my fanfiction

Mitsuhirato’s story of the Blue Lotus

We had been driving through the big and wild field of Manchuria for some time. Through the car window, I could see the dark field and the silhouettes of mountains at the far end of it in the dusk. Travelling from Shanghai was quite a distance. However, what made us all fall silent was not the tiredness of our journey but the nature of the task we had been assigned for. Sometimes, I wondered why life was so full of conflicts and difficulties. I had gone through too many things in my life; wars, revolutions, political power struggles…, probably because I lived in the time of changes and political turbulence. Moreover, international relations had become so tense and unpredictable in recent years. The sad thing was that this turmoil did not seem to settle down in the near future. The West, especially the U.K and America had become so powerful that they were exploiting the resources from the countries all over the world, which did not have means to resist. The Western countries had done nothing good to the East. They had forced their way into Asian countries with their industrial advancements. It was Japan’s responsibility to save its Asian neighbours from the greedy Westerners. We could not survive as individual countries but we had to get together and collect our resources under the leadership of Japan to compete with them. In the time of difficulty, one had to be strong and decisive and sometimes a small sacrifice was necessary for bigger benefits.

‘Sir, we have arrived at post 123’, said one of the two Japanese sappers.
‘O.K. Let’s get on with it straight away’, I commanded them.
It was still September but the night air in Manchuria was cold enough to give all of us a shiver when we got out of the car. Now we were alone in a big field almost deserted at night and the only thing we could see was leafless trees scattered in a barren field. The moon was not too bright to hide our movements, nor was it too dark to carry out the plan.

The two Japanese sappers were well trained and experienced for this kind of job. They swiftly completed the task in a few minutes and a section of railway was blown off by the bomb they planted. It was inevitable for the benefit of not only my country but also for the ‘far East’. Japan had to have control over China otherwise the U.K. and America would soon grab China, taking advantage of its political instability, and spread their invasion to other Eastern countries. Sometimes, strong measures have to be taken. We need our army present in China. Our plan now was to announce to the world that Chinese rebels had blown the railway off causing many casualties and chaos in the region. This would demonstrate that China was in need of help from outside to keep the law and order. This incident would provide the legitimacy of our army’s post here.

What a country really need for its survival was not its culture or traditions but the advanced, well trained and equipped defence system, and wealth. Through these defence system and wealth, a country had power and influence in the international relationship. Power was everything nowadays, or probably it had been all along. China had a prominent culture and tradition but it lacked a strong defence system and wealth. Now they were suffering because of that.

‘Look, there is someone watching us sir’, shouted one of the sappers, pointing to a person hiding behind a tree not too far away.
‘Get him, hurry!’ I shouted back.
The man, now realised that he had been discovered, began to run away but he could not run as fast as the trained soldiers. He was not able to go very far before being caught by us.
‘Well, who have we got here? Tintin!’
He was hiding behind a tree watching what we had been doing.

Tintin, the Belgian international correspondence, was not someone I was expecting to meet. He came into my life all unexpectedly. Quite recently, one of my sources in India reported that Tintin was meddling with the international drug trade and would possibly interfere with our business as well. Not long after receiving the information I was told that the ‘Sons of the Dragon’ had sent for Tintin in India. The ‘Sons of the Dragon’ was a secrete organisation in Shanghai devoted to fight against opium. They had grown quite strong in the last few decades and were exerting noticeable power in Shanghai. They were gaining strong popularity and support among Chinese, who had become tired of the political power struggles among different political groups for many years. Their international intelligence network was nothing compared to mine but somehow they had knowledge of Tintin and his achievement in India.

Drug trading is one of the most important works we were operating here. It had been a great success with my extensive intelligence network. Without the revenue we made from it, a lot of our operations would be impossible. It was a shame that we could not stop the messenger. My man tried to shoot a dart poisoned with Rajaijah juice, the poison of madness, to the messenger but it was too late. The messenger was able to reveal that Tintin was urgently needed in Shanghai before he went mad. It would have been a simple task and there would not have been any annoyance from Tintin if my man had been a couple of minutes earlier. Since I obtained Rajaijah juice, I frequently used it on many occasions and all were successful except for this one. The poison was so powerful that it could spread along the circulation inside the body once it penetrates human skin and turn people mad in a few minutes. The man was very skilled and experienced with poisoning people with Rajaijah juice however, this time he failed.

Even though their messenger was not able to bring any productive news to them, with time the Sons of Dragons would eventually find Tintin. Therefore I had to contact Tintin before they did when he arrived in Shanghai. The plan was to persuade him to go back to India and solve the situation peacefully. I did not want to give Tintin any unnecessary negative impressions about me nor have any conflicts with him. One of my beliefs was that I should get on with people I meet and be in good terms with them for as long as possible. This was one of the lessons I learnt over the years of political turmoil. One could never predict what a person would become in the years to come. In addition to persuasion, I was also planning to give him a scare so he could make up his mind promptly. I went out to see him at Port Shanghai with his photograph. It was easy to possess his photograph from my network, and I was able to spot him quite easily when he was getting off the boat. He was more a boy than a man, and looked confident and secure, which was rather unusual for a person who had just arrived in a foreign port. Probably, he had acquired this attitude from his numerous trips to overseas as an international correspondence. I followed him to the International Hotel and left my letter with a hotel employee. I said in the letter that I wanted to visit him in the hotel but he replied back to say he would come to my place. His reply made me feel very suspicious about him.
‘Why does he want to come to my place? Does he know who I am?’
‘It can’t be. The Sons of the dragons can’t be that precise.’

Tintin was on time. He came to my place, which was located behind the women’s clothing shop I owned. For the most of people in Shanghai, I was known as a businessman running the shop. It had been established with the start of the International Settlement in Shanghai and had acquired reputation of having good quality and trendy women’s clothes over the years. A good number of people visited the shop each day. Half of them were genuine customers who wanted to buy clothes. The other half came for the purposes related to other operations I was involved in, such as drug trade and intelligence network.
‘Mr Tintin, what a pleasant surprise! It is nice to meet you,’ I welcomed him.
‘Thank you, Mr Mitsuhirato. It is nice to meet you too.’
Tintin answered a little bit awkwardly but he appeared to be genuine and not aware of my true identity.
‘Mr Tintin, you should go back to India immediately. The Maharaha of Gaipajma is in great danger.’
‘What do you mean? I don’t understand.’
‘I have business relations in several countries in Asia and was able to obtain this information. I was concerned so I sent a messenger to tell you to protect him. Didn’t you see him?’
‘Yes, but he was struck by a poisoned dart. He was only managed to say your name and that I was needed here. What’s going on here?’ Tintin looked puzzled and was obviously unaware of what was happening in China.