The Psyche Diver Trilogy: Demon Hunters (18 page)

“You’re sure?”

“I think so.”

“And the police?”

“They were hardly concerned about the cash, let alone the pamphlet. They didn’t even add it to their list, just said they couldn’t imagine why anyone would steal a pamphlet, that I’d probably just lost it. I was fine with that. I mean, it was just a pamphlet.”

“They got it wrong. The pamphlet was the real target, the rest was just to make it look like a regular break-in.”

“But who wanted it?”

“Whoever pays the bills of the unconscious guy in the trunk.” Fuminari dug his teeth into his thick lips.

Illusory pain pulsed through his left hand.

3

There was a single bed in a small room.

The only other furniture was a small table and a chair. There were no windows, but the room had two doors. One of the doors led out of the room and could not be opened from the inside, the other opened freely, leading to a bathroom with a toilet and a sink. There were no windows in the bathroom. A single carpet had been pulled across the floor, not quite furniture. It had a curious design, like a mural you might see at an esoteric temple in Tibet or Ladakh. It depicted gaudy and vivid renditions of male and female deities engaged in various modes of sexual intercourse. Some were having mutual oral sex, a few of the male deities mounted their female counterparts from behind.

A young girl lay on the bed, Yuko.

She had been abducted while out walking, thrown into a car and brought here where she had been locked up ever since. The lack of windows and clocks meant that she had no way to track the passing of time. She had tried to keep track of the number of times she was brought food, but she still had no idea how long had passed between meals. She was fed three times a day, maybe four. Of course, she had no clue why she was kidnapped. All she could gleam from the men that visited her was it was somehow related to Biku.

She could guess. Her visitors were, without exception, men--some young, some almost elderly. With each visit they would rape her. Sometimes they would turn up while she was asleep, crawl into her bed, force her to turn over, and raise her buttocks before penetrating her from behind.

Why is this happening?
She had cried at first, but no-one paid any attention. When she attempted to resist, the men would pin her down and rape her all the same. She could scream and attempt to resist them, but they would force their way inside her regardless, and because her body was already privy to the joys of sex, it would automatically respond. It had only been the first couple of times that she had actually felt nothing.

A woman had visited once. Her skin had been abnormally pale and her eyes narrow and slanted. There had been a cloying sense of unearthliness to her. She had arrived with two young men in tow and ordered them to remove Yuko’s clothes. She ran her pale hands over Yuko’s naked flesh. Her hands had been soft, almost sticky; she had clasped her red lips over Yuko’s nipples, teasing them with her tongue. Yuko had been unable to keep her moans in check as cold pleasure tingled down her spine. When the woman pulled away, she had just stood there, running her sticky gaze all over Yuko’s body.

“She seems suitable,” she had said, the two men nodded in response. “I think we have our next girl.” Yuko remembered the words, whispered as the woman left. Yuko had no idea what the woman had been referring to. That had been two, maybe three days ago now.

As she slept, Yuko dreamt of a single man, of his ruffled hair. Although she had only been with him once, he had been oddly charming. She had dreamt of him a number of times since her imprisonment, but she was unsure why. It could have been the peculiar scent of his body--yes, that was it. It was the smell of freedom, of a wild animal. His name was Hosuke Kumon.

She dreamt of him now. Hosuke’s lips glided softly over her skin. Just as he was about to enter her, she heard the familiar creaking of the door. She wanted to hold onto the dream, but a male voice forced her from it. An old man was standing next to her bed. He slid open the belt of his trousers and pulled out his penis. It hung down, flaccid, like a shriveled caterpillar.

“Suck it,” he said in a deep voice. Yuko got up from the bed and sidled onto her knees before him. Without a word, she took the man’s penis in her hand and guided it to her mouth. She was in her underwear. She flicked her tongue over the tip as she rubbed her fingers up and down his shaft. The man uttered a groan as she fingered the bridge of flesh below his anus. His cock began to harden inside her mouth. She released it when it had grown too big to fully take in.

“Not yet.” The man pushed it back toward her mouth. As Yuko opened her youthful lips, the man grabbed her by the head and thrust his penis deep into her throat. She retched, almost throwing up, but the man pumped his hips regardless. Tears began to pour from her eyes. After a long while he finally pulled away. “Undress,” he ordered.

