Back From the Undead (15 page)

In the dim light of the guttering candle is a face I recognize.

It’s Tanaka.

*   *   *

Kamakura Tanaka of the Nipponese Shinto Investigative Branch and I have history. Not all of it’s good.

We met when I first arrived on Thropirelem. He was my liaison with the Japanese authorities while I was there hunting Stoker, and after an ill-advised night of drinking we wound up spending the night together. He’s my first official ex in this reality, though one night hardly counts as a relationship. No, that was more embarrassing than anything else—where our shared history gets interesting is in the professional realm. And by interesting, I mean the part where he betrayed me, committed treason against the United States, and almost stranded me on a deserted atoll with an evil creature from another dimension.

“Tanaka,” I say. “Huh. Never thought I’d see
you
again.”

He looks ashamed, and a little sad. “Nor I you. You want an explanation—and I will give it to you. But not now. We should go, before we are attacked again.”

“You okay?” I ask Charlie. “You took a lot of hits.”

“I’m fine. This jacket has an internal layer with the same kind of self-sealing goo they use on tires. The whole damn thing is glued to me now, but it’ll hold until I can do a proper repair job.”

I consider our options. “Truce,” I say to Tanaka. “Until we’re out of the park.”

“Then we’ll see,” Charlie growls. Charlie does
not
like Tanaka; I’m going to have about five seconds after we leave the forest to prevent him from performing a lethal lycanectomy.

“What he said,” I say. “We’re going
that
way. You can take point.”

He bows his head in acquiescence, then covers the lower part of his face again and darts into the woods. We follow.

He obviously has a very similar route in mind; I only have to correct his course once. I hiss at him to stop, then creep nearer to tell him he needs to head more to his right.

“As you say.” He starts to move, but I slow him with a hand on his arm and then fall into step beside him.

“You’re stealthed too, right?” I ask.

“Of course.”

“Then we can talk without worrying about being overheard.”

“I thought you wanted to wait.”

“No, that was you. It occurs to me that you might just vanish once we leave the trees. I’ve heard ninjas do that, you know?”

“You have seen too many movies.”

“Probably. Have you seen the one where the giant monster rises from the bottom of the ocean and scares the hell out of the Japanese? Fortunately, the day is saved when one of their intelligence agents double-crosses the slutty American investigator and escapes with information vital to stopping its rampage—wait, no, that’s not right. He winds up under arrest and has his ass deported back to Japan. I must be thinking of a different movie.”

“I … am sorry, Jace. Deeply sorry.”

His voice is sad yet composed, and he doesn’t attempt to deny or justify what he did. I shouldn’t be surprised—Tanaka always struck me as honorable in the extreme. I never doubted that he felt badly about his actions, any more than I blamed him for following the orders of his government. That was why I convinced Cassius to let him return to his country, rather than prosecuting him.

“I believe you,” I say. “But you understand that I can’t exactly trust you now.”

“I know. I do not expect you to.”

“What are you
doing
here, Tanaka?”

“I … am attempting to regain my honor.”

“How? By leaping from the trees like a kung fu version of Tarzan and saving my life?” I pause. “Wait. That’s not it, is it? You haven’t been shadowing me and looking for excuses to play hero, have you?”

He sighs. “Yes, that’s it. You know that woman you buy coffee from every day? That’s me. The new receptionist at work? Also me. I am
very
cunning.”

Good Lord, Tanaka’s grown a sense of humor. “Okay, okay. So why
are
you here?”

“Isamu.”

That stops me. Isamu is the name of the Yakuza
oyabun
who tried to turn me into the same kind of blood cow we found in that hemoglobin factory. Charlie and Tanaka disabused him of the idea, killing his prime assassin in the process. I was warned that Isamu would eventually come after me, but the last I heard he was embroiled in some kind of local turf war in Japan that was keeping him too busy to bother with petty things like revenge. Of course, I was also warned that centuries-old vampire crime lords tended to have extremely long memories …

“Isamu,” I say. “What’s he got to do with this?”

“The Yakuza supposedly has a blood farm in this park. I was attempting to locate it.”

“So this is a coincidence?”

