Tantei wa Mou, Shindeiru - Volume 9 - Chapter 3.03

  Lost treasure

When Saikawa’s performance ended, Natsunagi and I headed straight for her dressing room.

Saikawa was sitting in a chair, looking dazed. The moment she saw us, her face crumpled with sadness.

“It’s all right.” Natsunagi ran up to her and pulled her into a hug.

“…! Nagi…sa…” Saikawa buried her face in Natsunagi’s arms. She wasn’t crying, but her voice was so hoarse it was hard to imagine her as the same person I knew.

How long had she been like this? If her voice had been this way before her performance, I really doubted she would have walked out onto the stage as boldly as she had.

In the end, the fans’ chorus and other performers had managed to hold the opening ceremony together. That hadn’t fixed everything, though—it was clear something was wrong with Saikawa.

“Let’s make a trip to the hospital.”

Natsunagi and I escorted Saikawa out of her dressing room. We also had to figure out how to deal with the media. We really didn’t want them snooping around and gleefully reporting on this like it was some kind of joke.

In case they tried to follow us, we had Saikawa’s chauffeur prepare a dummy car and drive it around as a decoy, while we took one of the Men in Black’s cars to a familiar hospital.

“Please be there, Stephen.”

We were headed to see the best doctor I knew.

About half an hour later, we reached the hospital where Siesta was.

Unfortunately, Stephen wasn’t there. It wasn’t all bad luck, though, as another doctor examined Saikawa for us. He was someone with close ties to Stephen, someone we’d met before.

“And? What do you make of Saikawa’s condition, Drachma?” I asked. He and I were alone in the consultation room together.

Drachma was a back-alley doctor who’d once been in charge of the SPES laboratory, which meant he had some serious history with Natsunagi and Siesta. Ever since SPES had broken up, he’d been working as a doctor for the world’s hidden side. At Stephen’s directive, he’d also helped with Reloaded’s treatment.

“It’s most likely aphonia,” Drachma said, jotting notes down in a chart on the desk. “Simply put, it’s a phenomenon where stress or other psychological trauma makes speaking difficult. There are no particular problems with the throat or vocal cords, but the voice abruptly grows hoarse or is lost entirely.”

Stress-induced psychological trauma. Was it because she’d been working herself so hard? Or was it…

“It’s not the yips, is it? Like when an athlete finds themself unable to move as they normally do. I’ve heard the term used when singers suddenly stop being able to sing.”

“If it were the yips, it would be an involuntary motion that occurs only when the affected person tries to do a specific action. A hairdresser becoming unable to hold scissors, for example, or a drummer who can’t use their drumsticks. However, the patient can’t speak at all, not just when she tries to sing. This isn’t the yips.”

“Then if Saikawa’s got aphonia, as you said, will it get better?”

“I can’t guarantee that it will correct itself if she rests up,” he said, summarily puncturing my hopes. “For example, the yips—or ‘focal dystonia,’ if you’d prefer—is clearly a neurological condition, which means it has an established scientific method of treatment. The main cause of aphonia, on the other hand, is psychological, for which there is no proven treatment method.”

“You mean Saikawa’s developed a psychological disorder?”

“Dr. Stephen might call it a ‘cancer of the heart,’ but yes… At the very least, she needs to rest for a month,” Drachma said. “Everything else comes after that.”

Just then, the door behind us opened.

“Pl…ease…w-wait…,” said a voice so raspy I couldn’t help but feel sorry for its owner.

I turned around. Saikawa was standing there, attended by Natsunagi, and she looked ready to burst into tears. She pleaded desperately with Drachma, saying that she couldn’t take time off, couldn’t put her serial song releases on hold, and that the musical rehearsals were still ongoing. She argued passionately, in a voice that was barely audible, that she didn’t have time to rest right now.

“I’ve heard of patients who pushed themselves that way and ended up losing their voices permanently,” Drachma told her coolly, and Saikawa gulped. She knew better than anyone what it meant for an idol to lose her voice for good.

“Saikawa, if you explain the situation, I’m sure both your fans and the project staff will understand.”

Saikawa shook her head. “…I-idols, have, to, be…ev…ery…body’s…i-ideal, so…” Her voice was gravelly, and caught on certain words, but Saikawa spoke as if she were wringing white-hot emotion from the depths of her throat. “So…I, have, to…stay, pr-pretty…as…an i…idol…” She couldn’t get the rest out, and bowed her head instead.

“Yui…” Natsunagi rubbed her back gently, trying to get her to raise her head.

I searched for the right words. I wanted to say something that would return twofold the energy Saikawa always gave me, along with my gratitude…but the world didn’t give me that kind of time.

Boom.

An explosion roared somewhere above us, and the whole building rocked. Natsunagi and Saikawa stared in shock, while Drachma narrowed his eyes as if something had occurred to him.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

Drachma was already starting to make a phone call as he replied.

“Be careful. An enemy of the world has arrived.”