Chapter 11: A Victory Stew
(A big thank you to Siatru, and to Daemon and Shade on the Tanya Writers Discord for beta reading this chapter. Hopefully the writer's block won't persist into the new year, and I'll deliver more AYGGW with Germanian efficiency!)
Two blocks away from the ruins of Shinjuku-gyoemmae Station, I ducked into an alleyway, Kallen hot on my heels. Resisting the urge to surrender to my aching limbs and collapse against the wall, I quickly started stripping away my disguise - the last thing I wanted was for any survivors to hear reports of people in bloodstained medical scrubs heading to a certain basement. The gloves came off in two efficient tugs, and were balled up with the goggles and the mask inside the knit cap a moment later. Bending down, I tucked the bundle of fabric into a pile of bricks fallen from a nearby building and swiftly pulled my scrub top off over my head, cramming it into the rubble pile after the hat.
Turning to check on my comrade, I saw Kallen doing much the same thing as I had, quickly stripping her disguise off. In the alley, dingy even in the faint light of the joyless November sun, her incredibly vivid hair was an eye-catching explosion of red as she shook it free from her cap. As Kallen pulled the scrub top off, leaning back to try and wiggle a shoulder free of the medical garment, I saw a flash of skin as the vest she wore underneath tried to follow the disposable layer and exposed her belly.
For some reason, I didn't immediately turn away. The adrenaline spike of going into danger had already begun to fade, and after days of planning and the intensity of the last fifteen minutes, my mind felt dull and heavy. My eyes locked on Kallen' smooth skin, and while I dimly knew I should look away I remained transfixed. I knew that it would be awkward if she turned around and saw me blankly staring at her, but that concern felt unimportant compared to the exhaustion that seemed to swallow me up.
I suddenly realized I was swaying on my feet, and about to fall over. The tilting sensation grounded me back in the present, and I realized I'd spent at least a few seconds blankly staring at Kallen's back. Immediately, I spun around and vigorously shook my head. This is no time to be zoning out! You're in enemy territory! The mission's not over yet!
Remembering the possibility that irate gangsters might already be out hunting for whoever attacked the market, I kept my eyes fixed on the entrance to the alley, checking to make sure nobody had seen us dart inside and followed us. Unfortunately, the street outside appeared entirely deserted, presumably as the wise had fled the sound of nearby explosions and the foolish had gone to the station to take a look, so I had nothing to focus on to distract myself from the grunting noises Kallen made as she fought to free herself from her shirt. If I wasn't so hungry and tired, I'm sure a few joking remarks would have lept to mind about how Kallen could effortlessly gun down a man but couldn't change her clothes without the help of a maid, but all I could think of at the moment was how badly I wanted a cup of the rare, watery coffee I sometimes allowed myself. Besides, I doubted that Kallen would appreciate attempts at levity while we were out on a mission, especially not about the man she'd shot minutes before. Her second kill, now that I think about it. The first with a gun... Wonder how it felt, compared to the knife?
Kallen soon managed to shuck off the scrubs, and after taking a moment to straighten her clothes out, joined me in the mouth of the alley. Free of our disguises, we took the "scenic" route back to the hideout, going far out of our way and taking a circuitous route through the tangled streets and alleys of Shinjuku. I did my best to move the same way I had during my long years of searching out day labor for my daily bowl of watery soup: head down, shoulders slumped, steps small and shuffling. Ohgi's hoodie, once again stained with blood and cement dust, was bulky enough to hide in and the hood deep enough to completely hide my unfortunately distinctive hair. Kallen, by contrast, made no effort to conceal her Britannian heritage, instead focusing on concealing her reason for being in Shinjuku Ghetto on the day of a major terrorist attack. Putting her cellphone to her ear, she immediately began to babble excitedly into the phone as we headed west, away from both the ruins of Shinjuku-gyoemmae Station and from the hideout. Even as she chatted with an imaginary conversation partner, Kallen still managed an impressive degree of mobility, somehow sliding in, out, and around the increasingly dense pedestrians, forcing me to speed up to keep pace with her longer strides.
When she'd first begun walking down the road as we'd left the alley, phone glued to her ear and a stream of almost stereotypical teenage babble filling the air, I'd nearly pulled Kallen right back into the shadows to give her a quick lesson on how to not draw every eye in the ghetto, but now I was thankful I had mastered that impulse; nobody would link the young woman prancing through the ghetto in short-shorts and leg warmers to a terrorist attack. While people certainly saw her, nobody particularly cared about a Britannian teenager on a thrill trip to the Eleven ghetto, especially not when the rising plume of dust in the distance and the already spreading rumors let everybody know something big was happening nearby. A few people frowned at her apparent insensitivity when Kallen commented on the smell of the ghetto or how lucky she'd been to be in Shinjuku when something interesting happened, but aside from muttering about 'damned Brits', nobody seemed particularly interested in what she was doing or where she was going. I was right to trust her as an intelligence agent, if her tradecraft has developed so rapidly!
