“You okay?” Yamada asked, folding the map back into his pack.
Iwata nodded and they set off down the road. They followed it for another twenty minutes until it dipped through a cluster of pine trees.
They saw a concrete wall. It was around five meters high and looked like a prison perimeter. Though it was old and crumbling, there was no way over without a ladder. With nowhere to blow through, the snow had collected around the compound in large drifts. The main entrance was blocked by two thick doors, splayed in police tape.
Iwata and Yamada followed the boundary, stopping at a side entrance—a tall heavy-mesh gate secured with chains and padlocks. Yamada started climbing. Reaching the top, he swore and sucked blood from his thumb.
“Watch yourself here, Iwata.” He carefully swept clumps of snow from the top of the gate to reveal broken glass. Iwata grimaced as he grasped the frozen metal links. Able to use only one hand, he struggled up the gate. He made sure to heft himself over the top without touching the glass. Iwata couldn’t afford any more injuries.
Hopping off the fence, he saw that he was standing at the back of a long, squat building. Double doors stood open, rusted and weathered, beyond which was a canteen. Melting snow poured through holes in the roof. Shards of sunlight pierced the walls. Chairs were upturned and tables lay on their sides. Iwata saw empty chicken coops and long-dead herb patches. A broken bucket rolled from side to side in the wind.
Yamada led the way through the canteen, wrapping his thumb in a handkerchief.
“You hurt yourself?”
“Almost fourteen years on the force.” He laughed. “It’s my first field injury.”
They left the canteen and saw the full size of the area now, a small theme park. More than two dozen buildings sat across from each other leading all the way up to the end of the compound, where a church-like building loomed.
Without a word, they separated; Yamada took the right-hand side, Iwata the left.
Brushing his way through an overgrown baseball diamond, Iwata came to a locked door. The padlock was rusted and flimsy and he broke it easily with his flashlight. Shunting the door open, he spread a beam of light across the room and saw that it had once been a classroom. Slime and moss had claimed the chalkboard, its lessons long forgotten. Children’s drawings of suns and moons curled away from the wall. Detritus carpeted the floor where puddles hadn’t collected. Clusters of small desks had formed.
At the far end, a desk larger than the others lay on its side. Above it, a framed photograph of what Iwata presumed to be Takashi Anzai hung on the wall. He was old with a patchy beard and large, tinted sunglasses. His mouth was too long and thin for such a narrow face. His eyes looked off to some distant concept, which had caused a slight smile.
The desk contained nothing of interest. Iwata left and headed for the next building. Passing through the tall weeds of the baseball diamond, he heard a loud noise and dropped out of sight.
Realizing he’d been spooked by Yamada breaking a lock, he swore and carried on to the next building. It was much larger than the first. Inside, rusted empty bunks lined the walls. A small mountain of rubble had formed from a collapsed roof.
The wind howled through, but there was no movement. Iwata searched through boxes and small cabinets but found nothing other than abandoned personal effects—the objects deemed unnecessary, articles not remembered in the rush. Iwata could make out families in these forgotten things—children, single men, widows. They had all gone, never to return.
Each box he found contained a thick copy of the same book:
The Black Sun’s Ultimate Truth, by Takashi Anzai
Iwata prized open wet pages to scan through the introduction. It spoke of a brave and exciting first step the first-time reader was taking. By opening the book, readers were also opening themselves up to a realization—that they were, like anything else in this world, subject to the sun’s pull. Not just gravitationally, but also spiritually and universally. Unlike conventional gods reliant on fantastical theological architecture, Anzai was simply pointing up to the sun that would watch over the reader for all the days of his or her life and saying, “There is our divinity.” His message was simple: that God would soon die and the “real world” would be revealed.
You, my dear friend, are holding a most precious opportunity in your hands that should not be passed up.
Iwata tossed the book away and climbed over the mound of rubble, causing a small avalanche of concrete and dirty snow. There was nothing at the far end of the room. The next building Iwata came to was set some distance from the others and much smaller. It had been erected sloppily, with hasty brickwork. The door had been torn off at the hinges. Evidently, the police had had some trouble gaining access.
