Firstly, THANK YOU ALL, thank you so much for all your reviews, I would love to reply to each and everyone, but that would take me a while. But I want to let every person know that I read them in earnest, and they all mean a lot to me. Each and every word. So thank you again, and I hope people continue to tell me what they think about my writing, it helps keep me going when I get stuck.
Welcome Jun Sumewari from Setsuna24's Ride the wind! If you're not familiar with his character go read it, otherwise, he is Akihito's personal guard and good friend. Kuroda's nephew, he is extremely capable and loyal, and was employed to be Suoh's second until he was assigned to Akihito. He is pretty fucking bad ass.
Thanks Setsuna, for letting me borrow his character!
Also, have no idea how I am going to top that last chapter, sorry haha!
Short one, to ease the writers block...
Suoh had to admit he wasn't surprised. The situation he was presented with was bound to happen, sooner or later.
Especially after all last week's events. It had been only 10 days since that Sunday morning paper, 10 extremely long days.
Suoh's wish that it was all just a nasty dream and he would wake up any second now hadn't come true. Thus he was looking at the paperwork on his desk, the first signs of cracks in the foundations, leading to the inevitable fall of an empire. The first piece had been yanked out unceremoniously, the corner stone of it all, it's name was Akihito.
He looked at the handful of resignations on his desk that had started coming in after it was evident Asami had no intention of even acknowledging that Akihito existed anymore. Resignations from people who had all been assigned to Takaba Akihito.
Akihito meant a lot to them all, more to them then he did to Asami apparently. It was as if Asami had pulled his heart out of his chest, tossed it aside and simply decided he didn't need it anymore.
If Asami could do that to Akihito, then where did that leave them?
Loyalty worked both ways in the underworld.
Suoh found himself angry at the fact that he didn't begrudge the men such thoughts.
Confirmation of his deliberations was standing right in front of him, with his own resignation in hand.
"Jun, you're sure about this?" he questioned the younger man, only a few years older then Akihito. Sumewari Jun had more then proven himself in being worthy to be Takaba's personal guard. He was Suoh's replacement should something ever happen to him, someone like him was resigning, this was bad.
"Yes Suoh san, I was employed to protect Akihito, and since Asami sama threw him under the bus, I don't feel the need to work for Asami anymore. Akihito's friendship means more to me then this."
Suoh didn't miss the anger there, even if you were blind it would be easy to see.
"Alright, I'll arrange your payout and you can be on your way."
Sumewari bowed.
"Thank you, also, Kou and Takoto have been on my case since the first paper came out. They want to see him, and so do I."
Suoh took a deep breath, feeling weariness ease its way in as he recalled what Akihito looked like after Kei picked him up from the cop shop. What Kirishima said Akihito had done. Akihito's reckless attempt to cling to his own light. It was all for naught. That bruised face, a reflection of what they all felt like on the inside.
"I'll talk to Kirishima, don't say I didn't warn you. You wont like what you see."
"Shit, that bad is it?" Pain flashed across the younger mans face, more pain then the two involved had shown this entire 10 days.
"It is that bad." Suoh admitted.
"Tsk, fucking hell. This is bullshit." Sumewari slammed his resignation down on the desk and stormed out. The slap of the paper on the desk, another lightning strike in the fermenting storm.
Asami betrayed Akihito, in the worst possible way. He had clipped his wings, shredded the pure white feathers beyond repair, and then set him free in the gusts of his own helplessness.
To betray Akihito was to betray them. The one eventuality everyone thought would never happen, the sky would fall before that happened, the rivers would stop flowing and mountains would crumble before that happened, or so everyone thought.
If you couldn't trust the boss…. No, Suoh wouldn't finish that thought.
The blonde guard let out a tired sigh, between cleaning up after dead secretaries and treading lightly around Asami, the man found himself exhausted, he would much rather a few turf wars at the same time then this. He would have laughed if it weren't so goddam sad, only Takaba Akihito was capable of causing this much trouble.
Suoh had no idea what Asami was thinking at this point. That fucking black façade was still rearing its ugly head, despite how tired Asami looked.
Oh yes, Suoh didn't miss the bottles of empty whiskey added to the recycling each morning since the secretary incident, the comforter on the couch instead of the bed, it seemed the man was human after all. You could put on that mask and deceive everyone else, but you couldn't trick your own feelings. Suoh knew that much.
The only difference between the condemned lovers now, was that the photographer knew too well that he couldn't live without Asami, but Asami had yet to figure out he couldn't live without Akihito, the bodyguard wondered what it would take for him to realize that fact, the fact that everyone knew, except him.
He thought about Kirishima's suggestion, to send the boy to Feilong, it would be wrong to go behind Asami's back and contact the Chinese Baishe leader, but it was starting to look like the only option.
He knew that Kirishima was all for it, Suoh would still rather not.
Still rather not admit that it was indeed that bad.
The bodyguard hoped they could fix this mess before it was too late.
He dialed Kirishima's number, to tell him the bad news about Sumewari, and to see what they should do about Akihito's friends.
He was so tired.