-ONE-


     Inspector Jiro Takeda looked up from his desk to a most unwelcome 
sight: that of tall and gaunt Detective Lieutenant Iwase Ozawa with 
two large manilla files in his hands.
     "Can I speak with you for a moment?" Ozawa asked.
     Takeda leaned his bulk over his desk to sweep a pile of folders 
from one of the chairs before him. The folders joined the stacks of 
boxes, more files, and takeout lunch containers in the disarray of 
his office floor.
     "Have a seat," he grunted with a sip of tepid coffee.
     Ozawa sat down and placed the two folders on Takeda's desk. The 
Inspector did not look at them.
     "I see this place hasn't changed a bit," Ozawa observed with a 
wave of his hand.
     "How are things in the Commissioner's Office?" Takeda asked, ignoring 
the remark.
     "Fine. Fine," Ozawa replied.
     "What brings you down here?"
     Ozawa composed himself slightly before speaking, a gesture that was 
not lost upon Inspector Takeda. "Two floaters have been found in a canal 
in Nerima ward in the last six weeks. Both were teenaged girls, both 
mangled pretty badly."
     "Sounds like a problem for Nerima Homicide," Takeda observed with 
another sip of coffee.
     "That's the problem," Ozawa returned. "It *is* a problem for Nerima 
Homicide. They have nothing right now. Nothing. They don't have anyone 
who has ever had to do something like this before. Most of them have never 
even had to deal with a homicide before." He steepled his fingers. "Nerima 
is pretty tame. They get petty larceny, vandalism, and some disturbances 
of the peace. That's about it. They're almost as weird as Tomobiki ward, 
but basically harmless."
     "What do I have to do with this?" Takeda asked warily.
     "We want you to go take a look. Just a look. Give the boys in Nerima 
some ideas, that sort of thing."
     "I don't do that sort of thing anymore. I work for the Special Unit 
now," Takeda countered. It was true even though he was Tokyo Prefecture 
Police and not part of the National Police. "Yakuza. There are no Yakuza in 
Nerima. Find someone else."
     "There is no-one else," Ozawa returned. "You're the only one with 
this kind of experience."
     Takeda cursed. His fat, ruddy, fortyish face became much older, paler, 
and wasted.
     "You think it's a Serial, don't you?"
     "What do you think?"
     "I think you're trying to bullshit me into taking this job."
     "Would I do that?"
     "Fuck you," Takeda growled. "You wouldn't come over from the Police 
Commissioner's Office just to get me to recite a precis on homicide 
investigation to the clowns on the Nerima force."
     Ozawa changed tacks. "You have no idea how big this has become. Hawa 
and Yamaga and the other assistant chiefs didn't even want to listen to me 
about this. I just barely got the old man to open the investigation."
     Takeda grunted in thought. Hawa and Yamaga were dull, stupid assholes 
who wouldn't believe in Santa Claus even if the fat old gaijin showed up 
on their doors with a sleigh and a sack full of gifts for them.
     "No-one wants to admit that there's a problem," Takeda said bitterly. 
"Serial murder is the product of the decadent and immoral United States; 
it simply doesn't happen in precious, holy Japan."
     "You'll help, then?" Ozawa asked hopefully.
     "Get someone else."
     "I just said that there was no-one else. You know that. We could ask 
the F.B.I. for help, and Interpol, but you know as well as I do that no 
potential witness will talk to them. They would be outsiders. They can't 
understand our culture enough to make the right connections with the 
evidence." Ozawa's gaze leveled on Takeda.  "You're the guy who's caught 
two wackos, remember?"
     "That was a long time ago," Takeda replied, secretly hating Ozawa for 
even mentioning it. "Look, just level with me. You aren't here to ask, 
are you."
     Ozawa's face tightened. "No. I wanted to be polite about it, but if 
you refused, the Commissioner was going to make it an order."
     "Your idea?"
     "No. I recommended you, that much is true, but they want this matter 
wrapped up quickly and quietly. Before it really leaks out to the press."
     Takeda felt the bile rise in his throat. He thought of mangled bodies, 
of cruelty beyond any ritualized Yakuza hit, of hatred alien and incompre-
hensible to rational minds. Even worse than the hateful madness, he thought 
of the cold unfeeling bastards in the Commissioner's Office. They didn't 
care that someone was out there turning schoolgirls into hamburger, the only 
thing that concerned them was making the whole thing disappear. Before the 
stigma of serial murder in Japan became a stain too tough to wash away.
     "I'm in," he said hoarsely. "But on one condition: I get everything 
and everyone I need to finish this. Anyone from Headquarters tries to 
fuck around with my investigation, and I promise you the only thing we'll 
accomplish is counting the bodies in the morgue until there are too many 
to keep this silent from the national media."
     "Fair enough," Ozawa replied. He took out an organizer and a pen. 
"What do you need?"
     "I want Ito over at Tokyo General to do the pathology from now on. 
He's done great work for us on Yakuza murders. I don't care whose ass I 
burn in Nerima, Ito gets first dibs on any more homicides that turn up."
     "Done," Ozawa replied. "Next?"
     "Ichiro Kogata at Latent Prints. He's done floaters before. I want him 
assigned to my investigation full time. Same with Ryu Tokaida at Hair and 
Fiber."
     "Done."
     "I want a liason set up with Frank MacFarlane of Behavioral Science 
at the F.B.I. -including labwork. You can go through the usual channels 
with the American Embassy. The same with the Anthropology and Forensic 
Dentistry sections at the Smithsonian Institute. I think Doctor Hale Alsever 
is still a point of contact for them. If they can't or won't help, see if 
you can get Colonel Paul Graham at Trippler Army Hospital on Oahu to do it."
     Ozawa's brow furrowed. Outside help would not be appreciated by his 
superiors, even if Ozawa himself recognized the invaluable assistance 
that the F.B.I. and the Smithsonian could provide. "I'll do what I can for 
those. Anything else?"
     "I don't know yet," Takeda muttered distantly. "I probably won't know 
until I get to Nerima. Maybe not until floater number three turns up."
     Ozawa flushed slightly.
     "Number three turned up this morning before I came over to see you."
     "What?"
     "I don't have any file yet. I didn't want to mention it right away 
-unless you were going to say no."
     Takeda's face grew taut.
     "Listen up, you cocksucker. You hold anything back from me again, and 
I'll walk. You got that?"

