The Last Assassin

43

The scene through the green light of the goggles was like something out of a George Romero movie: scores of people stumbling in all directions, expressions fearful, arms splayed in front of them, bumping into one another and crying out in the dark.

I moved to the right, my head swiveling in sync with the front sight of the gun. The near panic in the room was palpable. Things felt one step away from a stampede.

I kept my back to the wall and kept moving to the right, toward the private rooms. That was my best guess for where Delilah had first joined Yamaoto.

I reached the corner of the room and started moving forward. Here and there small flares of light were appearing as the relatively cool-headed took out lighters and turned on cell phones. Come on, come on, I thought. I was running out of time.

I reached the first private room and tried the door. It swung open. Empty.

From somewhere in front of me, I heard a man shout in Japanese, 'The emergency exit is stuck!'

A woman cried out, 'What if there's a fire?'

And that was all it took. Everyone charged, mostly toward the front, but some, disoriented in the dark, went the wrong way and collided with the others. People tripped and fell over one another. The ones on the ground, their faces kicked and fingers stepped on, started screaming, and the screams fed the panic.

I heard Dox in my ear. 'You all right, man? Delilah, can you talk?'

'I'm good, I'm in,' I said, moving. 'Stay put., Cover the entrance.'

'Roger that,' he said. There was nothing from Delilah.

I made it to the second private room. Empty, like the first.

The booths, the booths, I thought. I kept going, as fast as I could while keeping my back to the wall. I knew there were four bodyguards in the room, and I scanned for them constantly, but in the chaos I couldn't spot them.

A man came stumbling toward me, his arms pawing the air in front of him. I shoved him to the side and he spilled to the floor with a wail.

The blocked emergency exit was just ahead, the booths along the wall to its left. I moved closer, still scanning. There, in front of the nearest booth, some kind of pileup on the floor, and…

There were the bodyguards, two of them, guns out, facing the room, looking sightlessly for the threat.

I cut left to the nearest row of seating surrounding the bar, avoiding stumbling, howling patrons, scanning as I moved. I hopped down onto one of the benches, wanting some cover in case anyone trained on my muzzle flashes and returned fire. I braced the gun on top of the back of the bench and put the laser on the first bodyguard's head.

Pffft. The man quivered and sank to the ground.

The flash was reduced by the suppressor. The other guy didn't see it, or if he saw it he didn't know what it meant. And the reduced muzzle report was eclipsed by the shouting all around us. The man stood there, still looking around, probably not even realizing his partner was now dead on the floor.

Pffft. I dropped him, too, another head shot.

I scrambled over to the opposite side of the bench, in case anyone else had tracked my muzzle flashes. There were still two bodyguards in the room, plus Yamaoto, Kuro, Big Liu, and Big Liu's associate.

But where? I scanned the room left to right. People were still scrambling in all directions. I wanted to shout, Delilah, where are you?

A light flared in front of the corner booth. I looked over. It was Yamaoto, holding up a cell phone, trying to see what was going on.

Son of a bitch. The corners of my mouth crept up. I brought the HK around and put the laser on his forehead.

The green inside the goggles was eclipsed by a huge white flash. I blinked and jerked my head away.

I knew instantly what had happened. The power was back on. The goggles had an automatic high-light cutoff feature that saved me from being blinded, but it still took a moment for my vision to adjust. I dropped behind the bench and tore off the goggles. When I popped back up, the HK pointed over the back of the seat, Yamaoto was gone.

Fuck. I scanned the area.

There he was, moving to my left. I zeroed in on his torso.

Bam! A shot slammed into the back of the bench inches from my head. I tracked to my right and saw one of the bodyguards, kneeling on the floor in front of one of the booths.

Bam! Another shot tore into the back of the bench. I didn't think. I just squeezed the grip, put the front sight on his torso, and pressed the trigger. Pffft. The shot caught him in the sternum. He fell backward and I put two more in him before he'd even hit the ground.

I swiveled back to Yamaoto. He was running now, and everyone was running with him, away from the gunfire. I brought the gun around, looking for a shot.

'Down!' I heard Delilah call from behind me. I ducked and a bullet whizzed over my head, the crack of a pistol following a split instant later. I scooted to my right and snuck a peek over the back of the bench. It was the fourth bodyguard. He swung the pistol over to my new position and fired again. I scrambled to the edge of the seat, thinking absurdly, Well, this is going well, isn't it?

I brought the HK out alongside the bench. The bodyguard saw me and adjusted again.

There was a Bam! Bam! Bam! of pistol fire, but not from him. His body jerked and he slumped to the ground. I glanced over. It was Delilah, holding one of the fallen bodyguards' guns.

I brought out a fresh magazine, dropped the nearly spent one, and slammed the new one into place. I reached for the one I'd dropped and said, 'Dox, Yamaoto's on his way out right now – front door or basement emergency exit, I don't know which.'

