Almost as if he heard Will’s thought, Mark turned around.
“Oh, hey, Will,” Mark said in slight surprise. “Good morning.”
“Morning,” Will answered back, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.
“You want some breakfast? It’ll be done in just a few seconds.”
Will nodded. “Sure.”
Mark smiled and got Will a plate before turning back to his cooking and finishing up. The food prepared, Mark put a modest amount of food on Will’s plate before fishing a fork out of his silverware drawer and placing it on the plate as he handed it to Will.
“Hope you like your eggs scrambled,” Mark joked lightly.
Will accepted the plate and took a seat at the counter while Mark turned back to the food and gathered up his own serving.
They ate in silence; Will picking at his food in a rather morose fashion while Mark ate normally, watching the morning sun through the windows. Occasionally, Will would look up from his food to stare at Mark. He seemed to be a stark contrast to Jin, leaning calmly back against the cooling stove, eating peacefully. Even though Will knew intellectually that Mark was also an assassin, he couldn’t see or sense anything like the raw violence that exuded from Jin. Though to be fair, he hadn’t sensed it in Jin at first either. There was also something else that was different, and this one Will gave voice to.
“You haven’t looked at me this entire time?”
Mark chuckled. “Would you prefer it if I had been?”
“No,” Will replied. “But it’s surprising. I would’ve figured that Jin would’ve told you to not let me out of your sight.”
“He did tell me to keep an eye on both you and your mother, yeah, but I’m not going to be terribly obsessive over it. Neither you nor your mother are terrifically stupid people.”
Will gave a short, quiet laugh. “And how do you figure that?” he asked.
“Because,” Mark answered simply, “if you had been terrifically stupid people, you wouldn’t have come here with Jin.”
Will tried to scoff, but the images of the four men in black that had attacked them, and the images of what Jin had done to them, floated back to the fore of his mind. He had to admit it; being in the situation he was in was certainly preferable to being dead. And of course, thinking about Jin made Will remember Jin’s offer to talk, and his plans for taking Jin up on that offer.
“So where is Jin?” Will asked.
“He went out to the lake earlier this morning, before sunrise,” Mark answered. “Why?”
“He said he wanted to talk to me,” Will shrugged, keeping his reason simple. “I just wanted to get it over with.”
“Well, if you want me to take you to him, I will,” Mark offered.
Surprise planted an incredulous look on Will’s face.
“Seriously?” he asked. “I thought Jin didn’t want me or my mom to go outside this place.”
“Jin doesn’t have a problem with you going out,” Mark explained. “He just has an incredible problem with you going out alone.”
“Ah.”
Will could understand that, even if he wasn’t thrilled about having to be escorted everywhere he went.
“So, you want to go see him?” Mark asked.
“Yeah,” Will replied, taking a last bite of hash browns.
--<(0)>--
Out in the forest, just inside the tree line of the lake’s north shore, Jin Sakai stood within a small clearing, practicing his sword technique. He moved slowly and gracefully, taking great care to make sure all his movements where perfectly controlled. The solitude of his location, coupled with his intense focus on his movements, allowed Jin to clear his mind and gave him some measure of peace. As he finished, he heard a series of footsteps move softly through the underbrush nearby. Turning around, Jin saw Mark and Will walking toward him.
“Oh, hey, you two,” he said. “What are you doing out here?”
“Will said he wanted to talk to you,” Mark answered.
“Okay,” Jin nodded, sheathing his sword.
“And before I leave,” Mark added, “I wanted to let you know that Dorigan has called a meeting tonight, so if you take Leah and Will anywhere tonight and I’m not there when you get back, that’s where I am.”
“Okay. Thanks for the heads up. Let me know if anything significant comes up.”
“I will,” Mark said as he began to walk away. “Later, Will.”
Will waved goodbye to Mark and then turned back to Jin, who had gone to sit on a large tree root.
“I wasn’t expecting you to want to talk to me so soon,” he said with a small smile.
“Yeah, well,” Will shrugged. “I needed some answers, and I didn’t feel like waiting to get them.”
“Fair enough,” Jin replied. “What do you want to know?”
“Wait, that’s it?” Will asked, suddenly skeptical. “I just ask a question and you’ll answer it honestly?”
“Yep.”
“Why?”
“Because there’s no point in lying to you. Because I don’t want to lie to you.”
“Why not?”
That question set Jin’s mouth into an uncomfortable grin. That wasn’t a question he had an easy answer for.
“Because…” Jin said slowly, “it makes me feel bad.”
“So you feel bad about lying to me,” Will came on, incredulous, “but you don’t feel bad about killing people?”
Jin expression twisted again. That was another tricky question.
“I don’t feel bad about killing these people,” he explained. “These people have had death coming to them for a very long time. They’ve deserved it countless times over.”
“And what makes you so different from them?” Will shouted, heedless of the volume of his voice.
Jin thought about this for a long time. What really did make him so different from Dorigan and the others? They were all murderers, but even in that, Jin came up with a series of glaring variances.
