Chapter Five

A man was leaning against the shop windows of a closed café. The day was young, and the sun had not yet replaced the moon on the horizon. A few birds were twittering in the bare trees adorning the street, and in the distance the rubbish collection was on its early round. The man was waiting, he had enough time. His face showed a light stubble and his shoulder-length blonde hair was half hidden under a baseball cap, not as carefully groomed as it normally was, but several days in prison did that to you. He held a red notebook in one hand, and a cigarette in the other. The one he had been waiting for arrived a little while after six.

"Thank you. I know they wouldn't have let me go so soon if you hadn't spoken up for me."
Noboru shrugged. "You're innocent, we both know that. I just did my job." His voice held little warmth, and it was clear that he would rather not be here. Hisaya Nigoshi had called him on his mobile phone just before they released him, and the only reason Noboru had followed the invitation was because he was curious what the younger man wanted from him. As it appeared, he just wanted to deliver a heartfelt thank you. Not that Noboru cared about that, he had other things on his mind. Including but not limited to two dead young women, a disgruntled Mamoru and several journalists who rarely left the police station in the vain hope of learning some sordid detail about the killings.
Hisaya snorted. "You don't like me much, do you?" The paparazzi's voice interrupted his train of thoughts, and Noboru sighed.
"That's not it. I don't know you, do I?" What was intended as a rhetoric question suddenly held more gravitas than it was supposed to. Noboru furrowed his brows. What about the question had sounded so strange in retrospect? And suddenly he noticed something else: something about the young man had changed since he had seen him last. When they had met at the café, Hisaya was a haunted man: insecure, nervous, restless. But the man he was faced with now was perfectly at ease, despite having spent time in a tiny cell with an irate Mamoru. So where on earth had all this confidence come from?

The two men looked at each as some birds shot up into the lightening sky.
"Nigoshi, have we met before? DoI know you?" A sharp wind brushed past them, and Noboru shuddered involuntarily. Spring was still far away.
Hisaya peered out from under the brim of his cap, leaving only his curled lips visible, while his eyes were thrown in the shadow. He smiled darkly, and it reminded Noah of a TV programme about sharks he had once seen. This was the time to stop paddling and hope that the beast would pass you by.
"Not any more."

Acting on instinct, Noboru turned on the spot and walked away, setting a pace that was too slow for the rapid beating of his heart. He fumbled in his pocket for his mobile and dialled Mamoru's number with trembling fingers, reluctantly admitting to himself that he had never met someone who could unsettle him as easily as the slight photographer did.

Something made him turn and look back over his shoulder one last time. Hisaya was watching him go.

When Mamoru entered their office at 7.30, Noboru was already there and busy putting pictures up on a large board. The bluetack didn't seem to stick right, so he slapped the photographs on the board with a little more force than necessary.
"Easy there."
"Shut it."
"Bad night?"
"More like bad morning. Did you bring food?"
Shaking his head, Mamoru threw two wrapped sandwiches on Noboru's desk. They bore a pink crest, signature of the small place around the corner Noboru preferred to their local caféteria.
"There you are. But just so you know, one day you will be a very fat man. You eat way too much." Not so deeply hidden in Mamoru was still the boy who wanted to be a doctor, and because of that he made a point to live a healthy life style. Noboru on the other hand had more than once claimed that Jack Nicholson was his idol in terms of debauchery and living choices. Who needed low fat salat dressing when you could have a steak?
"Okay Chiba, what have you done?" Noboru had abadoned his project and focused his attention on his partner. His face showed just as much scutiny as curiosity, which resulted in a strange mix of furrowed brows and uplifted lips.
"Excuse me?"
"Mamoru, I keep telling you to go the small sandwich place, and yet you never do. Is this because of Nigoshi? Because frankly, that's not necessary. Just don't go to the Chief over my head again, okay? By the way, he's no longer in prison, he was released earlier this morning."
Mamoru looked stunned and nodded. Before he got a chance to answer, Noboru continued.
"And don't look at me like that, I'm an Inspector, have been one for longer than you're even on the job. I deduce, it's what pays my bills. Guilty look plus proper sandwiches equals you being ashamed of something. But it's okay, mate, it's okay." A friendly pat on the shoulder emphasised the sentiment, and Noboru began to unwrap one of the sandwiches.
In attempt to hide the blush that was creeping on his face, Mamoru took the two steps to the board (because in their office, nothing was ever more than two steps away) and turned his back on his partner. Noboru was right, he did feel guilty, but it had nothing to do with Hisaya Nigoshi and everything with Setsuna Meioh.
"You're looking for similarities in the crime scenes?"
"Yeah. Look at the pictures of the victims: Aino looked relaxed, Ami looked shocked. Why?"
"Ami is... was very smart. She might have figured out that the person who appeared in her bedroom was up to no good whereas Aino might have thought that it was just her lover." Mamoru plucked the picture of Ami's bedroom from the board and and brought it closer to his eyes. "What about the tea?"
"Huh?"
"Ami had a cup of tea next to her bed. And look here, two glasses of champagne on Aino's nighstand. One full, the other showing some red liptstick and missing about a quarter. What did Aino's tox reprt say? Any sedatives?"
"Let me check." Noboru reached for a thin folder that held Katsurou Hanzo's report. "Tox screen isn't there yet. Can you call Hanzo and ask?"
"What is your problem with the man? Seriously." Mamoru put the pictures back up, and crossed his arms.
"The hair. It's shinier than mine. Now can you call him and ask or not?"
"You have food, you should be happy. What's wrong with you?" Glad to have found something to distract Noboru with, Mamoru sat down. His chair gave an onimous creak as he settled himself in a more or less comfortable position. Noboru just kept eating his sandwich, spilling some mayonaise on his red lumberjack shirt. "Nothing."
"Fine, be cranky."
"I'm not cranky, I just had a bad morning. And now let me eat in peace and call McCreepy."

