by Steve Bein
“I know. The second one went off in my face.”
“No shit?”
“Yeah.”
He looked at her probingly, as if he could diagnose wounds on sight. “I’m okay,” she said. “I mean, not okay okay. I’m beat to shit and my ears are still ringing, but that’s the worst of it. I don’t suppose you happened to overhear anything from the bomb squad.”
“Nope. But I know what you’re thinking. Hexamine.”
Mariko’s skin went cold. She and Han shared the same suspicion: if the Divine Wind was responsible for this attack, they’d likely have used the same explosives used by Joko Daishi’s lieutenant, Akahata. One of the key ingredients in Akahata’s bomb was a chemical known as hexamine. If analysts found traces of it in the blast residue here, it would go a long way to corroborating Mariko and Han’s theory. But what Mariko had never thought of before, and what now had her heart racing, was that if Akahata had managed to detonate his bomb—if Mariko hadn’t stopped him a split second before he hit the trigger—that subway platform would have looked a lot like this terminal. So would Mariko. There wouldn’t have been enough left of her even to identify her through dental records.
The thought that she’d come so close to death—and a death as violent as this—gave her goose bumps and made her stomach lurch. Now just sitting here made her feel guilty. It was a stupid reason to cry, but only now did she find herself crying. She’d made it. A hundred and twelve people hadn’t, and she had. She’d never been at serious risk here. She’d faced a far greater risk facing Akahata. That was when she should have cried. But she hadn’t, and now she was, and she felt like a little girl but she couldn’t help herself.
No. As soon as the thought struck her, she refused to accept it. She turned off the waterworks. “Goddamn it,” she said, accidentally reverting to English. “I’m just tired. Give me another—” She switched back to Japanese. “Give me another swig of that Chivas.”
It wasn’t healthy, medicating herself like this, but she needed to put a little fire in her belly to keep herself from total collapse. As long as she kept working, she’d been able to suppress her exhaustion, but now that she’d stopped, she wanted nothing more than to go to sleep. If her mother had been there, she’d have said it was perfectly natural; if fourteen hours of hard labor wasn’t a good excuse for a nap, nothing was. But Yamada-sensei, her late kenjutsu instructor, would have told her exhaustion of the body leads to clarity of the mind. He’d have reminded her that it was only when her arms were so tired she could hardly hold her sword that she learned her best technique. This was no coincidence; it was because she couldn’t use physical strength that her technique had to be perfect.
Similarly, it was because she’d been working her ass off for fourteen hours straight that she could now sit in a Zen-like state of calm. Six o’clock in the morning, she thought. On a Wednesday. The bomb went off on a Tuesday afternoon, and notably not on a Sunday, the busiest flying day of the week. This attack wasn’t meant to run up a body count; it was meant to deliver a message.
Akahata’s attempt at bombing the subway was supposed to send the same message. And Mariko realized that if Kusama buried the Divine Wind’s involvement in the Haneda bombing the same way he covered up their connection to Akahata, he’d be playing right into Joko Daishi’s hands. Mariko couldn’t stand aside and let that happen.
“Han, have you seen Captain Kusama?”
“Hell, everyone’s seen him. He made himself the media point man on this thing.”
“Damn.”
“Don’t write him off. He’s doing a good job. You should hear him play those reporters. For hours he had all of them saying ‘explosion,’ not ‘bombing’—”
“Because explosions aren’t necessarily attacks,” Mariko said. “They can be accidental.”
“Smart, neh? Controlling public perception from the get-go. Now he’s saying ‘bombing’ and so are they.”
“Yeah, but I’ll bet you ten thousand yen he’s not telling the whole truth. Has he mentioned Joko Daishi by name?”
“No. But we’ve got a lot of evidence to collect before we jump to that conclusion.”
Mariko gave him a stern look. “Come on. You’re sure too.”
“Yeah. I guess I am.” One hand scratched his cheek where his sideburn used to be. “But I don’t get how he could have ordered this from prison.”
“He didn’t have to. We let him go this morning.” She told him all about her meeting with Captain Kusama, and about Joko Daishi’s release along with his mask. “Han, I think I know how he picked his targets. I need to talk to the captain—and I could use your help in explaining things to him. Every time I open my mouth around him, I just piss him off.”
