January 4th, 2044
4:30 PM
Central Ward
Sunset District
Senior Inspector Asahi Takeyoshi
Takeyoshi, strode in the shadow of an enormous skyscraper, his hands shoved into the pockets of the green jacket he wore over his black Bureau uniform. The wind whipped at his messy dark hair, but the Inspector was wrapped in an invisible curtain of Negativity that made the rain fall around him. The Inspector didn’t move with any haste; it was clear to him that situation was already resolved regardless of what he did at this point.
The rain poured down on the Heights, that cluster of spiral argent towers that dotted the northern reaches of Sunset. Fingers of smoke poured from the side of Tower 5, though the dark cloud was swiftly dispersed by the howling wind and rain. The skybridge that once connected Tower 5 to its nearest neighbor had fallen to pieces and collapsed into the streets below, becoming a slag heap of metal and glass. It was there, in the ruins, Takeyoshi found Shin.
The young man had seated himself on a broken and scorched chunk of the metal rails that had fallen to the earth. His elbows were on his knees and his posture was hunched, directing his eyes down towards the ground to stare at the space between his feet. The young man’s Omen was still in the form of a black claymore, which was speared into the concrete some fight feet away from the Deputy, who didn’t seem keen to even look at the weapon. Laying on the ground with the sword driven through its skull was what remained of a human body.
“Sloppy,” Takeyoshi shook his head, looking at the tortured remains of the Casualty. The dismembered body sparked as drops of rain struck it, and it spasmed in its death throes, but the voice in Takeyoshi’s head was silent, telling him that the corpse posed no threat. Shin had done the job; his sword had pierced the Human Calamity’s brain, though he’d seemingly torn the creature limb from limb first, with no regard for his own safety, or mercy for the Casualty itself.
Looking down at the young man, nothing needed to be said for Takeyoshi to know what the young man was going through. He’d taken his first life; even in the clearest life and death situations where lethal force was justified, the act of killing was something that could scar the survivor for the rest of their life. To an Inspector, who was forced to deal with death on a daily basis, the act of taking the lives of Casualties took a heavy toll. He’d seen how it affected other Inspectors; hell, he lived that life himself.
“If you’d just retreated instead of charging into the building, things would be different now,” Takeyoshi silently admonished the young man. “I was kind of hoping to keep you from having to get your hands dirty for a while. Honestly, making your first kill on the first day has got to be some kind of bad omen.”
The young man stood up as his mentor drew closer, and Takeyoshi found himself looking into the younger man’s green eyes. There was a confusion in the Deputy’s features; a sense of being lost. Takeyoshi looked back, fixing the younger man with his most disapproving glare, but he didn’t say anything. There would be a time for upbraiding him later.
Reluctantly, Shin stood, brushing his slick blond hair out of his eyes as he rose. He crossed towards the sword, then reached his hand out towards the hilt of his weapon. He hesitated for a moment as Fubuki Kamui twitched again in her death throes, and electricity cracked from her corpse. His hand shaking, Shin wrapped his fingers around the weapon and withdrew it. No sooner than he held the weapon up, than it released a shower of digital sparks and returned to the shape of a phone. The small black device produced a flaming eye which peered at Shin impassively, but the AI within the phone said nothing.
Takeyoshi withdrew Ink from inside his coat pocket, and he tapped the screen. The AI within interpreted his gesture, and from down the street behind him, Takeyoshi heard the roar of an engine. The Survivalist taxied down the street, moving with rare restraint towards the pair of Inspectors. The Bureau’s jet-black vehicle was soon joined by a parade of white and red emergency vehicles, their lights and horns blaring.
Takeyoshi directed the Survivalist to park itself alongside the street, giving space for the Civil Services to cordon off the wreckage of the collapsed skybridge. He stepped to the side, moving to lean against the passenger side door of the Survivalist, while Shin followed suit, seating himself on the hood of the vehicle. The white-clad members of the Civil Services picked over the rubble, setting up holographic barriers to create a boundary around the collapsed railing. A number of EMTs dressed in protective suits circled the blackened and charred remains of Fubuki Kamui, looking at the cadaver with professionally disguised confusion and revulsion. Seeing the EMTs begin to extract the body of the Human Calamity from the debris, Takeyoshi drew Ink out again.
“Ink,” Takeyoshi spoke as he held the dark grey Omen to his mouth. “Radio HQ; tell them we need a hearse out here to pick up the remains of a Casualty. Civil Services is going to have it bagged up for them by the time they arrive.”
“Roger,” came the feminine voice of Ink.
With that, Takeyoshi tucked Ink back away into his pocket, and returned to watching the Civil Services go about their business. There was no need for the Inspectors to linger; the Casualty had been eliminated, and the Forecasters hadn’t contacted them about any further potential emergencies. All Takeyoshi needed to do was summarized the day’s events into a mostly fictional incident report, and the death of Fubuki Kamui would become nothing more than a record in the Bureau’s database, destined to be forgotten. The only person who would likely remember today was Shin, who stared sullenly at the scene. For his sake, Takeyoshi stood silently next to him, giving them young man time to process everything.
“Are they demons?” Shin broke the silence, and the question he asked caught the seasoned Inspector off-guard, but he quickly found himself following Shin’s train of thought.
“No,” Takeyoshi answered quietly, knowing the mental struggle his trainee was wrestling with.
