Gravity Fluctuation (1)
"Hyun-woo, do you have a moment?"
As soon as day broke, Nadia came looking for me. She was holding a bread roll from the store in her hand.
"Of course I do."
I nodded without hesitation—I'd been stretching right after waking up anyway. And, perfectly timed, I was hungry.
When I motioned for her to come in, Nadia grinned bashfully and hopped inside. Entering the tent always required a jump. Carry came in too, with the bread stacked on a box like a room service cart.
"Celestia should eat with us. I brought plenty."
"Ah, thanks."
Surprisingly, Nadia had thought to include Celestia. Normally, she only cared for me and wouldn't have paid the slightest attention to anyone else.
'Good for you, Nadia.'
Go conquer everyone with your fluffiness. Chewing on the bread Nadia brought as a substitute for breakfast, my mind wandered to such silly thoughts.
I quenched my throat now and then with the artificially coffee-scented water. As the calories soaked in, I could feel my depleted body slowly regaining strength.
Nadia sat with me while we ate, but she only picked at her food, seemingly disinterested. No, it wasn't that she had no appetite—her mind was on something else. Likely, it had to do with a conversation we hadn't had yet because I'd been so deeply asleep.
"Listen as you eat, Hyun-woo. Today— ...huh?"
"Why'd you stop in the middle?"
"Um..."
Nadia had begun to say something, but then she suddenly furrowed her brow. She got up and leaned her torso toward me.
She reached toward my neck and clavicle, sniffling me as well. For a moment, her gaze shifted to Celestia and then back.
"Hyun-woo, what's going on here?"
"What do you mean? Is something there?"
I lowered my eyes to check where Nadia had touched, but of course, I couldn't see it. It's never a place you can see on your own.
At Nadia's cue, Carry activated his video recording function. He filmed the spot she indicated, then showed it to me.
At first, I was confused, but it looked as if my skin was swollen red, like a bug bite.
"What the...? When did this happen? I'm pretty sure I didn't have this yesterday..."
Several blotchy spots, like rashes, gave me a sudden fright. I wondered if this was a delayed reaction from contact with the underground sector's water.
When my expression turned grave, so did Nadia's. Breakfast forgotten, I thought I'd better ask Carrot to take a look at it.
With us causing this fuss, the person who reacted was, rather awkwardly, Celestia.
"It—it's probably just fatigue, Hyun-woo. You haven't slept properly and you drained yourself a lot. When your body's out of balance, sometimes strange skin reactions happen."
"Really?"
"Of course. Look, I have it too."
Celestia showed me her forearm. Sure enough, there was a mark similar to the one on the back of my neck. Unlike me, she could just lower her head to see it, and she only had one, but her words made sense.
"If I get enough rest, will it get better?"
"It might... stick around for a while..."
Celestia trailed off, watching my reaction anxiously, then rushed to add,
"It's not like you're in a good environment to rest! That's all I meant! Other than the redness, it shouldn't have any effect, so don't worry!"
"... Okay."
What was with that energy? She was forceful, even in the morning. I reluctantly accepted; if it really was nothing, then I didn't need to worry. I finished the rest of my bread.
Nadia, sighing in relief, picked up the thread of conversation we had dropped.
"Anyway, today we're going to look for a new outpost."
"A place like a town?"
"No."
"Then what?"
"I need to hear more from her... but the plan is to find a mobile outpost this time, because staying in one place makes us too easy a target for the pureblood supremacists."
'A mobile outpost?'
Was such a convenient thing possible? The thought made me skeptical, but I quickly shook my head.
There was no point in second-guessing what Licorice said; I didn't need to interject with, 'That doesn't sound right, that's not possible, just can't do it,' and ruin things.
We'd get the details in time anyway, so all I needed to concern myself with was eating and resting.
As I patted my now-full stomach, Nadia shyly grabbed my hand—holding on, as if she wanted to take me somewhere.