Inside, there was no fitting for a bulb overhead. This space had not been constructed for light. Along one wall, ten refrigerators stood side by side, all of them old and rusting. A slat for passing through food and removing waste had been carved into their doors. Broken padlocks lay in coils of rusted chains beneath them.
“A jail,” Iwata whispered.
He went on to search each building in turn, finding nothing more than the ruins of Anzai’s lost civilization. Countless traces of the sect and its followers. But of Keiko Shimizu, he found nothing.
It was early afternoon by the time Iwata had cleared his half of the compound. He sat on the broken steps leading up to the church and, with ruined fingers, smoked his last cigarette.
Yamada emerged from his last building, his palms held out—no luck. He sat down next to Iwata and they shared the cigarette, each blowing into his hands while the other smoked. Yamada swept snow from his shoes.
“Next time we’ll dress for the occasion, huh?”
Iwata chuckled out smoke, wincing at the pain in his skull.
“For a guy who’s spent fourteen years in a basement reading up on lunatics, you have a sunny disposition.”
“That’s what an endless supply of job satisfaction will do for you.”
Yamada handed back the cigarette. Iwata took a final drag and stubbed it out.
“Well. I found nothing on my side.”
“Nor I.” Yamada held up his sliced thumb to the sun. “Shall we finish this?”
The two policemen stood and approached the doors of the church, which were secured by a thick chain with a heavy padlock. They made their way to the side of the building and found the fire exit propped open. It was chained from the inside, but there was enough space to squeeze through. They came up a sodden carpeted stairway leading into a gloomy expanse. The stench of urine and broken bottles that covered the floor made it clear that this place was used for shelter by the local homeless in warmer months. Corners were laced with cobwebs. The walls were decorated with graffiti and burn marks. Iwata spread his flashlight across the filthy pews and pigeons corkscrewed into panicked flight, making both men jump. Water dripped through cracks in the ceilings and lost snowflakes swirled in the air, illuminated by stray sunbeams. A gutted piano had been smashed up for firewood and burned. They split up, taking one side of the church each. Halfway down the pews, Yamada called out.
“Iwata, look at this.”
He held up a handful of empty bullet casings and pointed to polka dot holes on the wall behind him.
“Looks like they didn’t leave quietly.”
A few paces ahead, Iwata came to a portable generator hooked up to the mains. He pulled the starter cord three times until a loud sputtering resounded and the bare bulbs above lit up. At his feet, Iwata found a tape recorder. Picking it up, he dusted it off and set it on the small plinth it had fallen from. A framed picture of Anzai hung above it, its glass cracked. On a whim, he pressed PLAY and the tape crackled into life at surprising volume. It was like no voice Iwata had heard before. It was loud and strong, but not strained, musical but droning too.
“Brothers and sisters, there is HARDLY ANYTHING that can be done properly that is done in a hurry. A glass of wine, a stroll, a chat, a view,
a fuck—ALL GOOD THINGS are done with time. Our GOD is never in a hurry. He takes His time to make a baby, or a flower, or a dolphin. He is never in a hurry.” There was a long, hissing pause. “Unless He is angry.”
Now came terrified but excited applause.
“I have heard rumors—RUMORS—in this happy kingdom. I have heard that I am too old to lead my brothers and sisters any longer. I have heard that our days are NUMBERED. I have heard that you believe that the ignorant COME FOR US.”
Iwata left the tape on and made his way toward a closed side door. Kicking a mound of dirt out of the way, he forced the handle.
“Well, my children, I must tell you … these rumors are true.”
Audible gasps.
Iwata was now standing in a small side office, the carpet almost completely covered in sodden paperwork. The room stank of pigeon feces. Two filing cabinets lay on their side. One half of the room was blackened from fire damage. A mound of files had been burned in the corner.