“Tell me they aren’t human,” Shin looked back down at the ground for a moment, before looking back up to watch the oddly shaped body bag carrying Fubuki’s remains being placed onto a stretcher. “Tell me there’s a reason for all of this. Tell me it’s aliens, or a military experiment gone wrong. Anything.”
“Anything to avoid the fact that we’re the same?” Takeyoshi cut to the heart of the matter. Shin hung his head again and placed his hands against his knees. He looked like he was bracing himself to be whipped.
“How is that possible?” Shin questioned.
“Hazard Energy,” Takeyoshi looked up into the sky, holding his gloved left hand up to catch a few raindrops on his palm. “It’s a hell of a thing. Makes the impossible possible. But Hazard Energy has a way of seeping into everything. The air. The ground. Buildings. And, of course, human beings.
“Normally, its benign,” Takeyoshi cocked his head to one side as he reconsidered. “I mean, you generally don’t notice it. Build up too many positive or negative Hazard Particles and it can really take you for a spin, but in most cases, people never realize what effect it’s having.
“But when Hazard Energy builds up in the brain, well, that’s when things get dicey,” Takeyoshi folded his arms. “The brain becomes a powder keg, waiting for the right conditions to become lit.”
“What conditions?” Shin looked up, his face pensive.
“Fear. Anxiety. Exigency,” Takeyoshi tapped his right temple with a finger to enunciate his point. “Hazard Energy gathers in the amygdala and when it gets excited, the energy surges through the brain and lights it up like a Christmas Tree. In that moment, an ordinary human becomes a walking calamity.”
“But why don’t Casualties look human anymore?” Shin pressed. “Why do they change? Why do they lose control?”
“It all depends on the brain,” the Inspector leaned over and poked the deputy on the forehead. “A human being that has been through trauma or has that natural ‘it’ factor can more easily adapt to the energy flowing through the brain and harness it. The amygdala transforms, becoming kind of a regulator called a ‘Dharma.’ But if the brain isn’t resilient enough, not adaptive enough, well, then the flow of energy causes it to mutate and deform. The Hazard Energy spreads down to the rest of the body, changing it as well. The original mind tends to get lost in the shuffle; I’m told.
“Casualties have a different kind of brain structure called an ‘Adharma.’ The Adharma is a natural processor of Hazard Energy and that’s all it wants: more energy. And the fastest way to get what they crave is through burning the world down around them.”
“But why did I become a Survivor and that woman didn’t? What makes us special?” Shin demanded, trying to find a refuge of reason in a meaningless universe.
“It’s not about us being special, or privileged,” Takeyoshi corrected the young man’s thinking. “It’s not even about being strong or weak. It’s about whether or not it’s in you to endure a crisis in the moment. Some of the strongest people you’ll ever meet can collapse in the face of the unexpected, and sometimes pressure can turn the weakest person into a diamond. You can’t predict it, Shin, and you can’t find a reason for it. You can only deal with each crisis as it comes.”
“I just can’t wrap my head around it,” Shin shook his head, clearly still troubled.
“Alright, you got me,” Takeyoshi spread his hands and smiled faintly. “You were right the first time: they are aliens.”
Shin allowed himself a quiet chuckle. For a brief moment, silence returned between them, both men not knowing exactly what to say.
“I screwed up,” Shin announced, abruptly. “I know I shouldn’t have gone on ahead, but at the same time, I. . .”
“Look, kid,” Takeyoshi began before he was even certain what he wanted to say. “I know you thought you were doing the right thing. And maybe you were, but you need to listen. The rules are in place for a reason, and the first day on the job is definitely not the time to start testing boundaries. If I can’t trust you to follow protocol or do as I say, when I say it, then we can never function as a team. Do you understand?”
Even though he was the one saying it, Takeyoshi wasn’t entirely sure what he was trying to communicate. Was he taking accountability for what happened or assigning blame? Was he admitting that Shin had been right or admonishing him for his actions? He couldn’t decide exactly what he needed to say. Why was this so hard?
“I understand,” Shin agreed, solemnly, and Takeyoshi thought they had come to an understanding, but Shin stared into the distance, and his eyes hardened. “But I’m not sorry for what I did.”
“You nearly died up there, kid,” Takeyoshi reminded him, but Shin shook his head.
“Maybe so,” the young man agreed, his voice grim. “But other people did die. She was only a Casualty for a few minutes, and innocent people got caught up in the situation. I can’t sit by and let that happen again.”
“And what happens the next time you pull this shit and get yourself stuck in another situation you can’t handle?” Takeyoshi asked, growing confrontational. “You got lucky today, Shin; twice if we count that situation this morning. Trust me, that luck is going to run out.”
“So, you just want me to shut up and sit on the sidelines?” Shin asked, and he looked back toward Tower 5, gesturing at it with one hand.
“Yes,” Takeyoshi answered without batting an eye. “If that’s what I tell you to do, then you do it. Do you remember what I asked you this morning?”
“About why I’m here?” Shin answered, a feistiness in his voice.
“Keep that in mind,” Takeyoshi pressured him. “There’s a reason for you being here, and it’s not about playing hero. That needs to be your motivator right now, not being a good Samaritan.”
“I’m not going to close my eyes and cover my ears when people need my help,” Shin protested, raising his voice. “That’s not who I am!”
