24 HOURS (24時間)
Inato crime lord Kento Karahawa turned his back and looked out at the city. “To show you how merciful I am, I’ll give you ten seconds, Robert, to have my ten million dollars.”
“What?” said Robert shocked. “But Mr. Karahawa-“
Kento glared at his watch nonchalantly, not caring too much about the actual time Robert had left. “Four, three, two, one! Time’s up Robert! Where’s my money?”
“If you give me time, I promise you that I’ll get it,” Robert Martin pleaded.
Kento turned around back to a naked and shivering Robert before him. All of Robert’s men were on their knees with pistols pointed to the back of their heads as Robert tried desperately to talk his way out of the situation.
“Time is something you don’t have the luxury of. I want my ten million dollars now.”
Robert dropped to his knees and began begging for his life. “Please, Mr. Karahawa! Give me twenty four hours and I promise you I’ll have it.”
Kento smiled. “Why should I believe you? You’ve already lied to me before about when you would have my money back to me.”
Robert looked up at Kento. “Because if I don’t have it, you can kill me.”
“No, I’m afraid that’s not good enough,” said Kento. “I need to know that you’re serious in your willingness to repay your debt to me. I need to know that you’ll do whatever it takes to make sure I get my money.”
“I will! I swear on my life,” cried Robert with tears pouring from his eyes.
“Kento, just let me waste this lying sack of shit and get it over with,” said Daiki Fukai with his gun at the ready.
Kento held up his hand to calm his fiery lieutenant down.
Robert crawled towards Kento and began begging and crying at his feet. “PLEASE, MR. KARAHAWA! I CAN GET YOU THE MONEY.”
Kento looked down at Robert mercilessly, “You see…the problem and dilemma I’m facing is that for an American, you’re a bullshitter and I have a very low tolerance for bullshit. You do know that, don’t you?”
Robert nodded.
“Your words mean nothing because they lack conviction,” said Kento. “So what I need you to do is prove to me that you’re willing to do whatever it takes. Can you do that?”
Robert nodded, “I can, Kento.”
“That’s Mr. Karahawa, to you,” said Daiki.
Robert nodded again, this time more fervently. “I can, Mr. Karahawa.”
“Perfect,” said Kento. “Here’s the perfect opportunity to prove to me your conviction. Understand that you’ll only get one chance to bullshit me and you’re dead.”
Kento unzipped his pants and pulled out his gun. “Open your mouth wide and close your eyes.”
Robert looked at Kento’s crotch, immediately closing his eyes, and opened his mouth wide preparing to give Kento fellatio. Within seconds, Robert could feel Kento grab the back of his head and force a piece of metal down his throat causing him to gag, knocking out one of his teeth.
When Robert opened his eyes, Daiki Fukai was standing in front of him holding the shotgun in his mouth.
Daiki smiled. “Yeah, suck it, suck it!”
Robert sat motionless looking at Daiki.
Daiki pumped the shotgun. “I SAID SUCK IT, MUTHAFUCKA!”
With a tear coming from the side of his eye, Robert slowly began to suck on the shotgun as if he were giving fellatio.
“Yeah! You done this before,” said Daiki with a mischievous grin on this face. “Faster!”
Robert sped up and began gagging, saliva leaking from his lips.
“Ah, yeah,” said Daiki. “Yeah, I’m about to…BAMMM!”
Daiki looked Robert directly in the eyes and pulled the trigger. With the sound of the click, Robert gasped as Kento clapped his hands and Daiki broke out in a sadistic laugh.
“You have done this before, haven’t you?” Daiki said in Japanese to Kento under sadistic laughter.
“You see this is what I’m talking about,” Kento said. “Conviction! It is the will to do anything and cross any line to get the desired result. You were willing to suck my dick in front of your men. I guess being out to sea too long, you sailors crave anything.”
Kento’s men laughed boisterously.
Kento continued. “Men who had sworn their loyalty to you. Men who would die for you and go to war just to save your pitiful ass. You think wearing a uniform makes you a warrior? You’re a coward, unfit for life.” He went to Robert’s men. “You have a choice to keep working for this miserable piece of shit that would betray you at the drop of a dime or consider working for me. Stand if you want to rule. Keep bowing if you want to be ruled.”
All of Robert’s men stood up with the exception of one: Robert’s brother, Harrison Martin.
Robert turned and looked at his brother. “HARRISON, NO!”
Kento smiled and walked to him. “Who are you?”
Harrison looked at Kento defiantly and spit in his face. “FUCK YOU!”
Kento calmly wiped the spit from his brow and smiled. “You have balls. I like that. It’s too bad your brother doesn’t have your heart or balls.”
Kento nodded and the Inato enforcer standing behind Harrison took the back of his gun and knocked him unconscious. Kento calmly walked over to Robert and grinned sinisterly. “Don’t worry, Mr. Martin! I’m going to help you out with your problem.”
