The Boss scooted his chair closer to get closer to the screen before his eyes, watching very, very intently. The innocent— a light haired man who'd been calling himself ‘Philliam,’ it seemed— had just left the premises, leaving only his fruitcake companion, who remained seated. The Boss refused to call him by name. Why should he? It's a thing of respect, supposedly, but who actually made that law? Regardless, for the Boss, it sufficed to call him a fruitcake. “It's perfect,” he remarked to himself.

From the corner of the room, Rukingu-san, Boss's current manservant, coughed for a second before speaking. “With all due respect, sir, why did we have to wait for the blond man to go?” He said things funny, with that funny little Japanese accent of his. Boss could never get enough of it. It was something rather special to be the leader of the local British Yakuza.

“He's done nothing wrong,” Boss clarified. “He shan't be hurt, or involved in this story at all. Send the orders to start.”

“Now? Are you sure?” Rukingu-san softly rebuked, stepping far out of line from his measly rank. Thankfully for him, there were much more pressing matters at the moment, and such missteps could be ignored.

“Yes, now. Don't you know how long I've been waiting for this? We will not get another chance.” Boss's tone was flat, yet booming, leaving his word abundantly clear. And ultimately, his word was the one that mattered. “Commence the operation.”

Those words hung in the air, as the manservant gently turned around and pressed one of the buttons on the wall. “It is done, my lord.”

 

***

 

“Oh, to have my own soul curl up tight into a ball, while my brain lies, facing up high towards the sky, its ethereal strands lain out wide. To bicker forever, unaware of—“

Jym's brooding monologue was rather rudely interrupted a small, squeaky scraping noise, sounding out from somewhere within the train car, though he could hardly tell where. “Hello?” he asked, his eyes calmly and collectedly darting all over the place. “Who goes there?”

His eyes landed to the seats to his left, on the opposite half of the car, which were empty when his eyes had turned to look there, but slowly, a figure formed in them before his very eyes. First, only in tiny scattered fragments, then a fuzzy silhouette, and finally, in full detail.

It turned out to be an Asian-looking man, in an all black suit, akin to what you may see a bandit wearing, although his face was completely exposed. He had a small, welcoming grin on his face, as if he was holding back laughter at a secret joke.

Jym, upon turning this development in the adventure over in his head for a few seconds, decided it was probably just another figment of his imagination, and saw little risk in interacting. “Why, hello there! What's your name?”

“Foshusu,” the Asian man replied, with an open tone and light accent, “and these are my friends.”

Looking around the rest of the train car, more Asian men dressed in the exact same attire slowly began to fade in, appearing in the other seats, as they turned off their cloaking devices, one by one. It eventually dawned on Jym that there was one in literally every seat, save for his own and Phil's seat right next to it. They all stared at him.

“Well, isn't this quite a crowded party we have here!”

He took them all in for a few seconds more, before turning back to Foshusu, who now held a small piece of cloth in his hands. His grin had widened a little, too.

“Ooh,” Jym let out, “is that a gag?”

And with that, they jumped on him.

 

***

 

“Alright, I'm back,” Phil announced as he walked back through the lonely aisle. The bathroom, while perfectly sufficient for his needs, had been rather unremarkable. That might have been why he'd taken so much time in there. He was fond of the lunacy going on around him, but this was the most normal thing he'd seen in this country yet, and he needed a moment to check in with himself, to make sure he was still slightly sane. He got to his seat and sat down, only to realize his pal was gone.

“What th... Jym? Jym, are you in here?” he asked the room, to no response. As he glanced around to check if he'd perchance hidden in behind some other seat, he saw through a window that the train had stopped. They'd already arrived at London again? Time had been all weird lately, though, so he figured it made sense with what didn't.

