Jinsei Reset Button - Chapter 5.2

Chapter 5: Think Ahead and Deal With It

Part 2

Natsuki’s tests continued. She had her blood drawn and was on an antibacterial IV drip practically every day.

“All this, even though I feel perfectly healthy. I wonder if I should make a break for it.”
“Don’t say stupid stuff like that.”

Seeing as I didn’t have any club activities, I visited Natsuki in her hospital room most every day. Though she seemed healthy enough, I still couldn’t help but notice that she was getting thinner every day. No, even that wasn’t quite true―it was more like I forced myself to notice.

Ever since that day, Shuu hadn’t visited Natsuki even once.

“My muscles are practically dissolving from me sleeping around all day. On the bright side, it’s kind of like a diet, but still, I can feel myself going blobby. Look, my calves are all squishy now.”
“Don’t stick your bare legs out from under the covers at me.”
“Aw, feeling shy, now? You shouldn’t be thinking lewd thoughts about the legs of a hospital patient.”
“N-no, I was…”
“Actually thinking lewd thoughts?”
“Oh. Kinda…”
“Well, good.”

Having boarded this awkward train of conversation, I found it difficult to segue onto the next topic. This was all Natsuki’s fault.

She suddenly blurted, “You know, I’m getting weaker by the day.”

“For some reason, it doesn’t really show on the outside, but the doctors told me that my strength will suddenly decrease.”
“Well, I mean, you’ve got a tumor. They can’t perform surgery on it?”
“I asked that, too…they said they can’t. It’s not like a normal tumor, it’s more like there are these tiny little ones dotted around everywhere, so it’s not like you can just go in and remove it.”
“Even so, they could at least…!”
“It was my choice. If I’m going to die, I’d rather go without having scars.”
“Don’t say things like that.”
“…I guess you’re right.”

Her reason to leave her body unscarred was probably something to do with Shuu. You could say that it was beyond cruel for her to tell that to me, the one who had once confessed to her, but on the other hand, I was the only one to whom she could speak frankly about her illness.

I took in her words silently, slowly digesting them, with no intention of telling anyone else. These very words might give me an upset stomach later, but if this was my role, then so be it.

I saw the door to the room open just a crack. A little girl peeked in, eyeing us curiously.

“Come in, Serina-chan.”

At Natsuki’s invitation, the child opened the door, revealing a pajama-clad girl who looked to be in about third grade.

“Is he your boyfriend?” the girl asked. 
“Nope~”

That hurt. It was the truth, though.

“Is she a patient, too?” I asked.
“Yeah…she has the same illness. She’s one of the kids who I saved during the station fire incident a while ago.”
“Yep! Natsuki-chan is Serina’s hero! She was super cool!! She went all Pshhhh!!!!! with the white smoky stuff!”
“Smoky stuff? Oh, with the fire extinguisher.”
“She was super super into it!”
“Yeah, well, I kind of got overexcited.”

The fire back then had been threatening to spiral out of control, so no wonder Natsuki had gone above and beyond.

In doing so, she had become this child’s hero.

“Wouldn’t have expected anything less,” I chucked to myself. Natsuki heard me, though.

“What?”
“Didn’t you want to become a superhero? I guess you are one now.”
“N-no, wait, I never said that, I’m not a little boy.”
“Oh, yes you did.”
“Natsuki-chan’s my hero!”

Faced with Serina’s boundless enthusiasm, Natsuki couldn’t help but to smile warmly and nod her assent.

October arrived, and Natsuki’s strength rapidly decreased. The number of strange machines present in her room slowly grew. There were generally 2 IVs attached to Natsuki at any given time.

To tell the truth, I was terrified.

Before she was hospitalised, she had been the picture of health, and I always assumed that as long as she stayed in the hospital, she would make a complete recovery.

Now, that thought seemed nothing more than a fanciful delusion, as Natsuki’s condition grew worse by the day.

There were more and more people staying in the ward suffering from the same disease.

It seemed like they were collecting all the people with Natsuki’s disease in this hospital, for some reason.

The second person who’d died was an elderly person, 82 years old, and the third victim―not a person, per se― had been a pet poodle.

Having arrived at this stage of outbreak, the people in charge decided to give an official announcement about this mysterious disease, by way of Associate Professor Kakitagawa holding a press conference. Natsuki and I watched it on broadcast relay from her hospital room.

“We are currently in discussion with the Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare on this subject. Furthermore, we have, at this time, isolated the virus that causes the disease. This virus’s infectious capacity is relatively low, and we have established that it is incapable of airborne transmission. There are some cases we have found where transmission was made by direct contact, but these cases are in the minority. There are currently 24 cases in this hospital. Two have passed away. Risk of infection seems unrelated to age or gender. We are collaborating with the police in an attempt to identify the origin of the disease, but as of now, our top priority is finding a cure.”

