Beastars: A Symphony of Life

Chapter 125: Old Games, New Players

The two cheetahs ran down the alley. They skidded to a halt and spun to face the alleyway's entrance. They emptied their pockets and threw the blood-meth into a nearby dumpster. If they were caught, they wouldn't be found with that substance on them. They hunkered down in the corners, the darkness hopefully enveloping them enough to hide. The shape dropped down from above, flattening one of the felines into the ground. They then grabbed the other by the throat and spun them into a wall, cracking the mortar and brick a little. The cat collapsed unconscious and the feline on the ground was grabbed by the scruff of their neck. They were lifted to the dumpster and their head was held on the lip of the container with the lid held at the ready to smash their head.

"Where's Melon?" they demanded.

"Who?" the cheetah asked.

"Your boss!" the attacker yelled with impatience. "Where is he?"

"M-m-my b-boss is Benjamin Black," they stammered in fear. "Halsenberg. The drug dealer-"

"Then why do I smell him on you?" they asked.

"I have a lot of clients," he said. "I don't keep track of their names."

"A leopard-gazelle hybrid," he growled, jostling them and pressing the cat's head harder into the metal. "Is that jogging your memory?"

"I-I don't know," they said.

The wolf picked him up again and raised him to his muzzled face.

"If you see him again," he threatened through clenched teeth. "Tell him I'm looking for him."

The cheetah was thrown headfirst into the open dumpster, the lid closing after him.

~~~~~

Legoshi climbed the fire escape to the top of the building. The wind whipped his scarf back behind his head. His insulated jacket and pants did their best to keep the cold out. At the top, he knelt on the ledge and looked over the district. He took off the muzzle so he could open his jaw in a stretching yawn.

"You'll get used to the hours," Louis said.

The wolf snapped around to the deer who was lighting up a cigarette, flanked by the lion Free. The cervid was dressed in a new black suit with a large red jacket draped over his shoulders. He had an eyepatch over his left eye, but the wolf could see the top and bottom of the large scar that ran across it from the bottom of his jaw to his forehead.

"If you're here to give me tips," the wolf groaned. "I don't need any. How'd you find me anyway."

"Your patterns are becoming predictable," the deer answered.

Legoshi looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

"You go through the Drusk with a zig-zag pattern," he explained. "Using the streets as the graph lines, you check the blocks back and forth. Your prey has most likely figured this out already and is probably hiding out."

Legoshi looked down at the street below, grabbing his scarf and wrapping it around his neck a bit more.

"My advice?" Louis started, stepping up to the wolf. "Don't follow a map. Follow your nose, words you hear around. Trust your instincts. Unpredictability will be your ally."

"I'll keep that in mind," he said, zipping up his jacket tighter against the cold.

"That," Louis said, pulling something from under his coat. "And you'll need this."

The shattered Adler mask had been repaired and modified, the pieces glued back together with the cracks filled in using the art of kintsugi. The gold had been mixed with black, dulling the shine but keeping it looking like gold. Black gold.