Aki the Brother

I lost my Venator licence. Asa-8 took it from me. Rather, she told the original Genshiken Asa what happened, and that led to telling other people—you get the idea. If the plan to assassinate Horace hadn’t been so vile, I’d probably have gotten reprimanded, but with the K-Type nerve gas and mystery surrounding the Rat King’s virus, the Sumiaka-kai needed somebody to take responsibility.

In some ways the loss hit hard. No money, no ease of acquiring things. In other ways, it didn’t hit at all. Despite having the licence for less than a year, I’d grown jaded toward some aspects of the “esteemed” Venator life. The constant spotlight from people, the unnatural ease of doing whatever you wanted, the growing sense that the licence wasn’t just a passage to duty and privilege but also a conveyor belt carrying you away from humanity and into a nebulous realm of Venators, as if another species.

For the first time in my life, I understood my eldest brother Tatsuya. He was the prodigy, an unwavering child of the Sumiaka-kai. Polite, strong, righteous, instinctually good at being a Venator. But on sparse occasions he’d tried to convey to me that being a Venator meant more than killing the Rat King’s androids.

‘It means being more, for better or worse,' he used to say. 

In spite of Tatsuya’s literary inclinations and frequent speeches at the Sumiaka-kai’s meetings, he could never fully articulate his own feelings. He tried, with me. He tried more often than with our parents or other siblings. I’d been too jealous and immature to realise it. All I saw was a figment of the man I wanted to be, not the individual trying to warn me.

No Venator licence. No reputation in the Sumiaka-kai. Still, I owed Mako. Chances were slim, but I figured it was worth trying to help her daughter get into the prestigious school sponsored by the Sumiaka-kai. With our rapidly dwindling funds, we flew to Shanghai, where Mako’s ex-husband and daughter lived.

Mako’s ex-husband met us at the door of his villa. He looked at Mako, at me, presuming we were a couple. He went golfing, leaving us with Mako’s daughter. Not the best father, leaving his daughter with a stranger; what if I’d been a crazed killer? Well, he cared less about their daughter, more about Mako being deprived.

Mako’s daughter had inherited her eyes and face structure. They used their features differently, though.

We sat in the living room, on the couch and reclining chairs, an awkward formation. Mako wasted no time going through her plan to get her daughter into the prestigious school, just like she wanted – allegedly.

Her daughter sneered. ‘Like I wanted,’ she repeated, sarcastic.

‘We talked about it?’ Mako replied.

Her voice rose. ‘Over a year ago, when you bothered to visit.’

‘I’ve been…busy.’

‘Sure you have.’

Mako twitched. I wanted to say something, but I suspected it’d make things worse.

‘You don’t care about me anymore,’ Mako’s daughter said. ‘You only visit these days to appeal me.’

‘She means appease,’ Proteus informed me.

‘And what’s with this guy?’ Mako’s daughter aimed a finger at me. ‘Is he your boy-toy?’

‘Where did you learn that word?’ Mako murmured to herself.

‘I don’t need you. If you don’t want to visit, don’t bother.’

‘I do—’

But Mako’s daughter had jumped from the couch and rushed upstairs.

Mako and I let ourselves out.

#

Mako and I didn’t talk much on the way back to Neo-III Tokyo. I was occupied with reaching the Rat King. Mako, I assume, thought about her daughter. During the transit, she toyed with a kyratalsate pill, rolling it between her fingers. She did this all the way to the pagoda, in which time friction had ground the pill to half its original size.

‘I haven’t taken one in a while,’ she said abruptly. ‘Haven’t felt the need.’ She flicked the pill to the ground and crushed it under her heel. ‘I’ll say this now, Aki. You’ve paid your debt. It didn’t work out, but that might be for the best. I’m ready to face the Rat King alongside you. What you did in Hong Kong, don’t even think about trying that again; besides, neither of us are Venators. I’m ready to see this through, for better or worse.’

Mako offered her hand, and I accepted it. No words required.

We did the only logical thing. We got drunk together.

No reason for reticence. I told Mako about Tatsuya, how in the past I was obsessed with avenging him because it felt like I couldn’t be his replacement. I wished I were capable like him, had his life, had the syndicate tell me what to do.

‘It isn’t rare to feel aimless,' Mako said. 'For example, when the war started in 2076—’

‘Major or minor?’ I asked.

‘Minor. Our army went through so many officers that eventually I got put in charge. Basically a kid. I did a lot of things myself, claiming to make certain it was done right. The truth is, it was less terrifying than giving orders. I got commended, so I kept doing it. Admiration turned to annoyance. Other officers kept saying I jeopardised the chain of command. Gods, I wasn’t even in the chain, not officially. I kept doing what I did, got in trouble, and my parents had to pull some strings to get me discharged for medical reasons. Got to transfer to the Corpse Maidens. You know how that went. After that mess, my parents wanted me to join the Sumiaka-kai. I never wanted it. I hate this syndicate stuff, always have.’

‘Why not leave?’

‘No point. None of it matters. Days of wolves and sheep are over,’ Mako said. ‘Wolves eat sheep. Sheep eat wolves. Wolves wear the newest wool clothes, and sheep wear decorative heads of wolves. Everything consumes everything, like an ouroboros. When there’s freedom like that, either you give up – or choose something to give a shit about.’

Mako leaned on my shoulder. She craned her head up. We kissed. Mako had rough, cracked lips. I was too drunk to enjoy it, and it’s unlikely being sober would’ve helped. We pulled away, neither of us positive why we’d done that. We brushed past the moment with remarkable poise.

Mako said, ‘I find ways to forget I’m alive; you find reminders that you are.’

‘That’s too abstract,’ I slurred.

‘I want oblivion; you want a wife, kids, an estate in the hills, and a golden retriever that barks on command. Is that still too abstract for you?’

‘I’m more of a Labrador kinda guy.’

Our drink-addled brains needed a moment to process our exchange, and when they did, we laughed long and hard. Good. Best to get the laughter out while we had the chance.

#

As per the deal for helping with Horace, Lia had shared her information with me. Our target: The Galapagos Islands, an archipelago of Ecuador.

Throughout every city, town, village, and hamlet in the world, people prepared for New Year’s Eve. Not an ordinary day on regular years, and extraordinary on the current one: 2099. You couldn’t walk three feet without encountering an ad for a turn-of-the-century party. But Mako and I didn’t go anywhere. In our pagoda, we geared up: Loaded rounds into magazines, ran diagnostics on cybernetics, sharpened Cat-Claws and sabres. Our expressions matched: Neutral focus.

Fireworks went off. Colourful lights spilled intermittently into the pagoda. I had a hangover.

Mako lit a cigarette and slid the carton to me. I took one. Click! Click! The lighter didn’t ignite. Click! Click! Sparks but no flame; the wick curled, black and shrivelled. My first cigarette ever and it didn’t light. It seemed to portend our fate. Mako crawled to me and brought her head close, using the lit end of hers to ignite mine. Had we been strangers, we’d maintain a necessary distance, a distinct gap to minimise the intimate proximity. Mako touched her forehead to mine. My cigarette glowed with the shared embers. I held the cigarette with my thumb and middle finger, index layered onto the middle, ring and pinkie hanging loose. I inhaled deeply, cheeks concave, and held the smoke deep inside, ending with less an exhale, more a gentle release of everything trapped among my bones and blood and corporate-branded steel, the smoke a vessel—a mere raft—and my soul rode upon the prow like a carved figurehead.