At least a dozen of the scrawny creatures stretched in the shade under the stairs or wandered between the house and the side of the road. When Eleanor approached, these wanderers meowed and tried to wind around her ankles.
Stepping between them, she peered at the names on the doors of the first-floor apartments. Most of them were barely decipherable. Takeda, something-guchi, Ikuno, Acupuncture Specialist.
Should she wait for Kazu to arrive? He said he’d ride the delivery motorbike, but it would depend on traffic how long he took. She might as well confirm whether this was the right place or not.
She climbed the iron staircase that probably doubled as a fire escape. Two of the top-floor nameplates were new and not Mari’s. The far apartment’s windows were boarded up, and advertisements clogged the mail slot. The remaining apartment had no nameplate, but she thought she heard voices inside. Three mangy cats bumped their heads against her ankles, meowing plaintively.
She knocked. Whoever was inside must know she was there, from the racket the cats were making. Someone moved behind the closed window next to the door. She knocked again. Should she call out?
Before she could decide, the door opened. Mari stood there, holding a roll of packing tape. She wore jeans and a T-shirt, and looked more relaxed than on Sunday.
“Aunt Eleanor—what are you doing here?” Mari stepped back in surprise.
Eleanor shooed away the cats and stepped in. “I came to see if you were all right.”
“Of course I’m all right,” she said. “Why shouldn’t I be?”
“Your parents can’t contact you, you haven’t called. We were worried.”
There were only two rooms in the apartment, the tiled kitchen and the tatami back room. From where she stood in the entry, Eleanor could see a couple of monitors and a slim, portable hard drive placed directly on the tatami against the wall.
“Who’s that?” said a voice. A young man, no more than twenty, with a dark, arrogant face, emerged from the back room and took the tape from Mari. He stared rudely at Eleanor.
“This is my aunt, the one I told you about.” Mari glanced anxiously at him.
The boy ignored Eleanor after that first stare. “What’s she doing here?” he said to Mari. “I thought you didn’t tell anyone.”
Mari avoided his glare. “I didn’t. Well, only Chee.”
“Good thing we’re leaving then.” He went back into the other room.
“Where are you going now?” said Eleanor. “You need to let your parents know what’s going on. They’re worried sick.”
“Come and get your stuff,” called the boy.
Mari looked at Eleanor, her expression unreadable, then turned and went into the other room.
“They’re not worried,” she said over her shoulder. “They just don’t want the rest of the world to know they failed as parents.”
She knelt in front of a long table and began to put things into a cloth bag—a hairbrush, some books, and a Buddhist rosary. The boy put the hard drive into a cardboard box and began to tape it shut, pulling the tape out with a sharp, tearing noise.
Eleanor felt a flush of irritation. She would have to argue with a stubborn teenager. Where was Kazu? She knelt at the table, too, and dumped her own bag on it.
“Mari, the police have been to your home. They say you might be involved with some pretty strange people. Is this true?”
The boy narrowed his eyes at her. “What did the police say?”
“Do you mind?” Eleanor said coldly. “I’d like to talk to Mari, please.”
He opened his mouth to retort, but Mari reached over and patted his leg. “Taka, please.” She turned back to Eleanor. “Tell them I’m going away with friends.”
“Why don’t you tell them where you’re going?” said Eleanor.
“Because it’s none of their business. It’s none of your business.”
Eleanor looked around the bare apartment. Dust coated the sides of the old tatami, and one of the grime-dark windows had long ago been taped shut.
“What do you really know about these ‘friends’?” she said. “Did you know that four students died? They fooled around with implants. Are you going to do that?”
Mari dropped the bag on the table and the contents spilled out. “Implants?” She turned to Taka. “But you said …”
“It was an accident,” he said. “These are new techniques. She wouldn’t understand.”
“Don’t patronize me,” snapped Eleanor. “I was wiring circuits before you were born.” She leaned closer to Mari. “They failed, and now they’re dead. Do you want to be like them?”
