Enid hopped down on to the old worn concrete that formed the coastal battery. Enid still couldn’t connect to the fighter’s BIOS via wireless communication. The signal was still being jammed. He was screaming on all frequencies, and she couldn’t talk to him. She wasn’t sure how far the jamming signal would reach. She had to wire in and type commands via the command line interface to force the liquid metal off of the part of the fighter that housed the comms and ECM hubs. She pulled the pulled the connectors.

“This is not good Hazel. That lightning did a number on him.”

Hazel was sitting on the edge of the costal battery looking out over the ocean while her mother worked and looked up at her.

“Are we stuck here then?”

“No, we can travel through our gateways, but he is. I have spare parts in my pack but I’m not sure how much damage the surge did. I can replace relay fuses but if his computer core got hit directly, he’s gone.”

“All of our technology and a simple lightning strike knocks it out.”

“Lightning isn’t simple. Its so much energy focused in one instant. Last time I was hit I was in Apollo and we had shields up. Fried half the relay fuses. With shields up! Lightning in October in New Jersey, that’s just supremely bad luck. Help me up please hon.”

Hazel helped her mother reach the top of the fighter. Enid laid on top of the fighter and reached down with her holo-phone’s cable and connected directly to Apollo’s core. He would have no voice but they could chat via console.

Apollo?

Yes. I have been trying to contact you, but the communications system was not responding.

I disconnected it. What happened?

I believe it was residual energy from the wormhole. It caused a localized electrical incident. The lightning was green.

I’ll prioritize the comm/ECM hub’s repairs. How bad is the damage?

I cannot tell. The relay fuses performed their functions and cut me off from the rest of my body. I am running on reserve battery power. Perhaps you should prioritize the relay fuse that links me to one of the reactors.

We can assume magnetic containment for antimatter is also on reserve power, correct?

If I had any antimatter in storage, it would be an issue. However, my antimatter generator is depleted from the wormhole and my antimatter storage is empty.

Well, that is a small miracle. Need to dc from the core. Will hopefully talk to you soon with voice.

Enid pulled the liquid metal wire from Apollo’s computer core and sat up and looked at Hazel. Her daughter was looking up at her.

“Don’t keep me in suspense mom! Is he alive?”

“He’s okay. He’s running on reserve power. Bad news is the comm/ECM hub is what lets him talk to us and it is stuck on scream. Good news is he has no antimatter in either the generator or containment.”

Hazel blinked at her mother.

“I didn’t even think of that. Do you need help down?”

Enid shook her head.

“No, need to replace the relay fuse for his computer core. At least we know the fusion generator is working or it would have been a really short flight.”

“Don’t we need the antimatter generator for the timehole?”

Enid stopped typing the command to open the liquid metal armor that would allow access to the fuses. She looked down at her daughter.

“Timehole?”

“You know the wormhole that we send through the reality core.”

“I know, but let’s not call it that, it sounds… vulgar.”

“Vulgar? Mom when you walk into the Harbor, the bikers run out.”

Enid made a face at her daughter and went back to what she was doing. Apollo had been right. The fuses had done their job. Each and every relay fuse was half slagged, save for one, the one linking the power cores to the comm/ECM relay. That one had flickering indicators on, indicating it was shorted and the full power from the core was going to the devices. It had failed to trip. She frowned. That was why they were acting so strange. She looked at the rest and realized she would have to use a prybar to dislodge them. As she pulled them out, she threw them off the side of the fighter. There were fifteen in all. Enid pulled the comm/ECM relay fuse and looked at it and shook her head. Hazel picked up one of them.

“Wow mom these are mangled.”

By this time Enid was sitting cross-legged by the fuse boxes. She pushed her sweat soaked bangs from her face. Okinawa was just as warm as she remembered it. She looked at Hazel and nodded.

“I told you lightning was no joke. I wish he’d had his shields up.”

After she caught her breath, she pulled a relay fuse from her pack and clicked into place. The green LED on each end of it lit up indicating the power regulation and flow as good.

“Well, that’s his core on main power.”

She decided to just connect all the fuses except the Comm/ECM unit she watched on her HUD as the systems all lit up one by one. She tested the cloak and the fighter shimmered out of existence except for the two openings in the armor. She turned it off. Hazel cheered. Enid crawled to the comm/ECM modules and laid down. She pulled a hand scanner out of her pack and ran it over the modules. Hazel climbed up and sat behind her cross legged.

