Work Text:
Minato didn’t tend to pay much mind to gossip, if only because there were so few contexts in which it was even passed on to him, and what he was lucky enough to hear, it tended to be about work. Gossip about work was inherently dull or extremely depressing, so that too was limited. Any “office banter” at the coroner’s office usually boiled down to Toriumi, his superior, complaining about failed dates or claiming she had proof that a public prosecutor was stuffing her bra to get more favorable verdicts. Riveting stuff.
One’s chosen profession was something to take pride in and have passion for, but Minato hadn’t felt such emotions in years. Perhaps that was what had drawn him to the job in the first place –– doing something so inherently morbid gave him an excuse to treat it as a job and nothing else. He lived his life bouncing between his apartment and the coroner's office, doing little else with his time and not paying much mind to what went on beyond the walls of those two places. Toriumi was his only gateway to the frivolities of living in the real world, as depressing as that was.
“Word on the street is, there’s this new hotshot prosecutor in town,” Toriumi was saying as she watched Minato carrying out an unremarkable autopsy. Minato squinted at the knife wound in the victim’s chest, eyeballing the depth of it and scribbling down a few notes. As happy as he was that it wasn’t more gossip about suspected bra-stuffing, he couldn’t say he really cared about some new prosecuting attorney. He didn’t like to mix with lawyers.
Minato nodded his head once as he continued his examination, hoping that it would be a sufficient enough response while clearly indicating his indifference to the topic. Unfortunately, Toriumi began to speak again, clearly not caring that he wasn’t interested.
“He’s young too –– must be fresh out of law school,” Toriumi said. “Everyone at the station and the Prosecutor’s office won’t shut up about him, calling him handsome and dreamy. It’s like no one’s a goddamn professional anymore.”
Minato resisted the urge to roll his eyes.
“They only think that because he’s from out of town,” Toriumi continued as Minato covered up the body with the sheet once again and began searching for his favored set of scalpels among the mess Toriumi had left the place in. “He got his law degree in Tokyo –– his schooling was fast-tracked, but that’s the most anyone knows. Some of those IT freaks at the station tried to dig up records on him, but there’s nothing. I don’t think any of them would give a damn if it weren’t for how he acts in court…”
Minato frowned as he pulled on a pair of gloves. At some point, he had actually started listening to Toriumi. He might even miss her once she transferred to Kyoto and truly left him by his lonesome in just a matter of weeks. There was no telling when he might get another coworker to keep him company. Cutting up dead bodies wasn’t many people’s idea of a dream job, after all.
“How is he in court?” Minato mumbled.
“I don’t know,” Toriumi said. She paused her rambling to point at a spot on the corpse’s side. “Make your incision there; the guy’s family wants an open-casket. Don’t get sloppy now.”
“Mmhm.”
“Anyway, apparently he gets really…is ‘intense’ the word? Maybe. I saw him prosecuting briefly the other day, since I’d gotten so curious, and I found it creepy more than anything. You should stop by and see it for yourself, Yuki-kun.”
“Sure,” Minato said, not meaning it at all. If there was one thing he absolutely couldn’t stomach, it was a courtroom. He could die happily if it meant he never ever had to step foot in one again.
“Anyway, I’m telling you all of this because this is the victim in the case he’s prosecuting. He’ll be coming by soon to pick up your report. And no , I can’t talk to him for you. I’m taking the rest of the day off. I have an eye appointment.”
“Have fun with the new Innocent Sin Online expansion,” Minato mumbled as he pulled his surgical mask over his face and prepared to get to work.
“Hey,” Toriumi said with a sneer. “Don’t forget your performance review’s coming up.”
“Have a good eye appointment, Toriumi-san,” Minato said.
After finishing the autopsy and taking a late lunch break, Minato found himself alone in the coroner's office, without much to do. He figured he might as well organize the place, even if it was bound to get Toriumi complaining about not being able to find anything for the following weeks. But he supposed once she was gone and the place was his own, he could start putting things where they actually belonged, and it didn’t hurt to get a headstart on that.
