Live in Infamy

by Caroline Tung Richmond

“I’d assume so.” The woman laughed softly. “She’ll move wherever her husband wishes.”

  The conversation tapered off, but Aiko’s shoulders remained tense.

  Finally, Ren realized what was going on.

  This wasn’t an ordinary party. It was an engagement celebration to toast Aiko and Forst’s upcoming nuptials.

  And that was big news. This union was obviously a political move, judging by Aiko’s reluctance, but she probably hadn’t been given any choice in the matter. Her opinion was secondary because the Empire had something to gain from this wedding.

  What, exactly, Ren wasn’t sure.

  While Ren continued sewing, he noticed Aiko touching the beaded necklace that currently hung at her throat. It was a simple strand of glass beads, each one the size of a marble, but when Ren took a closer look he realized that the individual beads were hand-painted. Half of them were adorned with swirls of blue while the other half bore tiny Japanese characters, so small that Ren had to squint to read them. Even then he could only make out a few.

  Higuchi Ichiy

  Yosano Akiko

  Ito Noe

  Ren almost dropped his needle. He had seen these names before. They were feminist Japanese thinkers — considered enemies of the state. All three had died before the war even broke out, but the Empire still used them as examples to fight “worldly” ideas like women’s suffrage or women seeking advanced degrees. Aiko had no business wearing a necklace like this. It wasn’t merely a rebellious act — some would see it as treason.

  “Are we almost finished?” Aiko asked, breaking the quiet.

  Ren hurried with the last few stitches. “I’m done, Your Imperial Highness.”

  Aiko turned around. There was no mirror for her to look into, but she didn’t seem to care. Her eyes were blank as she said, “Hand me the pearls.”

  Ren reached for her mother’s double strand of white pearls, which weighed heavily in his hand. No doubt one of those pearls could feed an orphanage for a week. He had planned on writing an essay about the distribution of wealth for months, and now he held the evidence in his palm, but he would have to return to the idea later. Until then, Aiko was waiting.

  Ren held out the pearls while Aiko tried to take off her glass-beaded necklace, but she struggled with the clasp.

  “May I help, Your Imperial Highness?” offered Ren.

  “No.” Aiko’s response came with a bite, and Ren automatically stepped away from her, wondering how he had offended her.

  “My sincerest apologies —” he started to say.

  “There’s no need for that,” Aiko interrupted him, but her tone had softened. “I’ve changed my mind. You can put the pearls back where you found them.” Her fingers drifted back to the beaded necklace that she was wearing, and a smile ghosted on her lips.

  Ren found himself saying, “It’s a lovely piece.”

  Aiko’s eyes brightened through her royal mask. “I made it myself,” she said so quietly that he almost didn’t hear her.

  Ren didn’t know what to say. Who exactly was this girl in front of him? She should be offended by someone like Ito Noe, but Aiko had painted the woman’s name on her necklace instead — which she planned on wearing to her own engagement party. She had to have known that her family would never allow her to break her engagement, and so Ren wasn’t sure what she wanted to accomplish. To make her parents angry? To exercise what little independence she had? Or was there something more at play, something deeper?

  Ren had no idea, and he told himself it didn’t matter. He had a mission to see through. Who cared if Aiko was wearing a scandalous necklace? And yet, he kept thinking about it anyway.

  Aiko put on her bolero and regarded Ren coolly. “This conversation never happened,” she said, her tone abruptly sharp. “Understood?”

  “I — I understand, Your Imperial Highness,” Ren stammered.

  Aiko left without another word, leaving Ren to slump against the pantry’s countertop, his head spinning at what had happened; but he couldn’t linger here. He had a to-do list to tackle. Ren gathered his things and was about to open the door when he heard voices on the other side. He paused, waiting for the guests to move on, but they stayed planted where they stood and their exchange soon floated into Ren’s ears.

  “What a lovely party. The Bavarian dessert buffet was absolutely divine,” said a voice that belonged to Deputy Führer Forst. His Japanese was heavily accented but passable. “I must thank the crown princess for such a thoughtful evening.”

