*Underground gym, Downtown Sumiyoshi
Hanzo sat on a worn-out chair close to the cluttered storage room in the gym.
Hoshi sat on a sturdy box crate that rested against the grimy wall just behind Hanzo, but positioned a bit to his left.
Asuka was leaning wearily on the same wall, right beside Hoshi, her presence submissive and silent.
"…I still can't fuckin' believe those bastards actually ambushed you guys.
How the hell did they even manage to carry that much hardware through the tunnels without anyone seeing a damn thing?" Genji asked, a strange, almost hysterically manic smile playing on his face.
His right hand was gently, almost absently, caressing his own shin, and his eyes stared blankly at the cracked concrete ground, which was littered with fragments of worn-out, discolored tile here and there.
The gangster, Genji, sat directly opposite Hanzo, with his imposing right-hand man – Hida – standing silently, watchfully, just beside him.
Genji then slowly looked up, his gaze shifting to Hoshi and then to Hanzo, who were both visibly unmoved by his statement of concern.
"Well, now, you don't have to worry yourselves about those punks.
My guess is that this whole situation is precisely why our commander has called for this little meeting… Ui Ui and his damn Sinners want a fuckin' war?
Then they are gonna get their fuckin' heads chopped clean off and then hanged on a goddamn spike for everyone to see. That, I can personally promise you," Genji said, deliberately dragging out his words in a dreadful, yet chillingly confident tone, a disturbing stain of excited madness now clearly visible in his glinting eyes.
"We both know that's not what's really happening here, Genji..." Hoshi gave a slightly vexed, weary response, his voice low.
"Genji, I… We had a deal with you people.
A deal for a reasonable taste of every single run that crosses through your territory, and other boons, like having Ayaka patch up any of your Black Bird when they meet the wrong side of a gun or blade.
In return, we were to remain strictly neutral on all sides, with all factions," Hanzo then said softly, his voice carefully maintaining an indifferent, business-like tone.
"…Then, just a few days ago, your guys went and roughed up the collectors from the Sinners, the ones who usually collect their own small, agreed-upon cut from us.
And now, the word out on the street is that WE somehow told you guys to go and collect 'your' cut from them," Hoshi picked up grimly from where Hanzo had left off.
"Then, predictably, they retaliated by ambushing us on our last fuckin' stroll down to the Fish-Market to move some goods.
That ambush cost us a lot of fuckin' money, Genji.
We honestly don't really care what you personally want to do to 'em, or not do to 'em.
Just keep your own damn WORDS and uphold your end of our fuckin' deal!" Hoshi finished, his voice rising slightly with controlled anger.
The duo, Hanzo and Hoshi, knew they can't possibly pay in straight cash for all the valuables that were stolen from them during that ambush.
The Black Bird are more about the coins and couldn't care less about honour or good will.
And they both also knew, deep down, that this whole recent escalation wasn't just some mindless or silly stunt by the Black Birds.
They are definitely saying something with these actions, sending a clear, unmistakable message...
"You fellas are neutral. You don't work for anyone…" Genji then repeated that chilling phrase two more times, each time letting out a short, comically exaggerated laugh after saying it.
Like a bad joke.
Then, he suddenly, abruptly, stopped laughing, and his eyes narrowed as he stared intently at Hanzo, who was still sitting tensely in front of him.
Genji's face was now a mask of pure, murderous intent.
"No one trust a bitch that fucks the whole damn neighborhood, Hanzo."
"Everything in this entire goddamn hood rightfully belongs to US!
There's no fuckin' neutral!
You really think we will just sit back and watch you hand over our bread to Ui Ui and his Sinners?!…" Genji suddenly yelled, his voice cracking with rage.
He shot up from his chair, standing up so aggressively fast that he immediately startled the three people sitting in front of him.
He then violently grabbed the wooden chair which he'd just been sitting on, and threw it with his full, unrestrained might straight towards the wall, right beside where Asuka stood, frozen.
