A/N – Finally, I've updated again! Hope everyone had a great Christmas!
This chapter is late due to a pretty major case of writer's block. I know I said I'd have the whole thing done by now, but I guess that was a bit too ambitious. Bear with me, it shouldn't take that much longer to finish now that this chapter's out of the way.
Cheers for all the reviews by the way, I don't think I've ever had so many for one chapter. Your comments really spur me on, so thanks everyone!
Twenty-Six
The last three hours had lasted forever.
Ever since they'd entered this hospital relative's room, time had stopped and left them helplessly in limbo. The only interruption came from the nurse, coming in briefly at hourly intervals to tell them that there was no improvement in her condition as of yet, but that the doctors were doing everything in their power and could make a breakthrough at any time. Her reassurances did nothing to ease the cumulative dread growing in the room. They all feared greatly for their friend and would not be comforted until they saw her back on her feet. Unfortunately, from the details they'd been given, it was unlikely that would be any time soon.
In the meantime all they did was sit in silence. Occasionally the restlessness would overwhelm one of them and they would get up and stride to and fro for a few seconds before sitting back down again. This tension was slow painful torture and even Yukina seemed too clogged up with worry to say anything. It left them as four fretting figures refraining from speaking or acting, as if doing so would prove that this terrible situation was real, not just some hideous nightmare.
At a few minutes past four the nurse came in again, causing both Yurika and Minato to shift forward to the edge of their seats, their eyes bulging in inquiry. The nurse was professionally calm, but Akito could tell from her grim expression that she hadn't come with good news. Fearing the worst, he took Yurika's hands in his own as a pre-emptive comfort.
"How is she?" he asked, realising that someone had to ask the dreaded question.
The nurse didn't reply immediately, but sat down opposite them, a sombre expression on her face. "Mr Tenkawa, your daughter is a very sick girl. She had a large dose of an unidentified drug injected into her body and has fallen into a coma. We've administered several antitoxins but with minimal benefit and she's becoming weaker with every hour that passes." She paused anxiously for a moment before saying, "I'm afraid to say that the chances of a recovery are looking very slim indeed."
Silence followed her words. Four heads bowed in unison as the bleak news sunk in. Of course, they had suspected something like this all along, but to have it confirmed like this crushed the flowers of their spirits into a collection of ruined petals. There was no question about it now. Ruri was dying and there was nothing they could do to save her.
"Isn't there anything else you can do?" asked Minato, her voice cracking with sorrow.
"No, I'm sorry," replied the nurse, shaking her head mournfully. "We've tried everything, but nothing seems to be effective. She'll need nothing less than a miracle to recover I'm afraid."
"No!" screamed Yurika, suddenly vaulting to her feet in a burst of defiant grief. "You can't let her die! There must be something you can do for her!"
"Yurika," murmured Akito, gently coaxing her back down to her seat. The former captain sunk back down, her face crushed up in distress and her body racking with silent sobs. Akito put his arms around her, murmuring soothing words to calm the devastated woman. The nurse looked down on her with the pitying face of someone who had seen this scene too many times before.
"I'm sorry we can't do more to help her, Miss Misumaru, I really am," she said sincerely. With a slight, helpless shrug she added, "If you like, you can come through and see her now."
"Okay, thanks," said Akito. Those simple words were all he could manage with the anguish churning up inside of him.
They all followed the nurse through to the room in which they were treating the young computer operator. Akito closed his eyes as they passed through the door. He wasn't sure if he wanted to see the extent of Ruri's illness. A combined cry of horror from the girls told him he was right. Grimacing in anticipation, he slowly opened his eyes again and gasped in awfulness of what he saw.
Ruri looked even worse than she had before. She looked ghostly, an image of death already. Her body was completely wracked with sickness with her pallid skin clutching her skeleton ever so closely and revealing the shapes of the bones in many places. Most of her face was obscured by the oxygen mask, though her closed eyes could still be seen above her sunken cheeks. Sweat drenched her forehead and hair, making it clear that she was deteriorating in her slumber, not regenerating. Her colour and complexion made her look like some marble statue that had toppled from its base and was now prepared to succumb to nature.
"Ruri," Yurika peeped tearfully. "Oh Ruri," She slowly moved over to the bedside to take the frail, almost skeletal, hand of the dying girl in her own. Ruri didn't respond to her touch in the slightest, just lay there unmoving like the corpse she resembled. Yurika clasped both her hands around it and brought it slowly up to her face, sobbing weakly in anguish.
