The Zero Option

by David Rollins

  ‘For what?’

  ‘A photo. For Grandmother. The three of us together. I don’t have one to give her.’

  ‘That’s because you don’t really care about her.’

  ‘Stop it.’ Nami grinned and pulled the Nikon from her carry-on bag.

  ‘Maybe you can get one of the potted plants to take it,’ teased Hatsuto.

  Just then a couple of Korean businessmen came around the corner.

  ‘Look, they’ve come to life,’ he said in mock astonishment.

  Nami went off to intercept the businessmen with the camera. Hatsuto watched them nod and smile with body language that said, ‘Of course, no trouble. No trouble at all.’

  Nami showed them how to work the camera and then she rushed to Hatsuto, put her arms around him and smiled.

  Flash!

  ‘One more, please?’ Nami took Akiko from Hatsuto’s arms. Hatsuto stood behind them and smiled.

  Flash!

  There was a sudden commotion nearby. A crowd of Americans appeared around the corner, moving in a hurry. The crowd was noisy, and it was closing in on them. She heard someone mention KAL 015. Whoever they were, she thought, they were on the other plane leaving just after hers.

  Hatsuto glanced at his wristwatch: 2:56 a.m. ‘Come on, Nami. Don’t let them get in front of you. You’ll get held up. I’ll see you at home at the end of the week. Give my regards to the old witch.’

  They kissed again, hurriedly this time. The Americans swept Nami along with them toward the immigration section. Akiko rolled in Hatsuto’s arms, disturbed by the activity invading her sleep. He lifted his free hand, realizing that in the confusion he’d been left holding the camera.

  Hatsuto looked for his wife, but she was gone.

  Nami joined the queue shuffling along the airbridge toward the door of the 747. Once in the departure lounge, the passengers had been told that the flight was delayed again, and now probably wouldn’t leave till 3:50 a.m. Nami wished she’d taken more time to say goodbye to Hatsuto and Akiko instead of dashing off in such a hurry. Somehow the camera had been left behind with her husband and now there was no photo to give her grandmother.

  The flight attendant, a young Korean woman, gestured to see Nami’s boarding pass and then directed her to the next aisle. Before moving forward, she glanced at the staircase that led up to the first-class cabin.

  A couple of flight attendants appeared to be fussing over one of the passengers coming down, offering him a drink from a selection on a silver tray.

  ‘Them politicians sure know how to travel,’ commented an old man wearing a cowboy hat coming up behind her. ‘Especially when they’re funded by the taxpayer, right?’ The man made a clucking sound with his tongue and shook his head. ‘US Congressman Larry McDonald,’ the man said when Nami turned to look at him. ‘I talked to him back at JFK. Not a bad fella—for a Democrat.’

  Nami gave him a polite smile and made her way up the aisle, pulling her overnight bag behind her. Seat 52A was midway between the wing and the very back of the plane. Working her way down the aisle, she saw that many people were already asleep—passengers who’d boarded in New York around seven hours ago and hadn’t disembarked during the stopover to stretch their legs. The warm air smelled close and a little stale, of dusty blankets and the acrid tang of old cigarette smoke.

  Nami found her seat beside a window. She watched the man with the cowboy hat open the overhead locker and stow his bag. There were plenty of empty rows. The two seats beside hers were vacant and she hoped they’d remain that way. Directly across the aisle, a heavy middle-aged European man was draped across his seat and the one beside him, snoring loudly, his mouth open and his tongue out, drooling onto his collar.

  Nami sighed. It was going to be a long flight.

  January 5, 2012

  Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan. Akiko Sato pulled the mail from her mailbox and headed for the elevator. The doors opened and a young couple stepped out of the tiny, mirrored box. Akiko knew them, or knew of them. They lived down the hall, two of the many residents jammed together in this small apartment building on the busiest street in Shibuya. Outside, a car revved its engine, a gathering crescendo of aggression that ended in wild tire-screeching. Akiko winced until the noise mercifully faded into the general traffic thrum.

