The only one crushed by this is me. You two are inside your little dead zone world. But, whoever you are now, can you understand how devastating this is for me? What’s going to happen to me if you two go off and commit love suicide? What am I? Just some kind of supporting character?
The most painful part is that I’m not trusted. You and Miko wouldn’t think dying was okay if you trusted me. Didn’t our friendship begin back when we made “Mixed Cameras”? We didn’t succeed at merging into a single body and soul and ended up totally separate, like we were there by accident. We agreed on that plan and knew it would be kind of half-assed, and we started to build a bond between us. Was that bond fake? Is half-assed not good enough for you anymore? Do you need to be united in a 100% pure and completely lofty death? Is everything we felt back then just null and void now?
If you mean it, then I mean it too. If you read this mail and still want to die, go ahead and fucking die then. I’ll survive and completely ruin your plan.
It was just as I’d feared. But I winced at the actual sight of those cruel words and fell into a depression. I regretted not having kept quiet and waited until after all three of us could have met at the Sleeping Café instead of writing over the net and arranging to meet alone with Mikoto first. It could have been more like what I’d hoped and not how it has played out. We could have been sleepily lazing around in the kitschy and cheap interior of the Narcissus Cell, the three of us getting along and transforming the space into a fallout shelter where we could find refuge from the world of lies and watch the projections until we were bored. Then, we could have started to watch our own films instead, sipping herbal tea when we woke up from catnaps in the red lip-shaped reclining seats, spending our day engrossed in heated conversations about nothing of consequence.
There were all sorts of real possibilities, but now there was no going back. Iroha hadn’t tried to bring us together during those years since she first started dating Mikoto. She was building up trust without any interference from either of us. The thought of that never occurred to me, but now I can really see why. It was Iroha herself who never truly trusted me. She positioned herself at the pivot of a folding fan, making sure her relationships with the two of us were stable by trying to control everything. Now that His Majesty is dead, Mikoto is deserting, and the folding fan connections are crumbling, she still won’t recognize Mikoto’s transformation.
I don’t want to go so far as it say such-and-such was the deciding factor. Only that it’s too late now. From this point onward, we have no choice but to rebuild our relationships anew. For that to happen ... I’ve written it so many times that I’m not rehashing it yet again.
If I tried to reply and explain things at this point, it would only have the opposite effect. The written word will only lead to misunderstanding. For now, all I can do is meet Mikoto and then later get together with Iroha in person and invest a whole lot of time and patience. I erased Iroha’s message without reading it a second time.
After that, I got in bed, but one line from Iroha’s message kept swirling around in my head and keeping me awake. She accused Mikoto and me of planning to commit love suicide. Where the hell did that idea come from? It sure wasn’t me. That was the only accusation I hadn’t already run through my head. I was restless and dizzy.
And then I embraced it as my conclusion. I finally truly knew exactly what I should do. I’d found what Mikoto called “my way.” The last hesitation vanished from my body. It wasn’t a question of persuading Iroha to get to this point. Ironically, Iroha had convinced me.
I scrupulously spelled out the particulars that brought me to this point, including that plan of action, and my notes expanded to become the text you all are reading right now. It’s ended up much longer than I’d expected.
It’s currently five o’clock in the morning and starting to get light outside. I can hardly believe that only twenty-four hours ago, I sighed at the sight of unruly cherry blossoms. Now that I’ve “participated” in society’s raw form, it seems like the world is something entirely different from what it was yesterday. I have a sense of belonging.
I’m going to finish these notes. I’ll sleep until evening. And then I’ll never have to clear my head again.
If I wake up and feel like the previous twenty-four hours have been a lie, I’ll contact Iroha. But the chances of that are roughly less than zero.
On the other hand, if my understanding of reality remains what it is now, I’ll head out to Dormir. And from there, I’ll upload these notes.
I have one request.
If I die, my website, films, and notes will probably be shut down quickly. Those of you who sympathize with what I’ve written, please download this page and, if you can, the film files too, and save them. And, if possible, please mirror it all or post excerpts on other websites. It doesn’t matter where. If the film files are too complicated, these notes alone will be fine. If as many allies as possible spread the words of Mikoto and me, and the images, we’ll get that much closer to a world without Majesty. If I put this record out over the net and lots of people circulate copies, it can continue to multiply even after I reach the afterworld.
At this stage, I can’t know whether or not my wish will be fulfilled. But I’ve had more than enough of the idea that the so-called competition for survival will lead to a world like the fountain of youth – vibrant and passionate. What begins today is not the survival of the fittest, but the demise of the fittest. There are no winners and losers, only a quiet procession. At least that’s what I believe.
I’m heading off to die now. But my death alone won’t stop the world from dying and writhing in agony. I need someone else, another person with whom I can return to death. My passionate desire to disappear all the people, animals, and plants left behind as illusions from the past will not be enough. My own strength is insufficient. I need to enlist the cooperation of another. Any attempt to change the world solo in one fell swoop is, generally speaking, a mistake.
