“Are you sure they came like this?” Marie nodded as the steam filled the small kitchen, Jubilee was elbows deep in the sink, her eyes on several kids all at once. Katherine was helping her supervise the baking class she held every month. The small tin box was clutched by Marie, the contents had been sifted through more than once and shown to both women. Katherine was trying to distract the kids by sending them outside to gather spring flowers for their table setting.
“Look if I remember what my old Aunt told me, you've got two months tops before he'll be back wanting an answer one way or another.” Marie bit her lip and began playing with her iron ring again. Katherine walked back in with a handful of children, dressed brightly like the flowers they were clutching in their hands.
“What's wrong now?” Marie met the smiling gaze of Katherine and spoke her heart's fears.
“What if he wants to marry me like the Japanese do? I don't know anything about it and I'm not sure I'd want to go through with something arranged like this.” Marie looked at Jubes, “No disrespect meant to your traditions Jubes but I'm not a wilting flower waiting to be plucked.”
Jubilee just drained the sink, wiped her hands and plucked the cuttlefish bone out of the box Marie was holding, “Chica, my Aunt got a bone the size of my pinkie finger and she had seven kids. Just how demure and small do you think he thinks you are? And my aunts was plain, this has been 'carved' baby girl and it don't look like any knife marks I know of.” She handed it back to Marie who was now seeing the large white bone in a different light altogether. It was Katherine who slapped her on the back and brought her back to life.
“Better get some practice in now with the kids, looks like you won't have time when he gets home.” Suddenly lighter in her soul Marie put the box down next to the sink and didn't see Katherine's smile widen. She had her own plans for their wedding and if he was back in the next couple of months all the better, seeing a small brown bee bang into the closed window Katherine opened it and let the small insect inside. Watching as it crawled over the delicate tin flowers of Marie's box and fly upto Katherine's eye-line, her whisper lost to the chattering kids but not to the delicate ears of the insect. As it flew away Katherine shut the window again, sure of the actions she'd just put into motion. Oh yeah, this was a wedding no one would ever forget, especially the bride and groom.
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Two weeks of sleeping rough, three days of pain to get the marks on his skin, marks that were now fading and looked old. A couple of tigers heads on his chest, one in blue, the other in red, one hand done with a bent needle, the other with a gun in a parlour. He didn't look like the man everyone back home knew, his hair was long, unfettered, he hadn't washed for an age. Dirt crusted on his body and he didn't mind the stink of it but the other men he'd been with were another matter. He'd been following the young man he'd locked into his truck, the young man with the carp tattoo's. Finding the catering company and the fishery, many men they employed had tattoos, some were just decoration but some were not. One man, a hulking piece of walking beef was covered from his neck down in Cyrillic script, his back was something else. A Madonna and child in front of a huge onion domed church, Logan knew the tales the tattoos were telling him. The man was a thief from birth, his family were old style criminals and for every dome he had on his skin, he'd spent a year in prison somewhere. The patterns on the domes were the language of the prison's location, the one with red stars had been Moscow, the pretty blue swirled dome was somewhere in the cold north, above the arctic circle somewhere. But he was here as a foreman and he'd been instrumental in getting himself a job.
It hadn't taken much, just a bit of a punch up near the dumpsters of the fishery and the big man had been over to see him take down a couple of dirty fighters. He used the old school fighting, the one that had morphed into a military style, the one where you kill first, not disable. Logan had watched a programme with Drake about it once, Systema it had been called, Drake had wanted Logan to teach them in class but Boy Scout had said 'no'. He'd toyed with the idea for a while but some of the kids didn't have the fine control yet to not kill someone by accident, but he'd thought about teaching Marie.
So when the big man saw him put down two men to get to the dumpster and the fresh carcasses they'd just thrown in there he'd been dragged into the large warehouse and really 'tested'. The man had barked at him in Russian and Logan had stiffened at the words, showing him he knew the language. But he hadn't moved, hadn't reacted to him as he'd threatened his life, instead he'd just cowered a little but made sure his stance was defensible. In broken Russian Logan spoke to the larger man, made out he'd been demobbed by the army, lost himself along the train tracks, eventually got himself to Vladivostok. Bummed around and he'd had to leave in a hurry, he'd upset the wrong boss and found himself on a Japanese smuggler bound for the North Island.
Been moving ever since, never staying too long anywhere, he twitched and shifted throughout the entire conversation. Logan barked his answers, made himself look dangerous and shifty, twitching as if he had 'other' problems which weren't leaving him alone. The large man had asked Logan to straighten up for him and he had, showing the fading tattoo's on his chest. He'd gotten up at that point and ripped Logan's shirt aside, revealing the badly blurred blue tiger, under it's badly formed paws were four skulls. The large man just looked at Logan and Logan knew the man in front of him would want proof of his claim on his skin. The tiger was a symbol of anti-authority, the skulls were the deaths at his hands because of his hatred of being told what to do.
