But That Big-Eared Guy Was Me? (3)
Reina turned around at the familiar voice. A single, unfathomable pair of large red eyes fixed upon her. Eyes that were always eerie, no matter how you looked at them. There was not a trace of life in those eyes, which always seemed to be gazing at something else that others couldn't see.
'So, what now...'
She pondered. Should she send the captain to Laura and tell her about this? Or should she ask the captain directly? The second option didn't appeal to her at all. If she irritated the captain, she'd be hit with a barrage of sharp words. If she asked, she'd become the victim of that sharp tongue this time.
Even the end-of-watch report from two days ago had been like that.
Obelisk, the assault destroyer, officer's meeting room.
"You idiots, sending me this garbage?"
Documents torn by the captain's hands fluttered in the air.
"I told you, garbage doesn't need to ride on my ship."
There were over 650 crew members. Among the 40 officers responsible for this, only about 10 passed the end-of-watch report on the first try. Of those, the ones who often passed were, if I had to pick, Laura the first officer, Chloe the command control officer, Duke the corps commander, Erica the special operations officer, Yuri the weapons control officer, Cecil the sound detection officer, and Lloyd the maintenance control officer.
"Reina Florence, Lieutenant Commander."
"Yes, Captain."
"I wonder if there's any medicine for these maggots sitting here."
"I'm sorry. There is no such medicine."
"What a pity. I wanted to make you a little busier."
'...Thanks to you, I'm already plenty busy.'
She swallowed the words.
"And... Kori Ingrid, Lieutenant."
"Yes~! It's Kori, Captain! Here I am! ♡"
"Calculation is accurate. The numbers are surprisingly clean. But..."
The report on the hologram. In the center of the blank space, a line of text written as if advertising to everyone else.
Captain, Hook Etcharius!
Etcharius.
A small herbivorous monster with sharp spikes all over its body. Under the scrawled sentence, there was even a drawing of a furious Etcharius.
"Is this what you drew?"
"Ahcha~! I must have forgotten to erase it! Ehehe!"
Kori playfully stuck out her tongue and scratched her head. Her fluffy fox tail wagged up and down. It was her unconscious habit when teasing someone.
"Interesting. Very interesting."
"Ah?! Does the Captain have an interest in drawings too?"
The atmosphere suddenly turned chilly with the open mockery. The officers, who knew the captain's ruthless nature, each swallowed hard with bated breath.
"Clearly, I must have warned you several times."
"Haha-! Sorry! I'll do it again!"
"And... your outfit is quite to my liking."
Kori was wearing the black tank top for maintenance that day too. The other 8 maintenance officers had already changed into new uniforms as per the captain's order and were present for the end-of-watch report.
"The smell of a beast. Very fragrant, even."
"Ah, is that so? I'm a beast, after all! Haha-!"
But this was also the outfit allowed for maintenance officers for convenience. When Laura was captain, it was an exception for the brutal work schedule, so Kori was giving her a cheeky joke with a bit of rebellion.
"Heh, I'll give you a prize. Come closer."
The captain's mouth curved into a smirk, eyes curving like a new moon. A tension that felt suffocating came over her with that eerie, terrifying laugh.
"Closer. Yes. Closer."
Kori came right up to her nose.
At that moment, an unbelievable thing happened.
It was also the moment Kori's my face broke.
"Uh-?!"
"Kori!"
Reina shouted in surprise.
Without time to react, Kori's shoulder was bitten.
Literally, 'chewed' and 'eaten'.
"Hmm......"
She chewed the flesh of Kori's shoulder in her mouth as if savoring it, then spat it out onto the floor with a "tch". The flesh that had been chewed several times and become mush stuck to the floor with a "thud".
"Your fair white shoulder looks quite delicious."
"K, Kori. Are you okay?"
"-By the way, fox meat is surprisingly tough, isn't it? Just like your pranks."
Reina hurriedly checked Kori's shoulder.
A fairly deep wound.
She needed to go to the medical bay immediately for hemostasis.
"Since the crazy ones don't listen to lectures, I'll educate you this way. Any objections?"
"Kuu, the crazy one is you-!"
"-Keep talking. I'll throw you in jail for insulting a superior officer."
"Uh-!"
Kori glared at her with a crumpled face, filled with anger.
"Etcharius... From today on, I hope you'll think differently, Lieutenant Kori."
But with an expression that didn't care about Kori's anger at all, she carefully licked the blood from the corner of her mouth and added with a faint smile.
"-Etcharius is a herbivore, after all."
Then, a short but intense reverie ended.
She greeted the captain in front of her again.
"Oh, Captain. Are you feeling better now?"
"Captain."
"...Reina Florence, Lieutenant Commander."
She greeted with the warmest possible courtesy, but the cold reply came first, picking on the title. At that cold answer, Reina stared at her with a look of exhaustion and thought.
'Really, this person doesn't get tired...'
But something was different today.
A sense of unease? Disorientation? Maybe both.
'Doesn't get tired...?'
She couldn't finish the words rising in her head.
It was only natural that today's captain was...
Very disheveled for the first time in history.
"You're sweating too much, Captain. Are you okay?"
Pale face. Thick dark circles under the eyes, hair not combed at all, messy. Moreover, the uniform that didn't tolerate even a single wrinkle was all wrinkled, with buttons undone here and there. Not only that. She looked like she was in pain. Rapid breathing, sweat dripping down her whole body.
'...Is it because of the aftertaste of Abutilon? Why like this...'
The sight that evoked even a strange protective instinct made her suspect hallucination. The overwhelming sense of disorientation she had never experienced before. She stared at the disheveled captain for a long time.
"Wait, that..."
