Chương 240: 95. Grouping 1

She laughed, quiet and brief.

"Congratulations, Shimo." I looked at the green indicator light on the flow bracket, then turned to Maki beside me. She was already looking back. Through the visor, I couldn't read everything in her eyes — but I saw her lift her hand and touch the back of mine. Not heavy. Just a moment. Like: not bad. Like: see, you could. Something in my chest pulled tight. I looked away, pretending to check the retrieval route.

"... Let's head back."

"Mm," Maki said. The instant the inner airlock door sealed shut and pressure flooded back in, I understood, for the first time in my life, that being able to hear other people's voices again wasn't a mark of civilization. It was the preamble to torture. Because I knew exactly what was waiting. The people outside — Jess especially — had already been waiting for me. And as it turned out, my read on human nature is depressingly, tearfully accurate. The hatch slid open.

Maki and I had barely stepped into the changing bay, one after the other, hadn't even gotten our helmets fully off, when Jess slid over from the side like a predator that had been lying in ambush for hours.

"Welcome back—" She dragged the end of it out, sweet and vicious at once, sweet enough that I wanted to put my helmet back on and file for permanent hull exile.

"Would our two model B-7 partners be available for an interview right now?"

"No." I answered before she'd finished.

"Next question." Jess kept going like she hadn't heard a word.

"First — what was that coordination out there really about? How are you two in sync enough to look like you secretly rehearsed wedding vows?" I nearly dropped my helmet.

"What kind of comparison is that?!"

"A precise one," Jess said, dead serious.

"One of you leads, the other stands by saying 'good,' the mood's steady, the delivery's practiced, the whole thing runs smooth — if that's not a marriage, what is?"

"That's called construction cooperation, at best!"

"Oh — so that's your idea of marriage. Construction cooperation."

"Don't go building me a weird worldview without permission!" I yelled that while slamming my helmet onto the rack. Too hard — the rack rang out with a sharp clang and startled me into flinching. Very dignified. Beside me, D was laughing hard enough that he could barely stand. One hand braced on a locker, the other pointed straight at me, laughing with zero conscience.

"Hoshino, right now you look exactly like someone who got caught, insisting she only went to the library to study, except she's still got someone else's shampoo in her hair."

"Shut your mouth."

"I'm being serious." He reeled the laugh in and put on his best talk-show-host face.

"Alright, let's break this down rationally. One: the comms were recorded the entire time. Two: Jess, in her role as monitoring officer, displayed abnormally elevated enthusiasm. Three: Maki, at the end, personally—""D." I turned and glared at him.

"Keep going, and even if I've passed every assessment today, I won't mind squeezing in one more combat evaluation right here."

"Wow, fierce." D threw his hands up, utterly unrepentant.

"That's called turning shame into rage."

"That's called self-defense."

"Then I'm on your side," Harvey said, unhurried, from the side. For one rare second, I was actually moved. Then I heard the rest of his sentence, delivered just as calmly.

"After all, if D keeps talking, the average IQ of this entire changing bay drops."... Right. Retracted. D spun to glare at him.

"Hey, that's not backup, that's killing me along with everyone else."

"Can't help it." Harvey started peeling off his gloves, tone steady as an academic presentation.

"You two provided some genuinely valuable observational data today. One specimen: a human capable of sustaining high-volume noise output even in zero gravity. The other: a rare type whose outer ear shows visible vasodilation under high-stress conditions combined with specific social stimuli." I turned to look at him, slow.

"Whose ear is doing what?" He looked at me, completely honest.

"Yours."

"... Harvey."

"Mm?"

"You'd better pray you never need my help with anything."

"That seems unlikely," he said, pulling his glove off and even nodding slightly.

"Maki does rely on you quite heavily for technical coordination, after all." The second that landed, the changing bay went quiet for half a beat. Before I could recover, Jess got there first with a drawn-out "Oh—" long enough to feel like a fishing line dragging back and forth across my nerves.

