The Commander's Nightmare (2)
This is so unfair.
It isn't as if I did this for my own sake. All right—maybe half of it was. But look at the results. I could have just rested and gotten better. Instead I went hunting for a way to keep giving something to the company, no matter what it took. I ground this body down so we could take even one more step forward today. Would a round of applause have killed anyone?
I appreciate them worrying about my health. I do. I just wish they'd think a little harder about why I did it.
...Not that saying any of this now would sound like anything but a pile of excuses.
"Did you have something you wanted to say?"
"...I'm sorry."
And so I found myself hauled off to the Medical Department, withering under a stare that could have stripped paint. The one small mercy was that Rielly had forced me onto a bed and then left, which meant the only person remaining was Cardia.
Not that this made the atmosphere any less oppressive.
"You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?"
"No, that's—that isn't—"
"Then what is it? You want to watch me lose my mind?"
If anything, this is worse. A doctor and her patient, left alone in a room. What possible reason would the doctor have to hold back? It wouldn't be strange at all for her tongue to get sharper without a guardian present. And when the lecture boiled down to why didn't you listen to me, there wasn't a single thing I could say in my own defense.
"Hah... fine. You really need to sleep now."
"...I'm fine, though?"
"You are not fine. How many times do I have to tell you this is getting dangerous?"
Cardia spent a good while wringing me out with a full sermon on the correlation between sleep and health. Then she let out a long breath, and her eyes narrowed to slits.
"In the past week, how many hours have you slept?"
"Uh... on average, maybe—"
"No. The total."
She wouldn't even leave me a crack to fudge the numbers. Did it really cost her that much to take my word for it, just once? Why did she have to be this ruthless?
"About... twenty-four hours?"
"Wait. How many hours?"
"Uh... sorry. It was actually twenty-three..."
"What?"
"...Huh?"
I'd thought she'd caught me. Apparently that wasn't it. I should have just put on a thick face and lied with conviction. It was only an hour's difference, but the difference between getting caught and not getting caught was enormous.
...Well. A little late for that now.
At least I'd gotten those extra eight hours when I slept with Hitsuko. I'd come dangerously close to dropping under twenty. If I had, I'd probably have been admitted on the spot. Not that I could exactly guarantee I'd be walking out of here in one piece as it was.
"If you really can't sleep, I could at least give you a sleeping pill..."
"...No."
"Excuse me?"
Maybe it was because it was a direct means of putting me under. The word sleeping pill had come out so lightly, and my body reacted all on its own.
No.
Why had I clung on so desperately? Why had I forced caffeine down my throat night after night? It was all because I couldn't stand that damned shadow that fell over me the moment I closed my eyes.
And now I had to die again? I had to look at that loathsome face again? Do nothing, be useless, be powerless—all over again? All by myself?
I don't want to.
I don't want this anymore. I'd met a painless death four times already, and I wasn't even close to getting used to it. I never wanted to go through that again. Never—
"...Comman-der?"
"...Ah."
The voice at my ear pulled me back. The darkness receded from my vision, and I could finally take in the room again. Sometime without my noticing, I had broken out in a cold sweat. Cardia was watching me with open concern.
And then I realized I was shaking.
"...Sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you like that."
"No, it's..."
I apologized and hurriedly hid the hand that had started to hurt. I had clenched my fist so hard my palm was stinging. Something felt like it was seeping out—blood, maybe. I hadn't been able to trim my nails lately; I'd been too out of it. The wound seemed a little deep.
"I'll put you on a nutrient drip later, so just rest for a while."
"...Okay."
She didn't notice... did she?
No. Of course she did. If I'd hidden it from the start, maybe. I'd been sitting there with it out in the open.
"...I'll put some ointment on your hand, too. Just wait a moment."
"...Thanks."
Figures. She'd let it slide, more or less—but ignoring it completely must have been bothering her. It would have healed on its own if she'd left it. Cardia would never have stood for that.
Still. To let my feelings show that easily in front of someone else. How embarrassing. Could someone like me even call herself a Commander? I wasn't supposed to be like this. Lately it felt like the doubts I had about myself were only growing.
"If you're grateful, then take better care of yourself so I have less work to do."
