Mercy and Sacrifice (2)
"Natsugahara Hina, please come through to the examination room—."
"Yes. We'll be right there. ...Hina, get up."
"O-okay..."
The call had come from the reception desk. Hina rose with Akane beside her, and offered a small bow toward Ninomae, Han Seoyeon, and the rest of their party where they sat on the sofa. A moment later she decided the greeting had been unnecessary. She would be right back, after all.
"What's this change of heart?"
"A ch-change of heart...?"
The corridor to the examination room was not particularly long. Somewhere along it, Akane spoke.
"Natsugahara Hina, making dinner plans?"
"I-I can manage that much... And she's a junior I talk to online all the time, so..."
Akane's brow furrowed. It wasn't that Hina's answer had displeased her. On Akane's side, it was probably nothing more than the look of someone who found it difficult to accept.
...Honestly, she's terrifying. That's what makes it thrilling, though. Hina flinched, trembling even as she muttered it inwardly. Akane was no Han Seoyeon, who had been sitting with them only a moment ago, but her eyes were sharp enough in their own right.
"You can make a plan, sure. You'll meet, too."
At any rate, the woman with that cutting look let out a snort, and went on.
"But a meal is a different story. You're not planning to eat with the mask on."
"......"
This time Hina gave no answer. Akane was right. To share a meal with someone was also to bare one's face at close range, and the woman called Natsugahara Hina was terribly afraid of showing her skin to anyone else.
Akane did not find that strange. Hina was someone who had lived through more than enough to justify it. Friends and colleagues she had treasured—she had watched those girls turn overnight and, right before her eyes, tear one another apart and devour each other. It had not ended there. The colleagues who had become monsters turned on her as well, and she had nearly lost her life.
Even her present state, Hina had been told, was an enormous improvement: coming outside while shaking all over, so long as every inch of her stayed covered. These days she could at least take the mask off in a place that held only the first generation. Ninomae, by contrast, was meeting her for only the second time.
"...No. Thinking about it, she was like that from the start."
Stopped before the examination room door, Akane murmured as if the thought had only just come to her.
"The first time you met—even from a distance—you took your mask off in front of Ninomae."
Hina gave a small nod.
"I felt this strange... sense of kinship..."
Mary was a haughty character, and yet in truth she was a tender-hearted girl. In that—stern on the outside, gentle within—Aki, which is to say Natsugahara Hina, had felt a faint kinship.
What she did not know was that Ninomae, too, had once gone through a time of hiding herself, disappointed in others and sunk in fear. That had been a mask of persona rather than a physical one, but the difference could hardly have been great. Perhaps, without realizing it, Hina had sensed something of the kind.
"B-but that wasn't it. I watched the live, and she was completely different. I mean... the exact opposite. She... she wasn't fragile at all..."
The words spilled out in a disordered ramble. Even so, what she meant came through well enough. Not stern without and gentle within, but gentle without and stern within. That the girl had a far firmer will than anyone had imagined—Akane had felt it too, watching the live this time.
"S-so I wanted to get stronger, too..."
In the space of an hour, sympathy had become admiration. Ninomae still raised an iron wall readily enough against strangers, but that fence already held several people inside it. Hina could not manage even that.
"Pushing away even a kind girl like her... yeah. I didn't want to be that sort of person..."
And so she had decided to be a little bold, and take just one step further. That was all.
"...Maybe I should be the one treating today, after all."
"H-huh? Why...?"
"If I'm paying, just eat."
Wouldn't it make a fine way to mark the occasion? Akane swallowed the words down hard.
"Miss Ninomae. Please come to the examination room."
"We ought to be going as well."
Not long after Hina and Akane returned, Ninomae's name was called, as if the two appointments were trading places. She headed for the examination room with Han Seoyeon.
"A doctor of the other side... what sort of person are they, exactly?"
"There is no need to worry so. Here or there, it is a place where people live."
"But if there really weren't any difference, there wouldn't need to be separate doctors on the other side, would there? You could just go to any hospital on the surface."
"That is true."
Han Seoyeon nodded, and then went on.
"Even so, the difference is not truly so great. For the most part, it amounts to their also serving as veterinarians."
"...Veterinarians?"
"Most of those who could simply go to a hospital on the surface, and choose not to, are people whose bodies have been altered into something no longer human."
In other words, these were professionals skilled, by and large, at mending aberrant flesh.
"Beyond that, they occasionally bring anomalies into the treatment—sorcery, prayer, things of that nature."
It was not as extraordinary as one might think. Unlike the quack "doctors of the underworld" who turned up in comics and the like, they held proper licenses—usually one apiece, for the surface and for the other side.
"Ah. Even so, the person we are meeting today will be a little different."
