Tuesday, April 2, 1985

"I beg your pardon?" Ichiro distanced himself from Anya and wrinkled his forehead. "I don't know what that is. Are you saying I smell bad?"

Anya's bluish-grey eyes flashed with an emotion that he couldn't discern. "Not at all. You smell nice for Japanese man."

He stared back at her, unsure if her statement qualified as a compliment or an insult. "What?"

She smiled again and waved him off dismissively. "Don't worry about what I say when drunk. We continue talking and go to hotel later."

Ichiro was familiar enough with the modern world to know what going to a hotel entailed, so he decided to play hard-to-get. "I'm afraid we don't know each other well enough. It takes more than one conversation for me to open up like that."

Anya frowned and sat up straight. The air around them seemed to drop by at least a degree or two. "Very well. I shall leave and wait for friend to pick me up. You will be sorry soon." She stood up and hurried past Ichiro, the fabric of her dress rustling just inches from his face.

He realized he was about to lose another client, so he reached out in a panic and tried to bargain. "Hey, wait! Don't jump to conclusions so fast!"

Anya stopped in her tracks and spun around, drawing the attention of Shiro and everyone else nearby. "What's that?"

Ichiro swallowed as it became clear that he had landed in quite the dilemma. If he chose to go with this strange woman, then he would end up unfaithful to Kumiko. Nevertheless, he also enjoyed the challenge of working up through the ranks and feared the ostracism that would come with squandering a good opportunity.

"I care very much about my customers," he lied after some hesitation. "I'll go to a hotel with you if it makes you happy. I won't bother you too much about payment either."

Anya huffed as if she was an actor in a stage play. "Good. You understand me now." She rushed forward, catching Ichiro by surprise as she retrieved her brown fur stole and the empty vodka bottle. "You have other customer tonight?"

Ichiro recalled that his other regular client Mrs. Ito was on a business trip and wouldn't be back until Friday. "Not at all. I have plenty of time."

"Then you come with me. I make night worthwhile."

The implication of her words wasn't lost on Ichiro, but he rose to his feet regardless. Evidently, he would have to submit for the time being and find an excuse to leave before things went too far.

He only hoped Anya wouldn't perceive it as a rejection and turn to violence to make him stay.

******

"Nice night, isn't it?" Ichiro remarked while accompanying Anya to the love hotel that he had seen many times on the way to work. "How long have you been in Tokyo?"

"One week," Anya replied, swinging her empty vodka bottle back and forth.

"I see." Ichiro couldn't overcome his fear that the bottle would become a deadly weapon in the right circumstances. "It must be troublesome holding on to that. I can show you to a rubbish bin if you want."

Anya glared at him and stopped swinging. "Fine. I throw it away."

Ichiro showed her towards the narrow alley up ahead, where she begrudgingly disposed of the bottle. Then, they continued on their way and checked in at the hotel's reception.

The receptionist regarded them with curiosity as she handed over the key to their room on the fifth floor. He supposed that with foreigners being a rare sight even now, it was unheard of for relationships to occur between them and Japanese folk like himself.

So, he decided to stay safe and seek confirmation that he hadn't violated some unspoken rule.

"You don't find this wrong, do you?" he asked. "This is an unavoidable part of my job."

"It's all right," the receptionist gave him a strained smile. "If not you, then who else?"

Ichiro stopped to consider what she was insinuating, only for Anya to drag him over to one of the elevators in her eagerness to get started. Guilt came over him as the silver doors slid open and she pulled him inside.

"We will have good time. Trust me."

******

Ichiro offered to take a shower as soon as they arrived at the hotel room, knowing it would allow time to think of a proper excuse to abandon his post.

He thought of Mrs. Ozaki while toweling off afterwards, and decided to feign remembering an urgent appointment, so that Anya would have no choice but to let him go.

She was sitting on the bed and speaking on the phone in her native language when he emerged from the bathroom. Her placid expression did little to indicate whether she was talking about something good or bad, and Ichiro's paranoia grew when he realized there was no way of knowing who was on the other end.

"I was just calling friend," Anya announced after placing down the receiver. "They want to know where I am."

"Oh. That's a relief," Ichiro said with a smile despite his lingering doubts. "It's your turn to shower now."

"Yes." Anya got up from the bed and gave his body a once-over before making her way into the foggy bathroom. The door swung shut, and Ichiro felt exposed even in her absence.

He resolved to act on his plan as soon as she came out, but when minutes passed by without any sign of progress, he grew impatient enough to knock against the door.

"Are you finished in there? I've just remembered that I'm supposed to meet someone in half an hour," he called out. "I hope this doesn't disappoint you."

To his shock, Anya cackled like a madwoman as the spray of the shower finally stopped. "Silly boy," she taunted through the thin walls. "My friend Igor is on his way. He decide if you are worthy."

"What?"

"Just one more minute."

Heavy footsteps thudded outside and with a pounding heart, Ichiro turned to face the bedroom door, right before it burst open and a statuesque man with light brown hair and intense blue eyes stormed his way in.

"Who are you?" the foreign man bellowed in an accent that sounded much like Anya's.