________________________________________________________________________
          J. Austin Wilde and Fission Park Press proudly present:

                               STIGMA
                              Part One
  
                     By J. Austin Wilde, K.B.C.S.
                       Special Agent in Charge,
                         Fission Park Press
                          wildeman@psn.net
                     http://www.psn.net/~wildeman/

            The characters and situations of Ranma 1/2 are 
            the creation and property of Rumiko Takahashi 
            and Shogakukan/Kitty TV.

                        --DARKFIC WARNING--

          The following work of fanfiction contains graphic 
          and violent presentations of torture, sexual assault, 
          and murder. It is not for the faint of heart or the 
          easily disturbed.
______________________________________________________________________



                              -TWO-



     Inspector Takeda took the offered jar of Vick's Vaporub from Doctor 
Ito, and smeared a glob of the menthol creme under his nose. He handed the 
jar to Ozawa, who did the same with absent ease. By the time the jar made 
its way around to the Nerima cops, they aped the procedure with little 
understanding of why they did so.
     Lying on a chipped porcelain examining table was a dark green vinyl 
bag. A large red tag was tied to the zipper. The characters for "Evidence" 
were most prevalent. Takeda was glad at least that the shape within 
corresponded to an *intact* human being. Some of the murder victims he 
had investigated in the past had come "some assembly required."
     The Nerima Morgue was an old building next to the ward hospital, 
dating back to the late forties, and done in faded pastel green paint and 
dingy tile that resisted even the most diligent efforts by the cleaning 
staff. The faint tang of chlorine bleach permeated the room. Old wooden 
cabinets painted a dull white were filled with trochars, autopsy saws, 
rib spreaders, and other instruments behind glass covered doors. 
     Takeda noted that the Nerima ward morgue also doubled as a funerary 
establishment at the sight of packages of Rock-Hard Cavity Fluid behind 
several cabinets. A mumbled question to the Nerima Chief Medical Examiner 
confirmed this: the deceased poor were handled here at a government 
subsidized discount by a moonlighting licensed mortician. There was an 
incinerator in the basement to handle their cremations.
     Doctor Ito motioned for one of the morgue assistants to open the 
body bag. The man lowered his paper mask over his nose and mouth and 
proceeded. The zipper made a sighing sound as it opened, and at once a 
horrible stench filled the room. The reason for the vaporub became clear 
to the Nerima cops. Without the menthol creme, the smell would have been 
sickeningly unbearable.
     "Smells pretty bad," Ozawa remarked. "It's been pretty hot out of 
late."
     "Time of death has been estimated at 10 PM last night," Ito began. 
"She was found this morning just before eight o'clock. That means worst 
case, she was in the water for twelve hours. The preliminary indication is 
that she was dead prior to her immersion in the canal."
     "Cause of death?" Takeda asked. What he saw in the vinyl bag did not 
give way to any specific method of slaying. Instead it looked like pure 
slaughter.
     "Indeterminate," Ito replied. He made a polite gesture to the medical 
examiner. "With all due respect to my colleague, it is very difficult to 
agree upon a specific cause until a full autopsy can be performed."
     "Best guess then," Takeda said.
     "Either strangulation or cervical displacement," Ito answered. "With 
the extensive damage to the face, throat, and thoracic regions, I can't 
find any ligature marks or bruises to correlate strangulation, and the 
broken neck may well be a post mortem injury."
     Takeda nodded. The autopsy photographs of the first two victims showed 
a similar savage disfigurement. Both also had broken necks, though the 
Nerima medical examiner was unable to determine if they were caused after 
death. He didn't hold it against the man, he was way out of his league 
for investigating such atrocities. That was why Takeda now had Ito working 
on the case.
     "Go on, doctor."
     Ito looked down at the mangled girl and sighed tiredly.
     "The subject is a female, approximately seventeen years old, well 
nourished. Apparent good health prior to death." 
     An assistant measured her from foot to top of crown with a fabric tape 
measure.
     "One hundred sixty-two point five centimeters long," he said. She had 
been weighed prior to being brought into the examining room. "Weight is 
fifty three kilograms."
     "Some of that will be water in her lungs and stomach," Ito replied. 
"We'll take a second measurement after we evacuate her torso."
     "The last two reports speculated at sexual assault," Takeda said. 
Several of the Nerima cops grit their teeth at his gall. This was an 
innocent girl, and here he was asking if the killer popped her cherry 
before he did her.
     "There is indication of penetration," Ito said, running his gloved 
hand down into the body bag, and thankfully out of sight. "No sign of 
seminal fluid -that's odd for a murder-rape." He knelt low over the body 
and shined a penlight down into the bag. "Marks inside the vaginal wall; a 
small sharp object, maybe fingernails. I'd rule out penile penetration for 