“It’s what you’re being told to do!” the Senior Inspector shot back, trying desperately to impart some sense of reason into the younger man’s head. “Do you have a death wish? Is that it?”
“No!” Shin insisted. “This isn’t about me!”
“Do you have family, Shin?” Takeyoshi changed tactics, trying to appeal to the young man’s emotions. “Are there people who care about you? Have you spared a single thought for them? What are they going to do when you get yourself killed running headlong into danger.”
“The people I love wouldn’t be proud of me if they knew I let someone else get hurt because I was too scared to fight,” Shin spoke solemnly as he drew himself to his feet. “And if I learned that my brother or sister was left to die because an Inspector refused to save them, I’d never forgive them.”
It was a rare moment in Takeyoshi’s life when the journalist found himself at a loss for words. What was he supposed to say to that? Takeyoshi had encountered Inspectors of all different sorts during his tenure with the Bureau, but none of them were quite as motivated in the same way Shin was. He wasn’t trying to be a hero or chasing a high.
Shin was motivated purely by a sense of moral obligation. As long as single person was in peril, Shin wasn’t going to sit idle, regardless of the risks to himself. That kind of zealous drive couldn’t be reasoned with; as long as the young man thought that he was acting in service to his own moral code, he couldn’t be dissuaded. Anyone so fanatic about their beliefs was dangerous, and Shin was most dangerous to himself.
Takeyoshi ground his teeth together. He was angry. The feeling surprised him. This kid, this child, was running headlong into a tragedy, whether he knew it or not. Sooner or later, someone had to knock him on his ass and teach him what life was really like, and the universe had picked Takeyoshi to do the deed. He held up one hand, pointing accusingly at Shin and opened his mouth to say something, but at that precise moment, he felt his Omen beginning to ring in his pocket.
“Listen—,” Takeyoshi’s momentum was interrupted and he pulled his Omen out of his jacket, glancing between it and Shin. The small grey Omen displayed a green holographic screen with words written in white text that spelled a name: “Kazuma Iori.” Takeyoshi’s breath caught at the name, and he stared at the incoming call with a sense of disbelief.
“What is it?” Shin asked, his mentor’s confusion was obvious.
“Nothing,” Takeyoshi immediately waved the young man off, the high emotions of their conversation forgotten in the span of a moment. “Just wait in the car.”
He turned his back on Shin and strode away as the Omen rang, trying to make sure he was far enough away from his deputy so that the conversation wasn’t overheard. He gave Shin one last glance, making sure the young man was staying put, before he turned away and tapped the screen, raising the phone to his ear.
“This is Inspector Asahi,” Takeyoshi announced, speaking in a low voice.
“Inspector Asahi, it’s me,” came the voice of a young man from the other end of the line. The speaker sounded furtive, and nervous, and he was also speaking softly, as if he was afraid of someone listening. “Do you remember?”
“Iori-san?” Takeyoshi kept his tone neutral. “What is it?”
“It’s been a while,” the caller tried to seem conversational, but he couldn’t hide how awkward he felt. “I honestly wasn’t sure whether or not to call you.”
“But you did,” Takeyoshi observed curtly, his patience quickly running thin. “What happened?”
“Well, it’s about Jinta,” Iori admitted, sounding as though he was coming out with a dirty secret.
“Have you heard from him?” Takeyoshi asked, his voice a razor-sharp whisper.
“That’s the thing. . .,” Iori struggled to speak.
“Did he contact you?” Takeyoshi demanded, his entire body tensing up.
“He called me,” Iori answered, sounding as though he was tensing up with the expectation being hit.
“He called you!?” the Inspector demanded, nearly shouting into the phone. He glanced around through the falling rain, making sure he hadn’t attracted any attention with his outburst. “When?”
“Well, the first time was last week—,”
“The first time?” Takeyoshi sputtered, but Iori went on.
“And he’s called me a couple of times since then,” the other man continued to confess.
The once and future journalist was left momentarily wordless for the second time that day, so angry and disbelieving that he couldn’t form a sentence. His teeth ground together, and his lips pulled back into a snarl of raw anger. He wanted to start screaming through the phone at the man on the other side, but he struggled to restrain his temper. Kazuma Iori was by no means obligated to help him, and right now, Takeyoshi couldn’t afford to burn any bridges.
“You spoke to him?” as much as he wanted to lay into Iori for not calling him immediately, that wasn’t what was important. Tanaka Jinta had finally come up for air after months of hiding. But why? Takeyoshi needed to know.
“The first couple times, he just called, but I didn’t answer,” Iori admitted, sheepishly. “I thought it was just a glitch in the system or something. I told myself that there was no way he was really calling me.”
“And?” Takeyoshi prompted the young man to continue, eager to tear through the young man’s hesitation to get to what he really wanted to hear. “You did eventually pick up, didn’t you?”
“I did,” the admission was quiet, and barely audible.
“What did he say?” the Inspector pressed, growing more and more irritated.
“He was just. . . Jinta,” Iori seemed to be at a loss as to how to express himself. “We just talked about better times. About the Bank. About Megumi. He was just himself.”
The irony of Iori’s statement forced Takeyoshi to scoff bitterly. He was just “Jinta?” That wasn’t true, no matter how much the man calling Iori made it seem.
