Genocide of One: A Thriller (16 page)

Dead.

There wasn’t a single person in the world who could save her.

Damn it, Kento muttered, and switched off his bedside lamp to go to sleep.

He tossed and turned. In the narrow space between wakefulness and sleep, confused
and chaotic images—neither thoughts nor dreams—came and went. A deserted laboratory.
Confusion following a failed experiment. A sense of being blamed. Mice scurrying around
in cages. An orphan receptor on the membrane of a cell in the dark, opening its huge
mouth. An electronic sound. A light melody playing somewhere—

Kento gave a start and realized he’d been asleep. He reached out with his right hand
from under the covers and picked up his cell phone from the floor beside him.

He blinked open his eyes and checked the screen.
OUT OF AREA
. It was 5:00 a.m. The room was still dark. Kento groaned and answered the call. “Hello.”

“Kento Koga. Please listen carefully.”

“What? Hello?”

The same high-pitched voice rang in his ear. “Kento Koga. Please listen carefully.”

A computer-generated voice. A flat monotone.

“Who are you? And why are you calling at this hour?”

Kento was testy, but the other party continued, unruffled. “Within thirty minutes,
you must be getting out of your apartment. Not remain where you are. Not remain where
you are.”

The Japanese was a little strange as the artificial voice repeated each sentence.
Figuring it was a prank call, Kento was about to hang up when the voice said something
new: “Do not give the small computer to anyone. Do not give the small computer to
anyone.”

It was talking about the black laptop, Kento realized. He shot up in bed and listened
carefully to the mechanical voice.

“Within thirty minutes, you must be getting out of your apartment. Not remain where
you are. Do not give the small computer to anyone.” The artificial voice repeated
the previous message. Then, at the end, it added, “Run away from your apartment quickly.
Run away from your apartment quickly. Stop the power on your cell phone. Stop the
power on your cell phone.”

“Hello?” he asked again, but the call ended.

Kento slapped himself on the side of his head, trying to force himself awake. As he
reviewed the weird message, he felt a chill—not from the cold air in the room but
from the cold welling up from within him.

Do not give the small computer to anyone…

Within thirty minutes, you must be getting out of your apartment…

It was a clear warning. In thirty minutes someone was going to force his way in here
and grab the laptop away.

Stop the power on your cell phone…

Kento hurriedly powered off his phone, though he wasn’t sure whether he should take
this warning seriously or not. The only person he could think of who might want to
steal his laptop was Yuri Sakai. But then who was it who called him? The high-pitched
computer-generated voice was probably just reproducing sentences that were typed in.
It ignored his questions because the text of the message had been predetermined.

Not remain where you are…

The meaning was clear, but the Japanese was unnatural, like sentences composed by
a foreigner. Jeong-hoon Lee’s face came to him. No; Jeong-hoon’s Japanese was much
more fluent. Nearly perfect.

Kento got out of bed, switched on the light, and turned on the heater. His head was
heavy from lack of sleep. If Yuri Sakai tried to force her way in, he wasn’t too worried.
He might be small himself, but he was strong enough to physically push her out.

Run away from your apartment quickly…

Still, the artificial voice had a strange urgency to it, as if it were telling him
that if he didn’t obey something horrific would happen.

As he went into the bathroom Kento again felt a chill. Yuri Sakai appearing in her
van at the university at night. There’d been someone else in the car with her. He’d
be dealing with more than one person.

“This is for your own good, too, Kento,” she’d told him. Now he was able to read between
the lines. It had been a threat: give me the laptop or else put yourself in danger.

As he dragged his feet, thinking it over, he’d already wasted ten minutes. But what
should he do? He couldn’t just be his usual indecisive self and give up. He had to
do
something
. He used the toilet, and as he was washing up he decided on his next step. He didn’t
believe the telephoned warning, but he would leave the apartment and see how things
developed. He’d go to a convenience store or somewhere else to kill time and come
back after the sun was up.

