-You're telling me they sent a Japanese hit man. To off me. Me.
-Yes.
-And that he's here.
-Uh. Where?
-Here, somewhere. Nearby. Whistling dixie distance. Like Manhattan. Queens. White Plains. An airport Sherator in fuckin' Newark.
-Probably.
-And you don't have a mug shot.
-Nope.
-Don't know his name.
-No, sir.
-Or, how to call him off. Get in touch. Pay him to cease, arrest, desist.
-Unlikely.
-Who hired his yellow ass. Do you know that. Please say.
-The Old Man of the Nakamuras, Tokyo. The craziest bunch of yakuza in all Japan.
-So that despicable sake-swilling old fart sent a Japanese killer over to my own country, a yakuza samurai killer, sent to kill me. The reckless gall.
-So it would appear.
-Get me more bodyguards. That's first thing. I want this place crawling with hardmen. I want to see potato faces everytime I look up. Swarm me with the Irish. No gimps. Licensed to carry if not to kill, every one. Large bore guns, if you please.
-That's not going to stop our man.
-What is he, a fuckin' ninja?
-He's a ghost. He walks through walls of iron. He eats fire.
-So get me some Chinese shamans. We have deals running with the Tongs and Triads. Call Johnny Chen for a loan out of his swordsmen. Tell him the tatoos are coming West. Tell them we need help to make tempura of Mr. Moto. Tell him anything but get him eager. I'm not going down cheap like a pint of Irish Rose. Nakamura-san's going to smell the gunpowder from here. We'll clean this kamikaze's clock, then bring the war all the way back to Japan. I'll fly over myself on the fuckin' Enola Gay if I have to.
**
-You're . . .
-The one. Mr. Tokyo.
-Yes.
-Do you have?
-Absolutely . . . This way. Here.
-Okay, that is the two pieces, nice job. Action, very smooth. Good. Nice grip there. Arigato. Now. You have the bullets, specials, with the notches?
-Oh. Yes. Sorry. In this . . .
-Okay. Also. The silencer attachments?
-Well. Right. That took some doing.
-Please.
-They're . . . that's them.
-Okay.
-Good?
-Good.
-I asked for . . . um, cash. In dollars. You know.
-Here. The amount. Correct?
-Okay. You're set?
-Sure. I'll take these now.
-Goodbye. Or, Sayanora. Right?
-Forget.
-What?
-Just . . . forget. Forget Mr. Tokyo, for ever. Gone and gone. You understand?
-Of course. I don't know you, Mister. You got the wrong room. Why not go down and check at the front desk for your party.
-Ah. Okay. Good-bye.
-Good-bye to you, Sir, and you ever need anything else, just. Ah. Jesus fuck me . . . I'm alive.
**
-So the tape's running now and we're waiting. Give us the long version, layer on the detail and the local color. We really want to hear it.
-Okay. I worked until yesterday for Teddy Krugmann.
-You were his, okay, what.
-I'm a professional bodyguard, one of the three crack men my employer always deployed for his security whenever he walked or drove outside the environs of his Long Island home. I am licensed to carry a firearm and skilled in its use. I have also studied karate, attaining the rank of black belt, and ju-jitsu ditto. You could say Mr. Krugmann is security conscious.
-Your employer was a fucking pimp. And now he's a dead fucking pimp.
-I don't know what Mr. Krugmann did for his daily bread. I didn't follow him into his meetings. He paid me solely to guard that most precious possession, of which he has since rudely been deprived, his life. And now that's gone, may the Lord have mercy on his immortal soul.
-Sure, it's roasting as we speak.
-Do you want me to give my uncluttered statement? Or will you persist in interrupting my chain of thought?
-Proceed. Tell us all about yesterday morning. Everything you remember. Lay it on us.
-Fine. Promptly at nine am Mr. K.'s driver, Colm, brought the town car around the circle driveway and parked it in a straight line from the door. He then radioed me inside. I did a brief check from the window to make sure it was Colm standing by the limo and not somebody pretending to be Colm. It was him, in full livery. There was no one else in sight. The gate reported no movement on the road beyond the wall, nobody, nothing. I put on my raincoat because it was raining over my quick draw shoulder holster. As you know I carry a .40 caliber weapon. I checked to see it was secure and then I checked my back up, the snub .38 in the ankle holster. Then I shouted down the hall to Tom and Frank who were still in the kitchen finishing up their Breakfasts of Champions. They came out just as Mr. K. began making his way down the stairs with his shiny briefcase. They were armed, I was armed, everything was tiptop and ready to fly. We were all set for our daily excursion the city. As Mr. K. reached the foyer he gave me a smile and a nod and I opened the door and went out ahead and Mr. K. walked out behind me and behind him came Tom and Frank, moving to either side so he was enclosed, that's just playbook, we've practiced it a million times. They're good men and I'm pretty good too and we'd never been surprised.
-Then it all went to shit.
