Whitewash High Ch. 33

Gale came out of the shower, rubbing herself all over with a towel. She let her wet hair hang there, enjoying the feel of it drying naturally. Looking over at the bed, Nik laid there, working away on his phone.

"I'll be gone for a while once we're done with our business at the meeting. I'll need to return to Japan to personally oversee the restructuring of the organization," Gale said, sitting on the edge of the bed.

Nik turned off the phone giving his wife all his attention.

"How long you think you'll be away for?" he asked.

"No clue. I'm hoping it is all bluff and bluster by the hardliners. It would make everything cleaner that way. If they decide they don't like taking orders from someone without a set of balls hanging from between her legs, I'll have to create some eunuchs."

Gale did not laugh at her statement. Nik knew when she joked around and when she meant business.

"Be careful. I don't want you to die over there too."

Nik shuffled over, giving him the range to caringly rub her shoulder.

"I don't intend to die, Nik. How did it feel when you killed your first person?" she asked.

"How did it feel? That is a scary thought. I try not to think about it anymore."

"But you still think about it? It follows you like a shadow, a ghost."

"Are we talking about mine or yours?"

"I want to know how you handle the guilt of killing each day? How does it not eat away at your soul?" Gale asked, solemnly.

Nik took a long moment to gather his thoughts before replying. The seriousness of the situation hung in the air. Gale rarely acted this serious, always putting up the tough chick, burnout aire to keep people off guard.

"I can live with the guilt because there is no guilt, Gale. I made a vow with my own blood, while recovering in a hospital bed, that I'd avenge Anri. I sold my soul to the devil to accomplish that task. Systematically killing off every member of the Ueno clan until mentioning the name in whispers would elicit people believing me to be an unrelenting Halloween trope brought me joy. I did what needed to be done to accomplish my crusade. Now I live with the consequences of that crusade but I feel no guilt over it," Nik spoke, softly.

"I remember the first time a hit squad attacked me. This was after you saved me. Hard to believe how our lives intersected and changed that day. I know for me it was for the best. I can still smell the blood on my hands, hear the sound of skull bone and brains splattering against tile, and the potent rush of adrenaline that felt better than any toy I played with. Kaze Yamato died when they sent their first hitmen after me. After that Kelly Gale rose from their dead bodies."

Many Years Ago

Keishu waited outside the lecture hall for Gale, managing a slew of text messages on her phone. They had a small commute back to their house, located a few blocks from the school. They found a place near the college, and secretly had bought it under an alias to try and keep Gale better hidden.

The twenty year old walked out of the classroom, bag slung over her shoulder and a bored look on her face. She walked past Keishu, prompting the older sister to follow along.

"Class is too easy, sis," Gale commented without looking back. "I could ace this in my sleep. I took harder classes at my cram school back home."

"More time for you to train in the gym then. You have ten months until the national amateurs back in Japan. I'd still advise you against going back to attend the event but you better start training now."

"Hear anything from my brother or yours?" Gale asked.

"Nothing, life seems to be going on normal."

"What about...you know...him?" Gale blushed, too shy to say his name.

"He is doing well."

"That is all, just doing well?"

"I'll tell you when we get home. You know we should not talk about this in public," Keishu reminded Gale.

"Fine, back to nationals. My physique has been coming along these past couple months but I don't know, I don't have the pop that the other girls have. Do you think I'm training enough?"

"I'm more worried you'd be overtraining. You've kept to a strict schedule this past year, never deviating from it, and have seen remarkable improvements. You'll do fine."

"Fine? Fine is more losers, sis, I want to dominate. I want to be the best there is in the sport."

"One tournament at a time, one at a time," Keishu advised.

"Can you hold on for a second? I need to take a piss."

Keishu waved her hand.

"I'll be out here waiting."

Gale walked into the girl's washroom, heading straight to the mirrors. Going to the farthest mirror, she looked into it, observing how her right eye healed. It looked black and blue from a previous sparring session, taking a kick to the socket when a deflection failed.

"Fuck, I look like shit. I'll need to get better or else I'll lose my good looks," she commented, running her hands under the water.

The cold water felt good, refreshing, especially after splashing it against her face. The boring class almost put her to sleep, so she needed the natural pick-me-up for the walk home.