  “We’re honored to host you in our home,” replied the soft tenor of Crown Prince Katsura. Ren held his breath, shivers tingling all over him at what he was overhearing. “I believe my daughter picked out the buffet options. She wished to pay homage to your heritage.”

  “Then I will thank her, too. Might I add that you’ve raised such a poised and graceful young woman?”

  Ren shuddered on the other side of the door. It sounded like Forst was talking about a show horse on his personal estate, not his future wife.

  “I can assure you that she’ll have every comfort imaginable once she moves to Berlin,” Forst continued. “I hear that she enjoys art galleries and museums?”

  “It’s a hobby of hers, yes. Her tutors have praised her talents,” Crown Prince Katsura admitted. There was a flare of pride in his voice, but there was slight disapproval, too. Maybe he had discovered Aiko’s plans on interviewing for the Institute of Arts.

  “Every girl should enjoy a hobby, certainly. My niece has become an accomplished rider and has her own stable of thoroughbreds. It’s a harmless enough pursuit until she settles down with a husband. Then she’ll set aside such fancies.”

  There was a pause, but if the crown prince disagreed with such a sentiment, he didn’t voice it. “I trust your visit so far has been comfortable?”

  “Oh, very. My staff has settled in and we’ve been in touch with our main office since we landed, thanks to your assistance. In fact” — excitement curled into Forst’s next words — “right before the party began, my office briefed me on an interesting development. Our military intelligence has been tracking Zara St. James as she moves toward our shared border along the Mississippi. If all goes well, we may be able to remove her Wanted signs.”

  “That’s very good news.”

  “No word yet on your little Viper problem, though?”

  “Not yet but hopefully soon,” the crown prince said.

  Ren broke into a cold sweat. He didn’t know if the crown prince had told a white lie or if his intelligence officers were getting closer to unlocking the Viper’s identity. He had to hope that it was the former. Ren had been more than meticulous about covering his tracks, but he’d always figured that his days were numbered. And wouldn’t the Empire rub its hands with glee if it captured him here inside the Fortress?

  “Ah, before I forget,” Forst said, shifting topics. “I meant to tell you that we’ll ship the vials from Neuberlin tomorrow morning and that the case will arrive here that evening. I do regret that I couldn’t bring it with me, but our team of scientists wasn’t quite ready. I was hoping to present it as an engagement gift.”

  “There’s no need to apologize. My father and I both are thankful for it.”

  “I’ve instructed the team to come to the fort directly from the airport, or shall I tell them to meet us at Alcatraz instead?”

  “We can rendezvous at Fort Tomogashima before driving north to the city. My personal yacht will await us at the dock to take us into San Francisco Bay. My staff will take care of everything.”

  Their dialogue shifted again, this time to the fruity undertones of the red wine being offered, but Ren had stopped listening. If he had heard everything correctly, the Nazis would soon bring vials of something to Alcatraz. Vials of V2? That would make sense. It would indeed be the perfect engagement gift.

  Now Ren understood why this marriage was so important. The Nazis needed help — their Führer had been assassinated and they were fighting a full-on
revolution against Zara St. James’s Revolutionary Alliance. Morale was low, and troops were spread thin. There were whispers that the mighty Third Reich could tumble and fall like ancient Rome.

  Imperial Japan, on the other hand, was faring better than their allies, at least superficially. The royal family remained intact, with the emperor heavily protected, and so far the WAT had snuffed out any flames of rebellion. But there were cracks splintering under the surface. The Resistance wasn’t backing down, and the prized Ronin Elite were dwindling in numbers. If the Empire didn’t solve these problems soon, they’d become like the Nazis.

  And that was where Aiko and Forst’s engagement came in. The old allies needed to make a trade — Imperial troops and supplies in exchange for Nazi vials of V2 — and what better way to cement that than with a royal marriage?

  Ren’s thoughts spun faster. The Resistance, however, couldn’t let this trade go through. The rebels had long struggled to take down the Goliath that was the Empire, and they would have no chance at all for independence if they had to take on a unified front of Imperial Japan and the Nazis.