-Yes. Yes, it did, that. I remember walking toward Colm and seeing that his face looked a little tight under the chauffer's cap and my mental alarm bells started jangling. On intuition, I was already going for my .40 when the trunk sprang. This fuckin' guy comes out so fast he's just a shape that's blurring, in a chauffeur uniform like Colm's, and I note he's Japanese. He's unarmed or at least his hands are empty. That don't mean he ain't dangerous. I'm shouting to Tom and Frank now to close in on Mr. K. and I've got my weapon out but as I bead him he makes the distance between us moving like a real karate expert and just knifes it out of my hand. You know, his fingers rigid like this, like a knife. Okay, I go for him with a fast thrust kick and he blocks it easy and then sweeps me, that's he does a foot sweep, and I go down hard on the gravel and then he stamps me in the chest so hard I think I blacked out for a second and anyway I lose all my breath and start to vomit. I turn to the side and draw my knees up trying to get to the back up piece and as I reach for it I see Tom and Frank going down just like me, bam bam like that, he just hits them with his fingers and they're out, Tom gets it especially bad, right in the throat and he's rolling around choking. Frank, just fell. Went down like a gunny sack. I finally got my snub wrested out and I try to aim it left handed as Mr. K. is running full-tilt toward the house with the fake chauffeur in pursuit. Then I see the attacker hurl something, and Mr. K. goes down a few steps from the door. I saw it was a knife and Mr. K. had it stuck right in the back of the head. Then the killer, he turns his head and looks at me and I set down my weapon quick, I show him my bare hands. I feel there's no point, Mr. K. is clearly as finished off as it's possible to be. A coup de grace wouldn't be necessary, not with that cleaver stuck in the brainpan. The man's face doesn't change, he steps over me and he walks around Colm and gets into the town car and scatters gravel. Gone. So that's what it is. Fuckin' Kato, Bruce E. Lee, that's what I think.
**
-You Japanese?
-Yes.
-Light? . . . For my cigarette? Thanks. Wow, not bad.
-Excuse me? Not bad, what?
-Not bad to look at. As in: you are . . . You talk nice, too. You don't talk that, like, Japanese way in the movies. You know?
-Domo arigato gozaimasu. Thank you very much. I studied English in school, some.
-So you're over here in America on business or something?
-Yes, oh yes, it's business. Or anyway, not pleasure.
-Not pleasure? Too bad . . . You have a sweet smile. Sorry, I'm drunk a little. Not drunk, I just didn't eat much today. I don't usually talk to handsome Japanese men I see sitting alone in airport hotel bars. Or handsome men, or really, you know, any men at all.
-You are a very pretty girl.
-Really?
-Yes. Pretty eyes and hair. I like your green dress too. Good shoes.
-I suppose you think I'm too direct . . .
-No.
-Too slutty, coming over like this, talking to you, asking you to light my cigarette. I suppose your wife wouldn't like it . . .
-If I had a wife, maybe she wouldn't like it, but do I tell her. That is the question. To tell or not to tell.
-No wife? Then, you know, your girlfriend . . . Hah. You shake your head. But how can you not have a girlfriend I wonder. You're like a, movie star, a Japanese one, like I don't know what his name is, from the last samurai movie. . . Listen, exactly when is your plane?
-Two hours, exactly. If there is no delay.
-Two hours. Listen, I mean, I'm being pretty graceless and forward and all, you can see I'm blushing, oh God . . . but would you like to go someplace alone? Like, up to a room? With pretty little me? Have another drink up there, a drink between just us two? I'll pay.
**
-So what have we got, people. We've got a killer, no picture or name yet, barely a description, he's Japanese and said to be "handsome as hell, like a movie star", that's all, albeit a movie star with some fearsome prowess in killing and mayhem, and he's in this country taking out mid-level members of a top New Jersey and a top Brooklyn crime family, to be much more specific the Manzettis and the Costas, along with a few higher players in the Irish mobs. He's on a rampage and he's drawing blood. These renowned and established families haven't been hit so bad in a long time. And by a single man, never. It would be laughable were it not in fact happening right in our fair outer boroughs. The task of this Special Task Force is, as I'm sure you're by now aware, to track and capture this . . . yakuza killer, Mr. X . . . before the said two Families or their allies or agents get to him first.
-Do we know the crime syndicate, er, the yakuza Family, operating in Japan that sent us the talented Mr. X?