the moment."
     "Could the killer be impotent?" Ozawa speculated. "Unable to get it 
up, so he finds some other way to violate them?"
     "Either that or he's too smart to risk leaving evidence that could 
link back to him," Takeda countered. "Even condoms aren't foolproof... 
Tell me about all this carnage here, doctor."
     Ito gestured to the ripped and torn body.
     "The face, throat, and torso front are heavily and deeply disfigured, 
the flesh apparently rent. Bone is visible near the sternum xyphoid 
process and right clavicle."
     "Could an animal have done that?" Takeda asked.
     Ito shook his head. "A human animal most likely," he said evenly. 
"The wound patterns don't correspond with tooth and claw injury. Neither 
do they correspond with some kind of instrument. They're *too* messy for 
that. We'll go over the body with a fine toothed comb looking for metal 
and wood slivers, but I don't think we'll find anything significant. If 
you want my opinion, I'd say that this was done with bare hands."
     "Bare hands?" Matsumoto, the Nerima Homicide detective gasped.
     "Yes, someone with great strength and ferocity did this."
     "You mean rage," someone else mentioned.
     "Maybe not a blind rage," Ozawa said. "It's convenient how the 
disfigurement makes cause of death difficult to determine. It might also 
conceal any ligature marks that could be matched up with rope or wire in 
the killer's possession, or marks that could match up with his hand spread 
and finger measurements."
     Takeda mentally gave him a few points for that theory.
     "You're saying he's ripping these girls apart with his bare hands 
just to cover up the evidence?" Matsumoto pressed.
     "It's a possibility. Especially if that's the reason why he didn't 
come all over her."
     "All that damage and you're saying it was strangulation or a broken 
neck?" Takeda teased. "Tell me why you think that, doctor."
     "Simple really," Ito replied. "The disfigurement was post mortem. 
Histamine and serotonin levels in the wounds are very low, even allowing 
for her soak. She was dead for at least five minutes before he ripped her, 
and most likely closer to twenty since serotonin levels are elevated above 
histamine."
     "That long," Takeda mused. "He had to have a place to do this. This 
wasn't something he did on the spot, in the open, and then dumped her in 
the canal when he was finished. There is no way he could do it like that 
three times already and not get caught in the act."
     "We've been up and down the canal bank," Matsumoto declared. "We've 
turned up nothing that would indicate that he killed these girls close to 
the water."
     "Any ID on her yet?" Takeda asked him. There had to be something the 
man could give him to work with.
     "No," Matsumoto answered. "We're discreetly asking the high schools 
to take thorough roll calls, and to call the homes of the absent students, 
but so far nothing. There aren't any missing persons reports for a girl 
in the last five days."
     "That was how you identified the last two, wasn't it?"
     "Initially, yes. We tentatively matched the victims with girls who 
were reported missing within the previous week. We were able to confirm 
their identification with a plantar, or footprint match, against their 
original birth certificates."
     "Who found this one?" Takeda asked, gesturing to the body. 
     "A barge operator named Ryutaru Eiji," Matsumoto replied after 
consulting his notes. "He was hauling old tires from a landfill north of 
the ward. He's about sixty five years old, so we weren't in any hurry to 
detain him."
     "Understandable. How many people have had contact with the body 
before she was tagged and bagged?" 
     Matsumoto gave a few names, but wasn't sure if this was all of them.
Ozawa knew Takeda well enough to know that unsecured crime scenes were his 
biggest pet peeve.
     "If we get another floater," the Inspector told the homicide detective, 
"You will not fucking touch her until my team gets there. I don't care 
if you have to leave her in the water, no-one outside of my team touches 
her. Is that clear?"
     Matsumoto was clearly stung by his words, but nodded agreement. There 
was no doubt that the man was under a ton of heat from higher up with his 
inability to make head-way in the murders. The only way to salvage himself 
was to play along and try to be as helpful as possible. Even if he choked 
on his pride.
     Takeda turned away from the body. "I've seen enough for now. Doctor 
Ito, if you would be so kind as to hold off on the autopsy until Kogata 
from Latent Prints and Tokaida from Hair and Fiber can take a crack at her, 
I would appreciate it." 
     The doctor bowed for him in agreement.
     Takeda went out the door. Ozawa and Matsumoto were close behind.
     "Now what?" Ozawa asked.
     "I want to go back to where this all started. What was the name of the 
guy who found the first body? I haven't had nearly enough time to go through 
the files."
     "Ranma Saotome," Ozawa said after a moment's thought. "He's a high 
school student at Furinkan High. About sixteen I think."
     "I know him," Matsumoto added. "One of those troublemaking martial 
artists. A real pain in the ass."
     "Martial artist, huh?" Takeda mused. "Interesting. We'll have to pay 
this Saotome a visit. Let's get some lunch. It'll give me a little time to 
read up on the first case before we go to the school."



