by Rob Jones
“Go ahead, Rich,” she said. “You’re on speaker.”
“I have determined the location of another ring.”
The team reacted with joy. “Just as well,” Ryan said. “My copy of the Codex is what you might call water damaged.”
“I won’t ask,” Eden said.
“Where do we go?” Lea asked.
“Tokyo.”
Hawke caught Lea’s eye. “Tokyo?”
“The Ring of Cyrus the Great is in the possession of a family of treasure hunters.”
“How I hate treasure hunters,” Scarlet said. “They’re always so greedy.”
Ryan furrowed his brow. “Is she being sarcastic or not?”
“I have spoken with the treasure hunter’s daughter. She says it’s a sad story, but she may be able to help us with the ring, and there’s more,” Eden said.
“Let us have it,” Hawke said.
“I’ve had some intel from MI6 that the Oracle has sent a large number of Athanatoi to Hawaii.”
“Funny time for a surfing holiday,” Ryan said.
“It’s no surfing holiday, Mr Bale. We’re looking into it and so far, it seems the intel is good. At least two dozen heavily armed men took off from Athens a few minutes ago in a private plane registered to a holding company linked to Otmar Wolff. The flight plan has it stopping in Anchorage.”
Ryan scrunched up his nose. “Eh? Now he’s surfing in Alaska?”
Scarlet sighed. “It’s a refueling stop, Dumble.”
“Ah.”
“From there it’s due to land at Honolulu and onto a property owned by a man named McKenna. I think it’s safe to assume this is a serious move by the Oracle to secure one of the rings. He has a copy of the Codex and is more than capable of translating it.”
Lexi said. “We’ve known right from the start that this was going to be a race and the idea we’d just get all the rings one by one was like Ryan’s haircut.”
“What does that mean?”
“Ridiculous,” she said deadpan.
Hawke laughed. “Not only do we now have two of the rings already, but we also have all the idols. It’s a great start and we’re winning, but we can’t afford to give the Oracle even an inch or he’ll destroy us. We’re going to need to split the team. Lea, Reap and Kolya come with me to Hawaii and Cairo takes Ryan, Lexi and Zeke to Tokyo.”
“And what about getting out of here?” Lexi said.
Eden’s voice crackled over the tiny speaker. “A chopper from the Royal Malaysian Air Force is already tracking the GPS signal on this phone. If the battery fails, stay where you are or they’ll never find you.”
“Great stuff.” Hawke slapped his hands together. “All set?”
“All set, locked and loaded, darling.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Scarlet’s half of the ECHO team landed at Narita Airport in a pink Tokyo dawn. The discovery of the second ring in Malaysia had been welcomed in Washington and London but no one was celebrating yet. With six more rings to locate there was still a lot of work to do, no one could be sure the Oracle hadn’t already secured any of the others.
At least they still had the idols.
Taking a cab to the Shinjuku Gyoen Park just south of central Tokyo, they were soon strolling along a tree-lined path waiting to meet their contact. The sun streamed through the cherry leaves and blossom blew on the breeze. People talked quietly as they passed them by, and no one had the faintest idea why these strangers were in their land, or what was at stake for the world.
Scarlet took a brief call. “That was Jack,” she said. “As in Camacho, not Brooke, and he says they’re just about to take off for Washington. When they get there the plan is to go straight to the White House. When they meet with Alex and the President someone will get back to us. Now, where the hell is Rich’s contact?”
“What about that guy?” Zeke pointed at a man sitting on a nearby bench.
“Did you not hear Eden’s briefing?” Ryan said. “We’re looking for a woman.”
“Story of my life,” the Texan drawled.
“There,” Lexi said sharply. “She’s over there, in the denim jacket. Three o’clock.”
“Ouch,” Zeke said. “No longer any need to look for a woman.”
“Do try and contain yourself, Ezekiel,” Scarlet said. “Or I’ll be forced to give your bollocks a squeeze until you start behaving.”
“Double ouch,” Ryan said.
“And I’ll raise you a goddam,” added Zeke as they walked to the woman.
She looked up and removed her earbuds. “You are the people who need information regarding a certain ring?”
“Only if you’re Hiroko Adachi.”
She nodded. “We should talk over here.”
The small party sat in the shade under a cherry blossom tree far from any paths and Scarlet kicked things off. “Your father was Tōru Adachi, the famous treasure hunter?”
“Yes, he was.”
“And he had one of these?” Scarlet turned to Ryan and snapped her fingers in his face. “Picture of the ring, boy.”
Ryan frowned at her and then showed Hiroko his phone’s screen and a photo of the ring they had secured in Malaysia.
“Yes, but ours is different.”
“They’re all different,” Ryan said.
Lexi leaned back on the grass. “Where did your father find it?”
Hiroko smiled. “I knew you would ask this, but he did not find the ring.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Scarlet asked. “You just said he did.”
The Japanese woman looked at her with a frown. “No, he did not find the ring – the ring found him.”
“You’ll have to explain that,” Zeke said. “I ain’t the fastest horse in the stable but I’m no dummy either.”
