8/8/12 Defending!
Note: If you watch any sort of Anime, it should become apparent just who Jinichiro and Karen are. The name changes are to prevent your pal Palazzo from getting sued one day. 🙂 Enjoy folks!
Charles Kerekes, when introduced to attractive women at parties, usually gave his profession as “monetary distribution agent”.
This was a fancy way of saying “thief”, which is precisely what he was. However, one generally doesn’t say that to people at parties, especially when one is trying to get into their pants.
Of course, Charles had other reasons not to state his real profession—he wasn’t very good at it, for one. For example, just last week, while robbing a bank in Kyoto, he’d miscalculated the night watchman’s schedule, and had been spotted at the very beginning of the job. He’d been forced to run with what little money he had already gotten, which turned out to be only 5000 yen. Even worse, the bank had turned out to be yakuza owned, and so soon he was on the run not only from the law, but from a group of very large, menacing men, most of whom had chopped off their own pinky fingers at some point or another, and were thus eager to share the experience.
Charles had made the very sane decision to leave Kyoto for Tokyo, but had blown most of his haul doing this, and so now was in dire straits. Lacking the resources for a big job, and not wanting to draw to much attention to himself, he was now reduced to petty stick-ups.
Such as the young couple he was presently holding at gunpoint. The pair stared at Charles in shock, since they, like many young people, thought of crime as something that happened to other people, usually in other cities, or even landmasses.
“Just hand me the money,” Charles explained, in a slow, calm voice. “There’s no need to try anything heroic.”
That was when the arrow shot past, inches away from his face, and buried itself in the wall behind him. “There’s ALWAYS a need to try something heroic!” shouted a clear, high female voice. Charles turned.
She stood there, silhouetted in the lamplight. She wasn’t very tall, and looked to be quite young. She wore a yellow jumpsuit, with a blue cowl with cat’s ears, her long black hair flowing behind her. A bow was in her hand, arrows held in a quiver tied around her waist.
Charles gulped. He was definitely not in any condition to take on a superhero.
The girl glanced quickly at the couple. “Just get away! I’ll take care of this crook. There’s no way the likes of him can stand up to the claws of Hellcat—and SON OF SATAN!”
As the couple took her up on her advice, the apparent Hellcat looked eagerly to her side. After roughly a minute, she hissed loudly. “Son of Satan! Don’t leave me hanging here…!”
A loud groan emanated from the shadows. “Do I have to do this?”
Hellcat pouted in a rather sulky fashion. “Yes!”
With a long sigh, Son of Satan slouched into view. He was a young man, clad in a rather archaic red kimono that someone had seen fit to scrawl a rather crude pentagram on. He wore no shoes, which was odd—he also had dog-ears, which was odder. Silky white hair hung down to his waist while a samurai sword hung at his side. He regarded Charles with a look that combined resignation with sheer boredom. “I am Son of Satan,” he announced in a dull monotone. “Tremble before my wrath, evildoer.”
Hellcat glanced at him reproachingly. “You could at least put some feeling into it.”
Son of Satan rolled his eyes, and crossed his arms. “Look, Karen, I just think this really stupid, is all…”
The girl’s eyes went wide. “HEY! We talked about this! It’s Hellcat! I have a secret identity to protect!”
“Oh, no!” Son of Satan shouted in mock horror. “Now he knows your one of the million or so girls in Japan called Karen! Whatever shall we do?”
“Jinichiro…” snarled Karen—then brought her free hand up to her face in shock. “I meant, Son of Satan…”
Charles felt a sudden sense of relief.
“Oh, wow, you’re really stickin’ with this ‘no names mentioned’ rule of yours,” laughed Jinichiro. “Man, why’d I ever agree to this…?” He began to walk away.
“Hey! Don’t you walk out on me!” shouted Karen. “I’ll remind you who’s got the upper hand here!”
“Right, right…” muttered Jinichiro, walking away.
“Umm, excuse me…” interjected Charles.
