Big Eyes, Small Mouth (BESM): In the Shadows of the City - [FIC] Too Cool for School [Completed]

[Kazuo]

Some months in the past...

Kazuo didn't know what he hated more about school, the fact that it started so damned early, or the fact that they required you to actually attend if you wanted to graduate. Uptight bastards. How in the hell were you supposed to get anywhere by eight in the morning after you'd spent all of the previous night and much of the morning after getting as inebriated as humanly possible? And when Kazuo had complained they'd just told him not to go to any more parties or get drunk on school nights! Seriously - what did that have to do with anything?

So Kazuo was late for school. Again. He was walking (well, more like shambling actually) to school with the most immense hangover in recent history, swearing never to touch another drop of alcohol ever again (which is what he always swore on the morning after an epic party), and as he walked he gave serious consideration to several different methods of suicide as a possible means of ending his suffering. He would have driven his motorcycle to school, but a few weeks ago he'd wrecked it in an accident while driving it with - what he'd sworn then - was the most immense hangover in recent history. Kazuo being Kazuo, he'd yet to make the connection between his accident, the ruined bike, and his post-inebriated state of mind, and figured it was just shitty luck. Kazuo was slow about some things.

Unfortunately, he arrived at the school gates before he'd managed to settle on a preferred method of premeditated, self-inflicted death, so he squared his shoulders and marched forward into certain doom. Or at least that's what it would've looked like to anyone watching Kazuo from a distance. A terminal cancer patient would've faced that walk with more optimism.

Kazuo realized as he walked on campus that it was lunch hour, and all the students were gathered in little groups at tables, on steps, or gathered together on the central lawn. Shit, he thought, was it already that late? Hmmm... maybe his odds of showing up to school on time would be increased if he got a watch?

Most of the students at the school were dressed immaculately; freshly cleaned and pressed suits for the boys, spotless sailor suits for the girls, and gleaming black dress shoes everywhere you looked. By contrast, Kazuo's jacket was unbuttoned and had a crumpled look about it, his shirt was only about half-buttoned, and was so wrinkled it looked like he had slept in it or something (which was a fun coincidence, because - as it happened - he'd slept in both his shirt and his jacket last night... along with his pants, socks, and even his shoes). His long hair was loosely tied back in a sloppy tail, and his chin was covered in two-day old whiskers. He was also still smoking a Lucky 7. On school grounds.

Kazuo stood just inside the school's front gate and watched his fellow students, oblivious to the impression he was making, trying to summon up the willpower to make it to his next class. God help the first person who tried to talk to him...

[z-Skye]

Unfortunately for Kazuo, he was about to get blasted by German propriety - worse, German propriety as filtered through the Japanese social shield. Skye spotted the disheveled Kazuo come through the front gates. It was rather like a dog going on point, probably a pit bull. Largely, that was because that had been building for a long time. Kazuo was always doing something wrong, and it was rumored that he was a thug outside of school. He was simply a disgrace, and Skye was tired of watching it slide because people were afraid of him.

She stood, and her group moved with her. Suki was the first to falter when she saw where they were going, but a stern glance from Skye brought her back in line. The five of them trooped across the yard, walking unerringly toward the smoking, unkempt and smelly Kazuo. As they get closer, the other four girls shrank back until they're all almost standing behind Skye. If she noticed the degretion of her support, she didn't show it. Skye's nose wrinkled as she got close enough to register the smell of stale beer, unwashed clothes and overnight funk that comes from sleeping in one's clothing.

"Kazuo," she said, totally and intentionally dropping any honorific, "I'm glad to see that you finally made it to school. You are only a few hours late. It must be hard to be such a delinquent; it seems as though it takes much effort. Just as much effort to make no attempt to make yourself presentable. And there's no smoking allowed on campus." Her pretty blue eyes narrowed. "Is all this an attempt to compensate for something you lack?"

[Kazuo]

Many of the students at Kiyamori High School would have balked at the sight of Skye Fell and her little coterie of Lesser Mavens of Subdued Sexuality and Proper Behavior swooping down upon them. Kazuo Kanai just used it as an excuse to check out some fine-lookin' ladies. MmMmm! That Skye was fuckin' hot for a gaijin!

As the beautiful, but refined blonde drew near, Kazuo took another drag of his cig, smiled mischievously and said, "hey bijin, what's up?", and then conspicuously blew the smoke in a long stream out of the corner of his mouth. This truly impressive display of nampa ((OOC: 'charm')) wasn't easy, either, as his head still felt very much like it might try something painful and uncalled for - such as, for example, exploding. Kazuo suffered through it, though. Anything for the ladies...

Originally Posted By: Skye Fell

"Kazuo," she said, totally and intentionally dropping any honorific, "I'm glad to see that you finally made it to school. You are only a few hours late. It must be hard to be such a delinquent; it seems as though it takes much effort. Just as much effort to make no attempt to make yourself presentable. And there's no smoking allowed on campus." Her pretty blue eyes narrowed. "Is all this an attempt to compensate for something you lack?"

