by David Haynes
“We all need to take a breath,” Kim said. “These two had nothing to do with what happened to your friend.”
“You’re sure of that?” Ookami said.
“I know these kids,” Leo said. “They’re good kids, and whatever happened to Sota had nothing to do with them.”
“So, what do you suggest happened?” Ookami pulled a handkerchief out of his inside pocket and handed it to Kenta. Another sign that he was more than just a street thug.
Leo shook his head. He had no idea. It didn’t make any sense.
“Poisoned,” Kenta said. He dabbed at his mouth with the handkerchief and winced. “He must have been poisoned.”
“Poisoned? What? By who?” said Leo.
Kenta spat on the floor again. Leo suspected it was a show of defiance as much as anything. He cleared his throat and then spoke. “If you’re saying the kids didn’t do it, and he wasn’t involved…” He glanced up at Chris. “Then someone poisoned him.” He gestured toward the candy and the chips. “Maybe all this crap is bad. Maybe it’s so fucking old that it’s going to make us all sick!”
“There’s nothing wrong with any of it,” Leo replied. “Maybe he ate something before he got here?”
The poison angle Kenta was working didn’t make much sense, but neither did Sota’s mummified corpse back in the storeroom.
“Or maybe he took something?” Kim said. “What are you on, Kenta? Crank? Coke? What’s your poison?”
“Fuck you!”
“So maybe instead of trying to blame everyone else for Sota, you should be blaming each other?” She glanced at both Kenta and Ookami. Her tone was heavily tinged with sarcasm. She turned to Ookami. “Who are you fighting with?”
He frowned. “Fighting? I’m not fighting with anybody.”
She stepped closer to him. “You know what I’m talking about.”
He laughed. “The cops know everything, right?”
“More than you think we do. What about your two buddies? The ones we found a couple of weeks ago?”
Ookami stiffened. The imperious look faltered for one, brief moment. A small victory for Kim.
“They were drunk,” Kenta butted in. “Both of them.”
“Maybe,” she said. “Or maybe someone got to them, maybe someone spiked whatever it is they were taking. Same as Sota.”
“You don’t know anything,” Kenta snapped. “We don’t talk to the cops. None of us will ever talk to you.”
“We won’t need you to. The tox report will tell us what we need to know. Maybe your supply is tainted? You ever think about that?”
Ookami simply turned his back on her. The implication was clear. It was something he was considering. One of the kerosene lamps sputtered and went out as if punctuating the end of that particular conversation.
“What are we going to do with the body?” Michelle asked. “I don’t want to have to step over it every time I need to pee.”
Leo looked at Ookami. “What do you want to do with Sota?”
“Put him in one of those freezers,” said Kenta.
“He needs to stay where he is,” Kim interrupted. “Nobody should go anywhere near him. The CSIs will want to take a look at him…”
“The police will not touch him.” Ookami turned back around. “We will take care of Sota. He is one of us.”
“I don’t think so,” said Kim. “Whatever it was that killed him, it sure as hell wasn’t natural causes. When we found those other two, the…”
“Two,” Ookami interrupted. “You found two. What of the other nine? Did you examine those men too? I think not. We took care of them.”
Kim was the speechless one now.
“Nine?” said Kenta. “What are you talking about?”
Ookami didn’t even look at him. “All of them like Sota, like Aki, like Satoshi. Frozen in the snow. Poisoned.”
“Don’t you think we should have been told about that? Shit.”
“Like I said. We take care of our own.”
Kim shook her head, her brow deeply furrowed. “You’ve got eleven men dead and you want to keep nine of them a secret! For what? So you can take revenge on someone? That’s bullshit. We can help, Ookami. We can find out what happened to them and deal with it. It’s our job. If this is the start of some kind of drug war, then you…”
“Those men were fit and strong. They wouldn’t have frozen to death unless they weren’t thinking straight. Unless there was something in their bodies that made them crazy. It’s our problem to deal with.”
