Get Off Your Phone and Pay Attention!

The man known as Zapad Brodny paused the torture he was inflicting to pull out his phone once again. He stared wistfully at it and sighed before putting it back into his pocket. He’d done it several times over since he’d brought Boris Grigoryev into this dark, windowless room lit only by a single bulb.

“I miss her, Boris…” whined the formidable brick wall of a man known as Zapad Brodny. “How does that saying go? Absence makes the heart grow…or something?”

Boris had an inkling who he was talking about. The Japanese neutralizer they’d discovered in England. He’d only joked about her being the man’s bride, but was she actually his woman? Why else would he go to these lengths otherwise?

His favorite sorcerer, Ivan Popov, went to Japan to look for her after he’d found a lead into her identity, only to return as a corpse crashing down onto Boris’ dinner table. Boris truthfully didn’t care about her ability as a neutralizer—it was the sorcerers who’d talked him into taking her alive for that reason. He only allowed it because he figured it would serve to piss off that traitor, Brodny.

If he knew it would piss him off to this extent, then he would have cut his losses. He had no idea just how mad his former “mad dog” was.

“It’s like…I can’t get her out of my head now, you know?” Brodny paced around, talking to himself. “I never planned for this! But I’ve just never met anyone like her!”

He’d been slowly torturing Boris through magic over the past few hours, but listening to this nonsense made the electric shocks preferable.

Brodny knelt down in front of Boris. He grabbed him by the ear and yanked it in a way that forced Boris to look at him. “Hey, is this how you felt when you first met your wife? Were you crazy about her, too? I’ve never felt this way before. Is it normal?”

Boris just glared impassively at him.

“Oh, that’s right,” Brodny said with a chuckle as he let Boris’ head drop to the floor. “I made it so you can’t speak right now.”

Zapad Brodny snapped his fingers, releasing the spell that had left Boris unable to make any noise. With the feeling of paralysis leaving his tongue, Boris launched into a series of expletives and insults.

“Fuck you! Sick bastard! You son of a whore! You’ll never get away with this! You’ll pay! I’ll kill you and ra–”

“Silence.” Brodny interrupted him with the command, and Boris found himself once again unable to speak or make noise. He stood up and pulled out a cigarette case from the pocket of his tracksuit jacket. “If you’re not willing to have a proper conversation, then you don’t get to speak.”

Zapad Brodny tapped the dangling lightbulb hanging from the ceiling as he walked away, causing the only light source to sway. As he sat on a crate, the light and shadows shifted around him.

“That trophy wife of yours is—was cucking you,” he said, lighting the cigarette with a flame produced by his thumb in lieu of a lighter. Brodny took a long drag, then exhaled. “Do you wanna know who it was?”

This was news to Boris. Had he moved on to psychological torture now? Brodny had to be fucking with him now. He was used to most people calling his twenty-year-younger wife a “trophy” or a “gold digger,” but this was the first time anyone insinuated she was unfaithful.

Brodny leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. The light had not stopped swaying, and the moving shadows on his face made that sinister smile even more terrifying.

“I guess it’d be faster to say who she wasn’t fucking in your gang…” he mused, taking another drag off his cigarette. “Me, for starters. Though that’s not to say she didn’t try. I just don’t like that kind of brotherhood.”

Boris felt his blood pressure rising, but he was completely paralyzed. All he could do was curse Brodny in his mind. You, your mother, your father, your whole family, and your damn woman.

He watched Brodny look back and forth between his blacked-out right hand and the cigarette. Then, he intentionally burnt himself with the cherry. The man didn’t even flinch. He wasn’t just crazy. He was a monster.

“Anyway, you said something about how I’ll ‘never get away with this’ and that I’ll ‘pay’?” he asked, bringing the cigarette back to his mouth. “How exactly is that going to happen? I killed all your men to get to you.”

Every single man in the Grigoryev Bratva…taken out one by one by this force of nature. Who was the real identity? The foppish Englishman named Royce Westbrook that he’d encountered briefly, or the stone-faced killer he knew as Zapad Brodny? Boris just didn’t know anymore.

“Ah, wait…” Brodny tapped the ash off his cigarette. “I didn’t take out all of them. I left one young sorcerer alive.”

Boris knew exactly who he was talking about. Out of all the sorcerers he employed, there was a young one—a fifteen-year-old who’d recently been scouted by the gang. He knew from experience that Brodny’s moral code kept him from killing kids.

If he got away… A glimmer of hope shone in Boris’ eyes at the thought.

Brodny tilted his head, noticing the change in Boris’ expression. “Hm? Do you think he’s going to help you?”

Boris braced himself for what was coming.

“Not a chance! He’s in my pocket now!” Zapad Brodny laughed heartily, slapping at his knee as if this was the funniest thing to him. “You forget that sorcerers are easily bought. I just gave the kid a place to stay and some money, and he was happy enough to get the word out that this is what happens when you dig into Zapad Brodny.”

