When she properly woke up, there was no sign of Yusei and Akiza had enough caffeine withdrawal to send a roomful of addicts to the nearest vending machine. Extensive travel had a way of messing with her body clock by just an hour or two. It was irritating but nothing that couldn't be fixed with regular high doses of caffeine. As well as being the perfect shoulder to cry herself to sleep on, Yusei also held the forethought to leave a mug ready on the side. Beside some curious sniffing from the tiny cat that roamed the house, it was exactly as he had left it. It had also been several hours since he left it and the persistent ticking of a clock on the shelf quietly reminded her of the soft-appointment she had coming that afternoon. After-noon being right-now. It was nearing one in the afternoon and she was still dressed only in what she had worn to bed the night before. Constant nightmares and waking up could do that to a person.
Not eager to lose possibly her only chance at getting a foot in the door in the world of medicine, she set the kettle to boil and lunged for the nearest shower. Only two issues arose in her plan: Hoshi decided that damp ankles made the best of toys until she bore the full power of the showerhead. Problem two was less easily dealt with. By the time she had managed to wrap herself in a fresh towel, the shrill ringing of her mobile had been sounding for more than a few seconds.
"Hello?"
"Dr Izinski?" Clipped tones hushed politely down the line.
"Not a doctor but yes."
"Your car is waiting outside." Peering through the glass in the living room, she could just about make out a faded grey convertible. It was a drab car, not one suited to the bustle of politicians and currying favour but one for the humdrum transport of a person from one place to another.
"Can you give me a few minutes to ge- finish getting ready?" A hand waved from out of one window. Taking the motion as acceptance, she sprinted back into her room and pulled out the only remaining professional outfit she had. A black silk shirt with matching stockings and an ankle-length skirt. Her shoes, though a shade of clashing red, were the only appropriate form of footwear to any sort of interview and she hoped they would be dismissed as a favourite good-luck charm. Shaking what moisture she could from her hair, Akiza ran a thick comb through the tangled mess left behind and hobbled down the stairs as quickly as she could with one hand trying to cram her shoes on.
Anxious not to make herself any later, she performed the mundane and possibly impolite action of letting herself into the car. In a way, the car was a disappointment. It lacked any sort of fawning attempt to win her over. From another angle, she found it quiet appealing. Ogino – the ever-so familiar but still unknown Ogino – obviously didn't want to try and win her over with flashy shows of expensive gifts.
"Shall we go?" She had been so caught up with examining the bleak interior that she hadn't put any thought to the driver sitting beside her. The dress sense of the woman sitting in the driving seat was almost the exact same fabric as the seats they were sitting on and drab brown hair was swept back in a tidy bun.
"Yes, it's." She reached for the list of instructions in the small purse over one shoulder but
"I know where we're going." It appeared that Ogino still believed in redundancy. Still believed? Caught off-guard but the slight release of information from her memory, Akiza almost missed the car joining the main roadways. "I'm Tabitha."
"Akiza Izinski." She moved to shake a hand but both palms remained rigorously attached to the steering wheel in the legally advised position. "But I'm guessing you knew that." Looking around at the drab interior again, she tried to surreptitiously wring more water from her hair.
"There's a hair dryer in the glove box." Little went by the driver as one eye remained firmly fixed on the road ahead. "It's under the user manual." A slight kick of speed stalled the search as Tabitha sped up slightly to get past a sign without Akiza noticing it whilst looking for the compact dryer.
"Nice car." A look of dry amusement filtered between the drying strands of hair.
"Don't be fooled, it gets the job done. Nobody tends to look twice at a breaking down piece of junk." Notes of biter memories hung in her words. "My other body is a total dreams. Growls like a tiger, runs like a dream and steers like a gazelle." Uncertain how to respond to such animalistic imagery, Akiza fell silent as she concentrated on drying her hair.
Before Akiza knew it, they were pulling to a halt in one of the more up-scale parts of the city with soaring buildings all around. Judging mainly from the steam starting to rise from beneath the bonnet, it appeared that something had gone wrong with the engine beneath. "It looks like you will have to walk some of the way." Leaning over, she pushed up Akiza's door and pointed to the buildings beside the road. "Go between those two, turn left, right and it's the second main entrance on your right. You might want to run, you're an hour late as it is." Mumbling some quick thanks Akiza hurried down the indicated paths.
