Tevun-Krus #89 - SamuraiPunk

Return to the Dead Moon - A Short Story by @JeffreyVonHauger

Megumu sat cross-legged staring forward in meditation. Outside his hexagonal window, the enormity of space was interrupted by a red and black freighter. The diamond symbol of the Yamaguchi clan shone proudly in purple neon across the ship's hull.

"You sure you want to go over there?" asked the intercom.

"Yes."

"Their dangerous customers. I told them I had a passenger and they want to talk to you. It's not too late to back out?"

"Put them through to my cabin."

Megumu's topknot was perfect, his expression stoic. A hologram of a scruffy haired young kid in a suit, tie, and sunglasses appeared before him.

"Whadda ya want?"

"I've come to see Kenichi," said Megumu as he entered his identification.

The digital calling card of Megumu Inagaki appeared on the screen, spun once, and vanished. The kanji symbols of the word Megumu looked like the letter K.

"Oh yeah? I've heard of you... Mr. Yamaguchi wants to know what you want to see him about?"

"The return of Prince Yasuhiko Asaka Abo."

A similarly dressed man appeared on the edge of the hologram. The audio cut out and the kid covered his mouth when he talked. Then he flipped the sound back on.

"It's just you coming over?"

"Yes."

"Ok... Scans check out... Use the rear hatch."

The hologram flickered out and the pilot, listening on the intercom, cut back in as he guided the shuttle toward the freighter.

"Way to actually make them nervous. You sure look tough, but the Yakuza are no joke. Hope you know what you're getting into?"

"After I depart, move out a hundred thousand kilometers and wait for my call," said Megumu.

He stood, sword in hand, tightened his belt, and slid the katana through. He wore the formal kimono of the Shogun's personal guard over his graphene mesh body armor. When he exited the cabin he stuffed bare feet into black boots with the space around the big toe for gripping and slipped them into a pair of square wooden sandals. Next to the footwear sat an ornate helmet and a pair of black gloves.

The figure that hopped down into the Yamaguchi freighter looked like an old-time Kabuki theater villain. His helmet's blast shield was cast into a fiercely stylized face. The airlock pressurized and opened to the kid in the sunglasses and two goons aiming illegally modified disrupter pistols.

"I like your style... Real old school. Gonna have to hand over the sword, though" said sunglasses.

"This weapon hasn't left my side in 27 years. It's over a thousand years old and passed through ten generations of my family alone. It is part of me."

The kid turned and tossed a slender hand in the air.

"Don't worry about the antique... What's he gonna do, chop us all up?"

The two goons holstered their blasters and let Megumu pass between them before following. He removed his helmet and gloves and walked with a series of odd-timed clicks and clacks. They went through an engine room with shirtless tattooed men moving about and down a long corridor to a double door with the diamond symbol of the family on it.

Sunglasses stopped and spun around.

"You and the boss go way back, that's why I'm letting you keep your sword, don't make me regret it."

He put his hands on his sides, parting his blazer, and revealing the butt of a nickel-plated blaster. He glided two fingers over a scanner and the metal doors opened. Megumu followed him while the gunmen hung back and stood silently outside.

The doors sealed and the interior opened up two decks high. The spacious room was laid out like a dojo. Traditional ceiling beams and paper wall dividers gave off the warm scent of real wood. Tea was being set on a squared-off area of tatami mats by two young women. They bowed out of the room as the boss made his way in.

Kenichi wore a pristine white button-down, stylish black spacer pants, and no shoes. Not a single hair of his thick oiled do was out of place. He smiled porcelain and gold.

"K! How long has it been? Twenty years? When did we become middle-aged? Please have a seat."

Megumu stepped out of his sandals, removed his sword, and sat down placing his weapon beside him. Kenichi pulled a small table between them. He left the tea alone and brought over two bottles of saki and two small glasses.

"First a drink." He poured the glasses full. "To old friends."

Megumu lifted his glass, tinked it into Kenichi's, and they both drank.

"It's because of our previous association that I was sent."

"Yes, yes, Niles told me. You're here to discuss the return of Prince Abo."

