#i actually have a little punk garlic hehe :]

[zevakritpel]

Hell-Bent: Prologue-- Introducing Our Colourful Cast of Characters

Chapter 1>

Fandom: Kuroko no Basuke

Pairing: Aokise, MomoRiko, Kagakuro, MuroMura, more???

u can find this on AO3 lol

Summary: Adult AU, Criminal Underworld AU. Where Kagami Taiga is a young heir suddenly targeted by 6 rather dangerous members of the criminal underworld (each with their own set of personal troubles), and Kuroko is a bodyguard with a dark past.

Warning: Violence, Strong language, a lil dark and angsty sometimes

[Wednesday. Time: 01:03. Meet the Sniper]

Today's lucky item for Cancers is a steel garlic press.

"Oi, Shin-chan. The target will be moving along the second floor, west wall any minute now. You ready?"

Midorima clicks his tongue impatiently and tenses his bandaged fingers against the cool metal of his M24. He's been lying on his stomach for the past half hour, with the kitchen utensil tucked inside his pants' pocket digging into his upper thigh the entire time. Still, with his intense focus and dedication, comfort comes secondary. Naturally.

Of course he's ready.

"Indeed."

The sharpshooter narrows his bright green eyes in concentration, and continues to watch the movements behind the windows of the building adjacent. His position on this warehouse roof  really couldn't be more ideal. No wind either, and just the right amount of clouds in the sky.

Today's lucky numbers for Cancer: 15- 73- 3- 22- 47

Takao is still babbling needlessly into his ear piece, to the point where Midorima is tempted to turn off the sound of his voice completely. This is exactly why he prefers working solo...no, no. He must persevere. In this case, teamwork is important, especially with Takao 'Hawkeye' Kazunari.

"Alright you've got one shot at this, don't miss <3 "

"I never miss."

It's true. He never misses.

Today's target is a corrupt bureaucrat that got way above his head in his dealings with the underground. Pissed off all the wrong people, couldn't have managed to fuck up this hard if he tried.

Middle aged. 180 cm in height. Dark hair, olive skin. Has until now gone through great lengths to avoid facing the consequences for his greedy actions.

And yet the exact millisecond that he enters Midorima's range, his life is forfeit.

Today's horoscope for Cancers:  You'll soon be faced with new challenges, in both work and romance. Advice: Be wary of those who bring up the past.

Midorima takes a deep, calm breath. His hands are perfectly steady; heartbeat unwavering.

"Man proposes; God disposes" he mutters, then pulls the trigger.

[Wednesday. Time: 02:09. Meet the Fake]

"As expected of a model," purrs the drunken businessman, sliding his fat sweaty hand up Kise's thin blue designer shirt and pressing his fingers against the small of the younger man's back.

"Your skin is so smooth . How nice to be so young."

Kise giggles nervously and starts absently toying with the thick cross pendant dangling from the silver chain on his neck. With his free hand, he fishes the lime out of his gin and tonic, drains the rest of the drink in one go.

"Hehe~. That tickles..."

The businessman practically leers at this reaction, but he stops groping Kise in order to take the empty glass from his hands, and saunters over to the hotel room's mini-bar.

"Another G&T?" he asks, pulling a bottle of Beefeater out of the small fridge.

Kise nods an affirmative yes, then he also stands up and walks over to where his new drink is being poured. His bare feet are light and silent against the carpeted floor.

"I'm so glad we moved to a more...private setting. "

"Me too."

Kise hums with a genuine smile, wrapping his arm around the other man's neck. He keeps at the chokehold for a few seconds until the businessman slumps down, out cold.

Ugh. That was a pain in the ass.

Well, okay. Thankfully it didn't come to that.

Planting one foot on the chest of the unconscious body, Kise readjusts his own disheveled clothing before pulling a few zip ties out of his pocket. One to secure the wrists together, and a couple around the ankles, for good measure.

Satisfied with his job of binding the pervy sleeping man, Kise next has to make a call. Quick dial.

"Are you done?" snaps the irritable voice of Kasamatsu on the other end of the line, without so much as a greeting.

"Easy-peasy! It wasn't any fun at all."

"Fun? This isn't a game, Ryouta."

"I know, I know," Kise lies with a pout, twisting his cross necklace around his fingers.

He does not know. Of course this is a game, that's the only way he can get into it.