Several minutes of quick running later, she fairly stumbled to a halt outside the imposing building. It had been concealed from her drop-off but it was as big as the KaibaCorp Stadium, if not bigger and stood almost twenty stories high. From what she could see, it was a single structure purpose build to house any number of rooms inside. Whatever it was, heavy security was evident. Only a few moments after she arrived, a thickly-padded guard stepped through the main doors and took up stance outside. Staring down the dangerous glare, Akiza met it with cool detachment. Her illusion of control was only marred by the slight sweat she had built up on the run over. Luckily, she didn't have to wait long.
"Here to see Dr Ogino?" A stumpy lady with almost black eyes came puffing up to her with flush spreading along her cheeks.
"You may want to catch your breath a bit first." Stoically waving aside the concern for her health, the diminutive woman began rifling through her pockets for something.
"It's fine." Digging a laminated card from the innards of her lab coat, she threw it about her next. "I'm a doctor." Flashing a smile, she took several deep breaths until the edge had gone from her wheezing. "Something we have in common." As the plastic rectangle spun to a halt, Akiza finally read the name printed beside the picture.
"Dr K Ogino? As in Keiko Ogino?" Straightening up as best she could with the painful stitched running down the centre of her chest, Ogino tried to project an air of authority and respect. "Former Minister of Health Keiko Ogino?" It all came back to her in a rush.
Her father had mentioned to Akiza that Minister Katō owed him a favour for helping to smooth the transition because Hideo Izinski had dealt with Ogino enough to know how not to set her off. Former Minister Ogino had earned herself a reputation for being prickly and talking her mind. It had not been bad enough to be any reason for dismissal but her prickly personality had not done her any favours in making friends. But that irate politicians was a far cry from the almost happy person before her.
"That was a long time ago." Enough strands of white and grey hair indicated that many things were a long time ago for the ageing doctor. "I never did have the temperament for politics. Too many snide comments and corner-cutting deals." If spitting in memory of past battles was still socially accepted, she would have gobbed all over the sidewalk. "Anyway, I'm sorry if you've been waiting long. There was a meeting I couldn't avoid. Seeing as you're I take it you're interested in the job." Although it had sounded a tad more basic than most of her research, any medical ground would have been welcome right then. "Come with me, there's something I need to show you first. Oh," Rifling through her pockets, Ogino withdrew a crumpled piece of paper. "First, you need to sign this non-disclosure. Just a gag order for anything you see today."
"Sounds easy enough." Scribbling her signature with the proffered pen, Akiza suddenly felt slightly unsure of her decision as an explosion sounded in the distance. "What was that?"
Peering in the direction of the sound, Ogino gave a calculated shrug. "Probably another fuel miscalculation. We usually get two or three a month in the propulsion labs. This way." Ignoring the first wisps of grey smoke, she lead Akiza into the squat grey building, pressing the card around her neck to a pad beside the door as she went. Stencilled into the walls inside were several frightening words 'Biological Pathogen Testing'.
"What are they working on here?" Scorch marks were still here and there along the wall – with some even framed and noted – as dozens of people in lab coats flocked through the hallway.
"Everything from space-borne viruses to the common cold." Green muck began bubbling up against a window as they walked past. "Nothing to worry about just yet." Pressing her card to the panel beside the lift, Ogino summoned a cubicle. "If you chose to work her, you'll be starting off with basic medical duties. Changing bandages, treating minor abrasions." Stepping into the newly arrived elevator, she hit the button for one of the higher floors. "But you'll need to know about the big stuff ahead of time." It was worrying to consider what 'big stuff' could mean after a rocket explosion outside had been treated as utterly normal. Fortunately – or unfortunately – Akiza didn't have to consider for long.
Moments later, the lift doors opened onto a hallway basked in red lights and a softly blaring klaxon. Thick transparent panels had been erected to make a sort of inner corridor to the main one. "Is it safe to be in here?" Not answering the question, Ogino simply walked down the hallway and left the decision to follow solely up to her.
