Encounter

Su, Sin, and Sing Ting all freeze with horrific looks on their faces, as an unbelievable chill passes through them all.

“It can’t be…” Crisp chokes out.

The initial sentry breaks into the dining hall and kneels down next to Butterfly and says, “Master the young lord has engaged in battle with a man who dons white and red. We couldn’t make out his face but they started a conversation with him before they engaged in battle.”

Crisp looks to Butterfly, “that sounds like our rival, doesn’t it.”

“But he wouldn’t dare come onto our land,” Meow responds.

“Not unless we are a contract now,” admits Butterfly.

Two minutes later the second sentry enters in a frantic panic.

“Masters, our young lord has been killed.”

The remaining Ting family all holds their faces in shock as the news of their baby brother’s death is confirmed.

“Masters it was the glowing red eyes that told me who it was… the assassin Kamikaze X of the Crimson Haired Family,” explains the sentry.

“The bastard, how dare he accept a contract to come after us. We will have our vengeance tonight,” says Butterfly.

“Our families have been rivals since assassination ruled Asia, and I hate him just as much as our family has hated his,” added Meow.

“The Crimson Haired Family and the Family of Blood will end this feud tonight, and I will be the one to end it right now,” Crisp says as he vanishes from the room.

At the front gate X stands over five sentries, which he just put into eternal slumber. He looks around and notices a man standing not even 30 feet away from him.

“You dare to take my brother from this plane of existence, then you shall join him so that he may torment you in the afterlife.” Crisp vanishes and three sharp objects seemingly like fingertips fly toward Kamikaze X. X raises his sheath and blocks them all, he is then surprised by Crisp appearing next to him. Crisp lunges his golden claw toward X, X barely gets away getting cut across his left forearm.

X looks up at Crisp as his eyes begin to glow red. X appears next to Crisp, Crisp counters by appearing behind X. X notices this action too late and receives Crisps claw straight through his stomach. X drops to his knees and coughs up blood, he looks down at the blood and smiles slightly. As Crisp walks in front of X he notices his smile and slashes his claw across his neck. Blood shoots out from X’s throat and X falls flat on the ground, no longer breathing. Crisp turns and begins to walk into the castle; he stops, takes a long breath, and sighs. Blood slowly drips out of his mouth, he looks down and notices a sword sticking into his chest. As he looks back up he sees X standing in front of him.

X stares back at him with a smile; Crisp looks at X and notices that all of his wounds were gone. He looks to where he had left X’s body and sees nothing, not even the blood. As he turns back to look at X, X begins to move even closer.

Crisp gurgling up blood manages to slowly say, “What… are… you?”

Getting his face right next to his X whispers in his ear, “I’m complicated.”

Crisp in shock drops slightly as X smile widens, X then waves goodbye and pulls the sword out of his chest. Crisp falls dead leaking an extreme amount of blood, as X slowly proceeds to find the other Ting Family members.  

As Butterfly and Meow feel their brother’s spirit pass they realize the threat that they’re about to face.

 “Butterfly he’s coming for us next, you know that don’t you. I’m not dying by his hands,” commands Meow.

“I’ll kill him before he gets anywhere near me and my children,” with those words Meow let out a large cry sounding like a cat. The three black cats stand at attention and four more cats (2 white, 1 black, and an orange striped one) run into the room and start to rub on Meows legs. She stoops down and begins to pet them all, “My children, you’ll find him and prevent him from entering this room.”

The seven cats meow in unison and all leave the room the room going in completely different directions.

“My children will stop him, Butterfly there’s something that I have to tell you, my sister.”

X walks down a hallway and comes to what seems to be a bathroom. As he steps in he hears a sound like hair being cut, probably shaving. As he draws closer to the sound he hears a man grunt and curse as if he’s upset at cutting himself. X comes up behind the man and can’t help but look as if there’s something wrong. The man is shaving, shaving his legs. X wonders what the man would think if he noticed that he was there, so he clears his throat. The man suddenly stops shaving; X then takes his sword from his sheath.

X raises the blade of the sword next to the man’s face. X tells the man to turn around slowly; as the man starts to turn he notices that this is the man that led him to their castle. X looks the man up and down, and then smiles. The man nervously smiles back.

