The Rise of Shiroi Nami – Chapter 17

It’s hard to believe that it was only yesterday I was infiltrating my enemy’s factory and running through a theme park being chased by giant cats, but here I am. I’m standing in the middle of Awashikawa on a bright and sunny day, and I’m thinking about how to frame my first shot.

I try to clear my throat from the giant frog lodged in it, but it feels like my whole body is unhappy with me. The antibiotics and pain killers have kicked in and lowered my fever, but I still feel like I’ve been run over by a truck. I guess I’m more out of shape than I realized. Months of living on the smallest of scraps will do that to you, though.

“Coffee?” Aimi appears at my side with a steaming cup, and the scent of coffee almost knocks me over.

“Bless your heart, yes.”

She laughs as she hands over the cup. “Need it, eh?”

“Do I ever.” I sip the steaming coffee and hum in pleasure. Just the right amount of cream and sugar. “Perfection.”

I amble down the row of food stands setting up for the day, and Aimi keeps pace beside me.

“So, what’s the schedule for today? Have you spoken with Rin and Kazuo?”

“Yeah, and it looks like the day will be packed before we even get to the announcement.” She jerks her head at the steady stream of people coming in from the direction of the train station. “All of the neighboring towns are Shiroi Nami sympathetic. I’m sure they will pack this place in no time.”

I hand her the extra camera. “Are you from around here?”

“Yeah, actually, my family is from this area. My parents died when I was young, and Aunt Reina adopted me into the Shiroi Nami family not long after. I’ve lived out most of my adult life on the Southern Continent around more of the upper echelons of the corporation. Then I spent time on Kurai too.”

I stop and turn to her. “Tell me the truth about all of this.” I wave my hand at our surroundings. “When we first crash-landed here, we were told by Aka Matsuba and Aoi Uma that Shiroi Nami had been exiled to Kurai. I didn’t think there would be this many people who would sympathize with them. Was I lied to?”

Sorting out this story is essential for putting together the picture of power here. I’ve only seen glimpses over time, and not everyone was very forthcoming about the details. Details made them look bad, and they couldn’t have that.

“Oh yes,” she says with a laugh. “You were lied to. You don’t get rid of a whole corporation employing thousands of people by exiling their executives and their families to a moon.” She rolls her eyes. “As if that would even be possible, right?”

“Right,” I agree with her. We step out of the way of more people streaming into town and heading straight for the local bakery. They’re already set up for the day with a bright and colorful banner and loads of baked goods on the tables out front. “Makes sense. So while Aka Matsuba and Aoi Uma thought they had gotten rid of their competition…”

Aimi fills in the rest. “Instead, they had made virtual martyrs of the leaders and caused everyone left behind to work harder in secret.” She lifts her finger. “And make no mistake, they are martyrs even if they’re still alive. They were all sterilized so they couldn’t pass the corporation down to legal offspring.”

Eugenics has always bothered me as a concept, and killing off an entire family, my distant family, makes my blood boil.

Aimi turns around and walks backwards so she can talk and face me at the same time. “Hey, I had an idea, and I wondered if you would be into it or not.”

I try not to be suspicious. “What’s that?”

“I thought we should broadcast bits and pieces of what we make along the way to filming this larger documentary. We can start our own news network on the underground forums. I have access to them and can set up our own, kind-of, portal where we post things regularly.”

A brilliant idea. Imagine having my own news network! I wonder what Chiéko would think of it. I pause my walk and turn my face to the sun. I wish they were all here, but Shintaro is making good headway bringing everyone together in Shin-Osaka. He and Chiéko were both in my messages to tell me how brave and stupid I was in Amagasaki yesterday. I take these as compliments.

“I love this idea. Thank you for bringing it to me.”

I don’t know what comes over me, but I throw my arms around Aimi’s neck and hug her tight. She hesitates for a moment before she hugs me back.

“Thank you for yesterday, too.” I lower my voice and pull away. “You were fabulous. A real force of nature.”

“Oh shit,” she says, waving at me. “Don’t make me blush, Yumi.” She lets out a gigantic sigh. “Besides, we’re family now. Practically blood. If you need help, I’ll be there.”

