THE woman behind THE DRAGON. Above the low, glossy black lacquer table, the painful feeling whiteness of the airline ticket stood out next to a serving bottle of sake and an ochoko[1]. The rain sounded, pretending to drown out the voice of Lie To Me[2], and percussed in the meninges of both as if it were a business of the nippy Roland TR-808 and TR-909 rhythm boxes, essential in electronic music. And there, there they were, slant to face, without smoke, without others to fill a non-existent track or MDMA to cloud their reasoning or neon lights to illuminate them. -Is that all? -Monique finally blurted out, in cold Japanese, subsequently the water dancing something like the torii of Itsukushima Shrine. Her ask was not answered subsequently words flowing from Stas lips, but in the manner of his raid of disturbing his feet upon the tatami to withdraw. For a few seconds, brief, intense and bitter, comparable to the taste of the dregs of her last mug of tea, she remained motionl