“Dr. Kakitagawa, I’ve heard that you are a biotechnology major who is currently working at Kouga University. Is there any possibility of your biotechnology research becoming involved?”
“If we can utilize biotechnology to pick out a large number of targets, then I’m sure we can work more easily with the tools we have. The chances seem slim, but we are still exploring this possiblity.”
“You mentioned that there are quite a few people who are infected. What is the means by which the disease is transmitted?”
“It’s unmistakable that this disease has a very low infectious capacity. By altering the environment and temperature, we can manipulate its infectious capacity in an upward direction. It is a great shame to have to say this, but this is all of the information we have so far.”

The Dr. Kakitagawa on the television screen had, indeed, the air of a doctor on the side of justice, one who was fighting with all his power against an incurable disease. That was partially due to his statement that there was little risk of contagion, as well as the fact that the purpose of the broadcast had been to try and lessen panic. The doctor was good at this kind of thing.

Natsuki sat unmoving, her eyes still glued to the screen. She didn’t say a word.

Just then, I heard a noise from the hall. Upon opening the door, a familiar set of pajamas. It was girl from before, collapsed face-down on the floor.

“Serina-chan!”
“Natsuki, call the nurse!”
“Got it!”

When I scooped the little girl up into my arms, repositioning her to make it easier for her to breathe, I noticed blood on my palm. There was blood was smeared all over my hands.

The little girl coughed violently in my arms, and I rubbed her back soothingly. She coughed up a large amount of blood, mixed with phlegm and stomach acid.

Serina continued coughing up blood.

There was now red spilling everywhere around me on the bed.

“No-!!”

Natsuki’s shriek wrenched me back to reality. The girl still lay in my arms, blood all around her mouth.

A doctor and nurse burst into the room, whisking us away.

The sensation of blood on my hand refused to disappear.

I sat in a folding chair in Natsuki’s hospital room. Natsuki had flung herself into the bed face-down, sobbing. I had no words with which to comfort her. It took everything I had in me just to keep myself together.

Natsuki continued crying on the bed, her voice muffled by the pillow. It didn’t look like she was going to stop anytime soon.

Just imagining Natsuki in that awful state made my heart clench. Was this it? Was this how it would go? Would her final moments be full of coughing up blood and writhing in pain? Why did this have to happen?

“…I want to die,” mumbled Natsuki, her voice thick with tears. “I’d rather overdose on a whole bunch of pills than die like that.”
“Don’t say things like that. Dr. Kakitagawa and Taishi are going to find you a cure, no matter what.”
“And what if I die before they find one? I’m scared. I just want to get it over with.”

No. That was all wrong. I knew it was wrong, but what could I say to Natsuki at a time like this?

“I see. Say, Natsuki, Do you remember what happened in elementary school? When we played with that second-grader in the park?”
“…..Yeah.”

She answered with her face still buried in the bed, not even turning her face to speak.

“You delivered a full-on body slam to that guy to protect me and Takeru, the second-grader. I thought it was the greatest thing in the world. I wanted to become like you. That’s the strong Natsuki who I know can keep on living.”
“Yuuto, sorry, but…you won’t like what I’m about to say,” Natsuki interrupted. I leaned forward in my chair, hoping to catch each muffled word that left her mouth.

“Don’t you remember what happened after that?”
“Huh?”
“That second-grader, Takeru, was abused later, by his real father. The person who had come to pick him up was his father’s elder brother, his uncle, who had come to rescue Takeru from his father. But we got in the uncle’s way…in the end, Takeru was taken away by his father.”
“That’s can’t be right.”

I had no memory of such a thing, no recollection of that development ever happening.

“One week after that, Takeru was handed over to a child consultation center to be taken care of, and it was quite the scandal…”
“…I had no idea.”

I really had no idea. I couldn’t remember a thing.

Why couldn’t I?

“I don’t want to bring up bad memories like that. I’ve always questioned myself, deep in my heart―why couldn’t I save Takeru-kun that day? Back then, I had no way of finding out what happened afterwards, and so I’ve never been able to uncover the exact details of the events that happened later…”

I sat silent, simply listening to her.

“Bringing up this topic after all this time is so painful. Just being here with you and thinking back to that time is painful.”

No!

I just…perfection…no!

I no longer cared about myself. All that I wanted was for Natsuki to live in happiness.

That was all I needed.

But as I was right now, I wasn’t good for anything.

