​Chapter 5. Yubitsume

Evening slid down on the City with the rain. The daytime downpour had exhausted itself and dissolved into a dense mist, a suspended dust of water hanging in the air. Thin, almost invisible strands of moisture clung to the glass, and the tower lights slid down the windows like neon tears, turning the world beyond into a blurred, impressionistic haze.

The car — a black, soundless capsule — drifted through this chaos with inhuman smoothness, its sensors reading a road no passenger could see. With a quiet hiss, it parted the water, slicing through the rain.

Ahead, among the seven highest towers of dark glass and steel, each shimmering with the sickly reflections of the City’s lights, one building stood apart — BioTech. It rose at least half again as tall as the others, its matte walls glowing faintly from within, a soft pearlescent shimmer in the dusk. An alien organism fused into the City’s flesh. Above the entrance, suspended in the air between the ground and the second floor, floated the logo. A perfect halo of order, a holographic cut in the dark.

The car came to a stop. Its lifeless voice announced:

“You have arrived. Your meeting is scheduled for eight p.m.”

Cold droplets whipped across his face; the smell in the air was different here — not the smoke and wet concrete of the Ring, but sterile plastic and a faint ozone from the filters. Underfoot, no mud, only illuminated glass plates leading toward the transparent doors.

Security stood at the entrance. Their armor caught the neon light and threw it back in distorted reflections, turning titanium plating into something out of an old science-fiction film. In their hands — the newest generation of rifles; their faces sealed behind helmets. When he walked past, the scanners would read his breath, his pulse — maybe even his thoughts.

The cuff on his wrist blinked.

“Welcome to BioTech, Mark,” said a woman’s voice. The same one that had called him earlier that day.

The glass doors slid apart without a sound. Inside — a brightness so sharp it seemed to erase depth itself; the whiteness of the corridor flattened everything: the lines of the floor, the shimmering columns, the endless BioTech logos repeating along the walls like a silent mantra. Protective sigils. Not decor, but a spell of authority — a brand burned into the flesh of the building.

Even the smell was white, barely there: not air, but the filtered whisper of air.

Mark stepped across the threshold. The rain stayed behind him, severed by the glass barrier.

The light in the hall burned away every shadow, leaving him exposed, almost stripped bare. He was used to the dirty half-darkness — that was his natural element. Here, it felt as though they were preparing to dissect him under a microscope.

“Proceed to the elevator,” the system instructed. The building itself was speaking through it.

From the toes of his boots, a thin line of light shot out, splitting into arrows that didn’t invite him so much as pull him deeper into the glass labyrinth. At the end of the corridor, an elevator opened — a sterile chamber grown into the wall. Inside, a woman was waiting.

“Good evening, Mark,” she said. “I’m Amy, assistant to the Director. She’s expecting you.”

The embodiment of a corporate standard: platinum-blond hair pulled into a flawless knot, a symmetrical face with perfectly balanced features. A poster-girl kind of beauty — appealing, but stripped of individuality. A thin cuff flashed on her wrist, likely studded with diamonds.

She turned toward him slightly — a calculated gesture of courtesy. Her lips curved into a perfectly measured smile, two faint dimples forming on her cheeks. And in that fleeting moment, something else slipped through — a lightness, almost girlish, that had nothing to do with the cold, polished mask of the Director’s assistant. A shadow of genuine, human emotion glimmered and vanished before he could grasp it, but Mark had seen it. That dissonance was the only living trait in her otherwise sterile presentation.

Not patched. Interesting.

There were no buttons: matte surfaces reflected silhouettes, as if the elevator were carrying shadows, not people. The doors sealed, and the cabin rose without a lurch or a sound; only a subtle heaviness in the pit of his stomach revealed they were moving at all.

Amy stood perfectly straight, hands folded neatly at her waist. In the panel to her right, her reflection wavered — as if the image of a human being hadn’t rendered properly. Something about it felt not just artificial, but unsettling.

“Ms. Thorne will receive you on the upper level,” she said when the cabin slowed almost imperceptibly.

