
"Yes, I guess. We're friends again, but" he shrugged, "somehow it's not the same." He stared at Kaz hard. "You know, I envy you a little," he said.
Kaz stared back. Envy? He'd just been feeling that way toward Yusei a couple of minutes ago. "Why? What do you mean?"
Yusei laughed a little and said, "There's this little smile he gives you when he sees you that he hasn't given us—me, or Crow—in a long time."
"Of course he smiles, right? When he's happy? To see a friend?" This was beginning to feel a little weird.
Yusei smiled a little. "Not like that. He usually wears this sort of mask."
"Mask, huh? Oh, here comes someone," he said, seeing a car pull in. He was slightly relieved to be able to change the subject and dissipate the weirdness. A barmaid stepped out as the two jumped off their D-wheels and made their way over.
"Miss?" said Yusei, "Could we ask you a question?"
Meanwhile, Jack was slowly examining the room in which he found himself imprisoned.
What little light that filtered in seemed to be coming from a few windows along the top of the wall. He wondered what time it was and whether it was even day. The quality of light was so poor and indirect that he couldn't even tell whether it was natural or not.
Well, this was embarrassing.
He needed to figure something out before Kaz—or worse, Yusei—found him and—ugh!—rescued him. After all, he did the rescuing for other people, not the other way around.
Dark basement. Was there anything in here? There seemed to be a lot of cold, dirty concrete. It was all fairly bare with some exposed plumbing and wiring except for a table with some shelves and cabinets over against the wall under the windows. Hampered by his bindings, Jack scissored his way to the table and, with some difficulty, pulled himself to his feet.
To his disgust, there was nothing on the table, so he pulled himself on top of it. That was even harder to do, but it had to be done so that he could reach the shelves and cabinets. He didn't find anything sharp on shelves or in the cabinets, just some cleaning supplies, but he did find a stray nail poking out of the wall. He was in luck after all. He began working on the bindings around his wrists with great fervor.
Before he was done, however, he heard the sound of boots clomping down stairs in his direction, so (cursing under his breath) he slid off of the table and moved quickly toward the center of the room. He tried to appear inactive by the time the door was flung open.
He looked at the person who appeared in the entrance and exclaimed, "So I did catch up with you!"
"For all the good it did you!" replied the man smugly. "I guess you don't remember the clubbing my friends and I gave you. You can call me Sato."
I guess they got the jump on me, Jack thought grouchily. "If that's your real name."
He said nothing to that but continued, "I'll be happy to let you go—for a billion."
"You have to be joking."
"Oh come now. With your take, plus endorsements, you should be able to come up with that easy."
"And how do you propose I do that? I don't have any family and I'm locked up here!"
"I'm sure your manager is good for it—or Duel Ace. I'm working on it. How come you weren't carrying a phone, anyway?"
"It's none of your business, I'm sure!"
"Well, now that you're awake, give me the number of your manager."
"Find it yourself."
"Don't you want to get out of here?"
"Not if I have to give you even one yen in return."
He got a jab in the face for that. "You make things more difficult for us and it'll only cost you," Sato said.
Jack wasn't happy about the additional punch. His headache really didn't need it. But it did get the guy out of the room. He'd have to get loose all the quicker. It wouldn't be too long before one of those oafs figured out how to contact Duel Ace and then he'd really be in a jam.
He climbed back onto the table as quickly as he could, glad that Sato—or whatever his real name was—hadn't bothered to check his bindings. After some work, he'd finally freed his hands. Then he untied his ankles.
Now, how to turn the tables.
"I'm sorry, Officer, I wasn't here at closing last night." The barmaid was cooperative enough, but not particularly helpful.
"Who would have been here."
"My boss is usually here at closing—and Tetsu."
"Tetsu?"
"He's our bouncer. Sometimes there's trouble late, and sometimes the boss needs help convincing people it's closing time." The girl gave the two a wink. "Sure you two don't want to stay for lunch? You're a cut above our usual crowd."
"Sorry, not until we find our friend. Maybe some other time," said Yusei, giving her a little smile. "Can we have your boss' number? And Tetsu's?"
"Sure thing! I don't think he wants us getting on the bad side of the cops. I'd have to look up Tetsu's, or you can get it from the boss."
"OK, thanks. We'll drop back by if we need anything else," said Kaz.
"Let me make the call," suggested Yusei, adding, "since this is still an informal investigation."