He tossed his cigarette to the side and pulled out a gun from inside his jacket. Brodny walked over to Boris and put the gun in his hand, then went back to the crate and sat down.

“Stand up,” Brodny commanded. Boris felt his body move against his will as he got to his feet. “Don’t move.”

Boris felt the cold steel of the gun in his hand. He was still paralyzed, but Brodny had wrapped his fingers around the grip with the index on the trigger. What was he planning to do?

“I thought about how I’d finish this before I got to you,” he said, crossing his legs. “I know you well enough to imitate you. I could have just killed you and impersonated you to take over the gang if it weren’t for one little problem…”

Boris stood in the center of the room, frozen in place by Brodny’s commands. This was why he’d so eagerly employed him—Zapad Brodny was the only sorcerer he’d ever met that could override a person’s will with his words.

He stood up and walked over to Boris. Standing nearly a head taller, Brodny raised his hand over his head and moved it through the air and down to the top of Boris’ balding scalp.

“You’re too short,” he said with a laugh as he patted the bald head. Boris could only helplessly fume at the mockery.

Zapad Brodny pushed the lightbulb once more to restart its movement before he sat back down on the crate.

“Put the gun to your head,” he commanded. Boris’ eyes widened at those words. His hand with the gun moved on its own, and the cold barrel pressed against the side of his head.

As the light swayed in circles, the way the shadows danced around Zapad Brodny’s face made it appear to shift and change. Different faces, different races. It had to be the terror—the terror of what was coming made him see things.

“I’m going to let you in on a little secret before you go, Boris,” Brodny said with an eerie calm. “Zapad Brodny is an alias. Royce Westbrook is an alias. You barely scraped the surface of all my identities.”

It was at that moment that Boris Grigoryev realized just how sloppy he’d been. It was so utterly foolish for him to think that it just stopped at those two names. If they’d just dug a little deeper, would the outcome have been different?

No. He looked at the smile on the face of the man before him. I dug my own grave from the beginning.

“Now, pull the trigger,” commanded Zapad Brodny.

***

“...curses and magic? It’s all the same.”

That was what Enishi Ryouma had once explained to Midoriko back in Gunma. Xiǎomíng could only explain so much with his magical knowledge rooted in Taoism. During his time in a triad, they’d used his power to create protective charms—blessings.

Midoriko understood Xiǎomíng’s power in the context of onmyoudou as it shared the same roots. His power had to be channeled through something. While he didn’t work with shikigami, he worked with fulu, acupuncture, and i-ching. He was extremely knowledgeable on enchantments for this reason, but he couldn’t explain the difference between a curse and a blessing—they were all just enchantments.

I bet he would be able to explain it perfectly, thought Midoriko as she looked over her message history with Ryouma.

“I discovered something about the kīla. I want to talk to you about it in person.” …Was her last message to him almost a week before. She could see that he saw it, but he never sent a response.

It was so irritating. She was finding herself worrying about him. Midoriko didn’t want to even think about this man, but he seemed to be infesting her mind like a cockroach. There were just too many things that would remind her of him.

“Hello? Earth to Midorikooo…” Akira waved a hand in front of her face, startling her. Midoriko quickly stuffed her phone in her bag.

“I’m sorry…What were we talking about?” she asked sheepishly. They were on their way home, but Midoriko was finding herself more preoccupied than usual to stay engaged in conversation.

“I was just recommending the perfect place to go for a lobotomy!” he said, grinning.

“Oh, of course. Maybe I’ll go sometime…” Midoriko nodded. As she felt her hand itching to reach for her phone again, she processed what he’d just said and froze. “Huh?! Wha?! Lobotomy?!”

“Ahaha! Gotcha!” Akira gave her forehead a playful flick. “I was actually saying that I know a really great Izakaya in this neighborhood.”

“Oh, I see…Haha…” Midoriko couldn’t help but laugh even though she felt embarrassed for tuning out. “I’d love to try it sometime.”

As she started walking again, she felt a tug on her wrist.

“Then let’s go now.”

“Huh?” Midoriko stopped and looked at Akira.

“You just seem a little down,” he said, letting go. “I thought maybe I could hear ya out. Y’know, since I’m so easy to talk to and all…”

Was he asking her out? No way, he was definitely just being nice. Akira was always very attentive—that’s why he’d make a perfect therapist.

“Ah, um…I’m fine,” she mumbled. Midoriko cleared her throat and forced a smile. “Really! I’ll be okay!”

“Ah, that’s too bad,” Akira whined. He patted her on the shoulder. “But I understand.”

“Th-thanks…” Midoriko brushed her fingers against the spot he’d just touched. “Maybe we can go another time…”

“Well, I’m gonna go now!” Akira said, trotting ahead. He looked back at Midoriko once more and waved. “If you change your mind and wanna talk about the guy in your phone that’s upsetting you, then come find me!”

Midoriko’s waving hand drooped as she felt her face grow hot.