Akito just stood there stunned and horrified at seeing his friend so close to death. It was unreal, the thought that the Ruri he knew was lying her here before him, her life draining away with every moment that passed. Seeing her like this brought back nightmarish flashbacks from his time on the Nadesico. He'd seen two of his friends die in a hospital bed, both his former fellow pilot Gai Daigoji and Yukina's brother, Tsukumo Shiratori. Would he lose Ruri too, just like he had lost them? How could he go through that again – the horrible instant when the heartbeat first ceased, the awful screams of grief around him, the hellish sensation of looking upon your friend and knowing that they would never talk, smile or laugh again? Those lurid memories still haunted him day and night and if Ruri's death added to them, they would become hideous beyond imagination. The prospect made him light-headed and dizzy.
Beside him Minato was struggling with her own tears, dabbing pathetically at her red-rimmed eyes with a pink handkerchief. Yukina, looking as solemn as he'd ever seen her, spoke in a glum voice.
"She's not going to wake up, is she?"
No-one answered her. There was no good answer to give. The Jovian girl lowered her head, letting red hair fall over her face.
"I hope Big Brother will look after her," she whispered, quiet as a ghost.
With one great sob, Minato pulled the young teenager into an embrace and held her close, offering what little comfort she could give though her own face was completely distorted with grief. Both of them wept in each others arms, while Yurika sat next to Ruri, holding her hand and crying salty rain. Only Akito's face remained dry and passive as he stood as a dumb spectator to the dismal scene before him.
"Ruri,"
* * *
As the long painful hours passed, both the daylight and Ruri's condition faded as one. It was as if the ending of the day was tied in synchronism with the ending of her life, an eerie thought that had made Akito feel more restless and troubled than ever. Mercifully, Ruri survived beyond the sunset but she didn't wake up and by the small hours of the morning, she was all but lost to them.
Akito and the rest of them had stayed at the hospital the whole time in the vain hope their little Ruri-Ruri would make a miracle recovery. She didn't of course – the nurse only ever gave them bad news about her status. It was heart-wrenching to admit, but Akito had lost all hope that Ruri would pull through. He didn't voice his thoughts, but he knew that if the advanced medical facilities here couldn't save her, then it was likely nothing could. All they were doing was counting down the minutes until her inevitable death. Killing time as time killed her.
It was three in the morning now. Yurika had long since fallen asleep on the couch, having spent all her energy on grief. Minato and Yukina were working on the crosswords in every magazine in the relative's room, trying to keep their minds off the present crisis. Akito however, had nothing to take away the trepidation. At the moment he was standing before a vending machine in the corridor, staring vacantly at his disheartened reflection in the glass and pondering his failure to protect his princess.
"I've really let you down this time, haven't I Ruri?"
Yes, he had. He had always assumed that she would be okay by herself. That even without them she would cope. Never, even in his wildest nightmares, had he envisaged that such a terrible fate could possibly befall her. But was that an excuse for not protecting her from it? Not to Akito's mind it wasn't.
He inserted some change into the machine and selected a bar of chocolate. The rings inside whirred around but while the snack shifted, it did not fall. Akito's face fell even further, but he was too depressed to feel frustrated.
"Figures I guess. Nothing's going right today,"
As opened his wallet to root around for more change, he heard a door open down the corridor and footsteps come towards him. At first he didn't move, but when the person approached him he looked up. It was Minato who faced him with a grave expression that matched his own. Both of them nodded to acknowledge each others presence but neither had the spirit to add a smile to the greeting.
"I'm going to take Yukina back to the hotel, she's very tired." Minato said quietly. "Are you going to stay here?"
"Er, yeah," Akito replied, nodding weakly. "Just in case there's any change."
"How about Yurika?"
"Yurika," Akito murmured, considering her girlfriend who was sleeping back in the relative's room. "Well, I don't want to disturb her now that she's asleep. If she wakes up, all she'll do is worry. Besides, she'll probably want to stay in any case."
"Okay, sure," replied Minato with a nod. She made as if to leave, but then turned back to him, as if she'd suddenly decided she had something more to say.
"Akito?"
"Yeah?" he said, miserably.
Her eyes sought his out. "Please don't blame yourself for this. It's not your fault, you know."
It was as if her eyes had penetrated his very thoughts. Akito sighed, bowed his head and replied in a murmur. "You can say that Minato, but I can't help thinking that I could have saved her if I'd just been there a few minutes sooner."
"Don't think like that. There's no point in worrying about 'could haves' when you don't know for sure how else it could have turned out. The fact that you were there gave her a chance at survival. Isn't that enough?"
