Kusanagi

by Clem Chambers

  ‘I went to see if my father had successfully returned the Yasakani no Magatama.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He had handed it to the Emperor himself.’

  ‘Great,’ said Jim. ‘I bet you’re relieved.’

  ‘Very.’

  ‘I’ve got a question for you,’ he said, sipping more of the delicious sake. ‘Who are the Happy Foxes?’

  ‘Very famous,’ he said. ‘They are celebrity bodyguards. They give protection to pop stars at events and nightclubs. Japanese fans are famously obsessive.’

  ‘I could have told you that,’ whispered Kuda, in his ear.

  He turned to her. ‘I’m sorry, I suppose you could have,’ he said. ‘So you’re a bodyguard to the stars?’

  ‘It’s just showbiz,’ she said,. ‘It’s not enough to be good at your job. You have to look good too.’ She smiled. ‘So what is your story, Englishman?’

  ‘The standard one. Boy meets girl, boy loses girl.’

  ‘I know that story well. I like the beginning part very much.’

  Jim wondered where Jane was. She was probably forty thousand feet up in the air on her way back to Virginia, or in a bar somewhere with one of the SEALs, laughing about blowing stuff up.

  ‘What about the boy loses girl part?’ he said.

  ‘That bit can be fun too.’

  Jim picked up a roasted giant sea snail. It tasted like a grilled action figure but he could kind of imagine it might be really tasty to a starving person. ‘So what did you think about today’s bit of action?’

  She seemed to consider a couple of different replies. ‘If we don’t get thrown in jail, we will definitely be able to put our fees up.’ She swished her hair. Jim wondered what the tattoos appearing from under her outfit did below the line.

  He took out his sat phone. There was still no message from Jane. He switched it off.

  The professor was talking animatedly to his Happy Fox. They seemed very close.

  Kuda threw him a talk to me look.

  ‘So you don’t mind unhappy endings?’ he said.

  ‘The end of one story is the beginning of another,’ she said.

  The waiter was topping up Jim’s box of sake. He wondered why Jane couldn’t at least ping him an SMS. The simplest explanation was that she didn’t give a damn. ‘Do you believe that the simplest answer to a tricky question is the right one?’ he asked Kuda.

  She batted her beautiful eyes at him. ‘No,’ she said.

  ‘That’s good,’ he said, switching the phone back on in the hope that when it synched up a delayed message might suddenly beam down to him. The phone was running on its 3G circuit, or so it told him, so it was acting like a normal phone. The signal bars pulsed.

  Nothing.

  ‘You’re sad,’ she said, taking his hand.

  ‘Jetlag.’

  ‘Let’s go for a drink after dinner,’ said Kuda. ‘My favourite bar is at the top of the Park Hyatt.’

  ‘I’m staying there.’

  ‘Wow,’ she said. ‘That is very convenient.’

  A huddle of wealthy young Tokyoites were waiting to be seated at the bar’s reception desk and a long line snaked back to the elevators. Kuda, with Jim in tow, waltzed past it and they were ushered straight to a table. The bar was a giant glasshouse suspended in the clouds, an uplit cavernous space with interesting shadows. Jim liked the sciencefiction film-set atmosphere. Rain ran down the panes, sparkling like diamonds rolling over a mirror.

  They were assailed by a bevy of waiters who fawned on her and, by reflection, him. She took off her tiny jacket, revealing a crazy sleeve tattoo of psychedelic undergrowth on her right arm. It was beautifully drawn, not the clumsy scribbling of the normal tattooist.

  A bottle of Dom Pérignon Enotica appeared and was poured. She leant forwards so that her long soft hair touched the side of his face. ‘So what do you do when you are not having shoot-outs in Tokyo?’

  ‘I save the world.’ He smiled cheekily. ‘You know the kind of thing.’

  ‘To saving the world!’ She raised her glass. ‘Campai!’

  There was still light in the love-hotel bedroom. Akira’s eyes were accustoming fast and he could see more than her shape. They had stopped kissing and now she was taking his shirt off. He stood frozen. She would see his stunted arm in its awful naked state, the full horror of a hand reaching out where an arm ought to be. The dream would end. With every move she made to undress him he felt as if his skin was being flayed.

