Chương 68: An empty office, and a not so empty corridor

Arc 4 cover (WIP)

 

EPISODE 16: BANTA

 

I push the underling in front of me aside as I swiftly walk into the long corridor.

The dim neon lights blink sporadically on the ceiling.

Trotting at my side, is a young handcuffed individual with a strange demeanour and a huge smile on his face.

His face… Something is wrong with his face…

He hums a joyful air while keeping his eyes closed.

A gigantic burn scar is drawn on the upper part of his face. It spreads from one ear to the other, on both of his eyes, his forehead and a good portion of the top of his head. Many discreet moles are splattered on what is left of his face.

I must admit that he’s quite uncanny. He doesn’t have any eyebrows or barely any hair on his head at all. He was wearing a cap to hide it, until he was forced to take it off during the inspection. He’s also wearing a formal-looking plaid shirt and running shorts at the same time. His legs are bare and he wears flip-flops on his feet. Ironically, while a beach towel is resting on his shoulders, his whole body is drenched because he kept this ridiculous attire without covering himself under the torrential rain outdoors.

What an incomprehensible fashion sense… Well, I guess if I were blind or close to it, I wouldn’t care about fashion either. Also, I’m not one to talk since I never pay much attention to what I wear. Only the most basic salaryman suit when I’m working, the rest of the time, I’m just hanging around in T-shirt and trousers.

His voice is a bit high pitched. He’s not tall and does seem quite young, even though it’s hard to tell how old he is, or his ethnicity for that matter, but there is something witty about his smile that annoys me to the highest degree.

We finally reach a small office that is entirely empty, apart from a single chair on which a boy with a constantly -stressed aura is seated, his tablet in hand.

“Who is this?” He asks without even looking up.

“A crazy guy looking for trouble.” I sigh.

TADPOLE raises his head and gazes at him.

“Oh boy, oh boy!” The guy says. “Don’t stare at me like that! It’s so awkward! Also, I’m not crazy and I’m not looking for trouble! I’m just here to speak with your boss!”

The awkwardness rises again. How did he know he was stared upon? Even if this guy wasn’t keeping his eyes closed, with a scar like this, I would assume that he’s blind.

TADPOLE skims through his tablet while responding. “I’m sorry but she’s busy right now. Do you want to get an appointment?”

Why does he feel the need to respond like this? This stupid secretary…

But the man nods rapidly. “Yes, yes. An appointment!”

When I look closer, I notice that his gigantic scar wasn’t the only odd thing about him… It turns out that… Apart from that, he doesn’t seem to bear any other wounds. It’s weird because I can’t think of any accident that would have left a scar like this, but nothing else. At least one or two cuts should be expected. Or burns elsewhere, like on the arms. Did he not even try to defend himself when he got this? I must add that it’s kind of a miracle that he has kept all of his teeth if he got into such a predicament. Unless it wasn’t an incident but something else… And why am I so obsessed with it?!

TADPOLE also seem interested in the newcomer and I even notice a faint smile on his face. Guess even he must find this guy comical. “Name, profession, motives for the appointment, please.” He coughs and hides his mouth behind his hand.

The man laughs, shaking his cuffed hands. “Can’t say, can’t say.”

I finally have a good reason to beat him up, so I pin him on the wall and spit. “Who the hell are you?”

I want to look him in the eyes, but he keeps them closed, and even though he’s threatened, he keeps smiling manically.

“Come on, come on. Let’s stay civilized. I just want to speak with your boss!”

“YOU THINK YOU CAN FUCK AROUND AND HAVE A CHAT WITH OUR BOSS WITHOUT PROPER MOTIVES?!”

Hearing the commotion, a group of underlings quickly rush into the office, their weapons in hand, ready to strike at this impertinent asshole when I give them the signal.

TADPOLE, though, starts biting his nails. “TORA, keep it down or they’re going to hear you! And my office is crowded now… Finish this outside.”

Well, it’s true that this scene looks rather absurd in such a narrow room.

“This is my first time entering Lord TADPOLE’s office…” I hear one of the underlings whisper to another. “Why is it empty, though?”

“Maybe he’s moving out?”

“No way! He’s so nice! I’m going to miss him…”

“I am not moving out…” TADPOLE pronounces faintly.

“A moment, a moment!” The blind guy is finally looking as worried as he should be. “You… Didn’t give me my appointment!”

“You…!” I seize him by the neck and push him out of the office. “Didn’t you hear what he said? Name! Profession! Motives!”

“D-don’t shout…” TADPOLE bites his nails frenetically. “Sir, even if you gave me that information, you wouldn’t get an appointment for the next four months. I recommend you come back when you’ll be willing to do so… And through the front door. Seriously TORA, why did you bring him here at all?”

That’s … a really good question…

There is something about this guy that is very weird, if it was anyone else, I would have already killed him.

It’s not that he is so charming or charismatic that I can’t lay my hands on him. It’s more that, he didn’t give me any room to do so.

Even though I’m holding him by the neck, and he should be at my mercy, he’s not showing any openings and I have the strange feeling that the moment I try to kill him, it will be too late for me.

I nonetheless push him out of the office and he falls on his ass in the corridor.

The neon lights are now blinking so much that they’re giving me a headache.

I cover one eye with a hand. “Hey you… Who are you…?”