The sudden, violent action made the woman shriek loudly in pure, abject fear.
The blur of the flying chair seemed to be heading directly towards her, which made her involuntarily close her eyes tightly and use her one good arm, and the stump of the other, to try and protect her vulnerable face.
Even Hoshi and Hanzo reacted involuntarily to the sight of that flying chair, flinching, but not nearly as pronouncedly as Ayaka did
Since the very first second of this so-called meeting, both Hanzo's and Hoshi's faces had now drawn into a shared expression of untainted, bitter disdain, simmering anger, and more than just a hint of deep, weary wariness.
This was because this outburst was exactly what they had been afraid of, what they didn't want to hear from this constantly unhinged, unpredictable gangster.
He had just unequivocally, called them and their operation a property of the Black Bird.
As the broken pieces of the now shattered metal chair clattered loudly to the floor, Hoshi attempted to quickly step up, to try and verbally confront the raging, out-of-control gangster now standing menacingly in front of him.
"Gen…" he started to say, but he was instantly, brutally cut short before he could even get anything else out.
Hida had already launched himself forward with blurring speed, delivering a strong, vicious front kick directly to Hoshi's right thigh, dangerously close to his genitals.
The force of the powerful kick forced Hoshi to let out a bitter, choked grunt of agony.
He then fell hard onto one knee, immediately using his two hands to quickly support himself by placing them flat on the dirty, uneven ground.
By the time he managed to raise his head back up again to try and face Hida, he instantly felt the dead, cold muzzle of a pistol being pressed hard against his forehead.
The pressure of it just made him freeze completely, all thoughts of resistance vanishing.
Hanzo, who still sat frozen in his own chair, mostly out of sheer, paralyzing fear and the complete inability to react quickly enough to this sudden, swift escalation – from Genji just lashing out verbally, to Hoshi now being down on his knee with a 9 millimeter Glock practically kissing his forehead – was stunned into silence.
Before Hanzo could even manage to say anything, or even process what was happening, he felt a strong, rough hand forcefully grabbing his bearded jaw, the grip like iron.
The pressure made his mouth curl up involuntarily, painfully, in an almost comical, grotesque manner.
"You either fuck with us or you get fucked hard by us. There's no more of all this half-cock, playing-all-sides bullshit anymore…" Genji said coldly, his voice a low snarl, squeezing Hanzo's already aching face tighter and tighter with each passing, agonizing second.
"So… Hanzo, my friend. Will you perhaps like to know how it fuckin' feels to see your own jaw get detached from your fuckin' face? Or will you finally, wisely, choose a fucking side, right here, right now?" Genji then asked, his eyes now open freakishly wide, pupils dilated, staring with manic intensity directly into Hanzo's rapidly forming, teary eyes.
At that exact, critical moment, a loud, sudden thud of heavy dumbbells and other heavy gym equipment hitting the concrete floor could clearly be heard from the main gym area.
The weights bounced and rolled noisily, finally resting on their own accord.
Then, the main entrance door to their private office area was violently kicked open with a resounding crash.
This whole sudden, unexpected ruckus made Genji slowly, almost grudgingly, turn his head, his neck moving in a crooked, unnatural way, to see what all the sudden fuss was about.
Besides Genji, Hida, Hanzo, Hoshi, and Asuka in a small corner, the entire gym had now abruptly stopped whatever they were previously doing.
All of them, were now staring daggers directly at Genji and Hida, their expressions grim, clearly ready to dice them up.
Razor and his crew who had just burst into the gym immediately pulled out their own guns, expertly cocking them and then pointing them at a slanting angle towards both Genji and Hida.
While those among them who were without cannons quickly picked up anything solid around them that they could possibly use as a makeshift weapon – iron bars, heavy chains, broken pieces of wood.
And those that couldn't immediately find a weapon simply cracked their knuckles or their necks loudly, clearly ready and willing to use their bare hands to try and tear right through Genji and his crew.
