Andrew Markham’s Reviews > 1Q84 > Status Update

Aomame covers the Leader in a blanket, tells Buzzcut and Ponytail he’s in a deep sleep and leaves. On the way to the safe house, Aomame learns the metro line she needs to take is out of commission due to the rain and suspects this could be caused by the little people. She eventually settles in to the safe house and reflects on what she’s done and how things have just monumentally changed.

Fuka-Eri tells Tengo to embrace her and hold her while the thunderstorm rages on outside. Tengo falls asleep and awakens paralyzed in a similar fashion to what The Leader had previously described. He has a vision of kissing Aomame back in the classroom many years ago and shortly afterwards, the thunderstorm subsides.

Aomame continues to talk with The Leader about 1Q84 and the little people and what it all means. The Leader also reveals that he knows Aomame and Tengo still think about each other romantically. He explains that she has a choice where she can kill him to save Tengo but likely die herself or spare The Leader but bring harm to Tengo instead. The chapter ends with Aomame plunging the ice pick into The Leader.

Tengo arrives home from the cram school and begins preparing Fuka-Eri and himself a simple dinner. They notice the weather beginning to turn stormy and Fuka-Eri says the Little People are becoming active and that “something is about to happen”. Tengo retells her the story of the Town of Cats which appears to be impactful to her and she asks him if they can go to a Town of Cats together because “they are one”.

Aomame continues to perform the muscle stretching exercises and eventually gets to the point she’s been preparing herself for, to plunge the ice pick in the special spot but she can’t bring herself to do it realizing that the leader knows what’s about to happen. The leader demonstrates the abilities he has to Aomame and invites her to kill him in order to restore some sort of balance to the world.

Tengo leaves his father and returns home to Tokyo. He gets a call from Fuka-Eri that she is at the grocery store by his house and needs a place to stay. He lets her stay at his house while he goes to teach at the cram school where he is confronted again by Ushikawa who says more ominous and vaguely threatening things. Fuka-Eri tells Tengo to rush home before the thunder begins as the little people are active.

Aomame enters a very dark room with the leader and speaks with him about his ailments and afflictions. He explains that he enters states of paralysis for hours at a time and they have been becoming more frequent and longer in duration. Aomame begins to feel strange learning all of the deep secrets of a man she is planning to imminently kill.

Tengo has a free day and decides to go visit his father who lives in a sanatorium by the coast due to his dementia. On the train, he reads a story about the town of cats. The father and son have an at times deep and at other times confusing conversation which spans many topics as they haven’t seen each other in two years. Tengo ends up reading the town of cats story to his father who seems enthralled by the tale.

Tengo has a free day and

Aomame arrives at the hotel and uncharacteristically begins to get nervous about her last job. She meets the different-haired bodyguards who escort her to the Leaders room. Aomame clocks them as amateurs who don’t do a thorough enough search to find her gun or ice pick before being told she is about to step into a sacred space with an extraordinary being.