022. Gift (2)
022. Gift (2)
That evening.
It had been a fairly busy day, even without any missions.
Organizing supplies with Sumire, deep-cleaning with Alicia, overhauling the simulation room.......
Thanks to that, I'd managed a quick meal with hands trembling so badly I could barely hold my chopsticks, and now I'd finally reached some downtime.
I ditched everything and went straight for bed. I was about to go right to sleep——but I didn't.
Because the conversation I'd had with Laika on the rooftop earlier that day came back to me.
The story about wanting to go retrieve Seo Se-rin's remains someday.
The story about wanting to deliver the birthday gift she'd meant to give Seo Se-rin back then.
The story about wanting me to find out what that 'birthday gift she wanted to receive' had been.
Objectively speaking, that was an extraneous detail with no bearing on preventing Laika's disposal.
Our goal was simply to reach 100 mission points, and we were only one mission away from that mark.
Whether I found the gift or not, we just had to finish one more mission and it was over.
That being said.
"......I should still figure it out."
It wasn't directly related to the disposal, but my true goal from the start was never just to prevent Laika from being disposed of.
More than that, it was to help her live a healthy life, both mentally and physically.
And in doing so, to have her perform at maximum efficiency by my side.
That was my real objective.
For that objective, I really did need to help her sort out her painful past first.
Even if I couldn't resolve it completely. Even if I couldn't deal with every last part.
At the very least, so she wouldn't have to carry the weight of 'not even knowing what gift someone precious to her had wanted to receive.'
Which meant.
"......Time to start looking. Let's see what kind of grand birthday present she'd wanted so badly."
I might not have the physical stamina, but I still had the time.
***
At this point, you might be wondering.
'How on earth are you going to look into Seo Se-rin's personal wishes, especially more than a year after the fact?'
If you were expecting a clear-cut answer to that, I'm sorry to disappoint.
To be frank, there was no clear solution.
No, there was no way there could be one.
No clear method to find out what birthday gift a person I'd never even met had wanted to receive from a subordinate she cherished.
That being said.
I did at least have an approach.
That approach was to comb through every document about Seo Se-rin that I was authorized to access.
......I was well aware that it was an incredibly reckless approach.
To begin with, all the documents I could access with my authority were official records. It seemed unlikely they'd contain private subjects like birthday presents.
Nevertheless, I decided to just search anyway.
It felt like I'd have fewer regrets that way.
Besides, maybe even if it wasn't directly 'an item she wanted as a birthday present,' I could still find out the kind of things she usually wanted.
Just finding that out and telling Laika would surely give her that much more motivation.
How many hours had I spent searching and searching like that?
......Three hours.
I'd started around nine, and when I checked my wristwatch, it had just passed midnight.
Even by then, no real answer had come up.
More than that, there were simply too few records.
It was probably because the military paid little attention to supplementary commissioned officers like her.
No matter how much they accomplished, they could never rise above field-base commander, and many of them died within a few months of being commissioned.
"Guess there's nothing I can do."
One last search, and if there was still nothing, I'd head back.
With that mindset, I opened the next document.
Soon, a filename appeared.
[Unit Counseling Logs and Personal Records (Seo Se-rin)]
"......Oh."
For the first time, I'd found something plausible.
Because if it was a counseling log or personal records, there just might be a mention of a birthday gift.
At the very least, it seemed likely a 'wanted item' would be noted.
And the most promising item was this document at the very bottom of the file.
[Counseling Records and Personal Evaluation Data - Laika]
It was a record about Laika.
To make matters more intriguing, the last modified date was...... the very day before the two of them set out on the Ice Shell operation.
Here, it really might be mentioned.
Brimming with anticipation, I clicked to open the document.
[This document is security-protected and cannot be accessed.]
"Aagh!"
I screamed.
My scream did nothing to make the message in the middle of the monitor disappear. It just stayed there, mocking me.
This document is security-protected and you can't open it~♥ You're just a pathetic Commander without the clearance~♥, it seemed to say.
