Editing City Series:Volume6d Chapter4 (section)

===Part 2===

All the lights were out in a small room and the chill of the night was seeping inside.

Two people stood near the window.

The enormous one turned aside from the window was Schweitzer with Der Held removed.

The one standing next to him was Lowenzahn.

They both wore their uniforms and faced each other in the light of the cross far to the east.

Lowenzahn’s head was lowered with her forehead against Schweitzer’s chest.

She was crying.

Her shoulders shook just once and she cleared her throat quietly.

“S-sorry for paying you a surprise visit and then crying.”

“You let your guard down after capturing the Messiah, didn’t you?”

She nodded.

“But I said something awful to the Messiah today.”

“Hm? Didn’t you leave most of your responsibility as commander with her? You have no more duty or obligation to lead us. Isn’t that what you told her, as our new master?”

“You could describe it like that…but it isn’t quite accurate. I said a lot I didn’t need to.” She grabbed his left sleeve with both hands. “I get so sharp-tongued when I say things I don’t really believe.”

“You’re also quick to kick people.”

That made her laugh.

“Ha ha.”

Her laughter continued intermittently before transforming into coughing.

“Don’t push yourself too hard,” he said.

She could only answer with a weak nod.

Tears dripped down her lowered cheeks. They caught the faint glow entering through the window and fell to the floor. The frequency of the falling tears was dictated by the trembling of her shoulders and her sobbing breaths, so they were intermittent but never ending.

She cried while trying but failing to swallow her voice.

“I’m…a terrible person.”

She inhaled, pressed her face against his shoulder, and stopped talking.

Her shoulders shook and she took a few rough breaths before getting out a trembling voice.

“But…”

“Lowenzahn.”

Schweitzer’s voice was enough to stop her shaking. Her breathing remained heavy and she left her face against his shoulder.

“…What?”

“I’m sorry, but could you let go of my arm? Without Der Held…I can’t do anything for you while you cry.”

She slowly lowered her head and hesitantly let go of his arm. Then she brushed back her disheveled hair and looked at his shoulder.

His prosthetic right arm was currently detached.

“So you keep it off in your room? Do you consider it separate from yourself, even though you used a part of your body to make it?”

He shook his head.

“I choose whichever answer to that question I like at the moment.”

“Then how do you think of me at the moment?”

Her Eingeweide device was an artificial heart. It could not be removed like his arm.

He saw her arms held lightly against her chest.

“What do you think while reciting your Ober Beweisen?”

“Eh?”

“An Ober Beweisen is your own Text. Since you use your Ober Beweisen to prophesy, you should already know that an Eingeweide device is a means to draw out your own strength.”

“My Ober Beweisen, huh?”

She suddenly reached behind her head.

She undid her hair. The long braid spun apart, starting from the bottom. The wave of separation stopped once all of her hair was loose. There were tears in her closed eyes.

“I rely on you for so much. I say to you what I want to say to others. Even though that only leads to regret. And I cry without telling you why.”

“Don’t worry about it. I promised I would trust you without asking for an explanation, no matter what happened.”

She looked up at him with damp eyes and a genuine smile.

“In that case…it’s about time I stopped lying.”

She pulled a small object from her coat’s breast pocket. The faintly reflected light revealed the shape of a key. The decorative gold key was about as long as her pointer finger.

“If you ever find you must know the answer, take this key to the old HQ. There you will find the truth about my prophecies, my parents, and so much more.”

“I will keep it with me.”

“Take good care of it. I don’t need it anymore, so it wouldn’t accomplish anything for me to have it.”

He nodded and held out his hand.

She placed the key in it.

He held the key up to look at it. He nodded again when he noted the dragon emblem decorating the back end of the key. Then he placed it in his shirt’s breast pocket.

“Lowen-”

He stopped before saying “zahn”.

She had removed her scarf and started unbuttoning her coat.

She tilted her head when she noticed him staring.

“What, you don’t like where this is headed?”

She sounded more troubled by the possibility than just teasing him, so he smiled bitterly. She initially responded to that with an angry look, but then laughed quietly.

“You can make up your mind after seeing this. I’m feeling blue today, so I’m short on confidence.”

She finished unbuttoning her coat.

She also walked past him to a bed that looked entirely unused.

She sat on the bed and removed her coat. When she placed the black garment on the side table, some solid objects clanked against the wood.

“Medals and sidearms are so heavy, aren’t they?”

She held her arms around herself as if to hide her chest. She turned to face Schweitzer who sat on the windowsill, but then she looked away and began unbuttoning her shirt with her arms pressed against her sides.

Her fingers slipped twice and her expression changed ever so slightly. Her cheeks grew a shade redder each time.

But that was all. Once her hands were down at her navel, she pulled the rest of the shirt out from her pants. Its hem spread out around her hips and she finished unbuttoning it.

Nothing remained to cover the skin showing through the slight gap between the two sides of the shirt.

“I never wear a bra. None of them fit me and I’m always wearing a vest or something,” she explained with the tone and expression of someone making an excuse.

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She looked him in the eye just once there.

After saying something more with the ends of her eyebrows lowered, she grabbed her shirt’s left collar with her left hand. She hesitated for a moment, blushed around the eyes, and nodded a few times as if to convince herself.

She removed just the left side.

The rustling of cloth filled the room. She slid the collar down from her left shoulder and around to her back. With her shoulder bared, her skin shined palely in the dim light.

Her chest was exposed to the air.

The right breast was made of human skin. It drew a curve in the pale light.

But the left breast was a different story.

It had been replaced with a machine. From the top to the center of her left chest, black artificial muscles took the place of her pectoral muscles and white support muscles, metal tubes, and a metal valve were contained within.

She looked up at Schweitzer.

“Does it look cheap?”

He said nothing but got down from the windowsill. He moved around to crouch in front of her.

With her seated on the bed and him crouching on the floor, their eyes were at the same level.

“Is your pulse elevated?”

“Yes.”

“Then…I will trust in that.”

She looked up when she heard that.

She used her right hand to wipe tears from her eyes.

Then she reached out and took his left hand. His flesh and blood hand.

“I see. If possible,” she said quietly. “I hope you can trust in me forever.”