-Rumored to be the Nakamura Clan of Tokyo. They're into all sorts of industries, trade especially, air freight and containers, and what probably happened is that these two families somehow went afoul of Old Man Nakamura on a big delivery of electronics, drugs, macrame, or some other bankable commodity. So he sent his boy over here to give the smart guys a spanking. And boy oh boy is he making them squirm. Ahem. Lights, thank you. First slide, please. That bloody slab of beef you see hanging there in full dead wise-guy Technicolor splendor is a bag man for Johnny Costa, name of Tommy the Clam Alione. Found him hanging from a meat hook in Queens. And here . . . here is a Manzetti front man, Sam the "Red" Tostes, knifed rather expertly while finishing his jug red wine on the sidewalk outside a lottery store. Note the Sicilian neck-tie effect, uh, the man's tongue yanked out through a . . . slit . . . in the throat. Haven't seen that one in a long time. It's like he's giving the mafiosi back their own playbook. Witty. Witnesses, usually not worth spit in this neighborhood, report a handsome Oriental in full chauffeur's regalia -- think Kato -- cleaning his knife with a hankie right after the attack then stepping into a buffed black towncar and driving away. Cool and smooth as you please. Etcetera etcetera . . . I could show you these revolting slides all day, but you get the idea. We're talking twelve reported fatalities tied to this . . . feud, grudge, contretemps or whatnot. So, basta. Lights up, thank you Marcie.
-But how high do you think this thing will go? I mean, is Mr. X after Johnny Costa and Paul Manzetti? Or will he be content to just stir up the hornet's nest a little?
-He'd have a hard time hitting those players you mention or even their generals. From what I hear both crime kingpins have taken sudden vacations with their posses, one to a heavily guarded luxury bungalow in Bermuda, the other to somewhere unknown, maybe a friend's yacht, in the Caymans. No, the Nakamuras would need a terrorist army to hit the big guys.
**
-We comin' up on da caye now, mon.
-Good. Keep it slow and steady. Put me down over there.
-What is da ting you got goin' on dis island? Dis caye most part be sand, crab and mangrove swamp. Plenty mosquito.
-Please. I told you. Slow and steady.
-I easin' it in mon, no worry. You witness my ease? I go real easy all de time. Put on 'dis staw hat, me brother. It look like you get too much of our sun.
-Yes. O-kay. Give me the hat.
-Take it now.
-And that machete also.
-Machete? What you need wid a big knife on 'dis empty piece of island?
-Quiet down. Cut your engine. I get out right here. Now. Now. Cut it.
-You gwan crazy?
-What?
-Dere be some big shark in dis water sometime mon.
-No sharks. I swim to the beach. And you sit right here in this same place just before dawn, tomorrow. Sunrise. Wait for me. Yes?
-Oh yeas, mon. I be here, I be sittin' here wid de motor cut afore sunrise, no later. I lie not. Driftin' along, no light. You find me no light?
-I find you. Yes. Shake hands on it? O-kay. Goodbye.
******
-Oh dis be da true life shit, mon. One bad 'ting to be gwan down here tonight.
**
-So here's all we found. A waterproof bag, on the beach, reeking of gun grease, containing some food wrappers, crumbs, and a half box of double buck shotgun shells. Some sand depressions indicating the killer sat there for a period of time. The moon went down approximately two-fifteen AM. So maybe he was just waiting for the cover of utter tropical darkness. I personally like to think so. Footprints, cheap deck shoes size 9, leading up to the bungalow wall. Spent shells, ejected smokingly from a 12 gauge, at three different points on the perimeter. Seven corpses, all native New Jersy-ites known to have been in the employ of this man. The presumed target. Right. Now. Here's the bungalow. More spent shells littering the sand on either side of the door. The door's been blasted to smitheroos. See? Inside, three more corpses, bodyguards, all dead of shotgun blasts fired medium to close range. This one's head is pretty much non existent. That's a close range discharge. Plenty of spent shells from their weapons found, too, all inside the door. .44 magnums, an Uzi submachine pistol, and even a thirty-ought-six rifle. It's carnage, a bloody reeking mess. But no sign of the bossman. Did he flee the scene? How? No extra footprints going away in the sand here or here. However, we do see evidence of drag marks, along here, and a dirty blanket with bloodstains on it was found by a clump of palm trees on the beach, right . . . here. Samples have already been flown to Miami for labwork. Then there's this. It's a machete. Very sharp. Found in the shallow lagoon water, so no blood or traces of any kind. We're guessing this belonged to the shooter, and he used it to hack up the body. Why? To dispose of evidence? Torture? To make the other Mob guys shit their pants? In any case, looks like the sharks enjoyed a human chum banquet about three, three thirty AM. Our ghost-assassin then waded or swam off to a waiting craft, likely helmed by a lonely local boatman for hire. Around sunrise is most probable, but definitely before nine, because that's when Club Dead's regular food, liquor and porn magazine delivery arrived by speedboat from the mainland, just like clockwork. Jeez, what a system-shock that musta been for the delivery boys. We're questioning the guys on the wharf right now about the boat handler, but locals don't normally open up to the 5-0, so nobody here's holding their breath on results. As to the huge nagging questions of A) who tipped the killer off that his beefy target was holed up on this Godforsaken little sand pimple on the ass of Nowhere, and B) how he managed to wipe out the whole wise-guy gunsel supporting cast without even taking a scratch, our current official status is: Stumped. So. Queries? Jokes? Anecdotes? Clever remarks? Anyone? No? Okay. Pending our report on DNA analysis, that will be all, you Johnny-come-ladies and gents.
