Killing Rain

obscure the signs of a profound acquaintance with violence. The obvious ones are the hard cases. These are men who’ve lived through the shit and have no ability, and certainly no inclination, to hide the predacious air such survival conveys. This type, which includes gangbangers, ex-cons, and a certain breed of former soldier, gives off the strongest, most distinctive vibe, and is the easiest to detect.
    There’s another type, too, as intimate, if not more so, with violence as the first, but better aware of the scent they now carry and more inclined and better able to conceal it. This type, which includes your average undercover operator, is harder to detect, but is often noticeable anyway not so much by the presence of a particular vibe as by the absence of any vibe at all. These people have become aware of the danger signals they put out and have reacted, or in a sense overreacted, by retracting everything. Within the energy of a given social environment, these men show up as an absence, a missing something, like gray in a color canvas, or a black hole against a tableau of stars.
    The third type is the hardest to pick up, and is probably unrecognizable to the first two and certainly to civilians. It, too, includes men who have been forged in violence, but who also are natural camouflage artists, chameleons. These men hide their predator’s mark not so much by trying to retract the vibe, but by concealing it behind a new persona that they recognize in civilians and then imitate and project like a hologram. I know this type because I call it my own.
    But even the third type is detectable sometimes, at certain moments, if you know what to look for. I find it impossible to articulate just what gives the chameleons away. Sometimes it’s something in the eyes, something that doesn’t fit with the clothes, the gait, the speech patterns. Sometimes it’s something that feels like a ripple at the edge of the persona, a not-quite-perfect fit in the façade. Whatever it is, it’s something the intuitive mind can flag, but that remains too subtle for the conscious mind to label. And as I sat in the food court, troubled by my thoughts, something must have surfaced in my expression, and it was this the man coming toward me must have keyed on and felt worth examining more closely.
    Operators don’t let people move in from their blind side, so if I didn’t turn or otherwise let him know I was aware of his approach, it might help persuade him to ignore whatever had caught his attention, to conclude that I was a civilian after all. He might then simply move on after taking a sniff. Or, if he got too close and forced me to act, he would be less likely to be properly prepared for what he encountered.
    “How close?” I asked, without moving my lips. I picked up a packet of sugar, tore it open, and started pouring it into the coffee cup. If you’re trying not to be spotted, it helps to do mundane things, and, if possible, to think mundane thoughts. Don’t ask me why, but it does.
    “Eight yards. Seven. Six . . .”
    “Hands?”
    “Still empty. Four yards.”
    At four yards, I should have heard his footfalls. Either he was naturally stealthy, or he was deliberately approaching quietly. Either way, I knew I was dealing with something more than typical rent-a-cop security.
    “Three yards. He’s stopped, next to a big old potted plant for partial concealment. Hands are still empty. I don’t think he knows what to make of you, but I don’t think he wants to be friends, either.”
    I busied myself swirling sugar into the coffee with a wooden stirrer, thinking, Hmmm, I hope this tastes good, I prefer my coffee black, well, this coffee was fairly bitter anyway, maybe it’s an arabica, yeah, dark-roasted, I wonder what country it’s from . . .
    I heard Dox’s voice again: “All right, he’s heading off. Must have decided you weren’t interesting after all.”
    I took a sip of the coffee. Actually, with the sugar it was pretty good. “I’m not,” I said.
    I heard him laugh.
    When the bodyguard had moved off, I got up and walked away, shuffling like a typical Japanese sarariman.
    I sensed him watching me go, knowing that he would take my exit as further confirmation that I didn’t present a threat.
    But at the far end of the food court, with the arcade between us, I ducked into the restroom. The room was rectangular, about five meters by six, with the entrance on one of the short ends. Three urinals along one long