Pornopsychedelica

by Chris Johnson

  Just around the corner from the Play Pen nightclub was a small restaurant within sight of the Egret Castle where they served the best okonomiyaki in Himeji. It was a traditional place where you took off your shoes before sitting at the low tables raised on platforms from the main floor. Gaijin - foreigners - were barred, anybody who wasn't Asian. Sato didn't want to see a white face while eating and talking business.

  The men sat at the three tables had paid their respects when Sato had arrived, and done the same when he'd left. A simple nod, a raised hand, a few words such as 'call on us again', or 'good health'. One of his bodyguards had helped him into his jacket while another had opened the door. All those years ago it had been pretty uneventful. As Jimmy recalled, the conversations had been mostly on women, family, current events and gambling.

  Sato's car had been an imported black Jaguar. It had exploded into a million pieces, killing Sato and his two bodyguards instantly. Through the snow falling from the midnight sky, Jimmy could see the car on fire, and chunks of it burning across the street. Peter Yang had walked casually into the restaurant and delivered his line.

  Nobody had moved. Five men had followed Peter and had sat at the tables like regular customers. Jimmy hadn't felt sorry for the waitress, he'd wanted to punch her in the face, anything to shut her up. Stop her from shouting abuse, waving her arms like a stupid monkey.

  Peter had sighed, like he was disappointed, maybe because she was stealing the limelight from his entrance, then he'd grabbed her by the throat and had pushed her face onto one of the scorching hot plates built into every table. She'd kicked and screamed, flesh had sizzled just like the cabbage and onions. He'd held her there until she'd stopped screaming, then he'd straightened his coat, taken off his gloves and run a comb through his hair.

  Jimmy Ho had a habit of remembering that night when he was drunk, and a couple of cold beers and several Suntory Hibiki whiskeys had done the job. He remembered the waitress sitting in a corner and whimpering, the only thing you could hear for a minute or two, besides the crackling of the burning car outside. He remembered that night, had it running through his head. Peter saying exactly what he'd said back then with Jimmy trying different lines. Thinking what might have happened afterwards if he'd said something different.

  Jun had driven him to the Casino de Genting not long after Tomoko had taken off, going up and up the winding road until you got so high that you had to wear a coat or a jacket from the cold if you stayed outside. It had taken over an hour to get there, Jimmy listening to classical music on the radio and smoking a Cuban Robustus from a box of five he'd hoped to sell at a considerable profit. Jun had hung back when they reached the resort, puffing away on a Habanos Cohiba while Jimmy threw red and gold chips across the roulette table, shuffling them to numbers he had a feeling for. I'll play the slots, Jun had said. Take as long as you want.

  The white waitress with the red hair brought him a double Suntory Hibiki with ice. He gave her another hundred-dollar tip, telling her to stay close. He drank the whiskey, savouring every drop. Alcohol brought everything into focus, made painful memories more bearable and numbed the sting when the steel ball flying around the roulette wheel came up black when you had everything on red. Jimmy merely smiled and swopped a wad of notes for more chips, placing them on numbers that had no significance.

  The dealer, a Chinese kid in a purple waistcoat, called no more bets and sent the ball on its way. Jimmy moved a few chips, a hundred dollars more on twenty, all the chips from five to thirteen. He didn't know why, he just felt the urge to push the odds in his favour. Maybe San Xing, the God of luck, was looking down on him.

  He'd spent a lifetime drinking, gambling and smoking, and something was keeping him on his feet, watching out for him. He'd never been to jail, never fallen to diabetes, the disease common amongst the yakuza from a poor diet and too much booze, and occasionally wondered why he'd never caught something itchy from a hooker or woman he'd picked up at a bar. He liked women, young ones with small firm breasts, the feeling of alcohol in his veins, the brief euphoria of tobacco, the buzz he got when that steel ball rolled into thirteen. He clapped his hands and emptied the whiskey glass, feeling alive. Maybe eight years ago Peter Yang had felt the same when he'd killed Sato and forced the other oyubun under his control.

  Jimmy thought about that night as he made his chips into five stacks, playing out in his head Peter Yang telling them how things were going to work out from now on. There would be one boss, and all the sub-bosses would have to prove their loyalty.