Kazuo had heard about this chick, so he wasn't completely surprised by this verbal assault, but he was a little surprised at just how much of a passive-aggressive little bitch she was. Being Japanese, Kazuo had spent his entire life dealing with "proper" people who hid their rudeness and cruelty behind a polite facade, but unlike most of his fellow countrymen, he'd never learned to deal with it in an equally "proper" fashion. Kazuo generally countered passive-aggressive behavior with aggressive-aggressive behavior - which was how he countered everything - but that was beside the point.

And so, completely misinterpreting what Skye was referring to, Kazuo flicked his cigarette onto the pavement, took a step towards the group of girls and, looking her straight in her bright blue eyes, said, "I dunno, bijin, you tell me." And with that he reached down and began unbuckling his pants with the clear, and very obvious intention of letting her decide whether or not he needed to compensate for anything!

[z-Skye]

Four shrill screams broke the tranquility of the school yard. Most of the students couldn't see what was going on, so had no idea why Skye's entourage turned and fled shrieking from whatever was happening. Skye had never been abandoned by her cohort, so now these students who hadn't already realized something interesting was happening were completely focused on the confrontation.

"Do not show me your verwesendes Mitglied," Skye snarled. The growl in her voice was impressive coming from a girl of only five-four. The German helped, as it tended to make anything sound rougher and meaner. Her blue eyes almost sparked with anger, and two dots of brilliant red color had risen in her fair skin. "I have no desire to see what passes for your genitals, nor was it my intention to imply that is what you are lacking. I don't care if you're lacking a suitable der Schwanz, because your propriety is the issue. You disgrace yourself and you disgrace this school when you show up like this."

Thankfully, he stopped his efforts, though Skye had gotten a glimpse of leopard print before her mind had stopped automatically following the motions of his hands. Sneering at him, she asked, "Do you value anything? Or do you plan to continue acting as a delinquent for the rest of your short life?"

[Kazuo]

Kazuo Kanai wasn't a particularly subtle young man, but he did have a gift for tactics. One smart remark and a measured ounce of lewd behavior and all four of the Lesser Mavens of Subdued Sexuality and Proper Behavior turned tail and ran just like that, leaving poor Skye to face him all alone. It was almost too easy.

Kazuo was still chuckling and following the fleeing girls with his eyes when Skye snarled at him. Her response concerning his manood so completely baffled him that he totally missed what she had to say about disgracing himself (which was just as well since he wouldn't have given a damn anyway). What the hell was she talking about, she didn't want to see 'what passed for his genitals'? Kazuo would love to see what passed for her genitals! Girls were so weird sometimes...

"Okay, okay", he muttered, zipping back up and trying to get his belt refastened, "jeez! You don't gotta sense of humor?"

Skye only sneered at him and asked, "Do you value anything? Or do you plan to continue acting as a delinquent for the rest of your short life?"

Kazuo was rapidly becoming bored with this entire exchange, since it had stopped being original and entertaining enough to distract him from his hangover, and was starting to aggravate it instead, but flustering this girl was kinda fun, so he went ahead and took another pass at it.

So he gave her a sly look and said, "Why the hell do you care so much, shorty? Is all this just your tight-assed way of letting a guy know you gotta thing for him, or are you actually planning on acting like an obah-san for the rest of your life?"

Having asked his question, Kazuo began walking towards the main school building. He figured he ought to at least make a passing attempt at coming up with some excuse or another for his tardiness. It probably wouldn't work, and he'd probably get detention or something, but hey - you never knew. As he brushed by Skye he added in an offhanded tone, "ya gotta lighten up a little, bijin."

[z-Skye]

Brushing past her only worsened her agitation, but she managed to ignore the obvious ploy to anger her by suggesting she was interested in him. She would never date anyone like that oaf, and she wasn't going to validate his suggestion by addressing it. Spinning, she called after him, "As I said, you disgrace this school! And this is my school, too. I want to see it standing proud, not run down by a smelly, social moron who drinks too much, smokes and can't change his own clothing."

Skye felt as though she had the patience of a saint for even trying to deal with this missgeburt. "And I will not 'lighten up,' not if that means acting like you. I couldn't act in such a shameful manner if I tried!"

Normally, with normal students, she wouldn't be having this problem. The moment she had mentioned that they were lacking, they would have flushed with embarrassment and quickly changed whatever was wrong. But not Kazuo, and Skye felt her blood boil as the arrogant jerk walked away from her. All sorts of German words floated around in her head, words that she shouldn't know but wanted to hurl at Kazuo.

For now, she'd have to be satisfied with making sure that the administration levied the full force of punishment against Kazuo. A quick talk with her homeroom teacher should ensure that the full force of the law came down on his head. After all, the nail that sticks up gets hammered down - as it should.

[Kazuo]

Kazuo was completely oblivious to the golden-haired harpy's challenges and insults as he walked off, though he was a little offended when she called him "smelly". However, a covert sniff at his armpits revealed the truth (much to his olfactorial regret), so there wasn't much he could say back. The rest of it he either didn't follow or didn't care about.