It hadn't taken long, a fight between him and a working man of the factory, he'd broken bones, snapped ligaments and made a mess of the man in front of him. Logan did it without joy, it was a means to an end, and the man he'd been put against had fought before so there was no shame in his victory. When he'd refused to crow about his victory over the man the large foreman had been impressed, a dyed in the wool killer didn't brag, he just kept quiet. A potential death in his gaze not the out and out violence that others seemed to think intimidated the sheep around them, wolves who howl are shot. Wolves who creep and keep silent stay alive and make more wolves.
So here he was, in the same draughty warehouse, but the interior had changed, the boxes were surrounding a squared off ring, this was a fight house. A private club where the elite got to enjoy their bloodsports, using men who had been chewed up by the system and thrown back into 'normal' life and ended up on the wrong end of the law. Logan was stood with several other 'helpers', he wasn't talent, he had better uses than that. Just in case the winners went 'a little far' as the large foreman had told him, he'd washed the grime off himself but he'd left his hair long. He didn't dress in the fancy clothes they'd given him, he'd just picked a workers plain jeans and dark indigo shirt, his feet were clad in waraji sandals. They gripped the floor nicely and left his feet easily available to him, he didn't have heavy boots to lift, just his own weighty leg.
The fights went on all week, he earned money and he gave most of it away, handed it out to those who needed it more than he did. The monks of the temple found several gifts of money in Yuriko's name that week, all offered for her soul to rest easily. Logan for himself was going to make sure he came to the attention of the big-wigs. As the nights went on the stakes rose, the fighters got better and finally it was the elite of the elite, both in the fights and the people who'd come to view the battles.
Logan had done his homework, he knew the faces he was looking for, the both of them smiling out of their adverts. Looking like the perfect family, just that the smiles never reached their eyes and the children at their feet had terror shining in theirs. No this was no perfect family, and no matter how much you paid the artist to alter the images, the truth could be seen if you were looking for it. The Kita clan were not what they seemed and their business in the world of transport and freight wasn't entirely legal. Yuudai Kita and his wife, Rin were all smiles the night they came, and Logan made sure he was on the opposite side of them as the fights began.
It was Yuudai that was into the fighting, Rin had the slimline phone stuck to her head, both had aged well but Logan could still see the young faces that had been photographed all those years ago. Now they were the best of the best here, along with several other Yakuza and shipping families, you needed to know the underbelly of the people you were working with and enjoy what they enjoyed. Logan watched the pair, especially Rin, she had no interest in the fighting only the last few moments of each one, when the crowd was asked to give it's verdict on the losing fighter. She always voted to kill the loser, sometimes she got what she wanted, other times she didn't, her face only showed emotion when she didn't get her own way. Logan did his job, moved around the fighters, kept them away from the paying and betting public, he didn't raise his eyes to anyone he didn't need to. His solid form was enough for some and the tiger tattoo's were enough for those who knew how to read the language. He was not a man to cross but he kept those who were there for a sick kind of entertainment alive and made sure he got a good hit of the Kita's scent. When the fights were over, he was asked to help with the clean up, he nodded to the large foreman and did as he was bidden. What he also did was drop a line to the police and told them where to find the small camera he'd installed in the roof of the warehouse, the clean up was still under way when they raided it. It wouldn't stop the death machine from rolling along but it wouldn't come this way again for a few years. But as for Logan, he'd already moved on, he had their scent in his lungs and nothing would stop him from finding them.
The blossom was falling by the time he found them, they were living in a restored house on the shores of Lake Shojiko, they had security, cameras and guards but the guards left after midnight. It wasn't the right image for the restored village, or so the pamphlets had read, security returned at 5am to do a sweep of the houses and the lakeside. The camera's would be checked and then the life of the day would begin. Logan took in the sight of the places, he'd come as an investor, rich, stupid and vapid, the sales mistress had latched onto him in an instant. His rich easy timbre and smile had her eating out his hand that day, dropping large sums of money to those who really didn't need it. A rich American Gaijin with no idea about how insulting he was being, but with the climate the way it was, money was money. He got a good look at the Kita's mansion and his eyes never left it as they pulled out of the model village and back to the sales patter a good three miles away. But as he looked back toward Mount Fuji all he could think of was auburn hair and the white of her streak, like the snow on top of the mountain. It'd be over soon and he could go home to Marie, free to act on his hearts desire, he only hoped she'd understood his message.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Marie and Logan figure things out seperately,the final pieces are dropping into place and soon the goal will be finished.
Chapter End Notes:
We're nearly there folks!