                               -THREE-



     Takeda flipped through the files of the first two victims, evaluating 
the evidence collected, judging the police theories, looking for any useful 
similarities between them. There wasn't much. There were no witnesses to 
either the murders, or the disposal of the bodies in the canal. Both girls 
had been alone for at least three hours before their estimated times of 
death, and the witnesses who had last seen them alive had nothing to give 
the police for possible suspects.
     So far, the only similarities were that the girls were both in their 
late teens, lived in Nerima ward, and died, were disfigured, and disposed 
of in the same horrible way. Ozawa was right, the Nerima cops had nothing 
to go on. He was essentially starting from square one.
     As he thumbed through the autopsy photographs, he mused that it might 
be better that way. The Prefecture Police psychologist would be giving his 
preliminary profile on the killer sometime this morning, Ozawa had informed 
him. That would be something to start with. He just had to be careful not 
to let it prejudice his thinking.
     "Ucchan's is a good place to sit down and eat," Matsumoto said as they 
drove down the narrow streets of the ward. "It's got some booth seats away 
from the seating area along the griddle, so we can talk out of earshot."
     Takeda nodded. Despite initial impressions, Matsumoto was turning out 
to be a decent cop, and seemed to have a good head on his shoulders, he was 
just very inexperienced for a lead homicide detective. Perhaps he could 
teach the guy right in the process of nabbing the killer.
     "The food's not bad, and it's a popular hang-out for young people," 
Matsumoto added.
     "Good enough for me," Takeda said. "I'm usually a ramen man. A little 
variety in the diet wouldn't hurt."
     They had to park in a side street to reach Ucchan's Okonomiyaki. 
Ozawa used his cellular phone to call his office and report their location 
in addition to a query on the status of Doctor Dosaka's profile. It was 
due at any time, and the office would fax it to them as soon as they 
received it. 
     Ucchan's was a quaint little shop, not upscale in any sense, but homey 
and comfortable. The hot smell of the griddle mingled with the tangy odors 
of sauce. The girl at the griddle wore a brightly colored kimono in a 
checkered pattern of red and white. A second girl came in from a door behind 
the counter, her long chestnut hair tied with a white ribbon, and wearing 
the traditional attire of an okonomiyaki chef. A spatula of prodigious size 
was slung on her back.
     "Welcome to Ucchan's!" the two girls greeted cheerfully.
     Takeda took a seat in a corner booth, far from the griddle and facing 
the single doorway available to the patrons. Ozawa and Matsumoto followed 
suit. The girl in the red and white kimono minced over to them to take their 
orders.
     Her voice was oddly falsetto, and Takeda noted that the hands which 
clutched the guest check book possessed a youthful masculinity. They ordered, 
letting Matsumoto go first to get an idea of what was good. The girl was 
shyly helpful as she took their orders, and left them to fetch their drinks.
     "Interesting wait staff," Ozawa noted. 
     "You noticed too?" Takeda asked.
     "Noticed what?" Matsumoto piped up.
     Takeda frowned. The Nerima homicide detective needed to be more 
observant. That was a difficult skill to learn; most people either have it 
or they don't. He was beginning to fear that the killer had left behind 
clues that were too subtle for the Nerima cops to notice.
     "The girl in the red and white kimono isn't a girl at all," Ozawa said 
quietly.
     "What?" Matsumoto hissed in reply.
     "He's a cross-dresser. A transvestite," Takeda said bluntly.
     Matsumoto turned to watch the waitress fill their drink orders. Her 
movements were graceful and delicate, as if she were performing the Tea 
Ceremony.
     "How can you tell?" he asked in a hushed voice. The server started 
over towards their table with a gait that was almost instinctively 
feminine.
     "The voice and the hands mostly," Takeda replied. "His posture is 
a little off because of his upper body structure. I'll admit, he's very 
convincing. I'd almost say he was raised as a girl."
     The girl who might possibly be a boy set their drinks before them 
with grace and shy smiles.
     "May I ask your name, Miss?" Takeda asked politely.
     "Konatsu Kenzan," she replied with a sudden shy sweep of her kimono 
covered hand over her mouth.
     "You look quite lovely, Miss Konatsu," Takeda offered.
     "Thank you, sir," she replied with a blush. The words came soft enough 
to avoid the falsetto and still sound feminine.
     "How long have you worked here, Miss Konatsu?"
     "Several months," she replied. "Mistress Kuonji has been very generous 
to me."
     "Mistress Kuonji is the woman at the griddle?" Takeda asked.
     "Yes, sir," Konatsu replied gently.
     "I would like her to come over for a few words after our meal. Would 
you be so kind as to ask her?"
     "Certainly, sir. May I ask who is making this request?"
     Takeda nodded, reaching into his rumpled suit coat for his tin.
     "Inspector Takeda Jiro, Tokyo Prefecture Police Special Unit," he said, 
flipping open the leather case to display his badge and credentials. He 
gestured with his hand to the other two. "This is Detective Lieutenant 
Ozawa Iwase, also of the Tokyo Prefecture Police, and I'm sure you've met 
Detective Matsumoto of the Nerima Ward Police."
     Konatsu's bright eyes flashed in surprise and a little apprehension. 
"I shall let her know."
     "It's nothing serious," Ozawa said quickly. Perhaps too quickly. "We 
just want to ask her a few questions about the neighborhood."
     Konatsu bowed extremely politely and left them to their drinks.
     "Was that necessary?" Ozawa asked Takeda.
     "I'm curious," the Inspector replied. "I want to know a little more 
about Konatsu, and the badge will get answers to embarrassing questions."
     "What's on your mind?"
     "Transvestites are a strange bunch, and I'm not talking about their 
dressing habits. Some have definite mental problems; the others simply 
like the clothes, and are basically harmless, if a little quirky, 
heterosexuals. There are Oedipal matters to be sure, but nothing dangerous. 
Doctor Dosaka could give you a more precise definition, but this is good 
enough to suit our purposes.
     "Transsexuals are another matter. A transsexual is someone who fully 
identifies with the opposite gender. Male transsexuals are a passive, 
nonviolent sort. Not very likely candidates for our killer."
     He rubbed his temples and took a drink of his Asahi beer.
     "What I want to know is whether our cute little waitress has been 
raised as a girl, or does he just like to pretend? If he's been raised as 
a girl, and resents it, there could well be a subconscious antipathy 
towards all females."
     "You mean he could be a suspect?" Matsumoto asked.
     "I'm not saying anything yet," Takeda replied. "I'm just keeping an 
open mind. It's a pretty safe bet that Dosaka's preliminary profile will 
talk about hatred towards women as a possible motive. That kind of 
disfigurement, performed bare-handed no less, would take an enormous 
amount of anger. Either that or the guy is a total sociopath -utterly 
lacking an emotional link to his actions. I don't even want to think about 
that. An intelligent sociopath would be almost impossible to catch."
     "I don't think he's capable of it," Ozawa said. "Not strong enough."
     "How can you tell underneath that kimono?" Takeda countered. "But 
you're right, unless he's putting on a pretty good act, I'd say he 
identifies with females very favorably. Not a likely candidate." He took 
another sip. "But not impossible either. Let's just call this a warm-up 
exercise."
     "What makes you think the proprietor knows the answers?" Matsumoto 
asked.
     "Just a hunch," Takeda replied. "It was what Konatsu said about his 
