In Cold Blood [Ash Lynx] - Banana Fish

Twenty-Six - I Predict A Riot

Head in her hands, Tora shakes her head. "I just can't believe it."

In their rushed get away from the meeting, the driver informed Tanaka of the situation before he dropped the three off at Fujimara and Tora's house to re-coop. Luckily the final martial arts class for the evening was just coming to an end as they arrived back and the three were able to catch Fujimara straight away to tell him of the latest development.

Clearing away the sets of nunchucks from his weapons class, Fujimara glances over at Tora sitting on the staircase. "Yuri, daijōbu. Ochitsuite kudasai."

"Calm down? How can I be calm, Sensei?" She questions, looking up at him and pulling at the collar of her white shirt feeling herself become clammy. "This is all too crazy to be true."

"I don't even know what to say, Tora." Blanca sighs. "This is a complete shock. I mean, your uncle of all people..."

"Betraying your parents like that —betraying his own brother." Ash crosses his arms.

Despite throwing up earlier in shock at the news of her Uncle now being the leader of the Daikoku-Kai syndicate, a heavy feeling remains in her stomach that she can't shift.

"I think I'm going to be sick again." She wipes the sweat from her forehead.

Blanca pulls a chair out from the side of the hall, sitting in front of Tora and resting his forearms on his thighs. He surveys her face. "Tora, I know this is all a shock. So, let's go back to the beginning."

His demeanour calming her down, she looks up from the floor, remaining in her hunched position as she nods at him. "Okay."

"What do you know about your Uncle?" He asks.

Sighing, Tora runs a hand through her hair, unbuttoning her blazer. "I don't remember much, to be honest."

Ash grabs another chair from the side and places it next to Blanca, sitting backwards on it. "Anything you're able to remember will be helpful."

Kicking her heels off, Tora hugs her knees into her chest. "I don't remember much about it but I know what my father said about him. They grew up sons of the yakuza boss, my father was the next successor of the title. They never got too much of a childhood. From what I understand, his brother couldn't handle it and ran away as a teen, leaving my father with all the work. He spent his late teens without his younger brother."

"Do you really think he ran away?" Ash asks.

Tora shrugs. "I always thought so. But it didn't matter anyway because my parents married at 26, had me at 28 and my father became the boss. When I was seven, my grandfather suddenly became ill. The bastard never liked me, telling my father that they needed to have a son as the next successor and I could never run the syndicate. When he passed away, my father assured me I was fit to become the boss when I grew up and that I was going to change history, or something like that."

"You told Yut-Lung you never wanted to be the successor." Ash reminds her and she nods.

"No one would've taken me seriously, and anyway, I wasn't interested. My father was well-liked and it would've caused an upset if I'd taken the title. Well, it seemed that way when he was alive..."

Blanca scratches his head. "Is that the end of it when it comes to Koji?"

Tora shakes her head. "A year or so into running the syndicate himself, my father got wind of his brother's death. He'd been in a small jet flying back to Tokyo to see my grandfather on his death bed when the pilot lost control, crashing into the Pacific Ocean. It was a big story on the news and it seemed like my Uncle really had died in the crash."