"I'll go see what's going on."
"I am coming with you," Circus Girl rasps.
Ah. A night of surprises.
I nod in acquiescence.
...
No amount of wheedling will help. Someone needs to watch the ship with Peter and Fon.
Ebisu was needed to find the right dealer for our purposes with Gorou.
Circus Girl's motivations are still unclear. She at least, seems to want something within Ba Sing Se. I'll be surprised if it's justice for anyone but herself, though. Which leads me to the question of what it is that she wants with the Dai Li. The Dai Li holds the key to Ba Sing Se.
Which is why she too needs watching even if she can be trusted with Peter. Haruto stays on board because I don't think Peter can fend off Fon if he tries something. He is still a child, after all.
"Haruto," I say quietly, intently to the boy, "This won't be some heroic effort to rescue our crew. I'll probably have to kill a few people and we won't come out of there unscathed. Depending on how this goes, we might have to abandon our plans altogether and enter the city as refugees. I know that you know all of this. Point is, no matter what we do, we still need the ship. And you're the only one I can trust to keep it safe from whatever machinations Ebisu and Fon are setting into motion. Because they are. This might be the revelation of that, or it might not, but you're not coming with us tonight."
I sigh at his pout. "I realise that you want in on the action, I do. But I'm not going to lie to you, you're not skilled enough to survive this fight, and I can't look out for you. I'll teach you some after tonight, if you do as I ask."
Reluctant, he nods, but that's all I need.
"Then good luck. Tell Mai what's going on when she wakes up," I ruffle his hair and get going, Circus Girl and Eyebrows in tow.
I know roughly to where Gorou went. I also know that that's gang territory. Because he was meant to come to an agreement with them, since they have certain contacts within Ba Sing Se that don't involve the Dai Li. Or if they do, they're tolerated in order to keep others out. Better to have one criminal organisation functioning, but in view, rather than having to deal with others coming in all the time to replace one another and fight for territory which would disturb the peace.
Because there is no war in Ba Sing Se. Of course not.
It's all just a neighbourly dispute, really.
I suspect that it was the panic when the city was breached from the outside the last time by the Dragon of the West that allowed for the Dai Li's policies to be set in place. This was when the Earthking was still the actual ruler. That is, until he was presumably assassinated by the very peacekeeping force he employed.
He wasn't the only one to suffer from that monumental point in the war's history. The price the Dragon of the West paid proved too steep for him, too. His son's life.
It is understandable that he should be shattered by the trauma of losing his child in a war of which he'd been the general and driving force. But then again, he was killing thousands of other people's sons with his conquest. So… it seems to have been a necessary event for Iroh, the Crown Prince then, to see what it was that he was devastating with his advance. The conditioning his father used on him and his brother must have left its mark. But there also must have been some capacity for empathy within Iroh from the beginning, or he would not have changed so dramatically in the wake of his son's death.
Iroh was not the only one to change after Ba Sing Se had been breached. I strongly suspect that it was then that the brainwashing truly began. That is, the protecting of the tradition within the city by and for the Dai Li. That's conservatism driven to the point of insanity. The Earthking is young. Perhaps it was the perfect opportunity to take power beneath the notice of a young, grief-stricken man who hadn't learnt sufficient distrust of people in and with power then.
In any case, we're about to deal with the most powerful organised crime organisation I know of within the Earthkingdom. And they've captured Gorou.
I'm hoping that this is only a test to see how well we do. Otherwise we might be getting out of this only by slaughtering our way out. Which would not fit into our clever, quiet plans to get into the city.
It is immediately apparent that we have arrived when five men in dark clothing, wearing demon masks, circle our small party, remaining at a distance of ten paces from my position only because I have Eyebrows at still-bloody knifepoint. Circus Girl has tensed and seems ready for a fight.
So, Gorou's meeting with his old employers didn't turn out that well. I suppose that all we can hope for now is a slightly more peaceful resolution than beating everyone up, or dying here.
People wearing masks that cover their entire face have always made me uneasy. It is why I wear one that covers only half of my face, for anonymity and the benefit of still being able to express what I leave unsaid. I am not a master of body language, after all, and I cannot expect everyone I meet to be able to read it accurately. I pause in continuing towards the large red gate that is the entrance to the organisation's headquarters.
"You know what the masks signify?" I ask Circus Girl once I have enough of her attention.
Her scowl is a negative one. Perhaps it should concern me that her expressions are easy enough to decipher for me, even with the limited amount of time we've spent in one another's company these past months.
"They represent the most malignant spirits we know of. It means that while wearing these masks, the people behind them cease to exist. There is nothing that they are unwilling to do to serve their master."
She frowns, but eyes the guards more cautiously. Good. We can't afford to underestimate their skill.
The masks are a warning. As we continue on, the red gates opening silently at our approach, I appreciate their explicit nature. There is no need for censure or subtlety here in Tananga, the city of gangs, thieves, pirates and what amounts to Mafiosi. There are no peacekeeping officials because any who attempt to enforce the King's law here die soon enough at the hands of someone they pissed off. No one is safe, just like anywhere else. It just makes even more of a difference here who your friends are.
We're strangers in this place. I can only hope they're willing to make new acquaintances tonight.
The compound behind the thick walls is impressive, to say the least. It's closer to a fortress than anything else, really. A heavily defensible fortress with enough shadows between torches for the masked guards to melt into. This is a place where intruders won't easily harness the darkness to their advantage. It is far more likely to be their demise.
It seems more and more unlikely that we'll escape here alive, should it come to a fight.
...
How very unfortunate. The inside of the fortress is cool and equally sparsely lit as the courtyard. We're silently led straight ahead through a set of black metal doors with spikes on them pointing t the outside, glinting dangerously. It seems that they're well-prepared for attacks. There is no such thing as overkill for an organisation like this, I suppose.
The inside of the large room reminds me of one of those old, Roman estates with the water in the inner yard, only it's closed to the roof. And the shallow pool's been filled with sand. Behind us, the doors are shut.
Beyond the thirteen masked guards that I detect, of which I only see five, there are two others in the room. They aren't easily made out as more than vaguely person-shaped figures in the odd lighting of the room. One spotlight into the sandpit that makes the places where blood splattered twinkle like bronze gemstones and the surroundings even darker in contrast.
Once my eyes adjust a bit to the strange light, I meet dark, intent eyes across the room. Across the drawn blades of the men who are meant to subdue Mai and me. I have made my decision to support Gorou in this. I will give these people a reason not to speak of any of this. If relations have already deteriorated this far, then fine. We'll force them to be our trading partners by making ourselves into what they need, but making it so that we will have to remain independent to move as we must in order to fulfil our purpose as whatever it is that they need.
But first I need to know what's transpired here. What has Gorou told them?
...
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