Vicissitude Yang Side

by Destine Williams

  5 results. She’s number 3. I click.

  Megumi Takahara

  Age: 20

  Gender: Female

  Marital Status: Single

  T-Status: Protected Person

  Employment Status: Tokaido Research Institute

  Most Frequented Location: Tokaido University

  Current Location: Unable To Load. Error Code: 539. Please see an IT Admin for more information. Last known location: Tokaido Research Institute August 30th at 6:31p.m.

  I squint. Error? That’s weird. People are supposed to give a chi reading whether they’re alive or dead. I’m not sure how to take this.

  “The mind is strong, but the flesh so weak, eh Jun?”

  My gaze snaps up from the screen. Then I relax. It’s only Ken. “Don’t scare me like that, I thought you were fucking Genji. How long were you standing there?”

  “Just got here,” Ken says, tapping my computer screen. “No one is supposed to be here today. All assassins have a development meeting.”

  My face burns. I feel like I should’ve known that. But even if I did know, what would I do about it? I smile sheepishly. “Am I in trouble?”

  He chuckles, shaking his head. “Oh yes, Jun. Lots of trouble. Like humongous.” He stretches his arms outrageously wide.

  I roll my eyes. “Oh, fuck you. I thought I was really in trouble.”

  “Nah, meeting isn’t even that important,” Ken says, grinning. “They just voted on the department hoodie for all the Hounds. Get this…” He holds out both hands and makes a rainbow shape. “It’s charcoal and it says, I Commit Sudoku.”

  I squint at him. “What?”

  “Come on, Jun. Sudoku puzzles. Like Seppuku but for smart people. Work with me here!”

  Raising an eyebrow, I turn in my chair. “I don’t have to buy this hoodie because I’m leaving, right?”

  Ken sticks his tongue out at me. “These are the golden jokes, Jun!”

  “What does a puzzle even have to do with committing suicide?”

  “It’s mental suicide!” Ken retorts. “Have you even tried to solve a sudoku puzzle?”

  I smirk. “Yes, and they’re easy.”

  “Ah fuck you then. I’m salty.” Ken folds his arms. “What are you up here for anyway? Icing somebody?”

  “No. My friend went missing, but I got something weird,” I say.

  Ken comes around the desk to look. I wheel back in my chair to give him room. His eyebrows dip and crease. “Error 539? I think that means that has something to do with chi receptors picking up mixed signals, but it’s better if an IT guy looks at this.”

  “Is Shig in?” I ask.

  “He should be,” Ken says. “I think he was looking into that old tagging case a few years ago.”

  “Tagging case?” I echo. “Not the same one from when I was new?”

  “Well, there haven’t been that many other tagging cases, so I’m assuming so.”

  Why is he looking into that now? That was years ago. And Shogun Tatsuo chalked that incident up to faulty tag chips in my gun. Gun watch has stepped up considerably since then. “Is Genji in?” The last thing I want to do right now is see his face.

  “Don’t think so. He popped into the Hound meeting for a little bit, but most assassins are gone by now. Don’t quote me on that though.”

  I close the screen and log out. “What about Mai? Did you pass my message to her?”

  Ken slips his hands into his pockets. “She hasn’t really been here since she last came, and it’s not like anyone can call until her phone gets fixed.”

  What’s with everyone leaving or being so hard to reach all of a sudden? I put my face in my hands, rubbing my forehead. First Mai. Now Megumi. Is something going around? Well, something besides Devil’s Disease, not that Mai can catch that.

  “Drive safe and bundle up,” Ken says. “News says the weather is going to be rough.”

  “Cuddle weather.”

  Ken gives a loud exaggerated sigh.

  I put my hand to my mouth. “Sorry.”

  He holds out his tattooed arms. “Two perfectly good arms wasting away.”

  I tilt my head. I’ve never paid too much attention to what was on his arm before. Twin golden nine-tailed foxes with red eyes wrap around his forearms. Both look like demons entangled in a fight when they’re next to each other: not really something a conservative Tokaido girl is dying to snuggle into. “Which reminds me…when should this tattoo get started?”

