Six Four

by Hideo Yokoyama

  And yet . . .

  The crime they’d committed was the greater one.

  This wasn’t an old injury. The truth that needed to be faced was that the wound was still festering, just hidden under bandages. The police had made an inexcusable mistake during a full-blown kidnapping case then they had systematically covered it up and lied to the public for fourteen years. If something like that was to reach the press, be broadcast all over the news . . .

  That thought alone was horrific. However fatal, their failure to make the recording was still nothing more than an error. Covering it up had been a deliberate act. And they had gone so far as to hide a call from the kidnapper, crushing in their hands information that could have been fundamental to the case. It was a criminal act, unworthy of any investigative body. The Prefectural HQ would have no means of defence if the truth came out. It would suffer attacks that were of a different magnitude to the censure it would have received if it had first confessed to its mistake.

  That wasn’t all. Kidnappings were different to other cases. Mikami knew, having read up on the documentation concerning national press policy since his appointment as press director, how dangerous they could be.

  Kidnappings brought with them the extremely delicate issue of the Press Coverage Agreement. The agreement had first come into being as an apology for a history of unregulated and irresponsible reporting of kidnappings. There is no way for the police to protect a victim once a kidnapper who has warned his target not to call the police learns, either from the papers or the TV, that the police have become involved. Because of this the press are required to sign an agreement whenever a kidnapping takes place, stating that they will refrain from reporting anything about the case until either the kidnapper’s arrest or the safe return of the victim. It falls to the police to bridge the resultant vacuum of information. They are obligated to offer updates and real-time reports on the progress of the investigation. This is where the difficulty begins.

  In reality, the Press Coverage Agreement is a slip of paper signed by various agencies of the press, but not between the media and the police. Despite this, the police take a leading role in the administrative task of setting it up; this is because they are usually the first to learn about a kidnapping, and also first to make a judgement whether the victim’s life is at risk. They present the general details of the case to the members of the Press Club, then request them to sign a coverage agreement. In most cases, the press accept the terms, giving the agreement the impression, from the outside, of having been made between the police and the press.

  The end result is the press signing the document, while entering into a ‘gentleman’s agreement’ with the police.

  On the surface, this resembles a promise made with the goal of protecting innocent life, but the reality is that it’s more like a negotiated contract. On the one hand, the police want the press to agree; if this happens, they can focus on the investigation without having to keep an eye on reporters’ movements. On the other hand, the press find themselves having to put aside their freedoms and the public’s right to know, but they are able at the same time to gain leverage from this to argue for greater checks and balances; also, being the side having made a concession, they are in a strong position to pressure the police into full and complete disclosure of all case information. Considered objectively, the contract means the press can sit back and watch as a vast amount of case-specific intelligence – more than they could obtain by themselves – comes tumbling into their hands. But nobody sees it this way. Each time a kidnapping occurs, one to two hundred reporters and cameramen push their way into the police station dealing with the case. While they might turn up in high spirits, the inability to conduct any real interviews, combined with being packed into a claustrophobic press area, leads to a gradual build-up of frustration; finally, they begin to suspect the police of trying to control them. We curbed our freedoms to help with your investigation. The sense of having done the police a favour spreads through the room, and if the police try to hold anything back while the agreement is still in effect, the press tend to become a hysterical crowd and launch a full-on attack.

  What about during Six Four? It went without saying that there would have been a coverage agreement in place. But the Prefectural HQ had concealed the kidnapper’s third call, forsaking their obligation to provide case information. They’d gone back on the promise they’d made to the press, and in the worst way possible. The bond of trust between the police and the media had been severed fourteen years ago; it had nothing to do with the present issue of anonymity.

  The press would have lashed out, torn any confidence in the authority of the police to shreds. And that would have been only a small sign of the storm yet to come. How many reporters would there have been, jammed together in the Six Four press room? Even the new recruits would be veteran reporters by now. Many would be editors, branch heads; many more would hold key positions in their respective head offices. They had all been there. They would have all felt shock, then outrage, at the deception; they would be vocal in their censure of the force. Their voices would become the voices of their companies, then the voice of the mass media, as it rallied against the NPA. The opposition party would have gained political traction. The media’s impassioned lobbying might have even influenced debates over bills on privacy and individual rights.

  Damn fool . . .

  Mikami let out a harsh grunt.

  Urushibara’s crime deserved the harshest punishment. One district police inspector’s attempt to shirk responsibility could have brought the entire organization to its knees. But . . . no, the real war criminal was Director Seitaro Kyuma, who had been in charge of Criminal Investigations at the time. He had turned a blind eye to one individual’s deception, and in the process had made it a crime committed by the organization itself. The letter Koda had delivered to him had been a cry from the heart. But Kyuma had crushed it underfoot. The man had thought himself an intellectual, always dressed sharply, but he’d lacked any real skill when it came to actual case work: he’d chosen to reward Urushibara for the decision he’d made in the field.

