V 07 - The Alien Swordmaster

by Somtow Sucharitkul (UC) (epub)

  “What about the Junior Dragons? They’re milling around at Po Sam’s, waiting for their weekly workout. You know how rowdy they are. Sam’s about to have a heart attack.” “Go ... go and buy them ice cream and send them home.”

  “But you’re always giving them the spiel about not eating too many sweets and not messing up their bodies and, you know, the body is the temple of the soul and all that—”

  “Look, just this once. Believe me, it’s an emergency.” “You’re the boss.”

  “I’ll say.”

  Sighing, Anne pulled a cash box from the safe. She extracted a twenty-dollar bill, uncreased it, folded it with

  the precision of an origami master, and stuck it into her headband (which bore the insignia of the Institute, a dragon swallowing the sun) so that it looked like a green feather. Then she went out.

  Matt went into the private office and picked up the phone.

  “It’s about time, you jackass,” said the gruff voice on the other end.

  “Rod! How’re you doing, old buddy? Haven’t heard from you in a year. Are you going to appear at my big event?” Rod Casilli was the world’s greatest expert at the almost totally vanished art of ikakujitsu, which derived its moves and holds from the leaping and ramming of an imaginary unicorn. Rod rarely appeared in public, and Matt had been trying to get him out of semiretirement for ages.

  “After all those crank telegrams you’ve been sending me, you expect me to turn up at your exhibition? You must be mad!”

  “Telegrams?” Matt said.

  CB looked up. “I got a sinking feeling about this, dude,” he said.

  “Yeah,” said Rod. “What’s with this ‘alien swordmaster’ bullshit? Am I supposed to get all riled up and jet down to California full of rage and vengeance or something? Is this a challenge? You know I never leave home anymore.”

  Matt knew. Rod Casilli had bought an estate in the middle of the desert in New Mexico somewhere; no one knew exactly where it was. He knew too that in order to make this phone call, Rod would have had to drive (or jog, knowing him) twenty miles to the general store, also in the middle of nowhere. He would have to be pretty furious to do that. “Hey, calm down, Rod.”

  Rod spluttered.

  “Hey, really, Rod,” Matt said. “I didn’t send you a telegram. 1 got one myself. So did our mutual friend Lex Nakashima—and he’s vanished without a trace, according to his wife Crystal. And last night CB and I were attacked by a couple of Visitors disguised as ninjas.”

  “That’s the most cockamamy story I’ve ever heard in my life,” said Rod. “Everyone knows those lizards have gone back into outer space. And lizard ninjas ... ha, ha, ha. Don’t make me laugh.”

  “It’s true!” Matt protested.

  “Lizard ninjas. Did that smartass kid of yours put you up to this?”

  “That kid of mine is huddling in a comei; scared to go to the bathroom, because of what happened last night.” “Don’t you think this is going a little too far? I mean, April Fools’ Day has come and gone.”

  It was useless.

  They talked about trivial things for a while. Rod said, “To be serious, Matt, I really don’t think I can make it. I landed this job coaching that movie stai; what’s-her-name, Marlene Zirkle. She’s doing a TV series about an eighteenth century female kung fu fighter in England: sort of a combination martial arts-Regency romance thing. It’s inane, but they’re paying me enough to build an electrified fence around my entire estate. I suppose, now that those Visitors have gone, the media can go back to escapist trash again.”

  “They haven’t gone,” Matt said.

  “There you go again. Hey, this actress is flying out here to train with me for a couple weeks. I’ll suggest your lizard ninjas to her, we’ll sell it as a series and split the money fifty-fifty, okay?”

  Matt sighed and said, “ ’Bye, Rod,” and hung up. Anne was standing in the doorway. “I got rid of them all. Now, would you like to tell me what’s going on?” Quickly, Matt and CB filled her in on everything that had happened.

  “That’s heavy,” Anne said. “What are we going to do?” “I think we should either get out of the L.A. area completely, like out to the Midwest or something. Or maybe hole up here. Turn it into a fortress.”

  “But why would they be after us? Their technology is eight hundred years ahead of ours. How could they possibly need to capture grand masters of martial arts—and where are they taking them?”

