Less Than Human (6 page)

As she arranged the plates on the table she thought how uncomfortable Grandpa’s uprightness would have made her own father,
whom she had seldom seen sober. Her early memories were fragmented—she suspected because of the accident—but she could clearly
remember long Sunday afternoons in Nagasaki, her mother taking Bible classes and her younger sister sleeping. Eleanor would
sit outside with her father while he explained some mechanism to her—a clock, a pump, an engine. He was always patient, always
willing to go over it again, a tiny tea bowl almost invisible in his thick, freckled fingers, his malty breath mingling with
hers as they bent over the mechanism. In exchange for not telling mother where he kept his “stash,” Eleanor was allowed to
disassemble something in the house or yard and try to put it together again. She knew the parts of an auto engine before she
could write her own name. All that ended when her sister graduated from naps, for Marion could never learn to be quiet about
the wee bottles dotted around the yard, and her father eventually retreated to the local Go parlor, where he could nip in
peace. But by then Eleanor had taken everything in the house apart at least once anyway.

She looked up as a tall girl carried more bowls into the living room. She had the Tanaka skin and round face, but long, careless
limbs.

“Aunt Eleanor. Uncle Masao. Welcome,” she said happily, and knelt at the table beside Eleanor.

Eleanor smiled broadly at Mari, something she only did in front of children or other foreigners. It just didn’t seem to fit
in to normal Japanese conversation.

“Nice to see you, Mari-chan.”

Masao peered over his glasses. “You’re looking very grown-up.”

It wasn’t her clothes, which were long shorts and a tank top, or her hair cut in an unfashionable bob; she held herself very
straight as she arranged the bowls. She seemed more poised, more contained within herself.

“You’re looking fatter,” retorted Mari.

Eleanor chuckled. Masao had indeed put on a couple of kilos since New Year. The university had moved his office closer to
a new subway station, so he wasn’t getting as much exercise.

“It’s all muscle,” Masao managed, before retreating behind the paper.

Grandpa Tanaka was engrossed in the Politics section and gave no sign he knew they were there.

“So,” said Eleanor awkwardly. “How’s university?”

“It’s okay.” Mari crossed her legs, boy-style.

“Do you still draw comics?” said Eleanor.

Mari shook her head. “That’s kids’ stuff.”

“You think so? I named my current research project after a robot in a manga. Can you guess which one?”

Mari smoothed her hand over her hair and didn’t answer for a moment, and Eleanor wondered if she’d dismissed the question
as kids’ stuff. Then she looked up and said slyly,

“Toramon?”

“Hah.” Toramon was a fat, badger-shaped robot sent from the future to help a clumsy boy get through school. It used a variety
of magic tricks, thinly disguised as future technology. “No,
not
Toramon,” Eleanor said haughtily. “More dignified.”

Mari chuckled. “Arai-chan?”

Eleanor chortled, too. Arai was a tiny girl robot who didn’t know her own superhuman strength. The stories and characters
were bizarre.

“No, definitely not.”

Mari glanced at her again. “It has to be Sam Number Five, from
Journey to Life.
”

Out of the thousands of robots in Japanese manga lore … “How did you know?” The main character of
Journey to Life
who wants desperately to become mortal had always seemed a particularly apt namesake.

“You never gave me back my copy of Volume One,” said Mari. “I lent it to you years ago. I must have been in junior high. Don’t
you remember? I said it was freaky, and you said you liked it when you were little but couldn’t remember the details.”

“Now that you mention it …” Eleanor did recall borrowing a book from her niece, but she’d been too busy at work to read anything.
It must have got pushed into one of the bookcases at home and forgotten.

“I’ll have a look for it,” she said. “It’s probably at home.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve got textbooks to read.” Mari didn’t sound particularly interested. “So what does your Sam Number Five look
like?”

“It’s about eighty centimeters tall…”

“Mari-chan!” Yoshiko called from the kitchen. “Give me a hand in here.”

Mari sighed and unraveled her legs. “She’s having one of those days.”

Eleanor remembered Yoshiko’s injunction in the kitchen and nodded, although she could see why Yoshiko felt put out. When Mari
was smaller, she’d ogled Eleanor in wide-eyed adoration and brought a succession of fascinated small girls to do the same
whenever Eleanor and Masao visited. The Amazing Gaijin Aunt, Masao used to tease Eleanor. And when Mari grew older Eleanor
had often unwittingly supported her in defying her parents, whether over reading manga or about buying a private phone.

So Yoshiko was probably justified. But it didn’t make their visits any more comfortable. And Eleanor was damned if she’d diminish
her relationship with Mari to please Yoshiko.

I
shihara sat at his desk in West Station and read through the incident report again. He was the only detective in the big room,
as the duty officer was in Homicide upstairs. Everyone wants Sunday off these days. We’re like bloody salarymen now, he thought
disgustedly.

He hadn’t yet signed off on the robot accident at Kawanishi Metalworks. He’d gone over the reports at least three times, letting
his eyes skim the words again and again, while his intuition prodded memory into spewing up whatever was making him uneasy.

Man gets hit by industrial robot. Man dies. Nobody else there to see what happened. No forensic evidence to indicate that
anyone else was near the man when he died or that the body was touched. Security records show nobody went in after the previous
shift ended.

Logical conclusion: Man made a mistake and paid the price. Dangerous things, these big machines.

Except that he had one smart-aleck expert who said there was a problem with the robot. Why trust her—because she’s a long-legged
foreigner with skin like milk?

He tipped his chair back until its wheels creaked, considering this.

No, he trusted her opinion because she designed the robot, and her company made it, so it was in her interest not to find
any problems. Yet she did.
The robot should have gone to emergency stop but instead it went to halt. Therefore, someone must have tampered with it.

