Paprika

by Yasutaka Tsutsui

  “That’s quite true,” Konakawa said, nodding at Atsuko to console her.

  But that did nothing to help her deal with the problem. “Yes, but what do you think should be done?”

  “Well, the normal thing would be to explain all the facts to the other directors and bring them over to your side,” Noda said as if it were nothing. “Don’t do it in writing. You should phone them. Or better still, go and meet them.”

  Atsuko sighed deeply. Where was she going to find the time to do that?

  “There seems to have been some collusion between your Secretary-General Katsuragi, the Vice President, and this company Tokyo Electronics Giken,” Konakawa commented. “And if the auditor Yamabe has been won over by Inui, I think it’ll all come clear when you inspect the books.”

  “I’m sorry,” Atsuko said dolefully, “but you’re talking about things I can’t possibly do.”

  “Of course, we’ll help you!” Noda countered with a smile. He seemed to positively relish the prospect; that gave Atsuko courage.

  “By the way, Miss Chiba – I mean, Paprika …” Serious as ever, Konakawa pulled a photograph from his wallet and showed it to Atsuko. “Take a look at this building.”

  “Hey! That’s the building we saw in your dream. An embassy or something …” The photo tugged at an important part of Atsuko’s memory. “So this building actually exists, as I thought?”

  “Have you never seen it before?”

  “I feel as if I have. But …” Atsuko was startled when she saw the sign in the photograph. “Inui Clinic! That’s right. I drove past it once. But I didn’t remember it clearly. Not as clearly as it appeared in your dream.”

  “I drove past the clinic myself for the first time yesterday. It all seemed so odd that I just had to stop and photograph it.” Konakawa looked Atsuko in the eye and spoke slowly, trying to maintain the low-key atmosphere. “Well now. Paprika. If all this is true, what we saw was not in my dream. Nor was it your memory, nor the collector infiltrating my dream.”

  “No. It was Inui and Osanai playing with the DC Mini,” Atsuko agreed. “But what would they have been doing at that hour? Why were they wearing DC Minis, when they should have been asleep? …”

  “If images from their DC Minis can appear in your collector, the reverse could also be true. They could use their DC Minis to observe your treatment with the collector. Couldn’t they?”

  “Hmm. When Inui appeared in your dream, I instinctively shouted out at him, didn’t I.”

  “That’s right. And he looked very surprised.”

  “They must already have known that the DC Mini wasn’t protected. Then they must have realized that, as well as accessing my collector and observing my patients’ dreams, they could actually enter them. But to access a dream properly they would have to be asleep themselves, or at least in a hypnotic state, just as with the collector.”

  “That means they could interfere with your treatment in future,” Noda said with his customary concern. “After all, they must also be quite skilled at accessing dreams.”

  “I’m sure of it. But that gives us the perfect opportunity for a counter-attack. Now I’ve got a DC Mini too. When it comes to accessing dreams in a hypnotic state, I’m the expert. But if I’m to attempt a counter-attack, I need to know what they’re doing when they use the DC Mini.”

  “This Osanai character, does he live in the same apartment building as you? On the fifteenth floor?” Konakawa said, looking pensively at the ceiling.

  “Yes …”

  “In that case, I think I met him once. In the lift. A strikingly handsome young man.”

  “What about it?” Noda said, his curiosity piqued by Konakawa’s interest in Osanai.

  “During my first session, I was surprised to see Inui’s face in my dream. His face was huge, and yet I’d never met him before.”

  “It surprised me too,” agreed Atsuko. “I thought perhaps you knew him.”

  “He was smiling, wasn’t he,” Konakawa said with a meaningful look at Atsuko.

  “Yes. I’d never seen that look on his face before. Kind of soft.”

  “Soft?” Konakawa tilted his head quizzically. “I would have called it lecherous.”

  “And what would that imply?” Atsuko hadn’t quite gathered Konakawa’s meaning.

  “In the second session, I dreamt Inui was lying next to me in bed.”

  “In other words …” Atsuko was beginning to catch on. “You were seeing images from a DC Mini worn by someone who was sleeping with Seijiro Inui?”