“You? Piss off a CO? No way.”
He chuckled and offered her a hand. She didn’t mind letting him help her to her feet; she was more tired than she’d ever been. So much the better, she thought. If she didn’t have the emotional energy to explode at Kusama, she couldn’t get herself suspended.
5
Finding Captain Kusama was easy; they just had to look for the reporters. Mariko spotted CNN and BBC in the herd now, and Deutsche Welle, and a host of other gaijin correspondents as well. They and their Japanese counterparts formed a tight semicircle around Kusama, out on the sidewalk just outside what used to be the main entrance to Terminal 2—Ground Zero, everyone was calling it now. There really wasn’t a better name for it. Kusama had chosen his backdrop well, and not because the dramatic background would emphasize his own importance. The floodlights from the cameras killed all the shadows and made everything around him seem unnaturally white. There would be no lurid, high-contrast images of Ground Zero beaming back to all those foreign news networks. Even under attack, Japan would appear neat and orderly.
Mariko found Lieutenant Sakakibara not far from where she found Kusama, and though he and the captain had arrived in the same car, they looked like they’d come from different planets. Kusama was energetic in front of the cameras. Somehow he’d even kept his uniform immaculate. Sakakibara was as pale as a ghost, dusted head to toe just like Han and Mariko. He’d rolled up his sleeves, and red teardrops stood out all up and down his forearms. Mariko didn’t ask how he’d spent the night, but whatever he’d been up to, he’d sustained dozens of tiny lacerations doing it.
He sat in the lee of a disaster management truck the National Police Agency had parked where the terminal doors used to be, a giant Mercedes Unimog painted in stripes of blue and white. Sakakibara sat on one of the big, knobby tires, elbows on his knees, his head and hands dangling toward the floor like heavy fruit from thin branches. “A little pick-me-up, sir?” Han said. He proffered a little bottle of vodka he’d stowed in his pocket.
Sakakibara unfolded himself and stood up to his full height, which was considerable. “Bribing a peace officer is a serious crime, Buzz Cut. I’m confiscating this as evidence.”
Sakakibara rarely called anyone by their real names. He assigned nicknames on the fly and never bothered to explain them. The name Han was a Sakakibara creation; Han’s real name was Watanabe, but just as his Han Solo hairstyle had earned him one nickname, his new regulation haircut now earned him another. Mariko wondered what Sakakibara called himself. Sonny Chiba, for his thick black hair that sat on his head like a helmet? Yao Ming, for his height? Mariko would put a vote in for Grumpy Hardass if she had a say. It was probably a good thing that she didn’t.
“Hell, Frodo, you look about as good as I do,” he said. It had taken Mariko a while to figure out her own moniker. The hobbit part was easy—she was short—but the nickname really turned on Mariko’s missing finger.
“Thank you, sir. You sure know how to make a gal feel good about herself.”
“Don’t get cute. In fact, turn around and go back where you came from. I know why you’re here.”
“Sir?”
“You’ve got a pet theory about who staged this attack. You’re thinking it’s only a matter of time before the bo
ys in the bomb squad come back with chemical signatures for hexamine. When they do, it’ll prove you were right all along. And for some reason you got it in your little hobbit head that if His Eminence hears all of this, he’ll be oh so very proud of you and he’ll give you your sergeant’s tags back.”
Mariko blinked. She tried to rebut but had some trouble opening her mouth. In fact, her reaction would have been exactly the same if she were a cartoon character and a stick of cartoon dynamite blew up in her face.
“Holy shit,” Han said. “Mariko, you got demoted?”
“Uh, yeah,” Mariko said, finding her voice again. “Lost my temper with Kusama.”
Now Han was dumbstruck. She could see the wheels working in his head. He’d lost his detective’s rank during a case they’d worked together, when she served not only as his partner but also his shift sergeant. This was Japan; guilt by association was the law. For Han, the only question was why she hadn’t told him already that his own misconduct had damaged her career.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “It had nothing to do with you—”
“And it doesn’t fucking matter, even if it did,” Sakakibara said, as polite as ever. “Look around, both of you. You and I are standing in a bomb crater. That means everything has changed. Everything. So today is not the day I lose one of my sergeants because she’s got a discipline problem.”