Then her mind snapped. The Type-3 medical pistol in the captain's hand. It didn't take long for suspicion to become certainty. All circumstances pointed to one truth.
Abutilon withdrawal.
"Step away from my sight."
The red eyes staring at her trembled slightly.
It was an eye full of panic at being exposed.
"Didn't you hear? I said step away from my sight."
The usual threatening tone, but somehow, the Etcharius Kori had mentioned came to mind. The small monster that, when threatened, would curl up and show its spikes to protect itself, strangely resembled the captain a lot.
"Elia Captain."
She had solemnly sworn to Erinyes, the goddess of mercy, to cherish all life. The one standing before her eyes now was not the captain, but a patient. Reina grabbed the captain's wrist, which was turning away. It was cold. A eerie feeling like touching a corpse that had been dead for several days.
"...Why like this, hah. Come with me."
Why so cold? The temperature difference between the hand holding and the wrist being held was so severe that the chill felt like it was climbing up her hand. Her chest ached with guilt. When had this started? Maintaining a calm expression, she returned to the medical bay.
"Please sit here."
The moment she entered the room, she filled a cup with warm water.
~Cerus Year 4312, December 24~
'15th anniversary of the Sigma infection in Sector 09, what remains there?'
'-Ah, I forgot to turn that off-'
The red eyes, thought to be dead, flickered with waves. The eye full of hope trampled and left only an empty shell pierced her heart, leaving a large hole in Reina's chest.
'...What kind of thing has this medical officer done, digging behind people's backs and saying such things.'
She secretly regretted and hurriedly turned off the hologram terminal.
"Here's warm water. Drink it slowly."
The hand holding the cup trembled slightly. All the demon-like appearances of the captain she'd seen so far felt like illusions. Thinking about it, she had never had a conversation with her for more than 5 minutes in private. At the same time, her heart felt heavy. If she had misunderstood? If all her actions were an act to hide her weakness?
"Medicine-"
"No."
Reina reflexively answered.
A medical questionnaire floated in her mind. Asking a doctor for Abutilon, illogical thinking. The expression on the face of refusing, as if the world had ended, extreme dependence. Restless, eyes shifting here and there, anxiety symptoms. Every line filled on the questionnaire cast a black cloud over her heart.
"...Cecil escorted the Captain to the room yesterday. Remember?"
"What are you talking about."
A sharp reply.
But the voice was faintly trembling.
"Abutilon."
Her body stopped trembling at those words.
She looked away and lowered her head.
"Cecil brought this thing she found for me just now."
Now, even if she showed the medicine bottle, she was silent without moving.
"And this thing you've been holding in your hand since earlier."
She snatched the hand holding the medical pistol. It hurt to keep pressing like this, but to start treatment, the patient herself had to face reality first.
"How much have you taken? Please tell me honestly."
The captain, who had the nickname 'Demon of Obelisk', suddenly looked so pathetic. Only then did Reina realize the true nature of the disorientation. The captain, who had caused fear in everyone on the ship and achieved historical feats, was just a young girl who was still under twenty by human standards. This young girl might have been dominated by the madness to overcome the weight of the responsibility she bore.
"...Captain, it's not because of anything else. I'm worried about the Captain's health."
Reina said, soothing with a soft voice. And she decided to put this aside and help her with all her heart. It wasn't too late. If she started treatment now, she could recover within six months.
"If it's addiction, you should receive treatment immediately. How many bottles have you taken? Two? Three?"
At that moment.
"Who...?"
Something happened.
"No... It can't be."
"Captain?"
Immediately followed by Yuri's scream.
She touched her own face with an incredulous expression.
"Ah, aa-, aaaaa? It hurts? Me? It hurts. Hurts?"
She soon grabbed her head with both hands and fell into confusion, starting to question herself.
"It hurts! It hurts, hurts! Hurts! Hurts!"
"Captain!"
She let out a strangled scream, twisted her whole body, lost her balance, and collapsed to the floor. Then, curling up with both legs wrapped around, she started frantically looking around.
"-S, shut up, not yet, dead"
Eyes glazed with fear.
It seemed like she had been hearing voices for a long time due to prolonged withdrawal.
Blood spurted from her tightly bitten lips in resistance to the fear.
But it was strange.
It shouldn't be like this.
"I'm alive."
"Hallucination, Captain! Don't listen!"
The side effects of Abutilon are-
'Hallucinations and voices about 'happy memories'.
But, no matter how hard you try to see it positively, this reaction is-
Not hallucinations and voices about happy memories.
"Shut your mouth. Even if it's not me, everyone is dead."
She muttered while staring at the empty space on the right side of the medical bay. Reina's heart fell into the abyss. What hallucination was she seeing? What hallucination made her say such things.
"Even if it's not me! In the end, everyone would have died!"
A desperate cry that felt like her chest would burst.
Could the unimaginable despairing past mean that the happiest memory she had was this? Reina, wrapped in an indescribable sadness she had never felt in her life, grabbed the captain's cheeks and focused her gaze on herself. From the lake of dead blood that seemed not to overflow, what flowed out was not dark red blood, but clear tears.
"There's nothing, Elia! Snap out of it and look at my eyes!"
There was no reaction in the empty eyes.
"It hurts, hurts, hurts, hurts, hurts, hurts."
On this day, Reina atoned.
To put it mildly,
She hadn't realized at all.
Not even a hint.
Etcharius.
The ferocious monster Etcharius, which digs holes, attacks with sharp poisonous spikes, and even eats meat, upon facing it, turned out to be the smallest creature without even the spikes to protect itself.
"Sorry, Elia. It's okay. It's okay..."
When she hugged the trembling body of Etcharius with all her might, what she felt was-
A chilling cold that made the bones shiver.