Blue War: A Punktown Novel

by Jeffrey Thomas

  “But you thought it was enough to hide and not turn over to the Earth people!” To Stake, Yengun said, “He probably would have kept it for himself if he’d thought it was really of value. He hid a handgun that he found at the site, too, and gave that to Tengu also – hoping to win his favor, knowing that he collects them besides selling them illegally to any farmer, teenager or drug addict who can afford them.”

  “So where is it we’re going now?” Stake asked, though he knew the answer already.

  “I’ve never visited Don Tengu at his place of abode before,” Yengun said. “Henry is going to introduce me.”

  ***

  They waited outside a metal wall adorned with rust art, like the wall that encircled the town of Vein Rhi, except that instead of country life and religious imagery the chemical corrosion had rendered lithe nude figures like water sprites cavorting around a pool, men firing rifles and handguns, tangles of bodies that might be orgies or heaps of victims. Razor wire topped the wall, and there had been two guards posted behind the barred gate. One of them, carrying a shotgun, had gone to report the arrival of these unexpected guests. The other, carrying a full-sized Sturm AE-95 assault engine, remained to glower at the men through the bars like a warder.

  Stake glanced around him while they waited. They were on the outskirts of Coo Lon, the capital city of the Ha Jiin nation. He had dozed off while riding, but a peek at his wrist comp had told him it was past midnight by the time they arrived, and the rain had stopped altogether. Night insects trilled in the saturated brush that sprouted thickly between expensive walled homes. Did living in this suburb afford Don Tengu a facade of respectability, or was he merely keen to stay that much closer to the Neutral Zone, it being the bridge between his two client bases?

  The man with the shotgun returned, and spoke to Henry in their native language. “Don Tengu will see us,” Yengun said to Stake, as the guard worked to unbolt the iron door.

  The three men were ushered inside the compound, and a man carrying a scanning wand came forward to pass it around them in search of weapons. It beeped when it circled Yengun, and he handed over his sidearm grimly. Satisfied, their guide led them past a built-in swimming pool, its interior surfaces beautifully tiled with colorful mosaics. Around the pool, even at this hour, frolicked what very well might have been the models for the rust art naiads. Tiny, slippery smooth figures in bikinis, some eschewing tops to reveal their breasts, either natural and slight or grotesquely bulbous from surgical enhancement. From their exaggerated beauty and the quality of their voices, Stake began to catch on that they were not women but young men transformed by synthetic hormones, even before he spotted one of the nymphs emerging naked from the pool, water dripping off a shy penis. A ladyboy squirming on the knee of a drunken man with a pistol in a shoulder harness licked his lips at Stake as he walked past.

  Inside, they navigated through close hallways, passing smoky rooms in which loud-voiced men appeared to be drinking and gambling, or soberly sorting through black market merchandise. Finally, their guide conducted them into a room in which sprawled heavy lacquered furniture with velvety cushions. A man lounged in a throne-like chair, cigarette drooping from his hand, watching a film that played within a vidtank covering the whole of the far wall. Though Stake could tell it was a very old movie, made before VT technology, the vidtank cleverly extrapolated to make everything appear three-dimensional. There was already one guard stationed in the room, and the new guard joined him by the door as the man in the chair sprang up to greet his guests with a sunny grin. He was short but uncommonly muscular, wearing a black polo shirt too small for his body in order to show off his chest and arms, and tight black jeans that revealed he had neglected to work his lower body. His head was shaved to a warrior’s stubble, eyes gleaming and hungrily alert. Stake was already sneaking wrist comp picture grabs of the man called Don Tengu.

  “Well, Henry,” Tengu said in accomplished English, “who are these guests you’ve surprised me with?”

  “Sorry to come unannounced,” Yengun spoke up, polite but firm, “and at such a late hour, but it’s a matter of great importance. It’s about the Blue City – something that concerns us all. Yourself included.”