Hooking his headphones over his ears, Minato got to work sanitizing the examination table and all the tools that saw constant use, bobbing his head absentmindedly to the music. When he was done sanitizing the workspace, he began to sweep the floor, already thinking of how he ought to organize the various chemicals that were haphazardly stacked up in the cabinets. As long as there were no surprise calls from the police department, Minato could go home early and get some rest.
“Excuse me?”
A low voice broke Minato out of his rhythm and stopped him in his tracks. Sighing and reaching for his mp3 player to halt his playlist, Minato turned around to regard whoever had just barged into the room without his notice. Upon seeing a complete stranger, Minato quickly removed his headphones, suddenly remembering that the prosecutor Toriumi had been gossiping about was going to pick up the most recent autopsy report in person. The identity of the stranger was suddenly all too clear.
“Are you the coroner?” the prosecutor asked, a warm smile spreading across his face. “I’m sorry I interrupted your cleaning. Is this a bad time?”
Minato shook his head and set down his broom, heading for the cabinet he’d filed the report in and promptly fishing it out. After double-checking that the folder contained all the proper contents, Minato approached the prosecutor and held it out to him wordlessly, really taking in the sight of the other man for the first time.
He certainly looked…eccentric. His pressed white button-down shirt, slacks, and suspenders were appropriate enough garb for a prosecutor, but the bright yellow scarf he had draped around his neck was an unusual fashion choice, to say the least. He also wore earrings that looked like feathers and a bracelet with an oddly shaped stone around his wrist. His eyes were as blue as a clear sky and as bright as the sun, and he wore a bigger smile than Minato had ever seen anyone wear in the presence of dead bodies.
He was definitely weird and gossip worthy, but Toriumi had said he’d been “intense” and “creepy” in court. Looking at the man across from him, Minato sincerely doubted that Toriumi’s assessment was accurate. The only thing that she had been right about…was that the man was undoubtedly attractive.
“Thanks!” the prosecutor said as he accepted the file, with both hands, his eyes sparkling. “Oh, where are my manners? I’m Ryoji Mochizuki, from the Prosecutor’s Office. It’s nice to meet you.”
Minato nodded in acknowledgement, waiting for the man to turn around and leave. Usually, prosecutors didn’t bother collecting reports in person, and when they did, they left quickly. Not many people could stomach lingering in a place so infused with the stench of death.
“What’s your name?” Mochizuki asked, stepping a little closer to Minato.
Minato held back a sigh. He didn’t want to encourage Mochizuki to consider him a peer. But it would be poor manners to refuse to answer, and between him and Toriumi, he couldn’t be the “rude one”.
“...Makoto Yuki,” Minato said.
Even after using that name for close to ten years, he still hadn’t quite figured out how to provide it without hesitating. He didn’t mind it –– it was that very name that had protected him from those who wished him dead so many years ago. But that name was just a mask, a barrier that kept him away from reality. It was like a sheet of plexiglass keeping him confined to his insignificant little corner of the world. Makoto Yuki was alive, but he did not live. Minato Arisato was dead of unknown causes, laid out on the table in front of him under a sheet that he didn’t dare lift.
“Thank you for your hard work, Yuki-san,” Mochizuki said with an aborted bow. “With luck, this will help me win my case tomorrow. Maybe I’ll win if I imagine you’re cheering me on.” Mochizuki had the audacity to wink after finishing his sentence, and Minato decided then and there that he didn’t care for the new prosecutor at all, and wanted him out of the office as soon as possible. He probably wouldn’t be back for a while.
The next week, Mochizuki stopped by the office again. Minato had somehow convinced himself in that time that he’d been embellishing his own memories, thinking that Mochizuki was hotter than he actually was. To his disappointment, Minato had remembered that prince-like face, the adorable little beauty mark, and those endlessly sparkling eyes with perfect clarity.
“Good afternoon, Yuki-san,” Mochizuki said as he entered. “I’m here to pick up the autopsy report for Ayako Yoshimoto.”