He got detention, of course, and - of course - he skipped out on it. It was a little known fact (little known only because most of the Kiyamori Student Body didn't get detention all that often) that the only Teacher who was ever assigned to watch over Detention was the oldest, most senile Teacher in the entire school. Which meant that all an unscrupulous student like Kazuo Kanai had to do was put a hefty stack of yen into one of the freshman student's hands, and tell 'em to go pretend to be him for an hour or two. Half the time the Old Fart didn't even seem to remember where he was, let alone which students were supposed to be there with or what they were supposed to look like. So far, the ploy had worked like a charm.

Which was good, since Kazuo had places to be and social mores to ignore.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Several hours later, but still some months in the past...

The streets of Roppongi were alive at any time of any night of the week, and tonight was no exception as Kazuo made his way past the many clubs, bars, and hotels. Roppongi was a lively and popular place, and fun to hang out at, though many Japanese shunned it since it was known to be a favored hangout of many visiting gaijin. Kazuo liked it though, and came here often for a good time. Tonight, however, he had other business in mind than a good time. He kept on walking, passing out of the thronging nightlife areas, and heading into the (slightly) quieter surrounding streets.

At a particular street corner, rougher-looking than its neighbors, and leading off into a deeply shadowed alley, Kazuo stopped and lit up a Lucky 7. Over the next several minutes three equally rough-looking characters approached Kazuo's street corner from different directions, exchanging brief formalities once they reached the corner and then waiting along with Kazuo for the rest. Once the fourth and final member of Kazuo's shady little group arrived there was a brief discussion, and then they all moved into the alley, casting suspicious glances behind themselves before disappearing within its shadows.

What all of them failed to notice was that they were being watched...

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

[z-Skye]

Skye had seen Kazuo by purest chance, but a small part of her was sure it was fate. After all, Kazuo so clearly needed rescuing from himself. He was headed on a downward spiral that would stop at a dark, violent place. All of this was for his own good, she told herself as she trailed them carefully.

But her mind angled into a little fantasy, where Kazuo came up to her at lunchtime - his hair cut, his suit pressed - and thanked her for leading him the right way. As he bowed deeply and spoke elegantly about her various and many virtues, her classmates watched, while the teachers nodded approvingly. But she wasn't doing it for the glamour, she reproved herself. She was doing it because it was the right thing to do.

The importance of the gathering of Kazuo's thugs was not lost on Skye, though the danger was. She had lived most of her life in Japan, and had spent many hours listening to her mother pontificate on how safe Japan was, compared to Germany. Skye herself had run all over the city with her friends over the year. She didn't quite realize that she could still be threatened, even in a safe place.

Glad that she'd had time to go home and change out of her school uniform, she followed Kazuo and his 'friends' into the alley, determined to catch Kazuo alone and give him what-for.

Half-dreaming of the allocades she'd recieve, Skye disappeared into the shadows and into Japan's underworld.

[Kazuo]

"Are you done yet?"

Skye could hear Kazuo and his fellow thugs before she could actually see them. The alley was narrow and was virtually unlit, leaving most of its length in total darkness. The voices of the four miscreants seemed to be coming from the deepest part of the shadows.

"Yeah, how long is this gonna take? We aint got all night?"

In pure gutter-slang, the unmistakable voice of Kazuo Kanai responded from the shadows, "Butsu butsu iu-na!" Even having grown up in Japan, it still took a moment for Skye's German-thinking brain to translate this phrase into its intended meaning of, "quit yer bitchin!"

Apparently, Kazuo growled this less than polite phrase a little too loudly, because another of his companions hissed angrily at him, "Oi! Urusen-dayo!" Which was an equally impolite way of telling someone they're noisy while simultaneously implying that they ought to do something about that - such as shutting the hell up, for example.

As Skye edged closer and her eyes adjusted to the darkness she was able to make out the four shapes of Kazuo and his three partners-in-what-was-most-likely-a-crime huddled together off to one side of the alley. Skye still couldn't see well enough to tell what they were actually doing, but as she approached nearer and nearer she became aware of a periodic clicking and metallic clanging noise.

Finally there was a much louder click, followed by Kazuo's voice again, sounding thoroughly pleased with itself, "Ne-eh, yatta!" Which didn't take much effort to translate as, "hey, I did it!" Skye wondered just what nefarious deed Kazuo had just "done", but she only wondered for a moment, because just then a bright beam of light pierced the darkness of the alleyway, seemingly conjuring Kazuo and his three friends from out of nothing. In the sudden light, Skye could see Kazuo in the act of turning towards his comrades and holding something aloft with obvious pride. Because of the sudden shift from pitch blackness to sudden illumination, it took Skye an instant to identify the object as a large, and currently unlocked, padlock. It only took her sharp and critical mind an instant longer to realize where the padlock had come from and how it had become unlocked (Kazuo must have picked it!). The question still remained of why, though that question would have to wait because Skye had just realized to her dismay that the light wasn't actually pointed at them - it was pointed at her!