"One of these days I'll land a solid blow on Keishu. I cannot believe we've been practicing over a year. She is either a savant or I suck at understanding her instructions."

Gale shook her head and splashed more water on her face. As she grabbed some paper towel to dry off, the bathroom door opened up and a white man, dressed as a student, walked in.

"Hey, pervert, this is the girls washroom," Gale chided him, looking over.

The man sized her up but did not move at her fierce voice.

"Are you deaf? Wrong gender. Get out of here, freak."

"You're Kaze Yamato," the man replied.

"Who?" Gale said, feigning ignorance. "Sounds like a Japanese name. I'm Chinese. Learn how to tell the difference."

The man took a picture out of his pocket and tossed it towards Gale like a playing card. She quickly picked it up, not letting her eyes leave the man. Quickly glancing at the photo, it showed her coming out of a bar with her brother back in Nagoya.

"Just who the hell are you?" she demanded.

The man took a knife from the back of his belt, brandishing it towards her. His intentions were quite clear.

"You're going to make me a rich man, bitch."

He walked forward, knife at the ready to strike.

Gale's mind tried to process everything quickly. Her senses freaked out, trying not to have a nervous breakdown at seeing the knife so close.

"Help!" she screamed, loudly, hoping to draw some kind of attention. "Help!"

The scream only forced the man to rush forward, thrusting the knife at her gut. All of Keishu's training kicked in, allowing Gale to sidestep the lunge. Her knee struck upwards, hitting the man's elbow. While the blow did not do much damage, it knocked the knife out of his hand, helping to even the odds for Gale.

"Help!" she screamed again, just before ducking a right hook.

She rolled towards the door, trying to avoid the man's arms. The knob did not turn. Something kept it from opening up.

"Shit. Fuck. Help!" she screamed louder, banging at the frosty glass window.

The assassin closed the distance, reaching out to grab Gale's neck with his hands. His thick fingers squeezed her windpipe, lifting her up in the air by using his strength to intimidate the young college student. She tried to call for help again, but her voice quickly turned its back on her, unable to be conjured up. Testing her luck, she spat in the man's eyes. It had the intended effect, dazing him as he could not see through the slop, quickly trying to wipe it away.

Gale took this time to kick the man right in the nuts, punting him with all her might. Keishu taught her to fight dirty. In a real fight, where losing meant dying, honor meant nothing. Fight to win, fight to live, fight to survive, she always preached. The honorable dead are still dead. The assassin grabbed his balls, falling against the nearest sink in excruciating pain.

Not wasting the chance to strike, she grabbed the man's hair and slammed his skull against the hard porcelain sink. Again and again, she smashed the bony skull against the sink until a piece of the fragile material broke off. Blood gushed out everywhere from the open, nasty gash across the man's forehead. It sprayed the mirror, the wall, the floor, turning the bathroom into a house of horrors. He slumped over but Gale kept attacking, mounting his back to slip in a chokehold. Too dazed and confused from the sink damage, the man gurgled on his own blood, trying desperately to breathe and stay conscious. He rolled over, atop Gale, but the lithe and nimble woman wrapped her legs around his stomach, sinking the choke in tighter.

He threw a lucky punch behind him, landing on Gale's temple, forcing her to break the hold from the shock. He rolled over again, choking, semi-conscious, trying to recover his senses to finish the job. While the punch stunned Gale, the staggering effect lasted only a couple seconds before she looked around to reassess the situation. The glint of a knife caught her attention. She scrambled for it, hoping he did not notice it too.

"Fucking bitch," he gasped out, finally getting his breath back. "You were supposed to be an easy million."

He did not notice in time that Gale had grabbed the knife, brandishing it at him now. She thrust it forward, stabbing into his shoulder. He screamed out in pain before backhanding Gale, knocking the girl down again. Tenacious, and used to the smacks Keishu gave her, she swept his leg. Falling onto the floor with a hard thud, again Gale mounted him. Straight for the hair, her fingers gripped it tightly so she could slam his skull back against the floor repeatedly. Each crack against the floor tiles knocked more and more of the man's senses out of his brain. Without warning, his airflow cut off again.

