On a Knife's Edge

by Nerdlinger1

Ren is starting year 1 at the Police Academy and Makoto is ready and waiting to welcome him to campus. With the baggage of his past still dogging him, Ren will have his hands full managing his classes and Makoto's complicated new life. Things get even more difficult for him when a series of suspicious deaths puts him in the crosshairs once again. UPDATED w/sequel: "Thief of Hearts"

30. Thief of Hearts, Ch 9: Fri Jan 9, Morni

— Chapter 9: Friday, January 9th, Morning —

Though she'd gone to sleep feeling relatively at ease, Makoto's dreams had been plagued with anxiety, and by the time her alarm went off the next morning, it was a slog to get out of bed. Her annual summary presentation to the department was at 10:00. While she brushed her teeth, she saw line graphs reflecting back at her in the bathroom mirror, carving their way across her face. Her blush compact reminded her of pie charts. Every number she saw brought to mind some statistic.

She'd already made note cards. She'd already practiced at least a half-dozen times. She'd timed her presentation again and again and computed an average amount of minutes. Then she did it several more times, while answering pretend questions that she anticipated the audience might have. She had it down solid.

The irony, of course, is that if she did a good job, she might have to do this again next year, which is a thing she really, really didn't want. She had good reason to make this presentation as underwhelming as possible. But this was Makoto Niijima, and she just couldn't bring herself to half-ass it.

The facts and statistics and flowcharts were bubbling through her mind—and until it was over, she couldn't think about anything else.

— — —

Jiro studied the faces of the other students as they stared at him on the campus shuttle. He understood why they were staring, but, then again, didn't really understand why they were staring, since, as fellow students at the Academy, they would certainly be able to recognize a bo staff when they saw one, and would understand why he had it. But stare they did, and frankly, if he was being honest with himself, he got a kick out of it. They probably thought he was a dork, but he owned it. He'd seen Ninja Turtles, and though even Donatello made fun of himself for wielding a stick, god dammit, he was the smart one, and he kicked ass with that fucking stick.

So he couldn't help enjoying the feeling of ballsily toting a bo staff around with him as he rode public transit, gawkers be damned. If the staring was meant to make him feel bad, it did the opposite, and if it made them uncomfortable, well, that felt good too. Did this make him a sadomasochist? He'd have to ask Naomi later.

By the time he made it to the athletics complex, though, he was just tired of the gawking and happy to depart.

Stepping off the shuttle, Jiro checked his phone: 9:12am. His first class on Fridays wasn't until noon, so he had a good chunk of time to practice with Chihiro before he needed to be in a lecture hall. Student Instructors—S.I.'s—had a dedicated communal office in the athletics complex where they could compare notes with other S.I.'s, meet with their content-area professors, and keep their gear. They even had their own locker room with private showers, so they didn't have to hob-nob it with the lesser students. Plus, you got paid. It was a pretty sweet gig, if you could get it. Ren had been an S.I. for his Blades cohort since his third year, and never looked back.

The S.I. office was their routine meeting place, so that's where Jiro went. Pulling the door open and heading toward the back of the large room, he found Chihiro at one of the desks, reading email on her laptop. She didn't notice him right away.

"Hey, Chihiro, good morning. Ready to duel to the death?"

Chihiro jumped at his approach and hastily shut her laptop. "Jiro! Shit, yes, sorry… I forgot what time it was… Good morning."

Jiro cocked his head at her. "It's a little early in the morning for you to have already lost track of the time. Everything okay?"

"Yeah, sorry," she said, getting up from her desk. "I was just… checking email. Let me get my staff." She headed toward a bank of lockers on the wall farthest from the entrance to collect her bo staff. She was already dressed in her workout clothes.

Once they made it to one of the empty sparring rooms and had spent a few minutes warming up a bit, the two of them crossed weapons. They sparred for quite a while, Chihiro pausing intermittently to reinforce various techniques and provide recommendations, giving feedback on Jiro's form.

Jiro's confidence increased the longer they went at it, and he found himself feeling creative. Showing off with a behind-the-back spin followed elegantly by a swift cross strike, Jiro went on the attack. Fully expecting his superior to counter with a side block, he found himself simultaneously over-the-moon and regretful when his strike caught her in the rib cage, knocking her over.

"Chihiro! Shit, I'm sorry. Are you okay?"

Chihiro's face reddened with embarrassment and she crawled away from him, heading in the direction of her lost bo staff. "Yeah… I'm fine. Sorry, I'm a bit distracted. I wasn't paying enough attention. Not to take away from your strike though—it was well executed. That might have connected even if I hadn't been spacing out."

"Why so hard to focus?" asked Jiro, momentarily oblivious. "Oh, is it guy stuff? Naomi said you were having problems with that…" He instantly regretted that he'd said that, but it was too late to take it back. "Sorry, it's none of my business."

"No, it's okay," said Chihiro. Regaining her feet, she leaned on her bo staff and sighed heavily. "I'm… It is guy stuff…" She looked depressed.

"Do you wannaaaa… quit sparring…?" Jiro smiled sheepishly. He had literally no idea what to say, and cursed himself for bringing this up.

"No, sorry… We should keep at it. You wanna beat Ren before he leaves school, right? Then you need to practice an hour a day, at least."

"Yeah, but, I mean… I could practice on my own, or find another partner. If you'd… prefer to be alone, I could—"

"He's just such a dick!" she shouted, beginning to tear up.

Uh oh… thought Jiro. I'm not good at this kind of thing… "Um… do you wanna… talk about it?" Pleasenopleasenopleaseno…

"He just… He said he loved me!" she cried, sharply knocking her bo staff into the floor. "He said we'd be together! He swore it! And now he just… I just feel like such a fucking idiot!"

"Ohhhh, hey now…." said Jiro, helpless. He took a few steps over to her and tentatively reached an arm out, going for her shoulder. "It's okay, Chihiro… Guys are dicks, but you'll find a better one, I'm sure you will." He patted her stiffly on the shoulder. "You gonna… be okay?" he asked, desperate to turn back the hands of time back to when they were just sparring, and not talking.

Chihiro let her bo staff fall to the floor and covered her face in both hands, giving in to her tears. She trudged forward a couple steps, and buried herself in Jiro's chest, crying. Jiro patted her awkwardly on the back, trying to be reassuring even as he prayed for this moment to end. "It's okayyy," he said stiffly, his voice about an octave higher than it should have been.

