Reunited – Chapter 17

The sun sets, lighting the sky in brilliant shades of pink and purple. When we leave the restaurant and come to a main road, the view stretches down the hill to the sea. Way out on the horizon, a bank of dark gray clouds sits over the ocean, lazily flickering with lightning.

“I think it’s going to rain tonight. The air is so humid right now.” Jiro rubs his hand on the back of his neck, and his palm comes away damp. “That was one thing about living in the desert in Nishikyō, no humidity. Are you okay outside? We have a bit of a walk.”

“Yeah, I’m fine. I was fine earlier, right?” He nods. “See? It’s getting better. I don’t understand my phobia, but I’ve been determined to kick it. Mind over matter.”

“You can be so practical sometimes.” He laughs and pulls me along. “But it works for you.”

We walk for ten minutes, Jiro navigating down the main avenue and off on the smaller streets.

“Mark, Oyama, and I were walking in this neighborhood after visiting the fish market and eating lunch. Did you notice anything about the shops you went to today?”

I think back on our day, but besides the coffee vendor who noticed my differences and the man who chased me out of the saké shop, I don’t remember anything strange.

We’re in a little residential neighborhood with narrow streets just wide enough to let a horse or a few bikes in on the cobblestones. The apartment buildings are four-stories high on both sides of us, and their windows are either dark or open and lit up, people making dinner or talking with their families.

“What a cute place to live. Everyone has balconies with plants, and whatever they’re making for dinner, it smells good.” Mmmm, onions and garlic.

Jiro leads me around a corner, and a small wooden shrine with a pitched-center roof sits between two buildings. How he and Mark thought to come back here, I’ll never know. Don’t they know curiosity killed the cat? (That’s a funny phrase I learned while researching cats). Besides, what’s so interesting about a little shrine? I like shrines as much as the next person, but excepting the neighborhood shrine on New Year’s Eve, I never frequented the ones in Ku 9. I’m not especially religious.

“It’s a shrine.” I wave at it, and he smiles and folds his arms across his chest.

“Obviously. Look closer.”

I swing the small doors open. The shrine is about two meters high and one meter deep, not big at all. This hutch is not a place to go in, sit seiza, and pray, only a small space for placing offerings to the gods.

Except, images of the gods don’t adorn the walls of this shrine.

My mind empties as I try to make sense of what I see here, and my mouth opens and closes but nothing comes out. Jiro walks up next to me and slips his arm around my waist.

“Our future.”

No. What I see are photos, photos of the man I’ve looked at since the day Sakai told me what I was, what kiku really meant. I see him young, just a happy, round-faced baby laughing at the camera. As an adult, talking in front of an audience, dressed in a white military uniform with a sash across his front. As an old man, sitting in the garden with his wife and daughter, all dressed in kimono.

I see Emperor Naruhito, the last reigning emperor of Japan before the wars, before the imperial family was lost to everyone but Sakai Clan who kept watch over them when no one else knew who they were. I see my great, great, great times thirty grandfather. And he’s sitting in a shrine.

A shrine!

“This is nuts. Where are the Shinto gods? Or even Buddha?”

“Don’t know. Mark, Oyama, and I were walking through here after lunch and came across the shrine. No one was here to ask.”

“I’m frightened by whatever you and Mark thought of this.”

“I thought we’d find you here.”

I whirl around at the sound of Sakai’s voice as he turns the corner with everyone in tow.

“Ah, good. I was worried I had the wrong complex.” He joins Jiro and me, on my other side, and smiles while gazing into the shrine with me. “This is amazing, right?”

“Mark, Mark, Mark…” I shake my head. No, this is not amazing. This is complete insanity.

Mariko peeks around Sakai, her eyes widen, and she gasps, her hands flying to her mouth. “I don’t believe it.”

“What?” Kentaro and Beni join us.

“Sanaa, if you lived here, on this planet, and your ruler was a tyrant, a despot, who couldn’t be overthrown, no matter how hard you tried, who would you go to for help?”

I take a moment to drink in more of the shrine. It’s not just photos. There are fresh flowers in here. An orange. A small dish of rice. A piece of paper tucked in with a wish written on it. A flyer that reads, “Stop the Heian Initiative.” Wait. I saw that in the window of the jewelry shop today.

“Who would I go to? I’d probably pray to the gods to strike him down. Pray he fell ill or was swallowed up by an earthquake or something.”

Sakai nods his head and rubs at his jaw. “But what if you weren’t on Earth anymore? And the gods didn’t mean as much here as they did back home?”

I smirk at Sakai. He loves to lead me down these logical trails and see where I go with them. “Shinto is a way of connecting with the past, and our gods are all based in the trees, the land, the rivers, in nature, but there’s nature here, Mark. I don’t see why they would need to abandon the gods and worship… this.” I wave my arms at the shrine. Worship the Emperor? But then, why not? Throughout history, the Emperor was revered and loved. It’s not a huge step to go from love to worship.

“We can’t know until we start talking with the native population, but, my guess? They arrived here and didn’t feel connected with the land or the gods, so they chose a different deity. Who better than him?”

Oh no. If this is true, then what does that make me?

I reach in and pluck out the flyer. Information is printed on both sides, but the title is in large bold print, in both English and Japanese, with a diamond pattern on both sides. “I saw this in a window today. Stop the Heian Initiative…” I need to think hard about my Japanese history lessons and all those books I’ve read. “The Heian period was the 800s to around 1200, right? Classical Japan. A period when the arts, poetry, and music were important, but Japan was run by the Fujiwara clan instead of the Imperial family. Hmmm, maybe that’s what’s going on here? Maybe Fujiwara is pushing this planet further and further back in time, to capture the splendor of the Heian period, a time when his family ruled Japan. That would explain why they seem so primitive.”

“They may have started a lot more modern and been steadily going backwards, but there must be a reason why.” Sakai takes the flyer from me. “Let’s bring this home and see what Lucy says.”

A chill runs through me even though the air is warm and moist. Mariko takes off her shawl and wraps the knit around my shoulders, securing it at my neck. “Here. Don’t want you to catch a cold.” My heart leaps, and I blush under her motherly ways. She pulls my hair out from under the shawl, and I have to stop from throwing myself at her and crying in her arms. One step at a time, Sanaa.

I sigh, turn, and kneel down in front of the shrine. Grandfather, what should I do? I know what Sakai wants me to do, but what about you? These people are smart and accomplished but Fujiwara has oppressed half the population. He’s doing other things too I wonder about. Why does he conduct blood tests? Why is he pushing them so far back in time? He’s trying to keep them in check, keep them cowering and afraid of fighting, but he’s the one afraid of something, isn’t he?

“Sanaa,” Jiro says, squatting down next to me in front of the shrine. “You understand what I was saying earlier, right? We need to tell these people who you are. With this,” he gestures at the shrine, “we could motivate people to overthrow Fujiwara. There’s already a seed here. We just have to water it and grow a revolution.”