The Gate of Sorrows (13 page)

Sashimi was followed by the main course, cold soba noodles with shrimp tempura. The rich aroma of sesame oil rose invitingly to Kotaro’s nostrils. His stomach rumbled.

“Things happening elsewhere in the world will happen here sooner or later. We’ve been saturated with American culture.” Ayuko sighed as she moved their empty dishes to the side.

“That’s why we need to be prepared. But the information we collect could uncover patterns that become self-fulfilling. It’s like two sides of a coin, or chicken and egg. I don’t want to dismiss Sei-chan’s concerns out of hand, but I also think we could end up causing exactly what we’re trying to prevent.”

Kotaro’s stomach rumbled again despite the serious tone of the discussion. He was perspiring with embarrassment. If that weren’t enough, he was also feeling giddy over something he knew was surely trivial. Ayuko was using the familiar “I,”
atashi
, with him. In their few exchanges until now, she had always used
watashi
, the formal first person.

“Don’t you care for tempura?”

“What?” Kotaro was startled from his reverie.

“It’s better when it’s hot.”

“Yes. You’re right. Thank you.”

I’m blushing big time. This is so stupid. What’s happening to me?

Ayuko laughed cheerfully. “Sorry for going on and on about this.” Little laugh lines spread out from the corners of her eyes. Kotaro had never imagined wrinkles could make a woman look so captivating.

“I was actually talking to Sei-chan about this just before I ran into you. Things got kind of heated. He sent me packing,” she added indignantly. “Said he was too busy to talk more about it.”

“I guess you needed to talk to someone.”

“Right. Maybe it’s not fair to you, but just listen anyway. Sei-chan actually laughed and said
I
was the one thinking about it too seriously.” She gracefully inhaled a mouthful of noodles. “Do you know why they’re calling the killer Toe-Cutter Bill?”

Kotaro had wondered about this. The name was already a fixture on the textboards, but he hadn’t found an explanation.

“There’s this novel called
The Silence of the Lambs
. They made a movie out of it.”

“A murder mystery? I’ve never been that interested in mysteries.”

“Really? It’s about a serial killer. Every time he kills a woman—” Ayuko glanced around the room and lowered her voice. “He flays his victims and sews the skins together to make a kind of girl suit. His nickname is Buffalo Bill. That’s how they came up with Toe-Cutter Bill, except this killer is real, and he doesn’t kill women only. I guess it was inevitable.”

That’s not much of a similarity. …

“The villain in the novel was inspired by a real killer, named Ed Gein.” Ayuko looked at Kotaro solemnly. “Toe-Cutter Bill is the nickname of a real killer based on a fictional killer who was based on a real killer. Real incidents give birth to stories. The stories are incorporated into real events, and they snowball. If an observer can grasp the underlying theme of the story, he might be able to predict the killer’s next move.”

Ayuko forgot to keep her voice down as she warmed to her subject. “Serial killers in the United States almost always start out as copycats. First they imitate, then they try to go their model one better—claim more victims, cook up fancier MOs. They’re looking for attention. Without attention they can’t get the satisfaction they crave. If the crimes don’t tell a story, no one will pay attention.

“The whole phenomenon is about acting out a story. To catch a serial killer, professionals look at the crimes he’s committed, deduce motivations and behavior patterns, and build up a profile.”

All Kotaro could do was nod.

“The thing is, the whole profiling thing strikes me as basically unhealthy. Killing is fundamentally
un
healthy, however you look at it. How should I put this—I can’t help feeling that trying to understand something like murder in terms of stories is causing murders that never would’ve happened.” She suddenly clapped a hand over her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” Kotaro stared at her with surprise.

“See? I’m doing it again. Lecturing,” she said in a small voice. “That’s why Sei-chan laughs at me.”

“No, I thought it was really interesting. I never thought of it that way.”

You really did need to talk to someone about it.

Kotaro hesitated. “Is that what you talked about to the media?”

Ayuko took her hand from her eyes and shook her head with surprise. “Not at all. That was something completely different.” She sat up straight in her chair. She was the president of Kumar again. “I want to start something new, but to do that I need investors. I’m just working with the media to generate buzz.”

Kotaro’s skeptical expression prompted her to laugh reassuringly.

“Don’t worry. It doesn’t have anything to do with Kumar. It’s completely separate, just my personal project. I can’t talk about it yet, but I’ll announce it soon.” She was back to the formal first person.

“Oh, look at the time.” She glanced at her watch and signaled to the chef.

“I’m sorry you didn’t have more time to eat.”

“No, it’s okay. The food was great. Thanks for inviting me.”

The manager brought the check. Ayuko handed him her credit card. She signed the slip and turned to Kotaro.

“Seigo told me you’re using our spider software.”

“Yes.”

“Be careful about patrolling too much outside office hours. You should concentrate on your studies.”

“Seigo says the same thing. I’ll be careful.”

“How’s the work? Is it affecting your outlook?”

Kotaro considered carefully before answering. “Until I started this job I never spent much time on the web. I don’t know if what I think is really valid. I’m still a beginner.”

“That’s all right. Tell me.”

“There’s so much information, or maybe knowledge on the web. So much that’s important. But it’s scattered around, like islands.”

Ayuko nodded. “I know what you mean.”

“The rest of the web—the part that’s like the ocean—is for killing time and blowing off steam. Not that it’s all bad, of course.”

Chatting idly with friends. Encountering people who share your interests, but who are so far away that you’d never have had the chance to meet them otherwise. The chance to complain and be comforted, confess your fears and get advice, exchange opinions about your favorite movies and comics, gossip about celebrities and their scandals.

“There’s not much truly useful stuff on the web, and not a lot that’s really dangerous. The web ocean is rough and chaotic, but it’s full of energy. That’s how it seems, anyway.”

