Blue Light Yokohama

by Nicolas Obregon

  “Need a bike.”

  The man blinked and Iwata shook him hard.

  “A bike! Now!”

  “W-we just do parts, some repairs…”

  Iwata pointed to the vintage motorbike in the window. The sign below it read: 1980 TRIUMPH BONNEVILLE—¥800,000.

  “Is the tank full?”

  “Full enough for test rides but—”

  Iwata was already marching the bike off the stand, out on to the road. He flipped the kill switch into position, turned the key, and hit the start button. He gave the throttle two slight twists to get fuel into the cylinders, and the bike lurched forward, picking up speed fast. In seconds, Iwata was hurtling through quake-shocked Tokyo. The Triumph weighed just a few hundred kilograms, yet the power it generated was incredible. He smelled the road, the exhaust, and the thick dust in the air. No window frame obscured his view of the broken city.

  Iwata, sailing through fire and destruction, was completely connected to it all. A numb silence reigned over Tokyo, a child cowering before its furious parent. And Iwata was racing toward the Black Sun Killer, toward death itself, feeling nothing but a quiet relief. Perhaps it was this understanding of the end that sharpened his senses. As Rainbow Bridge loomed into view, Iwata felt a clear readiness.

  * * *

  By the time Iwata had reached Green Gardens Community, the Triumph had begun to sputter; it didn’t have much left. All around him, Odaiba was ablaze. A thick canopy of black smoke pressed down low. Metal creaked. People in the street crouched down, faces blank. Car alarms blared in the distance.

  Iwata approached the main gate and drew his gun. It was 3:05 P.M., some twenty minutes since the sniper had missed his shot. He scanned the rooftops. Across the street, the warehouse where the sniper unit had been positioned was simply no longer there. It took Iwata a moment to realize that it was now just rubble, dust, and smoke. Nothing moved. Only Yamada and one uniformed cop were inside the house.

  Iwata reached the front door. To his surprise it was still shut. He closed his eyes for a moment and tried to clear his mind.

  “The Lord is the strength of my life. Of whom shall I be afraid?”

  He turned the door handle and it quietly relented. Stepping into the gloom, Iwata instantly smelled copal. His stomach lurched and his knees became weak.

  You’re a fucking coward, Iwata. You won’t ever outrun that.

  “When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up…”

  Iwata forced himself up the stairs.

  “Teach me Thy way O Lord, and lead me in a plain path because of mine enemies. Deliver me not over unto the will of mine enemies for false witnesses are risen up against me and breathe out cruelty.”

  Iwata heard a scream. He quickened his pace. The SIG weighed him down as though he were holding an anvil out in front.

  “I had fainted unless I had believed to see the Goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”

  Iwata wiped sweat out of one eye and squinted through the dusty darkness. He leaned down against the stairs and crawled the rest of the way up. On the last stair, he poked his head over.

  Another scream and a blur.

  But no impact.

  Opening his eyes, Iwata saw a large turkey strutting around the carpet. Two other birds had been slaughtered. Their black eyes shone like valueless stones. Blood and black feathers were strewn around the room.

  Trembling, Iwata got to his feet and wondered if he had shouted out. He listened for any sounds but the apartment was silent again. Through the copal, he could smell gun smoke now.

  Iwata followed the smell and found Yamada lying on the floor beneath the kitchenette, his eyes closed. Blood oozed from a gash to the back of the head. Iwata felt around his body but found no other injuries. He put his fingers under Yamada’s nose and felt faint breathing, but there was no time for relief. Looking across the room, Iwata saw that the uniformed cop had been eviscerated, his entrails pink snakes trying to slither out of his stomach. The eyes were blank, the expression slightly concerned. Next to the body, the balcony door was wide open.

  Iwata started up the stairs, fear clouding everything now, his legs slick with sweat. Every one of his senses squealed with the purity of human fear—its stench, its rate, its vitality. Every muscle quivered with focus.

  “Wait on the Lord. Be of good courage and He shall strengthen thy heart.”

  Iwata reached the top of the stairs and heard hissing. The bathroom was empty though the shower was on. A stream of urine led from the bathroom, into the corridor, toward the bedroom.

  Iwata began to creep toward it, whispering words without knowing why.

