RAVE REVIEWS FOR ERIC VAN LUSTBADER'S SHAN:
Eric Van Lustbader strikes again."
The Houston Post
'His development of power politics is gaining more depth with each novel. . . . Lustbader fans will not be disappointed."
Publishers Weekly
As SHAN draws to a close, the reader, in his eagerness, might be tempted to rush ahead, to see what the next page brings. Don't rush, you might miss something important."
Associated Press
"Lustbader writes some of the most erotic scenes in contemporary fiction."
Newsday
Also By Eric Van Lustbader
Novels of Asia:
The Ninja*
Black Heart*
The Miko*
The China Maroc Trilogy: Jian* Shan*
A Novel of America: Sirens*
The Sunset Warrior Series:
The Sunset Warrior
Shallows of Night
Dai-San
Beneath an Opal Moon
* Published by Fawcett Books
ZERO
Eric Van Lustbader
FAWCETT CREST • NEW YORK
A Fawcett Crest Book Published by Ballantine Books Copyright © 1988 by Eric Van Lustbader
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following for permission to reprint previously published material:
Universal Press Syndicate: An excerpt from an article by Richard Reeves. Copyright © 1987 Universal Press Syndicate. Reprinted with permission. All rights reserved.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 87-27225 ISBN 0-449-21682-9
This edition published by arrangement with Random House, Inc.
Manufactured in the United States of America
Calligraphy by Carma Hinton
First International Edition: September 1988
This is for all my friends on Maui,
who helped me discover another side.
Aloha and mahalo.
Most especially,
this is for V.,
who—as always—helped so much. Zero could not have been bom without her.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Many people were of particular help in the various difficult phases of research for Zero. Thank you.
To Marsha and Bruce, and German John for opening up Kahakuloa to me.
To Bud Davison and his "flight crew" at Butler International for all their aviation lore.
To Frank Toomey, vice-president, Bear, Stearns & Co., Los Angeles, for his explanations of the macro-economics theories that are so vital to the novel.
To Henry for the practicalities of editorial assistance.
To Stu, for flight command control.
I drew from factual elements and quotes used in an article by Richard Reeves of the Universal Press Syndicate, titled "Asia's Dreaded Superpower," printed in the Honolulu Advertiser, for the newspaper article that Lillian Doss reads in Book Four.
Very special thanks to Ronn Ronck for his invaluable assistance in opening the files of the Honolulu Advertiser on the Yakuza.
And to Kate for brainstorming and counseling above and beyond.
It is in changing
That things find purpose.
—Heraclitus
Goke no kimi tasogaregao no uchiwa kana
Her beauty clasped by twilight
the widow
gently wields her fan
—Buson
CONTENTS
book i INKA: to catch fire 1
book ii TENDO: the way of heaven 95
book iii HA GAKURE: hidden leaves 219
BOOK IV ZERO: THE ABIDING SPIRIT 325
SPRING, PRESENT
WEST MAUI,
HAWAII/TOKYO,
JAPAN
Not another night.
The man known as Civet opened his eyes. A gray-green gekko was staring at him. Immobile, the tiny lizard clung to a wallpaper anthurium blossom. Its head was twisted so that it could continue to stare at Civet.
Beyond the screened window-doors, coconut palms whispered as cooling winds coming off the West Maui Mountains brushed their long, sensuous fronds in a lover's caress. It was here, to this special spot in Hawaii, that Civet always came after an assignment. After an extraction. But this went beyond an extraction, beyond even death.
Civet wiped the sweat from his high forehead. He felt his fingers trembling as the animus of his nightmare stalked him. But the presence of a nightmare meant that at least he had slept.
Yes, another night.
He saw the pale gold light flooding the tips of the palms as the sun rose above the peaks to the east, and thought, I've gotten through another night.
It was always like this after he completed a directive. Yet this was different. So different that his very bones ached with the knowledge that he had carried out a directive of his own making. His mind boiled with the understanding that this was either the beginning of his life—or the end.