"The other personal records opened just fine, so why is this one suddenly like this......."
More importantly, wasn't there some way around this?
I gritted my teeth and looked for a way, but naturally, there wasn't one.
After all, the document was stored on the military's server, not our computer. Unless I was some super-genius hacker who could break the military's cybersecurity, there was nothing to be done.
I was still wallowing in despair when—
—Deureureuk.
Unexpectedly, the front door of the command-and-control room slid open.
"What?"
Had Alicia come because she heard me shouting?
No, Alicia wasn't the type to come looking for me just because I yelled a bit.
Or was it Laika?
I could see Laika rushing over, but at this hour, she would be resting in her personal room in the residential block, not here in the main building where the command room was located.
Krädel's buildings couldn't even keep out a draft, but there was no way a shout from the next building over would carry this far.
Sumire couldn't leave the Manufactory without my permission.
......Then who else would come looking for me here?
I was perplexed for only a moment. The intruder's figure soon came into view beyond the command room panel.
First of all, she was a biodroid.
Aside from her overly sharp eyes, she was a picture-perfect beauty with impossibly colored eyes and hair.
Red eyes. Red hair.
She wore her hair in a two-side-up style.
Her attire was a white tee even shabbier than the military gym clothes Laika wore, and denim hot pants so short they were practically underwear. White over-knee socks.
She was slightly shorter than Laika.
Her figure was even slighter than Laika's. Her plump thighs made up for it somewhat.
In summary——
"Who are you?"
She was someone I had absolutely never seen before.
And this person I'd never met in my life was walking into my base's command center with an outfit and demeanor as if she'd just popped out for a stroll in the neighborhood.
Caught off guard, I was both dumbfounded and slightly wary.
But the girl herself just frowned at me.
As if she were the rightful owner of this command center and I was nothing more than a cockroach that had snuck in.
Sure enough, the girl soon asked me without bothering to hide her displeasure.
"Ha? Who are you?"
A squawking voice, like the chirping of a sparrow.
It was a voice that wasn't entirely unfamiliar.
Since being assigned to Krädel, I'd heard this voice at least once, though not often.
Which meant.
This girl, could it be.
"......Are you Rinne, by any chance?"
Rinne.
The third and final official member of Krädel alongside Laika and Alicia.
And among those three, she was also the least cooperative.
Just how little? ......To the point that even now, nearly three long months since I was assigned to Krädel, she'd never once shown me her actual appearance.
No, setting aside meeting in person, we'd barely even had a conversation.
For the first few days, we'd exchanged words through the wall, but later on, she stopped responding to even that.
After that, contact completely vanished. I was on the verge of slowly forgetting her existence entirely——
"Yeah. I'm Rinne."
I see.
So you're Rinne.
So you did exist.
You were a real character after all.
Rinne pressed me again while I stood there dumbfounded.
"So who are you, then?"
......Hm.
"Who else. I'm your Commander."
"Commander? When did you get assigned, then?"
"About three months ago."
"Hmmm—"
Rinne made a token show of surprise, as if saying, 'I'm not interested, but since I asked, I might as well react.'
A moment later, she asked again, genuinely startled this time.
"What? Three months?"
"Yeah."
"Don't lie. How does anyone assigned here last three months?"
I agreed with her. Which was why I felt a renewed sense of pride.
As I shrugged, Rinne started counting on her fingers.
Then she asked.
"......Then are you that guy who ordered that recon mission or whatever the other day?"
She must have been counting back the dates.
And that recon mission had been ages ago.
Dumbfounded, I answered anyway.
"Yeah. That Commander was me."
Now that she knew that, she ought to show a little respect, right?
Rinne openly sneered at me, crushing that expectation.
"Hyehng— you held out a long time. For such a pathetically weak-looking guy."
......I should have expected this.
Well, anyway.
"What are you doing here?"
Wasn't Rinne a character who just holed up in the basement?
Rinne gave a simple answer to my puzzled look.
"Who cares?"
......Hm.
"I'm telling you for the second time, I'm your Commander."
"And I said who cares?"
