Don't Ask Don't Tell

Chapter 15: The mob runs unchecked, murdering as they please.

  An hour and two changes into business dress later, V was leading Yoongi by the hand into an unmarked building in the middle of fucking nowhere. How the mafia managed to find a bunch of unmarked abandoned places in one of the biggest cities in the world, Yoongi would never know.
V led him into a boardroom, where Jungkook sat, flanked by Felix and Changbin.
"Oh, good. You're here. Suga, welcome." Jungkook greeted them.
"Enough with the niceties. What the fuck do you want?" V said as Yoongi gave a tentative wave.
"Well, I have some news," Jungkook said, with an oddly sadistic grin. "We've found a rat."
"Literal or metaphorical?"
"Metaphorical. Greasy little fucker's been snitching us out for months, apparently."
"And who is it?"
"Well," Jungkook said, punctuated by a loud thump from the hallway. "Why don't you see for yourself?"
Yoongi pressed himself into a corner as two of the largest men he had ever seen in his life burst through the door and unceremoniously threw someone into a chair. The manhandling was hardly necessary, since whoever it was only looked to be about 1.62m tall and rail thin. He continued to struggle as they tied him down, a wholly unneeded black fabric sack over his head.
"You made the stupid mistake of hiring him, after all. God, I should have known what a moron you are." Jungkook said, looking pointedly at V. Yoongi was too caught up in who they'd just dragged in to really care. There was only one person that short and skinny at work. It couldn't be him, could it? Yoongi thought back to all the shitty, bitter looks, the smugness in recent weeks, the glares across the locker room.
One of the massive bodyguards pulled the bag off of his head. There, sat before him, looking as pissed off as Yoongi had ever seen, sat Ruki.
Yoongi felt his heart stop for a moment.
"You." V said the same way someone might say "tapeworm." He looked at Ruki with the most intense disdain Yoongi had ever seen in his life.
"Yeah. Me." Ruki said, seemingly not phased by the absolute rage V was looking at him with.
Yoongi thought this was a situation that was... not going to end well, what with V's periodic explosive fits of inexplicable slobbering looney tunes rage, Felix's well-documented clownfuck lunacy, Jungkook's complete lack of emotion other than contempt, and Changbin's continual decision to stay by Felix no matter what, this was going to go very badly. And Ruki didn't seem to care at all.
"What the fuck did you think-"
"You're a shitty person, fucking over a bunch of other people because you're a fuckwit." Ruki spat.
The sharp crack of the back of V's hand striking Ruki's face was the loudest thing Yoongi had heard that day.
"You're not going to make me change my mind with violence."
"Oh, but I can try, can I not?"
"Are we killing him in a boardroom?" Felix asked, eyes wide and hopeful, much like a Dickensian orphan at a sweet shop window. "That's so fucked, I love it."
"But the carpet..." Jungkook said, looking down at the blue carpeting under them. "It's gonna be so hard to get blood out of this."
"Tear it up." Changbin supplied.
"You're smarter than I give you credit for."
Changbin smiled, and Yoongi realized it was the first time he'd actually seen Changbin smile in a genuine way before.
"What did you tell them?" V said, crossing his arms and looking at Ruki. "And who told you?"
"Lots of things. I'm not telling you-"
This time, it was a closed fist and not an open hand. V's ring left a welt, although the massive bleeding cut was more impressive. So that's why people wore big fancy rings; easier to injure people with.
"What did you say?"
"You're a cunt."
"Are we doing this the easy way or the hard way?" V asked, looking at Ruki like a mother might at a disobedient child. Ruki smiled in a dangerous display of defiance.
V slid his suit jacket off and folded it neatly on the boardroom table, rolling up his sleeves as he did so.
"The hard way it is. I don't care what I have to do to make you tell me what you snitched us out for, you will tell me at some point."
"We'll see about that."
Felix gave V a look of absolute joy. Yoongi felt sick.
V smiled at Felix, who produced a pocketknife seemingly out of nowhere. What thirteen year old had a pocket knife? The crazy ones, apparently.
"Can I?"
