The Fifth Profession (57 page)

Kamichi's unnervingly rational tone distracted him. “I'll take care of that problem later. I'll make sure that the weapons are fired. The fingers of the corpses of my loyal followers will be placed and tugged on the triggers while the weapons discharge, to leave powder residue in case forensic tests are performed. Every aspect of the plan must be correct.”

“What did you hope to accomplish?”
Akira asked.

Kamichi turned, resisting the pressure of Savage's pistol against his skull. “I'm disappointed. You've managed to guess so much, and yet you haven't understood the ultimate noble motive?”

“Apparently we're just too stupid,” Akira said.

“So tell us,” Savage said. “Convince us how smart you are.”

Kamichi straightened. “The record will show … History will record …”

“Just tell us,” Savage said.

“Tonight,” Kamichi said proudly, “it will seem that assassins, hired by enemies of Amaterasu, felt I was such a threat that they committed a massacre to get at me. … But they failed. A devoted core of brave samurai managed to force them away, though not before the leaders of the massacre were destroyed. You.” He gestured toward Savage. “A member of the CIA.
And you”
—another gesture, toward Akira—”a member of Japanese Intelligence.

“I needed an incident, so dramatic, so symbolic, so
national,
that it would catalyze my followers, urge them,
compel
them into greater action and like a magnet, attract new members to the Force of Amaterasu. The scene of the massacre, this shrine to Japanese history and architecture, will intensify the significance.”

“Of?” Savage asked.

“The American government, the assassins they sent to kill me, with the help of Japan's own corrupt establishment. The incident will arouse such anger, such resentment, such …”

“No one will believe you,” Savage said.

“No one in America. But in Japan? They'll believe. In the next few days, the course of history, the course of this nation, will change. I'll erase the mistake of the Meiji Restoration and return my country to the cultural purity, the cleansing quarantine of the Tokugawa Shogunate. All foreigners will be expelled, their contamination eradicated.”

“And you're the great man who'll lead the shogunate, I suppose,” Savage said bitterly.

“In the name of the emperor, who will no longer have to renounce his divinity.”

“You're so crazy”—Savage tugged him closer to the stairs—”you'll spend the rest of your life in a padded cell.”

“The strangest part,” Akira said, aiming toward the guards, “is I agree with him.”

“What?”
Savage said.

“Then
join
me,” Kamichi said. “I can change the plan so that only the
gaijin
would die. Other evidence can be manufactured to link this man and his CIA employer with Japanese Intelligence. Your talents would be useful to me.”

“Agree with you? Yes,” Akira said, aiming. “I wish I lived in another time. I wish history could be reversed—not just the American occupation and the constitution it forced upon us, but the Pacific War and the militarism that caused it, and the Meiji Restoration, and above all Commodore Perry's ‘black ships.’ The Tokugawa Shogunate. That was our finest flower. When we stayed to ourselves, when we shut out the world, looked inward, and perfected our spirit. I wish we had nothing to do with America. The atomic bombs they dropped on us were modern versions of Perry's ‘black ships.’ And because of them, we now try to dominate economically instead of militarily. Greed, the hunger for power, a work ethic so severe that it leaves us no time for contemplation— we learned these vices from America. They're destroying the beauty of our spirit. We're no longer the land of the gods. We've
forgotten
the gods.”

Savage couldn't tell if Akira meant what he said or was merely trying to distract Kamichi and his men. In turmoil, he tugged Kamichi closer to the stairs while Akira aimed.

“Then
join
me,” Kamichi repeated.

“No!” Akira said. “What you've done tonight is …” Disgust filled his voice. “Obscene. Nothing good can come of this. All those men didn't have to die. You
perverted
the code of loyalty. You're not a savior. You're a monster.”

“Then die with the
gaijin.”

“Like hell.” Savage reached the stairs, tugging Kamichi. “We're getting out of here.”

Kamichi spoke in Japanese to his men.

They stood rigidly and bowed.

“Akira, what did he say?”

“He told them, ‘You know what must be done. Obey your oath. I honor you. I commend you to Amaterasu.’ “

“Oh, shit,” Savage said.

