Chapter Text
You have never made waves. Well, not in the traditional negative sense. You have always been an overachiever, someone who stands out from your peers in the best way. You’ve always got your best foot forward, a star student at the top of your university, recognized yearly for your achievements with a pretty certificate to match. As far as everyone is concerned, you are the absolute cream of the crop. But you never cause trouble.
In the small town you grew up in outside of Tokyo, Nikko, you’re something of a celebrity. When you come home to visit the quiet streets of your hometown, people recognize you. They stop you and ask how you’ve been, if your studies are going well, before calling you their pride and joy. The mountain city is quaint but beautiful, famous for the shrine built nearby after the 17th century. Nothing really ever changes there and people tend to stick to the same ordinary mold, so when you got accepted into the University of Tokyo and decided to leave that cycle, people talked. They called you exceptional.
You attend the University of Tokyo on a merit scholarship, are overly involved in school activities, and are a well-known face throughout all of campus. If there is something going on, it’s likely that you’ve been a part of organizing it. That’s just how you are. A good girl with a good streak who wouldn’t dream of stepping out.
Still, you’re a people pleaser. You’ve known this about yourself since you were young, finding yourself bending to meet the will of others and coast by as a “good kid”. It’s what earned you these grades, glowing recommendations from teachers that earned you a spot at one of the most prestigious universities in Japan. You should be proud and you absolutely are.
In exchange for the ability to have complete control over your future, you give up any chance of mistakes. One slip up and that beautiful future you’ve crafted comes crumbling down. You can’t afford to let your iron grip on yourself slip.
So you don’t drink, you don’t smoke, you don’t party, or date, or have sex because none of those things fit into your life narrative. God knows you’ll probably settle down with a man (probably a medical student), work, have kids, and retire to become a housewife who runs their home with charts and lists and bulletin boards.
You will probably marry someone like Ichiro Hasegawa. Clean cut and grad school bound, he should be sitting across from you in your club board meeting. In your free time on campus, you run a student collective for learning how to network in business. It’s a large club with about 300 active members and a small board of twelve students who ensure that organization activities run smoothly. You are the Vice President, set to take Hasegawa’s place as President next year during your final year of university before graduating. Elections will be held next quarter in March.
Ichiro has dark hair and wears glasses. He’s a lot like you and honestly, you quite like him, even as his seat remains glaringly empty while the treasurer rambles on about next quarter’s budget. It’s all incredibly boring and though you enjoy the responsibility, his spiel has you tapping your foot against the floor in exasperation.
“Will we still be hosting the job expo next quarter?” He turns to you, leaning forward. “I know by that time it’ll be a new council rotation, but it’s good to know for budgeting.”
“Looks like it. We’ve just got to book a venue on campus and contact companies for programming, then we should be set. I can forward you the list of contacts later.” You chime, not needing to check your notes. It’s easy now, to put on that little fake smile and pretend you’re having a good time. You remind yourself that it’s all for your future. All of this will pay off when you have your dream job and the cushy corporate life you’ve always dreamed of.
“Sorry I’m late.” Hasegawa closes the club room door behind him, adjusting the collar of his sweater with a nervous hand.
He’s handsome, really handsome. Even now, as he takes a somewhat hurried seat across from you, you find yourself admiring how put-together he looks, the way the light from outside hits his dark hair and high cheekbones at a perfect angle. Yeah, you could definitely marry someone like Hasegawa.
“A text would have been nice.” The treasurer pipes up. Ever the straight edge. You don’t take the time to admire the irony in that thought.
Hasegawa gives you a look over his glasses that makes you instinctively straighten, nerves humming through your body as you toss him a shrug. You’re unable to protest the other’s statement, but you feel heat rise to your cheeks nonetheless. Something about him makes you nervous. This delightfully innocent back and forth the two of you have shared for the better half of the year almost makes the stress worth it.
The meeting continues about as smoothly as any meeting before it had. Hasegawa picks up the slack that you have been unable to pick up and pushes forward until the meeting nears its close, all the while sneaking you pleasant glances across the table. It’s positively middle school, but something about the way he peers at you makes you shiver pleasantly. Maybe he’ll ask you out, not that you have time for dating right now anyway.
You find yourself slipping into a pleasant daydream, one where you can relax a little bit and let him take you on a date. You might be getting ahead of yourself but hey, what’s the harm in a little fantasizing to pass the time.
