Chaos in Kadoma Ward – Chapter 6

I try to memorize the area in which I’m expected to live, though my eyes glaze over and my brain fills to max capacity. Rin’s high-rise building stands on a corner, about four blocks away from the nearest subway stop. The vicinity offers the usual conveniences, a small diner across the street, a tablet repair shop next door, and an office building next to that. Everything is built into buildings that soar into the sky. I’d lament the lack of green space, but every street displays mature trees, vines crawl up the corners, and potted flowers line the walkways.

Kadoma Ward is a mixture of residential and business, low on the entertainment scale but high in comfortable amenities. I can be okay with that. I don’t even know what these people do for fun. What are their movies like? What about clubs or gambling? I remember when the first club opened on Orihimé, and how many people fell on either side of the line of mistake or blessing. I could dance all night long, but only occasionally.

The doors to Rin’s building whoosh open and the lobby is sedate with polished stone, warm wood walls, and soft lighting. People sit in chairs, talking in low voices, and a woman at the front desk bows to us as we breeze past.

“Good evening,” she says, not asking who I am. Good. They mind their own business.

At a bank of elevators, Rin waits, his eyes scanning the staff, the lobby, everywhere but looking at me. I guess this is his usual state of being, alert and ready to cut an android in half. I wonder if he’s ever killed a human. Has he ever messed up?

“Rin Hara. Twenty-ninth floor,” a soft female voice chimes from an opening elevator.

“This one.” He jerks his head at the open door. I follow him in.

“All of your systems seem to be efficient,” I say, as the doors slide closed. “The elevator came on its own without you calling for it.”

“Sure. All elevators work like that.”

He would die if he saw the primitive things we have on Orihimé. But that’s what happens when a population is oppressed and forced to live without technology for hundreds of years.

I lift my right wrist. “Will the elevator work for me?”

“It should, but because I own the residence, it responds to me first.”

Hmmm, I wonder where, when, and how these microchips work? Where does all my personal data go? Who has access to what? Does some corporation have all the data on everything Rin has bought or eaten, everywhere he’s been?

“I…” I bite my lip, remembering the dressing down I got upon arrival here and Rin’s annoyance with me. I have a million questions, and I’m hungry for answers. I have to remember that Rin is one of them, and he has no obligation, really, to be nice to me. Though I feel he’s trying his best to be open and tolerant, I saw how uncomfortable he was inserting me into his personal life at Kotashi’s noodle shop. Hell, anyone from a thousand kilometers away could see how uncomfortable he was. His demeanor was a blinking neon sign with circles and arrows pointing to him, screaming, ‘I’m not okay with this.’

“What?”

I backtrack. “Nothing.” I’m saved when the doors open.

“This way.” He leads me from the elevator bank and towards a window that points away from the city across the lowlands to the sea beyond. “This is how you’ll always know which way to come when you exit the elevator.” He hangs a right, past the window, and two doors down, we stop at apartment 2911. The door clicks open with no visible sign of a lock. “And the door will respond to you as well if you want to come and go. No need to worry about locks or getting locked out, okay? I handled everything on the way down from Kurai.”

He sighs as he enters his apartment and dumps his bag inside. I let the door click closed behind me and press my back to it, watching him interact with his personal space. He kicks his shoes off and leaves them in a jumble right next to his bag. Walking across the tiny main entryway, he rubs his neck and rolls his shoulders as his feet scratch along the short carpet into the family room.

“Lights up. Give me the jazz club and a playlist. Something quiet.” A soft illumination rises in the main rooms, and light jazz music hums from hidden speakers before the room changes and becomes a jazz club.

I gasp at the realness of the scene. Musical instruments appear along the wall like they’re waiting for musicians. Three café tables with flickering candles occupy the middle of the room, and the walls and ceiling darken to look like wood. Rin pauses to stare out the main window. Its floor-to-ceiling view of the grassy lowlands seems to stretch forever.

