Sumire offered an offended snort. “It’s all in the way you put it, isn’t it? Though I’ll admit, the limiter was probably the right answer. Lowering the processing speed does a great job reducing the burden on the user’s brain. But there’s one term I want you to remember: terminal horizon.”
“Terminal horizon?”
“Right. Your eye’s processing speeds up in tandem with your emotions, such as anger or sadness. When you have it activated, I’m sure it feels like time slows down for you, but it’s not like time itself is slowing. Your brain is just operating at faster speed as it works with the powerful computer in your eye, so time feels slower by comparison. But eventually you hit a wall, and that wall’s one two-thousandths of a second—in other words, a second of real time slows down to what feels like two thousand to you. That’s the terminal horizon. All the patients who crossed that never came back. Their brains were completely fried.”
Rentaro was shocked. Even in the fight against Kagetane Hiruko—when he was sure his eye ran quicker than it ever did before—he’d peg the slowdown to around fifty virtual seconds for every real one. Maybe it maxed out at a hundred on limited occasions, but even that was iffy.
Two thousand, though? That far ahead?
But Rentaro also understood that, if anything, this was good news for him. If he didn’t want to see himself lagging behind the rest of the Tendo Civil Security Agency’s employee roll, trying to come as close to this terminal horizon as possible would never be a bad thing for him. Even if he still couldn’t handle a sniper rifle as deftly as he wanted, it would be a killer advantage.
“But let’s get back on topic,” Sumire said as she recrossed her legs. “I know you have to maintain confidentiality with your client, and I don’t need to know his name, either. But you better make sure this guy’s safety is a priority for you, as much as you can. If your client has the same info the other three victims had, he could be in serious trouble.”
That settled it. Rentaro stood up, figuring he’d better go to Suibara’s meet-up site immediately.
“One more thing.” Sumire shot a sharp look at Rentaro. “We still haven’t come to terms with something else. What are you gonna do with Kisara?”
Rentaro froze to the ground.
“I’m not gonna do anything.”
“Nothing? So you’ll just sit there and gnash your teeth while she goes off with another guy?”
Rentaro left his stool, looking down at Sumire. “Doctor…I talked to you before about the thing between Kazumitsu and Kisara, didn’t I?”
“Yeah…”
During the Third Kanto Battle, Kisara Tendo killed Kazumitsu Tendo, her adoptive brother. In the cruelest of manners, no less.
“I…I mean, I like Kisara. I’d be willing to do just about anything for her. But after that experience, I think I realized something. She’s let her hatred for the Tendo family dominate her.”
For a period, after her parents were eaten by a Gastrea before her eyes, Kisara lost both her speech and any reason to keep living. One day, though, she just got out of bed, begged Sukekiyo Tendo to teach her, and began learning swordsmanship at an astonishing pace.
The one thing driving her heart and having her try to keep living was the desire to plunge the people who ruined her life into the deepest pit in hell.
“Things were pretty fun for the first year or so the Tendo Civil Security Agency was running, so I thought she was forgetting about it. But I was wrong.”
“Don’t you understand? Justice isn’t good enough. Justice can’t oppose evil. But absolute evil—evil that goes beyond evil—can. I have that power.”
Rentaro gritted his teeth, head hung low.
“Nothing I said reached her…”
As he spoke, his thoughts gradually coalesced together. Now he was starting to see what kind of attitude he needed to approach Hitsuma and Kisara’s arranged marriage with.
“Ever since the Tendos took me in ten years ago, I’ve owed so much to Kisara. I could never pay her back in a million years. I’d do anything to make her happy. I’ve made up my mind, Doctor. I want Kisara to realize something. That life’s worth living for more than just revenge. And if I can make that happen…”
Then Rentaro realized something. The decision he had just made in his heart meant a final good-bye to all the emotions he had accumulated for Kisara over the past ten years.