“When was the last time he called you?” More concerned about discerning his enemy’s motives than Iori’s feelings, Takeyoshi continued to pump him for information.
“Today,” the answer made Takeyoshi’s heart race.
“What did he say?” the journalist in him came to the fore, though Takeyoshi wasn’t motivated by a desire for the truth. “Be specific: did he mention where he was staying? What about names: did he mention anyone you know in common?”
“I don’t really remember,” Iori sounded like he was wavering, torn between respecting Takeyoshi’s authority and whatever obligation he thought he owed the man pretending to be his friend. “He sounded tired; I’ve never heard him sounding so depressed, and I. . .”
Takeyoshi ground his teeth, ignoring the pain in Iori’s voice. “Jinta” was well versed in covering his tracks; evidently, he’d been very careful in speaking with Iori to avoid letting any hints about his whereabouts slide into the conversation, but that left Takeyoshi with another question. Why contact Iori in the first place?
Jinta had to know that all of his former friends and associates were being watched for any sign of him contacting them. The fact that he withheld information from Iori spoke volumes about how cautious he was being, but what was he hoping to gain from even reaching out? Was it desperation, or was there something he thought Iori could give him?
“Did he ask you for anything?” Takeyoshi’s question seemed to catch Iori off-guard.
“What? No,” the way Iori answered told Takeyoshi everything. The Inspector lapsed into silence for a moment, considering his next choice of action. Whatever play Jinta was hoping to make, Takeyoshi knew that if he pushed back too strongly, then he risked scaring his quarry back into hiding. He had to be careful.
“The next time Jinta calls you, don’t answer,” Takeyoshi advised him. “Don’t talk to him anymore. Don’t text him. If you see him, avoid him. Does he know where you live?”
“Of course he does,” Iori scoffed, sounding almost insulted by the question. “We’ve been friends for years.”
“You should find somewhere else to stay,” despite the severity of his words, Takeyoshi could only wonder if the young man would listen to him. “Leave the house for at least a month. Don’t tell anyone where you’re going.”
“Come on!” Iori sighed over the phone, his voice filled with exasperation. “You can’t be serious! I have a life to live! I can’t just pull up stakes and disappear! I don’t have the money for that!”
“You have no idea what you’re dealing with, Iori-san; the man we’re talking about is too dangerous to be put into words.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Iori seemed to deflate again, his voice losing all its strength. “I’ve known Jinta for years; he’s not some kind of monster.”
Jinta was half-right: Tanaka Jinta had been an ordinary person. The man that now went by that name, the man that had called Iori, however, was the worst kind of Human Calamity.
“Remember what I told you,” Takeyoshi could only hope that Iori would appreciate the gravity of his words. “Whatever happens, how ever often he tries to contact you, do not speak with Jinta again. If you see him, go to the police. Never, under any circumstances, allow yourself to be alone with him. Do you understand?”
Iori didn’t answer, and Takeyoshi sensed that the other man had precious little to say. The conversation had run its course, and Takeyoshi needed to turn his attention to more important things. Namely, trying to pin down Jinta now that he was coming up for air.
“Look, I have to go,” Takeyoshi was curt with his informant; Iori had played his part, however late he was with the information. The next move was Takeyoshi’s, and he felt a surge of adrenaline telling him to plunge forward. “Remember what I told you.”
Takeyoshi hung up the call and turned about, looking back towards the car, but not really seeing. His mind was occupied, already racing through different scenarios. He needed to try and pump Jinta’s other associates for more information on the off-chance he’d tried to contact them as well. He also had to consider trying to discretely protect Iori, just in case Jinta had homed in on him as a future victim. So distracted was he by his various thoughts, that he didn’t realize that Shin wasn’t where he’d left him.
The young man was no longer sitting near the Survivalist. Stepping towards the car, Takeyoshi bent down, trying to peer through the windows to see if the young man was waiting inside as he was told, but he knew he was bound to be disappointed. In the distance, Takeyoshi heard the sound of raised voices, a clamor he’d been ignoring during his phone call, but it demanded his attention now. He whipped around and caught sight of Shin striding away through the downpour, headed back toward the Tower entrance and the lineup of emergency vehicles.
There was a man dressed in a dark business suit with a long brown trench coat standing outside the tower doors. He stood arguing with one of the firefighters, who held up a hand to silently refuse the man entry into the building. Whoever the newcomer was, his voice carried across the street and through the rain, though his exact words became faint and hard to understand at a distance. Shin was making a beeline toward the two men, evidently dead set on intervening.
“Shin!” Takeyoshi called out, trying to get the younger man’s attention, but his trainee kept on walking. The Senior Inspector hastened after him, but it was clear he wasn’t going to reach Shin before he butted into the situation that was unfolding.
“You can’t do this!” the man in the trenchcoat spat, his voice filled with outrage. “I’m a taxpayer and a resident of this Tower! I demand you let me inside!”
Getting a better look at the newcomer as Takeyoshi approached, he appeared to be a man in his early twenties, judging by his face. The newcomer reached into his coat as it whipped in the wind and pulled out a leather wallet. He opened it up and held it in the face of the Civil fireman, for all the good it did.
“I’m sorry sir, but access into and out of the Tower is suspended until we’ve made a complete survey of the damages,” the fireman replied from behind his heavy mask. “You’ll be notified as soon as we’re done.”
