The night of September 15th
With one hand on the wheel and the other on the gear stick, Fukashi asked, "Are you nervous?" He glanced at his son's loosening grip on the handle of his katana.
“What? I’m not scared!” The son replied, with lies written all over his face.
“Come on Hashimoto, it’s alright for you to be nervous.” The father commented, as a reassuring smile formed under his nose. “You know well that this mission is nothing like the others you’ve done.”
“You’re right about that, but shouldn’t I be confident?” Hashimoto questioned whilst tightening his grip on the handle, strengthening his resolve as they continued to talk. Conversing has always helped control his worries and this time was no different..
"To be completely honest, yes!" Fukashi said, his voice filled with encouragement. "I'm not saying it's bad to be nervous, but just remember that you're the most suited for this job. So you should have a bit of confidence in yourself." He offered no reason for Hashimoto to feel worried “Remember, the key to being a great fighter is keeping your emotions in check. Whether it’s anger, fear or whatever, it’ll affect your combat skills, and you won’t be able to control yourself afterwards.”
“I know, I know. I’ve heard that line so many times I could’ve said it along with you.” The son chuckled to himself, his hand released its grip on the handle, reached over to press the button that rolled down the window. Resting his elbow onto the window armrest, he tilted his head to the side and looked out the window while they were stuck in traffic: a bright warm gleam illuminated the roads of the city that caused his eyes to glitter, bits of rubbish lost their camouflage under the streetlights. The smell of the cars’ emission fogged the sky that battled against the smell of street food. A group of joyful friends, seated on a bench beside an open restaurant, laughed from their chatters that were soon drowned by the sounds of a car honk that roared longer than it should’ve. Hashimoto’s father raised an eyebrow, popped his head out of the car window.
“The hell’s the problem? Are they that pissed about the traffic jam?” Fukashi asked, inspecting the situation. Both noticed the cars in the next lane driving freely while their lane remained still. The car in front of them joined in to synchronize the roars of the first horn. Fukashi popped his head out again and noticed that a black car, two vehicles ahead of them, was stationary with no cars in front of it. Suddenly, gunshots echoed, coming from the restaurant where the group of cheerful people were once sitting beside, now have fled the scene. A group of black suited men ran out of the restaurant as one of them bombarded the sky with bullets to threaten the people around them not to interfere.
“Let’s go, let’s go! We can’t waste anymore time here!” one of the men yelled at his group. The men rushed into their car, slamming the door shut as a drawn out squeak could be heard from the same car before driving away.
“Hah! There’s the group we need to take down!” Fukashi pointed out as two of the same model of the black cars pass by. “Great, seems like this won’t end well.”
“Don’t frighten me with your jokes, father!”
“My baaaad!” Fukashi exclaimed, swerving the wheel to change lanes and flooring the gas pedal to try and match their speed. Hashimoto felt himself being thrown back in his seat.
“Careful with your driving! You tryna get ourselves killed?!” Hashimoto yelled.
“We can’t let them get away, have you forgotten what they’ve stolen?” Fukashi yelled back. His son’s mind raced, recalling the purpose of this mission: retrieve the stolen Public Safety documents.
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“Right, take back what they’ve stolen” Hashimoto recalled, able to keep his body sat up straight to fight back the force that’s pulling him into his seat. He unbuckled the seat belt to get his upper body out of the car window. Gusts of wind ruffled through his black hair as he extended his arm to reach for his katana before clipping it onto his belt. Fukashi slowly released the gas pedal until he matched the enemy’s speed.
Fukashi stuck his head out of the window which messed up his gray hair, “Go on, son! Show how worthy you are!” the father motivated Hashimoto to playfully roll his eyes. He rested a foot on where the car door’s window originated, allowing himself to climb on the car roof with the other foot assisting him. He positioned a hand to hold onto the sheath, the other wrapped around the handle.
He shut his eyes for a moment to focus on his breathing: taking in as much oxygen as possible before exhaling deeply. His eyelids snapped open before he displayed a smirk.
