Part 12 (1/2)

There were two exits from belowdecks and Jake picked up a crate, setting it atop the closed forward hatch. Then he crept along the deck, heading aft.

The night was very dark. It had begun to drizzle and he s.h.i.+vered as he made his way aft. Stopped suddenly, went as still as stone. Then, crouching, he reached out a hand, felt the warm, sticky wet, and knew before his eyes deciphered the black mounded forms in front of him. Three Oaths's guards: one, two, three, their necks had been sawed almost through, with wire.

Jake crept around them, stared down into the blackness of the open hatchway. Dark as the entrance to h.e.l.l, he thought, and something caught in his throat, Oh, Buddha, keep my father safe! But it was so still now, and he s.h.i.+vered again. The tiny rhythmic lapping of the wavelets against the hull of the junk seemed magnified, a cras.h.i.+ng of the elements against the creation of man.

The stench of cordite was even stronger here. Haze rose in spectral languor from belowdecks. It was not a time to think clearly, to consider options. He knew that his father was down there and that invaders armed with Gion machine pistols had let loose their fire.

We have many enemies in many countries.

Who was down there with his father? What evil wind had brought them here? If Zilin was dead, then the Chinese would say joss and go on with their lives. But Jake could not. Though he was half-Chinese himself, his Western half cried out against a world this hideous. His wife, his daughter, his friends a and now his father? All dead? What evil joss was this? Far from being the Zhuan, he was the unluckiest man in the world.

If you cannot be ruthless, Jake, then my ren will have been for naught.

Jake felt as he did when he woke up screaming, the dream of Lan still clogging his brain. And had Bliss been beside him at that moment she would not have recognized him, seeing instead the terrible mask, monstrous with hate, rage and fear, like the disfigurement of some mythic creature.

Anguish and agony were his companions as he dropped through the hatchway, taking the steep companionway in the manner of a nocturnal animal, gliding and spidery, clinging only here and there as it aided his headlong descent.

Within the bowels of the junk, the whiff of death blew straight at him, a night wind off the mountains, animals stirring after the kill.

And the shadows erupted into whirlwind motion.

Jake feinted left, hurled himself bodily to the right. Bright lightning and the eruption of thunder. Wood chips whirring and spinning and he was forced to s.h.i.+eld his eyes; it was easy to be blinded by a near miss in these close quarters.

Kicking out, hearing the grunt and gagging within the hollowness of the awful silence.

Moved back to the left, striking out with his fist, saw a head snap back, brief flash of wide eyes, then the jaw coming up and with another smash, the cracking as the bone shattered.

Blood upon him, hot and sticky, turning his hands black in the dimness, a grim surgeon doing his work, cutting and slas.h.i.+ng with frightening precision.

The Gion, or its twin, erupted close, very close, and Jake took the breaths needed and, opening his mouth to its fullest, gave out with kiai, the warrior's bloodcurdling cry, meant to confuse and terrify the enemy.

The effect achieved, he plowed on, able to pick out the living shadows from the inanimate ones. Heard gagging and almost slipped on a slick of blood creeping across the deck beneath his feet.

They had said not a word and this worried him. He did not know how many were there, only that his enemy numbered more than one. He felt the silence of the professional and something more, an element with which he was all too familiar.

Dantai?

Could it be? No time, as they attacked in concertthe wounded one as well? Impossible!

On his back after a succession of vicious kites to his rib cage robbed him of all breath. He inhaled their breath, their sweat, the stench of animals on kill: A pack. Dantai?

The b.u.t.t of a machine pistol crashed into the side of his skull, setting off flas.h.i.+ng lights behind his eyes. He was effectively blind for the s.p.a.ce of several heartbeats and they took swift advantage of their gain, working on the same spot on his rib cage, forcing the breath back out of him yet again.

A kick and he groaned inwardly. Another one of those and his ribs would crack and splinter, like his enemy's jaw, and the internal bleeding would begin. The end.

He lashed out from his p.r.o.ne position and missed. And knew. Discovered what it was that Bliss had already discerned. He was without ba-mahk. In a flash he knew it was not going to come back. The ability to sink into his surroundings, to find the pulse of qi energy surrounding him was gone, forever! He felt like a man who, upon waking, finds that he has mysteriously lost his sight.

Ba-mahk was what Fo Saan had taught him. It was how he won at wei qi, how he planned his strategies in life. It was how he saw in the dark, divined the intent of those around him. How he prevailed in combat.

Now there was nothing inside him but an open wound, a pit blacker than the darkness enveloping him. He was like everyone else. He felt helpless.

The b.u.t.t of the Gion found him again and he grunted, reaching blindly out with questioning fingers. By accident and proximity, he found the machine pistol and used the grip in an aikido throw, employing the other's momentum, his own immobile position as the strong fulcrum, to bring his enemy close to him, inward in an arc.

At its apex, when the enemy's panting breath was full in his face, brought the edge of his free hand down at the angle that would offset his own lack of leverage.