“I’m not just going to sit out here!” the man continued to protest. “I work directly for the Cabinet! I can have your supervisor down here in the next ten minutes with one phone call!”
“He’ll tell you exactly what I’ve told you, sir,” the firefighter replied, having the patience of a saint. “No one gets in or out until our survey is complete.”
“My wife is still in there!” the young politician pointed up toward the building. “I have every right to—!”
“Fubuki Kamiya?” Shin stopped two paces away from the disgruntled new arrival and the man in the trench coat turned to face Shin. The rain poured down young Fubuki Kamiya’s features and Takeyoshi saw there was palpable fear in his eyes. Kamiya beheld Shin as though he were an embodiment of death itself, despite the relaxed and meek posture the young Inspector had adopted.
“Yes?” Kamiya answered, his voice shaking with apprehension.
“I’m afraid your wife has fallen victim to an unforeseen calamity,” Shin bowed, holding his hands out toward Kamiya, a cracked and blackened ID held in his grip. Kamiya reached out toward the small card, his hands shaking as he stared at it. He almost pulled back, as though he were afraid to take it. Eventually, his quivering fingers plucked the small card from Shin’s hands, and he held it up to his face. At once, his face contorted with agony, and his breathing became ragged.
“Where is she?” Kamiya demanded, trying and failing to control his breaking voice. “Can I see her?”
“Your wife’s remains are within Bureau custody,” Shin answered, his voice soft and understanding even as he recited the standard answer. “Once we’ve finished our final examination, her remains will be cremated and you’ll be notified when you can retrieve them.”
“I can’t even—!” the man stuttered, holding the picture of his wife up to his face. “I can’t even say goodbye.”
He held a hand to his mouth as tears began to flow, mingling with the raindrops on his face. His mouth contorted into a toothy rictus as his shoulders began to shake, his entire body soon wracked with sobs.
“I should’ve—, I should’ve been here!”
Kamiya collapsed to his knees, splashing onto the asphalt as he wept, the unbearable realization that his entire life had been destroyed in the space of a few minutes bearing down on him. As he cried out in his grief, Shin looked down at him with sympathy, clearly lost as to what to do past the Bureau SOP. The Deputy Inspector opened his mouth to say something, but Takeyoshi placed a firm hand on his shoulder, silently urging the younger man to keep his peace. No combination of words, no elegant prose, no heartfelt utterance could soothe the pain of a man that just learned the woman he loved was dead.
“There are a lot of hardships that come with being an Inspector,” Takeyoshi observed as the rain fell down around them. “But this is probably the hardest part.”
January 4th, 2044
08:15 PM
Central Ward
Lunar District
Deputy Inspector Atarashi Shin
The rest of the day after the events in the Heights was uneventful and awkwardly silent. Neither Takeyoshi nor Shin had much to say to one another after their argument at the Heights; Shin was emotionally drained from his battle with Fubuki, and seeing her husband in the aftermath only served to put a painful seal on the event. Takeyoshi, for his part, barely seemed to remember that Shin existed. He spent the rest of the shift constantly finding excuses to pull the car over so he could make private phone calls. That was fine with Shin; he didn’t want to spend more time in the car with Takeyoshi than he needed to. Fortunately, the rest of the dreary day passed without further incident, and the end of the twelve-hour shift mercifully came.
Shin leaned his head against the passenger side window as Takeyoshi sat behind the wheel. The young man stared out at the city, watching as the rain continued to fall through the night. The meager sun had long since fallen, leaving Yōgai-shima to be lit by a sea of lights from its thousands of buildings that clustered together in the darkness. The Survivalist headed south towards the Lunar District, joining the endless flow of traffic heading into the Bureau’s private sanctuary.
The line of cars moved in a staccato fashion, stopping and starting unpredictably. The Eclipse Tower rose in the distance, illuminated day and night by the lights that shined up from the base of the building. The black wall that surrounded the entire district was nothing more than a tenebrous silhouette in the night, whose outline could only be seen by the glare of headlights and lamps mounted on the walls.
The line of cars was made up of vehicles of every shape and sort, many of them automated trucks delivering supplies. Occasionally, Shin could see the shape of other Survivalists in among the queue ahead of them. Takeyoshi sat patiently behind the wheel of the car, saying nothing, although Shin noticed that his mentor was yawning every thirty seconds or so. Every few seconds, Shin would glance away from the window and look towards Takeyoshi from the corner of his eye, checking to make sure his sleep deprived senior wasn’t falling asleep at the wheel.
Eventually, after what felt like a small eternity, the car began to move forward again, and a lane opened on the right for the Bureau’s vehicles that allowed them to quickly break from the congested traffic and bypass the checkpoint. The vehicles of the Inspectors swiftly broke away and sped towards the black walls of the checkpoint. Ahead of Shin and Takeyoshi were two more Survivalists, one a cherry red color, the other the same polished black, but with a massive cleaver strapped to the back. As the red Survivalist augured towards the black walls around the Shadow District, a sensor detected their approach and a retractable gate slid open, allowing the Inspectors in past the checkpoint.
