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Takemichi couldn’t stop the tears that flowed freely down his face, even when Chifuyu poked fun at him. Here he was, sitting at Pah-Chin’s wedding , and everyone was alive, and Chifuyu and Kazutora owned a pet shop, Hakkai was a model, Mitsuya was a designer, Inui and Draken owned a bike shop, and everyone was alive-
And then just as the tears began to slow down, Takemichi saw Naoto and the tears returned tenfold. Everyone was alive. As Takemichi sobbed into Naoto’s shoulder while clutching tightly onto him, he couldn’t help but think that he finally did it.
“We reached the world where my sister lives, Takemichi-kun,” Naoto said. Takemichi looked around the wedding revenue, filled with everyone from Toman and Hinata waiting for the bouquet toss. They did, didn’t they?
Before Takemichi returned to the future, he and Hinata had a long talk. When the time traveler finally had some time in the past to think about what love really meant to him, he discovered that while he loved Hina, he didn’t love her in the romantic sense. He thinks that he loved the idea of her: because she represented the sun-lit days of his past, his innocence, and his hope. He loved what she represented, not who she actually was.
Hinata and him talked for hours. It was filled with tears and broken hearts, but they ended up deciding that they would be better as friends than lovers. From then on, Takemichi and Hina became really close friends, and their relationship actually improved from when they were dating.
Takemichi looked at Hinata who was now dancing on the floor, with her head thrown back laughing and her hands holding the thrown bouquet. He made the right decision, he decided. They were both much happier now. Besides, according to Naoto, she had a small thing going on with Yuzuha, and they were both dancing around each other much to Naoto’s dismay.
Of course, Takemichi would still do anything for Hinata, and he already got an earful about his self-sacrificialness from Hina herself.
The now black-haired adult gazed around the venue, and realized that one person was missing. “Eh? Draken-kun, where is Mikey?” Takemichi asked the tattooed adult who sat next to him.
“Oh, he’s overseas working in a restaurant. He really wanted to come to the wedding and see you, but the timing just couldn’t work out for him,” Draken reassured. Takemichi looked at his calm smile, and wholeheartedly believed him.
Hearing that Mikey worked in a restaurant surprised Takemichi, but anything is possible. After all, Hakkai became a model .
Takemichi smiled widely. He really did it, didn’t he? He finally saved everyone, and reached the best future.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Takemichi did not reach the best future. What the fuck. He should not have believed Draken-kun when he said that Mikey was working overseas; actually, Mikey may have been overseas often but he certainly wasn’t doing that because of a restaurant . “Mikey isn’t the same Mikey anymore” Draken had said. What. The. Fuck .
When Naoto told him about Bonten and his hunch that Mikey was the infamous leader of Bonten, Takemichi had to physically restrain himself from grabbing Naoto by his shoulders and shaking him because what the actual fuck . The time leaper was pretty sure Naoto could see his thoughts based on his own solemn facial expression, and the fact that Takemichi was never able to keep any emotion off of his face. Hinata did always say that he wore his heart on his sleeve.
So yeah. That was the reason why Takemichi was currently rifling through the back corner of his closet, which held all of the items his grandparents used to own. His hand grazed against the smooth, familiar surface of a wooden box. Bingo.
The box was carefully pulled out from under a precarious pile, and Takemichi smiled in victory once he succeeded in prying the lid open. As soon as the lid was lifted off the top, he inspected the rifles, pistols, shotguns, and other varieties of guns that were carefully organized in the box. Most of the guns seemed to be in good condition, but one or two of them would probably have to be replaced, and he would definitely need some more ammunition.
Takemichi hoped that this would be enough to go against Bonten. Honestly, it probably wasn’t, but maybe if he got some help…
Takemichi had never told anyone this before, but his grandparents had dealt with the shadier side of the world when they were alive. He never figured out exactly what they did, and his grandparents made sure that he never found out. Once he turned 18, they made him take shooting classes for his own safety (Takemichi feels like he should be more concerned about what they did but no one has come after him yet), and they made him promise that he will maintain his skills even after their death.
The point is though that Takemichi knew how to work a gun, and he had connections. Sure, he knew that there was probably a better way to bring Mikey back (and Kakucho, Koko, and Sanzu, apparently, what were they thinking ), but he didn’t want to bring anyone else into his mess when they were all alive and had good careers.
Takemichi loaded some bullets into his revolver and spun the barrel. After all, modern problems required modern solutions.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The first person to notice that something was wrong was, unsurprisingly, Koko. The white haired Executive of Bonten squinted at the numbers that covered his laptop screen. The profits from the last deal with a smaller gang on the south coast of Japan weren’t as large as they should have been. Koko quickly reviewed his math to see if he made a mistake somewhere, but didn’t find any.
