Death Before Dishonor Page 35

They drew their ninjatō and crept through the first cluster of cottages, spotting more bodies. It was a scene so horrible that they could have only imagined it in fiction. What started as a cautious slither, became a brisk walk, and then a hurried sprint. Terry went one way, checking for survivors; Akiko went the other.

  Terry was in and out of cottages, one after the other, hoping that he could find someone alive. Most of the residences were empty or burning, and corpses lay in the snow and on the porches and draped the rails.

  He bounded off a porch, into a rock garden, and was hurrying to an adjacent cottage when he noticed several children arrayed in a bloody fan, with two matronly Kunoichi sprawled behind them in the garden. He approached to inspect them. The two women had attempted to spirit the Kodomo to safety, but they’d all been machine-gunned as they ran. Just beyond them were the pigpens filled with bullet-riddled, freezing animal carcasses.

  Terry shivered. It wasn’t the cold; it was the emotions that were flooding him. He closed his eyes and breathed loudly, trying to calm the rising tide he felt on the inside. How could this have happened? Who had done this? Who dared? Could everyone truly be dead? Had no one escaped? Terry had witnessed massacres when he’d been a mercenary, so they were questions to which he already had answers.

  Akiko initially went from body to body, which were strewn about the snow and buildings like leaves blown from tree branches in the harsh autumn wind, checking for signs of life, but she eventually resolved to move faster to look for survivors instead of the barely living since there seemed to be none. The deeper she got into the village, the bleaker things looked. Never had she seen death on such a scale. The snow in the village was equally as red as it was white, and the smolder of the cottages crackled and popped and sizzled when red coals and embers fell into the snow.

  Then she heard a whimper. It was coming from the direction of the river. She felt a sudden glimmer of hope. “Terry!” she screamed as she hustled in the direction of the cries. Frantically, Akiko darted between the cottages, trying to close the distance to the sound, calling to it, saying she was there to help. She narrowed its origin to two cottages facing the bank of the river. It sounded as though it was coming from beneath the buildings.

  She hustled down the walkways and was looking beneath the structures when she heard the cries from an opening into a cottage’s crawl space. Akiko went on her hands and knees into the opening and then onto her belly. Then she saw movement. She low-crawled through the frigid, wet dirt to the survivor, leaving her sword behind and digging in with her fingers. Akiko reached the individual. It was a little girl, aged eleven years. She had beautiful jet hair and angular features, but now she was a charred, melted mess like a plastic doll left unattended way too close to a hearth. She had only a sliver of hair left, the cartilage of her ears was cooked to the side of her head, and her eyes were clouded from heat damage. It was a miracle, though, she was still alive.

  “Terry!” Akiko yelled, getting her arms around the girl and starting to drag her from the crawl space, accepting there was no painless way to extract her.

  The girl shrieked in abject pain.

  Terry dove through the opening and crawled to Akiko, getting a hold on the girl as well and doubling Akiko’s effort. They reached the opening and extracted her, carrying her into an otherwise undamaged cottage. They laid her on the floor, and Terry went searching for blankets to warm her. He returned minutes later with a single half-burnt blanket. Damaged as it was, it was better than nothing.

  “We must help her,” Akiko said in between singing a song to soothe the young girl, who was crying and sobbing.

  “We’re not doctors.”

  Akiko looked at him. “We must do something. You know the way to a hospital. You know Tokyo well.”

  “Akiko,” Terry said, shaking his head, “she won’t survive the trek.”

  Akiko stopped singing and lowered her head, placing a hand on the girl’s forehead.

  “I’m sorry,” Terry said.

  Akiko nodded, tears stinging her eyes.

  Terry drew his tanto and sidled up to the girl. He was going to end her suffering. Then Akiko reached out and touched his hand.

  “I’ll do it,” she said.

  He relinquished the knife to her.

  Akiko resumed her song, not fighting tears but trying desperately to hold back sobs. The tune was a tranquil melody recounting the bravery of a flower withstanding a monsoon. See how it blossoms, little flower, in the face of danger. Sweet little flower, none braver. Then she jammed the blade into the girl’s weak heart. The girl squeaked, her little hands twitching. Then she let out a hic before expiring. It was quick. Humane.