“I’ve got it, I’ve got it,” Toriumi said with a grunt, getting up from her chair and heading to the filing cabinet. “Go ahead and take your lunch, Yuki-kun.” Minato shifted on his feet, trying to avoid looking at Mochizuki. He couldn’t fathom why he’d come back so soon. Didn’t he know that usually those reports were digitized and sent right to the Prosecutor's office when they were needed? He was supposedly a talented prosecutor, but his actions were moronic, in Minato’s opinion. It was an exceptionally unpleasant place to be.
“Where do you usually get lunch?” Mochizuki asked suddenly. “I’m still new to the area, and I’d appreciate a recommendation!”
Minato made eye contact with Mochizuki again, shifting a bit under his gaze. Toriumi was cursing at the filing cabinet, and thus, couldn’t run interference between Minato and the chatty prosecutor. “Hagakure,” Minato said. “It’s pretty good ramen.”
Mochizuki’s eyes lit up instantly with excitement.
“Thanks!” Mochizuki said. “Ramen actually sounds pretty good right about now. I was planning on getting some lunch myself. Would you care to join me? I’ll treat you to repay you for the tip.”
“I brought a lunch with me,” Minato said, shaking his head and stuffing his hands in his lab coat pockets. He thought of the convenience-store bento sitting in the mini fridge and was grateful that the mask on his face was concealing his grimace. He didn’t know why he’d instinctually turned down free food. Mochizuki was weird, but not unkind. Having Toriumi, his superior, as the closest thing he had to a friend would just be too depressing, and suddenly, an attractive young man had waltzed into Minato’s workplace and practically demanded they become friends. But no matter what he tried, Minato’s walls stayed firmly in place, not to be shaken even by the will of the one they were keeping safely confined away from everything that could hurt him.
“Maybe some other time, then,” Mochizuki said, undeterred even as Toriumi practically shoved the folder into his hand. “I’ll be seeing you.”
Minato nodded shortly. A retort sat on the tip of his tongue: “There’s really no reason for you to see me. Prosecutors have no need to come in person for this sort of thing.” But he kept the words in. He didn’t want to be overtly rude to someone who was his peer in many ways. He figured that Mochizuki was stopping by and chatting him up only because he was convenient company, but that behavior would die down once he got settled into the island and made some proper friends. Then, he’d have some peace and quiet at his job again. It was such a relief that the dead didn’t speak.
As Mochizuki turned to leave, he shot Minato that disarming smile of his once more, though there seemed to be less bravado in it. It was softer than it had been before –– a little more hesitant. Minato couldn’t find the energy to return it, but the image of it didn’t quite leave his head as he turned around and stared at the bare counter, suddenly feeling himself filled with nervous energy.
“Shameless,” Toriumi groaned under her breath.
“What is?” Minato asked.
Toriumi didn’t answer, but leveled a very unimpressed glare at him until Minato awkwardly finished cleaning up the workstation and disappeared into the breakroom.
It was Minato’s first day at the office as the sole coroner working for the Iwatodai Police Department, and he was bored out of his mind. While it was a good thing, he supposed, that he didn’t have any bodies to examine and dissect, since it meant there were fewer tragedies taking place beyond the confines of the brick building, he was going a little crazy in complete silence.
He’d underappreciated Toriumi while he had her in his life, though he would never dare admit that to her. It just left him in an empty room, surrounded by the dead who slumbered in their refrigerated coffins in the walls. He had never minded silence before, or at least he thought that he didn’t, but lately he’d been wearing his headphones to work and only removing them when there was actually work to be done.
As the hours dragged on, Minato organized and digitized records, exchanged a few emails with his superiors, and generally sat around, waiting for tragedy to strike somewhere, as it always did, and bring with it familiar work. But no fresh bodies were delivered to him at all, and eventually, Minato began to pack up his things, turning on his pager so he’d be available if needed but resigning himself to a quiet evening of reading the vampire romance novel he’d bought online when he suddenly heard the handle to his office turning, slowly and hesitantly.
“Come in,” Minato said. He’d wondered if someone might stop by and ask him how his first day on his own was, as if he hadn’t been more than carrying his weight when he had Toriumi there with him. But it was important that he remain in good favor with the police, so Minato turned around and removed his headphones, ready to nod politely to his visitor.