Now that he thought about it though, some Bonten members noted that there was a weird gunman seen loitering around where the deal was supposed to take place. At first Koko wrote it off as some stranger trying to make some extra cash who would undoubtedly be dealt with, but now he wasn’t so sure.
If there was someone who was stealing Bonten’s profits, that would definitely be a problem. Bonten didn’t take kindly to thieves, and anyone who dared to take from them would be repaid generously with murder and a sprinkle of torture.
Koko twirled his long hair with his finger as he thought about what to do. Sanzu and Takeomi would be heading down to the Chubu prefecture soon, so he could have them check out the problem. They wouldn’t be happy about doing it, but they would do it. Or, at least, Koko could trust Takeomi to get it done. He wasn’t so sure about Sanzu.
The Bonten executive huffed out a breath and sent a message to Sanzu and Takeomi. Sanzu responded with a chain of angry emojis and swears, but thankfully Takeomi sent back a text saying that he will look into it. At least Takeomi was slightly reliable.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“HOLY SHIT TAKEOMI CALL FOR BACKUP!”
“WHY WOULD I CALL ,YOU’RE THE ONE WITH THE STILL FUNCTIONING PHONE!”
A bullet whizzed by, missing Takeomi’s head by a mere centimeter. It then proceeded to bury itself into the cellphone that Sanzu had just pulled out of his pocket.
“What the hell that’s so rude- THE PHONE ISN’T FUNCTIONING ANYMORE-”
Another series of bullets flew through the air and the two Bonten executives ended up diving behind a concrete column. Luckily there was a person hiding behind the pillar and Takeomi quickly wrestled his phone away from him. He also had a gun, which Sanzu grabbed from him.
“Okay, I’m going to call the Haitani brothers and tell them we need extra help, so that- Sanzu. Are you really getting high right now?” Takeomi looked towards his fellow Bonten member only to see him drop a pill into his mouth. Where he got the pill from, he didn’t even know.
“What?” Sanzu sneered. “Today has been such a shit show that I need this”.
Takemeomi rolled his eyes while not even attempting to hide his disapproval. He should talk to Koko after this, he really needed a raise for putting up with Sanzu. The yellow and black haired adult dialed the number for the Haitani’s in the phone, and listened for the dial tone. It went straight to the voicemail. In the meantime, Sanzu checked behind the pillar and shot at where their shooter was.
“Hey, this is Haitani, I’m busy so don’t bother leaving a message that I won’t listen to-”
Irritated, Takeomi hung up the phone and dialed again. Yet again, it went to voicemail. Takeomi dialed one more time, and he swears if it goes to voicemail-
“Hello?” Rindou asked from the other end of the phone call. “Whoever this is, you better have a good reason for calling or-”
“Rindou, this is Takeomi you asshole. We’re at Suguru Bay, and we need back up right now”.
“Oh yeah, we’re on our way. We got a distress signal, so we’re coming down now. If you see a helicopter fly in after around five minutes, just know it’s us”, Rindou notified.
“Fine, we’ll keep our eyes out for you”. Takeomi rubbed his head, he could already feel a migraine begin to form.
Sanzu looked back at him from his spot near the edge of the column. “I think our little gunman has left,” he updated. “There haven't been any more bullets for a while now”.
Takeomi stood up and walked out from behind the pillar. A bullet flew towards him as soon as his entire body left the protection of the pillar. He dove down to the ground, and sent his pink haired counterpart a nasty glare.
“Or maybe not,” Sanzu shrugged.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Eventually Ran and Rindou showed up and landed the helicopter nearby. Sanzu noted that the gunman seemed to have left for real after the Haitani brothers arrived.
“Did you see who it was?” Rindou asked.
“No. All I could make out was black hair. Everything else was covered up. The person was wearing black long sleeved shirt, black pants, and even had a black face mask on- I couldn't even tell if it was a guy or a girl,” Takeomi sighed. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a cigarette, which he lit with a lighter he found in the helicopter.
“The black hair doesn’t give any hints though, considering how we’re in Japan,” Ran hummed in thought.
“Yeah, no shit,” Sanzu scoffed from the back of the helicopter. “If he or she knows what’s good for them, then they won’t repeat anything like this”
Takeomi hoped that whoever it was wouldn’t pull this shit again either. He really was not getting paid enough for this.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Of course, that person decided that they, as a matter of fact, would not stop. The Haitani brothers ended up being hunted down at a night club, Koko was chased out from a hotel, Mochi was attacked in an underground brawling ring, Kakuchou was ambushed in a fucking park, and Takeomi suffered through a second gun fight.
