Harry Turtledove - End of the Beginning

Nobody could stay sad for long around Osami Murata. “What, no fish for me ?” he exclaimed when Morimura introduced Jiro to him. “I’m so insulted, I’m going to commit seppuku. ” He mimed slitting his belly, then laughed uproariously. “Now, Takahashi- san, let’s figure out what we’re going to talk about when we get you in front of the mike.”

He was a whirlwind of jokes and energy. Jiro could no more help being swept along than his sampan could have in a gale. He wasn’t even nervous when Murata plopped him down in a chair in front of a mike in a room whose likes he’d never seen before. The ceiling, three of the walls, and even the inside of the door were covered by what looked like cardboard egg cartons.

Noticing his stare, Murata said, “Stuff deadens sound.” He pointed to the fourth wall, which was of glass and let Jiro see into the adjoining room. “Those are the engineers in there. If they’re very, very good, maybe we’ll let them out again once the show is over.”

Did he mean it? He might-some of them were haoles, and had surely been doing their jobs here before the Japanese came. Or he might be fooling again, trying to put Jiro at ease.

“Nervous?” Murata asked. When Jiro nodded, the broadcaster poked him in the ribs and made funny faces. Haoles were often boisterous and foolish. Jiro didn’t know what to make of a Japanese who acted like that. Murata scribbled some notes, then pointed to a light bulb that wasn’t shining just then.

“When that comes on, we’ll start. All right?”

“Hai. ” Jiro didn’t know whether it was all right or not. He didn’t know which end was up just then.

The bulb lit up. It was red. “This is Osami Murata, your man on the go,” Murata said glibly, leaning toward the microphone. “I’ve gone a long way today-here I am in Honolulu, in the Kingdom of Hawaii. I’m talking with Jiro Takahashi, who’s been here a lot longer than I have. Say hello to the people back in the home islands, Takahashi- san. ”

“Hello,” Jiro said weakly. Here in Hawaii, his old-fashioned Hiroshima accent was nothing out of the ordinary. Most Japanese who’d come here started out from that part of the country. Murata’s elegant tones, though, told the world he hailed from Tokyo. They made Jiro acutely self-conscious.

Murata winked at him again. It didn’t help much. The broadcaster said, “Why did you move to Hawaii all those years ago?”

“To work in the fields here,” Jiro answered. “The money was better than I could get back home, so I thought I’d try it.”

“And how did you like it?”

“Hard work!” Jiro exclaimed, and Murata laughed in surprise. Takahashi went on, “As soon as I could, I got away from cane and pineapple. I rented a fishing boat till I could finally afford to buy one. Put everything together and I’ve done all right for myself.”

“A man who works hard will do all right for himself wherever he is,” Murata said. Jiro found himself nodding. The younger man asked him, “Did you ever think about going back to Japan?”

“I thought about it, yes, but by then I’d married and settled down and had a couple of boys,” Jiro answered with a shrug. “Looks like I’m here for good. Karma, neh ?”

“Hai,” Murata said. “But Japan has reached out to you, and you’re under the Rising Sun again. What do you think about that?”

He’d mentioned the Kingdom of Hawaii, but now he didn’t bother pretending the islands were under anything but Japanese control. “I’m glad,” Jiro said simply. “Japan is my country. I want her to do well.”

“That’s good. That’s what we like to hear,” Murata said effusively. “And your family thinks the same way?”

“I lost my wife in the fighting, but I know she would have agreed with me,” Jiro said. And that was true. Reiko was also from the old country, and from his generation. Of course she would have been happy to see Japan take over from the United States.

“I’m so sorry to hear of your loss, Takahashi- san. ” Osami Murata sounded as if he meant it. “And what about your sons?”

Jiro might have known he would ask that. Jiro had known he would ask it. Answering it wasn’t easy, though. Carefully, Takahashi said, “I always tried to raise them as good Japanese. They went to Japanese school every day after American school was over. They learned to read and write, and they speak with a better accent than the sorry one I’ve got.”

“You’re just fine the way you are, Takahashi- san, ” Murata said easily. If he noticed that Jiro hadn’t really said how his sons felt about the Japanese occupation of Hawaii, he didn’t let on. One of the men on the other side of the glass gave him a signal. He nodded to show he’d got it, then turned back to Jiro.

“Do you have anything to say to the folks back home?”

“Only Banzai! for the Emperor, and that I’m proud to be a Japanese subject again,” Jiro answered.

“Thank you, Jiro Takahashi!” Murata said. The red light went out. The broadcaster leaned back. “There. That’s done. I think it went well. Arigato. ”

“You’re welcome,” Jiro said automatically. “They really heard me in Japan?”

“They really did, unless the atmospherics are just horrendous-and they’ve been good lately,” Murata said. “I’m glad Chancellor Morimura arranged for you to meet me. You’re exactly what we needed.”

Nobody had ever said anything like that to Jiro before. “The way I talk-” he began.

Murata waved that away. “Don’t worry about it. Not everybody comes from Tokyo. This is better. It will remind people the whole country is together here.”

The whole country… A slow smile spread over Jiro’s face. “Being part of Japan again feels good.” Osami Murata smiled, too. “It ought to,” he said, and set a hand on Takahashi’s shoulder. “You don’t want to be an American, do you?”

“I should hope not,” Jiro said quickly. Hiroshi and Kenzo had other ideas, but at least he hadn’t had to come out and say so on the radio.

WHEN JIM PETERSON LOOKED AT THE JUNGLE-COVERED Koolau Range from a distance, he’d always thought how lush the mountains seemed. Now, up at the end of the Kalihi Valley to drive a tunnel through them, he had a different view of the jungle.

Green hell.

When he thought of a jungle, he thought of trees full of tasty fruit, of animals making a racket and common enough to be easily caught. What he thought of and what he got in the Kalihi Valley were two different things. Nobody had done much with the valley till the Japs decided to drive a road up through it and to tunnel through the mountains. Almost all of the trees in the valley were Oahu natives, and they didn’t have much in the way of fruit.

As for the animals, he’d seen a few mongooses-mongeese? — skulking through the ferns. Every now and then, he spotted a bird up in the trees. And that seemed to be it. He and his companions in misery had little chance to supplement the tiny rice ration the guards doled out. It was live on that or die.

Actually, it was live on that and die. A man couldn’t possibly do hard physical labor on what the Japanese fed him, not if he was going to last very long. Of course, if a man didn’t do hard physical labor on what they fed him, they’d kill him on the spot. That put the POWs in the Kalihi Valley in an interesting position.

Green hell, again.

It rained a lot of the time up in the mountains. When it didn’t rain, water dripped from the trees. Peterson’s clothes started to rot and fall apart even faster than they had when he was in a less muggy part of the island. Some of the men he worked with, men who’d been in the valley longer, were next to naked. Odds of getting anything from the Japs? Two chances-slim and none.