  “You have to pick it the design first, you know,” Ken says. “Gonna be running around doing Showguns errands with Dad the next few days. Gotta set up for a little sacrifice.”

  “Sacrifice?”

  Ken grins. “You’ve never heard? I thought they told the story to apprentices.”

  “Mai sure as hell didn’t tell me that story.”

  “Then I ought to share it sometime. But now, I kinda have to get back to work before I’m missed.”

  “Working on cheesy lines for our hoodies at the front desk?”

  “Shush, Jun. You don’t even go here anymore.”

  Ken walks me with me to the elevator. I ride down a floor and get off at the IT floor. Behind the see-through glass wall it’s an air-conditioned jungle of cubicles, hunched workers with headsets, and cloying men’s body spray and sweat. There’s no women in their office, or at least if there are women here they’re cleverly disguised. No pencil skirts, no girly perfumes, no dresses, no pumps or heels, not even the slightest hint of pink, only bowl cuts, premature bald spots, combovers, white or pale blue dress shirts, red ties, and fingers touch-typing faster than a guilty suspect running away from the police. No one bats an eye at me as I head all the way to the back row where Shig thumbs through a manila folder. He glances up at me. “Hey, hey, you didn’t tell me you’d be by today.”

  “I came to take care of a few things, but the phone desk doesn’t open until like 11. I figured I might as well come to see how the search is going along.”

  “Thank the gods.” Shig plops the folder on the ground. “I thought I was going to have to blow an airhorn or something to get some excitement going in here.”

  I sit on the edge of his desk. “Bored?”

  “More like I need another cig. Break isn’t for like another thirty minutes.” Shig sighs. Then he lowers his voice. “But as far as the search for you-know-who. I’ve been looking at his movement patterns and they’re weird for an assassin.”

  “In general, or lately?”

  “Depends…” Shig holds up a finger. “When was the last time you or an assassin that you know went down to the Gene Splicing Lab?”

  I furrow my eyebrows at the question. “I don’t know…like once? I mean after they give us the Akuma gene combo for our roles, we don’t need to ever go back unless we have complications.” I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. “I think Mai has to go in occasionally, but she’s got the raw Akuma gene in her.”

  “Exactly. But take a look here…” Shig turns his computer monitor towards me. It’s homed in to a section of the Geisha’s last major check-in locations.

  Genji Fujiwara

  Last Recorded Check in: PoleControl Weapon Room August 31 10:58 am

  Checked in: Gene Splicing Lab (August 30: 5:29pm)

  Checked in: Gene Splicing Lab (August 29 4:36pm)

  Checked in: Gene Splicing Lab (August 28 5:07 pm)

  Checked in: Gene Splicing Lab (August 27 5:35pm)

  Checked in: Gene Splicing Lab (August 26 4:26pm)

  Checked in: Tower of Dao (August 25 3:54pm)

  Checked in Tower of Dao (August 24 3:20pm)

  Checked in Tower of Dao (August 23 3:31pm)

  Checked in Tokaido Middle School (August 20 2:45pm)

  Checked in Dr. Akimoto’s Office (August 20 3:26pm)

  Checked in District 1: Residence #526.C(August 20 4:20pm)

  I peer in closer. Tokaido Middle School? Why would he check in there? He doesn’t have any younger siblings, and I’m pretty sure that he
doesn’t have family anywhere in this area. Not to mention, Dr. Akimoto is a pediatrician. I don’t think the Geisha qualifies to go there. But as for that residence, 526.C is my streetcode and my house code. “What the hell? He was at my house?”

  Shig raises both hands in surrender. “Hey, don’t shoot me. I only pull up the info.”

  I frown, barely listening. Where was I that day? That was the Friday before last. I don’t think I had an assignment that day. Pretty sure I wasn’t with Regi. Maybe I had to stay until closing? But why would Tammy call him? “But still, I not sure what any of this means.”

  “Well, I’m not sure either, but I actually found a close match. Apparently, they were like this around the time that tagging incident happened, but that’s as far as I’ve gotten on this.”

  I drum my fingers on the desk. “You think he might’ve been involved in that?”