“Thanks.” I squeeze her arm. “Same, but that means Shintaro is also your family. I hope you’re ready for his constantly devious behavior.”

She throws her head back in a laugh. “Trust me. I can handle him.”

We break off, each of us taking a camera and circling the festival stalls. I finish my coffee, take a quick breather for some energy, and then wander for a bit, strolling along while no one knows who I am. There are people here, I’m sure, who have seen my diary entries online, but I look a lot different now with my short hair and slimmer frame. It’ll be a little while before people get to know this new me.

When I see a break in the action at one particular food stall, I decide to approach the man and woman who are staffing the table.

“Oh, look. I love senbei!” I pick up a package of large, round rice crackers and sniff them. “These smell amazing.”

“Just grilled them this morning,” the woman says. “Would you like to try one?” She proffers a tray of samples. The rice cracker is crunchy, sweet, and salty. It melts in my mouth.

“I love it. I’ll get two packages.”

After I’ve paid for the packs of senbei and put them into my small backpack, I explain to them both that I’m filming a documentary about the return of Shiroi Nami to the continent. Though they’re skeptical at first, they both warm-up once I take out my camera. I shake their hands, and they introduce themselves as Mr. and Mrs. Kokoda.

“Have you lived in Awashikawa for a long time?” I ask, framing them both side by side.

“Oh, no. Only until about two years ago,” Mrs. Kokoda says, continuing to replenish the supply of rice crackers as more people come to try them and listen to my interview. “We moved here when we got word from our corporation that we should move farther out of the Southern Continent to save ourselves and our businesses.”

“What was their advice?”

“Well, things were getting tough on the Southern Continent. We had a small senbei shop there, and we couldn’t make a profit, much less anything of a living, with the yakuza shaking us down every day. The corporation thought we would be safer here.”

Mr. Kokoda leans in. “The yakuza there are relentless, and I think it’s because they know their way of life is ending. With a corporation like Shiroi Nami in the lead, we never had to worry about yakuza interference. And rumors about Shiroi Nami coming back made the yakuza crack down even harder.”

Anxiety rises in my chest, but I concentrate harder on my subjects.

“Have you ever been to the Southern Continent, dear?” Mrs. Kokoda asks.

“Yes, I have. I spent a few trying months in Kitakyushu, and then…” I close my eyes and think hard about the town we went to next. What was it called? Something with an S. And there was an estate there. I shake my head. “Anyway, yes, I have been there. The Southern Continent has a lot of charm.”

“It does,” Mrs. Kokoda says, her face lighting up with a smile. “The yakuza were horrible, but I never had to worry about androids. Here, I’ve been worried about androids constantly until I saw the stories of what happened yesterday. Did you know there have been no cases of android malfunctions since the big fire at the factory in Amagasaki?”

“It’s all she can talk about,” her husband chimes in. “We think Aoi Uma got hacked.”

“And a good thing, too,” she says, nodding her head. “That corporation needs to go. Shiroi Nami has always been where our hearts and credits lie. We don’t need anyone else.”

“Thank you.” I shut off my camera and slip it into my pocket. “I appreciate you speaking to me.”

“Anytime, dear.” Her smile reminds me of someone… an older woman I met on the Southern Continent. Who was that?

After another hour of circling the food stalls and doing impromptu interviews, I realize I’m parched and on the verge of a migraine. Everything about my body hurts. My brain is in a fog, and my eyesight is blurry too. I’m probably just tired, but I don’t want to push things. I’m on a lot of meds, after all.

And I have an infection, too. Don’t forget that, Yumi.

Don’t forget. Don’t forget.

I sit down at an empty table and pull my little notebook from my bag. Running my shaking hand over the cover, I close my eyes and force myself back to the time when Kazuo gave it to me. It was before we went to rescue Rin, before so many other things happened. It feels like a lifetime ago.

Flipping through the pages, a sense of calm warms me from my belly to my chest. Right, that town was Susami, and Rin lived there in the little apartment above the florist. Susami, Susami. I say the name over and over, try to make it stick. Then yes! It was Grandma Endo, the woman who sheltered us in the no-name town by the sea where Saki lived with other Fukusha Model Seven rejects.