“It’s too late now.” Mari reached up and pulled at her fringe. Her hair came off neatly, leaving her with a wig in one hand. Her shaved skull shone softly. On the side of her head, an implant reflected the light with a colder gleam. It looked like the new compound type, with both retinal and cochlear attachments.
“You see?” Mari was almost pitying. “Mother and Dad wouldn’t understand.”
“Don’t tell her any more.” The boy reached past Eleanor roughly, and pulled Mari up. She fitted her wig and bent down for her bag.
“Sorry, Aunt Eleanor. Say hello to Uncle Masao for me.”
“Wait,” said Eleanor. She had to keep Mari here until Kazu came. “Please don’t go yet.”
“Why, so you can call the police?” sneered Taka.
Eleanor stood up, too. “Her father’s on his way. At least let him see you’re all right,” she appealed to Mari.
“He’s coming to see me?”
Eleanor nodded. “He only wants you to be safe.” She reached for Mari’s hand, willing her to stay.
Taka shoved Eleanor backward. Her foot caught on the table. She lost her balance and fell backward, her head and shoulder hitting the corner of the table with a crack that filled her vision with bright dots and set her ears buzzing.
“Taka!” Mari cried.
“We don’t want parents or cops here.” He went to the kitchen and picked up the box.
Mari’s face blurred in front of Eleanor’s eyes. “Are you okay?”
Eleanor sat up unsteadily. “Don’t go. Please.”
“Mari, hurry up!” Taka called from the doorway.
Mari shook her head. “I have to do this. I know you don’t understand but … Look, when I was little, I used to have this strange dream. I was falling into a huge white nothing that swallowed me out of existence. Then I’d wake up screaming.” She paused, her eyes focused on something not in the room. “I think that’s what dying’s like, and it scares me. If there’s a way not to fall into that nothing, I want to try it.”
“How can I contact you?” called Eleanor.
“You can’t.” She picked up a book that had fallen off the table and slipped it in her bag.
“Mari, come on!” Taka reappeared in the doorway and glared at Eleanor.
“Sorry, Aunt Eleanor. Tell Dad I don’t really think it’s his fault.”
She left without looking back. The door closed, and Eleanor was left alone with the peeling wallpaper and flat, gray screens.
Ishihara frowned at the blank computer screens, willing them to show him something useful. Two forensic teams, one from West Station and one from Taiho Ward, swarmed over the dusty apartment room. McGuire had called him at West Station, and this incident was linked to one of their cases, but the apartment itself was in Taiho Ward territory, which meant ward police got called, too, as courtesy. A couple of their detectives had dropped in at the apartment, then rushed off on another case, leaving the forensic teams and the West Station detectives to get what they could from the empty rooms.
“You looked at the computers, I suppose?” he said.
McGuire raised her eyebrow quizzically. “They’re only monitors, generic hardware available at any retailer. The kids took the hard drive.”
He cleared his throat in embarrassment. “Ah, yes. I meant, if you touched anything we’ll need your fingerprints. For comparison,” he added, seeing
her expression.
“They’re in the Immigration database,” she said.
“I know, but that one’s hard to access.”
“It’s linked to NDN.”
“The police can’t just poke into anyone’s affairs,” he said, stung. The public seemed to think that database was solely for police convenience.
“Not unless we’ve done something wrong?”
“Exactly.” He wondered why she grimaced at his reply.
“Assistant Inspector.” The man next to McGuire, the missing girl’s father, Kazu Kitami, blinked his prominent eyes nervously and held his motorbike helmet in front of him like a shield. “Do you have any idea where my daughter might have gone?”
Ishihara kept his face bland. He hated doing this to people. “We don’t have any information at present.”
Slow footsteps clanged on the iron stairway and Beppu panted into the flat. The man needed to diet.