A rough and extremely unfriendly voice shouted at her from what sounded like the entrance to the alley, back the way she had just come, "Temee!! Nan nan dai kore?" Which, roughly (very roughly) translated, meant, "Hey asshole! What the hell do you think you're doing?!" Clearly, whoever it was doing the shouting didn't know Skye was a high school girl, and just as clearly, Skye was somewhere she most definitely was not supposed to be as far as this someone was concerned!

Just before she turned to face her challenger, Skye's eyes met Kazuo's and she saw something truly rare. A look of pure shock, surprise, and not a little fear written all over his face. Life's little pleasures, and all that.

[z-Skye]

There is nothing worse than thinking you were hiding and being found out without warning. Skye's fantasies crumbled, burned away by that searing light. But more troubling, on a personal level, was the look on Kazuo's face. While she'd wanted to see that look on that Horst's face since her first day of school, this hadn't been the circumstances she'd imagined it would occur under. It was definitely a case of being careful what you wish for.

Skye didn't have time for that now. She turned to see shadows in the blinding light, amorphous, vaguely man-shaped objects. But she didn't feel compelled to remain and investigate this - she was far more interested in the sudden fear that cascaded down her spine.

It was animal instinct that made her turn back toward Kazuo and his group and run. She meant to sprint past them, but one of the men in the group reached out and grabbed her arm, shouting, "Busu, what are you doing?!"

The grab arrested her run and and spun her again. Skye was able to see more in the light, but it quickly followed her, fixating on her - and Kazuo's group. "Sheisse," she whimpered and began prying at the hand holding her. "Let me go!"

[Kazuo]

"Baka yaro!!", shouted Kazuo, grabbing Skye away from the thug who'd grabbed her. "She's not with them, kono kusoutare!"

"What?!", the other thug hissed in a hoarse whisper - still foolishly trying to be quiet, despite the flashlight currently pinning them to the wall like bugs in a display case. "You sure?", he asked, still half-heartedly fighting with Kazuo for possession of Skye, as though she were something to be possessed in the first place.

Kazuo had already given up on any stupid notion of keeping quiet - though, he was being pretty loud even before they'd been spotted - and he shouted at his companion, "of course I'm sure, dumbass! She goes to my -" *Blam!!!*

Kazuo and the boy he'd been arguing with both stopped dead in the midst of their argument. They all seemed to have gone suddenly deaf, Skye included, and simultaneously turned their heads in a slow daze towards the source of the tremendous noise.

At the other end of the alley was another group of figures, though they weren't pointing any lights into the alley, and were only barely illuminated by the lights coming from the other end of the alley. But none of that really mattered to Skye - what mattered was that they had guns! She could see the muzzle flashes in the darkness!!

Four things suddenly registered in her overloaded and shocked mind all at once: 1) all around her was a strange plinking, tinkling, and zinging noise almost like metallic rain, 2) loud booming noises were coming from both ends of the alley now, 3) these two sounds were intimately and dangerously connected, and 4) Kazuo was shouting obnoxiously loud directly into her ear! What an oaf!!

"Get in here!!", he was hollaring over and over. Skye blinked and realized that there was an open door behind him! Of course! The door that had been padlocked until Kazuo had picked it!

Suddenly becoming aware of her surroundings again, Skye looked about her and saw that one of the thugs was lying on the ground and the other two were already gone - presumably through the open door, but who knew? At either end of the alley were an unknown number of armed men - probably Yakuza - and both groups had taken to shooting at each other for no readily discernable reason. And gripping her arm and pulling at her was Kazuo, still shouting in her ear...

[z-Skye]

Too much, too fast and, with Kazuo serving as her not-so-gentle guide into this catastrophe, she wasn't getting a chance to assimilate it either. Of course, had Kazuo given her a change to assimilate, she'd likely be assimilating her brains right into the pavement of the alley. With a yelp, she allowed him to yank her into the room. Without consensus, they both grabbed for the door to slam it shut. As a result, Skye slammed it on Kazuo's head once and got it shut twice on her hand in the scramble to get it closed. All the pains were temporarily forgotten in the attempted cooperation.

"Lock it! Lock it!" Skye shrieked as she pressed her weight against it.

"It locks from the outside!" Kazuo shouted back. In truth, they were probably louder than they realized because they were both half-deaf, but that didn't excuse the edge of hysteria in their voices.

"Well, Scheiß brace it with something!" Skye screamed.

"I'll just pull something out of my ass!" Kazuo snarled. On the other side of the door, the gunshots stopped. "Find something! I'll hold it!"

Skye spun around - and stopped dead. Despite the urgency of the situation, a naive sixteen-year-old high school girl can't handle finding herself in a room full - full - of porn. Women of all shapes and types were doing all kinds of things on the front of the DVD and VHS cases around the room. "Oh, Gott," she whispered.