"No. Not if she dies," Akito muttered darkly.
Refusing to be discouraged, Minato continued. "Look, there was nothing you could have done, even if you had been there sooner. Didn't you say the man had a gun? If things had been different and he'd seen you first, then both you and Yurika might have been killed along with Ruri. It's impossible to say. All we can do is hope and pray to God that she makes a recovery. Fretting about the past can't change it and it certainly won't make things better." She gave him the tiniest smile. "That's probably what Ruri would say."
"Yeah. Yeah, I guess she would." Akito turned back to the vending machine. "I know what you're trying to say Minato, but it's hard to think that way when I see just how sick she is."
"I know, I know. But don't let it get to you."
"I'll try,"
"Please do," she said, touching his arm lightly. "Ruri doesn't need you torturing yourself like this." The edges of her supple lips curved upwards a touch as she continued.
"In any case, you shouldn't hurt while there's still hope that she will live. She will pull through Akito, you'll see. And when she does, you'll feel like an idiot for feeling so guilty now."
"Maybe," murmured Akito. He knew that Minato was trying to comfort him and was grateful to her for trying, but groundless optimism would help neither him nor Ruri.
Finally accepting that her attempts at reassurance were falling on deaf ears, Minato gave up trying. Her face fell slightly as she said, "Well I'd better go. I'll be back as soon as I can. My mobile will be on so call me if there are any developments, okay?"
"Sure," Akito murmured glumly.
Minato gave him a quick hug before walking back down the corridor. Akito watched her go and then turned his dumb gaze back to the vending machine.
"Don't let it get to me? Huh. How can I just ignore the way Ruri is? The fact is she's dying and there's nothing I can do to save her!"
Both those truths were undeniable. He'd blown his chance of saving her earlier today. Now she was beyond his help, and possibly the help of modern medicine as well.
He abruptly turned away from the vending machine and started walking away. However, rather than returning to the relative's room he headed the other way down the corridor towards the room in which they were keeping Ruri. As painful as it was to see her suffering so badly, he knew he should make the most of the little time she had left. Besides, there was no knowing for sure when she would choose to let go and he would be damned if he was going to let her die alone.
As he pushed open the door to the room, he noted how dark it was inside. He saw Ruri's still form lying in the bed, currently the only occupant of the room. At this time, with all treatment possibilities exhausted, there was no need for a doctor to tend to her – a machine next to her bed monitored her condition and would call for assistance if there was any change in her condition. Because of that, it was just her and him alone in the room at present.
"Hi," he said, closing the door behind him very quietly (somewhat pointlessly he realised – what was he trying to do, not wake her?!) and crossing slowly over to the bed. His greeting received no reply, not that he'd expected one. With a sigh, he seated himself in the chair by her bed, rested his hands on his lap and started to fiddle nervously with his fingers. After taking the time to pluck up the necessary courage, he forced himself to look down on his fallen princess.
She was so tiny and pale, lying there on the bed. Without her typical stoic expression and confident posture one could have mistaken her for a normal girl, not the child prodigy that Akito knew her to be. It made her look all the more innocent and defenceless. Akito bit his lip to hold in the tears that threatened to spill. What kind of a sick mind must a man have to want to hurt this darling child?
He suddenly cursed himself for not pulling the trigger on that stranger when he'd had the chance.
Shaking his head clear of murderous thoughts, he concentrated on Ruri again, taking a closer look at the unconscious girl. He'd hoped to see at least some sign of improvement, but if anything, she looked weaker than before. Both her breathing and heartbeat were slow and feeble, while her skin had reached high new levels of paleness. Yet despite her critical condition, her pale childlike beauty was still there on display, standing as one last defiance to the sickness that consumed her. She was an angel lying there – a magnificent white figure with her adorable face serene in the peace of sleep and long shiny white hair serving as her wings behind her. The dim light created a surreal atmosphere, giving the girl and the room around her a hazy dreamlike quality. She was a creature from a fantasy – a pure princess of light surrounded by the boundless darkness.
Akito tried not to let the ambience affect as he spoke. "Er, I thought I'd stop by to see if you were feeling any better," he started, his voice surprisingly calm. "I also figured you could use some company."
Ruri didn't reply or give the slightest indication that she had heard him. Shrugging off the dull disappointment, Akito continued, though he felt a tad foolish speaking to someone who couldn't hear him or talk back.
