Chapter Text
For the past hours, Takano sat in her bed and thought about how to approach the situation. Seeing Tomitake like this and knowing he was sorry just broke her heart.
But she couldn’t tell anyone about her feelings at the moment.
She was actually forbidden to enter Tomitake’s room again, for unknown reasons.
I need to find a way to contact Jirou-san about this situation. And also, I need to ask him what happened in that past Fragment, even if it hurts him. Should I ask Irie? No, I can’t tell Irie about this… it didn’t even work in the past Fragment, so it won’t work here…
Then, she heard a knock on the door. The doctor came in, accompanied by the nurse who dragged Takano back to her room.
“Takano-san, you know why we are here, don’t you?”
“Let me guess… It was because I wanted to see my partner and went to see him? I still don’t get why I got dragged back in here!”
“Please, calm down and listen to what I have to say.”, the doctor said, grabbed a nearby chair and sat next to Takano’s bed.
“We don’t know why, but Tomitake-san keeps mumbling apologies to himself and acts really strange. We don’t know what exactly is going on with him, but for your own safety, we think it’s better you wait a few days until you can see him again. It was a mistake on our side that his room door was opened and I really want to apologize that we had to get you out of there this way.”
He looked over to the nurse.
She nodded and went over to Takano’s side as well.
“I am sorry for being so harsh to you, Takano-san.”
She bowed, but Takano looked at her in disgust.
“You two no nothing about what Jirou-san and I went through. You’ll never understand how much you have broken my heart by not letting me see him.”
She turned her head and tried to hold back tears. Tears of anger.
“I just wanted to tell you that we may dismiss both of you in a few days, together, if that’s what you want.”
The doctor checked something on his clipboard again.
“We wanted to dismiss you way earlier than Tomitake-san, but I can see that you really want to be by his side, so that’s the best we could do. Normally we would dismiss of you earlier than him but-“
“Great, now leave me alone.”
Takano had interrupted the doctor, her tone of voice was shaky, it sounded like she waws trying to hold back her tears a lot.
“Alright…”
The doctor signalized his nurse to go out of the room with him.
Silence.
Takano’s room was covered in silence.
That’s right.
No one but her was in this room.
Just like in Tomitake’s room.
Was that normal?
No.
It couldn’t be normal…
Was that really the new Fragment she landed in?
Takano began to feel uneasy, being all alone in this silent room.
Shivers ran down her spine.
This fragment felt like a dream. Like it wasn’t real at all.
“I need to talk to Jirou-san… Quickly.”
She looked at the table next to her. Aside from a water bottle, a glass and a vase there was nothing.
Not even a piece of paper or a pen.
Are they trying to prevent me from contacting Jirou-san?
Takano heard the sound of the door being opened. A nurse came in, smiled at her and asked, if she needed any medication.
Takano politely declined, but then got curious.
“Tell me, which medication are you giving me?”
“Ma’am, its forbidden for me to talk about it-
“Please, from nurse to nurse?”
Takano put on her puppy eyes. A move she almost exclusively used on Tomitake.
“… I am sorry. I can’t do that.” Said the nurse and got a glass of water for Takano to take the medication with.
Takano bit her lip. That would’ve been her chance to find out more about the whole situation…
What if I cause a tragedy within this hospital?
So that Jirou-san and I can flee?
… H-173… is it still in the Irie Clinic? If so, I have no chance to obtain it… dammit.
… We have to go to the next Fragment as soon as possible. But that would mean I have to kill both of us.
Am I even able to do it?
No… But I also can’t tell Jirou-san to kill me… again…
Takano got lost in thoughts, then, she came to an answer.
“I have to do it… There’s no other way for us to go to the next Fragment.”
That’s when she heard a doctor talking to another one on the hallway.
“We got the wrong medicine? Are you sure about that?”
“I am absolutely sure. There’s no way we should have a medicine called H-173 here.”
“Who brought it here?”
“Dr. Irie brought a suitcase with him, I think that was it.”
Did she hear that right?
They were talking about H-173…
Irie brought it into the hospital?
Why?
How?
The vaccine should be a secret to the public.
What was going on in this fragment?
“Hahahaha…. Hahaha…. That’s it. I just need to find the medicine, get Jirou-san to L5 and let him kill himself… He should still be on L3 after all the shots I already gave him in past fragments-”
She stopped.
Was that okay?
Was it okay to do that to Tomitake?
After all they’ve been through, was that the right way?
To do it all over again?
“…. It should be okay. I’ll just take care of it myself.”, Takano whispered and made her hand into a fist.
At night, Takano made sure to be extremely careful of her surroundings, of who was following her and whatnot.
She walked around the hallway only in socks, to avoid any footsteps that could be heard.
She grew anxious with every step she took, but she knew that she had to do it.
A few times, she nearly got caught by a nurse or night watchman, but every time she spied one, she pressed herself against the wall she was next to.
She still couldn’t believe that Irie would casually carry the H-173 with him. That just wasn’t like him at all.
The vaccine was never made public. Just in what kind of Fragment did she and Tomitake land in this time?
After a few more minutes, she found the room where they stored the medicine.
Takano looked around once more, then she walked to the desk.
She couldn’t believe that they were so reckless and would just leave the suitcase unsupervised.
Fortunately, Takano still remembered the code and opened the suitcase with ease.
She actually took a couple of syringes with her, just to be sure.
She also saw a box of sleeping pills in the medicine shelf. She self itself was locked, but Takano found a hairpin laying around that helped her open it at ease.
“With them, my trip to the next fragment will be a lot more bearable…”, she whispered to herself.
With those, she walked towards Tomitake’s room.
As expected, Tomitake was sleeping. He was in such a deep slumber, not even the creaking door woke him up.
Takano walked towards him and for a moment, just stood there and looked at him.
She always thought that Tomitake was good looking.
He was like a big teddy bear, that you just wanted to hug forever.
The syringe in her hand, she walked over to him and softly lifted up his arm.
“I’m sorry…”, she whispered…. And injected H-173 into his vein.
“Once you wake up, you’ll most likely kill yourself again. But I just can’t bring myself to kill you by my own hand… I hope you understand that.”, she whispered and gave him a kiss on his cheek. To her, Tomitake looked the sweetest when he was sleeping.
But she already knew that he would wake up and kill himself, which was his personal nightmare.
Takano kind of regretted her decision, but she didn’t have another choice.
She silently made her way back into her room and waited for the nurses to announce the death of Tomitake.
The next morning, Takano woke up from several voices and police sirens outside of the building screeching.
“Tomitake-san clawed his throat open? My my…”
Takano could hear the voice of Kuraudo Ooishi outside on the hallway, accompanied by Irie.
“We shouldn’t tell her immediately, not in her current state. It would just shake her up too much.”
That was enough for Takano to hear.
She took the sleeping pills, a handful of them and chugged them down with water.
“See you later, Jirou-san.”
Kuraudo Ooishi walked towards Takano’s room. He actually didn’t want to tell her the news just now, but he didn’t have another choice.
He asked a nurse to go look after her.
“Ooishi-san, she… she doesn’t wake up.”
“… What did you say?”
Ooishi stormed into room, Irie followed him.
A smiling Takano was found on the bed.
On the floor lay a box of sleeping pills.
The case was clear.
Ooishi and Irie stood there, speechless.
“Rest well, Takano-san…”