by Kōji Suzuki
Kensuke couldn’t find out if the story was true by asking Aso. Even if Aso said, ‘I was lying,’ the story wouldn’t just go away. The possibility that Aso’s confessing it was a lie was the real lie would remain forever.
Kensuke tried dialling the number on the calling card that Yukari had given him, and got neither her parents’ home nor her apartment, but rather, a sort of dormitory where the members of her religious cult lived. Kensuke told the feeble voiced woman who took the phone that he wanted to speak to Yukari.
‘She’s not here,’ the woman said, and that was all she said.
Kensuke had expected Yukari to come to the phone without much of a to-do, so this stole his tongue. After a pause, he managed to ask, ‘Where may I find her?’
The woman replied simply, ‘I don’t know.’
‘How long has Yukari been away?’
‘I haven’t seen her face the last couple of weeks.’
When Kensuke asked her for Yukari’s parents’ number, she merely responded with a question of her own: ‘Ms Nakazawa has a home?’ The way she said it made Yukari seem like a vagabond with no family.
‘So she doesn’t have one?’ Kensuke pressed.
‘I wouldn’t know,’ the woman responded unceremoniously.
Kensuke couldn’t tell whether Yukari did in fact have no home or whether the commune had simply been given no information. He put the phone down. All he had been able to confirm was that Yukari had not been back to the dormitory for about two weeks now. The awful thing was that Aso’s story was beginning to show signs of plausibility.
It did occur to him to visit Battery No. 6 and check for himself, but the Tokyo authorities had declared the place off limits. Kensuke was due to take the public employment exam in order to become a teacher, and could not afford to get in trouble with the metropolitan government. Besides, he didn’t have the courage to make a clandestine landing on Battery No. 6 under cover of darkness.
He felt he needed to see Aso again to get to the bottom of the matter. If Aso hadn’t been lying, Kensuke needed to do something before it was too late. He didn’t know what sort of criminal charges accrued from stripping a woman naked and leaving her on Battery No. 6. He figured that if she died of starvation, prosecution was inevitable.
He was thus on the verge of contacting Aso when news came that he had been hospitalized in his alma mater’s affiliate. A chest X-ray had apparently shown a patch on Aso’s lungs. A bronchoscope, and tests, revealed that a particularly virulent form of cancer had claimed most of his body already. His brain was blighted too, and surgery was impossible. Even with some desperate chemotherapy, Aso had only two months or so left to live.
Strangely enough, Kensuke was left unfazed by the news. He closed his eyes and calmly let the fact sink in that the time had come. The happy days that they’d shared sped all in a jumble across his mind’s eye, but the idea that ‘it was unbelievable’ simply didn’t occur to him – only the terrible pity of dying at twenty-three, Kensuke’s own age.
Aso had probably sensed, even before he took the tests, that he didn’t have much time left. And so he’d come that day to say goodbye. Given death as a premise, Aso’s recent behaviour made sense. Just as Aso had seen his own death looming, Kensuke had intuited that his friend’s days were numbered, and had no doubt been bracing for this.
Ten minutes or so after he’d digested the news, Kensuke suddenly began to sob. It wasn’t that he was sad; rather, it was because confusing emotions besieged him deep inside. After crying for some time, he felt an irrepressible desire to go and see Aso. It was Kensuke’s turn to say goodbye.
Kensuke thought he’d chosen a slow time for his visit but, in addition to Aso’s mother, there were a few others gathered there in the private room. Aso lay on the bed, in no condition to carry on a normal conversation. The man who’d come to see Kensuke in a car just a month ago now lay before him hardly able to breathe and wreathed in tubes. The cancer cells that riddled Aso’s body had wrought so dramatic a change in so short a time. His left lung had completely ceased to function; apparently, the end would come when the phlegm accumulated in his windpipe.
Right before he left, Kensuke approached Aso’s pillow, bent low, and asked in a gentle whisper: ‘Was that true, about Battery No. 6?’
Kensuke felt certain Aso wouldn’t tell a lie on his deathbed. If he’d only shaken his head then, Kensuke’s suspicion would have been allayed.
Instead, Aso smiled and nodded.
In disbelief, Kensuke tried again: ‘Are you sure?’