Sumire looked dubious. “You’re gonna stand down because you’re putting Kisara’s happiness first? Do you know what that means, Rentaro? If you really just want Kisara to be happy, you’re gonna have to keep killing off your own feelings. There’s no way to half-ass that. Do you swear you’ll do that?”
Rentaro closed his eyes. Behind his eyelids, he could see the beautiful Kisara, a graceful hand near her lips.
“I swear, Doctor.”
“Even if this proposal goes well and Kisara gets married, has children, gets happy—even then, she still might not forget about her revenge. You can always rebuild a broken body, but a broken heart’s beyond all help. You can’t do a thing with it. And if it’s too late for Kisara, that’s gonna be up to you to manage. Can you do that?”
Rentaro stood up and turned his back to Sumire.
“I’m leaving, Doctor. I’m meeting with my client in a bit.”
He half-walked, half-fled from Sumire, but his feet were heavy as they pounded on the stairs.
I can do anything for Kisara’s sake. Anything…
Realizing that his breathing was growing rapid and out of rhythm, Rentaro instinctively put his hands to his hips. He wanted to grab his pistol’s grip with both hands, clasping his fingers around it in a macabre prayer as he tried to calm himself.
But his hands caught air instead. The familiar weight hanging from his side was gone. In a panic, he felt around with both hands. Nothing. Rentaro’s XD gun was gone.
He couldn’t believe it was possible, but there was no sign of the gun in any of his pockets. Did I drop it somewhere? It’s been hectic all day since the morning, so I wasn’t really paying attention, but…
Suddenly, his conversation with Suibara shot back to his mind.
“…I’m sorry. My evidence got stolen.”
“Stolen?”
“My place has been broken into a few times lately. A few things were stolen, including the evidence. The only option I got left is to appeal directly to the Tendo Group or Lady Seitenshi as a living witness. I mean, you’re about the only guy left I can trust.”
And he’d said this, too, hadn’t he?:
“Rentaro, I’m pretty sure they think you’re involved with me by now. Sorry I got you involved in this, but watch out, okay?”
He shook his head. This is ridiculous. There was no way Suibara’s enemies could just reach out to him like that in less than twenty-four hours. And even if these supposed “enemies” were behind this, why would they bother stealing Rentaro’s gun?
It was almost time to meet up. Rentaro shook off the premonitions making themselves known in his mind and hurriedly walked to the designated building.
5
The new Magata City Hall building was still under construction, its bare concrete walls lit dimly by the pale moonlight, which itself fell through a mass of scaffolding and temporary platforms to create an evocative piece of shadow art.
In this landscape stood Suibara, scuffing at the floor with his hands in his pockets. He was a good hour early for the planned meeting because he was fresh from a little quarrel with his Initiator back home.
He began to wonder if meeting in a more crowded public place would’ve been a better idea, but quickly shook it off. There was no way they could have a relaxed conversation someplace where there was no telling who might be listening in.
Just a little bit longer, Suibara forced himself to think. If I get this out to the public through Rentaro, it’ll all be over. Then I can finally sleep in peace again. Everything’s going exactly as I want it. Just a little bit—
Suibara turned around
, hearing heavy footsteps behind him that echoed across the darkness. His shoes were the first things to appear, the moonlight streaming in diagonally through a crevice, illuminating the man from the bottom up.
Checking his cell phone, Suibara realized he still had forty minutes to go. He grinned to himself. Man, he’s here already? What’s with all the hurry? The idea of Rentaro being as impatient as he was gladdened him as he walked up.
“Yo, Renta—”
The roar and light of the muzzle flash was perfectly synchronized with the impact he felt on his side. The force made his cell phone fly out of his hand and into parts unknown.
“Uh?”
He didn’t know what had happened at first. An empty shell casing clinked on the floor, and right after that, his side felt burning hot, as if someone took a branding iron to it.
Hesitantly looking downward, he saw the blood that seeped through his shirt in the abdominal area.
“Ah…nnh…!”