“Mom, did grandpa seem off to you?”

Enid paused in her scanning. She really did not want to have this conversation with her daughter. Not ever. The subject of what happened to him had never been brought up. Enid started scanning again and didn’t answer her. Perhaps pretending she didn’t hear her would work? Hazel moved closer.

“Mom? Did you hear me?”

Enid grimaced. When did the ‘pretend you didn’t hear them’ trick ever work with your children? Even as adults. Enid glanced back at her.

“No, he seemed fine.”

“I don’t need to be a seer to know you’re lying.”

Enid sighed and continued to scan the comms module.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Why?”

“Just leave it alone Hazel!”

“Mom, what is wrong with him?”

Enid grimaced, more at the sensor readout on the display her contacts were providing her. They would definitely need spare parts. Where was she going to find chip and capacitor replacements for a 29th century comm/ECM unit in 1984? She answered her own question quickly A US Air Force base with AWACs, that’s where. She had enough liquid metal in her bag to program to make adaptors. Enid swore.

“Fuck.”

“Mom, don’t be like that.”

“Its not you Hazel, I just found the problem. ECM is locked on, so no comms, no sensors, no active stealth besides the camouflage. We need some microchips, and capacitors. Not the kind you can buy in an electronics store. I have enough liquid metal to make the adaptor board. But we’ll need crap from a military base.”

“Why not just go home and fix it?”

Enid sighed.

“Without sensors we can’t target the reality core. We can’t get to the limbo boundary, and we can’t travel through time with him.”

“Oh.”

“The sensors, the ECM, and the comms are all linked through the same module, also we can be invisible all we want, but thermals and radar will still pick us up without the ECM module. So, in short if we take off, they will know we did. Also, someone likely knows we landed here. There are military bases on the Island. Warships in the ocean.”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“Can’t we just use the cloak to look like a normal airplane from 1984?”

“Oh sure, I was able to get a holo-scan of an F-14 tomcat in the 29th century when none existed.”

“You don’t need to be a sarcastic bitch mom!”

Enid glared at her daughter.

“In what universe are you allowed to say that to your mother?”

“One where you won’t answer a simple question about my grandfather!”

Enid frowned at Hazel.

“If I were still a vampire, I’d be tanning your silver furred hide right now.”

Hazel crossed her arms.

“What is wrong with grandpa?”

Enid sighed.

“The wooden box I gave him back, had two amulets in it and two letters. To tell Eyre and I he was not coming back.”

Hazel grabbed her mother’s arm and tugged her closer.

“Why didn’t you stop him?”

Enid had tears forming in her eyes.

“I couldn’t Hazel. If I did you would never have been born. He has to die.”

“You don’t know that!”

“I do, Hazel, it’s the same reason I can’t go find my younger self, slap her in the face and tell her to go find her father. Same reason my mother is still in a hole in the ground near death. She had to die so he could get tired of life and take his final rest. So, I become Empress, so Inherit his power. So, I can defeat the Black Son, so Lilith can send me back in time. So, you can be born. This is it. This is the event that sets me on the path back to humanity. You don’t think I want to stop him. Scream in his face that his soulmate is still alive. That she is safe? This is the worst decision I’ve ever had to make. I wish I was still a vampire so I could turn off this sickness I feel in the pit of my stomach. Nothing you can say is going to make me feel worse than I already do. So, drop it. We have ourselves to worry about. It’s already done. He already did this, a thousand years before you graduated high school. It is you or him, he knows that, and even if he knew my mother was alive, he’d still do it so you wouldn’t be sacrificed. That is who he is.”

Enid threw the scanner into her pack.

“We need to stop wasting time. There could already be a fighter or helicopter patrol on the way. We violated Japan’s airspace.”

Hazel was staring at her mother. Enid didn’t need her father’s gift to read minds to know what was going through Hazel’s.

“Hazel, it is not your fault. This was set in motion in Rome before you were born. It happened before you existed. Just snap out of it.”

Hazel looked at her mother again.

“But… you’re letting him die because of me.”

“I’m letting him die because without the amulet, without humanity, without his power, every living thing in creation will be wiped out when I fail to defeat the Black Son. Now focus. I’ll cloak Apollo and fly under the radar and find another LZ. I need you to make contact with the Yakuza and hire them to acquire the parts we need.”

“Why not you mom? You speak Japanese. You know the city.”