  There had been a lot of talk about loyalty from Peter Yang, and honour, tapping into what the Japanese in the room respected and feared. He remembered what Kazushi - the old boss from the east side of the Kakogawa River - had said, go fuck yourself, then he'd picked up his glass of beer as if that was the end of the matter. But boss Giichi had different plans, like falling in line and proving his loyalty, maybe just so he could get out of the room in one piece. He'd shot Kazushi through the chest with a .38. Jimmy found another cigar in his shirt breast pocket, taking a light from the waitress after he'd clipped off the end. He drank whiskey, trying not to remember, concentrating on the game and where he wanted his chips to fall. He put ten one-thousand dollar chips on 'even'.

  'Odds' came up, number eleven.

  Jimmy found Jun feeding tokens into a slot machine, trying to make sense of the virtual buttons floating confusingly above the main console.

  'Let's go,' said Jimmy.

  Jun fed in another token, lost it, and said, 'Where to now?'

  'Let's go to Taisho's.'

  An old fashioned gambling den where they played traditional games like hanafuda and cho ka han ka, just like he used to play in Japan.

  In the car, Jimmy touched the switch to darken the windows, Jun driving steadily down the mountainside. He closed his eyes, thinking he might have drunk just a little too much, memories coming back to him all too frequently. That night, with Sato's car still smouldering outside, Peter Yang had told everybody to leave then sat across from Jimmy. He remembered the conversation, could see Peter Yang drinking from a tall glass of mineral water before he spoke.

  'Why didn't Saigo kill me? Do you know?'

  'What would he gain?'

  'I took his wife from him, isn't that reason enough?'

  'He can't bring her back.'

  'Tomoko still works at your place? I heard about what happened at the dōjō competition. I never realised Saigo was training her.'

  'He pushes her, trains her pretty hard.'

  'I'm going to have to watch her. Now about Saigo, something has to be done. I can't make plans with him threatening my business. You'll have to do something about that, not just for your sake, but for Tomoko's too.'

  'What are you saying?'

  'You can keep your bar, and whatever else you have going on. Tomoko can work for me. You've lived here long enough to understand how important loyalty is.'

  Jimmy opened his eyes, saw the mid-afternoon sun disappearing behind a black cloud. His phone buzzed and he pulled it from his pocket to tap the answer button.

  'Hello. Okay. I'll be back at the cottage in about an hour.' He hung up.

  'Who was that?' asked Jun.

  'Tomoko's bringing some guy and his daughter to the cottage.'

  'What guy?'

  'I don't know.'

  'We still going to Taisho's?'

  'Forget that now.'

  Eight years ago, on a dry evening in the middle of winter, Jimmy had fallen behind Saigo a few steps so he could pull a pistol from his pocket. He'd shot Saigo in the back of the head and killed him instantly, the martial arts sensei falling down the steps of the dōjō, blood splashing over the faint scratches where Tomoko and some kid called Clark had carved their names.

  Coercion

  28

  Message in a Bullet

  Watching Tomoko on the large TV, Peter Yang could see the defiance in her, the calm restraint that stopped her from killing Travis, hurting him with a
sudden blow practised repeatedly in Saigo's dōjō. Her eyes remained steady, Travis talking slowly, then she took a breath.

  Peter touched 'rewind' on the remote and the picture backed up a few seconds. He watched her mouth, the full lips parting when Travis told her the arrangements for the birthday party. Tomoko told Travis she would kill him one day, calmly moving the bag of guns from the coffee shop table and placing it on the floor. The hidden camera caught the moment, though no matter how many times he watched the footage he could see no signs of emotion. The pauses, the breast rising with deeper breaths, the predatory eyes fixed upon Travis - he still couldn't discern what she was thinking. Peter wasn't sure whether he found that arousing or frustrating.

  A telephone sounded and his assistant, Giselle, answered the call in her office. She had a room at the house, close to the living area, where he kept a TV and a library of books. She was easy on the eyes, attractive in a skirt and blouse. He'd insisted the skirt always be above the knee so everybody could see her slim, tapered legs.

