Chapter 10
"The thing about growing up with Fred and George […] is that you sort of start thinking anything's possible if you've got enough nerve."
– Ginny Weasley, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, chapter 29.
Thankfully, there hasn't been any more of this kind of break-ins for weeks. Being the Commander's bodyguard has devolved into an even bigger waste of time and the safer he feels, the better his mood and the more incredibly annoying he is. I've caught myself daydreaming about strangling him a few times, but at least, I haven't had to kill any more soldiers.
Still, I much prefer when he sends me off to steal something, like today. Being a common thieve doesn't exactly make me swell with pride, but it's much better than enduring him all day and potentially hurting or killing others for his sake.
He never sends me to rob banks – I think he finds it too common. He goes after museum and art pieces, which he resells or arranges to have returned for the reward. Today, he wants a particular painting by Van Gogh, currently on loan by the Federal Gallery. I'm staring at it now, pretending to be a tourist, complete with a camera dangling from my neck, an oversized sun hat, sunglasses and even a Hawaiian print shirt.
The glass case the painting is in is wired, judging by the faint electrical buzz and the simple fact that it's plugged into a secure outlet. It's also in an alcove equipped with retractable bars that I assume will be at best difficult to cut through. The Gallery itself, after closing, will be locked tight and crawling with guards.
By contrast, there is currently only one guard in the whole area and he's eyeing a group of high school kids at the other end of the room; the bars of the alcove are up to allow visitors to view the painting properly and the place is full of visitors who will impede the reinforcements that are sure to come rushing in when I trip the alarm on the glass case from doing much to stop me.
All in all, it makes much more sense to steal this now than wait for tonight. All I'm missing is an effective exit strategy. I can try to run, or I can take a hostage and walk out.
I'd prefer not to hide behind someone else, so I'm going to run. There is no window in the room, and only one door, which will likely be shut and locked automatically by the alarm, unless of course I trigger the fire alarm first. Outside this door is the main hallway, with the emergency staircase just a few steps to the left.
I tap the case with my fingernail to determine if it's tempered – I doubt it but I may as well make sure. It's not, which will make things a bit easier – not that they really need to be.
I put plugs in my ear and throw a smoke bomb at the nearest smoke detector. People start to scream when they see the smoke and hear the alarm. The combined noise is a bit loud for comfort, even with my earplugs.
I break the painting's protective case by tapping it with the handle of my knife. It's only meant to keep the dust and greasy fingers out while not distorting what's inside, not for protection: it shatters. However, thanks to the relatively gentle tap, the glass doesn't fly towards the painting, crumbling to the floor instead.
I grab the painting and start for the door. I have to sidestep and jump over some of the visitors, but I'm in the hallway without notable trouble. The guard yells at me to stop and runs after me. I throw a couple of shurikens right in front of his feet and predictably, he stops running.
I run down the staircase to the ground floor and find myself outside, in the parking lot of the Federal Gallery. From there, I duck into the nearest alley and stop long enough to stuff the painting in a garbage bag I brought for that specific purpose. I add in my hat, camera, glasses and Hawaiian shirt, take out my earplugs and casually start walking back to Cobra's local outpost, a pawn shop situated at the other end of town. I'll start running again if I'm recognized or pursued, but otherwise, walking is less likely to attract attention and as a bonus, I can enjoy my day out for longer.
I don't encounter anyone who even takes a second glance at me or my package. At the pawn shop, a limousine is waiting for me. I climb in and turn on the TV, curious as to whether I've made the news.
I did, as it so happens. A reporter is talking about the theft on the very channel the TV happens to be on, describing it as if it were the crime of the century. I roll my eyes, more at myself for turning the idiot box on than anything else, and shut the thing down. For crying out loud, it's just an old painting and even though I stole it in front of witnesses, nobody got hurt. It's barely worth a news story, there is really no need to make it sound like an extraordinary event.
The next few weeks see a marked increase in criminal activities for Cobra and I find myself reminding the Commander every day that he has agreed to my condition when we made our deal. He makes a show of rolling his eyes and sighing every time this happens, making me suspect he jut gets a kick out of it.
I suppose he might as well get something out of me. All I do for him is protect him and steal for him, both of which he could easily get someone else to do. He hasn't even been in any real danger: there have been attempts on his life, but they have been pathetic. I take comfort in having been made to keep him alive from the fact a trained monkey would have done just as good a job.