I couldn’t even comfort her properly…

I persuaded Shuu to visit Natsuki’s hospital room a few days later. However, when we got there, we were met with a “No Visitors Allowed” sign taped to her door. We sat in the visitors’ waiting room, playing on our cellphones to pass the time. The “No Visitors Allowed” sign gave me a bad premonition, but I couldn’t bring myself to put my suspicions to words.

After about an hour had passed, the nurse approached us.

“Her condition’s stable, so the doctor will let you two speak with her, but only breifly.”

When I stepped into the room, the first thing I noticed was that the number of machines had once again risen since yesterday, and so had the number of tubes attached to Natsuki.

Natsuki lay face-up in her bed, breathing softly.

“She’s doing fine right now. You can just sit by her badside,” said the nurse, kindly.

Natsuki’s eyes were only half-open. She was staring at the ceiling, but her gaze flickered to us as we drew closer. She moved her lips, and then rasped out her words with a long sigh.

“It’s painful…why do I feel so bitter…”

Those were the exact words she had once told me. The words she had flung at me, after the thousands of loops that I created stopped her from getting closer to Shuu.

I clenched my fist. Unable to bear looking straight at her face, I directed my gaze to the air above her.

What was I doing? Nothing had changed. I’d done nothing but stand around idly and watch.

I should have at least been able save Natsuki from this pain.

“Shuu.”

I barely managed to squeeze the words from my throat.

“I know that Natsuki confessed to you. And I know that you answered that you wanted the three of us to stay together. So, Shuu―”
“What?”
“I want you to respond to Natsuki’s feelings.”
“But I want the three of us…”
“No! This is different! I’m a good-for-nothing! You’re the one she wants, Shuu. Do you intend to just watch her struggle with her feelings for you as she…gets taken away? She’s important to you, right? I know that she is. So, Shuu…I want you to accept her feelings.”
“…Are you okay with that, Yuuto?”
“I want you to do it. Please.”

Shuu gently took Natsuki’s hand, the one that didn’t have an IV drip in it. Her hand squeezed back.

“Shuu…I guess I still have feelings for you.”

He answered, his gaze never straying from Natsuki’s face.

“…So do I. I can finally admit it―I like you. A lot.”

It’s fine, I’m fine with all this, I convinced myself.

I left the room, trying my best not to make a sound.

Natsuki and Shuu loved each other, and I was nothing but a pest. We were still friends, but we couldn’t keep walking the same path that we had taken before.

I didn’t mind at all. This was yet another answer that I had been searching for all this time.

In the end, on the day Shuu and I visited Natsuki, I only showed up to her room at the very beginning, and spent the remainder of the time sitting alone in the visitors’ waiting room. I wanted to let them have some time to themselves.

I had no knowledge of what they said or did during that time. Those minutes, spent hidden from my eyes, were set aside for Natsuki to enjoy what little time she had left as happily as she could.

I sat on the sofa in the visitors’ waiting room and fiddled with my cellphone.

What was this?

Why did I feel so bitter, dammit?

I thought that all I needed was for Natsuki to be happy. For Shuu to be happy.

Dammit, dammit, dammit, dammit.

I could feel tears threatening to spill.

It hurt. I felt so hurt. My head, my eyes, my throat, heart, stomach, legs, my fingertips, they all hurt. Hurt so much that I just wanted to lay right down on the sofa and let myself slip into unconsciousness.

I held my knees to my chest, and felt the wetness of my tears seep through the cloth.

My tears wouldn’t stop. I ran the back of my hand over my eyes to wipe them, again and again, yet they wouldn’t stop.

I clamped my hand over my mouth.

The ringing in my ears persisted. The sound prevented me from thinking clearly.

I felt like my emotions would all come spilling out―I wanted to scream, even if people looked at me like I was crazy. I wanted to scream and barrel through the halls of the hospital.

I want someone to look at me.

Please, look at me, I wanted to cry out.

I wanted someone to understand―to see how, no matter how many times I reset, perfection was still out of reach; how I couldn’t even manage to find my own happiness―I wanted someone to understand my pain.

Listen to me.

Look at me.

Understand me.

This was nothing but my own selfishness, a tantrum thrown by the little boy inside my head.

I was bitter, after all. No matter what I did, I still felt bitter.

Help me. Someone, save me from this fate.

I just wanted to be happy.

I liked myself.

I liked Natsuki―loved her.

I liked Shuu. I liked them both.

Their happiness was supposed to be my salvation.

Natsuki was happy, Shuu was happy. That had been my one and only wish, but…

The tears overflowed, and still would not stop.

◆

Finally, the time came.

It was around noon, on a Monday.

