Zero. Part 16

The anger in Masashi's rising voice intrigued Joji because it had an odd element to it. Joji had been listening hard, not only to what Masashi was saying but to how he was saying it. The bitterness was unmistakable, a corrosive core that went beyond philosophy. That m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.tic undercurrent of self-hatred. If so, it fit the memories Joji had of their childhood. Masashi had been the baby of the Taki brothers. He had always been the most difficult, the most headstrong; the willful one, the contrary one. It was entirely conceivable that Masashi, having been coddled by Wataro Taki, grew up resenting that very attention.

"Do you really hate our country so much?" Joji said. "I cannot believe what I am hearing. It is the place that has given us life, the place that nurtured us."

"Drivel," Masashi said contemptuously. "Well what else can I expect from my mouse of a brother? Your timidity was always your worst fault. You cannot see that the only way for j.a.pan to be great in this new atomic age is to expand its boundaries."

"The greatness of j.a.pan," Joji said, "is in our hearts, where the spirits of our ancestors dwell. It is in our minds, where the memories of our history remain eternal."

"j.a.pan has rebuilt itself from ashes," Masashi said. "But it has gone as far as it can. Now it is up to men with vision to take it farther." He downed his drink. "I speak only the truth," he said. "And the truth is often not what a man wants to hear."

"Do you want the truth?" Joji said. He spread his hands. "Look at these suckers, my brother. Here is where you find your new recruits, neh? They come here to be voyeurs. They stare the night away. Then they go home and m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e." He made a sound deep in his throat, as if he were going to spit.

"There is nothing real in looking beneath the skirt of a woman who leaves her underwear off for a living."

The waitress removed their gla.s.ses, placed fresh ones on the table. Thesungla.s.sed singer was crooning.

"Listen to that insipid garbage," Joji said. "It's what your new recruits listen to for hours on end. Do they care about haiku, the poetry of their own great heritage? No. They have lost touch with the past, with all that makes j.a.pan great.

" 'We sit and stare for hours/At the smoke in each other's eyes,' " he mimicked the sungla.s.sed singer. "It's meaningless. Like the manufactured violence in the movies, where audiences root out loud for more and more mutilation. Like the manufactured grotesqueries of television news shows. The violence they bring us is as contrived in its way as that in films. Why?

Because all of it is meant to manipulate us. The viewer is t.i.tillated but never made to feel any real emotion, such as outrage or disgust. The electronic world has no place for such realities. Simply because its business is fantasy."

Joji was aware that he was talking too much, that his brother was staring at him, but it seemed he could not stop himself. He felt the anger like a knot inside himself; it was as if he had become infected by his brother's rage.

"The new breed of Yakuza you are bringing into the Taki-gumi is without honor, without a sense of tradition," he continued heatedly. "And this is why. They were raised on electronic junk food. They were manipulated since birth. It's mother's milk to them. Consequently, all they know is how to manipulate. Each other. Themselves."

Joji gestured. "Look at their pleasures. They require bombardment for any reaction to surface. Their spirits are decayed and callused. Extremism is the banner they hold high. Because the extreme is the only thing that has sufficient power to move them. All the rest falls on deaf ears and sightless eyes."

"Extremism," Masashi said, "is often misunderstood." He leaned forward. "Today it is extremism-and only extremism-that will wrench j.a.pan from the hands of the Westerners-the itekil If you were not so soft-bellied, you would see this truth as I do. If only our father had understood. The only good he did was use the Taki-gumi as a weapon against the Russians."

"How can you speak this way about our revered father?" Joji said.

"I say what has to be said. I am the only one with enough courage to do so. As usual."

Masashi has not changed, Joji thought wearily. All the elation he had felt at the beginning of the meeting washed out of him. Joji realized that he was on a fool's errand. Masashi had not changed one iota. He was still contemptuous of the old traditions. It was Masashi who had argued at clan meetings that the Yakuza were mired in the past, that their code of honor-though once useful-was now more of a detriment. "We are nearing the year two thousand," Joji recalled Masashi saying. "If the Yakuza is to have any chance at all of surviving the new century, then it must look to expand its base of operations.