“He was not searching for the ring when he found it. Normally, his treasure-hunting missions are meticulously planned down to the last detail, but on this occasion, he was simply on holiday in India. He was in a junk shop in Shimla in the north and there it was, sitting in a box of other rings. He knew at once he had something special. How long had it sat in the box among all that other comparatively worthless gold and silver? I do not know, and neither did he.”
“It has some kind of engraving on its face,” Lexi said, hope rising in her voice. “Can you remember what it looked like?”
“Etched into the gold was a very complex pattern, yes. Lots of lines and shapes. It was very beautiful. My father loved all of his treasures and treated them with reverence.”
“If he loved them so much, then how come he sold the ring?”
“He did not sell the ring. Categorically not.”
Hiroko was silent for a long time as she watched a man in a surgical mask slowly cycle toward them on the path. For a few seconds, Scarlet wondered if she had even heard the question. Then she said, “Have you heard of the Japanese concepts of giri and ninjo?”
“Can’t say I have, darling,” Scarlet said.
Hiroko gave a sage nod. “Loosely translated they mean obligation and human feeling, and they are very important in Japanese culture. Together they create a force of feeling that means debts of treachery or kindness to one must always be repaid, no matter the cost.” She paused a beat and the gentle smile fell from her face. “And particularly important to the Yakuza.”
“Not liking where this is going,” Lexi said.
“Quite. I am very ashamed to say that my father got into some financial trouble with the Yakuza and caused a lot of trouble for our family.”
“I see.”
“He became heavily in debt in the pachinko parlors and then made things much worse by trying to recover his money playing mah-jong in an illegal casino in Susukino. Unfortunately the casino was owned by the Yakuza. They were very clear about what they were going to do to him if he did not pay them back what he owed.”
Lexi knew all about the pachinko parlors. A two hundred billion dollar a year national obsession, half of Tokyo was full of the
places. The sound of the ball-bearings crashing about inside the machines could be heard up and down many streets in every Japanese city.
“I thought you said he never sold the ring?” Lexi asked.
“He didn’t.”
“So what happened?”
She sighed and started plucking at the grass near her knees. “The Yakuza demanded the ring as part of my father’s giri – the obligation he owed them for waving his debts. They did this because they knew he was a treasure hunter and something more valuable may come along in the future.”
“A lifelong debt?”
Hiroko nodded.
“It wasn’t so bad. He had many more items he coveted more. But the ring was the single most expensive piece he owned. His choice was to give the ring to the Yakuza and clear the debts, or he would be forced to choose from several items he held much more dearly. Now you know the story of Tōru Adachi and his daughter Hiroko.”
“He paid his debts,” Lexi said. “Why didn’t he use his skills to get the ring back?”
“He was a treasure hunter,” Hiroko said quietly. “Mostly he dived into wrecks but he wasn’t above digging holes in the dirt. What he didn’t do was break into the private residences of Yakuza bosses to steal back relics they had taken from him.”
Scarlet got the picture. Hiroko’s father had been a treasure hunter of some repute during his salad days, but had fallen on hard times and turned to gambling in his desperation to improve his life. A brief encounter with the Yakuza had ended with him handing over much of his life’s work to keep them at bay.
Including the Ring of Cyrus the Great.
“What was this Yakuza man’s name?”
“A man? I never said it was a man.”
Scarlet frowned. “I thought Yakuza were always men?”
“Then you thought wrongly. Most are men, but there have been women leaders in its history.”
“In that case,” Lexi said. “What is the woman’s name?”
“Her name is Makiko Jojima, and I would think very carefully about crossing her if I were you. She inherited her empire from her father when he died in a gangland shooting. She is bitter and impulsive. Ruthless. If she finds you in her home trying to steal the ring, she will kill you, and it will not be fast or painless.”
Hiroko paused to watch as a couple walked along the path with a little girl. She was holding a pink balloon and singing a song as her mother unwrapped an ice cream for her. “Only if this ring is of greater value than all of your lives should you pursue it.”
“It is,” Ryan said bluntly. “Where does this woman live?”
“The answer to that is, wherever she desires. All I can tell you is that the last I heard she lives at a luxury address here in Toyko – Izumi Garden Tower in Roppongi.”
“And you know where this is?”
Hiroko nodded. “Do any of you speak Japanese?”
“I do,” Lexi said.
“Then you don’t need me.”
“When we get what we want,” Scarlet said, “we’re out of here, no looking back. It’s always that way with us. If you want any of your father’s relics for yourself then your only chance is to come with us.”
Hiroko thought about it for a while. She drew in a deep breath and then blew it out. “There is only one item I would like back. A jewellery box that belonged to my mother. It has a tiger carved on the front. They took that too.”
“It’s yours if we find it.”
“Then I will come. I will take you to the address in Roppongi.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
They stepped up into the helicopter and quickly took their seats. They all seemed to know where to go so she guessed they usually sat in the same places. The Texan smacked his shovel hand down in the seat next to her and smiled. “You can sit here!”
She struggled to understand his accent but she knew what he meant so she sat down beside him and returned his smile. Buckled her seatbelt. Above them the engine was already spooling up and the co-pilot was closing the door. They jerked upward and started lifting off the helipad.