I glance up in time to catch Saki wandering through the food stalls. Raising my hand to grab her attention, I call her name, and she smiles and comes right over.

“How are you feeling?” she asks, sitting down. “I saw Aimi on the other side of the festival taking video and interviewing people. I was wondering if you were resting or not.”

“Just taking a seat for a few moments. Catching my breath. See anything you’re interested in?”

“Food, of course,” she says, her smile edged with wickedness. “I figure maybe if I keep trying, the food will taste good someday.”

“Well, at least you can store it in your fake leg.”

She laughs, throwing back her head. “I remember that conversation.” She sighs. “Though everything before the reprogramming feels like a dream.”

I nod, not wanting to break the magic of this moment, the awareness of the before and after. It’s like finding religion or getting in shape and realizing how bad off you were before.

“Hey, I wanted to follow-up with you about Samurai Seven.”

If Saki wasn’t an android, she would have had some physical tell to let me know if I was treading on dangerous ground here. But she is calm and silent.

“Have you heard from any of those other people I met when I was in the town with you?”

She shakes her head. “No. My guess is they went into hiding after we left. Probably for good after the battle in Susami.” She pauses for a moment, watching a family walk by with their kids running around their feet. “I often think about them and wonder what’s going on. They were the closest thing I had to family, you know. My brother is gone, though I suppose a fraction of his consciousness could be somewhere in Aoi Uma’s databanks. And I wonder if those people left behind got the laws and what they thought of our solution.”

“If they’re still in that town by the sea, then possibly not. They were off the grid to begin with, right?”

“Yeah, we had severed ourselves from Aoi Uma’s update network way before we had moved to that town.”

“Is this something we need to worry about? Aoi Uma having androids that won’t update?”

She shrugs, and I love that she still does so many human things in her android body. “Maybe? My guess is it’ll be a tiny percentage. And the laws are sticky. Isao was brilliant. He built it into several subroutines that feed other subroutines. It’ll take them months to wipe the laws from all their models. Months they don’t have.”

That’s true. We’re in swift-attack mode, blitzkrieg. Today is technically our only day off, and even then, this festival is a propaganda machine. It’s a way for Shiroi Nami to come out of hiding. Tomorrow, we’ll be gone again, giving no time for Aoi Uma to come after us.

Because I don’t want to rest on my laurels here. There can be no time to waste. We’ve tried to play the subtle underground game, and it didn’t work. Now, we have to fight, keep on punching until Aoi Uma is down and begging for mercy. There is no other way.

We’re quiet together for a bit while more people arrive in town, and the lines start to lengthen at the food stalls. Far into the mayhem, Rin and Kazuo are talking while waiting in line for yakitori and rice bowls. They appear relaxed and casual, sharing a laugh while Kazuo makes big gestures about something. I rest my head on my hand and smile at them. Saki looks between us and nods.

“I’m happy you and Rin are still together after everything that happened before I was shut down. I often hear from Shiroi Nami people that he can’t be trusted. Why do you think that is?”

A burst of chills covers my shoulders as anger rises in my chest. But I push it down. I push it way, way down. Because I’m sick of letting my anger rule me. Anger is not productive anymore. It doesn’t spur me to make good decisions, only terrible ones.

“It’s because Rin is Kiiroi Yama.”

“But he’s not anymore,” she points out.

“Yes and no. No, he’s not a corporate employee anymore, but yes, he uses his influence with Yori Okamoto to get us protection and transportation and many other things we seem to need every day. Things Shiroi Nami can’t provide. When it comes down to it, Shiroi Nami doesn’t trust any other corporation. And me starting my own corporation makes the whole situation like walking on eggshells. I need to fix this somehow, and I need to fix it in a way that Shiroi Nami can’t back out.”

Saki peers out at the crowd of people, all here to support Shiroi Nami. There must be a few thousand people in town already, and more arrive every minute.

“Seems to me that, with this many witnesses, it would be a good day to back them into a corner and not let them say no.”

I pull up another chair to our table as Rin and Kazuo cross the crowded area to eat with us.

“I like the way you think, Saki. Let’s have lunch and figure out what we should do.”