by Matt Lincoln
“Keep it vague,” Junior suggested. “Just say you’re in Tokyo and looking for a prostitute. You’ll probably get tons of hits, but if we make it too specific, we might not lure him in.”
“Specify that you want an American prostitute,” I added.
“What, why?” Gardner asked, looking confused.
“Laura was American right?” I asked. “She was a tourist on vacation. Japan is one of the safest countries in the world for tourists, and there are plenty of prostitutes there already. This means someone went out of their way to abduct her specifically. They could have done it for any number of reasons, but I have a feeling it had to do with the fact that she was foreign.”
“That makes sense,” Junior nodded. “Japan is extremely homogeneous. Something like ninety percent of the population is native Japanese, so Laura would have definitely stood out.”
“Okay,” Gardner agreed, nodding as she created the post and submitted it. “Now we just wait.”
For a long time, nothing happened, and we decided to look through the message board as we waited for a response. What I saw disgusted me. Gardner hadn’t been kidding when she said you could find anything here. Drugs, guns, even people were all listed for sale.
“And this is just in Japan,” Gardner grimaced, shaking her head in revulsion. I could feel my temper rising, but before I could say or do anything, Gardner’s computer chimed.
“We got a response!” she announced, quickly clicking back onto the post we’d made. “He says he has several women for us to choose from.” Gardner’s expression turned horrified as she read the post.
“How awful,” Junior lamented sadly.
“Apparently, he wants to meet us tonight at Shinjuku East Station,” Gardner read. “Oh, crap. What do I say?”
“Stall,” I told her. “We need to get more out of him to take to Wallace.”
“Right,” she nodded as she began to type. “I’ll tell him I want to know more about the women before I make the commitment. I’ll ask if he has pictures.” A few seconds later, the response came in. Gardner gasped and clapped her hands over her mouth. The message contained pictures of several women. Each of them appeared to be dazed. Their expressions were blank as if someone had drugged them.
“Gardner, save the photos, quick!” I exclaimed. She was shaking, but she nodded and began to save the photos before the conversation got deleted.
“Ask him where he got the women from and how old they are,” Junior prompted. “Tell him… that you have very specific preferences.” He sounded disgusted at his own words. Gardner nodded and sent the message. For a few seconds, there was no response.
“He’s asking if I’m really in Japan…” Gardner stuttered, her eyes going wide.
“Damn, what tipped him off?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Gardner shook her head, stammering over her words. “Maybe I got too careless in my rush, and something didn’t translate well?” Another message came through. Gardner gasped again.
“That’s not good,” she muttered.
“What?” I asked, wincing when my voice came out more aggressively than I’d meant it to.
“He’s asking why I saved the photos,” she bit her lip. “Apparently, this program alerts people when someone makes a screenshot or tries to save any part of a conversation. Crap, I should have thought of that. It’s specifically meant to deter authorities. How could I make such a rookie mistake?”
“It’s okay, Fiona,” Junior consoled her. “You were under pressure. We still managed to get evidence that this guy is holding American citizens captive overseas.” A second later, Gardner’s computer made a loud whirring sound, and a command input window appeared in the center of the screen.
“Oh, no, no, no,” Gardner gasped as text quickly began to fill the window.
“What’s happening?” I asked. I didn’t know much about computers beyond the basics, but even I could tell whatever was happening wasn’t good.
“Someone’s trying to hack into my computer,” she yelled as she began to type furiously. “I’m guessing it’s our human trafficking friend. He probably realized something was up and is trying to break his way into my system to figure out who I am.”
“Can you stop him?” Junior asked, standing up from his chair and coming to lean over Gardner’s shoulder.
“I’m trying,” she said, breathing heavily as she began to hyperventilate. I wanted to tell her to calm down, but I didn’t want to distract her when she was in the middle of something so important. It was agonizing, being unable to do anything but sit and watch as Gardner tried to push back the hacker. After what felt like an eternity but was really only a few minutes, Gardner finally stopped typing. Her hands were shaking, and there were tears in her eyes.
“I… I think I stopped him,” she stammered, her voice cracking. Junior moved closer to place a comforting arm around her shoulders. “He didn’t see any of MBLIS’s files. I made sure of that. When I realized what he was trying to do, the first thing I did was encrypt and lock everything that had to do with the agency. I don’t think he saw any of my personal data and files, but that stuff is less important, anyway.”
“What do you mean, your personal files?” I asked.
“You know, like daily reports I write or stuff saved locally to this computer,” she responded. “Most of it only has my personal information attached to it, so even if they did get it, they wouldn’t be able to find out anything about you, or Junior, or any of the other agents or any of our cases.” It seemed she was more concerned about the hacker finding out about us than she was about herself.
“But you blocked him, right?” Junior asked quietly, using the tone he always used when he was speaking to the victim of a crime. “So he’s not going to get any of your information, either.”
“Yes, I blocked him,” Gardner nodded, wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater.
“Do you want us to leave you alone for a minute?” Junior asked gently.
“No,” Gardner answered quickly. “Sorry. For being such a mess, I mean. I’ve never had someone get that close to tracking me down. Not even the FBI. It was kind of a shock.”