"Hyun-woo, could you spare a bit of time? There's something I couldn't talk about yesterday."
"Sure."
"We're not going far."
"Doesn't matter to me."
"But it matters to me."
Nadia shook her head, not wanting to cause any unnecessary trouble. She turned to Celestia and told her she'd leave Carry here, so if Celestia needed anything, she should ask him. Then she bowed her head slightly.
Celestia said, coincidentally, she had to talk to Eric anyway, so she'd see us off.
Outside the tent, chilly air hit us as if it had been waiting. Still, without a suit it wasn't unbearable—thanks to the military shuttle parked at the center of the temporary outpost.
The shuttle was providing us with all the potable water and power we were using.
Rather than a 'shuttle', it was more apt to call it a ship—the special operations semi-large vessel Griffin.
It didn't have a shielding field, but it could create a web in the air that filtered toxins from an area. With a little heating effect added, we could get by without respirators.
As expected for a military vessel, it had all sorts of functions essential to sustaining operations, including water purification from ice.
Kanna, or someone who looked like her, was leaning against the ship's hatch, talking to someone. There were things I meant to ask her, but Nadia's business took precedence now.
Nadia, leading me in silence, finally stopped at the edge of the outpost, where the toxin-filtering effect just barely reached. Frost pillars surrounded us, making it a perfect spot for a private talk.
Pausing in a hollowed-out spot between two frost spires, Nadia turned and looked at me, hesitation in her green eyes. That only lasted a moment. When she blinked, her hesitation hardened into resolve. The ground had two seats set together, ready.
I sat down, and Nadia sat down close beside me.
"Now that I actually try to say it, the words won't come out easily."
She took a deep breath, then, as if afraid she might not have the strength if she paused, pressed on.
"You heard from Carrot, right? That I'm connected to the Reformist group."
"I heard about the bio-circuit in your heart."
The Reformist group—less extreme than the pureblood supremacists, but still notorious for their violent acts. I'd heard that its members, filled with hatred toward non-beastman, caused a lot of trouble.
What started as minor street scuffles had escalated to full-blown terrorism with specialized equipment.
"The bio-circuit... Yeah, I should start there. What I'll say now is about my past. I won't say it twice, so listen carefully."
Even recalling it seemed hard for Nadia; she trembled slightly. She looked so fragile I almost told her not to go on, but instead, I just held her hand. She had found the courage—it wasn't my place to stop her.
Nadia clutched my hand tighter and began, slowly.
"I made the bio-circuit."
As a child, family was everything. Nadia had shown remarkable talent in engineering.
At first, the adults dismissed her, thinking a kid couldn't possibly know anything—but when she produced the bio-circuit, their attitude completely changed.
They realized the bio-circuit wasn't the childish toy they imagined, and they instantly grasped its value. In their eyes was greed beyond mere envy. Being so young, Nadia didn't sense their dark and seething desire.
She just liked being praised. Having been almost neglected before, the sudden flood of attention felt amazing. She felt she had proven her worth.
Little Nadia indulged in recognition, unable to restrain herself. She made bio-circuits as they wanted, and generously shared her other developments, too.
More. More. More. Anything for more praise. To be loved.
"My talent was a crime to me. I realized it too late."
She was ignorant—much too sheltered to realize the consequences of flaunting her shining genius. Nor did she know what impact her bio-circuit would have.
"I didn't want to see people get hurt. People around me would get injured often and wear bandages."
Not knowing what was going on, that had been the extent of her concern. She made more bio-circuits to help them operate equipment safely.
"But the more I made, the more people got hurt. Some never came back."
When praise from people who'd been there yesterday suddenly stopped, young Nadia felt something was wrong at last.
She ignored the group leader's order to never leave her room, and for the first time, she worked up her courage and stepped outside.
The first thing that struck her when she opened the door was a blinding light that made it hard to keep her eyes open.
"It's not true now, but back then, a part of me wished I'd never opened my eyes."
