Chapter 39 Bullets and Fire #2
Toma was fighting in the far aisle. He'd taken a cut across his shoulder, but he was still swinging.
Still dropping men.
The floor was getting worse.
There was this pull in my chest to go back and help, but Akiro was climbing that staircase.
The kusarigama chain dragged behind him, clanking against each step.
I changed course and cut diagonally across the seats.
The fire mag in my right hand was down to its last rounds. I ejected it mid-stride, slammed a fresh one home, and racked the slide.
Once we got close, two of Akiro's men blocked the base of the staircase and raised their guns.
“Fuck you!” I shot the first one.
Bullets and fire.
The round punched through his shoulder and the flame caught his neck. He screamed and grabbed at the fire.
The second one raised his gun.
Yuki threw his blade. It buried itself in his forearm.
He dropped the gun.
Aki grabbed him by the front of his shirt, headbutted him, and threw him into the seats.
We hit the stairs.
Aki and Yuki flanked me.
We climbed fast.
Two steps at a time.
Then, three.
The stairwell was narrow and dark. Red carpet. Gold trim on the walls. The sounds of fighting below echoed up like thunder in a canyon.
A man appeared at the top of the stairs and fired down at us.
The bullet hit the wall next to my head.
Plaster exploded.
A second shot hit Aki's shoulder. He grunted and stumbled back a step.
Yuki grabbed him before he could fall.
"I'm good.” Aki hissed. “Protect the Dragon."
Blood was already seeping through his jacket.
I clenched my jaw, stepped in front of them, and returned fire. The flame lit up the stairwell like a torch. The man caught it full in the chest and tumbled backward.
“I’ll be fine.” Aki checked his shoulder.
Yuki checked his brother's shoulder, met his eyes, and nodded. “Let’s go.”
We headed up.
Two more men came running down the stairs after him.
Yuki shot the first one.
The bullet took him in the hip.
He fell screaming, rolling down the steps toward us.
We pressed flat against the wall to let him pass and Aki shot him in the head.
The second man leaped forward and came at me with a blade.
Yuki caught his wrist and twisted it.
The knife fell from his hand and clattered against a step.
Aki headbutted him and he went limp in Yuki’s grip. Next, the twins threw him down the stairs.
We raced up.
Once we hit the top, I burst through the door and entered the performance box.
It was one of the grand ones. Private. Overlooking the stage. Velvet chairs. A small table with champagne glasses still sitting on it. A balcony railing wrapped in gold leaf.
And ten men.
All of them armed and waiting.
Another trap.
I looked past them, through the door on the far side of the box, and I caught a glimpse of Akiro.
Just his back.
The chain of the kusarigama dragging behind him as he disappeared into the hallway beyond.
He used them to slow me down.
The door slammed shut behind him.
What a coward! Is this your chosen, Father? A runner?
The ten men closed in.
The first one came at me with a short sword. I ducked the swing and drove my elbow into his ribs.
He bent forward, and I grabbed the back of his head and slammed his face into my rising knee.
Teeth cracked.
I spun him and shoved him into the man behind him. They tangled.
I shot them both.
The fire caught them, the velvet chairs, and two others.
Smoke curled toward the ceiling.
The other men’s eyes widened at the realization I had fire.
Yeah. Pretty hard to fight that. Just run.
One came from my left.
Big.
Wide.
Built like a boulder.
He swung a fist the size of a cinder block.
I leaned back.
Felt the air move.
Grabbed his wrist and used his momentum to pull him past me.
Straight into Yuki—or Aki—who was already moving. His blade opened the man's stomach, and the twin spun away before the body hit the floor.
While I set fire on two more, another grabbed a twin from behind, locked his arm around his throat, and lifted him off the ground. His feet kicked. His blade fell from his hand.
His face was turning red.
Then purple.
"Aki!" Yuki screamed and launched himself across the box, drove his blade into the man's bicep.
The man howled and released the twin.
Aki dropped to the floor, gasping. He grabbed the fallen blade and slashed the back of the man's knees.
The man buckled.
Yuki finished him.
The remaining four came at once.
Two rushed the twins.
Two came for me.
I shot the first one in the chest. The fire caught the second before he could raise his weapon. Both went down screaming, flames spreading across the velvet floor beneath them.
The twins moved as one. Aki swept the first man's legs while Yuki drove his shoulder into the second's chest.
Both men stumbled toward the balcony railing.
Fast, the twins grabbed them by their collars and slung them over the edge together.
Two bodies hit the audience at the same time, and people below screamed.