The elevator doors parted, opening onto a new corridor. Here the light was softer, free of glare; nothing cast shadows. The click of Amy’s heels was muted by the cushioned floor underfoot.

They walked twenty meters or so. On the right stretched a glass partition; beyond it, an empty gallery with sparse plants growing in identical gray containers — either mutants or relics dragged back through technology. To the left, a smooth wall extended, marked at regular intervals by the same motif: a tree and a serpent. Light threaded through the emblem, making each symbol glow from within.

Amy halted before a massive door. The sensor above the handle flashed green for an instant — recognizing both their cuffs at once.

“Please,” she said, stepping half a pace aside to clear his way.

The door slid soundlessly into the wall. Mark entered first; Amy followed.

The office impressed not by its size, but by its emptiness. A single wall-spanning window served as the room’s only artwork: a panorama of the City below, carved into perfect lines of roads, blurred by threads of rain. It looked two-dimensional, like a map. No sound from the streets penetrated here. In the center of this sterile space, like a lone exhibit, stood a desk. As in the elevator, the air held no scent at all.

Behind the desk sat Lily Thorne — the perfect completion of that emptiness. Immaculate porcelain skin, long black hair, sculpted facial features. Her beauty carried no life, like a statue carved to an ideal template. Even her expensive clothing, tailored with engineering precision, felt less like attire and more like a uniform of absolute authority.

Mark knew her youth was a carefully maintained illusion masking her true age. He saw it in the faint, unnatural exactness of her movements. Not a flaw — a form of control so absolute it had become one.

“Ah, Mark,” Lily said almost warmly, as if greeting an old acquaintance. “Mark Kane. Second precinct. Thirty-eight years old. Twenty years of service. War veteran. Correct?”

Tilting her head slightly, she rose, and her black eyes glimmered with a trace of amusement.

“Sit.”

Amy remained by the door while Mark approached the desk. A chair slid out from beneath the surface without a sound, stopping at a perfectly calculated distance. The armrests were dry and smooth — as if no human hand had ever touched them.

Everything here was flawless, devoid of even the faintest trace of human presence.

Lily didn’t sit. She remained standing, one hand resting lightly on the desk, fingers spread — the posture of someone who is used to ruling. A standard tactic: establish dominance in the first seconds.

There were no papers, no devices on the desk. Along the edge, faint indicator lights pulsed — the quiet breathing of a machine hidden inside.

“You wanted to meet with me,” Lily said. “Where shall we begin? No, let me guess. A transfer to the Center? Almost twenty years in uniform — it’s about time, isn’t it?”

For a brief moment, Mark faltered. He opened his mouth to object, but the words stuck to his tongue.

“No...” he finally forced out. “That’s not why I came.”

“Oh, you’re conducting an investigation?” Lily tilted her head slightly, the corner of her mouth lifting. Almost a smirk — the entire situation amused her far more than it concerned her.

A deliberate mockery. The police hadn’t conducted investigations in decades, and Lily was clearly trying to unbalance him.

She circled the desk — soundless, like a precision mechanism, and sat on its edge, facing him, turning her body just enough, settling down as carefully as if she were lowering herself onto the back of some exotic creature. The desk — a patient beast beneath its mistress, pretending calm before the lunge.

The fabric of her skirt tightened, and Mark couldn’t help noticing: even the angle of her hips and the fall of the cloth were calculated. Not vulgar, not overt — just enough to draw the eye.

“Then what is it you want, Mark?” she asked softly.

“It’s about your logo,” Mark said. He paused. “Or rather... about the woman who has it on her wrist.”

Her face remained fixed in that cool, faintly ironic expression, though he watched her closely, hoping to catch even the slightest shift.

“Our employees don’t wear the company logo on their hands,” she replied evenly. “What exactly did you see? A patch? An image on clothing? A tattoo?”

Her tone stayed impeccably polite, but her gaze sharpened, as if she genuinely wanted to assist with such a delicate matter.

“Something like a tattoo,” Mark clarified. “But... not exactly.”