"Safety is relative." Following the path of the thick shield, they took a winding route a short way deeper into the building. "You can go decades without going on an aeroplane but nothing will stop one dropping out of the sky and killing you anyway." Finally reaching the end of the inner-corridor, she pulled to a halt outside a lab where people were shambling about inside. They all appeared to be on the brink of collapse and one was already slumped over a table. "That's the sort of problem this lot are facing."
"Is this one of those psychological tests? Trolley and the victims sort of deal?" Such tests were so prevalent in the business world that some psychologists were starting to grow concerned that they were actually creating enough stress to skew the results by simply expecting the examination to go poorly.
"Not this time. There was a containment breach three days ago. Somebody dropped the wrong vial and unleashed a swarm of flesh-eating bacteria." As Ogino said the words, the room on the other side of the glass shifted slightly. Adjusting her eyes to the tinted light, Akiza suddenly saw through the thick mask of the sleeping scientist to the skeleton within. What she assumed had been baggy clothing was actually just draped loose on the gaunt frames inside. As the figures continued to stumble about, it was clear that all had given up hope and were simply going through the motions of finding a cure. "If you do choose to work here, you have to understand that you can't save everyone. Those people in there can't even have a decent burial. This entire building is going to be cleaned down to the smallest cell and then burnt to the ground." Wrenching her eyes from the pitying display of death and hubris inside the room, Akiza saw Ogino had an unshed tear in each eye. "If you chose to work here, you can move on to almost any job you chose within a few months. But you have to accept that you can't save everyone. There might come a time when you can only stand and watch." Feeling a surge of compassion, Akiza hugged the sturdy woman standing beside her.
"I don't think that I will ever accept that. I plan on saving everybody who needs help." A stiffening of the shoulders announced that Ogino was done with their physical contact and they both stepped back.
"Okay then." Rapping her knuckles on the glass, she made the shambling figures inside suddenly jump in a flapping display of loose plastic. "Shows over guys, get back to work." The muted alarm cut out completely and white light returned to the lab inside. "And somebody stick Fred back in the closet." A sweaty bundle of hair dragged the cover from the skeleton. Squeaks of horror actually squeezed from Akiza as the skull rolled across the floor. It was that tiny movement that finally hit the truth home – when she saw that the jaw was wired to the cranium.
"So it was a test then." Icicles dripped from her every word. Escaped polar bears would have frozen to death in the chill tone.
"Not exactly." Steering the conversation and her guest back to the secured lift, Ogino waved her badge past the scanner. "What I told you was based on fact. Another facility did suffer a containment breach some years ago. Most of the details have been classified and the experiment was almost entirely redacted." Stepping in, she waited for Akiza to join her and the doors to close before continuing. "Three men were exposed to an unknown element. Something about their exposure artificially accelerated their ageing process. When they realised what had happened, they sealed themselves in a lab in hopes of a cure." Looking Akiza dead in the eye, she delivered the final fact that had become the basis for the earlier fiction. "They didn't find one in time. When the lab was finally opened, it almost destroyed a small town nearby. Luckily, a cure was developed but what remained of their work was lost." Without either of them touching a button, the cubicle began moving. "That's why we put on these performances. If you want a job at saving people, leave now. If you want a job saving lives, stay a little longer." A slight shudder stopped Akiza before she could answer, the brakes slowing the lift at the lowest floor.
As the lift stopped, a shabbily dressed man lurched in from the dimly lit hallway beyond. He had the sort of look that thousands of office workers the world over wore – failed smart-casual. In this case, he had trousers that looked several years out of date, a belt faded and scratched so many times that it was held together with sheer willpower and a shirt that had been ironed and tucked precisely but crumpled at the first sign of any movement. Hung loosely over his right arm was a dusty labcoat that sported one too many stitches to be called intact and a sleeve too few to be called practical.
"Dr Ogino, I... Oh." A polite English tone wove through his words as he made to step out of the elevator. Seeing Akiza, he paused in the pre-movement. "Giving the grand tour, I see." Suddenly bashful, he avoided making direct eye-contact with either of them. "It is nothing that cannot wait." Tapping the close button, he tried his best to leave as quickly as possible.