  As she pulled the shirt off him she was kissing his neck. He was rigid with tension as he waited for the inevitable signal of revulsion. His shirt was on the ground. She was kissing the fingers of his short hand. A shiver streamed through his whole body. No one had ever kissed it before, and from her lips he experienced hot shocks of pain and pleasure.

  He took her around the waist and lowered her onto the bed. He was enveloped in sensation and his reason had left him. All he could feel was her; all he could hear was her breath.

  ‘No,’ said Jim, swaying down the corridor. ‘You can’t come in. I’ve got to be up in four hours and heading for Narita.’

  Kuda didn’t reply, just giggled in the way Japanese women did to please their men. She stopped him and they kissed. ‘I won’t stay long,’ she said.

  She felt so good in his arms. Her perfume lured him; her lips made love to his. She was pressing herself against him, and he could feel himself heading quickly to the point at which he would be unable to resist. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘that’s my room down the hall and I’m very sad to say I’m going in there on my own. I have my reasons and you can probably guess them.’ He smiled sheepishly. ‘They don’t make much sense to me right now, but I have to do the right thing. You understand?’

  She flicked his nose. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Your loss.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I’m sure of that.’ He made for the door, hoping for a clean getaway. He was having trouble finding his room key. When he looked back, she was gone.

  Idiot, he thought. We were thirty seconds away from a mind-blowing fuck.

  His fingers registered the old-style metal key. He slotted it into the lock. There was a click. He pushed in against the strong door spring, struggling to extract the key.

  The lights were on. No doubt the bed was turned back and a little chocolate was waiting for him on his pillow.

  He started.

  Jane was in the bed, reading a book. She looked up. ‘What kept you?’

  Jim took a moment to collect his thoughts. He suddenly felt a bit too drunk to think straight. ‘I was drowning my sorrows.’

  ‘What sorrows?’

  ‘My baby left me high and dry.’

  ‘Too bad,’ she said.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I’m not here – I’m at the embassy. Coming here would be a dumb-ass thing to do.’

  ‘Right.’ He focused. ‘I’m having a shower.’

  ‘Good idea.’

  63

  Jim saw the professor waiting outside Virgin check-in on the concourse. He looked unusually relaxed and happy.

  ‘Good morning, Evans-san.’ He smiled boyishly. ‘Now to finish our historic quest.’

  ‘That’s a hell of a long cab ride to the airport,’ said Jim.

  ‘You look very cheerful today, Evans-san.’

  ‘Really? I don’t know why – I’ve only had about an hour’s sleep.’

  Narita airport was a paragon of efficiency, and in a few minutes, they were going through the formalities of leaving Japan.

  There was a parade of luxury stores inside the airport but he knew buying anything for Jane was pointless. For one thing he had no idea when he was going to see her again. His head was throbbing. He found himself in a shop selling strange candies. ‘These are very famous,’ said Akira. ‘Rice cakes.’

  Jim squinted at the boxes and their exotic contents. ‘Rice cakes?’

  ‘Very delicious,’ said Akira.

  ‘Let’s buy some for Stafford,’ s
aid Jim, and wondered what his butler would make of them.

  ‘He will enjoy them, I’m sure.’

  The Virgin lounge at Narita continued the Austin Powers theme that had started in London and seemed to complement Jim’s mild hangover. He was eating a sausage butty and the professor was regarding his sushi as if he had to show it a little respect before he consumed it.

  ‘So,’ said Jim, swallowing a mouthful, ‘we get in first thing in the morning, go straight home, pick up the items and take them straight to your embassy on Piccadilly.’

  ‘It opens at ten but they will not be expecting us. I can’t trust anyone but you with the plan.’ Akira sipped his green tea.

  ‘I have no idea where Stafford’s stashed them,’ said Jim, ‘but they must be relatively handy. The sooner we get hold of them the better. They know you at the embassy, right?’

  ‘I will show them my letter if there is any delay,’ said Akira. ‘Once we are through the front door I think we are safe.’