  The flood of emotions had no words. Terry anguished audibly through gritted teeth. He hadn’t felt such terrible pain in decades. This resurrected the empty pain of the loss of his parents and stirred the grief over the death of the children in Israel. It was a mix, a miasma of emotional torment, that came to life like reanimated corpses in a horror flick walking about inside him.

  Akiko’s grief shook the peaks of the Suzuka Mountains. She couldn’t hold it in. It was like she was drowning in a pool of glass shards. She’d wanted desperately to save the girl’s life, but she hadn’t been able to. The one life that had managed to survive the carnage in Togakure Ryu, and Akiko had been able to do nothing except see it to its bittersweet end. She had never taken a human life until now, and her first kill had been the act of euthanasia of a beloved Kodomo. A terrible duty, indeed.

  Terry and Akiko anguished over the girl’s body, Terry blaming himself for not acting fast enough, Akiko angry that she had not been there to fight and die with her people. What next? Where would they go from here? They couldn’t just leave their people to litter the ground like trash spilled in a neglected alley, left behind to be scavenged by animals and vermin. They’d build a pyre and burn the bodies, then; there was no way the two of them would be able to dig a suitable grave for seventy people in frozen earth.

  Terry and Akiko toiled for hours, well into the morning light, cleaning the corpses of their clansmen and dragging them to their fiery resting place atop the pyre they’d labored to build. It wasn’t the way any Shinobi wanted to be honored, but what other choice did they have?

  Terry and Akiko did their dismal, melancholic duty. The first couple of hours were white hot and scalpel sharp. As the hours passed, though, the voltaic emotions dulled and the pain numbed. They felt hopeless and dejected as they stood there in front of the pyre’s charnel heat and smell. All was lost.

  Something caught Akiko’s attention through the licking flames—the only unburned stanchion on the central hall. The kanji carved into it translated to read: Allow Not Dishonor To Go Silently. She read it to herself first. Then she mouthed the words. Then she said it aloud; Terry looked at her. Then Akiko said it loudly, and it was as if the pyre’s blaze leaped into her, filling her veins. Vengeance was her only recourse—their only recourse. They had to return the clan to honor since they could not return the Fujibayashi to life.

  Terry and Akiko found their strength and decided to pursue the murderers, using the information they had uncovered when they had searched the village and when they had tended to their clansmen’s remains. Among the dead, Terry and Akiko had found six bodies not of Fujibayashi origin, no doubt stabbed to death by Fujibayashi fighting back. In fact, four had tattoos like Oharu. In addition to the six strangers, three additional clues put Terry and Akiko on the track of those responsible: tracks leading into and out of Togakure to the southwest, bullet wounds riddling the bodies of the Fujibayashi, and bullet casings beneath a layer of fallen snow.

  Unfortunately for those responsible, years of freelance espionage had made Terry a peerless tracker. He pooled his resources and skills, connecting the clues to find affiliations and eventually names. Two names interested him most: Itsuki Kawaguchi and Takehito Kato—the man in command of the attack during the ritual and the man calling himself the Shogun.

  Terry tracked the S
hogun, who appeared to be a bureaucrat that was well insulated by the underworld, to the Peninsula Hotel, where he was attending a political conference with a small security detail. Terry ordered Akiko to eliminate the so-called Shogun while Terry dedicated himself to finding Kintake and addressing the Momochi.

  Now she came to the door of the Shogun’s security chief’s suite, just down the hall from the penthouse suite that the Shogun occupied during the week-long event. She needed access to the penthouse; the Shogun’s security detail had access. Tap, tap, tap. She lightly rapped the door with her hand and checked that she was in order before returning it to her side.