Niles, his sunglasses, leisure suit, and gun slipped into a shadowy corner and leaned against a wall. Megumu picked up the saki bottle and poured two more glasses.

"I am prepared to transfer ten million into any account you see fit to secure his immediate release."

Kenichi picked up his glass.

"A generous offer, but you must know this isn't about money. It's about the secession of power."

"I'm authorized to provide you with a million just to allow me to verify his safety."

Kenichi slugged back his drink with a grin.

"Now that's something we can do."

A door opened in the back near Niles and he was heard exiting and talking under his breath outside.

Kenichi poured another drink and handed it to K.

"One more thing, there's another old friend of ours on board with a vested interest in the prince."

Megumu turned and saw her silhouette in the doorway with Prince Ado standing nervously behind her. He downed the sake and barely managed to get the glass back on the table. He stood in disbelief.

"I'm sure you're familiar with the Dead Moon, and their new matriarch Hotoke Mizuki," said Kenichi.

"Tsuki!?"

Megumu's shaken instincts reminded him he forgot to grab his sword and he looked back in time to see Kenichi reaching for the weapon. He stepped on it hard with his foot and the ferociousness of his look was enough for the boss to retract his hand.

"I'll leave you two alone to talk. As you can see Abo is in good health and not harmed. I'll be with him on the bridge."

He walked past Mizuki and closed the door keeping the prince out of the room. Megumu picked up his sword, put it in his belt, and walked toward her.

"Tsuki."

"K."

She was a decade older but beautiful as ever. She allowed a wide silver streak to form in her hair and she was dressed in form-fitting spacer fatigues; grav-boots, leather pants, and a reinforced jacket. She wore a long-barreled blaster off her hip like a cowgirl gunslinger.

"You're Hotoke Mizuki?" asked Megumu.

"It's a title the Dead Moon give their leader. Doesn't hurt that my real name means moon, it's almost like I was born for the role. You were once aligned with us politically."

They both stepped closer to each other.

"That was before the Shogun unified Neo-Edo and brought the planets together under one banner. I'm here for the prince to continue the time of peace."

Their eyes locked, intense in their gaze, and equally as soft in their hearts. She reached out and placed a hand on his arm.

"He cannot be allowed to take the throne. His only interest is in conquest."

"He's a boy. Training and guidance can put him on the correct path."

"He led a shock trooper army that rampaged across the system's most settled moons. They slaughtered millions."

Megumu closed his eyes and took a breath before saying, "the age of warlords must be put behind us."

"He is a warlord! Or at least a little wanna-be one," she said in disgust.

"I'm here to pay his ransom."

"There is no ransom."

"Then why keep him alive?"

"Leverage."

"Then I'm here to tip the scales."

His hand moved to the hilt of his sword and she took a step back.

"I never stopped loving you," she said with a bite to her lip.

"Some things are bigger than us."

"If you can't see the truth through me then they brainwashed you beyond all reason."

She quick-drew her blaster and fired. She was calm and confident and took aim even though she saw the sword coming. Her bolt struck him in the shoulder before his sword sliced her gun in two. She dropped the broken pistol as the ship's alarm rang out.

"I forgot how fast you were."

She rubbed her hand and wide-eyed his kimono on fire at the shoulder. The door burst open and the goons rushed in. Megumu turned and stepped to the left as disrupter blasts zipped past. In two lightning-fast swipes and a single wide gated lunge, he disemboweled both the gunmen. Their guts splattered across the floor.

K turned around the personification of the Shogun's power, blood speckled, and arm smoldering. Cold unfeeling determination hardened across his face. Tsuki backed toward the other door as Niles entered sword in hand. K grabbed a pistol off the dead.

"I told you not to make me regret it," said Niles.

He held his sword in a tight double grip that revealed a missing finger on his left hand. He was about to attempt a master-level high-low attack. His stance alone demonstrated Kenichi personally trained him.

"I don't have time for this."

K shot him through the right lens of his sunglasses and hopped his body as it fell.