  But what if the Resistance could cut this engagement short and get their hands on V2? Kidnapping Aiko would take care of that first part, and the attack on Alcatraz could possibly ensure the second. If they could pull this off …

  Ren’s heart glowed with the possibilities.

  After another minute of chatting, both Forst and Crown Prince Katsura headed off to give yet another toast and Ren swiftly slipped out of the pantry, hurrying back to the workers’ wing. He had a new item on his to-do list.

  He needed to find Jay.

  He had to send out another message.

  Ren jolted awake the following morning before the alarm went off. His pulse was already accelerating, ready to sprout wings and rocket into the sky. He hadn’t been able to track down Jay the night before, which meant Ren had to find him before their shifts started. After all, it was already Monday morning, with the Joint Prosperity Ball coming up fast on Friday night. There was too much to be done — finding a new escape route, figuring out Bird’s and Beetle’s identities, and passing along the intel he had overheard at the engagement party — but Ren could do none of that without Jay.

  And the soldiers weren’t helping him much, either.

  Just like the morning before, they stormed inside Bunkroom 8 before Ren could head out for the day. Once again, Ren and his bunkmates lined up against the wall, and Ren tried not to move as the morning news report played on the television. The newscaster went over current events (this time praising a plentiful crop of cocoa beans at the Empire’s holdings in South America) before seguing into the upcoming union between Princess Teru and Deputy Führer Forst. The engagement had been officially announced the night prior during a three-hour international telecast, but even that sort of coverage wouldn’t be enough. A big event like this one would occupy the news reports for days to come, and it would build up to the Joint Prosperity Ball, where the happy couple would make their first public appearance.

  While the newscaster speculated about possible wedding sites — perhaps a ceremony in Tokyo and then a reception in Berlin? — the TV screen filled with photographs taken at the engagement party last night. The first few pictures showed Forst greeting ambassadors from the Nordic Territories and the Canadian Zones, while Aiko hung a few steps back, dressed in the red dress that Ren had mended. But the last photo showed Aiko with her parents. Her mother and father looked stiff, but the slightest of smiles tilted on Aiko’s mouth as her fingertips trailed along her necklace. Ren wondered if anyone else had noticed the writing on her beads. Apparently not.

  As soon as the report was finished, Sasaki cracked his knuckles and gestured for Ren to step out of the line. Ren stifled a groan and did as he was instructed.

  “I did a little research on you,” said Sasaki, closing the distance between them. “I heard you shine shoes in town.”

  Anxiety churned in Ren’s belly. The Cabots’ shop specialized in tailoring and cobbling, but he and his father would shine shoes, too, if a customer requested it. This didn’t mean that Ren wanted to shine Sasaki’s boots, though. The thought made him nauseous — stooping down to an imperial soldier while the bunkmates watched in silence.

  “Let’s see how good you are.” Sasaki took a clean rag from his pocket and dropped it to the floor.

  Ren bent down and got to work, telling himself that he didn’t have to smell Sasaki’s breakfast breath anymore at least. His cheeks flushed as he heard the other soldiers snickering, but he pretended he was back at the shop and attending to a picky customer.

  “You missed a spot on the left boot,” Sasaki said halfway through the cleaning. “Here, let me help.” Then he spat onto his shoe, but half of it landed in Ren’s hair instead. That got another laugh from the soldiers.

  Sasaki’s spit seeped into Ren’s scalp, which made his skin crawl with disgust. Worse, he couldn’t stop to clean himself up. He had to ignore the saliva and the chuckling soldiers and his staring bunkmates. And somehow he did. By the time Ren was finished, his hands were quivering and he wanted to quit right then and there. But he had to smother that impulse. He told himself that the Alcatraz prisoners had been tortured and experimented on for years, and if they could survive that — his mother included — then he could endure Sasaki for a few days.

  But that did little to rein in his anger.

  The soldiers left and dismissed everyone from the bunkroom, and no one asked him if he was all right. It didn’t matter. Ren was too busy sprinting into the bathroom to rinse his hair. He turned the hot-water faucet as far as it would go and then doused his scalp with the scalding water, but no matter how hard he scrubbed Ren didn’t feel clean. Humiliation coursed through him, and it was soon joined by a white-hot fury. He breathed and he counted and he clenched his eyes shut, but when none of that worked, Ren wrapped a towel around his left hand and punched the wall hard.

