I accomplished…nothing.
She could hear the officers’ voices closing in. She could see flashlight beams approaching from the other side of the larch trees. Their time was running out.
“I’m sorry.” Echika blew out a puff of white smoke. The air was so cold, it stung her skin, and only now did she notice that she’d been crying. There was no stopping it now. “I just wanted…to protect you somehow. That’s why… But in the end, I didn’t do anything…”
“Like I said earlier, this was enough for me.” Harold turned around, too, noticing the lights. “They’re going to arrest me now, but I don’t intend to remain in shutdown mode forever. I have to find Sozon’s killer. So this is only temporary.”
Was he saying this because he had some kind of plan in mind, or just to put Echika at ease? Either way, it didn’t make for much comfort.
“Echika, listen to me.” Harold touched placed his hand on her shoulder again. With his other hand, he wiped her cheeks with his fingertips, like he was consoling a crying infant. “You need to testify to Chief Totoki that you were being threatened by Professor Lexie and me. Tell her we forced that HSB on you. Don’t let them Brain Dive into you, no matter what. It’ll just make your position worse.”
“I don’t care about that anymore…”
“I’ll figure something out.” His lakelike eyes were terribly calm. “So please, don’t reduce all of my efforts to nothing. I want you to promise you’ll respect me this time.”
Echika could only understand half of what Harold was saying. She shook her head vaguely. She knew the way she’d been acting had been unreasonable. But she couldn’t contain herself. This was a nightmare, a bad dream. Even this late into the game, the impulse surged up in her. Because if things kept going down this path, he really would—
Up until now, she’d kept giving up on things. So many things. Humans can get used to anything, be it scorn or dislike or solitude. But despite all that, Harold had just appeared out of the blue and changed everything for her.
So she knew she was doing this out of conceit and self-interest, and yet—he was the first person she’d felt this way about. And so—
“No.” A breath choked with tears spilled into the air. “I can’t do that. You have to run. Hurry up and go. I’ll buy you time, so—”
“Please, be reasonable.” Harold tightened his grip on her shoulder. “You got better after giving Matoi up, so this time—”
“This isn’t like Matoi.” How many times had they had this exchange? “Please!”
“You’ll be fine.”
“Harold, run!”
“Believe in yourself.”
“That’s not what this is about. I just don’t want to lose you.”
“And I appreciate that, but—”
“—I’m saying you’re more important to me than anything!”
For a second, it felt like every particle in the air around them froze in place. Harold was shocked into silence, his eyes wide. But even the sight of him in this moment was muddled by her tear-smudged eyes. His outline was vague, and it was hard to tell what he looked like. Her thoughts were just as jumbled as what she was seeing, and she had no idea what to do.
“Sorry.” Echika said with a sob she couldn’t hold back. The glass bottle in her heart had long since shattered to pieces and was beyond repair. “But… It’s how I really feel. You’re the most important thing in the world to me. You matter more than anything, so I—”
Aaah. I’ve ruined everything.
The effort she’d made to put distance between them. The pains she’d taken to let him go. It all turned out to be meaningless. Ultimately, she’d forced her selfish, impure delusions onto him. She’d made a show of how unsightly she was—like she always did. All she did was fail, and things never, ever improved. She wanted to be better, more eloquent about this, to be a good person who thought of what would be to Harold’s benefit.
But all she did was cause him more trouble.
“I’m so selfish, in everything I do… I’m really so sorry.”
She could hear the footsteps of the officers crunching into the snow as they approached. The beams of the flashlights were brushing against the trees, looking for them. She managed to blink, shedding the layer of tears clouding her eyes, and saw Harold’s face clearly.
He simply gazed at her, shock on his handsome countenance. His hand stayed in place on her shoulder. His lips, somewhat ajar, trembled slightly.
“I…”
But this time, the beam of a flashlight spilled directly on Echika and Harold.
“You two, hands in the air!”
Several officers emerged from the trees. Harold stirred, snapping out of his surprise. He acted so swiftly, it was hard to believe he’d been absentminded just a second ago. The next thing she knew, he’d snatched the automatic pistol from her pocket and pulled Echika’s arms behind her back.
