Tokyo Ink (Gay SF Erotica)

his chest. He continued curling into himself as his body left the chute, rolling alongside Youran.
    The dancer tried to scrabble away but Tetsu hooked him by the foot. Youran almost matched him in strength and build, but he managed to pull the dancer back with one hand while he felt his own body to make sure he still had everything on him.
    Gun, butane, mobile and lighter.
    Jumping to his feet, Tetsu hauled Youran up and pointed his gun at a stairway door. They were only one level below ground. The stairs led directly to the back alley for laundry pick up.
    "Get moving!"
    Slowly obeying, Youran glanced at Tetsu's gun. "I guess if you wanted me dead, I would be already."
    Dead or on fire, Tetsu thought as he stepped in front of Youran to check the stairs. He couldn't be sure whether the cameras were back on, or if they had caught his and Youran's slide down the laundry chute. At least the stairs were empty.
    Tetsu stopped at the door to the alley. Pausing to listen for the quiet rustling of a security team, he examined Youran. His makeup was miraculously unsmeared but his hair was a mess and the sheet, although silk dyed a rich crimson, still looked like a sheet.
    Wasting precious seconds, he fished through his jacket pockets and found a rubber band. Gaze jumping to the dancer's hair and the sheet, he shoved the rubber band into Youran's hand before turning his back to him. "Fix yourself. Fast!"
    Praying the door alarms were still disabled, he slowly opened the door and looked onto the alley. Empty. He started out, hooking Youran by the arm when the dancer started to go right down the alley to the open street with its afternoon crowd.
    "Are you crazy?" Youran hissed. "Let's get into the crowd."
    The crowd would be safer, but he'd lose control of the dancer. He strained, trying to quickly find some excuse to go left that the dancer would buy. He shook his head, looked Youran straight in the face and tried not to get lost in the slate blue eyes. "Trust me, Youran."
    Youran blinked, exhaled. "Gabriel...Gabe..."
    Gabe blinked again and then faced left where the alley split off into more alleys.
    They didn't run, but their steps were quick. Gabe kept his eyes on the ground, looking for hazards to his bare feet while Tetsu guided him with a touch or whisper down the next alley and the next.
    About eight blocks on, Tetsu pulled to a stop in front of a double door. It looked like the back of an apartment building. He nodded at the wall, directing Gabe's attention to half a dozen vents with steam issuing from them.
    "Laundry room." His hand emerged from his pocket with a slim band of steel. Half a second later, the double doors yielded to him and they stepped inside. In the laundry room, he pushed Gabe towards a sink, grunting "face" before rummaging through the dryers and finding some pants and a shirt.
    Shoving the clothes at Gabe, he put the sheet in a washing machine and started it. Out in the hall, Tetsu guided Gabe toward the front of the building.
    "Look." Tetsu pointed at the shoes that rested alongside some of the apartment doors. They were almost to the front door when they spotted a pair of men's sandals just large enough for the dancer's feet.
    Dressed, with shoes on and a crowd around him, Gabe became slightly less manageable.
    "What's this all about?"
    Tetsu tried to smile at Gabe as if they were just two men out for a walk, standing, perhaps, a little too close to one another. The smile turned into a grimace. "Not here."
    "Where?"
    Tetsu puffed once turned down a side street, moving them into the grungier parts of the city into areas that were far outside any corporation's control.
    "Not the dead zone?"
    Tetsu nodded. He had a one-room safe house in the zone, with a hot plate, canned food and, more importantly, chemicals that would painlessly remove the ink. "Don't sweat it. You're safe for now."
    "With a kill bounty on me?" Gabe arched one exquisite brow that was as pitch black as the rest of his hair and drew his mouth into a soft sneer. "You do understand why it's called the dead zone?"
    "You're safe." He put his palm flat against the small of Gabe's back and gave a solid push. They had another 10 blocks of winding alleys, side streets and crowded boulevards to maneuver and his patience was growing thin. "Besides, it's a dead comm zone. That's why."
    That wasn't technically true. Anyone with the right frequencies could get a signal in or out of the zone. Data, voice or video feeds. Tetsu had access to the