Crash Land on Kurai – Chapter 13

Footsteps along the roof echo through the life pod.

Three steps to the right.

Two steps to the left.

My heart is beating way up in my dry throat. I clutch Kazuo tight, hoping to draw strength from him.

Our heads pivot back and forth until the person stomps, thumps ringing through the interior of the pod.

“What do we do?” I whisper, bringing my white fingers to my lips. I want out. I’d rather be warm and in custody than dying of hypothermia in here. I realize it’s tradition to die on our swords, but come on. We left home on a mission, and I want the chance to accomplish it.

“Wait. They don’t know we’re in here.”

“They must. We laid out Shien.”

An ear-splitting creak accompanies the life pod tipping, the airlock moving, and more water pouring into the interior.

My breaths come short and ragged as the water climbs my chest.

“No, no, no.” I pull away from Kazuo and try to scramble away from the water, but he grabs both my hands and looks me in the eyes.

“This is what we do.” His voice is soft steel, confident. “You go out first. You come out with your hands up and begging for mercy. They’ll be distracted by you, and while that’s happening, I’ll swim out and around to the side. Come at them from behind. Okay?”

He’s crazy, but I’m dying to get out of here. Literally. He pats my hip, where he knows my blade is, and then gathers up a nylon rope floating in the water. I float up high in the rising water, hyperventilate by breathing rapidly, then dip down and through the airlock.

Through to the other side, a pair of black-clothed legs rushes up on me and pushes me further down into the water, knocking my feet out from underneath me. Shit. I didn’t even have time to come out with my hands up! I’m going to drown. This man is trying to drown me!

I flail, attempting to gain purchase in the rushing river and not inhale water at the same time. A hand grabs the back of my flight suit, yanking me up.

I gasp and kick my legs as an iron arm closes around my chest. The more of a fuss I make, the easier it’ll be for Kazuo to get out and cause mischief, so I really put my heart and soul into it. Whoever has me in his arms could pull a knife and end me, but if I’m going to go out, I’ll do it in style. I kick my legs again, but I don’t see Kazuo exit the life pod. I assume he must’ve taken the opportunity, though, because he said he would.

“Hold her still!” My eyes follow the sound of the voice. On top of the life pod, a man stands dressed all in black from head to toe. Only his eyes are uncovered.

The man who holds me grips me harder, and my chest won’t expand to bring in air.

“You’re – going – to – suffocate…” I begin to black out, my body no longer capable of handling all the stress thrown at it. It’s been a grueling day.

“Stop thrashing,” he commands in my ear, and I go limp. His grip around my chest lightens, and I draw in a deep, painful breath. When I think back and catalog all my injuries, I forgot about the rib I probably cracked in the initial volley of missiles on board the Murasaki. Then there’s my head, my hand, and the injury to my leg too. It’s enough to put me in the hospital. I’m pretty broken.

“Where are the other people that came down with this ship?”

It takes a full second to translate the dialect in my head. The man standing on the life pod used ‘fune’ for ship instead of what we use, ‘senpaku,’ and the way his words dance around charms me to no end. It reminds me of when my nanny would sing me songs at bedtime in the Osaka dialect that her grandmother and her grandmother before her would use.

“Gone,” I shout over the rush of the river, and trying to move my arms, I wiggle against the man holding me. “We split up.”

“Why would anyone be stupid enough to do that on this moon without knowing where to hide?”

I huff a laugh. Stupid? Who’s stupid? “It’s not like we wanted to crash land here, asshole. Someone shot at us without provocation.”

He kicks at the life pod. “What a lie. Doesn’t Tamura have enough power already?”

I switch to recording mode, my memory capturing every last detail he’s willing to give. Tamura. Who is that?

“Hello? We’re not from here. Can’t you tell by the way I’m speaking to you?”

He tips his head to the side.

“Can’t you tell by the way we’re dressed? By our technology?”

“Considering we wiped out everything you had, and this is very… primitive, it means nothing. A very convincing act, indeed. Kill her, Rin. We don’t need her.”

I panic, my whole body stiffening.

“Well… But…” Rin, the guy holding me, softens. His voice sounds unconvinced.

My self-defense training kicks in. I throw my arms down, straightening and twisting them. His lock around my chest breaks. I grab his left arm, pull forward, and slam my elbow into his temple. Everything moves in slow motion, the water flowing around me causing a considerable amount of resistance.

But I free myself! Rin falls backwards into the river, and I pull out my knife, ready to fight.

“Hey!” The man on the life pod squeaks as a lasso of rope flies over him, cinches him tight, and pulls him into the water.

“Get to shore, Yumi!” Kazuo holds the man under the water, kicking and flailing, much like I was a minute ago.