“You should never do that at work. I’ll let you live if you leave right now and never come back.” X says with a very serious look on his face.

The man looks at X then looks at the straight razor in his hand. X looks at the man and shakes his head letting him know not to do anything rash. The man turns to pick up his things then turns quickly to try and cut X, yet X had already cut off the man’s hand. The man screams in agony and stops instantly, he’s shocked to see that X is no longer standing in front of him. He’s also noticed that he’s looking at his own body from his legs on up, his legs look perfect, yet he’s no longer alive to show them off.

As X exits the restroom he notices a cat at the end of the hallway. X never had pets yet he really likes cats. He looks on at the cat and smiles, the cat looks at him and meows in a strange noise that he’s never heard a cat make before. The cats strange meow grows louder and louder, X looks at the cat wondering why it’s acting so strangely. Six more cats appear next to the cat, X finds this even stranger. The cats all start to slowly walk towards X; he then slowly starts to back away. Suddenly the cats’ rush at X hissing at him, looking as if they have the intent to attack him.

“What is this surprise my sister, at a time like this you have a surprise. It can’t be anything worse than what’s going on right now.“

Meow sadly looks Butterfly in the eyes, “do you remember when that prince in Zaynon and I started to date about three months ago. Remember you told me not to do anything stupid like sleep with him.”

Butterfly sternly looks at Meow, “you did not sleep with him Sing... you couldn’t have. You swore to me that you wouldn’t.”

Butterfly starts to levitate and starts cursing in Chinese. Meow looks Butterfly in the eyes and Butterfly stares back at Meow,

“Su… I’m pregnant.”

As X looks through the crack of a closet door he sees only one cat sitting outside the door. Curious as to where the other cats are X grabs his sword firmly and opens the door. The cat sitting there hisses at X and licks its mouth. The other three cats then fall on top of X from the ceiling and begin to claw and bite at him. The cat on the floor then jumps at X’s crotch. X tries to fight the cats off but they’re stronger than normal cats and begin to scratch deeper into X’s skin.

X attempts to fight off the cats as a few sentries flood the room X and the cats are fighting in. The sentries draw their swords and start to attack X, yet X still accurately fights off the sentries with the seven cats clawing at his body. X begins to draw his sword and the cats start to attack his arms, making sure that he can’t use his sword.

“You’re pregnant and didn’t tell me,” yells Butterfly.

“I’m your sister, I’m your best friend. You decide to tell me during our possible assassination, you’re full of it.”

Butterfly then floats over to Meow and hugs her.

“You have no idea how happy I’d be for you if the situation was different.”

Meow looks at Butterfly sadly, “Butterfly I told him last week that I’m pregnant. He didn’t take it so well, he told me to get rid of it. I told him how our family looks to have our numbers grow.”

Butterfly looks at Meow in dismay, and then says, “he put a hit on us after you declined to abort the child. No one else has ever come after us before now, and that’s a reason.”

With those words, Butterfly holds Meow and levitates her out of the castle.

While X fights off the cats and the sentries, he looks out of a nearby window and sees Butterfly and Meow flying away. He notices that he has to get away from the battle that he is in now. X spin kicks one of the sentries close to him into another knocking them all down. He then flips quickly and frantically all around the room, shaking the cats from his body. When he is freed from the final cat he withdraws his sword from its sheath and stops flipping. He sizes up his opponents and his eyes begin to glow red.

With three swings of his sword, X appears behind the cats and the sentries. He then runs from the room and jumps through a closed window shattering it. As the cats and sentries turn to look at which direction X went they all stop moving. Motionless the eerie sound of liquid dripping in the silent corridor alerts them to their fate. As they attempt to move they all begin to fall apart into 3 separate pieces and blood covers the room.

Up in the sky

“Sister, where are you taking us? We should be exacting revenge for our brothers.”

Butterfly looks at Meow and says, “We are going to exact revenge we’re going to see a man named Viceroy.” With those words, Butterfly begins to fly even faster.

“Butterfly who is this Viceroy. I’ve never heard you mention him before.” Meow says.

“Well, rumor has it that he’s the man to talk to when you want to hire Kamikaze X. We see him, we should be able to confirm who put this hit on our family.”

