CAR 39

Dennis, who had sat up rather defensively, looked to his left. Over there, three or four empty beds were placed at regular intervals. Whispers could be heard from somewhere.

It was then that a scream filled the basement. Startled, Dennis stood up without realizing it. To his right, a curtain was drawn. Dennis could not see what was happening beyond it.

But if Dennis’s turn was after that person… Dennis, grabbing the bars that barely allowed one arm to pass through, turned his head this way and that.

The silhouette beyond the curtain was having a seizure. Next to it was a small figure as well. Even though the large body was twisting violently, the small figure showed no agitation. A fine smoke rose toward the ceiling. It was a tremendous struggle, as if being butchered alive.

Presently, the small figure disappeared further away. The thing that had been twisting on the bed neurotically struck down the curtain. The curtain, which had been set up as if to divide the rooms, fell in an instant.

Dennis finally came face to face with it.

It was a naked Vittorio.

He was lying face down on the bed. The burning smell Dennis had caught was not a delusion or a trick of his mind. Vittorio had a black iron on his back and was staring into the air.

It was only a moment before his lost gaze crossed the empty space and reached Dennis. His limbs were bound. His back, oozing with fluid, was filthy. Some flesh was completely black, and some parts were covered in reddish burns.

“Dennis…”

Vittorio’s two eyes, which had been soaked in grief, suddenly gleamed slickly. A strange light shone in his pupils, which resembled a muddy pit. He rolled his eyes ceaselessly, as if he was both pleased and bewildered to run into Dennis here.

“Dennis, Dennis, Dennis…”

He called Dennis’s name like a child looking for water. In contrast to the tattered skin on his back, Vittorio’s face, pressed against the pillow, was terribly beautiful. The veins of pain had subsided, and his face was now filled with rapture, as if he had met an angel. Vittorio, his mouth open like a bird’s beak, called Dennis without rest.

Dennis, Dennis, Dennis, Dennis, Dennis, Dennis, Dennis, Dennis, Dennis…!

When Dennis stepped back instead of answering, the calling gradually became a scream that seemed to tear through the air. To Dennis, he looked close to madness. Vittorio, thrashing like a bound shark, slammed his head against the iron bars. Vittorio, incessantly banging the crown of his head against the bars, did not seem to be in his right mind.

The bed moved here and there, as if overwhelmed by Vittorio’s thrashing force. It was unlikely, but it felt as if he would break through the countless bars and charge at Dennis just like that.

When Dennis moved to the opposite side, Vittorio burst into laughter as if he would go mad. Something white was dried and stuck to the corners of his mouth. Dennis reflexively looked around.

Hadn’t the gatekeeper called this place an ‘infirmary’? But Vittorio did not look like someone who had received treatment.

This was clearly torture.

Vittorio lifted his head and glared at Dennis. It was as if he was trying to distinguish whether Dennis was merely a hallucination encountered in the midst of pain, or if he was ‘his Dennis’ who had actually been brought to the infirmary.

Doesn’t one normally quiet down when their back is in that state? As Vittorio thrashed, the black iron fell down, and pieces of charcoal flew in all directions.

“Tsk…”

“…”

“Bad for one’s emotional state…”

Dennis was startled by the leather glove that covered his eyes. A faint smell of disinfectant came from the glove. There was only one person who would reek of such a smell even from his gloves.

He was also the person who had saved Dennis from the beating when he was being hit by the gatekeeper. At the same time…

“…Take your hand off.”

“How cute… Any muscle aches?”

It was Yan, the very person who had pushed Dennis into the cabinet.

When he smelled the disinfectant mixed with his body odor, anger and sadness surged at the same time. At the same time, he recalled the small key that had been in Sami’s hand. He had, in truth, left Dennis to rot in the cabinet.

“I thought you might be slowly losing your mind, so I stopped by the classroom… and it was a complete mess. Blood, filth!”

“Let go of me.”

He was still half-covering Dennis’s eyes. Vittorio was trying to lift his body from the bed he was bound to. Vittorio’s form could be seen far away.

“Why do you hate me?”

Yan’s innocent question pierced the top of Dennis’s head like an arrow. Dennis, who had shaken off his hand, pointlessly straightened his clothes.

“You crazy bastard.”

“I’m perfectly within the normal range, Kahler. The crazy one would be Bonaparte over there.”

“Did you follow me all the way here just to mock me?”

“You need to see the forest, not the tree.”

“Ha…!”

Yan was dressed more neatly than anyone else here. Wearing a different vest from yesterday, he looked like a gentleman at a riding stable, or like a noble son of Volle. Yan, with his forehead neatly exposed, looked down on Dennis as he spouted sophistry.

To save Dennis, who was experiencing ‘that kind of thing’ from the students, separating them from Dennis was the best course of action. Even for him, who was trusted by them, the riot of vigorous young men was scary, he said, needlessly stroking his own arm.

“As for throwing away the key…”

“Shut that mouth and get the hell out of my sight right now.”

“Yes, it’s because you often act like this. You treat other people’s goodwill like something filthy.”

Goodwill? He had never once shown goodwill to Dennis. Deceiving Dennis, placating him, exhibiting his dirty, abnormal sexual desires… Just thinking about his dealings with Yan made him want to vomit.