I can do only what is within my range of ability, and hopefully that will be enough to disappear us. I’m sure I could probably bring along three or four people, but if one person can find just one accomplice, I think that’s plenty. If a million of the living dead who remain in this world take the journey with a companion, that will make two million dead. And if two million people become dead, then perhaps the number of sympathizers will increase to four million and even eight million. There’s no way to save the world from suffering over its own duplicity other than by steadily expanding the pool of sympathizers.
I will lead the vanguard and sacrifice myself. If enough of you identify with my dream, we can really bring this world back to what it is truly meant to be. We can extinguish the phony world and return to the real, natural, and authentic world of the dead.
But it’s too soon to say. If there are more people with lingering attachments to this fake world than the like-minded, I’ll probably be labeled a murderer and relegated to the dustbins of obscurity. That’s up to fate.
May my prayers somehow be answered.
This world is the other world, and you should die too, together with someone else.
Shôji Inoue
TWO: THE LOVE SUICIDE ERA
A slight chill works its way through the still hot and humid wind like a single gray strand mixed into a head of black hair, and it’s full speed ahead into winter. This year, that cool air began to blow today, on September 27. I had gone out to Yellow Hell Spring for a bit to gaze at my reflection in the mirror-like surface. The floating reflection of my face on the water quivered as gusts of wind called up waves. It crumbled into bits that spread out across the pond. Shivers ran up and down my spine, and not just because of the touch of winter in the wind. Somewhere in my body I could still hear a voice that wasn’t Miko’s or Inoue’s calling out to me.
That happens every time I go to the spring. I’m not saying I channel spirits there. I don’t get anything useful like an inspiration out of the experience, and nothing
impressive enough to make me a believer. I’ve spent a lot of time out there by the water, trying to resurrect memories of Inoue and Miko, so much so that those memories now live in the water. Whenever I look at the color of the water and smell the water and grass, I feel the presence of Inoue and Miko, like a conditioned response. The real Miko and Inoue didn’t even know about this place, so this series of associations is a product of my own imagination. If at times their presence is comforting to me, there are also times when I’m overwhelmed by a bitter sense of fate. To honor these moments, which have taken on a special meaning for me, I make the fifteen-minute walk from the mountain lodge to the spring almost every day, regardless of what might await me there.
We had so much rain this summer that we might make it until next summer without suffering a drought. There’s also been more water bubbling out of the spring than usual this year, enough to overflow the banks of the mountain stream that continues up to the lodge. Waste not, want not, so we carved out a makeshift tributary to guide the water into an open well for storage. The series of heavy downpours led to more flood damage in the Kantô Desert.
Whose idea was it for water to become such a precious commodity anyway? The abundant freshwater on these islands, which are surrounded by sea and filled with mountains, has all but disappeared in the span of only five years — like rats fleeing a sinking ship. They say that the amount of water reserves has dropped a third of what it was five years ago.
Luckily, our mountain retreat has a number of wells and the spring. So even though our “reservation” on Ascension Pass is isolated, we get by just fine. Of course, it would be a different story if someone poisoned our water. That would pollute the land too, and we’d have a real mess on our hands. I started making my daily pilgrimage to the spring out of a personal desire, but now it involves the added serious purpose of double-checking on the water source. I can’t feel at ease unless I visit the spring at least once a day, no matter what the weather is, and if I have the time to do more than that, I also keep watch on the surroundings through images transmitted from the surveillance cameras. I set the cameras up myself, originally to record minute changes in the water, light, and sound from moment to moment. The equipment is ultra-small like the kind a spy would use, so I doubt anyone will find them.
I’ve spent the past five years peering into Yellow Hell Spring, which glitters like a golden mirror because of all the yellow sand that’s settled at the bottom. I’m reflected on the surface of the water now instead of in Inoue’s camera lens, which once took in light and served as an extension of Inoue himself. When I admire myself like that, or rather when me and I look longingly at each other, I can’t help but remember the unrelenting images of “Mixed Cameras.”
Narcissus fell in love gazing at his own reflection in the water, and he kept staring at himself after he’d been turned into the flower that bears his name. For me, there’s no escape from the images of what happened at the Narcissus Cell in Dormir, the Sleeping Café. What Inoue did to himself and Miko was shot on film from start to finish and left addressed to me. I only watched that film once. It’s recorded and archived inside me, and whenever I look at the Yellow Hell Spring, the images are displayed there before me, as if I were a projector. And like a bewitched Narcissus unable to look away, I’m compelled to keep watching Inoue slide his knife into Miko’s heart and liver and then, while Miko’s blood is spilling, stab himself in the throat, cutting deep through and bursting his carotid artery.
It’s as if I’ve lost track of the passage of time, and the incident is always happening in the moment. Memories have a mind of their own. I’ve probably undergone some significant changes over these past five years, but, for me, each and every second of the present always starts back at square one. Inoue’s document, which you all have just read, is not merely an artifact from the past.