“Interesting.” Ayuko smiled. “Do you post on textboards to blow off steam?”

“Oh, no. Seigo’s always reminding us about confidentiality.”

“That’s not what I meant.” Ayuko rested her chin in her hand and looked at him closely. “Some people are really aggressive all the time.”

“You mean they like to pick fights?”

“Not exactly pick fights. Maybe it’s a film you saw or an actor you’re sizing up. What you have to say is right on target, but you put it in an edgy, aggressive way. Everything you say comes out sounding aggressive.”

Kotaro nodded. “I know what you mean. When I was dredging the textboards for BB Island, most of the people posting used this kind of nasty tone.”

“I have friends like that—very straightforward and responsible, good at what they do, good home life. But they get stressed, and they blow off steam by posting aggressive comments on the web. Their web personality is different from their real personality. They keep them separate. They just laugh and say it’s okay to write whatever you can’t say in the real world, no matter how critical or negative it is. That does seem to be one purpose of the Internet for a lot of people.”

Kotaro nodded.

“But I think my friends are wrong. Their posts will never disappear. They think they’re just putting opinions out there. They don’t use real names. They say what they think. They assume no one pays attention for more than a few moments. That’s a big mistake.”

“Most of what goes on the net, stays on the net—somewhere.”

“That’s not what I mean. No matter how carefully they choose their words, whatever they say, the words they use stay inside them. Everything is cumulative. Words don’t ‘disappear.’

“Maybe they post a comment saying a certain actress should just die. They think they’ve blown off steam by criticizing someone no one likes anyway. But those words—’I hope she dies’—stay inside the writer, along with the feeling that it’s acceptable to write things like that. All that negativity accumulates, and someday the weight of it will change the writer.

“That’s what words do. However they’re expressed, there’s no way people can separate their words from themselves. They can’t escape the influence of their own thoughts. They can divide their comments among different handles and successfully hide their identity, but they can’t hide from themselves. They know who they are. You can’t run from yourself.”

Mom would say, “What goes around, comes around.”

“So be careful, Kotaro. If the real world is stressing you out, deal with your stress in the real world, no matter how dumb you think it makes you look. Okay?”

“I’ll remember,” said Kotaro.

A day that began like any other had ended amazingly. It had been wonderful, but it had also left Kotaro feeling exhausted. He punched his ID code and departure time into the clock. It was just past eleven, and it was all he could do to suppress a giant yawn.

Somehow his dinner with Ayuko had left him feeling hungry for more. He headed for the lounge to pick up something from the vending machines and found Kenji at a table by the wall, scarfing instant ramen out of a Styrofoam cup.

“Hey Kotaro. Working late?”

“Just getting off. How about you?”

“Graveyard shift. I’m not off till morning.”

Kotaro bought a can of coffee and sat down across from Kenji, who started talking about the day’s visit from the media. The camera crew had also visited School Island, and the reporter from the TV station had been quite hot.

After rambling on for a bit, Kenji asked, “By the way, how’s that problem of yours?”

“Thanks for the advice. I’m starting to understand what’s going on, but I’m still in the dark about some things.” Kotaro gave him a brief rundown.

“I see. So it was all about matters of the heart,” Kenji said solemnly. “Hopefully the whole thing will die down naturally.” He noticed Kotaro’s look of unease. “But you don’t seem satisfied.”

“It keeps bugging me.”

“These problems are never cut-and-dried,” Kenji agreed. Then, almost as if to himself: “Sometimes they just get worse.”

“I saw some statistics that say 49 percent of middle school students have smartphones,” he continued. “The figure for high school students is 98 percent, but no one’s teaching them net literacy. It’s scary to think about the future.”

“That’s the second time I’ve heard that today.”

Kenji laughed. “Then I’ll leave it at that.” He stood his chopsticks in the empty cup. “Listen, do you know much about the area along the Seibu-Shinjuku commuter line?”

Kotaro stared at him uncomprehendingly. “Why?”

“Well … I mean, I’m not from Tokyo.” Kotaro remembered that Kenji’s hometown faced the Sea of Japan.

“Google Street View doesn’t give you a good feel for the environment in a city like Tokyo, even though the area along the Seibu-Shinjuku is mostly residential.”

“It’s a lot more urban and busier than where I live,” said Kotaro. “There’s a large student population, too.”

Kenji nodded. “One of the cases I’m handling for the island involves middle school kids attacking homeless people. Maybe they think it’s fun, or maybe they’re just bored. These kids go out in groups of a few members to a whole gang, attacking homeless people. Sometimes they injure them. Sometimes the victims die. The police have investigated dozens of incidents. Newspapers run articles now and then. Sometimes even elementary school kids are involved. It makes you wonder what the world is coming to.”

“I know.”

“A lot of these idiots are active members of the net society. They keep in close touch, share information and try to top each other. Sometimes they upload videos of their attacks.” Kenji sounded truly disgusted. “These attacks are a big part of our work with the Hotline Center.”

Several years earlier, the National Police Agency had launched an Internet Hotline Center. Citizens could call with information about illegal or dangerous web content. The Center would notify local police and work with Internet providers to remove the offending content. In effect, the Center was Japan’s highest-level cyber patrol. Sometimes the Center also subcontracted patrol work to companies like Kumar, which bid for one-year contracts. The year before last, Kumar had been awarded one of those contracts.

Kotaro hoped Kumar would win another contract while he was working there. He knew it wouldn’t affect his day-to-day work, and corporate consulting contracts were much more profitable, but working for the NPA sounded cool.

“I’ve been monitoring this for a while,” Kenji said. “Sometimes the kids just make fun of the homeless, or kick down their cardboard shelters. Steal their stuff. But you never know when things will escalate. They have a way of egging each other on, on the textboards.”