Razor then coldly, his voice like ice, ordered Genji, "Get your fucking hands away from him right now, dickhead!" while pointing his own heavy handgun directly, unwaveringly, at Genji's head.
Hanzo and Hoshi had already known, from the very beginning, that the recent stunt the Black Birds had pulled with the Sinners gang was far, far from innocent or accidental.
And they also knew that holding a private meeting with a known psycho like Genji - a lieutenant of the Black Bird, especially in a confined, private space like their own small office, would just be making their own asses that much more appealing get smoked, easily, so having the meeting in the workout area was more sensible... And they were right.
No matter what kind of supposed good history or business Genji might have had with either of them, he is, at his core, a stone-cold fuckin' killer, whose loyalty lies only within his own ambitions and desires.
Nothing else can match that.
He would undoubtedly kill both of them without wasting a single fuckin' thought on it if he feels like it.
Genji and Hida, however, weren't entirely alone in this confrontation.
Some of Genji's own boys had also followed him to this meeting, and were now positioned few feet behind him and Hida.
They now quickly, pulled out their own tantos and guns, clearly just waiting for the waste every fool point their weapons at them.
The small room was now clouded with the almost palpable, suffocating intent of imminent blood and murder.
The tension was so dense, so thick, that you would probably need a goddamn chainsaw to even try and cut through it.
While the respective bosses of both opposing camps were still locked in a dangerous, stalemated silence.
Which can't really, accurately, be called a true stalemate just yet, because Genji still had Hanzo's face crushed painfully in his palm, clearly prepared to turn his features into unrecognizable moosh if he doesn't get the exact answer he wants, and very soon.
And, at the same time, the cold muzzle of Hida's heavy Glock is still intimately, uncomfortably, caressing Hoshi's damp forehead.
"Hanzo… Man, just chill… Let's just try to play along with 'em for now, okay?" Hoshi finally spoke, his voice strained, in broken accented South-Korean, trying to sound as calm as he possibly could under the circumstances.
"But we fuckin' outnumber them here, Hoshi! At least five to fuckin' one… We can fucking take them, right now!" Hanzo replied angrily, his own words muffled and distorted due to Genji's crushing grip on his lower jaw, though he spoke in fluent, clear South-Korean.
"Why won't you ever fuckin' listen to me, Hanzo?!… Some of 'em out there, Genji's backup, they are fuckin' Evolves, man!
Besides these two fuckers currently holding us hostage right here!
We won't ever walk out of this alive if bullets start flying... And neither will any of our own guys currently in this gym! You know that!" Hoshi strongly, desperately, rebuked Hanzo's rash, impulsive thinking.
"Can you two please speak in fuckin' Japanese, so that the rest of us can actually hear what you're sayin'?" Genji then broke in, his voice deceptively pleasant, as he smiled like a complete, gibbering maniac.
"Just say 'Yes' to him, Hanzo, and I will then tell my guys here to put down all their weapons… please, man, just do it," Hoshi ignored Genji's interruption and said again, very softly now, directly to Hanzo.
Hanzo was still visibly fuming, his eyes blazing with impotent rage, but he resisted the overwhelming urge to just yell out for his own loyal men to cut down every single one of these Black Birds motherfuckers currently in his gym.
He knew, deep down, that everything Hoshi had just said, even in his terrible, broken South-Korean, was unfortunately, undeniably, the absolute fuckin' truth.
"Yes…" Hanzo finally whispered softly, almost inaudibly, in Japanese.
He was extremely, bitterly reluctant to let Genji's obnoxious, humiliating provocation just slide like this, but he knew, with a certainty that chilled him to the bone, that he had to do better, to be smarter, for the sake of his men.
"Huh? Yes to what, exactly, my friend?" Genji responded immediately, theatrically putting his ear much closer to Hanzo's trembling lips, feigning deafness.
Hanzo then clarified his earlier statement with a weak, barely audible mutter.