It's too bad I can't actually get a trained monkey to fill in for me. Lately, he has me following him EVERYWHERE. To make things worse today, he's in a good mood: he's even been joking with his troopers and much to my annoyance, trying to make me laugh.
I finally find out what he's up to at dinner time, when Destro walks in and announces that everything is set for his announcement. The Commander immediately gets up, abandoning his supper.
"Wonderful! Storm Shadow, come with me. You should witness this."
The metal molding Destro's eyebrows lift.
"Commander? Wouldn't you prefer to do this alone?" he asks.
When I first arrived, he used to whisper to the Commander when he didn't want me to hear, but he eventually figured out I could hear him better than the Commander could when he did that. He's since learned to just speak in tongues, much like he's doing now. I stay in my chair, hoping against reason that Destro will succeed at convincing the Commander not to drag me along. I don't know why he doesn't want me to come along and I don't care. He's no threat: the Commander is his best client and he'd never risk seeing Cobra falling under the control of someone less inclined to buy his weapons.
The Commander laughs at the suggestion. I hold back a sigh and get up to follow them.
"Commander, I'm not sure…" Destro says.
"Destro, if you keep insisting I leave my bodyguard behind, I will stop finding it merely funny and start becoming suspicious very quickly. I know what's going on between you and the Baroness, and I know how far I can trust HER."
He falls just short of sounding serious. Like me, the Commander knows Destro is too smart to kill the goose with the golden eggs. Destro glares at the Commander, shrugs and walks ahead, leading the way.
We go into the Command Centre, which is rigged up to put the Commander through on the direct, 24 hours lines to the leaders of the most advanced countries of the World. These are the lines their staff can use when they need to contact their leaders urgently, at any hour of the day.
The Commander sits himself in the only chair in the room, which comes complete with a series of buttons the Commander can use to launch weapons or to open communication lines.
He presses one of the buttons and a series of screens all around the room light up. We hear phones ringing for each of these screens, and it gets loud enough to make my eyes water.
Thankfully, most of the phones are answered within two rings and even the slowest leader picks up after 4 rings.
"Good evening everyone," the Commander greets, blatantly ignoring the fact that most of his interlocutors are in a completely different time zone than we are. The presidents, prime ministers and other officials stare at him and all over one another, demand to know who he is, what's going on and how he got on this line. The Commander lets them vent for about three seconds before gesturing them to stop. The results are mixed, but the Commander starts talking anyway.
"I am the Cobra Commander," he says. His audience is growing quieter with each word, obviously realizing that they can't hear answers to their question if they're still yelling.
"I am calling you this evening with a proposition. You have something I want, and I have something YOU want. Specifically, you have power. I want that."
He pauses, looking for reactions. He gets only puzzled and angry looks. A few of the leaders actually declare something along the line of "we don't negotiate with terrorists" and hang up. I'm guessing the other ones are staying on the line solely to give their security or intelligence a chance to locate the call – not that it's going to work or that it would matter if it did.
"And I," he says, pausing theatrically, "I have security. You, and your people, all want that, right? So! Here are my terms: you give me your power, I give you security. I'm sure you're familiar with this type of deal; it's a very popular business model."
I can't help rolling my eyes. It's a popular model, all right. Even school yard bullies can pull off a protection racket. The leaders aren't any more impressed than I am and proceed to say so, with various degrees of decorum or rudeness.
"Now, now." The Commander cuts them off. "I realize I need to demonstrate that I can deliver what I promise. Mr. Russia, you were quite rude just then." He pushes a button and sits back. Another screen lights up, a satellite image that zooms on Moscow.
I catch Destro glancing at me, I detect the Commander's heart and breathing accelerating in anticipation, and suddenly, I understand what is going on. The Commander is demonstrating his weapon, and he's already launched it. I have no idea how powerful it is, and at this point, I can't do anything about it. I try to make myself believe it's only going to destroy one building or landmark, and I can't take my eyes off the screen.
From the satellite shot, it looks like a small luminous dot that suddenly appears on the roof of a building identified on screen only as "Russian Target".
"What you're all seeing now is a satellite shot of a randomly selected building in Moscow. To be frankly honest with you, I don't actually know what it is. If you're lucky, Mr. Russia, it's abandoned. Otherwise…"
I clench my jaw. Part of me wants to try and stop him, but I don't. He's not even touching any button anymore, nor does he look like he intends to. It's painfully obvious that whatever his weapon does, it only needs one command to do it, and the Commander has already given that command. In other words, the thing is just charging up.
