Status Updates From Seis Cuatro

Koda had been with Violent Crime in First Division when the Six Four kidnapping had occurred, and he’d been one of four officers assigned to the Home Unit stationed in Amamiya’s house during the kidnapping. Something had gone wrong while he was there. Something that had resulted in Amamiya losing confidence in the police. The Koda memo contained the details of what had happened.

On 10 January three days after the police had retrieved the suitcase, Shoko Amamiya’s dead body was found at a car dump in the city’s Satamachi district. A scrap metal merchant had opened the trunk of a rusty sedan after noticing some stray dogs making a noise nearby. The body was in a pitiful state. The girl’s hands had been forced behind her back, tied up with washing line; her mouth and eyes had been covered

The fifth of January, in the sixty-fourth year of the Showa period. I’m going to get my New Year presents. Shoko Amamiya had headed out saying these words a little after midday, only to disappear on her way to the house of a nearby relative. Two hours later, her kidnapper had called the Amamiyas, demanding ransom. The voice of a man in his thirties or forties, slightly hoarse, with no trace of an accent.

The Press Room was a unique environment. As rivals in the same industry, the reporters sought to keep tabs on each other; at the same time, they had the solidarity of co-workers in a single workplace. When they came up against the police, this solidarity could grow into a sense of joint struggle. Sometimes–as they had just now–they were able to put up a monolithic front that could put even the police to shame.