Chapter 20: "Guilty Mind or Steel Trap?"
The basement of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department building had two floors. B1 was the higher level, and it contained the firing range, gym, and the shower area. It was frequented by various officers who want to practice their marksmanship; do some weight training or running at the gym; play some sports; or just freshen up after a long shift. You would always see a lot of people here at all times of the day.
B2 was the absolute bottom of the building and was a ghost town when compared to the floor above, No one went down there. And if anyone did, that generally wasn't a good sign. It was jokingly referred to as the 'the Chiller' because of the cold temperatures that were intentionally maintained for vital purposes. Why?
The morgue was down there.
Exactly 5 days had passed since Saito's body had been discovered, and I was told that a preliminary post-mortem examination was performed. Shiba and I arrived down there at around 3PM today, and as usual there was not a single live human being in sight as soon as we got off the elevator.
B2 was dimly lit by a few hanging lights that illuminated circular spots on the floor. They continued down the hallway, separated by one another from a fair distance. Our footsteps echoed eerily, bouncing off the walls and inducing a disorientating effect within our ears.
The drab gray concrete pillars contrasted heavily with the crystalline architecture that made up the rest of the space around us. Glass sheets instead of solid walls made it so you could see into every room. Almost every room, actually. Obvious to anyone with eyes, the body storage area was behind a 7 centimeter-thick steel door. I had made this trip enough times in my early career as a detective that I had developed the muscle memory to move on autopilot to my destination: the forensics lab located at the back right.
Like every other room, the lab was a glass box on three sides with the concrete foundation of the basement acting as the final wall. The only light that could be seen was from a medical observatory light that was suspended over a silver table with a white tarp covering… something. The lab was spotless, not a single speck of dirt or dust anywhere, even on the glass. There was a single man in a white lab coat hunched over the black granite counter with a hexagonal aluminum pen in hand. [1]
I walked up to the door and knocked twice with my knuckles. The sound attracted the man's attention, whose neck snapped upwards and his eyes narrowed to look me in the face. For a second his cheeks slackened in shock before transforming into one of barely concealed annoyance. He stomped toward us, violently jerking the door open inwards.
"What the hell?" He growled, sizing me up and down. "I thought you were allergic to dead bodies?"
"Call it 'exposure therapy.' Maybe trying to get 'acquired taste.'" A facetious grin came to my face. "You could even call this 'conditioning,' if you're into that."
It had the intended effect, as the skin on the man's forehead scrunched in exasperated confusion.
"Exposu— the Chief let you down here? No way. Impossible. You vomited at the first whiff of formaldehyde."
Meet Doctor Nagai Shuuji, the resident expert forensic scientist at Tokyo Metro PD. Nagai was a man with no filter, and so I found him easy to talk to. He had no qualms letting everyone know that he loved being alone and hated anyone or anything that bothered him.
One of the rumors floating around was that as a child, he told his mother that he didn't want to deal with people at his job when he grew up. His mother had informed him that if he wanted to avoid human interaction in its entirety, he only really had two choices: work with computers or with dead bodies. Allegedly, the ten year old Nagai Shuji had responded: "I don't have to restart cadavers."
Legend also had it that he was somehow married.
"Well, I'm here now," I said, shoving my hands into my pockets, knowing full well it was getting under his skin. "I stuffed my nose with tissue paper and I got a Noble Super Sour Lemon drop in my mouth. Let's get to it." [2]
"You're suicidal."
"What are you talking about? You would love to see my dead body carted down here."
"That's what I hope and pray for every night before bed." He snorted and rolled his eyes.
"Strange religion you follow. Any holy texts?"
"Yeah, 'Self-Euthanasia for Dummies.' It's enlightening."
"I'll take your word for it."
My dry response didn't go over well. "Hmph…" Nagai puffed impatiently before stepping out of the way and letting us in.
"Shiba, I thought you knew better." I heard Nagai chide my partner after I walked past.
"I thought I did too." Shiba admitted tiredly, causing me to chuckle under my breath.
The medical observatory light was a square light fixture on an arm, with an array of LEDS that produced a brilliant bright white light that shone over the white tarped body on the examination table. My nose was clogged, and all I could taste was an extremely sharp lemon flavor aided by citric acid to distract my tastebuds through sheer brute force.
I felt numb, and it wasn't because of the cold air.
"So.…" Drawled Nagai as he donned purple examination gloves with excruciating slowness. "Chief wants me to give you what I got? I'm guessing it's about the latest guest that checked in at my hotel here."
Was he trying to be funny? That's a horrible metaphor.
"That's correct, Nagai-sensei," said Shiba, a person dictated by the heavens to play the straight man in any and all circumstances.
Nagai scratched his head and sighed deeply. "Alright, let's get it over with..."
He grabbed his clipboard and began narrating.
