Afterwards: The Fourth Tekken Novel

Crashed Party

The party was more or less cancelled, now serving as an interrogation room.
"How did you even survive?" Lars grimaced as he asked. "That was a volcano that you were thrown into."
"And how are you so young?" Nina added, stuffing her face with some cake.
"I saw it with my own two eyes, you crumbled in that lava," Kazuya spoke, sounding disturbed. "I made sure."
"But yet, here you are," Lee scowled. "What is all of this? Are you a cockroach or something? Or are you something else? Did the lava somehow make you young?"
"He was cloned," Jun's voice got everyone's attention. "You cloned yourself so that you can forever torment Kazuya, didn't you..."
Kazuya wordlessly got up and walked towards the nearest window. He paused for a moment, standing in front of the glass as he stared at nothing in particular. Kazuya sighed and sat himself at a further table.
"I didn't expect that all of these changes would happened, at the time, I only thought that things would just worsen..." Heihachi sighed. "And now it just feels like I'm invading something..."
"You are invading something," Jin blatantly said. "You just want your family to suffer more and more, don't you..."
Heihachi turned away, a frown on his face. "So what are you doing with this Zaibatsu?"
"We aren't giving it back, if that's what you're asking," Jin practically had him cornered. "You did bad things with this company. It took me ages to clean its name."
"Why did you choose to come back?" Lee frowned, still holding his baby. "After all these years too?"
Shasha sighed. "Haiya, this feller die also, he clone and come back." She whispered. "Come back young some more." She realised that she had seen white hair poking from under the hat and looked for it. She spotted it laying upturned on the table in front of Heihachi. Shasha wasn't even surprised to see that the white hair came with the hat. "So you disguised yourself to look old with that hat?"
"Yes," Heihachi nodded. "Who even are you? And how are you so close with them?"
"Because she didn't once try to ruin our family or kill any of us," Kazuya remarked from the table he sat at. "She only helped us, helped us reunite. Unlike you."
Heihachi frowned. "Kazuya..."
It seemed like Kazuya finally lost his cool as he stood up so fast that the impact threw the chair back. "What, so you think you can just come back like this and try to pull everything back to its old ways?!" He paused and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I understand. I understand that it was hard to go through what you did, with your wife turning against you after she had given you a son. But what did Grandpa do to you? All he ever did was give you the best, give me the best. What did he ever do to you?"
"What did five-year-old Kazuya ever do to you?" Lee added, stepping up for his brother as well. "I've never seen him in person at that age, but he was one of the most adorable kids I've ever seen in pictures." He smirked. "Other than myself and Tori, of course."
"Glad to see that you haven't changed much, to say the least," Heihachi remarked. "But you're a father now." He paused before speaking again. "Now that's just strange."
"What, me being a better parent than you is strange?" Lee looked at him smugly. "At least I'm here for my child, children in the future, while you. You only hammered hateful thoughts into our heads, and what about your other kids?" Lee laughed. "You didn't even try to care for them, did you?"
Lars scowled. "I've seen you like, what, three times as a child? Even that, your efforts were way below the minimum."
Anna sighed. "So like, you're young, but your brain is old?"
"When they cloned me, I managed to make my DNA younger, it's easier to do that than do it to myself, older self. But I had fully cloned my memories, at least up to before the final battle."
"So you don't remember me killing you?" Kazuya scowled.
Heihachi shook his head. "No."
"Then I don't mind doing it again," Kazuya cracked his knuckles as he stepped closer.
Jun groaned. "Kazuya, please don't. You know what happens when the cycle restarts."
Kazuya turned to look at Jin, who sat near Heihachi with his eyes filled with anger and hatred. He was at the brink of tearing Heihachi apart. Flashes of his past fights with Jin, fights with both him and Heihachi together. They were a miserable bunch, fighting amongst themselves for power alone. He thought all of that ended since he had ended Heihachi, but here he was again, physically younger than before. 
"What do you want of us?" Kazuya sighed as he went towards Heihachi. "What do you need to stay away from us?"
"I don't need anything else, I already have everything," Heihachi muttered.
"A place to live?" Jun asked.
Heihachi nodded. "One of my old guesthouses just in the outskirts of Tokyo, near Tsukishima. That's where I've been all along."
"Yet, you don't know a thing about what we've been up to?" Jin couldn't help but say.
"I was deep in training, training for a fight that I realise now I would never have," Heihachi said. "I'm still in shock about everything that has happened, how you're all living your lives in peace. I... don't think I want to destroy all of this."
Heihachi slowly got up and left the room. Hwoarang looked around at everyone else, realising that no one made a move, and went after Heihachi to make sure that he left the building instead of loitering about in the corridors.
"This is outrageous, why did he have to do this?" Adam groaned. "And I thought I managed to dodge all of the bad stuff."
"At least he didn't invade your taxi to get here," Shasha sighed. "That was terrifying, not gonna lie."
"He didn't do anything to you, right?" Steve asked again.
Shasha shook her head. "Nah. He even paid the driver, so my ride was free."
"He wouldn't do anything to anyone that doesn't concern him," Kazuya stated. "For him, the power of the Devil Gene must be his."
"So that means... he's gonna try and... extract yours and Jin's powers?" Shasha said, confused. "Like does he have... a harness(?) for it?" 
Jin shrugged. "I'm honestly not sure what he even planned to do. The last time I checked, his plan was to shoot me in the head and leave."
"He shot you in the head?!" Shasha said in surprise. "Gosh, some grandfather..."
"Don't say that, he is not my grandfather past genetics," Jin frowned. "The only favour he has ever done for me is bring my father into this world, though he tortured him so much, but at least that happened."
Kazuya shook his head. "I barely survived my childhood. Thank my servants for that. And also my grandfather."
Jun had a pained look on her face as she put an arm around him, leaning against his arm. Though she spoke no words, that was a gesture that provided the comfort that he needed.
"We have to keep a lookout," Lars said. "Guys, we need to train harder. Who knows what he's planning on us."
Lee nodded. "He's right. We have to prepare ourselves. All of us."
Hwoarang returned at that moment, breathless. "He left the building. I made sure."
The rest didn't know what to respond to that, but thanked him for his effort nonetheless.
"So... party?" Hwoarang awkwardly said.
To his dismay, his statement didn't have the desired effect.