Yuko stripped off her underwear, revealing young breasts and smooth white buttocks. The man shoved her back onto the bed and pulled her so that she was poised on its edge. He took an ankle in each hand and hoisted her legs upward, spreading them in a wide ‘v’. Yuko’s pink flesh lay exposed below her fine pubic hair. He hooked her legs over his shoulders and took his cock in his hand, thrusting into her. She was still dry. If he hadn’t been soaked in her saliva it would have been impossible. He thrust deeper, chafing her the whole time. Yuko closed her eyes and drew an image of the man in her dreams. She imagined Hosuke crying, his smile faltered. The old man shook as he came. He muttered something as he pulled up his trousers.

“Almost ready.” He sounded like he was talking to himself, but the words were clearly meant for her. She had no idea what was ‘almost ready’. She asked him.

“For the rite,” the man replied, smiling for the first time.

But it wasn’t a real smile, just a reptilian expression that happened to resemble one. It felt as though some creepy black insect had just crawled over her face. She had no idea that the rite he was referring to was the Black Mass of the Heruka worshippers, the very same ritual that Senkichi Fuminari had witnessed two summers ago.

Ten

Into the Den of the Amorous Beast

1

The room was spacious and bare.

The walls and floors were exposed concrete; there were no windows, only a single door. Light came from a solitary bulb suspended from the ceiling, the yellowish gleam falling on a man sitting in the corner. There were no chairs, he was crumpled directly on the concrete floor, back to the wall. He sat legs crossed, hands on his knees. Every now and again he would peer nervously around the room, and sometimes he would just glare at the door and cough up some phlegm, but neither state took hold for very long. He looked 35, maybe 36, but he could have been older. He was well built, but he could not hide the way his flesh had begun to sag. The door swung open, pushed by thick arms. A huge man came in, more like a grizzly bear. He ducked to avoid hitting the frame before closing the door behind him.

He was more than just big; his entire skeleton was covered with powerful, armor-like muscle. Muscle, carefully developed for fighting, bulged underneath his short sleeve sweater, tough and fast, hinting at explosive power. The oppressive force of his body flooded the room. The man was Fuminari. His mouth coiled into a ferocious smile. It was the smile of a lion catching the scent of blood.

“So, you’ve come around,” Fuminari said. The man turned away, desperate. Fuminari held two light bulbs in his left hand. They clanked softly together; in his huge palm they appeared no larger than the size of an egg. “I found these wonderful little things. Thought you’d like to see them.” Fuminari put them down, taking care not to break them on the concrete.

“You son of a bitch, what the hell do you think you’re doing locking me up in a place like this?” the man said, standing.

“What happens depends on you, I guess.”

“What does that mean?” The man could not even conceive of resisting. The absolute terror of his abduction, just as he was attempting to abduct Ryoko Kitano, was too fresh. He remembered how the giant had leaped over the car as it raced toward him, even landing a kick on the front windscreen, cracking the glass. Then the giant pounded his fists against the roof and plucked him from the car like a rat from a tin can.

“Where am I?”

“Probably the last place you’ll ever see.”

“Who the fuck are you? What do you want?”

“Listen, I don’t want any misunderstandings. You’re here because
I
have some questions for
you
. Not the other way around.” The grin. Fuminari took a couple of steps toward the man. He was wearing black gloves; there was something odd about them. The man stumbled backward. “Scared?” Fuminari growled.

“Fuck you!”

“You’re free to try your luck if you’re so sure of yourself, I’m not hiding any weapons. We’re both unarmed. Overpower me and you’re free to leave.”

The man was silent.

“Yoshio Ozaki, right?” Fuminari said, altering his tone in the wake of the man’s silence. The color drained from Ozaki’s face.

“How do you know that?”

“You’re the private detective, why don’t you tell me.”

“How the hell do you know my name?”

“Hm...” Fuminari pulled something from his back pocket; he balanced a white card between his index and middle fingers.

“What is that?”

“Your business card. At least I think it’s yours, there was a bunch of the them stuffed in your chest pocket.”

“You bastard...while I was unconscious.”

“Sure, I took the liberty to rifle your pockets. And here I was thinking that detective agencies only handled adultery. A side-business in kidnapping, who knew?”

Ozaki said nothing.