  “The lights of the city are so pretty … I’m happy with you … Please let me hear … those words of love from you…”

  The bedroom door was closed. He wiped away tears as he stood before it now, his heart flapping like a dying bird.

  Let us not fear the bear.

  Iwata smashed the door open with his shoulder, immediately yelling out in pain and losing his balance. He saw movement on the left of the room—the skull mask and the glinting black blade raised overhead. Iwata fired twice—then realized that his shots had cracked the wall mirror opposite his target. The shaman was already bounding toward him. He was huge, naked, and covered in soot.

  The rattle of the decorative bones pronounced each movement, turkey feathers adorned his chest, and blood dripped from his black blade.

  Thud, thud, thud.

  He moved in a terrible, unnatural way, like film that had been speeded up and then slowed down.

  Iwata fired three times.

  Miss.

  Miss.

  Hit.

  The shaman roared and jerked sideways, losing all balance. He fell across the mattress, rolled and landed on the other side of the bed. Iwata aimed his gun over the mattress and fired blind.

  Silence. Pounding. Gasping.

  Yumi was spread-eagled on the floor, encircled by candles and feathers. She was not moving. Eyes fixed on the bed, Iwata crawled over to her. Her bare skin was covered in blood, but she had no wounds that he could see. The black sun symbol had been drawn on her massive belly. Her eyes were closed and her face was expressionless.

  “Yumi, it’s me. Are you all right?”

  He touched her shoulder and her face twisted. She began to sob. Iwata saw the small tablets strewn around her.

  “You’re tripping, Yumi. Don’t worry. Just don’t move.”

  Iwata struggled up to his feet. Sweat poured down his face, stinging his eyes. His hand shook violently. He was struggling to breathe.

  “Hideo Akashi,” Iwata shouted, grasping for authority. “I’m arresting you for murder. The house is surrounded. Give up your weapon, and you will not be harmed.”

  Deep laughter bubbled up from behind the bed.

  “Akashi.” The shaman spoke the word as if repeating a good joke.

  Iwata hadn’t kept count of his shots.

  How many rounds did the SIG hold? Seven? Nine?

  Quaking severely, Iwata forced himself to peer over the mattress.

  “Akashi, come out.”

  The obsidian blade whistled toward Iwata’s face. Gasping, he fell backward as the knife thudded into his solar plexus—handle first. Badly winded, he dropped the gun. Akashi stood now, another blade in his hand. He took a step forward, but something stopped him.

  A voice coming from downstairs.

  “Iwata?! Are you there?!”

  “Up here! He’s here!”

  Footsteps crashed up the stairs.

  Hideo Akashi smashed the window with his elbow and hurled himself out. Iwata scrambled to his feet, picked up the gun, and ran to the window. Akashi, unharmed by the fall, was running, head down, putting distance between himself and the house with long, powerful strides. Iwata staggered away from the window.

  “Yumi, stay here. You’re safe now.”

  He opened the door and ran straight into Hatanaka. The younger man slumped ag
ainst the wall and puffed out his cheeks.

  “Fuck, Iwata. I almost shot you in the head.”

  “Yumi is alive.” Iwata pushed past. “Have you called an ambulance?”

  “Already done but there could be a delay—where are you going?”

  “To finish this.”

  Iwata mounted the Triumph and hit top speed in a few seconds. He knew where the Black Sun Killer would be heading.

  * * *

  Hideo Akashi ran on to the footpath leading onto Rainbow Bridge. A hundred meters behind, Iwata hopped off the Triumph and began pursuit. They were now on the pedestrian walkway, a contained aisle with a waist-high railing, fifty-two meters above Tokyo Bay.

  Iwata could just about see Akashi up ahead, head down, arms pumping, pouring on the speed. He seemed unaffected by the distance he had run. The walkway narrowed—not wider than two or three meters—and was now enclosed by metallic grilles on both sides. Occasional cars thundered by, close enough to touch. The grilles rattled deafeningly when they passed. Iwata could smell a faint sea breeze. Thick clouds of black smoke obfuscated the city. It was if they were suspended in the sky.

  Alone. Together.

  The smoke dissipated now, and Iwata squinted. He could no longer see Akashi.

  “Are you there?!”

  He had to be, there was nowhere to go.