Exploring a bit further, Philliam found that the doors to get off were open. Maybe Jym had just... taken off running and abandoned him here, again. Wouldn't have been the first time he'd done it. Though it did leave him confused. Weren't they ‘friends’ now? Phil sighed, stepped off the train, got out of the station, and began slowly making his way back towards that little home in Hammersmith. It was a little harder, seeing as he'd annihilated his phone in the sea, but with some luck, he managed to find Trafalgar Square, which was where he'd started the first time around. From there, he was able to recall the path he'd taken and retrace his steps back to the home. It was starting to get late— the blue sky giving way to darkening orange rays of dusk, and there were fewer people out and about on the streets, until eventually, he was completely alone, again.

Eventually, he reached the place, and was walking to the door with his hand poised to knock, but as he was about to do it, something surfaced in his brain. What did Jym have that was so important as to abandon him in the train? What had any of this trip been? Philliam wanted answers, and he imagined that being direct about that wouldn't earn him any.

Maybe... he could sneak a glance through a window, and see just what was being kept hidden from him. He walked around to the side of the building, and luckily, there was one, showing directly into the living room. Phil discreetly peeked through, as to not be spotte—

Oh.

Well, that doesn't look super fun.

From what he could make out in the dim lighting, he saw a figure that appeared to be Jym, sitting in a chair, which upon closer inspection, he was tied down to. There were dozens, and dozens of other men standing around him, all of whom were completely naked, save for what looked to be loincloths. Their bodies were almost fully covered in large swathes of intricate, black tattoos. Probably the more important part, though, was that each and every one of them had a gun, and each and every one of them aimed at Jym. He didn't really seem scared, although he did appear slightly miffed by his bonds.

Philliam, upon seeing all this, swiftly retracted out of the view of the mirror. God, what if they saw him looking in? He couldn't think about that now. This, he was sure, was outside of the plan. Jym was absolutely crazy, but there was a god damn limit, and this surpassed that, by some margin or another. Phil tried to listen in and hear what they were saying inside, but he couldn't hear anything. If they were speaking, these walls were very much soundproofed.

Help. He needed to find help, police, someone, anything to get that situation under control, for he highly doubted he could take them on his own.

But where? His phone was wrecked, and he'd seen nobody around whom he could ask to call the police for him, either. He felt that he could scream for help at the top of his lungs, and neither nobody nor nothing would even bat an eye. He spotted a semi-broken red telephone booth down the street to his right, and figured it was his best shot. Sure, all of his banknotes were in soggy tatters, and he'd no coinage on him, but... maybe, someone had dropped some change in there, and he could use that, even if for a few seconds. Sadly, this plan wasn't meant to be, for the booth floor was empty, save for a few dozen shards of glass. He fleetingly wondered how the machine could distinguish what was a coin and what wasn't, and considered trying to insert the shards in there for a few seconds.

By now, the sky was a deep, murky blue, and the streetlights had turned on. He wandered around the neighbourhood, searching. For a while, none of the stores he passed by were open, or had anyone inside them at all. He was starting to lose hope. He'd never find anyone who had a phone he could use, those men would kill Jym, Philliam had literally nothing with him, and he'd slowly fester into being a bum. The vision was all too clear in his mind.

Eventually, though, he did spot what appeared to be a pub, with an old timey sign outside that read ‘The Hitchin' Hiker.’ An intense, yellow light came out through the windows, and he found that there were plenty of people inside, having a gay ol' time, it seemed. Philliam didn't wait one second, he just went in.

If he'd actually come here to have a drink, then he would've been utterly amazed by the sheer atmosphere of this place. Most of the crowd, which was a little on the older side, looked pretty wasted, and those who weren't were too busy dancing along to the slightly medieval and bardic music. The floor and tables were of a rugged, dark wood, which went perfectly with the equally dark stone-brick walls and ceiling.

Phil's eyes settled upon the barman standing at the counter to his left, who seemed to still be conscious enough to run the local, though at the same time not fully sober either. Phil decided to go up to him, and asked, “Excuse me, do you have a phone I could use?”