The parade of Inspectors rejoined the traffic on the other side of the wall, smoothly merging into the faster flow beyond the chokepoint. The two Survivalists plunged ahead, making a beeline for the ramp on the right side of the road that led into the garage beneath the Eclipse Tower, but Takeyoshi brought their car up to the side of the street and put it in park. Shin looked at Takeyoshi, not understanding why they were stopping, but Takeyoshi continued to stare out the windshield without making eye contact.
“I’m gonna be taking the car,” Takeyoshi explained before Shin, stifling a yawn with the back of one hand. “You can get out here.”
“Yeah,” Shin accepted the curt handoff without complaint, popping the passenger side door open before climbing out into the rain. He stepped onto the wet cement and took hold of the car door as he turned around, preparing to slam it shut behind him. He paused for a moment, holding the door open as Takeyoshi finally glanced in his direction. It felt like there was something unsaid between the two of them, and Shin had an urge to speak, but he didn’t know what he really wanted to say.
Takeyoshi didn’t say anything either, breaking eye contact with disinterest, not even asking why Shin was leaving the door open. The chance to extend some kind of olive branch vanished in the space of a second, and Shin stood dumbly holding the door open for another second before he swung it shut. Barely a moment passed before Takeyoshi hit the gas, and the Survivalist continued down the street, merging back with the flow of traffic to leave Shin and the Eclipse Tower behind. Shin watched his mentor leave with a sense of defeat and reluctantly stepped out of the street and into the sidewalk beneath the Eclipse Tower. He stared up at the monolithic structure through the pouring rain, looking at the symbol of the Bureau with dampened spirits.
“Same time tomorrow, huh?” Shin remarked with a wry smile.
He walked down the street, his hands in his pockets, letting the rain cascade down on his head and shoulders. He turned into the sloping tunnel that led down into the garage, ignoring his surroundings as he strode through the concrete hollow. He was lost in his thoughts as he called the elevator and then descended to the below ground tunnel that connected the Eclipse Tower with the Dormitories.
It was a strange and automatic process that guided Shin to return to his sleeping quarters; he didn’t really want to just go home and go to bed, but the year he spent in the Academy had instilled in him a mentality that he wasn’t allowed to have time to himself. He’d spent that entire year either working or resting, and the realization that he was now able to spend his free time however he chose hadn’t sunken in yet. He wasn’t just an academy recruit anymore: he was an Inspector, now.
Shin let the automatic walkway carry him through the tunnel, watching the luminescent signboards with a blasé expression as they cycled through pictures of a dozen forgotten cityscapes, all of them far from Yōgai-shima, and all of them consumed in the endless chain of disasters that had destroyed the once auspicious 21st century. He was only ten years old when his family came to Yōgai-shima, and over the past decade, his memories of what the world had been like had faded. He wracked his brain, trying to recall anything solid or tangible about Japan, and already, the recollection eluded him.
“In ten years, I’ve already forgotten so much,” Shin savored the melancholy flavor of that thought for a few moments as he was bathed in the blue light of a billboard that showed Tokyo Bay. “I doubt either Rina or Keni remember anything about Japan at this point, either.”
He spent the next few minutes embroiled in thoughts about that distant world once known as “Japan,” which seemed more like a fantasy with each passing day. While he was lost in those feelings, his feet carried him to the elevator that took him up to the Dorms. He emerged onto the tenth floor of the Dorms, stepping out of the elevator and into the familiar but off-putting interior of the building with its blood-red carpets and dark walls. The sound of his muffled footsteps on the carpet was the only noise he could hear, adding to the uneasy atmosphere. Looking at the endless series of dark brown doors that ran up and down the hallway, Shin hesitated, momentarily unable to locate his own room.
“Number 12,” the sound of Shin’s Omen reminded him, though it was still inside his pocket. He thought about reprimanding the device again, but he chose not to. He didn’t have the energy. Instead, he found the dark wooden door with the number twelve rendered in silver on its surface. Shin dug in his coat to pull out his ID to unlock the door, but the sensor detected it before he could even draw it out. The door slid open, welcoming Shin inside.
“I’m home?” Shin’s words disappeared into the empty apartment behind the door, sounding strange and unfamiliar.
The room he’d been given was larger than the house he grew up in. In contrast to the red and black color scheme of the Bureau, whoever designed the apartment was sensible enough to give Shin a living space with far more neutral oak floors and cream-colored walls. The front door was situated in a small alcove between the fully-furnished living room on the left and the kitchen on the right, the cooking area separated from the rest of the floorspace by a chest high counter. There were two doors in the kitchen, one that led to a built-in pantry that contained countless shelves of prepackaged ready to cook food and ingredients, while the other led to a room that held a washing machine and dryer. The living room itself was so spacious that all of Shin’s belongings still sat shuffled to one side of the floor in a pile of cardboard boxes that scarcely took up even a fourth of the floorspace. His new apartment didn’t feel like it was his, at all. If anything, it felt more like an expensive hotel room.
He slipped off his shoes at the gekan, and walked into the living room, stripping off his jacket as he went. He glanced toward the kitchen, considering the possibility of making something to eat, but he found himself without the energy to cook. Shin crossed the largely empty living room to the door at the opposite end of the apartment, where his bedroom was. Opening the door, he flicked on the light, revealing a king-sized bed with black sheets. Atop it lay a black bag nearly as tall as he was with a hanger protruding from the top and a zipper down the front. Pinned to the front was a note and Shin stepped forward to read it.