"But it's lucky I copied that 'seduction' skill from-"

"'Seduction' isn't a skill you can copy, you tacky bimbo. Airheads like you are just naturally good at that shit, which is why I got you to do this job in the first place."

"KYAH ! Did you just praise m-"

"Shut the hell up. "

Kise's smile widens but the tears in his yellow eyes glisten like jewels.

"Anyways, now that you've lured him in, we've got how many hours until someone notices his useless ass is missing?"

"What is it now? 02:15....He says he's just got a meeting at 13:00 today."

"Perfect. I'm coming over to take care of the rest. You sit tight until then."

Kise hangs up with a despondent sigh. He plops himself down on the older man's stomach, which makes for a nice cushion to sit on. This guy's in for a real world of pain, huh?

The young man slips his pendant between his lips, sucking at the silver cross thoughtfully.

Not that this isn't exciting work or anything (it's not), but....Kise can't help but feel his jobs lately have been pretty lackluster. He's not really putting his special skills to use, fucking over these stupid lechers that get themselves into stupid troubles.

Something good better come soon. Otherwise...

The cross falls from Kise's lips onto his chest. Right against his heart.

[Wednesday. Time: 04:04. Meet the Chessmaster]

[white noise feed]

[Wednesday. Time: 23:52. Meet the Blood Knight and the Book]

"Ahh, that smarts a little."

Aomine spits out an alarmingly thick lump of blood and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. The taste of copper on his lips only further fuels his bloodlust, to the great misfortune of the four men surrounding him.

Not that they're fully aware of this quite yet.

"Listen, I'd love to play mafia with you kids, but I've got some grown up things I'd like to take care of, so why don't you just skip along home-WHOAH OKAY."

After dodging the bullet aimed at his left shoulder, Aomine finds his back pressed up against a brick wall. Behind his favourite nightclub, no less.

"You. You're going to pay for what you did." This coming from punk #3, who would sound a lot more formidable if he didn't look like he was about to cry.

Aomine rubs the side of his face, which still stings a bit from the earlier hit (courtesy of punk #1, who was granted the first number for actually managing to get within face-punching range of Aomine).

"You're going to have to be more specific." he laughs, though he's actually much more serious than his tone would imply.  Aomine is a man who has done many things that could warrant armed pissbabies cornering him in a dark alley under the false illusion that they can harm him in any way.

He tries to mentally run through all the women he's slept with in the past month that could have had jealous lovers; it's too much work, so he gives up.

"Don't play dumb!"

This from punk #2, the gun-wielder, who seems to have realized halfway through that this kind of command is futile on Aomine. He clears his throat to elaborate:

"You've got a lot of nerve showing up in this area after the disrespect you showed our boss."

Aomine squints.

"Our boss.....last night? At the bar across the street? You broke his arm..."

Punk #2 is faltering at Aomine's complete lack of remembrance, but his comrades are growing livid.

"This motherfucker...guess we really should teach him a lesson."

Aomine's heart almost skips a beat when he sees Punk #1 pull a crowbar out of his bag. But his excitement is short-lived: the fight is over before it even begins. It takes less than 3 minutes to curb these shits into the ground and leave them writhing in the same pain and regret their boss experienced yesterday.

Pathetic.

Disappointed, Aomine kicks the unconscious Punk #4 in the ribs one last time, then staggers away from the bloodied scene and wanders off onto the main street.

Before he can brood over his easy win, Aomine spots a familiar someone leaning against a parking sign, waving right at him. That long, silky pink hair, the sweet but kinda shit-eating grin...the unmistakable three sizes-

"Hey, Dai-chan," Momoi smiles, walking up to greet him. She has to tilt her head quite a bit to maintain eye contact.

"I was worried about you after I heard you quit your job, but I'm glad that you're not above picking fights with petty thugs."

Aomine grimaces and covers half his face sheepishly with his fingers.

"Ugh. You saw that?"

"I sure did. Seriously, what the hell happened?"

Aomine would love to answer that. He really would.

"What about you, Satsuki? What brings you to this area?"

Momoi raises her eyebrows, to assure Aomine that his attempt to change the subject is not going unnoticed. However, more pressing issues are at hand.

"Looking for your NEET ass, actually. Here,"

She rummages through her bag--which is full of various papers, as is the lot in life of an information broker--before pulling out a small white envelope and handing it to her old childhood friend.