"Starting off..." His eyes squinted behind his reading glasses as his gaze focused on a line. "... getting identification was a real pain. Records had nothing on him; no missing persons filings or restraining orders. On the off chance he was out of town, we took the extra effort to contact the police departments all over the country. Got nothing that matched our friend here. Similarly, comparing his thumbprint and DNA with the national database got us nowhere, just a bunch of false positives."
"'Tedium' is the name of the game here in the the police force." I shrugged. "But I'm assuming you have something?"
Nagai cleared his throat. "We did manage to tag him, but the process was a bit… backwards."
"How so?" Asked Shiba.
"Our friend here has a very 'distinguishing' dental situation. There are crowns on his two of his second molars; tooth 27 and its mating tooth 37, according to the FDI notation. The breakthrough was identifying the material that they were made of: nickel chromium. It was discontinued for dental use in Japan about two decades ago. We only use polymethyl methacrylate now, since the resin self-cures and the material is durable."
Shiba chimed in. "If I remember correctly, the second molar grows in between the ages of 12 and 13. So that means that he was 30 years old at the least."
"That's exactly it." Nagai nodded in confirmation. "Furthermore, both crowns have identical crystalline composition, which would imply they were from the same source. The most plausible theory I came up with was that he had the crowns applied at the same time during the same operation. So I double checked dental insurance claims from that time period it was legal for patients who were older than 11 then, and 35 or less now.
"Not a lot of people had nickel chromium alloy crowns; even fewer had both applied on those two teeth; and even fewer than that had them on the same day. We narrowed it down further by checking blood type. The final batch of matches were checked manually. Took four days, but we eventually got an ID. The name on his birth certificate was Saitama Toshi."
Saitama Toshi.
SAItama TOshi.
SAITO.
As expected, it wasn't his real name, but it was close. The best lie was the truth, after all. Saito was probably a nickname he had in childhood. It was a common habit among humans. Studies showed that when making usernames for games or email services, 64% of people tended to default to a childhood moniker. This was even more common among criminals who had aliases.
"Obviously, he's male. 32 years of age. 160cm in height, and weighs in at 61 kilos." Nagai glanced at me. "BMI is a tad high, and he was starting to get a bit porky around the torso. From the makeup of the adipose tissue I would say he started putting on mass recently. What do you think, Detective?"
"Someone wanted him dead… probably." I shrugged apathetically, pretending to not know the truth of Saitama Toshi's circumstances. "My guess is stress eating. If he was always on the run he would be eating large meals infrequently. The body compensates."
"Great minds think alike." Responded the forensic scientist with the vigor of a zombie. "His lungs are pretty clean too. I would say he stopped smoking… what? Maybe 3 to 4 years ago? His throat had some tar residue, however."
"On and off smoking then. Most likely stress related as well?" I asked with a raised eyebrow, swallowing the juice from my lemon drop.
"Correct again, Hikigaya." He frowned with barely concealed frustration. "It's starting to annoy me."
"Sorry."
Either my natural trickery stat wass obscenely high, or Nagai's insight roll was shit, because this deception check was a cakewalk. [3]
"Any who… cause of death is obvious." Nagai puts down his clipboard and moves towards the body. He carefully folds back the cover, just revealing Saito's head. The deceased drug dealer's skin was unnaturally pale, and his eyes were shut closed. You would have thought he was asleep.
Which he was, technically. It was just a permanent one.
Nagai leaned down and pointed at the finger wide tunnel. "As you can see, our buddy here got drilled. Side of the cranium, right through both temporals. The bullet was a real bastard. It went and shattered the sphenoid and vomer for good measure, just to be an asshole. Victim wouldn't have felt a thing. Instant death."
I loved how he talked about bullets as if they had minds of their own. That these tiny bits of metal and explosive powder hatched machinations while rubbing their hands with cartoonishly evil glee. Everyone needs hobbies, I guess.
"The culprit? 9mm cartridge. NATO parabellum," Nagai said with confidence as he once more covered up Saito's carcass. "We found the steel penetrator stuck inside a home down the block. Family was hysterical. Apparently the bullet broke their lamp and put itself inside their closet after ripping apart a fur coat. Took forever to find."
"Must have been a nice lamp." I mused uninterestedly. "Any guesses on the firearm?"
"Of course, who do you think I am?" Sneered Nagai, he walked over to a computer screen on the counter and nudged the mouse to wake the monitor. After a few clicks, a series of pictures showed up. "Classic case of a Type 54. Ballistics analysis on the bullet and the entry and exit wound matches up perfectly with records. The usual."
Type 54. A Chinese pistol that was prevalent everywhere in the SEA right now. It was an improvement in design over the old Type 51, which itself was a copy of the TT-33, the Soviet service pistol. Made after the Korean war, the Type 54 was distributed by China to North Vietnam during the ongoing war. After that, it was history. Guns with no records of ownership that could easily accept a ubiquitous round was quite desirable by criminals. A considerable number found their way into Japan, used by our very own Yakuza.
It was also the gun Ouma used.