"In what way?"
"Experiencing it yourself would be faster. Still, to put it briefly."
With that, Han Seoyeon turned the handle and opened the door of the examination room.
"It would be easiest to understand if I called her an esper."
Inside was an examination room of the familiar sort one might see at any hospital. The person seated there was much the same: a woman with a short bob, round gold-rimmed glasses, and a white coat, the sort of figure one felt one had seen a thousand times on the news or on educational programs.
"Miss Ninomae? Please, have a seat."
"Ah, yes."
Only the atmosphere was somehow different. Perhaps Ninomae, too, was beginning to develop a sense for telling the people of the surface from those of the other side. For now she sat where the doctor indicated, in a black chair with no back—plush and round, able to swivel and to rise and fall.
"So the symptom is... a sudden, heavy nosebleed. And you didn't strike anything."
"Yes, that's right."
"Let's begin with a simple examination. A little closer, please."
The doctor, who had seemed to be studying the monitor, said this and at once beckoned her over. Ninomae drew the chair in—it had wheels as well—and the doctor rolled one sleeve to the middle of her forearm, then set the tips of her index and middle fingers gently against Ninomae's brow.
"I'm going to read your memory for a moment. Please don't be too startled."
"M-my memory?"
"Yes. That's right. Have you ever heard the word psychometry?"
Three fields of sight, where information was concerned. If precognition was the sight of the future and clairvoyance the sight of the present, then psychometry was the sight of the past: to touch a thing and read the records left upon it. That such an ability existed, and that one might be startled to learn it, was proof she had not yet grown entirely accustomed to the other side. So long as a thing could be imagined, the chance of its existing never fell to absolute zero.
"Would you happen to know when it occurred? The more precise, the better."
"Um, well... Shion-san. Do you know when it was?"
"Please wait a moment. I will check the VOD."
So saying, Han Seoyeon took out her phone.
"Was it not right about here, when you staggered? Then, allowing for the stream delay, roughly..."
Hearing the time from her, the doctor nodded.
"The memory will come back for a moment. Depending on the person, you may feel a little sick, or get a migraine. If you start to feel unwell, raise your hand and tell me at once."
An instant later, a flash burst before her eyes.
"Mmm...?"
What she felt on waking was the plush give of the bed, a gentle warmth wrapping her whole body, and—ghosting across her forehead—a soft, yielding touch. That she knew it for Han Seoyeon's lips was surely because the sensation had grown all too familiar.
"Ah, Ninomae-san. Are you awake?"
Ninomae did not answer. Lying on her side, face to face with her, she kissed one of Seoyeon's cheeks and then the other.
"Hehe. ...Fwah."
She was, of course, counterattacked at once by a kiss on the tip of her nose.
"Honestly. What was that for."
A soft smack. Ninomae kissed Han Seoyeon's chin again, and pouted.
"I went to the trouble of kissing you, and you keep giving them straight back. The one placed in difficulty is me."
Another smack. Lips found Ninomae's dimple once more.
"Hmph. You're the one who started it, Shion-san. This is just a counterattack."
This one landed a little below the eye, on the soft swell there.
"But you have done it twice. At that point it is an entirely excessive counterattack."
It was a strike upon the eyelid, sprung in the brief instant her eyes blinked.
"Nnh."
Ninomae let out a small sound.
"Sh-Shion-san, you definitely did it several times while I was asleep, didn't you?"
"That is groundless. By such reasoning, you would also be obliged to believe the claim that Ninomae-san kissed me in her sleep."
The exchange went on, one for one. The nape, the shoulder blade, the forearm, then back again to the cheek and the bridge of the nose. The forehead, once more...
"...Is this not enough by now?"
"If you stop first, Shion-san, I'll stop too."
"And if you were the one to do so, Ninomae-san?"
The reply, of course, was a kiss pressed deep enough to leave a faint mark upon the nape.
In truth, the reason they had kept trading blows to this extent was not pride alone. It was only greed finding its way out: the wish to give more, and to receive more. Still, however much one loves a thing, one cannot tumble about in bed without end. An ending had to be made eventually... and at precisely this moment, a strange stubbornness had taken hold of them both.
They were silent for a while, looking at one another. Through the press of their chests a heartbeat made itself known—one hundred percent Han Seoyeon's. The throb of Ninomae's own heart lay behind a thickness through which no pulse could possibly leak forward. Warmth trapped under the blanket drew a fine sweat to the skin.
Both of them had been so mature as children that they had scarcely ever properly quarreled with anyone, and yet even without leaning on such experience they knew how empty the promise I'll let go if you let go first truly was. They understood just as easily that the agreement which customarily followed—on the count of three, we let go together—was every bit as hollow.