But one call down to the morgue revealed that Katsurou Hanzo had called in sick for the day.

They were looking through Ami Mizuno's living room when the call reached them. Once again, they rushed to a new crime scene while not having spent enough time on the old one. It was beginning to turn into a wearisome routine, as if the murderer was planning to confuse them by putting more and more work on their desks. While there had been over a year between Usagi's and Minako's deaths, Ami had followed the singer after only five days and now there was another victim. The files were already piling up, and they were no closer to solving the case than they had been on day one. And the fact that only one of the two Inspectors was looking at three murders didn't make it much easier. Noboru had not yet found the right moment to tell Mamoru what he had found out while speaking to Setsuna Meioh.

As soon as they crossed the threshold, they knew what they would find inside the house. The smell gave it all away. Whoever had died in here, had been dead for a while.
The Inspectors moved slowly, dreading what awaited them. Seeing dead people was nothing you got used to, but if they had been dead for longer than three days, it made things even harder.
Again, it was a bedroom that their colleagues pointed them to. Again, it was a girl with a hole in her chest. What was different this time was that she had been dead for at least a month, and that she had fought. The scorch marks were all over her rotting flesh, and her agony was etched into the walls. Several vases with rotten and singed flowers adorned the few untouched surfaces. Looking down, Noboru noticed he was standing on shards.
Mamoru's voice was dark. "I think we will have to go by dental records. Even if we find her family, we can't ask them to identify her. Not like this." Mamoru was trying to hold himself together, to work, to function, but Noboru knew that despite his partner's attempt at behaving like a cop and not a man, he was deeply unsettled. He hadn't recovered from Ami Mizuno's murder, in fact Noboru had wondered more than once if Mamoru shouldn't better take a long vacation and return once the case was closed. Hell, he might even join him and let someone else deal with this crap. From the corners of his eyes, he saw his partner wipe his eyes before storming out. On the bed, the dead girl lay waiting to be avenged.

Tying his chestnut curls into a ponytail so as to not shed all over the crime scene, Noboru debated whether or not to follow his partner. But someone needed to be here, and he wasn't as emotionally involved as Mamoru. So he looked anywhere but at the victim's face and set to work. It wasn't even possible to tell which hair colour the women had had because all of her hair had been burnt away. Ash and dust danced in the stale air, set into motion by the police men littering the room. A light flashed; one of the officer had begun to take the necessary pictures. Noboru closed his eyes and wished that he would have chosen another job. This was too hard.
"Lads, step out for a sec, okay? I need to look at the room for a minute." His colleagues obliged him, all shuffling out as fast as possible. Noboru didn't doubt that they would return with Vick Vaporub smeared under their noses; the smell was beginning to get to him. It was something they didn't teach you in the Academy: the smell of rotting flesh caused headaches likes nothing else in the world. It blocked your respiratory passages, turned your stomach upside down, tied your brain into a tight knot. And it lingered on your skin for days. No shower in the world could erase this smell. The woman's unburned flesh had turned purple, and while the decay would have progressed even faster had she died in summer, the sight of her was repulsive nevertheless. A few weeks ago, she might have been pretty, she might have been the most beautiful woman on earth, who knew, but now she was just an image that would haunt Noboru in his nightmares for years to come. He had tried his best not to show it in front of Mamoru or the rest of the team, but dead bodies that already begun to decompose were his kryptonite.
Swallowing down the bile that was rising in his throat, he crouched next to the bed and looked at her. She was dressed in a nightgown. No wedding band, but silver earrings dangled from her ears. Her left calf might have been adorned with a tattoo, but with the massive decomposition that had already taken place, it was impossible to be certain. Hanzo would have to tell him more. Suddenly, it was all too much and Noboru stepped away from her again, almost sending her nightstand crashing to the the floor. He just managed to catch it and instinctively, he wanted to take a deep breath, but he stopped himself just in time. Instead, he looked down on the floor. Right, the shards. He had noticed those earlier, but hadn't really checked where they were from. Scanning the floor, it didn't take him all that long to find out that a mirror in the corner had been destroyed in the unsuccessful fight for the victim's life. But there was something else...