"Is there anything else you can figure out?"
"Not much. Distance from the shooter was at least two meters, three at most. Close enough to be noticed, but also enough to absolutely make sure he was dead. From the film covering his teeth and material from a tongue scrape, he was smoking at the time of death."
"What about the scene of the crime?"
"Suburban neighborhood, in front of a convenience store where he had just bought a bottle of oolong tea according to witnesses."
The setting was starting to form in my imagination. As soon as it became tangible in my mind's eye, I knew what my next step was.
"Well, that's all I got." Nagai loudly removed his gloves before throwing them into the hazardous waste bin. "The reason for death, analysis, professional opinion, blah, blah, blah, blah. It's your problem now: figuring out the motive and finding the killer or whatnot."
"Hold on," I said quickly, attracting a curious look from Nagai. "Can I get the autopsy report?"
"What?" Growled Nagai, leveling a simmering glare at me. "Did you finally go off the deep end? I'm not even done. Besides, Hikigaya, you're not a newbie. You know I'm not allowed to."
I expected this, but I had a trump card ready. "Want to make a deal?"
"No." He huffed and turned around.
"It's about your wife."
That got his attention. Nagai quickly whirled around to face me with wide eyes. "... what?"
"I know something about your wife."
"What do you know!?" The scientist exclaimed, walking up to me.
I'm hardly phased.
"Let's make a deal then."
"... go on…"
"Give me the report, and I'll tell you if your wife is cheating on you or not."
"You saw her?"
"A few hours ago. She probably came to drop off lunch for you, right?"
Nagai's eyes buckled. "H-how…"
"Maybe try to get out some more? I could read your face like the morning paper." Didn't need to tell him his body language made it even easier; less a periodical and more like a children's picture book.
Nagai's eyes closed and he brought a few fingers to his temple in deep thought.
"Alright." Sighed Nagai. "If it's you Hikigaya, you're probably right."
It took ten minutes for Nagai to have the incomplete report printed. He handed me the packet with a stone-cold face. I took the papers without hesitation.
"So…?" Asked Nagai with baited breath.
I let out a heavy sigh before answering. "Stop being paranoid. The age gap doesn't mean anything to her. She just wants to see more of you, but your ass just stays down here, brooding. Go home earlier from now on. Eat at the table more. Quit being such a baby."
"Wha—"
I turned on my heel and walked away quickly, not being able to catch the rest of Nagai's words. Shiba scrambled after me, calling out my name hurriedly, but I didn't acknowledge him. My brain churned with a strange sort of outrage.
It really grinded my gears, watching people squander away happiness without a second thought. Feelings trampled and ideals tarnished; both the status quo for human beings. People are really terrible things. Maybe Nagai was right, working with dead bodies was probably the best thing ever.
Δ▼Δ
It was evening, and the late August air was starting to chill with the approach of Autumn. It made the brown jumper I was wearing a bit more appropriate, and I patted myself on the back for the unintentional foresight.
The car was parked in the lot just before the convenience store along a residential street. All was quiet, even the cicadas. The drop in temperature drop as the seasons changed was most likely the culprit for the disappearance of that characteristic buzz.
The automatic doors slide to the side to allow me entrance into the bodega. I quickly made a beeline to the wall of refrigerators in the back and grabbed a 0.5L bottle of amber oolong tea. My mind was monetarily fascinated by the condensation that formed on the glass when I pulled open the door to the cooler. On impulse, I took my index finger and drew a smiley face. The two vertical lines and upward arc beneath them beamed at me, and my lips form a grin right back.
I just had to keep telling myself: even though things were tough right now, it would get better.
The warmed food display was on the way to the register and I noticed an onigiri that sat by its lonesome. The feeling of kinship resonated within and I plucked it from the shelf and made my purchase at the front. When the cashier told me my total, I took out my wallet. In the past, it frequently would have been filled to the brim with cash and various credit cards. Now? I only carried 20,000 yen at max. The rest was stowed within the emergency flat tire tool-set that was underneath the carpet lining of the trunk of my car.
Genius, I know.
I handed a bill and I waved away the coins of my change the cashier tried to give me. Walking around with coins jingling in my pocket wouldn't attract that much attention, but I couldn't handle the idea of doing anything more to stand out. I took a bite into my onigiri. My luck was usually terrible, and this time was no different. The spiced fish-flake flavored paste didn't happen to be in the middle, but was instead shoved into a corner. The same corner I had just bitten into.
An overpowering taste of salt and burning spice ripped over my tongue and nose, the few bits of rice that managed to make it into my mouth did little to dilute it. My vision watered and I blinked a few times to rid my eyes of the tears. I wolfed down the rest of the snack, knowing that the taste couldn't get stronger since the brain can only detect a certain amount of any flavor. Everything past that threshold is not translated to sensation.
Twisting open the cap of my drink, I relished the refreshing taste. Ah, the simple joys.