It was an impressive performance, so much so that I started to doubt my decision to go as low-profile as possible. While everybody saw Kallen, nobody was suspicious of her – irritated, yes, scornful, maybe, but suspicious, no; on the other hand, with my features hidden by the oversized hoodie and the way I instinctively shied away from touching anybody else while still keeping as close to Kallen as possible, I suddenly realized that I probably looked exactly like a fugitive desperate to escape the scene of a crime undetected.
I thought of myself as being fairly decent at reconnaissance, my eye for terrain details sharpened by my time as first an artillery spotter and then as the head of an independent command of aerial mages, but I couldn't pretend to be similarly experienced with human intelligence. I had been, after all, a combat asset, not a spook.
There were only so many problems you could solve via signaling, after all, and a savage beating wasn't the end-all, be-all when it came to interrogation.
As a result of my magical abilities and talents as a soldier, I'd never been trained for this sort of subterfuge in my past life. The extent of infiltration planning had been a brief seminar on planning and executing ambushes, the lessons of which had already paid off in this third life, when I'd gotten the drop on those unlucky gangsters in the truck. Fortunately, I now had comrades who understood human intelligence, and who were clearly cold-blooded enough to push every advantage at their disposal to advance the mission. I looked admiringly at Kallen as she made her way down yet another Shinjuku street, seeming to dodge around elderly pedestrians, street vendors, and the heaps of stinking garbage without noticing anything around her, absorbed in her noisy, faked conversation. What audacity, to hide in plain sight and make not the slightest effort to conceal your presence! She'd clearly grown from her previous encounter with violence – last time she'd barely walked a block before bursting into unconcealed anger and pain, and now it was as if nothing she'd seen in the subway station had touched her. Or maybe her mask has just gotten better...
Eventually, the crowds thinned out, and we finally made it back to our basement hideout. The sun had begun to set as we came down the stairs, which were thankfully free of any signs of a struggle, much less a force of irate gangsters waiting for us in our little hole in the ground sanctuary with murder on their minds. Apparently, the Kozuki Organization had gotten away undetected, at least for today. Safe for today, sure... How long do you think that's going to last? With a vigorous shake of the head, I muted that particular internal voice. I couldn't even truly say we were safe for the day yet, not until I'd checked in and made sure that all the other scattered guerrillas had all made it back safely. I'm sure they did, I told myself as I followed Kallen down the last flight of stairs, the sound of the 'secret' generator throbbing through the uninsulated wall of the sub-basement, they probably didn't even wait for us to start celebrating their victory.
As it turned out, we had been the last to return, but contrary to my expectations we did not walk in on a party in full swing. Instead, as Kallen opened the door to the hideout and stepped inside, I caught a brief glance of a room full of anxious, silent people sitting on the couches or pacing around the firing range before everybody noticed us and chaos descended.
"Kallen!" Naoto practically hurled himself to his feet and almost tackled his sister in a hug, rushing from the couch to the doorway in a red and brown blur. Kallen mumbled a greeting into his jacketed shoulder as she wrapped her arms around him, returning the hug even as she took a step back to compensate for his momentum, nearly stepping on my foot. I could hear what sounded like her cursing at him through the leather of his coat, probably some sort of endearing sibling spat about how she wasn't a kid and he was embarrassing her, but I noticed that she made no effort to let go of her big brother, and indeed clung on to him just as hard as he did her.
Dodging Kallen's foot, I tried to take a step around the siblings into the room, intending to give them some space. I was sure that Naoto was probably still at least somewhat upset with me for getting Kallen involved in the first place, and I'm sure stewing in his own juices for a few hours as we'd taken a pedestrian tour of Shinjuku probably hadn't done anything to soothe his aristocratic temper. Furthermore, now that the adrenaline of the situation had gone down, I was sure he'd be upset that I'd taken his baby sister to a mass casualty incident. I suddenly remembered seeing Kallen stumbling to a halt and shaking in her boots, eyes wide and pupils dilated in the dark subway station, and winced. Even if Naoto wasn't upset with me about instigating that particular traumatic episode, my lack of sympathy in the immediate aftermath would guarantee his anger. I'd hoped that, between his logical intelligence and leadership experience, he'd realize that I was just trying to keep things moving and would understand why I'd been so callous, but considering how fervently he was hugging Kallen it was clear that Big Brother Naoto was in charge at the moment, not Revolutionary Leader Naoto.
Which made it all the more surprising when, as I stepped around the siblings, Naoto abruptly released Kallen and grabbed me, pulling me close. For an instant, I tried to resist the pull, impulses to flee from the sudden onslaught or launch an attack warring within my exhausted mind, but between the surprise and the fatigue I was too tired and surprised to fight back. The moment passed, and I realized that I wasn't under attack – instead, for the second time, Naoto was hugging me. I grimaced, discomforted by both the public display of... emotion? Affection? Either way, it made me embarrassed to be casually manhandled in front of everybody, and the unaccountable warmth inside me at the feeling of being held tight to another person who wasn't trying to hurt me did nothing to soothe my mounting embarrassment at this latest humiliation. Kallen smiled happily down at us until she met my eyes, saw my displeased expression... and her smile curved wickedly before she burst out laughing, the treacherous wench.
