Chapter 020
“IT’S LIKE A shitty action flick,” Kunugi said. “I used to watch those things as a kid. Vulgar stuff.”
Ayumi silently looked down the road. Shizue was trying to digest everything that was happening.
Without so much as sorting or organizing, abstracting or finding symbolic meaning in it, Shizue was trying to swallow what had just happened, whole.
This indescribable, complex, dirty, potent odor. It was the smell of earth, water, grass, and trees. Those things alone were already too much for Shizue. But she had learned that children needed those things.
Shizue herself was raised in an environment where such odors had been completely extracted. Shizue knew full well the negative effects that an environment without nature held for people. She had a vast amount of information on the subject. Still, there was nothing she could do about the way she’d been raised.
There was no turning back time. She’d thought seriously about what was called a “resocialization,” but Shizue was already completely developed. So she had given up on the idea.
She couldn’t take it anymore.
“Maybe you should have stayed back after all,” Kunugi told Shizue. “There was nothing they would have held you for. You shouldn’t be hiding in the bushes like this. You could say you escaped an abduction, no?”
“I became plenty suspicious before you were brought in.”
“Even so,” Kunugi rubbed his nose. He got dirt on himself. “Now you’ve made one hell of a criminal of yourself. Not a prosecutable criminal, but one that’s clearly guilty. You just ran into the woods with this stupid middle-aged loser who just kidnapped a minor. Even if they didn’t press charges, you’d be hard-pressed to get your job back, I’m sure.”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
That was enough.
Shizue stared at Ayumi’s profile.
“I trust you,” said Ayumi. That admission made Shizue feel like her job as a counselor was done.
If she dilly-dallied any further no one would trust her.
“This is all just hearsay anyway, and there’s no evidence to speak of. You’re still a good counselor.”
Kunugi, tired from squatting, collapsed into a seated position on the ground. “If you were my counselor, I’d be set.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Hmph,” Kunugi let out through his nose. “It’s getting darker and I’m starving. But we can’t move. If I keep quiet I’ll lose my nerve. They didn’t see me in their surveillance cameras, right?”
“I don’t think so. By the time I fled the gates, several area patrol officers had gotten to the entrance hall and possibly a few police officers. I ran as fast as I could and didn’t look back, so I can’t say for certain, but they’re sure to have at least seen your back.”
“I saw,” Ayumi said.
“Saw? Who?” Kunugi asked.
“They were probably police. They weren’t wearing uniforms and they weren’t area patrols.”
“You saw all that while running in the other direction? That’s something else.”
“I was pulling Ms. Fuwa’s arm, so I was already facing the building.”
“Oh, right. Then why aren’t they chasing us?” Kunugi asked stupidly. “Don’t they think they should chase us? Or is that how futile it is for us to hide?”
“They’re probably waiting for us to come out to arrest us.”
“That’s definitely one way to get us, but…now we have no idea who the enemy is.” Kunugi threw his hands behind his head. “Role-playing games are so much easier to decipher.”
“You really should have stayed home with your games, you know.”
“I can play the old ones from memory, I’ve played them so many times. The newer ones are actually a little harder,” Kunugi said.
They saw a light go on in the distance.
Probably street lamps.
Shizue had thrown her portable while on the run and now had no idea what time it was. If they’d placed a GPS tracker on her they’d know with one search where they were. She had had no choice but to throw it away. Yet without her coordinates, she didn’t know exactly where she was. How inconvenient.
They were on the west side of the green area surrounding the center; that much was certain. Yuji Nakamura had been suspected of hiding out here. Turned out he was not hiding out here after all, but now Shizue was.
It was getting darker.
Kunugi’s already nebulous profile became hazier still and eventually disappeared into obscurity.
All they could hear was their own breathing.
In a room, the sound would seem strange. In their new setting it sounded natural.
“Someone’s coming,” Ayumi said.
The sound pierced through.
“How do you know?”
“It’s the area patrol and Hinako Sakura.”
“You can see them?”
“Yes. Two area patrols. They’re holding a flashlight.”
“That’s some incredible vision you have,” Kunugi said, incredulous.
Sakura.
She’d probably finished being interrogated and had now been released. They’d been questioning her this whole time. To her it probably felt like torture.
