Karasu no Tengoku

Chapter Four: Crossroads…

(A man sitting at a table at a café near a busy avenue dials a number already stored in his cell-phone memory…)
“Are they still stuck with the letter??”
“Yeah…that’s the last letter I wrote…and that was a looooong time ago…”
“Oh well…I’ve got to go…can we meet here once again??”
“Yeah…I’ll call you…”
“Alright…see ya…”
(Flips the cell-phone closed…)

“Well, we came all the way to London, now what?? I mean, are we even SURE that he’s here????”
“Honestly…you complain too much…come…”
(Hideki and Kaito reached Trafalgar Square, and sat on a bench, from there you can see several narrow and wide streets, so it’s an excellent point if you’re tailing someone)
“Do we have any other clue besides of knowing this was the last place he lived in??”
“Not really…but I suppose that there must be some place in here in which you can check the population registry or something like that…”
“Yeah probably…”
“Do you think they are public??”
“That’s the problem…we’re foreigners…we can’t see them…and the investigation we are doing is completely civil…it’s not like we have a government’s order to go and investigate, they won’t let us in…”
“So…what you’re basically telling me…is that I’ll have to hack it, isn’t it??”
“Yeah…but, isn’t hacking government files a bit of difficult, risky and…what was it again?? Oh yes! Illegal??”
“When, since we began this entire thing have we NOT done legal things??”
“Oh well, that’s an EXCELLENT question…so, when are you hacking it??”
“When we get back to Japan…or, will it be wiser of us to do it when we stop by somewhere else?? That way it’ll be more difficult to track us, in case they actually did??”
“That sounds much better…where is there a wireless LAN that we can use, between London and Tokyo??”
“There are lots…maybe hundreds…”
“Oh well, we can see that after we eat something…I’m starving…”
“Ok…I want spaghetti!!!!!”
“You’re such a kid…”

(They didn’t really stay too much time in London, but they didn’t waste money on going there neither, they went to several museums, in the very short time of three weeks, they reached a good Italian food restaurant near one of the corners that still faced the Square and began discussing about the wireless LANS)
“Where is it not suspicious to watch two Japanese men alone on vacation??”
“You mean…that we don’t look gay??”
“Precisely…”
“Pretty much nowhere…I believe that anywhere we go…we’ll be suspicious of that, ironically, our country seems to have that fame…but I don’t think that’s really important…we’re just hacking government files, why would that make us look gay??”
“I don’t know…just asking…anyway…where is it less risky?? Asia or Europe??”
“Definitely Asia…in Europe they will track us even faster, unless it was one of those undeveloped countries of Eastern Europe…but I still think Asia is much less risky….”
“America would be much safer, actually the safest…but right now, I don’t think we’re in any condition to go…so, which country??”
“America? With our budget? Yeah right! We certainly need it not to be TOO advanced since we don’t want to get tracked quickly…but developed enough for it to have wireless Internet…”
“Almost EVERY country has it nowadays, so that’s not a problem at all…”
“True…”
“Ok…farther or nearer??”
“Farther…more difficult to get tracked…”
“Ok, then our prospect is among China, Nepal, Malaysia, Cambodia, Russia, Indonesia, India, maybe Korea, and even possibly Okinawa…which do you like the most??”
“Cambodia…I’ve always wanted to know Angkor Watt…”
“It’s settled then…”
(After agreeing that they’ll hack the English population data base from Angkor Watt, Cambodia, where, miraculously, was a wireless LAN because of the tourists and all, e-mail the information to Hideki’s account and then just blow up or throw the laptop to some rocky gorge, they went back to a little hotel they’d found near there to rest, it was getting late after all, Hideki was a nocturnal person, but Kaito not that much, so they decided to go to the airport the next day and then to Moscow, it was true that it wasn’t exactly near to Cambodia, but Hideki’d complained that he wanted to visit it…like if it was some pleasure trip…)