But Genji was clearly far from satisfied with that, and he then yelled out in cruel jest, "What the hell was that, Hanzo? I'm not so sure those guys standin' by the entrance could even hear you properly! Fuck, even I can't hardly fuckin' hear you from this close!"
"Let go of my fuc… mouth then… if you …an't fuckin' hear me, you mother…ker!" Hanzo responded, his voice a series of hatefully muffled, choked sounds, as he gave Genji a raging, yet ultimately defeated and helpless, stare.
Genji then roughly, abruptly, let go of Hanzo's lower jaw, finally allowing him to speak more clearly.
Hanzo quickly redrew his head back a bit, a wave of profound relief washing over him as Genji finally let go of his aching mouth.
He then said, his voice now thick with barely suppressed emotional pain and humiliation, "We… we work for the Black Birds now."
As he did so, Hoshi immediately raised up his left hand and then waved it down gently, but firmly, repeating this specific hand wave three times.
It was a clear, pre-arranged gesture to silently signal his own guys to pull back their weapons and to immediately seize their current aggressive, threatening manner.
They all responded surely, but still somewhat slowly, to his command, their eyes still warily staring daggers at all the Black Birds members, who, for their part, didn't retreat back an inch, since Genji hadn't yet ordered them to do so.
Genji then looked to his right and gave a slight, almost imperceptible nod at Hida.
Hida immediately, smoothly, pulled his gun away from Hoshi's head, and his own subordinate, standing just behind him, followed suit without a word.
Hida then stepped back a pace, while Genji, with a smirk, gently, almost mockingly, slapped Hanzo's face twice, with just enough force to sting.
He then asked rhetorically, his voice dripping with contempt, "So, tell me, Hanzo, does it feel good to finally be a proper bitch?"
Hanzo didn't respond, didn't say a word.
He just crooked his head a bit to the side as he stared hatefully, venomously, at Genji, his mind still boiling with an unquenchable, furious rage.
Meanwhile, Hoshi quickly stood up and then softly, cautiously, placed his hand on Hanzo's trembling left shoulder – a silent, supportive gesture, urging him to try and calm down, as Hanzo still sat there, frozen and still.
"Well, now, I think we are all pretty much done here for today. Let's allow our good friends Hoshi and Hanzo here to go and clean themselves up a bit… They clearly have a hell of a lot to think about now, don't they?" Genji then announced loudly to the room, as he stood up straight himself.
He then casually dusted off the left-breast area of his expensive, tailored suit, and then gave another curt nod to Hida and the rest of his assembled crew, signaling for them to finally take their leave.
As they all got close to the main door of the office, Genji suddenly turned around again and said, "Hey..." casually nodding his head towards Hoshi, who just stared back at him impassively, without saying anything in return.
"You make sure you take very, very good care of some of my guys who are still healin' up back here in your gym, alright? Because if even just one of 'em happens to die under your watch, well, then I personally wouldn't mind at all if there was only one person left runnin' this whole joint from now on, if you catch my drift," Genji warned sternly, his voice now laced with a chilling bit of dark humor.
They all then finally took their leave after that last, ominous pronouncement.
As the very last of Genji's crew exited the now quiet gym, Hanzo immediately, explosively, stood up.
He raised his right hand up to his face, to try and massage away some of the numbing, throbbing pain that Genji's small, yet incredibly strong, grip had left imprinted on his face.
He then suddenly yelled out, "FUCK!" at the very top of his lungs, his voice filled with unbounded, helpless vexation, before violently kicking the sturdy wooden crate he had just been sitting on.
The heavy crate skipped and tumbled a few feet across the floor, with the specific area of the box that Hanzo had kicked completely spattering, splintering into pieces all over the place.
He then yelled out that same single, profane word again, repeatedly, his voice raw with emotion, as he swung his arms around aimlessly, with intensified, furious annoyance and uncontainable anger, like a completely mad person desperately fighting against invisible ghosts that only he alone could see.
