An hour before dawn Captain Yoshihiro entered the aircraft hangar. Suzuki knew the captain was under orders to provide the kyuuketsuki with anything and everything they needed. The leader of the vampyr pilots could not help smirking as a wicked notion occurred to him. Yes, Captain Yoshihiro would provide exactly what the kyuuketsuki needed: a target that would put up a fight, a victim that forced them to use all their skill if they wanted to feed.
Yoshihiro kept his eyes averted from the bloodless corpses littering the barbed wire enclosure, preferring to concentrate on Suzuki. "I trust everything was to your satisfaction, sir?"
"No, it wasn't."
"I'm sorry to hear that, sir. Did you mean more... fodder?"
"We're not cattle," Suzuki snapped. "You can't satisfy us so easily."
The captain blinked, his composure shattered by the violence of this reply. The other vampyr turned to observe the confrontation, intrigued by their commander's opening gambit. "I'm sorry, sir," Yoshihiro said. "I didn't mean-"
"I don't care what you meant," Suzuki hissed. "Your meaning and your opinion are as insignificant to me as the lice on our last meal."
"Forgive me, if I offended-"
"Enough!" the kyuuketsuki commander snarled. "We require sport."
The captain frowned, confusion in his eyes. "Sport?"
"We are predators. We live to hunt, and hunt to live."
"I see."
"You will provide us with a quarry, a creature of cunning who knows the surrounding terrain better than us, a victim with a sporting chance of escaping our best hunters. It is an hour until sunrise, yes?"
Yoshihiro checked his watch. "Yes, about that."
"Then it is settled. My men will hunt their quarry for the next hour. If the target eludes them, it lives for another day. But if they find the target..." Suzuki let his voice trail away, but his head tilted towards the leftovers splayed across the floor behind him. "Then the victim's blood, the victim's life is forfeit."
The captain nodded. "As you command, and who is to be the target?"
Suzuki smiled. "You are, of course. I give you sixty seconds to run."
"No, you can't!" Yoshihiro protested.
"You've seen my orders. You know I can do anything I want. I would start running, if I were you. There are now less than fifty seconds before I let slip my kyuuketsuki to hunt you down. They've never pursued a target in the wild before. You do want to give them good sport, don't you?"
The captain's mouth fell open. His gaze slid around the hangar, taking in the ravenous expressions on Suzuki's pilots. They best resembled savage dogs, feral animals ready to pounce on their prey. There was no sympathy, no help to be found in their eyes, only blazing hunger. Realising any pleas for mercy would fall on deaf ears, Yoshihiro turned and ran from the pitiless hangar, drawing a service pistol from the holster on his hip as he fled.
Otomo approached Suzuki, flanked by the others. "Is it true?"
"Yes, he's all yours. Consider it thanks for all your efforts these past months, becoming kyuuketsuki and teaching me how to fly a Zero. We shall achieve great and terrible things together. For now, enjoy yourselves. You all know the drill: be back by sunrise or suffer the consequences. Go!"
Kissy spent the rest of Friday night keeping busy with the customers and staying away from Kimura. It wasn't difficult, Friday being the second most popular night of the week. Servicemen on 48-hour furloughs and those with overnight passes flooded into downtown Honolulu looking for drinks, love and a good time, Tokyo Joe's specialised in two of those. But anyone looking for love had better look elsewhere, as one sailor discovered not long after midnight. He grabbed Kissy and sat her down on his lap, determined she would kiss him before he let her go. A peck on the cheek wasn't enough; he wanted to put his tongue down her throat and his hand up her silk skirt. She squirmed and struggled, trying to get away from his iron grip without success.
If Tetsuzo had been there, the incident would never have happened. He kept a close eye on her to make sure she stayed out of trouble. But Kissy's efforts to keep away from Kimura were almost her downfall. When the soldier grabbed her, she called out for help but none of the men at nearby tables came to her aid. Those who bothered to look around cheered her assailant, whistling and applauding. All that stopped when Kimura appeared as if from thin air, standing next to the drunken sailor. Kimura grabbed the American's wrist and squeezed, until the sailor let go of Kissy. She got herself to safety, but Kimura kept hold of the sailor.
