[fic] The Things We Can't Control - Chapter 74 ~The Last Five~
Title: The Things We Can't Control
Author:
prettyorianna
Pairing: Akame. Others to be added later.
Rating: NC-17.
Genre: crime drama au
Beta by: my cat Gemma. and maeda_marika
Disclaimer: I don't own KAT-TUN, any of its members, any other JE people. I write this for fun and for other fans of these fine folks. But don't steal my plots, mmkay? I put a great deal of time into them except for when I'm randomly spastically spitting words onto a page. But I value those too...
Summary: Two criminals with vastly different styles meet by chance one day. They immediately clash but is that all they'll ever be? How much is fate and how much choice? And how will their meeting change the world around them?
Author's Note: Back to the past. Enjoy.
BANNER BY DESHISORABA!! THE MOST AWESOME BANNER EVER AND I WILL FIGHT ANYONE WHO DISAGREES!
Warning: This gets graphic often occasionally, containing at the very least foul language, character death, nefarious crimes, rape, etc etc.
The Master Posts:
On my journal - The Things We Can't Control Master Post
On the akame_ Community - The Things We Can't Control Master Post
On the akame_fanfics Community - The Things We Can't Control Master Post
On the je_kamenashi Community - The Things We Can't Control Master Post
On the kattun_fanfics Community - The Things We Can't Control Master Post
On the jin_fics Community - The Things We Can't Control Master Post
Chapter 74 ~The Last Five~
Kame was happy when Yurina opted to sleep in her bed Friday night. She was recovering from her ordeal a lot faster than Kame could have imagined and he was grateful for that. She really was a strong woman, wasn’t she? Though she didn’t seem to think so. He didn’t understand how she couldn’t recognize her own strength.
You know, she really deserved to know what he tried to do at the prison. Yes, he’d failed but still…
So Saturday morning at breakfast, he told her all about going to the prison and sitting down with Shibata Takeshi. Yurina sat across from him, listening intently, and by the time he finally finished the story, her eyes glistened with tears she was desperately trying to hold back and she whispered, “Oh, Kame…”
“I had to try!” he explained. “I’m so sorry it didn’t work, Yurina. This is just all my fault and I don’t know how to help them! I know you’re probably mad at me; I keep messing up. I couldn’t keep you safe and I couldn’t help your brothers.”
“That was incredibly brave, Kame. Stupid to meet him so alone, but…” Yurina gave a soft smile though she still hadn’t gotten to the point where her smiles reached her eyes very well yet, and continued, “I don’t blame you, not for any of it. Not for them or me. I wanted to. I tried to. I tried so hard. I wanted someone to blame for everything happening. But no, I’m not mad at you.”
Kame didn’t know what to say to that so he didn’t say anything.
“I guess there’s nothing to be done for them,” Yurina sighed and Kame could tell she was still barely holding back her tears. He couldn’t blame her, though. After what she’d just gone through, knowing it was more or less happening to her brother without hope of relief had to be a hard truth to face.
It was something even Kame hadn’t experienced. Yes, he’d been raped, more than once by different people. But it was by one man each time. Not a by group, being taking by one after another and taunted by those waiting for their go ‘round. It’s what made Yurina’s recovery pace so remarkable. She really was an extraordinary person, just like her brothers.
And on the subject of the twins… he wasn’t finished. Talking to Shibata hadn’t done the trick but by all that’s holy, he’d find another way.
But that was a task for another day, because it was finally Saturday and he had five more people to kill.
God, he was just a terrible person, wasn’t he? So many deaths on his conscience and he wasn’t done. Actually, that was the worst part. He didn’t regret killing Abe, Taro, and the other two for what they did to Yurina. He didn’t regret it at all. They deserved far worse than he gave.
No, what really bothered him is the fact he could ever think that about anyone, no matter what they did.
Some fucking light, huh? Akira swore it was there but Kame wasn’t so sure…
After dinner, Yurina took Abe’s gun, put it in her purse, and left for the firing range. Before she left, Kame gave her some of the money to pay any fees, bribe people who get too suspicious about her lack of a permit, and to buy bullets.
Kame took the rest of the ammo for Naito’s two guns and put it in the backpack along with some spare clothes in case the ones he was wearing got bloody. Hmm… most of the guys lived alone and they were all in bad neighborhoods but one of them had a live-in girlfriend and it would be difficult to kill him at home. That was going to be the most problematic one so he should probably take care of him first, stake out his apartment and follow him when he left for whatever reason.
Taro had told him the man frequently went to the strip club a few blocks away from his apartment. Apparently, that’s where the girlfriend used to work and it was a constant source of contention between the two of them but she stayed for the free coke. At least, that was Taro’s judgment though Kame had to admit the man had been a little distracted by the multiple gunshot wounds when he was questioning him.
Once Kame got off the bus and out of sight, he armed himself from the backpack and went to wait for the man. It took two hours but the man finally came out of his apartment. Kame could hear a woman shrieking almost unintelligibly and the sound of a vase breaking against the door just as it closed, after which the man shouted, “Damn it, woman! You’re being unreasonable!”
After jiggling the doorknob a few times, the man started pounding on the door. “Open the damn door, bitch!”
The sound of more glass breaking.
“Fuck!” and the man kicked the door. “Let me in you stupid slut! I don’t have my key!”
Kame didn’t really think too much about what he was doing. He just rounded the corner he was hiding behind and laughed, “Wow, man. What a bitch, huh?”
“You don’t know the half of it,” the man growled irritably.
“Eh, women. Can’t live with them, can’t kill them and tell the neighbors they left to pursue a career in show business.” If he could get on this guy’s good side, he might be able to lure him away to some place a bit more ideal for shooting him. “Though around here, I don’t think you’d have to tell the neighbors anything. They don’t care.”