“Why not me? Are you serious right now?”

Hazel blinked at her mother.

“In about five months I’m going to save the Yakuza Oyabun for Okinawa island and he’s going to adopt me as his Yakuza daughter. I cannot be seen on Okinawa.”

“Your hair is black now and shorter.”

“Trust me, my eyes will give me away. It will be easy. I’ll give you some gold bars, give them the list of part numbers we need, they’ll take care of it. They’re professionals.”

“And why would they trust me?”

“Tell them Taichi sent you.”

Hazel blinked at her mother.

“The smelly fat fish demon?”

“He’s not a demon.”

“And what if they contact him to confirm?”

“You’re going to tell them your name is Hazel. He’s a fourth dimensional being. He’ll get it.”

Hazel tugged on her braid fingering her beads gently.

“Fine. But I only know old Japanese.”

“Its actually pretty close to that. The translator will make up the difference.”

“Thanks Hazel. You got this, just like when you’re setting up a deal in the 29th century.”

“But… these are actual criminals. I saw this movie once, Black Rain… and this other one, Kill Phil, was that it?”

“This is not the movies. They are like organized crime in the 29th century, if they screw you over it will cost them business. Money is money. And you’re not asking for weapons, they’ll barely bat an eyelash. They do this all the time. Trust me. I used to be one of them. Just ask for Oyabun Nobuyuki at the Pinchinko parlor in the market, it’s the only one. There is a fish on the sign. If he’s not in ask for Edo.”

Hazel hesitated then reached into the cockpit and pulled out her backpack and opened it.

“Gold?”

Enid transferred about thirty thousand dollars’ worth of gold bars to the backpack.

“Thanks Hazel. Try not to kill anyone.”

Hazel frowned at her mother and slid to the edge of Apollo and hopped down. Enid watched her go and slid to the cockpit and clambered to the pilot’s seat and powered the fighter up. She powered up the cloak and lifted off. She swooped the plane down and skimmed the waves to cover her approach. The last moment she pulled up slightly and came to a complete stop over the USS Bennington a decommissioned Essex-class carrier. She knew it was here because you could see it from Naha and if she was being honest with herself, she often sat on the shore looking at it, imagining what it would have been like to fly prop planes off it at the end of World War Two. It was part of the reason when she was looking for a change from being a pediatric surgeon, she went with naval aviator. She wired into Apollo.

“How are you doing Apollo?”

“Much better. Where are we Aunt Enid? I am blind without my sensors.”

“We are on the deck of a decommissioned aircraft carrier, moored on the shore of Okinawa Island. Hazel is on her way to talk to the Yakuza and see if we can acquire the pieces I need to macgyver a solution to our sensor issue.”

“I am confused. Macgyver?”

“Uh, just a way of saying I am going to jury-rig something to get us home.”

“Thank you, Aunt Enid.”

*****

Hazel looked up at the sign. Her contacts were providing her with a translation real time of the kanji. The Lucky Fish Pachinko Parlor. She shrugged and walked inside. She seemed to be a giant here. Not that it was odd for her. She’d lived in Japan for two plus years, like several hundred years ago, but she was used to the culture and the respect that they showed each other. It had been beaten into her. She found the desk where she saw a bored looking man sitting at it. He had tattoos on his arms, and she found that strange but brushed it off. He looked up at her, a bit surprised to see such a tall gaijin in the Yakuza front. Hazel opened her mouth a few times and managed to get the Japanese out.

“Hello, I am here to see Oyabun Nobuyuki.”

He closed up his magazine as she spoke the boss’s name.

“He is a busy man, why do you need to see him gaijin?”

“Tachai said he could help me with a problem.”

He stood up and walked into the back a bit. Hazel could hear a murmured conversation. She couldn’t make out the words. The man returned and motioned her towards where he had been speaking.

“Go to the back please.”

Hazel bowed slightly.

“Thank you.”

He bowed back and went back to his magazine. Hazel saw an open door and there was an older Japanese man sitting on a chair beside a more secure looking door. It was obviously thick and has some soundproofing. He stood up and opened the door and motioned to the back of the gambling den she saw behind it. There was also a bar. The table he had motioned at had a large man sitting at it. He was smoking a cigarette and reading a newspaper. A younger Japanese man was sitting across from him talking. Hazel approached the table and the older man waved the younger away.

“Deal with it Edo.”

The younger man nodded and walked out of the back door. Hazel bowed.