The moment he realized he was shot, Suibara experienced an intense pain across his entire body.
No. This isn’t Rentaro.
The figure fired two more shots as it walked forward, striking Suibara in the thigh and stomach. He crumpled to the floor.
He couldn’t breathe. And as a second wave of pain crested over him, he felt something rise up from his stomach and vomited a large volume of blood.
Now chills ran across his body. Not wanting to die without knowing what happened, he bent his body like an inchworm, stretching it out, trying to get even another millimeter away from his assailant.
But the awkward attempt at escape ended in an instant. Something thumped against the back of his head. He could tell by instinct that it was the barrel of a gun.
An array of happy memories began to flicker across Suibara’s brain. Tears fell in a waterfall. His breathing pitched; he reached out into the air to grab at the greatest memory of all—the memory of a certain girl.
“Hotaru…!”
There was a gunshot, and the building was bathed in light for an instant. The sound of the empty cartridge clinking against the floor, and the seemingly incessant echo of the explosion, stayed in the attacker’s ears for a long time to come.
A warm wind blew through, shaking the nearby rows of trees.
The moment he arrived at the Magata City Hall construction site, Rentaro stopped, sensing something was wrong as he looked up at the building. There was a crisp, clear August moon above the unadorned walls. He still had around twenty minutes until the meet-up time, and as he ascended the stairs, he wondered if he had shown up too early.
He shook his head and continued climbing to the fourth floor, remembering Sumire’s parting words. They’d agreed to meet here, but it was still dark, vast, and empty. He turned on his smartphone’s flashlight and called out to the void.
“Hey, Sui—”
He didn’t make it to the bara part before the smell of blood wafted into his nostrils. He swallowed nervously, motionless for a moment until his brain could catch up, then brought his smartphone above his head to light up the darkness.
It took only a few moments for him to notice the man in a pool of blood, collapsed behind a column.
“Suibara!”
Rentaro flew like an arrow to the site, desperation already consuming him. Suibara was lying facedown, having been shot four times: in the side, the thigh, his right breast, and the back of the head, which must have been the killing blow. He was dead—this man who, just yesterday, was breathing, smiling, talking assorted random nonsense with him.
Then Rentaro spotted something that put him in even more disquieting spirits.
“What the hell…?”
On Suibara’s exposed back was a gun, presumably the murder weapon. Hesitantly, Rentaro reached out to it. A voice in his heart was urging him to stop: This is a crime scene now. You’re about to tamper with a crime scene.
The warm night air brushed past his skin, and a cold bead of sweat ran down his cheek. Driving the appeals to reason out of his mind, he picked up the gun.
The slide was four inches, the left side engraved with a notice that it was a .40-caliber weapon. It all looked too familiar to him.
In fact, it was clearly a Springfield XD pistol. The slide was the same length as the one he used. It was the same-caliber model. And there was no doubt at all this gun was just used to commit a murder. A closer look at the nicks and scratches on the frame and slide, the results of years of heavy use, confirmed it for good—this was the gun that saw Rentaro through his battles against Kagetane Hiruko, Tina Sprout, and Aldebaran.
The gun he thought he lost was right here all along. At the scene of Suibara’s murder. Why?
Then, right at that moment, two beams of light flooded the room. Rentaro covered his face against the brightness.
“Police! Don’t move!”
Squinting, Rentaro could open his eyes just enough to spot the police uniforms. A cold shiver ran up his spine.
“No! Wait a minute!”
“Drop the gun now!”
With a loud boom, a warning shot gouged its way through the floor beneath him. It made Rentaro realize he had a steely death grip on the gun that just killed Suibara. He let go of it at once.
One of the light beams approached, and before Rentaro knew it, he was tackled, his arm screaming in pain as it was twisted behind his back. The concrete floor advanced upon him, and he groaned as the impact hit him face-first.