'Yeah, lot of people streaming out from both,' he said, his voice with that supernatural calm it got when he was behind the scope. 'I'm looking for him, I'm looking for him.'

I turned to Delilah. Her dress was half torn off and she was naked down to her waist, but she seemed oblivious to it. She had the bodyguard's gun up in a two-handed grip and she was scanning the room for danger.

'You all right?' I called to her.

She kept scanning. 'Go! You have to take out Yamaoto, he knows it was you in New York!'

I spun off the bench without another word and ran toward the swinging doors. I peeked through the crack at the center – one side, then the other. The hostess and the valet were gone. I went through, my head swiveling left and right, the HK tracking with it. Island. Office door. Stairwell.

'Goddamnit!' Dox said. 'I hit him, but I didn't drop him!'

'Where is he?'

'Out the basement exit, heading west! He came up the stairs with a crowd of other people and I only had a second, I didn't have the head shot. Drilled him from the side and he went down, but people were in the way and he got back up before I could put him away.'

I started for the stairs. 'West, toward Kotto-dori?'

'Yeah, he's stumbling, you can still catch him!'

I took the stairs three at a time. As I turned the riser, I heard shots from back in the main room. Delilah's position.

I stopped and looked back. Then I looked down again. Just a few more steps and I'd be at the exit, close on Yamaoto.

I took another step down and stopped again.

Dox said, 'Where are you, man? You've got to hurry or we're going to lose him!'

I took one more step down. I heard myself groan. Then I raced back up the stairs the way I had come.

'Shots from the main room,' I said. 'Delilah's in there.'

'Shit! All right, I'm taking off after Yamaoto, you go to Delilah.'

'On my way,' I said. I raced back across the entrance room, repeated my sneak and peek through the swinging doors, then went in.

I saw Delilah, standing in front of one of the booths. I crept closer, tracking with the HK as I moved. The room was empty.

I moved closer. There was something under the table in the booth.

I came up alongside her and looked. It was Big Liu and his associate, their mouths and eyes open as though in dull surprise, a clean red bullet hole in the center of each man's forehead.

Delilah looked at me. 'Did you see Kuro?'

I shook my head.

'We have to find him,' she said. 'Yamaoto told him you were behind New York and Wajima. I don't think Kuro believed him, but he will now.'

I gestured to Big Liu. 'You mean…'

'I couldn't let him leave,' she said. 'Yamaoto told him, and this whole thing would have been proof. The triads would have come after Midori and your son, they wouldn't have had a chance.'

But Yamaoto had made it out. He knew it was me, and I could imagine what he would do next. I had to get out of here and call Midori, tell her to take Koichiro and go, hide. She would never see me again, but at least they'd be safe.

Focus, I told myself. Deal with the situation at hand, then you can warn Midori. Nothings going to happen that fast. Use your head.

I heard Dox from the other side of the room: I'm coming in, don't shoot.'

We turned and saw the burly sniper moving toward us, the butt of the M40A3 shouldered, the muzzle pointed downrange. A slight lift of the eyebrows was his only reaction to Delilah's half nakedness.

'Yamaoto's gone,' he said. 'Saw his driver pick him up. Shot out the tires, but they're the run-flat type and they kept going. He's bleeding, though. It's all over the street. I knew I hit him good.'

I heard sirens outside. We all stopped and listened for a second. Dox said, 'I respectfully propose that now would be an appropriate time for us to beat feet.'

'Did Kuro leave?' Delilah asked.

'I didn't see him,' Dox said. 'But there were a lot of people and I was looking for Yamaoto. Why, was I supposed to shoot him, too?'

'I'll explain later,' I said. 'Come on, let's go.'

'He might still be here, hiding somewhere,' Delilah said. 'We should…'

I shook my head. 'You've done enough, more than enough. We need to go.'

I pulled off my jacket and helped Delilah into it, and the three of us hurried out through the basement exit.

The sirens were close now. We cut along the eastern side of the building and through an alley, emerging on the street that bracketed the club complex to the south. The van was there, where I'd parked it earlier. We got in and drove off, Delilah in the passenger seat, Dox in back. Soon we were heading south on Nireke-dori, the serene streetlights and shuttered boutiques surreal after what we'd just been through.

'What about Yamaoto?' Delilah asked.

Dox told her what had happened. I could tell he felt bad he hadn't gotten a confirmed kill.

'That was a hell of a shot you took,' I said. 'Moving, only a second, all those people running around in a panic…'

'Yeah, but…'

'Yeah, nothing. You hit him badly, no one could have done better.'

'Not as bad as I'd like, but that was a hollow point round and he's wearing a hell of a hole somewhere on his chest right now. Only thing that got that boy to his car was a bucketful of adrenaline and a shitload of luck. I just hope there aren't any hospitals nearby.'

Hospitals, I thought. Of course.

I pulled out the cell phone and called Tatsu.