"Hold on, we'll ride with you." Following her new boss into a corner of the steel box, Akiza did her best to ignore the tingling feelings coming from her intuition. Lost in her thoughts, she almost didn't hear Ogino talking to her as the shaking figure took up stance right beside the buttons and the lift doors. "If you're willing to start tomorrow, we can get you through training and orientation by the weekend and have you on payroll from next week." Something was off about the wrinkled shirt in front of her. It was damp and dirty but not as if he had been sweating. It looked as if it had been coated in dust and then instantly soaked with warm water. Before touching the button, the hidden right hand had twitched slightly as if it was the dominant hand and one leg was taking most of the weight.
"Excuse me," Quite possibly cutting off her career once more, she tapped the shoulder just before her. "What happened to your shirt?" Muscles stiffened where they shouldn't have as the stark white face peeked out the corner of its vision.
"A pipe burst during maintenance. It should not take too long to fix." Each word was carefully precise and polite but sounded unnaturally hurried as they came.
"What's that noise?" Ogino had also noticed something wrong, casting panicked eyes to the ceiling. It appeared the retired doctor disliked small spaces filled with the noise of dripping liquids.
"I believe it is me." Resting his right shoulder on the cold metal, a look of extreme fatigue dragged claws across the British face. "Pay it no mind."
"What's wrong with your leg?" Akiza had finally put all the pieces together. Why the jacket had carefully concealed much of his legs and not moved, his reluctance to talk and that hurried demeanour. Why he was leaning so heavily against the wall and looking whiter than freshly blown snow.
"Nothing important. I will... rest and you can... continue with your... tour." Increasingly large gaps appeared in his sentence before the Englishman started slowly pitching backwards. By the time Akiza managed to properly react, he had gained enough velocity to slip through her grip and bang his head on the handrail before landing on the floor. Momentarily unnoticed was the jacket. As its owner had fallen, so had the coat revealed the grimy metal shard embedded deeply in the right leg.
"Hey, can you hear me?" As Akiza tried to keep their patient awake, Ogino smashed in the fragile window guarding a medical box. "What is this, another test?" Cutting open around the wound, the doctor exposed a makeshift bandage of tissue and tie that had been a feeble attempt to keep the wound intact.
"Not this time." Sensing the look of suspicion, she spared a precious moment to return the gaze. "All I do is fake a containment breach and ask people if they can take losing a few patients. Stabbing people is – surprisingly – beyond my authority." Thankfully, a few hearty taps to the face were enough to rouse the man once more.
"No, you have to continue the tour." Shock had clearly set in and denied the man the ability to recognise how badly he had been wounded. "Do not waste your time on me."
Forcing him back down with one hand, Akiza tried her best to keep a calm and level voice. "There's a piece of metal in your leg. Moving it could puncture an artery so you need to stay still." Usually patients started tearing up at the point but the confused blue eyes just stared up at her from over a short-trimmed beard. "Can you tell me what happened?"
"There was a pressure build-up in a pipe." Pained hisses interrupted as Ogino applied strong antiseptics to the cut. "I had to check the interface to identify the reason. It spiked," A flicker of a smile passed across his face at the unintentional pun. At least, she hoped it was unintentional. "And then exploded. I tried to stabilise the wound as best I could but I am not a doctor." Speaking urgently into her earpiece, it appeared that Ogino was giving directions to an emergency medical team to meet them on the ground floor.
"Why did you come looking for Dr Ogino? Why not simply call a medic to where you were?" Curls bopped to and fro as he shook his head.
"I did not have any comms with me. The readout showed me that Ogino had just entered this building and I was already near the basement." Blood loss was making it harder for him to stay awake yet he was forcing his dimming mind to construct clear sentences. "It was the quickest way to get help." Then his eyes fluttered shut. When they finally reached the ground floor thirty seconds later, a fully staffed medical team were waiting with a gurney and ears eager to absorb any information they could about the new patient. Barely four minutes after encountering the man in the lift, Akiza watched as he was wheeled away in a flurry of shouting medics and beeping equipment.
"You kept a tight head in there." Even with blood coating her hands and most of the notes she had taken that day now useless, Ogino seemed to be in a good mood. "Kept him calm, explained what was happening." She sniffed and wipe her hands dry on the least bloody portion of her jacket. "Shame about dropping him. You'll have to watch out for that." Looking up and down the formerly pristine outfit Akiza wore, Ogino made a snap decision. Unlike the sturdy scrubs she was walking around in, the expensive jacket and dress were not designed to wash blood stains from easily. "Here," Draping the moderately less bloody lab coat about the taller lady, she dragged Akiza down the maze of corridors.