(Kaito didn’t normally wake up at night, but that night, he wasn’t even able to sleep at all, Hideki was sound asleep, so he thought that the city could burn down to ashes and he wouldn’t even stir, Kaito’d seen a little restaurant near the lobby, but it didn’t quite appeal to him, but the idea of just lying there, sleepless all night wasn’t quite appealing either…he hadn’t undressed at all, so he thought that it wouldn’t make any difference if he went out and took a stroll through the city…he was in the lobby when a man kind of called his attention, it was a Japanese in fact, but it was like those times when you suddenly think that someone is suspicious even if you can’t exactly place the reason why, and it wasn’t the fact that he was or seemed Japanese…so he followed him, the man was exiting the hotel and he seemed to be looking for the same he was, distraction…)

(The man walked down some streets until he reached an old building that seemed to have been engulfed in flames at some moment and entered, obviously, Kaito thought it would be completely devoid of people, but, he was kind of disturbed when he saw that there were a lot of people holding some kind of meeting there, they were all wearing goth-like clothes, Kaito fell a bit out of place, but his curiosity was picked by then, and besides, they didn’t seem like the kind of people who would willingly let him get out of there so easily...another guy, who wasn’t Asian, he seemed like a typical English brunette, he was standing behind something like a podium, and began to speak, though Kaito could understand English perfectly well, he wasn’t paying attention at all to what he was saying…what actually called his attention was that the man he’d been following had moved amazingly quickly to the left side of the podium, he was standing in the platform that supported the podium with another group of people that seemed to be like the ‘leaders’ of this people…Kaito kept on watching, analysing people among the crowd, in fact, nobody was looking at him, something he thought would happen...he felt a tug, his sleeve, at his left, he turned slowly and there was the guy again…Kaito raised an eyebrow slightly…he was interested in how the HELL could he move so fast…now that he looked up closely, the guy was quite a young one, 18 at the most, something he didn’t expect but hey, who was he to judge…)
“What are you doing here?”
“Me? What about you? Aren’t you too young for these things??”
“Young?? For real?? Can’t you SEE at all??”
(Kaito turned again to look at him…the guy had a lop-sided smile…he turned again…to the front…)
“Mm…I see…”
“Now the real thing…you know what I mean...what are you doing here?”
“I thought you would know…”
“That’s precisely why I’m asking…can’t you see it?? Can’t you feel how your life is shortening faster the closer you get to the truth, Minagawa??”
(Kaito glanced at him from the corner of his eye…)
“Who are you?”
“Who are YOU?”
“Who are you? Some obstacle we have to overcome??”
“WE?”
“Stop it…what do you want??”
“I’m warning you…he’s set his eyes on you…and he’ll come to look for you, and when that happens, the day your brother finds you…it’s all over…”
“Wha!? What the!?”
(He turned to look at the guy, but he was gone…he swung around, all deserted, no people, no light, not anything, just the dark insides of the building…he collapsed to his knees…)
“What the FUCK?????”
(He concluded that it would be no good to stay there wondering, so he quickly went back to the hotel, he didn’t know if he’d be able to sleep at all, but he thought that trying wouldn’t hurt…)

“Kaito…Kaito~~~~, wake up…KAITO!”
(Hideki poked him awake, by the time he finally woke up Hideki’s finger digging into his head was beginning to hurt, he grabbed Hideki’s hand and slowly opened his eyes…)
“Stop it…already…”
“Ah…sorry…it’s just that you wouldn’t wake up…Kaito??”
“What??”
“You look good in the mornings…”
(Hideki smiled and walked to the bathroom, closing the door behind him)
“Wha…WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT!?!? Must be the London air, must be the London air…”
(He heard Hideki shout from inside the bathroom)
“No it’s not!”
“Shut up damn it!!”