  Iwata pressed on, but he could hear a strange sound getting louder now—a wet sound, like a thirsty giant swallowing too fast. A crashing sound with a murmuring underneath that.

  Ug.

  Ug.

  Ug.

  Feeling himself falter, Iwata grabbed the railing with one hand. He no longer felt any pain—he knew that was a bad sign. He could draw only short, spindly breaths. He realized now the blow to the solar plexus had done more than wind him. Iwata’s consciousness ebbed and slackened, his gun was an impossible weight.

  He was now in a small room. Familiar somehow. He’d seen this before.

  Wanna see something?

  “Kei?”

  Well, do you, or not?

  He closed his eyes and saw his friend. Kei pointed downward.

  The eye of the whirlpool was blinking up at them.

  And Iwata realized where he was standing.

  The first tower of the bridge.

  The maintenance door swung open and there was Akashi, the shaman, the Black Sun Killer, skull mask grinning. Iwata fired.

  He missed.

  Click.

  Click.

  Click.

  Akashi stepped forward, as if to embrace him. One hand on Iwata’s shoulder, a dull thud, then the sound of ripping grass.

  Before registering the ruin, Iwata smashed his gun into Akashi’s face. It was all he had.

  Then he was on the ground, coughing up blood.

  He could hear only the sound of his own eyes.

  Blink.

  Blink.

  Blink.

  His eyes or distant explosions. Blinking or Cleo’s chopping board.

  Thunk.

  Thunk.

  Thunk.

  Iwata sucked in breath in quick threes.

  Then twos.

  Then slow.

  Far above him, Hideo Akashi circled into view like water going down a drain. His face was blackened. His eyes were so white. His movements were beautiful, like a predator around its prey.

  Iwata realized his own lips were moving.

  The lights of the city are so pretty. Give me one more tender kiss.

  Akashi crouched down and cupped his ear to Iwata’s mouth.

  “What are you saying?”

  I walk and walk, swaying, like a small boat in your arms.

  “What are you saying to me?!”

  I hear your footsteps coming. Blue Light Yokohama.

  Iwata hacked up blood and realized he was laughing. Akashi bared his gums, reached down, and tore out the knife from Iwata’s belly. There was no pain, no sensation. Just the sound of air being sucked in, or expelled. Akashi held a modern hunting knife over Iwata’s face, dripping blood across his lips. Iwata tasted metal and salt. He knew why it tasted this way, he knew the copper was there to help transmit nerve signals. He knew it would take ninety minutes to cremate his body.

  But he felt nothing.

  Let us not fear the bear.

  Akashi pushed the knife against Iwata’s cheek.

  “You laugh?!”

  With great effort, Iwata spoke. “You’re just crazy.” His voice was soft. “That’s all.”

  Akashi’s face scrunched up with anger.

  “What a recent little invention you are, Inspector. What amusement you give the earth—passing judgment on its natural way of things, punishing the strong and protecting the weak.”

  Akashi gestured wildly with the bloody knife.

  “Unworthy man, you tread on that which you do not understand. This world is destined for darkness unless we nourish The Maker. And you would defy Him, for the sake of the insignificant?”

  “They’re people, Akashi. People.”

  Akashi spat in disgust.

  “The family. The old woman. The girl. All of them. They were all marked for death and I am that death. I am the nourishment.”

  “Marked by you. Potential witnesses, Akashi. Nothing more.”

  “Disbeliever.”

  Akashi stood up on the railing now, smiling with wild reverence at the blackened skyline.

  “Look at it. This thing they call ‘city.’ An absurdity. We are so near now. Soon it will die.”

  You ever hear that saying about Tokyo being a million cities all at once? You wonder if maybe some of them are good and some of them are bad?

  “Witness what happens when the living foundations grow angry. This world cracks open without nourishment—Tezcatlipoca screams for the blood of the indebted. You could not stop me feeding him, Iwata. You could not. And if you had strength enough to look inside yourself, you would feel the divinity of my work.”

  “Is that what you call it? ‘Work’?”

  Iwata closed his eyes. He knew he shouldn’t but it didn’t matter.

  “Soon enough the world will witness the New Way. And perhaps one day what I have done will be recognized. The sacrifices I’ve made will be seen. Perhaps one day the name Hideo Akashi will be spoken of as the one who cleared the path.”