"Ahaha..."
I'd like to. That's going to be hard, though. ...Quite a lot.
And so I lay there on an IV until quitting time, at which point I received Cardia's recommendation that overtime was forbidden for the day. Recommendation, she called it, while quietly browbeating me and shoving me toward the door by the small of my back. What was I supposed to do except go home without a word? The moment I so much as opened my mouth to protest, a dozen more sentences would have come flying at me.
Cardia really is something else. Speaking softly and chewing someone out, occupying the same breath. What kind of rhetoric was that? A genuine new discovery. If she wrote a paper on it, she might even win an award.
Damn it. Who's the boss here, anyway?
"Did you get some sleep before coming?"
"...No."
Drained of every last drop of strength, I trudged my way to Hitsuko's room. Walking there of my own accord to see the traitor who had reported me to the two people hardest to shake off in this entire company was not high on my list of things I wanted to do. But she was this week's illustrious counseling partner. If I just ran off on my own, there was no telling what I'd hear for it. I had to show up.
"...Happy about it?"
Of course, the faint sense of betrayal hadn't gone anywhere, so I threw that out the moment I arrived.
"My. My knowledge is so limited, I haven't the faintest idea what you might be referring to."
"Don't you dodge the question... hah."
Well, well. That was not the work of someone who'd only pulled an evasive maneuver once or twice. She slipped away smooth as water. I hadn't actually been planning to tear into her, but it was still irritating. If I'd been serious, I would have kept the argument going—but I hadn't been, and Hitsuko knew that perfectly well.
"...Sigh."
Fine. It wasn't as if Hitsuko had meant any harm. She'd done it because she was worried about me. I ought to understand that. It wasn't that I had nothing to say for myself, but who was I going to blame at this point? I'd brought this disaster down on my own head.
"Nothing happened while I was gone?"
"Not in the least. As ever, today passed quite smoothly."
"...Good. That's enough, then."
Even that last thread of wanting to blame someone vanished completely. Guided by the dolls, I sank into my seat, and almost at once a spread of tea and sweets from the Far East appeared in front of me. Had they calculated the time of my arrival? It was far too quick to have been prepared after I walked in.
"...Mm."
Hitsuko, as usual, started toward my lap with those quick little steps—then suddenly stopped. She composed her expression with one pale, slender hand, and only then did she speak.
"You look as though you are in need of counsel."
"...Me? Do I look like that?"
"That fair countenance and those beautiful eyes are so laden with worry, quite unlike their usual selves. Who in this world could possibly fail to notice?"
Leave it to a rich young lady to talk so prettily. More to the point—she'd caught me. I'd thought I'd done a decent job of managing my face today, with Cardia as a cautionary tale. Had Hitsuko simply read me that well, or had I fallen apart that badly?
...Who knows.
"Nothing you need to talk to me about?"
"Does it appear to you, Commander, that I have something of the sort?"
"...So same as yesterday, then."
Well. Other than petting Hitsuko and being waited on, there hadn't been much else to do. Except for the first day, I'd been sleeping separately in my own room. I had a prior record of getting picked apart from breakfast onward over that one thing, so I'd been trying to avoid sharing a bed as much as possible. Hitsuko had seemed sorry about it too, and from the next day on she'd sent me off without a fuss.
But Hitsuko having nothing to consult me about, and the counseling partner being reversed... those were not the same story.
Should I even tell her?
It was already a strange picture—an adult taking counsel from a child so much younger than herself. And the content was so far from normal it wasn't even close. The intensity of it, everything else, all of it. So I hesitated, and then, tentatively, I broached it.
"Hitsuko."
"Yes, Commander."
"It might make you uncomfortable. Is that all right?"
"I, too, have experienced all manner of things within my clan. The content itself is of little concern."
If anything, she was calmer than I was. I thought that was only natural, because it wasn't her problem—then I thought, but she's still that age—and then it occurred to me that in a world like this, one might grow up early.
Well. Better than not saying anything at all.
"Hitsuko...?"
"Please, go ahead, Commander."
And yet—even after I had steeled myself—it took a considerable amount of time to actually lay out what was inside.