boss. Being very generous that is. She has to know something personal about 
Konatsu, or she wouldn't have kept him around this long."
     They ate in silence, with Takeda poring over the files. The proprietor 
gave them a respectful period of time after they had finished before 
presenting herself. She appeared slightly nervous, a reaction normal for 
most people faced with interviews by police. Takeda made certain the 
files were closed and placed in an attach� before she could see them.
     "How can I be of assistance, officers?" she asked them.
     Takeda made the introductions again, and flashed his badge and ID. 
     "We can start with your name."
     "Kuonji Ukyo," she said evenly.
     "How long have you been in Nerima, Miss -it is Miss?- Kuonji?"
     Ukyo ticked off the months on her fingers.
     "Almost a year. And it is 'Miss.'" 
     Takeda nodded. "How do you like Nerima? It must be quite a change 
from Osaka."
     Ukyo flushed for a second before realizing that what people from 
Tokyo considered an accent had not entirely faded. Her place of origin 
would be clear enough for a detective.
     "It's all right," she replied. "Business isn't great, but I get by."
     "You're quite young to be in business for yourself," Ozawa remarked. 
"You're what, sixteen? Seventeen?"
     "I'll be seventeen in a few weeks," Ukyo replied. "And yes, I am a 
bit young, but I've been an independent sort since I was a kid."
     "You have a nice place," Takeda complimented.
     "Thank you, sir."
     Takeda took a last sip from his beer.
     "Can I ask you a few questions of a more personal nature?"
     "Um... I guess," she replied uneasily.
     "What's the story with your waitress, Konatsu? Or should I say, 
*waiter.*"
     He watched Ukyo's face carefully as he made his revelation. She was 
surprised more than upset or anxious. 
     "Oh," she began. "He's been working for me for a few months. He 
tries real hard, but I don't think he's cut out for the okonomiyaki 
business."
     "Can you tell me why he dresses and acts like a girl?"
     "Um, he was raised as one actually. By his mother and sisters. I guess 
they didn't like the idea of having a boy in the family."
     Takeda nodded. "Would you say he was fairly comfortable as a girl?"
     Ukyo bit her lip. "At first I think he was..."
     "Go on."
     She blushed in embarassment. "Well, he sorta has a crush on me right 
now. He still acts like a girl and all, but it's there."
     "Why would he act like a girl around you if he was interested in you?"
     Ukyo shrugged. "Because that's the only life he knows?"
     Takeda nodded again. There was something else, something she didn't 
want to talk about. It was probably a kinky little intimacy between the two 
of them. It was none of his business; he let it drop.
     "Fair enough," he said. "Can you answer one last question about Konatsu 
for me? I'd like to know if you can recall any time when he might have been 
angry or violent, I mean irrationally violent -a response completely out of 
proportion with the cause."
     Ukyo thought for a moment, but it was clear that she couldn't think 
of anything.
     "No, I don't think so. Konatsu is really quite sweet."
     Takeda smiled. "Thank you for your time and cooperation."
     Ukyo smiled weakly and excused herself with thinly veiled relief.
Then she turned back to him. "Inspector Takeda, is this about the murders?"
     Takeda saw no sense in lying to her, though he could feel the heat 
from Ozawa's stare.
     "Yes."
     "And you think Konatsu might be involved?" she whispered in disbelief.
     "We have no suspects as of yet," he replied evenly. "The investigation 
is just starting... Personally, I don't think he is the person we're looking 
for."
     Ukyo nodded. "I know Konatsu, and I know he wouldn't hurt anyone."
     She returned to her customers.
     "Think there's something between them?" Ozawa asked.
     "None of my business," Takeda replied.
     Ozawa's cellular phone bleeped for attention. He answered, nodding 
his head and looking around the room.
     "Dosaka's report just came in," he supplied. "I need a phone to 
set up the portable fax machine." He looked over to Ukyo, who was tending 
to the late lunch crowd. "Excuse me, Miss Kuonji, is there a telephone 
I could use? It's very urgent."
     "There is one in the back," she replied, busy with an order of the 
House Special. "Konatsu can show you."
     Ozawa thanked her and gathered up the small facsimile machine from 
his attach�. He followed the pretend girl into the back room, where 
large clay jars of sauce aged, and bags of flour sat stacked up in a 
corner on a wooden pallet. There was a small walk-in refrigerator for 
perishables and beer, and several boxes of assorted dry goods. A staircase 
led up to the apartment over the establishment.
     He noted the neatly folded bedding and a traveling bag in the corner 
opposite the refrigerator, close to the heating vents, and decided that 
the apartment upstairs was for Ukyo exclusively. Konatsu showed him the 
phone that rested on a preparation counter close to the door. Several 
knives and a large cleaver gleamed on a shelf. He thanked the boy and 
indicated that he needed privacy. Konatsu was only too glad to leave.
     He called the office and gave them the phone number printed on the 
unit. Then he unplugged the phone from the wall jack and inserted it into 
the facsimile machine. After several minutes the machine received an 
incoming call and began to print out Doctor Dosaka's report.
     When he was finished, he reconnected the phone and headed back out 
front. Ukyo was still busy, and Konatsu was politely deflecting the 
flirting advances of one of the patrons. Takeda and Matsumoto were having 
a quiet conversation about baseball, which was odd because Ozawa had never 
known the Inspector for a fan. He talked with some authority on the matter.
     "Dosaka's report," he said, offering it to Takeda.
     "I know you looked at it already," Takeda said. "What do you think?"
     "You were right about him thinking misogyny was a possible motivation, 
but after what I saw in the morgue today, that wasn't a difficult theory to 
come up with."
     Takeda scanned the pages.
     "According to the good doctor, what we have is a person with a 
tremendous antipathy towards the female gender. He is possibly suffering 
from some sort of rage disorder -likely undiagnosed and untreated- and 
possibly even suffering a gender identity crisis." His eyes drifted over 
towards Konatsu. "Dosaka rates his intelligence as bright average. Things to 
look for are a history of abuse, probably very early, at less than six years 
of age, from the mother, maybe even a grandmother if the person was from a 
broken home or was an orphan.
     "Other than that, our killer isn't following a lunar cycle, nothing to 
correlate with the zodiac, no observable pattern other than where he's 
dumping the bodies. The killer's period is getting shorter though, and that 
means we'll start seeing bodies turn up more often."
     He narrowed his eyes at them.
     "Dosaka thinks the reason for the decreasing period is because the 
killer is getting into his work. Whatever it's doing for him, he likes it, 
and he wants to keep it up. That means a suicide isn't likely."
     He rose from the table.
     "We have to find this guy. He won't stop until he's caught. We can't 
let him keep piling up the body count... Let's get this guy."
     "Where to next?" Matsumoto asked.
     "First I want to visit the three sites along the canal where the 
victims were found, then we visit Saotome. He was the first person to report 
a body. After that we'll talk to Officer Tenkai -he found number two. We'll 
go from there."
     After they had settled their bill and walked out of Ucchan's, Takeda 
looked at both Ozawa and Matsumoto.
     "I'm putting Konatsu Kenzan on the list of possible suspects."
     "Oh?" Ozawa replied, surprised. "Any particular reason? I thought you 
said he wasn't a likely suspect."
     "Just a hunch," Takeda told him.



