Chapter 5

  Tanya leaned forward her shovel placed across her legs as she rested her head in her hands and began to plan out a convincing story that would pass muster for both her and Visha. After several minutes she had the outline of her own backstory and would have to flesh out any details she missed as they were asked of her.

  Visha’s was another story due to the language barrier. She was partially worried that Visha’s German and Russian would be too different from this worlds. It was by accident she had found out that English was the same in both worlds, but she had never gotten the opportunity to speak Japanese with anyone in the Empire to test if it was also the same.

  It was closing in on the two-hour mark since they had first shown up on this world, and Tanya could feel herself getting impatient. Haste makes waste and all that but every moment she spent planning was a moment that something could go wrong taking the initiative out of her hands. Finally, she decided it was good enough and waved Visha over to explain to her their story.

  The essence of their backstory would mostly focus on Tanya. It sounded like something from a K-drama, but it would work. Tanya’s father Kaizaki Soto visited a dive bar sometimes after work and on weekends where he met a foreigner hostess from Germany named Hannah Degurechaff. Not knowing her situation, he began relations with her, concluding with the conception of Tanya.

  Soto did not know of the child, he was also unaware that the foreigner was an undocumented worker owned by the local yakuza. They planned on using the child to extort money from Soto. Thus, Tanya was born in a sketchy clinic that made no record of the birth. She was allowed to grow and her mother continued working for the gang.

  Years passed and Tanya turned ten, then Soto was approached with the big reveal. For a few more years things went well, Soto paid his dues and got to visit Tanya and her mother, as well as keep clean of any scandal. Then Tanya’s mother died and there was no one to take care of Tanya. Soto found out and wanted to take Tanya away. He was killed shortly after.

  Then Tanya was moved around and sold to another gang where she met Viktoriya Ivanovna Serebryakov. Visha was trafficked from Russia after her father, a criminal vagabond, finally had his debts catch up to him. Visha was sold to pay off those debts and transferred to Japan.

  Finding herself alone and unable to understand anything anyone was saying, she latched onto the first person who spoke a shared language, Tanya. They had been placed in a container together for transport at one point and had figured out they both spoke German. After that, for convenience they were kept together, Tanya acting as a translator for Visha.

  After telling Visha to stay light on the details and to try and act traumatized as much as possible.

  “You’re going to have to act like a scared little girl as much as possible Visha. Try acting uncomfortable whenever they talk to you and I’m not around, we want to reinforce the dependency angle as much as possible.”

  Visha gave Tanya an incredulous look. She couldn’t imagen what Tanya acting like a scared innocent girl would look like and doubted her buddy could pull it off. The aura of command hung on her like a mantle. Shaking those idle thoughts from her head Visha settled in and focused on memorizing her story.

  ~

  In the stillest part of the night they made their move. Reentering the hallway they silently made their way to where they heard the heavy footsteps disappear to. Moving down the hall they came upon another doorway. It was unlocked and after easing the door open just enough for a visual, they made their first contact.

  The form of a man lay sleeping in a single person bedroom. The room was clearly a personal space with all manner of personal effects strewn about. Clothes, bottles and cans made up the majority of the mess. In the center of it all was a futon with the man sleeping on his side facing them. Tanya could see the telltale gang tattoos on the man’s only visible arm and shoulder.

  She debated interrogating the man but decided against it in favor of stealth. Leaving the man alone, they closed the door and moved further down the hall. The plan required them to find a large group of enemies and engage them thus drawing in all other combatants, while making the scene look like that of a fight between gangs.

  Slowly assassinating everyone while they slept would raise too many questions for the police. The most difficult part would be making sure they stayed clean and didn’t leave any witnesses.

  Finally, they made it to what must be the kitchen and communal area. There were several drunk men passed out on a couch as well as two men sitting at the kitchen table speaking in soft tones, a bottle of sake and glasses between them. The remains of a card game that must have at one time included more members lay scattered on the table.

  Two other doorways led off into other rooms. All this Tanya took in in but a moment as she searched for a weapon that would not be connected back to her if used. The weapon she was searching for was shortly provided as one of the men at the table noticed them and stood up. Grabbing clumsily at his belt for his knife and flicking it open.