  She and the odd couple from down the hall exchanged small bland smiles. The girlish boy wore dark eye make-up and one side of his blue-black hair was dyed white with a pink stripe down the middle—white, pink, white, black. He was extremely thin, tight jeans accentuating skinny legs. His companion was dressed in a short baby-doll outfit. She looked like a cute ten-year-old slut. On their way to a nightclub, Akiko thought, where they would fit right in, dancing and popping whatever drug was on the menu that night.

  The girl glanced at her as they squeezed past each other, surveying her up and down. Yes, this is what a schoolteacher looks like, Akiko thought, reading the girl’s mind, particularly if she’s exhausted and lives alone with a cat. Akiko opened the door to her apartment and a large Siamese charged her.

  ‘Komainu, Komainu,’ she sang. ‘Home at last.’ The animal leaned into her shins and coiled its tail around her kneecap, meowing and purring loudly. ‘Late today, I’m sorry. Are you hungry? You’re not going clubbing tonight, are you? I hope not. I have papers to grade. You have to hang around here and keep me company.’

  With Komainu dodging between her feet, Akiko dumped her mail and satchel onto a small wooden dining table and went to the kitchen, a galley off the compact one-room apartment. She lifted a tin from the top of the stack in a cupboard.

  ‘You had teriyaki beef last night, didn’t you?’ The cat purred, circled. ‘Yes, I know you like that. Well, tonight it’s gourmet Atlantic salmon with lemon and rice,’ she said, reading the label. ‘You eat better than me!’

  She peeled back the lid and forked the beautifully presented fish into the cat’s bowl. Komainu unfurled himself from her legs and attacked the bowl before it reached the floor.

  Akiko washed her hands, threw some instant noodles in the microwave, and spooned some rice from the refrigerator into a white porcelain dish. She carried it to the altar, a narrow wooden shelf attached to the living room wall beside the entrance to the kitchen. On it rested two old color photos of her kami—her chosen spirits—as well as two small, carved komainu, the guardian lions protecting them, and a rice offering.

  Exchanging the old rice for the new, Akiko bowed and then prayed to the kami, asking that they guide her and look out for her. The prayer was the one she always said. In fact, she hardly heard the words any more and nor did she really see the photos perched on the altar, even though she spoke to them every single day. Indeed, Akiko often had to remind herself that these two kami were her parents, Hatsuto and Nami. Hatsuto, her father, had died recently. He wasn’t particularly old—his heart had just given out. The photo was taken a couple of years ago, before he went into a final decline. Nami, on the other hand, was just thirty-two when her photo was shot, shortly before she’d perished all those years ago—the same age Akiko was now.

  Akiko lifted Nami’s photo off the shelf and took it into the kitchenette to wipe the glass. She studied her mother’s features. They were almost identical to hers: the same full mouth and pronounced cheekbones; the same thick black hair, a gentle wave sweeping the ends in a soft layered curve to the right. Akiko had looked in the mirror six months ago and seen Nami staring back. At that moment she’d made a decision. It was time to stop asking what had happened. There were no answers, only questions. Nami’s life had been cut short in the Korean Air Lines disaster when Akiko was just four years old. Suddenly seeing her mother’s face in the mirror had made Akiko realize that it was time to pack away the hundreds of books, articles and scrapbooks she’d collected and compiled on KAL 007 from the age of twelve. The obsession had consumed all of her adult life, but now it was all stacked in a storage locker several blocks away. Finally, it was time to move on.

  Akiko wiped her ka
mi with a cloth, placed the photo back on the shelf and gave a final bow. She stood back and regarded the altar. It wasn’t impressive, but it was always clean and well cared for.

  The microwave pinged, reminding her that it was her turn to eat. She took the instant noodles, gathered up the mail and settled onto the couch, picking through the pile as she ate. A hairdresser was offering free haircuts in exchange for promotional modeling shots. Akiko wondered whether the boy down the hall with the pink and white skunk hair had taken up the salon’s offer. A computer shop was advertising ten percent off on second-hand portable hard drives. Pizza Hut was running a three-for-the-price-of-two teriyaki special. She could also have her drain deodorized for thirty percent off and get twenty phone numbers from a singles club for just ¥550. None of it appealed.