But it wasn’t one of his superiors who walked through the door. It was Prosecutor Mochizuki. For a second, Minato panicked, thinking he must have missed a message about him stopping by, or if he’d sent over the wrong information in one of his reports to the Prosecutor’s office, but with the day being as dull as it was, both seemed unlikely. He had plenty of time to be obsessively meticulous with the messages he received and the work he sent back out.
“Good evening, Yuki-san,” Prosecutor Mochizuki said. “I…just realized I forgot to tell you that I was going to stop by. I’m terribly sorry for that. If you’re leaving for the day, I can come back tomorrow.”
Minato shook his head.
“You’re already here,” Minato said flatly. “What’s the name?”
“Katsue Sugi,” Mochizuki recited.
“You prosecute a lot of murder cases,” Minato said as he walked over to the filing cabinet and began to comb through it. Lots of murder cases meant lots and lots of autopsies that Mochizuki would presumably continue to stop by to noisily collect.
“...yeah,” Mochizuki said. His smile wavered, but didn’t quite fall. “Where’s your co-worker? Is she sick? If she is, I’d love to send her a care package! What sort of flowers does she like?”
“She moved to Kyoto,” Minato said. “It’s just me now.”
“That’s a shame,” Mochizuki said, tilting his head slightly as if trying to size Minato up. “It must get terribly lonely in here, now that you’re by yourself.”
“I’m not,” Minato mumbled. He gave an aborted gesture at the mortuary refrigerators that held already-examined cadavers. “They’re here too.”
Mochizuki startled a little at Minato’s attempt at a joke, but then snorted. Somehow, though, it felt incredibly forced. Minato tried not to take it too personally.
“Well, I’m better for conversation,” Mochizuki said, beaming as Minato shoved his hands in his lab coat pockets and shifted on his feet. “As long as I’m welcome.”
“Prosecutors can come and go as they please to collect autopsy reports,” Minato said. Mochizuki nodded, his gaze drifting around the empty room. Every so often, his eyes would settle on a random spot of air and glaze over, like he was fighting desperately to appear normal and even staring straight ahead was something of a struggle.
“...everything okay?” Minato asked, without really knowing why.
Mochizuki froze, his smile stretched out across his face like a mask and his eyes growing a little wider. After a second, he cleared his throat and began to fidget with one of the straps of his suspenders.
“Y-Yes,” Mochizuki said. “Everything’s fine.”
Minato found the report and snatched it out of the cabinet, taking a moment to write himself a notice to print another copy to replace it the following day. As he walked the documents over to Mochizuki and held them out, he noticed the other man fighting to regain the former glory of his smile and not quite getting there.
“It’s nothing really,” Mochizuki said. “I just…I lost my first case today. I knew it would happen eventually –– of course it would. But I wasn’t prepared for it.”
“Losing isn’t fun for anyone,” Minato said, rolling his eyes.
“I don’t care about winning or losing,” Mochizuki said, his eyes suddenly wide and searingly bright. “I care about justice being served. When I take the stand…I’m the vessel of the dead…of the deceased who can no longer use their own voice to bring about retribution. I know that the defendant was guilty. I know he was. But…I just couldn’t prove it.”
Minato didn’t know whether he ought to awkwardly apologize or attempt to console someone who was still very much a stranger to him. But despite not knowing how to appropriately react…he had to admit that he certainly felt for him. Mochizuki looked crushed, like he would never recover from the devastation of letting down a dead person, who wasn’t even around to be mad at him in the first place. It was ridiculous, much like a lot of things about Mochizuki, but Minato’s heart still clenched as he watched Mochizuki awkwardly fix his smile back into place.
“I’ll…get over it soon enough,” Mochizuki said. “Sorry about that.”
Minato nodded, acknowledging the apology but not responding to it. He didn’t think that an apology was necessary at all. Being a lawyer…standing in court…it was an unenviable profession, through and through.
“Um…” Mochizuki said, his smile turning sheepish as he rubbed the back of his neck. “Are you…sure that it’s alright if I keep coming by in person for autopsy reports? No one else really seems to, so I can stop if it's a bother.”
“I don’t mind,” Minato said.