It sounded foolish, as if even he didn’t quite understand what he’d seen himself.

“It’s flattering to hear that someone would tattoo our symbol,” Lily said with the polished smile of a corporate poster. “You know we help people, especially the disabled. Perhaps someone truly did it as a gesture of gratitude. A lovely thought. If you find this person, we’d be happy to meet them and offer a collaboration.”

Her knee brushed his — accidentally. Except nothing in this place ever happened by accident.

“Describe this person, please.”

“A woman. About thirty. Thin. Short black hair. Heterochromia. The mark was on the back of her hand.”

Lily listened without blinking, as if committing every detail to memory.

“And why are you looking for her?” she asked, calm and not pressing, as though they were discussing something entirely mundane.

But the tension in the air grew thicker. This wasn’t a formality anymore — it was a probe. A test.

What was she trying to learn — and why?

What could he possibly tell her? That he’d met the woman on a rooftop during what might well have been a hallucination? That she spoke of destroying the City? That he could think of nothing else since?

Lily seemed to read all of that straight off his face.

“You like her,” she observed. “How interesting. Did you sleep with her? That would explain quite a lot.”

Mark looked away — and that was enough.

Lily leaned back, and for the first time something like a satisfied smirk curved her lips.

“Fine,” she said suddenly. She shifted slightly, her voice almost... confiding. “Let’s assume I know her. Let’s also assume I know where she is. But every deal requires an exchange.”

A brief pause — letting the words settle and tighten around him.

“And what can you possibly offer me?” she asked, the softness gone, replaced by steel.

He was trapped. He’d come here to ask, and had nothing to give. And Lily knew it.

“You know,” she went on, “I’m not without a romantic streak myself. So I’ll be generous. Show me proof — real proof — that your interest in her isn’t hollow.”

She stepped back to the desk, bent, retrieved something. Metal glinted — a blade. Double-edged, with a dark wooden handle, too elegant to be just a knife. She placed it on the desk and pushed it toward him with one fluid gesture. The knife slid and came to rest precisely before him.

“Prove it,” she ordered.

“... Prove what, exactly?” Mark asked, thrown off balance.

The atmosphere shifted in an instant; the conversation had turned into a trial with rules he didn’t yet understand.

“You know,” Lily said, rubbing her fingers lightly as if she still held an invisible handle, “the yakuza had a ritual. A finger for loyalty, a finger for guilt. A man did it himself and handed over a part of his body to the one he owed.”

She made a small gesture, miming the downward strike of a blade.

“In your case, it’s much simpler. You’ll prove to me that this woman matters to you. Or”—her smile deepened just a fraction—“say, you’ll pay in advance for a betrayal you haven’t committed yet. Everyone betrays, sooner or later. It’s just timing.”

Her expression hovered somewhere between friendly and predatory. Mark looked at the knife again.

“I’m not cutting off my finger,” he said, voice low. “You’re... insane.”

The last word came out firmer than he expected, as though he’d finally found a border he would not cross. Lily lifted one eyebrow, almost delicately.

“Am I insane?” she echoed, stretching the words as if tasting them. “Perhaps. But there’s more meaning in this supposed madness than in your twenty years of service, Mark.”

She swept her hand around the office — the panoramic windows, the city spread beneath her like obedient circuitry.

“And besides... look where I am. And look where you are.”

The line hit harder than he expected. There was nothing to throw back.

“So,” she concluded crisply, “either you do it, or you get nothing. No name. No location.”

Her face sealed itself back into that flawless, unreadable mask as she leaned forward.

“The choice is yours, Kane. One stroke of the blade — and you get what you want.”

The rain outside slashed the City in crooked lines. Mark felt it with the back of his skull: Amy was standing by the door — motionless, an obliging shadow, observing everything without emotion. In the polished metal of the blade he caught a flicker of Lily’s face — carved with scars, her eye sockets black hollows, a monstrous grin ripping across the ruined features. A hallucination.

“Well?” Lily pressed, her voice edged with impatience. “I’m offering a choice. The decision is yours.”