"Touch her again, you never use this hand again, yes?" Kimura asked. He clenched his fist tighter, until the bones in the sailor's wrist were grinding together. "You understand?" The sailor nodded, his ugly face contorted by pain. "You leave now," Kimura commanded, his voice like gravel and thunder mixed together. He released the sailor and turned away.
The humiliated serviceman looked at the others around his table. All were nodding and gesturing for him to go after Kimura. The sailor got up from his seat and hurled himself at Kimura. "No, don't!" Kissy shouted. She was trying to stop the sailor, not warn Kimura, but she was too late.
Kimura spun around and slammed the base of his hand up into the sailor's face, snapping his attacker's head back. Blood spurted from the sailor's nostrils as he flew through the air to land atop the table he had just vacated. It shattered beneath his weight, collapsing to the floor and scattering the others around it. Total silence fell on the bar, as everyone stopped to see what had happened, even the Hawaiian band in one corner stopped playing.
"Touch her again and you all need ambulance to get home," Kimura warned the sailors. "You want girls who love you long time, go down street to Madame Cho," he added.
The sailor's friends carried their insensible colleague from the bar, and several more tables nearby emptied, the customers unhappy at seeing one of their own felled by a single blow from a Japanese barman. But the empty seats were soon taken by other customers, eager to take the weight off. "Thanks for the warning," Kimura said as he walked past Kissy on his way to the bar. His mouth was smiling but his eyes remained cold, devoid of life. They reminded Kissy of a shark's eyes, empty and chilling.
Juzo Yoshihiro was running for his life. Dawn was still thirty minutes away, but the sky was softening from black to blue, like a bruise changing colour. As sunrise got nearer, so it became easier to see where he was going, to find his footing in the dense undergrowth. But the captain was all too aware that this also worked against him; if he could see better, so it was easier for the hunters to see him. His survival was all a matter of time: could he avoid the kyuuketsuki long enough to see another dawn, or would they find him first?
Thus far he had been lucky, using his local knowledge of the dense jungle around the airstrip to his advantage. Yoshihiro was fond of getting away from the stresses of his job by taking extended walks beyond the base's boundaries. He found the exercise enervating, and the chance to stretch his legs also gave him the opportunity to get some perspective on whatever was troubling him. He'd never thought that those long, brisk hikes might one day save his life, had never imagined he'd be using those same tracks and byways to avoid the fangs and talons of blood-drinking monsters.
Twice he'd been close to disaster, when the creatures had swooped low above him, scouring the jungle for his presence. To look upwards and see something that looked human flying overhead, a pair of massive wings of skin and bone beating the air, it beggared belief. Then there was the sound those wings made, a mighty thunderclap that chilled the soul. Yoshihiro had flung himself into the shadows, using whatever foliage was close at hand to hide.
The second time one of the vampyrs came close, it spiralled down to the ground and landed nimbly on its feet, less than a stone's throw from where the captain was cowering beneath a fragrant jasmine vine. The creature sniffed at the air, inhaling its surroundings, filling its lungs time and again as it turned in a slow circle. Yoshihiro felt certain the stench of his fear would give him away. He gripped his pistol in both hands, hoping that might steady his aim, as the kyuuketsuki's gaze swept towards his hiding place.
The captain could see the face of his hunter. It was the pilot called Otomo, whose chubby features usually gave his face a friendly, childlike aspect. There was nothing friendly or childlike about the creature standing in the midst of the jungle. The face was stretched and distended, the jaw line unnaturally elongated. The brow bulged and furrowed, while Otomo's eyes were black slits of malice. Two fangs jutted from the mouth like twin daggers. Everything about this creature was terrifying and brutal.
Otomo's nostrils flared as he caught a whiff of something on the early morning breeze. He stopped and stared at the shadows where Yoshihiro was hiding. Convinced he had been discovered, the captain closed a finger around the trigger of his pistol. He didn't know if bullets could harm these monsters, but it was better to die fighting than to surrender himself and his honour. Yoshihiro offered a silent prayer to the heavens and willed himself to shoot. But his fear was too great, the malevolent gaze of those eyes too terrifying.