The gunman had the uncanny ability to figure out where the Bonten executives were at all times. Hell , he shouldn’t even know who the executives were, the information was kept under very tight wraps. Every single time the person found an executive did a lot of damage to their pride.
The only person who hadn’t faced the attacker yet was Mikey, and everyone was counting down the days until he would inevitably be found and shot at too.
So far, everything they knew about the gunman was that 1, he was a man, 2, he had black hair and blue eyes, 3, he was lithe and average height, and 4, he had insane shooting skills.
That was it. Kakuchou managed to narrow down the list of potential suspects a lot, but there were still hundreds of possibilities. They still had no idea what the gunman’s goal was . He seemed to only be disturbing their transactions, but there had to be an end goal somewhere.
Yeah. Bonten was pretty much fucked unless they got lucky soon.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In the meantime, Takemichi was slumped over the counter in Chifuyu and Kazutora’s pet shop. He groaned out loud, and banged his head against the counter top. Chifuyu glanced over at him in concern from where he was carrying a cat into its cage.
“Takemichi, are you okay?” Chifuyu asked. He put the cat into the cage, set up the lock, and walked over. Takemichi lifted up his head and nodded.
“Yeah I am, just having a little trouble with something. Say Chifuyu, if you were trying to accomplish something and you did it over and over and no progress was made, then what would you do? This is a completely hypothetical situation of course!” Takemichi prodded for advice.
Chifuyu raised an eyebrow. “Exactly how hypothetical are we speaking?”
Takemichi shifted guiltily. “Completely hypothetical?” He tried for.
The pet shop owner raised his brow even higher. “Is this related to your time traveling abilities at all?”
“No, no!” Takemichi promised. “I don’t plan on time traveling again. This is the best timeline so far, and I want to keep it that way”.
“That’s good,” Chifuyu breathed out a sigh of relief. “I guess I would ask other people for help. If it’s something you don’t want to bring others into, then only ask one person, the person who can help you the most preferably”.
Takemichi mulled over the idea. He really didn’t want to bring anyone else into it, but he wasn’t getting anywhere with his recent attacks. All he wanted to do was cripple Bonten enough to make Mikey and the others listen to him, or notice him at least. His own resources and contacts could only help him so much, and so far Takemichi is pretty sure he’s only a minor annoyance to them.
The black haired adult worried his lip. As long as he didn’t get them any more involved than asking for some information, it should be okay, right? Takemichi absolutely would not allow them to do anything more than provide some information.
He carefully thought about who he could ask, before thinking of the perfect person. Right! That person would probably still be in contact with that Bonten executive, considering how close they were.
Takemichi bounced up from his spot on the counter and almost ran out the door. “Thank you for the help, Chifuyu! It was really beneficial!” he called out from over his shoulder.
“Sure…?” Chifuyu replied, confused. “Make sure to not do anything stupid!”
“No promises!”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Hi Inui!”
“Hey Takemichi, what’s up?”
“Nothing much! Actually, there’s something I wanted your help on. Do you still have Koko’s number?”
“Koko’s? Yeah, I do, why do you want it?”
“I just had a few financial questions for him! I remember how good he was with money, so I thought he could help out a bit”.
“He probably could. Here’s the digits, but he might not answer- wait Takemichi didn’t you find out that- TAKEMICHI-”
“Thank you Inui! I promise I’ll pay you back for it somehow!”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Takemichi?” Kakuchou gaped. The scarred Bonten executive looked at the man in front of him, looked at the black mask in his hand that he ripped off of the other, and then looked back at the man.
“Ehehehe, hi Kaku-chan…?” Takemichi tried for.
Look, Kakuchou was prepared for a lot of things regarding the gunman. He was prepared for it to be someone who held a grudge against Bonten, someone who wanted revenge for his actions from when he was in Tenjiku, even someone who was in Tenjiku or Toman. However, he in a million years never would have thought that it was Takemichi, former childhood best friend and Toman captain, that was scarring every Bonten executive like it was his one true calling in life.
“Ah shoot,” Takemichi muttered. He seemed to accept with resignation that Kakuchou now knew who he was. The time traveler jumped up to the railing that bordered the balcony the two were on, because somehow he found Kakuchou at his favorite restaurant, as well as at his own personal table on a balcony that overlooked the city that no one else knew about .
Using Kakuchou’s shock to his advantage, he kicked the gun the scarred man pulled on him out of his hands and over the edge of the railing. Takemichi then proceeded to put his own gun back into the holster, and scale up the wall of the restaurant up onto the roof.
