The Windup Girl полностью

A man with dragon tattoos on his stomach and a takraw ball tattooed on his shoulder gawks at her as she walks past. "Heechy-keechy," he murmurs.

Emiko doesn't slow, doesn't turn at the words, but her skin prickles.

The man follows her. "Heechy-keechy," he says again.

She glances back. His face is unfriendly. He's missing a hand as well, she's horrified to notice. He reaches out with the stump and prods her shoulder. She jerks away, stutter-stop reaction, betraying her nature. He smiles, and his teeth are black with betel nut.

Emiko turns down a soi, hoping to escape his attention. Again he calls after her. "Heechy-keechy."

Emiko ducks into another winding squeezeway, breaks into a faster walk. Her body warms. Her hands become slick with sweat. She pants rapidly, trying to expel the increasing heat. Still the man follows. He doesn't call out again but she hears his footsteps. She makes another turn. Cheshires scatter before her, shimmers of light flushed like cockroaches. If only she could evaporate as they do, fade against a wall and let this man slide past.

"Where are you going, windup?" the man calls. "I just want to get a look at you."

If she were still with Gendo-sama she would face this man. Would stand confident, protected by import stamps and ownership permits and consulates and the awful threat of her master's retribution. A piece of property, true, but respected nonetheless. She could even go to a white shirt or the police for protection. With stamps and a passport, she was not a transgression against niche and nature, but an exquisite valued object.

The alley opens onto a new street, full of gaijin warehouses and trading fronts, but the man grabs her arm before she can reach it. She's hot. Already flushed with her rising panic. She stares at the street longingly but it is all shacks and dry goods and a few gaijin, who will be no help for her. Grahamites are the last people she wishes to encounter.

The man drags her back into the alley. "Where do you think you're going, windup?"

His eyes are bright and hard. He's chewing something-an amphetamine stick. Yaba. Coolie laborers use them to keep working, to burn calories that they do not have. His eyes sparkle as he grips her wrist. He pulls her deeper into the alley, out of sight. She's too hot to run. There is nowhere to go, even if she did.

"Stand against the wall." he says. "No." He shoves her around. "Don't look at me."

"Please."

A knife appears in his good hand, glinting. "Shut up," he says. "Stay there."

His voice has the power of command, and despite her better instincts she finds herself obeying. "Please. Just let me go," she whispers.

"I fought your kind. In the jungles in the north. Windups everywhere. Heechy-keechy soldiers."

"I am not that kind." She whispers. "Not military."

"Japanese, same as you. I lost a hand because of your kind. And a lot of good friends." He shows her the stump where his hand is missing, pushes it against her cheek. His breath gusts hot on her nape as he wraps his arm around her neck, pressing the knife to her jugular. Indenting the skin.

"Please. Just let me go." She presses back against his crotch. "I'll do anything."

"You think I'd soil myself that way?" He shoves her hard against the wall, making her cry out. "With an animal like you?" A pause, then. "Get down on your knees."

Out on the street, cycle rickshaws clatter over cobbles. People call out, asking about the price of hemp rope and whether anyone knows the time of the Lumphini muay thai fight. The knife hooks around her neck again, finds her pulse with its point. "I saw my friends all die in the forests because of Japanese windups."

She swallows, and repeats softly, "I am not that kind."

He laughs. "Of course not. You're some other creature. Another one of their devils like they keep in their shipyard across the river. Our people are starving, and your kind take their rice."

The blade presses against her throat. He will kill her. She is sure of it. His hatred is great, and she is nothing but trash. He is high and angry and dangerous and she is nothing. Even Gendo-sama couldn't have protected her from this. She swallows, feeling the blade press against her Adam's apple.

Is this how you will die? Is this what you were meant for? To simply be bled out like a pig?

A spark of rage flickers, an antidote to despair.

Will you not even try to survive? Did the scientists make you too stupid even to consider fighting for your own life?

Emiko closes her eyes and prays to Mizuko Jizo Bodhisattva, and then the bakeneko cheshire spirit for good measure. She takes a breath, and then with all her strength she slams her hand against the knife. The blade slices past her neck, a searing line.

"Arai wa?!" the man shouts.