"Damn it!" Kazuo snarled and left the door, grabbing her. Skye started to protest, but he shoved her through another door. She fell over something and was yanked back up, only to have Kazuo fall against her as he tripped over the same large, body-like objects that she had. He caught himself and pushed off her, and she heard him start cursing in Japanese, throwing slang around so fast she couldn't understand it.

That was about the time she glanced down and saw that they were actually bodies. "Mein Gott! Mein Gott! Sie sind tot! Sie sind tot!" Without really thinking about what she was doing or who she was doing it to, she tried to climb up Kazuo so she wouldn't be standing on corpses. He wasn't exactly helping her though, and she merely ended up comically scampering up and sliding back down while he tried to detach her.

"Shaddup and hol' still so I can shoot you," a lazy voice drawled, and Skye froze, unaware that she had an arm around Kazuo's neck and he had a hand under one of her thighs. He dropped her abruptly so that he could put his hands up.

Moaning, Skye crawled off the bodies, only to have one of the men in the room grab her. Clearly, they were Yakuza - he could be nothing else, not with his clothing and dyed hair. Trying not to whimper, Skye wondered if they were going to die like the other two men. A gun was pointed at her, she saw her life flash before her eyes, and then someone said, "Hey! These are a couple of kids!"

[Kazuo]

"No shit, genius", retorted Kazuo, resorting to his default state of Poor Behavior as a means of coping, "what gave us away?"

"I said shaddup!", snapped the first yak, centering his weapon on Kazuo and cocking the hammer.

"Hey, fuck you, kid!", retorted the second yak, still holding on tightly to the squirming Skye.

"Fuck you!", returned Kazuo with what was arguably some very bad judgement and a severe lack of originality.

Then things happened really fast and crazy. The first yak took a step towards Kazuo and aimed directly at his head with the clear intention of proving just how bad Kazuo's judgement really was. But before he could pull the trigger, Kazuo did something fantastically dangerous and grabbed the gun itself, attempting to wrestle it out of the yak's hand. All that really happened though was that they both wound up all tangled together.

Seeing things about to go sideways, the second yak shoved Skye to one side shouting, "hey, leggo of him, punk!" Kazuo responded by spinning on one foot, while still grappling with the first yak, and knocking his gun out of his hand with an impressively well executed roundhouse kick. Even Kazuo seemed momentarily surprised by how well this maneuver worked, and nearly lost his grip on the first yak's weapon as a result.

Seeing a window of opportunity, the first yak jerked his gun back and pulled it free of Kazuo's grip. This time he didn't bother trying to aim at anything particular - it was point blank range and he was feeling rushed. Kazuo displayed his uncanny reflexes (and general lack of common sense) yet again however, and quick as a sarcastic, moody, and foul-mouthed snake he whipped himself around to one side and slammed his arm down on the first yak's hand just as he was pulling the trigger. The gun's barrel wound pointing downward at precisely the right angle to blow a sizeable hole in the second yak's shoe and, presumably, the foot housed within. The yak screamed and dropped to the ground, grabbing at his ruined foot and rocking back and forth.

Kazuo didn't quite scream, but he definitely grunted as the first yak landed a solid blow to his ribs, and then shoved him away. Kazuo tried to catch himself but tripped over the wounded yak and went down hard. By the time he'd gotten his bearings again and had turned over on his back, the first yak was already standing over him pointing his weapon and preparing to fire. Kazuo just stared.

Unnoticed by all them, Skye had watched the altercation with horrified fascination and mounting fear. In fact, she almost didn't realize that the second yak's gun had slid to a stop right next her after Kazuo kicked it out of his hand...

[z-Skye]

Skye was beyond thought now. She was an animal reacting to the input flying at her. Hence Kazuo's poor judgment didn't really have an effect on her. When the gun came flying at her, she ducked away from it, and let out a girly scream.

It took another few seconds for her to realize the possibility and power that the gun offered. She picked it up, cradling it in her hands, as if it belonged there. It had been build to be held, so the comfort wasn't completely surprising. She extended it out, as if in a dream, and heard someone else say, "Let him go, or I'll return the favor."

Skye recognized her own voice, but it was filled with the power and strength of The Gun. When the Yak paused, looking unsure, Skye added with a bark, "Now!"

He took a step back, letting the gun fall. His face was set in a sour scowl as he stared flatly at the girl. "Back up," Skye said. "Get away from K- from my... from the kid on the floor."

"Thanks," Kazuo muttered as he climbed to his feet.

"Over there," Skye said, gesturing with her head. The Yak was slow to move, and she growled, "Do it now! Now!" To emphasize her command, she shook the gun at him, just two quick bobs. It was designed to let him know she was serious.

He got the idea, though not the way she intended. She knew that when you put pressure on the trigger, it fired. But she didn't intend to do anything of the sort; it was enough to threaten, in her mind. Sometimes, this worked, though sometimes, people like Kazuo called your bluff. But a threat that will not be used isn't a threat. It is only when you mean your threat, when you know that you'll follow it through one hundred percent without hesitation, that it is a good threat.

