“Huh? That’s a human voice?” Nijo asked.
Dr. Blue-Eyes pointed to an open door between escalators. “You don’t hear it? Someone’s whispering over there. Probably a woman.”
“Oh, I hear it. I just thought it was a turnstile.”
Now the doctor couldn’t be so sure anymore. The words had a slightly different tone than the familiar sound of the automated turnstiles, which every person who lived Inside knew. However, it was also too flat and repetitive to be human.
After the door, the hallway passed under the escalators, proceeding level along the contour of the mountain. The voice was coming from farther down. They were close to the mouth of the volcano; if an eruption occurred, this area was sure to be filled with smoke.
Farther along, there were four automated turnstiles, facing outward. Two of the machines turned their heads when the men approached them.
“You are leaving the station. Please be aware that you will need a Suika to reenter.”
They sidled against the wall to clear the path.
By definition, any place not consumed by the structure of Yokohama Station was “outside.” It happened the most in the mountains, where undulations in the surface made the generation of the building impossible. These became highly isolated exterior spots, known as station hollows.
Yet for whatever reason, there were also spots the automated turnstiles labeled as outside despite being firmly within the complex. This seemed to be one of them.
“Wow, my first time outside in ages. It’s physically within the building, so it looks the same—but the air always feels different beyond the boundaries,” Nijo commented, marveling. Dr. Blue-Eyes could only grunt noncommittally.
“Have you ever left the station, Doctor?”
“A few times. When I need to perform special treatment. It’s called an injection. I stick a small needle into a person’s body in order to deliver some kind of medicinal solution into the bloodstream directly. Can’t do that Inside, of course.”
Nijo laughed. “A needle? To heal someone? It seems positively immoral.”
The repetitive voice had stopped at some point, but the two continued walking. The hallway was curving gently with the contour of the mountain. The farther they went, the fewer lights there were, making it steadily darker. There was a pungent smell around them.
At the very end was a small, dark room. There was a couch in the corner with black cushions and something that looked like a white blanket resting atop it.
When Nijo approached the blanket, it made an animal sound like “Aaa, aauuu?” and rolled off the couch. It tumbled onto the exposed concrete floor and shrieked, then put its hands on the floor and stood.
It was not a comforter but a person. A girl of about eight or nine years, with unkempt hair so long that it reached the floor. When she saw Dr. Blue-Eyes and Nijo, she made another bestial “Aauaa,” then began to smack the doctor around the waist with both hands.
“Were you the one making that sound?” Dr. Blue-Eyes asked.
“Aa?”
She looked at him, then used both hands to clench his thigh through his pants. She was fascinated, as though she’d never gotten the chance to examine a human body before.
“Is there anyone else around?” he continued, submitting to the physical examination of his leg.
“Eee, eee,” the girl responded, and she pointed to the hallway they’d just come down.
“Doesn’t seem like she understands language,” Nijo remarked from the rear.
“Do you know your name? N-a-m-e,” said the doctor. The pudgy girl made a gesture of understanding something, clapping her hands.
“Suika not detectid. Pleez present a vallid Suika or tikit to entir,” she recited all at once. Unlike her animalistic grunts, this was as flat and monotonous as a machine. The men immediately recognized it as the words of the turnstiles.
“Ohhh… That solves it, Doctor. She’s been cast out.”
“So it would seem,” answered Dr. Blue-Eyes, putting a hand to his forehead. “Her parents must not have been able to cover the cost of the Suika implant.”
Nijo looked around the little room. It was too dark, so he pulled out his device and turned on the light, pointing it at some large trash receptacles in the corner.
“I think she must be getting stuff from there.”
He went to the line of three trash cans and opened the lid on the one marked FLAMMABLE TRASH. It was connected to some other, much larger space, judging by the sound of rushing wind on the other side. Nijo stuck his arm inside and pulled out some sealed pieces of bread and a bento lunch.
“It’s a cramped space, but she seems to have all she needs to survive. Which is how…this happened,” he stated, glancing at the girl.