Mochizuki softened noticeably at the confirmation that his presence was tolerated. Minato had to turn away entirely from him to avoid getting fixated on that bright smile, that mark under his eye, or those damned ocean-blue irises of his. Having Mochizuki around certainly upset the order of the workplace, but not in a way that was bothersome. It was somewhat baffling to have such a mundane, brainless reaction to someone attractive. Minato was about as off-the-market as a single person could get.
Not that he wanted to date Mochizuki. He barely knew him. He was just…very pretty.
“Well,” Mochizuki said, winking at Minato. “Guess I’ll be seeing you. I’ll look forward to it.”
Minato didn’t tend to bother learning any details about the cases that came attached to the bodies he examined, outside of what was strictly necessary, but occasionally, he was given a cadaver that baffled him thoroughly, not in any way by its state, but rather, but the fact that it was unremarkable. The body of a middle-aged man that he just finished examining was one such case.
Minato had determined the cause of death to be a heart-attack. There were no signs of foul play present on the body. According to medical records he’d received, the man had lived with heart problems his whole life, so such an end was expected, if anything. It was strange to have his examination ordered by the police.
That afternoon, he’d had a rare visitor –– the Chief of Police himself, Takeharu Kirijo. The only person who ever lingered in the coroner’s office for an extended period of time was Mochizuki, who stopped by without fail for every new murder case, often bringing an interesting story or a packaged snack for Minato along with him. The Chief of Police was a stark contrast to that, his grim professionalism somehow making a room with a body in it seem more off putting and cold than it ever had been before.
Still, Kirijo was not unkind by any means. When Minato reported his findings to the man, he’d looked somewhat relieved, if anything, but still guarded. Minato bit his tongue to hold himself back from asking what the point of such an autopsy was, but ended up lucking out when the Chief of Police filled in the blanks for him of his own free will.
“Thank you for taking the time to conduct this report,” Kirijo said. “I myself didn’t suspect foul play, but the timing was too suspicious, and even the most baseless of rumors must be examined, should they point to wrongdoing going unpunished. I can only hope your hard work may help put some unsavory gossip to rest.”
Minato bowed as Kirijo left, troubled by what he’d heard. He wondered if his time working under Toriumi had given him a taste for gossip after all. It was all he could think about as the workday continued, and it was more than a little maddening. He thought about it while organizing the filing cabinet, while taking the monorail back to his sad, empty apartment, and the entire time he was being unhelpful in a raid with Toriumi and some of her friends.
“Woooow, Makoto,” Toriumi said over their voice-call once the raid had failed and they’d dragged themselves back to a quiet part of the hub world. “Did you fall asleep at your keyboard? You’re playing like a noob!” Judging by her tone of voice, she was drunk. He wondered how the new job was treating her, but knew better than to ask.
“Sorry,” Minato mumbled. “Weird day.”
“Oh, lemme guess,” Toriumi said. “You heard about Prosecutor Mochizuki, didn’t you?”
Minato froze, his heart thumping in his chest as the words rang in his ears.
“...what about Prosecutor Mochizuki?” Minato finally found the strength to ask.
“Geez, you really don’t hear any gossip, do you?” Toriumi said with a snort. “I dragged my ass all the way to Kyoto to get away from it and I’m still getting the news. Basically, someone Mochizuki was prosecuting walked free recently –– Mochizuki lost the case. And then the very next day…the accused dropped dead. Guy’s name was…Tanigami, I think.”
Tanigami was the name of the man Minato had examined earlier that day –– the unremarkable body. It had just been a heart attack that had caused the issue; there was no reason to suspect foul play, in Minato’s opinion. It was just a coincidence, which was hardly gossip worthy. Perhaps the stress of being on trial had been the impetus for the heart attack. Minato could certainly sympathize –– even so many years after being traumatized while testifying in court, he still had nightmares about it.
“So what?” Minato asked.
“It’s the third time this has happened,” Toriumi said, her voice suddenly steadier and a lot more serious. “Since moving to town, Prosecutor Mochizuki has only lost three cases. And every single one of those defendants, shortly after being acquitted…has died. Some people at the station are calling him ‘The Reaper’.”
“They think…he’s killing them?” Minato asked, unable to believe what he was hearing.