  The door opened, and a man wearing a dark blue suit—minus the coat—answered. His eyes bulged out of his head when he saw Akiko—her lustful eyes, rosy cheeks, ruby lips, slender, muscular frame, and porcelain skin. She wore her ebony hair in a messy bun held in place by a crisscross of chopsticks; she was dressed in a sheer pair of black panties and red satin robe that barely reached the middle of her thigh. It was tied loosely, and a sliver of her almond nipple showed. The man hooked the neck of his shirt with his finger and vented the steam of his instant boil.

  Her lips curled into a fiendish smile. “I was instructed to ensure that you have settled in well,” Akiko said. “Is there anything you need?”

  The man sized her up with his eyes. “What do you mean by anything?” the man asked, sounding almost occupied.

  “Anything,” she deadpanned.

  The man chortled, taking another moment to regard her. “Well, come in, then,” he said, opening the door fully. “I suppose I have some things that I need.”

  Akiko entered, walking straight through the sitting room toward the bedroom. Her eyes touched every inch of the room as she sashayed—she was mapping the environment and looking for weapons. She noticed two pistols, one on the counter of the kitchenette and one on the coffee table. There was also a fork in the sink as she passed it. The windows were large, but all the curtains were drawn. The TV was on, and there was a box of cigars on the coffee table next to the pistol, with a suit jacket draped over a seat. There was also only one way in and one way out.

  She flung the door to the bedroom open, startling a skinny man sitting on the bed and browsing the internet. Akiko slid her robe off her shoulders, letting it flutter to the ground. The man on the bed didn’t blink. The first man approached her from behind and stroked the tattoo of a wrathful serpent that ran the length of her spine.

  “Look what I found,” the larger man said to the skinny man, urging Akiko onto the bed with his hand.

  She slithered onto the bed and rolled over, sitting up on her elbows and inviting him with her legs. The larger man chortled again and, with a hand, offered her to his companion while the larger man went into the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

  The skinny man surveyed Akiko’s curves. Akiko wrapped her fingers around his wrist and pulled his hand towards her, cupping her breast with his hand. He swallowed hard, hovering there for a moment before mustering the courage to explore her body. His hand reached for her panties and stalled. She impressed him further, her rib cage expanding and her back arching. Akiko tugged at the man’s shirt, drawing him towards her. The man rolled over finally, setting himself between her legs and grasping at her underwear. He pulled them from her supple curves. Akiko lifted her head just as the underwear reached her ankles and found the man’s face hovering at the base of the v that her legs made. She could feel the humidity of his breath against her womanhood. Not bothering to take her panties off completely, he descended his face into her sex, her thigh muscles pressing into his face. She crossed a leg behind his head, driving his face deeper. Akiko grasped the ankle with the opposite hand and pulled it tight, closing the vice that her thighs created. The pressure, at first, didn’t bother the skinny man, until it became difficult to breathe. He cracked the seal that his face made and drew in a raspy, labored breath. They made eye contact, and he didn’t see the same woman he’d seen just a moment ago. He saw the conflagration that blazed inside her, and he realized that he was in terrible danger.

  Akiko squeezed with every ounce of power she had in her small frame. The skinny man struggled in her grip like a coyote caught in a trap, becoming more violent as he struggled more and more for air. Akiko’s years of ground fighting kept her in control, using her weight to prevent him from standing, and overpowering his arms with the strength of her legs.

  The skinny man swung wildly, pounding her sides and buttocks; she blocked and absorbed the majority of his desperate strikes. Despite her effort, he was beginning to slip free of her grip. Akiko grabbed hold of her underwear, still attached to her ankles, and stretched them, wrapping them around his neck like a spider spinning a web around its prey. Now she had a leash to aid in controlling him. If he tried to pull away, he’d strangle himself just the same.

  The toilet flushed.

  She renewed her devotion and pulled as hard as she could on her noose. The skinny man shook and retched, his eyes turning the color of ripe tomatoes. He tried several times to hit her in the face, but she batted away his attempts.

  The sink’s faucet began to run.

  Akiko bore down, trying to finish him, a shiny layer of sweat appearing all over her skin. The skinny man’s arms flailed and then dropped. Akiko quickly rolled over his body.