I reloaded both guns and ran off in Akiro’s direction.
Seconds later, the twins caught up with me.
One twin was bleeding from his shoulder and his cheekbone was swelling purple, but his jaw was set.
The other twin’s throat was already bruising where the man had choked him, a dark band forming across his skin.
But neither of them slowed.
The hallway curved.
Twisted.
Passed a series of locked doors with numbers on them.
Private rooms.
The air smelled like old perfume and cigarette smoke.
A door opened to my left.
A man stepped out, saw us, and reached for his gun.
I shot him in the chest before he cleared the holster.
The fire caught the doorframe.
I rushed on.
Where are you?
I stopped running where the hallway split and looked left, then right.
Come on, you son of a bitch!
I listened.
Nothing.
Akiro's footsteps were gone. He'd made it out.
“Fuck!” I slammed my fist into the wall.
The plaster cracked. My knuckles split open, and blood smeared across the peeling gold wallpaper.
“Maybe this will help.” One of the twins pulled something out of their pocket. “I found this when we were on the stairs.”
I holstered my guns and looked at his hand. “A phone.”
“Could be Akiro's phone.” He gave it to me.
The case was glass, not plastic.
Beneath it, sealed under a layer of hardened resin was a rose with a single, large thorn.
I dragged my thumb slowly across the back. The surface was smooth, polished — but the image beneath it felt violent.
The Glass Thorn.
"Yes." I turned it over. "This is my brother's."
The screen was frozen on a text conversation. Cracked down the center but still readable.
Akiro: Kenji and Hiro are here.
The Fox: Kill them!
Two words.
That was all my father had for his sons who had stood by his side and protected him for decades.
I shut off the phone.
The twins watched me in silence.
"But you couldn't kill us, Akiro." I stared at the dark screen. "All you could do was run."
But even as I said it, something nagged at me.
Akiro didn't fight today. He never intended to. He showed up with a weapon he barely swung and a smile he never lost. He let ten die in a theater box so he could walk down a hallway.
And then it hit me.
The mines in Yoshiwara. The cleanup crews on every level. The snipers guarding the service exit. The men waiting in the performance box. Every single layer of today had been designed to funnel us, box us in, and kill us without Akiro ever having to raise his blade.
This wasn't my father's plan.
My father would have faced us, would have made it personal, would have wanted to watch.
This had Akiro's fingerprints all over it.
The Glass Thorn.
I'd been thinking of him as a coward. A runner. A puppet on my father's string.
But puppets didn't build mazes with multiple contingencies and sacrifice men as a delaying tactic.
Akiro wasn't running from me today. He was testing his defense system. Seeing which traps worked and which didn't. Watching how we moved, how we fought, how we adapted. And the whole time taking notes.
And the only reason we were still alive was Hiroko—a variable he hadn't accounted for.
My jaw tightened.
You're not a fighter, brother, but you're something worse. You're fucking patient.
My mind was already working. If I gave this phone to my hackers, they could crack it open and go through every call and message.
They would discover every location Akiro had visited in the last six months. Cell towers. GPS data. Meeting points. Safe houses. Every place my brother had been in Japan was stored in this glass case—and wherever Akiro had been, my father wasn't far behind.
Even better—they could trace incoming calls.
The Fox was careful, but Akiro wasn't. Not careful enough to hold onto his own phone while running from me.
You still have a lot to learn, Akiro.
A wicked smile spread across my face.
This was more than a clue.
This was a map straight to my father.
Relief loosened in my chest.
And then Hiroko lying on blood-stained flowers flashed in my head, and the grief surged back.
My throat tightened.
Footsteps echoed from the far end of the hallway.
Heavy.
Fast.
The twins reached for their knives.
Reo appeared around the corner.
Bloodied.
Limping slightly.
Holding his ribs.
But upright.
"Kenji, our people arrived." Reo stopped to catch his breath. "The theater is clear on the inside and the outside."
I leaned my head to the side. "Hiro?"
"Downstairs. Alive. Pissed off. The rest of the Claws are hurt, but okay."
“Akiro ran off. Did anyone find him outside?”
“No.”
“That’s fine. We’ll catch the coward later.” I showed him Akiro’s phone as I walked toward him. "I've got what I need. Let's go."
“His phone?”
“Yes.” I gave it to Reo.
“Hmmm.” Reo looked at it. “We don’t take this back to the island. We’ll have Scales meet our hackers in Tokyo to go through it. For all we know, Akiro intentionally set it there, and there’s a tracker inside.”
“Smart. Get it done.” I walked past him.
I'm coming home, Tora.