The Fallen Tabernacle of David (3)
A straitjacket, as a rule, is not an object one encounters in the course of an ordinary life.
The people liable to wear one come in three kinds. First, a magician. Second, a patient committed to a psychiatric ward. And last, a violent criminal.
All three stand well clear of most people's daily existence, and so there are more than a few who might live out their years without ever once setting eyes on a straitjacket at all.
Which was why the bewilderment Hitomi felt, beholding Apostle John—a woman bound in a straitjacket—was nothing more than the reaction of a proper young lady.
What unsettled her even further was that everyone else took the situation in stride, as if it were simply a matter of course that the woman should be restrained.
Is she some terribly serious criminal? No... even so, I can't imagine they'd make a person like that an Apostle...
Hitomi tilted her head. Whatever else might be true, they would hardly have chosen for an Apostle someone whose character was such that she might throw a wild fit in an official setting.
Put another way... it might not have been a matter of character at all.
Difficult to control, regardless of her own will... is that it?
The thought that followed was a premise that turned up often enough in manga.
That would make sense. If she possessed tremendous power, and for that very reason couldn't even control herself...
Click.
"Huh?"
And then her eyes went perfectly round as she watched the cardinal undo Apostle John's restraints with perfect casualness. The cliché she had conjured only a moment before seemed to be announcing itself a complete miss.
Once the straitjacket was off, John—Elif Yazıcı—rolled those long sleeves up to her forearms. One after another she removed the blindfold, the headphones, and the gag herself, and set them down on the table.
Then, letting out a low groan, she stretched, and dropped into a slouch upon the stone chair engraved with the name John.
Her gaze swept the assembly... and came to rest before Hitomi. Eyes the color of emeralds stared straight through her.
"This is just my taste."
"...Pardon?"
Her appearance carried a distinctly Middle Eastern air, and yet what came from her mouth was fluent Japanese.
Hitomi, who had been about to look away beneath Elif Yazıcı's stare, had no choice but to look back at her the moment she heard that voice.
"You figured I was tied up because I'm some monster I can't possibly control, didn't you? That's not it. About half of it is just preference. The other half does have a practical reason, I'll give you that."
"Ah, th-thank you for explaining...?"
Listening, Hitomi offered her thanks, awkward though it was. She wasn't sure this was a situation that called for gratitude, but the words had spilled out on their own in her fluster.
No, more than that—how did she know I was thinking that...
"How did I know? Obviously. Do you have any idea how incredible I am?"
Her thoughts had been read again. Watching the flustered Hitomi, Yazıcı snorted.
"...She isn't precisely wrong. She is one of the finest minds belonging to the Church."
Having taken in Hitomi's bewildered expression, Seoyeon added the words as if supplying a footnote.
"Baptismal name, Nino. Secular name, Elif Yazıcı... She was once counted among the Seven Madmen."
"The Seven Madmen—you mean Professor Senjoji's..."
"Yes. The seven who were regarded, by the standards of the time, as the greatest geniuses in the world."
Laura Groothuizen. Senjoji Chihaya. The nameless Necromancer. Anna Anderson. Black Rabbit. Mister F.
And, with Elif Yazıcı among them, the Seven Sisters—seven people who lived out, more thoroughly than anyone, the old adage that genius and madness are separated by a single sheet of paper.
"Though that title's ancient history by now."
Yazıcı shrugged, as if to say it had been years since anyone called them that.
"Three of the seven have stopped operating entirely."
"I don't believe the renown they earned in the past simply disappears on that account."
"Ha. This is why I really do like you, Seoyeon. You pick out exactly one thing I'm good at and state it, neat and objective."
So saying, Yazıcı snickered and shifted her gaze. There sat the cardinal who had brought her in and undone her restraints.
"Adam. She probably doesn't speak Italian or Latin, so we'll need a translation."
What followed from her mouth was English, and she spoke quickly enough that Hitomi had trouble following.
At that, the cardinal called Adam nodded and came over to Hitomi's side.
"Miss Ninomae. Might I borrow your phone for a moment?"
"Yes? Ah, yes..."
The request struck her as odd before anything else... but it didn't seem as though anything strange were afoot, so she handed him her smartphone.
Adam connected Hitomi's phone to the laptop set at Apostle James the Greater's seat, then returned it to her.
"A translation application. It runs by borrowing a portion of Abraham-Delta's processing power, so it will function only within this room."
"Ah, thank you."
On the screen of the phone she received back, a nameless application had appeared. Unlike Yazıcı, Adam explained it calmly, in a slow and carefully articulated voice.
The moment she launched it, a melody like a xylophone being tapped spilled from the phone's speaker.
"This is the first time I've seen you this way, Miss Ninomae Hitomi."
What followed was a woman's voice.
"Ah, hello?"
The other party was a smartphone, and yet the voice was so natural that Hitomi answered before she could think.
"An artificial intelligence developed by Doctor Laura Groothuizen... I am called Abraham-Delta. I look forward to working with you."
"Yes. I look forward to—wait? Groothuizen?"
"...I thought you would recognize it."
Groothuizen. To an East Asian ear the pronunciation was unfamiliar, and the name itself quite foreign.
Even heard in passing, it was not the sort of name one would remember perfectly.
And yet Hitomi, having heard it once, could murmur it back at once without missing a single syllable. ...Because, somehow, it was a name she knew.
"Would it be easier to place if I spoke in English?"
"Uh... uhh?! Th-that voice?!"
Hitomi's eyes had no choice but to go wide. The voice speaking English was far too familiar.