The bartender stood there for a few seconds, giving Philliam an odd look. “A phone?” His voice was jovial, perhaps even more so than Jym's, but the wisdom laced beneath the words, while not lacking, went a whole different direction. “Sir, you must be misunderstanding. We're hitchhikers. None of us got no phones, and I take it ya don't got one either, so welcome to the club!” he said, as he playfully hit Phil across the back, lightly pulling him onto one of the stools there

“Oh,” Philliam said, as he got up, “no thanks. I'd love to stay, but I need to get to one now.”

“Aw, come on, why all the hurry? Here, I'll getcha a nice, big mug of ale. On the house!” Before Phil could object any more, the barman had already taken off towards one of the taps.

... Indeed, why all the hurry? Jym was wily, but he wasn't stupid, maybe he could get himself out of whatever that was happening over at the house. Maybe Phil could afford— Maybe he deserved a short break, to just sit down and enjoy a drink.

The barman came back with a big stein of what looked like nothing but golden liquid goodness. “You know what, I like the look on your little face. I'll lend you a free refill or two— actually, you know what?” He raised his voice to a shout, “Everybody, free refills for the rest of the night!”

The room went into an uproar.

Philliam smiled.

Yeah, he could stay here for a bit.

 

***

 

“Tell us now, or you die!” the man closest to Jym said, waggling his fancy schmancy shotgun in front of Jym's face.

“Yeah, you keep saying that, but I'm still alive, so I think you may want to reevaluate.”

The Yakuza men had been poking their shiny things at Jym for what felt like a little under an hour at this point. They wanted to pry at him for his secret recipe, the one he'd been hoping would ramp up Çhutwin's profits by quite the significant margin. It was abundantly clear though, that they weren't going to kill him as long as they didn't know the idea lurking in his mind, which, in turn, gave him all the less reason to say.

It had been a good attempt at getting words out of him, honestly. If Jym had been any other random person the British Japanese mafia had decided to track down, he probably wouldn't have a secret meth plan, but aside from that, he would have likely spilled any beans he'd be carrying. Thankfully for him, he was himself.

They listened to his frequent requests, but only sometimes. For instance, when he asked how and where they'd heard him mention the recipe, they'd slipped that ‘The Boss,’ their probable leader, had been tracking down Jym's every move for months, and now was their moment to rejoice, for they'd caught him. This piqued Jym's interest, more so than anything else. Who was this supposed ‘Boss’ man, that had been looking for him for so long? If he'd wanted to meet, he could have just asked. Some little birdie would have heard, and gladly traversed the winds, carrying that request to Jym, and he in turn would have accepted it without a moment's hesitation. Alas, a meeting was what he'd wanted, and now, it was what he'd get.

On the contrary, though, when he'd asked them to at least loosen the ties on his arms and legs, or to fetch him the cup of cold coffee in the kitchen, they'd pretended to not have heard him, which he'd found to be rather bothersome behaviour. It's not like he could have escaped with these few dozen eyes on him, anyway.

The men had been whispering to each-other in Japanese, likely trying to come up with better ways to push him into talking, for a minute or two, when suddenly, a loud, slow knock came from the house-door. They all hushed, as one of the scrawnier ones from the far side of the living room skittered out into the next room over, and opened the door for who could only be one person.

The Boss was here.

The unremarkable Japanese underling gently strolled back in accompanying a slender, elegant man with a proud gait. He wore no hat upon his dark wavy locks, which billowed partway down the back of his same-coloured coat, yet still he was tall. And he wasn't smiling, although his pale and angular face did have a short, well-defined beard on it, like ink on paper. Everything about him was just so deliciously mysterious.

The gang members all around put their guns away and backed off, leaving a circular clearing around Jym. The Boss walked up to Jym, towering over him, and merely stared down upon his prisoner, wordlessly.

“Well, good day, sir! If I may ask, who would you happen to be?”

“Mmmm,” the Boss murred, “I'm but a human, I suppose. Feel free to call me that.”

“I'm sorry, have we met, human?”

“I'm not sure. You tell me. What kind of freakish creature such as myself would have a desire to kidnap and torture you?”

“Well, let's see, there's my competitors, who have been wanting to take the number one spot in this industry for a while.”