The girl on the rooftop flashed through his mind. For the first time in years, someone had spoken aloud the things he had been afraid to even think about. For the first time, he hadn’t felt alone. Step forward — or rot in the Ring. There was no third path for him.

Everything felt like a fever dream — unreal, deranged, as if he were trapped in a nightmare where someone else dictated the rules.

His hand closed around the knife before the thought had fully formed. He placed his hand on the table and brought the blade down on his pinky. Steel split bone and bit into the desk; pain detonated behind his eyes as blood splashed across the immaculate surface and the severed piece of finger dropped to the floor.

Mark clamped his other hand over the wound, warm blood leaking between his fingers. His breath came ragged; his heart hammered against his skull. A dark stain spread across the white tabletop. Barely holding back a groan, he remained frozen, shaking, blood-soaked hand pressed against the mangled finger. Pain pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat. His chair and jacket were drenched.

“You see how easy it is?” Lily said serenely. “You choose, and you accept the consequence. Curious that you’ve only now decided to make one.”

Her gaze drifted over the spreading stain on the white table, the knife jutting from the surface. Then, with a faint note of regret:

“By the way, you ruined the desk. You were supposed to do it on the armrest.”

Lily turned toward the window.

“Amy, escort our guest downstairs.”

Amy responded with a brief nod and stepped closer to Mark. She pulled a slim aerosol can from her purse and sprayed it onto the wound. The cold mist burned against the torn skin; the blood sealed instantly, and the sharp pain collapsed into a dull, throbbing pressure.

“Temporary,” she explained with a faint smile. “You’ll be fine soon. Follow me.”

She gave Mark a pleasantly warm look, as if what had happened a minute ago were nothing more than an amusing performance. She’d clearly enjoyed the show. Clutching his injured hand, he rose from the chair.

They walked in silence. The elevator slid downward with effortless smoothness; the white panels reflected their blurred faces. Mark pressed his wounded hand to his chest — that made the throbbing bearable.

The doors opened onto the parking level. The wide space was as sterile as the rest of the building: perfect rows of cars, muted white light without shadows, the monotonous hum of the ventilation.

“Yours is there. I’ll take you to it,” Amy said, her tone businesslike, neutral.

The car lit its headlights, recognizing the cuff; the bright beams carved their silhouettes out of the dimness.

“Babylon Bar. Tomorrow,” Amy said. She inclined her head slightly — a gesture with a hint of Japanese ritual — almost a bow.

For an instant something alive, something warm flickered in her again, but vanished immediately.

Mark reached for the door — and suddenly caught a sound. A dull, insistent knocking, as if something were desperately pounding somewhere deep inside the building or beneath the ground. He froze, listening.

Amy stood beside him without changing her expression. She either didn’t hear it — or pretended not to.

The knocking came again — louder this time, more insistent. Mark turned, searching for the source.

“Open the window, Mark,” Amy said calmly.

The world shattered like a dream. Amy, the parking level, the walls — gone. The windshield was once again a waterfall of rain, the familiar dashboard glowing faintly. He was sitting in his car, and a security officer in full gear was rapping impatiently on the side window.

“You’ve been parked here for over an hour, citizen,” the officer barked through the narrow crack as the window slid down. His face was hidden behind the helmet, but the irritation in his voice was unmistakable. “Clear the area, or we’ll have to remove you.”

Rain hammered down, breaking the headlights into jagged slants of light. Mark glanced at his pinky: the finger was intact, the skin smooth, no trace of a cut. He ran his other hand across the place where the wound had been seconds ago — nothing. And yet the pain pulsed in memory, so vivid he clenched his teeth by reflex. He flexed his fingers — all intact.

A metallic tang clung to his tongue, and something deep in the bone still throbbed. The dashboard clock read 9:11 p.m. — he had missed his meeting with Lily. Rain drummed on the roof in a relentless, rapid staccato.

“Home,” he told the car.

The headlights carved a pale wedge into the wet darkness, and the vehicle slid forward into the night-soaked haze of the City.