  ‘I disagree,’ said Jim. ‘Once we’ve handed it over properly, we’re home and dry, but on the wrong side of the counter we may as well be out on the street.’

  Kim sat at the back of the small HS-125 jet. They were refuelling. Damascus had stayed open for him and military fuel was being pumped into the tanks. His masters had friends, and their friends were only too happy to oblige him.

  He had refused pain relief from his doctors in Tokyo. He didn’t want anything dulling his mind, and the pain in his ribs would spur him on. The nurse sat forwards in the galley and awaited his command, but no man had ever died from bruised ribs.

  The mirror and the sword had not yet been returned. He would smash his enemies into a pulp and take Kusanagi and the Yata no Kagami.

  The banks were calling his office incessantly as his stock price had failed to recover from its collapse. Rumours of the incident at his office had spread like wildfire, and the gossip was as bad as any front page headline. To some extent, he had managed to hush it but… The mirage of his invincibility had vanished. He had to get the remaining pieces of regalia or he was finished. Even one item would be enough to buy him out of his dire financial situation. If he could get both, his riches and power would multiply.

  It was a desperate gambit, but it had to work. Otherwise his life was over. His best men awaited him in London.

  Jane was reviewing her email on the floor of the transport plane. She would have preferred a seat, but the floor would do. She had enjoyed the first hour or two but now her butt needed something less Spartan. When she’d had enough of the hard floor, she would go for a walk and talk to the pilots. These days, some of them knew her by reputation and that was a buzz.

  The trouble was, a question kept popping up in her mind, and no matter how she thought about it or responded to it, it wouldn’t go away. It was like a furious itch that wouldn’t be banished by scratching.

  The conundrum lay somewhere between: What the hell am I going to do with Jim? and What the hell am I meant to do with Jim?

  Ranking officers had husbands and wives and they lived the army life. It was a comfortable, normal American existence in happy, well kept communities. They went to church and followed college sports. They had barbecues and drank beer. They did charity work, and held garage sales. They wore T-shirts, shorts and flip flops.

  Normal expectations didn’t intersect with the Jim-world. She was having the kind of does-not-compute moments that guys had with her.

  Going any further down the road with him would rip her world apart. He wouldn’t turn into some dim, gentle, shrugging guy taking care of business while she shot off around the world blowing shit up. He wouldn’t be sweating the money and the kids’ education. How was she going to be in charge with him, Mr freakin’ Billionaire, successor-designate to the legendary Max Davas, the US Treasury’s own financial market manipulator?

  If she committed to Jim she’d end up heading straight at a hell she had spent her whole adult life avoiding: the idea of a family being a guy and his little wife.

  She knew what her mom would say – she could even hear her voice in her head: ‘Don’t be a fool! What are you waiting for? You love him, so what’s the issue?’

  She knew what her dad would say too: ‘Duh! I mean, you don’t want him? That strikes me as not the smartest thought you’ve ever had.’

  When she had saved Jim’s skin in the Congo, she had felt much closer to him. Now he had done the same for her in Tokyo, she felt out of control.

  She was staring at her email stack, her eyes unfocused. She blinked, then scanned the plane’s no-nonsense skeletal interior. Stripped down was good. Complicated was bad. Her thing with Jim was complicated. Ergo…

  She wished she had a stick of gum to chew. It would help her think.

  Maybe the next time they were together the whole thing would resolve itself. She closed the Apple Airbook, got up and walked towards the flight deck.

  Stafford came into the lounge where Smith was watching the television. ‘It would appear from this cryptic message that Jim will be back in the morning.’

  ‘Really?’ said Smith. ‘Can I see?’

  ‘If you must.’

  ‘“Get the tea on,”’ he read out. ‘Very cryptic.’

  ‘I thought so,’ said Stafford.

  ‘Do you think he got Jane out?’

  ‘I would imagine so,’ said Stafford, ‘or his message would not have been so flippant.’

  ‘I could find out – what do you think?’

  ‘Can we wait to hear it from Jim himself?’

  ‘I’m expecting full disclosure, you know,’ said Smith, as if it was a punishment.

