(Volume - 4 - Beneath the Scarlet Helix)
Chapter 1 - Brothers in Blood
The storm that had whispered warnings for months finally arrived with a roar. Tokyo's skies were torn open, spilling silver sheets of rain that battered rooftops, alleys, and neon-lit streets alike. The city seemed to shudder under its own weight. Somewhere between the thunderclaps and the flickering streetlights, the world that Akio Hukitaske had built began to tremble.
Inside the pharmacy, the air was still. The ticking of the wall clock was louder than it should've been. Akio sat at the front counter, a mug of steaming herbal tea between his palms. The warmth didn't reach him. His gaze was locked on the photograph on the table — that damned photo that had come with the black parcel weeks ago.
Hakurage Yakasuke.
The name was a curse on paper. The photo showed a man in his late twenties, sharp eyes that burned through the camera lens, a faint smirk like he was watching a chessboard only he could understand. He wore a sterile white lab coat with a small insignia stitched into the collar — a crimson double helix twisting into the shape of a cross.
The new leader of Yaka Lab.
The phantom behind every recent attack.
The architect of the next nightmare.
But the longer Akio stared, the more a single thought crawled through his mind like static.
He looks like someone I know.
The resemblance was uncanny — in the jawline, the slanted eyes, even the shadow of an old scar near the temple. It hit him then, suddenly, like lightning.
Hakurage looked like Hikata.
The Blood You Don't Choose
Hikata entered from the back room, yawning, hair still half-wet from the rain. He carried a box of supplies under one arm and looked as casual as ever — unbothered, easygoing, the human embodiment of misplaced confidence.
"You called for me?" he asked, setting the box down.
Akio didn't answer. He turned the photo around slowly and placed it on the counter.
"Who is this?"
At first, Hikata tilted his head in confusion. Then he froze. The color drained from his face. His usual grin evaporated, replaced by a tension Akio had never seen before.
The silence that filled the room was not surprise. It was recognition.
"That's…" Hikata started, voice breaking slightly. "That's my older brother."
Akio didn't move. Even the rain outside seemed to hesitate.
"You never mentioned him," Akio said quietly.
"Because I don't want to." Hikata sank into the nearest chair, rubbing his temples. "He was always… cruel. I don't mean strict, I mean cruel. He hated me for being happy. For laughing. For existing, I think. He used to tell me I was born defective — a mistake with a pulse."
His voice dropped lower, more brittle. "He was brilliant, though. Top of his class. Everyone adored him. My parents used to say, 'Why can't you be more like Hakurage?' He left when I was ten. Didn't call. Didn't write. Not even when Mom got sick."
Akio's hand tightened around the photo. "And now he's leading the people trying to erase us."
"Of course he is," Hikata muttered, a bitter laugh escaping his throat. "He always wanted control. If he's running that lab, it makes sense. He's not experimenting on people for science — he's experimenting for ownership."
Akio hesitated, then asked softly, "Do you still love him?"
Hikata's reply came like steel. "No. I never did. Because he never gave me a reason to."
He stood and faced Akio, eyes burning. "If he's part of this, then we end it. Whatever it takes. Arrest him. Expose him. Hell, if it comes to it… I'll stop him myself. But I won't cry for him."
Akio studied him — not as a leader assessing an ally, but as a friend measuring a man's breaking point.
"Listen to me," Akio said, his voice low and steady. "He's their leader now — our enemy. But this is bigger than revenge. If you go down this path, you can't turn back. You'll have to face him — not out of hate, but out of duty. Can you do that?"
Hikata looked down, hands trembling. His jaw tightened as if he was chewing on old ghosts.
Finally, he looked up. "Yes. But we don't kill him. We take him alive. We end the lab, expose them all. Justice — not vengeance."
Then, softer, he smiled — that old kidish grin returning like sunlight after a storm. "You know, Akio Hukitaske… you were the first real friend I ever had. Looks like nothing's changed."
Akio chuckled. "Nope. Still stuck with me, you idiot."
They laughed — two men bound not by blood, but by the scars it left behind.
For a brief moment, the world outside the pharmacy ceased to matter.
But the storm wasn't done. It was only gathering strength.
The Night of Three Shadows
The first sign came at 2:14 a.m. — a flicker in the security feed. Just static for half a second. Akio noticed it immediately; he had learned to live between those fractions of a second where death liked to hide.
By the time he reached the monitor, the power cut.
Silence followed. Not the quiet of sleep, but the suffocating kind that makes the skin crawl.
Then, a whisper of movement — barely audible — from the alley.
Three figures emerged from the darkness, faces covered by rebreather masks, coats dripping from the rain. Their movements were precise, almost inhuman.
One raised a small EMP device, and the pharmacy's outer sensors fizzled out with a dying hum. Another planted small cylindrical disruptors along the alley — each glowing faint red. The third, taller than the others, walked straight to the front door. Calm. Deliberate.