Gale leaned in closer, shoving her elbow into the man's larynx, making it hurt as much as possible, all while still smashing his head against the floor. Blood poured out of the head wound, turning the bathroom into a blood pool. His hands tried to paw at Gale, grabbing at her face and hair to push the woman off but all strength quickly ebbed away with each passing second. The fierce, determined look of a woman trying not to die was the last sight the unknown man saw before he took his final breath, dying there in the dirty, university bathroom.

After a few more head cracks for good measure, Gale grabbed the knife and backed up, breathing heavily. Her nerves suddenly sputtered, as the adrenalin began wearing off. She desperately tried to keep her breathing at a somewhat calm rhythm, wanting to prevent a full-blown panic attack. She killed a man, saw the life drain from his eyes second by second. No gunshot from twenty paces, Gale got a knife's edge view.

The door creaked open, and the sound of shoes clicking against the tile made Gale turn her gaze from the dead body to the new person.

"Hey, help, he...he tried to kill me. Please, call...call the police..." she stammered, trying to keep her nerves together.

The woman shook her head, pulling a pistol from her waistband. She wasted no time pointing it at Gale, aiming for center mass.

BAM!

Gale flinched, afraid she got shot. A complete look of terror covered her face.

BAM! BAM! BAM!

The second assassin's skull exploded and turned the wall into a free spaghetti meal. Four bullets cracked open the shell and blew it out the opposite side. The partially headless body collapsed in a heap, with the gun harmlessly clanking on the ground. Keishu walked in, pointing her gun at the body.

BAM! BAM!

Two more shots for good measure made sure the woman could never be identified naturally. She smoothly picked up the gun off the floor and pointed the assassin's pistol at the man Gale killed.

BAM! BAM!

Two headshots caved in the dead man's face, making sure he would not pull a horror movie trick.

"Are you okay?" Keishu asked, walking over and kneeling next to Gale.

She checked over for any bullet or knife wounds, all while keeping an eye on the door for another possible attacker.

"Listen to me, listen," Keishu stated commandingly. "You're not safe here, we need to get you out of here quickly. Follow me, and do not let go of my hand."

Keishu took the knife, retracting the blade, and stashed it in her pocket. Before leaving, Keishu patted down the assassins, finding their wallets. After taking them, she grabbed Gale's hand tightly and led her to the door. Taking some sneaky looks around the corner, gun pointed out at the ready, she led Gale out once the coast was clear.

Not stopping for anything, or anyone, Keishu used a route she had memorized to lead the pair back to an alternate safe house off the college campus, not saying a single word until they were inside the home and locked down like a fortified bunker. Heavy duty locks were latched on the front door. Going down into the basement, they shut the expensive, panic room door, locking it as well.

The basement looked like the inside of a prepper's bunker. A couple cots hugged one side of the wall. Shelves of preserved food and bottled water filled another side, as well as various medications and medkits.

Gale simply followed Keishu, saying nothing, too in shock to comprehend what had happened to her. Instead of a kidnapping someone sent legitimate assassins after her. Sat down on one of the cots, both eyes were glazed over.

"You're not stabbed, are you? Dumb question to ask right now, I know, but getting you away from there was priority number one," Keishu asked, feeling around the blood splatters for open wounds. "There were four of them who attacked us. Two tried to take me out in the hallway while the woman I gunned down held the door closed so you could not escape. I could hear your screams, Gale. I'm sorry I could not get there sooner. Gale? You with me?"

"Why?"

"What?"

"Why, Keishu? I'm just a girl. Why are they trying to kill me?"

"You know why," Keishu sighed.

With so much adrenaline coursing through her veins, Gale did not notice nor feel the open gash on her shoulder. While not debilitating, Keishu did not want to take any chances. She walked over to grab a medical kit to treat the wound.

"I'm not in the family, that family, Keishu. I'm just a university student. What am I to them?"

"You are a target, an opportunity, Gale. They want to get at your brother by getting to you, we know that."

Gale looked at her hand, staring at the blood soaking into shaking palms.

"Never again, Keishu, never again. You're teaching me the basics but teach me more."

"Just relax, you're still in shock and I need to take care of this wound."