“Oh no.”
“What?”
“Sakura saw me.”
“Liar. Where is she?”
“On the main road.”
“The main road. The one leading out of the center? Don’t be stupid. You couldn’t see that road in broad daylight, much less in the dark of night. It’s too far from here. Why do you think we hid here?”
“I don’t know. She noticed me though,” Ayumi said.
“The area police have stopped.”
“Are they coming this way?”
“No. It looks like they got an emergency call. One of them is running off. The other one and Sakura are walking again.”
“Can she really see all this?” Kunugi asked Shizue.
“I’m sure there are things children see that adults cannot.”
“Because they’re innocent.”
“Because they’re ruthless.”
“You mean adults are nice?” Kunugi asked.
“Adult vision is fogged.”
Hmph, Kunugi let out through his nose again.
“Miss Kono,” Shizue called Ayumi. “How’s it…err…” What was Shizue supposed to say?
“I’m fine,” Ayumi said.
“Miss Fuwa.” This time Ayumi addressed Shizue. “I want to ask again, but killing people—it’s wrong, right?”
“Yes. It’s bad. One should absolutely never murder. It is against the law.”
“Nice and simple,” Kunugi said. “It was so much more sticky when they explained it to me back in the day.”
“What do you mean, sticky?”
“You know…” Kunugi leaned to one side. “We talked about morals and ethics, about being an upstanding citizen and the importance of humanity. Whether it was important.”
“Of course it is.”
“Right. Of course. My feelings as a concerned citizen, improving the human condition—humanism, is it? Obviously I learned all that. I know it, but hmmm, I don’t know how to explain this. When I was young, those words were all somehow meaningless. No, I mean I knew a lifetime’s worth of sadness and pain and fear. I got mad at the really flagrant criminals. I’d get unreasonably frustrated, enraged. You know, social order. I used to believe in social order so much more than now. But then, I sort of…”
“You weren’t satisfied with it,” Shizue suggested.
“Kind of…” Kunugi answered. “Even I don’t understand why I’m not satisfied. I just knew this was not the way a police officer should feel.”
“These emotions and humanist theories are not why we must not kill. Those are only the reasons why we created laws against killing humans. Confusing one for the other has led to our discordance, no?”
“Hmm?” Kunugi made a strange sound. “The reason why the laws were created?”
“Isn’t that so? When a friend or relative is killed you become sad, angry, hurt. That’s only natural. Therefore it is universally understood that any violent attack on one’s right to live of healthy mind and body is a bad thing. That’s why laws forbid the murder of humans.”
“That’s probably true, but doesn’t it amount to the same thing?”
“No, it doesn’t,” Shizue said.
“How’s it different?”
“Well, let me put it to you this way. If no one was sad about the death of a particular person; if no one felt anger or vengeance or hurt from the death of someone who would have caused more suffering to others alive than dead—is it okay to kill that person?”
“N-no. I mean, of course not,” Kunugi said, sounding defeated. “No one should ever be murdered.”
“In that case, all those complex feelings and ethics and teachings don’t constitute reasons for forbidding the murder of humans. Even if you are sad, upset, or for that matter happy, you cannot kill. The law is blind. It doesn’t matter who you are.”
“Ah,” Kunugi said smartly. “That’s why you insist on saying that murder is wrong simply because the law says so. Morals and ethics in and of themselves can’t explain the reasons behind the law. Of course, it’s axiomatic that laws are created on the basis of morals and ethics, and if you can’t believe that, you will most certainly be confused, but I just don’t think the same way about the question of whether committing a crime is ever justified. As it stands, the thinking is that morality is attained as a result of abiding by the law and that it also leads to our emotionally comprehending the meaning of good, right?”
“You mean why one shouldn’t doubt the law.”
“No. Doubting the law and disobeying the law are different. If you believe a law should not be abided by, you should do everything in your power to change it. There’s no rule that because the law is bad it should be disobeyed. That’s an infringement of the rules. You can’t get along that way. Even breaking a bad law is a punishable crime.”
“But changing the law is difficult,” Shizue said.
