End of the Beginning

by Harry Turtledove

  Getting up at dawn did nothing to improve his mood. The tea he gulped with his breakfast of rice and pickled plums didn’t do nearly enough to pry his eyelids apart. He couldn’t get more, either. It came from the home islands, which meant it was in short supply. That he could have any at all meant a freighter must have made it in not long before. Only officers got all they wanted.

  Some officers shared the precious stuff with their men, using it as a reward for duty well performed. Unfortunately, neither Shimizu’s platoon leader nor company commander seemed to have thought of that. It was going to be a sleepy, stupid day.

  His squad dragged, too. Even Shiro Wakuzawa, who ordinarily was perky as you please, dragged and slumped. He said, “If the Americans do that every night, they’ll drive us crazy.”

  “They can’t do it every night.” As usual, Senior Private Furusawa sounded surer of himself than his rank gave him any right to be.

  “Why not?” Shimizu said, and yawned. “They’ve been doing it more and more lately.”

  Furusawa yawned, too, but politely turned his head away from his superior before he did. “But they need submarines to refuel their flying boats,” he said. “They don’t have planes that can make a round trip from their mainland to Hawaii. Even ours have trouble, and they’re better.”

  “How did you hear all that?” Shimizu demanded.

  “I listen a lot. I keep my head down. I keep my ears open. People who know things like to blab.”

  “I suppose so.” Shimizu wasn’t sure he would understand things even if he heard them. He was just a farmer’s son. Furusawa, a city man, had the education to make sense of what came his way.

  So why are you commanding him and not the other way around? Shimizu wondered. But that had an answer he understood. Experience and toughness mattered more in rank than education did.

  Still, education—or maybe just raw brains—also came in handy. For three or four nights, American flying boats stayed away. But then they returned, little wave after little wave, disrupting the lives of the Japanese stationed in and around Honolulu. Shimizu really started to hate them then. He had a certain amount of trouble not hating Senior Private Furusawa, too.

  COMMANDER MINORU GENDA STEPPED UP OVER THE STEEL doorsill and into the cabin that belonged to Akagi’s skipper. Saluting, he said, “Reporting as ordered, sir,” and then, “Congratulations on your promotion.”

  Rear Admiral Tomeo Kaku bowed in his chair. “Thank you very much,” he said, even his hard features unable to hide his pleasure. “Why don’t you shut the door and then sit down? I have news you need to know.”

  Asking Genda to close the cabin off from the corridor meant it was secret news. Excitement and curiosity building in him, he obeyed. He wanted to sit on the edge of the seat, but deliberately sat back, making himself seem relaxed even—especially—if he wasn’t. Keeping his voice as casual as he could, he asked, “What’s up, sir?”

  “Zuikaku is finally on her way back to these waters,” Kaku answered, sounding pleased with himself and with the world. “The decoded message came to me not ten minutes ago. You’re the first to know.”

  “Domo arigato.” Genda bowed more deeply than his superior had. “I’m very glad to hear it. About time, too, if you don’t mind my saying so. They took longer repairing her than they should have.”

  “I agree,” Admiral Kaku said. “I’ve growled and fussed and fumed more times than I can tell you, and it’s done me no good at all. Shigata ga nai.” Genda nodded at that—some things couldn’t be helped. Kaku continued, “But she’s on her way at last, and she’ll be here in a couple of weeks. I’d hoped they would send us Taiho, too, but they say she’ll be shaking down for months yet.” With a shrug, he repeated, “Shigata ga nai.”

  “Too bad, sir. We could use her.” Genda sighed. Everything he’d heard about Taiho said how much they could use her here. Among other improvements, she boasted an armored flight deck—a first for a Japanese carrier—that was supposed to protect her vitals from a 450kg bomb. Genda added, “We could use any more carriers they want to send us, big or small. The Americans are definitely getting friskier.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kaku said, deadpan. He was so perfectly deadpan, in fact, that Genda started to believe him. Then Akagi’s skipper yawned a yawn that threatened to split his face in two. The Americans’ nuisance raids were more than a nuisance for him. The carrier anchored at different places in Pearl Harbor every night, to give the U.S. flying boats a harder time finding and hitting her. So far, it had worked; she’d taken only incidental damage from near misses. But Admiral Kaku had to be up on the bridge whenever she was threatened. He wasn’t a young man; that lack of sleep must take a toll on him.