“You know that when we get out of here, I’ll make sure there’s cops on every corner of every block for ten miles. I’ll have the drug team down here. Pretty soon there won’t be any coke, crank, meth, speed or even weed to be found within a hundred miles of here.”
Ookami shrugged. They both knew that even if she could get the city’s PD to descend on the block, there was always a way in, a way to bring drugs into the city.
Leo wished he could find more sympathy in his heart for Sota. He’d never seen anyone die from an overdose or from being poisoned, but it was obvious that was what was happening here. A drug war between two rival gangs, both of them sampling their own products and getting something extra, something they didn’t vouch for. Good riddance.
He glanced at Michelle and Sam. They both smoked pot from time to time. How much they used he had no idea, but perhaps this would give them pause. Maybe. And if Kim was right and the tainted supply was cut off, maybe they wouldn’t go down that route. Both kids looked at their feet.
Kenta sat down on the mattress. He looked lost. The news about the other deaths had been an obvious shock; information that had been kept from him. If he had any delusions of being in a position of knowledge and power within whatever gang or organization he was part of, it had been quashed. He was cannon fodder, just like Sota and the others. Maybe it would quieten him down a little.
“You have a basement?” Ookami asked.
“Sure, but you’re not putting him down there.”
“Why?”
“Because the woman’s down there. She might not like sharing a room with a corpse.”
“Then she can come and sit with the rest of us,” he replied.
“Maybe she doesn’t want to?” said Kim. “Maybe she doesn’t like the company.”
Ookami bit his upper lip. It looked like it was taking him an enormous amount of self-control not to retaliate.
“I don’t trust cops,” Kenta said. “She’ll start examining him, making notes, telling the other cops what happened.”
Kim released a long sigh. She was losing her patience with Kenta.
“We can take him to your apartment?” Kenta said. “Lay him on the bed next to Abe and his wife? Reckon they’ll like that?”
“That’s just stupid,” Chris said. “You’re stupid. You know that? You’re a goddamn moron!”
“Why don’t you just shut your mouth!” Kenta shouted back.
Chris came out from behind the counter. “Make me!”
Kenta stepped toward him but Kim put herself in the middle.
“You know what?” Chris said. “It’s people like you that ruin everything. My dad’s been running his store for forty years and last week one of your buddies came in and threatened to burn the place down if he didn’t give him a thousand bucks. A thousand goddamn bucks! He doesn’t even have a hundred bucks. He can’t even afford to pay me. I work, you sonofabitch, what the hell do you do except take drugs and threaten people? Jerk! You so much as look at one of these kids again and I’ll rip your face off. Got that, dickhead?”
Leo was taken aback. The vehemence and sentiment in his voice was powerful. He hadn’t seen it coming.
Kenta less so. “Oh, boo-hoo!” he shouted. “Anytime.”
Chris tried to get past Kim but Leo grabbed him. “Not now,” he said. “He’s not worth it.”
Chris tensed against him, keeping his eyes on Kenta. For a moment Leo thought he might have to push him back, but slowly his body rela
xed. “Piece of shit,” he whispered.
“Yeah, yeah,” Kenta sneered.
Ookami didn’t seem interested in keeping them apart but all this bickering was only going to get worse.
“Let’s just take him down to the basement. Put him in the corner. And if she won’t come upstairs, then that’s her choice,” said Leo.
He figured that taking Sota out of the storeroom would not only give them something to do and put an end to the squabbling, but it might actually appease Ookami and Sota. If the cops wanted to argue about it when they all got out of there, then so be it. That was nothing to do with him.
Kim flicked her head around. She didn’t look too impressed with Leo’s decision.
“You can do all the tests when this is over,” he glanced at Ookami, “or not, but for now, I’d rather Sota was out of the way.”
She shrugged but said nothing. There was no blood, no signs of trauma, and so moving him would have minimal impact on any investigation they did. If Ookami and Kenta couldn’t get Sota out of here before the cops arrived.
“Chris, you want to help us carry him?”
