Murder Time, Fun Time

With their gambling operations crippled and their enforcer having ‘committed seppuku’, the Ronin were really hurting. The Akujis were now vulnerable to major attacks by the Saints. The question that remained was where their hideout was.

While Shogo was young, reckless and stupid, chances were that his father, Kazuo, was going to keep him on a short leash. The old man was not the leader of the Yakuza for nothing.

For now, all Pinkamena could do was wait until something came up.

“Maybe we can go rescue some people from those mean guys who wanna abuse their sexual services?” Pinkie offered.

“You mean rescuing hos from some pimps?” Pinkamena tried to correct.

“Yeah, that, there’s someone who needs help like that at Brighton in the Downtown district.”

“Do you know who the contact is?”

“Someone named Helmers.”

Pinkamena frowned deeply, “Fuck that, I’m not helping that guy.”

“Why not?

“I heard about him from Playa, he’s insecure and the reason his hos leave him is because they can’t stand him. Honestly, if I have to see him, I’m not sure I can hold myself back from…” Pinkamena took a moment to choose her words to avoid disturbing her sister. “...from turning him into one of my art projects.”

“So what do we do about him? He still needs help.”

“Let Playa handle it. It’s about time he got his lazy ass out of the hospital anyway.”

“Wanna go visit him?”

“Might as well, I got nothing better to do anyway.”

With that, Pinkamena decided to head to the hospital where Playa was staying. On the way out, Johnny decided to tag along since he was getting bored of simply mopping the streets of Ronin.

The hospital receptionist caught sight of the man and mare entering the building and addressed them as they approached. “Hello, how can I help you?”

“We’re here to see our friend, Playa,” Johnny answered. “The one who was injured in a car accident.”

The receptionist looked through the record and found the person they were referring to. “Ah yes, the guy who doesn’t know the meaning of a red light at an intersection,” she snarked.

“That’s him.”

“He’s on the fourth floor in room four fifty-one.”

“Thanks.”

Johnny and Pinkamena entered a nearby elevator and went up to the fourth floor. Pinkamena could only deal with the annoying elevator music for so long before she pulled out her SMG and blasted the speaker the music was coming from.

“I thought that was nice music.” Pinkie commented.

“You and I have very different tastes.”

When the elevator finally reached the fourth floor, the duo casually walked out and toward the room Playa was staying in.

The sounds in Playa’s room were beeps from the medical equipment and the man’s loud sighs of boredom.

“Either find someone who can make the time to teach you how to drive or hire a driver,” Pinkamena commented. “On second thought, just hire a driver. I don’t want the Saints going bankrupt trying to teach you how to drive.”

Playa raised a middle finger at the pony as his sighs of boredom continued. He started speaking a moment later, “So how are things going with the Ronin?”

“Pretty good, we just took out their enforcer so now we just need to find out where the Akujis are staying so we can drop wherever they’re staying on top of them.”

“So Pierce and Shaundi aren’t much help in that regard?” Pinkamena shook her head in response. Playa thought for a moment. “Well, there’re only five hoods left under Ronin control.”

“They could also be somewhere in our territory so I doubt we can just search their areas and find the Akujis.”

Suddenly all of the lights went off and all of the medical equipment deactivated. The trio looked around in confusion for a moment before realization kicked in. “Time to leave,” Playa said.

Pinkamena drew her knife and made her usual evil smile.”Johnny, make sure Playa gets out of this place in one piece.”

“No fair, leaving me to do all the boring work while you get to have fun,” Johnny complained.

Pinkamena shrugged helplessly, “What can I say? I’m good at playing the antagonist of a horror movie where the protagonists die in the end.”

The Ronin who were still alive in the hospital huddled in a dark room where they hoped they would survive the fiasco they started. They had to wonder where it all went wrong.

While it started like a simple hunt for the Saints leader while he was recovering from some injury, it quickly turned into a nightmare as a pony stalked the Ronin from the darkness of the corridors that they themselves had darkened.

Each scream they heard was a sign that one of their own had disappeared from the group and there was no telling who was next. Creepy giggling could be heard all around them. Between the screams and the giggles, the Ronin were on edge and ready to fire at anything that moved.

The gang members moved as one while keeping an eye out in all directions for the one who had been abducting their comrades.