“But FEAR NOT. Fear FORSAKES all that I have taught you. Have I not told you of this time? Have we not always known that these days would end? Yes, it is true, the ignorant come for us. As sure as you hear my voice now, they COME FOR US. But come as they may. They will NEVER tarnish our TRUTH. No, children. The truth cannot be taken from us. FATHER will NOT allow it. Will He allow it?”
The crowd screeched in disgust.
“Will HE allow it?”
A whole chorus of screaming NO’s erupted. Anzai giggled now.
“Speak His name!”
The crowd screamed as one.
“Tezcatlipoca!”
“Speak His name!”
“Tezcatlipoca!”
“That’s right, children. Lord of the Night, Lord of the Far. Lord of the Wind, Lord of the Darkness. His time looms. LOOMS. And no man can take what He has BESTOWED upon me. In turn, no man can take from you what I have GIVEN YOU. Remember always, soon the sun will turn black and die and will be replaced by His TRUE FORM. The Black Sun Tezcatlipoca will REIGN over this night world and the ignorant all around us will be ENGULFED. Their hearts RIPPED OUT leaving them BLIND.”
Squeals.
“But not you, my children. For YOU have followed me, your humble father, in the ways of the LIGHT TO COME. You have followed me toward the ONLY salvation from the DARKNESS.”
There was loud applause.
“In the years to come, long after me, this message will be clear and strong and a new people will rise up from our flesh. A new people and a new faith, with new tenets and new missions. I have given you many brothers and sisters, and my essence will live on through them. I will always be there to lead you, now, and in the new world. But remember, my children…”
There was a long, painful silence. Those that couldn’t bear it cried: “Tell us! Tell us!”
“Our god is NEVER in a hurry. And you ARE His creations. So, do not hurry about your tasks. LET the ignorant come. Remember that the time of the BLACK SUN draws close. Remember that the ignorant and their puppet systems can only touch you outwardly. Do not FEAR them. Accept them. For the DARKNESS will see to them. The darkness will ENVELOP them. And you will all walk FREE in the revelation.”
Yamada appeared in the doorway.
“You know, I’d never heard Anzai’s voice before. It has a certain compelling quality about it, eh?”
“Why did he record that?”
“Probably to ensure there’d be enough people here to keep the cops busy when they showed up. Anzai fled long before the police raided this place. He ordered his men to fight to the death and the women and the children to poison themselves. Over fifty of them did.”
“He got away?”
“Anzai was found in Vietnam working as a church minister a year later.”
Yamada nodded to the scorch marks.
“Looks like they tried to destroy as much as they could.”
“But they used the wrong accelerant.” Iwata sniffed the walls. “See the burn marks? That fire took a long time to get going, which tells you they didn’t use gasoline. Whatever they used would have been relatively easy to put out.”
“Let’s just hope there’s still some trace of Keiko Shimizu or her girl left here.”
They started on the filing cabinets, scanning personnel records. Though many were destroyed, there were still hundreds of files left. The information contained within ranged from basic data, to extreme detail. Bank balances. Penis length. Criminal records. Secret fears, admissions, and perversions were all recorded. Each file had a small Polaroid portrait. Young, old, male, female. Each face compliant, submissive, hopeful.
Iwata opened a file and read aloud.
“‘Mr. Junichi Ando, 206:F—during group session he admits to sexual contact with sister.’ Why would they record that?”
“Leverage. It would be framed as therapy through honesty, but with this kind of information, they could strong-arm sect members for huge ‘donations.’ They could also ensure members would never leave for fear of recriminations.”
Iwata tossed his file away and picked up another. They stretched their limbs and tried to keep warm as they worked through the afternoon.
It was almost dark when Yamada spoke.
“Iwata.” He looked up, his eyes wide. “I think this is it.”
“You’re sure?”
“1137:H, Ms. Keiko Shimizu. This is her.” He met Iwata’s eyes. “She did have a baby … Oh shit.”
“What is it?”
“The name of the little girl is Midori Anzai. I think she was the child of the cult leader, Iwata. They weren’t married, according to this file. She was probably a sex slave of some sort. Doesn’t say why but it looks like she absconded from the camp and was then excommunicated. Keiko then returns for Midori and takes her from the compound several months later. ‘Kidnaps’ her, it says here.”
