The funeral was attended by seven people.
Josu stood beside the simple wooden casket. A coffin that processed death with assembly-line efficiency, wearing a black suit borrowed from a social worker who'd appeared with paperwork and false sympathy. The other attendees were strangers—a neighbor who'd occasionally said hello, two distant relatives who'd never visited while his grandfather lived, the social worker herself, a priest going through motions, and Hazuno.
Hazuno stood beside him throughout the ceremony, silent and present in a way that meant more than any words could. When the priest spoke about eternal rest and divine mercy, Josu felt Hazuno's hand find his, squeeze once, an anchor to reality when everything else felt like dissociation.
Be softer, the old gramps had asked. Be someone I'd be proud of.
But all Josu felt was a rage so pure it turned cold, freezing him from the inside out. Rage at the cancer that had stolen his grandfather. Rage at parents who'd abandoned him. Rage at a universe that seemed specifically designed to take everything that mattered and grind it into dust.
When the ceremony ended, the social worker cornered him with practiced efficiency. "Josu, we need to discuss your living situation. You're fourteen, which means you'll need to be placed in—"
"No." His voice was flat, absolute. "I understand this is difficult, but you can't live alone. The apartment lease is under your grandfather's name, and without a legal guardian—"
"I said no." Josu looked at her directly, and whatever she saw in his eyes made her take an involuntary step back. "I'm not going into the system. I'm not becoming another file in your cabinet of broken kids."
"That's not how it works—"
"Then make it work differently." He turned and walked away, Hazuno following, leaving the social worker sputtering protests about legality and responsibility and all the bureaucratic machinery that turned grief into paperwork.
Outside, Tokyo's October afternoon was crisp and indifferent, the city continuing its endless rotation regardless of individual suffering. Josu stood. "What now?" Hazuno asked quietly.
"I don't know." Josu pulled out his phone, checked his bank account: ¥47,000 remaining after the funeral expenses. The medical debt loomed like a monument: ¥520,000 still owed. His grandfather's pension had ended with his death. The apartment rent was due in twelve days. The math was simple and devastating—he had maybe two weeks before everything collapsed completely.
"You could stay with me," Hazuno offered, though they both knew that was impossible. Hazuno's own home situation had deteriorated further—his father's violence escalating, his mother's drinking intensifying, the apartment becoming a war zone neither kid wanted to navigate.
"The warehouse," Josu said. "It's still standing. We have two weeks before demolition." "And after?" "I'll figure something out." The lie tasted familiar, comfortable. He'd been telling himself similar lies for years—that things would get better, that he'd find a way, that the universe owed him something for all the shit it had already put him through.
His phone buzzed. An unknown number. He almost ignored it, but something made him answer. "Katsugawa Josu?" A persons voice, professional and cold. "Yeah."
"This is Administrator Fujikawa from Tokyo Metropolitan Hospital. Regarding your grandfather's outstanding medical bills—" "I'm fourteen," Josu cut her off. "I don't have half a million yen. Send your bills to someone who can actually pay them."
"The debt is legally transferred to next of kin, which in this case—" "Means you're trying to collect blood from a stone. Good luck with that."
He hung up, hands shaking with adrenaline and fury. The phone rang again immediately—the hospital, persistent. He powered it off completely, silencing their demands along with everything else.
"They can't actually make you pay, can they?" Hazuno asked.
"I don't know. Don't care." Josu started walking, no destination in mind, just movement to keep the numbness at bay. "Let them try. What are they going to take? I've got nothing left."
They walked through Tokyo's afternoon crowds, two kids carrying grief too heavy for their age, invisible among the salarymen and students and tourists who navigated the city with purpose and destination. At some point, Josu realized they were heading toward Shibuya—the scramble crossing, the neon chaos, the place where Tokyo's heart beat loudest.
"Why are we here?" Hazuno asked when they emerged at the crossing.
"I don't know. Felt right." Josu looked up at the massive screens advertising products he couldn't afford, dreams he'd never access, a future that felt increasingly fictional. "Grandfather brought me here once, when I was seven. Right after my parents left. He bought me takoyaki and we watched the crossing for hours. He said..." His voice caught. "He said Tokyo was proof that chaos could be beautiful if you looked at it right."
The crossing light changed. Thousands of people flooded into the intersection from all directions, a choreographed collision that somehow never resulted in actual contact, everyone flowing around everyone else in unconscious cooperation.
"He was right," Hazuno said softly. "About the beauty part."
They stood there for thirty minutes, watching the dance repeat itself—green light, flood of humanity, red light, stillness. Green, flood, red, stillness. The rhythm was hypnotic, almost meditative, and Josu felt some of the rage in his heart unclenching slightly.