                               -FOUR-



     The canal was wide and not very deep, allowing only shallow draft 
barges and tugs to transit. A road bridge crossed over the water upstream 
of the spot where Ranma Saotome had discovered the body of sixteen year 
old Hiroyuki Kimiko. She had hung up on a broken down section of chain-link 
fence that screened the canal from the pedestrian walkway above.
     "The current isn't very strong," Takeda noted. "How much does it change 
with the tides?"
     Matsumoto shook his head. "Very little, actually."
     "So it's likely that the killer could have dumped her from that 
bridge over there." 
     "That was our conclusion," Matsumoto replied. "There were bridges 
within one hundred yards of each discovery. Unfortunately we haven't been 
able to come up with any witnesses. We found some blood spatters, but we 
were only able to categorize type. Type B blood at all three sites."
     "Type B blood," Takeda said. "That's a big help. Seventy percent of 
Japan has Type B blood, including all three victims." He coughed. "I'm going 
to go take a look," There was a chance that Matsumoto and his men had missed 
something. He only hoped that after six weeks there would be something left 
to find.
     Ozawa stayed with Matsumoto, who answered various questions the 
Detective Lieutenant asked. Takeda huffed along the walkway to the bridge. 
He cursed as he looked around. The homes that were within sight of the 
canal crossing were screened by trees and tall fences. Unless a person were 
directly on the road -and close, or on the walkway on either bank, no-one 
could see you dump a body. It would be easy enough for the killer to watch 
out for witnesses before he dumped the body.
     According to the reports he had read, the streetlights in Nerima were 
in a state of disrepair. Vandalism mostly. In the wake of the murders, the 
heat had come down from above, and maintenance crews had made replacing and 
repairing the lights their number one priority. They still had a lot of 
work to do, Takeda noted. The lights on this bridge were all broken, 
possibly by the killer himself.
     He stepped onto the bridge and walked over to the middle, on the side 
facing the discovery of floater number one. The killer would probably dump 
her here, the water was deepest at this point, and the sluggish current 
would move the body better than close to the banks. He visualized the 
killer, swathed in blood...
     **Swathed in blood!** Takeda shouted in his head. **Where is the damn 
blood?! A body as mangled as that has to drip something, even if he let her 
drain for a few hours before dumping her. And that's all he has, none of the 
girls were missing all that long before they died.**
     "How did you do it?" he asked the phantom killer. "How did you dump 
them without leaving a gory mess?"
     He looked around. The cement of the walkway was clean save for a few 
small brown spots circled in faded white police chalk close to the rail. A 
few weeds poked up from the expansion joints and odd cracks in the paving. 
There was nothing else.



                               -FIVE-



     The other sites also turned up nothing. Even the most recent one. 
Floater number three had been spotted drifting in the middle of the canal 
by the tug operator, Ryutaru. He pulled her alongside with a boat hook and 
radio'd for help.
     As they drove towards the Tendo Dojo, and current home of Ranma Saotome, 
Ozawa's cellular phone rang.
     "Ozawa," he said into the phone.
     He nodded his head several times.
     "Yes, thank you."
     He hung up.
     "They identified floater number three," he told Takeda and Matsumoto. 
"Ogata Yuka, aged seventeen. A student at Furinkan high school. She was 
reported missing shortly after we left the morgue. They identified her with 
her dental records. The plantar prints from her birth certificate are 
expected to confirm. Doctor Ito completed the preliminary autopsy, and all 
he's waiting on is the labwork; toxicology and whatnot. He'll fax us the 
report later this evening. Tokaida couldn't get anything useful off the 
body, and Kogata couldn't get any prints."
     "I doubt he'll find anything unusual in her blood," Takeda said. "The 
others were clean. As for Kogata and Tokaida, I was hoping more than 
anything. He's a careful one, this guy. About the only thing that could 
have left a decent print was the girl's fingernails."
     "We have to be thorough," Ozawa replied. "One more thing; he found an 
interesting burn pattern on her back."
     "Burn pattern?"
     "Chemical burn, maybe lime or caustic soda, even a concentrated bleach. 
Any traces of whatever it was washed away in the canal, but the marks are 
clear enough."
     "Lime..." Takeda murmured. "That clinches a common location for his 
killings. He's using lime to destroy the blood and serum evidence... But he 
still dumps the bodies instead of burying them and coating them with lime to 
break them down quickly."
     He thought for a moment.
     "Wherever he's doing it, he doesn't live there alone. It could mean he 
lives in an apartment, or he lives with other people in a house, but he 
doesn't have the full run of the place."
     "It's a start," Ozawa said, knowing that the game of murder was often 
a game of centimeters.
     "Now if only we could figure out how he's picking his victims."
     "What about Ogata Yuka?" Matsumoto asked.
     Takeda grunted a reply. "Get a couple of local cops to do a walk around 
of Furinkan. Have them find out who knew Yuka, who hung around her. I want 
names and addresses. We'll talk to them during the week."