Confirming my guess, the dot suddenly expands to about 100 times its former size, covering the whole building and small chunks of its neighbours, with no prompt from the Commander. The explosion is heard from the location of the Russian Prime Minister, who turns white and whips around, obviously looking out a window.
He turns back towards his phone just long enough to hang up. The Commander flicks the signal back to himself and addresses the world leaders again. I'm not focused enough to know what he's saying. I'm not sure I'd understand him any better if he were speaking Japanese. I'm going back and forth between thinking this will make the Commander public enemy number one and make it uncomfortably likely he will be neutralized before he gives me the information he owes me, and thinking that he might have just killed hundreds of people, just to be taken seriously, and that I've been helping to keep him alive for eight years.
I snap out of the cycle when he says my name. I notice all the monitors are off.
"That went wonderfully well," he says once I'm looking at him. He doesn't seem surprised by my reaction to his little stunt.
"You're…" I start, intending to call him a monster.
He cuts me off.
"The things money can buy, hmm, Destro? How much did that set me back?" he hisses happily.
Destro coughs.
"Each shot costs about two millions," he says.
The Commander laughs.
"But how much was the weapon?"
"You invested over 10 billions over the past five years," Destro says, sounding irritated. "You paid another billion to actually buy it."
The Commander turns back to me.
"I'm sorry to bore you with accounting details, my dear ninja, but I wanted to let you know just how precious you are. I would never be able to afford this without your financial contributions. Why, that last painting you got for me, the Van Gogh, paid for ten shots all by itself."
My eyes widen and for a second, I forget to breathe. He can't be serious. Paintings aren't worth that much, are they?
"I don't believe you," I say.
"The Van Gogh sold for 25," Destro says, smirking. "But your other fundraising activities make more than that in a month, Commander."
I hear everything he says, but I really don't understand what the Commander's other criminal operations have to do with this. The only thing I do understand is that if they're telling the truth, I have financed this shot of the weapon and nine more. If art is worth that much, how much money have I generated for Cobra with the other art pieces I've stolen over the years? The Commander seems to guess what I'm thinking.
"I've kept tab on how much you've brought in since I've hired you, if you're curious," he says.
Destro rolls his eyes – or at least he moves his head as though he has, it's impossible to tell with his mask – and leaves. "Oh fine, be that way," he mutters on the way out. "Break your toy."
I clench my jaw, realizing he's right: the Commander is playing with me. He's getting his revenge for my not killing everyone who crosses him. At the same time, he doesn't appear to be lying. I'll have to look up on the value of the pieces I remember stealing when I get a chance.
"Let's see…" The Commander says, taking out a notebook. "The total…"
"I don't care," I interrupt him. "I'm not responsible for your actions just because I padded your bank account."
I try to sound like I mean it. He shatters any illusion that I might have managed it by bursting out laughing.
"Of course not," he eventually sniggers.
I say nothing. I want to leave and go break something. I need to think this through – I've done everything I could to limit my contributions to Cobra, to keep the amount of blood on my hands to a minimum. I can't stomach the idea that I've given him that much funds, that I've single-handedly given him the financial means to blow up that building, whatever it was, and nine more. I can't stand the thought of how much more funds I've generated for him by stealing from galleries and museums. Why do people put so much value on things? 25 millions, for a bit of colour on canvas? It just sits there! It doesn't do any good to anybody! How was I supposed to know it was worth that much?
"Although you ARE helping," he continues. "It would be terribly ungrateful of me not to recognize your contribution. Nearly 250 millions to date, after all."
I did not need to hear that. I try to tell myself he's lying and I find that I can't; I believe him. It would be too easy for me to find out about it if he were indeed lying about this – all I'd need to do would be to look up the value of the pieces or even the news archives for the rewards that were offered. Therefore, I believe him. I really wish I didn't.
The Commander bursts out laughing again. The sound drives the shock out of my mind and replaces it with cold fury. He used me. We had an agreement that I would not harm innocents and he danced right around it. And now, he's rubbing my nose in it.
I have never been tender-hearted, I kill my enemies without a second thought. But unlike him, I am not a murderer. I don't take lives for no reason whatsoever – I'm not some blood thirsty barbarian! The Arashikage is not the type of ninja clan who kills from the shadow, at the request of the highest bidder. We have never, in all our history, accepted a single murder contract. It's one of the reasons some of the other clans call us samurai wannabes. They mean it as an insult, but we only see it as their admitting we have more honour then they do.