“Oh you keep out of this!” Karen stated forcibly. “You’re not worried, Jinichiro? Not worried in the slightest that I’ll say, si—”
At that moment, Charles fired his pistol in the air. “I’d just like to say,” he began calmly, as he pointed the pistol at them, “that I really seem to have the tactical advantage here. After all, I’m a man with a gun, while you’re a girl with a bow, and a freak with a sword.” He smiled at them. “So please hand over all your money.”
“That’s what you think!” shouted Karen. With surprising speed and grace, she fit an arrow to her bow, and released it. The arrow sped quickly over Charles’s shoulder, and buried itself in the wall behind him.
Charles’s smile turned into a grin. “Missed.”
It was at precisely that moment that the wall behind him exploded, tossing him to the ground, and causing his gun to fall out of his hand and skid away.
“Umm, did I do that?” Karen asked quietly.
Jinichiro gave a slight nod. “Yep.”
There was an awkward silence for a moment. Finally, Karen coughed slightly. “Oops.”
Jinichiro glanced at her oddly. “That sort of thing never used to bother you.”
“I never used to worry about getting sued.”
Jinichiro gave an understanding nod. “Right. Lawyers. You mentioned them once…” He scratched his chin. “Don’t they suck blood, or somethin’?”
Karen blinked, then thought it over. “More or less.”
While the pair chatted, Charles crept forward to grab his gun.
Unfortunately for him, Jinichiro noticed him.
In the amount of time it takes a man to blink then cough, Charles found himself being hoisted into the air, by a very angry would-be superhero. “You don’t learn, do you, creep?”
Charles gulped. He hadn’t noticed it before, but Jinichiro had claws. And fangs. And a rather unpleasant glint in his eyes. “PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE DON’T KILL ME—I’LL DO WHATEVER YOU WANT!”
Jinichiro laughed darkly. “Oh, yeah, like you’re not goin’ to just turn around and try to get us some other way if I let you go…”
“Son of Satan!” chirped Karen disapprovingly. “You can’t kill him!”
Charles sniffled. Listen to the girl, listen to the girl, god, oh god, listen to the girl…
Jinichiro gave a snort. “Save us a lot of trouble.”
Karen raised a finger, and started to admonish him. “Superheroes can’t kill people. Not unless the villain has killed somebody, and then they have to make it happen by accident.”
Jinichiro stared at her, puzzled. “How can you do that?”
“Well, like, you fight on a mountainside, and they pull out a super weapon to beat your weapon, only they misjudge how powerful it is, and the mountainside collapses, burying them in rubble.” Karen explained helpfully.
Jinichiro scratched his head. “That seems like a pretty complicated way a handling things…”
A blissful smile appeared on Karen’s face. “It’s the way of the superhero, who strongly respects life enough to bludgeon people into unconsciousness, instead of simply killing them.”
Jinichiro narrowed his eyes. “Right.”
Karen glared at him. “Just take care of the bad guy!”
Jinichiro gave a hasty nod. “Sure thing.” He raised his fist, and drew back his arm in preparation for a terrific uppercut.
“Hang him up on the fire escape!” shouted Karen. “The one near the bakery!”
Jinichiro sighed, then jogged over to fire escape, and leaped up onto it. He glanced at Charles. “You trust this suit?”
Charles gulped. “It’s hand-tailored.”
Jinichiro nodded. “Good.” He hung Charles up on the side of the fire escape, using the jacket as a snag. “Hope you trust your tailor.” He leaped away.
Karen gave a triumphant grin as he came down. “Well, now we just go to a phone booth, and inform the police, and then—this looks like another job well done by—HELLCAT and SON OF SATAN!”
Jinichiro gave a slight cough. “You know—this the first time we did this.”
Karen visibly deflated. “Umm—right.”
The pair walked off together.
“And it wasn’t that well done,” added Jinichiro.
“Shut up, already!” cried Karen.
An Insomniac's Dreams 
LOL good stuff. I desire moooooore
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Thanks Lynci! I’ll see what I can do 🙂
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