“Not exactly. I was conducting surveillance on a local thrope tribe that has an alliance with the Yakuza. When a scout reported the presence of a human woman and an enforcement lem, I knew who it must be. I trailed them to where they encountered you.”

In the darkness, Tanaka is only a black blur beside me. I wish I could see his face. “Well … thanks for the assist.”

“I am glad I could help.”

“And that blood farm you were looking for? I can give you directions if you’d like—but after tonight it’ll no longer be in operation. More like in pieces.”

“I cannot say I am surprised. You have a knack for destruction.”

I wonder if I should mention Stoker, then think better of it. I still don’t know whether or not Tanaka deserves my trust, and I’m not about to give it to him just because he may have saved my life. Charlie and I could have taken that pack. Maybe. “So the NSIB is after Isamu, huh?”

“No. This is a personal mission.”

I frown. “Sorry? What does that—”

“After the events of the Ghatanothoa affair, I felt it was my responsibility to neutralize the threat to your life posed by Isamu, as I knew he would not let it go. I attempted to persuade my employers of the rightness of this course of action, but they disagreed. I resigned.”

“Wait. You’re not a cop anymore?”

“I still serve the cause of justice, Jace. But I no longer answer to those whose political loyalties run deeper than their morality.”

I’m not sure what to make of that. “So you quit your job because of
me
?”

“You saved our world, Jace, despite what it has done to your kind. In return, I betrayed you. I could not—will not—let an amoral monster like Isamu destroy you. You deserve our eternal thanks, while I—” He breaks off.

“You think you need to atone.”

“My needs are irrelevant.”

Ohhhh, boy. Nobody does the martyrdom-for-the-good-of-all bit better than the Japanese. If I told Tanaka, right now, to pull out his sword and fall on it for me, the only question he’d probably ask would be if I minded setting him on fire first. You know, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble.

But I can’t just tell him to stop, either. I have a psych degree—framed certificate and everything—and I know that someone like Tanaka won’t just give up. He’ll gladly throw himself under a train for me, but anything less noble and more rational won’t do it for him. This is less about me and more about him; he
needs
to atone for what he’s done, and eliminating the threat to my life may not be enough. He’s convinced himself he needs to suffer, too … the only thing I’m not sure about is just how much. If I want to find out, I’m going to have to get him to talk.

“A debt of honor, then,” I say. I nod. “I understand.”

He glances toward me, then away. “I’m … thank you. I thought you would be angry.”

“You don’t know me as well as you think, Tanaka.”

“Perhaps I do not. I have been mistaken about many things.”

“No. You made a single error. One helluva big one, granted, but it was made honestly, in the interests of your country. Don’t belittle yourself—you did the best you could. It wasn’t a moral lapse.”

“It is not a decision you would have made.”

“Exactly. So you had a pretty good chance of being right.”

I hear a low chuckle. “Now who’s belittling herself?”

“Hey, I’ve practically turned self-denigration into an art.”

“That’s very Japanese of you.”

It’s my turn to laugh. “I guess. But even I would think twice about taking on the Yakuza on my own.”

He holds up a hand for silence and we all freeze. A few seconds tiptoe past while Tanaka listens intently to something beyond the range of my merely human senses. When he motions that we can proceed again, it’s another few minutes before I feel like it’s safe to speak. “So how exactly are you planning on doing that?”

“I will find Isamu, and kill him.”

“Sure. Because it’s not like he’ll have bodyguards or anything.”

“He
will
be well protected.”

“And easy to find. You can just look up a list of his public appearances on the Net.”

“He will no doubt take pains to conceal himself from any possible attack. He will use sorcery as well as cunning.”

“And being in charge of a criminal empire for hundreds of years, it’s not like anyone has ever tried this before.”

“He has buried
many
unsuccessful assassins—”

I snort in annoyance. “Will you
please
stop doing that?”

“What?”

“Agreeing with me. It’s really getting on my nerves.”

“I have considered all the possible obstacles, and prepared for them. They will not prevent me from completing my task.”

“Uh-huh. You’ve got resolve, Tanaka, I’ll give you that. But I’d feel better about your plans if you could provide me with something concrete, as opposed to steely-eyed determination.”