He heard a sudden creak on the stairs below him and, glancing sharply downward, saw eight men stalking toward him, aiming.

“The guards who pretended to be assassins and drove away,” Kamichi said. “They had orders to come back after you arrived. One of my men contacted them by radio.”

“Tell them to stay away,” Savage said.

“Or you'll shoot me? That argument no longer matters. You see, the final stage is about to begin.”

“The final stage?”

A man below fired at Savage.

Cringing from the feel of the bullet zinging past his head, Savage jerked his pistol away from Kamichi and fired in return.

The gunman toppled.

But at once the other men started firing, the corridor filled with ear-ringing thunder, bullets splintering the banister, walloping walls.

Savage kept pulling the trigger … again and again! … empty cartridges flinging from his pistol, men falling, screaming. Next to him, he heard other shots, from the guards in the corridor, from Akira. But even as Savage shot and shot, he sensed …

Something was horribly wrong! Bullets kept hitting the wall behind him. Akira kept shooting. Men kept screaming, falling. Blood kept spraying. And suddenly, when the last men dropped—

—the corridor and the staircase a hideous shambles, the stench of cordite, blood, vomit, and excrement reeking around him—

—Savage realized in horror what it was that he'd sensed was wrong.

I shouldn't be alive! Those men were ten feet away.

Kamichi dove when the shooting started so we couldn't use him as a shield.

And in all that shooting, with all those bullets flying, Akira and I weren't hit even once?

Impossible!

Unless …

He shuddered.

Unless they never meant to, never
tried
to hit us!

Dear God, they wanted to force us into killing them!

They committed suicide!

Madness had been added to madness. Too much, too long. Savage doubted that his mind could withstand another assault. He wanted to scream. He felt his sanity tilting, on the verge of a breakdown, about to crack!

Rage made the difference. “Kamichi, you son of a bitch!”

Savage spun to confront him, aiming toward the floor where Kamichi had dove when the shooting started.

But Kamichi was gone.

“Where did—?”

“There!” Akira shouted, “He's running down the corridor!”

Savage raced after him, dodging the bodies on the floor. Akira chased him as well, blurting what sounded like Japanese curses.

As Savage neared the entrance to Kamichi's room, suddenly everything seemed in slow motion,
jamais vu and déjà vu
colliding in his brain. I've been here before! I know what's going to—!

Before he could stop and react to his premonition, a fierce blow deadened the nerves in his wrist and slammed the Beretta out of his hand. Behind, he heard a bone snap, Akira wail, a pistol thumping on the floor.

He spun, and now his nightmare was complete.

He faced three men. Muscular. Midthirties. Japanese.

Wearing dark suits.

The assassins from the Medford Gap Mountain Retreat. They'd lunged from the room across from Kamichi's and struck with wooden swords at eye-blink speed, disarming Savage and Akira.

Aruptly Savage recalled that there'd been
four
men, not three!

And the fourth had gripped a samurai sword instead of a
bokken.

His terrified confusion dissolved as Kamichi reached into a room and pulled out a gleaming sword.

“Full circle,” Kamichi said. “In your end is your beginning.”

A man swung a
bokken.
Savage pivoted to escape the blow, but too late. The wooden sword whacked his arm with such force that he was slammed against the wall.

“I promised a conclusion to your nightmare,” Kamichi said.

Another man swung at Akira, who doubled over from the impact of the
bokken
‘s blunt end being driven into his stomach. Agonized, Akira sank to his knees, holding himself.

“Answers,” Kamichi said. “That's what you wanted. … I arranged for you to shoot all those men so the authorities would be convinced of—and the media would spread the word about—a major battle in which my bodyguards fought bravely to defend me. The bullets had to come from your pistols. The powder traces had to be on your hands. And when at last you confronted me, only these three samurai remained, armed with wooden swords.”

“And you,” Savage groaned, “not with a
bokken
but a
katana
—because you're the
shogun,
the hero of your story.”