“...What?” Kakuchou could physically feel himself bluescreening. He did not just see Takemichi hold a gun up to him, put the gun away, and then climb up a wall like the perfect replication of the worst of his eldritch nightmares.
No, he refused to accept it.
Takemichi looked down at him before frowning. “What? I’m not going to hurt you or kill you Kaku-chan. I might not exactly… approve of your career choice but I’m not going to mortally wound you like some kind of avenging angel either”.
“Why are you doing all of this then?”
“I want to make sure that when I share my thoughts with you, you’ll actually listen and take me seriously. Besides, I might not hurt you, but hurting the success of Bonten is a bonus.”
Ominous, but valid, Kakuchou supposed. Takemichi stood up on the roof, dusted off his outfit, and then prepared to leave. Kakuchou wasn’t going to stop him either. His old friend might be annoying Bonten, but… It was Takemichi . He heard about what Takemichi did in Toman a bit from Sanzu, and he’s positive that Mikey would skin him alive if he did anything to him.
It’s not like Kakuchou valued the idea of hurting Takemichi himself either.
“Shouldn’t you be more concerned that I know who you are now?” Kakuchou yelled after him when Takemichi began walking away.
Takemichi glanced back from his place by the edge of the rooftop. “Not really,” the now-identified gunman countered truthfully. “I doubt anyone in Bonten would believe you”.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
He was right. Not a single Bonten executive believed him.
“Are you sure you didn’t hallucinate Hanagaki?” Sanzu asked from his spot on the couch. As soon as Kakuchou found out, he told everyone to meet him in the headquarters of Bonten.
He was about ready to murder everyone in the room though, guns blazing. “ Yes , I am 100% sure that I didn’t hallucinate him”, Kakuchou gritted out.
“I don’t know, maybe the alcohol you had messed with you. Hanagaki was really weak at fighting, even while he was in Toman,” Ran voiced out loud.
“He also cried about everything. There’s no way he would have the heart to go against Bonten, much less shoot at anyone,” grumbled Mochi by the wall.
Kakuchou walked over to the bar in the room, and grabbed a glass as well as the heaviest drink the bar had. The scarred executive popped the drink open, looked at the glass, then decided to drink straight from the bottle.
“Mikey, do you believe me?”
The head of Bonten looked over from the armchair, where he was munching on a dorayaki. Mikey knew Takemichi the best, so if he backed him up, everyone would finally believe Kakuchou.
“No”, the white haired man responded with absolutely no hesitation. Damn, there went that hope. “Takemitchy is really stubborn, but that was the only reason why he survived half of the fights he was in. It’s impossible that he is the one constantly shooting at us”.
Fuck . Koko looked at him with a ‘what can you do’ expression, and tilted his own drink back.
Kakuchou sighed and ran his hand through his hair. He could see why they didn’t believe him, but he knew that Takemichi was the perpetrator. In the end, he should probably gather up evidence before telling the others again.
Kakuchou looked longingly at the multiple unopened drinks the bar held. Clearly, one bottle wasn’t going to be enough.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Draken pulled out a chair from under the wooden drink stained table and sat down. It was the obligatory weekly meeting with all of the old members of Toman, and almost everyone was there. This week, it was decided that everyone would go to a club to have some fun. They tried to change up the location every week, but the club was a favorite.
The only people missing from the gathering were Hakkai, who had a modeling gig happening, and Takemichi who made some excuse about being too busy.
The dragon-tattooed man frowned as he traced his finger around the rim of his beer. Takemichi had been busy very often lately, and every time Draken saw him, he seemed to look more haggard somehow.
The eyebags Takemichi started sporting recently were Bad™, to say the least.
Draken knew that Chifuyu was worried about his friend too, based on his recent lack of sleep. The tall man drummed his fingers against his table, and stood up to join Inui, Kazutora, and Mitsuya by the pool table.
“Care to let me join the next round?” Draken implored. Kazutora hummed out a response, and beckoned him closer to the table. Mitsuya lined up his stick to hit the white ball, pulled his arm back, and then completely missed.
Draken bursted out laughing and slammed his hand on the edge of the table. “Oh shut up,” Mitsuya grumbled. Kazutora could barely stifle his snickers behind his hand, and when Mitsuya scowled at him, he gave up on trying to hide his laugh.
The fashion designer handed the stick off to Kazutora, who actually hit a ball into the hole. “I shouldn’t have picked Mitsuya to be on my team,” Inui said wryly as he gazed at the losing game.
“Mitsuya is notoriously bad at pool, I was surprised you picked him in the first place,” Kazutora laughed.
“Yeah, I’m beginning to see that now,” Inui chuckled. Mitsuya jabbed his elbow into the blond’s side, who choked out a wheeze of pain.