Again, the walls had only a few framed scorch marks and small clusters of scientists were scurrying around with clipboards and datapads. Only a few of the quicker eyes managed to catch the bloodstains but habitually dismissed them out of turn. A few broken bones and ruptured spleens were the day-to-day in advancing science. There was no cause for even the briefest concern with the chief medical officer steering Akiza by one befuddled shoulder. "Dr Ogino." A bubbly little bundle of energy blurred to their side. "Oh no, what happened?" Another bout of familiarity washed over her as Akiza struggled to place the young lady hurrying to keep pace with them on the other side of Ogino.
"Some idiot caught pipe-shrapnel in his leg. Akiza helped me to stabilise him until the medics could arrive." Utter adoration seemed to flow cloyingly from behind the glasses of the young woman. "Can you get her some clothes whilst I fill out some paperwork? It shouldn't take too long." Beginnings of a question were cut short as Ogino leapt on ahead without pause. An unspoken look passed between the pair as Ogino stepped back into the foyer area with a phone appearing in one hand.
"Come on." Dragging her by one hand, the bubbly bundle of energy dragged her down the corridor to a small locker-room. "Here," Bumping the mechanism of a hatch midway down the first row, she grabbed a set of folded scrubs from inside. "It's not much but they should fit." Reaching further in, she pulled out a set of wet wipes for Akiza to clean her hands with and a large paper bag for her bloodied clothes.
"Thank you." Still reeling over the display of efficiency, Akiza struggled to place the young woman. "I'm sorry, have we met? I feel like I know you from somewhere." Politely turning her back, the young woman gave her some privacy as Akiza began changing clothes.
"It was a few years ago. To be honest, I didn't expect you to remember me at all. The sky was falling down after all." Akiza paused in the act of pulling her top over her head. "You even visited me in hosptial after.
"Haruka?" With a squeal, the two ladies gave a tight embrace that nine-tenths of men would pay to see. "What are you doing here?"
"I got onto a medical scholarship program." Tugging down the crumpled fabric down her midriff, Akiza examined the young girl standing before her. It had been some years since the two had been face-to-face so only a few traces remained from the old days. A certain wide-eyed amazement at everything, glasses slightly too large to be practical but held in place with a piece of worn elastic. "Ogino helped set up a bunch of them when she first got here. She let me start by observing how she went about her day before letting me start helping with the paperwork. Then there was an accident inone of the labs and I had to fetchall the bandages and antisepticscreams sothat nobodywouldbeseriouslyhurtinthelongterm." Before the syllables could be crushed from the sentences altogether, Akiza managed to place a calming hand on each shoulder and use that powerful smile she had learnt from Yusei.
"Haruka, when I get this job, we can spend days talking about everything." Another tight hug emphasised that literal days might be spent talking. "Can you tell me some more about it? All I know so far is that I'll be doing standard nurse duties."
"Don't be silly." Excited giggles burst from her mouth in a wave of amusement.
"Well, then what?" Looking up in the middle of folding her skirt into a paper bag let her see the suddenly nervous look on Haruka's face.
"Dr Ogino can tell you the rest. She's in charge after all." For somebody who had just been unable to squeeze any more words in her sentences, Haruka was suddenly being incredibly evasive. "Oh but she asked me to sponsor you! That's kind of fun." A look of nervous indecision crossed her face.
"Sponsor for what?" Tugging the scrubs into place, Akiza was pleased by how comfortable they were. It was unusual to feel this happy with work clothes but they had all the emotional weight of a cosy jumper.
"The job." Eager to move events ahead, Haruka practically skipped back out the door. "Dr Ogino couldn't do it because that would be really in appropriate so I said I really wanted to and she let me before," Clamping a controlling hand on one shoulder Ogino managed to stop the spilling of any crucial information.
"A couple of guys in Resources owed me favours." Steely glints in her eyes indicated that those favours might have been only minutes old at time of asking. "If you want the job, it's yours. No muss, no fuss, no distractions." A look passed between the two employees in the hallway and the potential employee would have been blind to miss it.