Aso nodded twice in succession. Kensuke thought he saw a look of satisfaction on Aso’s face, but it could have been his imagination.
Placing his hand on Aso’s, Kensuke told him, ‘Hang in there,’ and left the hospital room. No doubt, it would have been more appropriate just to say ‘Goodbye.’ Two days later, Aso was dead at the young age of twenty-three.
5
The assembly point was the lounge of the Dream Island Marina. Sasaki looked quite busy lapping his ice cream. Aside from him and Kensuke, the only one there was a metropolitan official named Naito; the councillors representing Minato Ward had yet to turn up. It was ten minutes past the appointed time of 10:00 a.m. Summer vacation had just begun, and on this weekday morning, many young men and women came to the marina. Whenever a young woman passed by, Sasaki’s face would lift from his ice cream and follow the woman as she walked off. Kensuke poked him in the ribs with his elbow.
‘Leader, it’s disgraceful. At your age.’
‘Don’t "leader" me, okay?’ replied Sasaki wryly.
‘You told me this was going to be a serious expedition.’
‘Leave me alone, will you?’
Kensuke’s sarcastic barbs were having their effect, and Sasaki waved his hand as though to chase away an annoying fly.
‘Making a mountain out of a molehill’ was a saying that existed to describe Sasaki. His trademark impulse to blow things up tenfold had been applied to the Battery No. 6 inspection crew, which in Sasaki’s telling was to consist of the best scientific minds the city could muster. But Kensuke had arrived to find only Sasaki and a city official.
‘Where are the other members?’ the baffled Kensuke had asked, blinking.
Sasaki had given this excuse cringingly: They’re all busy and called in one after another to cancel.’
Naito, the city official, revealed a different story when Kensuke questioned him about the matter. Apparently, just one ward councillor and one city official were required for the inspections, but Sasaki had nagged them persistently to be taken with them. All Sasaki’s talk about having been ‘commissioned by the ward council’ and having ‘organized a survey team’ had been barefaced lies. The truth was that Sasaki had tapped Kensuke so he wouldn’t look too bad just tagging along by himself.
‘Here comes Mr Kano. We’re ready to go.’ Spotting the representative of Minato Ward, Naito rose to his feet. Reflexively, Sasaki and Kensuke also stood up.
Waiting aboard the small cruiser tied up at the wharf were the captain and a single deck hand, also government employees. The team, now six members in all, motored out of Dream Island Marina under the bright summer sun at half past ten and headed for Battery No. 6, which was but a stone’s throw away.
On their way they passed under four bridges. The girders of one of them, so low as to be almost within touching distance, blocked out the rays of the sun for a moment, and the whole weight of the thing seemed to bear down on them. As they passed under the fourth bridge, the Rainbow Bridge came into view and beyond it Battery No. 6. Kensuke recalled how he’d looked down at the island from the Rainbow Bridge’s pedestrian walkway shortly after the bridge’s completion. At the observatory, using the binoculars, he’d peered into the depths of the woods that overgrew the battery. Now, for the first time, he was seeing the island from approximately sea level.
As the profile of the island loomed larger, Kensuke was getting his hopes up. He was finally gaining access to the setting of a
nine-year-old fantasy that had burgeoned and morphed with a will of its own. Battery No. 6, an irregular pentagon with a surface area of about twelve acres and a perimeter of about a third of a mile guarded by a stone wall sixteen feet high, apparently had a freshwater well on it despite its being a manmade island in the middle of the bay. Thinking that with water you could survive, for nine years Kensuke had kept Yukari alive on that walled island. He understood it was a ridiculous notion. Yet he couldn’t discount that bizarre smile of satisfaction Aso had displayed on the threshold of death. Had Aso, his brain invaded by cancer, succumbed to his own lie? Or had he perhaps, hoping for a place to live after death, conflated the image of heaven with the uninhabited island?
Likely expecting to be fed, a large flock of seagulls circled the cruiser. Flying just above the surface, the birds skimmed Battery No. 6 and swept up high over it. As if shaking the gulls loose, the cruiser pulled alongside the landing on Battery No. 6.