You’re torn from your daydream by the club room door opening. It’s odd, as you weren’t expecting any visitors, but you see the small, quiet boy across from you grow pale, his face falling into something that looks like terror. It isn’t until you turn to the doorway and realize just why.
In the door frame stands perhaps one of the tallest men you’ve ever seen. He looks to be about twenty-something with jet black hair, save for the streaks of bleach blonde, yellow from a lack of toner. He wears a suit, gray with pinstripes and tailored to the inch. On his face are a pair of silver round-rimmed glasses and behind them sits the coldest pair of eyes you think you’ve ever seen. Just his presence sends a chill down your spine.
He glances over the room with half-lidded eyes, looking bored despite the fact that he’s just rudely intruded on a meeting, and you find yourself standing from your chair on instinct.
“Uhm, I’m sorry sir but-” You step up to him, eyes trailing up his figure as his looming presence settles over you. For a moment, he doesn’t look down, eyes staring straight ahead at Suzuki Haruto, the treasurer, whose body is rigid in the chair across the room. Then his gaze sinks down to meet yours and you’re met with stoney gold eyes. You suddenly feel like prey before a predator. “This is a uhm… private meeting.”
“Is it?” He speaks, a rich baritone voice dripping from his lips, and you can’t detect a single ounce of care. The man looks away from you just as quickly. “Suzuki, you’re late.”
“Hanma, sir!” The boy stands up, trembling as his eyes dart across the room and then back to the pather standing in front of you. “I know, sir. Money is tight and- and my mother she- we don’t- I’ll have it to you by Monday. Give me until then.”
Suzuki pleads, hands stiff by his side and his slacks bunched in them.
“So you’re in a position to beg now?” The man named Hanma replies, pulling his hands from his pocket and inspecting his nails. On the back of his hand, there is a tattoo that reads punishment. You shiver. “You think I wasted my time coming down here to hear you beg?”
It takes you a moment to register the situation, the tattoos on his hands, the demands for money, the expensive gold and diamond earring hanging from his left ear. This man is dangerous and the alarm bells in your head are firing on all cylinders as you stand before him. Even Hasegawa is stunned into silence.
“No, sir!” Suzuki shouts, far too loud for the room.
“So, if I give you until Monday, you’ll have my money? All of it?” Hanma questions, tilting his head to the side. “If you don’t, I’ll take your teeth instead. As if that would cover half of your debt.”
Hanma’s gaze drifts down to you, straight-backed in front of him. It’s bad enough that he has to take time out of his day to come collect this debt and he should be upset that he’s not getting it. Honestly, he should be taking his teeth out here one by one and making all of you watch while he does. He’s sure that would be fun and in idle passing he imagines which one of you would be sick first. But he’s bored. Hanma is so, unbelievably bored, until he sees the way you tremble when he sets his gaze on you.
You look so… malleable. Shorter than him, though just about everyone is, and cute as a button. Hanma can’t help but think that you look like you’d be fun to break and he figures that he might just poke some fun at you in his own cruel way.
“Need something?” He leans forward slightly, lacing his fingers together.
Your eyes dart to his hands where you get a good look at the tattoos, and you visibly suppress a grimace, heat flooding your body because despite yourself, his fingers look enticing. Whatever energy he has, it’s making your heart race in a way entirely unfamiliar to you. Hanma looks like someone you should be on your knees for. You shake your head slightly, answering him as well as clearing your mind of whatever repulsive thought just pushed its way into your brain.
“Uh no-” You pause. “Uh, sir.”
Hanma stands at his full height again. “Good answer.” Not that he means it.
He watches the way you look at him, wide-eyed. You look fun, like a new toy for him to break. Probably pretty when you’re in pain, when you’re so scared that you swear you’ve got ice in your veins. If Hanma is capable of showing interest in anything, it would be in you right now.
Your toes are curled in your shoes, the air deathly still. If Hanma is thinking anything, you can’t tell what it is. You pray he doesn’t find your name, that he doesn’t remember your face and you acknowledge that you’re flattering yourself thinking someone like this would take an interest in you at all. You watch as Hanma tilts his head, eyes still half-lidded and bored, watching you. For your reactions, you think. Under his gaze, you feel incredibly small.
You think he might speak again to you but instead, he looks back to Suzuki, pointing a finger at him. “Monday.”