"You know, I never thought something like this could happen to one of us," he said, holding his head up. "I always thought that we'd all be safe once the war was over. We'd all be able to go out and make real lives for ourselves and not have to worry about dying anymore." He gave a sardonic chuckle. "Guess it didn't quite turn out like that, huh?"
He cast his gaze down on to her again. Noticing that her face was glistening with sweat, he went over to the sink in the corner to wet a flannel. He then came back over to cleanse her cheeks and forehead. Her face was unresponsive to his touch, but a wash did make it look just a tad less sick than before.
"I hate seeing you in such a bad way," he continued, putting the flannel to one side. "And the girls are worried sick about you. I wish you'd just wake up and call us all idiots for thinking you were so ill."
She still didn't respond. Akito, struggling to sustain this one-sided conversation, moved it into deeper territory. He bent over the girl, lines forming on his face as he searched for the words he wanted to say.
"Look, I don't know if you can hear me Ruri, but I just want to apologise," he eventually breathed. He bowed his head in shame as he continued. "I can't believe I let this happen to you. I guess I was just too preoccupied with the whole detention thing. We all thought that you were being looked after and that you would be okay, even if you weren't with us. I mean, on the Nadesico you always seemed so self-assured and confident, it was hard to imagine that you could ever have problems. I guess we just always saw you as the computer operator and hardly ever as the little girl you really are." He covered his face in his hands. "I was such a blind fool! I forced myself to believe that you'd be okay by yourself because there was no way I could help you! Then I was too damn useless to save you when I did have the chance!" He kicked the floor in a sudden surge of self-loathing.
"I can't believe I failed you so badly. I'm meant to be your knight, aren't I? I'm supposed to protect you! Damn, I'm such a worthless idiot!" He bit down hard on his own teeth and drove his fist into his thigh, inflicting a fair amount of pain on his leg. Not that he felt it – by now he was teetering on the edge of total despair. For many seconds, he just sat there trembling, dominated by the foul cocktail of anger and anguish inside of him. The silence had grown long by the time he eventually brought his head up again. Sitting up, he leaned in nearer to the comatose girl.
"Ruri, I promise you. If you pull through I'll never let anyone harm you again. Whether it's as a father, friend, knight or whatever, I'll protect you forever."
Maybe he wanted to enforce to his words or perhaps it was simply that the moment demanded it. Whatever it was, he suddenly found himself moving in closer to Ruri's tranquil face. Taking great care, as if the she were just as delicate as the beauty she held, he brushed back her fringe and kissed her tenderly on her forehead. When he drew back again, his eyes were brimful with tears.
"God, you don't deserve to be lying there, waiting to die. You're just a kid! And you've seen so little of life." Akito found his voice choked as he spoke. "You had your whole childhood stolen from you. You've never had your own life, everything you've ever done has been for someone else's greater purpose. And now you're going to die, before you've ever really lived." His voice broke in sorrow on the final word. Overcome with emotion, he suddenly took up her dead hand and clutched it with both his own, his eyes leaking desperate tears.
"Please wake up Ruri. Wake up and I promise we'll give you the life you've always deserved!" Those were the last words he was able to speak, for despair finally overwhelmed him. Flinging his head down, he wept for friend who had been deprived of not only her future, but of every day of her life. His choked sobs echoed in the dark corners of the room, as frail and wretched as the broken man producing them in the chair beside the bed.
As great as Akito's grief was, it did nothing to revive her. It would take more than yearning words to drag her out this coma. Ruri was too far gone to hear or respond to anything, save a call from the heavens above. And so, while Akito wept, the pale prodigy just slept on, oblivious to his anguish and the torment he was putting himself through. The blank response was befitting, not only to Ruri's normal demeanour, but to the total absence of hope that hung in the air of the room.
Given the extent of Akito's sorrow, it wasn't surprising that he hadn't realised he had been watched the whole time by a tall figure standing in the doorway. The shadowy visitor kept her secrecy throughout, viewing the scene with interest, and just a touch of pity. She observed Akito a few moments longer, one contemplative finger on her chin, before revealing herself by speaking.
"A sleeping princess. Perhaps she'll awaken to a kiss from her Prince Charming."
Breaking out of his misery Akito vaulted around at the voice and gasped at who he saw standing there.
"Miss Fressange!?"
"The very same," replied the blonde scientist, walking into the room with her hands in her pockets. "It would appear that the cavalry has finally arrived."
A/N – The moment of truth is nigh...
I know that according to what I said last time there should only be one chapter left, but I've had a bit of a rethink and decided that there's going to be a mini chapter before the final chapter. That one should be up soon, so keep an eye out for it.
All the best for the 2003!