“No sign of them.” He wiped his upper lip and forehead with an already-soaked handkerchief. “Two constables are doing a house-to-house. Why didn’t you keep them here?” he reproached McGuire.
She glared back. “They’re both bigger and younger than I. What was I supposed to do—lock the door and swallow the key?”
“Aren’t you smarter?” retorted Beppu.
Before McGuire could answer, Ishihara’s phone buzzed. The text message said Prefectural Office detectives were on their way over.
“Are you sure she went willingly?” Kitami asked McGuire. The man looked stunned. It was always difficult for the family to accept that their loved one might want to join the cult; might want to leave them. He still had trouble believing it himself.
“You can go now,” he said gently. “We’ll contact you if we hear anything.”
“Do you need me here?” McGuire said.
“No, we’ve got your statement,” said Ishihara. “The kids didn’t say anything about where they were going, right?”
“No.”
“You mean, they did say something?” said Beppu, puzzled.
“No, I mean they didn’t.” McGuire was puzzled, too.
“Why didn’t you say yes, then?”
“Because they didn’t say anything.” She eyed Beppu warily, then inclined her head in farewell to Ishihara. Kitami bowed low over his helmet.
“Please tell us if you hear anything, Assistant Inspector.”
“We will. Next time, call us earlier,” he said to McGuire.
Her face clouded, and she nodded, unexpectedly contrite. “I will. I’m sorry.”
He was so surprised she should be sensible that he didn’t push the point, and the two of them left. He could hear Kitami’s voice as they walked away, apologizing for not getting there in time to … Nice bloke. He didn’t deserve to lose his daughter like this.
“Bloody gaijin, can’t understand what they mean half the time,” grumbled Beppu.
“Shaddup,” said Ishihara.
The Prefectural Office detectives got there in an amazing twenty minutes. This alone would have convinced Ishihara that the Silver Angels were bigger game than he’d been led to believe.
Which pissed him off in a big way. If he was expected to provide backup for these hotshots, the least they could do was tell him what the stakes were. The old priest Gen hadn’t given him any practical information, although his philosophical rambling was sometimes useful.
Inspector Funo came into the kitchen, peeling off her platex gloves with a frustrated snap.
“We got a statement…” began Beppu.
“Why didn’t you call us earlier?” she interrupted.
“We called you as soon as we confirmed it was genuine,” said Ishihara. He was on solid ground here, playing by the rules.
“And why didn’t you keep the informant here until we came?” Funo wasn’t playing.
“We got a statement,” Beppu said again.
“Inspector, what are we doing here?” Ishihara said politely.
“You’re following orders,” she snapped.
“The information I’ve been given access to,” continued Ishihara, “indicates that all we’ve got is a group of runaways who get off by painting themselves silver and using people’s empty homes. Surely it’s a problem for Missing Persons and Juvenile Crime?”
The western sun turned the light in the closed kitchen to bronze, and it felt like a sauna. Funo patted her upper lip with a neatly folded handkerchief. “It’s classified. I couldn’t tell you if I wanted to.”
“How can we assist PO if we don’t know why we’re doing it?” put in Beppu reasonably.
Funo looked from one to the other. She doesn’t want to do anything without permission in case it affects her career, thought Ishihara in disgust. This is what’s ruining the police force. Lack of initiative.
“At least give us a hint of what we’re after.” Beppu gave Funo his best competent smirk. “It’s not like we’re going to blab about a case in progress. Give us credit for a little professionalism.”
The three of them waited as the forensics team trooped past them and out of the apartment. They sounded like shod elephants on the iron stairs. The apartment seemed very quiet once they’d gone.
“Remember how the four kids got into the Betta?” said Funo finally. “We’re worried they might have a hacking technique that can bypass Betta security.”
“Or they’ve got someone on the inside,” said Ishihara. He still suspected the Betta manager of knowing more than he let on.
“Possibly,” conceded Funo.
“What did you find in those computers?” said Beppu. “The ones the kids were wired to?”