  “Who knows?” Matt said. “Okay, let’s go ahead and lock up.”

  They made a complete round of the building; even the secret side entrance that only staff members knew about was double-locked. Matt shooed away some members of the Junior Dragons who were still waiting in the lobby of the Institute. Then they went back inside and closeted themselves in Matt’s office.

  Anne said, “Well, the first thing to think about is, what relationship does all this stuff have to the exhibition we’re arranging?”

  CB said, “Only that we’ve invited most of the best in the country.”

  “What about someone we haven’t invited? Could they be in danger too?”

  “ You could call that guy up in Oregon who specializes in takodo. That’s a pretty obscure school, but he’s probably the best practitioner in the world at it. What’s his name? Kunio Yasutake. Up in Eugene.”

  “Yeah,” Matt said, becoming more and more confused at the implications all this might have. “Old Yasutake. I never could understand takodo. That’s when you think yourself into the soul of an octopus, and you do everything by flinging out lines of force, like the eight arms of an octopus squeezing people to death. More akin to wrestling than to our kind of martial arts. Well, what’s his number?” “Here,” she said, dialing the access code and the number off the top of her head.

  “Wow! How’d you do that?” CB said. “You haven’t called him in years, maybe never”

  “That’s what Anne does,” Matt said. “When you think she’s just making coffee or clearing the desk, she’s actually memorizing every name and address in the National Martial Arts Association directory. Why do you think I pay her so much money? Wait. Put him on the speakerphone so we can all hear.”

  “I can read your mind,” Anne said.

  They waited tensely for someone to pick up.

  They could hear a frail, aged voice: “Moshimoshi? Yasutake desu.”

  “Ah . . .my Japanese isn’t that great,” Anne said. “My name is Anne Williams, I work for the Matt Jones Institute—”

  “Ah, Miss Wirriams! I have seen your name in National Martial Arts Association directory. How charming.” “Awesome!” said CB excitedly.

  “I’m calling to ask, Mr. Yasutake—”

  “No need. You are going to invite me to your tournament, no? I received telegram this morning. Such funny idea, this ‘alien swordmaster.’ I laugh and laugh.”

  “Oh—my—God,” said CB.

  “But, you see, I cannot come. Today I receive a personal phone call from Ogawa-san, minister of culture in Japan. He ask me to fly to Tokyo for a grand demonstration of takodo, first time in over four hundred years. I am deeply, deeply honored; of course, I cannot refuse.”

  “Put me on,” Matt said. He took the reciever. “Look, Mr Yasutake? This is Matt Jones. Yeah, I’m honored too. Look, I don’t want to get into a complicated explanation, but I am so glad you’re getting out of town. Please take care, for God’s sake. I hope you’ll be safe in Tokyo.” “Safe from whom? Alien swordmaster? Very good joke, Mr. Jones. I like jokes. Ha, ha.”

  He hung up.

  “Well, at least they won’t find him for a while,” Anne said. “Who are we going to try next?”

  “Wait a minute. Wait a goddamn minute!” Matt said suddenly. “Ogawa, minister of culture. Where have I heard that name before?”

  “I was playing ‘Galaga,’ ” said CB. “Yeah, of course.

  The guy who banned the monster movies, don’t you remember? Too much antireptile propaganda?”

  “U
h-oh,” they all said at the same time.

  “He’s one of them. Gotta be,” CB said.

  “But what about the red dust? It didn’t work in Japan?” said Anne. “But I remember; on the news, footage of the Mother Ships leaving Tokyo and Peking and Seoul and Hong Kong and all those Far Eastern cities.”

  “Maybe this Ogawa guy is working for them,” Matt said.

  “But what human being in his right mind would— especially one that was a cabinet member and everything?” Anne said.

  “Well, we had a lot of collaborators here too.”

  “He could be like Sean,” CB said suddenly.

  “Sean who?” said Matt.

