The next morning, Alanna met Alexander in the hotel restaurant. He was awfully cheery; she wasn't. At first he teased her about spending the night with Sachiko, until Alanna finally snapped at him. It was around then that he figured something was wrong.
"Hey, where is she, anyway?" he asked, suddenly seeming worried.
"She left," Alanna replied bluntly.
"What do you mean, she left?" Alexander demanded. "Sachiko wouldn't just leave me behind like that!"
"Yes she would," Alanna said matter-of-factly, leaning across the table.
"How would you know?! She's my sister!"
"No she's not," she replied with the exact same tone.
"What do you mean she's not? You can't just--" he started to say, becoming edgy.
"What I mean," Alanna interrupted, "is cut the shit. She's not your sister. She's not related to you at all. She's a pretty good actress, but you're not."
"What--" he tried to butt in unsucessfully.
"Alex, I'm serious. Last night I had a wonderful, nice little chat with that lying bitch, and she told me everything," she said sharply. "So can we please skip the whole part where you deny everything and just start with the truth?"
He stared at her, trying to think of something to spit back at her, but nothing came to him. Alanna was almost amused at the sight of him doing the exact same nervous lip quiver that Sachiko kept doing; almost. She could tell, though, he wasn't pretending.
"Fine," he said with a reluctant sigh. "If she's really gone... I'll be honest with you. No, she's not my sister. She's not even really Japanese."
"I figured," Alanna replied.
He looked at her nervously. "So... what do you want to know?"
"I don't even know," Alanna admitted, sitting back. She didn't; right now, she was just infuriated and trying not to let the betrayal get to her. A little voice in the back of her head was telling her that she wanted to get some answers... but answers to what, the little voice couldn't tell her.
"Why me?" she asked-- knowing full well that definitely wasn't the right question.
"I don't know," Alexander said. "She never once mentioned bringing someone else along. I don't know why there was the whole sibling facade at all; when we met, she just whispered to me to play along, so I did."
Alanna sighed. She believed him.
"Okay, so what's the big interest in you?" she asked. God, she thought, this thing with Sachiko's thrown me. I'm way off my game. But she was still sure that was the right question. "I... exaggerated with Sachiko because I wanted to see where it led, but... Christ, the military actually wanted you back badly enough to put out a bounty? The Soviets wanted you enough to send a KGB agent after you?
"Jesus," she said, "that's insane. How could one antsy French soldier possibly be that important?"
He stopped, looking both upset and uncertain. He thought about it, clearly struggling for words.
"It's not me," he finally said. "It's something I have-- a box of crap that's been in the family that dates back to the first ancestor of mine who left Japan after-- well, you know."
Alanna nodded. "What's in the box?"
"I dunno. It's just... a bunch of useless heirlooms from like, World War 2. There's a notebook, dated back to the middle of 1950... but it's just all full of crazy talk. I think great-grandpa Yazawa was a bit touched."
"What? That's not World War 2. World War 2 ended in 1947," she corrected.
"Well, whatever, I'm not a historical scholar. All I know is it's from around then, and everyone wants their hands on it. A bunch of CIA spooks came in, saying that in that box were the plans for a super powerful weapon, and I should hand it over to them. Patriotic duty and all that shit-- said they'd been looking for Dr. Yazawa's notes for ages, and that he was really some sort of brilliant scientist-- but they wouldn't say anything more than that. Just that it was my duty to surrender any information about him that I had."
"So... why didn't you?" Alanna asked, puzzled.
He stopped again, seeming reluctant to continue. He looked strained, but Alanna stared at him intently, forcing him to answer.
"Alanna...," he said at last, "look at me. Do I look like the sort of person who volunteers for the army? I got drafted, I'm not fit for war at all! You have to understand... all I know's everyone's after old man Yazawa's things. I give them to the CIA spooks, I get a pat on the back and get to continue getting my ass shot at in some sandy hell hole I couldn't care less about; I help out the cute sounding KGB girl-- Sachiko? Freedom.
"It wasn't a hard choice," he told her, looking down.
Alanna stared at him, amazed; all she could think about was how pitiful that was. She couldn't imagine betraying her country to save herself a year of service. The thought made her blood boil. She was about to shout something at him, when she regained control at the last moment. Just then, the waiter came by.
"May I help you, sir and madame?"
