Setsura didn’t return to the safe house. He stopped at a payphone on Yasukuni Avenue. Three minutes later, he hailed a taxi coming from the station and gave the cabbie an address.
He settled back in the seat and closed his eyes. The gas turbine engine whined soothingly in his ears as the car wound between the mountains of debris.
The cabbie was driving in anything but a soothing manner. The tires squealed as he banked through one turn and then the next. Setsura didn’t open his eyes. He was aware of the cabbie watching him in the rearview mirror, lips creasing into a smile, before wiping it off his face.
“Hey,” he said into his headset. A panel of bulletproof glass insulated the front seat from the back. Setsura didn’t react in the slightest. “We’re almost there.”
Setsura still didn’t answer. He seemed sound asleep. The cabbie was licking his lips by then. Nothing but suckers and easy marks flitted their way home first thing in the morning. A man as good-looking as his passenger would sell for a pretty penny at an underground gay bar or host club.
If he put up a struggle, he’d roid up and have himself a free sample before delivering the merchandise. Just imagining the writhing, moaning body was getting him hot and bothered already.
They came to an intersection. The address Setsura had given was on the right. The cabbie made a left. The transmission hummed. He spun the steering wheel.
The taxi turned to the right.
A startled shout rose in his throat. “Left! Freaking piece of shit!” He cranked on the wheel with all his might.
The next intersection approached. He tried to turn the car again. The steering wheel didn’t move. He paled, realizing that his own arms were being held down. He had to stop. He raised his foot and stomped down—on the accelerator.
The taxi jackrabbited away from the stop. The green line on the digital speedometer wound hard to the right. Fifty miles per hour, sixty, seventy—the cityscape became a blur outside the windows.
The cabbie shrieked. The car was being driven by somebody that wasn’t him, his hands moving in directions he didn’t want them to go. His whole body broke out in a sweat—or more like whatever passed for his soul trying to flee through every pore on his body.
The car came to a halt, and his passenger yawned. “Wow, got here in a hurry. Shinjuku’s private taxis really go above and beyond the call of duty. You take your life in your hands, but the service is first rate.” He covered his mouth with his hand and stifled another yawn. Checking the meter, he expressed surprise. “No fare? A free ride, to boot!”
The cabbie checked it himself. The meter was indeed pegged at zero.
“I’ll be getting out here.”
By this point, the cabbie was barely surprised to find his own hand moving to the lock release and pressing the button. Any inclination to inquire about the strangeness of it all evaporated away.
“Thanks for the lift.” With a polite nod, the young man strode away.
“Hey, wait!” the cabbie called out, happy enough that he still had the ability to speak. “I know it was you that done it! You gotta fix this. I won’t do it again! Promise. C’mon, give me a break.”
The passenger turned around.
“Really?”
“Really. Swear on my mother’s grave.”
“All right, then. But it may sting a little.”
“F-fine. I can take it. Just do it.”
The cabbie felt something thin and narrow being drawn out through the tips of his limbs. The world went black. The pain was indescribable. He pitched forward without so much as a twitch.
Setsura looked down at him with an almost discouraged expression. He raised his left hand in front of his eyes. “There was a time when I would have been impressed with myself. But now I’m not so certain—whether I can beat him or not.”