Before I could extract myself from the hug to take revenge on my traitor of a subordinate and didn't that word seem just a bit forced, Naoto loosened his grip, backing off a step and making eye contact. His blue eyes, a slightly darker shade than his sister's, were as intense as they were watery, and I felt the same treacherous acceleration of my heart I'd experienced a few hours earlier at the sight of his sister's smooth skin. His ancestors surely must have engaged in some form of eugenics program – it's the only reasonable explanation. Genetic inheritance surely wouldn't be so cruel as to randomly give a single already wealthy and powerful family beauty, strength, and intelligence on top of social standing and financial power, would it? Nature might not, but like all things Britannian and noble, the Kozuki siblings were clearly the products of unfair competition. Definitely not interesting for anything beyond their connections and abilities, not at all. Just part of my path to a cushy job administering their father's demesne. That's all, damn those blue eyes... This was ridiculous. He was showing just a slight amount of affection to me, and I was obsessing over his eyes. Is this some sort of insidious Britannian love-bombing? Am I being influenced? ...No, that's ridiculous.
"Thank you, Tanya, for everything you've done." I felt myself sway slightly, suddenly pulled out of my thoughts by Naoto's thankful babble, hating how my paranoid, interaction-starved mind and weak knees betrayed me. That, or the cost of tapping my energy reserves during the rush out of the station was finally making itself known, and I was about to pass out from exhaustion and hunger. Perhaps that explains why I can't stay focused – I'm dead on my feet. I really needed to ask Kallen to get me more fat- and protein-heavy food if I intended to keep using my limited magic, especially if it left me this mentally fatigued whenever I pushed a bit too far, and Naoto was still talking. I probably didn't miss much... I wonder if he's got any snacks...
"Your plan was everything I could have ever hoped for and more. And thank you, thank you, for keeping Kallen safe. You were true to your word. The Goddess Amaterasu herself couldn't have done a better job smiting those monsters." Naoto chuckled at his joke, before clapping me on the shoulder, rising back to his full height, and leading his sister over to a table creaking under the weight of a heavy pot full of what looked like a thick stew, perched precariously on an ancient cooking stove. As soon as I saw the pot, which Souichiro was carefully stirring, a sudden awareness of the heady smell of cooked food burst upon me, and I felt my mouth flood with saliva as my nose suddenly registered the scents of grease, salt, and broth. I was sure the visibly greasy stew swirling in the pot would have turned my stomach in my past life, when I'd grown passionately sick of endless wurst, but I was so hungry that I'd even be willing to pull of Vi... Visha's old stunt and eat a plate of K-brot.
Before I could take two steps to follow the Kozuki's and snag a bowl for myself, another hand landed on my shoulder. Wearily, irrationally fearing that taking my eyes off the soup would guarantee I'd never get fed, I looked up at Ohgi. He seemed about to say something weighty, judging by his expression, something that he had to get off his chest, but something he saw made him take pity on me; instead of the lecture I was certain the sadistic former teacher would deploy to devastating effect, he simply smiled and patted me on the shoulder. "Go on and get something to eat – we can talk later."
Almost before his hand had lifted away, I capitalized on my advantage and surged away from the second in command, blazing a line straight towards the soup. Nagata, sitting beside Naoto on the couch, pressed a bowl into my hands as I passed, and Souchiro filled it with a generous ladle. Cradling my bowl like the precious thing it was and slowing only to grab a spoon from heap of loose cutlery at the end of the table, I sat down on the other couch between a Tamaki and Chihiro, who were both chasing after intoxication as quickly as they could drink. Tamaki had a bottle of some sort of homemade rotgut in his hand, while Chihiro had a water glass a third full of some evil-smelling clear spirit. As soon as I sat down, Chihiro lifted the glass over my head and with a loud "Kampai!" Tamaki filled it from his bottle. I didn't care – I was in a slice of culinary heaven. The broth was almost painfully salty, the few scraps of meat were either gristly or greasy, and the vegetables had been over-boiled almost to the point of dissolution and well past the point of tastelessness, but the fine spice of hunger made it a meal fit for the Kaiser in his palace, free from any rationing or shortage.
As I inhaled my soup, I took the opportunity to look around at the rest of the Kozuki Cell, covertly observing my comrades over the rim of the rapidly emptying bowl. On first glance, all appeared to be well. Souchiro and Ohgi stood by the door, bowls in hand and talking about something I couldn't quite make out, presumably the good old days as old men are wont to do. Inoue sat over at the firing range's loading table, going through one of the packs deposited in a heap by her feet, clearly taking the initiative and starting an inventory of what loot we'd managed to get away with, a bowl of cooling stew near her hand. Nagata and Naoto were swapping jokes back and forth, laughing at each other, Kallen laughing along from her seat between them, across the table from me. Chihiro and Tamaki continued to drink, Tamaki loudly bragging about something mostly indecipherable and Chihiro nodding along, every so often extending her glass towards him in a silent request for a refill of the pungent homemade liquor.
