"Repeat that." Akira's voice was calm.
Too calm. Tetsuya remained standing across the table.
"You are A-001." Akira stared at him without blinking.
"Are you sure?" "I saw you."
"At Genesis?" Tetsuya nodded.
"Yes." That one word felt heavier than it should have.
Akira lowered his gaze to the photograph in his hand. A little boy behind glass.
Black hair. The same eyes.
A face that had not yet learned the world. And the number on his chest.
A-001.
"How old was I?" Tetsuya did not answer right away.
"Eight." Akira raised his face.
"And Genesis was destroyed after that?" "Some time later."
"Who got me out?" Tetsuya fell silent.
Akira realized it immediately. "My father?"
"Takumi tried." "Tried?"
"He couldn't save everyone." The words made Akira grip the photograph tighter.
"Including me?" Tetsuya sighed.
"Akira..." "Don't call me that."
Tetsuya fell silent.
"If you really know who I am, don't give me half-answers." Akira's voice remained low.
But for the first time since Tetsuya had known him, there was clear anger in it.
"I want to know what happened." Tetsuya looked at him.
"The truth doesn't always make life easier." "I didn't ask for an easy life."
Silence.
"I asked for the truth." The door opened.
Sota stood there. He stopped when he saw the atmosphere in the room.
"Am I interrupting?" There was no answer.
Tetsuya shook his head. "Come in."
Sota stepped inside. His gaze moved from Tetsuya to Akira.
"What happened?" Akira looked at him.
"I'm A-001." Sota froze.
For several seconds, he simply stood there. Then he looked at Tetsuya.
"Sir..." Tetsuya nodded.
Sota slowly exhaled. "So all this time..."
Akira cut him off. "All this time, I was part of Genesis."
"Akira..." "I don't remember."
Sota fell silent. "That's what they did to me."
Tetsuya nodded slowly. "Your memories were erased."
Akira stared at him. "Who?"
Tetsuya did not answer. But one name had already surfaced in Akira's mind.
Seiji Amemiya.
A few minutes later, Tetsuya led them deeper into the archives. He opened an old steel cabinet.
A code was entered. The mechanical lock clicked.
The door opened.
Inside were only a few folders. Not many.
As if most of Genesis's history had been deliberately destroyed. Tetsuya took one folder.
Written on its cover:
A-001 — CLASSIFIED
Akira looked at it. "Is this mine?"
"It was." Tetsuya handed him the folder.
Akira opened it. The first page was almost entirely blank.
There was only one photograph. A young Akira.
Sitting in an examination chair. Electrodes attached to his head.
His eyes stared at the camera.
Not crying. Not smiling.
Just empty.
Akira looked at the photograph for a long time. "I look like..."
"Scared?" Sota asked.
Akira shook his head. "Like I don't know what I'm supposed to feel."
Tetsuya said nothing. Akira turned the page.
There were several examination results.
Heart rate. Brain activity. Response to stimulation.
Then a term appeared repeatedly.
ECLIPSE RESONANCE.
Akira read it quietly. "Eclipse."
Tetsuya looked at him. "Don't jump to conclusions."
"Is this the system they used?" "It's more than that."
Tetsuya picked up a document. "Genesis wasn't originally the kind of project you saw in the video."
Akira looked at him. "It started as medical research."
"Yes." "And Seiji changed it."
Tetsuya nodded.
"He believed human beings possessed biological potential that wasn't fully understood." Akira read the next set of data.
"And me?" "You showed the highest response."
"Is that why I was A-001?" "That's why you became the primary subject."
Akira closed his eyes. Fragments of images surfaced.
A needle. White light. Small hands.
A man's voice. "Stay calm, Akira."
He opened his eyes again. "Who called me Akira in there?"
Tetsuya looked at him. "Takumi."
Akira fell silent. "My father?"
"He always called you by your name."
A strange warmth appeared in Akira's chest. Then vanished. "And Seiji?"
Tetsuya lowered his head. "Seiji usually called you A-001."
Akira stared at the photograph of himself. A child whose name was barely regarded as human.
Meanwhile, at Airi's house...
Reina was still standing in the same place.
"So I was at Genesis." Airi nodded.
"How long?" "Several years."
"Why don't I remember?" Airi did not answer.
Reina felt her throat go dry.
"Why was I never told?" "Because I wanted you to live."
Reina looked at her mother. "What happened there?"
Airi closed her eyes. "Things that should never happen to children."
Reina lowered her head.
The fragments of memory that had surfaced over the past few days began to feel different.
White corridors. Beds.
Needles. A little boy.
Akira.
"Subject R..." Airi immediately looked at her.
Reina noticed the change in her mother's expression. "You knew?"
Airi did not answer. "You knew who Subject R was?"
