you're too young & eager to love

This required me to look up way too much Japanese stuff, like weapons and geography and shrines. Next it'll be clothing and familiar sayings. O-Ren Ishii just had to be from heritages that I know nothing about, besides the American part of course.

But yes, here we go, just a few try-outs for her character. Lots of Sofie and Gogo included. Also lots of implications.

I hope to try more soon.

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Her silence is demanding.

She hides a smile behind the length of her fingers and dips her eyes. Behind her, Sofie speaks in unhurried but constant French, her working mouth pressed close to the speaker of her cell phone. Gogo’s metal chain whip whistles near the edges of her plaid skirt.

When the blood splatters across the table, bright as cherry blossoms, O-Ren settles the pristine silk of her kimono. Gogo giggles and rocks back and forth on her shoes.

O-Ren Ishii’s home is a temple, literally, and stands on hallowed Japanese grounds. A shrine of the Shinto, the Japanese scrolls murmuring in the breeze, and the fires lit routinely. The sound of water and shiver of blossoms more sharp and delicate than a katana’s steel.

She steps into it barefoot, leaving the blood on her shoes to be cleaned away later.

Gogo keeps her rope dart upon entering, but Sofie tucks her phone into the pocket of her dress.


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Behind her palm, O-Ren whispers to Sofie.

The brunette unwinds the strict bun, her hair loosening and falling heavily across her pale shoulders.

“Stop that,” she murmurs when Gogo’s hand touches her thigh, the skin dusted with freckles like the tops of her cheeks.

The younger girl continues and O-Ren backhands her across the mouth, a smooth swipe of her knuckles, so that Gogo’s pink lip-gloss smears across her skin. It’s a warning, not a threat, and Gogo puts a hand to her lip, grinning.


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O-Ren is meticulous. She measures each member of the Crazy 88, picks them personally, because she understands how the human flesh can be made into a weapon. They dip and weave and mold to her; they form themselves beneath her till she can use their backs as a bridge to cross the Fuji Five Lakes.

Gogo is the only one who prizes impulsiveness and spontaneity, once thrusting a fork into the neck of a Crazy 88 over drinking games and wages. Sofie, flicking a screen-fan back and forth lazily at the time, made a note to find another recruit in her appointment book.

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