  Fair enough, he’d done it to protect the force. Both the magnitude of the case and the scope of the error itself made the information too dangerous to be made public. The timing had been off, too. It had been days since the error had taken place, Shoko had been found dead and the force had already been facing mounting criticism. Mikami understood how difficult it would have been to stand before the lines of cameras and admit there had been another phone call.

  Even so . . .

  It would have come down to self-protection. Kyuma had been close to retirement and had already been promised a golden handshake and an executive role in the private sector. Whatever his circumstances, he was an executive who had looked after his own interests; in doing so, he had chosen to leave his successors with the parting gift of a live grenade. We can defuse it if we deal with it internally. Perhaps Kyuma had concluded as much, but that only proved he was as narrow-minded as the rumours had said. The reality was that there had already been a whistle-blower, in the form of Koda, and that the girl’s father also knew the truth. It was a barely sleeping giant, one that might be chanced on or woken up at any moment.

  It truly was a cursed legacy. The director’s secret was passed down the lines. Kakinuma’s words. When he was about to retire, Kyuma had confided the truth to his successor, Tadahiko Muroi. The failed recording. The cover-up. The Koda memo. Muroi had no doubt been stunned, but he would have realized he’d become complicit the moment he heard the words. If he had let the facts come to light, the press conference to mark his promotion might have ended up marking his resignation. So Muroi had done as instructed, he’d taken the poison. It was probably during his reign that the framework for maintaining the secret – the surveillance and intimidation of Koda, after he’d left the force – was put in place. Muroi had primed Kakinuma for the role and appointed Urushibara to head up the operation. Keeping the Home Unit under loc
k and key was integral to preventing any leaks, so the blanket ban on Kakinuma’s transfer was added to the legacy. Criminal Investigations’ greatest secret. Carried down the line by eight successive leaders, all the way to the present day – to Arakida.

  Mikami’s mood darkened.

  Michio Osakabe was among the eight. As was the celebrated commander Shozo Odate. He had acted as a go-between for Mikami and Minako, and he’d been a father figure to the entire department. Still, they couldn’t have done anything. The potential danger of revealing the cover-up would have grown with time. They’d been handed a live grenade, and it had harboured more destructive energy than ever before. It wouldn’t have been about self-protection; it was all they could do to bury it as deep as possible.

  Mikami nudged open the driver-side window. Cool air brushed his cheek. The north wind rustled the remaining leaves on the winter trees dotted along the pavement.

  He needed to reset his line of thought.

  He thought he could see through to Arakida’s way of thinking. Perhaps he had grown worried, sensing some kind of hidden motive behind the commissioner’s visit. Soon afterwards, word had reached him that Futawatari was digging around to find information on the Koda memo. It would have felt as though someone was sniffing around the hole in which he’d buried the grenade. Like a cornered animal, he’d panicked, sensing the danger, and had imposed the gag order before the night was out. Was there a real chance he would lash out, if he was pushed? Whatever Arakida did, Mikami felt certain Matsuoka wouldn’t take it quietly. He would be prepared to fight Tokyo directly if he perceived a threat to the department.

  Mikami sensed he was beginning to understand the reason behind Futawatari’s actions, together with the aim of Administrative Affairs. They were working to remove any and all obstacles to Tokyo’s agenda. Did it forward this agenda to condemn the Six Four investigation? They would expose the department’s shortcomings, its weaknesses, then hold them up to its throat, hoping to breach the castle without spilling blood.

  Was that the plan?

  Even so, the knowledge that the bomb concealed within Six Four was related to a cover-up, that it had the potential to bring down not only the department but also the entire Prefectural HQ, clouded Mikami’s understanding of what Futawatari was trying to achieve. There was no guarantee it wouldn’t turn into a hornets’ nest. Yet he had gone from one place to the next, openly enquiring about the Koda memo. That was no different to advertising the bomb’s existence. It was a hallmark of inspections made in Administrative Affairs – whether to do with Personnel or Internal Affairs – that they were carried out in silence, in the shadows. More to the point, its inspectors were experts at measuring risk, always conscious of the public mood and wary of any possible legal action. They would expose the force to danger despite their duty to protect it. Were they capable of such a thing? If the truth came out, the Prefectural HQ would face the censure of every one of the 260,000 officers across the nation, together with the condemnation of the NPA. It would be a disastrous loss of face. The HQ would be stripped of its autonomy and forced into performing ablutions, into spending a long winter under the roof of Tokyo’s scrutiny. It would become a lame duck. Wouldn’t that be the outcome Futawatari feared the most?

  Although . . .