"Firstly," Folding her coat over crossed arms, she made a point of facing the bloodstains towards Ogino. "Tell me what's really going on. Nobody gets a job this quick without ulterior motives." Ogino swallowed as Haruka squeaked enough morse code to break their cover ten times over.
"Under normal circumstances, I would play dumb but we don't have time." Dropping her phone into one pocket, she pulled out a datapad instead. "You're a good doctor Izinski. Epps said you were possibly the best student he has ever met and nobody who knew you at university could say a bad word. Well, except one guy but he was a weasel." From the way she spoke, Akiza could guess who the weasel was. "Whatever happened to your records, I know you're a great doctor. If you sign, here and now," Turning on the screen, she scrolled to the bottom of the page. Datapads could technically accept input but writing in the air was uncomfortable for many people. "You get a good job, with good people that you can back out of any any time. If you wait longer than," Tipping her watch, she checked the seconds ticking away. "Two minutes, somebody is going to get here who can make it all go away."
Turning to Haruka, Akiza simply stared. Ogino was a seasoned veteran when it came to the intricate mazes of politics and deceit. By contrast, Haruka poured out her heart and soul to everyone who cross her path. It took only a few seconds before the tears started welling up and she began nodding to confirm everything as true.
"Why me?" Facing Ogino once more, she tried to figure out the most pressing question. "Why not another doctor – one already allowed to practice medicine?" Shuffling her feet slightly, Ogino continued to hold out the datapad between them.
"I wanted somebody unafraid of authority. An unknown factor but a damn reliable one. You fit the bill." It wasn't the truth, not the whole truth. There was something else, something missing. But there was only a few seconds left until it was all snatched away again. If it had to go again, it would be Akiza's choice. Raising a finger, she scribbled a light copy of her signature into the document moments before it was hastily shoved back into an inside pocket.
"Ogino!"
With those rushes of insight that come right before (or after) a catastrophic mistake, Akiza managed to put all the pieces together. Why the paperwork had gone through so quickly, Haruka's sponsorship and their shared reluctance to give a solid explanation of what the job would entail. It also explained why Yusei was standing in the outside doorway with a face as close to fury as he could get.
"Akiza." It was maybe the greatest example of abbreviation-isms ever. In that one word, it contained several questions. Questions like 'What are you doing here?',
'Why are you wearing those scrubs?',
'Is that blood on your coat?',
'Why is there blood on your coat?',
'Did you forget about the jail-time for practising medicine in Japan?' and the inevitable,
'Can we pretend that I don't know you for what I have to do?'
All these and more went in to the "Ogino" he directed at the dumpy woman who suddenly looked like a cornered elephant. "I just received a very interesting message from human resources." Held out in one hand was the pale blue screen of a datapad. "They wanted to know who they were meant to put down as the emergency contact for Akiza here." Sensing a spectacle in the offing, scientists in the hallway casually began drifting over to do what scientists do best – observe every tiny detail. "They thought it might have been me and were concerned about a conflict of interests. As I told them, I was very interested to hear about Akiza applying for a job." Taking the screen, Ogino tried to put on a face of open and honest ignorance. Sadly, doctors aren't trained in secretive faces, only reassuring ones.
"Well, there must be some mistake." Under the guise of scrolling through the screen, she 'accidentally' filled in several more boxes. "Ah, here it is." Holding up the screen, she dropped 'open and honest' for 'deceitful smile'. "See? I just put Haruka's name in the wrong box." A flicker of irritation actually twitched one cheek at the impetuous comment. At that point, the observing scientists did what they always do – call in more scientists for outside opinions.
"I think there has been some miscommunication." Lowering his voice, he tried to maintain a professional outward appearance. "Akiza isn't here to apply for a job. Come to that, she isn't allowed to practice medicine in Japan right now." Whilst she had not forgotten the events of the day before, they had been far from Akiza's mind during the frantic rush to stabilise the dying patient in the elevator. Somehow, she doubted the government would be understanding.
"In case you forgot," Thrusting up the datapad to his face, Ogino marshalled all her limited height to meet him. "You told me to hurry and find Richardson's replacement. In your own words," She tapped the screen and held it close enough to squish his nose slightly as several words highlighted themselves. "'Make sure they're good enough to deal with all the crazy and brilliant enough to keep ahead of these idiots'." With the ball – and blame – now fully in his court, Yusei went cross-eyed trying to read the tiny print in front of his eyes.
