Rules of the Hunt (60 page)
He gave an order, and one of the
yakuza
placed safety glasses on Fitzduane.
The
incongruity of following safety regulations while escorting their prisoner
around in chains caused him to give a wry smile.
"We Japanese," said Kei, "achieved some of our earlier
postwar successes with steel.
While the
West was working with old technology — too greedy to invest and lacking in
vision — we built new modern steel plants and produced cheaper, higher-quality
steel faster.
This, in turn, provided
the raw material at the right price for car production and for
shipbuilding.
It was the beginning of
our economic recovery.
Later, of course,
we developed into electronics and other high-added-value products, but steel
was our initial breakthrough."
Fitzduane nodded.
The Japanese
achievement was undeniable, but it had not occurred in a vacuum.
Without
Second World War.
Subsequently,
Still, this was no time to get involved in a
geopolitical debate.
"But Namaka Special Steels has little to do with cars and ships, I
think," shouted Fitzduane.
The noise had increased as they had approached the center of
operations.
The primary sound was like a
wave, loud and continuous.
He had been
around Vaybon's steel facilities in
came from burning flames of gas.
It was
the noise of the tempering ovens generating the awesome temperatures that
steelmaking required.
There was something frightening about the sound, as if it represented
a ferocity
beyond the ability of mere humans to resist.
In fact, almost all the machinery he could
see was vastly larger than human scale.
It looked like a workshop for giants.
Humans might have conceived it, but now their very creation had
surpassed them and seemed to have a life of their own.
In the center of the floor was an immense vertical construction of tubes
and black metal and cylinders that looked like a cross between some insane
scientist's vision of the ultimate destructive robot and a rocket complete with
strapped-on boosters on a launching pad.
It was roughly the size of a six-story building, and Fitzduane felt
dwarfed by it.
It emphasized the scale
of the facility they were in.
The huge
machine was in turn comfortably accommodated by its surroundings.
The roof must be well over a hundred feet
up.
He looked, but his gaze was lost in
darkness.
"Project Tsunami," shouted Kei into Fitzduane's ear.
"This is what makes it all
possible."
"What is Project Tsunami," Namaka-
san
?" said Fitzduane.
"I haven't the slightest idea what you are talking about."
"Hah!" said Kei.
"You know exactly what I am talking about,
gaijin
, and it is why we could not let you live, even if we did not
have a past obligation to kill you."
The thought occurred briefly to Fitzduane that, in the interests of
self-preservation, it might be a good idea
not
to get to know any more about Tsunami.
Then he thought,
What
the hell!
For one reason or another, Kei, quite
obviously, had not intention of letting him live.
He had not blown up three people just to have
the pleasure of Fitzduane's company for a pleasant half hour or so.
"Indulge me, Namaka-
san
,"
said Fitzduane.
"Let me put it as
simply as I can.
What the fuck is
Project Tsunami?"
Namaka looked at him curiously.
Perhaps the
gaijin
did not
know.
Perhaps he was not the threat he
had appeared.
That would be ironic.
Well, it was too late to turn back now.
"Project Tsunami," said Kei, speaking into Fitzduane's ear to
counteract the noise, "is the name we have given to our North Korean
project.
In defiance of the
providing
weapons.
It is an immensely profitable
project and will restore the fortunes of Namaka Steel and indeed the
keiretsu
as a whole.
And this machine — we call it Godzilla —
is
an important element.
Godzilla allows us to forge the huge pressure chambers required for an
essential part of the process.
Few
companies have the technology, and fewer still have the production plants of
this scale.
Look!
They are just about to forge another
chamber.
You can see the whole process
for yourself."
Fitzduane looked across to where Kei was pointing.
A giant crablike machine running on tracks
had scuttled up and extended two metal arms and was manipulating an enormous
glowing cylinder.
A darker material
seemed to surround it, and as Fitzduane watched, the cylinder was beaten by
what seemed to be a giant flail of chains.
"That is the ingot for one chamber," said Kei.
"It weighs forty-two tons and it has
just been heated to forging temperature by one of the ovens.
The ingot oxidizes on the surface, so the
impure surface layer — it is called scale — must be removed or it will hinder
forging.
Scale is peeled away partly by
the chains and then by the initial forging."
For all the talk of high technology, beating a white-hot lump of metal
with chains seemed to Fitzduane to be a crude process, but Kei certainly got
some fun out of it.
His face was glowing
with enthusiasm and the ambient heat.
Under his
samurai
helmet with
its ornamental horns, he looked like some demonic goblin king.
"The ingot is now going through a series of preliminary deformation
processes," said Kei.
"The next
stage is that it will be given a predetermined diameter by one of the smaller
processes."
The crab moved the ingot away from the flail and placed it under a giant
ram.
The ram descended and deformed the
ingot, making it shorter and wider.
As
this happened, the remaining scale fell from the shape and there remained only
glowing,
pulsating
steel.
