Kimura

Kimura’s defining conflict is the collision between a father’s devotion and his inability to control what happens to his son. A recovering alcoholic who has spent a month and a half beside Wataru in the hospital, he boards the Hayate Shinkansen intending to confront Prince and return to his son. Instead, Prince turns that purpose against him: Kimura is bound, pressured to cooperate, and finally shot by Lemon. His story is shaped by the hope that Wataru might still be saved, a hope that repeatedly restrains Kimura when rage might otherwise take over.

Identity and Background

Kimura is Wataru’s father. He is presented as gruff and brooding, and his recent past includes a serious dependence on alcohol. When he could not drink for even a short time, he became anxious and irritable. Wataru, acting on his grandparents’ instructions, hid the alcohol around their home; Kimura would search the apartment for it and, in desperation, came close to drinking his hair tonic. Looking back, Kimura is grateful that he never became violent toward his son. He understands that harming Wataru would have left him with a remorse he could not escape.

Kimura has since stopped drinking, a change he describes to himself as clawing his way out of a dark forest. The timing makes that recovery feel painfully incomplete: Wataru is now in a coma and cannot witness his father’s new beginning. Kimura’s sobriety is not offered as a simple resolution to his past. It is a hard-won change whose meaning is put under pressure by the crisis that follows.

A Father’s Vigil

For the month and a half after Wataru entered the coma, Kimura barely leaves Wataru’s hospital. His son cannot respond, so there is no conversation or encouragement returned to him, but Kimura continues to care for him in practical ways, changing his clothes and moving him in bed. The work and the difficulty of sleeping in the hospital accumulate into exhaustion.

The hospital room holds as many as six young patients at a time, with parents staying beside them. The other parents do not make small talk with Kimura, but they do not conspicuously avoid him either. Watching him sit with Wataru and speak to the unconscious boy, they recognize the grief and effort they share. Kimura, accustomed to other people being enemies or keeping their distance, initially does not know how to understand their sympathy. Over time, he comes to see the parents as members of the same team, on the same bench in a common struggle.

That sense of responsibility makes Kimura’s regret over leaving Wataru alone especially sharp. He had believed the absence would last only a day. His plan was to board the train, point his gun at Prince, shoot him, and return to the hospital. The scale of the plan is starkly limited: Kimura imagines a single act of revenge followed by a return to the bedside. He does not anticipate becoming a captive in a situation that will make the return uncertain.

Fear, Restraint, and Cooperation

Before the train journey, Kimura is confronted in a narrow alley by schoolboys frightened of Prince and the disorder they believe he has brought to their school. Kimura initially responds with helplessness rather than a plan. He feels as if he has casually cast a fishing line and hooked a monster capable of dragging him into the water. In desperation, he offers to get rid of Prince, then names a price of one million yen from each boy to make clear that he does not mean it. The boys begin discussing how they might raise the money, forcing Kimura to explain that he was joking and direct them toward their parents or teachers. The episode shows how easily his offhand response becomes a commitment in the eyes of people looking for help.

Aboard the train, Prince removes the tape binding Kimura’s wrists and ankles but remains confident that Kimura will not risk Wataru’s safety by attacking him. Kimura recognizes the pressure behind that confidence: Prince has threatened his son, and the possibility that cooperation might keep Wataru alive is enough to restrain him. When Prince asks for his help, Kimura suppresses his hatred and asks what he is supposed to do. Prince leads him toward a gangway, explaining that the suitcase is inside a trash bin set into the wall. Even after being untied, Kimura does not feel free; his choices remain governed by the danger to Wataru.

The prospect of a possible rescue keeps that restraint in place even when Kimura doubts Prince’s assurances. He cannot know whether there is really someone waiting near the hospital to act when given a signal, or whether Prince has invented the promise to control him. Because the promise might be true, Kimura believes he must keep Prince alive. His anger remains intense, but he forces himself to calm down rather than risk the chance that Wataru could survive.

The Conflict with Prince

Kimura’s central question is why Prince hurt Wataru. Prince offers an account in which Wataru followed him and his friends onto a roof and fell after being warned that it was dangerous. Kimura rejects the explanation as a lie and asks why Wataru, specifically, was targeted. The question is not just a request for details: Kimura is trying to understand whether his son’s fall was an accident or an act directed at him.

His suspicion is connected to an earlier confrontation. Kimura had seized Prince by the uniform and torn it while preparing to attach electrode pads to the boy’s chest. Looking back on that encounter, Kimura argues that Prince may have been afraid of him, and that Prince went after Wataru to retaliate for being frightened. Prince nearly objects, then suppresses the response, leaving the accusation unresolved rather than confirming Kimura’s theory. The exchange brings Kimura’s own previous aggression into the conflict: his effort to protect his son has become part of the explanation he offers for Prince’s actions.

Prince then gives Kimura another task, describing it as a preliminary investigation but intending to have him kill Yoshio Minegishi. Kimura immediately recognizes the mismatch between the label and the actual objective. Prince’s plan is to go to Minegishi’s compound, distract its security, and send Kimura inside to attack the leader. The proposed mission redirects Kimura from his original plan against Prince and makes his cooperation serve Prince’s conflict with Minegishi. Kimura sees through the phrasing, but recognizing the true purpose does not remove the pressure exerted through Wataru.

Ending and Narrative Significance

As Prince pushes Kimura along the train aisle, Kimura is no longer bound, yet still experiences himself as constrained. Hatred for Prince remains, but he describes it as distant and unreal, as if the rage belonged to someone else. He also questions whether he is afraid of the schoolboy. The uncertainty exposes how thoroughly Prince has unsettled Kimura’s confidence: even his own fear and anger seem difficult to claim as his own. A tall man waits in the gangway ahead, and Kimura continues forward with Prince behind him.

In the train’s curtained sink area, the hand dryer masks the sound of Lemon’s silenced gun. Kimura does not immediately realize that he has been shot. As his vision blurs, Lemon addresses him, and the scene ends with Kimura unable to see and unsure whether he is on the floor. The abruptness of the shooting cuts across the plans that have organized his actions: returning to Wataru, killing Prince, and cooperating in the hope that his son might be spared. Kimura’s arc therefore turns not on a settled victory or reconciliation, but on the painful distance between the care he can give Wataru and the outcomes he cannot command.