  Komainu scratched in his box before crouching and urinating, neck craned forward, eyes narrowed to slits of concentration. The sound distracted Akiko. She watched him dig at the litter with his hind paws and then shake them as if he’d stepped into something distasteful.

  She found the letter between a flyer for a dog-walking service and a solicitation to be a telemarketer. The envelope was white, her address penned with great precision in black ink. The handwriting was not familiar—old-fashioned, the Japanese characters almost calligraphic. Akiko could not remember the last time she’d received a personal letter.

  And that’s what this was—personal. She couldn’t think of anyone who might actually post something to her. It hadn’t happened in years. Perhaps it was from one of her students?

  There was no return address on the flip side. She shrugged, opened it and pulled out a . . . kuso! Shit! A check with her name on it. For ¥10,657,460! Her heart leapt. Akiko could not believe her eyes. She read over her name and the amount several times. This had to be a joke, a mistake, or perhaps some stupid lottery-style promotion. She examined it again. No, the check was real; a cashier’s check from the Bank of Japan, and it was made out to her. She looked inside the envelope and pulled out a note, a single sheet of paper, folded in thirds. As she opened it, an old newspaper clipping fell in her lap. Her breath caught in her throat. The article was so familiar she almost knew it by heart: ‘The Tragic Survivors’. And she knew the photo—the original was in a frame on the nightstand beside her bed. It showed her mother and father and herself as a small child. She was asleep in her mother’s arms; her father’s arm around her mother’s shoulders. It was the last photo taken of the three of them together before . . . Akiko had a sour taste in her mouth. Why would anyone be sending her this? Perhaps it was someone’s idea of a cruel joke after all. She held up the note. It was handwritten in Japanese.

  December 03, 2011

  Dear Akiko

  You are not the little one in the photograph any more. But I know she still lives, perhaps not so deep within you.

  My name is Yuudai Suzuki. We have met. Perhaps you remember. We spoke a number of times, often in the elevator. It is unlikely that we will ever meet again because, by the time you read this, I will be with my ancestors and my good friend Curtis Foxx.

  We talked on a couple of occasions about KAL 007.

  I never told you that many years ago I worked for the Chosa Besshitsu, specifically the Annex Chamber, Second Section, Investigative Division. I was a radar operator and I manned the Wakkanai radar facility tasked to track and identify Soviet aircraft over Sakhalin Island.

  In the early-morning hours of September 1st, 1983, I witnessed the terrible events that changed your life and the lives of so many hundreds of others. I saw the Korean Air Lines 747 Flight 007 transit prohibited Soviet airspace pursued by hostile fighters. I heard and observed the interception on my radar screen. It was widely reported that after the aircraft was struck by missile fire, it plummeted into the sea.

  While I am sure KAL 007 sustained damage from the missiles, what I observed was a stricken aircraft, maintaining an altitude of 5000 feet, fly beyond the coastline of Sakhalin Island. It was on a heading for the Soviet air base of Dolinsk-Sokol before disappearing from my radar screen, too low to be tracked any further by my radar. I most definitely did not see the aircraft ‘plummet into the sea’ as was widely reported.

  I can’t tell you why it has been so important for the authorities to lie. However, I do know that my silence and the silence of others have been part of making it legitimate. Now that Curtis and I are dead, perhaps the world can know what really happened.

  Little Akiko, I have no children to survive me, but our talks confirmed to me that my legacy would be in good hands if left to you.

  What you need to know is that I believe your mother, and many other passengers on KAL 007, could still be alive. My friend Curtis had a son and he will help you find them. His business address is 3147 South Kennedy Blvd, Key West, FL, USA.

  The money enclosed here, all I have left, is yours. It is not much, but hopefully it will be enough. Spend it wisely and in pursuit of the truth.

  Yours sincerely

  Yuudai Suzuki

  Her mother, alive? Akiko reread the letter, her fingers trembling. Yuudai Suzuki. Yes, she remembered him well. He was a large man who lived alone, further down the hall. He was about the same age as Hatsuto, or perhaps a little younger—it was difficult to tell. She had met him often while waiting for the elevator. On one of these occasions, she’d been carrying an armful of reference books on aviation disasters. And thereafter they had talked about this accident or that, and on a couple of occasions about KAL 007, but only in the most general terms. She hadn’t bumped into him for more than a year, but hadn’t given it a second thought. If she had, she’d have simply concluded that he’d moved out. Why hadn’t he just told her what he knew from the beginning? Had he been spying on her?