  Falling to his knees, Ren blinked back tears and stared at his throbbing knuckles. Four and a half more days until Friday. He had to stomach this treatment for that long, but it would be worth it. He would make it worth it.

  He couldn’t fail the Resistance. He wouldn’t let his mom down.

  After splashing some more water on his face, Ren took off running. He was already late to his first appointment in the cadets’ changing rooms. Weaving in and out of the morning foot traffic, Ren grabbed a dress rack of uniforms from the sewing room and dragged it toward the indoor gymnasium. The class of seven-year-old cadets was already lined up outside of the changing rooms, awaiting Ren’s arrival before their first training session of the day, and Ren got an earful from their instructor for his tardiness.

  “My deepest apologies,” Ren said while catching his breath and trying to hide the residual frustration in his voice. He had to put Sasaki out of his thoughts and work quickly to make up for his lateness. He couldn’t let this get back to Fräulein Plank. With flying speed, he doled out each uniform to its corresponding student and waited for them to change before he started each fitting, pinning new pant and sleeve hemlines, marking where a waist should get taken in, and noting if a collar gapped too much around the neck. He moved from cadet to cadet, and when he reached the last student, he had to stretch his cramped fingers before measuring the length of her skirt. This cadet, however, kept yawning and fidgeting and making Ren’s job almost impossible.

  The instructor regarded the girl with a frown. “Did you stay up too late again, Hata?”

  The girl bowed her head, her bangs hiding her eyes. “The trucks woke me up.”

  “What trucks?”

  “I saw them outside my window. Emi did, too! We counted five of them.”

  “I’m sure it was nothing. They were probably delivering supplies.”

  “Yes, but —”

  “But what?” pressed the instructor.

  The girl kept her chin down. “I apologize. It’s nothing.”

  “Tell me what you were going to sa
y,” the instructor said with a sigh.

  “We … we saw the soldiers taking someone out of one of the trucks.” She whispered, “In chains. It looked like a prisoner.”

  The instructor’s mouth pinched. “It was probably nothing but a training exercise. The next time you hear something at night, shut your blinds and go back to sleep.”

  The girl looked chastened. “Hai,” she said softly.

  The girl remained quiet and still for the rest of her fitting, making it easy for Ren to finish his work, but his fingers went clumsy because his thoughts had leapt elsewhere. As far as he knew, the Fortress didn’t take any prisoners — that was what internment camps and Alcatraz were for. Most likely the girl was mistaken.

  But Ren’s paranoia sank teeth into his skin. He never liked giving in to his nerves, but his isolation inside the Fortress made him more anxious than usual. What if the Empire had arrested Marty? Or his dad? The patrols were always looking for an excuse to take Mr. Cabot into custody.

  Stop, Ren told himself. He couldn’t panic. Right now, he had only heard a rumor of a prisoner at the Fortress. From a seven-year-old. Ren needed to stop worrying, but the idea had been planted in his head and it was hard not to dwell on it.

  Mercifully, the morning passed quickly from there, and the afternoon flew by even faster. Ren left two more notes for Jay, but aside from that he didn’t take a break from his worktable. There were too many alterations on his plate to even grab a bowl of rice from the cafeteria.

  A little past nine o’clock at night, Ren had started on another pair of trousers when he heard footsteps thudding toward the sewing room. Ren groaned. It was probably Plank coming in to check on him and tell him that he wasn’t working fast enough.

  “Thought I might find you here, tailor boy,” said Jay, leaning over Ren’s worktable. “Got a minute?”

  “Where’ve you been?” demanded Ren, the day’s frustration coloring his words. They were alone in the sewing room; the other staff had left over a half hour ago. “Didn’t you get my messages?”

  “Whoa, there. You’re not the only one working around the clock. And yes, I got your messages.” A slight smile danced across Jay’s mouth. “Felt like I had a secret admirer.”