Svaha, page 10
Lisa nodded, not trusting herself to speak. The movement made her headache worse.
"I will see to it that he is properly interred then," the Claver said. "But first I want you to take some broth."
Even through the blur of her unshed tears, Lisa could see that this Claver could move. He was quick and smooth, not a wasted motion. He returned with a small metal bowl from which came the most astonishingly good smells. Lisa's stomach was in knots and she had absolutely no appetite. Still, he helped her sit up, tucking the blanket in around her like a towel after a shower. When he placed the bowl in her hands, her palms protected from the hot metal sides by padded cloth, her mouth began to water.
"Please," the Claver said. "Drink it. It will help you heal more quickly; make you strong."
What if there was something in it? Lisa thought. But if he'd wanted to hurt her, he wouldn't have gone through the trouble of bandaging her wounds, would he? Still, what was a Claver doing here so close to the Plex? She'd never heard of such a thing. Unless… And then she knew. He was after the same thing Goro and everybody else was—the Claver chip that the chinas had taken from her.
"This is an old bruise?" he asked, pointing to her cheek.
"Yeah. Bunch of chinas jumped me."
"I see. They are not of your tribe?"
Lisa shook her head. She immediately regretted the movement as it made the headache throb more sharply between her temples. She sipped at the broth.
"What is your symbol?" He frowned, unhappy with the word. "Your patron animal?"
"You mean totem?"
He smiled. "Yes."
"We don't have 'em."
"Then how is it that you know—"
"What you're talking about? Gimme a break. I watch the vids."
She paused after sipping at the broth some more. Her headache was receding and the other pains weren't so prominent any longer. She was feeling almost perky, she realized. The hole inside her that Kay had filled, the despair she'd been feeling over Donnybrook's death…everything had taken on a distant quality.
"What's in this?" she demanded.
"Herbs. Roasted rabbit drippings. Dried vegetables."
"I'm feeling a little buzzy."
"That would be the mushrooms—a form of psilocybin that our medé have genetically altered so that it serves as a form of natural painkiller, rather than a hallucinogen. You shouldn't worry as it is non-addictive."
"Yeah," Lisa said, "but what about the way it's making me float away from everything that's real? I don't like pain. I don't like hurting for lost friends. But I don't like being cut off from what's real by some buzz. I'm not ready to party just now."
"I apologize," the Claver said. "I realize that you would wish to grieve for a comrade—especially one who suffered a Stalking Death—but my concern was for the pain that your wounds would be causing you."
"No shit? Then how come I'm still hurting?"
"Believe me, without the mushroom's medicine, you would be feeling a great deal more pain."
Lisa tried glaring at him, but the floating feeling made it hard to concentrate on anything negative. And it was hard not to trust that guileless face.
"Screw it," she said, and finished the broth in one long swallow.
"Do you wish more?"
Lisa shook her head. This time the headache hardly made its presence known.
"What's your name?" she asked.
"I am Gahzee Animiki-Waewidum of the Turtle totem. My people are the Anishnabeg."
"That's some mouthful. What does it mean?" In the vids all the Clavers had names like Running Bear, or Moon Over Dark Water, so she was curious about how true that was.
"My name means Swift Speaks With Thunder," he said, translating it into patois.
"And what about that Anishna-whatever?"
"We are the Spontaneous People."
"Come again?"
"Sky Woman gave us life, but unlike all else that is, we were made from nothing; our substances came not from rock, or fire, or water, or wind. And we were given spirits—though not the same spirits as the mysteries. The mysteries receive visions; the People must quest for them."
"Right."
"I'm sorry. I did not mean to bore you."
" 'Sokay. I'm just finding it hard to concentrate. My name's—" she hesitated, "—Maki Ota."
The Claver regarded her for a long moment, the pupils of his dark eyes expanding. "That name," he said finally, "suits more what you were wearing than what you are."
Lisa shrugged. "What can I say? It's all I've got."
Gahzee took the bowl from her hand. "You should rest," he said, gently pressing her back down onto the bedding. "I will see to the interring of your friend while you sleep."
Lisa tried to connect with the sorrow she knew was inside her, but the drug in the broth washed over with a wave of blurriness. Before she knew it, the comforting dark had taken hold of her again.
3
Fumiko Hirose was still at home that morning when the call came. She sat down in front of her com-link and switched it to receive.
"Goro-san," she said, startled. "I hadn't—"
"I was monitoring your conversation with the drone last night," the oyabun said without any preliminary discussion, "and am most displeased."
"Gomenasai. But—"
"It seems to me you play a very dangerous game, Fumiko. Did I not specifically request you to nurture a friendship with him?"
Hirose was thinking quickly. "Hai, "she said. "But, Goro-san, he is a man, and a man likes to think he is in control. And he already suspects my interest in him. It is for this reason that I have approached the matter in a more circular fashion. Yip cannot be taken by a frontal attack. As in go, one must make many apparently unrelated moves, until the moment comes when one's opponent is snared all unknowingly and there is no escape."
Goro's face studied her from the screen. "So this warning of our interest in him that you gave him—it was all a part of your plan to snare him?"