  Akiko looked up at the kami and found her vision blurred, tears streaming down her cheeks. Nami, alive?

  January 12, 2012

  Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan. Once the initial shock had worn off, doubts set in about Yuudai Suzuki’s bizarre letter. How had he known about her mother being a passenger on 007? She had never mentioned Nami. The more Akiko thought about it, the more she came to the conclusion that Yuudai Suzuki was just some kind of cruel troublemaker. But that had changed when the Bank of Japan processed the check and the funds appeared in her account. She had looked at the statement online wide-eyed for a full minute. Her next action was to google for a private detective in her local area. The money was real, but what about him?

  There was a private detective with an office three blocks away from her school who, according to his website, specialized in missing persons. His name was Thomas Watanabe. Akiko had made an appointment immediately, seeing him during her lunch break. He was ex-Japan Defense Force and ex-Tokyo police, and had spent the last ten years of his career in missing persons, the experience and contacts from which he’d brought across into private practice.

  She’d briefed him a week ago. And earlier this morning, Watanabe had called to inform her that he had a result, and apologized for taking so long.

  After pressing the buzzer on his door, Akiko sat impatiently in the waiting room Watanabe shared with a wedding dress maker and a two-man tourist agency. Watanabe appeared after five minutes, a smile on his round face and his hand outstretched as he walked toward her. He was in his early fifties and a drinker, Akiko decided, from his capillary-crazed cheeks and the strong smell of sake that preceded him like aftershave. He was short and stocky, his shoulders tending toward round. His belly was thick, his loose gray suit pants secured by a thin, tight belt. His leather shoes needed polishing. He also had an old-fashioned Adolf Hitler mustache, which looked wholly at home on his lip.

  ‘Akiko, Akiko, yes . . .’ he said in a voice full of gravel, adding fish to the array of smells. ‘Glad you could come over so quickly. Please . . .’ His hand gently came to rest on her shoulder.

  She got up and he motioned her into his small windowless and airless room, which was stuffed with a compact desk and chair, a laptop computer and print
er, two filing cabinets and, hanging on a wall, a couple of citations as well as pictures of fellow officers from the Tokyo police force. He came in behind her wheeling a chair, taking the last square meter of space, and positioned it in front of his desk and said, ‘Sit, sit . . .’

  He then pulled a file from the cabinet and placed it on the desk in front of her. ‘I have good news.’

  ‘You traced him?’ Akiko asked.

  ‘Yes. The fact that your benefactor stayed in your apartment building made it relatively easy. There was a forwarding address, bank account details. And there were willing contacts in the military. Speaking of which, there are some added expenses incurred in loosening tongues. Nothing unreasonable.’

  He placed an account on the table. Akiko’s eye went to the bottom line.

  ‘¥180,000? That’s a lot of money.’

  ‘Are we in agreement?’

  Akiko hesitated, unused as she was to having any spare cash.

  ‘If you are not completely satisfied, pay nothing,’ he reassured her. Akiko knew she had no choice. ‘Okay.’

  Watanabe opened the folder and a color photo of Yuudai Suzuki looked up at her. He appeared much younger than he was when she’d met him, but it was definitely the same man. And now he was dead.

  ‘It’s him,’ she said, a tingle running up her spine and into her ears so that she shivered. I believe your mother, and many other passengers on KAL 007, could still be alive.

  The private detective sifted through the folder and handed her a lease agreement on a Honda signed in December 1982 by Yuudai Suzuki. The dealership was located in the city of Wakkanai. Suzuki had given his residential address as an apartment in Wakkanai.

  ‘This contract puts him in the right place at approximately the right time,’ said Watanabe. ‘And here is a photocopied page of his military record.’ He produced a sheet with a Japan Defense Force logo at the top. The language was full of abbreviations and acronyms and difficult to decipher.