“I guess you could call me one of your competitors. It's lame though, isn't it? I come all this way to dethrone you, and in the end, I'm just some Joe Schmoe who's never even seen what happens behind your eyes. No. There's got to be something better.” At this point, he had leaned in closer to tease, and run his fingers across Jym's face. The Boss had often wondered if that face was soft like a plant, or firm like a shot glass. Either way, both of those things broke if you crushed them in your fist.

“Are you actually going to make me go through the list of every person I've ever met? Because that sounds like something that would actually be fun.”

The Boss's eyes took on a dismal, far away look, as one question effortlessly flooded over his lips, as if he'd dreamed of this moment every night of his life. “Are you in need of help? Your situation appears a little dim.”

“Why, indeed, it seems I could use a hand here. Although, I doubt you'd help me escape yourself...”

The Boss stood straighter, and fished in his coat pocket for a second before pulling out a small, clear bag with a bit of white powder in it. Another question came, just as flat as the first. “Do you know what this is?”

Jym's lips slowly curled up into a smirk, and then split open into a grin, as he realized. “I'd reckon it's cocaine, innit?”

There was half a minute of silence, as they read each other's eyes, and for an instant, their minds intertwined.

“Would you like to sell it with me?” quoth the two of them in sync.

More silence. For a while. Nobody kept track of how much.

Jym, to his own surprise, spoke. “Well, that's quite a few questions I've had on my chest answered. How long has it been, now?”

“Twenty,” Boss said, traces of emotions finally seeping in.

“Twenty years? Good lord, they did not feel that long.”

“I disagree. They felt longer.”

“Really? Interesting... Just why? Why any of this? What did I do to you?”

“I'll continue the story where you left off, when you recounted it to that blond chap on the train a few hours ago. The next day, I woke up, and went out to sell my goods, and just go about my business, when suddenly, I found out that nobody wanted to buy from creepy, independent dealers anymore, when you could get yours from the shiny, brand new 'Çhutwin drug troupe!' It turned out they were a group of others, like me, who had been brought together by some broke young lad who'd come to town last night. I seeked them in person, and asked if I could join them. I even told them that I'd been the one who taught that lad how to take care of himself that way to begin with. And the thing is, they almost let me join their team, and then it would have been a beautiful ending for all, with sunshine and rainbows and cupcakes. But then, they decided that I was lying, and taking your name in vain by supposedly trying to use it to enter their good graces. Because of course, all of the teens in remote British villages already know how to trade. Maybe, I could have gotten that boy to come and vouch for my absolutely scandalous claim, but as it turned out, he'd left the place that morning, and was already onto the next town, where he was probably having a good ol' time in some bar. So, they didn't let me in. And thus, I went home with no career and rent to pay. I tried to find a fair work— I really did, but nobody took me, and in the end, I became a bum. There was nothing else left to save me then.”

“Uhh,” Jym said “okay, wow. I'm sorry to hear I did that to you, Mister... oh dear, I've slightly forgotten your name.”

“Oh, is that how little I mattered to you? You'd rather think you don't owe me one thing, not even lending my very name a spot in your brain? You'd rather ignore the fact, that if it weren't for me, you would have died on some lonely street corner, in the middle of the night, at fifteen?”

“I only said slightly, Heathcliff.”

“Ah. Well. Make me look like the fool, why don't you?”

“Anyways," Jym continued, "I take it you got out of being homeless?”

“Oh, I certainly did. My mind lasted but a few months, until things came to a small murder or two. Let me tell you, I slept in the dumpsters quite a few times up until then. But I managed to get back up on my feet, and apparently all the heat for the Çhutwin had died down, enough so that there was enough market to sell on my own. I amassed enough money to live a decent life, and finally, left that town. To come looking for you. I went north, where you'd supposedly gone, but by when I'd heard you'd returned to the village I'd just left, I was already far. Then, of course, I come back, and find you've gone to Paris or wherever, and the cycle just keeps happening, and it never ends, and my entire life is chasing you, for twenty years!” His voice had been level so far, the ocean of rage within Heathcliff having surfaced just now. He had to stop himself, and his heaving chest settled back down into deep breaths.