Otomo dropped into a crouch, his muscles tensing. This is it, the captain thought. This is the moment when I die. Instead the vampyr leapt up into the sky and flew off, leaving a mystified Yoshihiro cowering in the shadows. When the sound of beating wings had died away, he stood up and jasmine brushed across his face. The pungent aroma filled his nostrils, blocking out any other scent. Of course, Yoshihiro realised, the fragrance of the flowers must have concealed my odour! He tore handfuls of jasmine down and strung them in a garland around his neck. If it had worked once, it might work again. Any defence was better than nothing against these fiends.
Yoshihiro knew his luck could not last forever. The vampyrs had chosen to hunt for him individually, their greed overcoming their common sense. Once they tired of that, the monsters would realise a co-ordinated search of the jungle would be far more effective. Working together, the six of them could drive him into the open and then his downfall would be assured. Yoshihiro decided to take matters into his own hands. Running and hiding would not save him; he needed to go on the offensive.
The captain circled back towards the aircraft hangar, keeping under cover until he had the smallest possible distance of open ground to cover between it and the jungle. He waited and listened, watching the brightening sky for signs of the creatures hunting him. When he was satisfied it was safe to break cover, Yoshihiro tore across the open field, certain that he would be attacked at any moment. He was surprised to reach the aircraft hangar unscathed and flung himself through the door, gasping for breath. It was empty, except for the remains of the dead prisoners. Suzuki must have gone to check on the progress of his pilots, the captain thought. He'd made it, against all the odds he'd made it. But his relief was all too short-lived.
"Clever," a mocking voice said. "You led my kyuuketsuki out into a fruitless search of the jungle before returning here, knowing it's the last place they would think of looking for you, very clever indeed."
Yoshihiro twisted around, unable to understand from where the voice was coming. He watched in disbelief as a cloud of mist formed in the air close by, solidifying into the silhouette of a man. A face appeared in the mist, its snarling features a menacing mask of hunger and hatred.
"I suppose I shouldn't be surprised," Suzuki said. "My men trained as pilots, not predators. They are used to having maps to find their targets. Their chosen battlefield is the air, not the jungle. It seems they still have much to learn about their new lives as kyuuketsuki. Thank you, captain; your cunning has given my vampyrs a valuable lesson." He arched an eyebrow at the garland around Yoshihiro's neck. "Why do you wear those flowers?"
"The scent, it masks my own."
Suzuki sniffed the air, inhaling deeply. "So it does, fascinating. You're even more resourceful than I'd realised. It seems a shame to kill you."
"Please," Yoshihiro whimpered, ashamed to hear himself begging but unable to stop. "I don't want to die, not like this."
"You don't have to die."
"I don't?"
Suzuki shook his head. "There is an alternative. You've shown skill and cunning in evading my kyuuketsuki, along with a talent for thinking on your feet. We have need of men like you. Become like us and you need never grow old and never die. You can become all but immortal, with powers and abilities far beyond those of ordinary soldiers."
Yoshihiro glanced over at the remains of the prisoners, the scraps of flesh and skin where living people had once been, before turning back to face his tormentor. "You're offering me the chance to be like you, to survive by drinking the blood of other humans?"
"Yes."
The captain looked down and realised he was still holding the pistol. But his hands were not trembling anymore. His terror had been replaced by a cool, calm certainty. "Then my decision is simple," Yoshihiro said. He stuck the pistol inside his mouth and blew the top of his head off.
PSYCHIATRIC REPORT: Wierzbowski, Russell.
DATE OF ASSESSMENT: Unknown.
The subject was brought for pre-sentencing assessment, having been found guilty of manslaughter after beating a man to death in an argument outsider a diner. The subject stayed mostly silent and uncooperative throughout the course of the interview, refusing to offer more than monosyllabic answers to questions. This appears to be a primitive defence mechanism, employed by the subject's subconscious mind to protect it from attack. When challenged to explain his violent behaviour, the subject offered this chilling explanation of his deadly tendencies: "I get angry sometimes, and I see red." The subject has twice been convicted of violent offences in the past, each one worse than the last. It is all too obvious to this observer that the subject is on an escalator of behaviour that will ultimately lead to murder.