Chapter Three

Chapter Three

The director looked quizzically at Kajiwara. “And that is?”

“An egg.”

“I can tell that. What kind of egg? Some creature from Demon City?”

“Correct. Though the parents are unknown.”

“Hatch it and you’ll find out soon enough.”

“This egg isn’t going to hatch—probably not during my lifetime.”

Observing the security guards exchanging glances, the director thought it might be best not to overplay his hand in the bluff and awe department.

“That’s a remarkable egg. Why can’t it be hatched?”

“I don’t know. I suppose because whatever’s inside isn’t eager to come out. I can imagine that the time a child spends in his mother’s womb, no matter the species, is the most felicitous time of its life.”

The director smiled thinly. “And this knowledge comes to you how?”

“Excuse the supposition.” Kajiwara reached into his suit coat pocket and took out a small flask. He spilled a bit of the clear liquid onto his palm. “Dye remover,” he said.

The guards became aware that their guns were no longer aimed in any particular direction. Kajiwara’s patter was obviously just that, and yet they were captivated by the aura of Demon City Shinjuku.

Kajiwara wiped his hands together and combed them through his hair. In a flash, the black hair turned white.

“Director, how old are you?”

“I turned sixty this year.”

“I am fifty-three. But if you looked only at my hair, you would think me the same age as your father.” The effect was like striking a silent gong. “Three years ago, my hair was the color you would expect of a man my age. And then I witnessed the incubation of this egg at a private biological laboratory.”

“You saw what was inside it?”

“No. I was shown something else.”

“What? By whom?”

“Probably by what is in the egg. A dream.”

“A dream?”

“A dream dreamed by what is inside.” Kajiwara examined the intrigued faces around him. “These men are still young. They should withdraw. Nightmares are for old men. Don’t worry. There’s no risk to life or limb. The burden has not proved unbearable—so far. Or are they too scared stiff to object, I wonder?”

“I won’t pretend to understand what you’re saying, but fine. Everybody leave the room.”

“But—” protested the guard captain. Yamase only held up his hand and he acquiesced. The guards nodded and exited the room.

When the door to the conference room closed behind them, one of the guards said, “Are you sure this is okay, captain?”

“Director’s orders. End of discussion.”

“Director. What happened to Director Negishi?”

Everybody nodded at the mention of Yamase’s predecessor.

“I don’t know. According to the rumors—”

At that moment, the door opened. “Director!” the captain shouted, running up to the uniformed man staggering out of the conference room. “What happened?”

Director Yamase tried to free himself from the supporting hands but lacked the strength. “I’m okay. See to the mayor. As for putting the egg back in the case—leave that to him. After that—no—leave it at that.”

The captain couldn’t decide how to respond. He was looking at the director’s head. His black hair had turned white as snow. In the meantime, the guards who charged into the conference room found the pale mayor slumped on the table. They took a SIG Sauer P220 semi-automatic from his hand.

Afterwards, they learned that the director had given it to him to try and break the egg. The hammer was cocked back and there was a round in the chamber, but no sign of it being fired.

Taking Kajiwara’s pulse, the captain muttered, “The dream—”

“Call the prime minister,” the director groaned as he was escorted down the hallway. But then he shook his head and added, “No. No need. Even if that dream becomes reality, the order must be executed.”

Yakou brought Takako to Mephisto’s room as soon as he returned to the manor house.

“So you won?” said the white-caped doctor, not bothering to look at him. A rainbow of colors played on the table in front of him.

“One way or another.” Yakou added with undisguised sarcasm, “That drug of yours really came through for me.”

“And how is Setsura doing?”

“He should be turning to ash about now.”

“That’s an awfully confident statement.”

“I guess.”

“Did you actually witness him turning to ash?”

“Not exactly.” Yakou furrowed his brow.

“In Demon City, it takes more than a long life to make a career.” Mephisto held up the object he was working on. A human arm, from the elbow on down. “This completes it. On to my next commission.”

Yakou watched without comment.

“This girl—set her down over there.”

The white finger indicated an operating table in a nook of the stone wall. Feeling it easier to go along than be contrarian, Yakou complied.

“Come over here.”

The two faced each other across the big table. Yakou asked, a searching air in his voice and eyes, “Doctor, do you believe in Setsura?”

“In what regard, specifically?”

“Everything.”

“Hard to say.”

“Don’t try to evade the question, please.”

“No matter how much you may want to believe in them, there are men who do not allow themselves to be believed in.”