  ‘I remember.’

  ‘And London is still crawling with Far Eastern miscreants,’ Smith goaded.

  ‘I don’t doubt you,’ said Stafford.

  ‘I hope your explanations are going to live up to my expectations.’

  Stafford closed his eyes. ‘I can’t possibly guess.’

  Smith made an exasperated grumbling noise, then perked up. ‘You wouldn’t have a beer hidden away somewhere would you, Bert– Stafford?’

  ‘I’m sure I can find one.’

  Akira appeared at the end of Jim’s Upper Class cubicle. Jim pushed the monitor to one side.

  ‘Evans-san, can I speak with you?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Jim, taking his foot off the little seat at the end of his plastic and leather clad capsule.

  Akira sat down. ‘I want to ask you something.’ He pulled out his mobile. He opened it and started hitting buttons with his thumb. He registered something and smiled. He turned the phone around and showed it to Jim. It was the Happy Fox he had been chatting with all night at the restaurant. ‘Is she not very beautiful?’

  ‘Very,’ said Jim.

  ‘Her name is Mitso.’

  ‘Nice.’

  ‘I’m not a man of the world like you, Evans-san. I am an academic and a cripple.’

  The word ‘cripple’ rang harshly in Jim’s ear.

  ‘Do you think she and I can be together?’ said Akira.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Jim. ‘Does she like you?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘More than I could have hoped for.’

  Jim was struggling to put the right question. Eventually he came up with ‘Was she still liking you this morning?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well,’ said Jim, ‘that’s OK, then. If she likes you that much, there’s no reason she won’t carry on liking you.’

  Akira took the phone back and pressed a button with his thumb. ‘The Happy Foxes are very famous celebrity outlaws,’ he said, showing Jim a glimpse of another picture, this time with Mitso posing by a large custom bike.

  ‘Does that mean trouble?’ asked Jim, as Akira showed him another image of Mitso pulled from the Internet.

  ‘For me, yes. For her, no.’ Akira flipped to another picture.

  Mitso wasn’t wearing much in the glamour shot Akira showed him next.

  ‘Don’t expect me to
be any help,’ said Jim. ‘My love life’s a disaster.’

  ‘But Jane-san is your wonderful sweetheart,’ said Akira, suddenly concerned.

  ‘Yes,’ said Jim.

  ‘And you heroically rescued her from the evil man Kim.’

  Jim sighed, ‘Well, that’s all well and manga, but the reality is, Professor, that I’m here and she isn’t.’

  Akira nodded. ‘I feel that loss for the first time myself.’ He clutched his chest. ‘It is a heavy sensation.’

  Jim took the phone from Akira and looked at the next picture he had selected. Mitso was skimpily clad in leather pants with a tight T-shirt and was again draped over some alien motorbike. The professor clearly had no clue what he was getting himself into. ‘Nice motorbike,’ he said. ‘Would you like to see more?’ Jim stifled a sigh. ‘Sure – how many have you got?’ ‘Many.’

  64

  Kim looked at the plans with the captain, who was also called Kim. Captain Kim was far too old to be an army captain any more. He had been working in the organisation for fifteen years and was the key man in Europe. He was responsible for kidnapping in Britain, Holland, Germany and France, and his success and skill had reflected on his clan’s prosperity in the deep countryside of North Korea. His sons were in China as a result of his boss’s patronage. He had sold his life and those of the people he took for the sake of his children. He believed any man in his place would have done the same. One day the impossible might happen and he might escape, but while his family and village depended on his absolute obedience that was just a tantalising dream.

  His boss perused the plans. ‘I don’t understand this man. It is not a normal house, it is a fortress.’

  ‘It is the house of a very rich man,’ said Captain Kim.

  ‘But so young,’ he shook his head, ‘too young.’

  Captain Kim didn’t reply. He waited for the boss to finish his inspection of the plans.

  ‘Can you not just break the front wall down with a truck?’

  Captain Kim waited for a respectful moment. ‘That might work but these are very solid walls and we would need to push away any parked cars in front before the ramming assault. If the truck did not breach the frontage, the attack would be over and thwarted.’