But from his p.r.o.ne position he was not able to exert the proper amount of force. The vertebrae of his a.s.sailant's neck did not crack. Felt the enemy gathering his strength and rolled because otherwise he would be dead in the next instant, the b.u.t.t of the Gion descending again and this time smas.h.i.+ng his skull.

One arm was pinned beneath him. He struggled to free it but he was right up against the bulkhead and there was no room. Felt movement above him, the intent to kill, and he shot his free hand forward, extending his fingers together, stiff as a blade of steel. Without conscious thought, rammed the weapon of his hand beneath the lower edge of his adversary's sternum; through skin and muscle, tendon and sinew. Felt the curve of the heart and squeezed.

Rush of blood and feces as the sphincter let go in death. But he had spent too long on his one enemy and the otherswere there two or three?were on him. They had scented their compatriot's death even, if this truly was a dantai, feeling the ending of his life.

A Gion went off and Jake felt the onrush of another figure. Kicked out, thinking, they were too dependent on those things. Missed and he was punished brutally for his error. He thought he felt a rib give way this time and he knew that this was where he was going to die in this narrow black corridor, with the stink of cordite and blood and excrement thick as fog. He felt the fear rising in him. Because he was without ba-mahk and his enemies' strategy was opaque to him, the moments incremental and separate, not part of a growing organic whole that he could use to defeat them.

Two came at him and he had no chance, chose one and attacked there while he was vulnerable from the opposite side. Consciousness was going, the flas.h.i.+ng behind his eyes becoming irregular, interspersed for longer and longer periods of absolute blackness from which he awoke startled and dismayed at his disorientation.

And like a man going down in icy water for the last time, he grasped out in desperation. He ceded control. Conscious thought was forgotten; he had even perhaps the wish to die here with his father because there seemed no reason to continue this cursed life. Instead, the unconscious or, more accurately, that part of the mind which exists between the two and which governs so much intuitive thought, rose to save him.

In this cramped environment the normal atemi or percussions were useless, so the primitive mind sought to use the lack of s.p.a.ce to the organism's advantage.

Jake lashed out, staggering another one of his enemies. But there was the thirdJake had worked out their number by nowwho was already attacking. This close, Jake knew instinctively that this was the one with the broken jaw. Used that, the heel of his hand slamming crosswise, had enough momentum for that at least and was rewarded with the sound of a heavy grunt. Not even crying out then, part of him storing the fact.

Went immediately for the cricoid cartilage buried behind protecting lines of cartilage in the center of his enemy's throat. Used both thumbs in concert to break through, and the body above him was done, a soft sigh like air escaping a balloon at a children's party.

Shaking his groggy head, Jake rose, his senses already questing in the gloom for his last enemy. Saw the glint of the Gion and rushed toward it, red rage suffusing him and now the stars exploding behind his eyes, his brain dull and working it out slowly as he pitched toward the Gion, clutched in the stiffening grasp of a dead man.

Bliss heard the chatter of the Gion once, twice, the silence then so long and unnatural that she was tempted to emerge from her hiding place within the cavern of the great horizontal clothes locker. But that would have been a mistake, she knew; and she had discipline.

Patience, she thought. Patience. She jumped when she heard the third outburst from the machine pistol. She heard nothing after that save the lapping of the water. Slowly, carefully, she crawled out. And froze.

Her eyes, staring hard into the darkness belowdecks, began to discern movement.

She could see from the formation that it was one figure, but she could not discern much more. The angle was acute enough so that even the ability to discern height was lost to her.

Jake, she said to herself. Where are you?

The figure was creeping along the corridor, a dark shadow coalescing out of the eerie twilight belowdecks. Somewhere a lamp shone, swinging crazily, alternately throwing shadow and light.

The figure disappeared, then abruptly reappeared disconcertingly near her, the head raised. And her eyes locked on its own and she screamed.

He was upon her in a blur of motion. The Gion came up, a block of metal, and struck her across the chest, knocking her backward. Her foot caught on a rope slickened by the drizzle and she fell heavily-on her hip. She felt his weight on her and she tried to twist away, striking with an atemi, but the angle was all wrong and he brushed her weak blow aside without difficulty. She was vulnerable to a body strike and he came in at an oblique angle, confusing her.

Pain filled her side and he increased the pressure of his pin because in that position she could get no momentum behind her percussives.

Her eyes opened wide in fear. They were nearer the crazily swinging light and she could see her target. She whipped her head toward him, biting down at the last instant with all her strength. Her teeth broke through the skin of his neck. She ground down, severing muscle and tendon, and saw his head snap back in reflexive motion.

His hand let go of the Gion to scrabble at her, trying to pull her away. But this was her only hope and she was not to be deterred. He shook and she shook with him, a dog with a sizable bone, refusing to let go of her b.l.o.o.d.y grip. She tasted his blood, salty and sweet at the same time, and fought not to choke on the hot flow.

His thumb found her throat and he began to press. It was quick, an improvisation, and he wasn't able to find the right grip. She growled deep in her throat and twisted, his thumb slipping away. But not before she had to stop herself from gagging.

His thumb was back and now he had thought it out, the grip beginning, and once he had it she would be done for, because he would cut off her air supply unless she let go of him.