The Ghost Ships of Arizona

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Mai Kitano prepared for the greatest battle of her life.

A Yakuza communication turned up before sunrise that morning. It conveyed that their warrior had arrived near Tokyo and suggested a time and a place for their engagement. Mai liked the simplicity of the words — it inferred nor assumed anything. It was plain. And there could be no misunderstanding.

It gave her time to reflect, to prepare her mind and body for what was to come. There were no outcomes in her mental arrangements, only designs. She allowed Dai Hibiki to be her second, the one who would accompany and observe, the one who would be forced to deal with the aftermath.

Before departure, she spent a few final moments with Grace.

“I will be back soon.”

The young girl stared at the floor, her new, now natural bounciness depleted. “Will you?”

“If I do not do this a war will begin. It is a credit to my enemies that they even make such an offering.”

“A credit?” Grace looked over, her brow creased in confusion. “You’re crediting your enemies? I don’t get it.”

“There is nothing to ‘get’.” Mai didn’t explain how she was doing this to keep Grace and the entire SPEAR team safe. How much the safety of her sister and Hibiki mattered. How much she loved the new emerging woman that Grace was becoming and wanted to protect her at any cost. It wasn’t something she felt she could explain succinctly.

“Please. Be careful.” Grace’s eyes watered.

“I know of no other way to be.”

“I don’t know what I would do now if you… you…”

Mai struggled to hold onto her composure. Grace’s words raised in sharp detail Mai’s foremost concern. The young girl was doing so well, growing and developing in mind and body every day. The healing process was as well advanced as anybody could expect. If she suddenly hit a hairpin curve the terrible regression might be even worse than before.

There was no way out. This Yakuza sword was well and truly double-edged. But it also gives me the greatest reason in the world to fight hard. To win.

The actual departure was even worse, Grace clinging as long as she could and Mai struggling to keep the tears from her eyes. I have made you my ward, my conscience, my life, and now I am leaving you.

The congested road through Tokyo was almost as hard. Hibiki drove, taking the journey slowly. He knew by heart the place they sought. It was an old mountain monastery situated at the end of a steep winding road. Above the monastery was a flat plateau rarely visited, sealed off from tourists and where the resident monks occasionally worshipped.

Tonight, at sunset, it would be the unhallowed ground for Mai’s conclusive rite of passage. Mai watched Hibiki from the corner of her eye but saw no emotion there. It put her in mind of how Drake and the others would almost certainly deal with the same difficult problem — it was a soldier’s reaction minus the camaraderie and leg-pulling that came naturally to most Europeans.

Time slipped by and the roads grew less busy. The sun passed its zenith and began to wane, turning a burnished gold for what were possibly her final few hours on earth. She was thankful for it, and spent the time contemplating the events that had led her to this appointed moment.

Finally, she cleared her mind as all roads led to the monastery, with its plateau at the very top. Beyond a certain point they had to park up and walk, the twisting path passing under overhanging trees and growing narrower by the second. A cool breeze caressed Mai’s countenance as, finally, Dai Hibiki turned his overwrought face toward her.

“It’s just beyond that bend in the path. Mai, there is no point of no return. It does not have to be this way.”

Mai touched the Japanese man’s fair face with the back of her hand, looking infinitely sad. “Tell Chika I will always love her,” she paused, “and that I am sorry.”

“For not saying goodbye?”

“We did that last night. It did not need to happen again. I am just sorry it all ended up this way. Violence and death have been my mentors from a very young age.”

“The Yakuza can be beaten in other ways.”

“But not without further bloodshed. Let mine be the last drop spilt in the name of all this madness.”

Mai eased past Hibiki and negotiated the final bend in the path. Beyond, a flat paved area bordered with wooden benches extended into a wide, circular grassy expanse. Its borders were cobblestones, its boundary a sheer two-hundred-foot drop. A small contingent of Japanese men stood silently at the center of the clearing, but only one man mattered to Mai.

The Yakuza warrior, the very best of the very best, the unbeaten devil, stood with both arms crossed. More than a showdown, this truly was a battle to the death and the warrior looked more than ready. A scarred face topped an almost naked, absurdly muscled body. He did not speak but regarded her as though she were already dead.

Mai stepped out, leaving her coat on a bench as she passed. Without even a backwards glance at Hibiki, she approached the clearing. “I am here.”