"Alright, show's over, people! Everyone just get the fuck back to whatever the fuck you were doin' before all this shit went down!" Hoshi then said aloud, his voice sharp and commanding, to everyone else in the gym who had continued to just stand there and stare at them – or, more specifically, at Hanzo, as he now stormed around in tight, agitated circles.
Razor and all the others then reacted, albeit slowly, to Hoshi's harsh words.
Many of them started to reluctantly move, to disperse, while others simply shifted their curious gaze towards Hoshi instead, their faces now etched with a variety of different, unreadable expressions – some showed open curiosity, others a bit of lingering vexation, a few just plain aloofness, and so on; nothing too overtly intense or threatening now, though.
"I ain't speakin' motherfucking Chinese here, you damn cunts!" Hoshi then suddenly yelled out again, his voice now laced with zero remaining will to try and sound soft or reserved this time.
His outburst immediately prompted those who had only been moving slowly before to now move much, much faster.
And those few who had still continued to just stand there and stare, despite his initial firm order, quickly picked themselves up and started moving too, getting back to their routines.
"Let's go talk about this in the office…" Hoshi then said calmly, his voice returning to normal, as he addressed Hanzo, who had by now finally stopped his yelling and frantic pacing around.
Hanzo was now just massaging his still-aching face and the back of his stiff neck as he stood there, trembling slightly, utterly still.
Then Hoshi turned his head to face Asuka, who had remained silent and watchful throughout the entire ordeal, and said to her, his voice tired, "You go and tend to those fucking Black Birds who are still here, the injured ones. That motherfucker Genji ain't fuckin' kidding around about that."
He instructed Asuka curtly.
She replied simply, with just a quick, understanding nod of her head, and then immediately left to go to the back room where the injured were kept.
Hoshi then turned to face Hanzo again.
He slightly, almost imperceptibly, but still noticeably, nudged his head a bit towards his own left – a silent, familiar gesture, indicating for them to go to their private office to talk.
They both then walked into their small, cramped office – which also doubled as their bullet-proofed counter – hastily closing the heavy, reinforced door securely behind them.
They didn't even bother taking a sit this time.
"Those fucking goddamn retards… Fuck! I can't believe this shit!" Hanzo yelled once more, his voice muffled by the closed door, but his rage still palpable.
"Hanzo, I would very much fuckin' like it if we can actually try to talk rationally about the absolute shit that just fuckin' went down out there, like, 3 seconds ago, instead of you just standin' here yellin' like a lunatic… It is not like I wouldn't also fuckin' love to personally crack the goddamn skull of that insufferable cunt - Genji... that fucking mutant," Hoshi hoarsely said, his own voice tight with suppressed fury.
He then unconsciously tightened his own massive fists, as if he was imagining himself crushing a particularly resilient bug between them, with all the considerable might he could draw out.
How much that giant freak of nature, Hoshi, truly wanted to just burst that arrogant little prick Genji like a water-filled balloon, right then and there.
Hoshi continued fueling this dangerous, vengeful trail of thought for another moment, which he knew might potentially prompt him to try and pull something extremely fuckin' stupid against Genji and the entire Black Birds gang in the not too distant future.
An action which would then most definitely spell his own certain death, and probably also the death of Hanzo, and the complete, utter destruction of their entire business all together.
He then consciously, deliberately, relaxed his tensed muscles, before slowly closing his eyes for a moment.
He then inhaled and exhaled very deeply, several times, finally, gradually, calming himself down.
He then met Hanzo's still somewhat wild, but now calmer, gaze, noticing just a little bit of residual fury still simmering in them.
"So, what the fuck do we actually do now, Hanzo?" Hoshi finally asked, his voice now a weary mixture of resigned defeat and lingering, bitter spite.
"What can we possibly do, Hoshi?" Hanzo replied softly, his question purely rhetorical, as he then lazily, heavily, sat himself down on a sturdy pile of wooden crates stacked in a corner of the small office.