  “Don’t you remember? I told you about him. He used to be one of my best friends in my old neighborhood. Sean Donovan. We always played baseball together. Then 1 didn’t see him for a long time, like we didn’t live that close anymore, and then when I went back he was like weird, totally weird. I mean, he was bragging about how he’d been inside one of them Mother Ships. He didn’t even want to play catch. And his eyes were . . . like lifeless, totally lifeless. I know they did something to him. ’Cause the kid I used to know wasn’t this kid. He was like cool, you know? Now all he wanted to talk about was the Visitors, about their awesome uniforms and their radical weapons. I think they can reach right into a dude’s brain and just pluck out whatever it is that makes him him, and his best friend wouldn’t even know him anymore.”

  Matt was chilled by how vividly the kid remembered, even after all these months. There was an awkward silence. The three stood there, staring at each other. The horror seemed to deepen. He couldn’t stand it. He wanted to chop a pile of bricks with his bare hands or take on half a dozen thugs. It was terrible standing there, just waiting.

  The phone rang.

  They let it ring for a while.

  “All right,” said Anne. “Who’s going to get it?” Reluctantly Matt picked it up. “Matt Jones Institute.” “Matt—for God’s sake—”

  “Rod!”

  “I saw them. They pulled into the estate in a black limousine. At first I thought it was Marlene Zirkle. Then I saw them get out. The sun was setting. They wore black. You could only see the slits of their eyes. I thought it was just a continuation of your practical joke, but it was just too elaborate. I slipped out the back and ran to the general store.” That was why he was panting, obviously. Running twenty miles was a big deal even for someone in superb physical condition. He must have been running for a couple hours.

  “Rod ... is there a car you can borrow?”

  “Yeah. Guy who owns the store’ll loan me his.” “Listen, for God’s sake. Drive to an airport, any airport. Catch the first plane to L.A. We’ll get to the bottom of this.”

  “Okay. Wait. . . . Who the hell? . . . Oh, shit! They’re coming into the store!”

  Sounds of scuffling, of a screaming woman . . .of the phone crashing against a wall. Then the thud of fists on flesh, over and over . . . and then the phone went dead. “Matt—” said Anne.

  “I’m scared,” said CB.

  They heard something crash somewhere in the building, down the corridor maybe.

  “I thought you locked up!” Matt yelled.

  “I did,” Anne whispered. “But that sounded like . . .” “Footsteps.” CB shuddered.

  “I didn’t hear anyone breaking in,” Matt said. “You’re sure you locked up?”

  “As sure as I can be,” Anne said. But she sounded unsure of herself. Matt didn’t want to take any chances.

  “Quick! Turn off the lights in the front office.” CB tentatively reached his hand out beyond the dooi; snapped them off, and snatched his hand back. The three of them stood in a pool of light.

  Footsteps.

  “Let’s ambush them,” Matt whispered. “CB, you go behind the filing cabinet. You and I will stand on either side of the door.”

  “Right, boss.” They obeyed instantly.

  Matt flicked the last light out.

  The steps came nearer, nearer—

  The tension: a coiled cat waiting to pounce.

  Nearer—

  Someone was in the front office now, coming nearer— “Now!” screamed Matt. His hands shot out to seize a body, a struggling body, and he felt Anne’s arms wrapping themselves tightly around the person who had stepped inside. “Lights, CB!” he shouted.

  The lights came on, hurting his eyes—

  “Tomoko!”

  He let go in a hurry.

  “Just what is the meaning of this?” said the wife he hadn’t seen in over a year. “1 didn’t know you were into all this cloak-and-dagger stuff, and . . . who’s that kid?” “Right,” said Matt, turning crimson with embarrassment. “CB—Tomoko. Tomoko—CB.”

  CB solemnly shook her hand, his eyes wide.

  “Thank God it’s you,” Matt said.

  “Well, who else could it have been? Every entrance to the place was locked. I’m the only one you know who has a key.”

  “Oh . . . right. A key,” Matt said sheepishly.

  “Who did you think I was? An alien?”

  “Well, actually ...”

  For the nth time that day they were forced to relate the whole story. It was hard for Matt to understand that she was actually back. He’d fantasized for so long about how they’d meet again, what he’d say to her. He had acted out their reunion with throbbing background music in his head and dialogue by the greatest screenwriters. He’d never expected that he’d be lying in ambush for a Visitor and instead discover her.