  “Judging from the evidence, I’d say Osanai and Inui are having a homosexual relationship,” Konakawa replied calmly.

  “What? No!” Noda opened his eyes wide in astonishment. He knew Konakawa was not the sort to joke about such things. “That’s disgusting!”

  Atsuko laughed. “Ah, but you’ve never met Morio Osanai!” she said, starting to believe Konakawa’s premise. “That would make sense of a lot of things. You know Osanai has begun to resemble Inui recently? His facial expression, I mean.”

  “They say that happens when people are in love. So you’re saying they put that, you know, DC Mini thing on when they sleep together?” Noda said with a pained expression.

  Atsuko thought back over her experiences with Tokita while they were experimenting with the PT devices. She was sure that wearing the DC Mini could be enormously sensuous as an act shared by lovers. For Inui and Osanai, it would promote the inner affections of homosexual love and turn them into darker passions. It was clear from Noda’s pained expression that he was thinking back to the erotic sensations he’d felt when Paprika had accessed his own dreams – the sensuality of lovers sharing the same dream, making love to each other in that dream.

  Atsuko explained the principle of anaphylaxis, or immune hypersensitivity. “And so you see, with repeated use they can enter each other’s dreams remotely, even when they’re not actually sleeping together. That’s what we call anaphylaxis.”

  “I see! It’s a bit like my jellyfish allergy,” said Noda. “I was stung by a jellyfish when I was a boy. Now I can’t go anywhere near the things without coming up in a rash. I can’t even look at them in Chinese restaurants!”

  “That’s it. Anaphylaxis.”

  “You said there were originally six DC Minis,” Konakawa said to confirm his understanding of the facts. “You’ve got one of them. One was absorbed into Himuro’s scalp. So they must have the remaining four.”

  “If only we had two more here,” said Noda. “We could put them on at night, then enter your dreams and help you fight those two.”

  “I wouldn’t think of asking anything so dangerous,” Atsuko said in astonishment. “Though I do appreciate your offer.”

  “You’re right – we’re just amateurs. We wouldn’t know where to begin,” Konakawa said dejectedly.

  “But Inui and Osanai must already have observed Paprika investigating your dreams, through their DC Minis.”

  “True …”

  “So they must know you’re a high-ranking police officer. If you accessed their dreams in counter-attack, you might be able to contain them.”

  “Momentary access wouldn’t be dangerous. It might be an effective way of exposing their crimes, and whatever they’re plotting next.” Noda’s idea had struck a chord with Atsuko. “You may be able to help me one day.”

  “Anytime,” said Konakawa. “Normally, of course, I would just say it was a police matter and seize the DC Minis. But it’s not so simple in this case.”

  “There would be a public outcry,” Noda said ruefully. “The impact on society would be devastating. I’d rather you kept this well clear of the police. Couldn’t we do something by ourselves?”

  “I know what you mean. But” – Konakawa looked hard at Atsuko – “at least let me mobilize my second-in-command, if nothing else. I’ll get him to provide protection for Shima and Tokita.”

  “Well, I suppose that can’t be avoided,” Noda said with a nod to Atsuko. “Would you per
mit that? You can’t keep them in your apartment forever. If they had police protection, you could leave the apartment without worrying about them.”

  Atsuko knew Konakawa’s real intention – to provide protection not just for Shima and Tokita but for herself as well. Noda must also have sensed that.

  “Thank you. I’ll be glad to accept your kindness.” Atsuko gave a little bow, then, thinking that overly formal, immediately returned to a more relaxed manner. “But I’d prefer you to leave them for the next two or three days. I need to treat them.”

  “Wouldn’t you rather get a good night’s sleep first, Paprika?” said Noda. “You’ve got rings under your eyes.”

  “They’re the least of my worries!” Atsuko laughed. “But I’ll take your advice anyway. I’ll treat them during the day tomorrow. Then there’ll be no risk of the enemy interfering.”

  “Good.” Konakawa looked relieved.