“But now twenty years is over. And now I have you, you fruitcake. And now, I'm gonna make you talk.”

“... Well,” Jym spoke in a tone that wasn't even mad, “alright, I'll talk! But first, do tell me, how did you get all these men at your command?”

“Fair enough. I went to the bar one night a few months ago. That's a rather rare occasion. I try to be as sparing with my little cash as possible, but there are nights when I can't take it anymore. This game of pub trivia broke out in the entire place, and somehow, I managed to obliterate the competition. One of the guys there happened to be their actual gang leader. He was absolutely wasted, and offered me ownership to show his amazement at my skill. Now, granted, his right hand man was there, who was supposed to prevent him from making stupid decisions, which may have worked, if he wasn't also wasted. And, just like that, I was on top.”

“Aha. Sounds like you've been up to quite some fun. Now, what was it you wanted me to talk about, again?”

Heathcliff didn't respond, and instead simply unsheathed a dagger from his coat pocket. And a pretty one, at that. Intricate, with fine curves and a deep purple handle. It looked like one you may use in a ritual. Not very large, but beautiful, nonetheless. He didn't make any threatening gestures towards Jym with it, either. He merely, gently held it at his side.

One of the gang men, all of whom had been silent during these exchanges, walked over to a table in the corner of the room and opened one of its drawers. He pulled out what looked like a wooden cutting board, upon which you might slice fruits and meats in a kitchen. However, it wasn't quite empty.

There was a gray little mouse, that laid bellyside-up on it. It had some little ropes tied around its little hands and legs, trapping it like a human on a stretching rack. The mouse's head jerked, looking about at all the people in the room frantically. The man holding the board came over to Jym, gently placed it in Jym's lap, and went back to the sidelines, to be ignored again.

“Give me your secret formula,” Heathcliff said, taking a step or two closer, “or I'll sink my blade deep into this rat's chest, but not deep enough to instantly kill him, and he will suffer. He will suffer a lot, and he will suffer slowly.”

Jym's eyes widened as he took in those words. He was rendered speechless. How cruel did you need to be to do such a thing?

“And as he bleeds under my hand, I'll cover his view so that the only person he can see will be you. He will look into your eyes, and take you for his successful hunter. Make your choice now.”

“Oh,” Jym cried, his resolve broken, “what are a few billion dollars to me, when I know this poor little mouse had to die so horribly for them? Please, let him live. I'll tell you the recipe, alright?”

Heathcliff smiled, and dropped the knife to the floor. It landed on his own shoe, slightly slicing through and cutting the skin on his foot, but the sensation was minor, at best. The mouse, despite not speaking much English, seemed pretty relieved.

“I'm listening.”

 

***

 

Phil felt a strange sense of pride when he realized his shouts were the loudest in the incoherent sea of drunkards. The vast majority of the room was yelling at each other to be quiet so that they could hear the story from the old guy over at that table in the corner, about how he got lost in the woods a few years back, but Phil and a table near the center had taken to going against the flow, and were begging for an encore from the young guitarist up on stage, who was probably the most sober person in the place, and who was presently questioning his life choices. Philliam didn't have a reason to. Who did? It was chaos, and it was peaceful.

This funky guy sitting on the next stool over, looked to be about fifty, noticed that Philliam was particularly causing a ruckus, and began aiming his attempted shooshings at him. “Hey, quiet, lad! Nobody wants you here if you're gonna scream like that!”

Philliam dropped his voice to a bit of a giggly whisper, and said “You know, it's funny I'm here at all, I'm supposed to be saving my buddy Jym from the Japanese!”

The entire room, every single person here besides Phil, suddenly and unanimously let out gasps of shock, before falling silent. Philliam looked about the room for a few seconds, trying to figure what everyone was so concerned about, until he realized they were all looking at him.

