Chapter 3
Chapter 3
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 3
Chapter Title: Prove Your Innocence
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"Answer me."
A grinding voice leaked from Dever's lips, thanks to his molars clenched tight.
The lingering breeze from earlier still lightly tousled the woman's long hair. Dever's eyes followed the trail of those strands brushing ticklishly across his face.
The hair that had swirled in the air settled obediently onto the chest of the woman's military uniform—or rather, what had once been someone's uniform. Dever's gaze halted at the name stained dark red.
"Graham Carter. Not your name, obviously."
Unlike his leisurely tone, the rough hand rummaging through the woman's uniform pocket made it clear no further mercy would be shown.
The medicines she had so carefully guarded now spilled messily at the kicking feet below, but Beth couldn't tear her eyes from the man.
It was fear.
The terror that she might die like this.
The hand clinging to the man as if begging for her life fell away with a thud.
Her legs, which had thrashed for so long, went limp like a beast that had breathed its last, and even the ragged gasps stopped.
Thud.
Dever dropped the woman's precious belongings—and finally, the woman herself.
Soon after, the sharp sounds of desperate inhalation and exhalation rang vividly in his ears once more. In the silent forest to begin with, there wasn't much else to hear.
Dever stared at her heaving chest for a moment before asking dryly,
"Your lover?"
Lover? Beth shook her head frantically in horror.
"Then you're with the Kovah Army?"
The answer was the same again.
Paper and pen. Paper and pen. Beth repeated the words like a mantra, groping through the grass.
"Commander Dever, if you push her too hard—"
Arthur, who had approached, came to a sudden halt.
He had set out ahead because Dever hadn't returned for so long, worried something might be wrong. He had spotted the Kovah Army corpse sprawled in the road and watched from afar, recognizing the situation. He had come rushing over, fearing Dever might kill the only witness who knew what happened. But of all things, it had to be a woman.
Her small frame had made him think she was just some scrawny guy. Arthur scratched at his brow in the complicating mess.
Women approaching Dever happened occasionally. Their aim was obvious: seduce him with their bodies to extract military secrets. It was also what Dever despised most.
But that was a few years ago. Anyone who knew how Dever dealt with those women—and had any brains on the enemy side—wouldn't dare try it again.
Of course, this case was a bit different, but Dever was likely wary of the woman approaching him in such an ambiguous way.
Arthur's eyes turned to the woman frantically scanning the ground. She seemed to be searching for something, clawing wildly at the grass.
Given her disheveled state and the scattered medicine vials, she looked more like a civilian who raided supply depots to sell on the black market.
Ah. Arthur's lips parted.
The mute nurse.
The gossip he hadn't managed to pass on to Dever flashed in his mind in an instant.
"Dever, isn't she a nurse? She seemed to know how to give injections."
It was the most positive inference he could muster in this situation.
"What makes you think that?"
Dever scoffed.
"Just because she had one syringe?"
The cold sneer left only an icier expression behind.
"Wayne's back-alley junkies handle that better."
Dever rolled his stiff neck from side to side. The woman slumped at his feet caught his eye. Shaking someone this slight wasn't exactly entertaining.
So he decided.
"Take it off."
To end this tedious interrogation quickly.
The woman's ceaselessly moving hands stopped. If this was an act... A small hypothesis bloomed in Dever's mind.
"Prove there's no bomb hidden in that baggy uniform of yours."
A dreadful silence filled the space between the three.
Her frantic black eyes slowly climbed from Dever's feet to his knees, waist, chest, and finally his face.
Looking up at him, he seemed to touch the night sky itself. So high, so terrifying, so inscrutable.
As Beth, knees drawn up, reached out a hand and took a step forward, Dever retreated exactly that one step.
The woman bit her lip hard, her trembling fingers scribbling something on the back of her other hand, but Dever didn't look.
The click of a reload stopped Beth's foot as she tried to advance again. Faced once more with the barrel pointed at her, she froze solid.
"You're both witness and suspect. I can't risk everyone dying just to carry you along. Your identity can wait."
Beth clutched the stiff, blood-crusted uniform until her knuckles whitened.
The metallic tang from her bitten lip, pressed hard to suppress the dizzying despair, reminded her she was still alive.
No matter what she did, this man wouldn't believe her.
In her swirling thoughts, the one crystal-clear fact pointed to the single path to survival. Her hand gripping the hem of the uniform slowly rose to the top button.
If it meant living. If it meant surviving.
Beth mulled over the life to come, trying to forget the immediate humiliation. The days she had always dreamed of.
Her sweaty hand slipped repeatedly on the smooth button, but the man didn't rush her.
As the second button came undone, a hand seized her collar, exposing her flushed white nape fully.
"Commander Arthur, turn around."
It was Dever's order as the third button headed toward release.
Beth stared into the man's ash-gray eyes, devoid of emotional waves. There was no lechery toward her body in his gaze. Just the look of sizing up prey to slaughter. Watching for the slightest mistake to end her.