Despite their caution, some members of the group would slip up sometimes and give the mysterious intruder an opportunity to abduct another of their number.

Any reinforcements that arrived from the elevator only added to the scenery that was slowly turning into a scene of a bloodstained hospital in a horror movie as the bloodied bodies of their comrades were found in different rooms with their blood smeared all over the walls. The reinforcements only arrived as corpses whose blood smeared most of the elevator’s interior.

The stairways were the same as the elevator where the bodies appeared to have taken a tumble down the steps and smeared blood on the steps and railings.

With no reinforcements and their numbers dwindling from the monster with them, the group hid in the nearest room and tried to find hiding spots, hoping that the intruder would leave them alone if the Saints leader got away.

Their hopes were dashed as more screams and giggles were heard more often than before. It wasn’t long before the sounds were silenced and a lone Ronin called out to any of his comrades in a soft whisper. He turned around to call out to any others in a different part of the room before he saw a huge upside down smiling face fill his vision. He was about to scream but that was made impossible when a sharp pain was felt in his larynx. His scream attempt was made into a gagging sound as a sharp object buried itself deeper into his throat. He panicked as his blood rushed from the wound in his throat but any move he made only made her bury the object deeper into his throat.

“Shh, no screaming in the hospital…” the monster whispered.

The Ronin’s eyes rolled to the back of their sockets as the sweet embrace of death finally set him free from the horror before him.

By the time Pinkamena had reunited with Johnny and Playa at the helipad, Johnny had already shot down an attack helicopter with Playa’s RPG. He noticed the mare covered in blood before groaning in disappointment, “At least you got to have the time of your life.” Pinkamena smiled cheerfully at that.

The trio boarded the helicopter and returned safely to the hideout.

The next day Playa was up and about and ready to get something done after spending several days in the hospital after his traffic accident.

When Pinkamena found Playa fully recovered the first thing she did was request for him to help his old acquaintance, Helmers, who was pimping at an intersection in Brighton. Playa was a little surprised to discover the man had stopped conducting his operations from his old trailer but shrugged before asking Pinkamena the reason why she wouldn’t help. After the mare had explained her dislike of the man Playa decided that it would be a good idea if he handled it.

It only took Playa a few hours to finish helping Helmers gather up his prostitutes...again. Playa, Johnny and Pinkamena spent another two hours lounging around the hideout and watching the television before an uninvited guest made his way into the hideout.

“This is a helluva place you got here...I mean, it’s a good thing I had my tetanus shot, but beyond that it’s, uh...cozy,” the intruder said.

The intruder had slicked back blonde hair and wore a dark grey business suit with vertical stripes.

“Do I know you?” Playa asked.

“Name’s Dane Vogel, he works for Ultor,” Johnny answered. “I remember he swung by the church and offered Dex a job a while back.”

“So that’s strike one toward my list of people I wanna kill,” Pinkamena said. “Hiring the guy who laid a trap for me and Playa at the church is not a good way to start in my view.”

Vogel knew about the mare’s reputation. He was a smart man, smart enough to know that aggravating Pinkamena would only end with him as a mutilated corpse in a dumpster somewhere. Defending Dex’s decision would have definitely led to that so he changed the subject to more important matters.

“Who’s Dex?” Pierce asked as he walked in.

“Nevermind that. I have information you need about the Ronin.” Vogel said.

“And how do we know you’re not just yankin’ our chain?” Johnny demanded.

“The Akujis reside at the Tohoku Towers hotel in Filmore. I’ll wait for you here...if you don’t make it back, one of your boys can take me out.”

“Why are you giving us the info so freely?” Pinkamena asked.

“Let’s just say that Ultor and the Ronin have severed ties.”

“Let me guess, daddy didn’t like the deal his son made so he made unreasonable demands to drive you off and now you want revenge for them humiliating you.”

“‘Revenge’ is such a-”

“Shut it. The reason we’re not taking you out now is because I’d rather not have to face your company while The Brotherhood is still an issue. Just know that once they’re gone, you’re next.”

Vogel watched the mare walk up the stairs out of the hideout with Playa and Johnny while Pierce kept an eye on him. He didn’t need that threat to know that the Saints would gun for him eventually, he knew that it was going to happen. He knew the history of the Saints and how that one pony was key to the defeat of three gangs from five years ago, becoming four recently.

