鞭打つ // Kis-My-Ft2
鞭打つ
Yokoo/Kitayama
PG-13, 699 words, cyberpunk
Yokoo is on the defensive even before he reaches into his coat pocket for his contribution to their weapons pile. It's not like he doesn't stand by his choice, but already in his mind's eye he can see the skeptical look on Kitayama's face, the raised eyebrows, the tiny little wrinkle in that fucking upturned nose full of arrogance.
The others are throwing down guns and knives, chrome and sharp and gleaming. The usual.
Tamamori has a revolver with a plastic grip painted in a kitschy neo-Catholic theme; but still, it's got ten rounds in the cylinder, and if there's anything they have plenty of, it's bullets, cast from sheets of platinum and industrial steel that they'd salvaged from the junkyards of the last century. Senga's somehow got matching sabers, and Yokoo can tell they're good by the fact that they're semi-opaque. Nano-material of diamond crystal can cut through metal too easily, so the higher the degree of transparency the better. Kitayama has a set of shuriken, chrome with kanji painted on in blood red. Typical.
When it's Yokoo's turn, he pulls a simple black cylinder out from the waist of his pants where he'd hidden it. It's about a foot long, made of some sort of hardened wood - bamboo, perhaps - that's coated with a layer of fibercrystal. There's a crystal pyramid at one end, point wedged inside the cylinder like a stopper in a wine bottle. A wrinkled old Japanese lady had pulled it out from under the counter of her tiny general store and offered it to him for 2 million New Yen. She'd shown him how to use it, too, for free.
Before he tosses it into the pile, Yokoo looks up, meeting Kitayama's eye. Sure as fire, there it is. That amused disdain.
"A police baton?" Kitayama drawls. "What, gonna play cops and robbers with the neighborhood kiddies, Yokoo?"
"Fuck you," snarls Yokoo. He knows he doesn't have the best temper of all of them but he's usually more patient than this. There's just something about Kitayama that pisses him off every time, makes him snappy in his ire. "It's a fucking cobra." He pulls on the stopper, barely remembering to point it at the ground before three coiled springs shoot out from the other end of the cylinder. The springs are wound so tight that they whine through the air, shrill and eerie, before snapping against the ground with an explosive crack.
"Christ!" Nikaido shouts, jumping back a good meter. "Careful with that thing!"
The others flinch too, and step back.
But Kitayama doesn't move from where he's standing with his arms folded directly across the circle from Yokoo. No, he laughs instead.
Yokoo's temper flares again, exploding in his chest the way the cobra had exploded out of its cylinder a moment ago. He snaps the cobra like a whip, wrapping two of the coils around Kitayama's torso and another around his wrist, aiming precisely for where he's wearing a plain wristguard of platinum. Kitayama stumbles a little over the weapons pile when Yokoo jerks him forward, reigning in the coils until the two of them are nose to nose.
"Don't think," hisses Yokoo, sounding the more dangerous for speaking softly, "that I'm not dangerous just because my proffered weapon is not lethal. I'm fucking lethal."
The smile is still on Kitayama's face, though there's a hint of strain now at the corner of his eyes. The coils around his chest will have cut into his skin, and Yokoo thinks that he'd probably whipped the cobra hard enough to draw blood.
"I applaud you, Yokoo-san," Kitayama bows. The incline of his head is sarcastic, but his words aren't, and Yokoo thrusts him away with a disgusted sound. He unwraps the cobra from Kitayama with an easy flick of his wrist, and notes with satisfaction a tiny spot of red seeping through Kitayama's shirt.
"Why can't you just trust me?" Yokoo asks, suddenly tired of all this. "This was a small enough fucking thing to argue over."
The smile is gone now from Kitayama's lips, and his eyes are serious as he looks at Yokoo. "Because, Yokoo. You do not trust me."