A threat that is accidentally used is almost as good as one stated in full faith.

Triggers have variable pressures required to fire them. Some have tight triggers, and you have to apply a lot of pressure, relatively, to fire it. Others are loose, also called hair triggers. Some people are comfortable with these touchy, easily fired triggers. The Yak who'd taken one in his foot was one such person.

So when Skye shook it, it fired. Because she was shaking it, she didn't fire it well. But another Yak found himself with a bullet in his foot, complete with sudden disinterest in continuing the fight. Shouting and cradling his foot, he dropped the gun and scooted - literally on his butt - back into the corner.

Skye stared, still pointing the gun at him. She'd followed him, but she wasn't seeing him. She realized she'd just hurt another living being. To the Yak, it looked like she was cold-bloodedly staring at him, contemplating whether to shoot again. Skye was just fixated in horror, trying to reconcile who she was with the girl she'd been this morning.

[Kazuo]

Kazuo couldn't believe how quickly this night had gone to hell. Only a few minutes ago he'd been in the middle of a simple robbery. Steal a bunch smuggled-in porn for some yaks over Chiyoda way and make a nice clean profit in the process, how hard could that be? Apparently very hard, judging by the astounding number of dead and wounded people in this room alone.

He was currently vacillating somewhere between embarrassment over how badly he'd cocked up his attempt at heroically disarming the two yaks, and a kind of nervous amazement after watching Skye blast a hole in a man's foot 'cause he wouldn't move fast enough (like the yaks, he didn't realize she'd done it accidentally). To cover for both of these emotions, Kazuo settled on acting cocky and over-confident, because it's like they say, "when in doubt, show out!" Or something like that, anyway.

"That's what you get, dumbass! I hope they have to chop it off!"

Both yaks responded to this (probably because they couldn't tell which one he'd been talking to), but their words were so clouded with pain it was impossible to tell what they'd said. Probably best that way.

Kazuo ignored them, in any case, and turned to Skye. "C'mon, let's get out of here!" But she continued to stare at the man she'd just shot like Kazuo wasn't there, and he realized she must be in shock or something. "Oi! We gotta go, girl! The others'll be in here any minute, and they aint gonna be any friendlier!"

When she still didn't respond Kazuo sighed in exasperation and simply grabbed the gun from out of her hand, tossed it into the back room, towards the door they'd come in through, and started dragging her out the front door. Handily, this turned out to already be open - probably, it was how the two yaks had gotten into the store before them - so Kazuo just plowed into it shoulder first and kept going, Sky in tow. He stopped for a minute and looked left, then right, and finally seemed to see what he was looking for.

By this point Skye had snapped out of her fugue state and was getting fiesty again. Hurray for that. "Let go of me, Kazuo! And where are we going?!" Kazuo responded by glaring at her and hissing back, "would you shut it?! Keep quiet and act natural. If you can..."

"Don't tell me to -!", an indignant Skye started to respond, but Kazuo cut her off with a large hand clamped over her mouth and a pointed look and corresponding tilt of his head off to one side. Skye realized that they'd come full circle, and were now right next to the head of the alley where the men with flashlights, whom Skye now knew were Yakuza, had first spotted them. None were in evidence at the moment, but they could be back any second and it would be bad if she and Kazuo were seen, heard, or otherwise discovered by them. So she shut it. Acting natural, on the other hand, seemed to be beyond her means just then, but who could blame her?

Kazuo led them at a brisk pace (Of course brisk! What was he gonna do? Stroll! Kuso...) past the head of the alley, not really daring to look down it and find out if there really was a crowd of yaks staring at them or not. To Skye's growing amazement, not to say alarm, he made directly for what was obviously their vehicle and popped the passenger side door open, indicating for her to get in.

"Are you crazy?!", she demanded in disbelief.

"No! Now get in!", he said, making an obvious effort to keep cool while arguing with a hot-headed blond only ten feet from an alley full of armed gangsters.

"I will not, Kazuo! This is insane!"

"Baka! Get in!"

"No! You're crazy as well as stupid if you think I'm getting in there!"

"Girl! Get in the -!", Kazuo started, but then seemed to think better of it mid-sentence. Instead, he stepped towards Skye, grabbed her, and physically tossed her head-first through the open door, shutting it behind her without waiting for her to straighten herself out. Then he walked around the front of the vehicle having what sounded like a very unpleasant conversation with himself, while studiously ignoring the voices and shouts coming from the alley, more and more of which seemed to be aimed his way.

Coming around to the driver's side door, he popped that open, fended off Skye's attempted blows, started to look for some wires to hotwire the car with, and realized the keys were still in the ignition. "Huh", he said matter of factly, and turned the ignition over. A bullet ricocheted off the hood of the car, leaving a large score mark most of the way up its length, to which Kazuo said nothing and Skye screamed, and they both stared. Then Kazuo popped that sucker in reverse, and they were out of there!

