Investigators raced from their tents as soon as Archive disappeared. They immediately treated Karamori’s injuries, and after they questioned him about what had happened, they moved on to other tasks including performing a follow-up investigation on the Duplicator Trees.
The investigators attempted to track Archive and Asahi Fujinaka using both Distortionism and scientific methods, but nothing they could immediately implement bore any fruit.
Karamori was seriously injured. He had suffered multiple broken ribs, two broken fingers on his left hand, and damage to his lungs and other organs. He was treated using Distortionist methods, but the simple tools available in the investigator tents weren’t enough to fully heal him. Excessive movement would likely completely undo the treatment he received.
Once the necessary reports were taken care of and Karamori’s trauma-induced fever receded, the investigators on site were finally able to relax. By that point, it had been some time since Archive and the others left.
Karamori and Fujinaka were in a room in the medical ward of a simple research facility. The room was made of plastic and illuminated by bright white light. Bare wiring connected to the medical equipment by the bed and the ceiling light.
The mood in the facility had calmed since Karamori was brought here, but he could still hear busy footsteps and voices on the other side of the thin walls. A vague sense of urgency remained, making it feel as if the place had been electrified. The air he breathed numbed his throat.
Karamori was sitting on the edge of the bed with his portable device to his ear. He was pale, the cause of which extended beyond his physical injuries.
“Six of the eight tracking methods we’ve employed turned up nothing. The other two need more time.”
He was talking to Nanba to give him a report on what happened earlier that day. Nanba was speaking with his usual easygoing tone, but his voice sounded a little harder than usual.
The Noary Group was not run by idiots. Nanba was able to use his silver tongue and convince his superiors to employ Archive, but they knew better than to employ an unpredictable element like her as a Canary without a firm leash. They paired her with Karamori, a partner who could kill her at any time, and prepared multiple methods to track or kill her from a distance in the event of her betrayal. Not that those methods were doing any good now.
“How much longer will the other two methods take?” Karamori asked impatiently.
“I wouldn’t tell you if I knew, kid,” Nanba said, his voice cold. “You’ll go after them as soon as you know where they are.”
“Of course I will! They have Archive!”
“I can’t sign off on that. You realize the scope of this situation, don’t you? We’re dealing with Grave Nest here. We have to be careful about striking back. Both sides will lose if this turns into a game of tit for tat. I’ve gotta speak with my superiors first, and if we decide to act, we’ll form a strike tea—”
“We don’t have time for th—argh…”
Karamori’s face contorted with pain from the strain of yelling. Blood seeped into his clothes over his shoulder.
“I get why you’re antsy… Two hours have passed since the incident, which means that in three hours, you’re gonna kill Archive. If what she says is true, that is.”
“I don’t think she had any reason to lie in that situation. It was pretty clear she was disobeying fate,” Karamori said.
Her form blurred when she spoke, just like it did when she tried to attack Asahi Fujinaka.
“Then fate whipped her back to where she was meant to be. If she can be believed, you could probably sit in bed twiddling your thumbs for the next three hours and somehow end up killing her at the appointed time anyway. Maybe you’ll misfire your gun just as she teleports directly in front of the muzzle.”
“…”
And then she would die. She would bleed out easily, unprotected by fate like she had been every other time he had killed her. Nanba’s example was absurd, but both he and Karamori knew to an uncomfortable degree just how irrational fate could be when it was decided ahead of time.
“I can’t just sit around doing nothing. I want to at least try to prevent this!” Karamori said.
“I know, kid. I know. But I’ve got no power here. I’m sorry. An investigator I fought for the company to hire just defected. My head is on the chopping block here.”
“Ah…”
“Not that I’m the one who suggested we make her an investigator… Life isn’t fair, is it?”
Hearing that calmed Karamori down a little. Nanba had always fought hard for him, often at his own risk. Asking more of him now would place too big of a burden on him.
He squeezed the hem of his shirt.
“Understood. You don’t have to do anything, Mr. Nanba.”
“Huh? Why?”
“Anything I do from here will be of my own accord.”
Canaries were the highest-ranking vanit investigators and had the authority to give orders to lower investigators. He should be able to use that to manage something on his own.
“Huh? I don’t like the sound of that. What’re you planning? Do you have any leads?”
“Nope. I’ve got absolutely nothing to go on. Talk later.”
“Hey, wait—”
Karamori ended the call before Nanba could finish his sentence and threw his portable device at his pillow.
“Um, Karamori? Are you okay?” Fujinaka asked, peering into his face. She was sitting in a nearby folding chair.
“Yeah,” replied Karamori. “Sorry. You shouldn’t have had to see that.”
Fujinaka shook her head. She looked down at her lap and laced her fingers.
“Are you…going after Dad?”
“Yeah. Even if it weren’t for Archive, that man would need to be stopped. He wants to make another vanit book. I don’t know his motives, but I can’t overlook the creation of a new distortion. I won’t let him give birth to any more victims like you and Archive.”
Fujinaka unclasped and clasped her hands.
“But…if you find him and Archive…you’ll kill Archive, right? Wouldn’t it be better for you to not know where he is? If you don’t find my dad, you won’t kill Archive.”
“That’s not how that works. Fate can’t be so easily avoided. You saw what happened when Archive tried to resist hers. She was continually forced back onto fate’s intended path. But that’s exactly why I can’t run from this. I won’t let fate rule my life. I didn’t become a Canary to hide when I don’t like what fate has in store.”
He could decide how he lived his life. Even if the end—and his very actions—were determined, he wouldn’t let fate rob him of his initiative.
“That’s why I’m going after your dad,” he continued. “I can’t let him make another book.”
“But you don’t know where he is…”
“No. But I know how to find him.”
“Huh…?”
Fujinaka’s head snapped up in surprise. Karamori looked at her, his eyes brimming with confidence.
“Fujinaka, you know where he is, don’t you?”
“Huh?!” Fujinaka jumped up from her chair. “What are you saying?! How the heck would I know where he is? Not even Noary has been able to find him.”
“That’s because Noary can’t find him. I’m apparently fated to kill Archive in three hours. Which means I’ll find her in three hours.”
He’d meant it when he said that you couldn’t run from fate. It would find you no matter what.
“I could do absolutely nothing and somehow find out where she is anyway, but I’d rather take action. We can’t rely on Noary’s tracking, which means the only way to find your dad right now is you. You’re the owner of Untitled, and he took it with him.”
“But—”
“And unless I’m imagining things, you’ve been acting like you don’t want me to find Archive.”
“…”
Fujinaka looked down and fell silent for a moment.
“It’s just…” Her voice was barely audible. “If I tell you where they are…you’ll kill Dad, won’t you?”
Tears welled in her eyes. One tear streaked down her face, quickly followed by another.
Karamori’s breath caught in his throat. He saw the fear in her words and realized how divorced his way of thinking had become from ordinary civilians.
Fujinaka was right. He was already operating under the assumption that he would kill Asahi Fujinaka. Without consideration for her feelings as his daughter.
That would be the right decision as a Canary. He had no reason to leave a harmful member of Grave Nest alive. But the fact that he didn’t even give that a second thought was proof of just how much the world he worked in had tainted him.
“I still love Dad, even after what he just did. Is that weird?”
“Of course n—”
“I had a thought. He created me…which means he could have made me so that I would never hate him, no matter what.”