  When they were through telling the story, Tomoko sat and stared at them with blank amazement.

  “I spend four months trying to get home after a hair-raising escape from the Visitors ... 1 come home and find out that I’m right back where I started. And someone else’s kid living in my house—”

  “Are you going to send me away now?” CB asked in alarm.

  “The kid stays,” Matt said.

  “Of course he stays!” she said. And she opened arms wide to embrace them both. “Oh, Matt, you’ve changed. There’s a new softness in you, a new compassion. I think that CB has a lot to do with it.”

  “We get along,” Matt said.

  Tomoko said, “It wasn’t easy getting home, let me tell you. Things are . . . bizarre in Japan. Maybe it all has something to do with the problems you’ve been experiencing.”

  She summarized what had happened to her in the last four months. She had thought: Freedom, I’ll just get on a plane and go home now. But of course things weren’t that simple. The departure of the aliens had destroyed the Japanese economy. Japan had been hard hit; half Tokyo had been left in ruins before it had been subjugated, and the willingness of the people to perform kamikaze attacks on Visitor installations had made peacekeeping a more violent and costly process during the Visitor regime. When they went away, Japan was bereft of working postal and telephone services; she’d tried to reach Matt for months and finally had just given up. The Ministry of Culture was restricting air travel in order to avoid what they called “cultural pollution,” and Tomoko had been on the waiting list for three months; Professor Schwabauer; who had sometimes used to come to dinner at their house, was still unable to leave Japan, either to return to his teaching post in America or to go to his home in Germany.

  “But I’m here now,” Tomoko said.

  “Yes, I’m glad,” Matt said. “And confused, too.” “Before I left you would never have admitted that.” She kissed him lightly on the lips. There was nothing sexual in it at all. That was wonderful to him, because since she had left him, he had never just been close to a woman without intending to conquer her. Seeming to read his mind, she said, “Yes, I’m not like the other women.”

  “There never were—” he began.

  She only smiled. And he knew she knew, and he knew she understood and forgave him.

  Anne said, “Forgive me for interrupting this wonderfully mushy scene, but maybe you can tell us more about what’s happening in Japan? Do you know
anything about this Ogawa, their minister of culture?”

  “Yes,” Tomoko said. “Before Fieh Chan’s . . . death, it was said that the two were intimately connected.” “And now? What’s this about banning monster movies? It seems pretty silly to me,” Anne said.

  “Oh, they’re really into cultural purity now. They’ve had all kinds of edicts. They want to put back the clock to the sixteenth century, before all the Europeans came along.” “You think it’s a front for something else?” said CB. “Who knows? All I know is that technology has gone down the tubes in a big way, and they have sword-carrying people in samurai costume patrolling the streets.” “Cool!” CB whispered.

  “And they’re always stopping people and demanding to see their papers.”

  “Like Nazis or something!” CB said.

  “All I know is,” Tomoko said, “that I’m glad to be home.”

  “For how long?” CB said, voicing the concern uppermost in their minds. . . .

  * * *

  That night Anne moved into the Joneses’ living room. They were afraid something would happen if they didn’t all stick together.

  And Matt and Tomoko got ready to put the pieces back together.

  “It’ll be like another honeymoon,” Tomoko said, giggling a little. They were both scared. In their absence their love for each other seemed to have grown, to become almost too huge for them to handle; it wasn’t a simple animal passion anymore.

  They were just about to make love when Matt heard a familiar voice at the door. “Matt, can I come in? I don’t want to sleep alone anymore.”

  “Who is it, honey?” Tomoko said, pulling Matt into a hard, passionate embrace.

  The voice in the doorway; “I had another dream. I dreamed that you sent me away.”

  “Can’t he come back later?” Tomoko whispered.

  “I think . . . he’s worried about you and me. He needs someone to tell him he’s still wanted. He’s pretty insecure . . . can you blame him? He saw the Visitors eating his own mother!”

  “Don’t remind me,” Tomoko said.

  Matt thought of Tomoko as the main course in some Visitor banquet. It was not a comforting thought. He said, “CB, you can stay.”