Young Nadia was horrified—thrown into confusion. She'd imagined the outside world as infinitely beautiful, like in a picture book. But the world she first saw was anything but.
A stench of blood so thick it numbed her nose, a crash so loud it made her head spin, screams so terrible she wanted to cover her ears. Corpses, ships, the injured. Beastman identical in appearance, endlessly piling up.
Nadia saw something: the bodies were heavily mutilated. The forbidden technology of clones, used as expendable soldiers.
Among them was her older brother—who'd always looked after her on the rare occasions she saw him. He was dead, a gaping hole in his chest.
"The place where the bio-circuit had been inserted. They were ripping the circuits from ruined corpses and inserting them into clones again. ... So they could keep fighting."
She didn't know what they were fighting for, but young Nadia understood one thing.
In storybooks, fighting was always wrong, so why were they fighting? Why shout? Why tear each other apart? I don't know, but it must be my fault. Let's make up. You won't? ... Why not?
She realized something was gravely wrong, too late. She decided then and there to stop making bio-circuits and followed through.
"I decided not to make any more. Once I knew they were being used for fighting."
The reaction, predictably, was furious screaming. The people who smiled when she gave them bio-circuits were gone.
They no longer treated her as one of their own. Nadia was confined to a dark room by a force she couldn't resist, given food only when she agreed to make bio-circuits.
Even then, they watched to make sure she ate it all in front of them, lest she try anything. If she disobeyed, there was violence no child could withstand.
"... I was arrogant. I had this illusion that I could make them smile and then I'd be happy, too."
All Nadia wanted was to be loved, and all they wanted was the bio-circuit. In the beginning, at least they both got what they thought they wanted.
Until she realized it was all a misunderstanding. Shut in darkness, the news she heard from outside was enough to crush her spirit.
In time, she learned what she hadn't known before. She was born and raised in Reformist territory. They hated anyone who wasn't a beastman, classifying them as diseased.
Reformists promoted the belief that the beastman were 'better'—that regular humans were an inferior species. They divided the world into superior and inferior. The bio-circuit only pushed them toward more radical behavior.
An unbearable truth. When young Nadia realized it, she vomited everything she had inside—even though she'd eaten nothing, so only dry heaves came forth, just retching sounds.
She couldn't fully remember what happened after that. Everything was so urgent and chaotic, only feelings lingered intensely.
"I escaped. Someone helped me, but I can't remember the face."
Nadia fled in a shuttle—out of Reformist territory. She headed for Titan, known to embrace everyone without asking questions about the past. She thought they'd accept her, who had lost everything.
Her expectations were fortunately correct—but only partly so. Titan accepts all, but that included the Reformists who'd pursued Nadia as well.
"You know what happened after that, Hyun-woo."
"... I see."
I had found Nadia in an alley behind the residential area. She was dying, blood gushing from a knife wound in her chest, showing no will to stop the bleeding, as if she'd given up on life.
At first, I'd thought she'd been mugged—the residential area had high security, but back alleys could be risky. That, however, was a misunderstanding.
She hadn't just been mugged—she had nothing worth taking in the first place. Her clothes were ragged, her build small and thin—just skin and bones.
And, unmistakable even if I tried not to see it, the purple bruises. The clear signs of violence showed Nadia had been abused.
"That's why I wanted you not to get hurt, Hyun-woo. I know how much pain it brings. I know how sad it is. I'm sorry I always caused trouble when I got hurt."
Nadia, her voice quivering, finally broke down in tears. Once the dam burst, there was no stopping it.
I lifted Nadia and held her in my arms. Her sobs were muffled against my chest, but her crying didn't stop.
"... There's nothing to be sorry for. I've never once felt that way."
"I'm sorry about the reckless thing at the refinery..."
"You should be sorry for that. You have no idea how scared I was."
I was already primed to scold her for that—but her crying washed away the urge.