The Inato soldiers quickly disrobed Harrison and brought in a toolbox.
“Hold him down,” said Kento.
“MR. KARAHAWA, PLEASE!” Robert tried to get up, but was pushed back down by an Inato guard.
Kento looked back at an Inato guard over Robert, “If he moves, kill him. Daiki, bring the pruners and knife.”
Harrison screamed in agony as Daiki put the pruners to his testicles and castrated him without flinching. As Harrison continued to scream from the pain, Kento took out his nine millimeter and shot Harrison in the temple.
“NOOOO!” Robert put his head down and screamed within, trying to keep whatever manhood he had left.
With the grisly deed done, Kento walked over to Robert and dropped Harrison’s heart and scrotum before him. “You have your brother’s heart and his balls. Now you have no excuse for not getting me my money. You have twenty-four hours, Robert, to get me my money or I promise that this will be a sweet dream compared to what I’ll do to you. And trust me! If you think about running, there’s no place in this world you can go that I won’t find you.”
Without saying another word, Kento walked out of the building. Robert owned the building thanks to what he had left on his military pension. He also had the loyalty of a number of military sailors.
None of that mattered.
Overcome with grief, Robert starred at Harrison’s mutilated body. Harrison had stood beside him when no other person would, and all Robert could do was stand idly by and watch him get slaughtered. Robert thought, if it had been him, his brother would have taken a bullet and died for him; or did something other than nothing.
****
Captain Robert Martin of the United States Navy knew he was on borrowed time and he wouldn’t be able to come up with the money.
Kento was right. Robert was a bullshitter, and thinking because he was a Captain in the United States Navy and the Japanese would see him as something honorable, he bullshitted his way into convincing one of most ruthless yakuza to let him live for another 24 hours.
For hours at home, Robert sat on the couch snorting cocaine, contemplating what he was going to do. He thought about his life living in Japan, first as a United States Sailor and afterwards his discharge because he was involved in a bribery and fraud ring with other commissioned officers. He spent the majority of his career in Japan commanding ships and working with different staffs in Yokosuka, south of Yokohama and at one point on three other bases in Atsugi, Iwakuni, and Okinawa.
After sniffing one more line as hard and fast as he could, he came up with a solution.
H
e was going to take his own life and die on his terms.
In almost a zombie-like fashion from the cocaine high, Robert put on his service dress uniform and walked to the roof determined to jump. As Robert looked up at the sky and the bloodshot moon radiated its light upon him, he climbed upon the ledge, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath.
“Isn’t it beautiful?” said the voice of a woman he’d later learn was named Illicit.
Startled, Robert wheezed and turned to her. “What are you doing here?”
She said nothing.
Robert eyes gazed upon her naked body forgetting the previous question and asked. “Who are you?”
Then, after some silence, Illicit asked, “Do you know the legend of the blood moon?”
“The what?”
Not paying attention to Robert’s tension, her eyes were hypnotized by the moon and her thoughts to a different time and place; a place not known to Robert or any other human being.
“Driven mad by jealousy of Amaterasu, the goddess of light, Izanami, her stepmother and goddess of the underworld thanks to her decisions seduced Tsukuyomi, Amaterasu’s brother along with a demon god from Yomi, in order to seize control of heaven and hell.
“When the war was over, Izanami was sentenced to be banished from the heavens and cursed to live forever in the darkness of the vicissitudes of space. As Izanami lay powerless before the mercy of the gods and goddesses with her sinister beauty as her only weapon, she devised a plan that would make Amaterasu pay and suffer. She convinced the Hachiman that was madly in love with her, to kill her and hide her spirit in the darkest souls of humanity.
“This Hachiman obeyed and killed Izanami out of love, knowing this would be the only way that he would be able to be with his beloved. Then, he went after Amaterasu by brutally beating down Tsukuyomi, the god of the moon. It’s said that after the demon punished Tsukuyomi, he was so broken-hearted from losing Izanami that he hid his spirit and soul inside a lineage of warriors. In doing so, he created a spell to be cast upon the light of the crimson blood moon. In doing so, the demon’s spirit and soul would begin to emerge out of a warrior and Izanami’s soul would be resurrected into an incarnate state, until she was able to pull her spirit out of the darkest souls of men.”
After finishing her story, the spellbinding eyes of Illicit looked back at a curious Robert. “Why do you want to die, Robert Martin?”
“How do you know my name?” said Robert.
“You haven’t answered the question. Why do you want to die?”
“Does it matter?”
Illicit smiled. “Do you fear those men so much that you would end your own life?”
Robert remained silent. Clinching his fists, he shouted angrily, “You think I’m afraid of Kento or any of the Inato organization? You think I give a fuck about any of this shit? My brother, my only family left, has just died right in front of me and I could do nothing to save him. I want to die because I deserve it. I couldn’t save him.”