He then dropped his face into his hands for a moment, looking down at the rough ground.
He then continued voicing out his bleak thoughts, his tone now much lower, almost a whisper, "There's just no fuckin' way for us to get completely out of this mess now, Hoshi. Except, maybe, by tryin' to fuck around with some other gang, and we both know that's just a terrible, fuckin' suicidal plan."
"All the damn gangs here in Sumiyoshi, they don't understand the fuckin' meaning of the word 'Alliance,' or even 'Partner,' not really. If one ever gets into bed with any of them, you either end up workin' for them as their bitch, or you just get completely used up and then discarded by them like trash for fuckin' peanut."
"But can't we just try to pit one of them against the Black Birds? Them Sinners are always lookin' for any excuse to try and smash in some Black Bird's skull, aren't they?" Hoshi then sort of asked, more to gauge Hanzo's current thoughts on this desperate idea than anything else.
"With those damn Enforcer's recent raids happenin' more frequently up in the upper districts, and also with this newly arising, open war now brewin' between the Black Birds and the Sinners, the streets down here are gonna run fuckin' red with blood, very soon.
We really don't need to go and fuck ourselves in the ass any more than we already are, by foolishly tryin' to make any kind of new bond with any of those other freaking assholes right now, especially not with the fuckin' Sinners.
No, let's just try to close up our main shop for a while, lay low, and then just deal with these Black Birds bastards as best we can, at least until after this whole bloody shit storm finally blows over," Hanzo replied swiftly, his voice firm with conviction.
"We could, perhaps, try to bring the cops, and maybe even those Enforcers, down here into Sumiyoshi after this whole thing really kicks off?" Hoshi then replied, thinking aloud.
"Nah, man, that won't ever fuckin' work... those fuckin' corrupt cops, they will just end up tearin' the whole damn of Sumiyoshi, without even properly bleedin' out the Black Birds first.
They might even just fuckin' cut some kinda new deal with 'em on the side, especially after they've all been forced to lay low for some time by the heat," Hoshi then immediately answered his own desperate question, throwing his head back in frustration, resting it wearily against the dirty, stained wall of their cramped office.
"And taking proper care of the Black Birds ourselves isn't even the worst fuckin' thing that can possibly happen to us in this scenario, Hoshi. The real worst thing is if the Black Birds somehow manage to get those same cops to just look the other fuckin' way, maybe with some well-placed coins or favors. And then, if those same cops, or the Black Birds themselves, somehow then found out later that we were the ones who were involved in callin' them in… Well, then it will literally be our own fuckin' guts found scattered all around in the filthy streets of Sumiyoshi, for the rats to feast on," Hanzo grimly completed the bleak, bloody picture that Hoshi was now reluctantly painting.
"So, basically, we don't really have any sure, safe way of gettin' rid of that cock-sucker – Genji – at all, do we?" Hanzo asked once again, his voice now flat with resignation.
"Honestly, Hanzo? I really can't think of any single fuckin' way right now that won't just get both of us quickly diced up into little pieces, long before the Black Birds themselves even properly hit the goddamn ground from whatever fallout happens," Hoshi replied, his own voice equally devoid of hope.
"Fuck!" Hanzo couldn't help but say, his voice a choked whisper, finally seeing, with horrifying clarity, that this grim conclusion might truly, inevitably, be the actual case for them.
The duo couldn't really do anything at all to truly save themselves from being crushed between the brutal law on one side - The Black Dragon's Enforcers, and the equally brutal lawless on the other – the Black Bird gang.
Any conceivable form of outside aid they could possibly think of was basically just like trading one vicious breed of hellhounds for another, equally savage breed of hellhounds.
They get royally fucked either way.
Clearly powerless, and completely out of any suitable, viable options, all the two small-time black market arms dealers could really do now, is to simply, humbly, bow down their heads to the particular hound that currently has them so firmly, so inescapably, by the throat.