Infinite Time: Time Travel Adventure (12 page)

My body is moving. I don’t know where I am. I went to sleep in my bed and had this really crazy dream… I had a gun and I shot three people! How crazy is that? And there was this beautiful girl who knew the most amazing karate moves. I wish I could fight like that. I think maybe I will see if I can talk my mom into letting me take a martial arts class downtown. If I could fight like that, I would never have to worry about Travis again.

And maybe then I would have a real chance with Clara.

No, not Clara. Kimi.
Look at you, Parker, a ladies’ man. All this time Kimi had a crush on you
, I joke to myself.

That thought makes me want to smile. But then my body literally lifts off whatever I’m lying on and I land awkwardly on my arm.

Where the heck am I?

There’s noise. An engine. I don’t want to open my eyes. My head is pounding like I ate too many Twinkies and spent the night with my head in the toilet. I don’t remember that. I remember falling asleep and finding myself in Tokyo, of all places. And I remember meeting Scarlet and being told that I’m not actually dreaming, but time traveling. And we were on an assignment to protect Tora.

Crazy, right? Who has dreams like that?

I can’t even imagine what would bring on such dreams. I didn’t eat anything weird. I wasn’t thinking about anything in particular when I fell asleep. Wasn’t thinking much at all, except about the game I’d just finished playing. Maybe a little about Travis and how he hit me so hard on the football field that I passed out. But there was nothing new about that. Travis was always doing stuff like that and I was always going to the nurse’s office, which wasn’t so bad since she was hot, but I don’t suppose it looked all that great to Clara. I mean, who wants to date a guy who’s always in the nurse’s office, no matter what the reason?

But, then again, who doesn’t have a little sympathy for the weakling who’s always being bullied? That’s my deepest hope, that she does feel a little sympathy for me and she will one day tell her boyfriend to leave me the heck alone. It hasn’t happened yet, but it will someday. And then I could finally sweep her off her feet, show her what a great guy I am when I’m not knocked out on the football field.

“Wake up, idiot,” a female voice hisses near my ear.

I open my eyes and find Scarlet glaring at me.

Scarlet?

It wasn’t a dream; we’re still here. Kimi is still dead.

I struggle to sit up. My head is pounding! I reach back and touch a place where my scalp bleeds just a little. Blood is dried and clotted in my hair. And the edges of the wound are sore to the touch.

“What happened?”

“One of those goons hit you with the butt end of his gun.”

I half nod as I look around. We’re in a speedboat racing across the Tama River. The city is behind us, lights twinkling on the water, the hotel we fled standing high on the skyline. It’s a beautiful sight, but quite hard to appreciate with a couple of madmen pointing guns at us.

Four men are on the boat with us. One’s driving, the other three standing unsteadily in a horseshoe formation around us, their guns trained carefully on our heads.

“They took my guns, bag, and watch,” Scarlet hisses at me.

“Now what?”

Without responding to my question, Scarlet gracefully kicks out, using a scissor kick on the man closest to her. He immediately falls over the side of the boat, hitting the water hard enough that I can hear the distinct slap above the noise of the motor.

Both of the other guards rush forward, one firing a bullet that goes astray because of the motion of the boat.

Scarlet is on her feet, landing punch after punch, her karate training serving her well in the unsteady boat. Her stance is perfect, keeping her balanced as the two men fight not only her, but the waves that bounce the boat up and over wave after wave in the wake of another boat just a few yards ahead of us.

One man goes over as he throws a punch and it goes wild, missing Scarlet. The momentum of the punch continues and he simply follows, landing head first in the river. Scarlet turns her full attention to the other man. I can see panic in his eyes even as he lifts his gun high above his head, intending to slam the butt into the side of her head. I wonder briefly why he doesn’t just shoot her. But then I remember Gumi’s order not to kill us. I guess there’s a little luck on our side.

This guy manages to stay on his feet despite Scarlet landing a set of blows to his shoulders and jaw. One of his fists catches her just below her armpit as she moves forward to punch him. She moans, but she’s not down. Not yet. She shifts to her right, giving the guy the wrong impression that she’s about to punch with her left hand. Instead, she kicks with her right foot, catching him across his ribs. He cries out as a wave unmoors him and that, combined with the momentum of her kick, knocks him overboard.

Scarlet is still watching her opponent fall overboard when I catch movement out of the corner of my eye. Instinctively, I stick my foot out and the boat’s driver goes flying over the other side of the boat.

“Hell, yeah!”

Scarlet glances at me, a rare smile cracking her serious façade.

“Thanks.”