Yan still had a smile on his face, as if he was enjoying Dennis’s reaction. Presently, Yan, who had reached the entrance of the room covered in iron bars, fumbled with the latch and asked.

“I am curious.”

“Get lost.”

“Between Bonaparte and me, who will take the place as your worst.”

Why he was curious about such a thing was something Dennis could not understand. One thing was certain: they seemed to be trying to abuse Dennis as if they were competing. Like a bet in a sport.

Dennis hid his hands, which were trembling with anger, behind his back. Since he didn’t even know where this place was, pouncing on him would be a rash move.

“How does it feel to have arrived at the infirmary?”

“…You should start by changing that crappy name.”

“Really? I guess it means it’s a place fit for a beggar.”

Yan, smiling faintly, rummaged through his pants pocket. What he took out was, coincidentally, a key. Dennis was now sick and tired of keys. If he held that thing and spouted more nonsense, he was planning to just lie down on the bed. But Yan, without any particular request or mockery, shoved the key into the latch.

“It’s not a very pleasant place, even if your enemy is locked up here.”

“…”

“This place was originally a cage for wild beasts.”

The door to the iron-barred room opened. Yan, who had opened it just a couple of handspans, gestured for Dennis to come out. If the treatment performed here was searing one’s back with an iron, it would surely be safer to follow him and get out.

Yan suddenly reached his arm out to Dennis. It was unpleasant, as if he were treating Dennis like a patient in need of support. Dennis, crossing his arms, gestured with his chin toward the front, as if to tell him to lead the way. It was when Yan was walking down the long hallway.

Dennis suddenly looked back at Vittorio. The wailing had stopped at some point.

He was still watching Dennis from the darkness.

On the landing that went up and away from the basement, he suddenly witnessed the door on the opposite side opening. The person who came out of it was the Bonaparte family’s nanny. In her hand was a bucket.

The woman called a nanny sighed softly as she looked down at the facilities Vittorio had knocked over and the broken iron. Presently, she poured the bucket onto Vittorio’s back. Perhaps the water she poured was also boiling, as steam rose from Vittorio’s back.

The nanny put the bucket over Vittorio’s head. The treatment did not seem to be over yet.

“Hurry up.”

Yan, as if conscious of her, reached his hand toward Dennis. Dennis, who deliberately ignored his white hand that looked like a lifeline in the light from above, placed a hand on the wall and carefully stepped up the steep stairs.

Once out of the basement, this place was, coincidentally, Vittorio’s annex. The upper floor was his practice room, and if you went out the door, there was the small garden that Sami used to take care of.

Everything felt unreal, coming right after witnessing the torture being carried out below. A clammy sweat trickled down the nape of his neck.

“Looks like our étoile will be away for a while.”

“…”

“The nanny was a soldier, you know.”

Yan, who had rattled on as if confessing something he hadn’t been asked, smiled faintly. He didn’t seem very curious as to why Dennis had ended up in the infirmary. And yet, he appeared at every crucial moment as if he had anticipated both Dennis’s escape and his confinement. Dennis was now at the point where he felt like a leech.

“Dennis Kahler.”

It was when Dennis, who had turned his back to him without a farewell, was about to return to the main building. Yan, who was habitually taking off and putting back on his leather gloves, gestured with his chin toward the path leading to the main gate.

“There are two types who use that gate during the semester.”

“…What are they?”

“Those who are carried out as corpses, or those who intend to become corpses.”

Then this place could not be considered a school. Incinerating corpses and filling the annex basement with iron bars was not in the realm of normal, to begin with. Dennis spat, as if in defiance of Yan’s kind sophistry.

Yan, who was gazing at his saliva that had fallen on the dirt floor, continued speaking.

“I’ll acknowledge your guts. In a way, you could call it bravery.”

Who the hell are you. The words rose up to his throat. Dennis glared at Yan’s neat face without replying.

“And the synonym for bravery is being foolish and stupid.”

“…Stop your babbling and get lost.”

“Kahler.”

Yan, who had called his name, only stared at Dennis for a while. To tell him the truth, or not… the signs of deliberation were evident.

“The main gate isn’t the only answer.”

The main gate isn’t the only answer? Before Dennis could decipher his words, Yan gestured somewhere with his chin and added.

“It means there’s one more gate that hasn’t been made public.”

An undisclosed gate… Dennis felt as if he had been struck by lightning. He felt incredibly foolish for having firmly believed from the very beginning that there was only one gate for entry and exit.

Of course, Yan casually added that the general students and teachers didn’t even know of its existence. It meant that he himself knew the location and use of the gate inside and out. He had, in effect, provided Dennis with a key.

“There’s no separate gatekeeper there either, Kahler.”

“…I’m curious about your motive for telling me that.”

“It’s simple. Because you looked like you wanted to get out of this place.”

He was right. There were things Dennis had to check with his own eyes. Furthermore, if Quachi’s death was true… there was no reason to return to this closed-off and crazy school.

“The location?”

“You seem to be in a hurry. I can’t just tell you…”

It was as he had expected. He looked at him with eyes that anticipated what kind of shitty condition would follow.

“I’d like you to swear just one thing.”

Yan, who had taken off his glove, held out his bare hand to Dennis. His hand looked cleaner than anyone’s, but Dennis was extremely reluctant to have contact with him.

“That you’ll take my hand, not Vittorio’s.”

“…What?”