"We are wholly local, as we have been for centuries. We have done nothing to better ourselves. We are, essentially, where we were in the days of our grandfathers.

"The world is rapidly pa.s.sing us by. In order to remain strong, we must seek new horizons. The Yakuza must do what our government has done. Compete on a global scale."

But going global would take an enormous outlay of capital. And there was only one way to fund such expansion in an ongoing manner. Drug running. Wataro Taki had vetoed any such involvement. And that had been the end of it. Or so everyone had believed.

Then Wataro had made his retirement announcement. And Masashi had made his move. Into the twentieth century. The age of thermonuclear nightmare and electronic dissemination.

Profit without honor was a life better left to corporate businessmen, Joji firmly believed. Honor was what set the Yakuza apart. It was what made them special, it was their link to the greatness of the past. The splendor of the samurai. Masashi would, no doubt, sneer at such a comparison. But this kind ofcontinuity was the only protection against the disconnection rampant in society. That was the difference between them.

He was wrong. It was not the mutilation served up daily on TV and films that had crippled the spirits of the new breed. It was the electronic media's murder of the past. According to the postmodern credo, the past was as disposable as last week's fashion trend. It had been made irrelevant.

"Learning is difficult enough for the young and inexperienced," Joji said. "It is impossible for your new Yakuza recruits to unlearn this explosion of fallout from the atomic age. What's bred in the bone," he added, quoting Shozo.

"What's that?"

"An American aphorism," Joji said. "But it is apt for us in this instance. You are resigned to the necessity of employing the young and inexperienced, for whom learning is impossible. Garbage is their mother's milk."

"Are you questioning my methods? Again?" Masashi said. "The problem is universal among us. Only the solutions differ."

"And what is yours?" Joji asked.

"An alliance," Masashi said. "Between the Yakuza, the bureaucracy and the government."

Joji laughed. Surely his brother was drunk on Suntory. "Who has been filling your head with such nonsense?" he cried. "The Yakuza are outcasts. They are beyond society at large. We are who we are because essentially we are misfits.

We cannot survive in the highly stratified society of j.a.pan otherwise."

"Perhaps that was true once," Masashi said. "But no more. Now the Yakuza will join the mainstream of society."

"Impossible!" Joji could not believe what he was hearing. "We are outlaws. We will always be viewed as undesirable by the ruling powers. You cannot change what is."

"I can change it," Masashi said. "And I am. I am taking the Taki-gumi out of the shadows. For one thing, I am planning to make public the heroic deeds performed by the Taki-gumi over the years in defense of j.a.pan; our history of work against the Russian KGB should be a matter of public record. I am stepping up our involvement in Yamamoto Heavy Industries' businesses. n.o.buo Yamamoto and I are planning several new ventures in which Taki-gumi members will partic.i.p.ate more fully. The clan will soon be as great and legitimate a force in j.a.pan as any business conglomerate you can name."

"Listen to yourself," Joji said. "The businessmen and bureaucrats with whom you seek an alliance will spit on you. They would sooner commit seppuku than grant Yakuza entry into their strata of society. Your self-delusion would be a source of humor were it not so sad."

"Enough!" Masashi shouted. Heads turned as he was heard even above the electrified music.

Joji persisted. "Don't you see that the very presence of your new breed of recruits spells utter disaster for the future of the Yakuza? They are ungovernable because they are rootless. Without a heritage, they cannot be committed to anything. Certainly not to a Yakuza oyabun. They will not submit to discipline, because the only thing they believe in is anarchy. You are an out-and-out fool, unfit to be oyabun of the Taki-gumi, if you believe otherwise."

Masashi leaned across the table, grabbed Joji by his shirt-front. Gla.s.ses crashed to the floor. Two bouncers moved in the table's general direction but were stopped by Shozo and Masashi's pockmarked soldier. "Listen! You may be my brother, but I don't have to tolerate this kind of discourtesy!

I am oyabun of the Taki-gumi. I took pity on you and was going to offer you a post back inside the clan for the sake of appearances.

"There will never be a chance of that now. You're like our father. You've got your head back a hundred years. I want no part of you. Do you hear me? Get out of my sight, weakling!"