“Though we are all murderers,” Jin began slowly, “I have never degenerated to the level of Dorigan or the others. They enjoy taking the lives of others; they feel it makes them powerful. They all do what they do for self-gratification. They all get something out of it.”
“And what about you?” Will asked, his anger cooling off. “What did you do it for?”
“I did it for the same reasons that the Black Dragon Clan existed in the first place. To remove corruption and evil from the world.”
That answer drew a sharp bark of derisive laughter from Will.
“Are you serious?” Will exclaimed. “Do you have any idea how stupid that sounds?”
“No,” Jin answered simply. “Because it doesn’t sound stupid to me. There is so much more to this world than the American media shows you, Will, so much more. For every story you hear about a despot, or a corrupt politician, there are dozens more out there, and no government or country ever does anything about them. I made my living as an assassin removing those types of people from the world, and though the work was violent, I felt like I was doing something worthwhile. At least in the beginning.”
“Why?” Will asked. “What changed?”
Jin sighed. This was a story he never thought he would have to tell. Just thinking about it made Jin feel as though the walls of his life were trying to crush him with darkness. Still, he fought through it and gave Will the answer he wanted.
“About thirteen years ago, an older member of the Black Dragon Clan staged a coup. At the time, the clan only accepted contracts from those looking to free themselves of a certain ill force, whether it be a politician, a military leader, or any other variety of things. Well, this member, Jared, had been making extra money on the side taking private contracts from the very people we were trying to kill. Eventually, he made the case to our then leader, Master Kowloon, that we could make more money serving the corrupt individuals rather than killing them.
“Well, Kowloon just wouldn’t have it. That wasn’t the reason the Black Drag
on Clan existed. That started a rather heated argument where Jared accused Kowloon’s beliefs of being archaic and meaningless in this day and age. In the end, Jared left the clan and none of us thought anything about it. A week later, he came back and laid siege to our headquarters. Only three of us survived that night – Master Kowloon, myself, and Mark.”
“Wait, Mark was there?”
“Yeah. I’d brought him into the clan five years prior. He’d been living on the streets in Ireland and had made the mistake of pissing off the leader of one of the most violent street gangs in the area. I was nearby and…well, one thing led to another.”
“Okay. So what happened after the coup?”
Jin took another breath and continued his story.
“After the coup, Kowloon went into hiding. He said something to me about a larger battle being played out and that I was to never forsake the beliefs that founded the clan.”
“But you did.”
“Yeah,” Jin said, shaking his head. “I did. Once he left, I never saw the point of it. If things were just going to keep playing out the same way, I felt my time would be better spent just taking care of me and my family.”
“Your family?” Will asked, confused.
At this, Jin sighed, and his mouth turned into a sad smile.
“I’m sorry, Will. I haven’t been telling this story straight from the beginning. Let me assure you now that there is a reason, a very specific reason, why my life is the way it is. That reason is very simple – I never had another choice.”
“I don’t…understand.”
“I know. Will, this is gonna be a long story, and I’d rather not stop once I start. Okay?”
Will nodded his understanding, and Jin began telling him the story of his life, just as he had with Leah. He told him of his start in martial arts, of his parents’ murder, of everything in his life that had led him to this point. Will was a very good listener. He never once interrupted Jin, and the only time his expression wavered from one of undivided attention was when Jin had told Will the truth of what Dorigan was planning.
“No…” Will had said. “No way. There’s just no way that could be true.”
“I know how it sounds, Will,” Jin replied. “But I saw what he was building, and whether or not it would’ve worked, I wasn’t willing to take that risk.”
Will conceded that Jin’s thinking made sense.
After that, Jin wrapped up his story by explaining the series of events that had led him to crash down on the roof of Leah and Will’s apartment building.
“I know I’ve been acting rather schizophrenic,” Jin said after he’d finished his tale. “And I apologize for that. I only hope that now you know what’s led up to me landing in your lives, you can understand why.”
“Yeah,” Will said. “I do. A little.”
And he did. Now knowing what Jin’s life had really been like, Will felt that he had a much better understanding of the man. Now knowing the truth behind Jin’s arrival in his life, Will felt all of his anger toward Jin evaporate. He was still a little bitter about things, but that bitterness was directed toward the world at large, and it lacked any real power. However, there was one emotion that did have real power, one that played the memories of his multiple outbursts of temper after leaving Manhattan before Will’s eyes.
Suddenly he felt very young, and very foolish.
“I’m…sorry, Jin,” Will mumbled.
“Hmm?” Jin asked, not hearing him.
“I’m sorry,” Will repeated.
“What for?”
“For being so…difficult,” Will said, looking away. “I was just so pissed off that my life had been uprooted like that again. First with my mother, and then again by some total stranger who meant absolutely nothing to me! I just couldn’t stand it.”
“I know, Will,” Jin replied gently, getting up off his tree root. “Your mom told me what happened.”
“She did?” Will asked, surprised.
“Yeah. Which is why I’m the one who needs to apologize. The night I landed on the roof, I had gotten emotional, and I had made a decision based on those emotions. If I hadn’t done that, you and your mother would probably never have met me.”