"Th-then let's just do it at the same time, and be done with it...!"
But as a continuation of that particular and therefore, Ninomae's proposal was far too outrageous. It amounted to the same thing as stepping between children who were tapping one another, each insisting the other had started it, and offering as mediation that they simply throw a full-force cross counter and have done.
"A-at the same time...? Do you mean, um, with our lips...?"
"...Eh?"
And yet the interpretation that followed left Ninomae no choice but to be thrown. For an instant, her brain stopped.
Th-that wasn't what I meant...!
She had only meant that they might finish like friends, holding each other and pressing a kiss somewhere along the lines of the nape. At Seoyeon's misunderstanding, Ninomae's face flushed... or rather, it did not. It had already been scarlet for quite some time. Still, if she had been misunderstood, she ought to correct it...
"V-very well. If that is what you are saying, Ninomae-san..."
"Just now, that wasn't what I— ...nye?"
Faster still was Han Seoyeon's acceptance.
To ask Ninomae for that closeness merely to feed a desire born of feelings she kept hidden would not have been right. But if Ninomae herself had offered it first, there was no reason to refuse. Or perhaps, without quite meaning to, she had simply read the words in whatever way favored her.
"Eh, eheh? Th-that's..."
Ninomae's pupils trembled. Huh? How had it come to this...?
W-wait. Please don't look at me with such passionate eyes!
The heart that had already been racing picked up still more speed. Something shivered, electric, deep inside her.
I... I have to refuse...
Within that quickening breath, Ninomae's lips slowly parted.
"......"
But—well. It wasn't as if she were the one forcing this, was it? She did harbor feelings for Han Seoyeon, and this would end with that desire fulfilled. Even so, she hadn't set out on purpose to take advantage of Seoyeon's goodwill...
Ninomae simply stayed silent, and quietly closed her eyes.
An arm circled her shoulders. A presence drew near. Breath grazed her, closer still. The air was hot. Stifling heat under the blanket dampened her skin.
Ah. She was coming. Closer. Ninomae's body curled in of its own accord. Their legs were tangled fast; there was no slack through which to slip free.
"......♡"
"Mmm..."
And then they met. The sweet, faintly rich taste of fresh cream must have been a privilege reserved for a first kiss alone. What remained was heat: saliva mingling, and nothing but the scent of each other seeping in where their mouths touched.
At that pleasure of the mind, that rapture, her hips gave a single jolt—
"—Hyaaaaaah?!"
And Ninomae Hitomi was flung back into reality. In an instant her face burned scarlet.
"Uh, um, well... I didn't think something like that would get read... I'm sorry?"
"Hiek— ah, uwaaah..."
"Ninomae-san? Are you all right?"
"I-I'm fine! Completely fine...!"
Han Seoyeon leaned in, worried, and Ninomae startled all the harder. She caught, with an effort, the gaze that had drifted unthinkingly toward those lips. ...And then she saw the mark left on Han Seoyeon's nape, and jolted all over again.
"For the sake of privacy I take a questionnaire and control the variables, so that I read only the memories that are strictly necessary... Hmm. A time error of this size—could it be..."
Even through all of this, the doctor seemed lost in thought. She had looked flustered, yes, and yet there was something aggrieved in it too—the particular atmosphere of a urology clinic.
"The most likely item is human sacrifice. You didn't check it on the questionnaire, but did you perhaps actually perform one?"
"What? No. That couldn't possibly be..."
"Think again, please. Even if the offering doesn't die—even if you offer only part of a body—it falls within human sacrifice. Bodily fluids included."
"Koff?!"
"...Shion-san?"
The one who reacted so violently this time was, unexpectedly, Han Seoyeon. Ninomae looked at her in puzzlement.
"Th-that is... Yes. Bodily fluids as well, you say...?"
"Yes. Blood, for instance, is quite common as an offering from which killing has been excluded."
"Ah. Y-yes. Blood. Of course."
"Shion-san?"
"Ahem... At any rate, kindly correct for that error and try once more."
"Yes. Let's try."
Leaving aside Han Seoyeon's inexplicable reaction, the doctor set her hand to Ninomae's forehead again.
"I'll do it once more. If it hurts or anything this time as well, please raise your hand."
"Uh... I just realized. That's what they say at the dentist every single time, and the more I turn it over, the less I trust that advice..."
And once again a flash erupted. A memory of the past glittered before her eyes.
"...Eh?"
What met Ninomae's eyes a moment later was the doctor, collapsed over the desk and spewing blood.
"Eek?!"
"Don't worry... in this line of work... it happens... all the time... koff."
"No. You do not look fine at all?!"
"Ah, Guardian... a Heal, if you would..."
"See? You are not fine!"