  “Who the hell are you two! How did you get in here. Kato get up! Some of the merchandise got out!” he shouted kicking at his companion.

  His actions had begun rousing the other occupants of the room. As they began to collect themselves a few men rushing in from the other rooms adding to the confusion. The newcomers began shouting commands and questions at each other. During the commotion Tanya noticed a large kitchen knife float over to Visha’s gloved hand.

  Leaning over Tanya ordered “Remember try to conserve your mana and watch out for blood spatter we need to make sure nothing places us here for the fight.”

  “Yes ma’am, I don’t know if I’ve ever been this happy to clean up trash.”

  “Not since Moskva eh Visha.”

  “To be truthful, I think that time was more enjoyable for you then me ma’am, my family fled before it got too bad.”

  “Your father must have been a smart man to see the writing on the wall and get out while he could. Now eyes up they finally got their act together.”

  As Tanya had said, the thugs had finally thrown off their confusion at the blatant disregard the two young women were giving a room full of armed men.

  If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  Tanya was sure a thug had shouted something or other as he stomped towards them, but she didn’t bother listening as she magically pulled the man’s knife from his own hand and launched it into another man’s chest. Then Visha’s kitchen knife sliced into another thug’s leg and all hell broke loose. People started screaming and shouting. A few ran for it clearly freaked out by what had just happened, but most charged at Tanya and Visha.

  “Spit up and prioritize the deserters!”

  Tanya covered herself in her protective film making sure nothing made contact with her or stained her uniform, as she reinforced herself and proceeded to bury her fist in a man’s gut. Pulverizing a kidney with the force of her blow. Taking a metal bat from his now limp hands, she rushed past in in a burst of speed, smashing one of the fleeing yakuza in the back of the head with the bat. Pivoting, she threw it at another catching him in the small of his back, sending him tumbling into a wall headfirst. Tanya made a mental note to ensure he was dead later.

  Then a gunshot rang out, startling everyone into silence for a moment. Tanya turned toward the shooter only to hear Visha shout out “Dibs!”. Before She practically appeared in front of the man. Grabbing his arm and slipping her hand over his trigger finger she began shooting every other gangster in the room alternating her shot location’s making sure each one would prove lethal. She shot several of the men twice and one man three times before stabbing a knife into the gunman’s back piercing his lung on one hit and kidney on the next.

  Tanya noted that the gunman was the same man who they found in the first room all by himself. Must have been the leader to get a room all to himself, she thought to herself. Eyeing the room, there was no one left moving and few left groaning. Aside from some screams coming from the room the girls had been left in, no one else seemed to be making a sound. Tanya and Visha moved around the room placing weapons back in people’s hands and ensuring everyone was dead.

  Tanya then made several bloody partial footprints going towards the exit with a dead man’s shoes before putting them back on his feet after recoating them in blood. Looking over the scene it looked like a fight had broken out whether from attack or disagreement would be hard to uncover. The only evidence left was that after a brawl several people had fled leaving the bodies behind.

  The two left the scene dropping their protective films, as they made their way towards the room with the girls. Tanya noted that her mana reservoir was down to a little less than half. She was frankly Startled by how far it had dropped. Especially since they had not even used any heavy spells. In the other world Tanya could keep her flight formula, protective film and defensive shell up nearly all day and only feel tired after doing so. Now however, she was seriously running low on mana, and it wasn’t refilling.

  “Visha, how’s your mana level doing?”

  “A little over half full, but it’s not replenishing, you were right Tanya there seems to be no mana here to absorb.”

  “Well, we shouldn’t need it in the future, and this way we won’t be tempted to use magic where we aren’t supposed to and draw attention to ourselves.”

  Tanya pulled out the phone she had taken from off the table in the kitchen and began looking up the number to several news stations, noting them down. She then looked up her location on the phones map app, finding out that they were indeed in Tokiyo as she had suspected, though she didn’t recognize the area they were in. With that information she called up the police from her old prefecture and explained the situation in a panicked voice. Only stating that they heard a fight and gunshots and claiming they were kidnapped before sharing their location. When asked to remain on the phone Tanya denied claiming that they didn’t want to get caught and hung up.