“I’m surprised that Takemichi didn’t show up today though,” Mitsuya thought out loud. “Usually he loves coming, even though he can’t hold his liquor at all”. Draken nodded his head in agreement, and while he turned to look at Kazutora play, he almost missed Inui who’s face turned pale.
After many years of working together, Draken knew his business partner like the back of his own hand. The bike shop owner narrowed his eyes at Inui, who widened his own eyes and fidgeted nervously when he noticed his gaze.
Draken took a slow sip of the drink in his hand. Hmm. Suspicious.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Okay, so Kazutora would like to make it clear beforehand that he did not want to be a part of this. All he wanted to do was dig around and see if he could discover anything about where Mikey was. He didn’t ask to be involved in this, this convoluted mess that Takemichi was a part of.
Maybe Kazutora should elaborate on what happened. The pet shop worker was walking around a back alley behind a fancy restaurant in the middle of the night, when he heard a door slam open from the back of the restaurant, and a string of curses fell out from a pink haired man.
Kazutora barely had any time to register that it was Sanzu that was running out the door before the pink haired man pulled out a gun and fired multiple shots through the door behind him. “Why are you doing this?” Sanzu yelled into the doorway. “ How do you keep finding me?? ”
Apparently Sanzu must have seen something, because he swore again before turning around and sprinting out of the back alleyway. A man dressed completely in back emerged from the doorway, and Kazutora swore that he felt his soul leave his body then.
However, when the disguised man turned to look at him, blue eyes widened in recognition. “Kazutora?” The man gasped.
Kazutora knew that voice. There’s no way he wouldn’t, not when the owner of it visited the pet shop nearly every day and designated himself as Chifuyu’s best friend over the years.
“Takemichi?” Kazutora gasped out accusingly. Shocked golden eyes met shocked azure eyes. The two pointed fingers at each other in the perfect rendition of a spiderman meme that didn’t exist yet.
“Oh no,” Takemichi ( it was him ) stuttered out. Menetally, Kazutora cursed at every being out there that decided to make his life like this.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Kakuchou, I am so sorry for ever doubting you about the gunman being Takemichi-”
“ Oh my god , finally Sanzu, see I told you that it’s him.”
“Yeah, yeah, you were right, but why the everloving fuck is he hunting us down ?”
“One time he said that it was to get us to listen, and that hurting Bonten was a side benefit, but it really didn’t explain anything”.
“Do you know how to get him to stop?”
“Not really”.
“What are you good for then?”
“...Are you serious?”
“Obviously.”
“Sometimes I wonder why I put up with this”.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Chifuyu petted Peke J who was purring on his lap, while he sat on the couch watching a new romcom that just came out. The green eyed pet shop owner glanced at the clock, and frowned. Kazutora was out late again.
Chifuyu sighed and stood up from the couch, stretching out his limbs while murmuring a soft apology to his cat who mewled in protest against the movement.
Earlier in the day, Draken talked to him about his worries over Takemichi, and Chifuyu was relieved that someone else felt the same concerns as him. His friend mentioned that Inui was acting weird, so he probably knew more about what was happening than he let on.
The pet shop owner set a bag of popcorn in the microwave, and listened to the sound of some corn kernels popping. When the microwave beeped that it was done, Chifuyu pulled out a bowl and poured the popcorn into it. Just as he was about to sit down, he heard the front door creak open.
Chifuyu turned to look at the door, and saw that Kazutora had finally stumbled into their shared apartment. The blond and black haired adult looked up at him with a startled gaze, and Chifuyu hid a snort when he noticed he looked like a scared cat.
“You’re back pretty late,” Chifuyu grinned.
“Uh, yeah-” Kazutora stumbled out. “I just met someone that I didn’t really expect to see”.
“Huh,” Chifuyu hummed out. “Was it someone you wanted to see again?”
“Sure?” Kazutora answered. “I think so, I was just really surprised”.
Chifuyu gazed closely at Kazutora, took in his disheveled state, and his nervous state, He was hiding something. Based on what Draken said earlier about Inui…
“Did that someone have anything to do with Takemichi?”
Kazutora flinched, and skittered backwards. “Uh, no! Definitely not, it had absolutely nothing to do with Takemichi!”
Well, Chifuyu only had a hunch at first, but that pretty much solidified his hypothesis. He’ll have to dig deeper.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Mikey squinted at the bright yellow, square sticky note he held in his hand. In blue ink, a large smiley face covered the entire expanse of the sticky note. The leader of Bonten poked around the sticky note, raised it up to the light, sniffed it, and did basically everything else he could to determine if the note was a possible threat or not.
