The Fault in Our Japanese Dating Apps

Koyuki Sanada did not, out of principle, do dating apps.

But Osaka was boring and she was (and would never ever admit to anyone) lonely. Homesick. The bustle and hustle of Tokyo that she so often railed again was something she did not know she would miss until she was spending weeks in Osaka at a time for this Momentum bullshit. What once was a weekend combat hobby had now become a full-time relocation after the Kaitei’s substantial investment into Winterbourne’s sorry vision. Osaka, Japan’s so-called City of Business, was by no means slow, but the vibe was different. There was an unfamilarity with its hecticness that she couldn’t really describe, but she felt it.

Off. Like a slightly crooked painting. Or a gaijin jew at a blood donation drive.

So, in an extended moment of weakness, she started sifting through dating apps. Tinder was out of the question in Japan. Too many travelling white boys looking for glorified Japanese whores to fuck. Omiai and Pairs was for that longterm shit, and connected to Facebook, which she never had. Bumble? Nah. Tapple? Big Nope. Which left her with one last option…

Japan Cupid.

And a day and a half later, she was set for a date with an Osakian yoga fitness centre owner called Reiko Fuka. Her profile was acceptable. Or perhaps more accurately, her profile was validated by what it was not; some corporate stooge droning away at life in an office waiting for retirement. Reiko Fuka seemed like the sporty sort; tennis, badminton, golf. Some amateur judo and aikido, so there was some degree of combat physicality. She was a 7 out of a scale of 10 looks wise. Alright. Had a pokemon quote in her profile, a plus point she would never admit to. Vegan. Also a plus point. Business ownership suggested some level of financial and personal independence. Great. Koyuki was looking for a lay but she had standards and she wasn’t getting some from a bum. All in all, it was a match she could accept, and so she did.

She, of course, presented herself as a real estate agent. It wasn't too far from the truth with how much of the past two years had been dedicated to property acquisition. Regardless, she learned very early in life that “Yakuza” tended to attract none of the normal people and all of the weird ones.

Spoiler:

And so here she was, sitting at a table for two on a busy Sunday night at Paprika Shokudo Vegan in Downtown Osaka, and waiting, waiting, waiting. Dressed up all nice in a Kensington coat, her hair down, her prescription glasses on, and tapping a finger impatiently against the edge of the table as she scanned the menu. Late, she thought. 3 minutes late and counting. Perhaps punctuality or the lack of it should have been a note on Japan Cupid as well.

How exactly did you go about catching someone's attention?

Did you go up to them, act honorable, and confront things right and properly?

Absolutely fucking not. If there was one thing you had to do when it came to an offending party that might want you dead, have bad relations with, or dealt with in the past then it came back down to try to set things up in your direction. You didn't wanna mess with anybody you didn't know without setting things up so you had the tactical advantage. A sane person would have probably brought forth a large sum of money, thrown it down, and maybe thrown a few favors into the mix as well to try and get on the good side of people.

Roman Foster, however, did not do sane.

Nor did he ever handle things simply enough anyway. Tokyo wasn't exactly new territory for the former soldier and mercenary. He had handled things once before and when he stepped back onto land, he was handling jobs from left to right with a slight code of conduct. He had principle, but he wasn't exactly what you'd call a 'fair' or 'honorable' man. At the end of the day, he was a man with a history and he needed to get an audience.

An audience that could be PREPARED.

So, did he call in for a few favors and ask someone to get him some details on a familiar face? Yes, yes he did. It was perverse with how he took about it, but it didn't take him too long before he set up a profile and asked a woman he knew, who also promptly slapped him for his shenanigans, for their picture.

And he proceeded to do what Nigerian princes had done since the beginning of time.

And that was catfishing a poor sucker. In this case, it was catfishing a familiar face and hoping to set things up the way he needed them to be set up. Of course, he would have preferred meat, but leave it for someone to like VEGAN food. Honestly, if that wasn't a punch to his face, he didn't know what was. Well, besides a punch to the face.