His phone buzzed in his pocket—he'd turned it back on without thinking. A text from an unknown number: Is this Hazuno's friend? The one who helped the kid with blue eyes? Josu's heart rate spiked. He showed Hazuno the screen.
"Who is this?" Hazuno typed back.
The response came quickly: Someone who knows where Kisuno Minazawa is. And who thinks he deserves better than what he's getting. Meet me at Yoyogi Park, north entrance, 6 PM. Come alone. Both of you.
"It's a trap," Josu said immediately. "Or it's real." Hazuno checked the time: 4:47 PM. "We have an hour to decide." "There's nothing to decide. We go." Josu's voice carried certainty he didn't feel. "If there's even a chance this is real, we have to take it."
"And if it's the police? Or social services? Or worse?"
"Then we deal with it. Together." Josu met Hazuno's eyes. "You said we'd find him. This might be how." Yoyogi Park at dusk was beautiful in that particular Tokyo way—nature negotiating with urban sprawl, creating pockets of green where people came to pretend the city wasn't slowly consuming everything. The north entrance was relatively quiet, just joggers and late-afternoon pocket pickers packing up their temporary escapes.
A figure stood beneath a zelkova tree, mid-forties, wearing business attire that suggested money and purpose. When she saw them approaching, she smiled—not the practiced smile of social workers, but something genuine and sad.
"Josu. Hazuno. Thank you for coming." "Who are you?" Josu demanded, positioning himself protectively in front of Hazuno despite Hazuno being perfectly capable of defending himself.
"My name is Akari Shimizu. I'm an investigator working on the Minazawa case—the murder of Kisuno's parents three years ago." The words landed like physical blows. Hazuno stepped forward, voice tight with barely contained emotion. "Where is he? Where's Kisuno?"
"Higashiyama Children's Home. Eastern Tokyo district." Akari pulled out a folder, handed it to them. "They placed him there five days ago. And in those five days, he's spoken exactly three words: 'Where are they?'"
Josu opened the folder. Inside were photos—Kisuno in institutional clothing, those bright blue eyes now dull and empty, sitting alone in a recreation room while other children played around him. The sight ignited something in Josu's heart, that protective rage he'd felt on the rooftop returning with doubled intensity.
"Why are you telling us this?" Hazuno asked.
"Because I've been investigating Kisuno's case for two years. The murder of his parents, his disappearance, all of it." Akari's expression was grim. "And I believe whoever killed Takeshi and Yumiko Minazawa is still out there. Still dangerous. And possibly still looking for Kisuno."
"Why would they look for him? He was three. He couldn't identify anyone—"
"Couldn't he?" Akari pulled out another photo—a person in his fifties, expensive suit, corporate smile. "Daichi Nakamura. Business partner to Takeshi Minazawa. Primary suspect in their murder, though we've never had enough evidence to charge him. Two months ago, he started asking questions. Hiring private investigators. Trying to locate Kisuno."
Josu's blood went cold. "You think he's coming for the kid."
"I think Kisuno saw something that night. Something his three-year-old brain couldn't process but might remember as he gets older. And I think Nakamura knows that." Akari's voice dropped. "Which is why I'm here. The children's home is secure, but not impenetrable. And if someone with Nakamura's resources wants to get to Kisuno..."
"What do you want from us?" Hazuno asked. "I want you to get him out." The statement hung in the air, absurd and impossible and exactly what they'd been hoping to hear.
"You're a cop," Josu said slowly. "You're asking us to take somebody from state custody."
"I'm asking you to protect someone who's already lost everything, from a system that can't guarantee his safety." Akari leaned forward, intensity radiating from her. "I've watched the security footage from the convenience store. I've seen how Kisuno looks at you. How he trusts you. He's shut down completely since being placed in the home, but when asked who he wants to see, he draws pictures of two teen's. You two."
She pulled out more papers—blueprints of the children's home, staff schedules, security protocols. "This is insane," Hazuno said, but he was already studying the blueprints.
"This is necessary." Akari checked her watch. "Nakamura's investigators have been sniffing around the home. I estimate you have maybe forty-eight hours before they make their move. After that, Kisuno disappears—either into Nakamura's hands or deeper into witness protection where even I can't reach him."
"And if we do this? If we actually get him out?" Josu asked. "Then what? We can't exactly provide legal guardianship."
"Leave that to me. I have contacts. People who can create paperwork, establish temporary custody, buy time while we build a case against Nakamura." Akari's smile was sharp. "But first, we need to get Kisuno somewhere safe. And you two are the only people he trusts enough to go with voluntarily."