The man who had just told Phil to shut up was the one to speak up. “Your buddy Jym? You can't possibly mean... it isn't the Jym, is it?”

In that second, Philliam's mind subconsciously realized that this was a moment to be serious, and all the alcohol in his body dried up, gone to the void. “I... Yes, Jym Daviese. I need to help him... How did I forget, I need to help him!” He got up and went running for the door, before he stopped in his tracks, and turned around to the rest of the room, all still staring at him. Well, actually, the singer up on the stage took this opportunity to duck away into a backstage. “Wait one second, how do you people know Jym?”

The old man who had been trying to tell a story a bit ago answered. “He was our savior. The night he came to our town, he taught us what it meant to be of a community.”

Philliam took a deep breath. “You're the founders of Çhutwin, aren't you.”

“Yes, we are,” they answered as a choir.

Everyone in the room promptly pulled out a gun and aimed at him.

“Now tell us, bub, how do you know Jym?” shouted a shouty man with a shotgun.

“He scooped me up to help him with an experiment, okay?” Philliam was surprised at how little fear he felt at this. He raised his hands up in a sort of surrender, sure, but barely broke a sweat.

“What experiment?” came from a woman with dark ginger locks.

“I... don't know the details.”

The room broke out into more screaming, before resolving into a ‘How do we know you're not lying, thief?’ said in a chorus, musical.

“You don't. But would you rather listen to me, come along, and find that I'm lying, and in the end, have wasted an hour or two of your time, or would you rather disregard me, and have it turn out that Jym really is in danger, and you all did nothing to help him?”

These words didn't echo, but they may as well have, as everyone slowly let their hands drift down.

“The kid's got a point,” said the bartender who had been silent up to this point. “We need to follow him, wherever he may take us.”

Philliam's face broke into a relieved grin, although his pride stung a little at being called a kid. Looks like these guys were a force just as armed and prepared as he needed. “Oh, thank you so, so much. Now come on, we need to go!”

 

***

 

“I'm listening.”

“Alright,” Jym began, with a hint of sadness in his voice at having been bested. “There's some crystal meth in the kitchen. It's in a cup. Go grab it. There's also some apple juice in the fridge. We'll need that.”

“... Apple Juice.”

“Yep! I find oranges too acidic.”

One of the henchmen to the side went to fetch the desired objects, but Heathcliff stopped him in his tracks. “No. I want to do this myself. This is getting interesting.”

He walked out of the room for about fifteen seconds, and came back with cup and juice carton in his his hands. He set them down on the table in the corner, the same one which had been storing the mouse that still sat in Jym's lap, confused and, frankly, a bit bored now that he wasn't the center of attention anymore. “Now what?”

“I still have that bottle of saltwater in this suit pocket, over here. And that's just about all you'll need!” His earlier sourness at having his recipe pried free from his mind had been replaced with pure excitement at seeing the test unfold. Heathcliff strolled over and gently but precisely reached into a pouch on the inside of Jym's open suit, taking out the vial.

“Okay, so. Pour the juice into the cup, until the meth is more or less completely submerged, and then add a pinch of the sea!”

Heathcliff frowned. “Putting meth in juice? Are you certain?”

“Yes, I am!”

Without too much hesitation, he went ahead and went to the kitchen for a second, to fetch a cup— it was a cute little piece of china, with poppies printed in a pastel style on the outside— and put all the ingredients together.

“Now let it soak for a second or two, take it out, and see the result!”

“Haha. Very funny. Now give me real answers.”

“And that's what I'm giving you, that's literally it.”

“... That's it? That was the big secret?”

“The taste of meth has been getting so stale lately, I figured people would appreciate me adding a bit of extra fruity punch to it!”

“And the salt?!”

“To balance out the flavour, of course.”

“... Foshusu,” Heathcliff said, beckoning over one of the men to the side. Jym recognized him as the one that had appeared first when he'd been assaulted on the train.

“Yes, lord?” he said, as he swiftly strode to said lord.

“Try out the concoction, and report on its effectiveness.”