Chris slammed down his laptop screen. It was no use now anyway. “I’ll help you, Mr. Newman.” He made a point of staring at Kenta.
“Thanks. Kim? You bring the lantern?”
“I can help lift,” she said.
“I know.” He glanced at Ookami and Kenta. “But I’d rather you use your experience to keep a lid on things if it goes up again.” He gestured toward the Glock on her belt.
She nodded. “Sam, Michelle? You want to stay here while we do this.”
They both shrugged. Never before had they looked so childlike to Leo. This was all adult stuff, things they should have no part of, and yet they were here, through no fault of their own. It was frightening. He wished he could get them out of there. If they went to the apartment they might be more comfortable, but then Michael wasn’t exactly being calm and friendly. He was rocking backward and forward, chanting something in Japanese that sounded vaguely apocalyptic. What a mess.
8
The five of them walked into the storeroom and picked up Sota’s wrecked corpse. Leo and Chris took the feet, going down the stairs first. The skin crackled beneath his clothes and the stairs were barely wide enough for two people to fit down. Each time they bumped into the wall, there was a sound like twigs cracking underfoot. Kim followed at the rear with the lantern.
If it was cold upstairs, it was polar down in the basement. Leo heard the others gasp as they felt it too. It felt almost as if a manic air conditioner was circulating freezing air about the room.
Leo guided Chris to the right and the others followed. “Watch your heads,” he said, ducking slightly. The ceiling was a crazy trail of pipes and conduits supplying the building with water, electricity and gas. The basement was the same size as the upper floors. There was no source of natural light down here and even when the four fluorescent strip lights were on, it was a grim hole of a place.
At the far end closest to the street there had been an access window for coal or stock deliveries, but that had been bricked up years ago. The old boiler had been stripped out and a new, efficient one put in its place. Right now the old one, running from coal, would have been more useful than the white box sitting on the wall.
“All the way to the back,” Leo said. He wanted to keep Sota away from the woman. She seemed traumatized enough as it was.
“I bet there’s rats down here.” Kenta’s voice was unmistakable.
“Big ones,” Leo agreed.
“I hate rats.”
“There was a nest down here a while ago. A big one. Hundreds of baby rats all running around. Quite some sight.”
Kenta hissed. Leo smiled. There had never been any rats down here, as far as he knew, but hearing Kenta’s distaste was too good an opportunity to miss.
“Up there on the right,” he said. “We’ll put him behind that wall.”
The old boiler had been separated from the rest of the room by a wall. It was open on one side but kept the coal out of the rest of the room. The mortar was black from coal dust.
“Here we go,” he said, turning at the wall. He stopped suddenly, his eyes widening. In the gloom he could see her, hunched against the wall closest to the street.
“Kim!” he called out. “Can I have some light please?”
A second later Kim was at his side, lamp held up, its glow barely sufficient to penetrate the darkness. “Shit,” she whispered.
Sota’s body shifted as Ookami and Kenta moved to see better. Leo felt the man’s knee socket pop as his skin and bones crackled.
All around the woman was a powdery covering of snow. Where the wall had been black from years of coal dust, it was now coated in a sparkling frost. Glacial air drifted out of the enclosed space.
“What the hell?” said Chris.
At their feet, the snow swirled in gentle eddies. It looked pretty, like a winter wonderland scene in a department store, but the polar air gave it an unwelcome sense of realism.
Somehow the weather outside had penetrated inside. Maybe there were some bricks missing, or the mortar had corroded. It had been so long since he’d checked down here that it wasn’t just possible, it was likely.
“What’s she doing in there?” Chris asked. “Is she alive?”
“Let’s put Sota down and then I’ll check on her,” Leo replied.
They backed away, turning to face the wall on the opposite side of the basement.
“You feel that?” Chris whispered.
Leo nodded. Sota’s right ankle socket popped. The sensation that traveled up Leo’s arm was sickening.
“Feels like his shoulder’s about to come out!” Kenta shrieked.
“Just hold him!” Ookami hissed.
