The Remembering

the earth blackened and the rivers and seas fouled, the cockroach will be there. He will survive. He will be awake, hungry, scurrying in darkness through holocaust and nightmare — an elegant, six-legged silent witness and ancient sentinel. He will be waiting for you there. He will be among the survivors. Underground, in the wall, at the back of the cave, the cockroach will be there.

It was 11:09 in the morning, August 9, 1945. Forty thousand feet in the air, the enormous cloud began to break up and spread across the sky in swirling whites and grays. Below it, the Urakami Valley and the city of Nagasaki were invisible under the dark mass at the cloud’s base. I hadn’t moved or blinked or said a word for seven minutes.

“Are you deaf and mute, Zezen, or have you not seen death before?”

I turned slowly and looked up to the top of the castle wall. The Fleur-du-Mal stared down at me. His hair hung loose, down over his shoulders. His green eyes were hard and bright. Then the huge, wrought-iron gate to the castle began to swing open. The old hinges sounded like giant fingernails scraping a giant black-board. “Come inside, Zezen,” he said, “and leave the body of the woman inside the gatehouse, if you wish.”

He waited for me to reply. I said nothing. Finally, he shook his head and said, “Have it your way, then, but the wind is shifting.”

I looked back toward the cloud, which was breaking up rapidly. “Why should that make a difference?”

The Fleur-du-Mal raised his head and laughed. His brilliant white teeth gleamed against the sky. “Radiation, you idiot,” he said. “Gamma, alpha, and beta radiation. That was an atomic bomb.”

“What is an atomic bomb?”

“Come inside and I shall explain it to you. Otherwise, you will likely die. I doubt the Meq have ever faced a nuclear explosion, let alone what that insidious cloud contains. Or would you rather stand there and find out for yourself?”

I looked down at Shutratek’s lifeless body. One eye had opened, so I leaned over and closed it, then stood and stared again at Nagasaki. Sailor and Sak had been on their way to a location near the Nagasaki railway station, close to where the Urakami River runs into the harbor. None of it was visible now. The whole city was silent under the blackness. I didn’t move. I couldn’t, I was frozen.

“They are all dead, Zezen,” the Fleur-du-Mal said from above. “All of them — Zuriaa, Susheela the Ninth … Sailor and the Ainu. All of them.”

I spun around. “You knew Sailor and I were in Nagasaki?”

“Please, Zezen, do not insult me. Of course, I knew. I knew the very hour of your arrival and I have been well aware of every one of your clumsy attempts at locating my many shiros.” He scanned the sky and the horizon, then added, “Your time is up, Zezen. I am closing the gate. Adieu, mon petit.”

He disappeared from view and the massive gate began to close. I glanced once more at Nagasaki and knew the Fleur-du-Mal was right. They were all dead, all of them. A wave of nausea passed through me. I thought of Sailor and felt a sudden sense of loss and despair I had only felt once before, on the day my own mama and papa died. Sailor was so much more to me than I even realized, more than a friend or a teacher. He was irreplaceable. Behind me, I heard the screeching of the hinges and looked back at the gate. It was almost closed. I half dragged, half carried Shutratek through the opening and just in time. The gate locked into place. I laid Shutratek down on the stone floor inside the gatehouse, then looked up to see the Fleur-du-Mal standing next to me. I tensed instinctively. He could have easily slit my throat at any moment.

He sensed my fear and laughed bitterly. “Sometimes I worry about you, mon petit,” he said. “Your nervousness is palpable. I am not going to harm you.” He paused and smiled. “Now, follow me inside. Rapidement!”

“What about the woman?” I asked, nodding toward Shutratek.

The Fleur-du-Mal had already started walking. He stopped abruptly and sighed, shaking his head from side to side. “She is dead, Zezen,” he said. “She will not be less dead by taking her inside the shiro. Leave her. Tomorrow, or perhaps the next day, when the air is safe, you may do with her what you wish. That is my final thought on the subject.”