“As I explained, I need an incident, something so dramatic, so symbolic, so catalyzing, that the nation will follow my lead. You're about to be a part of a legend. The people will talk about this moment for a thousand years—how the wicked
gaijin
and a traitorous Japanese led a team of mercenaries to try to kill me. And indeed you killed all my men. Until at last, after the rest of your team had been forced to retreat by my brave dying samurai, we confronted each other, you and I, firearms against a
katana.”

“Who gets to win?” Savage dove for his pistol, grabbed it, and screamed as wooden swords struck his skull, his back, his arms and legs.

Again!

It was happening again! He felt helpless!

Everything was preordained!

No, postordained! Time was being reversed! He was living backward!

And history couldn't be changed!

He screamed again, but not from the agony of the wooden swords pounding him, instead from the greatest fury he'd ever known.

“You bastard!”

Rolling, Savage kicked. He felt the satisfying crunch of a kneecap breaking. A guard wailed, dropping his
bokken,
grabbing his knee, toppling.

Savage continued to roll. He heard a rush of air as a
bokken
swept past his head.

The wooden sword slammed the floor. Savage kicked again, heard a grunt, and grabbed his Beretta, surging upward.

But another
bokken
struck him with brutal force, behind his right shoulder, where the blackjack had left a massive bruise. Reinjured, his arm lost its power, muscles paralyzed, the Beretta slipping from his useless fingers.

Anguish increased his fury. He jabbed his left elbow backward, struck a guard behind him, and heard a wheeze, ribs cracking, the man doubling over.

Savage pivoted, prepared to kick the third guard, but the man leapt clear, swung his
bokken,
and connected with Savage's side, just above his left kidney, the pain so excruciating that Savage's vision blurred. He kept pivoting, disoriented, banging against a wall. The guard swung toward his skull. Savage raised his left arm, desperate to shield his head, though his arm would likely be shattered.

A blur intercepted the
bokken.
Akira! He'd been slumped, on his knees, clutching his stomach from the devastating impact of a wooden sword's blunt end rammed into his guts. The guards had apparently assumed that Akira was sufficiently disabled for them to concentrate on Savage.

They'd been wrong. Thrusting a karate-callused hand upward beneath the third guard's wrist as the man swung his
bokken
toward Savage's skull, Akira impeded the blow, chopped another hand across the guard's nose, spun him, and kneed his groin. The guard fell, blood pulsing out of his nose.

Savage strained to steady his consciousness. He managed sufficient awareness to realize that Akira was charging toward Kamichi, and as Savage turned to help, he felt his legs give out. The guard with the shattered kneecap had crawled and struck with his
bokken,
whacking Savage's shins. The force of the blow shocked nerves and knocked Savage's legs from under him. He fell. The floor rushed toward him. His jaw struck wood. Stunned, for a moment he couldn't see.

Then he could, and peering up … dazed … in agony … he saw Akira attacking Kamichi.

Kamichi raised his
katana.

No! Savage inwardly screamed.
Jamais vu
had become reality! What never happened was now occurring! Full circle. Living backwards.
In your end is your beginning.
Except that the beginning had been a lie, and
this
was unbearably actual.

As if watching a movie he'd seen too many times … witnessing a nightmare he'd endured too often, Savage cringed as Akira attacked Kamichi.

The fourth assassin.

The man with the gleaming sword.

If the present had become the past—Savage kept inwardly screaming—was it also a forecast of the future?

No! Akira! Don't!

Sprawled in pain on the floor, Savage focused his delirium-distorted vision …

And felt his heart stop, swollen with hope, as he realized that Akira had grabbed the third guard's wooden sword after knocking the man to the floor and preventing him from striking Savage's skull.

The past that had never occurred was
not
taking place identically in the present! In Savage's nightmare, Akira had
not
been armed with a
bokken.
This wasn't full circle! Reality did
not
conform to false memory! The future did
not
have to match the lie of the past.

Kamichi swung his gleaming sword.

Akira dodged. He parried with the
bokken.

Kamichi swung yet again.

Again Akira parried.

They circled, testing each other, lunging, twisting, darting.