  “By the way, Paprika. Do you have a list of all the Institute’s trustees?” asked Noda. Konakawa nodded in agreement.

  “Yes, in my apartment.”

  “Let’s go back then,” Noda said, standing impatiently. “I know the director Ishinaka, together with six of the trustees. If I see the list, I may know more. Same goes for you, Toshimi.”

  “Yes. There must be some,” agreed Konakawa, standing to leave.

  “We’ll pick them out and start contacting them right away. Our work starts tonight!”

  4

  Atsuko slept late and started her treatment the following afternoon. Shima’s condition improved dramatically in very little time.

  Atsuko ate a light dinner and fed her two patients. Then, as Paprika, she accessed the dreams of the now slumbering Shima. Past memories of treatment by Paprika must have been etched deeply on Shima’s mind, together with a sense of nostalgia.

  In readiness for the expected intrusion by Inui and Osanai, Atsuko attached the DC Mini to her head by applying a bead of adhesive to the point and placing it on her scalp. Now the device could be used in parallel with her treatment using the collector.

  Shima’s subconscious was contaminated with the same schizophrenic dreams as had been used to infect Tsumura. The Nazi salute symbolized submission to a father figure, but as this particular complex had never been one of Shima’s personality traits, it had quickly been destroyed. What Atsuko needed now was for Shima to talk as much as possible in his dreams. Even if his speech was full of nonsensical delusions, expressing those delusions would help him recover his own ego.

  Shima dreamt he was in the student canteen of his old university. The university canteen?! thought Paprika. Not that the real Atsuko had turned into Paprika; she merely had to assume Paprika’s personality for the dreamer to recognize her as Paprika.

  In real life, the student canteen had been modernized, expanded, and made brighter during Atsuko’s time at the university. What appeared in Shima’s dream was the old canteen, when it was still cramped and dingy. Shima was still a student. He was peering inside, timorously, through a gap in the partition separating the canteen from the corridor. He seemed hungry, perhaps because he hadn’t eaten much dinner just now. Or was it a visceral memory of chronic starvation in his student days?

  In the canteen, part-time director Owada was eating with the other students. He looked like a student, but Paprika knew for a fact that he hadn’t studied at that university. Shima seemed to fear him; perhaps that was why he couldn’t enter the canteen.

  “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Shima called loudly. But Owada seemed not to hear him.

  It would have been highly inconvenient were Shima to suffer a recurrence of anxiety neurosis. To make sure that couldn’t happen, Paprika sat at one of the tables and beckoned him over. She would try to make him forget his feelings of guilt toward the other directors, symbolized by Owada.

  “Hey, Shima! Over here! You don’t have to apologize!”

  “It’s a quarrel between friends,” Shima said to excuse himself as he went to sit opposite Paprika. “That shouldn’t be possible. You seem to be a woman.”

  “That’s right,” Paprika replied, smiling agreeably. “We are not the same person.”

  Shima was beginning to recognize that he couldn’t identify himself with Paprika, but he persisted in remaining on the boundary between the two personae. In his own words, it was as if Paprika was “quarreling” with his obsession over “friends.” A side effect of using the DC Mini was that she could read Shima’s dreaming thoughts with absolute clarity. Visual clarity was also enhanced; her field of vision had widened to include blurred areas on the periphery.

  Shima leant toward Paprika. “It started with someone putting on airs,” he muttered timidly. “There’s a demon in the kitchen.” They were sitting in a theater, in a corner of the dress circle.

  “I said don’t worry! Is there anyone else in the kitchen?” she asked.

  “Paprika!” The provocative nature of her question seemed to stimulate his memory. He at last remembered Paprika’s name, and his love for her. “Ah. Paprika. After you put the empty juice bottle down and went home, I shaved my head and you were angry. Because young Tokita fought and was courageous, you went away. But the house of Mejiro hasn’t gone under yet.”

  As she observed Shima’s speech patterns, Paprika felt something untoward in his oddly dreamlike mood. She turned her attention to the stage. Seijiro Inui was standing in the center, wrapped in what looked like priestly vestments. An altar appeared, the only lighting provided by hundreds of candles flickering on candlesticks. The scene had changed to the inside of a chapel. The congregation all rose in unison.