He nodded, and set to the task. It was a little troublesome to separate the drug from the liquid, but he was able to use his hands to scoop out a few lightly browned crystals out of the juice. Everyone watched as he stooped down, sniffed a few of them straight up, before instantly going into the most violent fit of coughing Jym had ever seen.

“It's horrible, sir!” Foshusu yelled, and hastily scrambled out of the room, likely to find a bathroom to hurl in, although that would do little to get the fruitiness out of his bloodstream.

...

“Well. Looks like this recipe of mine was a bit of a flop, innit?”

“... Months. Years, more than a decade. Years spent tracking you down this rabbithole, wasted.”

“No, no, not wasted. No time is ever wasted. Merely lived without as much joy as could be. What was your plan, anyway? Take this new recipe, and steal all my profits?”

“In essence, yes. I'd have stolen your market, and made you feel everything I felt.”

“Not very effective, if I could fall back on my vault of billions, and nothing about my life would have changed in the slightest.”

“I guess I hadn't really thought that far ahead.”

...

“I'm going to kill you now. It's all the power over you I've got left,” Heathcliff said, joyless and strained.

“Alright, but if you don't mind my asking, I've actually got one more question I'd like you to answer me first before you do that.”

“Ask away,” he said, as he knelt down and grabbed the knife he'd dropped on the floor earlier.

“Why did you help me along that night, when we first met? Why didn't you just walk on by and leave me to die on my own?”

“Because I thought you would help me in return, not run off after creating something which would end my career.”

“But weren't you glad, or at the very least proud, that I took off, and was successful in my own right, thanks to you?”

Heathcliff stood there, and all he could see were Jym's brown irises. “No. No, I wasn't, and nor am I now.”

“Eh, fair enough. I understand. Thank you.”

The sound of the door in the next room over busting open was heard, and many yells came through, and the other men in this room yelled back, too. But the two of them tuned out the noise, and shared a pleasant smile, as the boss drove his dagger into the fruitcake's chest.

And then, Heathcliff's eyes shot wide open, as he fell to the floor and bled out through a small hole in his back, leaving no other last words.

Jym was a little surprised by that, but had little time to be mourn this death, for his attention was jerked to all the other commotions going on around him. People, in plain yet elegant outfits that you might wear on a casual outing, were all storming into the living room, with guns, and clearing out the yakuza people around, all of whom had luckily turned their attention away from Jym, in any way possible. It was actually pretty incredible that none of the bullets went into Jym. All of these newcomers, while they did seem keen on him if they were putting in so much effort to rescue him, didn't interact with him as they were too busy taking care of the dangerous men that had been sitting in that room and not hurting anybody for over an hour. Well, all except a funny little blond man in a suit.

“Jym?! Jym! Jym, are you alright?” Philliam rushed over to him, taking note of the knife sticking out of his chest, as well as the mouse, who was a bit shook at the loud gunshots. His hands seemed to reach for the blade's handle, and retract, and reach again a few more times as he debated on whether or not taking it out would calm the bleeding, or speed death right along. He eventually decided it’d be better to leave it in.

“I'm okay,” Jym croaked, just now realizing how hoarse his entire being felt. “Well, at least as I'll ever be!” Those words, granted, came with a quick little cough of blood.

Philliam tried to look around for a phone to call for help with, but found that one of the other rescuers had already taken the landline in the corner, and was either dialing the ambulance, or the local pasta joint. Both seemed like they would make the situation a whole lot nicer.

“Just hold on, okay?” He put his hands around the wound and pressed down on Jym's chest, trying to stop the bleeding, or at least that's what he hoped he was doing. “It'll be al— alright, it'll be good...” Those words were more so spoken to himself.

“Oh, they absoultely will be, my dear— Aghck— my dear Phillia—“

Another fit of coughing. Through his shuttering eyelids, Jym took note of the dark reddish hues that were embedding themselves into both their suits, and in the little mouse's fur, and a strong wooziness suddenly crashed upon his mind.