The Fleur-du-Mal turned and continued walking toward two heavy wooden doors directly under the lowest roof of a five-tiered wood and stone tower. Both doors were covered with iron straps, ancient protection against battering and cannon fire. The shiro was a magnificent structure and compound. I stared up at the five tiled roofs, one piled atop the other. I felt numb and strange. Sailor was dead along with an entire city full of people. Everything was surreal. I got to my feet slowly. The Fleur-du-Mal had said it cold and with a cold heart, but I knew he was right about Shutratek. I could not help her now and he gave me no choice. But what was I doing? Only a few hours ago I had set out to trap and kill him. Now I was agreeing with him and about to become a guest in his house. And why hadn’t he killed me when he had the chance? Nothing made sense anymore. I followed the Fleur-du-Mal across the courtyard without another word.

Inside the shiro it was dark and cool and completely silent. I could see several windows off to one side, but they were all shuttered. There was no furniture, except for two hand-carved wooden chairs sitting against one wall. The Fleur-du-Mal locked the reinforced doors with a long iron key bigger than his own hand, then turned to me. “This way,” he said, motioning me toward a stone stairwell that led only down. He reached up and removed a screened lantern from the wall and lit it. I paused at the top step. “Please, you first, Zezen,” he said with a slight grin. “Youth before beauty,” he added, laughing.

He held the lantern high over our heads and we started down. After ten steps the stairwell turned ninety degrees, then again after ten more steps. With the Fleur-du-Mal at my back, I expected to feel the net descending, the prickly feeling of fear I nearly always felt in his presence, but I didn’t. I felt no fear whatsoever.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“You shall see soon enough. Keep walking,” he said without emotion.

Finally, three stories beneath the ground floor of the shiro, our descent ended. We were standing on the stone floor of a long hall that led to our left and right. The Fleur-du-Mal pointed the lantern to the right toward a heavy wooden door, which was reinforced with iron straps like the doors above. As we approached, the door opened slowly and a short, middle-aged Japanese man in Western dress was standing in the doorway. He wore extremely thick, round glasses, making his eyes look as big as walnuts behind them. He was not surprised to see us and he did not look at us as ordinary boys. He knew we were Meq, I could sense it.

The man smiled wide. “Hello, mister. Yes, hello, yes? Hello, hello.”

“Out of the way, Koki,” the Fleur-du-Mal told him. “Bring us tea.”

“Yes, yes,” the man answered. “Tea … hello, yes?” He was still smiling and staring at me.

“Hello,” I said. His smile widened. His teeth were stained brown and he smelled of tobacco.

“Now!” the Fleur-du-Mal said firmly.

“Yes, yes,” the man replied. He glanced once more at me, then turned and scurried away into the depths of a huge room with Persian rugs covering the stone floors and elegant tapestries and modern paintings covering the walls. The room was brightly lit and looked warm and inviting. It was filled with Spanish leather chairs, English oak tables, and Belgian lamps. Greek, Roman, and Egyptian artifacts and sculpture were everywhere. There was nothing Japanese about it.

“You are staring, Zezen. Are you not well?”

“No, no, I was just … I mean, I didn’t expect …”

The Fleur-du-Mal laughed loudly. “Quickly,” he said. “Inside, and make yourself comfortable.”

I stepped into the room a few paces and looked back over my shoulder. He was locking the door with the same long key he’d used on the other doors. “Who is that man?” I asked.

“Pay him little mind,” he said, dismissing the thought with a wave of his hand.

“But who is he?”

The Fleur-du-Mal paused and sighed. “His formal name is Naohiro Nishi. However, I refer to him as Koki, an abbreviation for Kokkuro-chi, the Cockroach.”

“The Cockroach?”

“Yes … it is a long story and not worth explaining. Simply stated, he owes me a debt, or shall we say his family owes me a debt. I need him for various services when I am in Japan. And there you have it. Please, take a