He pauses, and turns around. “Very well. I don’t want you needlessly worrying about me, Jace; I will do my best to allay your fears.” He tugs down his mask so that I can see his face. “What do you know of the history of Imperial Japan?”

“Not much. Warlords, emperors, feuding clans of samurai—”

His eyebrows go up. “You know about samurai?”

“Only what I’ve learned from movies and TV.”

He shakes his head. “Most curious … here, they have largely been forgotten. The samurai clans embraced the way of the wolf many centuries ago, valuing not only their strength and fierceness but also their loyalty. However, when vampires infiltrated the Imperial Court and turned the emperor, he saw the samurai as a threat, and tried to have them destroyed. He very nearly succeeded, though it took many years. But the undying can afford to be patient …

“It was called the War of the River Swallowing the Stone, a long, slow battle of attrition. Eventually, all the samurai clans were hunted down and killed—all except one. They went into hiding, surviving by posing as a roving nomad pack, never staying in one place too long. They kept the traditions and practices of their kind alive in secret, until the very idea of the samurai had passed into legend.”

He meets my eyes, unblinking. “The name of that clan was Tanaka.”

I study him. He’s dead serious. “So you’re telling me you’re what, the last living samurai?”

“I did not say I was the last. But the members of my clan
are
the only samurai left—and I have learned their lessons well.”

“That’s very impressive, but—”

“It is not meant to impress you. It is simply a statement of fact. The Tanaka clan has survived for centuries, despite being ruthlessly hunted for many of them. We, quite simply, refuse to give in to circumstances. Isamu will die at my hand; I have sworn it. Can you not see this is the truth?”

What I see on his face is more than calm resolve; it’s the complete and total focus of an obsessive. “Yes,” I say. “I can see that.”

“Then we need discuss it no more.” He slips his mask back on and stalks into the shadows ahead, making no sound at all.

“That guy,” Charlie says, “is going to be trouble.”

“No kidding…”

We reach the edge of the park in another few minutes, but keep going until we’re at least a block away. Tanaka turns to me as we stride down the sidewalk, pulling down his mask and hood. “I suppose our truce is concluded. Do you wish to take me into custody?”

“Don’t see how I could. I don’t have any jurisdiction here. But as far as I’m concerned, our truce is still active—I don’t hold your past actions against you, all right?”

He gives me a slight bow as we walk along. “Thank you. Your forgiveness means a great deal to me.”

“Look, we’re staying at the Clarion hotel. Maybe we should think about pooling our resources.”

He hesitates. “I will contact you if I obtain any information I think you might find useful.”

“Fine—we’ll do the same. Where are you—”

But I’m talking to myself. I only took my eyes off him for a second as we walked along, but he’s vanished—probably slipped into that alley we just passed. I know it’ll be empty if I bother to check, so I don’t.

“Guy moves fast,” Charlie notes. “You sure know how to scare ’em off.”

“I wish that were true,” I murmur. “But he’s not going anywhere until he does what he came to do.”

“Kill Isamu?”

“Or himself…”

Great. So now I have an obsessed, self-destructive thrope to worry about, too, one who’s determined to regain his honor by killing an ancient Yakuza overlord. I also have to worry about said overlord, who holds a very definite grudge against yours truly. Maybe if I’m lucky they’ll take each other out and I can ignore the whole thing.

Yeah, right.

Damn it, Tanaka. Why is it ex-lovers always pick the worst possible time to show up? I mean, yes, it is good that he has my back when it comes to Isamu, and yes, he’s very capable, and I’ll even admit that it’s nice to have another friendly face around in a dangerous environment, but he’s a distraction. I don’t need to worry about his safety, I don’t need to think about when or if he’s going to call, I don’t need to have those soulful brown eyes reminding me of that one night we spent together …

No. Oh,
hell
no.

TEN

When we get back to the hotel, I get on the phone to Gretch while Charlie fills Eisfanger in. I’m doing my best to plunge into full-on work mode, because the realization that I’m still attracted to Tanaka is almost as disconcerting as learning he’s in town in the first place.