In the hall, the alarm screamed and Tsuki turned a corner to the main passage that led to the bridge. When K got there, she was going through the bridge door as three men with rifles came out. K shot two before the third lit the hallway with machinegun fire. K threw the pistol at his head and the gunman ducked raking the wall and ceiling with blaster holes. K'd been shot several times and the thin material of his kimono ignited in flame. The gunman looked into the eyes of death. He saw the walls, the ceiling, then the floor roll by before he realized his head had been removed from his body.

On the bridge, the panicked pilots kept the ship on course. Kenichi stood with a pistol in one hand aimed at the prince and an electro-dagger, alive with purple electricity, in his other. Tsuki leveled a blaster rifle at K as he entered.

The Captain stood from his central chair and said, "we can not have weapons fire on the bridge of this ship." He reached over and silenced the alarm. "Now, please, resolve your differences away from the control systems vital to our survival."

He looked at Kenichi who wasn't budging and at Tsuki who lowered her rifle and backed into the corner to draw a sword from a wrack on the wall. The Captain turned his attention on K, only to be separated from his life with such haste no word escaped his parted mouth.

K stepped over the fallen Captain and one pilot jumped from his seat with a blaster. A flash of steel sent him after his commander.

K advanced on Kenichi and the prince. Kenichi aimed and sunk three shots center mass before K's sword pierced his heart. K was slowed and severely wounded. His armor stopped the shots from entering his body but each one was like getting hit with a bat in the chest. He withdrew his sword and Kenichi went down.

The last pilot ran for his life from the bridge. The ship began to tilt in space. Alarms trumpeted and red lights flashed.

"Yasuhiko Asaka Abo, your father sent me to retrieve you."

"Great! Kill her and let's get out of here," said the prince backing up against the front of the room.

Tsuki stepped between them holding a long sword in both hands. Her left foot glided across the deck and she adjusted her footing in a low crouch turning the blade and bringing it back behind her readying an attack. K raised his sword high above his head with sweat dripping down his pained forehead.

"I know your moves before you make them. You taught me everything you know," she said.

"Never has there been a finer student."

K brought down his blade as hers came up. The clash echoed between alarms. Tsuki stepped quick, turning and swinging wide toward K's midsection. He let go of his sword with one hand and grabbed his blade higher up as her sword cracked into the hilt of his. Blood ran from his fingers as he turned the sword at an angle that nearly took his hand. His sacrifice blocked another of her attacks. She raised her blade and paused before the coup de grâce.

Purple flashed out of her throat and a look of surprised fear moved across her face before she collapsed. The prince stood behind her with Kenichi's dagger in hand.

"There're escape pods down the hall," said Abo.

K leaned on his sword breathing heavily and held his side with a wince that said internal hemorrhage.

"Come on, let's go! Do you have a ship waiting?" asked Abo.

K looked at Tsuki in disbelief.

"Wake up, old man, we need to go. That's an order!" shouted the prince.

Megumu looked at the heir to the Shogunate.

"She was not your's to kill."

"What!? She's the leader of a terrorist organization! An enemy of the state! She signed her death warrant the minute she inconvenienced me."

"To be a leader is to have many inconveniences," said Megumu.

"Not when you eliminate them."

The prince fired Kenichi's blaster into the flight controls causing an explosion that silenced the alarm and crippled the ship. Then he pointed the gun at K.

"My rule will not require advisors like yourself. Father's mentality is the way of the past. Your code of honor holds no place in my kingdom. My army needs no negotiators of peace."

He was smart enough to aim at K's head, but before he could pull the trigger the lower half of his arm landed on the floor with a thud. K grabbed the howling prince and shoved him down the hall and into an escape pod.

"Let your missing hand remind you of the value of negotiation. Talking too much saved your life."

The pod launched, K called his shuttle to pick it up, and he returned to the burning bridge. The fire had spread to the bodies on the floor and Tsuki was engulfed in a funeral pyre. The ship groaned and creaked, caught in a gravitational pull.

Megumu looked out the window at Tsuki's moon. Only a third of it still reflected the light of the sun. The rest was black from the explosion that doomed its surface to extinction. He smiled at the sublime beauty of the approaching silver crescent that represented the final escape of Tsuki's troubled soul.

"I've fulfilled my obligation. We can finally go home, my love, together... Forever."