  'I am occupied,' he said when he heard Giselle's footsteps coming toward him.

  'I'm sorry. He said he's called Martin.'

  Martin? Peter wasn't sure if he knew anyone called Martin. He took the phone, remembering the new man Travis had said was ex-military.

  'What's the problem, Martin?'

  'Paul's dead,' the voice said. 'She cut his head off.'

  'Who's she?'

  'The girl. The girl at the hospital.'

  He fumbled with the remote for a moment, wanting to pause the picture but hitting fast-forward instead. He stopped the video and the screen went blue. He placed the remote on the leather cushion next to him. 'Are you certain?'

  'Yeah, I'm sure it was her. She took the package we collected from the guy at the hospital.'

  'They're gone? What's that terrible moaning?'

  'It's the barber.'

  'Well tell him to be quiet.'

  After the phone call, Travis on his way to sort out the situation, Peter decided to take a long shower, feel the powerful double jets massaging his back and chest. He watched the white, frothing soap washing away from his feet, thinking that if he'd lost the tickets Yamaguchi would have had no choice but to kill him.

  The boss of the Miyamoto-gumi answered to even higher oyubun, and to keep face with them he would have to pay a hefty loyalty fee. He ran his fingers across the short black hair on the back of his head, wondering if Yamaguchi would send a lone gunman or maybe something more elaborate like a DNA bomb.

  He could imagine the headlines, 'Business Tycoon Gunned Down', 'Kuala Lumpur Crime Lord Murdered in Gangland Vendetta'. He was accustomed to making headlines, preferably without undignified pictures. Sprawled out on the floor, maybe his suit from Chu's on Hennessy Road covered in blood, holes torn through his Maples of London shirt, limbs at awkward angles. He imagined they'd shoot him in the face, just to glorify the pictures in the morning papers.

  He would find Tomoko, take the tickets back, and then do what he knew one day had to be done. It would be easy to kill Tomoko, tell her he'd pushed too hard and he was ready to let her go. I'm sorry, he'd say in Japanese. Then Travis would shoot her. Everything would be washed clean.

  He pressed his palm to the gold shell on the wall and the shower stopped. Giselle handed him a white bath towel embroidered with his initials.

  'Your meeting is at seven,' she said, stepping back against the wall while he wiped water from his arms and chest.

  'Plenty of time. Have the car brought round. I'll be ready in twenty minutes.'

  She nodded and left. In the next room Hawkins was preparing his clothes, laying them out on the bed, along with a pair of black shoes, freshly polished. The man used to whistle Western tunes Peter didn't know, so he'd put a stop to it. Now he quietly did his job. He could never find a way to silence Tomoko. The girl felt no fear, he was sure of that.

  He'd shaved earlier in the day and didn't see any need to shave again. His chin felt smooth when he applied a touch of Vito's Resurgence face cream, standing at the mirror in the master bedroom to work it into the lines around his eyes.

  The night before he'd slept in the fourth bedroom down the hall with a bikini model from Hong Kong, famous for a twenty-two-inch waist and large breasts. He'd ripped off the Daniel Yam dress, leaving it in tattered ribbons on the floor and trailing from her body. It had taken considerable effort to reach her underwear, her hands by this time pulling at his pants.

  She'd met his requirements perfectly, credit due to Giselle. The dress had come from an auction at Sotheby's of Beijing, suitably expensive at ninety-thousand dollars, the woman chosen from Top Sport magazine. He leaned into the mirror and pouted, checking if there was any visible damage where she'd bitten his lip.

  Peter took his time dressing, thinking about Tomoko. He chose a raw silk red tie, the gold cufflinks with the three jade spots, thinking he would have to keep everything smooth with Yamaguchi, tell him nothing about Tomoko. He felt sure she would appear some time later in the day, maybe at his apartment in the city, throw the tickets on the ivory-inlaid table and then leave without saying a word. Killing Paul the way she had done had said everything.

  He slipped on his black suit coat, Giselle appearing for a moment to tell him that Baker had arrived, the accountant who looked more like a musician, hair in a ponytail, red sports car parked on the drive.