While I was happy to see my comrades enjoying a well earned moment of relaxation, the longer I looked at them the more superficial all the celebration seemed. Tamaki might be a drunk, but I'd never seen him pound away at a bottle of hard liquor with the same aggressive pace he was setting beside me. Chihiro, in my experience, was typically a hairsbreadth from an explosion of rage at the best of time, periodically flying off the handle at seemingly minor setbacks during training – her uncommunicative, subdued state seemed wildly out of character, as did the amount of liquor she was downing. Inoue was always a hard worker, but she usually socialized with the rest of the cell when we all happened to be at the hideout at the same time – burying herself in work was something she typically did while alone, or when it was only the two of us working on keeping the Benevolent Association's books straight. Nagata and the Kozukis might be laughing and joking, but the laughter from all three sounded hollow, and Kallen in particular looked worryingly bleak, chuckling half-heartedly while staring into the bowl of congealing stew sitting on the table in front of her. While I couldn't hear what Ohgi and Souchiro were saying over Tamaki, I could see how Ohgi's eyes darted from person to person, keeping tabs on his class and making sure nobody had wandered off.
In short, the party was a sham and nobody was happy to be here. Completely understandable, considering what we'd all seen just hours before. My stomach twisted, and I cursed under my breath. I known I would pay for wolfing down that disgusting meal so quickly, but I hadn't expected indigestion so soon.
Setting the horrible feeling and my empty bowl aside, I tried to think of what I should do to address this new problem. My experience managing human resources in both my previous lives told me that letting my organization stew would likely decrease both individual and organizational efficiency, and could severely impact intra-organizational relationships, particularly with myself as the instigator of the whole event. Even beyond the concern that I might become the whipping girl for any misplaced anger or stress, letting fresh employees or soldiers go without support after major milestones was an excellent way to impact their ability to develop and grow from their experience – if I didn't intervene somehow, and just let the cell self-medicate their problems away, didn't that make me a negligent manager?
At the same time, I had no qualms admitting that I was not, in fact, a qualified therapist, and I doubted that my experience performing performance reviews and career advancement meetings would carry over to dealing with this kind of issue. It certainly hadn't the last time around, now that I looked back on my second life. I'd periodically invested my efforts in improving the abilities of my subordinates, both before and after the formation of the 203rd, but that had mostly been performative in nature and technical in scope. I might have improved the skills of the soldiers I'd worked with, but I had never thought it necessary to give any psychological support to my subordinates. I had maintained the distance of command, concerned that any laxness or casual interactions would undermine my authority, always a concern when one is three heads shorter and a hundred pounds lighter then everybody around them.
The only time I had ever so much as tried to help my subordinates with their qualms regarding the War and what we were doing had been coercing Grantz into engaging with the Francois partisans during the Arrene operation. That whole operation, including my advice to Lieutenant Grantz, now felt bitterly ironic, now that I myself was a partisan conducting terrorist acts. I remembered the callous way I had stood by and recorded the summary executions of captured Germanians by the partisans, and the equally callous way I'd rained fire down on suspected partisan positions, uncaring of potential civilian deaths. I hadn't been wrong, when I'd told Grantz that "those who survive always come back for vengeance," and the Britannians would certainly learn the truth of those words from long ago and far away too. At the same time... I could have handled that whole situation better, both the tactical problem of Arrene and the managerial problem of Lieutenant Grantz. Grantz clearly needed a reach out, a reassurance, something constructive to build his loyalty and faith in the righteousness of our cause – and I'd bungled the situation and resorted to threats instead. It was fortunate that the whole experience hadn't burnt Grantz out entirely, and that he'd continued to serve as part of the 203rd.
That had been far from my first managerial error when it came to my first independent command. With the benefit of hindsight and free from the mind-altering influence of the Type-95, I could admit to myself that I had gone overboard in both my initial training of the 203rd. The only saving grace had been that my training hadn't actually killed anybody, and that my pool of recruits had been selected from the crème of the Imperial Army's mage corps, and thus already had some training and superhuman toughness. Even with those advantages, if I didn't have the military hierarchy and the desperation of the war to hide behind, I likely would have been court martialed for my abusive conduct.
And now, stripped of those advantages, I found myself once more outside of my core competencies for the second time in a day. Earlier today, Kallen had proven her grasp of human intelligence and infiltration had, in some ways, far exceeded my own. In a moment I had neither prompted nor planned for, she had immediately understood the best way to guarantee her safe passage back to the hideout unconnected to the attack we had perpetrated minutes before. I had not understood what Kallen had been aiming for until I examined her actions and the responses they prompted minutes later – in fact, I had nearly stopped her and forced her to do things my way, which ultimately might have led the vengeful survivors of the Kokuryu-kai straight to our front door. Although...
Perhaps that was the lesson I should have learned; I might be somewhat skilled, especially when it came to combat, but I wasn't the only member of the organization who brought specialized experience to the table. I was a member of a team now, not a lone child fending for herself on the streets, and I should act accordingly. Trying to take all responsibility on myself was a sure way to crash and burn, or at the very least make everybody resent me more than they already do, the murderous little half-Brit whorechild. Yes, delegation was important. Someone needed to talk to the members of the cell, to get their grievances aired so they could be addressed, before the trauma and resulting dissatisfaction tore us apart or undermined my comrades' mental health. And that someone wasn't going to be me, because I'd probably definitely screw it up just as much as I had when I'd tried to talk to Lieutenant Grantz.