It was as if this was new life emerging from
a chrysalis, and it was a dramatic sight.
Even Fitzduane, who felt he should be preoccupied with more important
issues — like his imminent death — was
impressed.
The crab next lifted the cylinder of pure steel and placed it under a
12,000 ton press.
The cylinder, an
approximate shape up to now, was placed in a mould and pressed to be
dimensionally perfect.
Then a further
process pierced the cylinder to make it ready for the main extrusion.
"By doing the piercing process first," said Kei, "you cut
down on the maximum amount of energy needed in Godzilla.
It is like preparing a screw hole by drilling
a small hole in advance.
The total
amount of energy used is the same, but it is spread and the peak is
lower."
The crab now inserted the squat, pierced, forty-two ton cylinder at the
base of Godzilla while Kei explained the procedure.
"That cylinder of steel now has a temperature of over 2,000 degrees
Fahrenheit — or over twenty times body temperature.
It is placed upon a pedestal, and then the FE
punch, or mandril, determining its internal diameter — in this case, one meter
— comes down, and the vertical press forces the steel up, compressing it and
reducing the wall thickness, so that what emerges at the top of the press as
the process reaches its conclusion is a longer, thinner cylinder with the same
diameter.
To achieve this result — to
extrude white-hot steel like toothpaste — it exerts a force of up to 45,000
tons."
The background noise of the gas ovens and the hammering of the pumps
providing the hydraulic pressure to Godzilla was now dominated in turn by a
long, appallingly loud, high-pitched screeching sound, as white-hot steel was
compressed and squeezed.
The sound receded, and like some huge pink erection, a long, thin, hot
shape —compared to the original ingot — was withdrawn from the top of Godzilla
by a crane in the roof.
Kei looked delighted as he exhaled.
"Now,
gaijin
,"
he said.
"That —
THAT — is power.
It is beautiful
to watch, don't you think?"
Fitzduane took a flier.
He was
talking to an enthusiast, and enthusiasts were notoriously indiscreet.
Also, who was he going to have time to tell?
He decided he had better throw in some
positive sounds.
Kei clearly expected an
appreciative audience.
"That is singularly impressive, Namaka-
san
," he said.
"And part of Project Tsunami?"
"Oh, yes," said Kei.
"You have just seen one pressure chamber made.
There are two hundred required for one phase
of the process alone.
So far, we have
shipped one complete chamber to our customer.
That will be tested, and then Godzilla will be put seriously to
work.
As you have seen, a
pressure-chamber section can be forged from ingot to tube in
under
ten minutes.
Allowing for finishing,
welding on flanges, polishing, and so on — the really time-consuming elements —
we shall still be able to complete the shipment in one year."
Fitzduane felt very depressed at what he was hearing.
So this was the world that Boots was
entering.
What he was seeing was
illegal, but nonetheless, here was
demilitarized and dedicated itself to peace, involved in the wretched business
of nuclear weapons as well.
It was a
grim note on which to die.
An inner rage
began to burn.
Kei shouted an order, and Fitzduane was roughly pulled away and propelled
between two
yakuza
across the vast
floor and back up the steps to the
dojo
.
As he was pushed through the soundproof double
doors, he could hear the screeching of Godzilla once again as another
pressure-chamber length emerged.
Inside the
dojo
, the silence
could almost be felt.
Fitzduane was pushed to his knees.
Ahead of him, a magnificent if barbaric figure in his medieval
samurai
armor was Kei Namaka.
Behind him and slightly to one side stood
Goto, similarly attired.
On either side
of Fitzduane were his
yakuza
guards.
Two more
yakuza
stood against the wall.
All six were armed with swords.
The
yakuza
also had submachine
guns.
"It is time,
gaijin
,"
said Kei Namaka, "for you to die."
He spoke rapidly, in Japanese, and Fitzduane felt his handcuffs and leg
restraints being removed.
He rose to his
feet, rubbing his wrists to restore circulation.
"The only issue here, Fitzduane-
san
,"
said Kei, "concerns the manner of your death."
Fitzduane smiled.
"I would
prefer, Namaka-
san
, if you don't
mind, to debate the timing."
*
*
*
*
*
There were four passengers in the Koancho helicopter besides the pilot,
and one of them was Sergeant Oga, who was not at all sure what he was getting
into.
The only thing he was certain of was that anything involving the
gaijin
Fitzduane-
san
, even after he was dead, was sure to be trouble.
He had much the same feeling about Tanabu-
san
as he sat across from her.
Even had he not harbored a deep suspicion
about the games the security service got into, the Howa Type 89 5.56mm assault
rifle she held resting on her knees would have given him serious cause for
concern.
The folding-stock weapon was fitted with laser sight, sound suppressor,
under-barrel 40mm grenade launcher,
and hundred-round C-Mag.
The U.S.-made C-Mag was an extremely compact,
spring-loaded, plastic double-drum that fed rounds from each drum alternatively
and provided over three times the capacity of a conventional magazine.