"I'm just such a fool…" she cried, quaking slightly. "I'm sorry, Jiro… I don't mean to be such a mess…"

"No, no… It's okay. Sometimes Naomi cries about the weirdest shit, so I'm used to it. This is a pretty normal thing to get upset over, so it's not even that weird. I'm just sorry I'm not better at knowing what to say to fix it."

"You and Naomi have a really good thing going, don't you." Chihiro pulled away a little bit and rubbed her face with both hands, wiping her eyes.

"We're pretty keen on each other, yeah," he said, seizing the opportunity to take another step back from Chihiro. He'd seen enough rom-coms to know that he might find himself a target of her rebound-energy if he didn't take a few necessary precautions.

"That's really great, good for you. I know so many lucky people… You have Naomi… Fumiko has Akio… Suki has Touma… Everyone has someone…" Her lower lip quivered as she counted off the different couples she knew.

Jiro almost said, "Ren has Makoto…" before he remembered that listing off more happy couples was unlikely to put an end to this uncomfortable situation. He realized he'd need to take a different tack. "Not everyone finds someone in college, Chihiro. You sound like you're beating yourself up over it, but you shouldn't. My sister's almost forty with all these lovely cats, and she's not married yet. Gen Z's not in a hurry to tie the knot—career first, you know?"

Chihiro stood there quietly, her cheeks wet with tears. Jiro couldn't tell what was going on inside her head at that moment—her eyes looked glassy. "I'm sorry Jiro…" she said. "I can't believe I just broke down like that… I guess… I guess you're right. I should just focus on… my career. Husband and… family… can wait."

Oh good, thought Jiro, she seems to be calming down. "That's right, one thing at a time. Just get through school—and we're almost done, right? Won't it be awesome? In a couple months, we'll be outta here, then our real lives can start." He knew it was sage advice, despite feeling a little less than anxious to cross that finish line himself. He probably needed to start working on his resumé…

Chihiro nodded, and her lip quivered a bit more. "Can we quit? I'm sorry, I'm just not really in the mood for this anymore."

Jiro held up his hands and took a step back to signal his resignation. "Of course, no worries. Let's call it a day. I really appreciate your help training though—you kick ass at this."

"Thanks," she said, wiping her cheeks. "However, you probably want to find someone in the Blades series to train with. Your staff work is good enough as it is. What you should be doing now is figuring out how to use it against a knife. I'm sure the strategy is totally different."

"You're probably right," said Jiro. Her advice was sound, but regardless, he had no intention of doing that. He didn't know anyone in the Blades series who was as good as Ren, and anyone even close to that good was kind of a prick. Those Blades guys all thought they were Machete, all intense and brooding. If Chihiro was going to back out, as it sort of sounded like she was preparing him to do, then this goal of Jiro's might die. Just as well, he thought—it had been born out of a short-lived resentful streak anyway.

The sweat on Jiro's body was already beginning to air-dry from his clothes. He bid Chihiro a better day, who then departed for her fancy Student Instructor facilities. She still looked dour, but was hopefully on the upswing. Naomi said that sometimes girls just needed a good cry. He then headed to his own crappy locker room to stretch and undress before hitting the showers. He had class at noon.

— — —

"And that concludes this annual report on criminal statistics in the greater Tokyo metropolitan area."

There was a smattering of applause as the audience transitioned from listening to departing. Makoto had thought there would be more questions. She had assumed there would be some amount of interaction between herself and the assembled peace officers, but there was hardly anything. She had clicked through her slides, expertly describing the themes and patterns presented in the data—everything laid out perfectly and easy to follow. Perhaps there were no questions because it was all so clear?

Makoto sighed and pulled her thumbdrive from the USB port in the conference room console. She was disappointed that she'd spent so much energy worrying about how this would go. No—worse than disappointed. She felt stupid. These people didn't care. She would be lucky if anyone who had been there would even remember her name, or the amount of murders to the first significant digit, or what a suicide even was.

Back at her cubicle, she opened the top drawer in her desk and unceremoniously tossed the thumbdrive inside. She went to her email and began sifting through old messages, deleting, archiving, and absently reading and rereading mundane messages about interoffice communications and scheduled network outages. Cradling her chin in her hands, she stared at the screen, eyes glazing over.

The ringing of her desk phone broke her reverie, and Makoto sighed and lifted the handset. "Niijima," she said, with about as much enthusiasm as a sedated coroner.

"Hello, Detective Niijima. This is Maeda at the front desk. I have the mother of Kento Abe on hold, and was wondering if you'd take the call."

Makoto wrinkled her nose in perplexity. "Kento Abe? Who's that?" she asked.

"Kento Abe was that subway suicide from New Year's Day that Detective Sakai investigated. The family isn't happy with the conclusion he drew, and we can't really keep handling it. I thought, now that you're his partner, that you might talk to them."

Makoto sat in silence for a moment as she considered what she'd just been told. This was Sato's case, and he'd considered it over and done with. For her to talk to the victim's mother might be stepping on his toes.

"Detective Niijima?"

"Yes, sorry," said Makoto. "I was just thinking… Go ahead and put them through." Ask forgiveness, not permission, she thought.

"Okay, please hold. Transferring…"

After a pause and a click, there was a new voice on the line. "Hello? Is this Detective Niijima? You're Sakai's partner?"

Makoto swallowed. "Yes, this is Detective Niijima. Who am I speaking with?"

"This is Rika Abe, mother of Kento Abe, who was found dead on the subway tracks on January first. I've been trying to get someone to follow up on his case. It's complete bullshit for you guys to tell me he killed himself—there's simply no fucking way he would do that. My boy made dumb decisions all the time, but he knew better than to kill himself."

Sato's voice and the suicide numbers from her presentation marched through Makoto's head in parade. "I know it can be shocking, and suicide can be a difficult thing for loved ones to accept, but—"

Ms. Abe interrupted with an exasperated sigh. "You're not a mother, are you? I know that wasn't the sort of thing my son would do. His girlfriend had turned him against me, and he'd stopped returning my calls, but he was a good boy. He had so many interests. He was into music production, he loved his dog, and he wrote and drew comic books—he just… enjoyed life. It just doesn't fit that, out of nowhere, he would throw himself in front of a fucking train."

"But that's the conclusion that the detective in charge of his case came to," said Makoto.

"Yeah, it is, but I'd love to know how he knows that." Makoto could hear the restraint in the woman's voice as she tried to control her tumultuous emotions. "I haven't seen the evidence, but if he killed himself, there should be video of it on the subway CCTV—until someone shows me that, I'll never believe that he killed himself. It seems way more likely to me that that bitch girlfriend of his pushed him, and I don't think she was ever even interviewed. That receptionist woman who you people keep shunting me off to doesn't know anything about his case. She can't tell me shit! I deserve to know, god dammit."