I found myself looking at Ohgi, still deep in conversation with Souichiro. As the second in command of the Kozuki Cell, not to mention as a former teacher, he definitely had the skills necessary to coax honest answers from our fellow terrorists about what they were feeling in the wake of our first major operation. His role as an officer was a double-edged sword, since while he had the power to take immediate action on any lessons learned or suggestions for improvement, that same authority might bias answers towards the party line and assurances that everybody was feeling fine, especially considering what I remembered from my first life. Complaining to superior was frowned upon in most cases, but especially if your complaints touched on about personal problems or concerns about mental stability. Considering the impact the Conquest had on the traditional forms of Japanese life, that might not be as big of a concern now, but there was still the hint of sadism I'd noticed in Ohgi before to worry about. If I asked him to start probing into our comrades, would he take advantage of them and use whatever he discovered to needle them, gratifying his sick impulses? Would he take advantage of me, blackmailing me with the weakness I'd revealed, the implied mistrust of my fellow cell-members? If Ohgi or Naoto ever decided that I was threatening their status as the unquestioned leaders of the cell, revealing that I'd wanted my comrades interrogated would lead everybody to turn on me, and I'd be found in an alley somewhere in Shinjuku with my tongue cut out and my eyes gouged.
I took another bite of soup, and closed my eyes. I was letting my fear get to me. Ohgi wasn't going to betray me, and he wasn't going to abuse our fellows. No matter what his personal predilections were, the man was a professional, loyal to both Naoto and the cause. It was wrong to judge him for enjoying the infliction of pain – such a trait could be useful in a soldier, doubly so in an irregular fighter. He had never been anything less than personally kind to me, and I doubted that Kallen, Tamaki, Nagata, or Inoue would simply sit by and let Naoto and Ohgi administer the traditional punishment for snitches, if push came to shove. I prided myself on my logic, on thinking things through clearly, and on utilizing resources to their fullest potential. I hadn't let fear immobilize me when Naoto had used Tamaki to test my abilities and loyalty to the cause, and I wouldn't let fear stop me from doing what I had to do to make sure everybody in this room stayed as healthy as could be, mentally and physically. We had a long road ahead of us, and I'd need everybody's help to finally get my rear into an executive-level cushioned office seat.
Well, no time like the present. Plus, I was out of soup, and Tamaki and Chihiro were only getting louder with each swig. With a grunt of effort, I forced myself to my feet and dropped my empty bowl onto the table next to the still half-full pot. The thick, rich scent of simmering broth was intoxicating, and I nearly halted in my tracks to serve myself seconds, but forced myself to keep moving. There would hopefully be time for more soup later, and if not, I'd had enough to tamp down the hunger pangs to a manageable level – I hoped that bowl would be enough to restore my mind to its typical efficiency at the very least.
Ohgi apparently saw me coming, as he clapped Souichiro on the shoulder and came over to meet me by the table. "Feeling a bit better now, Tanya? You can have more if you'd like." The man's smile was kind, and I nearly succumbed to temptation once again, but I persevered. The attack on the market had been my first mission as a strategist and junior officer of the organization – I couldn't rest until my mission was complete, including dealing with the aftermath and accounting for our gains and losses. Which reminded me that after I talked with Ohgi about meeting with the other members of the cell individually, I needed to meet up with Inoue to see if we'd managed to at least break even on our mission; apparently, my schedule wouldn't allow me back for seconds. Maybe I'll see if I can raid Ohgi's snack stash again later... If he didn't move it after Kallen broke in the last time...
"Thank you, but I'm alright for now." For some reason, Ohgi didn't look pleased at my professional response, his smile seeming to shrink by a few teeth. Perhaps the cool response was puncturing the party atmosphere? It would be unfortunate to be seen as aloof, but more so to be seen as unreliable, so I soldiered on. "Can I speak to you privately, for a moment? I have something I need your help with."
Ohgi's eyes widened slightly, but his only outward response was an easy nod. "That's fine with me, Tanya. I actually wanted to talk with you about something myself." He jerked his head towards the door of the hideout, and continued, "Want to go up and get some fresh air? It's getting a bit too loud in here for me."
I nodded, even as I tried to puzzle out what it was he wanted to talk about. Now that I thought about it, Ohgi had tried to take me aside before I'd eaten, practically as soon as I'd returned from the mission trailing behind Kallen. Presumably, whatever it was the second in command had to share was time sensitive, and I cursed my short-sightedness that I had opted to satisfy my hunger before listening to whatever it was he wanted to say. He had told me it could wait until after I'd eaten though, presumably because he'd realized that I wouldn't be able to think straight with the tantalizing scent of dinner in my nose. Sadist or not, I've worked under far worse bosses before. I really should be more thankful to Naoto and Ohgi for the amount of trust and support they had extended to me, as well as the opportunity to prove myself worthy to the game Lord Stadtfeld was playing with us all.