  “It is a troubling situation, isn’t it? Or perhaps not. It would normally take generations for a city of that size to be built, and a world as relatively untamed as ours to become so civilized. Now, it’s practically happening overnight! Resourceful people with vision will know how to turn this to their advantage. I can think of certain possibilities myself!” Yengun began to reply, perhaps to protest, but Tengu stepped nearer and extended his hand to Stake. “I’m already familiar with you, Captain Yengun, though we’ve never been formally introduced, but who is your Earth friend, here? I’ve only rarely had visitors from the Earth Colonies in my home, sorry to say.”

  Stake shook his hand. “I’m Jeremy Stake, a private investigator from Oasis. I was commissioned to help look into the identities of the three clones found in Bluetown.”

  Yengun resumed, “It has come to my attention that the men who excavated that site were employees of yours, this man Henry among them.”

  “Well, I do allow my employees to make money on the side in any manner they choose. Isn’t that right, Henry? And by the way, are you all right? You look like you’ve been injured.” Don Tengu gestured at his man’s bandaged ear.

  Henry could only nod and grunt something unintelligible. Stake thought he looked like he might pass out from terror more than pain, at any moment.

  “It has also come to my attention,” Yengun said, “that certain items found at the excavation were not given to the Earth Colonies authorities, but to you instead. It is greatly important that these items be returned. Again, this is a matter of national security.”

  “Again, that’s a matter of perspective. I think it’s all quite exciting. When I watch the news and see the latest developments of the Blue City, I feel like a colonist on a brand new world, filled with opportunities. That’s the way your people feel each time they conquer a new world, isn’t it, Mr. Stake? That’s how they felt when they first came to Sinan, I suppose? The proud conquistadors?”

  “I wouldn’t know, Mr. Tengu – I was born on Oasis.” To avoid duplicating Don Tengu’s appearance, Stake kept looking past him, following the action of the VT film. Noticing this, Tengu glanced over his shoulder.

  “I collect gangster movies, Mr. Stake. Twentieth century Earth gangster movies are my favorite. You can learn from them! Educational...yes.” He snorted. “That’s why my men call me Don Tengu, after the mafia don in The Godfather.”

  “I see. Well, some people call me Don Quixote,” Stake said. Tengu smiled warily, recognizing the use of wit but not catching its meaning, and probably feeling the remark was at his expense. Not wanting to alienate the man, Stake quickly changed course. “I’m an admirer of Brando myself.”

  “Ahh – a chameleon, that one.”

  Huh, Stake thought. Did Tengu know something about him, and wanted him to know he knew, or was he being too wary himself?

  Tengu approached the vidtank and waved an arm toward it, as if he were a director presenting his film at a press screening. “This is one of my favorite movies, called Afraid to Die. I can watch it again and again. It’s a Japanese yakuza movie from the year nineteen-sixty, directed by Yasuzo Masumura and starring the great literary figure, Yukio Mishima. Mishima had the script written for him, with the requirements that he play a gangster, wear a black leather jacket, and die in the film. Oh, and what a death scene he has! At the end of the film he is trying to escape his criminal life, and has changed into a brilliant white jacket, but he is shot and runs in place on an escalator, unable to get anywhere, unable to escape his destiny...until he dies there.”

  Stake liked the crazy, screechy, discordant jazz score he was hearing, distracting as it was. “Seems like a nice blend of cheesy and artsy.”

  “Yes! And so is the dialogue. My favorite line is when Takeo’s girlfriend – Takeo
is Mishima’s character – says to him, ‘You call yourself a man?’ And Takeo says to her, ‘Me? Nah, I’m a yakuza!’” Tengu barked a laugh and walked away from the VT. “I love that!”

  Stake had the sense that Yengun was letting him run with the ball. At a bit of a loss but trying to be courteous, he asked, “So you feel a connection with Takeo?”

  “Him, and Mishima. I’m a body builder like he was, for one thing.” Tengu stopped to flex one arm, bunching thick muscles. “Impressive, huh? A lot of work, making myself big and hard like this. Like Mishima, I used to be small and scrawny. A complex man, a fascinating man. But you might think I am patterning myself after him, or after some phantom gangster on this screen. What would that make me, though? A phantom of a phantom?”

  Tengu touched a key on his VT’s remote to put it on pause. Mishima was frozen in a wild-eyed expression that reminded Stake the author had died by ritual suicide, disemboweled and then beheaded by his male lover.