“The FBI…” I remarked coyly, hoping to alleviate the mood a little. “Oh, you mean back when you used to be a hacker.” Gardner’s eyes went wide, and she looked at Junior accusingly. Junior, in turn, looked to me as if I’d betrayed him.
“It was an accident, Fiona, I swear,” Junior insisted, smiling sheepishly. “A slip of the tongue.”
“Wow,” Fiona blinked. “It took you all of, what, one day to spill that secret?”
“In my defense, you never specifically said it was a secret,” Junior argued weakly.
“Oh, no, you’re totally right,” Fiona responded sarcastically. “I mean, why would I want to keep the fact that I used to break the law on a regular basis a secret?”
I snorted at that. I’d never heard her use sarcasm before, but I thought it suited her.
“Well, it’s not like Charlie’s going to tell anyone,” Junior argued, throwing the attention back on me. “I can barely get him to talk to me, and he’s my partner. It’s not like anyone’s gonna get your secret out of him.”
Gardner laughed as I scowled at Junior, and I was glad that she seemed to have calmed down. Honestly, I hated to see people cry. I didn’t even like it when strangers cried, but it was especially bad when it was someone I knew. It made me feel helpless, and I didn’t like being presented with problems I couldn’t fix.
“Thanks, guys,” Gardner smiled bashfully, looking up at Junior. He blushed when he realized he still had his arm around her shoulder and moved away.
“Alright. I think that’s enough for today,” Junior concluded. “It’s been a stressful experience, and I don’t think we should push our luck anymore. Fiona, do you think you can run a search on those photos tonight when you get home? It would help our case a lot if we had something concrete to prove this was a case that MBLIS should look into.”
“Got it,” Fiona nodded, nodding before she turned back to her computer. Junior and I left then and made our way back into the bullpen. As I sat down at my desk, I thought about what an unexpectedly tense day we’d had. I could still feel the effects of the adrenaline that had shot through me as I’d watched Gardner fight off the hacker. The possibility of a new case filled me to the brim with excitement.
7
Junior
I’d woken up the next day, still anxious from the events of the day before. Although I was calm and collected on the outside, my mind was moving a mile a minute. I personally knew how skilled Fiona was when it came to computers. If what she said was true about this being the first time that someone had almost managed to hack her, then we were definitely dealing with someone very dangerous.
I had been so worked up that I’d been unable to sleep the night before and had stayed up playing video games until past midnight. I was paying for that decision now as I walked through the lobby of our office. I was trying my best not to yawn or let my eyes droop, but the quiet hum of the heating unit as it blew warm air across the lobby just made me want to curl up and take a nap.
As usual, the lobby was empty aside from our receptionist, Svetlana. She’d joked before that she had the easiest job in the world since we hardly ever had any visitors. Today, there was a large pot of roses on her desk, and I wondered if someone had sent them to her. That reminded me that Valentine's Day was only four days away now, and I pushed the thought down before it could warp into something negative. Just another year I’d be celebrating alone, no doubt.
“Good morning, Svetlana!” I called as I made my way past her desk.
“Oh, Agent Chapman!” she called before I could make my way into the office. “Could you take these inside? Someone sent them to Agent Gardner.” She smiled dreamily and laced her hands together as she said this as if she might swoon.
“Isn’t it so romantic? And they smell so lovely too,” she crooned as she pushed the pot toward me. I picked it up and balanced it in one arm so I could use the other to push the office door open.
“Uh, sure, I’ll give them to her,” I answered, peeking at Svetlana over the top of the roses. There really were a lot of them, at least two dozen or more. Part of me felt a little disappointed as I carried the roses into the office, and it took me a moment to place why. Fiona and I had been hanging out for months now, and she’d never once mentioned having a boyfriend, or even someone she was interested in. On the other hand, I had confided in her the troubles I’d been having with dating recently, and she’s expressed that she had similar issues with interacting with other people socially. I recognized that it was childish and unfair, but part of me felt betrayed.
I brushed the feeling away, though. Fiona was my friend, and it was good that she was interacting with other people enough for someone to want to send her flowers for Valentine’s Day. As I thought that, I felt even more like a jackass for being upset that Fiona wasn’t as alone as I was. I made my way over to her office slowly, as I couldn’t really see over the giant bundle of roses, and I didn’t want to trip on my way there.
“Oh, Junior, finally,” I heard Fiona say before she abruptly stopped mid-sentence. “Whoa, here, let me help you with that.” She guided me into her office and toward a back table where I was finally able to put the flowers down.
“Thank you,” I smiled appreciatively, stretching the muscles in my arms. “I was starting to cramp up.”
“It’s no problem,” Fiona shrugged. “Anyway, I’m glad you’re here. I found something. Remember the photos from yesterday? I found out the identities of all five of the women he sent us pictures of.”
“Really?” I asked, following her over to the computer where several windows were open. Each contained a report on every woman’s background information.
