Chapter Two

Chapter Two

Zaa— Zaa— Zaa— Zaa—

The sound coursed along Fifth Street.

“What the hell is going on?” the bartender wondered. He stood on the stoop and peered at the waters swirling beneath the steps.

“The taxi!” the boyfriend wailed. “Where’s my taxi!”

“Button it,” said Setsura Aki. The reverberations made him think of winter frost. The bar was wrapped in silence. “Can’t you hear it?” Setsura pressed. “Can’t you?”

“Not at all,” the bartender answered.

“Not at all,” the boyfriend echoed.

“I can.”

Setsura slid off the stool. He went to the window and slid it open. The expected wave of heat did not sweep through the opening. Instead, he breathed out white mist. He could see his breath. When the road became a flowing river, the heat had turned to a bone-chilling cold.

“All will bow their heads and wait,” Setsura intoned, staring intently at the rushing waters before his eyes. “Even the heat. Obviously somebody is putting on a production. But who is directing the play?”

Born in fire to reign in ice. And somebody was arranging a coronation ceremony behind the scenes.

The bartender craned his head. “I hear it,” he said in a small voice.

“I hear it,” the boyfriend said.

From the far reaches of the river in the direction of the Hilton Tokyo, a sweet and painful melody accompanied the eerily approaching world that flowed towards them.

The sound of a koto.

“They’re coming,” Setsura Aki said. “Just like in the legends.”

At the same moment, he couldn’t have known that those same words were being repeated in the corner of a nightclub in Kabuki-cho.

The sound drew closer. And something else as well. The bartender began to shiver, and it wasn’t just because of the cold.

Setsura saw it first, emerging from the depths of the darkness. A black ship glided toward them. The oddly raised bow of the boat appeared first. Two masts. The sails were furled. An old and weathered hull.

Not steel. A wooden ship, not one from this era. Ten oar holes dotted the hull at the waterline. Wooden sculls stuck out of the holes, hovering horizontally over the surface of the water.

“There are people there,” Setsura heard the bartender say behind him.

The silhouettes of three people on the deck. Three people who looked back at them.

On the left was an old man with white hair and beard, thin as a crane. Next to him was a girl. She still had youth left in her. Her luxurious black hair was tied up in buns behind each ear. Her large eyes flitted about her surroundings, taking it all in.

The third person had a young and graceful countenance. Between his full eyebrows was a small dot, like an embedded pearl. All of them were decked out in Chinese clothing gorgeously woven with threads of silver and gold. All their eyes focused on Setsura.

The girl disappeared. She’d left to fetch somebody.

The sound of the koto ceased.

The girl returned with a new person. It was as if a halo of light had blossomed between the girl and the old man. That was how radiantly attractive this new woman was. On a par with Setsura, with Doctor Mephisto even.

Her black hair fluttered gently to one side in the wind, casting a shadow across her snow-white skin and white robes. Standards of beauty changed with the years, with the eras, and from country to country. But the beauty of this woman—no older than twenty—was eternal and immutable, surpassing every possible expectation.

The sound of the koto rang out. Setsura couldn’t see her hands, but they must have been playing the music.

Their eyes met for several long seconds. The ship crossed from right to left, from the heart of darkness toward the heart of Shinjuku, where some rough beast was waiting to be born.

Setsura silently watched as the ship slowly slipped by.

The koto sounded again. A voice like a silver bell began to recite a poem. Setsura translated the ancient language in his head.

Crossing the waters we’ve crossed before

Seeing the flowers we’ve seen once more

Spring breezes along the riverbank roads

Before we know it, we’ve made our way home

The verses wafted through the frozen night air, evaporating as they reached his ears. These four strangers were right now sailing to Shinjuku.

Setsura looked at the quiet moon high in the night sky.

“That’s a nice smell,” the bartender mumbled to himself. “Perfume? From what country?” He wiped his face with his hands.

Setsura noticed it as well. The heat was making a comeback.

“The water’s retreating,” the bartender observed.

Without a second glance at the sparkling wet pavement, Setsura shut the window and returned to the counter.

“What happened just now?” the bartender asked. “It’s like being inside a living dream. That happens a lot around here, you know.”

“Maybe so,” Setsura said, grasping his glass of tea. “But there are dreams we’re better off not seeing. Dreams that should not become real.” He drained the remainder of the tea.

The boyfriend cried out, almost on the verge of tears, “Hey, hey, where’s the taxi?”

Michio Hyuuga couldn’t settle down. The sense of unease carved a hole in the pit of his stomach. Combined with the tightness around his ankles, it made his insides feel like a loose sock full of rocks. He had no idea why. He cursed and swore, but venting didn’t do him any good. All he could do was throw up his hands in exasperation.

He wanted to talk it over with somebody. He had—albeit vaguely—a candidate in mind. A real egghead. A straight dealer with a well-established reputation. And having real muscle at his disposal couldn’t hurt. The problem was, for an ordinary working stiff, getting in good with a guy like that was way out of his league.

But nothing ventured, nothing gained. Hyuuga was in agony. The sweet music strummed in his ears. A guitar, he thought.

He looked around. Grubby little shops, with doors and windows shuttered. He seemed to have wandered down a back alleyway. No streetlights, but the moon shone brightly overhead. His shadow was clearly outlined at his feet.