Josu looked at Hazuno. An entire conversation passed between them without words: This is crazy. Completely insane. We could go to jail. We could lose everything. But it's Kisuno. It's Kisuno.
"We'll do it," they said in unison. Akari nodded, satisfied. "Good. Here's the plan."
The Higashiyama Children's Home sat in a quiet residential district, a three-story building that tried to look welcoming with pastel paint and cheerful murals, but couldn't hide its institutional nature. High fences. Security cameras. Locked doors that opened with key cards.
Josu and Hazuno watched from across the street, hidden in the shadow of a convenience store, studying the building's rhythm. Staff change at 8 PM. Night security was minimal—just one guard in the front office, monitoring cameras that covered the main entrance and common areas but had blind spots in the side alley and rear loading dock.
"East wing, second floor, room 214," Hazuno whispered, reviewing the information Akari had provided. "That's Kisuno's room. Window access is possible if we can get to the fire escape."
"The fire escape is alarmed," Josu said. "Akari said she'd handle that. 9 PM exactly, the alarm system cycles for its nightly diagnostic. Thirty-second window where it's offline."
Josu checked his watch: 8:47 PM. Thirteen minutes.
His heart hammered against his ribs, adrenaline flooding his system in ways that felt both terrifying and exhilarating. This was different from fighting—fighting was reactive, instinctual, his body moving before his brain engaged. This required planning, precision, trust in someone he'd just met and faith in a plan that had a thousand points of failure.
"You don't have to do this," Hazuno said quietly. "Your grandfather just died. You're dealing with enough—"
"He told me to be softer. To be someone he'd be proud of." Josu's voice was steady, certain. "Protecting a person who needs us? That's exactly what he meant."
At 8:58, they moved.
The side alley was dark, lit only by ambient glow from surrounding buildings. They'd dressed in dark clothes, faces partially obscured by hoodies, moving with the kind of purposeful stealth that came from being intimately familiar with Tokyo's forgotten spaces.
Josu reached the fire escape first—a metal ladder that descended from the second floor, currently raised but accessible if someone was tall enough and athletic enough to jump for the lowest rung.
"Boost," he said.
Hazuno laced his fingers together, providing a platform. Josu stepped into it, used the momentum to leap, fingers catching the ladder's edge. The metal groaned but held. He pulled himself up, muscles screaming from the effort, then lowered the ladder for Hazuno.
They climbed quickly, silently, reaching the second-floor landing at exactly 9:00 PM.
The fire escape door opened into a darkened hallway. According to the blueprints, room 214 was third door on the right. They moved like ghosts, every footstep carefully placed, breathing controlled, hyper-aware that discovery meant failure.
Room 214's door was unlocked—the door was unlocked.
Inside, four beds. Three children sleeping peacefully. And in the fourth, pressed against the wall with his back to the room, a small figure in institutional pajamas who wasn't sleeping at all.
"Kisuno," Hazuno whispered.
The child turned, and even in the darkness, his blue eyes caught what little light existed. Recognition flashed across his face, followed by something Josu had never seen there before: pure hope.
Kisuno scrambled out of bed, moving toward them with desperate silence, and Hazuno caught him in a fierce hug that both of them needed. "You came back," Kisuno whispered against Hazuno's stomach. "You promised and you came back."
"Always," Hazuno said. "We'll always come back." "We need to move," Josu urged quietly. "Thirty seconds before the alarm resets."
They fled—back through the hallway, down the fire escape, into the alley where Akari waited with a car idling, engine running, passenger door open. "Get in. Now."
They piled into the back seat, Kisuno between them, as Akari pulled into traffic with practiced ease. Behind them, the children's home sat quiet and unaware, its security system resetting, its staff oblivious that one of their orphans had just vanished into Tokyo's night.
"Where are we going?" Hazuno asked. "Somewhere safe," Akari said, eyes on the rearview mirror. "Somewhere Nakamura won't think to look."
In the back seat, Kisuno had grabbed both their hands, holding on like they were the only real things in the universe. His small fingers trembled, but his voice when he spoke was steady:
"Thank you. For not forgetting me." "Never," Josu said, surprising himself with how much he meant it. "We're family now. And family doesn't forget." The car merged into Tokyo's endless traffic, three broken kids and one determined investigator racing toward an uncertain future, but together.
Above them, the night sky stretched vast and dark, punctuated by stars fighting through light pollution. And for the first time in days, Josu felt something other than rage or grief or numbness. He felt purpose.
TO BE CONTINUED... [Next Episode: "The Brightness Before Dark"]