“That’s something only lawmakers say. It’s humans who’ve created the laws, and if they follow the right procedures it’s humans who will change the laws. However, so long as the majority keeps acknowledging the law, it will not change. Even if the laws are not correct. Even if the law looks wrong to everyone. But of course, no one’s going to abolish laws against murder.”
But.
“But a long time ago in this country, vengeance killings were forgivable. Even in this century, murder was publicly sanctioned. The death penalty, I mean. Those laws were eventually changed by people, right?”
“I see,” Kunugi said.
Now they couldn’t see anything.
There wasn’t enough light for their eyes to even adapt to the dark.
“When I was about the age of this young girl here, murder was popular,” Kunugi said.
“Popular?”
“By that I don’t mean that it was a free-for-all of everyone killing each other. But kids my age were committing these crimes one after the other. I don’t know if they thought killing someone would improve their own lives, or if they were thinking at all. Well…I had nothing to do with it. Kids knew the consequences of things like that, I’m sure. It’s only the idiots that ignored the consequences. But…”
It felt like Kunugi had stood up.
“When I was in elementary school…That is, back when there was such a thing as elementary school, that would be about when I was about seven to twelve, kids were grouped and separated into classes to learn things with other kids the same age.”
“I had that when I was growing up as well,” Shizue said. “Obviously it’s been banned since, but elementary schools existed until pretty recently.”
“Is that right? Well, it was elementary school, then junior high school, and throughout that whole time I had this one friend. A boy. He was serious and didn’t like to play outside, so we got along. That kid came over to my house one day and asked a favor of me.”
“Favor?”
“Yeah. He asked me to record an emission on what you kids call an on-air entertainment channel now. Back then we still used magnetic tapes. Anyway, it was not uncommon back then, so I agreed. I taped this thing and brought it to his house the next day. But when I got to his house, there was a tarp stretched around it,” Kunugi said.
“What is a tarp?” Ayumi asked.
“A blue sheet. I thought maybe they were renovating the house. But then it turned out to be the police.”
“Police…what was going on?”
“It was a crime scene. There had been a murder,” Kunugi said nonchalantly. “He’d killed a girl from the neighborhood, and his parents found out. He then killed his parents and siblings.”
“That’s—”
Kunugi started laughing. “That fucker beat the girl with a stone and then went home covered in blood. He was scolded right in front of the house. I guess that was when he decided he would kill his entire family. He knew that the only time his whole family would be in the same place was when his favorite show was airing. Obviously he wouldn’t be able to watch it, so he asked me to record it for him. What do you think about that?” Kunugi said. “When he came over with the blank tape, he’d already killed the girl. While I was watching his show, he was stabbing his mother in the throat with a kitchen knife. I didn’t know what to do.” Kunugi seemed to lean to one side again.
“I got angry. Even sad. But I didn’t know what I was sad or angry about. He was totally normal. He didn’t cry, yell, scream, or act frightened. So I didn’t think to bother asking him to confide in me or to tell me anything. He didn’t look like he was thinking about anything at all.”
“That’s…” Shizue couldn’t find the right words.
“I just thought ‘hmph.’ It must not be a big deal to kill people. Then I was scared of myself for thinking that. That’s why I asked an adult about it. Just like this young woman did. It’s wrong to kill, isn’t it? It’s not right to kill, right? I learned that it was wrong. No, I knew it was wrong. Any brat knows that. My heart aches when I see a child crying over murdered parents. When I see parents who’ve killed their child, I want to kill them with my bare hands. But it’s like you said before. It would be wrong for me to kill even the parent who murders his child. So then what? What’s the difference between me and that kid?”
“What was the difference between you two?”
“Nothing at all,” Kunugi said. “He was a minor. Back then, unlike today, minors were protected unconditionally, and on top of that, they got psychological assessments. Behavioral disorder, they decided. Certainly thinking about it now, it was a typical behavioral disorder, but at the time, I was totally unsatisfied. I guess I still am, actually.” Kunugi laughed.
“I mean if he was guilty of behavioral disorder then I was too, I thought. It’s the same. I couldn’t forgive him for being a murderer. I was really torn up. I was confused and frustrated. By the time I realized what was going on I was the washed-up old man you see before you today.”
He sounded defeated.
