Harry Turtledove - End of the Beginning

“You were in the palace basement, neh ?” the local Japanese said. Furusawa nodded, and didn’t wish he was dead right afterwards. The other man-who was, Furusawa slowly realized, an interrogator-went on, “Do you know what happened to the man and woman who called themselves King and Queen of Hawaii?”

“Hai.” Why not answer? What difference did it make now? What difference did anything make now? This felt more like a strange life after death than anything else. “He shot her. Then he shot himself. They didn’t want to be captured, either.”

“Well, I can believe that,” the local man said. “They would have had a hard time of it.” He paused to look at a notebook. Questions he wanted to ask? “Do you know who the Navy officer who committed seppuku was?”

“Commander Genda.” With a certain mournful pride, Furusawa added, “I had the honor to act as his second.”

“Lucky you.” The interrogator’s tone proved him more American than Japanese.

“I thought so.” Furusawa paused and winced. It felt as if someone were trying to drive a blunt spike through his skull. “Please excuse me. My head hurts.”

“I believe that. They say you’re lucky it didn’t get broken for good,” the local Japanese answered. This is luck? Furusawa thought. The local Japanese held out two white tablets. “Here are some aspirins. They may help a little.”

Poison? Furusawa wandered. But, as a druggist’s son, he recognized aspirins when he saw and smelled them. He swallowed them with a last little swig of coffee. “Arigato,” he said. Maybe the interrogator meant it. Maybe the Americans were easier on prisoners than his own people would have been- were. He could hope, anyhow.

And hope was all he could do. He’d fought as long and as hard as he could, but now, for him, the war was over.

KENZO TAKAHASHI WONDERED IF HE’D BEEN SMART TO MAKE SURE HIS GIRLFRIEND was all right. For the first few days in the shelter under the Sundbergs’ house, things had been pretty quiet. He and Elsie and her folks could go up and use the bathroom. They could come out at night during lulls and get avocados out of the trees in the back yard. They could even sleep in beds if they wanted to, though that was risky. You could get caught when the shooting picked up again.

Now, though, the fighting had moved east. Too much of it was right in this neighborhood. The Japanese special naval landing forces didn’t yield ground till they had to. By the pounding U.S. forces were giving them, they would have to before long. In the meanwhile, though…

In the meanwhile, what had been a quiet, prosperous residential street turned into a good approximation of hell. Shells burst all the time. Machine guns stuttered and chattered. Rifles barked. Planes flew low overhead, strafing anything Japanese that moved-and anything that moved that might be Japanese. Coming out would have been suicidal. Kenzo had long since lost track of how many bullets tore through the house above them.

Mrs. Sundberg cried softly. “Everything we worked so long and hard to build and get…” she choked out.

“Not everything,” her husband said. “We’re still here. Things are just-things.” He’d always struck Kenzo as a sensible man.

“What do we do if the house catches fire?” Elsie asked.

“Get out as best we can and pray,” Mr. Sundberg answered bleakly. “That’s the one big worry I’ve got.”

There were smaller ones. Mr. Sundberg had dug that narrow trench to a latrine pit. People used it when they couldn’t go up above. It wasn’t pleasant, or anything close to pleasant. He’d stowed bottles of water down below, but not a whole lot of food. Everybody got hungry and cranky. Kenzo also felt very much the odd man out. Elsie’s folks were polite about it-he didn’t think he’d ever seen them less than polite. But they and Elsie made a group he wasn’t fully part of.

Her father joked about it: “If you can put up with her here, Ken, you’ll never have to worry about it again.”

“I think you’re right,” Kenzo answered. He and Elsie slept huddled together. So did her parents. They had no room for anything less intimate. Mr. and Mrs. Sundberg didn’t say boo. They had to know he’d really slept with Elsie, but they didn’t let on.

And then the firing got worse. Kenzo hadn’t thought it could. Japanese soldiers were right outside. They shouted back and forth to one another, trying to set up a defensive line. They sounded excited and frightened, but still full of fight.

Maybe one of them smelled the stink from the latrine pit. He came over and shouted, “Who’s in there?” Elsie and her folks couldn’t understand the words, but the tone made them gasp with fright. Kenzo was scared almost out of his wits, too-almost, but not quite. Trying to sound as gruff as he could, he barked, “This is a holdout position. Get lost, you baka yaro, or you’ll give it away.”

“Oh. So sorry.” The soldier clumped off.

Elsie started to ask something. Kenzo held a finger to his lips. Even in the gloom under the house, she saw it and nodded. When Kenzo didn’t hear any Japanese soldiers close by, he explained in a low voice.

“I think you saved all of us this time, Ken,” she whispered, and put her arms around him and kissed him right there in front of her parents. He was grinning like a fool when he came up for air. Maybe he wasn’t such an outsider after all.

“Thanks, Ken,” Ralph Sundberg said. “I don’t suppose you want a kiss from me, but I’m glad you and Elsie like each other. I’ll go on being glad when we get out of here, too.”

“Okay, Mr. Sundberg,” Kenzo answered. He couldn’t have asked to hear anything better than that. If the older man really meant it… He hoped he got the chance to find out.

A couple of hours later, something a lot bigger and heavier than a machine-gun round smashed into the house above them. The shooting rose to a peak, then slowly ebbed. Kenzo heard fresh shouts. Some of them were the cries of the wounded, which could have come from any throat. Others, though, were unmistakably English.

“My God!” Mrs. Sundberg whispered. “We’re saved!”

“Not yet,” Kenzo said. And he was right. The fighting went on for the rest of the day.

As evening turned gloom into blackness, he heard a Marine outside say, “Lieutenant, I think there’s Japs under this house. I’m gonna feed the fuckers a grenade.”

“No! We’re Americans!” Kenzo and the Sundbergs yelled the same thing at the same time. Getting killed by their own side would have been the crowning indignity.

Startled silence outside. Then: “Okay. Come out under the front steps. Come slow and easy and stick your hands in the air when you’re out.”

One by one, they obeyed. Scrambling out of the hole was awkward. Kenzo helped haul Elsie out. It wasn’t quite so dark as he’d expected when he returned to the world outside the little shelter. Four Marines immediately pointed rifles and tommy guns at him. “You guys are Americans,” one of them said to the Sundbergs. “What about this-Jap-lookin’ fellow?” In the presence of two women, he left it at that.

“He’s as American as we are,” Mrs. Sundberg said.

“He saved all our lives when you were pushing the Japanese back through here,” Mr. Sundberg added, looking back at the wreckage of his house. That must have been a tank round through it: the hole in the front wall was big enough to throw a dog through. Shaking his head, he went on, “We’ve known him for years. I vouch for him, one hundred percent.”

Elsie squeezed Kenzo’s hand. “I love him,” she said simply, which made his jaw drop.