He changed clothes and stuffed his wallet, apartment key, and the powered-off cell
phone in his pocket. He was about to leave when he realized that in his flustered
state he’d almost left the most important thing of all. The black laptop. But how
to carry it? He took off his down jacket and rummaged through his closet until he
found a lighter sports-type coat. The coat had a map pocket on the chest, just big
enough for the laptop to fit in.

Just then he heard a car outside. It was 5:26.
I thought I had four more minutes!
He opened the curtains and sliding glass door and stealthily stepped out onto the
balcony. It was still dark outside. He gazed down at the narrow, one-way alley below,
lit only by the streetlights, and saw directly below him the roof of a van. It was
similar to Yuri’s van, but the color was different. It was clear, though, that it
had deliberately parked in a spot that would block the entrance to the building.

Escape was cut off. If he were to get out of the building he’d have to slip past that
van.

The passenger door opened, and a man emerged. He seemed about to look straight up,
so Kento quickly pulled his head back. What was going on? Bent over, he went back
to the door and crawled inside. His glasses had slipped down his nose, and he pushed
them back up and paced the apartment. He’d made a fatal error. His light was still
on, and the curtains and sliding door were open. The man from the van would know he
was at home.

He heard several car doors opening and closing down below. There must be two or three
of them, he was thinking, when he heard someone right outside his door, much sooner
than he’d imagined. The intercom buzzed angrily, over and over. Kento started to tremble.
It was too late to try to pretend he wasn’t at home. He went over to the front door
and peered out of the peephole. Just outside the flimsy door was a scowling middle-aged
man. He had on a coat and looked like a businessman. Behind him were two more men,
both wearing white surgical masks.

Kento was too frightened to respond, and he stood there, peering at the scene. The
man in front turned and nodded to the other two. One of the masked men took out what
looked like a cylindrical magnifying glass and held it over the peephole. Kento’s
vision suddenly grew blurry, and he couldn’t see outside anymore.

He knew right away what they’d done. The magnifying glass compensated for the distortion
of the fish-eye lens of the peephole, allowing them to see inside. The man with the
mask could see him.

Kento instinctively stepped back. An angry voice suddenly yelled out. “Mr. Koga! Mr.
Kento Koga! Metropolitan Police Department. Open up!”

Metro Police Department? Kento thought, totally confused.

“We know you’re in there, so open the door!”

The police. Why would detectives show up at his door? He did know one thing: this
wasn’t a friendly house call. Shouting like this so early on a Sunday morning meant
they were deliberately trying to draw the attention of the other residents.

Kento reluctantly unlocked the door and half opened it, the chain still fastened.

“Kento Koga?” the man with no mask said, thrusting an ID of some sort at him. “I’m
Kadota from the Metro Police Department. Please let us in.”

Kento was so tense his mouth had dried up. “Wh-what’s this all about?”

Kadota looked even more stern. “It’s about your father, Seiji.”

“My father?”

“Unchain the door and let us in and I’ll tell you the details.”

A faint hope sprang up in Kento—maybe the police had started investigating this drug
development fraud. But no matter how good a spin you put on it, banging on his door
when he was barely awake wasn’t exactly a friendly gesture. Kento looked out at the
three grim-eyed men. “Can you show me your police ID one more time?”

Kadota made a sound of annoyance and flipped open the ID folder again.

“Doesn’t a police ID have a black cover?” Kento asked.

“The old type did. We’re using these now.”

Kento read the division that this detective belonged to. “What does the Public Security
Bureau do?”

Kadota closed the folder. “We’re helping with an investigation. The police abroad
asked us to look into the late Professor Seiji Koga.”

“Abroad?” Kento tried to suppress his rising panic. What foreign countries had his
father visited? He’d attended conferences in the United States and France. And he’d
gone to Zaire, in Africa, to investigate the HIV virus. “From which country?”

“The United States.”

“Which state?”

“It isn’t from a state. The inquiry is from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The
FBI.”

Another shock. “What does the FBI want to know?”

“Your father is a suspect in a crime. They think he stole some data from a research
facility in the States.”