She takes control of the boat. Scarlet’s hair flies back as the speeding wind flows through it. The boat moves faster as we chase after the boat in front of us. I move up next to her. I hadn’t realized it before, but Tora and her family are on that boat with more of Vandir's and Gumi’s men. I can see Tora watching us over her father’s shoulder.

“What are we doing?”

Scarlet gestures to the boat. “I need my stuff. And we need to get Tora away from them.”

“How do you—”

“We’re running out of time, Parker. We have to do this
now
.”

Scarlet pulls the boat up alongside the other. We’re close enough that the other boat’s wake is washing up over the side of our boat. I can see everything so clearly, like I’ve just put on the world’s clearest glasses. The expressions on everyone’s faces range from scared to relieved to angry to excited. And I can see Scarlet’s bag sitting on a plastic seat on our side of their boat.

“Grab it!”

“What?”

“Reach over there and grab my bag.”

“Are you insane?”

“There are things in there that we have to have,” she says without looking at me. Instead, she’s concentrating on the path the boat is cutting through the water. We’re coming close to the shore—too close—and there are other vessels, smaller vessels, that are going to be a problem very soon. “Reach over and get it.”

“I can’t. I’ll fall in.”

She looks like she’s about to argue. But then she takes one look at me and nods.

“Take the wheel.”

She doesn’t give me an option this time. She grabs my hand, places it on the wheel, and then she’s gone before I can even think to protest.

Scarlet takes a running start and jumps. My heart stops as I watch her fly in the air between the two boats. She lands gracefully in the belly of the other boat, ducking into a tight roll. She’s on her feet before Gumi and his men can figure out what’s happened. She grabs her bag, throwing the strap over her shoulder as she turns and lands a quick kick to the man rushing up behind her. Then another moves into the fray and she lands a few quick jabs.

“Get close!” she calls.

I don’t realize she’s talking to me at first. But then again, who else would she be talking to? I turn the wheel too sharply and the boats collide. Scarlet’s thrown off her feet, but she manages to catch herself by grabbing the rail that’s attached to the outer rim of the boat. Three of Gumi’s men aren’t as lucky. They fly into the water.

I’m lucky I’m holding onto the wheel. I manage to keep my feet. And Tora and her family fall to the floor, but also remain in the boat.

In the confusion, I lose track of Gumi and the two other men who managed to remain in the boat. Before I realize what’s happening, Gumi slips up behind Scarlet and hits her over the head with the hilt of a hunting knife. She falls into a heap on the bottom of the boat, clearly unconscious.

Gumi and one of his men jump across to my boat, the man tugging a gun from his waistband as soon as he gets his feet steady underneath him.

“It’s over, son,” Gumi says, almost kindly. “Why don’t you take a seat?”

Three to four. The odds don’t seem bad. But when one of those numbered is a five-year-old child, one a frightened, middle-aged woman, and another a dweeb of a teenage boy, I realize that the odds aren’t as great as they might appear.

I hold up my hands and surrender, well aware of just how pissed Scarlet will be when she comes to. I suck at being the hero.

The boats dock outside a large warehouse that opens up right on the river. It’s like one of those warehouses that you see in all good gangster movies, where they have the good guy and they torture him, and he only gets out alive after they have broken him. I really hope this… whatever it is—a dream, my first time to time travel— doesn’t end that way.

“Get off me,” Scarlet yells as one of the men ties her hands behind her back, then drags her inside the abandoned warehouse. Her body falls to the ground with a thud as another man pushes her down. She grunts in pain as her hip slams onto the concrete floor. Scarlet showers him with what I can guess is verbal abuse.

I wait for them to do the same to me, but they don’t tie my hands. I guess they don’t think I’m much of a threat. Instead they just push me into the water, and I wade through it to the warehouse. My shoes make awkward squeaking noises, as my socks, shoes, and water all mix together with each step.

They don’t tie up Tora or her parents, either.

Heavy metal chains hang down from the warehouse ceiling, like chandeliers for killers. Beneath the chains Gumi’s men actually have Oshiro in a chair and their guns leveled not only on him, but his wife and child as well.

Tora is crying as she curls up next to her mother. I want to go to her and console her, but if her mother can’t get her to calm down, what luck will I have?

Why does it chew at my soul to hear her cry, to see the pain in her eyes? I have no idea, but I kind of wish it wouldn’t. It would make all this so much easier if I didn’t give a crap about whether she or her parents survive this thing.

How callous is that? I’m starting to sound like Travis.