"Waaah...!"
"No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you more."
I hurried to comfort Nadia. Though I didn't show it, my chest ached. Sometimes it felt like the only people who came close to me were those with hard lives.
'The Reformists.'
I dwelled on that group. The ones who abused Nadia, who beat her to keep her making bio-circuits. They may have killed fewer than the pureblood supremacists, but the two groups were equally vile in my eyes.
Between sobs, Nadia confessed. Just as I had saved her while her bio-circuit was being ripped out, she had wanted to save me.
So even knowing what might happen, Nadia had handled the unstable Big Hand, bearing its recoil with her injured body.
That act both stopped the contaminated Power Loader and in exchange, left her with multiple fractures and internal damage from the overheated bio-circuit.
If I hadn't gotten the biocell in time, she might not have gotten up for a long while.
It wasn't arrogance—that only I could save her—but I still wanted to save her, no matter what. After all, we were partners.
Nadia and I cared for each other, watched out for each other, respected each other. Yet ironically, our mutual devotion ended up hurting both parties, rather than keeping us safe. It wasn't one-sided—it was both of us.
"Let's not dwell on all that. As long as we can be here like this, that's enough for me."
I hugged Nadia tighter. Hearing the past I'd only guessed at made my chest ache.
Her distrust of people, her sensitivity to wounds, her desperate refusal when Carrot tried to draw blood—all of it was rooted in her past.
Before, when Nadia mentioned Celestia's brother, she'd said she used to have a brother too. She'd dodged the details then, but now it all made sense. The trauma was deep enough to last.
'What kind of monster would hurt someone so small?'
It hurt to know—especially because nothing could change the past. At the same time, I was in awe. Nadia hadn't fully overcome it, but she was facing the present even with such a painful past.
"You're strong."
"Me?"
"Yeah."
"... That's not true. I still have nightmares all the time."
Nadia seemed to think I was just trying to make her feel better, drooping her head in a gloomy expression. Her animal ears hung low.
But I wasn't lying. I truly meant it.
"Nadia, the fact that you still have nightmares means you're still enduring. Even if you've fallen all the way down, you haven't lost the will to fight."
"..."
"If anything, it's good dreams we should fear—they'll trap your mind over time. So it's all right. If you're aware it's a nightmare, it means you're fighting, even unconsciously."
That's why you're strong. When I told her so, Nadia buried her face deeper in my chest. I quietly patted her back. The steady rhythm seemed to calm her.
"Nadia, just say the word. Whether it's the Reformists or whoever, I'll take care of them all for you."
"They're not even worth it. I don't want your hands dirtied because of them."
Nadia rubbed her face against my chest and said we should just focus on leaving Titan and going to Earth. Her bushy tail curled around my hand.
Then something occurred to me.
"You said you grew up in Reformist territory. From what you've said, it sounds like you were pretty deep in their organization—so how did you end up there?"
If her first sight of the outside world was so horrific, it meant she must have been there since the start. Otherwise, maybe she'd been abducted even younger and couldn't remember, but that seemed unlikely.
After all, the Reformists only started abusing her and forcing her to work after seeing her make the bio-circuit.
"Didn't I say?"
"That you were kidnapped?"
"No, I wasn't kidnapped. I was born there."
Nadia said candidly, maybe her ordeal wouldn't have been so hard if she had just been kidnapped. Raising her head, she went on.
"Hyun-woo, I'm Neo's daughter—the current leader of the Reformist group. Right now, that person's even taken out a hit on me."
"What? ... Wait, hold on. Say that again. Let me prepare myself first."
I cut her off and shoved as much water as I could into my mouth, ready to spit it out. All that was left was to hear it again and be shocked.
I signaled for her to repeat it, and Nadia mouthed the words. At some point, she had stopped crying.
-------------= Clacky's Corner -------------=
Damn, Nadia is high up in the totem pole of the Reformists.
【(；☉_☉)】