Spoiler:

"Well, hey there, fancy meeting you here, snookums."

He had stepped into the shop a minute late and kept an eye out whilst hovering around the counter. A simple drink before he told them he had a friend there he'd 'bunk' with. A simple grin was all it took before he finally glanced over to his 'target'. Primed and ready for a proper date, perhaps a simple lay at the end of it, and dressed suspiciously. Well, to him anyway, but how else would someone from organized crime dress, right?

And once the three-minute mark had passed, he walked over and set his drink on the table, sliding into the chair across from her, and giving the woman a plain look.

"So, I could give you a cheesy one-liner that's NOT going to work or I could introduce myself. Got a preference? I couldn't help but notice you were sitting here. Alone. Isolated. Pretty much left in an awkward space." He paused for a few moments before grinning.

"My manners... Right, how is it going?"

Roman Foster was TRULY a foolish man, but he sure as hell had balls.

They had never personally met before. Koyuki had only heard stories and gossip. She had only seen a portrait of him a year or two ago in a do-not-lend register for the Kaitei-Gumi's Loans Divisions when she was doing her rotations through the many, many branches of the Yakuza money-making machine. Yet Koyuki felt an odd personal animosity towards Roman Foster, as if she had suffered him for years-

Or as they called him among the Kaitei Assassins, the 100 yen man.

-And the reason was because her boss, Masuyo-san, occasionally bitched about him since, well, forever.

"You know, Ko, I didn't really appreciate what having two eyes meant until I went to watch Avatar 2nd year anniversary re-release down at Toho. All that next-gen 3D goodness limited by my now finite depth perception. Will I ever fully appreciate the tapestry of Pandora's lush ecosystem and the Navi's place in it with only one 3D glass? I think not. This is the 2nd worst thing that has happened to me today. The first is Roman Fuckin' Fos-"

"I'm sorry, I must have misheard you." she vividly remembered her saying over the phone as she stared at the clock, late for the Jurassic World premiere. "What do you mean 'missing'? No, a pencil goes missing. A police detective goes missing when he snoops where he shouldn't snoop. My shipments do not go missing. I'm not even the contact person anymore, you fuckwit! This is waaaay below my paygrade! Shut the everloving fuck up, call the right person, and let me go watch my raptors. Fuckity bye."

And well, she never quite got around to killing him. Or as Koyuki understood it, he was a useful idiot. Or maybe her boss thought doing what she did to him was much, much funnier. Masuyo-san always did like to play around with her food. After one annoyance too many, she dropped what would be his namesake on him: a 100 yen kill-on-sight bounty. A seemingly petty rebuke that said he was only worth that much. Yet, in the weeks ahead, it became clear what the intention was on a bounty that no one would bother going after.

It was a soft ban on the Tokyo underworld.

No pub in Kabukicho would serve him, no criminal from the highest enforcer to the lowest thug would treat with him. The Gaijin gangs that operated at the Godmother of Tokyo's pleasure stayed clear. She blocked him out and that was that, he was done as an illegitimate businessman in Tokyo.

And as Koyuki stared at the grinning man who put himself into the seat of her very, very late date, three things ran through the mind behind her withering stare:

This wasn't Tokyo.

This was going to annoy the shit out of her.

And...

Did this fucktard catfish her?

No... No, he could not have. The amount of algorithm trial-and-error, the effort to make the profiles that could pass basic scrutiny, the-

She narrowed her eyes. Maybe...?

No. What would be the purpose of it? She had killed for way way way less.

No, no it couldn't be. Nobody was that suicidal. Her reputation was well known. Unlike her starved-for-entertainment loon of a boss, now ascended fully to her Corporate heaven to pull the strings from behind, she did not suffer clowns.

"You are," Koyuki said slowly, deliberately, with the patience of someone who clearly didn't have any. "In the wrong seat."

She gestured her head to the side, as bidding him a premature farewell.

"Move."