Makoto couldn't bring herself to argue with any of that. She knew the pain of losing a loved one, and knew that any closure she could provide, even if it was just a more detailed discussion of the evidence, could help the woman with her grieving. She grabbed her notebook and her pen, and prepared to write. "Okay, Missus Abe, here's what I can do. I'll pull up your son's case file, and I'll see if I can furnish you with more specific information of what happened to him. His name was 'Kento'… spelled with the kanji for 'healthy' and… 'winter'?"

"That's correct," said Ms. Abe. "And his girlfriend's name was Kimi Okada. I can email you her picture if you want."

Makoto jotted down the information she was being given and nodded her head. "There should be a photo in the file, but you can go ahead and send it to me anyway at niijima. makoto{at}TMPD. jp. Can you tell me anything else about your son's girlfriend that might be useful? Phone number, address, anything like that?"

"Well, I didn't really approve of her, so no, I don't have any of that kind of information. I just know she worked in music. They met at a venue in Shinjuku. I think she plays bass or something."

"That's fine, I should be able to locate her with just her name. And can I get a good call back number for you?"

"Yeah, it's seven-eight-oh-nine-one, three-three-four-two. That's my cell."

"Thank you. I'll pull up the file and see what I can find out for you."

"Thanks," said Ms. Abe. "And will I actually get a call back from you?" The way she said this made it clear she'd been let down before.

Makoto creased her lip, biting her tongue about her new partner. "Of course, Missus Abe. I have other cases and it may take me a few days though, so please be patient." It was a lie, but one that she hoped would be more true once her partnership to Sato had had some more time to get going—and at least it would buy her some time.

"I understand." The woman's energy was spent. "He's already dead, so there's not really any urgency, I'm just… not satisfied with the conclusion, that's all. I just sent his girlfriend's picture, by the way, so hopefully you have that?"

Makoto looked up from her notebook and examined her inbox. A fresh email arrived from "spicy_paprika". She opened it and clicked the attachment. It loaded. "Yes, I have the photo, thank you very much."

"No problem, thanks for listening. That detective who handled my son's murder, or accident or whatever it was—not suicide—was a lazy cunt. You sound like you were actually hearing me, so I appreciate it. Don't let me down, Detective."

"I can look into it and let you know what the investigation found out, but please understand that there's every possibility that my conclusions will be no different," said Makoto, trying to tamp down the woman's expectations. "I'm certain the evidence points to suicide, or they wouldn't have declared it a suicide, after all."

There was a ragged breath from the other side of the line. "I understand. But I haven't seen anything convincing—any evidence at all, really. And until I do, you won't be hearing the last of me."

"I can respect that," said Makoto. "I will do what I can for you."

"I'll hold you to that." The fire was returning to her voice, but fortunately the conversation was coming to a close before she could get wound up again. "Thank you again, Detective. Take care."

"You as well. Good day, Missus Abe." There was a click, and Ms. Abe hung up. Makoto placed the handset in its cradle and leaned back in her chair with a sigh. She pinched her eyes tight, before refocusing her attention on her computer and the email she'd been sent. The photo was of a woman and man, their faces very close together in an apparent selfie. The man, Kento Abe, most likely, was the photographer, and he and the young woman were smiling together at what looked like a music venue at night. Makoto could see a lit up stage in the background, as well as many other apparent concert-goers. The digital timestamp on the picture file dated the photo to mid-November of last year, less than two months ago. Both the people in the photo looked very happy.

Makoto studied the young woman's appearance closely: Kimi Okada. She appeared to be in her early twenties, with chin-length black hair accented with green streaks. She wore a lot of black eyeliner and had a nosering in her left nostril. Her smile was broad, showing her teeth and tongue, which was also pierced. Kento's hair was short and styled with gel so that it stuck out in places. He had no piercings, but wore a thick chain around his neck with a bone-shaped dog tag hanging from it. There was a name on the tag, but she couldn't make it out.

She sent the photo to the printer and proceeded to navigate her way into the TMPD database to look up the case file for Kento Abe. Finding it, she double-clicked and proceeded to read:

Case no. 58382: Kento Abe, DOB: 28/11/2003
Investigator(s): Det. Sato Sakai

Subject Description:
Sex: Male
Height: 1.7m
Weight: 63kg
Hair: black
Eyes: brown
Other: Tattoo of musical notes behind right ear

Narrative:
Victim was found lying prone on subway rails at Nakano Sta. Fully dressed in black jeans, white t-shirt, white socks and black and white sneakers. A search of his pockets revealed a wallet (containing 12000 JPY, a Tokyo Metro subway pass, and a state-issue ID identifying him as Kento Abe), candy wrappers, and ziplock bag of dog treats. Victim's head was further from the platform. Blood at the scene (see photos). Body was reported to police at 0530 on Friday, 02/01/2026 by F. Ikeda, subway patron.

Interviewed Oda Samegawa, subway security attendant on duty the night before. Samegawa reported not seeing anyone else at the station with the victim during the time of the death.

Photos and body remanded to ME for examination. Report to follow.

Makoto clicked the attachments, looking to view the photographs taken at the scene. As the first of them loaded, Makoto had to hold back the bile rising in her throat—the photos were grisly. The angle of the first photo was taken from the tracks, from the direction the train would have struck him from. Kento Abe's headless body lay next to the subway tracks, prone. He was on his knees, bent forward, and you could see his right arm coming out toward the camera. Makoto scoffed a bit that the written report hadn't spelled out explicitly that the victim's head was severed from the body—it just said it was "further from the platform." Indeed, Kento's head was a few feet further down the tracks from the body, staring blankly back into the camera.

She scrolled through a few other photos. A bird's eye view of the corpse taken from the platform above showed the victim's arms sticking straight out on either side, propping him up like a couple of kickstands, hands palm-up, and the body leaning slightly to the left, in the direction the train would have been traveling. Another photo, a closeup of the head, revealed other blunt force trauma to the cranium besides the ragged edge where it had been torn from its body. It had certainly been battered about as the train proceeded to roll over it before coming to a stop. A closeup of the torso's neck showed the pool of blood that resulted from the injury.

Makoto sent the photos to the printer and promptly closed the attachment. She took a deep breath to settle her stomach before clicking on the medical examiner's report.