Ishihara sat down, stared into the computer’s recognition sensor until the machine started up, and searched for the relevant
file. If he took McGuire’s opinion seriously, he’d have to arrange another expert opinion to confirm it; he’d be knee deep
in reports for weeks.

McGuire hadn’t been sure, though. And it was a long way from a technical problem in how a robot stopped to suspecting something
suspicious about the death. So why did he find himself unable to close the case?

He found the transcripts of the interviews with the security company, the manager, and the technician, Sakaki.

The dead man, Mito, was described by them all as “quiet.” The manager had added, “modest, thorough, always careful.” Ishihara
hoped that when he died, he’d have made enough enemies to deserve a more colorful obituary.

What was it one of Mito’s coworkers had said? “He was a by-the-book man. Started on the dot, checked out right on time.” In
answer to a question about socializing, he added, “Mito hardly ever came out for a drink with us. Always had to get home.
I mean, sure, it’s a good thing people have their own lives outside work … but you never really got to know Mito.”

He flicked back one screen. Mito was a registered member of Happy Universe, one of the largest New Millennium Religions. This
meant that the group would take all Mito’s assets, whatever they were. Anybody who knew him would realize that, so if he was
killed, it wasn’t for money. It also explained his preference for a quiet home life—Happy U members spent most of their spare
time praying.

Mito had arrived at work just in time for the late shift at 10:30
P.M.
, as usual. Normally, the manager had added, Mito would spend most of his shift in the control booth. He’d go out and visually
check the lines twice, probably at about midnight and again at 5:00
A.M.
before the morning watch arrived.

The factory itself was in the middle of Minato Ward gang territory, so none of the local thieves would break in for fear of
offending the gang. And the security system, while not up-to-date, was sufficient to keep out casual intruders. One guard
robot patrolled continuously, and a human security guard would check it at the beginning of each shift. Cameras kept a record
of the exterior of the building, but not of the factory floor.

Financially, Kawanishi Metalworks was barely hanging on. The company assembled auto and machine parts for two large manufacturers,
and also did some work for a third. The owner was middle-aged, had a heart condition, and was gradually losing his urge to
succeed. According to one of Mito’s workmates, the owner now left more and more to the managers. He hardly ever came to the
factory, and rumor had it that he was playing the market in the hope of bailing the company out. Not a situation to promote
confidence in the future.

Mito seemed to have been content enough. Sakaki said he was “dependable” and “careful” but seemed to have a lot on his mind
lately. When pressed as to whether Mito might have been tired and, therefore, have made a mistake, Sakaki stammered a bit
and said he didn’t know.

Ishihara frowned and turned back a couple of pages. What was Sakaki doing at the company on Saturday morning to be interviewed?
His shift had finished at 10:30 the previous night, and his next shift wasn’t until Saturday night.

He found the incident report recording and ran it on his desk screen. Here was Sakaki, looking distraught as he told Detective
Yamaguchi what time he left the factory.

“About 10:45, I think. I didn’t get changed because I always do my laundry on Saturdays.”


Detective Yamaguchi: “Did you talk to Mito?”


Sakaki: “I handed him the day report as usual. There wasn’t anything special on it.”


Yamaguchi: “Why’d you have to work this weekend anyway?”


Sakaki: “The manager told you. We had to finish a big contract.”


Yamaguchi: “And you’re so keen that you came back to work a day early?”


Sakaki: “I told you, I forgot it was Saturday. You get into a rhythm, you know? I came as far as the station before I realized.
Then I thought, what the hell, I’ll go and pick up the magazine I left in my locker. When I get here, there are cops all over
the place.”


Not the most persuasive explanation Ishihara ever heard. Sergeant Yamaguchi, too, had noted in the Investigating Officer’s
Notes that Sakaki “seems to be hiding something but there is no evidence to link this with Mito’s death, which would appear
to be an accident.”

McGuire didn’t think it was an accident. Blast the woman. He wondered if any of his usual informants had information about
Kawanishi that might help.

And speaking of McGuire … He checked his phone for new messages. Aha. Bon holiday or not, newspapers were working. His usual
contact at
Yominichi News
had sent him the requested information.

A few scanned newspaper cuttings, short biographic note. Too many damn roman letters.

Eleanor McGuire, born Naha 1978, father U.S. serviceman, Navy. One younger sister. Father recalled to U.S. in 1992, discharged
for health reasons (someone had noted “alcoholic” in the margin). Died 1995. McGuire entered Tokyo Industrial University,
Mechanical Engineering faculty on a scholarship in ’96. The scholarship was revoked because of involvement in the student
movement, but she still finished her degree in ’99. Returned to U.S., entered Ph.D. course at MIT but didn’t complete it due
to illness, returned to Japan in 2002 to take up position as researcher at Tomita. Note in margin: “recruiting officer, N.
Izumi.”

The newspaper cuttings were arranged in chronological order. They ranged from a short piece about engineering students and
the university, in which McGuire’s name was mentioned as the first female foreign student in a new department, to an article
from a year ago in the SciTech section of a big daily. It was an actual interview with McGuire. She gave predictable answers
to predictable questions, which disappointed Ishihara—he expected more from a foreigner. She was supposed to be part of the
“Seikai creative boost,” whatever that meant, but all she said was things like, “It’s our goal to use mechatronics to assist
the transition from a postindustrial society to an IT-integrated one.”

He hadn’t found a mention of her in police records, at least in the computerized ones. He wasn’t going to rummage through
paper archives, although if she’d been involved with the student movement, there might be a mention. It did mean that Tomita
must have made a special effort to get her visa put through.