Civet sat up in the huge bed. The sheets drifted around his waist as, wrapping his arms about them, he hugged his knees against his chest.
He glanced at the bedside table. On it was a half-empty bottle of Irish whiskey and a water glass. Civet found himself reaching for the bottle and caught himself. Quite deliberately, he turned his head away.
And was confronted by the gekko's unblinking stare. The bastard looks so accusing, Civet thought. But it was his own conscience, he knew, that transformed the gekko's stare into something more than dull curiosity. It probably doesn't even know what I am, Civet thought. But Civet knew what he was. Only too well.
He was cold. Cold and sweating. With a groan, he swung his legs over the side of the king-size bed. The expanse of bed covers behind him seemed endless. The empty space depressed him so that his memory brought back to him Mi-chiko's scent, a heady combination of perfume and the musk of her own skin.
He was dizzy. He put his head in his hands and thought, Ah God, but I miss her. Even after all these years, the wound is still fresh. It seems just yesterday that I lay with her.
Thinking of Michiko was like putting an ice pick in his heart. But, he thought bleakly, it was better than contemplating what he had done. Three days ago. So different. How could he have known how different it would be? An eternity of agony, because now there was no turning back. It did no good at all to know that it was different this time. It only served to remind him of what he had once been, to make him feel more like Sisyphus, putting his shoulder to the rock, rolling it up the hill yet again. It made no difference that he had been at it in the service of his country. There had been no glory in what he had been—only medals engraved with his name locked in a sealed room, and blood on his hands. (Was that why he had gotten into the habit of burning his clothes after the completion of each directive—because of the blood?)
That, more than anything else, Civet decided, was the consequence of killing another human being: a descent into purgatory. The dark closing in each night like the accusatory finger of God. The river of life turned to dust in your hand, ashes that once God had animated with His breath. How much more terrifying then, to contemplate the death of millions.
Civet thought a lot about God these days. He felt now that with each assignment, with each life he expunged from the world, he was taking a step closer to his maker. At night, he trembled in the solar wind of His presence; he breathed in an energy beyond his comprehension. Yet it was a power that terrified rather than energized him.
Tracing it back—logic and connections were among his
strong suits—he at length came to the realization that his terror stemmed not from the fact that he was repentant for his sins, but rather that he felt no remorse for the life he had chosen for himself. But not even he would have thought that his life would have led him down this particular path.
For the first time in decades, he was truly alone. Which, of course, was why thoughts of God blew persistently through his mind. Everything now had devolved onto him. And he was a fugitive, running for his life. Once, already, they had almost caught up with him. Everything gone up in smoke. Almost. But he had evaded them; he had come here.
How long? he wondered. How long did he have until they tracked him down here? Two days; three, at most. They were smart. And they had the organization. Christ, no one had to tell him that! He almost laughed at the bitter irony of it; he bit his Up instead.
And now, he thought, it all comes down to one hellish gamble. Hope may spring eternal, but it is such a fragile thing. I am gambling everything—more even than my own life, oh, much more!—on an instinct. I believe, truly, that I am right. But what if I am not?
All around him he felt the stirring of ordinary people for whom two kids, two cars and an hour's commute to work were the parameters of life. Civet shuddered at the thought of living his life in any mundane fashion.
Yet it puzzled him sometimes, this lack of contrition on his part. He felt like a monk who, having come so far in his ecclesiastical studies, nevertheless finds himself unable to take his final vows.
During his life, he had been in many places of worship. Once, twenty years ago, he had almost been killed in one and had, in turn, been forced to extract his assailant. Piety, he had come to learn, rarely coincided with purity of spirit. Civet knew many men in his profession who went to church every week. They seemed to be the ones who enjoyed killing the most.
Civet did not enjoy his work in the same visceral, oftentimes sexual manner these others did. But surely, he told himself time and again, one cannot be as good as I am at what I do without enjoying it.