“It turned out we’re no different,” he said with the same voice. “I just discovered that. It’s really all about whether you can learn to abide by the laws as a matter of fact, or not. It’s that simple, but it took me thirty long years to figure it out,” said the voice in the dark.
“I didn’t have any adults like you around to tell me the straightforward truth. So I got to thinking. And I kept thinking…and thinking…and then became a cop. Even after I became a cop though, I didn’t fully understand. Just that it was bad to kill people, but that just because someone had killed someone, the crime didn’t make them a bad person. Humans are stupid, so they make mistakes easily. They won’t even notice that they did. By the time they do it’s too late.”
“Too late?”
“Yes. There are such things as do-overs, but when someone dies it’s forever. It’s too late,” the darkness said in Kunugi’s voice.
This was something Shizue had been saying herself for a long time. Shizue extended her arms out on the ground. The warm earth felt cool despite its real temperature.
Like a corpse. Like her mother’s dead body.
“When someone dies it’s forever.” Ayumi’s voice. “They don’t come back.”
“Kind of like us now,” Kunugi mocked himself. “Good adults like us, stuck here now. It’s stupid.”
Really stupid, Shizue thought.
They were silent for a moment.
“What time is it, I wonder. How long have we been sitting here?”
“Probably about twenty minutes.” Ayumi seemed to have stood up.
“Miss Kono, you sure? You said you left your monitor.” When Shizue had thrown her portable terminal away Ayumi had said she didn’t have hers to begin with.
“I don’t carry that thing unless I’m going to the communication session. Even though you all tell me to.”
“Then how do you know how long—”
“The position of the moon,” Ayumi said.
“The moon…”
In the sky the moon hung large.
“The moon…”
Of the ten thousand lux light waves emitted by the nearest fixed star, a mere 0.5 lux was feebly reflected in the earth’s only satellite, which hung 384,400 kilometers from earth.
“The moon’s out?” Shizue asked.
She hadn’t seen the real moon in so long. Just when she was a kid. This inorganic and aimless 0.5 lux star was quiet and calm, cold like the skin of a dead body.
The clouds had obscured it.
The reflected light was almost a complete circle, like a hole in the sky. It was a weak pale blue color, but it provided plenty of light to counterpoint the outline of dull humans.
Shizue looked at the sphere of light in the sky. Kunugi probably did too.
“You can tell time by that, eh? Can you also tell where we are?” Kunugi said sarcastically. It looked like Ayumi’s silhouette had just nodded.
Her head was pitch black with the quiet light of the moon behind her.
“Did you train in this kind of thing, or are you one of those stargazer types?”
“Animals always know exactly where they are.”
“Hmm?”
“They know where they are between the earth and the sky. In other words, they know exactly what they are. I didn’t know what I was before. I was envious,” Ayumi said. She then waded her way through the grass ahead of them.
Shizue stood up.
All of a sudden…
In the path of the pure and mysterious spotlight of the moon appeared another silhouette.
The figure’s entire body, jet black, was basking in the moonlight.
“You’re a man-eating being,” the pitch-black human form said, its voice thin. “A woman-eating, child-eating being…” It was a voice that sounded like song, like weeping.
“I beg of you, embrace the blood. Give human blood. Embrace it tonight…”
Kunugi stood up.
The small black shadow slowly advanced toward Ayumi.
“Are you a wolf?” the shadow asked.
Wolf?
This voice. Hinako Sakura.
“Is that you, Miss Sakura?”
It was indeed Sakura, dressed in black mourning clothes.
“Wolves are extinct,” Ayumi answered.
“I beg your pardon,” Sakura said in characteristically over-polite language.
She lifted her face.
Straight black bangs.
Gray eyelids. Gray lips.
The face that floated in this moonlight was completely different from the one that tried to explain the meaning of a word like occult, seated uncomfortably in the counseling room chair. Her monochrome makeup didn’t feel out of place here. It was probably very difficult for a girl like this to lead an existence under the power of sunlight. In this weak moonlight she seemed more alive than ever, Shizue thought. She was very pretty.
“Why did you come back?” Ayumi asked. “Didn’t they escort you home?”
“I’ve come to warn you.”
“Warn?”
Hinako shifted her gaze from Ayumi to Shizue.
