Shifting the Focus

Over the next few days, Barbara, still accompanied by Henry, toured Los Angeles and Hollywood. They even tried to sneak into the film sets of various movie studios for a visit.

Actually, in places like this, people come and go, and the film set guards can't tell who's who. As long as you don't look suspicious and get mistaken for a reporter or a fan, no one will bother you when you walk around inside.

Only on certain film sets with exceptionally high security requirements would entry and exit be restricted and people deliberately ushered out. Otherwise, with Henry's actor's pass registered with the Actors Guild, he could move freely in most places.

The two even observed several filming locations, and received drastically different treatment.

For example, Henry was almost pulled away to do odd jobs. Barbara's beauty made her a target for the actresses on set, who thought she was some whore who had slept with the director and was trying to replace someone's role.

Anyway, the two of them slipped away before things escalated.

There are no instances of actors being temporarily pulled in to play minor roles, since the Actors Guild is watching closely, and no producer would dare disregard the rights of their contracted actors, even for minor roles.

However, Barbara's appearance and image attracted the attention of many agents and talent scouts.

The girl who claimed to be interested in developing her career in Hollywood simply accepted these people's business cards. She didn't seem particularly proactive; instead, it appeared that she was prioritizing her studies again.

Unfortunately, Barbara, who had been on the offensive, didn't succeed. Henry always managed to come up with various excuses to say goodbye each night.

On the first day, the cat hadn't been fed yet.

The next day, the cat got a bone stuck in its tooth, so we had to go back to check on it.

On the third day, the cat had eaten too much the day before. I hadn't prepared much food in advance, so I had to go back and keep an eye on it to prevent it from throwing a tantrum and turning the house upside down.

On the fourth day, the cat had injuries, so they had to go back early to take care of it. Henry, of course, wouldn't say that Kitty had thrown a tantrum the day before and he had kicked her. Anyway, after kicking her once, she behaved herself. Loving education is all bullshit; a combination of kindness and strictness is the Reason.

Therefore, Barbara almost considered Kitty the Tabby Cat a rival in love.

On the fifth day, which was also the last day of the university's winter break, Barbara had to catch a flight back to Georgia, so there was no planned tour of Los Angeles, and she didn't get to meet Henry.

The two had said goodbye the day before and agreed to meet again during their next holiday. After all, the two sides were quite far apart, one on the East Coast and the other on the West Coast.

However, the fact that we agreed not to meet beforehand was, of course, pre-arranged.

As planned, Nick Fury stirred up a fight near Tinkerer's Black Clinic in South Los Angeles.

The conflict was neither too big nor too small to attract police attention, nor was it something that would simply be resolved by those involved going home and licking their wounds. Of course, no Deadman, and no innocent bystanders were affected.

For Black and Spain street gangs, getting some money and causing something like this isn't difficult. It's become almost routine for both sides. So no one suspects whether someone is behind it all, instigating this commotion.

Those who weren't injured are left out. As for those who were injured, they should go home and apply medicine. Or, they can simply clean their wounds and apply some saliva, and they'll be fine.

If someone is seriously injured, their companions usually just dump them in the hospital emergency room. Although they might survive, they usually end up in jail for a while.

The police wouldn't let such a case slip by. Even if doctors don't recognize whether a patient is a wanted criminal, they will recognize what caused the wound. Gunshot wounds are always reported; it's standard procedure, no doubt about it.

If the seriously injured person has close friends around, they might be able to take the person to a veterinarian or find some medical personnel with first aid skills to treat the person privately. This way, they can avoid reporting to the police and avoid being detained.

Since the Tinkerer's clinic opened, the options for seriously injured people have become much simpler. Just bring them to this dirty, messy place that looks utterly unhygienic.

It only costs a small amount. Although the treatment process may not be humane—it's common to see bat anesthesia, or several people restraining the hands and feet and operating directly without anesthesia—at least the person can survive.

So today, the Tinkerer's Black Clinic is seeing business again. And it's not just black gangs, but also Spain, which are basically Mexico gangs, with seriously injured people coming in for treatment.

Everyone tacitly agreed not to cause trouble here. It wasn't that the Tinkerer's Black Clinic was a neutral zone where no one was allowed to cause trouble.

Instead, someone caused trouble and got injured at Tinkerer's place, and now they're demanding extra money for medical treatment! This applies to both the victim and the perpetrator.

If you don't pay, we'll call the police and have you arrested!

Tinkerer don't even need to call the police for rigging medical bills. People will just keep coming to their door anyway; nobody's got a clean slate. Once they're arrested, a check reveals they're all sleazy. How long they're in jail depends on their luck.

Of course, the person had to be thrown far away so as not to implicate them. Even if the arrested criminal implicated the Tinkerer, the police would often tacitly pretend not to know. On the one hand, they had made several attempts but failed to catch the person, so they simply wanted to save themselves the trouble.

So the two rivals, who had just wounded each other, didn't pull out their guns from their pockets when they stood in Roll-up Shutter. Instead, they pretended not to know each other, opened the Roll-up Shutter, and pressed the call bell on the empty refrigerator.

The Tinkerer opened the door from the inside and poked his head out. The scarred-faced man glanced at the group and said, "Those who are about to die, come in first. The rest of you, wait."

Having spotted his target, Nick Fury, hiding in the shadows, immediately used his cell phone to contact Barbara Morse, a trainee agent at S.H.I.E.L.D..

Barbara also appeared near Henry's rented apartment from her hiding place. She immediately spotted old Gary sitting in the morning Sun Pharma by the apartment door. She waved and greeted him, "Good morning, Gary."

"Oh, isn't this Bobbie? Good morning. Aren't you going back to university today? Aren't you going to the airport to catch your flight?"

"I'd been so grateful to Henry for showing me around Los Angeles these past few days, and I wanted to give him a thank-you gift. I just finished preparing it last night. Is he home?"

Old Gary knew nothing about the Tinkerer; he only saw the man leave. So he said, "He just went out. Looks like he won't be back anytime soon. Why don't you give me the things, and I'll bring them to him later?"

The gift was packaged in a small pink paper bag, which didn't seem like a gift for a regular friend.

Old Gary raised an eyebrow, made a lewd expression, and said, "So, how about it? The guide I introduced you to is pretty good, isn't he? What If...? you like him, then be proactive. He's a great young man, a very reliable boyfriend."