  Was there anything to suggest Futawatari had made any progress? Mikami had been in Criminal Investigations until the spring, but it was only fifteen minutes earlier that he had finally learned the truth about the Koda memo. Futawatari had failed in his attempt to get to Kakinuma. Urushibara definitely wouldn’t talk. And the field officers were all subject to the gag order, banned from talking to Administrative Affairs. They wouldn’t let their guard down in front of the enemy’s star player. The rank-and-file officers weren’t even aware of the facts. The odds were stacked against Futawatari. It was safe to assume he had still to get to the truth. He’d overheard someone talking about something called the Koda memo; that was the extent of what he knew. He had no idea what it said. He wasn’t aware of the danger, and that was why he was going after even the newly recruited detectives asking after it.

  Mikami’s line of thought stopped there.

  Futawatari must have overheard the memo being mentioned. But where?

  His theory, only half thought through, took a sudden hit. This was Criminal Investigations’ dark secret, handed down from director to director. It wasn’t anything you could simply overhear. Where the hell could Futawatari have got wind of it? Had somebody told him? Was it Akama, whose orders he was working under? He’d known the detective’s code name for the case. Mikami had to admit that anyone overseeing an entire department had access to streams of information that were entirely off limits to anyone of a lower rank. Mikami refused to buy it. His authority meant that any number of people would seek to curry his favour, but it still didn’t make sense that he would have heard a code name that had never made its way around the headquarters as a whole.

  Mikami felt at sea again. The mystery of Futawatari expanded to take over his thoughts. Futawatari knew something he wasn’t supposed to have heard about. He was discussing something it was taboo to speak of. The man’s dark eyes flickered in and out of Mikami’s mind, devoid of emotion.

  Futawatari was doing something without realizing the risk. No. It was unthinkable. Mikami was more and more sure of it. Futawatari had always weighed the risks against his actions – it was how he’d made his name as the department’s ace.

  Why was he doing it, even though he knew it was wrong?

  Futawatari fully understood the dangers posed by the Koda memo. He might not know the contents, but he had already worked out that it was potentially explosive. No doubt he had immediately set out to learn what had happened. Two of the officers from the Home Unit had resigned from the force. Koda’s whereabouts were unknown. Hiyoshi had become a recluse. And relations with Amamiya had broken down. These facts alone would have suggested that the memo – itself classified, and bearing Koda’s name – was more than just a sheet of paper. He’d caught a whiff of gunpowder. But it was Six Four, and he’d known he would have to proceed carefully in case it brought down headquarters. Yet he had continued to accelerate his investigation.

  Why?

  Because his position had left him no choice. As far as Futawatari was concerned, ‘the police’ had become more than just the Prefectural HQ. More than just a department to uphold public safety, Administrative Affairs was in many ways a regional branch of the NPA. Futawatari was an inspector for the Prefectural HQ, but he was also a loyal servant to Tokyo. He had been quick to climb the ranks and be singled out, earn the trust and attention of many career executives, but, having done this, he was no longer able to move independently of their various machinations. The commissioner’s visit was in four days. Futawatari would have been instructed to bring Criminal Investigations into line, to make sure of its compliance. He was running out of time. And the Koda memo was the only weapon he had. He had decided to use it as his opening gambit, all the while averting his eyes to the danger it constituted to the station.

  This time, the theory spread like water, saturating his thoughts. Futawatari was in the same boat as he was. They were both under pressure, backed into a corner. Beneath his poker face Futawatari’s eyes were bloodshot, fixated on the clock and the calendar. The commissioner’s visit was the watershed moment, in four days’ time. The deadline.

  Of course.

  Everything became clear. The commissioner’s visit would intensify the feud between the Tokyo faction and Criminal Investigations. The idea had been there, subliminal. But that wasn’t what would happen. The battle would be short, and decisive. And the countdown had already begun. The matter would be settled before the visit was even completed. The visit was more than just a formality, more than just ceremony or symbolism – it was going to be the sentence. Commissioner Kozuka would deliver the reality of Tokyo’s goal in person. He would make some kind of important announcement. It was probably safe to assume that much. />
  His heart skipped a beat. He didn’t know what the commissioner would say. But he knew where and when he intended to say it. Outside Amamiya’s house. During the walking interview scheduled there.

  Mikami caught his breath. His subconscious suddenly became aware of a red light up ahead, which forced him to slam on the brakes. He was a good way past the stop line when the car finally came to a halt. He looked around, but there were no cars or pedestrians to be seen. He was at a small intersection in the middle of a farming area, already in what had been the district of Morikawa, before its absorption into the city. Just minutes from Amamiya’s house.

  He felt a strong urge to turn back. His role was painfully clear. Bring Amamiya around. Change his mind. But this was much more than just groundwork for the visit. The commissioner intended to use the walking interview to issue a public message to Criminal Investigations. And the power of the media – in print and over the airwaves – would set the outcome in stone. If that was the true goal of the Tokyo faction, it meant that Mikami would be helping to set up the gallows on which to hang Criminal Investigations. He would act as producer, ensuring the final scene had as much impact as possible. It would be his job, as press director, to oversee the entire proceedings.