"Rikyu..." Ichiro remembered once more to use his host name while regretting his terrible judgement. "I believe this is a misunderstanding, so I shall take my leave..."

He got up to approach the bathroom again, but the foreigner crossed his arms. "No. You stay."

Ichiro's hand hovered over the doorknob. "I beg your pardon?"

"Anya make mistake tonight, and now we must find solution."

Having heard her name being mentioned, Anya opened the bathroom door and tiptoed out with a towel wrapped around her body. She looked in the foreign man's direction.

"Igor, I am sorry."

Igor released a puff of cold air and lowered his arms. "No matter. You still young and foolish." He turned back to Ichiro with a scowl. "We have second guest coming. Unlike you, he is real vampire."

"I still don't know what that is."

"Then I will show you." Igor licked his lips as his canine teeth grew in length and became rather sharp at the ends. Ichiro was reminded of the first time he had seen Kumiko transform, so he tensely awaited the rest of the process.

However, nothing else happened, and Ichiro was left confused. "Is that all? Aren't you going to shapeshift?"

"You fool," Igor rasped. "I am not werewolf."

"Werewolf?" Ichiro glanced at Anya to find that she had also sprouted beastlike fangs. "I don't know that one either."

She gave him a look of pity, then bit her lip hard enough to release a trickle of dark blood. A creak sounded from out in the hotel corridor, catching Ichiro's attention before the door opened yet again and a young Japanese man sauntered in like there was nothing strange to be seen.

Ichiro noticed that the man possessed features many would consider harsh. With his high cheekbones, deep-set eyes, strong nose, and sharp jawline, he was evidently handsome in the same way as Hideo, and Ichiro surmised that this was the preferred ideal of attractiveness among male vampires.

"Good evening," the newcomer greeted while bowing first to Igor, then to Anya. He straightened his back and stared contemptuously down at Ichiro. "Who is this boy?"

"Our captive," replied Igor. "He come to us because of misunderstanding."

Ichiro froze at the realization that he was in deeper trouble than he could ever have imagined. He was cornered by three supernatural creatures he knew very little about, and there was no telling how they'd react if he tried to escape now.

The newcomer crouched in front of Ichiro and grabbed him by the chin. "That's a shame. He's got a pretty face and a nice body."

Ichiro squirmed against the man's firm grip and tried to raise his leg so he could deliver a strong enough kick to free himself, only to find that for whatever reason, his body refused to obey him and seemed intent on remaining exactly in its current position.

"But I'm still new to this whole vampire business," the Japanese man declared, letting go of Ichiro and rising to face Igor and Anya. "Until last month, I was just an ordinary guy, living off my father's money and going to nightclubs whenever I was bored. I've never killed anyone before, so I'd like you to show me how it's done."

Ichiro's heart began beating so hard that he expected it to explode out of his body. He glanced around in terror, hoping for some salvation and release from the paralysis he was under.

"Very well," Igor acceded. "Anya, do your thing."

The Japanese man stepped away from Ichiro to make way for her. She knelt down at the foot of the bed and slipped her fingers beneath his chin. "Don't worry, pretty boy. I make this quick."

She pressed her other hand against his neck, giving him only enough time to blink before she wrenched his head sharply to the right and a loud crunch filled his ears. Sharp pain flooded his neck and scalp, then quickly dissipated as his body went numb. He slumped backwards upon the hotel bed, making out the blades of the ceiling fan through his blurred vision.

All the while, three shadowy figures drifted towards him. They forced his limp body off the bed and dragged him into the bathroom, where he was dumped unceremoniously in the bathtub and abandoned to the sound of a slamming door.

******

Ichiro had no idea how long he'd been lying alone in the darkness when his fingers regained sensation, and he was able to wriggle them as he pleased. Then, he became aware once more of the existence of his arms and legs and tried flexing them to make sure they were in working order.

Once he was satisfied with the level of movement, he clambered out of the bathtub and landed on the cold tiled floor. Craning his neck, he spied his clothes folded in a pile by the bathroom sink and staggered towards it to get dressed.

He heard rhythmic creaking and loud moans coming from the next room as he pulled on his pants. There was no mistaking what his vampire captors were doing, and while he would have peeked at them in curiosity under normal circumstances, his life currently depended on being able to escape without detection.

He buttoned up his shirt in a hurry and threw on his suit jacket, then turned his attention to the window above the bathroom sink. It looked just big enough for him to squeeze through, so he reached out to unlatch it and push it open.

Cool air drifted around him as he climbed onto the windowsill and poked his head out to estimate the distance between him and the narrow alleyway below. Given that he was on the fifth floor, it was likely that he'd fall about ten ken, or at least fifteen meters if Kumiko were to describe it.

I think I can survive that, Ichiro reassured himself. He stood up tall and sucked in a breath before leaping off the windowsill. Wind whistled past his ears and his insides shook as the paved ground reared up to meet him.

His eyes widened in regret, then everything went dark, and all of his thoughts vanished. 

******

A/N: The ken was an old Japanese unit of measurement that was generally a little shorter than two meters, but has now been standardized as 1.82 m. 

The math at the end is intentionally wrong to reflect how Ichiro has never received a formal education and is used to just estimating numbers.