Chalice didn’t answer. As the elevator doors began to close, Rodeo pressed the button again and reached out to support Chalice, placing a hand on his arm. He could feel the cold sweat Chalice had been drenched in soaking into his palm.
“I don’t need it.”
In an instant, Chalice extended one hand and shoved Rodeo’s shoulder away, then walked into the elevator with a face completely drained of energy. For just a brief moment, Rodeo had been fussing as though that solidly built man might collapse — and now, finding that laughable, he silently mocked himself and wet his lips.
“…Seems like it.”
As Rodeo followed Chalice into the elevator, Chalice stood far off to one side, barely managing to push his disheveled hair back, and then, looking exhausted all over again, leaned against the elevator wall and stared at nothing but the floor. As though it were only natural that a subordinate should press the buttons, he didn’t even glance toward the panel. Rodeo irritably jabbed the button for the 21st floor and stood on the opposite side, running his tongue along the inside of his cheek. His expression was plainly sour, but Chalice didn’t seem to care in the least.
What a bastard.
The faint flicker of sympathy he’d felt — imagining what Chalice might have been through all this time — was fading again.
“Why do you live here?”
Rodeo asked as though he didn’t already know the reason Chalice was here.
“…None of your business.”
“The Decorker — I heard it selects Guides based on proximity. But this place is an officetel connected to the facility.”
“…….”
“There are a lot of Espers here, naturally.”
“Shut up.”
“So you’d be doing all of their Guiding. Quite the dedicated one, aren’t you.”
The elevator stopped at the floor where the two of them lived. Chalice, without a word in reply, walked out with brisk, assured steps and reached for the door.
“Is that why you’re here? Because you want it?”
At the unmistakably insulting question, Chalice paused mid-turn of the door handle and looked back. Rodeo had taken a large step forward and was standing right behind him.
“You used to treat Espers like inferior beasts — so is it that you actually enjoy the shame and pain those inferior beasts give you?”
“…Stop mocking me.”
“You’re not answering.”
“…….”
Beep—
Just then, Chalice’s Decorker sounded once more. The sudden collapse of his body, as though he were about to sink to the ground, pushed the front door shut.
Rodeo reflexively caught him and held him. Chalice too, as dizziness crashed over his vision, grabbed onto whatever his hands could reach — Rodeo’s back and the hem of his clothes. The hot breath that poured from Chalice’s mouth as he continued to heave ragged breaths for a long while struck Rodeo’s ear again and again, until the sound of it gradually quieted. The displeased expression Rodeo had worn earlier was gone from his face, replaced entirely by worry that spread plainly across his features. And yet, in the midst of it all, the corners of his eyes and his cheeks were faintly flushed — enough to make one wonder who, between the two of them, was actually unwell.
“…….”
“…….”
“…Let go now. …I have to go to work.”
“In this state, what kind of work — actually, …what kind of work does a Guide even do?”
In an instant, Chalice shoved Rodeo hard with a look of contempt on his face. Caught off guard by the sudden brutal force, Rodeo nearly toppled backward, but barely held his ground by bracing himself.
“So Guides can’t work — they should just live off subsidies, is that it?”
“Pardon?”
“Unbelievable.”
Rodeo, unable to understand and approaching with a look that said what’s your problem, was shoved away again by Chalice’s elbow as if to tell him to get lost, and then Chalice quickly opened the front door and went inside. Left with no idea whatsoever what tune he was supposed to dance to, Rodeo stood blankly for a moment before hesitantly making his way toward his own front door.
“Wasn’t he supposed to be trying to get on my good side. Good grief.”
He muttered it under his breath — and yet, in that same moment, the warmth of Chalice’s skin that had touched his palm burned like a brand, searing hot. But Rodeo shook his head, let out a sigh, and forced himself to wipe the sensation from his mind.
“Not doing missions, and yet — two guys sitting quietly at home doing Guiding, within just a few minutes of each other? Dropping out like that, seriously… what kind of assholes are they…”
Rodeo sat at the dining table, chewing on cherry tomatoes as he muttered to himself. Seeing him up close, Chalice did seem to be older than the Chalice Rodeo remembered. Though his body looked like ten years ago was just yesterday.
“…Why did I even reach out. Like a guy that size was gonna fall over.”
Rodeo stared at his palm, then for no particular reason opened and closed both hands a few times, rolling his eyes. He rolled his shoulders and chest — the shoulder and chest that had been shoved away multiple times — stretching them out. The fact that there was still a pretty good sting in certain spots meant Chalice’s strength was just as it always had been. And so was his personality.