“Yeah, well, fuck ‘em.” The man shrugged, but then he shouted through the door, “YOU HEAR THAT? FUCK YOU!”
Going with an old stand-by, Kame said, “Yamamoto Ryuichi. What’s your name?”
“Shimizu Akihiko…” The man was still grumbling about his girlfriend under his breath. One last kick to the door and he sighed.
“Ah, you’re one of Mitsu-kun’s friends,” Kame said offhandedly, using the nickname Taro had for Abe. “Shame about what happened to him. Well, I’ll see you around maybe? I’m off to Utopia!” Utopia was, of course, the name of the strip joint a few blocks away.
Turning to leave, Kame mentally counted the seconds before Shimizu stopped him. “Hey, I was about to go there, too. What do you mean about Mitsu-kun?”
“Hmm, well… I wasn’t going to go straight there, actually. I have to stop at a… friend’s house. Since Mitsu-kun got killed I have to go elsewhere for… you’re not a cop, are you?” Kame asked suddenly, eying him suspiciously.
Living with the twins had taught Kame that a little suspicion went a long way in blending in. Most people engaged in illegal activities were by nature suspicious. If you were likewise suspicious, the assumption was that you were engaged in illegal things as well. Not very sound logic but it was the way of things. And the reasoning continued that, if you were doing illegal things, you probably weren’t a cop or, if you were one, you were dirty and thus bribable. Again, not very sound logic but it seemed to be the way it worked.
“Hell no, I ain’t no cop!” and Shimizu sounded downright offended. “So anyway, what the fuck do you mean, Mitsu-kun got killed?”
“You haven’t heard about that yet?” Kame sighed impatiently. “Look, I have to get to my, uh, friend’s house. You want to know more, you’re welcome to come with me.” And this time he didn’t glance behind him as he walked towards the stairs. He knew the guy would follow; he was insanely easy to read.
Guess the skills he learned as a whore had practical applications outside the realm of selling sex. The same ways he’d judge a man to know the best method of seduction worked here to tell him just the right ways of manipulating the man into doing what he wanted without tipping him off that he was being played.
“So, what happened?” Shimizu asked once they were out on the street.
Kame made something up and just kept playing his part until he got them to a vacant alleyway and then he drew the gun and shot the man. The first shot went a little wide, hitting him in his left shoulder. The second shot got him right in the heart. Kame took off running. Sure, it was a bad neighborhood but still, just in case, putting distance between himself and the, well, crime scene, seemed like a good idea.
The other four members of Abe’s circle didn’t take nearly that much effort. He pretty much knocked on the door, glanced over their shoulders to make sure the room behind them was empty when they opened the door, and shot them. At such close range, it was a bit messier than he’d have liked but he remained more or less clean. Just to be extra sure, though, he ducked into an alley near the apartment building of the last of the four and quickly switched to his extra clothes, tucking the ones he was wearing into the dumpster before continuing on home.
By the time he got home, it was almost dark. Yurina was already long back from the shooting range. Before she could say anything, Kame told her plainly, “It’s done. All of them. All eight of those bastards who hurt you.”
Truth of the matter was, now that his task was done, he felt kind of numb. Eight more people dead at his hands…
Yes, they were scum.
Yes, they deserved far worse.
Yes, he was glad they were dead.
No, he didn’t regret it.
He was turning into quite a monster, wasn’t he? Because what other word could describe someone who could kill like that and not regret it, no matter what the other party had done? The eight friends of Abe, Abe himself and his two guards, not to mention Naito, three of Naito’s men, Komatsu, Ryuichi… seventeen bodies at his feet and yet he knew he’d sleep fine that night.
It wasn’t right.
But… now Yurina would be safe. The people who hurt her could never touch her again. Maybe she wouldn’t have needed that level of assurance if Abe hadn’t already proven that he could get at her a second time, even though three years had passed, but that was the way of things and they’d have to work with the situations they’re given.
Yurina, upon hearing they were all dead, sank to the floor, not quite crying but nearly so. “I don’t know how to repay you for this, Kame! Thank you! T-thank you…” She shook her head, “I know I shouldn’t have asked you to do this. It was unfair to put this on your conscience but… but…” and now she actually was crying a little. “Thank you! Thank you… Th-thank…” She kept saying it, over and over, only now she was sobbing.
He wasn’t sure he should say anything, but he really didn’t like the idea of keeping secrets from her. “I destroyed the tape too, that Taro had…”
Yurina’s gaze snapped to him. She looked afraid. “You… he… showed you…” she whispered. “You… saw?” He gave the smallest of nods. But apparently she couldn’t look him in the face anymore after that because she quickly looked away. “Kame, why? Why? You… you saw… Don’t look at me! Stop looking at me!”
She was up on her feet and had locked herself in her room much faster than Kame could have imagined.
Great. Just great. Real smart move there. Further traumatize the girl. Damn. There was no way she could ever know Taro sold copies of the tape. If she was reacting this way to Kame having seen a part of it with the tape now destroyed so it could never be viewed again, she’d fall completely apart at the thought that even more people were watching it and with much more lecherous purposes.
There was nothing more he could do for her except be there when she needed him. Past that, it was up to her to come to terms with her ordeal.
Well, at least life could go back more or less to normal. He’d go back to work on Monday. She’d keep taking her defense classes on weekdays and going to the shooting range during the weekend. Once a month, they’d go see Aoi and he hoped eventually Akira as well. They’d get by. Life would go on.
But when Monday came around, it seemed that just wasn’t the hand Kame had been dealt.
+++++++++++++++++++
The story continues:
Chapter 75 ~Kame's Confusion~
A/N: No time. Enjoy chapter.