Mizukawa acknowledged the stabbing was an accident, but who was to say the gangster with the knife had no intention of hurting Okada? He took his weapon out, so he might’ve been planning to attack or even kill Okada, but fear seized him when the burly man charged him. In either case, Okada was dead, and Mizukawa wasn’t going to let that slide.
“Do you know what Okada’s last words were?” the boss asked.
“‘Let’s grab some ramen after this.’”
“Don’t be an idiot. That’s just the last thing he said to you.”
“Oh, right…”
It was times like this that his lack of sense and schooling showed the most. A wave of frustration washed over Mizukawa. He shifted his gaze from his boss to the clock. The conversation was dragging on longer than he was willing to tolerate. Once he made a move, the guy who killed Okada—Ijyuuin—would start taking more precautions. If that involved getting a firearm from his family’s safe, that wouldn’t particularly bother Mizukawa. But if he fled abroad, Mizukawa wouldn’t be able to chase after him.
“Just before he died, he called your name,” said the boss.
Mizukawa guessed that Okada was trying to tell Ijyuuin, “Mizukawa will get you!” Or perhaps he was issuing an order, like, “Mizukawa, avenge me!” Which was exactly what Mizukawa would, of course, do. He was going to avenge his brother. He didn’t have to be told what to do for that.
“Boss, let’s cut to the chase…” He stopped when he turned his gaze back to the old man, experiencing for the first time in his life what people called a chill running down their spine.
The boss wasn’t sitting cross-legged anymore. He was sitting formally with his legs folded under him. That was it. All he had done was change the way he was sitting. But while people would change from sitting on their legs to sitting cross-legged to be more comfortable, no one did the opposite. And what really sent alarm bells ringing in Mizukawa’s head was that he hadn’t heard or sensed the old man move at all.
He was about to be attacked.
It was just a hunch, but he was absolutely certain an attack was coming. He jumped, just as a blade swished below him. The old man had quickly drawn his sword, still seated. The attack was terrifyingly fast.
“Most people would stand up or lean away.”
The old man was now in a half crouch. He slowly rose from the floor, keeping his sword pointed at Mizukawa.
“You were kneeling, so how the hell did you jump up? What is with that body of yours?”
Mizukawa was about to jump away again the second he landed, but he changed his mind and straightened up slowly, his movements matching the boss’s. It was a miracle his legs were still attached to the rest of his body. He couldn’t believe he was still in one piece. The old man could have easily beheaded him if he’d wanted to.
“Why didn’t you kill me?”
When he looked away at the clock, he had been defenseless, but it seemed the old man had been waiting for him to turn his head back toward him before attacking.
“I wanted to take out your legs.”
The boss had been anticipating Mizukawa standing up in fear. He was aiming for his legs, but swinging the sword with only one hand and in a seated position, he wouldn’t have struck with enough force to shatter the bones.
“Thank you, Boss…”
The old man wanted to spare him. A gesture of kindness? Did he have a soft spot for Mizukawa? Or was he simply wary of the trouble Mizukawa would bring?
The last possibility was the most likely. Disposing of a body was costly, and the gang wouldn’t want to risk having another corpse on their hands while the police were sniffing around. They were a long-established family, yet only a dozen or so members were guarding their boss in his residence right after one of their members was killed and another was threatening to rebel to avenge him. Anyone could tell their power had greatly diminished due to the pressure from both foreign crime groups and the police. In the past, disposing of bodies was a piece of cake, but that was then.
Their boss seemed almost religiously devoted to the doctrine of avoiding trouble as their family slowly weakened, but it made no sense to Mizukawa. If they were going to die out, he’d rather stay true to the yakuza way and go out with a bang.
For a moment, he wondered whether explaining his perspective to the boss was worth it, but he remained silent, not so much because having a katana pointed at him made him less chatty, but because he didn’t consider persuasion part of his skill set.
After all, he was just a dog, eating what he was fed, baring his teeth at enemies when the need arose. Dogs weren’t known for being good at talking. They weren’t meant to talk at all.
The thought calmed Mizukawa. His head cleared, and he was no longer intimidated by the threat before him. He couldn’t let the boss kill him, not yet at least, but he didn’t need to be so wary. They were indoors, and the old man’s sword arm was pitifully thin. Mizukawa figured his chances of survival were high.
The room was too small to swing a katana around haphazardly, and the ceiling was too low to swing overhead. A fully extended horizontal swipe was also impossible. The boss could either try to thrust the blade at him or use short slashes, but it would take incredible strength to critically wound an opponent with a little slash that had no follow-through. The real danger was getting stabbed. Knowing what to be wary of, Mizukawa felt confident he’d be able to make do.
The boss would have one chance to attack him, and it was unlikely he’d manage to inflict a severe injury. Meanwhile, Mizukawa could kill the old man, and he didn’t even need a weapon. His bare hands were plenty.
“Tsk! My mistake for taking in a half-feral dog.”
The boss stuck the katana deep into the floor and sat down cross-legged again.
“Why did you do that?”
“If I can’t stop you, I’d rather you not die for nothing.”
He sounded sincere.
Mizukawa relaxed and nodded a thank-you. Then he walked over to one corner of the room, pulled the tatami mat off the floor, and smashed the floorboards with a kick.
“What are you, a caveman?! They weren’t bolted! You could’ve just lifted them!”
But the damage was already done. Mizukawa bowed his head again, this time in apology.
He removed the rest of the floorboards with his hands, revealing a large metal safe lying face up. It had been placed that way to allow easy access from above. Mizukawa knew the combination.
“Damn that Okada. He never could keep a secret.”
“He told me the number in case of emergency. I’d say this counts.”
The lock clicked open, and Mizukawa opened the heavy door. There were stacks of banknotes and complicated-looking documents wrapped in plastic bags, but those things were of no interest to Mizukawa. The item he was looking for was at the very bottom of the safe.
“It’s in pieces?”
“It wouldn’t fit in otherwise. Sorry, but I don’t know how to reassemble it.”
“Not a problem. I do.”
“Tsk!”
Mizukawa pulled a bag out. It contained a large amount of rifle ammunition, packed together with some desiccant and disassembled AK-47s.
As far as he knew, these were the most powerful weapons in possession of his gang. He had to have one if he was to strike the enemy with full force.
There were four rifles in total, but Mizukawa needed only one, so he returned the other three to the safe.
“I was going to throw all that away. The times have moved on, and there’s no need for that sort of stuff anymore.”
“There will never be a time when weapons aren’t needed.”
Mizukawa lifted the bag with the rifle and ammo with both hands, bowed, and left the room. A memory flashed in his mind on his way out—Okada teaching him to bow to his superiors.