Etsuko Asato

**Etsuko Asato** is a member of the Tandeki Group in the *Wonderland* series. According to her personnel file, she has been with the group the longest along with Katsuhiro Kitano. In fact, she is considered his second-in-command.

## Appearance and Personality

### Appearance

Etsuko has short brown hair with some gray peppered in it with brown eyes. She has wrinkles under her eyes and on her cheeks. Etsuko sometimes wears black-framed glasses at work.

### Personality

Etsuko doesn't play around on work. Because of her stern ways of running things, Kitano has her as his second-in-command on Tandeki. Depiste her cold demeanor, she seems to have a soft spot for Kaori. Etsuko is really good at creating drugs. It took her ten days to fix the formula for Amaterasu.

## Back Story

   Etsuko graduated from Nara Women's University in 1980 with honors in chemistry and biology with a minor in psychology. For her thesis project in her final year, she created the formula for what would later become the drug, Mnemosyne. She had just finished med school when Kitano recruited her in the summer of 1989. He interviewed her while looking for a skilled chemist to help him figure out what he was doing wrong with his drug, Amaterasu. She asked to give her ten days to solve the problem. He did and she successfully managed to correct all of the flaws in the drug. From then on, she became part of the Tandeki Group. As far back as the group's records could tell, Etsuko has been in the Tandeki Group with Kitano the longest.

She has worked with Kintano on Project Tadpole in the past while they worked at Chou Mori Institution. She did such a good job with fixing Amaterasu that Kitano let her go ahead and work on the beta drug.

In 1991, Etsuko went to Tsushima Island to treat victims of a typhoon. She was in the words when she found a little girl about five years old lying next to a dead man, trying to get up. Feeling curious and her sense of duty to help people, Etsuko picked up the girl after convincing her to leave behind the dead body. She had to care for the girl in the hospital because she wouldn't let anyone touch her. After six weeks, Etsuko ended up adopting the child and taking her home with her. One day while bathing the child, she noticed the Kanji for "death" tattooed on her back just below her neck. Etsuko snapped six pictures and took her to Kitano's apartment. He told her that she had a rare fiind, raise the child right, and she will come to understand her true nature. Kitano gave his colleague a book about apocalypse mythology. When Etsuko read the book for five days, something clicked in her mind when she reread the section on the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse. When she saw that girl again, she knew what she had to do. Etsuko named "Kaori" and taught her how to walk, talk, use the toilet, eat solid food, wash, dress, and feed herself. Kaori was quick to learn all of her developmental skills. Afterwards, Etsuko taught her about different weapons and methods of killing people while Kaori learned everything else on her own.

## Storyline History

### Happy Wonderland

Kitano picks her to head round two of their game. Junko isn't too happy about this. Etsuko briefly talks to the members of the inner circle before revealing that she is going to make Masaomi, Mikado, Anri, Chiharu, and Noriko remember everything that happened to them via Mnmosyne. Later, she goes to Russia Sushi under the pretense of doing a relaxation study with her drug of choice.

It is revealed in the season finale, that Etsuko worked with Kitano on Project Tadpole.

### Deep Blue Wonderland

Etsuko makes a phone call to an unknown person and tells them about the second round of the game. She calms them down after telling them not to go crazy and makes up for it by giving them the job of "shark hunting". Etsuko is later seen talking to Kitano about the upcoming plans for their game and Chirin and the other tadpoles.

She and Kitano talk about the basics and that everything is ready for the resurrection. However, Etsuko has her own questions about Izaya. Mainly, how much does he remember and how much Mnmosyne did Kitano give him. She isn't too happy about him not measuring the amount and giving Mikado another dose of it. Etsuko says they can't give the latter any more for the next five days. She is still concerned about Izaya and suspects that Kitano wants the information broker to make Mikado remember his time in Chou Mori.

Etusko is currently making a fresh batch of Mnemosyne. In "Tadpoles", she, Kitano, and their interns begin their newest experiment on the tadpoles. Etsuko made two baggies of red and blue gel capulse pills to put into the heartseed plant. After the interns voted to use blue first, Kitano showed them the plant and fed it the blue pills. Etsuko pulled out dice from her pocket and led the interns back across the hall.

She notices that Nebula is spying on them and tracks down the source at Shinra and Celty's apartment while taking the elevator down to the basement and telling the story of how the Greeks defeated the Trojans with the Trojan Horse. Etsuko then declares that the Trojans will now be followed in this story.

In "Tandeki", Etsuko talks to Junko and Aya about what they are going to do next with opening the gate and cutting Mikado's ties with the Blue Squares. Junko asks about the Greek mythology analogies. Etsuko explained who everyone was, but she didn't know who Helen was. She later gives her interns the next instructions to open the First Gate. At the end of the halo, the doctor greets Kaori at Rampo Biotech.

In the Halloween special, after Aoba Kuronuma is admitted to the hospital after being beaten up, Etsuko injects the sleeping boy with the drug Lethe to make him forget all about Mikado. She is later seen in another inner circle meeting talking about the progress of the game. She sees Kitano staying behind and asks if he some paperwork to catch up on. When he says yes, he leaves.