  “Might is being generous.” He taps the manila folder. “I mean sure he went to the weapons room, the tower, and the lab, but that doesn’t say much about tagging a gun.”

  “He’d have the motivation. Gods know the guy hates my guts.”

  “Yeah, but the way guns get tagged is that your gun info gets picked up by the security towers around the city. And they route it to PoleControl. The police get it last so they can track you. Even if he had something to do with it, his records aren’t super conclusive. The Tower of Dao is more involved in like radio broadcasts and cellphone signals.”

  I fold my arms. What else is there then? “Hmm, maybe check the records of the retirees? I mean, I wasn’t the only one to get the boot.”

  “Gonna need to get some approval for that from Mai,” Shig says. “We’re not supposed to touch you guys.”

  I scrub my face. “And gods know what her situation is right now.”

  “Yeah, I heard about the phone thing.”

  I press my lips together. “Speaking of phones…” I get up from Shig’s desk. “I need to hurry up and take care of my own phone situation. Regi is gonna want his car back soon.”

  Shig raises an eyebrow. “You’re in his car? What happened to the GX Panda?”

  “Wrecked.”

  Shig grimaces. “Rest in peace, Panda. That was a nice car.”

  “Don’t remind me. I miss it.”

  “Well, I’ll let you sort yourself out. I’ll do what I can on this case, but until Mai gives the thumbs up, my hands are tied on that.”

  “If you can’t get a hold of Mai maybe see if you can talk to Tamotsu or something,” I suggest. “He ought to know where to find her.”

  “Oh. Forgot those two were a thing. But you…” Shig stands up. “You be careful.”

  “Then hurry. He wants me to do some work for him. And I really don’t want to know what that’s all about.”

  After talking to Shig, I head to the elevator with the mystery note clasped in hand. The corners of it dig into the meat of my palm. Please let the door be open.

  The elevator lets me off onto a spartan hallway. If there is anything that we assassins are not getting first prize for anytime soon, it’s visitor-friendly interior decorating. These walls are as blank as a whiteboard, and the dim light panels give the hall the ambience of a horror movie waiting to start, which I guess is appropriate. I mean, people don’t come to this floor to have anything that resembles fun. Most of the time, you come to this floor because the gods hate you so much that they want you to sit through development meetings that drag on for hours in a room that may as well be a deep freezer.

  I round the corner into the mid-hall intersection. The only door at the end is open and the light is on. My pulse leaps. But no one is inside. The computer is on and papers pile high at the edge of the desk. And her blue mug with white polka dots sits next to the mouse. Should just leave the note? I didn’t expect anyone to be here.

  “Jun? What are you doing up here?”

  I turn around. My eyes widen. “Tamotsu?”

  In a simple leather jacket and jeans, he’s clearly not here for work. His eyebrows wrinkle up. “Looking for Mai?”

  “Yes, is she here?” I ask.

  He shakes his head. “No she’s not coming in today. I’m kinda filling in for her. Did you need something important?”

  “No…Well, sort of.” I hold out the note. “Someone wanted me to give her this. They couldn’t reach her directly because of her phone and so they figured it was best to give it to me.”

  “And who is this person?”

  “Not sure. But judging from the writing, they seem to know each other well enough.”

  Tamotsu stares at the note. Then he looks away. “Honestly, I’m probably not the best person to give this to. Right now, I don’t have any clue what she’s up to.”

  “At all?” I ask. “You don’t even know if she’s okay?”

  “I haven’t seen her in person since the party, and I haven’t gotten anything from her,” Tamotsu says.

  “Have you tried using the locators to find her?”

  A faint smile appears on his lips. “Tch. Do you know the shit I’ll catch from your mentor if I do that? Besides, her signal isn’t viewable in locators.”

  I blink. “You can just hide your signal like that?”

  “Not just out of the blue, but yes. The Shogun formally requested it after she was shot.” Tamotsu puts his hand in his jean pockets, a firm frown cementing lips together. “I was there with her when it happened. The guys who shot Mai knew who she was and their car had already been at the scene, so there’s no doubt that they’d been tracking her chi signal.”