  Again Shima called out in a voice of fear. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”

  The dreams of Inui and Shima had merged. Paprika guessed so. Either that, or Inui was deliberately interfering with the treatment. Whatever the case, Shima was frightened, and the two had to be separated. Paprika decided to leave herself in Inui’s dream and confront him there. It was the moment she’d been waiting for.

  Paprika remained in her half-sleeping state while her experienced fingers pressed the keys on the PT console, breaking the connection with Shima via the gorgon. Shima would have to dream on alone.

  The chapel resounded with music that was not at all solemn, but more evocative of debauchery. Inui was continuing to incite his congregation with the oratory of one who railed against the world. Paprika issued a loud yell of opposition from the gallery above. Momentarily surprised as he looked up to see her there, Inui forced a derisory smile, then pointed straight at her and hurled words of abuse in her direction.

  “There is a ***** of science, a brazen ****** who knows no shame!”

  Paprika knew what Inui was trying to say, since she could read his dreaming thoughts. It was his usual dogma; that made her angry. Had it been her own dream, she would have soared through the air, down to where Inui stood before the altar, and laid into him there and then. But sadly, it wasn’t her dream. It was Inui’s dream, and his resistance would probably have rendered such an attack impossible. To make it her own dream she would have to enter a deeper sleep, but then she would lose all control over her actions. There was nothing for it. Paprika would have to use the stairs.

  Paprika ran to the bottom of the bizarrely twisting, crazily winding staircase, but still couldn’t reach the altar. She passed through a corridor, a hotel lobby, and a shopping mall, then found herself inside a shop that looked like a beauty salon. Why the detour? It could have been because Inui was trying to prevent her from approaching him, she thought, or because she herself didn’t want to approach him. But in this case, she concluded, there was another explanation.

  It was because there was something she had to do before she could confront Inui directly. Facing the mirror, sitting in a chair with his hair in curlers, was Morio Osanai. He must have come to protect Inui. That’s right. She needed to deal with this man first.

  “It’s Doctor Chiba … Isn’t it?” Paprika’s image was reflected in Osanai’s eyes. He observ
ed her warily. “As I thought. It’s Doctor Chiba.”

  “How did you know?”

  “Poison. Unmistakable. But why the little girl act? Oh, I know. You’re Paprika. Right? You’re Paprika … aren’t you!”

  Paprika wondered how he could smell her perfume when he wasn’t sleeping with her. Perhaps people who used DC Minis to share the same dream could even smell each other’s body odor, even when they weren’t sleeping together. These were Paprika’s half-sleeping thoughts. To her, the bizarre no longer seemed bizarre. She may have been falling into a deeper sleep, and that may have been Osanai’s plan.

  Sensing danger, Paprika laughed aloud and started to fight back. “Yes – I’m Paprika! I’m young and I’m coming to get you!”

  Osanai analyzed the shock he felt on hearing these words from Paprika. Why was he so startled? Because it meant danger. Yes, that’s right. What was so dangerous? The woman was too confident. Access seemed to be working both ways. If she was only using the collector, she would merely have been observing, not taking part. In that case … Surely not?! … She must be using a DC Mini!

  “Oh? I thought you’d stolen them all?”

  But of course, Osanai could also read Paprika’s thoughts, since he was also using a DC Mini. This was an attack from someone unaccustomed to using the device. She hadn’t had time to familiarize herself with it.

  Osanai was visibly unsettled. He stood up and tried to run away. Damn it! She’s using a DC Mini! Where did she find it?

  “I won’t let you get away,” Paprika said with a suggestive laugh, designed to make him sleep more deeply. “Don’t forget – I can always follow you, no matter where you run!”

  Osanai picked up a plastic makeup bottle and hurled it at her. Reading his thoughts, Paprika knew his intention was to wake himself up. He would wake up and think out a new strategy. Paprika clung tightly to his will to prevent him from doing that. Now, if ever, was the time to deploy a woman’s disregard of logic.