Nick's Past

"So you're my new partner, eh?" Slayer Hitoshī asks Nick. The child prodigy, the famous Bumblebee that I've been hearing about, Slayer Hachi? You're even younger than I expected."

"Sure, whatever," Nick mumbles as he continues fidgeting with his phone, turning up the music connected to his earphones full blast to ignore Hitoshī's words. Nick is wearing the standard black ninja suit and body armor that assassins wear, although instead of a black ninja mask, Nick wears a long yellow scarf to cover his mouth and nose. "Name's Nick, by the way, old man."

Hitoshī's eyes begin to twitch before reaching out, and snagging the phone out of Nick's hands.

"Hey!" Nick cries as he looks up to face Hitoshī.

"Two things, Hachi," Hitoshī begins to say. "One: Is that I love formalities. You will only refer to me as "Hitoshī," and I will only refer to you as "Hachi." No first names, no nicknames, nothing. And two-"

Before Hitoshī can continue, Nick electrifies his entire body, dashing over to Hitoshī and snatching his phone out of his hands. Nick then reconnects his headphones and turns his music back up. "Two things-" Nick begins to say as he turns around to face the star-struck Hitoshī. "One: Is that I don't care about formalities. I don't care what I call you or what you call me. And two: I don't even care about being an Assassin. I'm here because I've got nothing better to you. Tasked by the Chairman to groom me into becoming the perfect Assassin or not, I ain't listening to you."

Hitoshī closes his wide-open mouth and smirks. "Well that coincides with my "number two" well. I hate kids.

And from that day onwards, Nick and Hitoshī were partners. But the two hated working together. They were always at each other's throats, annoyed, angry at the other. Nick hated the whole idea of Assassin Slayers and the Slayer Organization, and therefore hated Hitoshī's dedication to the craft. Hitoshī hated how seriously Nick took assassination, calling the boy "Wasted potential." Nick wouldn't use either stealth nor intelligence when assassinating, but simply rushed into any situation, using his supreme power to overwhelm the enemy. Hitoshī was also annoyed by Nick's habit to refer to anyone informally, most likely stemming from Hitoshī's over formality which combined with the fact that Nick hated Hitoshī, forming said habit.

Nick assumed that for the rest of his life, that he would simply be unhappy. But one day, in the middle of a drink at his usual bar, Nick met a woman named Lucille, and the two began to talk.

They got married months after.

And soon after that, I had a son.

Nick was a great father and husband, and while his family knew that he was a Pro Slayer, only his wife knew that he was an Assassin. Nick was breaking the rules of being an Assassin just by being with other people. Not that he cared, obviously

From that point on, Nick was happy, truly happy, for the first time in seven years. Everyday, Nick convinced himself to take all the pain, take all the shit, put on a brave face at work so when Nick got home, he could see the loving faces of his wife and son. And soon after getting married, Nick was able to quit his job of being an Assassin, and became just a regular field patrol Slayer again, gaining fame and popularity and becoming the Strongest Pro Slayer, because Nick, of course, wasn't known during his time as an Assassin.

But then one day Nick came home from work, not seeing the loving faces of his wife and son, but the face of a deranged man and the duck taped, bloodied faces of his wife and child. "Lucille! Gale!" Nick cried.

"Make any sudden movements and I'll Blow their fucking brains out!" The man shouts.

You see, Nick made plenty of enemies during his time as an Assassin Slayer and this deranged man was just one of the many.

"Do you even know who I am, Hachi?!" The man sneered.

"No, I'm sorry, and I don't know what I did to you but please, my wife and son have nothing to do with this, let them go!" Nick pleaded.

"And neither did my brother, he was innocent as well!" The man snapped.

"I've killed many, and I hated it, all of it. Taking life after life, running person after person, it makes you go mad, it's sickening! So please, tell me, what was your brother's codename, maybe we can work out?" Nick suggested, trying to remain calm.

"Does Slayer Deddo ring a bell?!" The man shouted.

"Oh, yeah..it does.." Nick said softly.

"And why did you kill him?!" the man asked.

"Your brother...killed many Pro Slayers in the line of duty for seemingly no reason. He was mad, drunk with power, and he needed to be dealt with" Nick answered.

"Shut up!" The man roared, covering his ears. The man uncovered his ears and pointed his gun towards Lucille Gale. "Shut up, Hachi, or I'll blow their fucking brains out!"

"Wait, please, let's talk this out! What can I do to make you leave us alone?" Nick pleaded.

"Nothing, Hachi," the man replied. "You killed my flesh and blood and now I'll kill yours! You've done enough."

Bang!

Bang!

"NO!!"

Two gunshots rang through the air, and before Nick could activate a single shred of Cursed Power, two holes laid in the side of the head of Nick's wife and child, blood seeping out.

"Oh, boy, did that feel good, hachi! I feel like something heavy has been lifted off of my chest, I feel free! You should try killing someone you hate sometimes, it feels great!" The man cackled. "Oh wait, you already have!"

"So, Hachi, do you want to kill me now?" The man then asked.

Nick was silent.

"No…" Nick growled. "I want to lock you up...torture you...rip off your fingernails, your toenails...wait for them to grow back and rip them off gain...starve you, give you no water for weeks...rip off your skin...pluck out your eyes...put centipedes in your ears and let them crawl around...that's what I want to do…"

"Well, too bad!" The insane man laughed.

Bang!

With a final gunshot, the brains and blood of the crazed man splattered out onto the corpses of Nick's wife and child, not allowing Nick to get his revenge. Nick collapsed to the floor,and crawled over to his late family.

"Lucille? Gale? Wake up, you too...this isn't funny, you know." Nick got up and shook their shoulders. "Lucille? Gale? Are you two asleep?" Nick then sunk to the ground, tears springing from his eyes. "Wake up...you two…"

"This isn't funny."

When Nick was thirty two, his wife of thirty two and his son were killed right in front of his eyes. Nick was unable to do anything to help, and wasn't even able to say his goodbyes. 

As one could imagine, Nick entered a massive state of depression. Nothing was able to fill the new void on Nick's heart.

Six months. For six months, Nick didn't return to the Slayer Organization. Then after those six months, Nick did return. He marched straight to the Chairman's office and told the Chairman: "I quit." Nick didn't fear whichever assassin the Chairman would choose to go after Nick. In fact, he welcomed it. But then the Chairman gave Nick a promise, just like how he promised Nick to promote him to an Assassin Slayer after winning the World Slayer Tournament. But this time, the Chairman offered Nick a different job. The Chairman told Nick that in five more months there would be a new batch of rookies, and, if Nick desired to, Nick could become a squad captain and look at these children, hoping to fill the void in Nick's heart which was caused by the deaths of Lucille and Gale. The Chairman told Nick that Nick had valuable information. Information that could ruin the Organization. And Nick was too strong to assassinate, he simply would have fought the Assassin Slayers off. So the Chairman's best bet was to keep Nick in arm's reach, to keep Nick as part of the Slayer Organization.

Then, another six more months later, the Slayer Hachi squad was formed. A squad of six young, naive Pro Slayers, wet behind the ears and ready to work. All except for one boy. The boy was named Luis Tramontana, who had a similar sadness to him that Nick had. A sadness that marked the loss of a loved one. A month or so later, Nick met another boy who soon became part of the Staten Island Squad. This boy's name was Mikey Hakan and, like Luis and Nick himself, Mikey had a certain familiar sadness to him.

Both of them desperately needed a father figure.

And the void in Nick's heart was caused by the death of his son.

So it just worked out.