"I don't care about the wound, Keishu," Gale stated, getting angrier. "Fuck the wound. Teach me to be you."

"If you want to be me then we're fixing this wound first. I don't want you getting some funky infection that'll end this all quicker than a bullet."

Gale winced in pain from the medical liquid applied to the wound.

"I'll make them pay. I'll make whoever is sending killers after me pay. I will not live in fear."

"One day at a time...there, your shoulder is fixed up. Look, I want you to stay here a few days until I get things sorted. I'll need to get in touch with my contacts in Japan but there is more to this than a simple hit."

"It has to be that Ueno guy, right?"

"I have no doubt the hit will make Ueno happy but there is a leak somewhere in the organization. So few people know where we are, literally only four people. You, me, your brother and my brother."

"So how did they find us?"

"That is what I need to find out. I could throw out theories like a phone being tapped and monitored, data services hacked, TV stuff like that. The bigger question is who would come after you?"

"We just said Ueno."

"Maybe, but if he could just do what I theorized he'd just take out your brother in one fell swoop. No, I think someone else is in play. Just do what I say and don't leave. The university is going to be crawling with cops after the mess I made of their bodies. If your professors ask what happened to you for skipping class, just tell them you got sick and will be back in a few days. They won't look deeper. They have better things to do."

"Alright, I won't argue with you, Keishu. I'll stay here. This won't change my mind about going to Japan for nationals. I won't live in fear like this my whole life."

Keishu let out a sigh but smiled, nodding her head.

"I know. I'll get you to that competition. You're like your brother the older you get. I understand how Ryuji feels when dealing with Musashi. Stay here for now and rest. Lock the hatch. I need to make some calls. I won't leave the house. It is just a precaution."

Getting up and walking out of the safe room, she heard the latch lock behind her as instructed. Heading up the stairs to her bedroom, they did not use this alternate safehouse often, allowing Keishu to stash a few important pieces of gear here without notice. Inside her closet, behind a hidden panel, she took out a fancy, yet bulky, phone. It had a weird attachment to it and a long antenna that Keishu extended before flipping it open. Dialing a number from memory, she waited for the other line to pick up.

"Talk to me," the male voice answered.

"We've got a major leak and it is in our department."

Back to the Present

"I've never told anyone this story. Only Keishu knew, obviously. Did it feel the same for you?"

"No, it felt good. I erased a piece of the painful memory. In my mind I could never see a clear picture of Anri anymore. Darkened and obscured, I tried so hard some nights to remember a happy time with her but the pain kept blurring the image. Until I killed my first Ueno member, then like a covered portrait, a piece lifted off to reveal a slice of happiness. Every dead body at my feet removed piece after piece of the barrier. Once Ueno himself took his last breath, the picture became clear. I felt free. I could move on in my life, no longer haunted by the past."

"Am I going to feel the same way, I wonder?" Gale mused.

"Are you doing this for your own ambitions or to get revenge for Musashi's death?"

"A lot of them did nothing while he got killed. They dishonored themselves by allowing a foreigner take up the banner and keep the family from crumbling. While you carried the family on your back, they sat around and collected checks."

"So it is revenge."

"No, at first it was revenge, Nik, but over time I grew to enjoy the power. Sending instructions to my regent gave me a thrill. It felt good, natural, like the position fit me like a glove, or as you always put it, a sword into a sheath. Anyways, I don't intend to get killed. Who else would give you the best fuck of your life at the snap of a finger? Valerie's black ass can only handle so much of you at once," she said, cracking a smile.

"As much as Valerie would enjoy getting more of my time, I know she would be upset to hear you got killed over a turf war."

"You were right, earlier, when we were fucking. You said I could feel safe with you because you held no ambitions. You're no longer in the game. I don't have to worry about being used for someone else's ambitions because I need my cunt satisfied. Allies are important. Family is important. I think you and Keishu are the only two people I can truly trust with my inner thoughts.

I already gave my first order. Yeah, I know the crown has not been officially put on my head but I consider this my first order. You might be wondering what it is but you don't need to know. It would complicate your standing. My hands are no longer clean. I'm in. There is no turning back, not that there ever was a turning back point."