Tokyo Metropolitan Hospital
TMPD case no. 58382: Kento Abe, DOB: 28/11/2003
Medical Examiner's Report

All biological specimens collected in accordance with State Policy 3500, governing collections in cases of suspicious or unknown manners of death. Per policy, the following specimens were collected and put into storage:
Blood, urine, vitreous humor, gastric contents, bile, liver, hair, fingerprint card.

Per policy, a battery of tests was conducted for the following intoxicants:
Alcohol, analgesics, antidepressants, antihistamines, benzodiazepines, cannabis, cardiovascular drugs, cocaine, narcotic analgesics, stimulants.

A litany of numbers and statistics followed, none of which Makoto could make heads or tails of. She skipped to the summary:

Routine testing revealed no suspicious substances present.

Time of death is estimated at 11:50pm, and is based on analyses of decedent's livor, rigor, and algor mortis, and statements by the investigating officer, S. Sakai of TMPD.

Conclusions:
Death scene photography is inconsistent with accidental, homicidal, or natural death. Furthermore, the absence of drugs or other suspicious substances in the victim's body suggests the victim had agency at the time of death. Most likely explanation is that the decedent arrived at the tracks just before the station closed for the night, getting into position for himself to be decapitated by the last train.
MANNER of death is ruled SUICIDE by MECHANISM of EXANGUINATION (i.e. blood loss) via CAUSE of DECAPITATION BY RAIL CAR.

So far, so straightforward. Kento's mother didn't believe that he would commit suicide, but those photographs and that medical examiner's report were pretty damning. However, Makoto could absolutely understand why Sato had balked at the idea of showing Kento's mother those photos. They were absolutely brutal. Makoto kicked herself for taking on this terrible task—for insinuating herself into this drama. She realized as she read through the medical examiner's notes that the mother wouldn't be convinced that there wasn't more to the story even if Makoto did traumatize her with these photos. Sato's voice whispered through her mind: "They'll even conjure convoluted murder plots for you to chase down."

"Shit," Makoto cussed to herself, then blushed as she looked around, hoping nobody had heard her.

It would be tough to argue that 'decapitation by rail car' was anything but suicide though—even if he'd been pushed onto the tracks, the likelihood that he would fall in that position and remain still long enough for a train to come along and chop his head off was pretty slim. Sato hadn't ever spoken to the mother himself, so maybe Makoto could explain it, and explain why she couldn't see the photos herself—although that would require trust, which was something Ms. Abe did not hold for the TMPD at the moment. It was something Makoto would have to earn.

And Kento's mother was correct about one thing: CCTV footage would confirm that this was a suicide, and do so without anyone needing to see the grisly aftermath that followed. However, for whatever reason there was no CCTV footage included in the file. Makoto would need to dig up the footage, and then, maybe that would be enough.

Makoto picked up the phone and dialed Tokyo Metro's security office.

"Hello, Tokyo Metro, Security, Nishimura speaking."

"Hello, this is Detective Makoto Niijima of the Tokyo police. I'm looking for some CCTV footage. I need, uh, the footage from the suicide on New Year's Day."

"Oof. Alright, let me see what we got. Just a second please." There was a pause as Nishimura looked up the files. "I'm sorry, Detective Niijima, but we don't seem to have anything."

Makoto was shocked. "What? You do keep CCTV footage from that long ago, don't you?"

"Of course, but there appears to be abouuut… a six- or seven-hour gap in the footage, starting at just before midnight on January first."

The evenness of her tone belied the suspicion in her thoughts. "Any idea why?"

"Ummmm, maybe a network outage? Sorry, Detective, I'm not sure—I've never seen this before."

"Is there anyone else at Tokyo Metro who would be able to shed some light on that?" she asked.

"Uh, my supervisor, Mister Shinji Aoki, might know something. Would you like me to transfer you?"

"That would be helpful, yes. Thank you very much."

"You're welcome, Detective. One moment please." The Metro worker transferred the call, and Makoto made some notes in her journal.

A click, and the security supervisor was on the line. "Aoki here," said the man on the other end in a gruff voice.

"Hello, Mister Aoki? This is Detective Makoto Niijima with the TMPD. I'm calling about Kento Abe, the suicide on New Year's Day."

Mister Aoki made a disgusted noise. "Aw, shit, yeah. What a mess."

"I know, I saw the photos," Makoto grimaced at the unbidden thought of them.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, I'm sure the photos were bad, too, but I was talking about the footage. That was a mess."

Makoto leaned forward at her desk. "How do you mean?"

"Well, uh, we had a situation with an employee…" Aoki paused, "You know who I'm talking about? I don't want to go divulging details from someone's personnel file before I'm sure you're real police…"

"I assume you're referring to Oda Samegawa, the security officer on duty the night of the suicide, and this is in reference to TMPD case number five-eight-three-eight-two."

"Winner, winner, chicken dinner," said Aoki, very matter-of-factly. "Okay then, Detective. So, Samegawa… We had to fire his worthless ass for gross negligence over this whole shitshow."

"Gross negligence?" Makoto repeated, adding to her notes. "And how was he negligent?"

"Well, that poor guy you're investigating, who chopped his own head off with a goddamn train, right? Samegawa was working station security that night, like you said, and he totally screwed the pooch. We go to look up the footage of the death, and find that all the goddamned cameras had been turned off. Well, not turned off—they were running, but nothing was being recorded."

Makoto's stomach dropped, and she found herself momentarily speechless. After a beat, she recovered, her tone steady: "You mean you have no security footage from the entire station for the night the man died?"

"Nope. And not only that, but Samegawa, the stupid prick, somehow lost his keys."

"What keys?"

"His station keys—all the keys to all the gate locks and doors at Nakano station. They were just gone, and he couldn't account for where they went. We had to get all the locks changed in the whole station—it cost a small fortune. Between that and the screw up with the cameras, that was it—we canned him."

Makoto paused to jot some notes and get her thoughts together. She would need to talk to Oda Samegawa. "Can you please provide me with Mister Samegawa's address and phone number?"

Mr. Aoki agreed, and Makoto recorded the details in her notebook. "Thank you, Mister Aoki. Is there anything else you remember about the night of the death that you think might be relevant?"

"I don't think so. Samegawa was the only one interviewed by the cops, I think. They took his statement and snapped some photos, then got the body out of there. We had to have alternate routes going in order to get people around Nakano for their morning commute. It was a mess."

"I'm sure it was."

"It's always a mess, every time. These dumb shits don't realize what they're doing to us. Find another fucking way to kill yourselves, right? Jump off a goddamn bridge or something."