I also sometimes feel as though I was born and raised in this mountain retreat and that people named Inoue and Miko are my imaginary friends and that the incident is also make-believe. Back then, just as it says in Inoue’s document, I thought we were all born clinging to the sense that we were alive. That’s why I thought my heart couldn’t break. I still haven’t changed my mind. However, over the past five years, I’ve been forced to accept a different way of living. And it’s only made me stronger and able to endure more. To borrow Mokuren’s words, maybe I am something of a good-natured and friendly nihilist, but even so, the unleashing of Inoue’s posts over the internet and the anticipation of my own arrest have really taken their toll on me.
As I’m sure you’re aware, it’s against the law to expose others to Inoue’s files. I may already have been arrested by the time you are reading this. Yet once those files are copied onto millions of hard drives all over the world, there will be no way to erase and destroy them. When people start to forget, I wander out into cyberspace to release them once again.
Why would I do something so heroic at this stage? And what’s more, why am I writing a document of my own and linking Inoue’s up to the present like this?
Is it because I want to give new life to Inoue’s final request? Please! There’s no way in hell. If Inoue came back to life and started talking that same shit again, I’d kill him myself.
Do I want to rewrite the curse Inoue put on society in my own words? Maybe I do. But then what use would I have for that long-since forgotten document of his? Wouldn’t the rambling document I’m writing now be more than enough?
Am I sick and tired of having to keep a watchful eye out on the “reservation”? If anything, I’ve been sick and tired of life since I was born. And the actual circumstances here aren’t what you’d call particularly tiring anyway. Visitors to the “reservation” have to go through a strict security check, and we lodgers are few and far between. We’re supposedly psychologically isolated, but those of us who live here are free to come and go as we please. Mokuren and some others are always traveling overseas, we get along well enough with the cops here, and once you’re used to it, every day is nice and quiet. Looking over my shoulder while uploading these files to get the public’s attention takes a lot more out of me.
To be honest, I don’t really know myself. Let’s just say I want to take advantage of the times and leave it at that.
Unlike Inoue, I’m not asking for these files to be circulated and multiplied, or any other kind of chain mail crap. Those who don’t want to read can stop here. If you are irritated, then please close it. And it’s okay with me if you mark the content as harmful and enable a filter. I half-expect browsers themselves will be outlawed.
But for those of you sympathetic readers, I recommend you print and bind it. You can read different things between the lines that way. Reading it out loud on a street corner might be good too. If you are shocked that you’d never heard any of this before, go ahead and ask your history teacher or someone about it. Then you can be a threat to security too. Presto! Doesn’t that make you feel alive? Or else you can keep these secret truths close to your heart and start to feel like you are someone who matters.
The waters of Yellow Hell Spring are still, so the yellow sand settled deep in the bottom looks like it’s pushing up to the surface, which has turned into a golden plate reflecting the atmospheric light. In my eyes, the yellow-hued Narcissus Cell naturally materializes in that golden surface. The underwater room is awash in the yellow rays of indirect light bouncing off the floors and walls and floating like fog. Buried beneath the surface are the three red lip-shaped recliners, the grass eyelashes placed oh so carefully along the edges of the oversized table modeled after an eyeball, the wall-unit laptop and AV panel, and the huge plasma monitors.
Inoue and I got a kick out of that kitschy and artificial interior, and we often met there to nap and chill out after a day of filming. Inoue always said, “When we get together with Mikoto, you have to bring him here. I’ll already be asleep anyway, so all three of us can sleep together. Wouldn’t it be just like us for the first time to start with a nap?” We real
ly did sleep well. We could sense that we existed while we were asleep. I think a lot of other people must have felt the same way, because with the momentum of a single cell organism dividing and reproducing, Sleeping Cafés suddenly started to pop up everywhere in the capital.
But now, the only people asleep inside the Narcissus Cell I see reflected on the yellow screen are Miko and Inoue. I’m not there.
The two of them are arguing, every day a repetition of that day. The document Inoue had worked on until dawn to finish is projected large on the wall monitor. Before uploading it, Inoue wanted Miko to read it and give his consent, but Miko’s response is harsh.
“Don’t let me get in your way. I won’t stop you. But I don’t know about this. I’m just letting it be known that I have reservations.” The only figure visible on film is Miko’s, and he looks directly at the camera while speaking. He wears a light-colored t-shirt, but little else is distinct under the yellow lighting.
“But I learned all this from you. I digested your teachings and just paraphrased. Don’t tell me you’re not sure. You have to fucking get it.” You can’t see Inoue protesting on film, but his deep voice resonates more loudly and clearly than Miko’s, which lets you know he’s close to the mic.
“I just think there’s been some misunderstanding.”
“Didn’t you send me an email last night to say you felt the same way?”
“Actually, I was trying to tell you I felt a disconnect. I think you’re turning His Young Majesty’s intentions upside-down.”
“Fuck His Majesty. I worked hard to understand what you were saying. But you come here and take back everything you said. That’s pretty cowardly, man. What, you just can’t handle the responsibility anymore?”
“No, I’m just not going to take responsibility for something you thought up.” Miko smiles sweetly and moves outside the camera’s line of view.
“Read it! I didn’t twist around your words and dream this up on my own.” Inoue stands up, and the camera appropriately bears down on Miko.
Lonely Hearts Killer Page 9