### Wonderland Chaos

Etsuko makes a call to an old friend in Moscow with an interesting offer to deal with Shizuo Heiwajima. Earlier, she put the proposal to Kitano and he approved it. In "Impulse", Kitano shows Etsuko a curious effect on the Heartseed planet. Because of Satoshi's death, the stem shrank back into the rest of the plant. Afterwards, she lets in the rest of the interns in so that they could begin the second new experiment. After the red gel pills are placed into the Heartseed plant's flowers, Etsuko and Kitano agreed to let the interns be more hands on with their experiments.

Etsuko plays the recording of Shinra, Emilia, Shingen explaining to the tadpoles that Celty can neutralize their powers. She and Kitano see this as a problem and don't know how this is possible. Etsuko decides to call Celty, Athena in her Greek mythology analogies. She doesn't trust Izaya, but has no choice but to accept as he offers to bring them of Celty's so they can study it. In "Aoba", Etsuko gives Kaori the miniature Tree of Life threads to combat her boredom. She gives her "daughter" the scissors to cut life threads. Kaori then begs her to let her act on her idea. Etsuko hears her out and lets her do it.

In "Yoemon", Kitano and Etsuko gather their interns for the next experiment. Etsuko and Kitano let the interns make the drugs to further the Tadpole Project. Later, they run tests on Celty's hairs against a blood sample from a tadpole. They decide to create a method to subdue the tadpoles when it's needed. In "Thursday", Kitano points out the heart as the weakness of the tadpoles.

In "Exposed", Etsuko and the rest of the inner circle along with Izaya hold a meeting on what to do with the leaked information about Project Tadpole. The doctor catches the nurse, Arisa Kawamata, trying to look into Room 19. Etsuko asks what she was doing and watches her leave.

### Caged Wonderland

Etsuko agrees to stay with the rest of Tandeki and see where the rest of the game will go after Kitano gives her and the rest of the inner circle the choice to leave or stay. In "Chiharu", Junko comes to her at the hospital asking for information on Chiharu's doctor. Though annoyed with the nurse for showing up at her place of work, Etsuko helps anyway.

Aya calls up Etsuko asked her be a witness to an exorcism of a woman in the hospital. She talks with the husband and agrees to help. Etsuko witnesses the exorcism with Aya, Junko, and Joe Brooker. The possessed woman ends up dying. Later, Etsuko and Kitano witness the final augmentation experiment in the Tadpole Project. It is revealed that Etsuko called up Dorothea Yashin to torture Shizuo to get him out of the way for their game. In "Yukio", she gets on Junko and Aya again for their fighting while she is working on new formulas for the Tadpole Project. Etsuko and Kitano later talk about how Izaya is catching on to something wrong with Shizuo. Kitano suspects that Izaya is spying on them, but not for the Russians. Later, Etsuko bandages up Kitano's stab wound as she lectures him on not carrying around his phone. She then asks what they will do with Satoru Joshuyo now that he's in Rampo Biotech. Kitano says that he has a way to solve two of their problems with him.

### Devil's Wonderland

Etsuko texts Kitano about the changes in the Heartseed. Later, she is seen in a meeting with the rest of the Tandeki Group called in by Kitano. All side projects are put on hold until the final gate can be found. Kitano later calls her and tells her that Haru Noda is back. They meet up on the roof to talk about it. Etsuko asked what they were going to do. Kitano said there wasn't much they could do at the moment. But Haru could lead them to the other tadpoles, including "Eve".

### Black Swan Wonderland

Etsuko and Kitano find that it doesn't make a difference whether they experiment on the tadpole in person or via the Heartseed. They decide to keep using the Heartseed while experimenting on the tadpoles in person from time to time. Kitano tells her that the seven deadly sins will be coming soon. He tells Etsuko she isn't needed for anything else at the time and tells her to be careful.

Etsuko stops by Kitano's office and they talk. He reveals to her about a previous incarnation of the apocalypse game. She later goes to the hospital to tend to the tadpoles in the experiment. Etsuko is the one who lets Kitano know about the arch angels. He asks her if this is what he thinks it is. She says yes. Kitano tells her that this could play in their favor. He asks her to walk with him and she says that she has a little bit of time before her work.

Later, Etsuko helps to treat the receptionist after she gets infected by Okui's puss by using a needle to drain it. She notices Roc walking out of the building. She asks where he is going. He tells her that he's going out. Etsuko has her concerns. She voices them to Kitano. They are founded when she learns that some lab equipment is stolen. Kitano says that he put a Trojan Horse tracker on Roc's phone. After Emily's death, Kitano calls in Etsuko and Aya to be there for Roc to be punished for his actions. The doctor held the intern's wrist in place while Aya cursed him. Later, Etsuko and Kitano prepared for the next tadpole evolution.

The doctor suspects that Mari Otomo is erasing pieces of the Dis Program. She tells the story of the Odyssey with Penelope and weaving. Mari asks what this has to do with her. Etsuko tells the intern that she is Penelope in this situation and knows that she is erasing some of the code secret. Turns out, the AI in the Dis Program told on Mari. Later, Etsuko and Kitano notice there's black in Mikado's blood. Etsuko and Kitano notice a new evolution in the tadpoles. They also realize that they still have to deal with Izaya. He is seen with a loose end. Kitano alarms her that Mam has found Raphael. The doctor asks if they should do something. Kitano says no. He believes that it will help them push their game along.