  Walking back down the hall Visha popped into the room they had originally shown up in grabbing her pillowcase bag of clothes, not seeing Tanya’s scowl as she took up her usual position at Tanya’s back.

  Stopping again in the studio room with the cameras and film props, Tanya and Visha ditched their combat knives, on a table next to a cheap katana, a whip, and what Tanya recognized as one of the magical girl wands from Sailor Moon. Exiting the room quickly before Visha could get a good look at any of the other objects on tables.

  The hallway had gone quiet in the last few minutes as they made it to the room where the captives were. Knocking softly on the door they unlocked it and slowly stepped in. Every occupant in the room was looking at the door with fear in their eyes. All were huddled together on the far side of the room. Tanya held up her hands in a calming manner speaking slowly and calmly.

  “It’s ok were not here to hurt you. We were brought here earlier tonight; they were going to do… That to us, but someone showed up and started yelling at them, so they put us in a different room. That was hours ago and then we heard a fight and gunshots. Then it got quiet, so we snuck out again, the front room is a mess there are ba, bodies everywhere and no one’s moving. I grabbed a phone and called the police. Does anyone else want to try and call them.” She said while holding out the phone.

  One of the older women stepped forward hesitantly and took it glancing at Visha who had closed the door and was pretending to tremble as she guarded it, her shovel in shaky hands.

  “What’s with the outfits?” The woman questioned as she took the phone and began to dial.

  Tanya put on a sad face mixed with shame and whisper shouted, “They used to dress us both up in all kinds of costumes and take pictures, this was just the last one we were wearing before getting moved here.”

  Tanya tried, she really tried to produce some tears, but she just couldn’t so she settled for biting her lip and widening her eyes trying to look pathetic. It must have worked because the posture of the woman softened. Then the call connected, and she seemed to lose what calm she had managed to muster as she began sobbing into the phone trying to explain to the police her situation.

  After giving her a few minutes to get the story out, Tanya again took the phone and handed it to another girl telling her to call a different police station. Explaining that she was worried that some of the cops might be in on it. That seemed to make sense to most of the captives, so Tanya proceeded to give them the numbers to the news stations to call next to keep them busy.

  Then she began covering her bases by asking the girl she had knocked out if she remembered her. Unfortunately, the girl did so Tanya apologized for hurting her, explaining to everyone that her and Visha were put in a different room but snuck out, and came to this room earlier.

  When the girl had started talking loudly and crying Tanya had gotten scared that they were going to get caught so she hit her to make her be quiet, but she must have done it too hard.

  Tanya apologized again, only for the young girl to apologize to her for having caused a commotion and almost gotten them in trouble. God, I missed this country and how polite and apologetic everyone is Tanya praised in her head.

  They settled in for a long wait, Tanya predicting that with the type of call they had made it would take the police a while to come out in force. With the added danger of firearms mixed in, they were probably going to assemble a specialized unit.

  So, Tanya took up position at the door with Visha, their shovels in hand. I wasn’t too long before the other captives loosened up a bit, some chatting among themselves, others just sat on the floor crying. The foreigners mostly just looked confused. After a while they began to hear the sirens.

  A few minutes later they heard a door slam and men shouting. Some of the captives began screaming again, some in fear, but most calling for help.

  It wasn’t long after that that Tanya heard heavy footsteps in the hall outside their door. Glancing at Visha, they both stepped back from the arc of the door and made sure they put their shovels back into their carriers. Tanya definitely didn’t want to get shot up by some trigger-happy rookie, and the odds of being able to keep their trusty shovels after this increased if they weren’t seen as a weapon by the police.

  The door was kicked in and after being blinded by a tactical light Tanya’s eyes adjusted enough to see the barrel of the gun the light was attached to. As well as the hard-faced man wearing a vest with the kanji for the SAT, the Special Assault Taskforce. The shouted orders to “get on the ground and put your hands on your head!” followed.

  Tanya quickly complied while giving Visha a look to do likewise. They stayed that way for several minutes with no officers moving to cuff them yet. It didn’t take long for some of the younger girls to start sobbing uncontrollably.

  Yet still they remained laying down in the commanded position, any sudden movements being berated and the orders of “Remain still! and Don’t move!” Being repeated every time someone did so.