"What is this?"

"A job offer."

[Thursday. Time: 13:16. Meet the Target and the Phantom]

"Huh? A bodyguard? I don't know what my old man told you, but I can take care of myself."

Kagami Taiga's red eyes are glowing with his usual dose of boundless passion. Passion his family's Head of Security, Riko Aida, wishes he'd put into his studies. Or something. Christ, this kid is such a headache.

"Of course, I'm well aware of your physical prowess and fighting skills, Master Taiga. However, I'm afraid that, given the exposure of your existence as heir to the Kagami empire and...well, other matters-"

Riko pauses for a moment, taking a peek at Kagami's expression, which, though indignant, does not show that he picked up on the poorly explained set of circumstances. Like at all.

"Aside from the usual thugs, I have reason to believe a rather notorious, skilled set of people will be hired to come after you."

"Let them come," Kagami  states rather fervently, slamming his open palm against Riko's wooden desk.

"I'll take them on."

Riko goes through physical pain in an attempt to avoid rolling her eyes. The attempt fails. Her patience has evaporated.

"Alright, well good luck with that. I'm still going to assign a 24-hour guard for you."

"WHA-?!"

"Lower your voice, you brat! He's worked in the underground since a young age, and has a lot of connections with these types of people. Be grateful to me that I'm not putting you on lockdown until this whole thing blows over."

The young Kagami is far from thrilled at this outcome, but even he can see there's no hope of winning this round. He sits back down in his chair with a small grunt of dissatisfaction, crossing his arms over his chest. A little petulant and overexcited, but always respectful. Riko doesn't bother to hide her smirk.

"So?  When do I get to meet this guy?"

"Ah, now that you mention it, "

Riko checks the time on her wristwatch, her brow furrowed slightly.

" I told him to meet me in my office before you got here, but it seems he hasn't shown up yet."

"Uh, actually,"

Riko and Kagami both freeze for a half a second, their blood running cold, faces drained of all colour.

Moving by pure instinct, Riko pulls out a loaded handgun, ready to fire, while Kagami is already up and wielding his chair like a weapon. Both natural fighters are completely ready for bloodshed...until they register the source of the voice.

A small, pale young man, roughly Kagami's age, is standing at the back of the room, right under the small framed portrait of puppies Riko nailed to the wall a couple of weeks ago. (It used to sit on her desk, but Kagami kept covering it every time he came in through the office, so...)

"H-how long have you been there?"  Riko, who has seen the carnage of multiple battlefields, barely stutters out.

"I was here the entire time." the stranger responds in a soft matter-of-fact voice, as if that isn't one of the creepier answers he could give.

Kagami gently places the chair back to its rightful place on the floor, pretending like he isn't suffering from massive heart palpitations.

"You called me here?" adds ghost child...no, no Riko, get a hold of yourself. He's clearly human...he's...

"OH. You must be Kuroko??"  Riko, finally having regained her composure, extends an arm of welcome as he nods yes.

"You really... should've said something haha. please, take a seat."

That's him? The Kuroko Tetsuya, the notorious 'Phantom'??? But he looks so...frail. He's clad a white button down shirt and grey pants, neither of which could seem to be hiding some hidden muscle-definition. His skin is very pale, very anemic-looking. This can't possibly be...

Kuroko blinks back at Riko with his large, pale blue eyes. Though he appears expressionless, Riko can't help but feel a certain level of scorn emanating from this man. He's judging hard for being judged hard.

That's fair.

Riko chews at the nail of her thumb for one contemplative second,then decides to roll with the benefit of the doubt.

"Alright, Kagami Jr. This is the man who'll be sticking to you for the next...little while. Meet your new shadow."

"Eh?"

Kagami looks down in disbelief at the tiny pale blue creature that has just been assigned to protect his life.

A very small, very cold little hand places itself inside Kagami's own.

"Nice to meet you."

"You have got to be fucking kidding me..."

[Thursday. Time: 17:08. Meet the Reaper]

"Atsushi, you've got like fifteen missed calls. Please just answer your phone."

Murasakibara could answer his phone, but...he could also just shove another fistful of all-dressed chips into his mouth and not answer anything that remotely sounds like work.

"Atsushi...please. I think it's urgent."

Don't worry. Murasakibara makes sure to chew his food properly. It's better for digestion.

////

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