Kaz nodded, stepping away and looking up and down the street as he listened to Yusei's calm voice in the background. He tried to picture Jack's tall, slender form striding purposefully down that grimy street toward them as though it would make him appear.
"Kaz," Yusei called, rousing Kaz out of his daydream, "I've got something." He stepped over to Kaz and said, "The bar owner says that Jack showed up just before closing looking for that guy—Sato he called him. Turns out he's pretty notorious around here, so the owner didn't mind sending trouble in his direction as long as Jack didn't say who sent him. I have an address."
"At least we have a lead," Kaz sighed in relief. If they'd had to start tracking down customers, it would have been frustrating, to say the least.
"It's just a couple of doors down, so that must be why Jack left his D-wheel here."
"Let's go."
Jack suppressed a laugh. They probably thought they'd left him there without access to any weapons. He hefted the length of pipe he'd wrenched from the plumbing, patting it firmly against his opposite palm. Right. No weapons. This length of pipe ending in a joint would do just fine, thanks. He was a little surprised that no one had come bursting in when he'd kicked the pipes loose.
He crept up the stairs, then kicked the door down, ready for anything.
Jack took in the room instantly. It was a kitchen stocked with plenty of potential weapons—and a potential opponent.
"I thought you said this guy was tied!" yelled a man sitting in the kitchen watching the cellar door. He dived for a gun sitting on the table, but Jack grabbed a pot that happened to be conveniently hanging next to the door and threw it, catching the man's hand and sending the gun skittering across the room. "Ow! I think you broke my hand!"
"Be thankful I don't break your neck!" he replied, wading in. "Trying to shoot me! I don't have a gun." He wasn't sure whether the guy heard the last of what he had to say because he was out of it in seconds.
Sato came running in armed with a baseball bat. Jack met it with the pipe, sending it across the room as well. Then he reached in and grabbed the guy's shirt, pulling his pockets out to make sure that he emptied them of any blades. "How dare you cut my friend!" he said. "If you have a problem, you take it up with me!"
He gave the guy a heavy punch just for emphasis, then tied both men up. Sighing, he decided he'd better use their phone to call his manager just in case. "Hey, Tom," he said, "did you get any strange calls about me today?"
"Well, there was someone calling Duel Ace, but it was something strange, asking for my number. Some sort of rumor that you'd been kidnapped. I was just starting to look into it, but I didn't get a return number to call. Whoever it was said they'd call us back."
"Well, don't bother. I've taken care of it."
"Oh? You haven't been getting into trouble have you? Because—"
"No, it's just someone's idea of a joke."
"Not very funny."
"I didn't think so. Thanks, Tom."
"For what? I didn't do anything."
"Still. Hey, I got to go. I'm staying with Yusei and I need to touch base with him."
"Bye, Jack."
Jack hung up and looked at the phone, deciding whether he wanted to call Yusei. Nah, he thought. Better call the police first. He sighed. Ushio probably wouldn't be that happy to hear from him again so soon.
As he reached for the phone, though, a pounding started at the door. He grabbed the pipe and walked to the door. He pulled back the pipe, ready for a free-for-all, and opened the door cautiously. "Yusei? Kaz?"
Author's notes ...
Reviews ... Thanks—as always!—to everyone for their continued support! I'm happy that you seem to have enjoyed the inclusion of evil Jack. One of these days I'll have to write a larger story that includes him (even though I generally don't enjoy the twin thing, I'll admit he has some interesting aspects ;) ). I hope you don't think that I resolved Jack's predicament too easily, but it's not the major focus of the story. ;)
this little smile he gives you: Jack really doesn't smile all that much, but (in the anime) he actually does seem to smile when he sees Kazama. Interesting ...
he did the rescuing for other people: Jack tends to dig himself (occasionally along with other random unfortunates!) into trouble on a regular basis, but, unlike certain other people (cough*Kiryu*cough), he seems able to dig himself out on his own (mostly, anyway!). I wanted to make this aspect of Jack part of this story. ;)
for a billion (yen): As of this writing, around a million US dollars.
And now for the preview of our next chapter:
"So what are your plans—or am I prying?"
"It's no secret, really. I'm just planning on dinner—you know, a get-to-know-you thing? Then I don't know. It depends on how things go and what comes up. A walk, or an arcade, or shopping, or … something."
Something? "Sounds fun."
Kaz goes on a date; Jack is curious.