“It’s been a month and a half since the last job,” Kimokawa said. “Seems like it’s about time we made some more money, right?”
As Hakayama remained silent, sunk deep into the Baxter sofa, the man sitting next to him banged his fists together loudly.
“Damn right. We always do a job every couple months.”
Shiro had a shaved head and was dressed in a hoodie, sweatpants, and sneakers. He was short, at just under five-five, but he looked much bigger. His hands were huge, with fingers as fat as zucchinis and palms so thick, they resembled floor cushions.
When he was in his teens, Shiro had made his debut in the underground fighting scene and, after a string of consecutive victories, had gone over to the United States by himself to compete in the famous QFC fighting tournament. He’d won two matches back-to-back, then killed his opponent in the ring during the third and lost by disqualification. After his contract was canceled and he returned to Japan, he’d wreaked havoc in every type of underground fighting competition there was, racking up experience in actual combat against fighters who were equally fierce and had just as little concern for their lives. The man was a hardcore battle junkie.
“What’s next? What’re we gonna hit? I don’t wanna do something boring. If we’re gonna do it, it’s gotta be a challenge.”
He smirked, revealing titanium teeth that shone with a dull gleam as a blue vein rose to the surface of his forehead. Shiro was a true close-quarters fighter who loved a brawl. He didn’t have a single one of his own teeth left. Normally, ceramic and other artificial teeth would be anchored to the bone with titanium screws, but Shiro had insisted on having his teeth be made completely out of titanium.
Every time he saw Shiro’s titanium teeth, the same thought went through Hakayama’s mind: This guy’s seriously crazy. Shiro always aimed to keep his body fat at five percent, and when he stripped down, you could almost see every one of his muscles. He took pride in his unbelievable physique, but it had gone beyond being impressive and was now just creepy. It was repulsive, even.
“The last one was…,” pondered a woman with a shaved head, placing her hand on the hood of a classic car. Midori. She was wearing a black MA-1 bomber jacket over a tank top, skinny jeans, and crimson stiletto heels, and she always had a whip hanging at her side. It was clear to see that this woman wasn’t respectable. Although Midori looked scary simply by having her head shaved, she also had a tattoo of an anime girl across her bald scalp. Hakayama wasn’t interested and didn’t really know much about it, but the picture was of a character called Magical Girl Matomato, or Momimomi, or Memomimo. Something like that. Of all the tattoos he’d seen, this one was particularly odd.
“The independent crime gang…Poraigon? Is that what it was called? The head of that gang, this guy Mutou, well, seems he was the kid of the Komamushi group leader, Ikoma or whatever. But Ikoma didn’t recognize him as his kid.”
“Ahh, the man you tortured and killed, Midori?” Kimokawa asked with a smile, taking a sip of his nonalcoholic cocktail. “Kouhei Mutou. Little Master Mutou. Well, he grew into a man with 450 million yen in hand. Even his old man, Ikoma, the head of the gang, must have been happy with him, don’t you think? Thanks to him, we were able to get that 450 million. It’s actually hard for the yakuza to move hundreds of millions of yen around these days. The only ones making real money are the handful of people right at the top.”
“Kyahaa!” Midori suddenly let out a strange squeal and started touching herself between the legs. “Mutooou. He was fun, wasn’t he? Right at the end. I shoved all sorts of things in all sorts of holes other than his mouth. And when I asked him whether it felt good, you know what he said?! ‘Help me!’ or some shit like that! What the hell, right?! I told him he should say, ‘This is amaaazing!’ And that guy, right?! He actually says it: ‘This is amaaaazing!’ He was so full of shit! Though just remembering it feels amaaazing for me. I tell ya, Mutou, a legend was created in those final moments of his! If he’d survived, I would’ve kept him as a pet. But he was already on the brink of death, wasn’t he? He asked me to save him! As if that would ever happen! He should’ve known that, at least!”
Midori jumped onto the roof of the classic car and burst into a high-pitched cackle. The car was a silver Chevrolet Corvette C3. Although it wasn’t particularly expensive, Hakayama couldn’t understand the mindset of someone who would put her feet on it like that for no reason. But Midori probably just wasn’t thinking at all. She was ridiculously callous and would calmly commit acts of cruelty for her own pleasure. There definitely weren’t many people like her. She had to be handled with care, but she was useful, which was why she was in the group.
Kimokawa and Shiro were roaring with laughter along with Midori. One was the type to commit intellectual, nonviolent crimes, while the other was addicted to violence. But in a way, they weren’t all that different. Kimokawa and Shiro wouldn’t engage in violent, disorderly behavior out in broad daylight on the street—but that was only because getting chased by the police would be a hassle, so they chose self-control. If not for that, though, who knew what they’d do?
Even the structure of their brains was fundamentally different from ordinary civilians. Although the environment they’d been born into and grown up in had something to do with it, Hakayama thought the majority of it came from their innate dispositions. A group of people like Midori, Kimokawa, and Shiro were bound to become criminals. No one could stop that. They were innately evil people.
Sitting on a second Baxter leather sofa were Hyougo Kurojima, who was silently doing maintenance on his modified gun, and Benny, who had his arms crossed and his eyes closed. Kurojima and Benny were a different species from Midori, Kimokawa, and Shiro.
Kurojima always wore camouflage clothing, a bandanna wrapped around his head, and big, black-framed glasses. Even from just a glance, you could tell he was a military enthusiast and gun fanatic—and an obsessive one, at that.
The Glock 17 he was currently reassembling was a gun he’d modified from a commercially sold replica to make it capable of firing live rounds. And it wasn’t just his own gun, either. The Colt Government hidden in Kimokawa’s inner pocket, along with the majority of the guns belonging to the members of the Scarecrows, had been made by Kurojima. He even manufactured the bullets himself. He’d also done enough test-firing to be a good shot.