  Tengu was pacing like a leopard in a cage. His tone was growing harder, his voice rising. “This is the arrogance of the Earth people. You would feel I identify with Mishima because he has slanted eyes like I do, and emulate him because he is an Earth man. You say of the races you meet on other worlds, ‘They look like Earth people. They look like humans.’ I have heard it said that we Sinanese, in our realm of existence, are an analog of a certain nation of Earth people. This is the height of arrogance – dismissing us as an entire world of mere shadows! Just some alternate version, a distorted reflection of one small group of your kind! But look at yourselves compared to us. We here on Sinan all have the same color, the same basic religion – we are whole, undiluted, pure! We are not in physical and cultural disharmony like you! That is why we opposed the Jin Haa in their desire to break from us, and it never would have been successful had the Earth people not interfered.” He glared at Yengun. “You are too proud to take my gifts, as your commander does...yes, I have heard about you. You disapprove of me. But I am as much a patriot as yourself!”

  “Really? While I was fighting the Jin Haa and the Earth people, you were building your empire on military contraband. Without the war, you never would have thrived.”

  “If your yubo dies while plowing the field, you must make the most of it and cut it into steaks. This is all I did. But do you understand my meaning, captain? Ben Bhi Ben told us that it is those who dwell on the other side of the veil who are the illusions. You!” He pointed to Stake. “Him!” He pointed to Mishima. “You are the ghosts, not I! I am not Mishima’s analog...if anything, he is mine!”

  “I didn’t realize you were so spiritual, in addition to being a patriot,” Yengun said.

  Stake wanted to shush him. Tengu’s wild mood swings made him nervous; they still needed to get something from this man, and had to treat him carefully. But Tengu’s mood swung back again, and he smiled as he replied to Yengun, “Gangsters are always ironically religious. Would you like to see just how devout I am?” He turned to one of the guards and gave an order in his own tongue.

  Moments later, a strange figure was escorted into the room. Stake suppressed a gasp. He had seen Sinanese clerics many times and so he was used to the yawning hole where a face should be, the lesser hole in the center of the chest, the fingerless mitt-like hands. The figure wore blue robes and the typical little three-cornered hat. But this cleric didn’t reach the guard’s shoulder, and Stake figured him to be a boy of about ten years. He had heard of such things, but had never actually seen it before this. A living icon. More so in the past than now, rich men had used them to attract the favor of the gods and bring them prosperity. Even then, it had been an illegal practice to fashion such a being – and they were created in early childhood, sometimes from one’s own offspring – but ownership of one indicated a person’s status and power. Stake had also heard that these blighted individuals, something between a prisoner and a pet, might even be taken to bed. Again, communion with them was thought to put one in touch with celestial forces.

  The child was barefoot, and around one of its ankles was clasped a familiar blue band.

  Stake glanced at Yengun. He could tell the captain had spotted it, too.

  “You asked me if I came into possession of anything found by my men in those pits. Yes, as a matter of fact, Henry did bring me a few things, to demonstrate his loyalty – knowing my love of the unique, the singular. There was this.” From atop a cabinet containing stacks of vid disks in their jewel boxes, Tengu picked up a formidable-looking handgun. It was a black cannon of a revolver, with an eight inch barrel and a translucent grip of red plastic. Stake recognized it as an old, classic Decimator .340. If it had indeed been found alongside the three clones, and thus belonged to a member of Lewton Barbour’s party, Stake figured its owner to have been the hired mercenary Johnny Esperanto. Tengu resumed his pacing, letting the gun hang at the end of his arm. “My favorite weapon, now – oh, does it pack a punch! And of course there was that.” He pointed the pistol at the living icon’s ankle as he paced past. “A trinket that I gave to my good luck charm as a gift from another world. Now, I don’t know which of these items you gentlemen might have in mind, but if it were your commander who had come here to ask them of me, I would have given them both gladly and asked for nothing in return.” Tengu quit pacing directly in front of Yengun, challengingly. “But since you have come to see me alone, unannounced, I must assume your commander knows nothing of this. Therefore, I don’t think he’d object if I demanded a price of fifty-thousand colonial munits for whichever of these two toys you desire.”

