“Um,” I raised my hand timidly. “Why did Mumuu’s editor-in-chief have to take the draft?”
“The obvious answer is that somebody didn’t want it getting published.”
“But it’s weird that the Mumuu editor-in-chief is involved, then.”
Of course, this was still a guess.
“But think about it. What if Mumuu was controlling information? What if they were making sure all the information that got out was stuff normal people wouldn’t believe in order to trick people? And then they kept the truth hidden... You could make a hypothesis like that, couldn’t you?” Toko said.
Toko was a Mumuu editor, too... Did she realize how impossible most of the stuff she wrote sounded? But...
“It smells like a conspiracy!”
Normally this was where Sarai would jump in to prove us wrong. But...
Sarai just bit his lip and clenched his fists. He was being emotional, for once. He was trying his best to keep his emotions in check with his reason... That’s how it looked.
Sarai sighed and took out his phone, making notes with incredible speed.
“I understand the situation. Let’s go over all this.” By the time he was done writing, Sarai was back to his usual self. “Sumikaze, do you know what was in the paper your boss was hiding?”
“Yes.” Toko nodded. “He hid the USB memory stick it was on right in front of me. I still can’t believe that his Easter Island statue had a gimmick like that. No, actually that’s more like something I would expect from him.”
So she’d been able to find his secret because she was a ghost? It was the same thing I’d done when I went to peek into the bath. I wondered if we could do some kind of detective thing. We could make Ryotasu the actual detective while Sarai and I solved the crimes. Like some kind of Conan thing.
“I copied the data onto my phone.”
“Huh, wait a second. Toko, you were able to touch that USB stick?”
“What do you mean?”
“No, just... we’re dead, and like ghosts, right? Can we touch physical objects?”
“That’s a good point...” Toko’s eyebrows furrowed. “But I was able to touch it just fine. I was even able to use the PC.”
“Oh...”
That’s right. I’d done plenty of updates on Kirikiri Basara. I was a ghost, but I could still use the laptop.
Toko took out her phone and showed me the screen. It was a PDF of a handwritten draft. Dr. Hashigami’s handwriting covered the page.
“The title is ‘Time and the Spiritualizing World.’ This was my father’s last essay...” Sarai took more notes with his phone. That seemed to be how he was trying to maintain his calm. “Can you up it to the Cloud? I’ll be able to download it then.”
Toko used her phone to start uploading the data.
“So was there anything else you noticed? You said he was talking on the phone. Who was he talking to?”
“I don’t know. But he said the name of some weird group.”
“Group?”
Toko nodded and gave me the name. “The Hachifukushin Circle.”
“What?!” That name! I was so stunned that for a moment I forgot to breathe.
“Gamon, you know it?”
“Kn-Know it? I just heard it from someone else today.” My father’s secret, which Asunyan had told me about. “It’s an organization my dad belonged to... I guess.”
“What did you say?”
What was going on here? The dots were starting to connect.
And it was my dad who connected them. An ordinary guy who’d died seven years ago. An ordinary guy who’d just happened to have his own mini-FM radio station.
He was kind, and gentle... and because of that he often suffered, but at least he wasn’t the type of person to trick people or hurt them. That had always been how I’d thought of my dad.
But today that image was falling apart.
“That... That can’t be true.”
“It doesn’t mean everything happened because your father wanted it to.”
Suddenly, someone whispered in my ear from behind, and I jumped up. It was a man with a young-looking face, wearing a trench coat and a cap.
“Oh! It’s the cosplaying detective!” When did he get here? I hadn’t even seen him come into the café!
Detective Moritsuka smiled. “Hello there. It’s me, Zenigata! Just kidding. By the way, this isn’t cosplay.” He took off his cap and bowed. “Moritsuka, with the Musashino Police. Not Morizuka, Moritsuka. Nice to meet you.”
Toko and Sarai bowed back, obviously confused.
“You’re dead too, right? Asu... the high school girl FBI investigator... was worried about you.”
“Was she?” Moritsuka whispered her name and looked sad. But that was only for a moment, and he quickly went back to his normal, faint smile. Then he put his hand on my shoulder, a little too friendly for my liking. “Can you tell her not to push herself too hard if you see her? Thanks.”
“So you do know her.”
“Yeah, I guess.” Moritsuka stepped away from me and began to twirl his cap with his fingers. “Still, she’s already found out all that about the Hachifukushin Circle? Pretty impressive.”
Asunyan said that Moritsuka had been in charge of the case before she was. She was investigating the hints that he’d left. So maybe he knew something about my dad and the case that I didn’t. But from what I knew about him, there was no way he’d just tell me...
“How much do you know, and about what?” Sarai asked Moritsuka warily.
“Tch-tch-tch. Don’t make too many assumptions about me.” Moritsuka didn’t answer. He always talked like this. “There isn’t much I know. Making it seem like you know more than you do and upsetting the person you talk to are both interrogation techniques. Scare them or make them mad, and they’ll tell you things they didn’t intend to.”
“Grr...”
He was so right I couldn’t do anything but groan.
“The thing is, though, we don’t have a lot of time. If we want to take action, it’s best that we hurry.”