Oishi: "........................"
...I am at a lost of words. ...I can't think of anything that I want to say, ...so I can only sigh in disbelief...
Kuma-chan: "Ah,...Oishi-san! I've been looking all over for you!! The section chief asked me about this wanted poster..."
Coroner: "Quiet! Can't you tell that this isn't the right place to talk so loudly!?"
The old coroner quickly snapped back at Kumatani as he barged in.
Kuma-chan: "...I...I'm sorry. Uh, the section chief wanted to inquire about the accused's wanted poster..."
Oishi: "...Ah...Well, can you discuss that with Komiyama-kun? I'm a bit tied up since I need to have a talk with this old man. Let him know that I'll be there shortly."
Kuma-chan: "Huh? ...Oh, yes, of course!"
Kumatani ran out the autopsy room in the same haste that he came in.
Coroner: "Lively young man, ain't he?"
Oishi: "The old man would've beat him for making such a russ."
Coroner: "...You should give yourself a break too. The air in this place isn't for people who ain't used to it."
Oishi: "...Yeah. The old man would probably beat me in the head for slacking off as well."
Coroner: "...Kakakaka. You're the most feared man out of all the gangs around here, yet this man was the only person in all of Shishibone who had the right to beat you up..."
Oishi: "He really was a merciless man... I think I've received more beatings from the old man than my own father."
Coroner: "There's no false to it. ...If you truly believed that you looked up to him as your father, then this man really was your father."
Oishi: "............"
My real father died in Nagoya.
...All I could say was that he was just unlucky.
If he wasn't given the order to go work at a plant in Nagoya, he wouldn't have died in an air raid. ..If he could've some how rided out for a few more months, the war would've been over.
Of course I was saddened by the news. But since I was already grown-up by then, I didn't cry down onto the ground like my mother. ...I believe people have different ways of feeling sadness. There are some who breakdown in an instant, while others have their sadness come through in gradual stages. ...I was the latter.
I hated my father when he was alive. At the time, I thought he was annoying and unfair. I lashed out inside on why he was passed over in the draft." And I thought that my hate for him would never change.
But then, the war suddenly came to and end. As I saw families and friends being reunited with joy as they came home from the fronts, that's when I first realized it. I've truly lost my dad forever and that I was sad.
At the same time, there were many people all across Japan who were saddened and undergoing hardships in their lives as well. I knew that I wasn't the only one whose life was in despair, so I didn't selfishly try to lash out as being the unluckiest person in the world. ...But what I remember that I felt truly saddened as his death finally came to me.
This country changed dramatically as soon as the war was over. As a police officer, my working environment drastically changed as well. All I could do was to focus myself in my work in order to forget my sadness.
Oishi: "...Back then, I was in charge of busting people for buying illegal rice. I went around searching travelers at each train station. And lo and behold, people after people were getting caught. There was this black market in Kokukura, so there were lots of people from in and around the Osaka region making their way to buy stuff there."
One of the most immediate effect in post-war Japan was the chronic shortage of the food supply. This affected all of the nation, and the government implemented an food rationing program called the "Food Control Law."
However, the rations that the government provided was clearly not enough to feed families, so people had to resort to buying food and supplies at the black market. Illegal trade was rampant, as people paid unlawful amounts of money in order to obtain rice.
Ironically, the government had a short supply on the food that they rationed, but one can find an abundance of groceries at the black market. The dealers and brokers would sell these at outrageous prices. Many brokers and dealers would make their wealth through these black markets. ...The Sonozaki family would make their wealth from such black markets as well, but that's another story.
However, the government decided not to go after these illegal brokers. These brokers were able to buy off corrupt officials and top members of the police department with their money. ...Instead, they decided to go after the people who bought them. And, we had to do the shitty job of confiscating the illegal rice that the people bought by selling off all of their belongings.
Coroner: "Oh yeah, I remember that time... Wasn't there a prosector who starved himself to death because of this?"
Oishi: "Yes there was.... There was a prosector who rejected buying any illegal rice, yet was later found dead due to malnutrition. What year was that...1947? Ironic wasn't it? A public prosector, a figure of justice and law, proved with his own death that people cannot survive by adhering to the law."
