“What’s happening? What’s all that noise?” said Kaguya.
“It’s probably just spillover,” Mari told her. “The other cafeteria must be full.”
The two of them immediately lost interest. For some reason, however, Sakura looked surprised.
“Strange. I didn’t expect him to come all this way.”
Him? Him, who?
But Kaguya and Mari didn’t have to wonder for long.
A young man soon emerged from the crowd. He was wearing a distinctive silver cross-shaped earring.
His eyes were dark and gray like the night, with a hidden spark of dancing fire, while his glossy hair was like silver ice. The silver cross earring in his left ear sparkled brightly, the one element in his appearance that seemed somehow out of place.
Oh, it’s that guy from the video, Kaguya thought disinterestedly.
His features, which had previously been obscured by poor image resolution, were handsome. Even to someone like Kaguya, who was barely interested in people.
Sakura grinned. “Azuma, you came, after all! We should have just traveled together!”
“Azuma…?!” Mari’s eyes went wide at the name.
Come to think of it, Mari did mention that this person was famous. Kaguya had forgotten about that, though. She had a habit of immediately dismissing any information that she didn’t consider relevant.
“Hold on a second! Does that mean that you’re transferring into that unit, Lieutenant?” Mari asked Kaguya.
“What unit?”
“You could at least try to take some interest in the people around you! Didn’t you hear what she said? That’s the Azuma—”
The young man named Azuma finally reached Kaguya’s table.
From up close, his expression was plain to read. He had a mature air about him, with an impression of general calmness, but there was something else smoldering beneath the surface. His eyes, in particular, were striking; he looked displeased.
Azuma completely ignored Kaguya. “Sakura, what are you doing here?” he asked.
“I came to inform the lieutenant of the transfer. I should be asking you the same question, though. You never come to the labs.”
“I came to tell her about the transfer, too.”
The corner of Azuma’s lip twisted up into a callous sneer. He clearly didn’t seem to think much of Kaguya.
“Sorry, but how about you just forget about this whole transfer, okay?” His tone of voice, in contrast to his facial expression, was dispassionate to the point of coldness. “My unit is already full, and I don’t see what use someone from the labs will be. You’ll just be in the way.”
“Excuse me…?!”
Kaguya was taken off guard by how disagreeable he was being. She found herself growing indignant, despite herself.
Azuma stared at her, hard. For a moment—his eyes seemed to contort in revulsion. Yes, almost as if he had just stumbled upon a spider lurking amid a bed of flowers.
Kaguya began to lose her temper under this young man’s nasty gaze.
“I’m sorry, but if you don’t mind me saying—”
“Why?”
Kaguya was surprised by the abrupt and hostile question.
“Why…what?”
“Why the hell are you here?”
Why the hell? He was making quite an impression.
“Me?! I’ve been here for research! Why are you here?! And who are you to speak to me like that when we’ve only just—?”
“Now, now.” Sakura almost sounded like she was trying to placate a child. “She’s right, though, Azuma. Is that any way to talk to someone who’s about to join our ranks…?”
“Don’t worry. I have no plans of joining anything he’s a part of,” said Kaguya, sulking as she glared at Azuma out of the corner of her eye.
Azuma had finally grown quiet.
“Azuma, I know how much you hate Technical, but you really went too far just now. That’s not like you.”
“…I’m sorry,” Azuma muttered quietly.
Sakura made no attempt to conceal her sigh. “You see, Lieutenant? Azuma’s not so bad deep down, I promise.”
“…He could be a saint deep down, but he’s got a rotten attitude.”
Kaguya stood up to confront Azuma. He was at least a head taller than she was, but she continued to glare up at him defiantly.
“Why ‘the hell’ am I here? Do you have no shame, saying a thing like that to a complete stranger?”
“…”
Kaguya’s sophisticated violet eyes met Captain Azuma’s smoldering gray ones.
They continued to glare at each other for several seconds. A complicated swirl of emotions surfaced in Azuma’s eyes.
“W-wait a second!” Mari suddenly sprang to her feet, her chair clattering behind her. “Why is your unit enlisting people…? And from Technical, of all places?! Isn’t your unit the one that—?”
“Mari, not now,” Kaguya told her.
Kaguya wasn’t sure what Mari was about to say, but she had something she wanted to get off her own chest first.
“You all seem to have arranged things very nicely on your own, but this is the first I’m hearing of this. I don’t know anything about a transfer…”
Kaguya wasn’t about to just let herself be sent away. Her work was far too important.
“Besides, I’m not interested in transferring. I already have something important I need to do here at Technical.”
“Something important?” said Azuma, a hard glint in his eyes. “More important than following orders?”
“Yes. Much more important.”
Kaguya didn’t have much time left. In a few years, maybe less, she would no longer be able to see heroes. She wasn’t about to let some silly transfer get in her way.
“I see. Are you aware, though, that your director has already given approval?” Azuma asked, his tone getting snippy.
Kaguya knit her eyebrows. “She did what…? When?”
“When the notice came through, obviously. ‘You can have Lieutenant Shinohara,’ was, I believe, her exact reply.”
Kaguya and Mari made eye contact. Naturally, Mari hadn’t heard about the director’s approval, either.
The director was a genius. She had demonstrated that heroes were originally human, and she was now working on developing more effective weapons against them. Unfortunately, she paid little attention to anything outside her own interests. With two whole weeks, though, she might have remembered to at least mention the transfer of one of her subordinate officers.