Panic at the alien surroundings grabs me and pushes me under the raging river once again. I didn’t know tōsha would be a part of Rin’s life. This is so strange and wrong, and I have to dig deep in my brain to realize why. The tōsha are a way to eschew everyday life. They’re a substitute for living in the present. Does everyone use projections like this at home? Is this how they get away from their jobs, the cycle of work and sleep?

My chest caves, a phantom kick to my heart. This is not my home. I’ll never see my home again. I may never have dinner with my older brother again or hear my mom squeal with glee when my story is the lead in the nightly news broadcast. I slide my back down the door and plop onto the floor, pulling my knees up and resting my forehead on them.

I regret my decision to join the Hikoboshi mission. It seemed like the right idea at the time. I was getting away from home, the place that coddled me and kept me soft. I was getting away from Takéji. Every time I looked at him with my brother, I thought about my failures. I wanted to do something good with my talents on this trip.

“Everything’s gone horribly wrong,” I whisper down at my feet. It’s been weeks since I’ve known what my fate would be, a part of Rin’s household, not expected to do anything but work and help earn back the money Aka Matsuba spent on me. Staying out of trouble, as Tamura put it. When I was with Kazuo and Shintaro, though, I could believe I was my own person. Now, I’m absorbed into a system I don’t even understand.

Something cold and wet knocks lightly against the side of my head. I blow out a long breath, making sure my eyes aren’t stinging with tears, before I look up. Rin stands over me, a beer in each hand.

“Thanks,” I whisper, taking the beer on offer.

He kicks his shoes aside and sits down next to me on the floor, his back against the door and his shoulder rubbing mine.

We sip our beers in silence for a few moments. The bitter bubbles of beer bite my tongue and remind me that some things are universal, even with light years between Earth and here.

“Is it really that bad?” Rin asks.

“What?” My life? My situation? The noodles I ate? The train we took?

“My apartment. I mean, I wondered what you would think. You said your family lives on an estate at home, so I figured my place would be a disappointment.”

Your place is gorgeous and weird and scary and comforting. And I don’t know what to think of the tōsha.

But I can’t say any of that.

My eyes shift left and right. “Why would you even care what I think?”

“I… I don’t know.” He sighs again and stretches forward. I keep hearing him sigh, over and over, and I wonder if that’s a thing with him, or if it’s something he’s only picked up since he met me. Sighing means defeat. It means ‘I’m tired,’ of this, of you, of everything.

“We talked about this on Kurai. This” — I point between us — “is a business relationship, you said. Right?”

He pauses, hopefully remembering the night we sat down and hammered all this out. He said to me, point blank, ‘This is nothing more than a business relationship. We’ll stick together until your people come, keep Tamura happy, and then you can go and we don’t have to see each other ever again.’ He seemed pleased with this choice too. It was something he wanted, and I read it in the confident nod of his head and his crossed arms.

“Right. You’re right.” He holds out his beer, and I knock my bottle against his. “Come explore your new home.”

“It’s your home —”

“No.” His voice is firm as he stands up. I follow the line of his body from his black socked feet, past his legs and waist, up to his frustrated face. “It’s your home too. You’re part of my household now and a part of this space. I need you to feel comfortable here, or I won’t feel comfortable here. This is my sanctuary. It’s the only place I have that doesn’t require my sword and the dedication of my life.”

“Is that why you’ve never had dependents?” I haul myself off the floor, but I’m bone tired. If there’s a bed in my new bedroom, I’m going to sink into it and sleep for days. The gravity must be stronger here.

“You’ve unearthed my dirty secret. Congratulations.”

“Is that why you and your wife broke up? You couldn’t stand sharing your space?” I try to keep my tone light and conversational, but I’m sure I give away my nervousness. If they broke up because he’s too isolationist, I’m in for a bumpy ride.

“My ex-wife divorced me because she missed dating other people. I apparently asked too much in wanting to see her and only her.” He puts his hand on my back and gently pushes me forward into the apartment, but I drag my feet, too intrigued by this story to give it up so easily and a bit reticent over the jazz club projections.

