The room was dark. Everything was in silence. Anyone would say it was the most peaceful and serene place on the planet. Nothing to do with the reality of the person who was lying in his bed. Unable to sleep, Kira did nothing but move from side to side. He had tried to rest, to disconnect his mind from it, but it was impossible. He couldn’t stop thinking about the night of the disaster in Seville, as everyone had insisted on calling it… He could still see Jack put himself back together after collapsing when they landed at the Morón Air Base. They believed that the threat was over, but nothing could be further from the truth. As they hurried toward the command center he couldn’t help but notice the frenetic activity taking place around him. Soldiers running from one side to the other, paramedics tending to the wounded, planes landing in a hurry without knowing where to park due to the saturation of the secondary runways. All illuminated by the lights of the sirens of the emergency vehicles and deafened by the roar of the jets as they constantly fly over them.
A Typhoon made an emergency landing engulfed in flames. The pilot jumped out of it. He couldn’t tell if he knew who he was, burning and screaming in pain. The firefighters arrived instantly and doused him with foam, while the man, or woman, collapsed to the ground…
The sight of the fire consuming that person awakened memories buried deep inside him. Memories that he had tried to push away for a long time. He opened his eyes. It was impossible. So he couldn’t sleep. He had spent the entire night trying to turn the thoughts out of his brain, but maybe what he needed to do was face them. He got out of bed and walked to the couch. He pushed the coffee table aside to make room and sat down, crossing his legs. He could see his reflection on the television screen. He alone was wearing boxers and even with the prevailing darkness he could almost perfectly see the traces of his tattoo in the shape of a dragon. It was the symbol of his family and what it meant…
Light as a feather, hard as steel, flexible as bamboo. He began to repeat the mantra that his father had taught him all those years ago, when he was just a three-year-old boy. He breathed in and out very slowly, slowing his breathing as much as possible. He closed his eyes…
He found himself again in Morón. He could see the pilot burning. He approached him. He was a man, he could tell his male voice from his yelling. He focused on the flaming tongues that were trying to consume him before the firefighters intervened. He reached out his hand, he could almost touch them. When his fingers touched the flames everything vanished and he was suddenly four years old again. He was in his house, in his real home back in Japan. The place where he had been born and where his parents had begun to raise him.
It was a large mansion located in a valley with walls surrounding it and several buildings inside. In the main one was the dojo, his favorite place. That was where his father had begun to train him, to form him under the philosophy and doctrine of his family. Light as a feather, hard as steel, flexible as bamboo. He could hear his words again. He remembered his stern face, but that he always smiled at him when he completed the exercises. He was a hero to him, someone who knew no fear. Except in that moment, in that place, where he now found himself again. When the alarm went off and his mother came running terrified and said something in his father’s ear. His face turned into fear, he hugged him and kissed his mother after saying something to her in a hurry. From the wall he took one of his katanas and, after casting a look of firm determination and love towards his mother and him, he disappeared through the door.
He remembered how his mother would take his hand and lead him to the hidden passage behind the dojo, his favorite place to hide when he played with the servants. His mother hugged him, kissed him and made him swear that he would not go out for anything in the world or make a noise, no matter what happened. After closing the small compartment, which had a grate from which the other side could be seen, his mother armed herself with another katana and stood in the center of the dojo. Outside there were screams and the sound of crackling flames. The house was burning.
Suddenly, his mother rushed towards the door and the sound of steel clashing was heard. He heard a scream and then nothing more. Just the creaking of wood as everything filled with fire and smoke. Kira wanted to go out to find his parents, but he had sworn an oath. It was his mission and he could not fail the promise he had made. He was trying to see through the grate. His mother was crawling on the ground, very badly injured. She reached the center of the dojo and looked towards him. For a moment their gazes met. It was fleeting, but at the same time there was so much in that look, in what her eyes said. These were extinguished instantly when the blade of a katana protruded from her chest. A tall figure had just appeared and skewered her.
Kira wanted to scream, he wanted to get out, but again the oath he had made kept him in the chute, silent, clenching his teeth and fists, until he began to bleed. The tall figure disappeared to return a few minutes later with a bundle. He dropped it on her mother. It was the corpse of his father. He then called someone and another tall figure appeared next to a much smaller one. He strained his eyes, he wanted to see their faces, and he almost had them…
His alarm clock rang. Kira came out of the meditation trance. He was back in the hotel room with everything in darkness and no trace of the devouring fire, his dead parents and the mysterious figures. He stood up resigned. After many years it was the first time that he was able to access that memory. He knew that he had been about to remember it, to glimpse the face of his parents’ murderers. He could still feel the nauseating heat. The whole house burned and he almost suffocated to death. But he kept his oath, he did not come out of the chute until he was rescued by firefighters the next day. He said nothing to them or to anyone for several years about what happened. His uncles welcomed him to the United States and gave him protection. Over time the wounds healed in his heart, although they never entirely healed. When someone asked him about his parents he always answered the same thing, that they had died in a tragic fire, although he preferred that the topic not come up.
He had vowed to one day find out who the culprits were and make them pay, but now he couldn’t think about family revenge. The day had come to say goodbye and pay tribute to Derek and James. In a few hours the ceremony would take place at Andrews Air Base. He would have preferred to have spent the night there after returning from the chaos of Seville in a C-5 Galaxy, but the USAF public relations people had said it was best to keep him and Jack away from the press and other military personnel. In fact, they had been confined to their hotel rooms since they had arrived, guarded by agents from the National Security Agency.
He got into the shower. He turned on the faucet and let the hot water fall over his head. He still couldn’t believe that James and Derek had died. He and Jack had watched the footage of Jack’s Typhoon dozens of times showing how his plane was destroyed. They had hoped that, in the heat of battle, they had missed that they had ejected or, at least, that some remains had remained. But no, every time they saw the images there was no doubt. The energy beam passed through their Eurofighter, completely volatilizing them. There was nothing left to recover, no remains to return home…
He finished showering and opened the closet door. His formal officer’s suit awaited him. He began to put it on while his mind became completely clear, clearing away the doubts that clung to him, replacing them with the firmness and discipline with which he had always led his life.
He had to accept reality. He had to accept that his comrades, his friends, were no longer there. He had to accept that they had died to save his life. He had to agree to live with the debt he had incurred with them and their families. I wouldn’t let them down. He was going to do his best to honor their deaths. To become the light that will put away the darkness on the day when he had to face the outside threat again. Since, if there was one thing clear, it was that the next battle that would take place would be the most decisive of all. He would be ready!
He looked at himself in the mirror, he was immaculate. He sat on the sofa holding the officer’s hat and prepared to wait for it to be time to leave for the tribute ceremony.