“I’ll show them who they shouldn’t mess with.” Hashimoto mumbled to himself, an enemy in the backseat of a car from the other lane caught Hashimoto’s figure in the corner of his eyes.
“We got a kid who wants to play with us,” the grey-haired man reported to the others in the car.
“Okay? Shoot the damn kid then, Arata!” the driver called out, Arata elbowed the car door window to not waste time. He lifted the bottom of his blazer to reach for his handgun before extending his arms out of the window and pulling the trigger. Hashimoto’s quick movement authorized him to unsheath his katana to deflect a bullet into Arata’s head which startled the others. Fukashi’s son puffed before leaping to their car roof.
“The bastard’s on us, someone take him out already!” The driver commanded the passengers in his car and the others with his walkie talkie. The car ahead of Fukashi’s armed themselves, bullets followed their straight paths to Hashimoto who had no problem with swiftly dodging and deflecting. A dagger was pulled from his pocket, and launched towards a bullet that divided into two before piercing the side of the man’s neck.
“Do something instead of sitting around, Botan!” the driver once again commanded another one of his men sitting in the passenger seat.
“It’s just a kid with luck, shut your mouth hole!” Botan yelled at the driver.
“Don’t talk back or you’ll be eating lead later!”
With Hashimoto distracted by the bullets raiding his defense, Botan broke the car door window and crawled on the car roof to be eye level with Hashimoto.
“You're a pain in the ass, you know? Ever thought of dropping this act of yours and letting us do our own thing?” Botan drew his katana out before clashing against Hashimoto’s katana. The men halted their fire to prevent them from shooting their own on accident.
“I’ve picked the role to take out scumbags like you.” Hashimoto said, and attempted to deliver a hack against Botan’s ankle but was blocked by his quick gesture. The enemies dragged against each other's blade, raised his katana in the air before being obstructed by Hashimoto’s blade. Botan snarled, introducing the hidden handgun in his other hand, however Hashimoto detected the other’s movement, too slow to point as that arm got sliced. The man let out an agonizing scream which was a cue for the armed men to refire. He snatched Botan’s collar and utilized his body as a human shield to block the bullets as he focused on his breathing for a moment.
“Must be a pain in the ass being beaten by me… both metaphorically and literally” Hashimoto chuckled, letting go of the body before he sprung himself off the car roof as bullets continued to be deflected. He angled his katana for a bullet to graze the cutting edge to sharpen it, and landed on the car roof before backing up to the trunk which granted him the ability to slash the car roof horizontally above the men in the car . The roof flew off as he leaped over it and landed on his bottom in the middle seat between two men at the back. The two men and the driver had a puzzled look facing Hashimoto.
“We can do this the easy way or the hard way.. What do yall say?” he calmly said, as the three men drew out their swords.
“Hard way it is.” Hashimoto sliced both of the driver’s and the man’s neck with one slash, the man on the left had trouble escaping Hashimoto’s strong grasp on the man’s neck. He stood up from his seat as he sheathed his katana, noticed the briefcase resting on the passenger seat. He freed the man’s neck once he completely lost breath to extend his arms and retrieve the documents. The driver from the other car was the last remaining enemy.
“Y-You son of a bitch!” The driver pointed his gun at the boy but Hashimoto made his move first: It was too late for the enemy to fire. Hashimoto had borrowed one of the men’s handguns back when he was seated between them. He backflipped onto Fukashi’s car as the father swerved his vehicle to the other lane, then returned to the same lane to dodge the enemies’ cars that had no one driving
“Hell yeah son, ya did it!” Fukashi cheered for his son’s accomplishment, a smile widened on Hashimoto’s face. He took in deep breaths, feeling the weight on his shoulder fade away. With the briefcase in his hand, the mission was a success. Hashimoto seated himself on the edge of the car roof, shrugged his shoulders and let out a relieved sigh:
“Maybe I was being too paranoid after all.”
Far Far Away arc commences in the next chapter.