Page 13
Panel 1
Close-up of Houjou. He sits in his chair, facing the computer keyboard. He
has a look of shock on his face, but is uninjured.
Houjou: Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit.
Voice (offscreen): Houjou, are you all right?
Panel 2
Close-up of Houjou. He has a hand to his head and is blushing, embarrassed.
Houjou: Crap. Was I yelling? I was yelling, wasn't I. Shit. I'm sorry. I fell
asleep. It was a nightmare. Do I feel stupid. Shit. What
does the "H" stand for?
Panel 3
Tex—Kevin Watanabe—is standing in the doorway of Houjou's office.
He is the guy we saw with Houjou in the baseball dream back in book 2. He is
now dressed in 1950s cowboy fashion: western shirt, chaps, and a white hat,
around which is tied a striped tie very much like the one Houjou had in books
2, 3, and 6.
Tex: "Haploid." Shit, man, I thought you were
dead. I was all set to go to your house and cheer up your widow.
Houjou: My widow is teaching right now.
Tex: Hell, that means I'd have to cheer up that whole damn girls' high school?
Panel 4
Tex pounds one fist on the other; Houjou is still seated.
Tex: Well, darn it! This is important! I'll do it! What
was the deal with that weird-looking kid and our phones?
Houjou: That was my brother-in-law, the mad scientist. Some kind of antivirus
thing.
Tex: He was praying over it.
Houjou: He's a Shinto priest. Took some kind of course in California while he
was at Stanford.
Tex: No shit?
Houjou: No shit. Here comes Curator Sakamoto.
Panel 5
View of the two; Tex holds up a cautionary finger.
Tex: Don't count till we git a visual.
Houjou: You'll have a visual. I used to have a tie just like that.
Tex: If it's the one that was draped over your chair this morning, this is it.
Houjou: You broke into my office to steal my tie?
Tex: Nah. I broke into your office to steal your extra chair. Chair was gone,
so I took your tie.
Page 14
Panel 1
Full length view of Sakamoto, who is leaning against the door jamb of Houjou's
office. He wears a dress shirt, cargo shorts, plaid knee socks, and fuzzy animal
(dog) slippers. A dotted necktie is tied around his head. Tex is handing a coin
to Houjou, who is still seated (with his back to us so I don't have to paste
in the legend on his t-shirt).
Sakamoto: It was one of your nightmares, wasn't it? I knew it was one of your
nightmares. Dig this! Pocket protector! Got it for free from the math department.
Houjou: (to Tex) 100 Yen. (to Sakamoto) From math? Is it making you smarter?
Panel 2
Tex reaches over and grabs Sakamoto's pocket protector, as Houjou looks on.
Tex: Gimme.
Sakamoto: Aaaaaah!
Tex: Serves you right. World's divided into predators and prey. You wear short
pants like that, it's the same as wearing a sign that says, "Prey."
People are going to take your pocket protector.
Houjou: Not a very good pocket protector. Can't even protect itself. Curator,
I demand that you set those slippers free.
Panel 3
Tex points to his head—like the Scarecrow does when he gets his brains—as
the other two look on.
Tex: The sum of the square roots of any two sides of an
isosceles triangle is equal to the square root of the remaining side.
Sakamoto: Hey, it works. You are smarter.
Houjou: No, he isn't. It's a right triangle, and the squares, not the square
root.
Sakamoto: Houjou, you're already smart. I should give you the curator's shorts.
Houjou: No, thanks. I'm a predator.
Panel 4
View of Tex and Houjou
Tex: The curator has to wear them damn shorts? Glad I'm
a field guy. Git to wear chaps.
Houjou: Here comes Kurausu.
Page 15
Panel 1
Close-up profile of the three, all looking toward our left (that is, toward
the door of Houjou's office)
Tex: Shit. That damn kraut? Have you seen his tie? I say we kill him. If we
get a visual, that is.
Houjou: Agreed.
Tex: Ready . . . aim . . .
Panel 2
Full length view of the group. The three are looking toward the door, where
Kraus has appeared. He is a pleasant-looking European man of early middle age,
blue-eyed and bald. He wears a dress shirt and slacks and a very wide necktie
on which is a picture of an attractive nude woman with extraordinarily large,
round breasts. A piece of duck tape covers her lower abdomen.
Kraus: So . . . is Houjou dead?
Tex: FIRE! "Wenn is das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer?"
Houjou and Sakamoto: "Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!"
[Note to the Python-impaired: The guys are reciting the Monty Python "deadly
joke," supposedly developed as a weapon for use against the Germans in
World War I. It's pseudo-German gibberish. If you were to walk into a busy coffeehouse
or bar in any university town in the world and yelled out the first line, it's
a safe bet that at least a half-dozen people in the room would immediately complete
the joke for you.]
Panel 3
View of the group. Tex is handing Houjou another coin.
Tex: Shit. He's still alive. This man's not German. I knew that accent was fake.
What are you really?
Kraus: Klingon.
Houjou: 100 yen.
Sakamoto: I have to admire your duck tape placement.
Tex: I cried because I had no hat, and then I met a man
who had no hair.
Houjou: You have a hat.
Panel 4
View of the group. Sakamoto and Kraus are examining Kraus's tie. Houjou has
closed his hand around the coin.
Kraus: I cannot take credit! Ms. Izumi put that there. I think she screwed up
the wiring. The two little red lights will not light up.
Sakamoto: I think I was married to her once . . .
Houjou: That tie is the most obscene thing I've seen . . .
Tex: since Sakamoto walked in wearing them shorts.
Houjou: Exactly.