Makoto sighed. "Thanks again for your cooperation, Mister Aoki. If I think of anything else, I may be in touch again."

"Not a problem, Detective. Good luck with your investigation."

Makoto thanked the station supervisor and hung up the phone. She studied her notes and sighed: There had been nothing in the file about an interview with the girlfriend, Kimi Okada. Had Sato conducted one? She should ask, but that would mean telling him that she was looking into his case, which she was still loath to do. Well, she could push that off for now, and submit a request through NCIC for Kimi Okada's address and phone number, then she could contact Oda Samegawa to find out what had actually happened at Nakano station the night of Kento Abe's apparent suicide. Plus she still had to update Saki Kobayashi about her missing husband. She could put off telling Sato about her meddling a little while longer.

— — — Friday, January 9th, Evening — — —

Emiko had spent the last couple of days doing her best to keep up with her classwork and her mentor. She knew that intellectually, when she was only a doctor and not also a student, that she would feel less like she was balancing a hundred spinning plates all at once, but she still wasn't sure that she would have the stamina for the endless laps around the hospital, moving from one patient to the next, to radiology, to the pharmacy, to Urgent Care—to the bathroom—and somehow keep all the paperwork organized and complete. Doctor Takemi had tried to assure her that her body would adjust, and she would figure out a system that would help her stay mentally and physically on top of things, but for now, that theoretical adjustment still felt like it was a long way off, if it was even realistic at all.

How much time had passed between Emiko losing track of her notebook and her realizing it was lost was anyone's guess. When she finally realized her mistake, they were headed back to Doctor Takemi's office for the day. Her shoulders slouched as she stared at her empty hands. "My notebook…"

"It's alright, just retrace your steps," Tae assured her. "I'll wait for you in my office. Here's the log of patients we saw today so you can remember where we were."

Emiko thanked her and headed back for her notebook. It was probably a good twenty minutes before she'd recovered the missing item and made it back to the office. When she arrived, she caught Doctor Takemi deep into paperwork, poring over some forms on her desk.

Tae looked up, startled out of her thoughts. She quickly gathered up the papers she'd been studying and tucked them in a file folder. "Found your notebook, I see."

Emiko's mind had gotten caught on the strange forms she'd recognized on Tae's desk. "Huh? Um, yeah—finally. What were you working on there?"

"Oh," said Tae with a dismissive wave. "Nothing, just some files from an old case I was re-examining."

"And old case? But those were coroner reports, weren't they?" Emiko pressed as she plopped down, just curious and not really realizing that she was prying.

"It's… it's nothing. Nothing for you to worry about, just something I'm working on for a friend. That's all." Tae placed the folder in a low desk drawer. "Where was your notebook? Radiology?"

Emiko blushed. "Way more embarrassing. It was in the bathroom sitting on top of the toilet paper dispenser in the last stall."

Tae laughed. "I can't tell you how many times I've left my phone in that exact spot."

Emiko smiled, feeling a little better.

"Hey, at least you were using the bathroom—that's progress. When I was an intern my school coordinator bought us all adult diapers as a joke."

"Oh my gosh!"

"Don't worry—I would never do that to you. Now a catheter? Maybe. Maybe a catheter…"

Emiko laughed. "It's just so hard to tear myself away from what you're doing," she said. "Unless I'm following you into the bathroom, it's still hard to remember that I might need to pee."

"It's a problem you'll eventually get over, I promise you," said Tae, before patting the patient forms on the desk before her. "Alright, these patient referrals aren't going to write themselves."

It wasn't until the train ride home as Emiko thought back through her day that she realized how expertly Tae had deflected from that old case she'd walked in on her investigating. Why had she had paperwork from the morgue? Why had she hid it? It gnawed at Emiko the whole way home.

— — —

Makoto was packing up to leave the office for the day, on her way to pay an unannounced visit to Oda Samegawa, the former Tokyo Metro employee who was apparently to blame for there being no security footage of Kento Abe's death over a week ago. Sato, her new partner, had been in charge of the investigation, and she felt a bit like she was intruding on his territory by looking into it at all, but the family wasn't going to rest until she did. In the absence of video evidence proving his death was a suicide, she would need to dig a little deeper. If his death was a murder, as was still an open possibility, then Oda Samegawa could conceivably be a suspect—his "negligence" with the security cameras could be a cover for his crime.

With the guilt of Mr. Samegawa as a distinct possibility, she didn't want to just pop in on him without telling someone that's what she was doing—but since it was Sato's territory that she was encroaching on, she didn't exactly want to bring him along, either.

She settled for sending some texts to Sato, Ren, Emiko, and Sae. She copy/pasted the same message to all four of them: About to pay a visit to someone who could be a suspect in a crime—just letting you know in case I don't check in later…

Ren replied first:

Thanks for letting me know
What would you like me to do if you don't check in again in a reasonable amount of time?

Don't do anything
I've texted Sae, Sato, and Emiko too, who are more available if anything were to actually go wrong
I'll call you this evening, so I'll catch you up then
I guess if you don't hear from me by tonight, *then* you can worry…

Reassuring, thanks… :P

She also heard back from Sato:

Want me to come along, partner? :D

No thanks, I've got this

This for your missing husband?

Besides Kosuke Kobayashi and Kento Abe, she had no other cases she was working on—she wasn't sure she could lie believably, but she definitely didn't want to reveal that she was cleaning up his loose ends for him.

Not exactly

? ? ?

Makoto decided to pretend she hadn't seen that message, and just grabbed the last of her things and hurried out of the station. She hoped she wouldn't run into him on her way out the door.

Her phone pinged again: Emiko.

Scary!
Do you have location services turned on?
I'm having flashbacks…

Makoto cracked a wry smile as she indulged her own sense of déjà vu. Once she was out of the station, she would make sure that Location Services were, in fact, turned on. A good idea is a good idea.

As she exited unseen through the front doors of the TMPD, her phone chimed one more time, this time from Sae, who simply gave a thumbs up emoji to acknowledge she'd received the message. Makoto frowned. She must be replying from her stupid watch…

— — —

The train ride to Nakano station from the TMPD could take anywhere from 25 minutes to an hour, depending on which lines were running and how long you got stuck waiting for your train to come. Makoto had gotten lucky and had a relatively short trip, but that hadn't stopped night from descending while she was on the train. This was winter, after all, and the evenings were early and dark.

Oda Samegawa lived in a ground-floor apartment within walking distance of the station. The alleys leading up to his front door were lined with garbage bags waiting for morning pickup—at least, Makoto hoped they would be picked up in the morning and weren't just a regular part of the Nakano alley backdrop.