“He is dead, whether or not you wish to believe that. What would you say if the dead man was standing in front of you?”

“Setsura Aki is dead?” Mephisto took a bunch of white flowers from within his cape. The pretty moon lilies looked faded and rather sad—compared to the fingers that held them.

“These were given to me by a man concerned for your welfare. However, the you that you are right now does not deserve them. Nonetheless, I cannot refuse a request from him. How do you think Doctor Mephisto should handle a man who has become prisoner to a woman?”

Yakou trembled. The product of fear and pleasure. He couldn’t allow himself to acknowledge it. He existed only for Princess, body and soul.

“Taken in by a woman, and in the throes of that infatuation, inspired to kill Setsura, and then come to me and brag about it. A reward is in order.”

“What would that be?” sneered Yakou. Then he shuddered, anticipating what manner of reward it might indeed prove to be.

The white flowers vanished within Mephisto’s grasp. He’d crushed them, the petals clinging to his hand before falling like snow. He’d apparently consigned Setsura’s request to dust as well. He pointed at the wall where Takako lay. “A punishment fitting for a man hell-bent on his woman. Come out, General Bey.”

His voice was answered with a growl, like a fierce beast rudely awakened from a slumber. A shadow fell across Yakou’s face. He went to jump aside as fingers like the gnarled limbs of an old tree clamped down on his shoulder.

“Kazikli Bey!” Yakou’s breath was sucked back into his befanged mouth.

A tear in the darkness. White clouds floated across a blue sky. Had he finally found his way home? But his memories quickly returned. Setsura stood up. The air was hot. His throat was dry.

To his left and a hundred yards deeper in, the forest was burning. All around him was sandy soil. Immediately to his right a river flowed. Clearly somebody had transported him here.

Setsura turned in a circle. At the foot of some black, moss-covered rocks lay a woman in a skirt.

As he ran over to Galeen Nuvenberg, the look on his face was something other than human. No one could have supposed that such an easygoing man was capable of such an expression. He seized the old woman’s hand—like a piece of withered wood—and checked for a pulse. He touched her temple. And then her neck.

He felt nothing. Setsura’s eyes focused on the arm by her side and what was in her clenched hand. Two bloody shuriken. He touched his own neck. Somebody had removed the weapon, staunched the blood, and carried him here.

A breeze wafted across the corpse of the Czech Republic’s greatest wizardess. The sound of the water never ended, nor would the light shining down ever cease.

Setsura turned the old woman’s small body onto her back. A shuriken glittered in her chest. She used the third one on herself, in order to frustrate a fate as General Bey’s servant.

No marks remained in her throat.

“You have left me with a debt I cannot repay,” Setsura softly said to her pale, wax-like face. “I will be sure to take you back with me to that city. But please be patient and wait a while first.”

He pulled out the shuriken and folded her hands across her chest. He should say a prayer for her. Then remembered he didn’t know any. He had the feeling he’d once been taught one, but couldn’t remember it.

Setsura stood up. The wind tousled his hair. He turned to the sound of the water and set off toward its source.

A path came into view soon after entering the forest. Above his head and beneath his feet he sensed things of unknown origin approaching. Scurrying away before making contact, but leaving behind buffeting wakes of the ghastly and the weird.

He’d walked for half an hour when the ruins appeared before him. Walls and stairs of stacked stones and packed earth, the footings of the towers engulfed in wild green. The parapets faced the river, suggesting the fortress was built to defend against an attack from the water.

A flight of stairs followed alongside the far wall, where the path also continued. The stone staircase descended from where Setsura stood, disappearing into the blue-green water filling the stronghold of the fort. The remains of what appears to be floodgates arose from that point.

Setsura continued straight ahead. A step ahead of him was a thirty-foot abyss. He strode unconcerned across empty space. He’d come to the center of the abyss when something fell on him.

First a right arm, and then a left arm, a right leg, a left leg, and a headless torso blocked his path, unscathed by the touch of his devil wires, perfectly perched and balanced on the invisible tightrope. He heard laughter from above as the last object fell onto his feet—Galeen Nuvenberg’s head.

The derisive glee now came from in front of him. Setsura looked up from the appalling gifts. Princess’s white sleeves fluttered in the air a dozen feet away.

“The fate of she who came to save you.”

The high, loud peals suddenly stopped, as did the sound of the wind and the birds. Time itself seemed to come to a halt.

Setsura Aki said, “Did you come here to shorten your own life? Or only to meet me?”