"Reina." "Me?"
Airi finally nodded. "Yes."
Reina took a step back. The world seemed to lose its voice.
"I..." She pointed at herself. "Subject R?"
Tears began to fill her eyes. Airi moved closer.
"I'm sorry." "Why?"
"Because I couldn't save you sooner." Reina shook her head.
"How long was I there?" "Eight years."
Reina covered her mouth. Eight years.
Her entire childhood.
Gone.
That night, Akira returned to his apartment. He placed the A-001 folder on the table.
He did not open it again. He simply sat in the dark in front of the table.
For the first time, the apartment that had always felt comfortable felt unfamiliar instead.
The walls. The table. The bookshelves.
Everything he knew.
Yet that night, he began to question whether he truly knew any of it—including himself. His phone vibrated.
A message. From an unknown number.
{Don't trust Tetsuya Hoshino.} Akira stared at the screen.
A second message came in. {He didn't save you.}
Akira did not move.
A third message. {He's the one who destroyed Genesis.}
Then a photograph was sent. An old photograph.
Genesis burning. Black smoke filled the night sky.
Several people were running away from the building. And among them...
a little boy was being carried. Akira zoomed in on the photograph.
The boy's face was unclear. But the person carrying him
made Akira stop breathing.
Tetsuya Hoshino.
He stared at the photograph for a long time. Then his phone screen lit up again.
The final message.
{If you want to know who saved you that night, find the name that was erased from every archive.}
Akira stared at the message.
Outside the window, rain began to fall. And for the first time, he realized something more horrifying than losing his memories.
Maybe... his memories had not been erased to protect him from the past.
Maybe someone had erased them so he would never remember who he should be afraid of.
The rain had not stopped when Akira returned to the office. The clock read 5:17 a.m.
The police building was still quiet. Most of the lights had not been turned on yet, leaving the long corridors lit only by the bluish light from the windows.
Akira had not slept.
The anonymous message was still saved on his phone. {Don't trust Tetsuya Hoshino.}
He did not know whether the message was true.
He knew only one thing: someone knew far too much about his past.
And that someone wanted to make sure Akira kept digging. He stopped in front of the digital forensics room.
The door was locked. Akira knocked.
There was no answer. He knocked again.
"Rina." A few seconds later, a sleepy voice came from inside.
"If this isn't an emergency, I'll kill you." The door opened.
Rina appeared with messy hair and an oversized hoodie. "You didn't sleep?"
"No." "Good."
Rina yawned. "Me neither."
Akira stepped inside. "I need access to the Genesis archives."
Rina immediately woke up. "Which ones?"
"All of them." Rina stared at him.
"Do you know how much data we have?" "The deleted data too."
Rina's expression changed. "Did you find something?"
Akira handed her the photograph sent by the anonymous sender.
Rina examined it.
"This is..." "Genesis."
"Yes." "And Tetsuya."
Rina enlarged the image. Several seconds passed.
"The resolution is terrible." "Can you clarify the boy's face?"
"I'll try." Rina got to work.
A reconstruction algorithm began running. The image enlarged.
The boy's face slowly came into view. Akira moved closer.
Rina stopped the process. "Don't get your hopes up."
The image became clearer. The boy had black hair.
A pale face. Closed eyes.
His body looked extremely weak. Akira stared at the screen.
There was no doubt. It was him.
But there was something else.
Behind Tetsuya... a woman was standing.
Her face was partially obscured by smoke. Akira pointed at the screen.
"Enlarge her." Rina did.
The image broke apart into pixels. But the woman's facial features were still visible.
Akira felt something in his chest. He had seen that face before.
A Genesis photograph. Airi Amemiya.
"That's Reina's mother." Rina turned to him.
"Are you sure?" "Yes."
Rina looked at the screen. "Then she was there when Genesis was destroyed."
Akira nodded. "And she may know what happened to me."
6:03 a.m. Sota arrived at the office.
As soon as he saw Akira and Rina still in the digital forensics room, he stopped. "Did you two sleep here?"
Rina raised her coffee cup. "Technically, yes."
Sota looked at Akira. "What happened?"
Akira handed him his phone. Sota read the anonymous messages.
Then he looked at the photograph. His expression changed.
"Who sent this?" "I don't know."
"Why did they send it to you?" Akira looked at the screen.
"Because they want me to doubt Tetsuya." Sota fell silent.
"And you?" "I don't know if I trust Tetsuya."
Sota returned the phone. "We'll find the facts."
Akira nodded. "That's what we'll do."
They began tracing the old Genesis archives. Rina worked from police data.
Sota contacted the national archives. Akira searched for personal documents preserved in old reports.
Names appeared one by one. But one name kept disappearing.