But he couldn’t deny that what Chalice had shown today was something he had never once seen from him before. Given that Chalice had served as an instructor in the Guide Combat Training Program, given that he had always worn his uniform and carried himself like a soldier — Rodeo could never have even imagined him faltering like that.
Rodeo stared fixedly at the Decorker he wore on his own wrist.
What on earth did they put into this thing, that it can knock even him out.
Rodeo popped another cherry tomato into his mouth and chewed it with needless ferocity.
Somehow this feels… strange…
He sat in a daze for a little while — tried cooking, tried turning on the TV — but his body, which had been busy with missions just a few days ago, felt sluggish and out of sorts. Rodeo, who had never once been cooped up at home like this, could feel his thoughts multiplying pointlessly.
Guides work too, apparently…
When the stream of his consciousness reached that point, Rodeo sprang up from the sofa and headed to the kitchen. He picked up his phone, which had been left carelessly on the dining table, and typed out a text to one of the few contacts he had. A reply came quickly, the vibration buzzing almost immediately.
[Are you not doing any more training?]
[That’s all there is for the materials. From here on, figure it out yourself.]
“…….”
[About a dedicated Guide, that…]
The text he had been earnestly typing was deleted entirely.
“What for. To see them every day? I should be driving them out, driving them out. What am I thinking.”
[But why does a Guide even work…]
Rodeo hesitated mid-rewrite, then deleted it all and threw the phone onto the sofa. He let out a low groan, stretched, and lay down lazily, muttering to himself.
“What does it matter to me…”
Drowsy in the warm sunlight, his cool cheek pressing against the phone felt pleasant, and Rodeo’s eyes slowly slid shut.
“Ugh… ngh…”
In the darkness, there was Chalice — crawling along the floor in a disheveled uniform.
Beep—
Beep—
Beep—
The mechanical tone kept sounding every few seconds, and Chalice, drenched in cold sweat, could only squirm — not a single word from him.
Then, from somewhere, a sharp whistle rang out, and three or four Espers appeared. Not one of them was a familiar face, but a man with strikingly silver hair stood out. The others all had faces as young as Turner’s, and were casually pressing their own Decorkers with a slovenly air.
“Hey, you bastards — do you think the facility guidelines are a joke?”
Rodeo shouted menacingly — and as if by magic, the distance between Rodeo and them widened in an instant.
“Huh?”
They acted as though Rodeo’s voice couldn’t reach them, surrounding Chalice and snickering. Chalice, body trembling uncontrollably from the incessant beeping, couldn’t even keep himself upright — he was grabbed wherever they felt like grabbing, lifted however they felt like lifting, and even as his waistband was being undone, he couldn’t manage even a semblance of resistance.
Before long, Chalice’s white uniform shirt was half torn off, his chest fully exposed, and his pants and underwear were bunched carelessly around his knees, swaying loosely. From a distance, Rodeo could see their hands groping all over Chalice’s body beneath his clothes.
“Ungh… ha, ugh……”
Whether they were too busy preying on a single body to bother, no matter how loudly Rodeo screamed, not one of them looked back. All Rodeo could see from where he stood at a distance were the backs of those vile Espers, Chalice’s shoes swaying, and the glimpses — brief but unmistakable — of a dark blue, tear-filled gaze turned toward him.
Rodeo ran with everything he had toward those low, leaking moans — but no matter how far he ran, he stayed in the same spot. No matter how loud he screamed, it was as if something was packed tight in his throat, and no sound came out.
“You fucking bastards — report this to the facility and you’ll be locked up immediately!”
Still no voice came, but Rodeo kept mouthing the words furiously. Then, one of the Espers holding both of Chalice’s legs behind the knees turned around. Whether it was because of the rimless glasses he wore, his face couldn’t be made out — but his voice came through crystal clear.
“Why? Have you ever seen him resist? He’s enjoying it. It’s consensual — what lockup? Chalice is just happily Guiding us.”
That fucking bastard… so Espers are using their abilities to gag him and put up a barrier between us.
In an instant, Rodeo, unable to contain his fury, thrust out his hand. Rippling air surged toward the group of Espers, and one by one they began bleeding from their ears and noses. One drop, two drops — the blood that had been falling in specks suddenly burst as if boiling, and then all of them clutched their chests and throats, coughing up blood and collapsing.
Chalice, now covered in that blood, barely managed to raise his upper body halfway. His lips parted, and it seemed as though some words were coming out. Rodeo was walking toward him, one step at a time. Was he asking for help? For some reason, his heart grew desperately urgent, as though every second counted.
Crash!
But the moment he was about to take Chalice’s hand, the surroundings suddenly flooded with light, and Rodeo snapped his eyes open with a grimace. The wind howled outside and everything around him was in a commotion.
“…Shit, this is bad…”