Will sighed and hung his head. Jin bowed his head as well and walked up to Will. He placed his good hand on the young man’s shoulder, and Will looked up at him. Jin looked him in the eyes, and Will was surprised by the depth he saw in Jin’s eyes.
“I’m sorry, Will,” he said softly.
Will held eye contact with Jin, and after a moment he nodded.
“I can see that now. I accept your apology.”
Jin smiled and patted Will’s shoulder.
“So what do you say? Enough heavy stuff for today?”
“Yeah,” Will agreed. “More than enough.”
“Alright, let’s head back to Mark’s then. Who knows, maybe we’ll even go out to lunch or dinner later? Sound like fun?”
“It sounds…like a good time,” Will answered honestly.
“Alright,” Jin chuckled. “Let’s head back and we’ll worry about fun later, huh?”
Will smiled. “Sure.”
So together, and both smiling, the two of them walked back toward Pine Lake.
--<(0)>--
Later that night, Jin, Leah, and Will were all sitting in Mark’s living room watching a comedy program on TV. For all three of them, it was a very pleasant change of pace; being able to sit back, relax, and laugh at a comedian’s jokes rather than fighting off and running away from a group of bloodthirsty assassins.
About halfway through the program, Jin heard the door to the living room open and close. Mark was back.
“Hey, Mark, how’d it go?” Jin called to him.
Mark didn’t answer right away, and Jin looked back to see Mark’s face surprisingly pale and holding a pained yet fearful expression. The comedian on TV was erased completely from Jin’s mind, and he left the couch to walk quickly over to Mark.
“Mark, what’s wrong? You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”
Mark didn’t speak right away. His mind was still trying to grind back to operating speed. Still, the simple knowledge that he must force the words out gave him enough strength of will to do so, albeit slowly.
“Jin, the doctor said that it would take three weeks for your arm to heal…about.”
“Yeah, so?”
“So,” Mark said, looking into Jin’s eyes. “Dorigan will complete Project Hellbound in one.”
Chronicles of the Apocalypse
--<(0)>--
Part 1: Revenge, Everything is Nothing
Chapter 15: Chasing Shadows
“No.”
It was a simple word that was spoken softly, and yet Jin filled it with the weight and power of the universe.
“No.”
He said it again.
And again.
And again.
He kept saying it, louder and faster until the word was coming out in an incomprehensible stream of sound. He backed away from Mark and turned around to face the nearest wall with his right hand pressed to his forehead, still chanting his stream of refusal.
“Jin?” Mark asked tentatively.
The sound of Mark’s voice broke Jin out of his shock, and he suddenly stood very straight and very still. He closed his eyes, let his good arm fall to his side, and took a deep, relaxing breath…and punched a hole in Mark’s wall.
The unexpected sound of Jin’s blow gave Leah and Will a terrified start, and the two of them swiftly left the couch to go and see what was wrong. As they approached Mark and Jin, Mark gave them a look to tell them to stay back, and they did so, Leah instinctively moving closer to her son. No one said a word.
Deep down inside of Jin’s mind, his emotions spiraled out of control. They came and left and changed so dizzyingly fast that Jin couldn’t make sense of them. It left him feeling momentarily weak and powerless. All his plans, all his effort, everything he’d been trying to do now meant nothing b
ecause it had all been done to stop the plans of a madman.
Plans that would come to fruition anyway.
Plans that meant the deaths of his children had been in vain.
That thought was enough to bring Jin’s chaotic emotions to a dead stop. Letting Alex and Katie’s deaths be in vain was simply inexcusable. It simply would not happen. That alone set Jin’s mind and steeled his will.
He knew now what he had to do.
“I need to leave,” he said to Mark.
“What?” Will asked, shocked.
“Why?” Leah asked.
Jin sighed and turned to them.
“Dorigan will complete Project Hellbound in one week. My arm will take at least three to heal. I can’t stop him like this. Not on my own.”
“So you intend to run?” Will challenged.
“No,” Jin replied evenly. “I intend to look.”
“For what?”
“Help.”
“In the form of…?”
“Mordechai.”
“Jin, he erased himself,” Mark interjected.
“He left a fingerprint on New York.”
“That Dorigan may have already tracked down and cleaned up.”
“I have to look anyway.”
“Jin, this is crazy. Even for you.”
“Don’t have a choice.”
Mark sighed, and Will looked frantically between the two men. This couldn’t be happening, he’d only just gotten settled into this situation, and now it was changing again!
“Jin…” he tried to protest, but Jin answered his protest before he could finish it.
“Will, this doesn’t change anything for you. You still need to stay here and keep your head down. Mark will look after you while I’m gone, that’s why we came here in the first place. I will be back in only a few days, if that.”
“You better be,” Will said, his voice quivering. “You better promise you’ll come back. You better swear it.”
“I swear to you, Will,” Jin vowed, staring Will straight in the eyes. “I will come back.”
Chronicles of the Apocalypse: Revenge, Everything is Nothing Page 18