  “It’s not just here, either,” Genda said. “They’re starting to attack our picket boats every chance they get.”

  “Yes, I’ve heard that, too.” Now Kaku sounded serious, and not at all happy. “They think they can clear them out and give themselves a better chance for surprise.”

  “That’s how it looks to me, sir.” Genda also thought the Americans might be right. Japan sent out new sampans when old ones were lost, but there were always delays and foulups. The Americans might be able to build a lane through which they could get ships close to Hawaii undetected.

  “I’ve talked with Commander Fuchida. He’s talked with the people who handle our H8Ks,” Admiral Kaku said. “We will have flying-boat patrols to cover the area no matter what. We won’t get caught napping.”

  “That’s good, sir,” Genda agreed. “And the more radar sets we can get our hands on, the better. They can see farther than the naked eye can.”

  “I suppose so. All these gadgets,” Kaku said fretfully. “It wasn’t like this when my career started out, let me tell you. In those days, you really had to be able to see the enemy to hit him. None of this business of sending airplanes over the horizon to drop bombs on his head.”

  “Yes, sir. I’ve heard Admiral Yamamoto say the same thing.” Genda hoped that would keep his superior happy. The difference was that Kaku sounded nostalgic for days gone by, while Isoroku Yamamoto always lived in the present—when he wasn’t looking into the future. Of course, there was only one Yamamoto, which was why he commanded the Combined Fleet. Men like Kaku were absolutely necessary, but were also easier to come by.

  “Admiral Yamamoto,” Akagi’s skipper echoed musingly. “If it weren’t for Admiral Yamamoto, we wouldn’t be where we are now.” That was true. Of course, it was also true that the Japanese wouldn’t have been where they were if not for Genda himself. He was the one who’d persuaded Yamamoto to follow the air strike against Oahu with an invasion. Rear Admiral Kaku seemed unlikely to be in a position to know that. He went on, “I wonder if we would be better off if we hadn’t landed. We wouldn’t be stuck at the end of such a long supply line, anyhow.”

  “Hai,” Genda said, and let it go at that. As soon as he could, he excused himself and went out onto the flight deck. He found he needed fresh air. Even now, the waters of Pearl Harbor stank of fuel oil spilled in the attack a year and a half earlier. Its rainbow gleam fouled patches of what should have been blue tropical sea.

  He reminded himself that Kaku was a good carrier officer. That was true regardless of whether the older man understood grand strategy. Genda remained convinced that, if Japan hadn’t gone for the United States with everything she had, the Americans would have come after her the same way. With Hawaii under the Rising Sun—or even (he smiled) under its own flag once more—the USA didn’t have the chance. To him, that counted for everything in the world.

  Thinking of Hawaii under its own flag once more made him think of King Stanley Laanui. And thinking of King Stanley made him think of Queen Cynthia, a much more enjoyable prospect. I need to find an excuse to get over to Iolani Palace, he told himself. Even if it meant conferring with General Yamashita, he needed to go over there.

  She hadn’t so much as kissed him. He had no assurance she would. Then
again, he had no assurance she wouldn’t, either. One of these days soon, he intended to find out.

  If she wouldn’t? If she raised a fuss? The worst they could do to him was send him home. He was sure of that. And odds were they wouldn’t even do so much, not with the next fight against the U.S. Navy plainly right around the corner.

  VII

  “THIS IS STUPID, OSCAR.” REAL ALARM RODE SUSIE HIGGINS’ VOICE. “YOU’RE going to get yourself killed, and you’re going to land everybody who ever heard of you in hot water.”

  “Which bothers you more?” Oscar van der Kirk asked.

  “You think I want the Japs breathing down my neck, you’re nuts.” Susie was one hard-headed gal.