Prosecutor Yamaguchi felt the dillemma of being a part of the government which prosecuted people whose only charge were doign whatever they could to survive. He tried to set an example by proclaiming that he was never going to buy black market rice anymore. ...But in 1947, he died of extreme malnutrition and passed away at the young age of 33.
The law prohibits people from buying rice illegally at the black markets. Yet, people cannot survive unless they buy illegal rice. Then isn't this "Food Control Law" unjust in itself? The death of prosecutor Yamaguchi was seen as a desperate effort by him to state his message to the government about the unjustness of this law.
Oishi: "...We rounded up the people with their bags of rice, and lined them up at the checkpoint next to the station. It was like a military tribunal. We inspectedtheir bags, confiscated everything that they bought at the black market, and set them up for prosecution. ...The women all cried when we did this. They sold off everything that they owned in order to buy these rice. They pleaded to us that if we confiscate them, they don't have anything to feed their children."
Coroner: "Unreasonable wasn't it? Yet, they forbid you from going after the black market dealers, so the whole ordeal must've been unfair from the view of the people."
Oishi: "The people also became sensitive in noticing such things as well. When they hear that a police checkpoint lies ahead at the next station, they begin to jump off the trains and start to run. ...We were aware of these too, so we've set up several officers near and around such ideal "jump track" spots in order to capture them.
...I remember running to capture such women desperately tried to evade capture with several kilos of rice on their backs..."
That was when I first met the old man.
Oishi: "...I was struck in surprise. ...He looked exactly like me father! The first thought that ran through me was that he somehow survived the air raid of Nagoya and came back alive."
I was chasing after a person who started to make a dash from the checkpoint. There was no way that the person could evade capture while holding such a heavy bag of rice. So the only option left for such people was to be arrested and have his or her rice confiscated, or evade capture by ditching the precious rice that the person bought by selling his or her belongings.
...Basically in either way, if a person is unlucky enough to be chased by the police, that person is unable to provide his or her family with any rice to eat.
I knew that what I was doing was a shitty job. I knew that people have to buy black market rice in order to survive. ...So, there was this tacit understanding among the police officers to let people go if they chose to ditch the rice as they ran.
Whenever I chased after such people, I pleaded in my heart to the person 'I don't want to arrest you...please just ditch that rice...." I couldn't bear to hear people's cries and plights of despair anymore.
That was when he showed up. ...I was dumbfounded as I saw the man who looked exactly like my father...!
All of sudden, that man punched me in my face.
It is a child's part to droop your head down in apology when your father disciplines you. But I was just too happy to see my father alive, so I felt a sense of joy welding up inside me.
The man then said to let the person go.
I realized that the man was not my father when I heard his voice. Joy quickly turned into anger and I tried to arrested him on the charges of assaulting a police officer. But of course, I was just this young scrawny guy at the time, so I was no match for a man who was so used to brawls. Basically, he beat the shit outta me.
Oishi: "...Yeah and he certainly taught me a lesson. I laid there in the middle of street all beat up, and he gave me a good scolding. Nahaha, you would think that a young punk like me would never listen to some man who just beat me up right? But something struck me then. All I could see was that man superimposed with my father. So I listened, like any child would do when they were given a teaching by his dad."
Coroner: "Yep, he wasn't just a plain ruffian, but he showed guts like a real man. That's what made him such a great person. You don't see men like him these days, he was truly an example of a man from the good old times."
It's a little embarrassing, but it seemed that I still need a father figure despite being an adult. I need a man to look up to, to show me what makes a man a man. I needed a father who I could spend time drinking alcohol with me as I asked for advice.
Hence, I can say with confidence...that I had two fathers in my life.
The old man was indeed, my dad, my older brother...and my best friend.
....And now he lies here with his head, body, and his limbs dismembered...with his right arm still missing...!
The same right arm which taught me how to be a man, how to drink alcohol, how to play mahjong, and gave me a good beating when I did something wrong...is still missing...!
Coroner: "...Got any suspects?"
Oishi: "Yes I do. ....I vow to retrieve his right arm...and payback for what they've done to the old man."
It has to be them - the ones who controlled Hinamizawa with a tight clench and the main perpetrators of illegal activities of this dam construction war...The Sonozaki family.
I make a declaration of war to myself.
...I already knew who the enemy was.