Below her to the right she saw one of the new JAL A350s lining up ready for take-off. Seconds later they were screeching up into the Tokyo skyscape, ripping through a bank of pink clouds and banking hard into the sunset. She stared out of the window in amazement as the tiny aircraft seemed to tip almost on its side as it made the sharp turn to the left.
She had grown up in a good neighborhood, and both her parents had earned very good money. She had traveled a great deal, particularly to countries rich in historical artefacts and relics as her father dragged her around his excavations.
But she had never flown in a helicopter before.
She was determined not to show her excitement to the foreigners. She kept a calm, neutral face and pretended for all the world this was just like any old day in the life of Hiro Adachi.
Below, the neon streets she knew so well were soon behind her and when she turned back to face the cabin, she saw the rest of the team were paying no mind to the take-off. Instead they were busily engaged in the business of retrieving her father’s mysterious ring.
Lexi turned to her. “Hiro, how long does it take to get from here to Izumi Tower?”
“I’m not sure, I have never flown by helicopter before. Maybe fifteen minutes.”
Scarlet looked at her watch. “Good, we have a quarter of an hour.”
Again, she thought about what they were saying. They were talking about attacking the heart of Makiko Jojima’s Yakuza empire, and they were talking about it casually. She wondered if any of them truly knew what taking on a woman like that would mean. This was the head of a criminal empire that consumed massive police resources every day of the year and it still operated with virtual impunity wherever it wanted.
She didn’t know anything about the people she was sitting with right now, but she knew enough about the Yakuza that even if they were successful in their mission to retrieve the ring, it would not end there. In stealing something from Makiko Jojima they would be giving her giri, or the obligation to pay them back for their deeds. It would never stop until that debt was repaid, and the only currency a person in her position would accept was blood and flesh.
As they crossed the city, Hiroko was amazed by just how vast metropolitan Tokyo really was. Bigger than New York, Miami, Washington DC, Chicago, Las Vegas and many other US cities put together, it was a monster of concrete and glass stretching to every horizon and offering endless possibilities wherever she looked.
She had been born here. Raised here. She went to elementary school in Hiroo and then they moved to Azabu where she completed her junior high and high school years. She had gone out on the town with her friends and attended university here, gaining her degree in marine exploration. She knew Tokyo like the back of her hand and yet she had never flown over her hometown in a helicopter before. Flying so low and so fast, it lifted the curtain on what an enormous metropolis it truly was.
Without drawing attention to herself, she glanced quickly at the foreigners sitting with her in the back of the chopper. Their leader was cool and distant. Tough, tall and with raven black hair, she seemed distracted. She turned and poked the younger man in the ribs and flicked his ear. The young man pretended to be annoyed but seemed to enjoy the attention nonetheless.
The Chinese woman was harder to read. She seemed quieter than the rest and spent much of the journey with her eyes closed. For some reason, the fingernails on her left hand were artificial – some sort of prosthetic replacement. They looked metallic and she had never seen anything like it before in her life. Some sort of accident, no doubt. Or torture, maybe. She shuddered to think.
The last of them was the squarest, chunkiest man she had ever seen. He reminded her of a Hollywood movie star with his toned body, chiselled jaw and sparkling, serious eyes. Upturned cowboy hat on the seat beside him with his shades inside it. A tough, determined face, and yet hiding behind the façade of merciless steel he had cultivated was another kind
of man, a man with a good sense of humor.
“Right, we’re here,” Scarlet said. “This is the building you’re talking about, yes?”
Hiroko nodded. “Jojima is on the top floor.”
“Of course she is,” Lexi said. “They always are.”
The chopper lost altitude and lined up with a helipad on the roof of a skyscraper two blocks to the south. “All right, let’s get on with it,” Scarlet said. “We land, take the lift down to the ground floor and then walk the two blocks to the Izumi Tower. Then we ask nicely and get the ring.”
Hiroko raised an eyebrow. It wasn’t going to be that easy, was it?
*
They stepped out the elevator and hit the streets of Tokyo, surrounded with flashing neon signs and commercial advertisements. In a way, Lexi felt lost here, just as she felt lost everywhere. Since the murder of her parents by the Zodiacs, the only family she had left were her friends in the ECHO team, but was that enough?
She still had feelings for Hawke, and she knew Alex did, but now he was engaged to Lea. They would be married soon. Another happy couple, and she guessed kids would be next. Scarlet seemed happy enough with Jack Camacho. Reaper’s on-again-off-again relationship with his wife in Provence was funny to hear about, but they still saw each other even after all these years and they had their twins to think about.
Ryan was destroyed after Maria’s murder but he had come back stronger and now he had started to talk about women again. He would be next. All of them happy except her.
She recollected the memory back on the Duncan of Lea’s engagement ring twinkling on her finger like a little star. Looking down at her own hand she saw nothing but the hideous, ugly prosthetic fingernails shining dully in the neon night. She had never felt so low, and it was at this moment that her betrayal of Joe Hawke reared its grotesque head and pushed her other thoughts far away.
It was a long time ago, but he would never forgive her if he found out.
Maybe it would be better for everyone if the sniper’s next bullet had my name on it.