As they reached the corner, a loud cracking noise bounced off the low ceiling. It was like a gunshot but it originated from Sota’s body. It was literally breaking up, shattering.
“Put him down here,” said Leo, lowering his legs. There was no ice or snow on this side but it was cold. The body would be preserved.
“We need to take her out of here,” said Kim. “She’ll die down here as easily as she would on the street. It’s freezing. I don’t even want to think about the baby.”
As if on cue, Leo’s mind was once again filled with the beautiful sound of a chuckling infant. He smiled.
“You don’t need to worry about the baby,” he said. “That’s the healthiest kid I’ve ever…” Had he seen the child? An ethereal image swam through his mind. A child, a ruddy-faced infant, laughing, giggling, nuzzling into the girl. “Let’s just say there’s nothing to worry about.”
“You know this woman?” Ookami asked.
“She’s his pet,” Kenta chipped in. “Keeps her down here as his personal whore.”
Leo wiped his face. Despite the temperature, his skin was covered in a cold sweat. He just shook his head. Kenta would never learn. That much was obvious. “I’ve seen her on the street a few times but never actually met her until tonight when I pulled her inside the store.”
“We don’t even know her name,” said Kim.
“Hey! Jane Doe!” Kenta shouted.
The few strands of black hair creeping out from under the blanket shivered in some unseen breeze.
“I think she’s Asian,” said Leo, “Maybe you could try and speak to her?”
“Maybe you know her?” said Chris.
“Oh what, so just because she’s Asian we should know her?” Kenta sneered. “We all look alike and we all know each other. That’s what you think, isn’t it? Goddamn racist.”
“Hey, screw you!” Chris replied. “I didn’t say that. If she lives in the neighborhood, you might have met her, that’s all I was trying to say. You’re the goddamn racist, you…”
“Okay, okay!” Kim cut in. “That’s enough! We’ve tried to talk to her, both of us, and she hasn’t said a word. It wouldn’t hurt for you to at least try.”
“Talk
to her,” Ookami said to Kenta.
Kenta stopped short of rolling his eyes but the look of frustration on his face was unmistakable, even in the murk. He shouted something in Japanese to her, waited for a response and then called out again. He shrugged and started to walk away.
“Get in there and try,” Ookami said.
“Me? Why me? There might be rats back there, I don’t…”
“Because I told you to.”
Kenta opened his mouth to object but checked himself. It seemed the only one who could control him was Ookami. What position, what power and leverage did the man possess to be able to achieve that feat?
“Give me that.” He snatched the lamp from Kim, then stepped cautiously across the threshold where ice and concrete met. The woman hadn’t moved, not an inch. She hadn’t even raised her head to look at them. It occurred to Leo that she might be deaf.
Kenta called out again and then used his toe to poke her. “Hey!” he shouted. He half-turned. “I think she’s dead.”
“I don’t think so,” said Chris.
The woman moved; no more than a slight shift in position.
Kenta looked down at her and spoke in Japanese again. She lifted her head, making her hair gently sway. It looked like spilled oil caught on the tide.
The blanket fell across her face, leaving just her eyes visible. Nobody spoke; even Kenta was dumbfounded. Leo had seen fear in her eyes when he first saw her, abject terror, but now they seemed to sparkle with blue flames and then just as quickly swim with black tar. In the lamplight they looked black, completely without color.
He was captivated. The depth was incredible. It just went on and on and on.
9
“I’m going down there,” said Sam.
“You heard what Mr. Newman said, Sam. And the cop. They told us to stay here.”
“But what if they need me? Those two guys are bad news. You know what Yakuza are, don’t you?”
“I’m not stupid.”
“I didn’t say you were, but those guys don’t mess around.”
Michelle looked up at him. Ever since Oliver’s murder, she had become a timid shell of her former self. It was understandable. Up until then, they all believed they were immortal, that nothing could ever harm them. Things had changed. They all saw the werewolf shoot Oliver in the face. They all saw it and they all wondered what their friend was thinking in the moments before the barrel exploded.