“But if Anzai has banished Keiko, why let the child live here?”
“As the cult leader, I’m not sure how much contact Anzai would have had with the child. Children were everywhere in these camps. They were often separated from their mothers early on, forced on to other women, names changed—it would get so that nobody could remember whose child was whose. Perhaps Midori simply blended in this way. Either way, clearly Keiko loved her. She came back for her despite the severe risk.”
Iwata looked up through the ceiling at the cold purple sky. He remembered gazing at the road, waiting for his mother to come. She’ll come, Kei had called.
“Iwata?”
“Yeah.”
“I was saying that after the abduction, Keiko and Midori now had to make it on their own. The outside world would have likely been a terrifying place for them. The compound might have been dangerous, but it was at least familiar. The outside world offered no protection, no friendly faces, no familiar infrastructure. By that stage, it’s likely Keiko had been assaulted often enough to have become desensitized to it. Perhaps she survived outside the cult by prostituting herself—possibly even the child too. It would have been an itinerant lifestyle, hand-to-mouth, until Keiko reached the breaking point.”
“Couldn’t she have gone back to her father in Nagasaki?”
“Estrangement from family is very common. Many of those affected by cults never really recover. Once you’ve had your mind rearranged, it’s not a question of simply snapping back to normality. Plus who knows what kind of relationship they had.”
Iwata looked at the picture of Anzai on the wall. Beneath it, the symbol of the black sun was displayed.
“Pass me that.”
Yamada reached up and handed Iwata the framed photograph. It was half-burned but the left side was clear enough. Takashi Anzai in black ceremonial robes. Next to him, a young man with a similar face and less ornate robes.
“That was his eldest son,” Yamada said. “By all accounts the favorite—Akira Anzai.”
A muscular arm, from a third person, was draped around Akira’s shoulder. The face had been obliterated by scorch marks, but it
was clear enough—a mask hung from this unseen person’s hand. A mask Iwata had seen before. Iwata closed his eyes and recalled the words.
Hach k’as. Eek.
“Son of a bitch.” Iwata tapped the photograph. “That’s him. Whoever attacked me in Dogenzaka was wearing this mask. This is the killer.”
“This would have been Anzai’s personal shaman. Not everything is known, but from what I’ve studied, we’re essentially talking about somewhere between a personal bodyguard and most trusted ally. This man would have died for him.”
Iwata was reeling.
“I should have opened the door to you.”
“Focus.” Yamada put his hand on his shoulder. “What do you want to do now?”
Iwata slapped himself in the face and nodded.
“Midori Anzai. We have to find her. She’s in immense danger.”
“Then we need to go now.”
Iwata and Yamada left the church and returned to the wall. Crows had gathered at the top of the fence where Yamada had cut himself. They pecked at the bloody snow and broke the frozen silence with their caws.
CHAPTER 34: ON THE BRINK
THE ISUZU COUPÉ WAS SPEEDING through Tokyo’s outskirts like a black pinball. Skyscrapers mushroomed. A dark limbo of thundery cloud pressed down on the skyline. Iwata’s ankle throbbed from mashing the pedal but the car couldn’t give him any more.
His phone rang.
“Hatanaka, be quick, my battery is low.”
“I’ve got him.”
“What do you mean ‘him’?”
“I mean you need to get here right now. Video suite four. Ninth floor, Shibuya.”
“I’ll be there soon. Don’t let anybody else in that room. Do you understand?”
“Got it.”
“Hatanaka, you’re really sure you have him?”
“I’m looking at his face right now.”
* * *
In the dank gloom of the TMPD Shibuya car park, Iwata switched off the engine. He took a breath. The dashboard clock showed 9:37 P.M.
“Yamada, do you have access codes for the central system?”
“I’ve hardly ever used them, but theoretically they should work.” He pulled at his mustache. “They should work.”
Blue Light Yokohama Page 30