“They think he’s cursed or some shit,” Toriumi snorted. “If I’d known something that exciting was coming to Port Island, I woulda stuck around. Anyway, enough about work stuff. You joining the next raid?”
“...no,” Minato said. “I’d…better not.”
He swiftly tore his headset off and shut off his computer, clutching his hands together in front of him tightly without really understanding why. He wasn’t afraid…try as he might, he couldn’t picture Mochizuki as a killer. He was appalled by the fact that anyone was apparently able to, enough that they were spreading rumors about it and even brandishing him with a cruel epithet.
He felt sick to his stomach with worry. He didn’t have any way to check on Mochizuki and make sure he was well. He wondered if they’d detained and questioned him, if all the people who had been calling him “dreamy” and “talented” had flipped their feelings about him on a dime and begun to shun him. He didn’t know, and couldn’t find out. They barely saw each other, and Minato only had his work email address. Even if Minato did have the means to contact Mochizuki, it wasn’t like he’d be able to say anything of use.
Getting up from his desk chair with a grunt, Minato walked a few steps over his worn-down futon and collapsed onto it, begging for sleep to take him over and put an end to his rushing thoughts. There was nothing to be done at present except keep up his routine, and perhaps, once he was back in the office the next morning, page through all of Mochizuki’s lost cases and re-examine the records of those victims.
He didn’t want to assume Mochizuki didn’t have anyone in his corner. But for the first time in dozens of years…Minato wasn’t satisfied with inaction. He had to learn more about Ryoji Mochizuki.
When Mochizuki finally showed his face again in the coroner’s office, Minato had expected to see him looking sullen, bitter, or even downright depressed. But disturbingly, he looked just as chipper as always when he strolled in, carrying a takeout bag and dropping it in the break room fridge with the excuse that Umiushi had given him an extra beef bowl by accident.
“I’m here for Nobuko Fukuchi’s autopsy today,” Mochizuki said. “It’s a tough case, so I hope you’ll be cheering me on!”
Minato nodded as he dug out the folder. He’d been paying a lot more attention to Mochizuki’s cases lately, and he had already known which autopsy he would be coming to collect. But he hadn’t pulled it out early. There was no need to rush his visitor out the door, after all.
“Do you best,” Minato said flatly.
“I always do,” Mochizuki said, his smiling thinning into something a bit rougher and more genuine. “It might all seem like a bunch of paperwork and arguing, but there are lives in my hands. Um…so to speak.”
Minato tried not to react, but he couldn’t help the way he tensed, stopping in his tracks for the briefest of moments on his walk back to deliver the file to Mochizuki. Mochizuki's sharp eyes jumped to Minato’s face immediately, narrowing slightly as if analyzing his reaction. Then, he looked away, letting out a short sigh.
“You’ve heard about it, haven’t you?” Mochizuki asked. “They’re calling me ‘The Reaper’.”
“...so it’s true?” Minato asked. “They’re really calling you that?”
“I’ve been reassured that none of my superiors think I’m involved with the deaths that have occurred,” Mochizuki said. “I had a conversation or two with the Chief Prosecutor and Chief of Police, but I am not being considered as a serious suspect in any of the deaths.”
“Obviously,” Minato said. Mochizuki looked surprised by his words for some reason, so Minato elaborated. “The most recent one died from natural causes. He had a heart attack. That’s all. Anyone calling that a murder doesn’t know anything about my profession. They’re just superstitious gossips.”
“Hmm,” Mochizuki said. He didn’t look perturbed by Minato’s harsh words, or by the fact that they were discussing such an outrageous, slanderous conspiracy involving him. Sometimes, even Mochizuki’s warmest smiles seemed like they were stuck in place, frozen in rigor mortis.
Minato handed off the files in silence, and Mochizuki took it, paging through it silently as Minato turned around and walked a few feet to shut the filing cabinet. On the short journey, he wracked his brain for anything intelligent or helpful to say, but came up with absolutely nothing.
