“Owwww!” Two days since the battle. Ichika lay in his bed at IS Academy, his wounds bandaged tightly. Today, his nurse was Tatenashi. “Jeez. Quit squirming. You’re a man, aren’t you?” “Listen, I’m telling you, it hur— Nnngh!” It wasn’t just his left hand. His entire body was battered. They may as well have just dumped a bucket of antiseptic over his head instead of trying to swab it on. “Sounds like it’s time for your nanomachine injection.” Tatenashi, in a nurse’s outfit, smiled while holding up a syringe. Normally, the appearance of an angel all in white to tenderly care for him would have a grin plastered over Ichika’s face, but all he could manage was a grimacing smile.
“Can’t we skip that? It really hurts.” “Of course not. You’re just feeling it working!” “Ugh...” Ignoring his complaints, Tatenashi made a quick three injections. He was so badly wounded that the normal one injection wouldn’t be enough. “There we go. Good boy.” Nurse Tatenashi smiled as she finished the injection, her miniskirt riding up as she leaned forward. “In thirty minutes or so, I’m going to see hell again...” Ichika shivered in anticipation of the pain that would soon wash over him, and Tatenashi sighed at his complete failure to notice. “Speaking of which.” Sitting down on the bed, she glanced sideways at him. As his heart turned a backflip, Tatenashi took the chance to run a finger along his lips. “Ichika.” “Y-Yes?” The worried look on her face made him nervous as she spoke seriously, “Promise me. Promise me you’ll never do something like that again.” “Well...” He’d do it over and over again for his comrades. She knew that. And that’s why she insisted. “What hurts you, hurts us. Do you want that to happen?” “Ahh...” Ichika wasn’t the type to argue with gentle admonishment from his elders. “Rest well, then. If you’re a good boy, I may just come back again.” “Haha...” Tatenashi disappeared with a smiling wink, leaving Ichika alone with his worries. “.........” He’d realized what IS really were now. But he still didn’t know what Tabane was really after or what her motivation was. How would he handle something like this? How would he handle himself? Would anything slow down the global IS arms race? “Ugh, jeez.” Worrying about it might not help anything, but that didn’t mean he could stop himself. Can we really trust IS with our lives? He remembered what Akatsubaki—no, Akatsuki, had said. That an IS acted on its pilot’s wishes. That it had kidnapped Houki in order to fulfill them. Could he really trust his life to something like that? He looked down at the gauntlet on his right wrist. Tell me, Byakushiki. Just what are you? The pale girl in his own subconscious. Was it just Byakushiki? Or the archetype of all IS? Ichika didn’t know. But he couldn’t help but wonder.
Even two days on, Houki was still barricaded in the kendo dojo, meditating. She’d said the time had come where she needed to face her own weakness. I’ve always been running away. From my own weakness. From my own immaturity. And now there was nowhere left to run. She wouldn’t let herself run away anymore. “You’re still worried about that?” As she opened her eyes, she saw Ling leaning against the wall with her arms folded. It was a pose she took often, but today it looked different to Houki. “What’s your problem? How long are you gonna keep staring at me like that?” “Um... Well...” Straight to the gut. Ling was nothing if not direct. “Anyway, though. You’ve seemed really gloomy lately.” “Wha—” “Like something’s really weighing on your shoulders. Yeah, that’s it.” Ling shifted her arms to behind her head nonchalantly as she continued. This was more than enough for Houki. “How rude!” “Not trying to be. I’m just curious, you know? Isn’t your IS gone?” “Ahh...” Both Akatsuki and Akatsubaki had disappeared. Without them, she was just another average student. But... She didn’t mind. “I don’t care. I can’t run away from my strength or my weakness anymore.” Houki was determined. Seeing it in her face, Ling smiled. “Mhm. Well, good luck with that.” Waving, Ling left the dojo. As Houki watched her friend leave, she was grateful for the concern. That’s right. I’m not alone. She now realized that that was true strength.