  Stake saw the muscles stir in Yengun’s tight jaw. “Neither of us have such an amount.”

  “I see. That’s a shame. Perhaps you should go tell your commander about all this, then, and see what he says about it.”

  “I suppose I’ll have to do that.” Stake didn’t believe Yengun, felt he was merely calling the crime lord’s bluff. “But I don’t think he’d be happy to hear that you withheld these items from the colonists’ investigation.”

  “I suspect your commander will remember, more clearly than yourself, with which people his loyalties should lie. In any case, until such time as he might discuss this with me, I’ll wish you gentlemen a good night. It was an unexpected pleasure, especially having a visitor from the ghost world some call Earth.” He chuckled, making it sound like a joke, as he switched the Decimator to his left hand so he could shake Stake’s hand again with his right.

  Yengun took Henry’s arm, to bring him along as he and Stake were led to the door by the guard who’d brought them in. Seeing this, Don Tengu called after them, “Henry, why don’t you remain here, since you’re home already?”

  “But he doesn’t actually live here, does he?” Yengun said, looking back, not letting go of his prisoner. “I’ll see him safely home.”

  Stake knew that Yengun had probably just saved the traitorous Henry’s life. But they still left behind the blind and mute avatar, prisoner and pet, and as Stake followed Yengun and Henry out of the room he glanced back at the child, strangely reminded of Brian.

  ***

  “He’s vile,” Stake said in a low voice as he, Yengun and Henry walked away from the iron gate that had just banged shut behind them, like the drawbridge of a castle.

  “I can not believe my commander would deal with this scum. All his talk. A criminal who sells drugs and guns to people on both sides of the Neutral Zone, a patriot? He questions my loyalties? He’s so confused with his love and hate of your people, he’d make a better Jin Haa than a Ha Jiin.”

  “That poor child he keeps.”

  “Yes.”

  “So what are we going to do now? Scrape up the money? Maybe if I talk to Persia Barbour –”

  “No.” Yengun stared straight ahead as he marched toward his parked vehicle.

  “No? Are you really going to talk to your commander, then?”

  “I have a different message to send my commander,” Yengun said through his teeth.

  TWENTY-FIV
E: AFRAID TO DIE

  During the ride from Coo Lon to the small town where Hin Yengun made his home, someone calling from a payphone at the Cobalt Temple Hotel tried to reach Stake, rousing him from another half doze. Blearily, he looked and saw that whoever it was had not set the call to block Stake’s preview feature, so he checked to see whose face was gazing into the screen before they could see his own. When he saw that it was Captain Rick Henderson, he hesitated out of dread but then accepted the call. “Hey, Rick. You up and around now?”

  “Hey yourself! Where the hell are you, Jeremy?”

  “I don’t actually know at the moment. I’m on the move.”

  “You don’t know, huh? And I suppose you don’t know where Brian is either, huh?”

  “Rick...”

  “You took him, didn’t you? You were going back to Punktown to talk to Persia Barbour – is this something you cooked up together?”

  “We should be careful about what we say.”

  “Jeremy, what the fuck, man? I hired you to find the kid’s identity, and it looks like you’ve done that – thanks. But I did not hire you to do this! You’re fired, okay? I want to know where Brian is, and then I want you off Sinan.”

  “You don’t trust my judgment, Rick?”

  “You aren’t here to judge, just to do your job! What the hell are you thinking? You’re a kidnapper now! Gale wants to nail your head to a wall! Are you trying to drag me down with you?”

  “I’m sorry if any of this hurts your career, Rick.”

  “Don’t try to pull that on me. I’m not just worried about myself, here – I’m worried about that kid.”

  “Believe me, I have his best interest at heart. I’m doing the best thing that can be done for him.”

  “That isn’t for you to determine!” Henderson shouted. Stake had never seen his friend even remotely this angry at him. Or at anyone else, for that matter. “And on top of all this, you stole some things from the lab – items found with the bodies. That makes it not only kidnapping, but espionage!”