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

About five minutes and a few kilometers down the road, the window part way down and a lit cigarette hanging from his mouth, Kazuo finally turned towards Skye again. With a sly and, let's be honest, annoyingly cocky smile on his face he asked, "so, you wanna go get somethin' to eat?"

((OOC: For those who don't know; Western style, uncensored pornography is illegal in Japan, and the Yakuza makes a healthy portion of their yearly profits by smuggling in and selling this porn - as well as producing some of their own along the way. This is why a group of Yaks would pay a low-level thief like Kazuo to break into an adult video store and steal the hidden stash of illegal porn in the back, and why the group of Yaks who'd had the porn smuggled into the country in the first place would be so upset over it.))

[z-Skye]

Oaf. Unbelievable moron. Ass extraordinaire. The list had been continuously playing in Skye's mind for the last five minutes, and showed no signs of stopping. It wasn't just that he'd bossed her around, and called her 'girl', it was his general attitude. He didn't respect her enough to treat her like a real person. The fact that Kazuo didn't respect anything didn't matter. He should respect her, even if he hated and reviled everything else in the world. She was Skye Fell, and she deserved at least that, especially from Kazuo Kanai.

"Eat? Eat?! No, I don't want to eat! I just shot someone!" Skye said, waving her hands around in general distress. "I had a gun. And I shot someone! I hurt another human-"

Skye stopped, turning her head away and staring out the window at the Tokyo skyline. She didn't like giving him her back, but she wasn't going to let him see her struggle not to cry. He probably knew. But she wasn't going to make it easy for him. She just needed to stop thinking about the man screaming, or about the terrible bloody hole in his foot.

She took a deep breath, then another. In and out, until she had cleared her mind of those images and until she had filled it with nothing but irritation. Irritation she could handle. And she could handle it without breaking into tears. "Eat if you want. I don't care what you do, Kanai Kazuo." She looked at him, her blue eyes seething with anger. "And you can take that as literal truth."

Lashing out at him made her feel better, more stable. It made the world seem right again, and not like a place where she shot people.

But what would make her feel better still would be getting away from him. "In fact, you can go do what you want, but let me out right now. I don't want to be in this stolen car when the cops catch you." She could find her own way home; the Japanese metro system was beautifully organized and she should have no trouble.

With a shrug of indifference - but with almost no change to that arrogant smile - Kazuo pulled over. Skye had the door open fast and had shut it again just as quickly. She had an urge to kick the car, but she reminded herself that it wasn't Kazuo's car, and would likely only amuse him. Without another glance at her, Kazuo pulled away and left her blissfully alone.

With a sigh, Skye felt her muscles start to relax. Just being around him was unhealthy for her, she decided, given how tense he made her. She'd have to make an appointment with the family's masseuse tomorrow, just to get the last kink out of her system.

Thinking about tomorrow made her remember that she'd have to see him again. Maybe he'll be sick... no, no virus could stand to be so close to him. Maybe he'll skip. Oh, or maybe he'll get arrested. Those pleasant thoughts sustained her all the way back home.

[Kazuo]

After dropping Skye off on the side of the road, Kazuo drove to a nearby chopshop he was known and trusted at and offloaded the yak-mobile for a hefty wad of yen. After that he walked back into the heart of the Roppongi district to burn off some of that tension and stress that he'd found tended to build up after a night of being shot at and nearly killed.

He managed to blow nearly all his newly gained illicit cash over the next few hours, completely forgetting his oath to never touch alcohol again, and nearly succeeding at forgetting the events of a few hours previous as well. He even managed to hook up with a fine looking gaigin whom he took to a nearby (and not too shabby) hotel for the evening. Unfortunately, by that point he had managed to so completely dilute the blood in his alcohol system that he really didn't remember how much fun he had - or much of anything else for that matter. Having managed to get everything off his mind (as they say), he also failed to notice that the she was a petite girl with pale skin and platinum blonde hair.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Kazuo's walk to school the next day was very nearly an exact repeat of the previous one, save that his outfit was even crumplier and his face even stubblier than before - which was saying something. He even arrived at school at about the same time, which was another way of saying 'very, very late'. This time, however, there was no snooty foreign bitch to stop him at the gates and aggravate the angry koalas hiding behind his eyeballs (okay, so there probably weren't any actual koalas hiding behind his eyeballs, but that's what it felt like, ok?). For the first time, Kazuo's day started looking up and he made for the school office to try and talk his way out of yet another session in detention - not that he would actually go if he got any, but it would save him bribe money if he could get out of it.

He had just entered the main school building and was rounding the corner to the school office, and had just started to think that today might actually be looking up, when some idiot going the other way and not looking where they were going ran straight into him! "Baka yarou! Temee nani shiten dai!", shouted Kazuo, which was a fun Japanese way of saying, "what do you think you're doing, dumbass?! Get the hell outta my way!" Ahh, those silly Japanese - always so polite!

Kazuo was so busy being tough and scary that it took him a moment to realize that the person who'd just run into him - and who undoubtedly thought that he'd been the one to run into her - was none other than Skye Fell. Oh, the horror. The horror.