### Edge of Wonderland

Etsuko is heading out to work. She has to calm Kaori down and promise her that game will get interesting soon. This seems to put Kaori at ease for the time being. Then Etsuko leaves for work. Later, Daichi and Yuuko comes by her apartment for the latter to visit Kaori. Etsuko doesn't seem to mind. Ever more so when Daichi asks her to let Yuuko stay over for the night. Etsuko and Kitano add to the current experiment. The doctor gives the heartseed the drug Asclepius to go with Kitano's Myoken. Then they wait to see what happens next. Etsuko understands that Aya is concerned about Mari being on the run.

It's Etsuko who notices that the game has an interloper. She asks Kitano if he remembers Jinnai Yodogiri. They come to the conclusion that his former secretary, Kasane Kujiragi, might have something to do with. Etsuko meets up with the woman. Etsuko asks what her real intentions are. Kujiragi says that she is merely curious. The doctor doesn't buy it, but she asks the secretary for help getting Mari back to Ikebukuro. She is amazed that Kujiragi got straight to the point in their conversation.

Etsuko and Kitano notice that there is a mutation in the blood of the tadpoles after the latest drug given to them. They need to work on an antidote for them. The interns get started, but Kitano has an idea to get the fourth player to get to work. Later, Kitano, Etsuko, and Aya meet up with Masaomi to make him the new player in the game. They push him into playing the game with the problem of helping Mikado get better. After Masaomi Kida turns back time, the antidote is given to the tadpoles. Etsuko brings to Kitano's attention about Gabriel's body parts being washed up around the world. She has her questions, but Kitano puts her at ease. He points out a key thing: Mam is messing a key piece.

### Dark Alice in a Dark Wonderland

Etsuko discovered that anyone connected to Kitano would be distorted in the camera. She and him began their plans to take the Tadpole Project to the next level. Later, Etsuko is seen at the meeting in the inner circle. She sends Kaori on a little fitch mission for a certain ingredient for the Tadpole Project. Etsuko happily thanks her.

### Poison Garden

Etsuko and Kitano make more plans with the game. She is ready get started.

### Dark Side of Wonderland

Etsuko and Kitano begin the latest experiment. She waits for him in the room with the Heartseed plant. They get started with Etsuko injecting some of the plants.

## Relationships

### Katsuhiro Kitano

*Main Article: Katsuhiro Kitano*

Etsuko and Kitano have worked together in Tandeki for a number of years. In fact, she is his second-in-command and he trusts her enough start off round two of their game. When he was interviewing people to help him fix Amaterasu, Etsuko stood out to him. She really won him over when she corrected the formula in ten days. Etsuko is the only one who can get away from lecturing him on leaving his phone behind.

### Tandeki Group

*Main Article: Tandeki Group*

Etsuko mans the Inner circle when Kitano is busy or not around. They have a neutral relationship, but she does her damnest to run a tie ship to keep things moving along. She refers to herself and them as the Trojans after the Trojan army.

### Kaori

*Main Article: Kaori*

Kaori and Etsuko appear to be rather close. In fact, Etsuko raised her like a daughter. It is revealed that the doctor is her handler.

### Dorothea Yashin

*Main Article: Dorothea Yashin*

Etsuko contacted Dorothea to deal with Shizuo. She found the disgraced therapist through the news reports and got into contact with him.

## Branch

### Interns

* Yuzuru Marusa
* Anna Konoe
* Mei Aihara
* Akihito Iseki

### Associates

* Kaori
* Dorothea Yashin (Deceased)

### Known Patients/Test Subjects

* Mikado Ryuugamine/Chirin
* Satoshi Aida (Deceased)
* Emily Akimoto (Deceased)
* Akiko Koike
* Kohaku Kimio
* Tetsu Aso
* Nami Shono
* Midori Amano
* Azusa Kibuishi (Deceased)
* Madoka Kurosawa
* Anzu Oshima
* Sota Iseya
* Megumi Fukao
* Naomi Aizawa
* Riku Ishii
* Naoki Minami
* Yukio Miwa
* Itori Inaba
* Satomi Inaba (Deceased)
* Saori Usui
* Erina Kate
* Hifumi Ushimaru
* Yamato Kato
* Shuichi Azuma
* Tomoya Tokiwa
* Norio Ono
* Sur
* Reo Tachibana
* Haru Noda
* Honoka Noda
* Yukari Chiba
* Taishi Sato
* Shingo Kawakita
* Chie Sakamoto
* Miya Chang

## Trivia

* Etsuko was inspired by the character Etsuko Ota from the movie, *Kyofu* or *The Sylvian Experiments* in the J-horror Theater series. She even shares the same birthday as the actress, Nagisa Katahira, who played Etsuko Ota.
* Etsuko is the second oldest of the Inner Circle. (The oldest is Kitano.)
* Her personnel file says that she prefers to keep her personal life private.