Illicit strolled to Robert and stared directly in his eyes, “How long will you keep lying to yourself? You didn’t give a damn about your brother dying. You’re afraid of these men. You’re afraid of dying. But I can help you.”
“How?”
“I can give you the power that you so terribly covet. I can give you the power that will topple the Inato family and bring it to its knees.”
“What do I have to do?”
She extended her arm. “Give me your hand.”
“What are you?” Robert asked once again.
“Vengeance!” She said her eyes began to glow dark blue. ”Power! Anything your heart desires.”
Robert took her hand and she tumbled backward twenty stories off of the ledge while still holding his hand. He screamed violently as they both plummeted to their death. She turned around in the air until she was positioned where she was falling on top of him. Robert looked behind his back and saw the concrete ten feet away. The instant they were about to hit the ground, darkness shrouded them…
****
Illicit and Robert appeared in his mansion in his king-sized bed.
Before the black-haired, blue-eyed, white-skinned Robert could say a word, he felt her warm moist lips. While he grunted fervently as she worked her hips back and forth in a cowgirl position with so much force and enthusiasm the entire bed moved back and forth with him biting down on his lower lip as he struggled to hold onto her hips.
He fought with all his might not to succumb to the passion as his eyes rolled back in his head. The sensation was so intense it paralyzed Robert’s entire body. All he could do was lay there as she rode him violently, pure agony from the former sea-fearing Navy captain.
The pleasure was so concentrated that Robert’s mind became clouded. He looked up to the mirrors on his ceiling he could have sworn he saw blackish-gray tails coming from her buttocks. Robert grabbed the cheeks of her ass and felt no fur, but continued to see tails in the mirrors. Robert shrugged it off, blaming his vision on the lines of cocaine he snorted earlier.
Suddenly, Robert’s body trembled and a hot chill encompassed him. As Robert laid there lifeless he glanced at her eyes which glowed a menacing shade of red. She stared directly in his eyes and whispered in his ear, “Awake, my love! Awake!”
King’s Blood (王の血)
David Hamada awoke gasping for air with his eyes glowing red.
Myoko Hamada quickly sat up and held him. “What’s wrong, baby?” The instant Myoko touched David’s skin his eyes stopped glowing.
“Nothing,” said David as he shook his head.
Without saying a word, David got up, went into the bathroom, and splashed water on his face. This wasn’t the first time he had horrible nightmares, but it was never pleasant. He rubbed his stomach because the uneasy feeling shifted from his head to his stomach, quickly making him nauseous.
The cringing feeling came when he had bad dreams. When he was dealing with both the Monster and Stripper Slasher cases, it fired off salvos into his conscious as it absorbed everything he was doing in his life. After the Stripper Slasher’s demise, the Monster took his place as the premier serial killer and in another round of young girl murders, the nightmares started again.
For the past couple of nights, one of those nightmares was of a crime scene he witnessed months ago in the case of the death of Mia Cheung Lee, a 14-year-old Chinese-Japanese girl who was left raped and brutally murdered.
The state of Mia’s body on that night brought David to tears. Panties pulled down to her ankles, face beaten to the point it was unrecognizable. The handprints upon her neck mixed with the cold stare of death made him sick and curious at the same time. David couldn’t help but stare at the body, and wonder what kind of person could do this to another human being.
It had been the fourth murder in the district in three months leading to the death of Takashi Fukushima, the Stripper Slasher, and all of the detectives in the city were baffled. David had his suspicions, but he wasn’t able to confirm them until the murder of Mia, in which his prime suspect left a condom full of semen next to the girl. When the test came back, the DNA belonged to Daiki Fukai, an up-and-coming gangster known to have an affinity for young girls.
The police arrested Daiki and in less than two hours, he made bail with the help of several of Inato’s power attorneys.
As Daiki’s walked out of the precinct with a smug grin on his face, he walked up to a disgruntled David Hamada and whispered in his ear in Japanese. “You do know this is never going to trial. I’ll be out raping and killing another girl before the ink dries on your evidence report. Don’t worry! The next pretty lil’ young thing I get, I’m going to dedicate to you, detective.”
David balled up his fist as rage surged through his body. He wanted to choke the life out of Daiki for what he did to that young girl, but he knew it would get him nowhere.
As David thought about how Daiki killed the young girls and how he was able to go free due to the evidence being lost, he lost it and i
n a fit of rage, put on a suit and left Myoko. She tried to stop him without any success. He drove his new Porsche out of the driveway and headed to the one place he knew his bad demons would not matter: the bright lights of East Shinjuku.
****
David landed in a spot called Night Nurses, a sophisticated strip club with a hospital-like mystique. Most the strippers dressed like nurses, but other than that, it played itself like an American-style strip club with a Japanese setting. David kept an eye out for anything out of the ordinary, mostly the yakuza thugs that frequented the place.
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