Should she call that a relief?
As her white slip threatened to reveal itself like her nape, Beth's hand missed the button again. Where had it all gone wrong? She had just run for her life.
As she squeezed her eyes shut and reached for the button, Arthur's irritated voice halted her.
"Dever Cliff! Let me take her in my car. I'll vouch for her identity."
"Why?"
"She seems like that nurse heading to Madam Molly's hospital. The one who can't speak."
Was there mention of this woman in some meaningless chit-chat over whiskey? Dever nodded readily. Maybe.
Dever's eyes, which had scanned Beth thoroughly, fixed on the ground. Precisely, on her bare feet peeking from under the oversized uniform he had thought shabby.
The red chafe marks on those pallid soles looked out of place, yet strangely suited the woman before him.
"Commander Arthur, you go in my car. Have the soldiers take her with them."
Dever issued the most merciful order possible without trusting the woman.
His final command.
Inside Dever's tent. Under the flickering yellow bulb, Beth's long lashes cast deep shadows.
She had escaped the humiliation of being stripped by a few words from the commander, but alone now with the army commander in the tent, who knew what might happen next.
Dever alone remained calm.
"Relax."
Beth tried to ignore the oppressive shadow looming over her. His shadow alone was enough to swallow the small side table where she sat.
"Write down everything you saw."
The only sound between them was the sharp scratch of the pen nib on paper. At the scrape of a Zippo lighter, Beth paused briefly but didn't look up.
Soon, the acrid cigar scent wafted over, and Beth bowed her head even lower.
The scent had no weight, yet somehow the man's cigar smoke bore down heavily on the air.
"Write your alibi for being out too."
Beth, pressing down hard on her letters, glanced up at the man.
At some point, he had sat across from her, eyes fixed solely on her statement. Wispy smoke rising from his slender cigar crept over the table toward the fingers clutching her pen.
Beth subtly pulled her hand back without him noticing.
"Death gratuity certificate?"
Beth's hand rose to her uniform buttons.
The uniform, buttoned tight to her throat, began unfastening one by one, just like on the forest path.
As her white fingers touched the third button she hadn't reached before, thick smoke poured once more from Dever's lips.
This time, the smoke brushed her skin before she could dodge.
With reluctant movements, Beth pulled the certificate from her inner pocket and offered it. Maybe things had spiraled this far because of it. Distracted by securing it, she had dropped the pen she guarded like her life amid the trash heap.
"Madam Molly's on her way. To verify your identity."
Dever skimmed the death gratuity certificate, familiar even to him. Nothing special. Common name, common surname. At the Nexus military hospital, it was a dime a dozen.
Dever slipped the paper between folders. What was so precious about a scrap like this? The woman couldn't hide her hurt gaze, as if it defined her worth, and he found it amusing.
Two a.m.
Four hours until the operation. Time to conclude.
Was this woman unlucky coincidence? A variable?
"Why help the Kovah Army? Even joining in the air raid. You know our side's short on meds too."
Beth's hand, which had flowed freely with her innocence until now, hesitated. Ink bled on the thin paper as she pondered.
Dever didn't miss the flicker in her eyes.
Acting so tough before. Now hesitating over something. Her hand wrote and erased several times before completing a short sentence.
'Young and in pain.'
"Young and in pain."
Dever recited the answer in his own voice.
Young and in pain. He toyed with the words on his tongue several times.
Meanwhile, a beast-like howl approached from outside, and a sentry called for Dever from beyond the tent flap.
"Bring him in."
At the command, a blood-soaked figure, bound head to toe, was thrown into the tent. Startled, Beth jolted back, but Dever had already closed in behind her, gripping her shoulder firmly.
More startled by the touch, Beth trembled, but Dever's hand moved faster.
Gently yet firmly, Dever cupped her chin. To fully see the spy before him.
The brute force from the forest path seemed a lie in this soft touch.
"Young ones lack experience, so Kovah mostly puts them on machine guns. Pretty effective compared to wild shooting."
Even as Beth twisted her head, the man's grip held fast.
"If you were a real military nurse, you'd have seen plenty. Limbs severed, breaths cut short, Nexus soldiers writhing and clinging in agony. The handiwork of those 'young and hurting' ones you wanted to save."
Dever looked down at her obliquely.
"Fancy yourself a savior?"
Dever released her chin, letting her glare up at him. Her eyes blazed with justified fury, but her lips remained sealed.
Ah, right. She can't speak.
Dever recalled the fact he had momentarily forgotten.
"I wouldn't mind receiving some of that arrogant salvation myself."
Her lips, regaining color thanks to the tent's warmth, gleamed red even under the dim light.
"Shall I show you how I treat real spies?"
A few soldiers entered at Dever's command.
"Load him up."
The calm order fell. And then.
"Watch together, Miss Beth Jens."
The horrific invitation followed, in a voice sickeningly sweet.