The door chimed and a group of teenagers walked in, gossiping with loud voices and obnoxious laughter. I shook my head and decided to sip at the oolong tea while watching the tiny CRT television that was anchored above the book display. The channel it was set to was presenting a serial drama I was familiar with, since all the magazines were talking about it (been reading a ton of those lately). The plot wasn't anything to write home about, but the actors were famous and delivered convincing performances. Before I knew it, I had stuck around to watch the entire episode without a single clue where the time had gone.
Lifting the bottle and only feeling a single drop of the tea hit the tongue made me realize that it was empty. A sign that I should leave, perhaps.
I dumped the plastic container into the recycling bin on my way out, hoping that the gods would give me some good karma for helping out Mother Earth. After exchanging nods with the cashier, the worker bid me farewell with a polite bow.
"Thank you! Please come again!"
The doors chimed again as I stepped back out into the cold air that was again staved off by my thick brown jumper. A breeze passed by and shook the trees, causing the branches to rattle and sound like a storm. A hand went into my back pocket and pulled out a box of cigarettes and a lighter. I shake the box vertically, before taking out a single white stick and holding it between my teeth. I thought I had kicked this habit a few years ago, since cigarette smoke tended to turn off women. Shallow, I know, but it worked and it was healthy.
But when the goings got rough (and boy, was it rough right now) the sensation of smoking a cig just calmed down the jitters. I cupped the end of the cancer stick and flicked the lighter's top. A small flame shot out of the top of the lighter, igniting the cigarette into a smooth burn in a single go.
Good omen. Thanks, divine spirits above, I'll recycle more often.
A tired breath escaped from between my lips, the action accentuated by acrid smelling white smoke that billowed out my mouth and nose. I looked downwards, taking the time to appreciate how the lights pouring out of the large windows of the convenience store illuminated the sidewalk in an ethereal manner. However, that feeling turned into confusion as the world shuddered. Suddenly the concrete floor was flying up towards my face.
Oh no. I'm falling.
Just as my face was about to impact the concrete, I heard a loud pop that echoed throughout the quiet street.
Here came the sidewalk now.
My nose touched first, and I heard a sickening crack before it all went black.
This. This was how I imagined Saitama Toshi's final moments must have gone.
I opened my eyes and was greeted by the sunbeams that spilled from my window and disturbed my slumber. I had forgotten to close my blinds last night, and also hadn't bothered to change out of my work attire before I went to sleep. My hand reached out and fumbled around, reaching blindly until a finger made contact with my phone.
Even in the bright daylight, the sharp glow of the backlit-screen made me wince. The time was 8:02AM. I'm late for work.
The bed creaked as I sat up, swinging my legs over the side. I felt clammy and had a layer of cold sweat covering my forehead. On the floor near my feet were the crumpled remains of the autopsy report I bargained with Nagai to get. I could recall every sentence, word for word. Who knew how many sleepless hours I had spent pouring over the ink to shove it all into my mind.
"Finally managed to wake up?" A familiar male voice emanated from in front of me.
I look upwards, seeing an equally familiar face. It was decidedly Japanese, with no real distinguishing characteristics. He did have a dopey expression, however. Brown jumper on his upper body, black jeans covered his lower. His skin was motley pale in complexion, having the same shade of green as spoiled milk. Blood trailed down from either side of a gorey tunnel that went from one side of his head to the other.
"Seen enough, pal?" Saito probed with a small smile. "You were up all night memorizing that shit."
"No..." I denied with trembling breath and shook my head from side to side. "No. No. No. No."
"..." Saito said nothing and just held that smile like a mannequin. A drop of blood fell from his earlobe, but the sound of it hitting the hardwood floor never came.
"I don't have enough." I admitted, putting my head into my hands. My fingers ran through my hair, painfully pulling them at the roots. This was the only thing that provided any measure of relief from the oncoming headache. There was a torrent of blood rushing in my ears, drowning out this reality through oppressive white noise.
Saito once again had nothing to contribute to the concophany.
"It's never enough." I managed to choke out finally. My throat was hoarse, as if it hadn't seen use in years. "No image. No sound. No thought." My brain was unable to make coherent sentences, as the world shimmered before my eyes like a dreamscape.
Saito broke his silence with a harsh chuckle that did little to ease the throbbing in my head. The pressure had continued to grow since the moment I gained consciousness, and now my skull felt like a balloon ready to burst.
His snickers escalated into barks of manic laughter that grated my soul. "Yeah? Alrighty then, see ya on the fucking flipside! I'll send a postcard to let you know how hot the fires are."
"Sure."
"As long as you don't forget about me."
"Never."
Suddenly my doorbell rang. My spine stiffened and froze my body in place. There it was again; once, twice, thrice more. Whoever was at the door must have lost patience because they began hurriedly knocking now. I covered my face with my hands and slowly slid them down before looking at the empty chair before me. Inhaling deeply, I tried to bring some like into my petrified limbs. I made my way down the halls unsteadily, having to use the wall for support as I neared the front door. Behind it was a wide eyed and hyperventilating Shiba.