“Yep, all American citizens,” Fiona confirmed. “Only one of them was reported missing, about three months ago. I thought that was weird until I dug a little deeper and realized that all of these women were loners. No close family or social media presence. Basically, they were all people who wouldn’t be missed if they suddenly disappeared.”
“So, they specifically targeted them for that reason,” I wondered aloud as I added this bit of information to the profile I’d been building in my mind. Whoever was doing this was well-organized and professional enough to only target women who didn’t have a lot of ties to the rest of the world. They’d have to be pretty charismatic as well if they were able to get this kind of information out of them. After all, it’s not like people go around announcing that they have no family or close friends to everyone they meet. There was a lot of thought and effort put into this plan.
“Exactly,” Fiona agreed. “It made me think that there must be other cases like Jane Doe in Chicago. She went missing nine months ago, which means that this organization has been operating for at least that long. I thought it was unlikely that this would be the only case of a woman trying and failing to escape, but I can’t find any similar cases. Any searches I run on the flower tattoo come up empty, even when I specifically look for Japanese results.”
“That could be because Japan is really strict about crime coverage on the news…” I mumbled as I struggled to remember what I knew about the Japanese criminal justice system.
“What do you mean?” Fiona asked.
“Japan regulates what can be disclosed on the news pretty heavily,” I informed her. “They usually don’t print the names of victims in violent or sexual crimes out of respect for them and their families. A lot of the time, even the names of the perpetrators are kept private.”
“Wait, so people won’t actually know who committed the crime?” Fiona asked.
“Unless you were the victim or directly related in some way, no,” I shook my head. “They really value people’s privacy. In a lot of places, you aren’t even allowed to take pictures of people without their permission. But anyway, back to the point. If there were similar crimes, it’s unlikely that they made any identifying details of the case public. Even if you searched for the flower tattoo, you wouldn’t get any results.”
“The police would have them, though, right?” Fiona asked.
“What, the details of the case? Yeah, of course,” I nodded. “But as I said, they’re really serious about privacy. They wouldn’t let us have that information unless we had a really good reason.”
“Not even if we told them about our Jane Doe case?” Fiona asked.
“Maybe, but again, we can’t be sure the cases are totally related,” I frowned. “We have proof now that a Japanese human trafficking group kidnapped at least five American women, but we can’t say for sure that it’s connected to the Jane Doe case. The hacker from yesterday never posted or mentioned anything to do with the flower symbol.”
“Ugh!” Fiona exclaimed, and I flinched at the sound of her voice. “It’s all just technicalities! We know they’re related. It’s all too much to be a coincidence. I really hate all this governmental red tape sometimes.” She clasped her hands together and rested her chin on them, staring forlornly at the computer screen.
“There might be a way for us to get those files,” Fiona mumbled meekly, her voice strangely void of emotion.
“What do you mean?” I asked with uncertainty. Fiona looked around shiftily and sighed before answering.
“I could hack my way in,” she sighed. “I already did it once, with the Chicago PD. That’s how I got the details of the Jane Doe case. I know it’s wrong, but isn’t it more wrong to sit here when we know that there are people in trouble? And who knows how many more they will kidnap and do horrible things to? All because it’s not technically under our jurisdiction? This could give us what we need to convince Wallace to let us take this case on officially!” Fiona’s eyes were wide and pleading, and she finished her ramble.
“You hacked the Chicago Police Department,” I stated slowly, and Fiona bit her lip nervously. “And then you gave Charlie a hard time yesterday for wanting to
investigate during work hours?”
Fiona looked stunned.
“You’re not going to lecture me?” She asked.
“No, I’d be a hypocrite if I did,” I conceded. “If you hadn’t done that, we never would have found the information we needed to start investigating. I can’t benefit from something and then condemn the way you obtained it.”
“I’m not sure Wallace will agree,” Fiona scoffed.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” I responded, nodding toward the computer. “Okay, do your thing. Find out if there’s any information hiding in Japan’s police archives.”
“Okay,” Fiona sat up straight as she turned to her computer and got to work. “I’ll center it in Tokyo for now since that’s where the train station is. The one that the hacker wanted to meet us at.”
I waited tensely for a few minutes.
“Oh no,” Fiona groaned despondently as the screen lit up with dozens of reports. “That is so many more than I thought there would be.”
As we clicked through the reports, it became clear that these crimes were the work of the same group. In each case, they had found a woman dead in a secluded location within the city limits. In every instance, the police were able to locate a specific flower tattoo, always on the back of the woman’s neck. The Tokyo Police Department was currently treating the cases as the work of a serial killer.
I closed my eyes as Fiona began to download the files to her tablet. Even with all the horrible things we saw every day, it was never easy to look at the awful things people were capable of. As I opened my eyes and glanced back at the screen, something about the women popped out at me.
“I think Charlie was right,” I stated as I began to scroll through each file.
“Right about what?” Fiona asked.
“Look at the victims,” I said as I pointed out their photos on the screen. “None of them are Japanese. Japan is almost entirely homogeneous, with something like ninety percent of the population being native Japanese. Yesterday, when Charlie said he had a hunch that Laura had been targeted because she was American? I think he was right.”