“Another girl has gone missing.”
“Huh?’
“Just as you and the police officer over there were fleeing the entrance hall a message was fielded at the center by a guardian reporting his charge missing. She’s been missing since last night, and the center’s director then ran to meet the head investigation officer, acting very confused.”
That’s why no one came after us.
The police had no time to waste looking for the likes of Shizue and Kunugi.
However…
“Who’s missing?”
“Another fourteen-year-old girl from our class. I have never talked to her myself, though I’m sure we’ve met. I have no memory of her,” Hinako said. “Someone by the name of Kisugi.”
Kisugi.
At least this wasn’t one of Shizue’s children.
What is this? Why do I care if she’s one of mine?
Even in such a confused state, Shizue couldn’t help thinking that.
How could she be worried about whether this was her problem or not when she should be worried about the girl’s safety? At least she should act shocked.
I’m really a coldhearted woman deep down inside, Shizue thought.
She couldn’t accept the facts.
No, it was probably just that she did not want to hear about any more people she knew getting killed. That was the truth; Shizue was sick and tired of all this.
Yet if Shizue turned her feelings around it meant she didn’t care if someone she didn’t know got killed. Either way one thing was certain.
Shizue was a horrible woman. She was horrified at herself.
It was like she couldn’t face herself.
She was depressed.
“And then,” Hinako continued. “Half the investigators left to go to the source of the call. I was left to finish my interrogation with a remaining investigator when we were interrupted by a call from the security company. He received an area-wide alert to the patrol and director. An emergency call. I overheard what they said.”
“Did something else happen?”
Something was happening as they spoke.
“Yes. At exactly 1900 hours, something went awry at the residence of Representative Makino.”
“Makino,” Ayumi reacted.
“Then almost all the remaining investigators at the center fled to that scene, and they decided to release me, but on my way out of the center while on the promenade, my accompanying bodyguard from area patrol suddenly got an emergency notification.”
“That’s what that was…” Kunugi looked over to Ayumi.
“And then?” Ayumi asked curtly.
“Ms. Hazuki Makino was then kidnapped by the alleged suspect of this serial killing spree, one undocumented resident.”
“What the hell?!” Kunugi bolted upright.
Shizue couldn’t move.
She was one step behind…again.
“But I’m sure these were all fabricated truths,” Hinako said.
“You’re saying they lied?”
“I believe so.”
“Do you have proof or is this…a premonition?” Kunugi asked.
“I inferred it from the way the director of investigations behaved and how he reacted to all the news.”
“You mean Mr. Ishida?”
“When the notice was received, it wasn’t yet known if Representative Makino’s case had something to do with the serial killings. That’s to say, it wasn’t yet determined if his call was in fact an event,” Hinako said. “At the very least it could have been a mere security system bug, and that could be resolved by any area patrol or security system representative without involving an investigative director. However, this investigator instructed his men to be at the Makino residence and assure the daughter’s safety at once, before the area patrol had sent him any official report on the matter.”
“That’s…”
“Normally, the area patrol would go there first, no?”
“That’s true, but circumstances are circumstances. If something was reported from the home and it’s known that there is a girl there the same age as a bunch of murder victims, you’d worry,” Kunugi said.
“Representative Makino has several homes in this area alone,” Hinako said.
“Oh…that’s right.”
“The fourteen-year-old girl lives alone in just one of those houses.
Even a police officer wouldn’t know which house she was in just from hearing the registration number from a security company, would he?”
“No, I suppose he wouldn’t.”
“Also…”
“There’s something else?”
“After this police officer told his men to go to the scene, after the investigators had left his side, he contacted someone and was given instructions himself. His personal camera was on, and he got a voice message. He said into the camera, “It’s Mao again.”
Rey Mao. The undocumented resident.
“Then he said to do as they’d been instructed in the handbook and contact the D&S Processing Center immediately.”
“And what about that?”
“The director of investigations, he’s with the police, correct?”
“Of course. He’s the lieutenant chief of Division R investigations in the prefecture. What…”
Shizue was struck by the prominence of the sinews on Kunugi’s neck as he spoke.
“What about it?” he finished.
“Do the police always give instructions to the area patrol directly?”