Meow then says, “so, what if he tells us nothing.”

“Then my sister, we’ll just have to kill him.” Butterfly says that coming closer to their destination.

Several hundred feet below them running with his sword housed nicely in its sheath is X. While running he starts to think of where they could be headed. They are approaching the city that Viceroy sometimes stays in. X thinks about it and knows that Viceroy only comes to this city for two reasons; to receive a job and to distribute one. As the sisters enter the city from above, X begins to go up to them. Realizing that earlier that day Viceroy left him a job in the statue, he thinks that he may still be in the city. X jumps building-to-building making his way up the rooftops of the city. When he gets to the highest rooftop near them he jumps up to the sisters height and draws his sword quickly.

Butterfly didn’t notice X and received a slice across the bottom of her right foot making her lose her concentration. They then begin to fall to a nearby rooftop, Meow lands on her feet like a cat and catches Butterfly. X lands softly with blood dripping off of his sword. Meow looks Butterfly in the eyes and Butterfly nods her head. Butterfly begins to reach within her kimono and pull out a small butterfly. X watches this firmly waiting for them to commit an act so that he can strike.

Butterfly throws the little butterfly towards X; the wings then expand as it flies toward him. Quickly X draws his sword ready to deflect the butterfly. Suddenly blades come out of the wings, X cuts the butterfly in half. That action allowed the butterfly to spawn into much smaller butterflies with bladed wings. X begins to fight them off getting cut all over his body, Meow then starts to leap rooftops following Butterfly’s instructions on where to go. They come to a rooftop looking across to an apartment building, a man with white hair sits at a desk smoking a cigar.

As Mei-Ling Chan looks over a list of possible candidates to join her task force, her phone begins to ring.

“Hello, this is Chan.”

A strange raspy voice responds, “Ms. Mei-Ling Chan it’s a pleasure to finally speak to you.” Mei-Ling a little confused asks, “Who’s this?”

The voice then says, “ this is a man that your government has inquired about for about twenty years, you’ve only known of me for the past two.”

“Viceroy…” she says, standing up from her desk. Mei-Ling hits a button on her phone to trace the call.

“Yes, you know who I am.”

She then says, “you’re calling me for what, turning yourself in?”

“No, no, nothing like that this is an opportunity calling.”

Mei-Ling makes a confused face, “an opportunity for what?”

Viceroy pauses for a moment then says, “For a chance to talk to my boy. The one you hassled earlier today. Yes, Ms. Chan, I was there.”

Viceroy blows hard as if he were smoking, “I watched you and your men follow him to a certain location, and of course, you were all defeated. I must admit bravo! No one pursuing my boy has ever gotten that close.”

Mei-Ling holds a moment before saying her next comment, “… Viceroy, you sure do boast nicely but why do you hide? Interpol would give…”

Viceroy cuts her off aggressively, “That’s enough young lady, I don’t exist remember. I’m just a name on a piece of paper that you received from very poor surveillance. This voice that you hear could be mine but it will not be recorded on that recorder that you have connected to your phone.”

Confused Mei-Ling asks, “Why is that Viceroy?”

“Oh, Why? You ask! Well, as it turns out there’s a second layer of sound running in the background that’s going through that wiring of yours straight to that central computer. That sound is deleting every file that has my boy's name on it or mine. That’s why I called your office and not your cell phone.”

With those words, Mei-Ling hangs up the phone and checks her computer, all the files linked to the names Kamikaze X and Viceroy had been deleted from the central computer. Mei-Ling holds her head in shame reviewing this. Suddenly her cell phone begins to vibrate on her desk. She views it and sees that it says, unknown caller. Mei-Ling hesitates to answer her phone then takes a chance and flips it open.

“Ms. Chan,” the same raspy voice from earlier speaks out, “I didn’t mean for you to hang up on me. I just wanted to schedule you to meet my boy… alone. Even though he’s not going to attack you, he will, if you leave him no choice.” Angrily Mei-Ling responds, “Where?”

“Soon, Ms. Chan. Very soon.” With those words, Viceroy hangs up the phone. Mei-Ling flips her phone closed, she begins to think about what she just did and walks over to her weapon case.