“Now you know not to carry your business card when you’re up to no good.” Ozaki watched Fuminari in silence; the fear was obvious in his eyes. Fuminari moved a step closer. “Well then, let me ask you a few questions.” Ozaki launched himself at Fuminari, spreading the fingers of his right hand, he punched at Fuminari’s eyes. They would have been dead on target if Fuminari had not moved.

Fuminari tipped his head casually to one side, avoiding the blow, then slashed the business card across Ozaki’s face, splitting the his cheek clean open. Fuminari had managed to slice his face with the business card. A pink split like a woman’s genitals formed on Ozaki’s cheek, blood began to collect around the wound before tracing a number of lines down to his chin. Ozaki wiped a hand across his cheek, smearing the red blood across half of his face. He saw the blood on his hand; there was a moment of shock before he squealed a half-choked wail.

“Ready for my questions, then?” Fuminari grabbed Ozaki’s collar in one hand and pulled him toward the center of the room. He lifted the man in the air until his toes stretched desperately for the ground. “We’ve established you’re not the brains behind this operation. So tell me, who’s your boss?” Fuminari brought Ozaki’s face inwards.

Ozaki kept quiet.

“You’ll talk either way. Do yourself a favor and let it out, you’ll save yourself a lot of pain.”

Nothing.

“I should warn you, I have trouble holding back. I can be clumsy.” Fuminari gradually straightened his arm, still holding the man by the scruff of his neck. Even fully extended, he was still able to hold the man in the air. His strength was terrifying. Fuminari slammed a knee into Ozaki’s stomach and let him go. Ozaki crumpled into a ball, clutching at his abdomen. Fuminari picked a bulb from the floor and, grabbing the man’s jaw with his left hand, he squeezed. There was an audible crunch of bone. “Open wide,” he said. The man half struggled to free himself from Fuminari’s grip, but opened his mouth nonetheless. Fuminari forced one of the bulbs inside. “There you go!”

The gold screw stuck out from Ozaki’s mouth like some practical joke. His eyes were bloodshot. Fuminari released his grip before sending his right fist smashing into Ozaki’s jawbone. There was a crunch inside his mouth as the bulb shattered. Ozaki screamed, the scream becoming an endless wail.

Fuminari used one hand to stabilize the man’s chin as he eased the shell of the bulb out with the other. It came out with broken glass, filament still attached, soaked with blood. The man’s head sagged, he collapsed onto all fours as Fuminari let go, his mouth gaping open over the concrete. He shook his head and wailed. Blood-soaked fragments of all sizes of rounded glass dribbled out. Droplets of thick, bloodied saliva trickled over red glass piled on the floor. Tears poured from the corners of his eyes. He could not get rid of the remaining glass in his mouth without moving his tongue, and moving his tongue would just worsen the cuts inside his mouth. Both his tongue and the walls of his mouth were torn to shreds. The man stuck his tongue out. It was pierced with a huge number of razor-sharp splinters covered in blood. He dragged it against his upper teeth in an attempt to brush away the fragments. All he accomplished was to drag the glass along his tongue and deepen the cuts.

“Nod your head if you’re ready to talk. I’ll bring you a bucket full of water.” The man nodded in a wild frenzy, still staring at the floor. Fuminari brought a bucket and the man submerged his face in it. He stayed like that for a long while. After managing to free some of the glass shards, the man eventually looked back up. The water was completely red.

“Now, who told you to kidnap Ryoko Kitano?” Fuminari asked.

“Ish...Ishibashi, a man cawed Ishibashi.” The remaining fragments of glass were stabbing at his tongue; the man was in obvious pain.

“Ishibashi? Who is he?”

“I don’t know.”

“Hah!” Fuminari crouched down and placed a finger under the man’s jaw, levering the man’s head upward. “Don’t fuck with me. It’s your job to look into people’s backgrounds. You’re not asking me to believe that you took on a dodgy kidnapping job without checking into the background of your employer, are you?”

Ozaki hesitated.

“You don’t want to underestimate me. You want me to do the same with that bulb up your asshole?”

Ozaki’s eyes widened.

“I’ll make it so you’d rather wring your mother’s neck than take a shit.”

“Wait, okay.”

“Ready to talk?”

“His name’s Akio Ishibashi, Shutaro Toyama’s secretary.”

“Shutaro Toyama? As in Shutaro Toyama, the Diet member?”