"No," Alanna said sharply, getting up. "Excuse me, Alexander. I need to get some fuckin' air-- that's all I have for questions for now. I'll be back in ten minutes." She wasn't done, but she knew that right now, she needed to get outside before she did something she regretted. Yes, she was pissed off at what Sachiko had done to her... but she couldn't take that out on Alexander. What he was telling her was important, she couldn't risk alienating him by abusing him.
She needed to get outside.
"Okay," Alexander said.
Alanna walked out of the restaurant, through the lobby, and out the door. The man at the desk seemed grumpy and didn't even say anything as she walked by; he usually greeted her, quite friendlily, too.
It was cold out, but she didn't especially notice then; she was too angry to care, right now she just needed fresh air. She walked aimlessly down the street, trying to collect herself. I should get something to read, she thought. She glanced around, there was a newpaper box just down the street. She walked over, suddenly taken aback as she read the main headline.
Three words: Germania ob'yavlyaet voinu. She stopped dead in her tracks. Nothing could describe how scary those words were to her; it was the worst thing she could possibly imagine ever seeing as a headline. She mentally translated it, thinking about what it meant.
<Germany declares war.>
Three simple words, that, throughout history, had consistently preluded the entire world being thrown into conflict; consistently were the precursors to the most bloody wars known to humanity. The idea of war in Europe-- not rebellion in Turkey, but an actual, straight out, war in Europe-- terrified her.
She bought the newspaper, scanning the article as she walked back. Last night, East German troops (with plenty of assistance from the Red Army, she was sure) had pushed into the West at night, making a frightening amount of distance until NATO forces had finally caught them.
She wasn't sure yet if the Soviet Union had actually declared war on the United States yet, but they might as well have; an attack on a NATO country by a Warsaw Pact member meant that both blocs were effectively at war with each other. This wasn't something discrete, like Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Turkey, Greece, Spain, Pakistan, or any of the other proxy wars of the last 150 years; this was definitely outright war between the two blocs.
It couldn't possibly get any worse, Alanna thought, as she walked back into the hotel. No wonder the receptionist was grumpy; business certainly wasn't going to be booming for the next few years.
She headed back into the restaurant, walking back to her table with the newspaper in hand; until she realized that it was empty. She glanced around. Had she just gotten mixed up? No, Alexander was nowhere to be seen.
Fuck! she thought. I just had to jinx it, she cursed to herself, looking upset as she shook her head.
"Madame?" the waiter said to her, as she stared in disbelief at the empty table. She turned.
"Yes?" she asked, angrily.
"I'm sorry, ma'am, but your friend left while you were away. He said to give his apologies-- extremely rude all the same if you ask me," the waiter told her.
"Christ," was all she could say.
"He paid your bill in full, and asked that you be given this," he said, handing her a heavy shoebox. "Normally, I wouldn't, but... I figured it was the least I could do."
Alanna took the box, staring at it in disbelief. It took her a moment to snap back to reality.
"Oh... well, thanks," she said reluctantly. "Thank you."
"My apologies, ma'am," the waiter said, and left, going back to his business.
Alanna went back to her room, drearily. Well, on the plus side, no news could possibly make this any worse, she thought to herself, knowing full well that it wasn't true. She went in, sat down on the edge of her bed, and started to pick through the contents of the box.
A notebook, a few sheets of paper, and a plastic case with Chinese writing and a few words of English all over it. She slowly went through them all, hoping that there was at least something of value in it. Finding Alexander at this point was a fool's errand; he'd probably slipped out the back, taken a taxi, and disappeared forever. People all around Moscow spoke English; he could be anywhere by now.
Worse, she thought, starting to examine the things more carefully, he's probably off with Sachiko right now. I'll never catch them.
Ten minutes later, she was at a loss. The notebook was full of crazy ramblings (she had been briefly amused by such gems as "the red-head can put everything right"-- but only briefly), the sketches were some sort of engineering diagrams that she couldn't make heads or tails out of, and all she could find in the plastic case was a shiny disc, and a little booklet full of more foreign writing.
This is hopeless, she thought. Alexander was gone, Sachiko was probably off laughing at her now, and the only lead she had left was hopeless indecipherable. I have to get out of here, she thought to herself.