Shuu and I had both been in class as usual when the head teacher ran down the hall and burst in through the door.

“I’ve just received news from her mother that Sugita Natsuki has passed away.”

Shuu and I both stood up before the teacher finished his sentence. We picked up our bags with our wallets inside and practically flew from the room. We both knew, without saying anything, that we were headed for the hospital.

The bus ride was excruciatingly slow. I could see that Shuu was trembling. I had never seen him so agitated in my life.

We lurched into the hospital room, only to find that the bed was empty.

“Yuuto! I’m going to head to my place.”
“Okay. Here, take this.”

I threw my wallet to him. Our wallets combined would likely hold enough cash for him to take a taxi. Shuu accepted the wallet and nodded, then ran out.

It occurred to me as I watched him leave that it would cost just as much for both of us to sit in the same taxi as it would if he took the taxi alone. Even at times like this, I managed to be an idiot.

I really was an idiot.

I stared blankly at the now-unoccupied bed. The sheets were fresh, so there was no trace of anyone having been there at all.

Had Natsuki passed away without feeling any pain? Or had she gone violently, coughing up blood?

I prayed that it was the former.

“Uu…gh….Natsu…ki…uwaaa…Na…tsuki…”

I hugged my knees tighty to my chest, stifling my sobs. Then I bent down and rested my head against the bed, and took to pummelling the mattress with my fists.

How could I let this happen? Why did Natsuki have to die?

Why?!

“…Yuuto-kun,” I heard a voice behind me say. I replied without even turning around.

“…Dr. Kakitagawa…You said you would save Natsuki…”
“I’m sorry.”
“Taishi and you…both…”
“Do you really think you have nothing to do with this?”
“…Excuse me?”

I raised my tear-streaked face at the doctor’s vexing question.

“Do you really have nothing to do with Hashidate-kun’s actions?”
“What do you mean?”
“…There’s something I need to talk to you about. The timing’s unfortunate, but please wipe your tears and come to the roof with me.”

I nodded, listlessly.

There was a slight wind up on the roof. The clear autumn sky stretched far above me.

The doctor walked up to the railing that enclosed the roof, and leaned on it.

“Mind if I smoke?”

I didn’t have the strength to answer.

“The death of a patient always really makes me want to smoke.”

He pursed his lips and tilted his head up, blowing smoke into the air. For someone who said that there was something he needed to talk to me about, he sure didn’t look like he was in a hurry to say anything.

My patience was starting to wear thin. Natsuki was dead, and he just wanted to stand around like it was none of his business?

“What did you want to talk about? If you’ve got nothing to say, I’d like to go home.”

His face suddenly took on a expression of deep thought, and he let out a sigh before speaking in a quiet, but clearly audible voice.

“The one who made the virus…was me.”
“What?!”

I didn’t understand.

“Wh-what do you…”
“The virus that has claimed victim after victim was made in my own laboratory.”

He calmly snuffed his cigarrette in his portable ashtray.

All the blood suddenly rushed to my head, and I lunged at Dr. Kakitagawa.

“Wh-why did you infect Natsuki with it, then? Why?!” I demanded, glaring at him.

“I’m really sorry. Apologizing won’t solve the problem, I know…But I knew that I would have to take responsibility sooner or later. Actually, though, there’s something that I must ask of you.”
“What do you want?”
“Please stop Hashidate Taishi―please stop your brother.”
“Huh?”

What was he talking about?

“Why him?”
“He tricked me. No, he tricked everyone. I had intended to wash my hands of the matter, to destroy the entire experiment. But then, he…he got…”

As he spoke, I could see his will cracking, like a dam at its bursting point. His voice trembled.

“That virus was made completely by accident…”

I stood in silence, waiting to hear what he would say next.

From what I could tell, at first, it was just an experiment to create a virus with low infectious capacity. It was just something for his thesis, totally useless and meant to be discarded afterwards, but then Danan Pharmaceutical, one of the major American pharmaceutical companies, requested to do co-research with Dr. Kakitagawa’s lab. The grant money made it hard for his struggling lab to refuse the offer.

At first, research went smoothly. However, it turned out that Danan’s goal was to create a virus with a low infectious capacity but a high fatality rate―over 90%. They wanted to use it as a bioweapon, for the purpose of assassinations. The most worrisome part was its low infectious capacity―in order for it to infect someone, the temperature needed to be raised to rather high levels, and test showed that the slightest error in the environment prevented the virus from spreading, even though direct contact.

At around that time, my brother started showing up at Dr. Kakitagawa’s lab.

Fired up at the prospect of taking such a kind, ideal student under his wing, the doctor trusted him immediately.