And now, this. I accepted to work for this man, I stole what he asked me to and I even enjoyed doing it. Predictably, he used the profits to hurt his victims. I couldn't know the scale of the profit, but I have no excuse for closing my eyes to the simple fact that, somehow, whatever money he made from what I stole would go towards killing, be it through buying weapons or people to wield them.
I've shamed myself. I tighten my fists and with a lot of effort, set my mind to analyzing the situation rather than dwell on it. I can't undo what I've done. I need to concentrate on choosing the best way forward.
My needs have not changed. I must avenge my uncle. I wouldn't have thought it possible, but I'm even more determined to do so than before. I will not give up after having done so much harm towards my end. The end only justifies the means if it's achieved.
The Commander is still my only possible source of information. I will only find out who my quarry is when he tells me, in less than two years from now if I keep my end of the deal. In other words, I can't leave Cobra or indulge myself in ripping the Commander's guts out with my bare hands just yet.
When our deal is done, I'll do what I need to and figure out how to make amends for my own crimes afterward. Up to date, I figured I'd just join the efforts against Cobra and terrorists in general. I'm no longer sure this will be enough, but what I'll do after my uncle is avenged is irrelevant just now. I'll figure it out later… maybe I'll just let the Soft Master decide.
In the meantime, I will make use of the wake up call I've received today. I walk up to the Commander and stare into his mask. My own deformed reflection glares back at me.
"Congratulations," I snarl, making no attempt to hide my anger. "You've managed to make me act against my resolutions. It won't happen again. Now that I've seen what you do with the money I've been securing for you, I will not help you gain a penny more. I will not steal for you anymore. From now on, I consider theft to fall under what you've agreed I would not be made to do."
"You are such a drama queen!" the Commander laughs. "Fine, fine. No more stealing. I expected as much and besides, Destro is right. When you come right down to it, you were still but a small part of my revenues. From now on, you will simply be my full-time bodyguard, except when I let someone else borrow you."
By someone else, he mostly means Destro. I've been tasked with accompanying him to meetings a few times, to help intimidate various business competitors. The Commander is staring at me, waiting for me to acknowledge his orders.
"Yes, Commander," I say, bowing to him.
"Good. Now, go get whatever you want to bring with you, we're moving out. I'll be here coordinating, so hurry back."
Despite my surprise, I do see it makes perfect sense to leave. We got away with being in a known location before, with relatively few attempts at invasion, simply because for the most part, we were inactive. It wasn't worth it for any nation to send a significant amount of troops here – most of those troops would have gotten killed, whether or not they eventually won the battle.
Now that we have officially made ourselves a world-level threat, it's time to move to a new, unknown location. If anything, I just wonder why we didn't start moving out before we actually used the satellite weapon.
"Did you just decide this?" I ask curiously. I'm not sure why I care, I suspect I'm just making conversation to keep my mind from wandering back to the destroyed building and my part in it.
He laughs.
"Of course not. I've been getting ready for months. But I couldn't very well let anybody else around here know about it, could I? If we have a mole, the world may have suspected we were up to something and I would have lost the element of surprise."
I should have guessed – the Commander has a way to ruin his own detailed planning with pure paranoia. Planning ahead that we'd have to clear out of here and making whatever preparations he could by himself, without any of the actual labour being carried out because he doesn't trust his own troops, fits him to a T.
"Won't it take days to evacuate?"
"We leave in an hour," he answers. "Now get going. Put your stuff in submarine three, I want you back here in 15 minutes to help with something else."
I shrug and leave. His voice resonates in the base through the intercom as I'm heading for my quarters, hissing instructions to different units on what they're assigned to pack. The assignments are pretty light – by the sounds of it, we're leaving just about everything behind.
Author's notes:
Sorry about the awkward stop, I'm running into the same problem as for the first few chapters: this scene is just too long, I needed to split it in order to preserve my shrinking buffer. I almost split it right after the theft, but that was just too short.
About the quote at the beginning: it was in my head while I was writing the theft scene. It seems to me like a good philosophy for a ninja to have.
Reviews are, as always, much appreciated. Right now, I'm thinking most people who click on the story do so by mistake, say to themselves "Oh no, not that stupid thing again!" and promptly close it. If that's not the case, let me know! Even a two words review is infinitely better than none at all (and that's true even mathematically).
Those who do review: thank you so much, you rock!