Ude found the two Hawaiians drinking beer at a local place in Wailuku. Theywere not difficult to find. Ude had put a tap on Fat Boy Ichimada's private line before they had had their little chat down in the lea. Ude had frightened him so badly, it had not taken Fat Boy long to get on the phone. The tap Ude had used was a TN-5000, one of the new generation that Fujitsu had designed.

Using an ROM microchip, it stored the computer tones coming into and going out of the phone base to which it was attached. That gave Ude the phone number Fat Boy had dialed. Ude was hooked into everyone and everything on the Islands; it had taken Ude only a short time to get the name and address that went with the phone number.

Ude sat down at a table near the front door. Took a chair at a ninety-degree angle from them, so he could keep an eye on them without having to face them directly. He had pulled up just as they were getting into their van. He had followed them here.

Ude ordered a club soda. He never touched alcohol or tobacco. Saving himself for the mushroom. He smiled. These Hawaiians, he thought, relaxing now, have got the life. They'll never amount to anything, but they sure are happy.

While he waited, he had plenty of time to think about Fat Boy Ichimada. In many ways the oyabun reminded Ude of his own father. Know-it-alls who couldn't see a foot in front of their face. They were the center of everything; they held the past in their hands.

Fah! Ude thought now. The past is meaningless. It is baggage that saddles you with its useless weight all through your fife. Ude had no such compunctions.

He saw only the future, brightly lit, overheated, eternally beckoning. The future was what set his juices running. Ude would do anything he was told in order to have a piece of it.

Now he had to find out what these Hawaiians were up to. He did not believe a thing Fat Boy Ichimada had told him; he could not afford to. Fear had its advantages, as Masashi Taki was ever pleased to enumerate. But it also made liars out of even the most honest of men. More often than not, you were told just what you wanted to hear. Which was why Ude had come to the source.

Eventually, the two Hawaiians got bored with drinking beer. It took them a very long time. Their capacity for liquid astounded even Ude, who had been with many prodigious drinkers in his time.

There was no problem following them. All they had on their mind was girls.

They picked up a couple of locals in another hangout, which was obviously familiar to them. Ude waited outside. There was no need to get out of his car because he had a clear view of the place through the open door.

The four of them emerged and got into the Hawaiians' van. Ude took off after them. They had a place in Kahului near enough to the airport so that the rumble of the jets' engines was a permanent fixture of the neighborhood.

He was going to wait until they were alone. But then he thought, What the h.e.l.l. Fat Boy Ichimada had p.i.s.sed him off, holding out on him when Ude had expressly warned him not to. The quicker this was done, the quicker Fat Boy Ichimada would get wind of it. Ude dearly wished he could be with the oyabun when that happened, impossible though that would be. Ude laughed, thinking of Fat Boy's expression. Sometimes, he knew, the dream was better than the reality.

Take now, for instance. Ude sitting in his car, the engine off but the engine of his mind chugging along. Feeding images of the death and destruction in which he would partic.i.p.ate moments from now.

Images of a surreal quality. Sometimes he would see the two Hawaiians. Looking into their eyes at the moment of their deaths. Watching for the transition. To see the spark go out.

In reality he never did, of course. It was impossible, no matter how concentrated one's mind was. That instant remained elusive, save in the images of Ude's brain.

In those images he would reach out and grasp the spark as it lifted free of the body, a blister excised. Open his mouth and swallow it. Would this impart to him a power sublime?In another image, instead of the two Hawaiians in the shabby house, Ude saw his father. It was his father's body beneath his. His father's face that he watched for the jump of the spark. It was his father he was going to kill.

Ude got out of the car. Crossed the street and went toward the house. The grounds were a mess. Gra.s.s that hadn't been cut; shrubs that had needed pruning three years ago were now as wild as a lion's mane. Ude felt a surge of revulsion at human beings who could be so unconscious of their surroundings.

Ude's own home outside Tokyo was fastidious in every respect. Especially the grounds, which to Ude were sacred. To plant, he felt, was to take on a holy trust. Gardens were a matter of considerable complexity. They required elan in designing, skill in planting, care in maintenance.

That was another thing, Ude thought as he picked the lock, of which my father was ignorant.

