A Death in Tokyo: A Mystery

"That's right. Kilometer zero for all the roads in Japan This was people's jumping-off point for journeys all over the country. That's supposedly why he decided to put wings on his kirins' backs."

"I didn't know that." Kaori took another look at the statues.

They're like us with all our hopes and dreams back then, she thought. We left the sticks and hitchhiked all the way down here We thought that was only our first step. We thought we had the whole world at our feet. We had such big dreams. We felt as though we had wings and could fly off into a bright, shining future.

In the end, they had never managed to get off the ground.

"Have you ever watched someone die, Kaga?"

"Many times. Too often to count. It's part of my job."

Kanamori slowly shook her head.

"No, what you've seen are corpses, not people. I have watched people die. God only knows how many times. People rediscover their real feelings when death is coming up on them. They jettison their pride and stubbornness and finally open up to their true hopes and desires. The living have a duty to listen to what they say then, to their final message. You abandoned that duty, Kaga."