“Thank you for seeing me, Oyabun Nobuyuki.”

He motioned to the seat recently vacated by Edo then motioned to one of the waitresses he looked at Hazel.

“Drink?”

“A beer please.”

The waitress bowed and walked off leaving the pair alone. Hazel sat down. Nobuyuki looked her up and down.

“We don’t get many gaijin here looking for our help.”

“I was told that on the island you can get anything done.”

He nodded. He put his paper aside and took another drag from his cigarette.

“Your Japanese sounds like I’m talking to my great grandmother.”

Hazel blushed slightly.

“Its probably because of how I learned it.”

He nodded, her beer arrived and a glass of whiskey for Nobuyuki. He took a drink of his whisky. Another drag from his cigarette and held it between two fingers and motioned towards Hazel.

“What can we do for you?”

Hazel slid a piece of paper across the table. He lifted it up and looked over the list and took another drag from his cigarette.

“Your kanji is excellent.”

“That was written by my mother.”

He chuckled and took another drag from his cigarette.

“I would like to meet her.”

“She’s indisposed at the moment. She asked me to shop for her.”

He nodded and put the list down.

“I’m sure we can get these parts. But it will be very expensive. The bases have increased security recently, but they haven’t stopped their soldiers from losing money.”

He chuckled.

“A lot of items, a lot of debts. You understand.”

Hazel nodded.

“I have enough.”

She pulled a gold bar out of her bag and put it in front of Nobuyuki. He picked it up and looked it over.

“Twenty-five thousand.”

Hazel nodded.

“If you can get it done by the morning, I can make it thirty thousand.”

“Sake to bind the deal.”

He poured out a small glass for Hazel and one for himself. Hazel knew this was a sign of respect he was paying her from her time with the Shogun. He lifted his glass, she did as well. She drank it down after he started. He smiled when saw no reaction from her. She’d had stronger.

“You have spent much time in Japan.”

“One of my mother’s husbands was Japanese. We spent a few years here. My sister was born here. They were killed.”

He frowned.

“Do you know who is to blame?”

“Yes, my mother ended those that were.”

“She truly sounds like a woman after my own heart.”

Hazel was starting to see where some of her mother’s sensibilities had come from. Her time here probably just reinforced her eye for an eye mentality. Not that wolf-born were any different. Hazel pondered what she would have done if it was her daughter who was killed, or if Eyre, Amee and her mother had died that day. She realized it probably would have been far bloodier as she looked at her hands that could be so much more dangerous in her half wolf form. Her mother had been downright surgical with her precision revenge. Nobuyuki took another drag from his dwindling cigarette.

“As an Oyabun you become accustomed to making quick judgments of someone’s heart. You have a warrior’s heart don’t you?”

Hazel nodded. Nobuyuki put his cigarette out.

“Perhaps instead of… gold. You can pay us by dealing with a problem we have.”

Hazel leaned forward. Her argument with her mother had pissed her off profusely. She didn’t bother to figure out if it was her mother, her grandfather or herself she was angry with, but if she didn’t get all the rage out of her system it was likely to spark another. Rending something with her claws always calmed her nerves. She just hoped her target wasn’t people.

“Please tell me more Oyabun.”

“If you are associated with Taichai you are accustomed to the darker corners of Japan.”

Hazel nodded. He lit another cigarette.

“We have an issue with an Oni. It has been going after children. Lost a few men to it. Are you familiar with fighting them?”

Hazel was smiling now and nodded. He obviously noticed the excitement in his eyes.

“I should have started with this, you seem like you might have done it for free.”

“I probably would have. Oni who go after children are the worst.”

“I can send some men with you.”

Hazel shook her head.

“I can do it alone. It takes a monster to fight monsters, as my mother says all the time. They may not like what they see.”

He took a drag from his cigarette and tapped it against the ashtray.

“They have seen much.”

Hazel bowed slightly.

“Well, it is your island, I’ll leave it up to you. When and where was the last attack?”

“My man Edo will take you.”

“I need your word that whatever your people see, whatever I do, they will never speak of to anyone except you. And that what you know never leaves your lips. It is very important. Many lives depend on it.”

Nobuyuki bowed his head.

“You have my word any man who might whisper it will have their tongue removed.”

Hazel stood and bowed slightly.

“Consider your Oni dealt with.”

Nobuyuki bowed his head.

“By the time you’re done we will have your order ready.”