Before approaching the door to Samegawa's apartment, Makoto snooped around the outside. Over the buzzing from the halogen lights in the alley, she could make out the sounds of TV noise coming from the units inside. Lights were on in most of the windows, so Makoto felt confident her target would be at home. She stepped up to his door, and knocked.

Makoto took a step back from the door and waited, but no one answered. She cautiously approached a nearby window and peeked inside. She could see a small kitchen table littered with the remains of single-serve microwave meals, and further in, a TV opposite a beat-up recliner. A door opened off to the right, and a man emerged, heading for the chair. He plopped himself down in the recliner and resumed watching TV, apparently unaware that anyone had knocked on his door. She tried again.

This time, he answered. The man, presumably Oda Samegawa, opened the door in a pair of black sweatpants and a dirty white tank top. He looked Makoto up and down before greeting her. "Can I help you, Detective?" he asked.

Kudos to him for recognizing that I'm a detective, she thought, before holding up her I.D. and introducing herself. "Yes, I'm Detective Makoto Niijima of the TMPD. Are you Oda Samegawa?"

"That's right," he answered. "Is there something I can do for you?"

"I hope I'm not interrupting anything. May I come in, Mister Samegawa?"

"Can you tell me what it's in regards to?" he asked.

Makoto took a breath. "I'm following up on the death of Kento Abe, the man who died at Nakano station on January first. I understand that you were the security guard on duty that night. I'd like to ask you some questions, if that's alright."

"Sure," he said with a sigh, and opened the front door a little wider, taking a step back and allowing Makoto a more thorough examination of the inside of the tiny apartment. It was a disorganized mess of grocery bags, dirty dishes, and miscellaneous trash. The floor looked disgusting, and most of the furniture was old and in disrepair. Mr. Samegawa didn't look like he'd been taking great care of himself lately, either. He smiled sardonically at her. "I love how you say, 'If that's alright,' like I really have the option of saying, 'Nah, that's not alright, sorry.' It's just so polite."

Makoto stepped through the threshold of the small apartment as Mr. Samegawa made room for her to enter. "My father always stressed the importance of treating people with respect," said Makoto, studying his expression.

"Right," said Mr. Samegawa, stepping over to the TV and turning it off with the remote. "Anyway, what do you want to ask me? The cops already interviewed me the morning they found that guy's head on the tracks."

"Yes, I read the police report. Can you remind me what you told the detective who interviewed you?" The Oda Samegawa portion of the report had been very brief, but part of establishing credibility was making sure his story remained consistent.

Oda Samegawa let out another long sigh and shifted his feet a bit. He stepped into the kitchenette and grabbed a garbage can, heading for the table with his food leftovers on it. In one motion, he swept the debris into the garbage can and took a seat at the table, motioning for Makoto to join him at the seat opposite. "I said…" Oda looked down at his hands, playing with his fingernails, "I said I didn't see anybody there with the guy that died."

Makoto took a couple steps toward the table, but did not sit down. She watched him closely—what he'd just said was consistent with the report, but by his body language, he seemed cagey. "Tell me more," she said. "What did you see?"

"I saw… a woman."

Makoto cocked her head, perplexed. "You just said you didn't see anyone else there."

"No, I said I didn't see anyone with the guy. They only asked me about the guy…"

Makoto snorted. "Mister Samegawa," she said, gingerly pulling the other chair back from the table and taking a seat opposite him, "I need you to be forthcoming with the details. The police report says you reported not seeing anyone with the victim at the time of the death—now you're saying you saw a woman. Please explain." Pulling her notebook and pen out of her purse, she prepared to take his statement.

Oda sighed deeply. "At the time they questioned me, I was still hoping I could keep my job," he said. "I knew I would be in trouble if I revealed why I hadn't been paying attention, and I figured the recordings would tell the whole story anyway. But the cops never even asked to see the recordings—the guy who questioned me just took me at my word. I told him I didn't see anybody with the dead guy, he wrote it down, then that was it."

Poker-faced, Makoto kept her disappointment in her new partner's lack of diligence hidden. "He didn't ask to see the recordings?"

"No, he didn't. And I didn't know, at the time, that there were no recordings."

"Yeah, tell me more about that."

Another sigh from Oda. "So, the woman I mentioned…"

She looked up from her notes at him. "Uh huh."

"Toward the end of the night, around… I guess it must have been almost midnight? This sexy lady comes to my booth. There aren't that many people taking the train that late at night, particularly not on a holiday when they've been up late partying the night before, so the station was pretty quiet. She asks me about the cameras… Turns out…" Oda Samegawa started fidgeting in his seat, looking uncomfortable. "Look, you're a lady… This is embarrassing…"

"Just be honest, Mister Samegawa. I assure you, I can handle whatever you're about to tell me."

"Okay… So, it turned out that… cameras, TV screens, switches, I don't know… They're her kink, you know what I mean? She comes in and wants to know about the cameras, and as I'm telling her about them, she gets all hot and bothered. She sits on the console and pulls her dress up a little… She… starts playing with herself…" Oda's face got pinker and pinker as he talked.

"Keep going," said Makoto, taking notes.

"So… the way she's looking at me, I can tell she's inviting me to have some fun with her, right? So, I unclipped my keyring from my pants and undid my belt, and—oh shit, that must be how I lost my keys! That bitch took my fucking keys!"

The sudden realization from Oda Samegawa took the conversation temporarily off-course. "You think this woman took your keys?"

"She must have! I looked everywhere for those fucking things! I was a little late getting around to locking up for the night due to… what we'd been up to, you know?… So it was after midnight before I got started, but after that, I tore that security room apart looking for them, and I never did find them…"

"How did you manage to lock up the station if you'd lost your keys?"

"We keep a spare set in a safe in the security room. I got those out and did my rounds, locking all the gates. Then I spent the rest of the night looking for wherever my keys had got off to."

"And you didn't notice that there was a body on the tracks?"

He gave another exasperated sigh. "I know I must seem like a fucking idiot, but no, I didn't. I mean, the way he was positioned, you would've needed to be pretty close to the ledge of the platform to see him there…"

"But his head would've been visible from further away…" she observed.

"Yeah, well… it's smaller… Anyway, my keys were lost. Between that and the missing camera footage, Tokyo Metro sent me packing."

"Yes, about the missing footage…" said Makoto, jotting down some more notes, "how is it that the cameras failed to capture the man's death?"

Oda shook his head. "It must have happened while we were f—while the woman and I were having sex… I guess we bumped a switch or something…"

"Is that that easy to do?"

