Tantei wa Mou, Shindeiru - Volume 9 - Chapter 1.01

  The scales of life

An hour later, still in our school uniforms, Natsunagi and I were visiting a certain hospital.

“Congratulations on your high school graduation.”

In a room at the very back of the third floor, Noches met us with a bouquet in each hand.

“We brought some of those, too.”

We exchanged flowers, and Noches switched out the contents of the vase in the hospital room. The flowers we’d brought were for the patient.

“What sort of dreams did you have today, Siesta?” I asked the white-haired detective sleeping in the bed. Of course, she didn’t respond. Regardless, I talked to her peaceful sleeping form practically every day.

“I bet it was a dream about spanking your butt, Kimizuka,” Natsunagi joked, coming up to stand by Siesta’s pillow.

“Nah, Siesta and I were never into spanking. We were more into… Uh, never mind.”

“What the heck did you two get up to?”

“I’m kidding. It was a joke. Don’t actually recoil, Natsunagi.”

“I have visual recordings of Mistress Siesta and Kimihiko disporting themselves. Would you like to view them?”

“Don’t just make up random stuff, Noches!”

After we’d had that ridiculous conversation in front of the sleeping Siesta, Natsunagi spoke to her directly. “We graduated from high school today.” Seating herself in a chair by the head of the bed, she squeezed Siesta’s hand under the covers. “You gave me those ordinary, happy days as a teenager. Thank you.”

Once, when she’d still been wearing Alicia’s form in London, Natsunagi had told us she wanted to go to school, and the detective had made it happen.

“By the way, Noches, where is he?” she then asked the white-haired maid. The person she was asking about was the second reason for our visit today.

“Do you mean my creator? He should be here any—”

Before Noches could finish her sentence, the door behind her opened.

“Thanks for waiting.” A man walked in, pushing his round glasses up with a fingertip, white lab coat flaring out behind him.

The Inventor, Stephen Bluefield.

He was the scientist who’d created Noches, and Siesta’s current attending physician.

“You’re three minutes late,” I told him, stepping aside to give the doctor room. Stephen checked Siesta’s vitals, then made some notes in her electronic chart. “You really helped us out the other day, though. I had no idea you could fight.”

A little over a month ago, Stephen had protected Natsunagi and me by fighting Greed, one of the Seven Deadly Sins. This was the first time we’d seen him since.

“That was merely part of a medical exam. The Inventor is a support position; the ones who truly fight the enemy are the Magical Girl, the Assassin, and the Ace Detective.” As Stephen spoke, his eyes were on Siesta, who was breathing peacefully.

“So? Why’d you ask us to come?”

Unusually, Stephen had been the one to summon us today. He’d even specified the time down to the minute… All this, when he vanished whenever we were looking for him. The doctor seemed to do whatever suited him in the moment.

“I thought I’d answer your questions. You have concerns about my treatment methods for the Daydream, don’t you?”

I hadn’t been expecting that, and it delayed my response for a second.

“That is what my colleague told me.”

“…Drachma, huh?”

A little while ago, we’d happened to meet that back-alley doctor, and I’d asked him about ways to save Siesta. It was true that, in the process, I’d developed doubts about Stephen’s treatment methods.

“You’re not a normal doctor. You can use superior science to save people… Drachma told us that the Inventor can make artificial organs that are genetically perfect copies. Wouldn’t it be possible to save Siesta by transplanting one of those into her body?”

If we weren’t able to remove the seed that had lodged itself in Siesta’s heart, then couldn’t we just get her a new heart, one her body wouldn’t reject?

“Yes. It would take time, but it is possible to create a heart. If we used that, we could save her life. In fact, after observing her for more than three months, I once considered doing just that.”

“Then—!”

“The test subject I created stopped me.” Stephen pointed at Noches, who hung her head.

“Noches? Why…?”

“Because even if the surgery were successful, Mistress Siesta wouldn’t be the person you and Nagisa knew when she woke up.” Noches’s expression was rigid.

Just as I was about to ask what that was supposed to mean, Natsunagi let out a murmured “I see,” as if something had occurred to her. “Even now, Siesta’s always there, isn’t she?” Her eyes were fixed on the left side of Siesta’s chest. “Her consciousness probably still lives on inside her heart. Her memories, her will—she’s entrusted everything to it.”

“…I see. Siesta did say her heart was special, way back when.”

In fact, she’d used the power of Seed’s seed to lock her consciousness inside her heart, and to take control of another body that heart was transplanted into. However, that also meant Siesta’s heart and consciousness were directly linked. In other words…

“Transplanting her heart won’t save Mistress Siesta’s mind,” Noches murmured, echoing the conclusion I’d also come to. “I explained as much to my creator two months ago.”

“B-but you could have told us then…,” I started to say—then it hit me. Two months ago. That was when Noches had scolded me, right here in this very hospital room. I’d been too preoccupied with how to handle the Magical Girl, Pandemonium, the Vampire, and the Phantom Thief, and she’d gently chided me, saying that if I tried to hold everything at once, something precious might slip through my fingers someday.

“I’m sorry. I ended up putting everything on you, huh?”

Noches shook her head, smiling faintly. “No.”

“That is how things stand. As such, let me ask you: Will you let me transplant the Daydream’s heart?” Stephen’s calm, levelheaded gaze was fixed on us. “When she wakes up after the surgery, she may have lost her memories. Her personality and disposition will change drastically, and the person you knew will no longer exist.”

“That’s not…”

“But she will live.”

I suddenly found it hard to breathe.

“What is it that you want to recover? The Ace Detective’s life, or your memories with her? I am a doctor, and as such, I will prioritize saving her life. I won’t tell you to make your choice immediately. However, I recommend you reconsider your answer with the understanding that time is limited. What exactly are you trying to save?”

With that, Stephen turned his back on us.

My wish to save Siesta had seemed so normal that I’d taken it for granted.

He’d just shaken its foundations.

We were going to have to decide what Siesta’s life would be like.