And Jym saw that Phil was saying more things, but the words just turned into letters, and then, into formless ink. The only form that sustained as his vision faded to black was Philliam's horrified face.

 

***

 

The tide danced its way up to him and licked his shoes, inviting him to come play, but Phil wordlessly told it that he was in no mood to play, and thus, the wave rolled back down through the sand, dismayed, before it filled with excitement again, and rushed to Philliam once more, to see if he'd perchance changed his mind.

Jym. Jym was in the hospital. Philliam had tried, to follow him in, he really had. But the doctors said it was serious, and the patient needed rest. So, they hadn't let him in. So here, by the Thames, Philliam sat. His mind a cloudy sky. God, he'd known this man for but a day, but he'd already grown fond of the bugger. At the same time, it's not like Phil had any other buggers to care about. He had emotion to spare.

A pigeon. A pigeon was fluttering in the air above him, dancing in circles as it gently glided upon gusts of wind. It was hard to see in the sunlight, but it looked to be a peculiar specimen. It didn't have any of those green and purple feathers on its neck, and there wasn't any of that orange colour in its eyes. They were black beads. It looked clean enough, and perhaps, some would have called it cute. Philliam asked himself if he was part of that some today, and his answer came out as a silence.

The bird had an envelope caught firmly in one of its claws, although after Phil had stared at it for a short few seconds, it let go, and the letter gently floated down onto him. The pigeon, deeming its job well done, took off far into the sky, and Phil watched it for a minute or two until it completely disappeared beyond the horizion, leaving just him and the letter. He was lucky that it had landed in his lap, and not in the watery erasers flowing all around him. It had no seal on it. He took it out, and read just two lines.

Dearest Mr. Johansen,

We regret to inform you that Jym is no longer with us.

 

 

 

The letter wasn't over, but the tears blurred his sight too much for him to keep reading. His hands were shaking, and the piece of paper fell out of them onto the sand. In a split second, the waves came back to talk with him again, and trampled over it in the process, reducing it to little but nothing.

“Yeah, bit of a shame, innit?” Jym said, as he sat down in the sand beside Philliam's shivering figure.

Phil slowly took his clenched hands off of his eyes, and turned to see his pal beside him, whom he took into a bear hug.

“I had you going for a second, didn't I?” he said, traces of glee breaking into his voice.

Philliam didn't respond, and just sobbed over Jym's shoulder.

“H— hey, take it easy, okay? It was a joke. It was funny because I didn't actually die, I just left the hospital!”

“It wasn't funny.”

“... I'm, sorry.”

Phil braced himself for some witty remark to come back from Jym, but none came. Instead, all that was to be heard was his own sobbing.

No. That wasn't just his. They were both crying, it seemed. Their tears flowed onto each other's backs, but they were warm, too. It calmed him, and made Phil laugh, which in turn made Jym laugh, which in turn made Phil laugh more, and this process repeated until the two of them collapsed into a joyous heap in the sand.

 

 

 

“... You want to know something?” Jym asked.

“Who wouldn't?”

“You came to me because you couldn't keep your word and supply that client of yours with enough of what he wanted, right? I sent the order to deliver that shipment before I walked into the airport. What did I have to gain from denying you this help that you needed?”

“Ah. Really? I guess I should have figured that out sooner.”

“Perhaps, indeed.”

 

 

 

“... One last question,” Phil tried. He actually had many, many questions left, but he couldn't hope of having them all answered. Not now, at least.

“Ask away.”

“What even was the experiment, you were doing with the meth? Our whole quest?”

“Ah, that? I was imbuing it with fruit juice to make it taste better.”

“Oh. How in the bloody hell would you go about doing that?”

“Put the crystals in a glass, add fruit juice, boom. The seawater just gave it that extra pzazz.”

“... And that was all?”

“Yep. Some of those guys you walked in on finished it up for me. Didn't turn out quite as great as I expected... Feel like a fool for having wasted so much time with that.”

Phil couldn't help but smile, although no-one was able to see it. “Nonsense. No time is ever wasted.”