While Dr. Blue-Eyes attempted to communicate with the plump child, Nijo rifled around in the corners of the room and discovered a notebook stuck behind a white pipe close to the ceiling. It was marked with entries in red ink.
April 2: Two months have passed since coming here. I suppose it’s fortunate that food is delivered to this place, but I’m not really sure. There is nothing to do but eat. Thankfully, there are multiple trash cans, so I can keep the flammable trash can with the food clean and use the empty can as a toilet. Food situation is good for now.
April 7: I’m so bored that I’ve started practicing my dropkicks against the automated turnstiles. Surprisingly, I can beat one of them, but I’m blocked by the other three and can’t escape. After many tries, I messed up my knee, so that’s the end of that.
April 15: I thought if I destroyed the top of the trash can, I might be able to get Inside, but it’s impossible to harm with my bare hands. It must be fastened in place by several screws.
April 29: Found a piece of metal in the flammable trash. Think I might be able to use it as a screwdriver. Food situation: good.
April 30: Peeled off the paint and exposed the screwheads. I was worried this would count as destruction of station property, but then I chuckled when I realized I’d already been expelled from the station, so it doesn’t matter. It’s been a while since I had a good laugh.”
April 30: Destroyed one screwhead. Trying to think of a better method. Food situation: good.
May 2: The broken screwhead is back to normal.
May 14: I don’t know my current location, probably the south side of Mt. Asama. Virtually no one passes this way.
May 17: The only thing I think about anymore is where the trash can leads. I hope it’s connected to somewhere spacious.
My clock battery is dead, so I can’t tell the date anymore. Food situation: worrisome.
Why can’t human beings eat food and store it for later?
The turnstiles brought a girl. Probably not for violations, but because she came of age.
The girl can hardly speak a word. A six-year-old should at least know how to say a few things. I suspect she was abandoned shortly after birth by her parents. Food situation: troubled.
If I get any skinnier, I might fit into the trash can without needing to take off the lid.
Would it have been any better closer to the ocean? But I’ve heard that people outside the station along the coasts have their own colonies, which is frightening in its own way. Food situation: perilous.
I can’t go back Inside due to a Suika violation, but perhaps someone who wanders by here can help her acquire a Suika and allow her to get back Inside.
I’ll leave this in a spot high up so that she doesn’t accidentally throw it away.
That was where the entries ended.
“What should we do now, Doctor?” asked Nijo, giving Blue-Eyes a piercing look. The doctor averted his eyes.
“I know what you’re asking,” he replied. “I’ve seen a number of children like her, and those who could have turned out like her. If we go to a nearby town, drag back a bioelectric technician with us, and pay the five hundred thousand milliyen, we could free her from this cage. But we shouldn’t.”
“Ahh, we shouldn’t?” Nijo questioned, pondering this statement. He smacked his fist into his palm. “I see! So what you’re saying is, as a wealthy doctor, you have the means of giving this girl a Suika and getting her out of here. But if you do that, other parents with kids of their own will think that’s unfair. ‘Why did you save her and not our children?’ they’ll ask. So you choose out of principle not to save any kids whatsoever.”
“Nijo, I beg of you—stop talking,” spat Dr. Blue-Eyes with a baleful glare. The younger man made a show of clamping his hands over his mouth.
The girl sensed something ominous in their conversation. She said, “Paa, paa,” and pulled a bag of bakery snacks from under the couch, offering them to the doctor.
They headed back into the hallway, leaving her behind. The four turnstiles were lined up in a row, facing their direction. When the turnstiles saw them, the two in the middle sidled out of the way.
“Keijin Nijo, your Suika is confirmed. Thank you for visiting Yokohama Station.”
“Eddie Shimazaki, your Suika is confirmed. Thank you for visiting Yokohama Station.”
They spoke in the same voice, delivered at just a fraction of a second’s differential, creating an ugly echo. It occurred to Dr. Blue-Eyes that these automated turnstiles were the only things that would refer to him by name anymore.