"Senpai!?"
"... Shiba…?"
"Where were you!?" He exclaimed. "I called you at least 5 times in the past hour!"
"... what?" I looked at the phone in my hand. The time was 10:37 AM, and I had several missed calls. "Shit."
"Nevermind that!" His eyes were excited, but in an unsettled manner. "We have to go! We have a lead on Aoi!"
"... give me a few minutes."
Δ▼Δ
While I was asleep, some strange things had occurred at HQ. The way Shiba recounted the events made it sound like something out of an overblown crime drama.
A strange package had been delivered to the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department building during the first wave of morning mail. It was a nondescript and small brown box with no return destination, but was addressed to the TMPD as a whole. The entire scenario would have raised red flags in any cop worth his salt, but with the terrorist attack on the Philippine Embassy a few weeks ago still fresh in minds, many thought (and rightfully so) that it was a bomb.
However, the box was exceedingly light and preemptive x-rays showed that there was but a single object in the box. It was a small and thin rectangular thing, just a few centimeters in length and width. The risk to open the package was taken. Cracking it open, they found a smartphone. There was no fingerprint or password lock. In fact, the phone had no protection whatsoever ("Straight up, horror-movie shit," one junior officer had commented to nervous laughter).
Its presence was inexplicable, and so the theories had begun about the purpose of this mysterious package. Some had brushed it away as some sort of prank. Other's joked that a bomber had dropped their cellphone in by accident when wrapping the thing and we'd hear an explosion go off somewhere soon. However, the true reason why an unlocked phone was sent to the police was discovered three hours after it was delivered, when a text message came to the device stating: "Aoi Kaito can be found at this address: …." Attached was a location in Minato.
By this point, Shiba had noticed that I had not come to the office and diligently waited for me while the rest of the department mobilized to head to the address given in such an indirect manner. He began to worry when half an hour turned into an hour. Concern transformed into fear when it became an hour and a half. Throw in the fact that he had called a few times to no response, and Shiba had officially assumed the worst.
The ultimate mother-hen, indeed.
We loaded into Shiba's car and drove to Minato to meet up with the rest of the force. The address in question lead to danchi apartment building among a cluster of similar residences in the area. An entire cohort of police cruisers, an ambulance, and a few familiar personal cars lined along the road. Police caution tape surrounded the building while plastic roadblocks closed off either side of the street. Officers had asked residents to stay inside while the investigation was ongoing, but of course this was ignored and a crowd of people stood behind the barriers while murmuring in curiosity.
The text message also included an apartment number, specifically the first unit on the west side of the second floor. It was a bustling scene, with investigators and other officers milling in and out through the singular door that was left ajar.
Walking inside, I was met with a rather off putting scene. Weeks of reading dossiers and looking at reports had made me familiar with Aoi's appearance, so I instantly recognized him… or rather instantly recognized his dead body. He was laying on the floor with arms folded over his chest and legs stretched slightly in either direction. Comfy, as if he had simply decided to take a nap on the tatami floor.
"Well, shit." I muttered, bending down to crouch over the man who was supposed to be our lead. "There goes that plan."
"Hikigaya. Fancy seeing you here." Greeted Hiura as he appeared in the entrance behind me in a navy blue police-branded windbreaker over his button-up shirt . Wet hair that was slicked backwards giving me the impression that he probably had gotten out of the shower when he first got the news. "I see Shiba's managed to find you."
"I wish he hadn't." I sighed, causing Shiba to frown. "Hello, Hiura. What are you doing this fine afternoon?"
"Oh, you know. The usual." Hiura mused tiredly, his eyes following the crime scene investigators and scribes as they collected evidence in the forms of pictures and written descriptions on report sheets. "Figuring out where I went wrong in life. Dad told me to be a paralegal. I said it was boring, now I'm starting to think that this job may be a bit too exciting."
"Didn't you volunteer to be transferred to the drug trafficking case, Hiura-san?" Shiba asked, puzzled.
Hiura groaned. "Yeah I did. Didn't have enough PTO to go on vacation, so after the laundromat burned down I asked the Chief to put me on this case, seeing as it was active and whatnot. With you two on it as well, I thought it couldn't be that bad."
"You underestimate me, Detective." I smirked facetiously. "I was born underneath the most unfortunate of stars."
"I'm pretty sure that's the case for most of us in this line of work. Although, some do get more than their fair share." Hiura agreed as he rolled his shoulders, a common stiffness we all felt from sitting in a chair while hunched over a desk all day.
"Succinct and witty. You're an absolute poet, Hiura."
"I try. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade, right?"
"An adage of golden words. Riddle me this, then: what do I do when life delivers to my door a particularly big and fleshly lemon that smells like carrion?"