I squeak my way over to Scarlet and help her sit up. She glares at me, but she’s glaring at everyone. Scarlet, I’m beginning to understand, is a very angry person. When things don’t go the way she thinks they should, she goes nuclear instead of trying to figure out what to do. That’s the difference between her and me. I guess she was never bullied, never learned that sometimes you have to accept your fate and just go on with your life. It’s a lesson I’ve learned well. But did I learn the right lesson?

“Why are you here?” she asks and, at first, I think she’s talking to me. But then I realize that Hector and Clint have come into the warehouse to stand beside Gumi.

“Why do you think?” Clint snarls at Scarlet.

Hector elbows Clint in the side, encouraging him to shut up. “You know why we’re here, Scarlet. We’re trying to influence the future, just like you.”

“But what is so important about this little girl and her family?”

Hector gestures toward Oshiro like he’s nothing more than a piece of furniture. “When he dies, his daughter takes over Sumiyoshi-rengo. We can’t let that happen.”

Oshiro starts to argue in Japanese, something that sounds like a curse even to my unfamiliar ears, but one of Gumi’s men smacks him across the head and orders him to shut up. Again, the words and the movement are spoken in such a way that I don’t have to understand the language to get it.

“Why?” Scarlet asks, pushing the subject.

“Because she changes things. Things in the future are altered because of the decisions she makes; the things the gang does under her rule. Things that we can change by getting rid of her and her family now rather than later.”

“So Yamaguchi-gumi works with Vandir now?”

Hector smiles one of those self-satisfied smiles that Travis often wears when he’s done something especially cruel, or when he thinks he’s said something especially clever.

“Yeah. We explained what the world’s like when she runs Sumiyoshi-rengo and he’s agreed that it’s not a great idea to let it happen.”

“They’ve enlightened me about quite a few things that will happen in the future,” Gumi says, “and Vandir has agreed to let me help redesign the future and create a world that is… let’s just say, a little friendlier to me and mine.”

“No, no, no,” Scarlet moans. “You can’t do this.”

“The deal’s already struck, Scarlet,” Hector says.

“No,” she says again, her voice becoming hysterical. “You cannot do this!”

Gumi laughs, and that makes the others laugh.

“Hysterical women,” Hector mutters under his breath, and that makes Clint laugh harder than he had before.

None of them notice how pale Scarlet has become, how frightened her eyes turn as she continues to moan, “No, no, no…”

I notice. But what am I supposed to do about it?

“Let’s get on with it!” Gumi suddenly calls.

His men immediately grab hold of Oshiro and drag him to Gumi, Bruce, Clint, and the others waiting. A couple guys also grab Oshiro’s wife, making her scream. Tora grabs onto her mother’s leg and refuses to let go, causing them to lift her off the ground as well.

Tora begins to scream in this high-pitched wail that drowns out her mother’s soft cry and Oshiro’s voice as he tries to calm the women. One of the men grabs Tora and tosses her away like she’s nothing more than a rag doll. I jump to my feet and catch her just an instant before she slams her head against the concrete.

“Hey!” I yell. “She’s just a kid.”

Gumi glares at me. “She’s not just some kid,” he says, his voice filled with loathing. “Don’t let those beautiful eyes fool you. One day she will lead the underground into a mess we will all regret. Even you, American boy.”

I pull her tighter against my chest, cradling her head against my shoulder as she sobs.

“The future isn’t set. And today she’s just a kid.”

Gumi rolls his eyes and turns away from me.

Two men hold Oshiro’s hands behind his back. He’s whispering to his wife and whatever he’s saying calms her. She stops whimpering, but she cannot seem to stop the tears that roll thickly from her eyes. Her eyes jump from Oshiro to me and Tora, to Gumi and back again, moving all around as though she doesn’t know who is the biggest threat, who’s in the most trouble, or who she can trust. I want to reassure her, but even if she could understand me, I'm not sure words would be enough.

I’m nobody.

I’m just the guy caught in a strange situation and trying to make it out alive. I’m still not even sure this is real, despite the very real pain that shoots through me every time I move my injured arm. The only thing I know is that I have to protect this little girl and time is quickly running out. I don’t even know why.

I pull Tora closer to me, drawing as much support from her as I’m offering. Her tiny body shivers. For a moment, she hides her face against my shoulder. But she wants to see, wants to know what’s going on. I try not to let her turn, but she’s stronger than she looks and, in the end, there’s not much I can do to stop her.

Gumi has moved up in front of Oshiro and is whispering to him. I don’t hear anything at first and, to be honest, it doesn’t look like a hostile confrontation. I glance at Scarlet, who is sitting back on her heels, watching closely. Tension screams throughout her body even though she doesn’t speak, doesn’t move. But the tension is there and I can feel it in my shoulders, too.