"Sarah Groothuizen?!"
"Yes. The VTuber, Sarah Groothuizen."
"Whoa, whoaa..."
She could not help but marvel, forgetting entirely that she sat among the other Apostles.
Sarah Groothuizen was, without exaggeration, the very pinnacle of the VTuber industry—a streamer whose subscriber count, in that world, was quicker to reckon by counting down from the top.
Among VTubers the world over, that is.
Come to think of it, hadn't Han Seoyeon mentioned before that Sarah Groothuizen was an acquaintance of hers...? Even so, she had never once imagined the woman would be an Apostle.
"Then, if that's the case, the reason the person inside has never been revealed until now is, don't tell me..."
"Because I am an artificial intelligence. A virtual in the literal sense. There is no person inside."
"Whoaa..."
A VTuber made entirely of data. Hitomi murmured it as if in awe.
"In any case, I will assist for the duration of the meeting. A translation is a simple enough task. ...This side is ready as well."
The Pope nodded at Abraham-Delta's words.
"Good. Then, as everyone appears to be prepared, shall we begin the meeting?"
"...Everyone?"
Hitomi, for her part, could only tilt her head.
It was not that she had failed to understand. The Pope had spoken Italian, but Abraham had translated it at once.
She had simply found herself doubting the words everyone is prepared.
"Um, Shion. One person still hasn't arrived. Is it all right to start?"
One Apostolic seat was still empty. Even so, they seemed about to open the meeting, and Hitomi put the question to Han Seoyeon in a whisper.
"Ah. Of course. You wouldn't be used to this yet, Hitomi..."
Seoyeon wore the look of someone who had forgotten, and then went on.
"Would you look at the empty seat once more, and focus?"
"That one? But why would I... huh?"
Hitomi obeyed even as she wondered why she was being told to, and a dazed little sound escaped her.
An elderly Black man with a beard was sitting in that seat. The brimmed hat he wore—a Cappello Romano—was banded in blue, declaring the mark of a Gravekeeper.
Apostle James the Lesser.
The Seeker. Infection, Guenael Dubert Bernardo.
He sat with his arms folded and his expression perfectly at peace. Before him lay a sinuous blade, kin to a flamberge.
"It is thanks to the power of a holy relic. Even so, concealing one's presence to that degree is simply a matter of his own extraordinary skill."
In any case, that ought to have answered whether everyone was present. And so it had, for Hitomi quietly closed her mouth.
Meanwhile the Pope rose slowly from his seat and closed his hand around the great key hanging at his neck.
There was no quotation of Scripture, no special incantation. He simply said it, and briefly.
But that spare, efficiency-minded opening suited the holy knights exceedingly well.
The Pope smiled faintly and went on.
"Barring some particular reason otherwise, let us take the agenda in ascending order of importance. Any objections?"
Silence followed. Taking it for assent, Apostle Peter nodded and sat back down.
"Then let us begin at once."
Now it truly started. Hitomi swallowed.
Low in importance, he had said... and yet this was a gathering that had summoned Apostles from nations across the world. One would have to set the word relatively in front of it; in practice, the items that emerged were bound to be monstrous.
"—The first item on the agenda concerns the recruitment of the third generation at Anathema Production Japan."
"...?"
Huh? What?
Hitomi's thoughts came to a dead stop.
It was an agenda item that left her no other choice.
For an instant she wondered if she had misheard. Or perhaps the translation had gone wrong.
Perhaps they had used anathema only in the sense of excommunication, and were not speaking the name of a VTuber agency at all...
...Of course, Hitomi herself knew perfectly well that this was nothing but denial.
She could set Anathema aside, and even if she somehow let the word Production slide... once third generation was added to it, the thing was far too certain.
"Confused? But Anathema Production is no ordinary company."
As if he had marked her confusion, Giacomo added the words with a wry smile.
"Is it not grounds enough for observation that Miss Ninomae belongs to it—a Living God and a True Ancestor, and moreover someone who could become the trigger for Scenario I?"
"Th-that's, um..."
Hitomi could not deny it. She had always known she was regarded as an exceedingly important person.
Even so, she had never imagined that the Church would be minding the company itself for the sole reason that she belonged to it.
"He's right. The truth is, it isn't entirely because of you."
Had her thoughts been read yet again? This time Yazıcı cut in.
"Professor Senjoji's younger sister and her childhood friend, Mer Yupa's prized disciple, the princess of the Hyakurenno Group, Marbas's contractor, a survivor of the Vampire Syndrome incident... and over there, Alejandra's favorite, the former idol."
She spoke while counting them off on her fingers, one by one.
"This still isn't a confirmed deduction, but I also judge there's a considerable chance the Almighty will enter the audition. At this level, don't you think it more than clears the minimum bar for being raised at an Apostolic council?"
It was not a matter grave enough, on its own, to gather everyone in the room, but if they were all assembled anyway, it was hardly strange to discuss it once. Even Hitomi had no choice but to nod at that.
Yes. When she first heard it, she had thought this was hardly some household conference of relatives, so why on earth were they talking about it... but once the reasons were laid out, it was an item that might well have come up.
"I believe this item is best considered together with another."
Then Apostle Matthew, Kirra Korhonen, raised a gauntleted hand and spoke.
"If you mean another item, which one?"
"Why, this one, of course."
She went on, her expression perfectly composed.
"The marriage of Ninomae Hitomi and Han Seoyeon."
"It would certainly be good to take them up together."
"Right? Anyone here want to speak on it?"
"...?"
Maybe this really is a family meeting...