He stabbed her in the shoulder with a long, callused finger. “Don’t misunderstand me, Frodo. On any other day, you’d get what you had coming. But today the TMPD needs every detail sergeant it can find, and that means that if you keep your damn mouth shut, maybe I can save your career. Understand?”
Mariko nodded and bowed. “Thank you, sir.”
“And you, Buzz, I’m going to shoot for getting you reassigned to detectives again. But listen to me: if you ever stray outside the lines again, I swear to you, I’ll mount you as a ramming prow on my car.”
Han nodded, chastened. Losing his assignment in Narcotics was a mistake he’d always regret, and one Mariko figured he’d never recover from. Then again, she supposed it was only fair that the TMPD reshuffle the deck in the light of a major terrorist attack.
A sudden shift in background noise drew Mariko’s attention. A gaggle of voices all shouted at once, their tone insistent, not inquisitive. It could only be that last burst of reporters’ questions as someone called a press conference to a close.
Sakakibara caught it too. “All right, here comes His Majesty,” he said. “Both of you, just shut the hell up and let me do my job.”
Captain Kusama became a different man as soon as he got out of sight of the cameras. His cheerfulness and vigor were just a masquerade for the press; once he joined Sakakibara behind the big, blocky Unimog, his shoulders slumped and he breathed as if he’d just come up for air. He didn’t have a word to spare for anyone until he got a cigarette in his mouth.
“Detective Oshiro,” he said, eyeing her up and down. Suddenly she was self-conscious about the state of her uniform. She couldn’t even guess where she’d left her jacket and cap. “You’ve been hard at it, haven’t you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good for you. I’ll see to it that a reporter gets to you for a couple of quotes. I know just the one, a very sympathetic woman from NHK. She’ll make you look good.”
Mariko didn’t know how to take that. All the makeup in the world couldn’t make her look pretty. Then she realized Kusama only had thoughts for repairing her smeared reputation. All she could think of to say was, “Thank you, sir.”
“Think nothing of it. Listen, ladies and gentlemen, I’ve been giving press updates every half hour all night long. These ten-minute catnaps in between aren’t doing the trick anymore; I’ve got to find a place to sleep. Lieutenant, you look like you mean business. Let’s make this brief, shall we?”
“Absolutely,” Sakakibara said. “Two things, sir. First, I want Buzz Lightyear and Woody here to be reinstated at their former rank.”
Kusama studied Mariko and Han with a critical eye. “If I’m not mistaken, Officer Watanabe faced an internal review board and was lucky to come away with his skin. Got a covert informant killed, as I recall.”
“I did, sir,” said Han.
Kusama nodded, apparently appreciative of Han’s forthright confession. “And I can’t see how Detective Oshiro could be any less temperamental today than she was yesterday afternoon.”
“Sir, I apologize—”
Sakakibara cut her off. “They’re both smart cops. We’re going to want every good head we’ve got assigned to this Haneda detail. We’ll need detectives, and we need sergeants for them to report to. It streamlines everything if you reinstate these two; they already know the job.”
Kusama sighed. “All right. If I weren’t this tired, I’d fight you on it, but damn you, I am this tired.” He fished in his pocket and produced a gold-and-silver pin. Mariko’s sergeant’s tag. Mariko hadn’t realized he’d picked it up as they’d left his office. He looked at it, resting in his soft-skinned palm, then looked up at Sakakibara. “You do understand I’m doing this against my better judgment.”
“Mine too, sir. These two are a royal pain in the ass.”
“You’re the one who’s answerable for their mistakes, is that clear?”
Sakakibara fixed his eyes on Han and Mariko. His glare could have melted steel. “Crystal clear. Isn’t it?”
“Yes, sir,” Han and Mariko said in unison.
“Done,” said Kusama, stifling a yawn. “Your second item?”
“I could use an update like the ones you’re giving the press,” Sakakibara said. “I wouldn’t say we’re all in the dark about what happened, but we sure as hell aren’t in the light yet, either.”