Outside in the ruins of the old tenement, the day's small heat was already a thing of the past, and the wind coming off Tokyo Bay kilometers away cut effortlessly through my hoodie. Shivering, I took shelter behind a wall that blocked the worst of the windchill and hoped this conversation wouldn't take too long. Already, the warmth and food of the sub-basement seemed like a dream in the brutally cold November night. Thankfully, Ohgi opted to stand between me and the shattered window letting the wet breeze inside, further blocking the wind, and didn't waste any time.
"You did a really good job, Tanya, getting everything planned out and working. It was... Impressive, seeing you plan out the attack in such detail, and then getting all the parts together. Solid work. I don't think Naoto or I could do something like that." Well, at least I don't feel cold anymore. It was nice having management that could appreciate my work, and was willing to offer positive feedback as appropriate. "That said..." Oh shit, oh shit! What did I do wrong?
True to his sadistic nature, Ohgi left me on the hook for what felt like a small eternity, the seconds-long gap slowly stretching out to a minute before he continued. "That said... I'm not comfortable with killing injured people. I know, I know, there were lots of good reasons that you'd be happy to share."
I hadn't realized my mouth was already open, ready to spout justifications and explanations until Ohgi gestured for me to stay quiet. Reluctantly, I closed my mouth, feeling fit to burst like an over-pressurized pipe. Did he think that I liked it? I didn't! I hated it! But what was I supposed to do – let them live and tell everybody what we look like? Even in costume, if they picked out enough details, everybody would be in danger! And the ones down in the station weren't going to live – should I have just let them suffer, Ohgi?! The last thought clotted the panicked babble into a sensation of solid mass in the back of my throat. He said he just didn't feel comfortable killing the injured, which made sense given his personality – a corpse, after all, cannot scream.
"I'm not asking you to justify anything – I don't have the right to do so." Ohgi had continued to talk after a brief pause, and I forced my attention back to what he was saying, doing my best to ignore the wet gurgles that the disemboweled man down in the station had made until I had silenced him. Ultimately, even though he still lived, he hadn't screamed either. "Naoto and I agreed to your plan, and helped you out – we even helped you plant the bombs ourselves. It's just that... well, it made me feel like a Britannian, I guess. They couldn't fight back, and we killed them. I guess that's just part of being a terrorist, though." Silently, I agreed with him. This wasn't going to be a clean war, and lots of people, including civilians, were going to die. The way he phrased that concern still felt like a gut punch though, even if I'm sure he hadn't intended it to be.
I remembered watching a Britannian officer pick his way through the pile of corpses strewn at the foot of a wall, carefully prodding each body and shooting any that groaned in the head with his pistol. He had been just as externally calm and collected as I had been, moving down the blood-slick platform. I suddenly felt nauseated and shamed by the praise Ohgi had given me just seconds before. I didn't regret what I had made possible, but the idea that I had acted like a Britannian, that the plans inspired by my past lives made being a Britannian in mind a possibility, a state of mind that came naturally to me and to my planning process... It was shameful. Once again, I remembered being on the side with dominance of arms and technology, and felt ashamed of my actions. Killing the Dacian army and taking only the commander alive had been effortless, knocking their country out of the war had been as easily achieved as the Britannian Conquest of my youth – even easier, since we didn't even suffer a minor defeat like the Britannians had at Itsukushima. At Arrene, while I hadn't had the authority to attack the city I had been the one to draw up the plan unbinding the Army's hands, and I had used my tactical authority to insure that plan was carried out as close to perfection as could be.
Perhaps Being X had been crueler than I'd thought, when he'd reincarnated me for the second time. I thought the hair, eyes, and face, the same as my second life, had just been his attempt at a joke; when I'd learned about the circumstances of my new life, I had thought it was a simple way to increase the difficulty of my new life, a cursed gift by a wannabe deity. Now, I wondered if his decision to encumber me with Britannian heritage had been a damning indictment of my moral character in his eyes. True, god or not Being X was in no way my moral superior, but I couldn't help but think his decision to make my sire in this life a member of the greatest race of callous murderers around was a hint about how the alleged deity saw me. If so, I couldn't honestly say that he was entirely wrong – my works proved him at least partially right.
"I'm sorry, I probably shouldn't have put that on you." I could still hear Ohgi talking, but he felt some distance away, as I pondered the mysterious ways in which Being X worked. "I'm sure you're beating yourself up now, but you really shouldn't. I was trying to say that I'm sure other members of our group are going to feel the same way, so I will talk to them to make sure they understand that Naoto and I fully backed your plan, and they should come to us if they have concerns... Tanya? Tanya?"
I snapped back into the present as Ohgi gently shook me, forcing my mind away from contemplating that evil unknowable bastard and trying to rewind what Ohgi had been saying as I spaced out. He was crouched low now, eyes level with my own, and he looked quite concerned. I tried to force a smile, to try and show that I was aware and listening, so he didn't need to look at me like I'm some weak girl who can't hack it. I'm not! I'm strong! I'm strong! I'm not weak, I'm not broken, so pleasepleaseplease don't look at me with pity! I was injured.