  Oscar couldn’t even say Charlie Kaapu hadn’t done anything. He didn’t know that, not for sure. From what the police sergeant in Honolulu said, the Japs sure as hell thought he had. The Kempeitai . . . The more he repeated the name to himself, the scarier it sounded. Would they knock on his door in the middle of the night, the way the Gestapo was supposed to do?

  “I’m just going to spread some fish around,” Oscar said. “The way things are these days, food works better than cash.”

  “You can’t even talk to the Japs,” Susie said, which was largely true. “How are you going to get them to do what you want? They won’t even know who you’re trying to spring.”

  He made money-counting motions. He couldn’t very well make fish-counting motions; there weren’t any. “I’ll manage,” he said with more confidence than he felt. “Besides, they’re bound to be using local clerks and such. Somebody will understand me. If you’re trying to give somebody something, people always understand you.”

  Not even Susie tried to argue with that. She only said, “You’ll get into more trouble than you know what to do with.”

  “You said the same thing when I went to the police station,” Oscar reminded her.

  She wasn’t impressed. “Okay, you were lucky once. How come you think you’ll be lucky twice?”

  That was a better question than Oscar wished it were. Trying to make light of it, he said, “Hey, I’m lucky all the time, babe. I’ve got you, don’t I?”

  Susie turned red. She was a lot tanner than she had been when the war left her stuck in the middle of the Pacific, but the flush was still easy to see. “Damn you, Oscar, why do you have to go and say stuff like that?” she said angrily.

  “Because I mean it?” he suggested.

  She turned even redder. Then, very suddenly, she jumped up and dashed into the apartment’s tiny bathroom. She stayed in there for quite a while, and didn’t flush before she came out. Her eyes were suspiciously bright. She wagged a finger at him the way his mother had when he was four years old. “You know, it’s funny.”

  “What is?” Oscar said. Whatever she’d been doing in there, it sure as hell wasn’t laughing.

  “First time I saw you, before you ever touched me or took me out on that surfboard or anything, I knew I was going to go to bed with you,” she answered. “I wanted to get the taste of Rick out of my mouth as fast as I could.” Rick was the ex-husband whose becoming ex- her trip to Hawaii had celebrated. She wagged that finger again. “And don’t you dare say anything about getting the taste of you in my mouth.”

  “Me? I didn’t say anything,” Oscar answered as innocently as he could, though she’d done that, all right. He’d slept with a lot of women getting over their exes in a tropical paradise. That was one of the things a surf-riding instructor—a surf bum—was for.

  “Oh, yes, you did.” Susie sounded fierce. “You said something sweet. Going to bed with you is easy. The hard part is thinking I might . . .”

  “Might what?”

  “Might love you,” she said in a tiny voice.

  “Oh.” Oscar went over to her and put an arm around her. “You know what, kiddo? I might love you, too. You know what else? I think we ought to wait and see what happens before we do anything. If it looks like the Japs’ll win and keep this place, then we know where we are. If the Americans come and take it back, then we know where we are, too. Right now, it’s just a mess. How can we make plans if we don’t know what the heck to plan for?”

  “How can we make plans if you go sticking your head in the lion’s mouth?” But Susie clung to him as if he were a surfboard and the shore a long, long way away.

  He kissed her. But then he said, “I’ve got to do it, hon. Nobody else is gonna give a darn about Charlie, but he’s my friend.”

  She took a deep breath. Had she said, If you loved me . . . , they would have had a row. A few months earlier, she probably would have. Now she swallowed it instead. “I’m not going to be able to talk you out of this, am I?”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, I’ll be here if you come back, that’s all.” She didn’t wag a finger at him this time—she poked him in the ribs. “Now I suppose you’ll expect another fancy sendoff. Won’t you, bub? Huh? Won’t you?” She poked him again.

  “Who, me?” Oscar hoped he didn’t sound like somebody about to drool on the shoes he wasn’t wearing. Susie laughed at him, so he probably did. Later that night, they emphatically enjoyed each other’s company. Oscar slept soundly.

