Christmas Eve Murders

Chapter 3

As soon as the two left the alley, they're in the 'Oasis' car that only has a broken part by the roof, and it is on to a stop due to the traffic light going red. Vincent noticed Yoriko is not starting the car when the light went green.

"What are you doing?" he demanded.

"The roof is a mess, so I got to clean this up," she replied.

"So? Lady Macbeth, we're sitting here, and the light's green. You don't have the cleanest car in La-La Land, and you just have to get used to this. Focus on the job. Drive."

The car they're on is moving afterwards.

"Now we go to the 6th Ward on the Otome Road where there's an apartment called 7652 Mountain," the hitman gives out the details of the next stop.

"I see..." the waitress said with disdain.

"How long?"

"For about 17 minutes. Why?"

It is then that she realized.

"Oh, no. No, no, no. Hold on," Yoriko said.

"Now, I told you about five deliveries, meaning five stops. That was your first delivery, and now you're completing the next one," Vincent added.

"But you just killed that man afterwards. I thought this is just a delivery."

"So what? You drive this delivery car, I make my rounds. You might make it through the night, I'll give you more 1000 yen for your cooperation."

This is just frustrating for Yoriko as she realized that as long as she cooperates with this man, she might be declared guilty for the murders he'll pull for this Christmas Eve.

"I'm not trying to get you angry, but I can't do this," she started to protest. "I can't drive you around while you kill people. It ain't... it ain't my job!"

"Tonight it is," Vincent stated.

"Look, you don't get it," the woman started to panic even more. "I mean it! I'm... I'm not up for this!"

"You're stressed. I get it, so just keep breathing."

She started following his instructions to breath in and out to calm herself from this unexpected errand.

"Are you breathing?" Vincent asked.

"Yeah, I am," was her reply.

"You know, for the entire night, you'll just drive me around and never be the wiser, but Serpent ended up falling to your car, so I got Plan B. You just have to drive me through the night and I make my rounds. You know what they say, improvise, adapt to the environment, Darwin, shit happens, I Ching, whatever, we gotta roll with it."

"I Ching? What are you talking about?" Yoriko looks disturbed by his killing towards Nishiki, who is called Serpent. "You threw a man out of a window."

"I didn't throw him. He fell."

"Well, what did he do to you?" she questioned.

"What?" Vincent asked.

"What did he do to you?"

"Nothing. I only met him tonight," was his reply.

Yoriko is really disturbed by her client killing someone whom he only met for tonight.

"You just met him once and you killed him like that?" she demanded.

"What? I should only kill people after I get to know them?" Vincent asked the obvious, giving her the answer that he doesn't have to. Besides, he already knows his targets. "Yoriko, six billion people on the planet, you're getting bent out of shape cause of one ghoul."

"Do you even know who that is?"

"Yeah, that's one of the ghouls in that now wrecked cafe known as Anteiku. Why? Do you have a best friend who is a ghoul and working at that place?"

Upon hearing that last question, Yoriko looks quiet but disturbed. She now knows Touka is a ghoul, and that she truly misses her. If only she knew where she is living in Tokyo right now...

"I thought so. I suspect you don't know any Rwandans, so you don't know who is in the trunk," the hitman added.

As he looked outside, Vincent saw cops are present, but are too busy checking out with the ghouls that are living in the area. Because of this, his killings are going to be easy for the night.

They arrived at their destination, and they parked on the side. Just as he is about to leave the vehicle and do his killing, he handcuffed Yoriko by the wheel, and she glared at him for this.

"Just a precaution if you try to escape," he said before leaving. To her, it is obvious.

Vincent took the delivery and walked his way to an apartment number known as 7652. He rings the doorbell, and his target answers it. Her name is Kaya Irimi, and she is a ghoul. In fact, she is Black Dog of the Black Dobers where she is the leader of a group of ghouls wearing Doberman-like black masks.

"Here's your delivery," he said.

"Thank you, sir. I'll be having this, and you can leave," she attempted to take her delivery, but he refuses to hand it over to her.

"But first, eat this, and make sure you digest this."

"What?"

"You heard me?"

Kaya has no clue that the man will kill her. Following his instructions, she started to eat human food, which a ghoul like her can't eat of due to her physiology. As a result, she started to feel like she's about to puke, but tries not to. After all, her delivery man is watching this, hoping she won't do this. This mirrored how Touka tried not to puke any human food Yoriko tried to make her eat in their high school days.

"Well, what do you think?" Vincent asked.

"It's... good," the female ghoul tried to hide her pain from the food she ate, but he can see through this.

"Good, because you're dead."

With those words out of his mouth, he pulls out his handgun and lands two shots to her chest, then one to her head, killing her. This is called the Mozambique Drill. Kaya is dead, so he left the place and went back to the delivery car, but before he could do so, he noticed two men walked past the vehicle with his briefcase being carried. Vincent realized Yoriko tried to call for help while she's being in captive, but all she got was two men attempting to rob her so they stole the briefcase.

Looks like they stole the item from the wrong man.

"Yo, homie," Vincent called for them. "Is that my briefcase?"

"You mean this? Why? You want it back?" the thug raises his gun at him, putting his hands in the air. "What else you got for me, huh?"

The hitman pushes his gun to another direction and shoots him twice in the chest. He even shot his accomplice two times in the chest and one in the head to kill him. As Yoriko saw this, she is in despair due to him killing without remorse. Vincent got his briefcase back and shot the thug in the head, finally killing him. He walked to the car and undo the handcuffs on Yoriko.

"A lesson to be learned, Yoriko. You attract attention, you're going to get people killed who didn't need to be," he said before forcing her to drive to their next location.

Two down, three to go.