"Of course. You get first crack, short stack."
Felix gave a squeal of absolute glee. Yoongi watched as Felix bounced over, looking at Ruki's face intently.
Jesus fuck. What had he gotten himself into? Crazy children slicing up someone's face? Bank robbery? The mafia?
Yoongi watched as Ruki spat in Felix's face, blood flinging from a cut above his eye.
"Get your brat off of me."
"Wanna tell us what you told the cops?"
"I'd rather die."
"Then the brat stays directly where he is."
"I'm not a brat. And I don't belong to anyone." Felix interjected, poking Ruki's cheek with the tip of his pocket knife.
"You're Yakuza property, kiddo. Sorry, you had to learn the hard way." Jungkook said. Felix frowned, slicing into Ruki's face again.
"I'm not a brat, though. Right?"
"Nah," V said, patting him on the shoulder. "Far from it. Don't listen to him."
"How wonderful. A real Kodak moment, here. If you quit slicing into my fucking face, I'd be touched."
Felix answered thusly with a stab, burying the knife up to the hilt in Ruki's shoulder.
"Better?" Felix asked as Ruki shrieked. Jungkook smirked.
"I like this kid."
"He's an even bigger asshole than you are." V quipped. Felix yanked the knife out. Yoongi wasn't sure if Ruki squealed more when it came out or when it went in. V knelt down so he was eye-level with Ruki, who looked infinitely more terrified than he did earlier. It's a miracle, you stab someone and they instantly start talking. There's just something about being bound and gushing blood that makes people a lot more willing to cooperate. Funny thing, that.
"Hurts, doesn't it?"
"You're fucking crazy."
"You can tell us what they know, or it'll get a lot more painful," V said. "I'm trying to bargain with you, here."
"I don't want to bargain."
"Does that mean I have to get more violent?"
"I'd rather you didn't," Ruki said, looking around the room.
"Well, I didn't want to have to do this, but," Jungkook said, and the grin that stretched across his face made Yoongi feel even more uneasy. "It's not you I'll injure to get information."
There was only a moment of confusion before they dragged Reita in, bleached hair falling in messy waves in his eyes. Unlike Ruki, Reita wasn't exactly fighting back.
"What did you do?" Reita hissed, and Ruki looked at him like he had just spit in his eyeball.
"I did exactly what I told you I was doing."
"You knew about this?" V asked, turning his attention to Reita. Reita looked like he was incredulously bored, which V didn't seem to take a liking to.
"I heard bits and pieces. I didn't know he'd go this far."
Judging by the looks of it, V didn't believe a single word Reita had just said. Yoongi couldn't blame him. After all, it was easy to tell that Reita was full of shit. Unfortunate for him, V didn't enjoy being lied to.
"Bits and pieces, hmm? And what would those be?"
"If Ruki hasn't told you, neither will I."
A look of absolute lunacy crossed V's face. Jesus Christ, what kind of shit was this going to start? At the end of all this, they really might need to tear up the carpet. Ruki had already left an impressive blood pool. Yoongi had the feeling it was about to get a whole lot messier.
"You can start talking," V said, pausing a moment before pulling what Yoongi could only describe as a fuck-off massive knife seemingly out of nowhere. "Or we'll have to clean arterial blood spray off the wall."
"This is all your fucking fault." Reita spat, uncharacteristically angry. "If you just kept your fucking mouth shut."
"I couldn't, it was impossible. That's kind of in my fucking job description, Reita."
"And you had to drag me into this?"
"I didn't drag you into this."
"You kind of did, when several very large men in suits arrived at my apartment and dragged me into a waiting van in the street, because of your job description, it kind of implies that this is all your fucking fault."
"I didn't think-"
"Do you ever?" The ropes binding him strained against his arms. "Do you ever consider that maybe, just maybe, doing a bunch of shit like this, being undercover and screwing around with the fucking Yakuza, might bring consequences to people other than yourself?"
"No. But don't act like it's me cutting your head off."
"You signed my fucking death warrant. It might as well be."