(After they both took a shower and changed clothes, Hideki, as obnoxious as he always was, and as childish too, said he was hungry, Kaito couldn’t say he wasn’t, but he wasn’t starving either, so they only took a little breakfast at the hotel’s restaurant, they carried nearly no luggage at all, so it was rather easy to move around and arrive quickly at the airport, there was a flight to Moscow at 3:45, they’ll only have to wait for half an hour, it was perfect…)

(When they reached Moscow…)
“I’m freezing!!!”
“Hideki…you’re just so stupid…I told you to bring some damn coat, it’s winter in all the damn Northern Hemisphere, you should’ve thought at least about that…”
“Could you stop lecturing me and just come with me to a damn clothing store?!?!? Please oh great and magnificent Kaito?????”
“…our sponsor’s going to kill us anyway…so many unnecessary expenses…”
“What sponsor?? You mean we have one???”
“Of course…but I’m not allowed to tell you who is it…”
“That sounds like CIA or FBI crap…”
“Yeah I know…oh look, there’re some good coats and stuff…”
(When Hideki was choosing one, he tried on a black one that wasn’t at all classical, it was more like if it was made with raincoat fabric and had goose feathers inside, which made it really, really fluffy and warm…)
“How do I look?? Kaito?? Kaito?!?!?! Don’t ignore me~~~~”
(Kaito returned from the other part of the store and stared at him…before turning back again to the other part of the store…)
“I don’t care how you look just buy one already…”
“Kaito~~~~~~~~~…just a simple damn opinion!! Please!!”
“Aaaah…whatever…you look fine, happy??”
“Not quite, but whatever, hey, saleslady, I’ll be taking this one please…”
(‘God…I think I’m beginning to understand why everyone think Japanese men are gay…’, thought Kaito, after buying a coat for Hideki…)
“Did you buy the tickets?? Where are we going now anyway??”
“Train…destiny, New Delhi…”
“Wo~~~~w, and here I thought you didn’t like India…”
“I don’t…let’s go…”
(They reached a train station of which I don’t remember the name in Moscow and saw they were almost 2 hours too early, so they decided to go get some hot coffee before departing…the waitress took their order and eyed them a bit weirdly for a moment for two reasons, first, she said she’d never ever seen any Japanese there in Moscow on vacations and that she’d never heard anyone speak English so well and fluently, but Hideki saw something in the way she looked at him that made his skin crawl a bit…)
“Kaito…”
“Now what??”
“I’m sure…she thinks we’re gay…”
“Not THAT again…”
“Really!!! I can swear that that small talk about the English and Japanese people was just to see how we reacted!!”
“You’re deluded…”
“I’m most certainly not!!! And you know it…”
“Hideki…to begin with….I’m too old for being gay…and secondly, WHY the hell are you so damn obsessed with that since we went to London?!?!?!! It’s almost as if the air there had suddenly got that into your head!!”
“Is that even possible??”
“Anyone who heard you would say it is…”
“Oh well…how much time do we have left??”
“An hour…yep, exactly an hour…”
“Ka-Kaito? You know…I don’t think the coffee was such a good idea…I’m beginning to feel just wa~~y too sleepy…”
“Damn…I’d forgotten…and I don’t want to drag you to the train…”
“I don’t mind…”
“I SO DO…sooo…give me that cup…”
“No…”
“Give it…”
“Yada…”
(Kaito snatched the cup away from Hideki and called the waitress, Hideki was practically laying upon the table, he asked the waitress for the bill, the waitress made the sum quickly and Kaito paid as quickly as he could, he grabbed Hideki and put his right arm around his own neck while circling his waist with his own arm and practically dragging him out of the café, the waitress giggled a bit at the sight and said something weird in Russian he didn’t want to even begin to figure out what it could have meant, Hideki began to mumble in his caffeine-induced sleep…)