     The Tendo Dojo was a large home dating back to the turn of the century. 
A high wooden palisade screened the place from the street on three sides, a 
more recent cinderblock wall marked the boundary of the back yard and garden. 
A handpainted sign in a steady hand indicated that challengers of the dojo's 
occupants should use the rear entrance.
     "Tendo School of Indiscriminate Grappling," Takeda read aloud. "Ever 
hear of it?"
     "It's pretty obscure," Ozawa admitted. He was a part time student of 
the Fighting Arts. "I think it was originally a kempo style." He sighed. "I 
can't *even* list the number of different schools in Japan. For instance, 
did you know that there's a school of Martial Arts Tea Ceremony?"
     "No," Takeda said. "I didn't. I'm not sure I wanted to know."
     The gate was open, and they stepped through into a well tended front 
walk. The house was before them, a two story affair that could accommodate 
a good-sized extended family, and the dojo was to their right. A covered 
wooden walkway linked the two structures. Beyond the walkway they could see 
a garden and what was perhaps a koi pond.
     As they approached the front door, Takeda noted that the shingles of 
the roof were unevenly colored. Some parts were obviously new while the 
others showed signs of weathering and age. The house had other subtle hints 
about it that it was undergoing continual repair, and not always by the most 
skilled of carpenters.
     A young woman about nineteen or twenty, possibly a little older, 
answered the door. She gave them a pleasant smile and greeting, and 
welcomed them in. She didn't seem to be concerned in the least when they 
identified themselves as police.
     "Oh dear," Kasumi said absently. "What has Ranma done this time?"
     "Nothing we know about, Miss Tendo," Takeda replied. Matsumoto's 
description of Ranma as a troublemaker came immediately to mind. "We just 
want to ask him a few questions."
     "I think he's in his room," Kasumi said. "Would you mind waiting in the 
living room while I get him?" 
     "Not at all."
     She led them into the living room. A rather large panda sat on a 
cushion watching a television soap opera and crunching absently on a chunk 
of bamboo. The panda looked over his shoulder at them, spotted Matsumoto's 
badge upon his belt, and turned back to the television with haste.
     "Don't mind Mister Saotome," Kasumi told them. "He's harmless."
     Genma growled something at this.
     "Mister Saotome?" Ozawa cried. "That's an unusual name for a panda. 
Does he belong to Ranma Saotome?"
     "Not really," Kasumi said. "Mister Saotome is Ranma's father. Excuse me, 
please." With that, she went upstairs to look for Ranma.
     Takeda looked to Matsumoto, who made a circling motion with his finger 
pointed at his temple. Takeda agreed. The girl didn't seem to have all of 
her cylinders firing.
     The three men knelt around the low table and waited for the arrival 
of Ranma Saotome. Takeda composed his thoughts into useful questions. He 
debated asking him about Yuka. The announcement of her death had probably 
not reached the high school yet.
     A teenaged boy about seventeen years old entered the room nervously. 
He had black hair braided into a pigtail, piercing blue-grey eyes, and a 
strong muscular build that would be quite formidable when he finished 
filling out in his early twenties. He wore a mandarin style blouse in red 
satin and baggy black trousers with a draw-string waist and legs.
     "Ummm," he began, "Kasumi said you wanted to talk to me." His eyes lit 
in recognition of Matsumoto. "It's about the dead girl I found, isn't it."
     "This is Inspector Takeda of the Tokyo Prefecture Police Special Unit," 
Ozawa told him. "I'm Detective Lieutenant Ozawa. We've been assigned to the 
investigation, and would like to ask you a few questions."
     "I already told you guys what I know," Ranma replied. He pointed to 
Matsumoto. "Just ask him. He's the guy I talked to." 
     "Inspector Takeda has a great deal of experience with this type of 
case, and he would like to hear your story again in case you can recall any 
new details," Ozawa said evenly.
     "I don't see how I can help, but okay," Ranma replied. It was obvious 
that he was uncomfortable with the situation, but he knew from the look in 
the man's eyes that the Inspector wasn't going to take 'no' for an answer.
     "Have a seat," Takeda told him. Ranma sat down cross-legged in front 
of them. The panda craned his head around to listen. "I would like you to 
start from before you discovered the body. What were you doing, where 
were you going, and how you ended up in the canal. I may interrupt you 
every now and then as a new question comes to mind, so please bear with me."
     Ranma took a deep breath and let it out before answering.
     "I was running along the top of the fence next to the canal on my way 
to school. I was late, as usual," he began. When he saw the looks on their 
faces he added, "I do that for balance training. Running on the fence tops 
that is."
     "Was anyone with you at the time?"
     "Yeah, Akane."
     Takeda tapped a pencil to his teeth. "Who is this Akane? Does she live 
around here?"
     "Her name's Akane Tendo, so I guess you could say she lives around 
here," Ranma replied a little flippantly. Takeda smiled graciously, making 
the jowls of his face stretch taut.
     "So you were walking along the top of the fence to school, in the 
company of Akane Tendo. Anyone else?"
     "Naw, just her. Nabiki can't stand to listen to us fight all the time, 
so she goes a different way to school."
     "Nabiki?"
     "Akane's older sister. She's a year older."
     "You said you fight all the time with Akane," Takeda pointed out. 
"Could you explain what you mean by this?"
     Ranma shot the panda a dirty look. "Akane is my fiance�. Sort of." 