  “But wait a minute. How would they track her? I mean the majority of locators are here, right?”

  Tamotsu scratches his chin. “Most of them. But PoleControl isn’t the only place that need to know where people are. I know they have them in the Tower of Dao, hospitals, police stations, FBI, convalescent homes, private investigators.” He counts each on his fingers. “They need more authorization than we do, but still…the guys who shot Mai could’ve been gotten her info from any one of those.”

  I snort. “A convalescent home?”

  He laughs. “Unlikely yes, but you never know, Jun. Better to make her untraceable than to risk those guys finishing the job.”

  “The note said something about a group called CRISIS-D compromising her communication devices, so maybe it could be those same guys.”

  Tamotsu’s gaze wanders to the ceiling. “CRISIS-D hmm? Sounds familiar. Maybe Mai said something about them. I’ll ask when I see her.” He steps toward the room.

  “Wait. Then you are going to see her?” I ask. “For sure?”

  At this he halts in the doorway, and his shoulders sag.

  My eyes narrow at his back. He tried to pull a fast one on me! “You know where she is.”

  He puts up both hands and turns around. “Alright. You caught me. But I didn’t really lie. I don’t know what she’s up to. And I haven’t been with her since the party. Wherever she’s hiding, she’s doing this all on her own. The only thing that she said to me was to meet her at a certain date.”

  “Then take me with you.”

  “No. She specifically told me not to do that, or tell you her location.”

  I gawk. She doesn’t want me to come see her? After she made that speech about being daughter to her? “And why not?”

  “Look. You’ve got every right to be concerned about her, Jun, but she doesn’t want the guys that shot her to come after you if they think you’re affiliated,” Tamotsu says. “If they start doing that, then they might start looking into Jin and Tammy too. Do you want that?”

  I purse my lips. “No.”

  He holds out his hand. “I’ll take her the note.”

  I hand it to him. “And when you talk to her can you do a favor for me?”

  He raises a bushy eyebrow. “And that would be?”

  “Shig needs the authorization code to look into the records of the retirees.”

  He draws back a step. “Why do you need that?”

&nb
sp; “Well, I know Mai wouldn’t want me to stand by and do nothing while so many assassins leave,” I say.

  Tamotsu eyes me thoughtfully. Then warmth enters his face. Glancing at the note, he says, “Alright. I’ll tell her. As long as you promise me that you won’t do anything crazy.”

  “You know Mai wouldn’t let me promise you that.”

  Tamotsu snorts, but then cracks a faint grin. “You’re definitely her student, then.”

  I leave him to his business and finally take the elevator down to the tech support floor. At the front desk, there’s a lone female clerk. Brown hair with white and pink highlights like a box of neapolitan ice cream. Mint green sweater vest with chocolate buttons against a vanilla shirt. Ice Cream Girl greets me with a smile as I approach the front desk. “Good morning. How may I help you?”

  “Hi. I suspect that my personal phone’s security might have been compromised. Is there anyway that I can check to be sure?” I ask.

  “Yes, we can run a test for any suspicious malware,” She says. “But first I’ll need to see your PoleControl issued ID.”

  I go through my purse for my access card and hand it to her. While she swipes it through the card reader, I get both of my phones out to be ready.

  Ice Cream Girl clacks a few keys on the keyboard, then slips my ID card back to me. “Jun Mei Akiyama, correct?”

  I nod.

  Her eyes scrunch at the screen, then widen. “Oh, it says here that you’ve retired as of last Sunday. Would you like to take care of that as well? Do you have your Showguns-issued phone as well?”

  “Sure.” I hand her both phones. “Might as well kill two birds with one stone.”

  She smiles and takes my personal phone. “I’ll take your phone to our specialists and be right back with the checkout packet for the issued one.” She heads for a door in the back of the office and disappears, leaving me alone in the waiting room with nothing but the TV running The Red Hood.

  “Rose.” Beautrice, Rose’s ebony-haired companion, grips her firmly by the shoulders. “I know losing your mother was hard but you can’t just give up on everything. She’d want you to be strong.”