Sachiko had her wide-brimmed hat pulled down over her eyes, not looking
up as she ate her eggs in the quiet country diner. She hadn't really wanted
to stop, as she was nearly certain that even in the best case scenario, the
KGB was surely on her trail; the worst was that her photo had been leaked
publically and every local militsiya was on the watch for her.
But it'd been several days since she'd eaten, and she was absolutely famished. The awful, slightly undercooked eggs... tasted about as terrible as they were, as Sachiko discovered that being hungry doesn't make food taste better, even if it was the first meal she'd eaten in days. She didn't care. She scarfed them down anyway.
When she was done, she paid in cash-- she knew that would look incredibly suspicious, but there was no other way of avoiding being traced-- and headed back to her stolen car. She hadn't quite worked out what route she'd take to get out the borders of the USSR yet; she wanted to leave as random looking a pattern as she possibly could, hoping to throw off any search long enough to get to East Germany.
She was quickly jolted back to reality as she turned around the corner of the diner, stopping dead in her tracks. A large man was standing in front of her car, tapping his foot. He looked up, seeing her instantly.
"<So nice to see you again, Miss Nguyen,>" the bounty hunter from before said dryly. She was shocked, her mind racing to figure out what was going on.
"<What the hell are you doing here?>" she demanded. "<I thought you were arrested. I thought you were arrested for treason. You should be building roads in Siberia by now.>"
"<Funny that,>" he said, with his characteristic, infuriating smirk. "<Turns out, I've got some friends in high places, who felt rather heartbroken after you betrayed them. They thought you'd be much more suited for the job of building roads in Siberia.>"
As he talked, Sachiko tried to figure out her options. They weren't good. The diner was in the middle of nowhere, a good several kilometres away from the local town. That had seemed like a good thing when she decided to stop by, but now she realized that even if she did make a break around the corner, there was nowhere to run to. There were no woods, no mountains, no lake to disappear into; just low brush all around. Running wouldn't work.
"<You? Friends? That seems improbable,>" she said, talking just to buy herself some more time, "<I mean, what with your oh-so-wonderful disposition.>"
"<Doesn't seem like that matters much, girl. You've got a pleasant one, but betray everyone you like,>" he replied. As she thought about it, it became clear that she only had one option open. He continued, "<Ironic, isn't it?>"
Another place, another time, she would've taken the time to take offense. It was hurtful, and in any other circumstances, she would've been heartbroken for someone to say something like that to her.
She didn't have time for that at the moment, however. But she did know exactly how to respond.
"<Yes, it is,>" she said, with a feigned dejection. "<It's like rain on your wedding day.>"
He stopped to think. He was hardly a master linguist, but he was pretty sure that wasn't what the word meant in the slightest.
"<That's not ironic, that's just--,>" was as far as he'd managed to get. As soon as he'd started to look like he was thinking, Sachiko sprung into action, leaping at him, catching him while he was off balance, and kicked him right in the face.
He stumbled backwards, starting to pull out his gun, but Sachiko knocked it out of his hand with a sharp blow. Before he could react, she punched him in the nose as hard as she could, breaking it on impact.
Sachiko punched him in the face again, feeling confident; so long as she kept him off balance, she could keep this up. She knew if she knocked him off his feet, he'd never be able to get back up; he was too big and it was doubtful that he was trained in any martial art, let alone one that taught how to strike from the ground. She jabbed again, her fists bloody from his broken nose.
But this time, he grabbed her arm right before impact and pulled, using her to regain his footing (and dislocating her shoulder in the process). He spat out a thick wad of blood, hitting her in the eye, and with his other hand, punched her stomach, putting his whole weight into it.
Sachiko collapsed instantly.
"<Stupid bitch,>" he cursed, feeling his nose to see how bad it was; wincing in pain as he realized how bad an idea that was.
Sachiko woke up to a feeling of intense pain, and had trouble breathing; her whole body was sore, but her shoulder especially was killing her. It was the worst she'd ever felt in her life.
She wasn't sure where she was at first. All she knew was it was pitch black, and there was something covering her face. She reached for her face, trying to move whatever it was that was covering her mouth, slowly realizing that her hands were bound; she couldn't move them from behind her back.
It was at that point that she broke down and cried.
The bounty hunter spat out the window of his car, tapping his fingers against the side of the door as he drove back to Moscow. First, he decided, he would stop at the hospital, because his broken nose was still bothering him; then he would turn over Sachiko.