"Great question. Well, first you gotta figure out how you got the damn thing on your front step to begin with. We found him like this. A syringe in one hand and puncture marks on his left forearm. We sent the syringe for testing, but we're pretty sure it's heroin."
"OD'd? Ouch." I responded and kneeled by Aoi. He had a pristine button up shirt on that was accompanied by a single solid colored dark-blue made from an obviously expensive material. Sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing thin arms and coarse veins. Trousers were beige, and had perfect creases down their length. His hair was a light brown, and neatly combed over to the side. "I have no clue what I'm looking at."
"From the blue tint to his skin we can assume that hypoxia was involved," said Hiura.
"Is that something heroin would do?" I asked.
"Heroin is morphine diacetate, an opiod, Senpai." Shiba informed. "Opioids are a class of active-group that bind to inhibitory G-protein-coupled receptors, or 'opioid-receptors.' They control the central and peripheral nervous system as well as the gastrointestinal tract. Death by overdose includes clinical presentation of stroke, cardiac arrest, arrhythmia, or hypotension. The most common method of death however… is that victims tend to forget to breathe."
"Oh." The childish meme, 'You are now breathing manually' was actually an anti-heroin overdose procedure. The more you know. "Do we have an estimated time of death?"
"A few hours ago according to one of the forensics guys. 7 to 8AM."
I raised an eyebrow and turned to face my partner. 'Shiba?"
Shiba sighed while massaging the back of his neck. "... the package arrived at HQ during the first run. Assuming he dropped it off at the main post office in Tokyo, it would have to before the cutoff at 7AM. The text message came at close to 8:50AM."
"... yikes…" Breathed Hiura, rubbing his eyes.
"Curious, isn't it?" I pondered aloud, empathizing with my fellow law enforcer. "I'm an inexperienced and young Detective and all, but I'm pretty sure dead bodies don't have the dexterity in their thumbs to type."
"Gets a bit stranger I'm afraid." Hiura dug through his pocket before handing me a folded paper square. "I spent most of the morning going through security camera footage of the main post office, and I got something."
I unfolded the wedge and smoothed out the wrinkles. It was a gray scale isometric photo of what appeared to be the floor of the post office. I could make out the tell tale silhouettes of waiting line ropes and the counter at the front. A shadowed figure stood there, frozen in the image as he spoke to a worker at the front with a box in hand. My eyes flicked to the timestamp at the bottom right of the paper.
"Someone came and delivered something at 6:30AM…. Is it Aoi?" I asked Hiura.
"Bingo."
I exhaled and folded the image once more before returning it back to Hiura. "So the timeline we have right now is that Aoi delivered a package to the post office at 6:30AM. Package arrives at HQ around 8:10AM, and Aoi died sometime before that. Finally, we get a text message by 8:50AM telling us where to find Aoi's body… what a mess…"
"Perhaps it's a diversion? Someone wanted us to find Aoi's body to distract the attention of the police?" Shiba suggests.
"There's one more thing I want to show you." Hiura motioned with a tilt of his head towards one of the rooms down a hallway. We followed him and came to a small room with a singular window that illuminated the white painted walls. There was a crinkled futon on the floor, as if someone had just slept there just moments prior. A wooden desk was against the wall and above it…
"You have got to be kidding me…"
Charcoal characters ominously spelled out a sentence on the wall. The eerie neatness of the strokes combined with the creepy shape of the blotchy lines had created a chilling scene, especially when considering we had a dead body just down the hall.
"What is this? Fatal Frame?" I scoffed. [4]
A series of complicated kanji adorned the walls forming the sentences:
" 建築中の聖域について、次のようにソロモンに語りました。わたしが言うとおりにし、わたしの命令を忠実に守るなら、あなたの父ダビデに約束したことを実行しよう。"
"The words came to Solomon: 'As for this temple you are building, if you follow my decrees, observe my laws and keep all my commands and obey them, I will fulfill through you the promise I gave to David your father.'" Shiba read aloud, slowly. "Hold on, 'Solomon' and 'David?' Aren't these names from the Christian Bible?"
"That's correct." Hiura confirmed. "Specifically they're from the Old Testament, we cross-referenced the lines and they're from—"
"First book of Kings." I reflexively said, interrupting the older detective. "Chapter 6, verses 11 and 12."
"..."
"..."
A silence befell the room, prompting me to glance over at the two. Hiura gave me a strange look while Shiba's mouth hung open.
"Oh yeah, sorry." I apologized. "I'm quoting from the New International Version. My bad."
"Senpai…" Said Shiba in shock. "You're Christian?"
"Nah. When there's only one book around to read for a year, things tend to stick."
Hiura chuckled while shaking his head. "Hikigaya's becoming a holy man."
I chuckled and stepped closer to the wall and carefully read the passage again. I compared it to the mental version of the English Bible I had memorized in Sri Lanka, translating on the fly. "If anything, my belief in deities got worse. Besides, Aoi's made some omissions and changes that are kinda strange."
