He sat in the lobby to the brothel, listening in apathy to the noises behind the doors, not aroused in the slightest. Madam Suzumi soon arrived with one of her employees in tow. The women were both slender and wore fashionable clothes. Anyone else would have called them sexy or attractive, but Ziann just thought of them as human beings who had a job for him to do. Prompting the employee to speak, Suzumi just stood to the side. "Okay, well, um, the thing is..." Suzumi just coughed sternly. "Sorry. I have this regular. He's been paying me in fake money. It took us awhile to pinpoint who was doing it, but it was definitely Fred. Here's a picture of him." Ziann wondered what kind of person would frequent a brothel and have a "regular" relationship with one of the ladies. He took the picture and examined it closely. This Fred didn't look like a pervert or a depraved man, just a regular guy with a terrible haircut. Ziann took the photo, with permission, and confirmed that they wanted him to either pay up in cash or his physical well being. Suzumi affirmed that they wanted him taken care of if he wouldn't pay up.
Fred was known to frequent one of the gambling halls here in the Crimson Quarter, so that's where Ziann headed first to see if he could catch him. Having the picture of this man's awful awful hair cut really helped as Fred stood out in the crowd of gamblers and dealers like a man with, well, a really bad head of hair. It was almost like a dead seagull was sitting on his head and still twitching in death throws as he moved around. Like a bad toupee was attached by a thin step to the top of his head but flopped around as he turned his head from side to side. It was a bad haircut indeed. Ziann immediately headed over his way. As he got to the card table, he slammed his hand down on it and startled everyone there. "Your money here fake too?" The dealer's eyes squinted as he checked the bills. They failed the check. "Don't worry, I'll take care of him." Dragging Fred out of the gambling hall, Fred was kicked in the rear by the bouncer on his way out.
Ziann pushed him into an alley, at which point Fred turned around and tried to punch him. Ziann just caught the fist and held it a moment. "Madam Suzumi wants her money. All that you owe her." Fred's eyes grew wide and he spit on Ziann's shoes. "I've nothing left to lose, now that you've exposed me. They'll never let me back anywhere in this town. You won't see a jewel of what I owe." Ziann squeezed the man's fist, twisted it, and forced Fred to his knees. "I was kinda hoping that you'd say that..." Ziann cupped his hand and slammed it into the man's ear with all his might, bursting the ear drum and causing the ear to start bleeding. Fred's screams fell on deaf ears as Ziann continued to wail on him until he wasn't conscious. Then he added a few more kicks for good measure.
Ending up outside the brothel again, Ziann left a present in Madam Suzumi's hands as he collected his reward and left. Fred's terrible haircut had been removed from his head and was left as a trophy and a warning to all who would dare cheat the brothel.
723/500 WC