“She… Did she cheat on you?”

He huffs and looks away. “Everyone cheats. Monogamy might as well be a fairytale.”

His face falls, and he sighs again. There it is. The ‘I’m tired of this’ sigh. Me or circumstances?

My body heats with anger for him and this society they’ve all fashioned. What the hell? Couples cheat. No one has babies. People work too much. This isn’t life.

“Do you believe in fairytales?” I ask him, somewhat serious.

“What would be the point of that?”

Taking a deep breath, I rub my eyes and cheeks and let go as I walk farther into the apartment.

“Right. Me neither. There are no fairy godmothers or knights in shining armor. I lost the only man I ever loved to my own fucking brother. Just imagine all the jokes I’ve heard over that one.”

“Sorry,” he says, looking at the floor.

“Not your fault.”

It was entirely mine.

I skirt past the empty table tōsha and take in the view, a view I’m sure I’ll see a lot of in the months ahead. It’s peaceful, and I understand why Rin would pay more for a place that had this luxury.

When I’m done, I turn and stand with my arms crossed, looking at the jazz club. It all looks so real. I reach out to touch the chair, and my brain expects my fingers to make contact with it, but they float straight through.

I snatch my hand back. Rin chuckles, but I shake my head.

“How do they form here?”

“There are generators in the floors, ceilings, and walls. In every room. Do you like them?”

“They give me the creeps.”

Rin raises an eyebrow. “Tōsha off,” he says, lifting his voice. All the projections disappear, and my heart rate calms. That’s better. “Music?”

“The music’s fine.”

I take a deep cleansing breath before turning around and dropping onto the couch. I bounce and give the cushions my full weight. Comfortable. The whole living room is nicely balanced with a couch, screens on the opposite wall and a low shelf with pieces of art, bowls and delicate metal animal sculptures — an owl, a fish, a horse.

Rin, done with talk about his ex-wife, leaves me be and enters his kitchen. I lie on the couch and stare at the ceiling for a moment, wanting to sink into oblivion and maybe handle the rest of my life some other day.

The light outside is waning, and the day is coming to a close. What will bedtime be like? How will we share the bathroom? I roll on my side and watch Rin in the kitchen. He’s cleaning out his refrigerator, dumping old food into a bin on the wall. I guess, even in this advanced society, food still spoils when you’ve been away for six weeks.

“Looks like we’ll have to raid the freezer for dinner tonight or I can order something.” His attention is on the kitchen. “Why don’t you go check out your room? It’s the first door on the left, down the hall.”

“Okay.”

Inside the small bedroom, the floor-to-ceiling window is partially covered with sliding opaque, dark paper screens. A large bed takes up half the room, stripped of sheets like he took them off a year ago and didn’t bother to remake the bed after the divorce. I’m surprised he did nothing with the room, but judging by his dedication to his job, I doubt he’d have reason to use the room for a hobby or anything.

A low, long dresser along the inside wall has several framed photos sitting on it. I like this attention to archaic Earth objects, photos in frames instead of digital wall videos. I pick up one photo, and Rin is with a beautiful woman, standing on a cliff edge with a canyon behind them. This must be his ex-wife.

“That’s Atsumi,” Rin says, making me jump and clutch my heart. I didn’t see him in the doorway. “Sorry. This building is quiet. You’ll never hear the neighbors, even if they join a heavy metal band.”

“This is your ex?”

“Yeah. Sorry. I should’ve put the photos away ages ago, but I never came in here. Hopefully, it’s not too dusty.”

I swipe my finger along the dresser, and yeah, there’s a layer of dust. I’ll clean it later.

“She left behind clothes.” Rin touches the front of a drawer, and it slides open. Shirts are jumbled up in disarray, a messy exit from Rin’s life. She left behind pants, underwear, even bras too.

“Why didn’t she take any of this?”

He shrugs his shoulders, leaning against the wall. “She packed in a hurry and left. Never came back. I was served with a divorce contract termination a week later. I asked her if she wanted anything, and she said I could just burn whatever she left behind.”