"What do you mean?" Asked Hiura.
"For starters, there's no explicit identity of the speaker given. The speaker of this line was originally 'LORD', or 'God.' But with the way the sentence is set up right now, the implication is that the speaker is the writer."
"Which would be Aoi…" Shiba reasoned, voice trailing off as he contemplates. "Wait, so are you saying that he's talking to us as God?"
I tilted my head from side to side. "Maybe… I could be reading too much into it. His kanji word choice also stands out. The kanji for 'temple' that we normally use in this context is '神殿' (shinden). But here he used '聖域' (seiiki). You don't usually read this as 'temple,' but more as a way to describe a sacred site, or a holy area that's limited to a few, like a 'garden' or… a 'sanctuary'..."
I bit my tongue. Something was about to click, I could just feel it. There was a connection my brain was trying to make. Think, Hachiman. Think!
"If this is Aoi speaking to us as the 'LORD' then this reads as more of a command than a suicide note." Hiura repeated my conclusions with a furrowed brow. "But if that's the case, what does he mean by 'fulfill?'"
"'Fulfill'..." I repeated softly under my breath, feeling the air pass between my teeth.
Aoi was speaking to us as "the LORD." Yet he kept the names of Solomon and David, the two kings of ancient Israel. Why not replace them like he did with the previous identity? Occam's Razor stated that the simplest solution tended to be the best solution. Let's apply that here: what was the most obvious reason Aoi left those explicit names?
"He's trying to communicate with someone or something who he considers as Solomon and David." I announced while looking at my colleagues, all of whom seemed to have to deduced something similar by the serious looks on their faces.
"Solomon was the son of David." Hiura said. "Is there some sort of familial relation between the hypothetical targets of the message?"
"Solomon was known as the wisest man in the world. He had requested information from God." Shiba added in. "It could be a teacher or a mentor of sorts. Perhaps a professor at Aoi's school? Maybe his own father?"
"If that was the case, why go through the trouble to contact the police first?" I questioned, causing the other two to go quiet as they wracked their heads to find a theory that covered all the bases. This part of the job was simultaneously the most interesting as well as the most stressful. With limited clues, we had to come up with a plausible hypothesis that we could operate on to find further leads. It was half educated inferences, half luck, and half gut feeling. Unlike Solomon, we couldn't simply ask some higher power for more knowledge.
What a funny thought, detectives asking for help from a higher power. Would make things a heck of a lot easier...
Hold on.
"Solomon isn't a single person." I said suddenly. "Aoi is trying to inform a group of people who seek knowledge. 'Solomon' is 'us.'"
"'Us?'" Repeated Shiba in confusion.
"'Us' as in 'detectives.' Aren't we technically seekers of knowledge? Our job is to gather information from as many sources as possible, and in many circumstances we end up asking others for that wisdom. Why would Aoi contact the police department first? And in such a roundabout way? He wanted us to receive the message first, and he wanted us to know that he has something to tell us."
"What's the intention? And why commit suicide? He could have come to the police with information and asked for protection." Hiura questioned, and rightly so. That would be the logical course of action.
My mind returned back to the previous week, to my final meeting with Saito. Saito was in a similar situation, and yet he couldn't directly go to the police, he was being chased by… Sanctum.
And what synonym of 'sanctum' has the same word at its root?
'Sanctuary.'
聖域
"Aoi was afraid that he wouldn't get to us in time." I explained, closing my eyes and imagining the thought process the medical student must have undergone. "He wanted to get the message to us without anyone knowing he was communicating with law enforcement. "
"... suicide was a way to ensure that the truth of what he did wasn't going to be taken out of him." Shiba added with a heavy tone. "This can only mean that he has information on the drug trade, the human trafficking, and Ouma. He feared retribution like Fujiwara."
"That makes sense." Agreed Hiura, massaging his elbow. "We can assume that this 'fulfilling' is to give us the information connecting to that. No. Actually it would be more realistic to assume he knew something that connected the three. But how?"
How indeed?
God gave Solomon knowledge by speaking to him directly into the mind. A personal form of communication. I cleared my mind and gathered the clues we had so far: Sanctum was involved; personal form of communication; Aoi; his relationship to Ouma; Aoi's strange method of communicating us through cell phones…
Communication. Cell phone. Personal form of communication.
Cell phones are a personal form of communication.
"The phone. That's how." My head whipped towards Shiba and my mind raced as the big picture started to form in my mind. I had to slow down my words to avoid stuttering. "Shiba, the phone that was delivered to HQ got a text message, right? Do you have the number of the sender?"
"Y-yes!" Shiba fumbled through his pockets and pulled out a notepad with a series of numbers. "We called it several times at HQ and managed to go through several carrier numbers, but no one ever picked up. As a result we weren't able to trace a location through the cell phone towers."
"No need. Call it again."
"O-ok."