6
While Sasaki, meticulously prepared, was armed with camera, video, and sketchbook, Kensuke had brought hardly anything at all except a pair of waterproof boots, which he put on instead of his sneakers prior to landing.
Sasaki hopped onto the wharf and cried, ‘Hasn’t changed a bit!’
Kensuke, surprised, asked him, ‘You mean you’ve been here before?’
‘Only once. Ten years ago, on a survey like this one.’
Ten years ago… mused Kensuke. That was a year before Aso’s death.
‘Look at that.’
Sasaki pointed to a narrow gap in the embankment. Behind it spread a dim space overshadowed by the trees, while in front, where it was practically still the shoreline, what looked like a variety of parsley grew in profusion.
‘Would that be parsley?’
‘It’s angelica. Angelica keiskei. Common on the Izu peninsula and Oshima island. Must have drifted no small distance! It was there ten years ago, too.’
Sasaki expressed admiration for the vitality of the angelica plant, whose seeds had washed ashore from who knew where and taken root and grown with such vigor. Sasaki repeated several times that the most amazing thing about Battery No. 6 was the variety and vitality of the seeds that found their way to it, and that the place was a natural treasure chest well worth investigating precisely because it was off limits to the public.
While Naito and Kano proposed that they first conduct a summary survey by circling the island once along the embankment, Sasaki clearly wanted to head straight into the center. In the end, it was decided that the team should split up into two, and Kensuke chose to accompany Sasaki. The captain and the crewmember were to remain on the wharf. It was also decided that each pair, Kano and Naito touring the perimeter and Sasaki and Kensuke venturing inland, would carry a portable receiver. It wasn’t a large island, with edges only a hundred yards or so long; they’d be heard if they shouted. But they had the receivers and there was no reason not to use them.
‘See you, then.’ Naito and Kano waved to the others and got going, walking along the top of the embankment.
Sasaki and Kensuke stepped through the growth of angelica and headed into the dim interior. Every time Sasaki caught sight of a fascinating specimen of vegetation, he angled his camera, recorded it on video, or drew it in his sketchbook. There wasn’t any plant Kensuke didn’t recognize that Sasaki could not identify; the mentor was indeed proving himself a specialist of the natural sciences. The serious look in his eyes seemed to give lie to his usual jocularity, and Kensuke saw him in a different light again.
The soil, unused to the trample of human feet, was soft, and black liquid oozed out of the humus under their deliberate tread. If not for their boots, their feet would have been soaked completely a good while ago. Even the air was wet. Grasses and trees that were a rare sight in Tokyo thrived here, giving off an eerie odour for some reason and forming a hybrid copse unique to the island. When the sea breeze stirred the treetops, sounds fluttered down all around them, and from time to time Kensuke would not know where he was. He had pretty much forgotten about Yukari. The island was just too different from the site of his fantasies.
The deeper they went, the thicker the gloom – and Sasaki spoke less and less. He wasn’t peering through his camera and video as frequently, either. Facing this way and that, he finally halted.
‘How odd,’ he muttered.
Kensuke, who’d been following Sasaki, also stopped. ‘What’s odd?’ he asked.
Sasaki just let out a sort of grumble and didn’t explain, lost in thought. They both stood still for some time, neither of them uttering a word.
‘Are you all right?’ Kensuke looked concerned as he broke the silence.
‘The clump of angelica back at the landing looked just the same. But the further in we go… something’s odd.’
‘You mean, it’s different than before?’
‘I can’t put my finger on it. Sure doesn’t feel right though.’
Hearing this, Kensuke looked around him nervously. He thought he was getting bad vibes, too. Apparently, back in the ‘20s, Battery No. 6 had been rumoured to be a sort of haunted isle. Just recently, a windsurfer practicing at the Seaside Park had passed from view behind the island and disappeared for good, board and all – or so Kensuke had heard. Recalling such stories, Kensuke didn’t feel too good.
‘Let’s go on, shall we?’ urged Kensuke, intending to muster courage, but his voice trembled somewhat.
‘No one’s supposed to have come here in ten years Sasaki mumbled to himself, as though to confirm the fact, and resumed walking. Naito had told them aboard the cruiser that the Minato Ward Council was participating in the survey for the first time and that there hadn’t been a comprehensive field investigation in ten years.