“Please place damaged uniform in the bag and leave it hanging on the rack at the back of the front door.”
He wasted no time in unzipping the bag, finding a perfect replacement for the uniform that had been put through the wringer during Shin’s patrol. The Bureau uniform he’d been provided had a layer of nanite laminate, allowing the clothes to resist wear and tear and even partially repair themselves, but the damage he’d done to them was mounting. He took out the new suit and crossed over to his spacious walk-in closet, hanging the new clothes up on a hook before stuffing the burnt suit jacket and shirt into the bag, which he tossed onto the floor next to his bed. He leapt backward onto the bed, feeling it shake beneath his weight. He lay there, arms and legs spread as he stared up at the ceiling.
Shin pulled out his Omen and the device connected to the private network of the building. Within moments, he was scrolling through a screen that detailed countless meals he could order from kitchens within the dormitories. Another tap of the button brought up a detailed map of the Bureau’s private district with little nodes marking the twenty-four-hour eateries that he could order food from at any time. There wasn’t a price tag attached to anything. Any service inside the Bureau’s area of influence, anything at all, was provided for him at no expense. A luxury apartment, private tailor, the best food: he could have anything he wanted.
“What am I doing here?” the question resounded in Shin’s mind, his headspace emptied of any other thought by exhaustion. It was a bizarre thing to ask; for the past year he’d been entirely devoted to his training to become an Inspector, putting aside all hesitation in his desire to join the Bureau. Now, though, at the end of his first day, he finally asked himself the question he’d been unable to ever answer.
He killed Fubuki Kamui; that she had transformed into a Casualty didn’t alleviate the sense of guilt he bore. She was a monster that had killed other people, and had tried to kill him, too, but she was also a victim. She’d never wanted to become the monster he’d been forced to execute. The old man from this morning was just the same.
The role of an Inspector always seemed to be that a protector; an agent standing between Human Calamities and the helpless population of Yōgai-shima. But that was a lie, wasn’t it? Inspectors and Casualties were both Human Calamities, only one of which was lucky enough to retain their reason. He was elected to take on the role of Inspector not for virtue, but by necessity: society needed people like Shin to kill Human Calamities only because the common man couldn’t.
A part of Shin’s soul desperately demanded that he be virtuous and stand apart from the Bureau, insisting that he would be sullied somehow, otherwise. In the end, though, whatever moral or righteous imperative he had inevitably had to bend the knee to rational needs. Whether the Bureau was a beacon of morality in a dark time, or a thoroughly corrupt institution, it didn’t matter. Shin had been swallowed up by the Bureau and he couldn’t go back. He couldn’t afford it.
“I’m not here for me,” he reminded himself, though that thought was bitter.
He spent some time trying to answer the question the Bureau represented. What did it stand for? Where did it come from? There were a thousand little questions Shin had sorted and archived in the back of his mind, now overshadowed by the dark realization that the answers didn’t matter. If the answers to those questions would’ve changed his decision to become an Inspector, it was too late. Looking for answers would do nothing more than satisfy his childish curiosity at this point. But that didn’t mean he had to like it.
The thought that he had to kill for the privileges that surrounded him only made him feel dirty. He felt like a vampire, a ghoul. Something that fed on the dead to sustain itself. All at once, Shin’s hunger vanished, and he quickly closed out the menus and advertisements that promised him rich food however he wanted it.
Instead, he scrolled through his phone, absent mindedly. He found himself going into his pictures folder and scrolled through several old photos until his eyes settled on a familiar image. A man in his late thirties with black hair going grey at the temples, a salt and pepper beard growing across his smiling face. He was bent over, his arms wrapped around a pair of children, one with raven black hair and her arms folded, while a young boy with honey-colored hair held up the piece sign toward the camera. A young man with messy blonde hair stood off to one side, a teenage boy that found himself too cool and mature for a family photo. What an idiot, Shin thought of his younger self, and not for the first time. His eyes looked over his father’s face, wondering what the old man would have thought of the situation Shin found himself in.
Seeing the faces of his siblings, Shin felt an urge to hear a familiar voice, and he closed the picture and scrolled through his contacts. His eyes fell on a name, “Atarashi Rina,” and his finger hovered over the call button. He debated with himself on whether he should call so late at night.
“It’s a school night; what are the chances she’s up right now?” Shin wondered. “Hell, she might not answer just out of spite.”
Regardless of the objections in his head, Shin tapped the button and held the phone to his ear. The phone rang three times, and it was picked up halfway into the fourth. Rather than say anything, the first thing Shin heard on the other end of the line was an exaggerated and exasperated sigh.
“What do you want?” the young woman’s voice on the other end of the phone was bratty and accusatory.
“Is that how you talk to your older brother?” Shin demanded, irritated at the churlish behavior of his sister. Still, he found a smile spreading across his face as he sat up.
“It’s how I talk to obnoxious telemarketers that call in the middle of the night,” Rina replied, coolly. “And my idiot older brother.”
“Well, excuse me, princess. I just thought all the times I carried you around and wiped your snotty nose might have earned me some respect.”
“That was like, a zillion years ago,” the grumpy girl objected with clear affront.
“I still remember you asking me to hold your hand everywhere you went,” Shin teased. “Telling your classmates about what a great brother I was.”
