Tantei wa Mou, Shindeiru - Volume 8 - Chapter 2.4

 Another back-alley doctor

An hour later, I was in the waiting room of a run-down hospital.

It wasn’t the same one Siesta was in; this was more of a small clinic. Just as Rill had said, a black car had promptly pulled up to the stadium, and it had brought us both here.

There were no other patients in the waiting room. There wasn’t even anybody at the reception desk.

While I waited for them to finish treating Rill, I cycled between sitting on the bench and standing around. The sound of the clock’s second hand was weirdly loud. That was probably just my anxiety, but all I could do was bide my time.

“Sorry to keep you waiting. She’s settled down.”

Thirty minutes later, the doctor—a thin man of about fifty, with salt-and-pepper hair—emerged from the treatment room and told me that Rill’s condition had stabilized. I realized I was standing and sat back down with a sigh of relief. So she was okay.

“Is something physically wrong with her?” I asked, since this was apparently her attending physician.

Reloaded’s health had just crashed. She didn’t have some sort of chronic condition, did she? She certainly hadn’t seemed frail before today.

“The girl’s a former athlete. Physically, she couldn’t be in better shape, and she isn’t ill. Ordinarily, she’d be the picture of health,” the doctor reassured me in his low, thick voice.

That “ordinarily” tugged at me a bit, but what concerned me more was this man’s identity. “Who are you?”

“A back-alley doctor,” he said, with a smile that wrinkled his gaunt cheeks.

“You’re not the first one I’ve heard of.”

“I’m sure. As a matter of fact, I have a connection to the man who just came to your mind. I’m taking care of her on his orders.”

I was pretty sure Rill had said something like that, too. She’d mentioned that someone besides Stephen was handling her medical checkups and weapons maintenance now. So this was him? In other words, it was safe to assume he knew quite a bit of inside information.

The back-alley doctor introduced himself as “Drachma.” Was that his real name, or…? No, it was probably a nickname or a code name.

“Still, why did a car come to get Rill the second she collapsed? I’m guessing the driver was a Man in Black, but…”

“Telling you would be a violation of my patient’s privacy. I may not much look the part, but I am a doctor,” Drachma said, smiling thinly.

“Then why did she collapse? You did say she wasn’t sick.”

“Same answer. Once she wakes up, ask her. I can’t promise she’ll answer, of course.”

An awkward silence fell. I couldn’t exactly leave Rill and go home, though, and Drachma was still here, so I made another attempt at conversation. “There’s something I want to ask. You’re skilled enough as a doctor that Stephen’s sending you work, so…”

“I’m not a skilled doctor; I’m a back-alley doctor,” Drachma said. This was the first really human expression I’d seen on his face. “I’ll answer anything except questions about the patient.”

Yeah, this question wasn’t going to be about Reloaded.

“A girl who’s close to me has a serious heart ailment.” At that, Drachma’s eyes narrowed. “They say her only hope is a heart transplant, but of course, finding donors isn’t easy. As a back-alley doctor, what other treatment methods would you consider?”

“Clone a heart with the exact same genes, then transplant that,” Drachma replied smoothly. That was about as bizarre as you’d expect from a doctor who didn’t follow the rules.

“Is that possible?”

“Stephen Bluefield is a virtuoso. He once created an organic android. I wouldn’t be surprised if he could provide an artificial heart with zero chance of rejection.”

…He had a point. In fact, Stephen had once made an artificial heart and created Noches…and yet he wasn’t trying to do the same thing for Siesta.

He couldn’t just be slacking off, though. That doctor considered saving lives his highest calling. If he wasn’t treating Siesta effectively, there had to be a reason that hadn’t occurred to me.

“Do you know where Stephen is?”

I really did need to talk with the Inventor more, but as soon as I asked—

“Get away from that guy right now, Kimizuka!”

—a girl threw open the door of the small clinic and strode into the waiting room. It was Natsunagi. Glaring at Drachma, she came to stand beside me.

“Natsunagi, what the heck?”

I was the only one out of the loop. Drachma gazed at Natsunagi with almost fond familiarity, then spoke in a low voice. “It’s been a long time, Number 602.”

A three-digit number. Not what you’d normally expect as a name.

Still, I did understand that number meant Nagisa Natsunagi. She’d told me about it once, long ago.

“I told you back then, at the facility.” Natsunagi glared at Drachma with those red eyes of hers. “I said the Ace Detective had given me a new name.”

Oh yeah. I’d heard that story.

Back when Natsunagi was still a kid, she’d lived in a research facility on a certain island. Those eyes were focused on someone she had a deep history with, and that realization pointed me toward the truth:

Drachma used to be in charge of SPES’s research facility.