  He went to Honolulu Hale the next morning. Life went on under the Japanese. People got married. They bought and sold property. They paid taxes on it. They got peddler’s licenses. They sued one another. Most of the clerks who’d worked for the U.S. Territory of Hawaii went right on working for the Japanese Kingdom of Hawaii.

  There was a new department, though. SPECIAL CASES, the sign above the door said. It wasn’t quite All hope abandon, ye who enter here, but it might as well have been. Several people in other, safer queues looked up, startled, when Oscar walked through that door. A little old woman who seemed hapa-Hawaiian and maybe hapa-Chinese made the sign of the cross.

  A clerk who might have been of the same blood glanced up from the papers on his government-issue desk. The nameplate on the desk said he was Alfred Choi. He gave a good game impression of never letting anything take him by surprise. “Yes?” he said. “You wish?”

  “I have a friend who’s been, uh, jailed. I don’t think he’s done anything, and I want to help him get out if I can,” Oscar said.

  “This is for the police, or for a lawyer,” Alfred Choi said. Oscar unhappily shook his head. Choi looked at him, as if noting the door through which he’d come. “This man, this friend”—he made it sound like a dirty word—“has some connection to the occupying authorities?”

  “Uh-huh,” Oscar admitted, even less happily than he’d nodded before.

  “Give me his name.”

  “Charlie Kaapu.” Oscar wondered if Choi was going to press a secret button that sent a dozen Kempeitai men with pistols and samurai swords charging into the room. Nothing like that happened. The clerk got up, walked to a four-drawer filing cabinet about ten feet away, and went through the third drawer for a minute or so.

  When he came back, his face was grim. “You can do nothing,” he said. “I can do nothing. No one can do anything. The occupying authorities have dealt with him.”

  “Is he—dead?” Oscar didn’t want to say the word, or even think it.

  Alfred Choi shook his head. “Not yet,” he said, which didn’t sound good.

  Maybe he was trying to put on the squeeze. Oscar hoped so; that was better than the alternative. Picking his words with care, Oscar said, “I catch a lot of fish—more than I need, sometimes.”

  “I have enough to eat, thank you,” Choi said. “I could take fish from you. I could, ah, string you along.” He used the slang self-consciously. “But since I have enough, I tell you straight out: I cannot do anything for your friend. Nobody can do anything for your friend. His case is pau.” The Hawaiian word for finished, in common use in the islands, sounded dreadfully final here.

  “Could I talk to anybody else?” Oscar asked.

  “Do you want the Kempeitai to talk to you?” Alfred Choi sounded abstractly curious, as if he did
n’t give a damn one way or the other. He likely didn’t. It was no skin off his rather flat nose.

  “I guess maybe not,” Oscar said reluctantly.

  “I guess maybe not, too. This is wise.” The clerk pointed to the door. “You leave through the door you came in by.”

  Oscar left through that door. Some of the people in the wider hall onto which SPECIAL CASES opened looked surprised anyone was allowed to leave. He decided he’d done everything he could possibly do for Charlie Kaapu. He wished he knew what Charlie had done, or what the Japs thought he’d done. And he wished he knew what they’d done to him.

  THE MEMORY OF HALF-RAW, half-burnt pork was just that—a memory—for Jim Peterson these days. He was back to not so slowly starving on the usual Kalihi Valley rations, back to working himself to death too many inches at a time.

  He stood in the rain for morning roll call. The Japs who did the counting had umbrellas, of course. The POWs? The mere idea was a joke. Peterson hoped the count would go smoothly. If it didn’t, the Japs would probably just send the whole gang of them into the tunnel without breakfast. Prisoners starving? So what? Time lost on the tunnel? A catastrophe!

  Things seemed to be moving well enough when there was a commotion to the southwest. The Japanese had the escape route well blocked off. Every once in a while, a POW grew desperate enough to try it anyway. Those who did usually got caught. Then they served as object lessons for the others. Watching them tortured to death a little at a time had given Jim Peterson more than one of his many nightmares.

  This wasn’t an escaped prisoner. These were new damned souls, come to take their places in hell. Along with his fellow sufferers, Peterson stared at the newcomers. “They aren’t soldiers,” somebody behind him said through the patter and plink of raindrops.