“On the first day of school, someone at school died. That night, I planned to get the virus and all of the data associated with it out of the school and dispose of it somewhere safe. I didn’t want to dig myself any deeper.”
“So then, what does Taishi have to do with…”
“I can’t drive, so I asked him to help me transport it, but…he betrayed me, and made off with the virus.”
“Hold on for a second. Taishi would never do anything like that.”
“You may think that, but he’s the only one who could have done it, as far as I know. He took it and ran off, somehow slipping through my fingers.”

Dr. Kakitagawa lost his composure by then. He pulled out another cigarette, despite having just finished one, and tried to light it. The wind must have picked up quite a bit, because his lighter kept going out. Eventually, he managed to light his cigarette, the trembling of his hands making the flame flicker just the slightest bit.

If Taishi were betrayed and cornered like this, he still wouldn’t lose him composure, I thought to myself.

“Do you remember the fire that broke out at the station while people were inside?”

Of course I remembered. I was there.

“…That was his doing. He created that situation in order to infect the people inside. He forced the station to become an airtight container, and using explosives, caused a fire in order to raise the temperature inside. Those were the optimal conditions for the virus to spread. Then he let the virus loose inside.”
“No, you can’t be―”
“Every single person with the illness had also been trapped in the concourse that day.”
“Eh…?”

It made sense. Natsuki and Serina-chan had both been there.

But that didn’t necessarily mean that…

“We gathered all of the victims in this hospital. Of course, when it was discovered that the cause was this virus, the police and counter-terrorism division were sent to try and find the origin of the outbreak. I didn’t want to cause a panic at the press conference, so I didn’t reveal everything, but it’s clear to me that eventually your brother and I will be exposed as the creators. It’s unheard of, unthinkable even, for a Japanese university undergraduate to commit such acts of bioterrorism on his own. Naturally, I won’t be spared.”

But…

“But that day, Taishi knew that I was going to be at the station. He would never think to spread the virus there. If he really were involved in that terrorist attack, then he would have stopped me from going to the station.”
“…You don’t know your brother very well, then.”

Huh…?

What was he trying to say?

I didn’t know my brother very well?

What the hell do you think you know about him, then?!

I wanted to lunge at him, to scream in his face, but I managed to hold back.

“Hashidate Taishi―your brother―is a deviant.”

He turned to face me, his eyes unfocused. “Please. Stop him. He has more up his sleeve. He still has that virus. There’s nothing more that I can do…”

Stop him, he said?

Dr. Kakitagawa slumped down into a sitting position, as if his very will were crumbling. I looked down, deep in thought.

It made no sense.

No sense at all.

What would Taishi have to gain from spreading this disease?

There was no motive.

But if everything the doctor said was true, then Natsuki contracted the disease that day at the station. If only I hadn’t asked her to meet me at the station―no, that wasn’t enough. Unless I did something to thwart the incident as a whole, the course of history would simply return to what was happening now.

Think. Think hard.

“But, if I reset again…on the other hand, Natsuki…”

I muttered to myself, my head hanging.

Dr. Kakitagawa looked up at me pleadingly.

Underneath that clear, sunny sky, strong winds battered the rooftop.

My mind was about to break, in accordance with all of the resets I had done. Would it really just stop working?

Beyond that was nothingness.

Days filled with blank space flew by, falling apart one by one as my life unfolded in my head.

Not remembering anything, not recalling anything―just passively existing, a hollow human-shaped container.

It was frightening, but Natsuki was―

Natsuki was dead.

In all of my memories, Natsuki was smiling. That smile was for me, as a friend. Even though I wanted to be so much more.

I wanted her to keep smiling. If I could help Natsuki and Shuu live out their lives in happiness, then my own life was a small price to pay.

I had already died that day, at the station platform.

If I had to give my life to save Natsuki, then so be it.

I clenched my hands and drew in a deep breath, then turned to face the sky as I shouted.

“Maki-chan!”

Did she hear me? Was she even there?

“I don’t care if I guve up every single brain cell I have! I want to reset one more time!”

It didn’t matter if my brain stopped working after that one reset. I would rebuild my life one last time with every drop of strength I could muster.

It didn’t matter anymore.

I took out the reset button, and held it above my head.

Maki-chan, thank you for the advice. Thank you for giving me the reset button.

I’ll use the strength that you lent me, the strength of my wish, to save my beloved friends.

I opened my eyes, gazing straight at the sky. One finger pressed down on the button.

―Reset.

The world wavered. This time, it pitched wildly back and forth, and my vision multiplied, layers sliding over each other.

“This is the last game, you know,” said Maki-chan. Her voice reverberated through the air.

–