Chapter 8 - Forsaken

The hours dragged on.

Takeda and I sat in the kōban with the body still in the cell — untouched, unmoved, cold.

We didn’t have gloves, markers, or yellow tape—no crime scene kits. No backup.

Just two officers from a village that hadn’t seen a serious crime in years…

…and a man with half his skull blown out behind a locked door.

We tried everything.

The landline.

The radio.

The emergency line directly to Omigawa HQ.

Nothing.

“We’re not that far,” Takeda muttered around 3:00 AM. “Signals don’t just drop out like that.”

We took turns checking the body — making sure it hadn’t… changed.

It hadn’t.

Renji still lay there, twisted on the floor, face frozen in terror. The blood had dried into a dark crust.

The smell was setting in now. Copper. Sour.

We left the cell door shut and locked.

Takeda kept the kōban door locked, too.

He jotted down basic notes in his crooked handwriting while I scribbled a rough sketch of the scene. Our “forensic report.”

At some point I brewed tea. Neither of us touched it.

I found myself staring out the kōban’s narrow front window, the glass already fogging around the edges.

Outside, the street was empty.

And then I noticed it.

It was snowing.

“Snow…” I whispered to myself.

Behind me, Takeda stood up from the desk, rubbing his temples like he’d just had enough.

He grabbed his coat from the back of his chair and slipped it on.

“That’s it,” he muttered. “I’m done sitting around.”

I turned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean I’m going to Omigawa. Myself.”

He slung the keys to the patrol car into his palm with a familiar clack.

“They’re not answering because they’re lazy, or drunk, or both. Fine. But I’m not sitting on a body in the back room while they pretend we don’t exist.”

“You sure that’s a good idea? What if—?”

He cut me off.

“You stay here. Hold down the fort. Lock the doors, don’t answer for anyone unless they flash a badge.”

I hesitated. “…You think it’s safe to split up?”

Takeda looked at me — really looked at me — and for a moment, the sarcasm slipped from his face.

“I don’t think any of this is safe.”

He turned, yanked the door open, and stepped out into the snow.

The wind swallowed him fast. The sound of his boots crunching in the white faded after just a few seconds.

Then, I was alone.

Just me, the cold, the chirping of crickets buried beneath snow…

…and a dead man in the cell.

Nothing…

No sound. No movement. Not even the wind.

I sat behind the kōban desk. I Checked the clock.

3:21 a.m.

I waited.

Maybe twenty minutes passed before I checked again.

3:23 a.m.

That couldn’t be right.

The clock was moving… wasn’t it?

I stood. Paced. Boiled more tea. Didn’t drink it. I thought about turning on the radio, but couldn’t bring myself to touch it.

I didn’t want to hear that static again.

An hour passed.

No call. No headlights returning. No Takeda.

Two hours.

I opened the door once — snow still falling, quiet as ash. Not even the crows were out.

Still no sign of the car.

Three hours.

I sat at the desk. The body in the cell hadn't moved, but I kept checking anyway — just to be sure. The smell was thicker now. Not rotting yet, but enough to cling to my uniform.

The clock read 6:17.

The first light of morning was beginning to seep through the frost-fogged windows.

And still… no one came.

No calls. No radio.

No Takeda.

Just me.

Just the snow.

Just the body.

I stood and stretched, joints stiff from hours of waiting. The tea on the desk had gone cold again.

CLANG!