"Hai. Yip is no fool. His first thought on my contacting him was that you had sent me."
Goro nodded slowly. "Yes. I saw that. Continue as you see best then, Fumiko, only consider: I am only pleased with results, neh?"
"Hai. "
"Ja mata."
The screen went blank before she could reply.
Hirose leaned back in the chair and wiped a thin bead of perspiration from her brow. She would have to be careful. And she would have to call Phillip again. But she would give him a little time. It was still early morning. She would wait until noon for him to call before she tried again.
As it turned out, she didn't have to wait until then.
4
If he kills me, you'll know I was right—that I speak the truth.
Yip sat in his office cubicle, staring at the news-vid on his desktop display, Huan's words ringing in his head. Minute by minute, it seemed, his familiar world was dissolving away from underfoot.
"SECURITY OFFICER SLAIN—INVESTIGATION LAUNCHED," the headline read. The Ho Anzen spokesman quoted in the report would make no statement except that an investigation was pending.
Yip read the article through for a third time. With Huan's death, he had lost his last foothold in a normal world. There is no black and white, Huan had said. Only grey. Greyness that lies like a fog over everything. In such a world, how was a man to separate the good from the evil? Whom could he trust?
When his section head entered his cubicle, Yip gave him only a perfunctory nod.
"This is a terrible loss," Aoki said.
His features were solemn. Yip schooled his own to betray nothing of what he felt. If Huan was to be believed, here was one of those responsible for his death. It was difficult to accept. His section head. The company's owner. Who else was involved in this conspiracy?
If he kills me…
The grey fog fell thickly across Yip's sight.
…you'll know I was right.
He felt cut adrift from all he had ever believed. Giri. Duty. Responsibility. He no longer knew what to believe.
"If you wish, I can arrange some time off," Aoki went on.
"I was there last night," Yip said slowly. "It must have happened just after I left."
Aoki's tone of voice shifted from sympathetic to businesslike. "What did you see?"
Yip shook his head. "Nothing. Only a troubled friend."
"Troubled? What did he speak of?"
Because he was watching for it, Yip spied the betraying twitch under his section head's left eye.
"He was lonely," Yip said. It wasn't a lie. "He was afraid of growing old without a family."
Aoki nodded. "You must take some time off, Phillip. A day at least, neh?"
"Thank you, Aoki-san. I will do that."
"Huan Som will be cremated with full company honours. Shall I see to the arrangements?"
"You do Huan great honour," Yip said.
The grey fog was clearing. Already he was adjusting, learning to lie, the untruths spilling easily from between his lips.
Aoki hesitated as though he had more to say, then gave a quick nod. "Ja mata," he said.
Yip nodded in return. "Mata."
He waited until his section head had left his cubicle, then read the article for a fourth time. He sighed and cleared the display. Having lost the wager, now it was he who must turn his life around and follow Huan's way.
Can I live with constant deception? he asked himself. Trusting no one?
Another's recent words came to him. Those that Fumiko Hirose had left him with last night. Goro's Dragon Lady.
In any relationship, a certain amount of faith is required of all parties concerned.
Hai. Or as Huan had put it, all people were good and bad, weak and strong. In some, the mix leaned more to yin, in others more to yang, but the mix was there in all of them. A simple truth. One of which he'd not been unaware. But he had also believed that a person's actions, good or ill, reflected to which side they leaned. Now he saw that circumstance—the grey fog of the world—could make a good man do evil. Could make an evil man do good. Another truth, but not so simple.
He reached for his com-link and punched out the numbers that would connect him to Goro's Dragon Lady lawyer, not caring that because he made the call from his office, it would be duly logged and filed in the company's files.
Hirose seemed startled to see him, her features immediately clouding with concern. "Phillip, I…" She hesitated, then began again. "I only just heard the news. I'm so sorry."
"Domo."
"Please believe me, we had no—"
He cut her off before she could complete her sentence. He already knew that Goro had nothing to do with Huan's death. What he didn't want was anyone else to know he knew that.
"Are you free this evening?" he asked quickly. "For dinner?"
Her dark eyes blinked with surprise. "Regretfully, no," she said. "I have a previous engagement—a reception at the Ojika Gallery."
Yip knew the place, though he'd never been inside. The Ojika Gallery was in the Tonda District and far too posh for his budget. He gave a curt nod.
"Another time then," he said.
"But I don't have an escort," Hirose said.
Yip regarded her for a long moment. Was this her way of getting back at him for last night? Bring the half-blood to a gathering of Nipponjin highbloods where he'd stand out like a squat rat and make a fool of himself? But he remembered.
A certain amount of faith is required.
"What time shall I pick you up?" he asked.
Hirose's smile was so warm that he could almost feel the temperature of his display screen rising. "After work," she said. "Ja mata, Phillip. I'm glad you called."
"Mata," he said as they both cut the connection.
He was glad, too. There was no question but that he was attracted to her, yet he also wished to observe her. To learn how such a master of the art navigated through the grey fog of the world with such success.
I am changing, Huan, he thought as he left his cubicle. But the cost of this learning has been far too dear, neh?