In front of him, another shadow approached. Hyuuga raised his head and started a bit.

A young girl dressed in a cheongsam bowed to him, her sleeved hands clasped in front of her chest. She smiled. In the dark, her crimson lips took on an adorable hue.

Hyuuga shook his intoxicated head and thought through the situation. He was on a Kabuki-cho side street. Though the main thoroughfares were relatively safe, the back alleys required a lot more diligence. Especially at this hour.

He wasn’t particularly worried about stumbling across the odd cat-eyed snake or man-eating rat. The regular “monster eradication campaign” had swept through the Kabuki-cho district two days ago with poison gas and flame throwers, and that generally kept the critters out for the better part of a week. Besides, today was his day off, and he owed himself a drink or two.

The girl was either a pickpocket or a prostitute. He didn’t have much cash on him and wasn’t in the mood anyway. So either option was a non-starter.

“What’cha want, little lady?” Hyuuga asked, trying to keep it polite.

She didn’t answer, smiled sweetly again, and then casually leapt into the air. She didn’t even crouch and jump. Hyuuga automatically craned his head back and felt the hairs rise on the back of his neck.

“Hey, you—” he said.

A pale hand appeared to the right side of his face. The forefinger pointed forward.

“What are you doing—?” He didn’t finish the question. He gaped in astonishment. He was walking, and not of his own accord. “H-Hold on a second. Hey—you—”

The finger before his terror-stricken eyes flexed at the knuckles, now pointing to the left. He noticed the black maw of an alley opening like a mouth. He was turning into it.

When the silhouette emerged from the side street and walked towards her, Hisako Tokoyoda nonchalantly pointed her handbag in its direction.

She’d found the “armored handbag” at the Hanazono Shrine discount bazaar. It turned out to have more capabilities than its price suggested, and Hisako was delighted with her find.

The handbag held a .25 caliber Colt pocket auto with an eight-round magazine. The safety release and trigger were operated by a single lever. Plenty of capacity and not too bulky. These days, bullets of that caliber made for self-defense were mostly high-velocity explosive rounds. At short distances, one would drop a sumo wrestler.

The muzzle jutted through a slit in one end of the handbag. Hisako pointed it at the approaching figure, proud of her ability to keep her cool.

She still wasn’t over the shock of getting assaulted by magical forces earlier that evening at the nightclub. But she should come out of it unscathed. In any case, she’d take a sick day, drop by the hospital tomorrow, and everything would soon return to normal.

Besides, this was the 2nd block bus stop in Kabuki-cho. The bus would be by soon. No place was truly safe after hours, so the ward government ran old retrofitted surface-street buses until morning in order to accommodate the drunks and graveyard shift workers. Passes were cheap and for sale everywhere.

Three yards away, and the man showed no signs of stopping. Hisako flipped the lever to the right. The safety released with a soft click. A round was already chambered. One more twist and this loaded gun would go off.

“What do you want?” she asked.

He didn’t answer.

She felt the numb tenseness seeping into her left hand at about the same time the man came to a halt. He stopped beneath the glow of a streetlight. Seeing his face, Hisako felt her apprehension begin to dissolve. His noble, graceful countenance was enough to prompt her to let go of that dangerous lever.

Despite the heat of the night, he was wearing a dark cloak with the collar turned up. It looked Chinese. At any rate, though, this was a fine-looking man.

“You here for the bus as well?” Hisako asked, the tension disappearing from her voice.

“I am not,” the young man replied, in hesitant Japanese.

So he must be Chinese. Anybody from anywhere could be found in this town.

“Then what are you doing here?” she probed, her voice tightening again.

“There is something I want. Here.”

Despite the radiant smile on his face, Hisako again pressed her finger against the trigger. “Well, sorry, but you can take a hike. I’ve got nothing for you.”

“No.” The young man slowly shook his head. “Everyone has what I want. You are overflowing with it inside.”

“Well, aren’t you a bad boy. Seriously, I’m into hot guys as much as the next girl. But if you don’t take it elsewhere and quick, I’m gonna have to shoot you.”

“Shoot?”

“Yeah. Like, bang, bang. You see this?” Hisako held up the bag and pointed with her right hand at the gun.

The young man shrugged, and continued to advance.

“I said, freeze!”

Only three feet between them now. The bag shook and spat fire. A black dot, blacker than the cloak he was wearing, appeared in the center of the man’s chest. A dull, rending sound came from inside his body. He reached out his hand. The smile on his face didn’t fade. Just a little fun between lovers, said the look in his eyes.

“Stop!” Hisako cried.

Her finger repeatedly squeezed the trigger.

The shots came one after the other.

The young man was standing right in front of her. She couldn’t miss. His sturdy frame bent slightly backwards with the impact of each bullet, and shook from the explosions that followed. But that was all.

He took hold of Hisako’s shoulders. His fingers dug into skin. Hisako screamed, more in terror than in pain. She’d begun to grasp that he wouldn’t be any more forgiving because of her gender. He would tear a child limb from limb if it suited him.

Before she could scream again, he pulled her against his chest. She saw that his lips, black in the light of the streetlamp, were so red they almost glowed.

“We have just completed a long sea voyage. We are hungry. You look delicious.”

Stop—Hisako whimpered, but couldn’t articulate the desire.

The young man bared his teeth. Seeing those ivory spikes, Hisako knew what his true nature was.