I stare at the photo of the two of them, trying to divine secrets from one moment in time. I’m struck with the beautiful symmetry of Atsumi’s face, heart-shaped and flawless. Her stance is firm and confident, her shoulders back and straight, chin lifted. She’s a porcelain doll made for intense board meetings and hiking in the woods. “She’s pretty,” is all I have to say.

“Looks aren’t everything.”

“I’m not so sure about that.” Kengo said as much earlier. If only I were pretty, then at least I would be worth the money. At least I’d be eye candy.

“I have extra bed linens, so don’t worry about that. We’ll make dinner, and —”

A soft, low chime rings through the room, and a disembodied female voice declares, “You have a visitor. Atsumi Sekino requests access to the apartment.”

“What the hell is that?” I ask, looking around.

Rin’s jaw tightens. “Atsumi? What does she want now?”

He stalks out, and I follow him to the front door. The door has changed, a screen overlay showing Atsumi standing in the hallway. I recognize her face from the photo, but she’s dressed for business in a smart suit with her hair down around her shoulders. Rin taps on the screen.

“Atsumi, can it wait till tomorrow? I just got home.”

“Rin, we have to talk now. I know Yumi Minamoto is in there with you.”

Rin lets out one of his weary sighs, and it’s ten times worse than what he uses for me. Now I know where this habit comes from.

As he reaches for the door, I hurriedly smooth myself out, patting down my ragged hair and weeks’ old clothing. I don’t know why I care, but I’d like for us to get along.

“Thanks. I know it’s getting late,” Atsumi says, barging in like she owns the place. She sets her bag to the side and slides off her heels. “But we have things to discuss tonight, and I needed to see this Minamoto in person.”

She looks right through me as her voice registers in my head. I’ve heard it before.

“Really, Rin? This?” She gestures to me. “I saw the photos, but I didn’t believe them.”

“Excuse me?” I say, holding back my temper. Barely.

“Yumi Minamoto, this is my ex-wife, Atsumi Sekino. Atsumi, Yumi.”

We stand, soldier-straight.

“You will bow. I’m at least six levels above you,” Atsumi demands.

“Atsumi,” Rin growls. “Is this necessary?”

I bow anyway, confused as to how this introduction went off the rails so quickly. What have I done?

“Good,” she says, a huff in her voice. “Rin is neglecting to tell you I’m also his boss.” Ah-ha. That’s where I’ve heard her voice, when I eavesdropped on Rin in his bedroom back at the temple on Kurai. “We’ve been divorced for over a year. I’m long past ex-wife status.” She peers around me to take in the rest of the apartment. “I see nothing’s changed, though. We should sit down.”

“Not a chance. You’re not staying. I just brought Yumi home. I’d like her to get settled in.”

“How gallant of you.” Atsumi’s voice is a river of sarcasm. “But don’t get too comfortable.” She bends over and retrieves her tablet from her bag. “Do you have any idea the kind of hell you’ve put me through for the last two weeks?”

“Nooooooo.” Rin drags out the one syllable into ten or more. “I spoke with you last week, and you didn’t mention anything. What’s going on?”

“Narumi Ogawa, that bitch of a boss from Aoi Uma, has been petitioning for the removal and disposal of Minamoto for” — she scrolls through something on her tablet — “excessive property damage, illegal termination of ten androids, arson of Shiroi Nami’s temple…” She looks up from her tablet at me. Blood from my brain is sinking to my feet. “You must have friends in Shiroi Nami because they went to bat for you on that charge, but the district judges let it stay.” She clears her throat. “Breach of contract, and on and on. What the fuck were you thinking?” Atsumi spits at Rin.

Rin stiffens. “We’re not married anymore. You can’t talk to me like that.”

I take a small step back, running through possible scenarios in my head. I can run. I can hide out.

I can do so little.

“I’m your boss, and you represented Kiiroi Yama when you bought her. You got us into this mess. She is a disaster.”

I take another step back.