He could only hope that he can prepare for what that pink equine had planned for him.

Playa, Johnny and Pinkamena drove to the hotel but met no resistance until after they entered the building. Upon entry the trio started shooting up everyone in their path, Ronin or otherwise.

During their ascent, Playa started planting high explosives while Johnny and Pinkamena guarded him. Playa planted two bombs for each floor they reached.

While the last bomb was being planted, Pinkamena and Johnny headed into the suite where the Akujis resided and murdered every Ronin in there. Unfortunately, their targets were nowhere to be found but there was evidence that the two of them did sleep there.

Playa shouted that the last bomb had been placed and they needed to make a very fast exit out of the building.

“You unlocked the ‘no fall damage’ ability from base jumping, right?” Pinkamena asked.

“What are you talking-” was all Playa managed to say before the mare tackled him off the edge of the floor and both plummeted into the building’s atrium as the explosions began. Pinkamena made sure to use the Saints leader as a cushion as he landed hard on the bottom floor.

“That still hurts like hell ya know,” Playa complained.

“Quit whining, you’re perfectly fine.” She pretended the hoofprints embedded in his back didn’t exist. “I wouldn’t have done that if you didn’t.”

Johnny landed a few moments later as he was the only one who remembered his parachute.

“Let’s get outta here and tell everyone the good news,” Johnny said.

The return trip to the hideout was uneventful. Once they returned, Vogel bid his farewell and left.

As the Saints offensive continued, two more neighborhoods were taken from the Ronin, Union Square and Brighton. This left the Ronin with three places still under their influence.

That soon changed when Shogo led a reckless assault on the Saints hideout. He shouted something from the entrance about the Saints humiliating his family and he was seeking revenge for it.

Needless to say, the attack was ill-fated as a single pink pony slashed through every lieutenant that he brought along with him.

Shogo decided to flee on his bike and try again another time but Pinkamena was not having that. Boarding a motorcycle that one of the dead Ronin Lieutenants let her keep, she chased Shogo around the city, evading cars while one tried to avoid the other but the other would not be shaken off so easily.

The chase ended at the Mourning Woods Cemetery when Pinkamena pulled out her platinum SMG and shot up Shogo’s bike’s front tire and sent him catapulting into a gravestone. The stone shattered on impact and possibly left a few bones cracked in the unfortunate young Ronin.

Shogo groaned as he looked up from the splayed position he was in on the grass. The pony approaching him had a sad smile on her face, he knew a look of pity when he saw one.

“You sad little boy, you have no idea how pitiable you are,” Pinkamena said.

“Shut up! What do you know about me?” Shogo shouted.

Pinkamena shook her head in disappointment. “The fact that you base your life on trying to make your father proud when the truth is that he will never be proud of you. Nothing you will ever do in your life will be good enough. If only you learned that lesson years ago maybe you wouldn’t be in the situation that you’re in now. If only you had simply told your father to go fuck himself and walk out on him then maybe you could have made something of your life.

“But the time for hindsight is over and your choices have led you to a dead end. All you ever did was ride on your father’s coattails, it’s no wonder you’re a disappointment to him. In the end, you’re going to die as a brat who has to rely on daddy to bail you out of your bad situation...but daddy isn’t coming to save you…”

Shogo ground his teeth and got off the ground to charge the mare, sword in his hand and shouting. Pinkamena hit the katana with her knife and sent it flying toward the other side of the cemetery. Shogo pulled out an SMG but Pinkamena countered by headbutting him in the stomach and sent him flying while dropping his SMG.

Shogo landed inside an empty casket and before he could get his bearings, the casket shut, leaving him in the darkness inside his tiny box.

He felt the sensation of falling a short distance before he realized what the mare was about to do. The next sound he heard was what he expected would happen as dirt impacted the casket, showing the mare’s intent on burying him alive. He began shouting nonsense about what she couldn’t do but his cries were ignored as more dirt was piled over the casket.

After a few minutes, the casket was completely buried while Pinkamena patted the dirt. She smiled as she left the cemetery to return to the hideout, knowing that a slow and agonizing death by asphyxiation awaited the young life cut short by his own decisions.

On the off chance that one of the Ronin would come and dig him up, Pinkamena called some Saints over to secure the cemetery just in case.