After a while, he deduced that it was probably just a normal sticky note. Koko walked into the kitchen then, and Mikey decided that he could ask around about the note.
“Have you received any sticky notes with a smiley face on it?” Mikey asked, in lieu of a greeting.
Koko looked up from when he was tapping away on his tablet. “Oh, you got one of those too, boss?”
“Yes,” Mikey frowned. “Are you saying you got one?”
The financial executive of Bonten set down his tablet on the counter. He leaned his hip on the wall, and tapped his manicured nail on his arm in thought. “At first I thought it was one of the other executives trying to pull a prank, but they know to not bother you, so it is weird that you got one too.”
Suddenly, Koko straightened up. “Could it be…” he wondered out loud.
From down the hall outside of the kitchen, a scream of bloody murder erupted. A set of footsteps sounded loudly before screeching right outside of the kitchen door. The door was yanked open, and Mikey and Koko both startled at seeing Rindou in such a frazzled state.
Soon enough though, they could see why he was so frazzled. A colorful array of sticky notes donned his entire body. A green one was stuck to his left arm, three blue ones covered his shoulders, a red one was stuck to his right arm, and one that was half pink half blue stuck onto his forehead. All of them had a smiley face, but the one on the face had a pair of horns sticking out.
When Rindou realized that it was Koko and Mikey in the kitchen, he composed himself and grabbed the sticky note on his face. “I just want to know who stuck all of these sticky notes onto me,” the Bonten executive sighed.
Mikey shrugged and Koko said, “We’re not sure, but we’re getting those notes too”.
From behind Rindou, Ran popped up. “That’s strange,” Ran added. “All of the other executives got them too after I asked them. Do you think that it’s…”
“I thought that it might be him,” Koko grimaced.
Mikey scowled. Whoever the mysterious gunman was, he was causing a lot of trouble.
“Oh look, there’s another sticky note on the fridge there”. Rindou pointed at a sparkly neon green sticky note that sat by itself on the fridge, and contained a red smiley face with two eyebrows pointed downward to the center. This one also had horns on it.
“That was not there when I walked into the room,” Koko whimpered.
Now, Mikey had never been religious really and he’s pretty sure that any prayer he does will immediately backfire on him, but he was beginning to see the value in believing in a deity.
“Koko, use some money from next week’s profits to use towards an exorcism”.
Mikey ignored the Bonten executives’ shocked looks and walked out of the kitchen. His grandfather did tell him before that a good way to get rid of bad energy was through an exorcism.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hina found out about everything completely by accident. It started with Takemichi making excuses about not being able to hang out with everyone as often, and it ended with Hina literally stumbling over his disguise.
The red haired girl stopped by Takemichi’s house in the morning to check in on him and bring some homemade dumplings for him, but no one answered the door for her, which was really strange. Takemichi was always at home in the morning, due to his literal inability to function properly before 8 am.
Hina grabbed the spare key from under the doormat of his apartment, and unlocked the door. She was really worried, and considering Takemichi’s streak of injuries and getting hurt to protect complete strangers, she felt justified in her concern.
“Takemichi?” Hina called out into his apartment. When met with no response, Hina entered the house and tried to ignore the spark of fear that flared up in her chest. The red haired girl moved past the empty kitchen and living room, towards the closed door of his bedroom.
Hina yanked the door open, and was met with a similarly empty bedroom. Weird. She carefully maneuvered around the messy room until her foot caught on something and she fell down.
“Oh my god, Takemichi really needs to clean his room,” Hina muttered while rubbing at her bruised backside. Shuffling around, she looked for the item that tripped her. It felt like cloth, like a shirt or pants or something…
Hina glanced around on the floor, and found a black jacket, black pants, and black shirt all bundled together. That was weird, Hina had never seen Takemichi wear those before, much less all together. And why would they be bundled together like that?
The woman furrowed her eyebrows in thought, before her eye caught onto a newspaper hidden under a pile of empty plastic bottles. Hina grabbed the newspaper, and looked at the blurry photo of a man dressed completely in black.
“Bonten’s Newest Grim Reaper?” The headline of the newspaper wrote in bold. Hinata gasped.
Almost everyone in Japan knew who the person in the photo was. They didn’t know their identity exactly, but they knew that the person had been hunting down Bonten members and had the uncanny ability to know where the executives were. Most people were rooting for him. How could they not, when he was literally going against Japan’s worst gang? Some critics did say that he was in over his head, chasing Bonten like that, but even they grudgingly admitted that the individual was hurting Bonten more than the police ever had.
The unknown person had also amassed a cult of followers. Something about his anonymity and success drew people in. No, she didn’t want to talk about it. She’s seen the fanfiction.
