FC Chapter 1.2

His blood ran cold. Rei reflexively threw a punch. But the man who fell while grabbing the edge of the table was not one of Dell’s men, but a tattooed giant.

 

“Keuh.”

 

“Phil, are you okay? You son of a bitch, you piece of shit!”

 

The man’s companions, who had wrongly identified the culprit, rushed at Rei all at once for revenge.

 

“Keuh! Let go of me. I don’t have time to deal with the likes of you right now…”

 

Rei, struggling to shake off the men in leather jackets and hoods, widened his eyes. Dell’s men were walking forward in front of the onlookers who were surrounding the fight in layers.

 

“You’ve saved us some trouble. We have important business to take care of, so hand that guy over to us.”

 

Dell’s man gestured arrogantly at the motorcycle gang holding Rei.

 

“Damn it, who are these guys?”

 

“You have business with this guy? Fuck off. We have priority, so you guys can go sit in a corner and jerk off until it’s your turn.”

 

Tension was stretched taut between the two groups with Rei in the middle.

 

“Damn it, now even these pathetic losers are pissing me off.”

 

“I don’t know where you hillbillies came from, but if you don’t want to get hurt, hand that guy over right now!”

 

“I said fuck off, didn’t I?”

 

The man with the flushed face knocked over a table piled high with empty beer bottles.

 

“What’s going on?”

 

“Looks like the fight’s getting bigger?”

 

The sound of the motorcycle gang and Dell’s hounds fighting could be heard over the loud music pouring out of the speakers.

 

The dancing customers couldn’t hide their agitation as they continued to hear the sound of glass breaking and things being smashed.

 

Some customers approached the scene of the group brawl to watch, only to become victims of random violence. The club’s burly guards were dispatched to quell the commotion, but there was no sign of the situation calming down.

 

“Ah, seriously. Stop pushing!”

 

The club’s exit was just as disorderly and chaotic due to the evacuating customers. Rei, who was struggling to keep his balance, was also mixed in with the customers who were rushing out in a mass.

 

As soon as he got outside, he got into a taxi that was waiting on the side of the road. He had barely managed to escape from the club, but he didn’t know when Dell’s hounds would catch up to him again.

 

“Where to, sir?”

 

“Shut up, and… step on it.”

 

Rei panted and kicked the car seat roughly. He hadn’t hailed the taxi because he had a destination in mind. The only thought in his head was that he had to get out of here before Dell’s men spotted him.

 

“Ah, okay.”

 

The scenery outside the window changed rapidly. Even though he had gotten quite far away from the street where the club was located, a deep anxiety lingered on Rei’s half-closed face.

 

“But sir, do you have any money?”

 

The taxi driver, glancing at Rei in the rearview mirror, asked with a dubious look.

 

Rei was silent.

 

“…..”

 

“Damn it, I’m having a run of bad luck. Get out right now.”

 

The taxi driver stopped the car in the middle of the road and dragged Rei out onto the asphalt. The sound of the taxi driving away faded into the distance.

 

“Ugh…”

 

Rei, sprawled out like the carcass of a roadkilled animal, desperately pulled himself up. He took a step onto the sidewalk, but a violent wave of nausea washed over him along with dizziness.

 

“Ugh, ugh. Keuh!”

 

It felt like his esophagus was burning. Fortunately, he hadn’t eaten anything, so only sour stomach acid came up.

 

“Oh my goodness.”

 

A middle-aged woman with a brown grocery bag hurried past Rei, keeping a wide berth, as if she had discovered a crime scene.

 

Rei, who had barely stopped vomiting, simply wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, showing no particular reaction to the middle-aged woman’s actions.

 

Rei had been raped, rolled around, and beaten just moments ago. A sour smell of sweat emanated from his body, and his torn shirt was stained with blood and vomit. His reflection in the darkened storefront window was that of a complete rag.

 

Rei staggered forward again. Perhaps because he had thrown up, the withdrawal symptoms had subsided somewhat. Instead, he began to feel thirsty, but it wasn’t unbearable.

 

‘What are you going to do, Rei Parker?’

 

As he felt a little more physically relaxed, various realistic problems came to mind. First of all, he seemed to have shaken off Dell’s goons for sure. But that didn’t mean he was completely out of danger. He had beaten up a congressman. He didn’t know if the congressman would personally hire someone to get revenge or mobilize the police, but he wouldn’t just let this go.

 

In fact, Dell was more of a problem than the congressman. Dell, a merchant to the bone, would never let anyone who had harmed him live. If he was relieved to have survived today, he was likely to be found in a trash can at dawn, a dismembered corpse.

 

Dell was more persistent than a viper, and he would wait years to retaliate against anyone who had screwed him over. He never forgot a debt.

 

Should he have endured it?

 

No, even if he went back to that situation, Rei would have made the same choice. He was at the bottom of his life, with nowhere else to fall, but he couldn’t bear to be a male prostitute. The experience of spreading his legs for a man was enough when he was a kid.

 

“Damn it, why do I have to think about useless things…”

 

Rei gripped his collar tightly, recalling the unpleasant memory. The urge to wash his whole body surged. But going home now was tantamount to suicide. Dell’s men, who had missed Rei, would surely be lying in wait.

 

He couldn’t visit his old friend Zachary or his former coach Samuel’s house for the same reason. Showgirl Nora? That quick-witted woman would secretly send Dell a photo and text message of Rei while he was taking a shower.

 

He thought it would be better to get rid of the blood-stained shirt first. Aside from the unpleasantness, he was more likely to be caught by the police or Dell’s henchmen, who would be combing the city to catch him, if he wandered around in this state.

 

Since he couldn’t afford to buy new clothes, Rei stole a jacket from a homeless man. It stank, but it was better than the shirt he was wearing.

 

Pulling the sleeveless hoodie down low, he stepped out of the alley when it started to rain.

 

‘Perfect timing.’

 

Rei frowned and quickened his pace. A black cat, rummaging through a trash can for food, was startled by the sudden rain and disappeared like a small rocket across Rei’s path.

 

Suddenly, he remembered hearing from Samuel that the 16th Street Gym had gone out of business and was left abandoned. He thought he could hide there for a day or two without being noticed. The problem was how to get to 16th Street…

 

Lost in thought, Rei stopped walking. Suddenly, he couldn’t see in front of him for a moment, as if the whole city had been blacked out.

 

‘What was that just now?’

 

He looked around the rain-soaked street. But he couldn’t find any signs of a power outage.

 

Was he mistaken? Maybe the subsided withdrawal symptoms were starting again.

 

‘I’ve experienced hallucinations and paralysis a lot, but I’ve never had my vision go out like this…’

 

Rumble, crash!

 

The rain intensified.

 

‘…I must be tired.’

 

Rei dismissed what had just happened as a temporary phenomenon and wiped the raindrops flowing down his cheeks. But soon after, he lost his sight again.

 

“Damn it, why is this happening?”

 

He rubbed his eyes. Then it got better for a while, but after a few steps, his vision flickered again. It was like the slide screen flickering and changing every time he pressed the button on a projector. As much as he couldn’t see well, he focused on his ears, but he couldn’t hear anything but the harsh sound of the rain.

 

Rei, who had lost his body heat to the rain, was so numb that he didn’t even know where he was wandering.

 

A huge building towering in front of him was vaguely visible like a watchtower due to the fog and rain. With a beep, the building’s parking barrier went up.

 

Rei, who was distracted, didn’t hear the sound and was hit by a car coming out of the parking lot as he crossed the road.

 

“…Damn it.”