Ten years later

  “Come on, Sarge, it’ll be fun. You’re into all that martial art shit, aren’t you? Sumo wrestling is an ancient martial art. They say the samurai used to have to train in it,” Corporal Harris nudged Johnny at the end of the day on Friday. They both had weekend leave to do whatever they wanted, and apparently one of the big sumo wrestling tournaments was going on.

  Johnny frowned. Harris grinned.

  “I know that look,” Harris said.

  Johnny looked at him with narrowed eyes.

  Harris grew an enormous grin, and his head moved up and down. “Oh yeah, you’re in.”

  “Yeah, fuck it. Maybe I’ll win some bets and make some money.” Johnny said when he climbed out of his desk chair.

  They were in Johnny’s little office at the army base in Tokyo. After that mission in Israel, that was the biggest fiasco of Johnny’s career. The brass had to get him out of the sandbox. They said it wasn’t a demotion, and indeed, Johnny was still a sergeant, but he did nowhere near the same kind of stuff. He was mostly a desk jockey now. They stuck him in the quartermaster’s office, moving around requisition orders and trying not to piss off entitled officers who felt they deserved special treatment.

  Harris lifted a finger and grew very serious. “No.”

  Johnny frowned. “No, what?”

  ”It’s very illegal to bet on sumo wrestling. We’ll just go and you’ll check out the sumotori, who use judo and other martial arts. You’ll love it. You’ll find a new way to kick everyone’s ass in the gym,” Harris told him, still being serious.

  Johnny groaned. No better would suck, but Harris convinced him with the martial arts talk. He had been put into the position he got in Israel because of his history of traveling the globe. In each place he had been, he learned the local form of martial art and could add it to his repertoire. Sumo could just be the next thing.

  “Alright then, where do I meet you?” Johnny asked.

  “There’s a few of us going over to get tickets to watch the last few matches today and then tomorrow. So, let’s roll now,” Harris told him, beaming.

  Johnny grunted and shrugged. He hadn’t let himself get close to a team since Israel. Not since the last team he had gotten close to didn’t make it out. “Yeah, alright. I just have to run home to check on Spike first..”

  Harris clapped his hands, and the skinny, nerdy quartermaster gave a whoop. In some ways, he reminded Johnny of Jim in some ways. The scrawny build and birth control glasses with the shaved head. Something told Johnny Harris wouldn’t be able to take someone out with a pencil like Jim could have.

  “Just shoot me a text when you get to the Kokugikan and I’ll come out and meet ya. Show you where we ended up. Don’t take long though, we’re already cutting it close,” Harris warned.

  Johnny nodded and stood from his desk and shut off his computer. “No worries, Spike doesn’t do much anymore. I’ll just make sure he gets fed and let him know I’m still alive. He gets depressed if I have to go somewhere overnight.”

  Harris got a serious look on his face, all the fun from the night’s activities gone from his mind. “Is everything-“

  Johnny raised a finger and shook his head, cutting him off. “Everything is fine,” he said with a fake grin.

  Harris nodded his head and then moved to the door of the small office. “Alright then, let me know when you get there.”

  It didn’t take Johnny long to get home, since he had a place close to the beach. Johnny took a short bus ride, and he was still surprised at how efficiently public transport worked. Back in the States, this same ride in NYC probably would have taken him an hour. Here? Ten minutes. Honestly, he could have walked, but it had been a long week and he was tired. It was amazing looking back at his old life. How he used to be up all night on guard duty or something all night and still be ready to party or something after his shift. After a week behind the desk and all he wanted to do was sit on the couch, drink a beer, and go to bed.

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  As expected, Spike was on the couch in the living room with the TV on. Johnny usually left it on daytime television to give the dog some background noise. Once Johnny walked in, Spike hopped down from the couch and moved towards his leash that was hanging on the wall.

  Johnny grinned and leaned down and petted the Belgian Shepherd on the head. “Sorry, buddy, I can’t do our walk tonight.”

  Spike whined.

  “I know. I’ll make it up to you though. We’ll go to the park this weekend and get you some treats,” Johnny consoled his pup.

  Spike whined a bit more, but the aging dog just hung his leash back up before he moved back and jumped on the couch. It took him a try or two before he could get his hind legs up on the cushions so he could curl up. Johnny had to make an appointment with a veterinarian to get him looked at. Age was catching up with both of them, and it was being more unkind to the dog.