Hinata glanced at the photo of the hunter again, then back at the identical clothes, then at the photo again.
Hina blinked. Grabbed her phone. Cracked her phone in her grip. Took a deep breath. And then dialed a familiar number.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From somewhere far away, Takemichi froze. He couldn’t tell exactly why he froze, but he got in trouble for doing something he shouldn’t have enough times to have an innate sense for when someone was upset with him.
The black haired man shifted uneasily in the air vent of a warehouse, right above where Mochi was making some kind of shady business deal.
“I’m in danger,” he realized. And it wasn’t because of Mochi who was looking up cautiously at the air vent Takemichi was in. That was an easy enough problem to solve.
No, it was because Takemichi’s phone was buzzing, signaling that someone was calling him, and one check of the lit up screen told him that it was Hina calling him.
Yeahhh, Takemichi was in danger.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hinata called everyone directly after Takemichi picked up her phone call, and told them to meet up at a cat cafe as soon as possible. Yes, a cat cafe. She needed the emotional support of a cat in these trying times.
“Hinata, what’s wrong? Why did you call us here?” Chifuyu asked while entering through the door of the cafe. Perfect, he was the last person that needed to arrive. Hina stopped petting the calico cat that laid across her lap, and beckoned Chifuyu over to her table, where the rest of the old Toman members sat.
Once he sat down, Hina took a deep breath. “I found out what Takemichi has been up to”.
The red haired girl looked around the table, missing how Kazutora and Inui both flinched.
“And he’s about to do something really stupid. So I need your help”.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Takemichi inhaled through his nose, then slowly exhaled through his mouth. He readjusted the black face mask that covered up most of his face, as well as the hoodie that hid his black hair. The old Toman captain took another deep, steadying breath, before dropping down from the ceiling into the main office of Bonten, where all of the Bonten executives were.
He landed in a crouch on the walnut wood table that the executives were circled around. Before anyone could draw their guns, Takemichi pointed his own directly at Mikey.
“If you try anything, I will shoot,” Takemichi warned.
His striking blue eyes gazed cooly around the room, taking in the positions and stances of every individual. A tense silence flowed around, before Mochi decided to break it.
“What do you want?” The Bonten member gritted out.
Takemichi raised a brow. “I want you all to turn yourselves in to the police, and pay for your crimes”.
Takeomi snorted out loud. “And what makes you think that we will willingly do that?”
The gunman gestured to his gun with his hand, making sure that the gun was still trained on Mikey. “You’re not exactly in a place where you can say no”.
“Damn, he would’ve been great for Bonten if he worked with us,” Koko grumbled under his breath. “Look, we can’t do that, is there anything you want instead? Money, drugs, anything like that?”
“No, I just want you to turn yourselves in.”
“There’s no way in hell that’s going to happen,” Sanzu snarled. The pink haired executive reached towards the glock hidden in his back pocket, and whipped it out to point at Takemichi.
Takemichi then pulled out his own hidden gun from the inside of his jacket, and aimed at Sanzu who was running towards him. Promptly, all hell broke loose.
Every member rushed towards Takemichi while pulling out their respective weapons. Takemichi leaped up to avoid Rindou reaching over the table to grab him, and then hit Ran with the butt of his gun.
“Fuck, I really hoped this wouldn’t happen,” Takemichi grumbled.
He caught Mochi’s arm and used his momentum against him to suplex him onto Sanzu. Right after though, Takeomi fired a few shots at him, and Takemichi shot some back in return. One of the bullets landed in Takemichi’s side, but it didn’t hinder his movements at all.
“How did that not affect you?” Takeomi roared.
“Oh, the bullet?” Takemichi replied. “I have an insane pain tolerance so it really doesn’t bother me”.
“It should still affect your movements though”.
“It would normally, but I am very upsetti spaghetti with all of you right now, and the bullet is very low on my priority list”.
Takemichi ducked down, and sweeped Takeomi off his feet. Mikey finally came forward and kicked his foot towards Takemichi in a perfect arc, which Takemichi copied perfectly, meeting his foot with his own.
“Yeah, that’s not going to work,” Takemichi grinned.
Throughout it all, Kakuchou leaned against the walls of the room, and covered his face with his hands.
When Sanzu pulled out a knife and was just about to stab Takemichii with it, the door to the office slammed open. From behind the doorway, a familiar face with a dragon tattoo popped out. The sight of the people in the room seemed to confirm something for him, and he whispered to someone behind him before walking into the room.
“This is an intervention,” Draken declared, “For everyone here”. He looked pointedly at Takemichi and Mikey.
“How did you know where we were?” Koko asked.