The lock clicked open.
They didn't break in. They entered like they belonged.
Akio stood waiting at the counter, a scalpel in one hand, the emergency alert switch under his thumb.
"Don't bother," the tall one said. His voice was distorted, mechanical. "The signal's already dead. The city won't hear you."
Akio glanced at their insignias — red double helixes embroidered on their coats.
"You're with Hakurage," he said.
The man nodded. "We are his voice. And today, the world sees you for what you are: a fraud."
He tapped a button on his wristband. Somewhere above, drones activated. Cameras whirred. A livestream began — broadcasting directly to the public.
On screens across Tokyo, Akio Hukitaske appeared: a man in a white coat, standing over medical equipment in dim light. The narration began twisting reality. Edited footage played — old clips spliced together from surveillance archives — showing experiments, sedatives, injections.
"Rogue pharmacist caught testing unapproved drugs on patients," the captions read.
Akio's world tilted. They weren't just trying to kill him — they were trying to erase his legacy.
Raka appeared from the back, already in motion. "Visitors?" she quipped, pulling twin syringes from her coat. She lunged at one of the intruders, her strikes fast and surgical.
Rumane rushed the civilians toward the basement, her voice calm despite the chaos. "Move! Stay together!"
Misaki tried the phone line. Dead. "They've jammed everything!"
Yamataro was already at the computer, fingers flying. "They've hijacked the public feed — it's everywhere! Every channel, every stream!"
Akio ducked as one of the intruders fired a tranquilizer dart that shattered a glass vial beside him. The scent of ethanol filled the air.
"Enough!" Akio shouted, slamming his hand against the counter.
The sound cut through the chaos. Everyone froze.
"You want the truth?" he said, voice trembling but unbroken. "Then I'll give it to you."
He reached for the backup terminal, the one Hikata had built for emergencies. In one motion, he connected the transmitter to the pharmacy's mainline.
And he told the world everything.
His voice echoed through the city as his face appeared beside the false footage. No edits. No filters. Just raw truth. He confessed to the experiment that turned him young again, to the guilt of the lives lost, to the family he failed to save. He spoke of rebuilding, of finding meaning again through healing instead of running.
The truth cut deeper than any weapon.
Break the Mirror
For the first time in decades, Tokyo froze.
Every screen in the city was split in two — one showing the edited lies, the other, Akio's confession. On one side, a monster. On the other, a man.
And somewhere in that fragile middle, people hesitated.
The intruders faltered. Their leader looked to his wrist console — the comments flooding in from the live chat. "This doesn't add up.""He's saving people, not harming them.""Who's behind this?"
That hesitation was all Hikata needed.
He burst through the side door, drenched from the rain, baseball bat in hand. He wasn't here to kill. He was here to speak.
"Listen up!" he yelled. "Hakurage Yakasuke — the man behind all of this — is my brother. My blood. He abandoned me, our mother, and this city. He's the one you should be afraid of, not Akio Hukitaske!"
His words burned across the feed. It was raw, unpolished truth, delivered straight from the wound.
The people listening didn't just see two men anymore. They saw brothers divided by ideology, by trauma, by history itself.
Public opinion flipped like a coin landing on its edge.
The leader of the intruders hesitated, mask trembling. "He'll come for you both," he warned. "You think the world believes you? He controls more than you know."
Then he vanished into the storm with his team, leaving behind broken glass and the echo of rain.
Ashes and Roots
Morning came quietly, like a truce. The pharmacy was wrecked. The counter lay in splinters. The shelves were overturned. But the sun pierced the clouds for the first time in weeks, gilding everything in gold.
And then the letters began arriving.
By noon, the front steps were buried in envelopes, parcels, and handwritten notes. Some were from patients. Others from strangers.
"We saw everything. We believe you."
"Thank you for healing my son."
"You don't owe them your silence."
A mural appeared overnight — a phoenix rising from a mortar and pestle, painted in vibrant red and white. Beneath it, someone had written:
'For those who were broken but chose to heal.'
Akio stood before it with Hikata beside him. Their clothes still smelled faintly of smoke.
"Your brother still hides," Akio said.
Hikata's jaw tightened. "And now we know where to look. The Scarlet Helix — their main branch. Deep under Shinjuku."
Akio nodded. "Then that's where we go next."
The wind blew through the alley, carrying the scent of rain and renewal. The storm was gone, but the war had only begun.
Hikata adjusted his coat, the faintest smile returning to his lips. "Together this time."
Akio grinned. "Always."
They turned toward the city — two silhouettes against the rising sun — walking toward the next battle, the next truth, and the next scar.
The echoes of the storm followed them, whispering through the wind like the ghosts of every dream they refused to let die.
[Next: Volume 4, Chapter 2 — Scarlet Labyrinth]