"Lover's quarrel?" Jungkook interjected, seeming to find the display endlessly amusing. He did enjoy undue human suffering, after all. V raised the knife, tip of the clip-point under Reita's chin.
"This is a great time to fight with your boyfriend, but I'm going to have to interrupt. What do you know that he won't tell us?"
Reita sighed.
"Fine. They know about the racketeering, the property crime, six thefts over two months totalling about 83 million, four murders, three prostitution rings, and a partridge in a pear tree."
"Is that everything?"
"One chop shop. And the sex trafficking. Don't forget the smuggling of both drugs and firearms."
"How long has this been happening for?"
"About three months that I know of."
Three months? Yoongi thought back three months ago. The roundtable discussion that he'd seen, where he'd first really talked to V, was that about Ruki? Did they know that far back?
V didn't seem to care very much about all of that.
"Did he name names?"
"Yes."
"Whose?"
"I can't disclose that," Reita said, and the knife moved to his neck. V grabbed a handful of Reita's newly bleached hair and yanked his head back, knife blade across his throat.
"Can't, or won't?"
"Both. Neither. Yes, maybe. Also, no. Does that answer everything?"
"You don't have much of a will to live, do you?"
"Well, since I already know Ruki's dying, I don't think it matters very much."
"How sweet," Jungkook said. "You're so loyal. You must really love that filthy rat."
Reita didn't answer. Yoongi stared at the carpet, noting that Ruki was bleeding out surprisingly rapidly.
"Don't," Ruki said. "Don't kill him."
V smirked. Felix sat cross-legged on the boardroom table, watching like this was a TV soap opera.
"I don't want to die. Please. Don't." Reita said, and Yoongi was alarmed that Reita actually looked afraid. Reita was always stoic, completely emotionless. "I've told you everything."
"I'll make the decision on that," V said. Yoongi could have sworn V pressed the knife a little harder in, just to prove a point. Ruki thrashed as violently as he could, but he didn't do very much.
"Reita?'
"What?"
"This is going to sound stupid," Ruki said, looking barely conscious. "But you know, I really do love you. And I'm sorry for dragging you into this."
"If I manage to survive, I'll remember you every day and everywhere because you've occupied everything in my life. You know that, right?"
"Of course."
"This is getting mushier by the second," Felix remarked, seemingly unimpressed. "I want death."
"We all want death, kiddo," Jungkook replied, and V looked more than happy to oblige.
"I'm sorry it had to pan out this way," V said. "But let's face it, you never were very good at bartending."
With a sharp jerk of his hand, the blade went into Reita's throat. The blood spray was intense enough to splatter Ruki's face. Yoongi nearly threw up. With a few disturbing gurgles, Reita slumped and didn't move again. V took the edge of Reita's white shirt and wiped the blood off the knife. Ruki started shrieking hysterically. Apparently watching a loved one die was enough to bring him back from the almost-dead.
"Don't kill me. Please. Please. I'll-" Ruki cut himself off when he spotted Yoongi again, the recognition flashing in his eyes.
"Suga. Don't let them do this. Don't let me die. Not like this."
"I'm sorry." Yoongi choked out. He had fucking hated Ruki for the last three months, but he didn't want him murdered.
"Oooo, this is more interesting," Felix remarked. "What do you think he'll do?"
"Ten bucks says he breaks and cries like a little bitch," Jungkook said.
Yoongi felt his heartache replace with anger. He wasn't that sensitive. He wasn't going to cry. Fuck, he'd killed a guy before, hadn't he?
He'd killed someone before.
Yoongi felt that maybe, he could do it again. To prove a point.
Yoongi took the knife from V and, barely thinking twice about it, plunged that fucker straight through Ruki's neck. Blood spray coloured his face a light red.
Explaining this one would be difficult later.
"Wow. You owe me a tenner." Felix said. Jungkook grumbled and fished his wallet out as Ruki gargled to death in front of them.
This was one fucked up chess game, and Yoongi wasn't going to be taken out by another pawn if his life depended on it, based upon principal itself.
Yoongi pulled the blade out of Ruki's neck, wiped it clean on V's suit jacket, turned on his heel, and left.