“Then it is time to settle this matter.” One of the Yakuza leaders moved aside, gesturing at her. “In combat we seek justness. In death, an impartial outcome. Let it begin.”

Mai waited until the Yakuza men departed before approaching the great warrior. His name, they told her, was Aoki and he bore no arrogance, no pretentiousness and no rage. She stood in silence before him and waited for the signal. If everything she was came down to this then it was an ignominious, inglorious end and one quite befitting.

No further thoughts entered her mind in that final moment of contemplation. In absolute silence and total emptiness there was a kind of cleansing.

“Fight.”

Mai sidestepped twice as the powerful figure loosened himself up. The head rocked from side to side, slackening neck muscles. The fingers flexed in anticipation. Aoki locked gazes with her.

And struck. The act had been mere misdirection. Mai deflected his clenched fist with an upraised arm, his rising knee with one of her own. They came together briefly, breath intermingled, before stepping apart once more. Mai tested the ground. The grass and soil beneath was firm, not slippery. The air was thin. The extremities of their battleground were always going to be precarious. The pack of men to her right constituted a point of reference, Hibiki another.

Aoki’s knee rose, but it was his fist that drove at her, glancing off her temple as she ducked aside. Instantly, the Yakuza warrior spun and planted a turning heel into her abdomen. Mai felt the impact and tensed her muscles but still she staggered. Pain exploded around the partially healed bullet wound. The blow was no accident. Incensed at such trickery, Mai ignored the pain and pounced before Aoki had a chance to right himself. Delving her right hand into his ribs she also chopped her left down on the back of his neck. Aoki’s muscles were large enough to absorb both blows but he certainly felt them.

Silver flashed, and two gleaming swords landed on the green grass.

Aoki leapt for the closest. Mai ignored the weapons and again hit the warrior hard. Two blows made him groan — a chest blow and another neck punch. Aoki would already be bruised there. Mai then dived headlong as Aoki swung his entire body, sword extended. The blade barely whistled over her ducking head and even from here she heard Hibiki’s sharp intake of breath. Mai allowed her momentum to become a roll and then revolved to her feet. Aoki came fast, swinging the sword fast like a blade in a Rotavator, scything the air with each deadly stroke.

Mai saw her death approaching. The avenue of evasion was just too narrow. Last ditch efforts came to mind and Mai took up the fastest. Against all of her — and Aoki’s — instincts, she fell to the floor, kicked out and rolled. Her heels slammed into his knees, her momentum took her under the sudden downswing of the blade. Still rolling she knew she just wasn’t fast enough to gain her feet.

The blade was already slashing toward her — the killing stroke. Mai twisted in mid-roll, brought her arm up and caught the blow of Aoki’s sword on the blade of her own. She’d barely had time to snatch it up and the angle wasn’t right — so his blade slid down hers, its progress only halted by the wide hilt. The slip made him lose his balance, his face coming down until it was an inch away. Eyes of hard unfeeling granite met her own. Impossible strength pushed the blade of his sword closer and closer to her face. Her sword was trapped between them. Mai kicked her legs and jack-knifed her body but to no avail. The man was immovable, a boulder, ensnaring both her hands between their bodies and pushing down with every straining sinew.

A collective gasp of victory went up from the assembled Yakuza. But she wasn’t done yet. Mai twisted her shoulders, flung her head back. Aoki rotated with it, and every second brought the edge of his sword closer to her face.

Mai felt the cold touch a moment later. Her body was held immobile, preparing for the inevitable. The razor-edge was cold as it pressed against her, first a mere presence and then a major concern. The first trickle of blood slipped down her face, spilling down her chin and across her throat to soak into the cold grass. From here, Aoki could only get stronger. His muscles bulged. The blade sank a millimeter further. Mai gasped in pain. Blood poured, the gash now over two inches long, the skin parting. If she stopped pushing back he would slice her face clean off. This knowledge as much as anything made her fight harder, channel more strength than she knew she possessed into her arms. If only… if only she could twist or curl one more time.

But Aoki was a hardened warrior and knew all her tricks. The only emotion he showed was when he thrust his face even closer, intimidating even her final moments. The blade sank further into her face, more than a gash now, an open, flowing wound, a grievous injury. Blood turned the grass into a deep, crimson mud. Not a sound could be heard. Mai saw the sunset waning to nothing in the skies above and a darkness starting to appear.

The day was over. All the light in the world had diminished, faded forever.