“Enough to worry the experts,” said Funo, then relented. “They found a completely unknown program. Some kind of indoctrination, I’m not sure of the details myself.”
“Computer crime is white-collar work,” said Beppu. “Nothing to do with us.”
“Not anymore.” Funo seemed on firmer ground. “We’re assembling multitasked response units for this kind of crime now. Got to move with the times.”
It made sense. If terrorists and gangs played the stock market to finance weapons, for example, there was no point in the police having two or more departments trying to deal with it.
“This person who called from here,” said Funo. “Any chance it’s a hoax? Or a deliberate attempt to confuse us?”
“No,” said Ishihara. “This same expert gave us an opinion on a different case, quite reliable.”
“We’ll have to talk to him. We should give him a quick-response number to call in case the daughter…”
“Niece,” corrected Ishihara.
“Niece contacts him again.” She put her handkerchief back into her handbag. A square, black box that looked big enough to contain an entire scene-of-crime kit plus folded laser rifle.
“We might even put a tracer in his phone,” she considered, then more enthusiastically. “Has he got a phone implant?”
“No,” said Ishihara.
“Er, it’s a ‘she,’” put in Beppu. “A foreigner.”
Funo’s eyes widened. Ishihara could see the fine, pale line of her corneal enhancement scars under the real line of her eyebrows.
“Well, well. We didn’t think the Angels had any foreign connections.”
“No,” said Ishihara loudly. “The woman is foreign. She has no connection with the Silver Angels except for this niece.”
“All right.” Funo looked at Ishihara speculatively. “Your informant, you handle it. But I still want to do a background check.”
“Do what you like.” Ishihara turned and stomped down the stairs. He’d never get anywhere with her.
At the bottom he halted. McGuire had asked him for help in getting her niece back from the cult. So far he’d done nothing. He needed more information, but to get that, he’d have to use McGuire as a bargaining chip. There was a nice irony there, one he was sure McGuire wouldn’t appreciate.
“Adam first surfaced in 2008.” Inspector Funo placed her
handbag primly on the low table in the tatami mat room. “He didn’t call himself Adam, he was just The Guru. He had a Web site where he posted all sorts of neo-Buddhist mystical proposals for self-enlightenment. Gradually the stuff got more and more over the top, and after three servers banned the site, it disappeared in 2012.”
“What do you mean by ‘over the top’?” Ishihara lit a cigarette, ignoring her disapproving eye. He and Beppu leaned on the peeling wall.
“He predicted a massive plague that would wipe out most of the human race and welcomed this. He actually offered a prize to anyone who could come up with a new disease.”
Beppu snorted. “What was the prize—a posthumous fortune?”
“He offered to tutor the winner in techniques that he claimed would make them invulnerable to any disease.”
“Some kind of out-of-body meditation technique?” said Ishihara, puzzled. “How would that protect you from a plague?”
Funo pursed her lips. “Out-of-body in a way. We’re not sure, but we think he meant some kind of downloading of consciousness.”
“Download? You mean, into a computer?” Beppu grinned. “Who’ll keep the electricity flowing into the computer if everyone’s dead? That’s the trouble with these messiahs, they don’t think things through.”
“We know from this,” Funo raised her voice a little, “that three years ago Adam was involved with advanced digital research. You can see why we were concerned to find that new program.”
It certainly fit in with the four dead children wiring themselves to computers.
“We lost track of him after the Web site was banned,” she said. “But now he seems to have gathered a group of believers, and he’s got private funding from somewhere.”
“Not from the believers,” put in Beppu.
Otherwise, they’d have to register as a religion.
“It all depends on the people close to him, doesn’t it?” said Ishihara. “We’ve all seen this before—charismatic leader, message that gets through to some people, funding that allows them to build places to worship, etc. But unless his second- and third-in-command are willing to carry out dangerous orders, the group is no threat.”
Less Than Human Page 16