"I mean… I wouldn't have thought so, but what other explanation is there?"

"Had you ever seen this woman before? You don't know who she was, do you?"

He shook his head again. "No. Didn't know her, never seen her before. She was gorgeous, though. Could hardly believe she was letting me poke her. Not that she let me finish, but still…"

Makoto abruptly paused before finishing the sentence she was writing. "She didn't let you… finish?"

"No… I was right on the edge, my face buried in her hair… I was having the night of my life. Then she just shoves me off, straightens her dress, and walks out. It was the weirdest damn thing."

"Did you watch her leave?"

"No, not really… I just watched her to the end of the hallway, then I… I had to… you know…"

"You had to finish?" she asked, her eyebrows raised knowingly.

"Uh, yeah…"

"So is it safe to say you weren't watching the live camera feeds at that point either?" she asked, jotting more notes.

"Yeah, I didn't pay great attention after that. I got out and locked up—once I was done—but then I was looking for my keys, so…"

Makoto finished what she was writing, then moved to her laptop bag. She removed the folder where she'd been keeping the photos from her cases. She opened the folder, and on top was the photo of Kimi Okada, Kento Abe's girlfriend, that she'd been given by Kento's mother. She pushed the folder at Oda Samegawa and gestured to the photo. "Is this the woman you had sex with?"

Oda leaned forward and studied the photo, picking it up to get a closer look. "No, I don't think so. The woman I was with had longer hair and no piercings. I think she was older too. Classier."

Yes, because classy ladies hang out in the subways looking for random security guards to bang. Makoto sighed.

"That might be her, though," said Oda.

Makoto's heart caught in her throat as she realized whom he was referring to. Underneath the photo of Kimi and Kento were the photos of Kosuke Kobayashi and the mystery woman. "Her?" she asked, pointing to the woman with Kosuke. Her mouth was suddenly very dry.

"Yeah, I think so." He picked up the photo, a shot of Kosuke and the woman laughing as they walked, and sifted through the other photos in Makoto's folder. She didn't stop him. He paused on a photo that showed a full frontal view of the mystery woman. "Yeah, this is definitely her," he said. "Those eyes… She's got that look that says 'I want you to fuck me'… Sorry, but that's what it said to me, at least. And those legs, good, sweet Jesus, those legs… Legs for dayyyys… That's her, alright. Where were these taken? This doesn't look like it was outside the station…"

"These are from a different case…" said Makoto, her mind reeling. She furiously wrote down what she had just learned, and in her head, was trying to put it all together. "So… It was a little bit before midnight on January first, and this woman steps into your booth and asks about the cameras… The two of you have sex, but she leaves abruptly and you continue to be distracted from the cameras as you masturbate to finish off… You realize your keys are missing, but you're able to lock up the station anyway because you keep a spare set of keys in a safe in the security booth. You lock up, then proceed to hunt for your keys, which you never find." She looked up from her notes. "Did you, at any point, see the victim, or any other person, near the tracks between when the woman showed up and when the body was reported to police at five-thirty the next morning?"

Oda Samegawa shook his head. "I didn't see anybody at the station, and I didn't know about the body until the morning commuters started coming in and waiting for their trains."

"Are there no cameras pointed at the tracks? Is there no way you could've seen the body there before it was discovered?"

Oda scrunched up his mouth. "There is a camera on the tracks, but we must have moved it when we were… you know…"

Makoto sighed. "So the camera that would have captured Kento Abe's death was aimed in the wrong direction," she asked. Oda Samegawa nodded. 'Gross negligence' indeed… "Okay, Mister Samegawa, is there anything else that might be noteworthy that you haven't mentioned yet?"

"Uh, I think I've covered everything…" he said, nodding his head at her.

Makoto pulled a business card out of her purse and set it on Mr. Samegawa's table. "Thank you for your cooperation, Mister Samegawa. If anything else comes to you, please call or email me. That's my direct line."

"Will do, Detective. Sorry for— Well, I guess it's not my fault that the other cop didn't ask me for more information, but I'm sorry I wasn't more forthcoming at the time. I was hoping I wouldn't have to give away the fact that I'd been… what I'd been doing at the time the guy was climbing onto the tracks to off himself. I'd had that job for eight years, and I really liked it. Now I'm begging for work as a barker at a club in Shinjuku…"

Makoto felt bad for Oda Samegawa, but not that bad. She got up from the table and pushed in her chair, readying to leave. "Well, good luck, Mister Samegawa. Thank you for the information."

Oda Samegawa didn't get up to open the front door for her. He watched her help herself out, offering her a nod and a small wave as she closed the door behind her.

— — —

It was Friday night, and like all the cool kids, Ren found himself once again rooted to his desk chair, pen in hand and laptop at the ready. He was nearly done with the first draft of his Correctional Theory course's final essay. He planned to reread it in the morning, after a good night's sleep, then turn it in electronically and get started on the essay for Behavioral Science. Provided Professor Shimada didn't have a million edits for him to have to address, Ren would be finished with Correctional Theory. One down, three to go. Plus the Blades evals, but whatever…

He checked the time on his phone: 8:43pm. He'd received a text from Makoto earlier in the evening letting him know that she'd made it out of her potential suspect's clutches no worse for wear, but she wanted to get home and eat something before she called him. He'd been working diligently, if just a little distracted, ever since. Morgana had been watching TV in the kitchen—some anime about catgirls in space—keeping to himself.

He had just finished typing the first sentence of his concluding paragraph when his phone finally rang. He answered immediately. "Hi Makoto," he said, getting up from his desk and taking a big stretch.

"Hi Ren, how are you?"

"Oh, I'm fine. Bored, but fine. I was glad to see that your liaison with your suspect was all above board. Anything interesting happen?"

"Yes, very, but I have a feeling I'll consume your whole evening if I get into it. Do you have time?"

"I have all night," he said, reclining onto his bed. "Tell me about it."

"Okay, so… Where to begin…"

"Was this for your missing husband case?" he asked.

"Oh! No, actually… Well, sort of? It turns out they might be connected…"

Ren's interest was piqued by this. "Really…" he said emphatically. "Connected how?"

"The same woman is showing up in both cases," she said. "The 'suspect' I went to talk to this evening was the subway security guard who was on duty when Sato's subway suicide killed himself."

"I'm confused…" said Ren. "Why were you investigating anything to do with Sato's suicide case that I thought was closed? Weren't you guys celebrating him wrapping up that case when you went to dinner the other day?"