Kensuke remained silent.
Sasaki stopped again. Looking up, he cried, ‘This forest’s nurturing something!’
‘Why not? Don’t trees always sustain nearby life-forms?’
Sasaki pointed diagonally ahead. ‘That’s a persimmon tree. The one beyond it is a medlar. Last time I was here, there weren’t any fruit-bearers.’
No sooner had he said this than Sasaki started running ahead.
‘Wait!’ cried Kensuke.
But Sasaki only gained speed, and it was all Kensuke could do to keep up. Dripping with sweat, he was about to give up the chase when the view changed suddenly and he found himself in a clearing about thirty feet wide.
The place seemed to be the centre of the island, the woods appearing equally thick on all sides. To the north the Rainbow Bridge towered against the sky. It was jarring to catch sight of a modern structure from the centre of an island that resembled an uninhabited jungle. It was as though the dimensions had come unhinged and Kensuke had wandered into an alien world.
The noonday sun drenched the grassy clearing with its rays. Cicadas chirped loudly. It wasn’t hard for Kensuke to come up with a word to describe the clearing: it was a garden. Tomatoes, eggplants, cucumbers, and other summer vegetables had been planted in a neat configuration. It was impossible now to deny that there was some force at work here other than nature. These vegetables had been planted according to some will for some purpose. This wasn’t a case of seeds washing ashore sprouting naturally on their own. Kensuke and Sasaki looked at each other and verified the impression with each other.
‘Look, over there.’ Sasaki jerked his jaw toward the east end of the clearing. Three slender strips of wood stood atop a mound of earth.
Walking over to take a closer look, they saw that the strips were tablets. Of the ink-lettered characters only two were legible, both of them what you’d expect on a tablet, while the others had completely worn off. What were the tablets doing there? Could they have come drifting to Battery No. 6, too? Why were they staked so firmly into the ground then?
‘What do you think?’ spoke Kensuke.
The mound of earth under the wooden strips suggested only one thing to both men.
Sasaki said it: ‘It’s got to be a g
rave.’
Ants were squirming in columns on the rounded heap of earth. A grave… It just couldn’t be anything else.
Just then, the portable receiver that hung from Kensuke’s shoulder sprang to life.
‘Kano here. Do you read me? Over.’
‘We read you,’ replied Kensuke, his finger on the transmit button.
‘We’ve spotted a small dark figure on the western embankment. It disappeared into the woods and must be heading toward the middle. Please exercise due caution.’
‘What?’
‘It was probably just an animal.’
‘A dog maybe? A cat?’
‘No,’ Kano refuted him without pause.
‘Why are you sure?’
‘We’re not sure. We tried to go after it, but it scrambled into the woods at an amazing speed.’
‘Western side?’
‘Yes.’
‘Roger and out.’ Concluding the transmission, Kensuke looked at Sasaki’s face and awaited his decision.
‘Come.’
Sasaki started walking toward the western woods, where the thing was reported to have vanished, and Kensuke followed closely behind. The two men stopped at the edge of the clearing and, taking care not to make any noise, scouted ahead. They couldn’t hear anything yet, but the thing was coming their way through the thicket right in front of them. Kensuke held his breath and waited for something to appear.
A mosquito hummed annoyingly close to Kensuke’s nose while he waited in a crouch. If he didn’t move at all, he’d be feasted upon where his flesh was exposed. Having to stay in that crouch and make fidgety little movements at the same time was indeed tiring.
The grass in the bush ahead seemed to sway. Soon, the approaching presence became audible through the branches being thrashed away. And then, all of a sudden, a small black thing jumped out at Kensuke.
Before he knew it, he was lying face up on the ground. The impact of something hard striking his jaw from below had almost knocked him out, but his two hands had instinctively caught hold of the thing. A beastly roar went up next to his ear, and an instant later, he felt a searing pain in his arm. He had no idea what was going on. He felt a weight upon him, and when it lifted, he opened his eyes to see against the blinding summer sun a small dark silhouette that was flailing its limbs in Sasaki’s arms. The creature that Sasaki had pulled off him was a boy perhaps seven or eight years old.