“...I wonder…if any of this was worth it,” Mochizuki muttered. When Minato turned around to look at him again, he saw Mochizuki clutching his own wrist tightly, almost like he was in pain. His hand was pressed against that stone he always wore around his wrist –– the one that was shaped like a rounded nine. “I wonder…if a man diverges from his fated path, will fate trade blows with him until his course is corrected? Perhaps, these spirits that I’ve let down are taking their revenge on me.”
Spirits? What is he talking about? Does he mean…the victims?
“I don’t believe in fate,” Minato said, shrugging easily as more hair fell into his face. “And I don’t believe in spirits either.”
Judging by the way Mochizuki’s eyes went wide, Minato wasn’t supposed to hear the words he was muttering. But instead of getting upset, to Minato’s surprise, Mochizuki let out a loud laugh.
“I guess that explains why you can stomach this profession,” Mochizuki said, the somber moment seemingly having passed. “If you believe in absolute death, then bodies are just collections of inorganic material. They’re nothing to be afraid of…and they can’t hurt you.”
Minato nodded slowly. He’d never considered that a way of thinking –– just something that was obviously true. He wondered if the other man was into more spiritual ways of thinking. He was pretty sure Toriumi had once described Prosecutor Mochizuki using tarot cards while prosecuting in court.
“A cadaver is just an empty shell,” Minato said. “People die. It’s just how the world works. They disappear, and they take their secrets with them. Often, they’re buried together.”
“An empty shell, huh?” Ryoji asked, his smile somewhat wry as he stared at the refrigerator where Minato had stored the body that was once Hirotaka Tanigami. “Without your own spirit…I guess that is what you become. Just an inanimate thing with…no purpose.”
“You’re right,” Minato said. “I don’t find this job hard to stomach. I pursued it because unlike most people, I’m not uncomfortable with death. There wasn’t much more thought to it then that. It’s a job that needs to get done, and I don’t mind it.”
“It wasn’t your dream as a kid to dissect dead people for a living?” Mochizuki joked.
Minato forced out a light laugh because honestly, he couldn’t even remember what he wanted to be when he grew up as a child. Back then, he’d been someone completely different. Someone with hopes and fears, someone with a family. Someone with a twin sister. He had none of those things anymore.
“Did you always want to become a prosecutor?” Minato asked.
The fluorescent light flickered overhead briefly, casting a second-long shadow over Mochizuki’s face. For that flash of a moment, it almost looked like Mochizuki’s expression had shattered completely, but once Minato blinked, the smile on his face looked the same as it always did.
“It’s actually not at all what I thought I’d be doing with my life,” Mochizuki said. “But…it feels a lot more important. You said earlier that often, when people die, the truth gets buried with them. Well…I can’t accept that. I became a prosecutor so I can call back the truth with my own power and piece it back together. I need to uncover every unjust crime that I can, and save people while doing it. It’s…an essential mission that I’ve given myself. I’m not going to let some silly nickname stop me from doing something that important.”
The words were something of a relief to hear –– audible confirmation that Mochizuki wasn’t letting the Reaper label get to him. At least, that’s what it would have been if something in Minato’s gut wasn’t screaming that Mochizuki was lying to him.
“But mostly…it just seemed fun,” Mochizuki said with an impossibly wider grin. “I wanted to get out of my hometown and actually see the world a little.”
“Your hometown?” Minato prompted.
“I-It’s small and remote,” Mochizuki said, waving his hand dismissively. “You won’t have heard of it before, and I won’t bore you with the details.”
Mochizuki pulled out his phone, read something on the homescreen, and then sighed, tucking it back into his pocket. It seemed that their time to talk had come to an end. They both had their own work to do. For Mochizuki, it was meaningful, and for Minato, just busy work to complete until he was the one stretched out on that metal table being carved open.
“I’m sorry,” Mochizuki said. “I have to run back to the office. But, thank you, as always, for the conversation.”
Minato nodded.
“Have a good day,” he said, “Prosecutor Mochizuki.”
“You can call me ‘Ryoji’, if you want,” Mochizuki said, turning his head back as he stood in the doorframe of the room. “We’re friends, aren’t we?” Minato looked away, grateful that his surgical mask was hiding his cheeks from view. He could feel them heating up against his will.
“...it’s unprofessional,” Minato muttered.