Alone with the dead woman in a room full of old flowers, Noboru picked a smashed picture frame up.
He looked at it for a while before he walked out of the house. He didn't stop to talk to any of his colleagues that lingered in the sitting room, but headed straight out. His heart had begun to beat faster and harder in fearful anticipation. Mamoru was sitting on the small porch, head in his hands. Folding his considerable length together, Noboru sat down next to him and wordlessly handed him the picture.
Ami Mizuno, Minako Aino, Usagi and a tall woman with a bouncy brunette ponytail smiled at the camera, the ocean behind them.

Their Chief Inspector seemed just as lost as they were. Looking at Mamoru Chiba was a painful experience. The young widower had shut down completely after Noboru had shown him the picture of his wife and the other victims. While Noboru had managed to go back into the house and finish the first assessment of the crime scene, Mamoru hadn't moved until the body was transported away. Only then did he go to his car, climbed onto the passenger seat and waited for Noboru to drive them back to the station. And now they were sitting in their Chief's tidy and spacious office, so unlike their own, and Noboru Sanjoin had begun to come clean. The Chief Inspector stared into his cup of coffee while he listened to the younger Inspector who sighed and ran his hands through his hair before crossing them behind his neck. He looked at the ceiling while he spoke, anywhere but at the man next to him.

"So there is a connection between all three victims, and we...I have reason to suspect that... that Usagi was involved in this somehow, too. Setsuna Meioh, Aino's manager, claims that Usagi had been to see Aino on the night of her death. Usagi's, that is, not Aino's-... Anyway, I spoke to the Chief Inspector of the fire-fighters who were at the house later that night, and he said that even though he didn't find any proof, he suspected it had been arson. Which means that we might talk about four victims and not just three. But because there was no definitive proof, barely any evidence even, he kept quiet. He meant well." An unspoken apology hung in the air, but Mamoru didn't respond. Noboru counted to ten before he continued. It seemed impossible that the hard part still lay ahead of him.
"Setsuna Meioh claimed that Usagi and Minako were in a heated argument that night. Minako was worried about something, but Usagi blew her off. It ended with Usagi leaving the recording studio and Aino remaining behind. Meioh said that Aino was unable to continue recording, she was too distressed and kept trying to call Usagi. Eventually, she left. This is significant because they only had the studio space booked for another four days and they usually recorded until morning. According to the studio's security logs, Aino left at three fifteen. The fire fighters arrived at the Chib- ... at your house at about three forty-three. Mamoru, I am so sorry." Finally, Noboru looked at his partner, his brown eyes pleading.

"Chiba, I have to take you off the case, I'm sorry." The Chief Inspector's voice was gruff.
Mamoru nodded, his blank eyes fixed on the floor. It hadn't been an accident. While he had been working overtime, his wife had been murdered. She hadn't been asleep. Her heart had been cut out of her body. Had she died peacefully, like Minako Aino? Or had she suffered just as much as the woman they had found today? As much as he wanted to believe that the deaths were not connected, it would have been too much of a coincidence had his wife not been the first victim. A group of unlikely friends, all of them dead, and only Usagi had died in an accident? Working in his profession for years had taught him that these sort of coincidences didn't exist. What sort of husband was he? What sort of cop was he to not have seen the signs? And he had always thought he had known everything about Usagi, when in fact, he hadn't even known three of her friends, presumably even her best ones.

On his back, the scratches left by Setsuna burned a hole into his soul. He felt like a traitor.

End of Chapter Five.