"Thank you, Ohgi." I forced the words out, and to my relief they came out smoothly, my voice cool and unwavering, untouched by my internal whining. "I actually wanted to ask you to talk to the other members of the cell. I realize that most of them haven't seen anything like... that, before, and I don't think I'd be able to... I don't think most of our comrades would be willing to truthfully tell me what they think." Now that I was acting again, moving forward on an issue I had identified, I felt a bit more in control. I just need to keep moving forwards, I realized, every time I look back I let myself get distracted, so I just need to stay active, not reactive. "If possible, I would like for you to meet with each of them individually, to give them an opportunity to freely express their views and concerns – the sooner the better. If we let them bottle it up for too long, their mental stability might be... undermined, reducing their efficacy."
"The same goes for you, Tanya." His immediate response was like a slap across my face, and if Ohgi hadn't had his hand on my shoulder I might have actually rocked back. Does... does he see me as mentally unstable? No! Nonono! I don't have anywhere to go! I can't leave the group! I don't want to be alone again! Please, no! I'm good! I'm good! I realized I'd started to hyperventilate, and fought to get my breath under control again. Passing out would do nothing to improve Ohgi's apparently low opinion of me, and it would guarantee I'd never have a hand in planning anything again, endangering my planned path to a safe management position far from the front lines.
Ohgi sighed, and patted me on the head with his other hand. I focused on the sensation of the hand on my shoulder and the hand on my head, drawing stability from the feeling of the pressure and hating myself for the weakness I was clearly showing to my superior. You're acting like an upset child, having a tantrum and needing her daddy to pamper her to calm her down. I cringed at the mental image and tried to force it away. Ohgi wasn't my father, he was my boss. I didn't have a father. I didn't have a mother. I just had a job, a cause, and coworkers. That's all. Feeling good from human touch may be instinctual, but it was also a weakness. This was a dangerous life, and it was impossible to know who Being X or the Britannians might tear from me next. I couldn't let myself get attached to Ohgi, to Naoto, or even to Kallen – I hadn't been hurt when my mother had died because I hadn't let myself get attached to her. One of the few times you've shown wisdom so far.
After a minute or three, once my breathing calmed, I stepped back, and Ohgi let me go, moving his hands away and standing up again. Even though I had resented being comforted, I still felt shockingly cold once I was alone out of his reach again. "You might have a point, but I request you speak with the others first. I've... seen something like this before – as best I know, none of them have. It will be harder on them, since it's their first time, so..."
Ohgi frowned slightly, but nodded, and started moving back towards the hidden staircase. "Alright, Tanya, I'll talk to them. You're right, everybody should have an opportunity to talk about... the station in private with someone. But..." He turned back around and looked squarely at me with the mien of a suddenly stern teacher gazing at a disappointing student trying to explain why her homework was missing for the fifth time in a row. "You and I are going to have a talk too – you're not getting out of it this time. You were right, people need a chance to talk, and that includes you, that includes me, and that includes Naoto. Just... please, trust us. You're one of us, so let me help you." As he made the last point, Ohgi's voice had grown increasingly intense. Seeming to notice this, he paused and took a deep breath, before saying "We're not going to think less of you because you need to talk, okay? So don't just beat yourself up."
And with that, he was gone, descending back down the stairs. And with that, I was alone again in the cold of nighttime Shinjuku, contemplating what I should do next.
Over the next several days, I buried myself in managing the Rising Sun Benevolent Association. Thankfully, at least one of the objectives I'd had in mind when planning the attack on the gang market had been accomplished – not only had the Kozuki Organization managed to recoup the costs of the operation, we had managed to turn a sizable profit. Between the clean and only moderately bloodstained cash the cell's members had managed to grab, the various narcotics scavenged from both a few of the stalls and fallen gangsters' personal effects, and the jewelry looted from those same dead gangsters, Inoue estimated that we were far enough in the black to keep the Benevolent Association running for quite some time.
Admittedly, the net profit of the mission was reduced by the need to keep greasing the palms of the checkpoint guards, and would further be reduced by the costs associated with the creative accounting we'd need to do to explain where the Association was getting its funding from come tax time, but such was the cost of doing business. While the need to contribute to societal corruption was galling, it was easy to rationalize; without participating in Britannian graft, it would be impossible to feed and clothe the people of the ghetto and all of our efforts would be for naught. Of course, the Rising Sun would hardly be seeing all the money we'd earned from our strike against the Shinjuku underworld – a significant piece of our income would be going to Mister Asahara in exchange for more of his devices.
Which brought me to the other objective I'd had in mind for my plan. I'd wanted to blood my new organization in a safe, morally unambiguous manner that would guarantee that everybody would kill at least once. Ideally, this would bind everybody together, increasing organizational loyalty through the shared experience of combat, and would also ensure that everybody was truly committed to the goal of improving the lot of our people, through violence if necessary. Whether or not I'd managed to fulfill this objective was still ambiguous, to say the least.
On the good side, we hadn't lost anybody. Thanks to my careful planning and our cooperative preparation, every member of the Kozuki Cell had returned alive and physically unharmed, while our enemies had suffered virtually total losses. None of the cell's members had lost their nerve when push came to shove, and I was fairly sure that everybody had killed at least once during the cleanup down in the station. There certainly hadn't been any shortage of targets. Thus far, nobody had confronted me about the plan, and as far as I knew nobody had challenged Ohgi or Naoto in regards to their support and agreement either.