EIGHT
1
Three generations past, the Okados were one of Trenton Megaplex's primary yakuza clans. Their fall from power was in part premeditated by their then-oyabun Ishidi Okado, in part brought about by Chomei Goro who was attempting to consolidate the yakuza into one clan at that time. As Goro worked for a takeover of the yakuza underworld in Trenton, Ishidi was moving his own Okado Clan into legitimate business. When his yakuza realized that the new business was not merely a front, more than half defected to the growing Goro Clan.
Ishidi's plan had its roots in the mid-twentieth century. The original yakuza in medieval times were outlaw gamblers and outcasts. Their code of an honour among thieves sprang from Japan's peasant lower classes, and was necessary for survival in those times since it prevented them from killing each other with impunity and gave them a core of human dignity. The Samurai Code was a code of divine duty; the Yakuza Code was a code of personal duty.
The Yakuza Code was a rough mix of Confucian ethics and Zen self-discipline. It demanded courtesy and honesty in all conduct—from eating to gambling, from being a houseguest to being an assassin, and expressly forbade any violation of a man's social obligations and debts. Although the early yakuza were hardened homeless outlaws living on the fringe of Japan's feudal society, they assisted the lower classes from which they'd come, often protecting them from the samurai of their lords.
In the mid-twentieth century, however, the yakuza formed bureaucratic syndicates, which purged their ferocity of all possible sympathies. Adapting the Yakuza Code to those times, they continued to plunder and blackmail the rich, but also ended their traditional protection of the poor.
Some very few oyabun maintained the original spirit of the Yakuza Code. They tried to move into legitimate businesses, but were blocked by both their followers as well as the other clan oyabun who wished to see no change in their current levels of power. Periodically then, over the generations, some few oyabun would make the attempt again, though few succeeded like Ishidi, and none retained their status in the yakuza community.
These renegade clans became fair game, but because they knew the ways of their brothers so well, they were better equipped to deal with their attacks. Those yakuza that remained with Ishidi grew in power as he did, buying shares of small companies until they had enough clout to have their own people sitting on Inizi/Bell Northern's board of directors.
By time Chomei Goro handed over the consolidated Goro clan to his son Shigehero, two generations of Okados had served as chairmen of the IBN board. The current chairman was Kenzo Okado, president of Usaijin Motors, a major shareholder of IBN, and the grandson of Ishidi Okado.
He had an office in the IBN building in the Jimu District and lived in the penthouse of the same building. A slender man with stern features, he bore the current assault on IBN with a public image of stoic restraint. His private face was one of despair, however, and more than once he half-seriously wished that his grandfather hadn't been so quick to trade the solid backbone of power of a yakuza clan for that of the legitimate business world. Some augmented yaks were exactly what he needed at a time like this.
He could hire security officers, but they would only protect. Industrial spies were just that—capable of stealing secrets, not lives. Neither had the clean efficiency of an oyabun sending out a man to bring him back the heads of his principal foes: Shigehero Goro, whose clan members were slowly eating away at Okado's control; the presidents of Shiken Sciences and Exxon Technics, who were taking the legal route through the courts; the faceless leaders behind the Jones Co-Op.
IBN and its affiliates were under assault from every side and there was little Okado could legally do to stop any of them. It was for that reason that he waited now in his penthouse office for a spokesman from the Ho Fung Triad with his personal aide Muato Kamo. His aide was a compact, round-faced man in his late forties—a full decade older than Okado.
"My grandfather would roll over in his grave," Okado said. He took a sip from his second whiskey of the day, though it was still before noon.
His aide made no comment. They'd been through it all too often before. There were only two options that they could undertake to save IBN from being swallowed by the Goro Clan, or letting the other corporations or the Co-Op eat away at its majority of Megaplex holdings. The first was that they could throw in with one of the Triads, but that was unthinkable. Bad enough to have any dealings with them, but to let them gain a foothold in the principal Nipponjin holdings? Never. Their other option was what they were now attempting: to buy stolen Claver technology.
With new high tech product on the market—particularly product that had its source in the mysterious dojin no Enclaves—they could recoup their position in the marketplace, thereby acquiring enough time to deal with all their problems. Liquid assets were the commodity they needed. Judges were far more partial to helping a company that could make such help worth their while in untraceable funds. And credits could buy upscaled protection from the yaks' continuing attacks as well. Hard currency in place of data-based power in the Megaplex's central computers.
"We have no choice," his aide said.
"Hai."
Kamo frowned as Okado finished his whiskey in one long gulp and went to pour another. Before he could voice a carefully phrased protest, there was a rap at the door. A younger aide stepped inside.
"Chien Foo is here," she said.
Kamo glanced at Okado. "Send him in," he said at his employer's quick nod.
The Triad representative was dressed in an immaculate red and gold bodysuit. His black hair was cropped short, his eyes hidden behind dark glasses which he didn't remove when he entered. When the aide closed the door behind her, he gave a short bow to the two men waiting in the room.
"Tsao, ni hao ma?" Foo said in Mandarin by way of greeting. "Huen Ho Fung sends to you his regards."
Okado put his empty glass down on the bar and Kamo rose, both men returning Foo's greeting.