Note(s):
1. 鞭打つ (v.) to whip; to spur on
2. The concept of the cobra is from William Gibson's Neuromancer.
Yokoo/Kitayama
PG-13, 699 words, cyberpunk
Yokoo is on the defensive even before he reaches into his coat pocket for his contribution to their weapons pile. It's not like he doesn't stand by his choice, but already in his mind's eye he can see the skeptical look on Kitayama's face, the raised eyebrows, the tiny little wrinkle in that fucking upturned nose full of arrogance.
The others are throwing down guns and knives, chrome and sharp and gleaming. The usual.
Tamamori has a revolver with a plastic grip painted in a kitschy neo-Catholic theme; but still, it's got ten rounds in the cylinder, and if there's anything they have plenty of, it's bullets, cast from sheets of platinum and industrial steel that they'd salvaged from the junkyards of the last century. Senga's somehow got matching sabers, and Yokoo can tell they're good by the fact that they're semi-opaque. Nano-material of diamond crystal can cut through metal too easily, so the higher the degree of transparency the better. Kitayama has a set of shuriken, chrome with kanji painted on in blood red. Typical.
When it's Yokoo's turn, he pulls a simple black cylinder out from the waist of his pants where he'd hidden it. It's about a foot long, made of some sort of hardened wood - bamboo, perhaps - that's coated with a layer of fibercrystal. There's a crystal pyramid at one end, point wedged inside the cylinder like a stopper in a wine bottle. A wrinkled old Japanese lady had pulled it out from under the counter of her tiny general store and offered it to him for 2 million New Yen. She'd shown him how to use it, too, for free.
Before he tosses it into the pile, Yokoo looks up, meeting Kitayama's eye. Sure as fire, there it is. That amused disdain.
"A police baton?" Kitayama drawls. "What, gonna play cops and robbers with the neighborhood kiddies, Yokoo?"
"Fuck you," snarls Yokoo. He knows he doesn't have the best temper of all of them but he's usually more patient than this. There's just something about Kitayama that pisses him off every time, makes him snappy in his ire. "It's a fucking cobra." He pulls on the stopper, barely remembering to point it at the ground before three coiled springs shoot out from the other end of the cylinder. The springs are wound so tight that they whine through the air, shrill and eerie, before snapping against the ground with an explosive crack.
"Christ!" Nikaido shouts, jumping back a good meter. "Careful with that thing!"
The others flinch too, and step back.
But Kitayama doesn't move from where he's standing with his arms folded directly across the circle from Yokoo. No, he laughs instead.
Yokoo's temper flares again, exploding in his chest the way the cobra had exploded out of its cylinder a moment ago. He snaps the cobra like a whip, wrapping two of the coils around Kitayama's torso and another around his wrist, aiming precisely for where he's wearing a plain wristguard of platinum. Kitayama stumbles a little over the weapons pile when Yokoo jerks him forward, reigning in the coils until the two of them are nose to nose.
"Don't think," hisses Yokoo, sounding the more dangerous for speaking softly, "that I'm not dangerous just because my proffered weapon is not lethal. I'm fucking lethal."
The smile is still on Kitayama's face, though there's a hint of strain now at the corner of his eyes. The coils around his chest will have cut into his skin, and Yokoo thinks that he'd probably whipped the cobra hard enough to draw blood.
"I applaud you, Yokoo-san," Kitayama bows. The incline of his head is sarcastic, but his words aren't, and Yokoo thrusts him away with a disgusted sound. He unwraps the cobra from Kitayama with an easy flick of his wrist, and notes with satisfaction a tiny spot of red seeping through Kitayama's shirt.
"Why can't you just trust me?" Yokoo asks, suddenly tired of all this. "This was a small enough fucking thing to argue over."
The smile is gone now from Kitayama's lips, and his eyes are serious as he looks at Yokoo. "Because, Yokoo. You do not trust me."
Note(s):
1. 鞭打つ (v.) to whip; to spur on
2. The concept of the cobra is from William Gibson's Neuromancer.