“No. Not normally. We have different protocols for alerts.” As soon as Kunugi said this he relaxed the muscles in his neck and said, “Good point. If he told someone to notify D&S, that means Ishida was talking to an area patrol, as you suggest. In other words, the message sent to all the patrols afterward was written by Ishida himself.”
It was all made up.
A truth made of lies.
“I do not know what is transpiring in this region,” Hinako said. “All I know is that something ominous, something wicked, is about to take place. Earlier when I was passing by, I was able to see all of you. I…it was decided you could be trusted, and so I came to tell you of what has happened.”
“Decided…by whom? God?” That was how Shizue heard it, at least.
“No, I decided myself,” Hinako said.
“Thank you,” Ayumi said to her.
With the moon behind her again, Ayumi faced Shizue and Kunugi.
“Miss Fuwa. Mr. Policeman. I have to go now.”
“Go…go where?”
Ayumi stretched her thin neck toward the moon.
“I hate talking to strangers.”
“Everyone does. Including me,” Kunugi said.
I don’t care about anyone.
That was what Shizue wanted to say.
“That’s why I don’t like this kind of thing. But I can’t go back, either.”
Ayumi’s gaze pierced through the moon.
It was no use.
They weren’t going to be able to stop this girl.
With the full moon behind her, the girl was frighteningly brave, refined. Shizue felt a strong sense of futility in the face of that image. She had no intention of stopping this girl. She couldn’t even think of a reason why she would try to stop her. Weak and baseless, Shizue had no way of intervening.
“I’ll be fine,” Ayumi said. She lithely walked off, disappearing into the woods.
Hinako prayed quietly and then followed after her. The shadows seemed to waver behind them.
The tired old beat-up cop and the totally exhausted counselor looked into the darkness of the forest that had just swallowed up two little girls for quite some time after.
“What do you think?” Kunugi was the first to speak.
“I don’t think anything.”
“You think this is all okay?”
“I don’t, but…no, I do.” Shizue stepped forward to where Ayumi had been standing. “What are we doing? Running away, hiding in a place like this…Isn’t there something we should be doing? This is no good. That’s what I was thinking. But we don’t know who we’re up against. I don’t even know what I’m angry at. All I can see in the darkness is my own face. I am most angry at myself.”
Kunugi lumbered forward the way he always did.
“That’s not very like you.”
“It is though. This is me. I’m a horrible woman.”
“That has nothing to do with it. But sitting here, I’ve finally figured out who the enemy is.”
“Huh?”
“I wasn’t even thinking about it at first. Then I doubted several times. But each time I doubted, I denied the implications of my doubts. It couldn’t be, that was stupid. I second-guessed myself. I’ve been able to go on over twenty years this way as a cop. If my theory is right, I’ve been had, I think. That’s why I deny it.”
“I don’t understand. You need to explain.”
Kunugi turned his back to Shizue.
“You don’t think Ishida is suspect?” he said. “If we buy what that girl was saying, this last call was connected to the deformée character serial killings. The culprits are Kawabata and Nakamura. Embroiled in this is an unrelated event. It’s structured exactly the same way. The reason an unrelated event has been connected to the serial murders is because the police saw an intangible connection no one would be able to make. A fact only the police have access to is a fact the police lieutenant has to know.”
“That may be, but—”
“All these investigators after the killer and somehow the killer keeps evading arrest. But what if it’s because the lead detective is throwing them all off…What do you think?” Kunugi said. “Of course they’re not catching him. The director has no intention of catching the killer. And why does the director have no intention of catching the killer? Because he wants to take advantage of the victims of the crime,” Kunugi said.
“The director…”
“Yes, the lieutenant,” Kunugi said. “If you’re gaining something from the victims, you’d want to draw out the crime spree. Make it a long ordeal, let the killer keep doing his thing, and throw your own crimes into the mix. Make unrelated events seem related. The real criminal is going to go on committing those crimes, so the investigation will obviously point its head in the right direction. But they will still not be able to catch the guy. But no one’s going to doubt the internal workings of the police. A lot of people dislike the police, but no one would do such a thing. The police will continue to suspect various potential culprits but never actually arrest them.