[z-Skye]

It had been a bad night once she got home. The Tokyo metro is beautifully organized but it still takes time to get across town. While her mother was pretty lenient, she chose this evening to become interested in her daughter's late-night trip. That had led to Skye flat-out lying to her mother for the first time in her life - because really, was any kid as smart as Skye going to tell her mom what she'd been up to? And while Alias didn't seem to completely buy it, she didn't know enough to get the truth out. There was a short argument that was ended by Skye being sent to her room.

She flopped back on her bed and went over the events of the night. She tried not to, but she kept replaying it - the sneaking, the yelling, the fear, and especially the shooting. She'd hurt someone. She'd shot them. That made her put her pillow over her head and cry for a bit, sure that it was the end of her future. She waited through the night for the police to come get her, but toward dawn she passed out.

Her dreams, crammed into her short sleep, betrayed her further, as she had strange fantasies replay in her head regarding the day’s events. Over and over, she replayed the events, each variation ending differently. One pleasing variation had her shooting Kazuo in the foot; another less pleasing but oddly enjoyable had depicted Kazuo not dropping her off, but instead turning to her, trapping her against the door of the car – a door that was unlocked. What had followed had woken her two minutes before the alarm, distressed and disgusted. Anything else she might have felt was drowned in those emotions, and deeply repressed in her subconscious mind.

That meant she was exhausted before her day began. She dragged herself through breakfast and into her homeroom, the bags under her eyes making her look like she'd been beaten. At the lunch break, when she actually looked in a mirror and saw how bad they were, she slipped into the bathroom and applied concealer - with the fawning help of her sycophants, of course. Hence she completely missed Kazuo's epic appearance at lunchtime.

But fate, unkind bitch that she is, arranged for an encounter anyway. Skye was glancing over her shoulder at James McAlister, covertly admiring the way his school uniform fit him, when someone ran into her. Skye's first clue to the identity of the mysterious roadblock was the whiff of unwashed, over-partied and over-sexed beauty that was Kazuo's signature aroma right now. Her immediate response - pinching her nose up and screwing up her face - was forestalled by the shock that froze her. Worse, a red-hot blush turned her face from milk-white to cherry-red, and for a moment her half-forgotten dreams made a vivid come-back.

Then a murmur of student voices brought her back and reminded her where she was, and Skye's shoulders squared. As that cute blush started to fade, she said, "You should watch where you are going, Kazuo Kanai. And I see we're still disgracing ourselves today." Her eyes raked down his uniform and back up as she made a perfect humph noise (perfect because she'd practiced it). "But could you please shower next time and save the rest of the world from having to smell your disgrace?"

Tossing her hair back, she walked around him, refusing to slow down or shut up, because she'd be damned if she'd let him say anything and ruin her. "It's not like being clean kills you, Kanai. I hear it even is good for you." Blue eyes glanced back at him, piercing and intense. "You should try it."

She swept away, praying he wouldn't say anything to her. When she reached the door to her room, she glanced back, afraid of what she'd see. But to her relief, all she saw his back as he walked away, slouching, hands in pockets. What she had said hadn't mattered a bit.

Such an infuriating man! she fumed as she went to class.

The more things changed...

[Kazuo]

As the blood and heat of embarrassment rose to Skye's face several realizations rose to the surface of Kazuo's mind, like dross in a melting pot, laid bare for him to see with ease and clarity. As she blasted him with yet another barrage of (mostly accurate) insults, Kazuo's confusion over her behavior was blown away. It all made so much sense now!

She acted this way because she was scared! Hah!

It was important to notice, however, that this realization of Kazuo's was not the most important thing to take away from all this. What was most important took place further down in Kazuo's subconscious where he wasn't even aware of its exitstance. To understand why, and to understand why it was important, one would have to know that Kazuo, being a young man and - above all - being Kazuo, he hadn't yet acknowledged how he felt about his father's death, or his mother's behavior afterwards, and he most definitely hadn't made a connection with those feelings and how they had influenced his behavior over the years. How he had his own fears driving him out into the Tokyo night, pushing him to push away everyone around him before they pushed back. These were not things he was ready to think about!

If one understood all of these things, one might understand why Kazuo suddenly felt so much sympathy - a feeling almost wholly alien to him - for the delicate young woman so full of fire and acid as he watched her stalk off down the hall, hoping to leave him in the dust before he could get any on her.

As he watched her go, Kazuo smiled ever so slightly. Then he shrugged, stuffed his hands in his pockets, and turned his back on her. He had some quick thinking and fast talking to do in the school office, and personal epiphanies would have to wait.

Skye turned too late, and could only watch him go, not realizing that her words had impacted him, though perhaps not as she'd intended, and not yet realizing how he'd impacted her. Both were confused and frustrated at having discovered someone who seemed unable to be moved or pushed aside or knocked off their chosen path. It was like the more one pushed...

...the more they stayed the same.

-End