David Peace - Tokyo Year Zero

For an explanation of Japanese words and phrases used in the text, please refer to the Glossary.

The hand taking up the pen had started to tremble.

He drooled.

Only after a 0.8 dose of Veronal did his head have any clarity.

But even then, only for half an hour or an hour.

Day by day he lived in this half-light.

The blade nicked, a slim sword for a stick.

A Fool’s Life , Akutagawa Ryūnosuke, 1927

I lie among the corpses. One Calmotin, two. Hundreds of them, thousands of them. Dead leaves, floating in the autumn breeze. I try to raise my head but I cannot. Flies and mosquitoes swarm over me. I want to brush them away but I cannot. Low dark clouds shift across the sky. It is time to reveal the true essence of the nation . Last night, sometime between midnight and dawn, between retreat and defeat, rain drenched this place and, though the storm has now passed, fresh torrents of rain still fall upon the corpses and onto my face. My head is numb, my thoughts the fleeting shadows of delirium. Images of my wife and my children float before my eyes, among the corpses. Ten Calmotin, eleven. Beneath the eaves of the Black Gate of Zōjōji Temple. Oh so bravely, off to Victory . My son has a little flag in his hand. My daughter has a little flag in hers. Insofar as we have vowed and left our land behind . My parents are here. Friends from school, teammates from my high school baseball club, colleagues with whom I graduated. Who can die without first having shown his true mettle? Each holds aloft a big banner, each banner bearing my name, each before the Black Gate. Each time I hear the bugles of our advancing army, I close my eyes and see wave upon wave of flags cheering us into battle . There are sight-seeing buses full of girls on school excursions. The earth and its flora burn in flames, as we endlessly part the plains . The clock strikes noon as my truck approaches the Black Gate. Helmets emblazoned with the Rising Sun . The truck stops in front of the gate and I jump down from the Nissan. And, stroking the mane of our horses, who knows what tomorrow will bring — life? I stare into the crowd, up at the banners and the flags, and I salute. Now the departure signal sounds. Or death in battle? Twenty Calmotin, twenty-one. The print of dear faces floating in a sea of flags as the mountains fade, the rivers retreat, waving our flags until our hands are numb, floating and waving. We are bound for Siberia . Down the Shimonoseki Channel, the waters choked with transports and cargo boats. We are bound for Dairen . I lie among the corpses, the damp bodies and the fetid air. We are bound for Shanghai . The two tiers of cheap bunks on the decks below. We are bound for Canton . The men shout, the men applaud, as Yamazaki begins to recite ‘The Bloody Handkerchief of Kioi Hill’. More shouts, more applause, as Shimizu tells of ‘Konya, the Harlot’. I love you, I love you, I love you, says Konya to her customer. The bell rings for the evening meal. The war horses stabled in the hatch below scream, their ribs exposed. The steam winch hoists their corpses into waiting boats. In their bunks, men hold their sennin-bari tighter, their belts of one thousand stitches, touching the charms and talismans sewn into the silk. The Eight Myriads of Deities and a Buddha from Three Thousand Worlds. I lie among the corpses, a three-inch image of the Buddha in my hands. No bullet ever touched the man who carried it, said my father. Through the Shino War, the Boxer Rebellion and the Russo War, without a scratch. Bags of five-sen or ten-sen pieces, vests of dried cuttlefish, every man has his charm. How far we have come from the homeland . The transport ploughs on through the black ocean. ‘ Tis the land of Manchuria, far, far from home . I lie among the corpses and I listen

Tokyo, 90°, fine

‘Detective Minami! Detective Minami! Detective Minami!’

I open my eyes. From dreams that are not my own . I sit up in my chair at my desk. Dreams I do not want . My collar is wet and my whole suit damp. My hair itches. My skin itches –

‘Detective Minami! Detective Minami!’

Detective Nishi is taking down the blackout curtains, bright warm shafts of dawn and dust filling the office as the sun rises up beyond the tape-crossed windows –

‘Detective Minami!’

‘Did you just say something?’ I ask Nishi –

Nishi shakes his head. Nishi says, ‘No.’

I stare up at the ceiling. Nothing moves in the bright light. The fans have stopped. No electricity. The telephones silent. No lines. The toilets blocked. No water. Nothing –

‘Kumagaya was hit during the night,’ says Nishi. ‘There are reports of gunfire from the Palace…’

‘I didn’t dream it, then?’

I take out my handkerchief. It is old and it is dirty. I wipe my neck again. Then I wipe my face. Now I check my pockets –

They are handing out potassium cyanide to the women, the children and the aged, saying this latest cabinet reshuffle foretells the end of the war, the end of Japan, the end of the world …

Nishi holds up a small box and asks, ‘You looking for these?’

I snatch the box of Muronal out of his hands. I check the contents. Enough . I stuff the box back into my jacket pocket –

The sirens and the warnings all through the night; Tokyo hot and dark, hidden and cowed; night and day, rumours of new weapons, fears of new bombs; first Hiroshima, then Nagasaki, next is Tokyo …

Bombs that mean the end of Japan, the end of the world …

No sleep. Only dreams. No sleep. Only dreams …

Night and day, this is why I take these pills …

This is what I tell myself, night and day …

‘They were on the floor,’ says Nishi –

I nod. I ask, ‘You got a cigarette?’

Nishi shakes his head. I curse him . There are five more days until the next special ration. Five more days …

The office door swings open –

Detective Fujita storms into the room. Detective Fujita has a Police Bulletin in his hand. Fujita says, ‘Sorry, more bad news…’

He tosses the bulletin onto my desk. Nishi picks it up –

Nishi is young. Nishi is keen. Too young …

‘It’s from the Shinagawa police station,’ he says, and reads: ‘Body discovered in suspicious circumstances at the Women’s Dormitory Building of the Dai-Ichi Naval Clothing Department —’

‘Just a moment,’ I tell him. ‘Surely anything to do with the Naval Clothing Department falls under the jurisdiction of the Kempeitai? This is a case for the military police, not civilian…’