“Yes.” Shutaro Toyama was an elected representative for the New Conservatives, a leading figure in one of the party’s more influential factions. Each time there was an election, there were accusations of bribery, but he had never been indicted, and each time it was those working for him that ended up taking the flak.

“And how the hell does a turd like you get to be pals with a representative’s secretary?”

“It was five years ago. I was out on an adultery case when I see Toyama leaving a hotel with a woman. They were incognito, wearing sunglasses, but I knew it was him; he was with the singer Natsuyo Kuwabara.

“Oh.” Fuminari smiled at the intrigue. Natsuyo Kuwabara was a well-known Enka singer. Even in her 30’s she still outshone her contemporaries with her looks and talent. She had been popular with the tabloids for her affairs with other singers and big-name producers, but the articles had all but dried up of late. “Let me guess, you snapped some photos and tried to blackmail him.”

“Right. That’s when I met his secretary, Ishibashi. I’ve never met Toyama in person. Ishibashi said he’d pay double the asking price, but in return he wanted me to work for them. The jobs were bad, they had me by the balls.”

“What kind of bad?” Ozaki fell silent. Fuminari lunged forward and wrapped the three fingers of his left hand around the man’s throat, squeezing. When he finally let go Ozaki broke into a violent coughing fit. Fuminari’s fingers had been trained to the point of being hard as rock. He had not stopped since Hanko had taken away two of his fingers. His remaining three digits could crush a walnut.

“Murder,” Ozaki said, clearing his throat.

“A key witness to his spreading money around during a particular election. I was to kill him, dress it up as a car accident.”

“So you and Toyama are partners in crime. Great job with the blackmail, fuckwit. Make a mistake and your ass is in jail, Toyama’s clean. Worst case, he could shift the blame to Ishibashi, end of story.”

“Ishibashi kept in contact a few times a year since then, more requests to do their dirty work. Toyama doesn’t know about most of it, maybe all of it.”

“Do you know about Yoichi Munakata?” Ozaki looked down. “I’ll take that as a yes.” Ozaki spat a globule of bloody saliva to the floor. He kept rinsing his mouth with water from the bucket between sentences, but his mouth would quickly fill with blood.

“We picked him up a while back, handed him to Ishibashi. I don’t know what’s happened to him since.”

“You think he’s been killed?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“Have you ever heard of
Panshigaru
?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Okay. Have you seen Toyama with any weird-looking, religious types?”

“No...although I did see a monk visiting Ishibashi once, kind of strange-looking. He was leaving the office when I arrived.”

“So the secretary has his own office.”

“I don’t know the details, but it looks that way.”

“Tell me more about the monk.”

“When he was leaving I heard Ishibashi call him Geshin. There was something odd about him. That’s all I remember.”

“Oh yeah?” Fuminari removed the glove from his left hand, revealing that his two smallest fingers were missing.

“Your fingers.” Ozaki swallowed loudly. He had not noticed until this point because of the stuffing in Fuminari’s gloves. His hand was grotesque.

“Not the handiwork of some Yakuza punk.” Fuminari grimaced, as though in pain. His eyes flashed violently. “What do you think happened?” Fuminari lodged his gloved hand under Ozaki’s jaw, pulling him slowly to his feet. “They were
eaten
, right in front of me,” Fuminari almost sang the words as he slid his left hand under the man’s raised jawline.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“Ha ha.” Fuminari’s lips formed a smile.

“Are you going to kill--,” the sentence ended abruptly. Fuminari’s three fingers squeezed tight into Ozaki’s throat. Fuminari grinned into Ozaki’s ear, speaking in a soft whisper.

“Don’t worry. I’ll make it painless, call it thanks for your cooperation.” Ozaki’s jaw made a horrific crunching sound. His head had been twisted sideways, like a doll, as though he was pondering his own fate
.
A muffled sound came from the door behind Fuminari, a woman trying not to scream.

“Ryoko.” He turned on his feet. Ryoko Kitano stood next to the open door, utterly pale. “You saw.” She nodded, her lips quivering. “I warned you not to come down here.” Fuminari’s voice was burdened, dark.

2

He was back within the hour.

Fuminari showered and dried himself before ascending to the second floor, walking into the room where Ryoko was staying. The lights were off, but the illumination trickling through the curtains kept it from being totally dark. The eastern skyline of the city was already brightening. There was a person-shaped swell under the bed sheets; it was Ryoko, laying with her back to Fuminari.