Kusama craned his head to peek through the crack between the Unimog’s cab and its trailer. He didn’t seem to like what he saw—too many microphones, perhaps—because he motioned for his three subordinates to follow him. He led them deeper into the airport, past where the security checkpoint used to be, back among the darkened storefronts.
“We have very little to go on,” he said. “I’ve announced early reports that Jemaah Islamiyah has claimed responsibility, and that investigations are under way to verify those reports.”
“Sir,” Mariko said, “begging your pardon, but this isn’t the work of Islamist extremists. This was the Divine Wind.”
Kusama sighed, this time out of exasperation, not exhaustion. “I wasn’t aware we had any women on the bomb squad.”
“And I thought we agreed that you were going to shut the hell up,” Sakakibara said.
Mariko bowed, and kept her gaze fixed on her captain’s feet. “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. It’s just—well, I don’t need to be on the bomb squad to know how Joko Daishi thinks.”
“Aha,” Kusama said. “Do enlighten us.”
“Joko Daishi means ‘Great Teacher of the Purging Fire,’ neh? This guy sees society as being impure, and he wants to burn away all our sins. He thinks comfort and stability are obstacles to enlightenment.”
“I remember the file.”
“Well, that’s why he detonated his bombs outside the security gates.”
“Explain,” said Kusama.
“He’s telling us safety is an illusion. The security screens are supposed to make flying safer, neh? But they don’t—at least not according to Joko Daishi. They just create a bottleneck. They give him a target.”
Kusama looked at her over the top of his smoking cigarette. “Then why not bomb the checkout line at a grocery store? Isn’t that a bottleneck?”
“It is, sir. But the purpose of the cashier isn’t to keep us safe. Look, back in the sixties, the bottleneck was right at the airplane’s door. A crowd of hundreds turns into a single file, neh?”
“Sure.”
“So with fifty years of hindsight, fifty years of new technology, all we’ve managed to do is move the bottleneck. Now it’s the next stage after the ticketing counter. Thousands of people on dozens of flights
, all lining up nice and neat.”
Kusama puffed on his cigarette. “You’re saying detonating the bomb outside the security gate sent a message. It says there’s no security at all.”
“That’s right, sir.”
“Mm-hm. And why couldn’t Jemaah Islamiyah or al-Qaeda send the same message?”
“They could, but they didn’t. You said that you’ve announced they claimed responsibility, not that they did. They haven’t, have they, sir? You said that just to appease those reporters.”
Sakakibara growled like a bear. “Frodo, do yourself a favor—”
“It’s all right, Lieutenant.” Kusama waved him off. “Sergeant Oshiro, you of all people ought to understand why I haven’t mentioned Joko Daishi to the press. Tell me, did you approve of it when I did the same thing with the Divine Wind’s subway bombing?”
“Yes, sir.” Mariko hoped all the dust caked to her face would keep him from seeing her blush.
“Yet you were the only one to suffer the consequences. Why approve of denying the Divine Wind’s involvement in that case but disapprove of it here?”
“Because the subway story could be contained. This one can’t. It’s too big, sir, and when the truth leaks out, Joko Daishi will say the people can’t trust their police department. His goal is to erode the pillars of our society. We’re one of those pillars, sir. If we compromise ourselves, we make ourselves an easy meal.”
That got Kusama’s hackles up. He stepped up in her face, and since he was a good fifteen centimeters taller than she was, when he locked eyes with her he was staring down at her. “You will not question my loyalty to the TMPD.” He waved his hand in her face as he spoke, jabbing her sergeant’s badge at her like an angry schoolmaster’s ruler.
Mariko cast her gaze to the floor. “Terribly sorry, sir. That wasn’t my intent. It’s just—”
“Frodo, goddamn it, keep your mouth shut.”
“I’ll have her speak her mind, Lieutenant.” Kusama didn’t bother looking in Sakakibara’s direction; he kept his eyes fixed on Mariko. She could feel him staring holes into her head. “Sergeant, I don’t care for subordinates questioning my judgment, still less when they do it in front of other officers, and especially when they don’t provide a single scrap of evidence to back up their claims. Why should I believe—no, why should I even entertain the notion that your beloved Joko Daishi is responsible for this attack?”