He entered the semidark house. Hearing noises, he paused in the hallway.

Listened to the grunts and groans, as if he were nearing the ape cage at the zoo. He could hear a box spring squeaking rhythmically.

He produced four lengths of cowhide rope. He preferred cowhide because it was supple yet strong. He moved forward.

It took him just over a minute to ascertain that the two Hawaiians had moved from separate quarters into one bedroom. The door was open. It was easy to look inside.

One of the Hawaiians had the bed. He was on top of his girl, humping away at breakneck speed. The other Hawaiian was lying on his back on the floor. His girl knelt over him. She was rising and falling, her hands on his chest. His eyes were closed.

Ude was wearing lightweight crepe-soled shoes that he had had made for him in Tokyo. They made no sound as he crept into the room and silently shut the door behind him.

Five people in the room, and he was the only one perfectly still. From this stillness he erupted into motion without warning.

At the bed, he grabbed the Hawaiian's wrists, twisting them backward. With a flourish he could only have learned watching Hollywood westerns, Ude whipped a length of cowhide around the Hawaiian's crossed wrists. The knot he made was slip-proof. In fact, the more the Hawaiian struggled, the tighter it got.

In almost the same motion, he turned to the couple on the rug. He kicked out.

The steel toe of his shoe caught the girl in the throat. She coughed, gagged, sank all the way down on the supine Hawaiian's p.e.n.i.s.

Ude pushed her violently aside as the Hawaiian's eyes flew open. They were still filled with her, his reflexes dulled by l.u.s.t. Ude punched him hard just below the rib cage and, as he began to double over, pushed him onto his stomach. Used the second length of cowhide to lash his wrists together.

Heard someone scrambling behind him, turned, lashed out with his right leg.

Caught the first girl as she was attempting to dash for the door. Connected with her hip, heard her heavy grunt, turned away from her before she had fallen to the floor.

By this time, the Hawaiian on the bed had gotten to his feet.

"Who the h.e.l.l are you?" he shouted. Fear lent a shrill note to his voice.

With a leg strike, Ude crashed him to the floor. He used the respite to tie up the girls. When he was finished, he contemplated the two Hawaiians writhing.

The one Ude had hit in the rib cage used both legs, striking Ude on his thigh.

Ude grunted, swung forward and down, jamming the toe of his shoe into the side of the Hawaiian's neck. That was unfortunate. It broke the man's neck, and by the time Ude knelt down beside him, took his head in his hands and stared into his face, there was nothing to see.

"You've killed him!" the second Hawaiian screamed. The girls began to whimper.

"The same thing will happen to you," Ude said, "unless you tell me."

"Tell you what?" the Hawaiian said.

"What Fat Boy Ichimada sent you to do."

"Who's Fat Boy Ichimada?"Ude used the edge of his hand. It was a neat, clean calculated blow to the heart, which terrified the Hawaiian. His face went white; he gasped. His eyes watered. Ude waited.

"Answer," he said.

"A hea.r.s.e!" The Hawaiian's eyes were squeezed shut. He was panting. "The woman was driving a hea.r.s.e!"

"A what?"

"At the airport in Kahului!" the Hawaiian screamed. "A hea.r.s.e drove up to take charge of a coffin flown in from the mainland!"

"Where on the mainland?"

"New York, Washington. I'm not sure."

"Why were you at the airport?"

"Because of the red cord."

"What red cord?"

"Untie me," the Hawaiian said, "and I'll show you." He rubbed his wrists when Ude untied the rawhide. Ude went with him to a chest of drawers. The Hawaiian opened one, rummaged through his underwear.

"Here it is." He produced a short strand of braided cord of a red so deep it was almost black.

Ude took the cord. "Where did you get this?"

"At the airport. A locker. Ichimada told us to pick up the key. At a hotel.

Under the name Michael Doss."

Doss! Philip Doss's son! Ude could smell the truth. "That's when you saw the hea.r.s.e?"

"Yeah. I was waiting for my brother. He went to take a leak. I noticed the woman right away because she knew about Fat Boy's men. The ones he uses to monitor everyone who comes in and goes out of the airport. She avoided them."