"See, when I said 'idiots'" Closing one eye to better read the email, "I meant 'highly valued and respected' members of staff." Surly grunts and angry murmurs sounded around as they all planned various methods of revenge. "Beside, I suggested promoting one of your other doctors to the post. Haruka has shown herself to be," A single look at the utterly unserious nurse cast aside professionalisms. "Fully competent." A few first stragglers started drifting from the crowd as the tension levels slowly began dropping back down. It was clear that any potential drama seemed doomed to fizzle out.
"I'm still working on my degree." Maintaining her status as quiet voice of reason, Haruka was just as quietly ignored by the three louder voices of pride, stubborn pride and overwhelming smugness. It wasn't clear which was which most of the time.
"Akiza has enough experience." Finally lowering the tablet, Ogino glared with granite eyes at her boss.
"Akiza isn't cleared to practice medicine in Japan." Out came the counter with plenty of guilt and shame yet forced by iron-cold logic through clenched teeth.
"Akiza technically only needs to be first-aid trained. Everything else is optional." Haruka wisely decided to stop helping as Yusei turned his overly-patient stare on her. "And the SRC provides first-aid training to any potential or successful applicant."
"Is Akiza allowed a vote?" Such onlookers as had begun filtering away found themselves dragged back by what in science is known as 'potential imminent social micro-revolution'. It was from the sort of science that gave the rest a bad name. Not geology, the other one. 'Social sciences'. Unfortunate origins aside, it was this psychological phenomenon that drew most of the lower floors into the tiny hallway.
Holding out an imperious hand, Yusei waited patiently until Ogino lowered the datapad into his scarred and worn palm. "Standard non-disclosure?" A curt nod came from his chief medical officer. "Richardson's posting?" Another nod. "Full benefits package?" Confused now but another nod came from Ogino. Those that knew Yusei longest – and Akiza had known him for many years now – would recognise that hidden twinkle of an inward laugh gleaming in one eye. Turning to her with that 'gotcha' expression that so readily adorned police officers around the world, he scrolled to the picture of her signature, freshly inscribed on the digital document. "Your signature?" Throwing across the tablet, Akiza admired her own penship for a moment. "Your vote." Leaning over the top, he scrolled far enough to let her fill in the gaps. "Your contract."
A long silence reigned. Eyes flickered from the contract to Ogino glaring at Yusei, Yusei glaring at Ogino and Akiza roving her eyes between both scientists and her unforeseen contract. "Exactly what job did you just give me?" Two quiet chuckles came from the back of the crowd. It appeared that at least one person was enjoying the spectacle.
"Not one that she was qualified to give." Only Akiza could see the laughters in his eyes but it was in stark contrast to the cold game face he put on.
"Actually," Stretching up to Yusei's height wasn't much of an option. Instead, the diminutive woman did what stocky people the world over do to intimidate – she stepped uncomfortably close. "Any and all medical and medical personal decisions have to be made – or passed – by the chief medical officer. And anything you don't like about it," She placed a single digit carefully in the centre of his chest. "Has to be reported to human resources." Leaning more weight than was necessary on the finger, she lent some more to her next point. "There are about fifty forms you can start filling out. On paper." In the age of digital progression, in possibly the most advanced institution on the planet, such an idea was nearing blasphemy and gasps actually sounded.
Squatting just enough to make a slight mockery of her closeness, Yusei pressed his face close enough to count the blackheads around her nose. "How does deputy medical director strike you?" Ruffles of hair were delicately ignored by Ogino as he turned his head. "Akiza?" All eyes turned to the fuming woman as Ogino leant back to watch. After struggling between her emotional desire to smack the humorous gleam from his eye and the proud instinct to simply walk away, she gave a single nod. "Dr Izinski, welcome to the New Domino Scientific Research Centre. Try and wear sensible shoes from now on." Before anybody could refocus, Yusei pecked Ogino familiarly on the cheek and melted into the crowd.
In the stunned silence that followed, another short bout of chuckles sounded from the end of the hallway.