It was the shadow world of secrets he inhabited that Civet really loved. It was like an Englishman's cup of tea, ever present and wanning. It made him feel apart, utterly independent, free. He was a fiercely painted kite riding the feral winds most people could not even imagine. He was made special; exalted, even.
Yet each aftermath was remorseless in its grip on him, and again he would return to purgatory. But this was different, and only he could know why.
The gekko was staring. Civet grabbed the bottle, poured himself four fingers. He looked at it, put it aside. He slipped off the bed onto his knees and prayed to a God he could not imagine, let alone understand. Was it Buddha to whom he prayed? Jehovah? Jesus? Civet could not say. But now, at this moment of ultimate crisis in his life—in, he believed, the future of the world—he needed to speak with something greater than himself. Michiko would have said it was nature. Civet could only bow his head and let his mind flow like a river to its source.
He threw the liquor into the sink. The ice he had not used during the night had melted, and he scooped some of the still-cool water. Then, to escape the lizard's disturbing gaze, he padded to the screen doors and let himself out onto the lanai. The lizard's scrutiny seemed to have become almost human to his keyed-up senses.
He was on one of the top floors, a strict stipulation with him. He was personally comfortable with the vistas thus afforded him and professionally at ease with the view of his immediate environment a high floor provided. He had been taught to be a very careful man.
Beyond the clattering palms and, below, the tropical profusion of the orchid gardens, the cerulean waters of the Molokai Channel beckoned invitingly. The early wind had died, and with a practiced eye, Civet knew that it would be a calm day. A great day for fishing.
He could already see the shining strand arrowing down into the water, could feel the tension on the line, the shuddering, and then the great monster tug as the onaga, the deepwater snapper he loved to eat, took the bait. Oh yes, he thought, happier now. The tang of the salt on his face, the challenge in the pull and leap of the big fish. That was the kind of activity that would wash his emotions clean of the detritus of the extraction.
Extraction was part of the jargon—-as odd as the argot of an African bushman—that men in Civet's profession used to indicate a sanctioned killing.
Below his lanai he saw a couple in their twenties cutting through the grass in their jogging outfits. Disturbed, the mynas rose, cawing. And as his eyes followed the arc of the birds' flight, Civet saw the figure standing beside the coconut palm.
The figure was partially in shadow and yet the power that emanated from it reached Civet seven stories above.
Civet forgot the hopping mynas, the jogging couple; he was oblivious of the soft air, the spectacular view across to the island of Molokai, which he loved so well. He was fully concentrated on the figure. Civet, who was as adept at tracking as he was at killing, was used to identifying people at a distance.
Civet was now at the far end of the lanai. Palm fronds waved, partially obscuring the figure. But the angle was better, and at last Civet could get a look at the face.
The glass Civet had been holding crashed to the cement floor, and he found himself gripping the railing to stop himself from falling to his knees. Vertigo overcame him. His mouth was open and he was gasping for breath. It cannot be, he thought. Not yet. I need to rest; I'm exhausted from all this running. It simply cannot be.
But he knew what it meant: They had already found him.
He turned and rushed back into the room, scraping his knee on the edge of the bed. He staggered into the bathroom, where he vomited in great racking convulsions. He wasn't emotionally ready. Dear God, he thought, protect me from what I have to do. Protect those I love if I don't make it.
His imagination, racing in panic, unraveled what was ahead of him. Stop it! he admonished himself. He got hold of himself at last, splashed cold water on his face, into his mouth, across the back of his neck. Then he hurriedly dressed, put wallet, car keys, passport and a small eelskin case into various pockets of his tropical-weight jacket. He reread the postcard he had written in the dead of night, then he went out the door.
He avoided the elevator, taking the stairs two at a time. In the lobby, he hurried past pale-skinned tourists in garish aloha shirts. Deposited the postcard with the concierge, who assured him it would go out with the morning's mail.
In the belowground car park, he took a quick scan, allowing his eyes to adjust to the gloom. When he was satisfied with his security, he crossed to his rented Mustang. Got down on his knees and, with his customary thoroughness, inspected the underside of the carriage.
...
allforjesus2001