Session 13. (10/10/01)

Finally we get to the end of episode four and with it the first half of the series. We began with Kimori, immobilised by his broken leg, instructing the rest of his group to go off in hot pursuit of a yakuza that ran away a few minutes earlier. They hurry out of the back door and up an alley way. We'll find out what happened to them later. Picking up Emiko and Komako, their group goes to investigate some stables. There is a horse there but no people. Moving into an attached house, they find a young stable hand, cowed by their presence. They force him to remove his jacket to see if he has yakuza tattoos, but he has none. Going upstairs, they find the venerable old owner of the stables, ask if he is a yakuza and force him to take his shirt off. His dignity and their On suffer, but he has no tattoos. Emiko salves her conscience with 2 CP. Tsunatane and Sugiyama, having taken out several yakuza in an accidental pincer movement, go their separate ways again. Tsunatane takes his group into a warehouse where they are jumped (literally) by a yakuza but whom they polish off quite quickly. A quick search reveals nothing unusual in the warehouse, so Tsunatane sends the two teachers and two doshin to search the shop to the north while he tackles the house to the east and the doshin post. He finds only a terrified couple hiding in the house, so goes to the doshin post. Here there is a trail of blood, two dead doshin and an injured doshin. The doshin, Ina, says they were attacked by yakuza ten minutes earlier. Tsunatane applies first aid then goes to meet up with the rest of his group. They report that they have found nothing in the shop, so the group heads over to the west of the ward, but as they do so they hear a disturbance...

Meanwhile, Sugiyama has left the central area and investigated the shops in the south east corner of the ward, and a house on the way. Entering the house, a man runs out of a back room shouting semi-coherently. "What you doing? This my house, you stay out!" Sugiyama wrestles with his instincts and takes out his badge of office rather than his sword of office. Explaining the situation in words of one syllable or less, Sugiyama orders the man to prove he has no tattoos. He hasn't and after a brief search Sugiyama moves on. He searches one of the shops, a cloth shop, while his companions search the other. Neither of them finds anything, the owners having run away already, so they go on to the two houses in the south of the ward. Here again they draw a blank and stop only to check the papers of a couple living in one of the houses. Then they hear a disturbance...

Leaving the stables by the back door, Emiko and Komako and their five companions enter the toolmaker's house. In the front is a large workshop with many tools both finished and unfinished lying around, and the various tools of the toolmaker. The fabricated items are mostly artisan's tools, there being little call for agricultural tools here in the city, but Emiko notices a few kama, nunchaku and kiseru, traditional weapons of the yakuza. The group moves through into the living area and it is Emiko again who spots the toolmaker hiding in a corner. Under questioning he admits to making weapons for the yakuza, because he is forced to and they pay well, and says that the place to find yakuza is down the alley to the south of his house. The troubleshooters take his advice, and warn him to choose his customers more carefully. They leave the house and are heading down the alleyway when they hear a disturbance...

...they hear it because they cause it themselves. Stepping out in front of Emiko and Komako's group are four yakuza, weapons ready to strike. Immediately blows are flying every where. The first casualty is Otawara, a level 5 yakuza felled by a critical hit from one of the teachers. Then Emiko screams as she notices that four more yakuza have appeared behind them, trapping them in the alley. The doshin turn to face them and the fight becomes even more intense. Komako and Emiko pepper a yakuza extra with mild hits before Komako manages a critical punch and knocks him out. Ina, a level 4 yakuza and Hiraga, a level 6 yakuza, each kill a doshin, but in the nick of time Tsunatane's group turns up behind them and the fighting reaches new heights of intensity. Tsunatane quickly polishes off Ina while the rest slug it out. Now Sugiyama arrives at the far end of the alley, trapping the two remaining members of the first group of four yakuza. Sugiyama uses silent kill to slice 'n dice Aoki, a level 5 yakuza, and Komako soon knocks down the last of that group. Emiko has been steadily plugging away for 1 hit per success, but now concentrates on healing those around her. At the other end of the alley, Tsunatane is steadily working through the opposition, and Sugiyama soon joins them. The last three yakuza are quickly overpowered, though one doshin (wearing a red shirt) is lost.

After a few minutes to get their breath back and do some healing, the law enforcement party splits up to search the buildings around the alley. Sugiyama and two others take the house to the south west of the alley. Here they find the bodies of the four companions of Kimori, who ill-advisedly chased a yakuza into a yakuza house. There is also the body of a yakuza here. Upstairs they find the yakuza that had been chased. Sugiyama's anger gets the better of him when the yakuza won't give himself up, and kills him outright with one blow. Tsunatane enters the house to the north west of the alley. The house is deserted, but he finds a secret door into the north east house. Pushing through it, he runs into the two doshin that were searching it. They are surprised, but not as surprised as when two yakuza burst through another secret door from the house to the south east. A vicious fight erupts, ending with three badly injured law enforcers, an unconscious yakuza and a dead yakuza. When Sugiyama arrives on the scene he recognises the dead yakuza as Hayashi, the head of the Bears. He and his henchmen had bolted from their second story offices, killing two doshin on the way, before meeting Tsunatane. Declaring the operation a success, Sugiyama organises a search and clear up, and distributes the reward among the survivors. He also sets up a fund for widows and orphans of doshin. The others donate money to local temples.

This effectively put an end to the problem of criminal control of Matsuyama, and life settles down to its normal pace for the troubleshooters. Over the autumn and winter months they concentrate on their day-to-day activities and also get in plenty of training. They also manage to tie up a few loose ends...

During the search of the Bear's headquarters, Emiko's stolen staff is found (in the warehouse).

The troubleshooters finally get to see the stolen map. It is of Kyushu island, and shows Lord Chozo's plan for an attack on Hyuga province. This attack has already begun and proves Komako's rumour about troop movements to be correct. The troops got to Kyushu on boats hired from Tamagawa Enterprises^*. The boats were of a new European design called a barque but written as baaku on the contract - if only doshin were more literate!

Mariko has a baby boy and returns to the troubleshooting team in spring in time for their next adventure^**.

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