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The underlings get out of the office while bowing to TADPOLE and get ready to circle the still-smiling bastard in the long corridor.

He raises his cuffed hands towards me. “Please, I just want to ask your boss something. Let me do this and I’ll go home!”

“You think you are in a place where you can ask whatever you want?! Kill him!”

The underlings have finished circling him, and are ready to strike, when the lights suddenly turn off.

“What?!”

Confusion instantly rises. What are the odds of getting a blackout now?

I quickly put a hand in my pocket to pick up my mobile phone, so I’ll be able to illuminate the place, but I’m too late and after the sound of something cracking and a chain being moved around, one of the underlings starts crying in pain.

When I finally switch the flashlight on, I see the madman using the chain between his handcuffs to strangle one of our boys who is visibly suffocating.

“What are you trying?! You won’t get out of here alive. How the hell did you make a blackout? Do you have friends?” I pull my handgun up and aim at his head.

“You should be worried about this boy… I’m about to kill him!” The madman laughs.

“That’s not how it works, idiot. For us, it’s an honour to die for our company.” I fire.

But he uses the underling as a meat shield and the bullet finishes the poor boy. “Is that really how it works? Damn, I guess my previous job was nicer.”

“Lord TORA…”

The other underlings have never seen their colleague die like this, by the hand of their superior, so they are quite shaken.

“He’s a cornered rat.” I shake my head. “Avenge your comrade.”

How the hell did that guy know where I was aiming at…? And he quickly mentioned his previous job, so I’m even more curious to know what that is.

But now, there is nothing that can save him. More underlings are coming from the left and right of the corridor, and he’s now circled by more than twenty armed people.

I take a step back in order to enjoy the show but… He’s taking them on… Singlehandedly…

One man jumps at him with his katana, but he dodges it, twists his arm until it dislocates, uses his chains to pull the sword out of his hands and plants it in a woman’s face. Then he jumps on her body and kicks a guy’s head with his heel. Someone tries to strike him from behind, but he raises his leg to stop the blade with the bottom of his flip-flops, that are definitely not made of a normal material, and pushes him backward to destabilize him. The madman, then, uses his chains to suffocate him again.

I raise my gun again and try to shoot his head thrice, but he dodges the bullets and hides behind his newly found meat shield. After another woman manages to make him drop it, I reload and shoot again twice, but he’s untouchable.

“Heyyy, you’re having fun!”

I turn my flashlight to the side and recognize a familiar face. A woman with very long curly blonde hair and frenzied blue eyes is laughing. She’s topless apart from a few bandages that she’s using like sarashi to tighten her chest and a leather motorbike jacket that is laid on her shoulders like a cape. “What’s going on here, TORA?” She rests the back of the long blade of her iaito on her shoulder, laughing.

I inhale. At least with her, the problem should be solved quickly.

“Come help us, GON. This guy is a real handle.”

GON laughs again and approaches. For some reason, the blind guy seems to notice something and twitches. He sweeps his leg all around him to give himself some space, feels the wall with his hand and jumps away in an instant.

“Ohohoh!” GON giggles. “And here I thought you were having so much fun! Why stop when I join the party?” I want to take advantage of the fact that he doesn’t have anybody to hide behind, so I point my gun towards his head and prepare to fire, but GON stops me. “No need to try, you won’t hit him.”

“You seem pretty strong.” The scarred man is still smiling.

“And you seem really weak.” GON squints her eyes to take a better look at him now that they are closer. She could barely catch a glimpse in the dark after all. But I notice her expression change drastically. “You … are blind…?” She seems disgusted. “How can I have a proper fight with a blind guy…?”

CLICK—

Finally, the lights are back on so we can better appreciate the carnage.

Among the twentyish underlings who fought him, only a handful are still standing in the corridor.

“You…!” GON grabs him by the collar, a gesture that reminds me of myself a few minutes ago. “You motherfucker, how did you do this in your state, how?! Who the hell are you?!”

“GON, stop being emotional and kill him.” I frown.

I’ve never seen her react like this, but I guess I never saw her face a blind person before. Her reaction is a bit weird, but she’s a weird person overall.

TADPOLE sneaks out of his office, his face is showing extreme worry. “Oh, you’re still not done. Can you finish quickly? I need to go to the bathroom…”

“Boy, there was a blackout, did you not notice anything?” I crack up.

“I don’t really care…”

“Nobody cares.” GON spits. “You. Tell me who you are. Now.” She pulls the blind guy up who for some reason, doesn’t seem to be smiling anymore. Since the moment GON appeared in the corridor, he lost all will to fight.

“GON, let him go.” A deep voice resonates.

Three silhouettes appear from the other end of the corridor. A tall man with long and straight silver hair in a white suit, a boy with short jet-black hair and an old woman in a very expensive kimono.

Upon noticing them, GON instantly lets go of the blind guy who falls to his knees, his breaths short.

The group stops a few metres away from us. Tipping the stalk of her cigarette holder towards her lips, the woman takes a drag with a cold expression. She doesn’t seem to care about the bloodbath. “Are you the man I was waiting for?” She asks.

My heart skips a beat. So he really was supposed to meet with her?! What a stupid mistake.

The blind man, sweating, raises his head with his habitual smile back.

The three of them stare at his scarred face with little to no reaction as he finally answers.

“The major sends his regards.”

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