(They sat on a bench near the platform where their train was due to arrive, and where the cold air brought Hideki slowly back to his senses, he was leaning on Kaito’s shoulder…)
“Damn…”
(Hideki yawned and began sitting properly)
“You’re not going to tell me you don’t remember anything, are you??”
“Ah Kaito…sorry…”
“Nevermind…”
“If I tell you something, you’ll believe me??”
“That depends…”
“That coffee…”
(Kaito turned to him)
“What about it?”
“Caffeine doesn’t get to the blood-stream that fast…and surely it doesn’t affect me so quickly…”
“You mean…there was drug in it??”
“I don’t want to jump to conclusions…but I think it’s highly probable…”
“That could mean…a lot of things…of course not good at all…”
“Sure…”
“God…this is just getting too risky…”
“Doesn’t that make it funnier??”
“If you like to be hunted…”
“It kind of attracts me…”
“You’re insane…”
“Oh yes~~~”
“Hey…we have to go…that’s our train…”
“So quickly???”
“You slept through the hour…”
“Oh well…let’s go then…”
(Hideki stood up and walked towards the train while Kaito just stared at him for some minutes, thinking about what Hideki’d said about the coffee, it didn’t quite make sense, but one never knows…Hideki calling him brought him back to reality)
“Hey let’s go! I want to end this quickly!!”
“Yeah yeah…I’m coming…”
(The trip to New Delhi was safe enough, and not as long as they’d thought it’ll be, one day and a half, when they reached New Delhi, they immediately noticed the weather change, so they had to carry the coats and they decided to stay one night there, they needed to take a shower and stuff…)
“Why oh why???”
“Now what?? You’re not going to complain about the room are you??”
“No…the room’s fine, I’m just complaining about having to share it with you…”
“…shut up…damn brat…”
“You don’t have the right to call me that…you’re not much older than me, you know?”
“But I AM, I’ll go first…”
“Yeah right, ignore me…”
“Did you say anything??”
(They spent the day in a normal fashion, they didn’t even bother in going out of their room, Kaito didn’t like India, and Hideki thought it was way too hot for his liking, so they passed the night quickly and left early in the morning for Cambodia…they reached Angkor Watt at about 10 a.m., it wasn’t as hot as New Delhi, and the sun wasn’t that high when they went to the most abandoned part of the complex, Hideki brought out his lap, which he’d been carrying ever since they came out of Tokyo and the hacking began…)
“Are you in yet??”
“Yeah, that was waay too easy…almost scary…”
“Yeah, yeah…hurry up so we can get rid of that thing before they notice you…”
(A few minutes went by while Hideki looked through the data base, scrolling back through the dates, years, finally he reached the middle 1800’s, he began copying the info, and just when he was about to sign out, the system spotted him, the page closed and Windows reported Spyware infection, that it was just the mere way of saying, “Hey, we found you, you’re inside our system, so now, we are tracking you down”)
“Shit…they found me…”
“Hurry…”
(He opened his e-mail and stuffed the data in a single mail, tagged it and wrote another e-mail quickly, the secondary one, sent the mail and gave his account a termination time: 1 hour and it will cease existing, he figured out he’d have to do the same with the one he sent it too after downloading the data, and again, not in Japan, or they’ll find out, after that, he stood up, with the laptop in his right hand, and threw it away, they were in the southernmost part of Angkor Watt, so they were kind of near to the natural depression of 4 km of perimeter that surrounded all of Angkor Watt, they heard the cracking sound the machine made, hitting the rocks, as they walked away to depart for Phnom Penh…)

