View source for Twelve Years (Kenji Tsukino)

{{Cutscene Header
|Date of Scene=2016/08/03
|Location=Tokyo
|Synopsis=Kenji Tsukino has that one unresolved story that's been plaguing him for twelve years.
|Cast of Characters=58
}}
Twelve years.

It's been twelve years to the day.

Every cop has that one case. Every reporter that one story. The one that got away. This is his.

In those earlier years, he'd allowed the obsession to consume him, obsessing over the case year round. It became...a problem. Now he allows himself a week. One out of fifty-two to pour over case files, to go through old notes. A week to consult the list of idea he'd sporadically jot down over the other fifty-one.

One week. From this day until his son's birthday, the case was his to obsess over again.

For eleven years, there'd been nothing new, Familiar dead ends, the whisperings of old threats.

This year, the boy's breaking routine. His time at the cemetery isn't what it's been the past seven, even more different from last year, and this time he isn't alone. Kenji hides himself behind a tree, waiting and watching, cursing under his breath. He'd have to wait there, cramped behind a tree to pay his respects and curse them both. And while there, he'd have to wonder why the boy is with one of his daughter's best friends.

This year, the twelfth, the boy he'd once helped carry from the wreckage had helped to rebuild his home.

Kenji isn't stupid. He's a ''reporter.'' He'd seen those looks between the boy and his daughter. He isn't stupid, but he tells himself that's all they are - looks.

Even when he'd dropped her off at the ball, knowing who was likely to be there, whose arms would hold her as they danced, ''all they are are looks.''

Otherwise he'd have to tell his daughter to stay away. Tell her the threats that had been made against him - his family - when he'd dug too deep.

Tell her that the day the Chibas' car had crashed over the rail it was reported that the weather was bad, the roads slick. That the burned rubber on the asphalt was from a last moment's effort to correct a turn taken too sharp.

He'd have to tell her that on that day, there had ''been'' no rain.