“It takes a special kind of nerve to do something that awful,” Kunugi said, practically spitting. “After the crimes, you dump all the sins on that original criminal and catch your breath, but if like last year the suspect has an alibi making it impossible for him to have committed all of the crimes, then you’re in trouble. Weapons can be tied to a crime anyway.”
“That’s awful.”
“You got that right.” Kunugi tied up his thought with the word.
“Awful. Indeed. So I’ve thought this over. But rethinking the situation made me softhearted.”
“To cover up one’s own crime, you mimic the pattern of another criminal, then overlook the original person’s crime,” Shizue said. “No, you actually force them to commit another one?”
“That’s right. However, this time something went wrong. In any case, a part of the criminal group ended up dead. But…”
Meaning there were several criminals?
“Even with one dead, there was another still living. They had no choice but to use him. That’s why the police approached the Nakamura crime with only one theory. Until you said something about it, Nakamura was going to be the criminal. But they’d lost him, even after proclaiming it was him for so long. Even I didn’t buy that, but there was no way not to believe it.”
“They let him go in order to continue committing crimes?”
“I think they might have even been sheltering him as a fugitive.”
“Nakamura?”
“Nakamura’s investigation was staffed with an unusual number of people. And if you believe he was the one who provided information about Mao, you can see the thread here. Nakamura was after Yuko. However, he couldn’t get her. She was probably protected by Mao. Then Kawabata died. But in order for the reverse-victimization to continue, they needed Nakamura to continue killing people.”
“That’s why they hid him?”
“They probably brought him in. Nakamura’s next target was Yuko Yabe, so they needed him to kill her. That’s why they were so fierce in their search for her. That’s also why they acted so quickly when news of her capture was sent in.”
“The area patrol aided in killing Yuko?”
To borrow Ayumi’s terminology, they whisked her away.
“According to what the young woman was saying earlier, the news was spreading too quickly. It’s hard to believe the culprit was outside. Besides, an actual patrol was attacked. Someone from the outside couldn’t have approached him. But—”
“Ishida could have.”
“Could have. He’s a direct heir to the SVC corporation, which is an affiliate company of the area patrol and directly linked to D&S, which manages the area security systems. What’s more he’s the lieutenant of the prefectural police department. In one sense, he can get away with anything. Look. It’s not that the police or the area patrol leaked information to the outside. The enemy was on the inside the whole time. Inside the police operation. The enemy was getting information directly.”
Kunugi spun around and faced Shizue.
“This one time, it didn’t go as planned.”
“Nakamura was killed before Yabe could be apprehended, you mean.”
“That’s right,” Kunugi said. His eyes were wide now, visible in the dark. “Once Yuko Yabe was whisked away, obviously Nakamura had to go to work. That’s why he was apprehended. However he was killed before he could kill. That made it impossible for him to have committed all these other killings in the serial crime spree. That’s why Ishida created a new culprit.”
“Mao,” said Shizue.
“Yeah. All those who believed Nakamura was the criminal now believe it’s this Mao. Ishida no doubt knew of Nakamura’s death before discovering the body. He trimmed all the branches so he could transplant just the root of his story. He’d already decided that Mao was a bother to Nakamura and his own crew, so if he could make her out to be the criminal, he’d be killing two birds with one stone.”
“But…” The story works. But…
“Why?”
“How the hell should I know!” Kunugi yelled. “Look, you said it yourself. These serial murder cases crop up every year like clockwork, and the only people who deal with the cases are the police. The reason I was suspended was because I suggested we weren’t dealing with a single serial killer. You were under suspicion because of your doubts too.”
“So what are we supposed to do?” Shizue was yelling now too. “A good-for-nothing middle-aged cop and a high-maintenance counselor with a spotless record, hiding in these goddamned trees. What are we going to do? We’re going to get caught and arrested!”
“That’s fucking right,” Kunugi said in a louder voice. “That’s why I tried not to bring you into it.” Then, quietly. “I’m sorry I yelled at you.”
“This could all just be my imagination. In fact it almost definitely is. But either way, we’re stuck here in this forest and it’s the middle of the night. So what do we do indeed. Should we surrender?”
“Huh?”
She didn’t want to think about the future. But it wasn’t like they could stay there forever. There was only so much putting off she could do with reality.