  Akashi reached down for his shaman’s mask, adjusted the leather straps, and lodged it on his face. One half of it had broken off, revealing the left eye.

  “But I have grown weary of your little footsteps.” Akashi lifted Iwata’s chin, exposing the trembling Adam’s apple beneath. “Hach k’as. Eek.”

  Iwata saw Kei balancing, arms out, as he tightrope walked across the boundary wall.

  Maybe I’ll get some money together in a year or two, come visit you.

  A tremendous convulsion tore through them.

  Metal yearned. An aftershock roared into life, slamming Akashi into the steel maintenance door. Rainbow Bridge was an animal struggling against its shackles.

  Heavy footfalls grew closer.

  “Iwata!”

  Akashi, still off balance, snapped his head round. He saw Hatanaka too late.

  The shoulder tackle was hard, crunching into Akashi’s nose. He stumbled backward into the metal railing, his weight carrying him over. Hatanaka threw out a hand and clutched a leg—Akashi’s weight lifting him off his feet.

  “Iwata! Help me!”

  Hatanaka’s voice was a long way off.

  Iwata didn’t want to hear it any longer.

  He saw Kei, casting a line on a warm afternoon. He saw the chestnut girl in her lonely garden. He saw Hana Kaneshiro on the slab, lips white. He saw the policeman’s granddaughter, blue in the glow of the screen. He saw Jennifer Fong, floating on the waves. He saw Cleo at her counter, shuffling through dust jackets.

  And then he saw it.

  The lighthouse.

  The lighthouse.

  The lighthouse.

  He saw Cleo in th
e sunset, standing on the cliff.

  He saw the baby broken on rocks below.

  A little dollop of honey for my honeybee.

  Bleeding badly, Iwata rolled on to his front. He crawled toward the feet of Hatanaka. Through the railings, he saw Akashi dangling above the abyss. His eyes were black and vacant as he screamed at the sky.

  “Ma’taali’teeni’! Ma’taali’teeni’!”

  Hatanaka kicked Iwata’s shoulder hard.

  “I can’t hold him!”

  Iwata reached out, snapping handcuffs around Akashi’s ankle and the metal railing. Hatanaka let go and fell against the stairs with a thud. The two detectives stared at each other, panting.

  “Oh shit,” he gasped, seeing Iwata’s gushing stomach.

  Iwata closed his eyes as Hatanaka called it in. First, he called for medical assistance—officer down. Then, taking a breath, he announced the capture of Hideo Akashi.

  Much later, Iwata registered being carried into an ambulance. He looked up at the skyscrapers and felt rain on his face. All around him, Tokyoites tentatively returned to the streets. He didn’t know what would happen now but he’d done his job. Kosuke Iwata was free to die.

  High above his ambulance, the gray clouds looked like restless elephants.

  CHAPTER 37: A DEER HEARS THE SHOT

  On the fourth page of the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper, buried under the fallout from the Tōhoku earthquake, the following article was printed:

  POLICE CORRUPTION EXPOSED AS TMPD FINALLY CATCHES “BLACK SUN” KILLER

  By Tetsuya Suda

  Less than an hour after Friday’s terrible earthquake, Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department homicide detectives sensationally arrested a former senior inspector for murder. Hideo Akashi, 48, who was thought to have killed himself last month, has been charged with multiple homicides, including the attempted murder of a heavily pregnant Daiba housewife. (See Page 3.)

  While the police should, of course, be praised for capturing the culprit in what has been dubbed the “Black Sun Slayings,” these sick acts must not overshadow the depth and the scale of corruption in our city’s noxious police force.

  Following allegations of falsification of evidence, torture, misuse of funds, and even collusion with yakuza groups, the National Police Agency has assumed immediate command of Shibuya’s homicide department—Division One. TMPD’s highest ranking police officer, Chief Superintendent Uwatoko Fujimura, 72, has been charged with a range of criminal offenses. Fujimura was last seen on Friday afternoon by his wife, though rumors abound that he may have taken his own life. Several senior inspectors in Division One have also been charged, and a raft of more junior officers are now under investigation. While many details are yet to be established, from documents received from an anonymous source, it seems that entire cases have been fabricated in order to increase funding, bribes have been freely accepted by yakuza groups, and even investigation expenses have been fraudulently inflated.