(Via boat they reached Singapore, they made the trip via boat during the night, Kaito was asleep, apparently the jet-lag hat had taken its toll on him, but not Hideki, he was used to travelling during the night, this time, they had separated cabins, so Hideki was watching anime on the TV, they had satellite service of course, someone knocked and he muted the TV, approaching slowly to the door, ever since the coffee incident in Moscow he somehow had grown wary…)
“Yes??”
“Mr. Iwamoto?? I have something I was asked to give you…”
“Ok…”
(He opened the door a bit, peeking outside he saw it was one of the girls of the crew, she was holding what seemed like a letter in her hands…)
“Sorry to disturb at his hour but, a gentleman asked me to give you this when we set sail, and I couldn’t find you earlier…”
(She offered it to him, he took it…)
“Did the man give his name?? Or anything of the sort??”
“No…he seemed to be Japanese too…but he didn’t say anything else…”
“Ok thanks…”
“You’re welcome, good night…”
(He closed the door and went back to the bed, raising the volume of the TV again, he couldn’t say he trusted the letter nor anything he’d been told about it by the girl but he opened it anyway, it said that someone would be waiting for him in the fourth floor deck at 4 am, it was in English and there wasn’t anything else written…he peeked at the clock, it was 3:45…)
“How convenient…”
(He turned off the TV, and putting on his shoes he wondered that, like they were in the sea the weather couldn’t be very cold, so he left the coat there and only grabbed a sweater he’d brought and went to the fourth floor deck...his cabin was in the second deck, it wasn’t that far, he reached the fourth deck in 10 minutes because of being checking along the way of not being followed and actually there weren’t a lot of people outside, he figured out that most of the passengers would be asleep or in the lobby or stuff…when he reached the 4th floor deck it was empty, his cell-phone said it was already 4 am, he let 15 minutes pass by and nothing happened, he couldn’t hear anyone approaching, just the silent sound of the waves hitting the boat and the wind…he was actually a bit mad because of being disturbed in the middle of watching anime when he went back to his cabin…)

(After arriving in Singapore, they took a flight to Sydney…)
“Do you have the CD??”
“Here…”
(Kaito handed him the CD and he copied the data from the English data base to it, he quickly terminated the account and took out the CD as soon as it finished ripping, after turning off the computer he said)
“Do you think we have to get rid of this one too? I kind of like it…”
“If we want to absolutely leave no trace behind…guess we have to…whatever, you can buy a better one once we get back to Tokyo…”
“Excellent…so what do you think? Do we through it into the ocean??”
“Sounds eerie…kind of corpse-like eerie, but it’s a good idea…”
“Ok…do you think they found the other one, back in Cambodia??”
“I don’t think so…I don’t think the tourists found it and if they did, they completely ignored and I DON’T think the monks found it…”
“…I’m hungry…when is the next flight to Tokyo departing??”
“Um…at 3 o’clock…which is too early, there’s another one at 9 o’clock…”
“Ok…that sounds perfect…why don’t you go buy the tickets while I find some place to eat??”
“Ok…”

(A girl entered a phone cabin and dialled a long, international call number…a cell-phone ringing…someone answers it…)
“Hello?”
“He went to the deck…”
“Really??”
“Yeah…he kept on searching for someone while he went though…I’m sure he felt observed…”
“It’s ok as long as he didn’t find you…so where are they now??”
“Australia…do you want me to keep on tailing them??”
“I don’t think it’ll be necessary…they will be coming back to Tokyo pretty soon, isn’t it??”
“Yes…”
“I can’t believe they went through all that trouble just to gain some information from an English data base…I mean, they could have hacked it from any other location without going all the way to the other side of the world!!”
“It seems they are pretty despaired to find you…”
“Whatever…I’ve got no plans of meeting them any time soon…”
“So what should I do??”
“Get back to Sendai…we’ll meet there at the same place as always…until then…don’t contact me anymore…”
“Alright…”
(The cell-phone closed, the girl hang up and got out of the cabin and walks down the street until she turns around a corner and disappears…)

(Hideki fell asleep during the flight, there was a turbulence, twice, and still he didn’t wake up, until they got to Tokyo, when they were on the airport, grabbing their things and almost exiting, Hideki suddenly froze)
“What’s wrong??”
“I…I…nothing, never-mind, let’s get out of here…quickly…”
“God you’re weird…”
(A car was parked near where they were, a person inside had been watching, but suddenly lost interest and drove away, smiling weirdly, Hideki followed it with the gaze, his skin still was crawling from meeting that cold gaze, he was so concentrated he didn’t hear Kaito’s voice calling him)
“Hideki!!! God, answer, will you?????”
“Sorry….soooorrry….what??? what is it????”
“You’re zoning out, that’s not like you, at least not when you’re in some state resembling consciousness…what’s wrong??”
“It’s just…um, I’ll tell when we get to my house…it’s not…safe, out here…for me to tell you, that is…”
“I’m not even going to ask, should we take the metro??”
“Nah…a taxi’ll do…”
“Alright…”