Not because it wasn't there. But because every time it appeared, the data concerning it had been deleted.
Subject R. No name. No birth date. No medical records. No official photograph. Only a code.
Rina tapped the desk. "This isn't an ordinary deletion."
Akira turned to her. "Why not?"
"The file metadata shows it was accessed several times after Genesis was shut down." "How many times?"
"Four." "By whom?"
Rina shook her head. "The user IDs have been deleted."
Akira moved closer. "But?"
Rina gave a faint smile. "I found the remnants."
She opened a file. A string of codes appeared.
S.A. T.K. A.A.
Akira immediately recognized the first two names.
Seiji Amemiya. Takumi Kisaragi.
The third...
Airi Amemiya.
Three people. Three accesses.
One subject. Reina.
8:21 a.m. Akira stood in front of Airi's house.
He had come alone.
No uniform. No police car.
He knocked on the door. A few seconds later, it opened.
Airi looked startled. "You."
Akira nodded. "Ms. Amemiya."
Airi looked at him for a long time. Then she opened the door a little wider.
"Come in." Akira stepped inside.
The house felt warm. Simple.
A long way from the sort of place belonging to someone who had once been involved in a project as large as Genesis. Airi sat down.
Akira remained standing. "I want to ask you something."
"I know." "About Genesis."
Airi closed her eyes for a moment. "I've already told Reina everything."
"Not everything." Airi opened her eyes.
"Not all of it." Silence.
Akira took out the photograph. The photograph of himself as a child.
Airi looked at it. Her hands trembled.
"This..." "You were there the night Genesis was destroyed."
Airi did not answer. "You were carrying me."
Airi's eyes grew glassy. "Yes."
"Why?" "Because you couldn't walk."
Akira stared at her. "Who did this to me?"
Airi lowered her head. "Genesis."
"Who?" Airi raised her face.
"Seiji." Akira clenched his fists.
"And my father?" "Takumi tried to stop him."
"Tried?" "He was too late."
Akira fell silent. Airi drew a long breath.
"Takumi wasn't a bad person." "I didn't say he was bad."
"He made a mistake." Akira looked at her.
"What mistake?" Airi did not answer right away.
"He believed he could control Seiji." Akira furrowed his brow.
"And it turned out he couldn't." Airi nodded.
"Genesis had grown too large." She looked at the photograph in Akira's hand.
"And when we realized what Seiji was doing to the children..." Her voice trembled.
"...it was already too late."
Reina stood behind the living room door. She had already heard part of the conversation.
Akira turned. Their eyes met.
There were no words. But Reina knew.
Something had just changed. Akira finally said,
"Reina..." Airi immediately closed her eyes.
Reina slowly came downstairs. "Don't."
Akira stopped. Reina stood a few steps away from him.
"Don't call me that in a voice like you already know me." Akira fell silent.
"I don't even know who I am." Reina touched her chest.
"Every time I try to remember, it hurts." Akira looked at her hand.
It was trembling. Without realizing it, he said,
"I'm sorry." Reina shook her head.
"You didn't do anything." "But I was there too."
Reina looked at him. "Yes."
One word. Simple.
Yet it made Akira feel as though something between them had connected again. Not as detective and doctor.
Not as two adults who had only just met. But as two children who had once sat behind glass.
Airi rose.
"There's something you two need to see." She walked toward an old cabinet.
She took out a small box. A wooden box. Old. Covered in scratches.
Airi opened it. Inside were several objects.
A Genesis ID card.
A video cassette. And a photograph.
Reina picked up the photograph. Her eyes widened.
It showed two small children sitting side by side.
Akira and Reina.
There was no glass. No distance.
Young Akira was smiling. Young Reina was laughing as she held a paper bird.
Written on the back of the photograph: {For the day they are finally free.}
Reina covered her mouth. Tears fell.
Akira did not move. He stared at the photograph.
The small smile on the boy's face felt so unfamiliar.
And yet... so familiar.
Airi picked up the cassette. "This is the only recording I managed to save."
Akira looked at her. "What recording?"
Airi looked at them both. "The last recording before I took Reina out."
Reina froze. "And Akira?"
Airi fell silent. Her gaze was filled with remorse.
"I didn't have time to take you." Akira lowered his head.
The question he had been unable to voice all this time finally came out. "Why?"
Airi looked at him.
"Because that night..." She stopped. "Takumi chose to go back inside Genesis."
Akira raised his face. "Why?"
Airi gripped the box. "To save you."
Silence.
Then Airi said quietly, "But he wasn't the only person who went back that night."
Akira stared at her. "Who else?"
Airi did not answer. Her eyes shifted to the old cassette in her hand.
And for the first time since they had begun searching for the past... Airi looked genuinely afraid.
"Seiji."
To be continued.