"Well, yeah, we were, sort of, but you remember how I said that he sometimes has secretaries make calls for him? Well, the subway guy's family was upset about the suicide verdict, and had been calling the department over and over, trying to get more action on the case. Now that I'm Sato's partner, the secretary shunted it to me, thinking I might handle it."

Ren scoffed. "So now you're cleaning up his cases for him? That didn't take long…"

"Yeah, don't get me started… Anyway, the guy's mom sounded like she just wanted to see the evidence that made us so sure it was suicide, so I thought it would be straightforward to prove. If he jumped in front of a train, there's gonna be video of that, right?"

"Right. So did you track down the video?"

"There isn't any!" cried Makoto. "That's what was so weird, and why I thought the subway worker might be a suspect. I thought, if he killed the guy, he'd be in a perfect position to cover up the evidence. So, I went to see him at his home, all prepared for him to get defensive when I started talking about the dead guy, but instead, he tells me that he didn't see what happened on the cameras because he'd been having sex in the security booth with some woman who was turned on by all the cameras, or something."

"Okay… that got real weird real fast…" said Ren.

"Yeah, I know. Anyway, here I am thinking that the woman he was having sex with might be the dead guy's girlfriend—the guy's mom had sent me a picture of her, letting me know she didn't like her, and that she thought it was way more likely that she would've pushed him onto the tracks than that he'd killed himself."

"Uh huh, okay…" said Ren, following.

"But when I showed him her picture, he was like, 'No, that's not her,' but the pictures from my missing husband's case were underneath, and when he happened to see those, he identified my mystery woman as the one he'd been having sex with."

"You're kidding," Ren exclaimed. "That's wild! Did he know who she was?"

"No, he didn't. And there was no video of the suicide—or death, or whatever—because they somehow switched off the recording when they were screwing on the console. And she stole his keys, we think."

"Huh—absolutely nothing suspicious about that at all," said Ren. "So, Sato's quote-unquote 'suicide' case might be a murder… And where does this leave you with your missing husband?"

Makoto sighed deeply. "I really don't know," she said. "I still have no evidence that she's actually done anything wrong—it's just an incredible coincidence. If she took the security guard's keys, then she would have had opportunity at any point during the night to get in there and kill someone—though the positioning of the body doesn't really fit with a murder…"

"What do you mean?" said Ren. "I thought he 'jumped in front of a train'… That could easily have been someone shoving him instead."

"Yeah, but it turns out he didn't actually jump…" Makoto blanched as the pictures of the body flashed through her head. "The forensic photography shows him kneeling next to the tracks, head on the rail. He decapitated himself with a train…"

"Fuck, no way…" Ren was stunned. "Who the fuck does that? My god, what an awful way to kill yourself. God damn… There must have been blood everywhere…"

There was silence for long enough that Ren was afraid the call had been dropped. "Makoto?" he asked. "You still there?"

After a beat, she answered. "Yeah… Sorry, yeah, I'm still here… You just got me thinking, that's all."

"What about?" he asked.

"Well… There wasn't that much blood."

"What do you mean?" he asked, genuinely confused. "There are major arteries in the neck… If he'd been decapitated, there would have been blood spurting all over the tracks—two liters of blood, according to my Forensic Photography class textbook."

"No, I know, you're right… That's what I was stuck thinking about. I think I need to look at the pictures again, but I don't remember there being that much blood. There was a pool where the neck opened up, but nothing that looked like a spurt pattern."

"Interesting…" said Ren. "And this is probably a stupid question, but did the M.E.'s report say that decapitation is what killed him?"

"It actually said 'blood loss' is what killed him—caused by decapitation."

Ren was quiet for a moment. "I find that weirdly funny…"

Makoto scoffed a laugh. "It is, kind of… So…" Makoto mumbled, "what do I do now…"

"Are you asking me or thinking out loud?"

Makoto bit her lip. "Both? I need to see those pictures again, then probably double back to the medical examiner, though that feels like it might be awkward."

"You could ask Emiko for her thoughts first, get a little background, know what questions to ask… I'm sure she had enough forensic pathology education to be able to tell you something useful to go in with."

"Yeah," agreed Makoto. "And, interestingly, it turns out Tae Takemi does some M.E. work too. Did you know that?"

"Uhhh, not sure I did, no. When I was working with her in high school, she'd make jokes about what she'd put in my autopsy if I died, but I thought it was just dark humor."

"Well, I heard that from Emiko. I guess it's part of why Tae picked her."

"That fits. Anyway, you could ask either one of them, then. Shit, maybe Tae did the report, who knows…"

"Maybe," said Makoto. They shared a comfortable silence as they each let their thoughts swirl around for a moment.

"And, getting back to your other, actual case… What are you going to do with the knowledge that your mystery woman banged the security guard at the scene of subway-dude's death?"

Makoto sighed heavily. "I really don't know… I'm not sure what good it'll do to tell Saki Kobayashi that the woman her husband disappeared with was at the scene of another man's death…"

"Agree…" said Ren, sympathetic. "All it will do is make her worry more. He is still missing, after all…"

"Yeah…" Makoto made a noise like a sigh or a groan.

"What's wrong? You've got exciting new leads to follow up on in two cases."

"I know, it's just… It's just that now I need to tell Sato that I nosed into his 'closed' case and maybe need to reopen it."

"Ooh… yeah. That's gonna be a fun conversation. Want me to text him for you?"

Makoto snorted. "My savior."

— — —

He felt so at peace.

It was dark, but his insides were aflame. A slowly rolling ocean at his back. A sea of stars visible behind her. He was so warm.

Hawaii…

"Oh, my love… It feels so wonderful to have you inside me," she cooed. "We were meant to be this way… Forever…"

He could feel her hands on his chest, gently caressing his skin as she moved. Slowly undulating, he floated on the waves of his ecstasy. "My love… My Saki…" He cupped her breasts in his palms… Didn't he? He couldn't actually feel his hands.

She kissed him, and her hair tickled his face. "Oh, my sweet… It's not 'my Saki'—you're still saying it wrong. But it's alright… I love you so much… We'll work on that. As long as we love each other, we can work through anything…"

Kosuke's eyelids fluttered, and he moaned low in his throat. Saki clenched around him and cried out into the night, riding her orgasm. He felt wet, and a confusion he couldn't pin down floated around in the space behind his eyes. Why was he confused?

After all, the ocean is always wet, isn't it? The confusion flitted away just as quickly as it had come. He let himself float out, further and further from shore, cocooned in the radiance of his beloved.