Panel 5
View of the group. Houjou holds up one finger.
Kraus: Why does Tex get to speak English?
Tex: We won the war. 'Course, my folks celebrated V-J
day in the internment camp . . .
Kraus: Mine were in Bergen-Belsen.
Houjou: Two people. One female . . . undergrad, I think—cheap perfume.
The other male—he has the hots for her—dripping pheromones. She's
not interested.
Panel 6
View of the group. Tex and Kraus look out the door into the corridor. Houjou
sits back with a smug look.
Kraus: He's good.
Tex: Shee-it. I'm running out of change.
Houjou: I could invoice you at the end of the month.
Sakamoto: You bet him? You idiot! Never bet him!
Page 16
Panel 1
Tex hands Houjou a coin as Sakamoto looks on.
Tex: One of these days he's going to be wrong.
Sakamoto: He's never wrong! I've known him for 20 years, and he's never been
wrong!
Panel 2
Close-up of Sakamoto.
Sakamoto: Don't bet him on his sense of smell. Don't bet him on baseball trivia.
Don't bet him on Star Wars. Don't bet him on Mozart's Magic Flute, or fairy
tales, or King Arthur, Or Anything To Do With Magic Swords.
Panel 3
View of Sakamoto and Houjou.
Sakamoto: And do not bet him on anything having to do with Japan's most obscure
legendary quest hero, Inuyasha Who Seeks The Shikon no Tama. If Inuyasha Who
Seeks The Shikon no Tama can't remember what he had for breakfast this morning,
he calls Houjou and Houjou tells him.
Houjou: Actually, I usually have to ask Kagome . . .
Panel 4
Close-up of Sakamoto
Sakamoto: Man, back in high school I made so much money pimping for Houjou's
nose and his collection of weird obsessions I almost didn't have to make money
by renting out adult viewing materials. Speaking of which, when did I stop being
your agent?
Panel 5
Houjou hands Sakamoto a coin, as Kraus looks on.
Houjou: Ten years ago. But here, have a hundred yen. I owe you that much for
the education you gave me. I think I can say in all sincerity that had I not
been friends with Sakamoto, I would not to this day have seen the uncut version
of "Vampire Pussies from Outer Space."
Panel 6
View of Sakamoto, Houjou, and Kraus.
Kraus: "Vampire Pussies from Outer Space"?
Sakamoto: The pinnacle of 1980s Hong Kong filmmaking.
Houjou: I have to agree, much as I like Jackie Chan . . .
Panel 7
View of the four.
Sakamoto: Oh, man, that Kotoko . . . I loved Kotoko.
Houjou: No, no, no. Michiko. Had to be Michiko.
Tex: The Vampire Pussies from Outer Space were Japanese?
Page 17
Panel 1
View of Houjou, looking thoughtful, and Sakamoto, looking indignant.
Houjou: No, no, they were . . . Outer Spacean. They just all coincidentally
had Japanese girls' names ending in "-ko."
Sakamoto: Outer Spacean! You imbecile! They were Voruptuan! From the planet
Voruptua! How the hell did you get a PhD?
Panel 2
Houjou leans back in his chair, grinning.
Houjou: That's right! Voruptua! How could I forget Voruptua? Beautiful Michiko
from the planet Voruptua. We were very simpatico. She was the only Vampire Pussy
with red hair. I knew she understood my pain.
Panel 3
View of the four.
Kraus: You chose your Vampire Pussy because her hair was red like yours?
Tex: I disapprove. Not much basis for a relationship.
Houjou: Well . . . not red like mine. Not miso red. Red . . .
Tex: Fire engine red.
Sakamoto: Never saw a fire engine that color.
Houjou: Maybe in outer space fire engines are that color.
Panel 4
Close-up of Sakamoto.
Sakamoto: It was my videotape. I'll tell you what color red. Imagine a stage
full of strippers doing a patriotic strip. They're forming a flag. All of them
are wearing white pasties with white tassels except for the most beautiful one—the
one in the middle—the Rising Sun herself.
Panel 5
Close-up of Sakamoto.
Sakamoto: The color of her tassels: that's the color of Michiko's hair.
Panel 6
Close-up of Houjou.
Houjou: Yeah, that's what I was going to say.
Panel 7
Close-up of Sakamoto and Kraus.
Sakamoto: But Michiko wasn't the most beautiful. Kotoko was the most beautiful.
Kraus: Sakamoto loves a pretty face.
Panel 8
Close-up of Sakamoto, pondering..
Sakamoto: . . .
Panel 9
Sakamoto talks to Houjou.
Sakamoto: Houjou, you saw that movie. Did Kotoko have a face?
Houjou: Not where I was looking.
Panel 10
Close-up of Sakamoto.
Sakamoto: Man, I used to dream about Kotoko. Did you used to dream about Michiko?
Page 18
Panel 1
View of Michiko, aiming a bow and arrow (like Kikyou earlier in the book)
Michiko: Inuyasha!
Panel 2
View of a startled-looking pre-teen Koinu, wearing "Harry Potter"
eyeglasses.
Koinu: What??!!
Panel 3
Koinu holds up his hands to protect himself from the arrow heading toward
his chest.
Koinu: Wait a minute! I didn't take it this time!
Panel 4
The arrow strikes Koinu hard in the chest, knocking him off his feet. We
can see that he's dressed in t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers.
Panel 5
Full-length view of Michiko, standing holding her bow.
Koinu (offscreen): M-Michiko . . .
Panel 6
View of Koinu; the arrow is sticking out of his chest, and his eyes are glazing
over.
Koinu: It . . . it's not fair . . .