David Peace - Tokyo Year Zero

‘I believe positive identification is now possible…’

‘No.’

‘But we’re wasting time…’

‘Room #1 has been assigned to this body…’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘But…’

‘And Room #2 the next body.’

‘But obviously, until this body has been identified, I can’t…’

‘Then I believe I am in charge of this case, detective.’

‘Yes, but…’

‘But what, detective?’ asks Inspector Kai.

‘Nothing.’

‘Dr. Nakadate,’ says Kai now. ‘I am sorry if we have disturbed your work. Please continue with the autopsy.’

Dr. Nakadate picks up a scalpel from the tray. Metal on metal . Dr. Nakadate inserts the scalpel into her chest cavity. Metal through skin . Dr. Nakadate cuts a Y-shaped line down through the centre of her body, from the front of each shoulder down beneath each breast, around her navel to her pubic bone. Metal through flesh to bone …

She crosses her arms. She grasps her own shoulders …

The skin, the muscles and the soft tissues of her chest wall are now peeled back and away, the chest flap pulled upward towards her face, the ribcage and the lower neck left exposed –

She turns and gazes across at me …

Her body is open. Her blood flowing –

‘I am here because of you…’

Black/white light. In/out knife –

‘Here because of you…’

Hack away. Cut away. Piece by piece –

To weigh. Measure for measure –

Here where there is pain …

Dr. Nakadate removes her stomach and an assistant opens it up at one of the smaller dissecting tables, inspecting its contents as another assistant slices her liver and the smell of gastric acid –

That stench of gastric acid fills the room –

Her ribcage is opened up now –

Here where there is pain …

Her heart taken out –

Here .

Finally, the rubber body block is placed beneath her head. Now Dr. Nakadate opens her scalp –

I close my eyes again –

Black/white light. The scalp of my wife . In/out knife. The scalp of my daughter . Hack away/cut away. My son …

I open my eyes –

Here …

Her head is slumped back while her eyes stare upward, fixed in one last cold gaze at the cracked ceiling of the autopsy room, her spinal cord cut and her brain removed –

Measure for measure…

Piece by piece…

To record …

Inspector Kai has closed his notebook. He has put away his pencil, taken out a cigarette. The detective has finished his work –

Her suffering recorded. Her misery noted …

Dr. Nakadate is washing his gloves in a metal bowl. The water red, his gown black. The doctor has finished his work –

The doctor’s assistants beginning to stitch –

Her suffering. Her misery …

I watch them work. I watch her –

Her breaking …

‘Preliminary conclusions, doctor?’ asks Inspector Kai –

‘I would estimate the time of death as being somewhere between ten and eleven days ago,’ says the doctor. ‘And the cause of death as asphyxia due to ligature strangulation.’

‘Thank you very much, doctor,’ says Inspector Kai. ‘I look forward to reading your full report.’

‘You’re welcome.’

Inspector Kai turns to me. ‘I’m going back to Atago now.’

‘What about the second body?’ I ask him. ‘You’re not going to stay for the autopsy. There might be…’

‘That’s your case,’ says Kai. ‘It’s mostly bones anyway. There will be nothing to see.’

I turn back to the autopsy table. Back to her . The stitching complete, her body is being lifted onto the gurney. The grey sheet is placed back over her body once more. The glass doors are opened and she is wheeled out of the autopsy room back to the mortuary –

The marble table washed down with a bucket of water –

I swallow bile. I swallow bile. I swallow …

Her blood running away in rivers.

*

I sit in the corridor between the autopsy room and the mortuary. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari . I wait for Dr. Nakadate to drink his tea and smoke his cigarette. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari . I wait for the orderlies to finish cleaning up the autopsy room. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari . I wait for them to bring in the second body. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari . I wait for the second autopsy to begin –

Itching and scratching. Itching and scratching –

My autopsy, my body. My body, my autopsy …

The bomb tape still upon the glass.

*

The second body is on a blanket on a stretcher on a gurney. The second body is mostly bones and clothes. Two orderlies take two corners of the blanket each to lift the bones and clothes off the stretcher and the gurney and place them on the autopsy table. The blanket is then removed from under the clothes and bones.

Dr. Nakadate has put back on the same stained surgical gown and the same rubber gloves and again begins the gross external examination with the measurements and the estimates, one assistant at the chalkboard on the wall, another one writing in the hospital notebook; the facts and the figures and the educated guesses; first in German and Latin, then in our native tongue –

The mumbled evocations. The muttered incantations …

‘The body is that of a young female, a young female once again aged approximately eighteen years…’

The same age, the same sex …

The clothes are now carefully removed from the bones –

Knives and scissors through buttons and threads –

First the yellow and dark-blue striped pinafore dress, next the white half-sleeved chemise, then the white canvas shoes with their red rubber soles, and finally the dyed-pink socks –

There are no undergarments on her –

The same sex, the same place …

I say, ‘Underwear was found near the scene.’

‘Have it sent here,’ says one of the assistants. ‘It may still be possible to compare its age to the age of these clothes and also to search for matching threads or fibres.’

I lick the tip of my pencil –

I make a note and then I ask, ‘What about time of death?’

Dr. Nakadate shakes his head. ‘With the heat and humidity this summer, with the insects and vermin that found her first, it’s difficult to be precise but I’d estimate about three to four weeks…’

I lick the tip of my pencil again. I make another note –

Three, four weeks; twentieth to the twenty-seventh of July …

Dr. Nakadate places his gloved fingers around the neck bones and the jawbone. Dr. Nakadate looks up at me. Dr. Nakadate sticks out his lower lip, nods to himself and then says, ‘The hyoid bone at the base of the tongue is fractured, as are the thyroid and cricoid cartilages, all of which were seen on Body Number One…’

The same place, the same crime …

‘This girl was strangled?’

‘More likely throttled.’

‘The same person?’

Dr. Nakadate nods. ‘And we’ve both seen this before, detective. Remember?’

*

Back out into the light. I curse. I curse. I curse. I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to remember . The heat on the street. I sweat. I sweat. I sweat. Keep it simple, keep it simple; two bodies, one murderer; one case, Kai’s case . The streetcar never comes or the streetcar is full. I itch. I itch. I itch. I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to remember . The trains always late, the trains always full. I scratch. I scratch. I scratch. Fuck Nakadate, hide the link, and bury the connection . Back down through Moto-Akasaka and along the side of the river. I run. I run. I run. I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to remember . Through the doors of Headquarters. I pant. I pant. I pant. Hear nothing, see nothing, say nothing . Up the stairs to the First Investigative Division and the door to the chief’s office. I knock. I knock. I knock. Remember nothing. Remember nothing. Nothing …