What are you doing?
Now it was Echika’s turn to be shocked.
“Stop. Get any closer, and I’ll shoot her.”
Harold said this loudly, pressing the pistol’s muzzle to Echika’s neck. The safety was on, but the officers couldn’t see that in the dark. They all flinched for a second but then raised their own pistols. Echika finally realized.
“Let’s say I coerced you into coming along with me.”
Are you joking? I never agreed to this idea.
“Harold Lucraft, drop your weapon and let her go!”
“You have nowhere to run!”
“HQ, come in. This is the mountain search team. We’ve tracked the target down. He’s holding Investigator Hieda hostage—”
The officers’ expressions were clearly warped with fear. They were shaken at seeing an Amicus turn violent and go out of control for the first time. The neuromimetic system was already seen as too dangerous, and Harold had only worsened its image by doing this.
“No!” Echika tried to shout that it was a misunderstanding. “I’m—!”
But Harold slapped a hand over her mouth, silencing her. He was serious. Echika tried to look up at him, but his grip on her was so strong, she couldn’t even manage that. Even if she tried to bit his hand, he could just switch of his pain receptors and ignore it. Any attempt to struggle would be in vain.
“I’m sorry.” Harold whispered so only she could hear it. “But don’t forget our promise.”
No. I can’t.
Everything went black with despair.
“Harold!”
A familiar voice cut into their exchange, making Echika jerk—Investigator Fokine walked into the officers’ encirclement. He, too, was holding up his automatic pistol and breathing heavily, but there was clear hesitation in his eyes.
“How very devoted of you, Investigator. Prioritizing the search for me while the matter of the Alliance still hasn’t been settled.” Harold taunted him calmly. “Did Chief Totoki negotiate with the London Met to get the local police to help?”
“The Alliance can’t lay a hand on us so long as we have their backing.” Fokine licked his lips. “Were you threatening Echika the whole time to get her to cooperate? Holding her hostage?”
“Yes, since I have no intention of being shut down.” The Amicus didn’t change his expression. “If you want her back safely, prepare a car without any GPS tracking and promise you won’t go after me.”
“We’re not going to comply with your demands. You know that.”
“You’re fine with me shooting the investigator, then?”
“You wouldn’t do that.”
“So you’re expecting a heartless machine to have a sense of morals?”
“This is your final warning,” Fokine said, half in plea. “Please. Throw away your gun.”
Harold stood there calmly, not stirring, but this was long enough of a pause for the surrounding officers to interpret this as a sign of hesitation. He carefully moved the gun away from Echika, instead pointing it at Fokine as he let go of his hold on her. Echika felt the Amicus, who her back had been pressed up against all this time, push her away.
And then an earsplitting gunshot shook the air.
Wait.
Echika turned around and saw Harold fall to his knees in the snow. Inky circulatory fluid dripped from the gunshot wound on his thigh, dyeing the snow black. There was a group of officers moving in from the trees in another direction. Harold’s hand went limp, releasing the automatic pistol.
“Stop, don’t shoot!” Fokine shouted. “Secure the target, hurry!”
The officers all charged in. A few of them ran past Echika, forcing Harold, who wasn’t resisting anymore, to the ground and grabbing him by the back of his neck. The thermal sensor activated his forced shutdown sequence, and the light drained from the Amicus’s eyes. The urge to shout at them to stop reached as far as Echika’s throat. And yet—
“Don’t reduce all of my efforts to nothing. I want you to promise you’ll respect me this time.”
You really are a coward, you know that?
Echika went limp and fell to her knees. Fokine hurried over and placed a hand on her shoulder.
“Hieda, are you hurt?” He asked.
“The hostage is unharmed!” another officer called out. “Someone get her a blanket!”
But all the shouting felt like it passed through her bones, draining powerlessly from her body into the ground.
The snow kept falling. With each speck, all manner of color and sound faded from the world, and everything ground to a halt. She could see, between the larches, the officers who’d suppressed Harold rising to their feet. The Amicus lying facedown in the snow didn’t so much as stir anymore, looking almost like a defenseless corpse.