Something bad is about to happen.

“You lied,” Gumi suddenly says, loud enough for everyone in the warehouse to hear. “We had a deal. I accepted your word as law. And you lied.”

Oshiro only stares at Gumi as he moves closer to him, standing less than a few inches from Oshiro’s face.

“I tried to be fair with you. I came to you and asked you to keep your people away from the western side of the city and we would stay away from your traditional territory in the east. I could have just moved in on your territory, could have pushed your people out. But I was considerate enough to come to you and ask that we respect each other’s space.”

Again, Oshiro doesn’t respond. He just stares Gumi in the eye as his wife continues to cry behind him.

“When we found half a dozen of your men in our territory, we thought it was a mistake. But when it happened again and again, I knew you were ignoring our deal. And I can’t sit back and allow that to happen. It’s disrespectful.”

“If my men were in your territory, it wasn’t by my orders,” Oshiro says.

Gumi doesn’t react at first. But then he slowly shakes his head.

“You disappoint me, brother,” he says so softly that I almost don’t hear him. “I never expected you to lie to my face.”

I can see that Oshiro is offended by Gumi’s accusation. His face tightens and his jaw looks as though he could chew through metal. But he doesn’t respond.

Tora says something softly in Japanese. Even though I don’t understand her words, I understand the sentiment. I can’t help but think about the night my dad died. I’ve often wondered, if he had known what was coming, what would he have done? What would his last thoughts have been about? Would he have thought about my mom and me?

I don’t know that Oshiro is about to die. But I can feel those same thoughts, that same idea, racing through Tora’s mind. I want to protect her from it. No one should have to live with the unanswered questions I will always live with. And no child should have to witness their parent humiliated. I want to turn her head away again, but she resists my touch on the back of her neck.

“You know what my gang does when someone lies?” Gumi asks Oshiro.

Oshiro stares at him unflinchingly.

“For every lie, the man gives me one finger.”

Even as he says it, I find myself glancing around the room. Sure enough, most of his men are missing one or more fingers. Mostly pinkies. Some middle fingers. But they all still have their index finger. The trigger finger. That’s not really reassuring.

Gumi holds up a knife. “So. Whose finger shall it be? Yours? Your wife’s? That pretty little girl’s finger? She’ll be gone soon enough, so I don’t suppose it would matter if she’s mutilated along the way.”

Oshiro lunges forward at that. Gumi steps back and laughs as his men yank Oshiro back by the wrists they’re still holding behind him. At the same time, Oshiro’s wife begins to sob quite audibly.

“You choose,” Gumi tells Oshiro.

“I will not.”

Gumi’s eyebrows rise. “No? Then I will.”

Gumi begins walking toward me, toward Tora. I tug her closer against me as I slide backward across the floor, scrambling to get to my feet. But before Gumi’s taken more than a few steps, Oshiro calls to him.

“Stop. I will do it!”

Gumi turns. “Yes? Who will it be?”

Oshiro’s eyes slide to Tora and me, his expression softening for a brief second. He mouths something, something in Japanese. Tora begins to cry again, the sobs vibrating her entire body. Again, I don’t know what he said, but I can easily guess. And a part of me wishes that my dad had had that split second to do the same for me. But then again, maybe I don’t.

“Give me the knife,” Oshiro says quite calmly, quite steadily. “It will be me.”

Gumi hesitates only a second. Then he gestures for his men to let Oshiro go. He hands the knife to him and watches with cautious eyes. But there’s nothing he can do. Oshiro is a brilliant fighter and a brave man, but there are too many. He could probably take out the two men beside him, might even be able to make a charge at Gumi. But then he and probably his wife would be gunned down by the half-dozen men standing around with their guns in their hands.

I can see him weighing his options, can see the moment when he comes to the same conclusion I did. A certain kind of resignation comes into his eyes as they move slowly over his wife, then Tora.

Scarlet curses under her breath, her wrists beginning to bleed where she’s been, very subtly, trying to get the ropes off.

I feel incredibly useless. I wish I knew what to do, but I don’t. There are too many.

Oshiro holds his hand high so that Gumi can see what he’s doing. And then he begins. The first cut severs the flesh, moving through the skin like it’s nothing but melted butter. There is no sound. Oshiro does not so much as grunt. There is pain in his eyes, but he is brave and full of pride. He will not give Gumi the satisfaction of his weakness. When he reaches the bone, the knife struggles. But he manages, bracing his hand against a low table that happens to be standing nearby. In a matter of seconds, the finger is severed and Oshiro stands there with the bloody knife extended to Gumi.

“Now it is your turn,” he says.