Tokyo: Officer Rabbit and Her Evil Partner

Chapter 9

"Huh? Already?" Kawai's eyes widened.

Tamako poked at her broccoli with her chopsticks. "Every personal item that students or staff bring in has to clear the gatehouse's security check. If we look at the logbook, we'll see who carried red ink..."

1992 was the year the Anti-Boryokudan Act took full effect; the Metropolitan Police were cracking down hard on the yakuza. To stop crime syndicates from planting moles in the academy, every police school had tightened personal-item controls—letters were opened and read. Privacy rights in Japan were on holiday.

"What if the logbook doesn't list it?" Kawai sprawled on the table, too lazy to sit up.

"If it's not there, then the red ink was bought by the school itself. They don't use it much—teachers grade with water-based pens. There's only one situation where the administration would need red ink."

While she spoke, Tamako nudged the broccoli to the edge of her tray.

"What situation?" Kawai speared the stray floret from Tamako's plate and popped it into her mouth. "Skipping vegetables is bad for you."

"N-no! I was saving it for last."

Tamako paused. "Haven't you noticed? All the notices on the bulletin board are written in fountain-pen ink. When the academy posts circulars, they use red ink for emphasis."

"Got it! That narrows the search." Kawai ruffled Tamako's hair. "Brilliant deduction, Detective Minamoto Tamako!"

Normally the praise would make Tamako beam.

Today she only sighed and stared at her tray.

Kawai straightened. "What's wrong?"

Tamako recounted every detail of the "deduction showdown" in art class.

"Maybe I've just been playing make-believe. Real investigations aren't like what I imagined..."

Classic confidence crisis.

Kawai slung an arm around her. "Stop overthinking! If investigations didn't need reasoning, why would the entrance exams have forensic-logic questions? Evidence chains are pure logic—that guy was just arguing in bad faith."

"Really?" Tamako lifted her head.

"Really. Plus, you figured out the sender's profile in minutes. He couldn't, so he dumped the job on you."

"But—"

Kawai leaned in, cutting her off. "Lanterns light the moon, crowds parade the streets—name the festival!"

Their old high-school game: Kawai poses riddles, Tamako solves them—lantern charades, whodunits, situational puzzles.

"Obon?" Tamako answered instantly.

"Bingo!" Kawai tapped her cheek with a fingertip. "Still the sharpest mind around."

Tamako's mood lifted, yet one worry lingered. "Hey, Kawai... does Fushimi hate me?"

"Huh? Why?"

"I invited him to lunch and he refused. And he never eats in the cafeteria. Is he avoiding me?" Tamako stabbed her rice. "Am I annoying?"

Kawai waved both hands. "You're overthinking. He just can't make friends. Notice you're the only one who talks to him? Poor guy eats alone in his dorm—total loner."

"Really?"

"Really. Classic tsundere—mouth like sandpaper, heart like marshmallow. He's probably over the moon that a cute girl spoke to him." Kawai tugged the corners of her eyes into Fushimi's trademark dead-fish stare. "'Alone again, naturally... until a cute girl talked to me—blessed be the day!'"

Tamako burst out laughing.

Confidence restored, she vowed to unmask the sender before lunch break ended and make Fushimi eat his words.

So what was the lone wolf doing in his room?

"The Fukushima Toilet Corpse Case. A man's body was found wedged beneath a school restroom's latrine. The victim, a staff member, was discovered in a bizarre position..."

Fushimi snapped the case file shut; lunchtime was no place for autopsy photos.

Yes—he was studying.

Every country's criminal codes differ. Precedents and statutes change. Even a former senior lawyer had to start over. Nights without sleep, memorizing penal codes, reading case files.

Not that he planned to return to the courtroom. He simply refused to be legally clueless.

If trouble ever found him, he'd save on counsel—Japan allows self-representation.

Chopsticks halfway to his mouth, he heard a knock. "Fushimi, you in?"

"Yeah."

He opened the door. The class leader stood outside. "Instructor Sakurai wants you in her office." Fushimi glanced back at his half-eaten meal. "Did she say why?"

"No, just 'immediately.'"

"Then it can wait until I finish." He started to close the door.

The leader wedged a hand in, embarrassed. "But Instructor Sakurai said right away..."

"Five minutes. I eat fast."

"Sorry." No give.

Fushimi sighed. Only the teacher's pet gets elected class leader.

He turned, grabbed his bento, locked the dorm door, and fell into step with the leader. "Let's go."

"Er—you're—"

"Eating while walking."

Chopsticks already flying, Fushimi shoveled rice as they moved. Cadets stared; the leader hung back a full pace.

Two lifetimes gave Fushimi supreme nonchalance. In his previous life he'd sprinted for buses clutching bowls of hot-dry noodles—walking lunch was routine.

By the time they reached the teaching building the box was empty. He lobbed it into a trash can. The leader whispered, "You're supposed to sort the garbage..."

"Environmentalism is a rich man's hobby. My ten thousand bentos pollute less than one TEPCO leak." Fushimi shrugged.

The leader bit back a retort—typical Fushimi logic. He left Fushimi at the office door and fled.

"Pardon me," Fushimi said, knocking on the frosted glass of the private office. "Cadet Fushimi—"

Before he could finish, faint, familiar gasps drifted from inside.