If today was any indication.
She was like a child. This was not how adults behaved.
But Shizue was an adult. As long as she behaved like one, she would have to assume responsibilities like one.
But…
Kunugi wasn’t telling a fiction. He was right about everything.
Shizue couldn’t imagine anything beyond that.
Kunugi on the other hand looked like he was actually relieved after having said everything he did. But…
“I for one,” Kunugi started, and scratched his temple with an index finger. “I for one thought I’d sit out my life till retirement bored every day—no fun, no excitement, then one day die. I never thought I’d be in this situation. Look at us! This is like a novel. First of all, that I’d ever be talking to a beautiful woman like you for any length of time…
“I hope that’s okay. This is about as private as it gets.” Kunugi let out a weak laugh. “Since my marriage failed, I haven’t been able to interact with anyone correctly. I don’t know how much distance to maintain and so I end up alone. Well, I’ve certainly gotten older but when it comes down to it I’m as wet behind the ears as I was when I was fourteen. I’m practically a child. Inconsiderate and imprudent.”
“If what you’ve said is not a figment of your imagination but the truth, then what?”
“If it’s true…”
“If we decide everything you just said is true, then what do we do?
What course of action would a prudent and considerate adult take?”
“There is no course of action. Yeah,” Kunugi said. He dropped his head a little.
“Someone’s coming again.” There was a flashlight behind Kunugi. It was close by. Ayumi was able to see so far into the dark, but here Shizue didn’t notice until the light was flashing right behind Kunugi. The grass rustled loudly.
The bright light shifted into the shape of a cross. Shizue’s eyes couldn’t get used to it. Her vision went completely blank for a moment, and then a flare burst in four directions.
“Boss? Is that you, Boss?”
The light shone on Kunugi.
He blocked the light with a hand and suddenly his filthy appearance was completely revealed.
“What are you doing here, Boss?”
“Is that you, Takasugi?”
The light moved over to Shizue.
“Shit. Did I walk in on something?” said a young voice. “Get a room, will ya?”
“That’s not funny. This is no time for jokes. This is—”
“I know,” the young voice said again.
He turned off the light.
An awful kaleidoscope of bright shapes floated in Shizue’s pupils.
“But aren’t you relaxed, Boss. Something bad must have happened.
It’s a good thing I’m the one who found you.”
“What’s going on?”
“They’re not saying anything to us yet. The brass is going crazy, calling this an unprecedented ill, but we’re in the middle of the crime spree now. This is the last thing we need, Boss. A scandal.”
“So what are they saying I did?” Kunugi asked.
“Don’t ask me what you did. But seriously. They said that you behaved inappropriately with a female employee at the community center, that you trespassed into the center during a forced leave of absence, and then you kidnapped both her and one of her kids during a counseling session.”
“Whaaat?” Kunugi let out in a strangled voice.
As Shizue’s vision returned, the silhouette of the officer disappeared and was replaced by the master of the man’s voice.
He was probably the same age as Shizue.
He had a boyish face for his age. He was wearing a stretchy training suit and had a flashlight in his hand.
“This guy’s one of my kids from Investigative Unit R I was talking about this afternoon. Takasugi.”
He’d probably been told he’d never get promoted working for Kunugi. The young cop said, “I’m Takasugi,” with an expression either humble or sweet, then snickered at Kunugi. “Geez. I’m sorry but there are some wild rumors running out there. To an old bachelor, a beautiful woman is certainly a sight for sore eyes. But I thought your type would be more uh, voluptuous. I guess you can go intellectual, huh?”
“Hey. Shut up. I don’t have time for jokes right now,” Kunugi said.
“I know. Whatever anyone else thinks, I don’t buy it. Anyone who knows you knows you wouldn’t do any of that. That’s why I went looking for you off-duty.”
“Looking for me?”
“Both of you,” said Takasugi. “Lieutenant Ishida…he’s acting really strange.”
“Strange how?”
“Everyone in the office has noticed too. Even in the way he’s treating you…it’s strange.”
Kunugi’s face fell as if he’d lost his nerve, and he turned to Shizue.
“In any case, let’s go somewhere safe. I have my vehicle ready,” Takasugi said.