Before Takeda could interrupt with the obvious question, Ranma continued 
with, "My dad and her dad decided we were engaged. I didn't like it, I don't
think she likes it... We argue a lot, I guess."
     "You don't like your fiance�?" Ozawa asked gently.
     "I didn't say that," Ranma snapped. "I just said we fight a lot." He 
shot another dirty look at the panda, who returned his attention to the 
television screen.
     "So how did you end up in the canal?" Takeda prompted.
     "I, uh, I think I said something to insult Akane, and she smacked 
me with her bookbag and knocked me in the water."
     "Do you recall what you said to her?"
     Ranma flushed. "I, uh, I called her an uncute tomboy. She hates that."
     "And she struck you with her bookbag hard enough to make you, a martial 
artist capable of running along a raised chain link fence top, to lose your 
balance and fall into the water."
     Ranma's face turned a deeper shade of red. "You don't understand what 
she's like when she's mad," he managed.
     Takeda filed that away for future reference. "So you ended up in the 
water, and then what happened?"
     "I landed in the water, and..." he paused briefly as he realized that 
he was about to spill the secret of his curse to a total stranger, and a 
policeman at that, and then continued. "...And there she was. It looked 
like she was tangled up in the bottom part of the fence that had come 
undone from the post... Her head was below the water, I couldn't see 
her... face. What was left of it, anyway."
     Takeda could see the unease on Ranma's face, and it didn't have 
anything to do with the curious pause in his narration. He had seen the 
photographs of the first victim after they pulled her from the water.
     "Then what did you do?"
     "I screamed," Ranma said sheepishly. He tried to downplay his reaction 
with "I mean, what do you think a guy would say when he lands in the water 
next to a dead girl?"
     "That's okay, Ranma. I don't blame you for being frightened," Takeda 
soothed.
     "I wasn't frightened," the pig-tailed martial artist retorted. "I was 
just startled is all."
     "Of course. Then what happened?"
     "I, um, I told Akane to go get help. I didn't want her to see... You 
know... She tried to see what was wrong, but I yelled really loud at her to 
go. She was pretty steamed, but afterwards, when she found out what happened, 
I think she let it go."
     "About how much time passed before the police arrived?"
     Ranma thought about this. "I'm not really sure. I don't have a watch 
or nothing, but I guess it took about fifteen minutes for a policeman to 
arrive, and a little after that for an ambulance. More cops kept coming in 
after that."
     "And you stayed with the body the whole time?"
     "No!" Ranma cried. "You kidding me? Why the heck would I want to stay 
with a dead body?"
     "So you climbed out and waited for the police?"
     "Not really," Ranma replied. "I, uh, I went to Doctor Tofu's clinic. It 
was only a half a block away."
     Matsumoto frowned. Saotome had never mentioned this to him.
     Takeda was intrigued. "Now why would you do that?"
     Ranma flushed again. "I, um, just wanted to make sure someone called 
for help. Akane was already there when I reached the clinic, so I went back 
and waited for the cops to show up."
     "About how long were you away from the body?" Ozawa asked.
     "I dunno. Five, maybe ten minutes."
     "Was anyone else there by the time you returned?" Takeda asked.
     "No. It was just me. Doctor Tofu and Akane didn't show up until after 
the cops came."
     Takeda nodded. "Did you know the victim, Hiroyuki Kimiko?"
     "No," Ranma replied. "And even if I did, I wouldna recognized her after 
what happened to her face."
     "What did you think happened to her face?"
     Ranma thought. "At first I thought she'd been mauled by a stray dog or 
something."
     "At first? You have a different opinion now?" Ozawa asked.
     "Well, when I saw the divers pulling her out of the water, I saw her 
head kinda roll around on her shoulders. I could tell her neck was broken. 
I think that was when I knew that someone killed her, and then some dog 
decided to... you know... mess her up after."
     "I see," Takeda said. "How about the second victim, Nakazawa Miko?"
     Ranma shrugged. "Never heard of her."
     Takeda decided to tell him. He went to the same school, so he'd find 
out soon enough.
     "What about Ogata Yuka?"
     Ranma grimaced. "...Yuka?" The color drained from his face. "Yuka's 
dead?"
     "She was found early this morning," Takeda said evenly. "I take it you 
knew her."
     "Yeah," Ranma said hoarsely. "She was a friend of Akane's..."
     "Can you tell us who else hung around with her?" Ozawa asked, he had a
notepad ready.
     "Well there's Akane," Ranma said. "And another girl named Sayuri. 
Kitano Sayuri. There are others, I guess, but those three always hung out 
together at school."
     "Did Yuka have a habit of staying out late on school nights?" Takeda 
asked. "Did she know anyone whom she might have been reluctant to talk 
about? An older boyfriend perhaps?"
     "How should I know?" Ranma replied. "She was Akane's friend, not mine."
     "Do you know where your fiance� is right now?" Takeda asked. "I'd 
like to ask her some questions regarding Yuka."
     "I think she's in the dojo. Come on, I'll show you. Just promise not 
to make her upset, will ya?"
     "We'll do our best," Ozawa returned.
     Ranma jumped to his feet. The three policemen stood and followed him 
out of the house.
     "It's the same guy, isn't it?" he asked them.
     "Pardon?" Takeda asked.
     "The same guy killed all three girls, didn't he?"
     Takeda nodded. "We think so."
     "That asshole better not come around here, or I'll break *his* neck."



                           END OF PART ONE