"You should care. Subordinate biodroids have a duty to answer their commander honestly, and addressing your commander respectfully is basic protocol......."
"Yeah, no~? I'm gonna keep ignoring your questions and talking however I want~?"
Haah.
If I'd had even a little stamina left, I would have tried to teach this cheeky brat a proper lesson...... unfortunately, I was completely drained.
I didn't even have the energy to correct her attitude, let alone teach her a lesson.
So as I just stayed silent, Rinne instead started nagging at me.
"Anyway, move. That's my spot."
"What?"
"The seat you're sitting in right now. The computer there. It's mine."
What was she talking about now.
"What do you mean. This is the Commander's seat."
"I know. But commanders assigned to Krädel always resign before they even sit there, or right after they do. So it's basically always empty, and I use it whenever I need to."
Hearing that, I almost thought it was a pretty reasonable claim.......
"But I didn't resign."
"Then resign. Actually, I don't care whether you do or not—just move. I've got something to do."
"I have something to do too."
At that, Rinne frowned.
"What could you possibly have to do here at this hour? What, watching porn?"
As if I would.
"Then what about you, Rinne? Did you come to watch porn too?"
"Huhhh? I asked first, didn't I? You porn addict."
"No, technically I asked first...... agh."
I stopped mid-sentence and let out a sigh of defeat.
A brutal wave of self-awareness hit me. Why was I doing this at this hour with a subordinate I'd only just met?
My search for the gift was already a lost cause anyway.
"Fine. You use it."
I said that and got up from the seat.
At that, Rinne quirked an eyebrow as if she found it suspicious.
"What's this all of a sudden. Why are you yielding? I thought you had something to do."
"I did, but it's gone."
"What was it, the thing you had to do."
I answered half-heartedly.
"Finding a way to save Laika. But it looked like it wasn't going to work."
At that, how should I put it.
Rinne flinched, a slight tremor going through her shoulders.
"Laika? That sleepyhead with the sky-blue hair?"
"Yeah. Her."
"Save her? What does that mean?"
"You said it was none of your business."
I snapped that and moved to leave the command room.
But Rinne outright blocked my path.
And not stopping there, she squawked at me.
"You can't just say something like that and go."
I meant to push Rinne aside and go on my way. I thought she was picking another pointless fight.
But just before I did.
How should I describe it.
It might have been purely my imagination...... but as I glanced down, I caught a look in Rinne's eyes that hadn't been there before.
Should I call it sincerity?
Or maybe interest?
Whatever it was, I got the sense that she wanted to hear my story.
Actually, she said so herself.
"Tell me. What happened, exactly?"
There was no harm in telling her.
Anyway, this girl was also a member of Krädel and Laika's colleague.
And from my standpoint, she was also my soldier—someone I had to take responsibility for and rehabilitate, just like Laika.
If I could exchange even a few more words now and our relationship improved even slightly, that alone would be meaningful.
So I didn't have any particular expectations.
Rather, I just laid out that 'thing I had to do' as if grumbling.
It wasn't an easy task.
Because this kid had spent three months completely cut off from everyone else at Krädel.
To make her understand what my task was, I first needed to explain why that task had come about.
So, well...... I decided to just tell her the whole story.
Starting from my first meeting with Laika going back three months ago, her issues, and my efforts to resolve them.
Plus the conversation we'd had on the rooftop that morning and even my thoughts regarding it.
I told her everything, without leaving a single detail out.
Only then did Rinne fully understand what I was trying to do.
"......So that's why I was looking for Seo Se-rin's records."
"And you're saying you failed?"
Rinne asked.
I shook my head. I couldn't exactly call it a complete failure.
"I did find a suspicious document. But it's behind a security clearance, so I can't open it."
I pointed at the screen as I said that.
On the screen were the same document and the warning saying I wasn't allowed to access it.
"......Hmm. Is that so. So that's what happened."
Rinne muttered softly, staring intently at the text on the screen.
A moment later, she casually tossed out a remark.
"If it's something like that, I think I could help."