Shiba took a few moments to punch in the numbers on his smartphone's virtual keypad. He traded a look with Hiura and I before nodding and pressing the green call button with his thumb. Several tense moments passed as we heard the soft hum from Shiba's phone as it tried to reach the mysterious number.
A muffled ringtone began playing from within the room. It was generic in melody, but distinct enough that all of us could easily assume that it wasn't from any devices we had. I moved slowly, using my well trained ears to pin down the source of the sound. Without the threat of gunfire from the shadows of foliage, it was relatively easy to narrow it down. It was coming from the desk that sat beneath the message written on the wall. Without hesitation, I pulled the single drawer it had, only to be surprised when I saw a completely empty storage space. There was not even a speck of dust.
But the ringtone got louder.
Well, since we're playing by tropes here, might as well…
I gently felt around the bottom of the drawer with my finger tips. The weight of my press made the plywood floor near the back dip downwards while the front lifted. As if the entire thing was resting on a fulcrum, like a seesaw.
My lips froze into a stiff line and my fingers pushed harder on the back. The plywood came up further with a soft sound. The front was now pivoted high enough for us to see what was underneath the false plywood bottom. It didn't take a genius to figure out that this was a hidden compartment. I pulled on the slip of wood, it took some strength as it was precisely cut to the dimensions of the drawer.
"... I think I've seen it all now." Hiura commented as he took the plywood square from me.
With the fake bottom now removed, the ringtone was even louder and completely clear. It continued sounding off for a few more moments before ending. At the bottom of the drawer were three objects: a smartphone, a piece of paper, and a very familiar white card.
"Senpai…" Shiba whispered to me, his eyes noticing the plastic rectangle. "That's…"
"Yeah. I know." I murmured back. I ignored the white card and reached for the piece of paper. Flipping it over, I inhaled a sharp breath. This attracted Hiura's interest as he came over to look at what I saw.
"Oh, fuck…" Hiura let out breathlessly.
On the paper was a black and white photo with relatively good resolution. It showcased Aoi wearing the clothing he did now with another unfamiliar man. And then between them was a young girl wearing a simple dress.
And taking the context of this wild investigation into mind…
"Shiba, call the Chief." I ordered lifelessly. I reached into the drawer and pulled out the smartphone. As expected, there was no passcode or fingerprint lock stopping me from accessing it. "Aoi has information on this girl, and he's going to tell us through the smartphone like he did at HQ. He wants the police to get to the bottom of this. All of it: drugs, human trafficking, everything."
"On it." Shiba quickly dialed another number and left the room, and I could hear his hurried voice speaking austerely with the Chief as he walked down the hall.
Hiura and I stood there silently, both digesting the sudden turn of events.
"Damn it." Growled Hiura in frustration, hanging his head and scratching his scalp furiously. "Where is this case going? Drugs, to human trafficking, to money laundering, to this? This can't just be a coincidence right?"
"I don't know." I grabbed the white card and held it up to the light. Just like my own card, there were strange striated swirls over the surface despite it feeling completely smooth.
"I don't know."
But we would get to the bottom of this. We had to.
Or else there would be no meaning to the deaths of Ouma Daichi, Aoi Kaito, and Saitama Toshi. There would be no meaning to me making it out of that Jungle clinging to my life like a coward.
Arc 1: "Detective Hikigaya Hachiman"
References:
[1] The Japanese retailer, MUJI, has a set of aluminum pens and pencils that I swear by. Nagai has the taste of a patrician, and thus uses them as well.
[2] Noble is a brand of Japanese candy, and one of their products is lemon drops. It's quite popular from what I hear, unfortunately haven't seen or tried it in America.
[3] Dungeons and Dragons reference. When a character is trying to deceive another, the character being lied to will roll for insight. If the insight roll is lower than the deception skill the lie is accepted. Else, the lie is caught.
[4] Fatal Frame is a series of Japanese horror games about cute girls getting stuck in haunted areas with the usual tropes of the horror genre all around. Our heroine(s) has to use a camera to take pictures of spirits to make them leave you alone. Equal parts scary and wack, Fatal Frame lacks the charm of the utter absurdity of the Resident Evil games, but it has interesting game play.
Author's Note:
This chapter marks the slow crawl down insanity that Hachiman embarks upon. The title refers to the phrase: "A mind like a steel trap." This is commonly used to describe someone with a good memory or someone who is unable to forget things. Hachiman's guilt has manifested into an obsession to remember the one he feels he has failed, Saito being the most recent. Our protagonist may be a man of compromise, but he is an idealist human at the end of the day.
Special thanks to thatguy8801 for being my soundboard for this chapter. Without his assistance I doubt this would have ever come out. He's currently writing the story "A New Request." Please, go and check it out.
-SouBU
(Editors: Lord of Admirals, Xynovitch)
Revision Log:
03/17/2020: Re-uploaded with overhaul of tenses and changes in word choice and sentence structure as well as major grammar fixes. Edited author's note to be more succinct and relevant.