I turn and try to move through the current. Adrenaline has grabbed ahold of my body and forced it to stop shaking like an earthquake, but I’m disoriented and turned around. Which way did we come in from? Back on shore, I spot Shien’s body, so I move a meter in that direction.

Panic halts me. Where is Rin, the man who was holding me?

He surfaces right in front of me, lashing out with his knife and cutting me across the chest through my flight suit. I bring up my knife in time to stop him from coming back and slashing me across the throat. Knocking his arm away, I fall backwards into the water.

I want to cry, but I know that’s weak, and it’s not me. I’m not a strong fighter. No matter how many hours I sparred with my father or Kazuo or Shintaro in the dōjō, I was never strong enough to match them. My power comes with the camera. Still, I’m good with my knife. No one usually comes at me when I have my knife out. I’ve bloodied enough people to get a reputation. Something tells me these men are no amateurs though.

As my father would say, lover of baseball that he is, this is a whole other ballgame.

Rin picks me up out of the water, knocks my knife out of my hand, and brings his knife to my neck.

“Stop! You kill her, and I’ll kill this man and you, and I’ll hunt down anyone else I can find and kill them too.” Kazuo has reached a level of anger I have never seen. He seethes with crazed fury, his face red and dripping with water. The man he has in his custody still thrashes, occasionally getting to the surface to breathe before Kazuo puts him under again.

“Use your head!” Kazuo yells. “Do we look and sound like your enemy?”

Rin pauses, and I swallow, feeling the cold edge of his blade on my throat.

He relaxes, and I slowly peel myself away from him, a sob bubbling up from my stomach. I look between Rin and Kazuo, and a hard glare passes between them before Rin says, “No. You’re not my enemy.”

Kazuo pulls the man he’s drowning from the water, and he chokes, coughs, and vomits.

“Yumi, get to shore,” he commands, dragging the drowning man with him toward Shien, still laid out on the riverbank.

I’m not going anywhere just yet. Looking in the water below me, I find my knife and retrieve it. I hold it up to Rin, but he raises his hands.

“This has been in my family for generations. Never touch it.”

“Of course.”

I pay close attention to his eyes, the only part of his face I can see, and they betray his feelings. He’s confused, regretful. But why?

When I’m in the studio watching footage from interviews, I dissect every word, every twitch, every breath of a subject. Reading people is what I do best, and I have never failed to make sense of even the most arrogant or insane people. This man, Rin, is my newest obsession. If I can unlock him, I can open the door to these people. How complicated can they be?

I move far away from him, keeping him in eyesight as I follow Kazuo to the river’s edge. Kazuo dumps his prisoner on the sunburnt grass and cuts him free, walking far away from him. I follow, limping in his wake. I must have also sprained my left ankle, but I can’t tell because my whole body is numb. Shivers rack me from head to toe, and my chest bleeds, running red blood down my front. I’m lucky he didn’t cut my bra to pieces. It’s the only one I have.

I fall to my knees, unable to move any farther. If I’m going to die now, I’m grateful it’ll be on dry land. Trying to focus on something other than my wrecked body, I watch Rin emerge from the water. His walk is catlike, smooth and easy, and he keeps me to his front, never turning his back on me. Touching a spot on his collar, he spreads his arms, and his black head-to-toe suit sheds all its water in a fine mist.

I must be hallucinating. My mouth drops open at this simple bit of technology I would never have thought of, but I’m too tired and confused to believe it. His companion rises to his feet, rights himself, and sheds the water from his uniform as well. The black fabric vibrates, the water mists, and he walks away from it.

“Yumi,” Kazuo says, coming into my eye line. I focus on these men past him, wondering what the hell we’ve gotten ourselves into. “Yumi, are you okay?” He presses his hand against the wound on my chest, and his eyes travel down my body, stopping on my thigh. Blood seeps through my flight suit there, the wound busted open again. He swears under his breath. “We need to get you dry and fixed up. Now.”

He stands up and faces the two men. “Are we going to have a problem?”

They look at each other. “You’re really not from Hikari? Or Kurai?” Rin asks.

“What’s Hikari? Kurai? Is this Kurai?” I wave at the surrounding land, my investigative instincts perking up.

“Shit. I told him this was damned irregular,” the unnamed man says to Rin. “Do you think… maybe?”

Rin nods.

“Excuse me,” I say, my lips bumbling and shivering. I call upon my reserves of energy, what little I have left, to bend forward in a bow. “We haven’t been introduced. I’m Yumi Minamoto. This is Kazuo Uchiyama. We come to you from many stars away.”

What more can I say? How about something poetic and memorable?

“You are Hikoboshi, and we are Orihimé. The lovers in the stars have finally met.”