Flashback

“Hai,” Sato said again, bowing his head slightly. “This would have happened at Nakamura-sama’s order at any rate. There was no escape for either my darling or her lover. Kumiko knew this would be the fate of both of them when she decided to go to your local Denver authorities—your beloved wife’s boss’s boss—to reveal the true origins of flashback. It was her jigai and I gave them both a quick and painless death.”

“You tore the boy apart,” said Nick.

Sato’s bowed head moved slowly from side to side. “Only the body. He died instantaneously.”

Nick had been holding himself up on one elbow but now collapsed on his side, still staring at Sato. Captain McReady, Val, and other people who’d come into the tent were just distant silhouettes to him. For Nick, it was just Hideki Sato and himself there in the night.

“I don’t understand,” said Nick.

“I needed Hiroshi Nakamura’s total trust if I were to do what I had to do,” said Sato. “Both my darling Kumiko and young Keigo had chosen their fates… Keigo’s attempt to tell the world about Nippon’s use of flashback to complete the collapse of America was daring and bold, as the young man himself was. As you said, Bottom-san, a true rebel in a culture with very few rebels in its history. By carrying out the executions myself, I passed Nakamura’s test for me.”

“To what end?” asked Nick.

“Your message to me from Omura-sama… In this world there is a tree without any roots; / Its yellow leaves send back the wind… a poem composed by Omura-sama’s and my own beloved teacher Sozan in the moments before he died… was the last coded message I needed to receive to know that tonight was the night to proceed.”

“Proceed with what?” asked Nick, his words dripping with audible suspicion. There was no need to believe a single word this man said… this man who had shot his own daughter in the face.

Sato was looking at him as if reading his thoughts. He nodded and looked at his wristwatch. “It is midnight here and four p.m. Sunday in Tokyo. Currently, hostile takeover offers are being made against eight of Hiroshi Nakamura’s eleven major companies which constitute the heart of his zaibatsu. Tomorrow, when the markets open in Japan, at least five of these eight takeover attempts, perhaps more, will succeed. The Nakamura dynasty will crumble.”

“He’s still a Federal Advisor here,” said Nick. “He controls the Colorado National Guard and a dozen other armed groups.”

“Nakamura and his people are being arrested as we speak, Bottom-san,” said Sato. “It is his punishment for never coming down off his Colorado mountain… and for believing too much in the reports of his spies, my people. For seven weeks now I have brought several thousand Japanese commandos—my own Taigasu Tiger Troops—from China.”

“We saw them at the old Denver Country Club this afternoon, Dad,” said Val, stepping forward and sitting on the far end of the cot that Sato was on. “The Ospreys were just deploying.”

Nick forgot everything else for a moment as he extended his right hand and grasped Val’s hand in a grip that was more than a handshake.

Captain McReady and the other men had also moved closer. “It’s true, Mr. Bottom. Colonel Sato, Advisor Omura, and others have been in touch with us for weeks now. Colonel Sato informed us of your record with the Denver PD. We need good investigative people in the Texas Rangers. Our role is going to be greatly expanded in the coming months and years.”

“Expanded?” repeated Nick, looking from Sato to the broad-mustached old Ranger. “Texas is Omura’s ally? Japan’s ally? In this big fight with the Caliphate that’s coming up?”

“Damned right we are,” said Captain McReady. “First we take back our own country, then we begin settling some old scores with others. We hope you’ll join us, Detective Bottom.”

“You don’t even allow flashback addicts to live in Texas,” said Nick. “You drive them to the nearest border and boot them out.”

“Are you a flashback addict, son?” asked the old Ranger.

“No,” said Nick after only the slightest hesitation. “No, sir.”

Sato stood and it pleased Nick to see that the standing hurt him somewhere.

“I must get back to Denver. There will be much to organize in the next few days. Many things to coordinate with Omura-sama and with certain daimyos back home who have long awaited Hiroshi Nakamura’s downfall. Sometimes, Bottom-san, even under the code of bushido, the best Shogun will not be the harshest or cruelest or most ruthless one of the candidates. Nakamura forgot that in his hunger for power.”

Nick said, “But you showed how ruthless you could be, Sato-san. Just in case anyone in Nippon had any doubts.”

“Yes,” said Sato. “I will not offer to shake your hand this day, Bottom-san, for I respect your anger.” He touched the thick bandages on his neck and smiled the broadest that Nick had ever seen him smile. “I thought, for a moment on the dragonfly, that you were going to eat me.”

Nick returned the smile and made sure he showed his canines.

“But perhaps we will shake hands and be allies again at some future date,” said Sato. “After your nine- eleven, many people—however briefly—spoke of the Long War that was coming. They were right about the Long War. They were just wrong about the two world-historical opponents who would be fighting to the death.”

Sato started to leave and then turned back.

“I thought you might want these, Bottom-san,” he said and handed across Nick’s phone and a stamp-sized flashdrive. The phone display showed Dara’s text files and Keigo Nakamura’s documentary video files.

“The drive has the video recording of your recent inquisition by Nakamura in the library,” said Sato. “Use all of these as you see fit.”

The big man clasped Val on the shoulder and walked out.

The nurse came back to check Nick’s blood pressure and to urge him to use the oxygen mask.

He shook his head. “Help prop me up, would you?”

In the end, Val and the young woman both worked to help him sit almost upright.

The pain in his head was less and the ground had quit tilting every time he turned his head. Captain McReady and three other Texas Rangers were still standing there. The old captain’s Stetson was back on his head.

“What do you say to joining the Rangers, son?” asked McReady.

“Let me get a night’s sleep and I’ll give you my answer,” said Nick. He nodded toward the sleeping Leonard. “You people do surgeries like valve replacements for money without a long wait, right?”

“Yeah,” said the younger Ranger to the right of McReady. “We’re old-fashioned that way. Down here we let you keep most of what you earn and let you pay for what you need.”

McReady turned to Val.

“How ’bout you, son? You going to talk to me tomorrow about joining the Texas Rangers?”

Val smiled and the sight of that smile made Nick’s heart lurch.

“No, thank you, sir,” said his son. “I want to see a man in Austin about something and then I may have some plans of my own.”

McReady nodded, touched his hat, and led the men out of the tent. Outside, the three dragonflies were lifting off silently in a rush of hot night wind.

Val sprawled on the empty cot next to Nick’s, bunching the pillow under his head. “The top doctor said we should spend the night here—sleep in these cots—and I think I’ll take them up on it. Talk to Leonard in the morning.”

“Good,” said Nick. In a few minutes, he was going to ask the way to the closest latrine and make his way to it. No bedpan for him. Not in this open-sided tent. Not for any reason.

“Wow, Dad, Grandpa really kneed that ninja’s gonads right out through the top of his head, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, he did,” said Nick, getting ready to swing his cast over the edge of the cot to the floor. He could use some help hobbling and he wasn’t going to wait for the Texas Ranger nurse. Might as well put Val to some use while he was still close by. “He really did.”