Kento stared, dumfounded, at Kadota. He might have had a low opinion of his father,
but would the man resort to crime? He couldn’t imagine it. Yet as soon as he thought
this, his father’s final, enigmatic message to him sprang to mind, and he suddenly
felt like he was standing on a precipice.

If you get this message it means I’ve been away from you and your mother for more
than five days.

Did he expect that he was going to be arrested?

“Your father has passed away, so of course he won’t be prosecuted. But we have to
ascertain the facts of the case.”

Kento no longer knew what to believe. In a situation like this, what path should a
researcher take? Logic. That’s right—logic is the only choice. Don’t rush to a conclusion.
Be like Jeong-hoon was last night. What was the message his father left behind? What
logical conclusion could be drawn from it?

But no need to worry. I should be back in a couple of days.

Kento looked down momentarily, away from the detective. His father was innocent. He
was telling him that even if the police took him away he’d be cleared in a couple
of days and be back.

“Do you have the laptop your father left behind?” Kadota asked.

“Laptop?” As he said this, Kento was surprised by the anger that welled up within
him.
Stop seeing my father as such a fool!
he wanted to scream.

“The one he used in his research.”

Do not give the small computer to anyone…

“Was it research data he supposedly stole? Not software?”

Kadota frowned suspiciously. “Research data,” he asserted.

“One more thing,” Kento insisted. “You’re here because you suspect my father, correct?
You don’t suspect me, his son?”

“Of course not. We’re just investigating all the parties involved.”

Kento did a quick mental calculation. Even if he were to run away, he shouldn’t be
charged with a crime.

“We’d like to confiscate the computer. So we’d like you to let us in.”

Trying to keep from shaking too much, Kento screwed up his courage. “I refuse,” he
said.

The detective’s eyes turned icy. He took a document out of his coat pocket and thrust
it in Kento’s face. “We have a warrant. This is a raid, and we’re coming in whether
you like it or not.”

Run away from your apartment quickly…

“All right. Let me get the chain off,” Kento said, and Kadota pulled the toe of his
shoe back from the crack in the door.

Kento quickly shut the door and slammed home the lock. Kadota started pounding on
the door, and the bolt he’d just turned rotated back in the opposite direction. The
detectives had gotten a master key from the owner. Kento hurriedly tried to slip on
his sneakers, but his fingers got tangled and he couldn’t tie the laces. The door
opened a crack, and one of the detectives thrust in a huge bolt cutter and started
to cut the chain.

Kento, finally able to get his shoes on, raced outside onto the balcony. Behind him
he heard metal snapping. They’d cut the chain. From the corner of his eye he could
see the detectives surge into his apartment. There was no time to shrink back. Kento
climbed over the balcony railing, pressed one hand tightly against the coat pocket
containing the laptop, and plunged over the edge onto the roof of the van. A 1.5-meter
drop. The vehicle, impact resistant, gave way slightly and suffered little damage
from this object slamming into it from above.

Kento rolled off the roof and onto the ground, and as he did, he was struck by how
clumsy he must look, though this was no time to worry about appearances. He stood
up, unhurt, and raced off in the opposite direction from which the van was facing.

He glanced back as he ran and saw a fourth detective stagger out of the driver’s side
of the vehicle, holding his head in both hands as if it hurt. The crown of his head
must have gotten hit by the roof when it caved in. Now they’d have something to charge
him with—assault and battery. The sudden, terrifying thought hit him, but he kept
on running as fast as he could.

It was early Sunday morning, and the streets were deserted. In less than a minute
he was out of breath. Kento was desperate, knowing he had to get away. These were
pros when it came to pursuing people. The longer the chase went on, the less likely
he was to get away.

He came out on a main street, two lanes in each direction. There was only a sprinkling
of traffic, and he couldn’t find a taxi. He slipped onto a side street, then turned
left, deliberately switching directions, and came out onto another main street. This
time he spotted a taxi. He waved both hands and climbed aboard when the taxi stopped.
He glanced behind him but didn’t see any sign of the detectives.