Ryoji let out that light laugh again, the one that stuck with Minato for the hours that followed every time he had the pleasure of hearing it.
“I guess so,” Ryoji said. “Please be well, Yuki-san.”
Friends. Ryoji had called them friends. Is that what they were? They felt more like distant acquaintances. They’d never seen each other outside of the coroner’s office, and that wasn’t likely to change anytime soon. Still…Minato couldn’t deny that Ryoji’s presence was pleasant, almost calming. He was curious about the man, so much so that he was almost tempted to bring up the topic of grabbing lunch the next time he came by.
But he wouldn’t. He couldn’t. Minato Arisato could only move between his home and his work, like a damned soul working off an eternal debt. There was too much of himself that was dead and buried, and Ryoji had proclaimed himself to be someone with a mission to unearth concealed truths at any cost. Their collision was a dangerous one. It would be better for both of them to keep things professional.
As a particular body bag was delivered to Minato, he happened to overhear one of the bailiffs say it had come straight from the courthouse and for a moment, the whole world was frozen over. Then, when Minato had the courage to unzip the top and reveal the victim’s face, he was somewhat relieved to see a stranger.
“What happened?” Minato demanded of one of the men who had come in with the body, who already looked a little queasy.
“The guy confessed to murder on the witness stand, and then he suddenly just collapsed, dead!” the detective with the goatee said, shivering a little in his shoes. “And the Reaper wasn’t even prosecuting! Maybe it’s the courthouse that’s cursed? Or the whole Prosecutor’s office…”
“Everyone, clear out,” one of the officers said. “Give Yuki-san space to work. He’ll report back to us once the autopsy is complete.” Minato nodded his thanks, but perked his ears up as the group of bailiffs and detectives headed for the exit.
“I feel bad for that greenhorn defense attorney,” one of them was saying.
“Yeah,” another officer said. “Shiomi-san, I think her name was.”
“It was her first case, I heard. She may have won, but this is sure to scar her for a while, maybe for life.”
“What do you think it was? Cyanide or something?”
“I still think it was the Reaper…”
When it was finally quiet again, Minato unzipped the body bag down to the portly man’s stomach, putting on a pair of gloves and taking a slow breath out to prepare himself to work. Once he was properly sanitized and prepared, Minato finally was ready to begin his initial assessment. He started the job by unbuttoning the man’s shirt just like he always did, then placed a hand on the man’s stomach.
Cold. Ice cold. Freezing.
Minato drew his hand away sharply, only barely holding in a yelp as his pulse skyrocketed and his vision began to blur. His knees were wobbling but he managed to hold himself up on the weight of the table, trying to get it together…trying not to think about the crash.
He’d crawled toward his mother, who was in the passenger’s seat, having reached over and purposely yanked the steering wheel to the left, swerving the car into the guardrail at full speed. He had been crying, seeking familiar comfort, but when he’d touched her arm, she’d been as cold as a statue made of snow, her skin brittle and unnatural. It was a phenomenon that he’d since convinced himself that he had made up, that it was a delusion of a child. But he had felt it again. The evidence of what he’d seen and felt back then was laying in front of him, and it was his job to document every detail.
He had to…document the truth. A truth so similar to the one he’d nearly been killed over as a child. The truth that had forced him to abandon his name and had separated him forever from Kotone, who he was sure he wouldn’t even recognize if he were to see her again. Whatever had killed their mother, fifteen years ago…could it have killed the man in front of him too?
Minato tried to focus his energy on flexing his fingers, tapping his foot, anything to remind him that his body wasn’t a cadaver yet, that he was still alive and served some purpose. Then, he did his best to swallow the past, kept his head down, and began to work again.
The truth had died with his parents so many years ago. The only thing that remained to be seen was if Minato was brave enough to act like Ryoji and unearth it at any cost. But even as he worked on autopilot, he was able to make one decision that he hadn’t been brave enough to previously. When he saw Ryoji Mochizuki again, he was going to give him his phone number. Maybe they’d both stand a better chance of putting vengeful spirits to rest if they had each other.
After all, they were…friends. That meant that Minato could trust Ryoji.
…didn’t it?