There was the sound of metal against metal, and then he felt something uncomfortable around his wrists. Gritting his teeth, he turned himself around, only to find his hands connected together by a pair of dully shining handcuffs.
“Secured!”
Rentaro shut his eyes tight.
This was a trap!
6
Rentaro slammed his fist on the steel desk as hard as he could.
“God damn it, I’m telling you I didn’t do it!”
“Quit lying to us! Who else would there be?”
“Someone framed me!”
“The victim was killed with your gun. The rifle in our database was a perfect match with yours. We got all the evidence we need. Trying to deny it all’s just gonna give you a longer sentence.”
This was getting nowhere. Rentaro crossed his legs and plopped himself back down on his stool. The cramped interrogation room he was brought into dripped with tension. The dull, dark-gray walls were complemented by a set of tiny stools. It was the size of a shoebox, but it was certainly tidy—there was no other furniture or decoration.
After two hours of pointless prodding and coercing, Rentaro was starting to get sick of it all. Enju must have noticed he wasn’t coming home by now. Hopefully, she wasn’t worrying herself sick.
Why did this have to happen to me? I need to get home ASAP. The frustration of being accused of a crime he didn’t commit brought him to the point where he wanted to beat some sense into the officers.
The door opened, and the detective interrogating him stretched up to see who it was. A thick, wrinkled face peered through the doorway. To Rentaro, it was like a helping hand pulling him up from hell.
“Inspector Tadashima!”
It was Shigetoku Tadashima, an inspector in the violent-crimes department. They had conferred with each other during any number of Gastrea attacks. Finally, a kindred soul! Rentaro was sure he’d testify that he’d never commit a crime like this.
But, at the next moment, he realized exactly how over-optimistic he was.
“So, you’re Rentaro Satomi?”
“What?”
His eyes looked like they were chiseled into his square-jawed face. A glare from him was enough to make even nonoffenders involuntarily shiver. That’s when Rentaro realized it. Tadashima wasn’t here to talk with Rentaro Satomi, his acquaintance in the civsec industry. He was here to question Rentaro Satomi, murder suspect. Expecting a warm welcome from him now would be as useless as crying and pleading for clemency on the guillotine stand.
Tadashima traded places with the younger detective in the room, sitting face-to-face with Rentaro. The detective questioning him before now stood behind him, pacing back and forth along the wall—a classic intimidation tactic.
Then Tadashima leaned over the steel desk. It creaked under him.
“How about we start by you telling me what you were doing the night of the murder? From the start.”
“I’ve already told you guys a thousand times.”
“You didn’t tell me.”
Rentaro stopped himself from lashing out at his arrogance. This was another conventional police tactic—have the suspect give his story time and time again, searching for any contradictions that appear along the way. He kept himself cool as a cucumber as he gave Tadashima the basic outline.
“So I understand the pistol belongs to you?”
“I told you, someone stole it from me. I reached for it, and it was gone.”
“If it was gone when you reached for it, why are you so sure it was stolen? You didn’t think that you dropped it somewhere?”
He broke into a greasy sweat. This wasn’t good.
“That… I said it was stolen because it wound up getting used to commit a crime. I didn’t think it was stolen at the time.”
“Misplacing a gun is a pretty serious issue. Why didn’t you immediately inform the police about it?”
“Well, like I said, I didn’t think it was stolen. I figured it’d turn up if I searched the office or my home.”
“When did you notice it was missing?”
“Um…a little bit before I was gonna meet Suibara.”
“Hmm. Just before meeting the victim, huh? Kind of a convenient time to remember that.”
The doubt and suspicion was clear in Tadashima’s eyes. Ah, shit. If Rentaro had a time machine, he would’ve used it right now to warn his past self to report it to the police first.
“Listen, Inspector Tadashima, when Suibara called upon the Tendo Civil Security Agency, he was already fearing for his life. Why would I be the one killing him?”
“Who would know about that?”
Rentaro Satomi, Fugitive Page 7