“Ugh,” Rina made a gagging sound. “I’m hanging up.”
“Wait a minute,” Shin insisted. “I wanted to talk about something.”
There was another sigh.
“What is it?”
“Today was my first day as an Inspector,” Shin told her.
“Oh, so you made it through to the end?” Rina couldn’t sound less impressed. “The Bureau must really be hurting for new hires.”
“Hey, don’t say that,” Shin chided her. “Besides, I’m still technically in training.”
“So, you still have plenty of opportunities to screw things up, then,” Rina sounded genuinely pleased.
“Come on, don’t be that way,” Shin implored. “This is important.”
“What do you want me to say?” Rina asked. “Do you want me to congratulate you on your super-special-secret-spy job? Do we have to call you ‘sir,’ now?”
“That’s not what I called for,” Shin insisted. “Thing is, I’ve been running ragged on the patrols for the last year just to prove I could cut it as an Inspector. I know I haven’t been around as much as I should have been, but it was all for this! I’m still working twelve-hour shifts and all, but being an Inspector comes with a lot of privileges, Rina.”
“Good for you,” his sister shot back with onerous passive-aggression. “I hope you enjoy them.”
“They aren’t for me,” Shin felt his frustration growing, but he tried to hold it in check. “They’re for you and Keni. Housing, food, medical benefits. I can get Keni fitted with cutting edge-“
“Stop pretending you give a damn about us!” Rina’s voice sounded strained and filled with ire. “You can’t just disappear for an entire year and then waltz back into our lives, showering us with gifts and pretend that makes us even!”
“I didn’t disappear!” Shin objected. “I called! I would have visited if I could have!”
“I haven’t seen you face to face for months,” Rina sounded like she was crying, now. “Keni hasn’t seen you. He asks about you, you know? All the time. He never shuts up about you. He still looks up to you, despite everything.”
“Rina, I—” Shin found it hard to form words as his throat tightened and eyes burned.
“But you were never there,” Rina went on, speaking over him. “Not when he was in the hospital. Not when he was learning to walk again. You just left us behind and never looked back.”
“Everything I’ve done has been for the two of you!” Shin grit his teeth in anger, indignation bringing his voice back. “Do you have any idea how hard this last year has been for me? Do you think it doesn’t cut me up inside knowing I’m halfway across the city from the both of you? But if joining the Bureau is the best way to make sure the two of you are safe, well-fed, and cared for, then that’s what I have to do!”
“We didn’t ask you for any of that!” Rina screamed at him through the phone. “You told me that it didn’t matter what happens to us, as long as we were together. But as soon as the opportunity came up for you to get a chance to play hero, suddenly we didn’t matter anymore. You just couldn’t wait to join the Bureau.”
“You’re right,” Shin agreed with heartfelt resolution. “I couldn’t wait. Because waiting would mean we would get behind on paying our dues to the city and you, me, and Keni would have fallen through the cracks of the system and gotten deported. Keni can’t work, you’re only fifteen, so you can’t get a high-paying job, and I can’t support the three of us and pay for Keni’s medical bills on an ordinary salary. So yes, Rina, I couldn’t wait. I needed to choose between staying with the two of you and struggling to tread water or join the Bureau and get the resources we needed, even if that meant I couldn’t be with the two of you. That’s what being an adult means. Making sacrifices to help the ones you love.”
“Get off your high horse!” Rina sneered. “You aren’t some kind of martyr, Shin! You’re just selfish. And Keni and I have been doing just fine without you. We don’t need your brand of help.”
“Listen, things are going to be different from now—” Shin was interrupted by the sound of a beeping on the phone.
Rina had hung up. Shin flopped back down on the bed with a sigh, staring up at the ceiling, the turbid conversation taking the last iota of his emotional energy for the day. He held up his phone over his face, once again looking at his family photo.
“I don’t care if they hate me,” he decided. “As long as they’re okay.”
Personnel Dossier
Deputy Inspector Atarashi Shin (新 信)
Birthdate: September 21st, 2023 (21)
Crisis Abilities
Explosion Emergency, Black Powder
Inspector Atarashi possesses the ability to summon clouds of black particles with explosive properties. He typically summons the Black Powder through his left hand, though he can seemingly generate the substance from any part of his body, and he can seemingly direct the swarm of particulates to an unknown degree. The amount of Black Powder Inspector Atarashi can generate is unknown, likely even to himself.
Parameters
Exigency: 7* (Unknown)
Inspector Atarashi ranks in the upper half of the Emon Scale and is a force to be reckoned with, easily hundreds of times faster and stronger than an ordinary human being while using Exigency. His biometrics have gone haywire at several points during his basic training, and during his patrol duty while engaging a Human Calamity, so I’ve been unable to pin down his precise reading at present.
Runaway: 8
Shin’s power grows very rapidly as he fights, and it bleeds away between his uses of Exigency very slowly.
Forecasting: 3
Inspector Atarashi experiences his prescience through a sense of dread and feelings of pain in his chest, though it’s a very imprecise method.
Account: 1 (30%)
Inspector Atarashi is a complete amateur in handling Karma.
Precision: 4
Inspector Atarashi has little control over his Crisis, which itself is designed for indiscriminate destruction.
Karma: 5
Inspector Atarashi has Balanced Karma.
Soon, the World Will End 