The 'morally unambiguous' aspect, however, was rapidly turning into a botched mistake in my eyes. The aftermath of the shrapnel bombs had been traumatic, and the requirement that the enemy injured had to be executed had deepened the trauma. I had overestimated both the callousness and emotional capacities of myself and my team. I'd expected shock, of course, but I had hoped that between my emphasis on the gang's nature as Britannian collaborators and Naoto's pep-talk assuring everybody that our cause was righteous, the initial shock would be the worst of it. Nobody had frozen during the brief period of active combat, and the cell was only briefly stunned by what they saw as they entered the station, but what they had seen and done were proving harder to cope with in the aftermath.
I could sympathize. Looking back, I hadn't even considered how I would feel after the operation, and if I had, I likely would have just shrugged it off and considered it unlikely that I would be overly concerned. After all, I am a combat veteran, hardened by years of combat and command, and I had been further hardened by the trauma of the Conquest and growing up in a ghetto under iron-fisted occupation. But, somewhere along the way, I had... gone soft, I suppose. I was... feeling things about this last operation, and about the impact it had had on my comrades.
I didn't feel bad in the slightest about killing my enemies, whether they be Japanese or Britannian, singularly or in batches. I felt no need to engage in a "fair fight" or warn the enemy before I attacked. I felt no regret about killing the wounded in the subway station either; none of those men would have survived for long, and letting them bleed out and suffer would have been far worse than giving them a quick death. I had been initially appalled by what I had so carefully planned out, and the sheer amount of blood and pulped flesh had been shocking as well – after all, it had been years since I'd last stood watch on the Rhine. As time went by, that initial shock from the scent of blood and shit leaking from perforated bowels faded, but I still couldn't bring myself to feel happy about the mission I had so carefully conducted.
As I tried to pin down exactly what it was about the plan that was making me feel somehow off, I kept my eyes open and an ear to the ground, carefully trying to gather up every hint of the reaction to the "Shinjuku Bombing", as it had already come to be called.
As I'd expected, the other gangs had smelled the blood in the water and set upon the remnants of the Kokuryu-kai mercilessly, avenging past defeats on the formerly rising gang and seizing as much territory and assets as they could. In doing so, a half dozen gang wars broke out between the new neighbors, with alliances and counter-alliances forming and dissolving every day. As November drew to a close and December dawned, the gang violence showed no signs of stopping or slowing down.
Despite the building's collapse, someone had managed to find the notice I'd left in the ruins of Shinjuku-gyoemmae Station – that, or someone had found one of the half-dozen other copies I'd distributed in the vicinity the next day, in case the original had been buried under tons of brick and concrete. While the initial bombing had gone almost unnoticed by the Britannians for hours, one of the notices had made its way into the hands of a reporter by the name of Diethard Reid, who had managed to blow up the story to the point where it was on the front page of the main Tokyo Settlement newspaper the next day. Lord Kewell had been compelled by his superiors, public opinion, his own pride, or some combination of the three to organize a press conference on the Bombing. While I didn't have the opportunity to watch it myself, based on the newspapers Kallen brought me after Ashford let out each day, he had done a masterful job avoiding taking responsibility for the attack while heavily hinting that the attack had been carried out by the Purist Faction. According to the editorials, the whole affair was surprisingly controversial among the movers and shakers of Area 11's government. The military leadership was decrying the rogue Purist operation, while the hardliners associated with Prince Clovis's retinue were praising Kewell as a man who clearly could get things done. The overall verdict was that the Purists had gained the affection of Prince Clovis for their "efforts to combat the criminals plaguing his fair fief", but had burnt their bridges with the rest of the Britannian military in Area 11.
As for the regular Japanese of Shinjuku... there didn't seem to be much of an opinion at all about the Bombing either way. Since as far as anybody seemed to know, no civilians had died in the blast, there wasn't the same seething current of grief and rage that Britannian collective punishments inspired. The few people who seemed to have an opinion were generally saying things like "good riddance", at least when they were sure no gang members were close enough to hear them talking. Of greater concern to the majority of the people of Shinjuku was the ever mounting food crisis. While the spiraling gang warfare was concerning, the desperate shortage of food was terrifying. The caloric income of virtually everybody living in Shinjuku was plummeting just as the teeth of winter bit, compounding the physical toll and further weakening immune systems. The winter, everybody knew, would be hard, and many would die of starvation, sickness, or exposure. More than gang fighting, more than the prospect of genocidal Britannians, the Japanese of Shinjuku feared the slow suffocating death by deprivation the Brittanians had arranged for them.
Perhaps that's my solution. How better to soothe the troubled minds of my comrades than a mission of mercy? The Britannians certainly weren't lacking in food or medicine – the ease with which the Rising Sun was able to import expired or rejected food from grocery stores proved that well enough. Still, that trickle wouldn't be enough to ward off the specter of starvation – but perhaps ramping the supply up would keep at least some of the population alive and healthy. Healthy enough to take up arms when the time comes.