  The heavier man opened the door and entered the room, smiling. Akiko straddled his partner’s head, clawing at the ceiling and moaning. The heavier man stroked her again and then climbed on the bed, aiming his face for her breasts. Akiko guided him into her chest, where she cradled his head in her arms while he began unbuckling his pants.

  Akiko extracted a chopstick that was holding her bun, allowing a lock of hair to fall down her back. The man opened his eyes and gazed up at Akiko, and she slammed the chopstick into the heavier man’s eye, hitting the back of the socket with a thump. He shrieked, spurting blood onto her face. She leaped upon him, driving him onto his back with her weight, and brought the second chopstick down in a merciless arc, burying it in the man’s neck. His arms shot out to his side. She pulled the red-painted utensil from his throat and stabbed him repeatedly with it, showering the bed in blood until he didn’t move.

  Akiko hopped off the bed and grabbed ahold of the heavier man’s pant legs, yanking at them to straighten him. He gurgled and hacked, but she paid no attention. She dug in his front pockets and rolled him over to check his back pockets. Nothing. She crawled to the skinny man and did the same. Still nothing.

  She slid off the bed and went over to the chair where the skinny man’s cashmere jacket hung. She checked every pocket but came out empty handed. Her mouth became a straight line. Akiko went back into the parlor and checked the heavier man’s jacket. She found two card-keys in the inside pocket. As she was preparing to make her way to the front door, she noticed the trail of red footprints she was leaving on the carpet.

  Akiko scurried to the bathroom. She started the shower running and stood back for a moment to allow it to warm, taking the opportunity to regard herself in the mirror: she was covered in blood. She had made her first two kills and had baptized herself in their blood—a crimson Picasso. This was what she was meant for, like her father before her. Her father would be proud of the Shinobi she had become, and she was only getting started.

  After a second, Akiko climbed in the shower and rinsed the blood from her skin and hair. She exited, slicked her hair back, and went to the front door without drying. She opened the door and checked the hallway in both directions—it was clear, so she sidled up to the penthouse door, pressing her ear into it. She could hear voices inside but couldn’t make out the conversations nor the number of occupants, but there was no one immediately near the door, nearest she could tell. Akiko inserted the first card-key, and the lock replied with a red light. She swapped to the second key; it yielded a green light and a mechanical buzz as the jam unlocked.

  She held her breath and pushed the door open slowly. The greeting room was
clear, and so was the hallway leading the parlor. The voices sounded amused. She counted three distinct ones. When the door was open just enough for her to fit, she squeezed through it and eased it shut behind her, ensuring that she didn’t close the door completely so as not to alert anyone with the sound. Then she slithered toward the parlor.

  To her right was a side table with a tray full of liquor bottles, shot glasses, and a bowl with a nugget of ice and an icepick. She picked up the icepick as she passed the table and hid it behind her forearm before emerging in the parlor opening. She stood at the throat of the hallway, scanning the room. The first man looked up, and his mouth dropped open. The other three—there were four, though she’d only heard three—did the same when they realized what he was looking at. There was a tense silence as the four Japanese men—two middle-aged, wearing business suits, one balding and one with glasses; a young man in a leather jacket, a shirt, and denim pants; and another young man covered in tattoos, wearing slacks and dress shoes—stared in disbelief from their individual seats of the parlor, which held a couch, a coffee table, and a single seat.

  “Who are you?” asked the balding middle-aged man, who was nearest. “How did you get in here?”

  The tattooed man jumped to his feet and drew a gold-plated pistol from his waist.

  “I was sent here as a gift for the Shogun,” she said, her eyes touching everything in the room. “Are you the Shogun?” She noted that two of the men were armed. There was also a leather bag on the counter in the kitchen and a knife and a set of nunchaku next to it—and only one way in and out.

  The leather-jacketed man looked over his shoulder at the furthest man, the one wearing glasses.

  “You didn’t answer the question,” said the tattooed man, drawing nearer.

  Her eyes found him.

  He came close and looked Akiko over from head to toe, gently probing her right breast with the barrel of his gun. The tattooed man glanced over his shoulder and grinned. “She is built well.”