(After getting past the door, his skin stopped crawling, instantly, it was weird, he dropped his luggage, so did Kaito, and then they went to the living room, Hideki fell tiredly upon the couch while Kaito stood standing, eyeing him questioningly)
“What?? Do I have something on my face??”
(Kaito sat on the couch across him)
“…you said you’ll tell me why you were zoning out…”
“Oh yeah…I forgot…didn’t you see that black car on the airport, parked near, really near us?? Actually, it was parked near the crossroad, it felt eerie…spooky…”
“Not really…”
“Oh God…”
“What’s wrong about that??”
“I don’t know…it had such a grim aura surrounding it, the driver, specifically the driver, it was at first when we got to the airport, since we landed I felt someone watching, and then…that, damn driver!!”
“Do you think…it might be him?? I mean, this is all too much like the feeling you said that waitress gave you back in Moscow…”
(Hideki’s head jerked up, staring at Kaito)
“It couldn’t possibly…why?? And about the waitress…that was a little bit different…just a little…”
“Why what?? Why was it so eerie? Or why was it watching us??”
“It’d be nice to have the answer to both…”
“No can do…”
“Ugh…”
(Hideki fell; face down to the couch again)
“I don’t want to go on with this…”
“What?!?!?! Are you insane!?!?! We’ve already come this far!! We can’t just quit right now just because some eerie guy came up!!”
“Ok, ok, you’re right!! What time is it??”
“7 o’clock…it’s not late…why don’t we go to that sushi bar you like in Shinjuku??”
“Sounds good…I’m hungry…”
(When they got out of Hideki’s house, he didn’t feel that eerie atmosphere anymore, so they went to the sushi bar and ate, they were there for about 2 or 3 hours…when they came back to Hideki’s house, they decided that Kaito’ll have to stay since it was already kind of late and the both were tired from the damn useless trip, Kaito said he was exhausted, so he went straight to sleep, and Hideki, being Hideki, went to his room, yes, but didn’t fall asleep, he watched TV for a little while, read, and about 2 or 3 in the morning he finally fell asleep, he’d turned off the lights a while ago, so everything was dark, except from the lights that came from outside but were nothing more than a reflection and the sounds from a busy city such as Tokyo, any other disturbance was muted…)

(A few hours before dawn, maybe around 3:30 or 4 a.m., when the moon is at it’s highest point in the sky, he walked across the streets, with his pawn walking right next to him, their shadows thinned and paled away enticingly in the cold moonlight, once they reached his house, he laid on his bed, naked under the sheets, he thrashed, he tossed, he knew he’ll find no rest in there, so he actually was beginning to think why did he decide to come here of all places, his hands slid from his hair, where they had been pulling the black strands in despair, crawled like spider legs down his cheeks, and the fingertips came to rest on the lips, the mouth half-opened, forming a fake smile, as the eyes rolled back and the lids fell upon them, sealing away the violet-grey irises from the outside, his pawn sat next to him, stroking his head, trying to sooth him, trying to loll him to sleep in some stupid, restless and oh so endearingly, so, so, annoying and childish way that only she knew, his hands scratched his neck, more tickling than actually causing pain, they remained there for a bit, until he embraced himself, his head thrown back, his pawn settled her head on his stomach, holding one of his wrists, he rose slowly, she did the same, and he embraced her, like if he was afraid of breaking her, like he actually meant it but she knew better, she knew he only was on one of his blood trances, during which he needed someone to hold onto…and to suck the blood from...so he spoke to her ear…)
“I desire his blood…I WANT it…I can’t stand it…the hunger…I can imagine it dripping from my mouth, from my hands…I WANT it…”