Before he leaves, he gives a look to the room, one that turns your limbs to lead. Despite his boredom, despite the seemingly permanent deadpan he wears, you feel yourself grow heavy within his orbit. Hanma says nothing, but you know what it’s meant to do. You know the message he means to ask and the consequences for the wrong answer. What did you see? Nothing. Nothing at all.
And then he tells you with anything but words, one simple twitch of his eyes as they narrow slightly, that it doesn’t matter anyway. You’d be dead before you even reached the station.
—
Haesgawa ends the meeting almost immediately after Hanma leaves. Suzuki looks panicked, eyes wide as he pleads you all to forget what you saw. He tells you all that it isn’t a big deal, his own issue involving student debt. Some part of you feels bad for him, but when he begs for none of you to go to the police, you find that his words strike a chord deep in your chest. It’s incredible that Hanma could make someone feel like this. It’s incredible, but his presence felt so huge that you hadn’t noticed the two people waiting in the hall for him, two people who had gone under your nose because you were so focused on him. What is it like to have that much power?
“Are you okay?” Hasegawa catches up to you on your walk back to your apartment, His eyebrows pulled together in genuine worry.
“Huh? Yeah? Why wouldn’t I be?” You turn, giving him a genuinely warm smile. You’re flattered he even came to ask.
Hasegawa frowns, taking in your appearance. “I’ve never seen you like that.”
You think back to Hanma, the way his gaze settled on you so cooly and despite your fear, something claws in your chest. Part of you wants him to look at you again, settle that cold stare on your features. You shiver at the thought of him, the defined edges of his face, sharp eyes and features, criminally beautiful, cold, and collected.
“Oh…” You pause, licking your lips slightly and scuffing your heel against the floor. “He was just scary. That’s all.”
You’re lying because some part of you knows that wasn’t it. Even if he is bad news, Hanma wasn’t just scary, he was terrifying, panther-like in manner and gaze.
Hasegawa looks at you for a moment, nodding. “Do you think we should…”
“No.” Your response is immediate and laced with panic. “No, I think that might only cause more problems for Suzuki. He asked us not to.”
When you meet his gaze, it’s full of regret, an understanding between the both of you that speaking to anyone else about it would only make the problem worse. Hasegawa nods, fair features growing a bit solemn before he mutters a quick goodbye, suddenly uncomfortable that he’d even brought it up.
You mull over the events of the meeting in your head for the rest of the day, distracted while you study as you imagine Hanma’s hands, long and broad, ghosting across the lapel of his suit. The way he inspected his nails as if he was thinking about how Suzuki’s blood might look under them.
It’s not as if you don’t feel bad. You do, unbelievably so. There is a part of you that is weeping in this helpless position, not used to the lack of power you feel, but drawn to it all the same.
Later that evening, between studying for class and bed, your fingers ghost across the keys of the keyboard, typing in the last name you’d learned. Hanma. Even typing it out feels sacrilegious, like you’re setting yourself up for some cosmic joke.
It doesn’t take long to find information on him, hoards of it. Ironically, his job description is just “entrepreneur” on nearly every website you can find. But you’re not too concerned with it, rather, you’re concerned with the news reports on him. Scores of articles written about Hanma Shuji (which you learn is his full name) and the Tokyo-based gang Toman.
It’s here, in your ideal bedroom, seated at your ideal desk as part of your ideal life that you learn about the less than ideal part of Tokyo that is Toman. A violent gang, more akin to white-collar criminals, run on a massive scale. Drugs, murder, informants, arrests, mass shootings, just about everything you see in those cheesy gang movies that run on late-night television. But this is real. This is real and you’ve just made yourself a witness to dangerous criminal activity. You and your perfect, squeaky clean record has just seen something that could get you killed.
You scroll for what feels like hours before stopping at a photo of Hanma in a club, seated behind a red velvet rope. Under his arms are two beautiful young women in matching dresses and they’re fawning over him, eyes wide as he stares ahead at something off-camera, entirely unbothered. It’s that same familiar stare he gave you and you find yourself squeezing your thighs together.
Your mind wanders back to Hanma and his tattoos, the very literal meaning behind sin and punishment and you’re certain that there is nothing you can do for your friend. Getting involved in this, going to the authorities, you’re sure that they’d hurt him for it. That his family or yours would pay the price for ratting them out. You might be a goody-two-shoes, but you have enough common sense to know your place in this particular food chain.
You don’t sleep much that night, unable to get the memory of Hanma’s eyes out of your head. But when you do dream, you dream of a deer and a panther.