"Room 13… Room 13…"
Seele followed the room numbers looking for Lín's ward, when she accidentally bumped into another person who also wasn't watching where they were going.
A blizzard of file papers rained down like snow.
"S-sorry." Seele quickly apologized, realizing she had caused a mess.
"Ah… No, it's fine."
Spaciel, recovering himself, smiled and rubbed his shoulder, then crouched down to pick up the files on the floor.
Seele also squatted down to help him gather the confusing mess: "I'll help you."
"I appreciate it." Spaciel, with only one arm, was indeed having trouble organizing the files, so he nodded politely.
In fact, when Lín visited Spaciel before, he had suggested letting Mobius build him a new arm, but Spaciel had refused without any hesitation.
The empty sleeve was proof of the pain he must remember, constantly reminding him of his initial principles, his wife's warning, and the tragic lessons.
"…Oh, you're Dr. Spaciel, aren't you?" After picking up a stack of files, Seele happened to look up and saw Spaciel and his empty sleeve, suddenly realizing this person was Spaciel. After about a year without meeting, her memory of him had faded, causing her not to recognize him immediately.
"Hmm?" Spaciel looked up in confusion, studying the spirited short-haired girl. After searching his memory, he recalled her: "I remember you… Seele of the Fifth Squad, right?"
"Yes, it's been a while, Doctor. How are you… doing now?" Seele hesitated when she saw his empty sleeve.
"Heh heh, I'm doing quite well. The research has made significant progress, and I've also found a child with good talent and character." Spaciel was quite open about it, shrugging humorously, "It's just that sometimes I'm a bit unbalanced when I walk and tend to bump into people."
"Then congratulations on your research progress, Doctor."
"No need for congratulations. This kind of thing…" Spaciel narrowed his eyes and saw Seele picking up an agreement. He immediately and casually took the files from Seele's hand, taking the agreement along, and laughed, "Are you here to see Lín?"
Spaciel's movement was natural and did not arouse Seele's suspicion. She shyly nodded: "Yes. I heard Lín is back, but he checked into the hospital again right after because of the assassin."
When she mentioned the word 'assassin,' the smile in her eyes faded a little, replaced by a momentary flash of chill.
Spaciel looked at the girl, so different from a year ago. She now seemed to have emerged from the shadow, becoming an independent warrior.
"Then I won't bother you two." Spaciel gathered the last of the files in his arms and nodded to Seele. "His ward is just ahead. There's no one in there right now, oh."
Facing Spaciel's gaze, which was identical to that of her Captain, Seele blushed, lowered her head, and hurried past him without a word.
"…"
As Seele walked past Spaciel, his smile gradually diminished until it disappeared.
Do you truly not care about the feelings of the people around you at all?
Spaciel looked at the agreement in his hand, his eyes incredibly complicated.
Spaciel walked to the side, placed all the files down, keeping only Lín's agreement. Looking at the name written casually on it, his fingers gradually tightened, crushing it into a ball.
Life is equal, that was the last thing his wife told him.
So, he had to look squarely at every life, even every corpse on the operating table. When drawing serum from their bodies, he thought of them providing the fuel for the living to survive.
But back then, Méi told him a different principle: He was a valuable person, so he needed to live more than others.
To abandon others in order to live, and the irony was that the reason for living was to save more people.
Spaciel raised his hand, intending to throw the agreement into the trash can, but his hand stopped mid-air. He sighed, and after a brief hesitation, put the body donation agreement into his pocket.
He took out his flask, twisted it open, and took a sip. The bitter taste of the alcohol filled his mouth.
He looked back at Lín's ward, picked up his files, and left.
Karen was right, and Méi was also right.
When Spaciel took out the body donation agreement, he actually had hoped that Lín would hesitate a little longer, realizing that this was a cruel thing, not a noble one.
At least, to realize within his remaining, limited life that his existence was important to the people around him. If Lín, through this agreement and this final chapter, understood why Spaciel made that choice back then, it would count as Spaciel's "revenge."
But Spaciel was ultimately only there to give him a choice, not to choose for him.
And Spaciel also understood that he would continue to meet more people willing to make the same choice. He would witness their sacrifice until he made the same decision himself.
How long would that day take? Would it be after Lín's death or before?
It seemed it no longer mattered.
The agreement in his pocket waited for the day it would take effect.
…
"Lín, do you have a moment?"
Lín, who was about to enter the Elysian Realm, stopped and turned the viewing window towards the hesitant Méi. The light signal flashed twice.
Was that meant to convey… that something was wrong?
Lín's unique style of communication was always difficult to figure out, but this time, Méi was not as suspicious as before. On the contrary, she felt a slight apology.
Méi seemed to be searching for a topic: "What are you… doing constantly shuttling through the Elysian Realm?"
"…Something came up."
"What exactly is it?"
"…" Lín paused at the attempt to make small talk, then turned around to face Méi, looking her in the eye. "Do you have something you want to say?"
"No…" Méi couldn't quite say why she had impulsively called out to Lín.
Since returning from the memory within a memory last time, her perception of Lín had changed.
Empathy? Probably not. No one else would likely have similar feelings to Lín's experience. His ideals were unusual; it was not an exaggeration to call him an oddity.
But Méi didn't sense any change in him brought about by firm conviction; only an indefinable sorrow lingered around him.
"You don't need to worry about what happened last time."
However, before she could figure out how to speak, Lín spoke first.
"What is seen is not necessarily the truth. What you saw there was merely a phantom of the past. It cannot represent that the me of the present is exactly the same as the me of the past."
"…You really are keenly perceptive."
"If you don't want people to notice, then wear a mask." Lín turned back. "A smile, sadness, anger… Use any kind of mask to hide yourself."
Méi asked, facing his back: "Is that what you did?"
"I did not do that." Lín stood in front of the door, looking up. "But someone once did."