“She has a name. Yumi. And she was caught in the middle. It was a war zone up there. Bullets flying, swords flashing. Hell, our transport was shot down by a rocket. She sustained life-threatening injuries.” Rin’s voice rises, but Atsumi doesn’t back down.

Look at this woman hounding Rin. His ex-wife. His boss. She’s in control. She’s got Rin by the balls. My heart beats swiftly, a horse galloping through my chest, and my upper lip breaks into a sweat. If I weren’t so fucking terrified, I’d be begging her for an interview. She’s the kind of person I always wanted to be — successful, smart, ruthless. So much like my old boss, Chiéko Mori.

Where is Chiéko? Is she dead?

“I got the fucking bills.” Atsumi chucks her tablet into her bag. Slipping back into her shoes, she stops and takes a deep breath. “Look,” she says, her voice dropping, “if you let me take her now, I can make it easy on you. I’ll give her back to Aka Matsuba, and this can all go away quietly. They can deal with her and this mess. There’s no reason for you to be involved.” Her voice is sweet and rich, palliative.

Dread deepens in my chest, halting my breathing, and I open my mouth to defend myself, to beg for mercy (because I am not above that at this point) and nothing comes out. Narumi Ogawa couldn’t kill me so now she’ll use the system against me.

No one can protect me from the system.

And why would they?

“Kazuo,” I squeak out, my throat closing up. Fuck. I want to see Kazuo right now. My brother. Anyone I know! Kazuo put his faith in this man, and the longer Rin stays silent, the surer I am that he’ll hand me over.

“What?” Atsumi asks, deigning to look at me. “Did you speak to me?”

I swallow, remembering how Tamura and his assistant, Sayaka, both lost their minds when I spoke out of turn. I’m a possession, a table or a lamp, to be turned off or on, to be used. Lamps don’t talk back. Lamps don’t question.

I look at Rin, begging him with my eyes to do something.

He looks between Atsumi and me, and I think, damn. He’s not going to choose me. Why should he? I thought we’d clicked, even in a subtle, friendly way, but maybe I’ve been reading him all wrong.

I let my shoulders drop and hang my head. “I’ll get my things.” I turn to head to Rin’s bag where my knife and tablet are, the only things I have.

“Stop,” Rin says, jumping forward. I halt in my tracks. “Atsumi, I’ll deal with this the legal way.”

What? What is he saying?

“Judge Ohno, Judge Saruma, the head prosecutor, they all owe me favors. Every last one of them. I’ll call them all in. Do you really think these judges will take Ogawa’s word over mine? I’m a top ranked kenryōshi, and her corporation is this close to losing their stewardship.” Rin picks up Atsumi’s bag and shoves it at her. “Narumi Ogawa is a bitter woman who breaks the law on a daily basis. You saw my report from Kurai.”

“Yeah, about that…” She slips into her shoes. “I buried it.”

“Why?” Rin’s voice cracks.

“Because the report sounds like it came from a raving lunatic, that’s why. I’m saving your ass, though I have no idea why, when you’re insisting on sabotaging yourself with this.” She points to me again, and now I’ve had too much.

“Don’t talk to me like that,” I demand, coming closer to her. “I’m a human being, and I don’t deserve to be treated like this.”

Atsumi smiles at me, but it lacks warmth and friendliness. “You’re not one of us, outsider.” Atsumi turns to open the door. “I hope she’s at least a good lay.”

“Better than you, sweetheart,” I say, reaching out with my foot to push the door closed on her.

A saxophone blows through a solo as the apartment’s sound system keeps playing jazz, oblivious to our confrontation.

Judges, legal motions, jail time. Removal and disposal.

“Well, that changes everything,” Rin says.

“Yeah.”

I look at my feet for a long moment. I may not have much, but my feet can carry me anywhere. Can they carry me far enough away from this madness?

“Dinner?” he asks, checking the door display. He tunes into a camera in the lobby where we can see Atsumi exiting the building and walking away.

“Yeah.”

I should eat before I get the hell out of here.