  Outside, the two bodyguards waited by the car, Giselle talking with Baker. Peter would make good timing for the meeting with the lawyers Yamaguchi had sent over from Japan. He took a moment to watch the birds in the aviary.

  Baker grinned, maybe still high from the night before. 'Good morning, Mr. Yang. You leaving? I need to go through a few things.'

  Peter said, 'It will have to wait.' Whites never got used to the heat, he could see the sweat beading on Baker's brow already.

  'You gonna be long?'

  'A few hours.'

  Giselle took Baker's arm. 'You want coffee?'

  'Sure. We got time for a round of golf?'

  'I don't think so. Maybe tennis.'

  Nobody heard the small car with the top down until it was halfway up the drive, coming fast to the fountain and skirting round the gardener working at the rose beds. He saw Tomoko behind the wheel, shades covering her eyes. It didn't look as though she was going to stop, then the engine shuddered and she braked right in front of them. The bodyguards tensed. Peter thought to say, 'Tomoko, I've been worried about you'.

  'Relax, it's just Tomoko,' said Giselle.

  A moment passed. Peter wondered if he should have worn the cufflinks with the four jade spots, feeling a good omen for even numbers. Tomoko would be a good addition to the meeting, then again the bruises on her face made her look unsightly.

  She raised a gun above the car door and fired. The illegal pressure gun had a distinctive sound, like the screech of a power drill with the crack of normal gunfire. Flat titanium pellets hit one of the bodyguards, tearing his chest open. Giselle screamed. The second bodyguard went down with his forearm hanging loose on thread of sinew, his gun and what was left of his hand still in the air when the back of Baker's head disappeared and painted Giselle's face with blood. Peter scrambled behind the back of the sedan, glass shattering, holes punching through the door skin.

  He was on the floor when she drove round, gun aimed at his head. The car purred softly.

  'I am Saigo's daughter,' was all she said before the tyres were screeching and she took off down the driveway.

  29

  Nanobot Waltz

  On the phone, Travis had a tone to his voice that suggested he was expecting what had happened. Peter didn't have time to react right now, having just arrived at the KL Plaza Hotel, thirty-two minutes late.

  'Deal with it,' he said to Travis, passing the phone back to Giselle. She was still shaking. He thought it would be best if she stayed behind and Yamaguchi's people didn't see her.

  Travis had said he'd sent some guys on the hunt for Tomoko. Guys,
he'd said, we can afford to lose if they did actually manage to find her. They'd be checking Jimmy Ho's place first, see if she'd been in contact with him.

  Peter imagined Jimmy looking smug as the elevator climbed the glass tower, then the bullet that would cut through Jimmy's head. That would be good, although maybe he'd be beaten to death, chopped up and buried in the forest. He never took any interest now in what happened to the people he needed removing, Giselle or Travis took care of the details, and then word went down the ranks until the job ended up with men who wanted to make a name for themselves, or just wanted the money.

  He gave Giselle a reassuring nod, letting her know that everything was fine. They'd both cleaned up as quickly as they could, Giselle showering to wash away blood and bits of brain. The elevator doors opened onto the fortieth floor, a blue-suited yakuza on the lobby talking into a radio. A voice responded in Japanese.

  Peter whispered to Giselle to wait by the elevators, talk to the man here and see if she could learn anything that might be useful. Peter moved down the corridor at a steady pace, thinking that it would make a better impression if it looked as though his lateness was of no consequence. He'd been here before, recognised the same lazy yakuza lounging around the bar, the lawyer called Watanabe who quickly approached with his hand out, his palm cold like he'd been holding a chilled drink. He didn't say anything, just directed Peter to the walnut doors of the conference room.

  'I trust you are all well,' said Peter.

  He bowed to the holographic projection of Yamaguchu before he sat at the long table. The boss was in Japan. He could just make out the shoulder of another man. The projection flickered, a ghostly echo to Yamaguchi's voice from the speaker.

  'Now that you've arrived we can begin.'

  Watanabe leaned close, said softly, 'Can I get you anything, Mr. Yang?'

  'Mineral water, please.'

  'No Giselle?' The lawyer called Taro shuffled his chair closer to the table. 'She's the only reason I came.'