Draken looked at him, and rubbed the back of his head. “I’ve known for a while now actually,” he revealed, “I needed to know where Mikey was so I did some digging. I didn’t do anything about it though because I was pretty sure I would be shot dead if I stepped foot anywhere close to this place”.
Rindou then piped up, “That still doesn’t explain how you managed to get in. The guards definitely should have taken you down”.
Draken pointed at Chifuyu who blushed. “That was because of him. Chifuyu is really good at talking to people, making them question their life decisions, and providing them unconditional comfort and forgiveness. I think your guards are still going through a life existential crisis”.
The Bonten executives stared at Chifuyu in disbelief. Kazutora shrugged from his side. “It’s true, that’s basically what he did with me”.
“Okay, I think we’re getting off topic. You all,” Takemichi gestured vaguely at Bonten, “Need to go to jail or something so that you will stop doing this and repent”.
“Okay, Takemichi, I don’t think just telling them will do any-” Draken got cut off as Takemichi began protesting.
“I’m not just telling them, I’ve been chasing them down for literal months just to make sure they will listen and do what they say!”
“Okay, wait hold up,” Takeomi interrupted. “Did you just say that this is Takemichi?” he demanded while pointing at Takemichi.
“Draken, now they know my identity!”
“They didn’t exactly know until you literally just confirmed that-”
“How could they not have known after what you sa-”
“It might have just been a guess-”
“QUIET”, Mikey eventually shouted. “If you’re really Takemichi you can prove that easily. Just show us your face”. Okay. That works too. Takemichi pushed down his hood and took off his face mask, revealing his face for everyone to see.
Softly, but with feeling, Takeomi said, “What the fuck”.
“I can’t believe Kakuchou was right,” added Ran.
“Fuck you,” retorted Kakuchou.
Mikey just stood in shock. “It was really you the entire time?” He eventually managed.
“Yeah, Mikey, it was,” Takemichi beamed. “I’m here to scold you! Twelve years ago you asked me to be there for you like a Shinichiro would have been. I’m here now, twelve years too late, but I’m here.” Takemichi walked up to Mikey and pulled him into his arms.
“You’re really here,” Mikey gasped. Eventually, he wrapped his arms around the other, and mumbled into his chest, “I’m tired, ‘Mitchy, really tired”.
“I know,” Takemichi murmured.
Mikey separated himself from Takemichi, and looked sharply at the other Bonten members. “Okay, I’m going to disband Bonten. You can all do whatever you want”.
“You can’t just do that!” Sanzu screeched.
Koko scoffed. “Of course he can. And he’s never been able to deny Takemichi anything, so I guess this was to be expected. I’m going to keep control of the finances, if you want anything just let me know.”
“Where will you go?” Takeomi asked.
Koko glanced at Inui, then bit his lip. Inui noticed the look and stepped forward. “He can stay with me”.
The financial head of Bonten looked at Inui again in shock. “Thanks,” Koko said curtly.
Mikey clapped his hands together. “All right. So, Takemichi said jail, so I guess we’re going to jail. If you don’t want to go, you better start running”.
A dark glint entered his eyes, and every Bonten member felt the fear of God be put into them. They didn’t even try to run.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Takemichi pulled back the white plastic chair, sat down, and pulled the phone off its mount on the wall. He brought the phone up to his ear, and smiled as the white haired man sitting across from him did the same.
“Hi,” Takemichi breathed.
“Hey,” Mikey greeted.
Takemichi tried to ignore the glass that separated them, but it was hard to. Well, Takemichi guessed that he couldn’t complain, he did ask him to go to jail. Jail wasn’t his favorite place for Mikey to be in, but it was better than being involved in the dealings of Bonten.
“I can’t believe that it was you chasing us down the entire time,” Mikey laughed. “We were all wondering who it could be, and you were terrifying. I never would have guessed that it was you”.
“Yeah, it was me. Maybe someday I’ll explain to you how it all happened,” Takemichi chuckled. He gazed at Mikey for a little longer before tears quickly formed and flowed down his face. “I’m sorry that you have to be stuck in jail”.
Mikey smiled fondly. “Still a crybaby, huh, even after all of these years? And don’t worry about the jail part, I know that they sentenced me for life but I pulled a few strings so I’ll get out earlier”.
Takemichi shook his head and let out a little huff. “I should’ve expected that. Hakkai’s going to have to pay Mitsuya money, he bet that you would remain in jail”.
“Hmm, Hakkai thinks too well of me,” Mikey reminisced. “Thank you for coming back Takemichi, and for scolding me like a big brother and stopping me”.
“Of course. Whatever it takes, you know?” Takemichi grinned lightly.
Mikey’s eyes softened.
“Whatever it takes”.