Cuttlefish
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Joined: 1/24/2007
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Shanghai, 1920, one week later:
Shun crouches in a pool of shadow at the end of row of crates stacked beneath a long, shed-like roof along a Shanghai wharf. His breath is coming in ragged gasps. His shirt is cut neatly across his left bicep, and the edges of the cut are stiff with dried blood.
A rat eyes the young Japanese man curiously from atop a nearby crate, but then it turns and vanishes as the sound of angry voices comes from somewhere nearby, growing louder. The pursuit is closing in again.
Shun hears it too, and narrows his eyes. For the one hundredth time he berates himself for his stupidity. He knew too little, and now that ignorance is about to kill him. Even his strength is reaching its limits, and he does not think he can get away from them again.
“They” are the Green Gang. Shanghai is controlled and virtually ruled by its criminal organizations, and all of these are controlled by the Green Gang. Their leader is Du Yuesheng, “Big Ears” Du, and he is the master of this city. The police are firmly in his pocket and rival gangs pay him fealty.
Liangyu, the young bravo who Shun had beaten a week ago, is the eldest son of one of Du’s chief lieutenants. Right now Liangyu is still suffering from a partially crushed larynx. He will eventually recover, though his voice will remain an unpleasant rasp for the rest of his life. The injury and indignity suffered by Liangyu is not something the triad can ignore. The Green Gang’s killers have been seeking Shun for seven days and nights. They have caught him twice, and twice he has escaped, the second time after killing two of them. But now they are closing in, and Shun is out of tricks and out of places to hide.
He has tried the Japanese embassy, but Du’s reach extends through their walls. He has twice tried slipping aboard a departing ship, but has been thwarted both times. Every exit from the city is watched.
Shun slips away from the crates and farther down the waterfront. He keeps to the deepest shadows as much as possible and concentrates on moving silently. He has to get away from this area somehow. His pursuers know he is along this section of waterfront and they are tightening the circle around him.
Ahead he hears more voices, but these are not the sounds of killers signaling one another. These are laughing voices speaking Japanese. Shun creeps forward and sees a group of six sailors in Imperial Japanese Navy uniforms coming down an adjacent street. Judging by the laughing and singing they are returning from a night ashore. On impulse Shun follows them.
They walk for several blocks and then turn down towards the docks. Shun finds some cover next to a dark and silent shop and looks around. Ahead he spies brightly-lit wharf. Tied up to it is a warship. Shun does not know what ship it is, but he can see a Japanese flag illuminated at its stern. Armed sailors patrol the wharf next to the ship. The sailors Shun has been following troop down the wharf and go aboard.
Behind Shun there is a cry. He has been spotted. He curses, knowing that someone clever among his hunters must have guessed he would follow the sailors. He gathers what energy he has left and plunges forward. He reaches the wharf ahead and runs down it with pounding footsteps.
Ahead Japanese sailors see him coming and unsling their rifles. A petty officer, sidearm still in its holster, steps forward to intercept him. Shun thunders up to him and stops, breathing hard.
“Who the hell are you?” the petty officer asks.
“My name…is Shun…” Shun gasps. Inspiration strikes him. “I wish to…enlist…in the Imperial Japanese Navy.” The petty officer looks past him. There are figures skulking at the edge of the darkness, and here and there he can see a glint of light on metal. He snaps an order and half a dozen armed men come forward, rifles at the ready.
He then turns his attention back to Shun. Ragged, worn, and dirty though he is, there is still something indomitable about him. He is obviously in a bad place, and if he is turned away now the petty officer has no doubt that he is looking at a dead man. Yet Shun stands there calmly as he gets his breath back. He might be waiting for a cab rather than waiting to see whether he will live or die. The petty officer reaches a quick decision. It is all highly irregular, but he cannot condemn a man like this to death.
“Welcome to the Navy,” he says, “and to the light cruiser Hirado. Kikuchi! See this man aboard ship. Take him to Lieutenant Kato and introduce him as our newest recruit. The Lieutenant can take it from there. Ask him to send for me if he has any questions.”
“Yes, Petty Officer,” says one of the soldiers. “Come on, you,” he says to Shun. Shun follows him down the wharf and up the gangway.
---
“Been in ever since,” says Shun to Taiki and Aikawa.
“What about that Du fellow?” asks Aikawa. “What ever happened to him?”
Shun shrugs. “He’s still around. He ran that city for something like twenty years. I don’t know where he is now that we control the place, but he and Chiang Kai-shek were pretty tight. The story is that Du got into favor with him by having his men kill five thousand Communist protesters. Shows you what kind of man he is, and what kind of power he’s got.”
“Do you think he’s still after you?” asks Taiki.
“No,” says Shun. “I wasn’t that big a fish, and it was a long time ago. I’ll tell you this, though. I have never taken shore leave in Shanghai. Every time a ship I was on called there I stayed on board.”
He stands and stretches. A few joints pop. “That’s enough yakking for one night,” he says. “I’m turning in.” Both Taiki and Aikawa wish him good night. They sit silently for a time after Shun departs, their thoughts on a time and place both now far away.
---
“Big Ears” Du
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