  Another short ride and he was standing in front of the massive arena that was considered the home of sumo wrestling. He smirked and fought through the people to get inside. He wanted to check some stuff out before he texted Harris, since there was an entire museum and everything.

  Walking around, fighting through the crowds of people trying to get to their seats before the last few matches of the day started. Johnny learned the history of sumo wrestling and how old it really was. Of course, all the various martial arts Johnny knew had rich in depth histories, but there was something about sumo wrestling. Gods fighting to decide the fate of Japan, warriors doing sumo to keep spirits away. Beyond that, Johnny, while Johnny knew Sumo had religious aspects, he didn’t realize how deep it really went.

  He looked at paintings and sketches that depicted large sumotori performing rituals and wrestling in front of priests. They wrestled to ensure bountiful harvests of rice and grain. He knew just from living here the past few years that sumo wrestlers were treated as rock stars, but apparently it went all the way back. As these men performed their craft before the Emperor and the royal family, they received practically royal treatment.

  “There you are. You missed everything!”

  As Johnny read about some of the first yokozunas, he lost his train of thought. He blinked and looked over and found Harris moving towards him with a grin.

  “I see you’ve found the cool stuff though, huh?” he asked and stood next to Johnny and looked over the paintings.

  “Yeah…” Johnny said, simply not too sure what else to say.

  Harris grinned and looked over at Johnny. “I guess you’re definitely coming tomorrow, huh?”

  Johnny matched the man’s grin and nodded his head. “I think so, yeah.”

  Harris clapped him on the shoulder. “Great! You really missed a few crazy matches today, but this basho is turning out to be pretty wild. I’m sure there’ll be more good stuff tomorrow, too.”

  The pair headed out through the crowds and fought their way out to find a cab. They spent the ride going over the details for the next day. Johnny learned what time to be there for the Juryo matches and what time the wrestling actually started. He wanted to go very early and thought about Spike. Leaving him cooped up in the apartment all weekend by himself wouldn’t be very nice.

  Harris took the cab the rest of the way to his house, and Johnny walked in and greeted Spike. The dog was still on his spot on the couch, and Johnny grinned and sat next to him, patting his head softly. The pair ate dinner and relaxed the rest of the evening until bedtime. Spike, the ever-protector, always slept right in the doorway of Johnny’s bedroom that led out to the hallway and then to the rest of the apartment.

  The next day, they both got up early, and Johnny fulfilled his promise to take Spike to the park. They took a nice long walk, still in the wee hours of the morning and got breakfast. At the park, Spike could run around as best as he could, and play with some of the younger dogs.

  Johnny even met a particular young lady named Mika, who gave him the number of a vet. She took her own dog too. He may have gotten her number and made plans for that evening with her after the sumo tournament. It turned out she wasn’t a fan of the sport.

  “Well, it’ll depend on this storm that’s supposed to be coming in,” she told him with a frown.

  “Storm?”

  Mika nodded. “Yeah, they’re saying it’ll be a bad rainstorm, but we’ll see, I guess. I’d rather not go out in it. Cujo gets scared of thunder.”

  Johnny stared at the little chihuahua she held in her arms, named Cujo, and blinked. Then he looked at her, not sure what to do with that name.

  Mika grinned and shrugged. “It was one of my favorite horror movies as a kid. The name stuck.”

  Johnny choked back a laugh and nodded his head. “Alright then. Sounds good. I’ll shoot you a text after the tournament and see how things are?”

  Mika, the petite Japanese girl, brushed a strand of her jet-black hair behind her ear and smiled warmly when she looked up at him. A simple nod of the head. “Yes, please do,” she said with a wink of that almond-shaped brown eye before she turned and walked away.

  Johnny looked down at Spike, and Spike just gave a soft whine.

  “Yeah, I know, buddy. It’ll be weird. I’m not sure if I’ll call her or not,” he said as he patted the dog on the head softly.

  It was later than he wanted to get to the arena, but he finally made it. He had to get Spike home and make sure his food and water bowls were full. Then he finds the perfect daytime television trash for the dog to be entertained by. He was here now, though in a box he had bought as close as he could, waiting for Harris and whoever else the man dragged along.

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