Chapter Text
The sun was hung against a pastel sky when the body was discovered. This city did not seem to notice. Gunfire rang through its unkempt streets in a beat-like pattern, making it seem that a celebration was occurring in this city. Foreigners and natives alike saunter along the streets, often drunk from burlesque clubs and bars. But even in their intoxicated states, they never dared cross the lines into enemy territory. Scarlet associates stayed where crimson roses lay, red-marked establishments, and the Cai’s de facto royalty, running their section of the city with more diligence and care than the crumbling government would dare to put into this city. The streets were adorned with white flower associates, blocky Cyrillic text lined stores, and Lord Montagov ruled. Yet even with the attempts some made, they had indeed stumbled into the others' territory, pistols wafting smoke and streets turning marron soon after. The city didn't notice, but it would, oh it would. It would hear the cries and sore throat screams like a soft caress. It would listen to the sorrows of people. And it must feel the destruction, the violent delights of its inhabitants, and the blinding, futile rage that drives it all. It would feel the hatred buried deep in its roots. And it will shrivel.
Tyler Cai had found the body first. He had sauntered into the room, his thoughts drifting from one topic to the next, most of them including the smattering of blood, until everything had come to a stop in his mind once his dark gaze had caught sight of Lord Cai's unmoving body. Tyler's thoughts of bloodshed, his thoughts of nothingness, had all but disappeared in an instant. Lord Cai was not moving or speaking, nor doing anything Tyler had come to associate with the leader of the Scarlet Gang. No, he was just still. As simple as that.
He was dead.
And nothing could be done to undo that simple fact. Tyler, on the other hand, wished it weren't true; that he could undo whatever had caused this. Hatred seared his veins, pulsing from his desolate heart in fast bursts. To destroy it piece by piece, limb by limb for what they had done to Lord Cai, White Flowers Tyler thought it had to be that no one else would dare commit such an act other than their most despised enemy. The foreigners may not appreciate the Cai's, may not like how they ran things in this divided city, but they would not provoke the Scarlet's in such a manner. It must have been White Flowers.
They are the reason Lord Cai is dead. And it changed everything. Even though he was remissed to admit it, it changed Tyler's thoughts more than merely revenge. What are we to do? Juliette cannot.... Lord Cai could not have...
The thoughts crowded Tyler's mind, allowing him to not notice a few insects scattering away from Lord Cai's scalp and the mutilation of his neck. And the drying crimson under his fingernails. Because it has to be White Flowers, it could never be the monster. After all, Juliette was working with monsters, not Tyler.