“Hmm.” Iris frowned to herself as she scanned through a magazine outside Ichika’s door. Well, it sounded good when I read it the first time, but... I’m not so sure now... The headline of the article: ‘Must-read tips for nurses! Spice up your checkups with these!’ That said, this wasn’t Iris’s day to take care of Ichika, so she was in her IS Academy uniform rather than a nurse’s uniform. All right. Double-check one last time... ‘The way to a guy’s heart? Never let him know how hard you’re trying’ ‘Make it so you without making it about you’ ‘He wants a nurse, not a doctor’ “Umm... Ummmmm.” Unable to work up the nerve to knock, she buried her nose back in the magazine for a triple-check. As she did, the door suddenly opened, catching her directly in the face. “Ow!” “Hm? Alice?! Are you okay?!” Ichika was under strict orders for bed rest, but she’d caught him sneaking out. “Ichika! What are you doing?!” “Well, uhh...” Mumbling an excuse, he slouched back into his room. Before the door could close, Iris slipped in after him. “Jeez, c’mon!” “What, you have a problem with me being here?” “That isn’t the problem, Alice. Just, guys and girls shouldn’t sleep together after they turn fourteen. That’s just common sense.” Ichika was sure he’d heard that from Houki at some point. He patted Iris’s head as he led her back out into the hall. “H-Hold on! Wait! What about your hand! Shouldn’t it be bandaged?!” “Ah...” A guilty look washed over Ichika’s face. Seizing the opportunity, Iris grabbed him by the wrist. “You... You’re completely fine! Ichika, did you learn some kind of healing magic?!” “Well, umm...” As Ichika mumbled, trying to avoid eye contact, Iris continued to push him. “What about here, then?!” She pulled up Ichika’s shirt and examined his bare skin. His wounds, so deep just recently, had completely vanished. The healing nanomachines may have been effective, but they weren’t that effective. There wasn’t even a fading scar left on him. It was less as if he’d healed, almost more as if he’d been repaired. “.........” “Answer me, Ichika! Who... Who are you?!” The shock and anger on her face told him that he couldn’t make any more excuses. “To be honest, Alice...” “Mm?” “I... I don’t think I’m a normal person.” “What?!” “Don’t tell anyone else what I’m about to say,” he answered reticently. “But this isn’t the first time I’ve healed so quickly from serious wounds.” “Ah! Some sort of cybernetic fusion with your IS? But...” Ichika shook his head, unwilling to go that far. “I don’t know. But. Byakushiki isn’t normal. I’m not normal. There’s no way a normal human would be able to shrug things like this off. So... I... I need to talk with Chifuyu. She has to know something about Byakushiki and me.” Again, he patted her head. “That’s a secret, okay?” His smile alone was nearly enough to make steam come out of her ears. “It’s safe... between the two of us...” “Yeah.” He forced a smile to his face. Neither of them knew that a third had been eavesdropping.
“Mmm-hmm-hmhmm~? Mm-mm-mmm-hm-mmm~?” Somewhere in the deep, deep blue between sea and sky, Tabane happily hummed to herself. “The time has come, Chichan.” Her finger poked at thin air, and around her, a 360-degree panoramic display opened tracing the status of every IS worldwide. “Time for the swan song!” Her palm extended to the heavens, and the indicators turned as one from blue to purple. “Activate IS Murasaki.” A single phrase spread across the display, [CODE VIOLET ACTIVATED.] The end had begun.
“Chifuyu. I’ve been looking all over for you.” In the secret complex underneath IS Academy... Ichika stepped from the long, dark hallway leading to the operations room, to find Chifuyu reading through some papers. “Ichika. What’s up?” She didn’t seem shocked to see him, even though he had strict orders for bed rest. In fact, she didn’t even turn her chair to face him. There was a coldness there that he couldn’t quite place his finger on. “Aren’t you surprised, Chifuyu?” “.........” She’d acted as if the changes in his body were completely expected. The healing—rather, repair of his wounds. His unnaturally-heightened senses. And, more than anything, his uncanny synchronization with his IS. As incredible as it was, it was all being taken as a matter of course. “You must know something,” he said. “‘Something’?” Chifuyu pushed away the stack of papers and stared up at the blank, featureless ceiling. “Probably everything you want to know.” She still didn’t turn to face him. He couldn’t read her expression. “Or maybe...” “Hm?” “Maybe more than you want to know.” “......?!” There was already a mountain of things he wanted to know. Ichika shivered as he realized that the truth went even deeper, that there would be no turning back. “Are you ready to find out?” She finally turned and looked at him, her stare as sharp as a blade. “I...” He’d never intended to push it that far. Curious or not, when it was put to him like that, he wasn’t ready. As if to remind him how childish his decision to bother her with it was, Chifuyu turned her eyes back to her papers. “Chifuyu, I...” “Enough talk.” Ichika fell silent for a moment which seemed to last forever. And then, just as he was working up the courage to speak again, the door opened behind him. “Mm? Aren’t you being a bit too strict with him, Chichan?” The voice was as playful as could be, but something about it terrified Ichika deep down inside. “Tabane?! What are you doing here?!” Why was she in the secret complex beneath IS Academy? How did she even get there? “You should know, Icky. There’s nowhere I can’t get to.” Tabane’s words would have been playful if they weren’t so twisted. Her abject, gleeful self-confidence set him on edge. He didn’t know what he wanted to do. Didn’t know what he should do. But there was one thing he did know. Chifuyu and Tabane had spent so long by each other’s side that the shadow which fell between them was far deeper and darker than he could comprehend. “That’s right, Icky! I’m going to tell you everything about your parents that Chichan never did!” “My parents...?” Why that, all of a sudden? That had nothing to do with what he was wondering. “Yup, Icky! It’s actually a really important part. Isn’t it, Chichan?” Chifuyu could barely hold back her rage as Tabane mockingly turned to her. “Enough, Tabane!” she snarled. “Ahaha! This so isn’t like you, Chichan! You’re supposed to be cool, controlled, even regal! Watching you melt down like this is hilarious.” Tabane opened up a projection display and tossed it toward Ichika. Columns of numbers and impenetrable lines of text filled the screen. And a single photo labeled ‘Project Mosaica.’ “Look here, Icky.” Tabane pointed to a part of the photo. “You know what that word translates to in Japanese? It translates to ‘Orimura.’ This is who you really are. The second viable fetus created by madmen seeking to surpass humanity.” “What the...” Unable to understand what Tabane meant, Ichika wavered. As he did, she joyfully launched into a monologue. “Now, the Orimura Project produced a great deal of interesting data. Some of which was later put to use in Germany. But enough about minor details. Here, look at this picture.” A young girl with dark hair cradled an infant. Who was it? He didn’t even have to ask. It was Chifuyu. “Orimura Project Experimental Subject #1000. The first successful result. Our very own Chichan. Isn’t it just so poetic? ‘A thousand winters’ for the thousandth subject.” “......?!” Struggling to understand, Ichika slowly turned his gaze to Chifuyu, who looked for all the world like she wanted to run and hide. “Wait, no... Chifuyu, why? How...” He could see the pain on her face, making it clearer than any words could that what Tabane said was true. She’d never told him. She couldn’t have told him. He never would have understood. “But wait, there’s more! The Orimura Project was going fine, until one day, it was suddenly canceled. And why do you think that might be? It’s because there’s absolutely no reason to waste your time developing the ultimate human when I’m right here.” The ultimate human. The once-in-a-generation genius. More perfect by nature than any man could imagine building. The Orimura Project was laid out to create something which could never exist naturally. But with nature having outdone it, it was meaningless. “And that was the end of the Orimura Project. But there was just one hitch. Along with two successful specimens, there was one more off-the-books skunkworks project. And that was a problem. Whatever could be done about that? It couldn’t simply be disposed of. Not for reasons of sentimentality or mercy, no, no. It was just an experiment. But because of how absurd its numbers were.” “Its... numbers?” “See, just having Chichan meant the success of the Orimura Project. She’d be the mother of a new mankind. But then, Icky. Then you came along. You, the chance to drive humanity’s transformation faster than it ever could have proceeded. You, with that forbidden Y chromosome.” The words poured from Tabane’s mouth like a song, like the chanting of an eldritch curse. “That’s the problem the backers of the Orimura Project created for themselves. They wanted to create something which surpassed humanity. But they ended up with something that wasn’t human.” Tabane sighed theatrically. “And that’s when Chichan made her decision. She chose. Chose the one thing more important to her than the rest of the world, more important to her than her own future... You, her beloved little brother.” And when she had, she threw away everything else. Absolutely everything. Everything she’d been promised. Even the little sister she didn’t even know she had. “So, Icky. The truth about your parents is, you have no parents! You’re just a wreck drifting ashore from the sea of DNA. ...And that’s why I want to say this.” Smiling, she leaned in, with words barbed enough to tear out his heart. “You monster.” In that moment, Ichika’s world ended, replaced by a void of despair.
“Ah!” Charlotte suddenly gasped in shock. The chain of the silver bracelet Ichika had bought her the summer before had snapped. “What’s wrong, Charlotte?” Laura asked curiously, stopping her stretches to look over at Charlotte. “Oh, uhh, nothing.” Charlotte papered it over, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that it was an omen. Why is my heart pounding like this? Where was Ichika, right now? What was he doing? She couldn’t help but be worried for him. As she looked out the window, a cloud passed in front of the moon. “I hope you’re okay, Ichika...” she whispered. It wasn’t just a bad feeling, though. The worst had come to pass.
“Ngh...” Ichika stood on the precipice of despair. Just a single push would send him tumbling to the waves below. That’s why Madoka couldn’t let it escape. Not this time. This one-in-a-thousand chance. With reflexes even quicker than an IS’ autopilot, she plunged a dagger into his chest. “It’s over.” Madoka pulled out the bloodstained knife and cast it aside, her expression twisted with madness. “I didn’t even care about you at first. You didn’t matter. But then I realized. Oh, yes, I realized. You were the only way to hurt Orimura Chifuyu.” Her face contorted into a parody of a grin. “DAMN YOUUUUUU!” Chifuyu cried out, her rage red-hot. “That’s it. Perfect. You finally have to notice me now, Orimura Chifuyu.” Madoka turned to face her—only for Chifuyu to dive by her toward Ichika. Toward her beloved little brother, as his lifeblood spilled out on the floor. “You...” As she wrapped her arms around Ichika, Chifuyu glared at Madoka. “I’ll kill you. I’LL KILL YOU ALL! No matter what.” “I was wondering when you’d work yourself up to that, Chichan.” Tabane smiled. Turning her back, she strode away. “Come, then. When you’re ready to take on the world.” She beckoned to Madoka. “We’ll be waiting, Chichan.” Waving, she disappeared even more adroitly than usual. “Waiting for you at the end of the world.” The words hung in the air as only the blood-spattered siblings were left...
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