"Rely, huh." D slapped the locker.

"That's a heavy word, Harvey."

"I'm stating an observation," Harvey said, perfectly composed.

"You're all overreacting." The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

"You call that stating?" My temple was pounding.

"That's pouring fuel straight onto the fire!"

"But it's burning very cleanly," he said. This man looks, most of the time, like someone who runs his entire life as a lab logbook. And yet every time he opens his mouth, he's still asking to get hit. At the center of this whole human disaster, Maki herself was quietly undoing her chest clips. Unhurried. Composed, even.

The upper half of her EVA suit clung slightly from decompression and sweat, and as the zipper slid down, she kept her head tilted at a clean, quiet angle — like the pack of monkeys around her simply didn't belong to her world. The problem was: the calmer she looked, the more I looked like the one standing next to her, detonating. Jess clearly noticed the same thing. So she redirected all her firepower back onto me.

"So?" She leaned in close, eyes bright — a genuinely pretty face currently wearing nothing but bad intentions.

"What did Maki actually say to you out there? That line — because she listens — I'm still savoring it. So gentle. She's never that easy to talk to normally."

"Why are you savoring that?"

"Because it's rare." Jess said it like it was obvious.

"And she touched the back of your hand at the end." I went rigid.... She saw that? Of course she saw it. She was the monitoring officer today. There is no justice left in this universe.

"That was a completely normal confirmation after finishing the task!"

"What kind of normal confirmation involves touching the back of a hand?" Jess looked genuinely thirsty for knowledge.

"Go on, demonstrate it for real. Any partner works. I'm happy to sacrifice myself for science."

"Get lost."

"D, then?"

"I decline."

"Harvey?"

"I'd advise against it," Harvey said.

"Her emotional state is currently unstable. Normal contact might escalate into deliberate bodily harm."

"Both of you, get lost!" I was mid-shout when a small, clean metallic click sounded beside me. Maki had just released her last retention ring. She looked up — first at Jess, then at D and Harvey — and spoke, perfectly level.

"Don't you two have anything better to do?" The room went quiet for a second. Jess blinked, and somehow still managed a smile.

"A little, no."

"Then go help the next team sort their equipment."

"But right now I'd rather sort out Shimo's feelings."

"She doesn't need sorting," Maki said. Four ordinary words. The problem was how she said them — too flat, too natural, like this was simply a matter that fell under her jurisdiction by default. The mischief in Jess's eyes shifted. Not retreat. Not annoyance either. Something that looked like she'd just spotted something even more worth playing with, glowing brighter and more dangerous than before.

"Oh." She drew it out, wearing an unbearably punchable smile.

"I see." My scalp prickled.

"You see what, exactly?"

"Nothing." Jess raised both hands in mock surrender.

"I just suddenly feel like today's division of labor on the B-7 team is very clear. Maki handles the technical side. You handle the anxiety. I handle the narration."

"That's not narration, that's polluting a comms channel."

"But your reactions are so entertaining."

"That's because you're insufferable!"

"I know." She smiled, thoroughly delighted.

"That's exactly why I come find you."... This woman genuinely has no shame. None whatsoever. D, watching from the side, had reached peak enjoyment, and even started feeding Jess lines.

"But seriously, Hoshino — your coordination out there today really was good. Way steadier than yesterday." That one wasn't pure agitation. I could tell. So I let some of the fire go and made a vague, noncommittal sound.

"Because Maki set a good rhythm."

"Ooh, mutual professional flattery has commenced." D perked right up.

"Noting that down. This is what partner culture looks like."

"It's not flattery. It's a fact," I said. Harvey had half his EVA suit off already, leaning against a locker, watching us, tone as calm as someone delivering the conclusion of an unfortunate observational report.

"Accurate. If you'd been paired with anyone else today, you'd probably have had hand tremors during the second weld pass from losing focus."

"... Why does every single one of you sound so certain my hands were going to shake?"

"Because you can't hide it," Harvey said. D nodded.

"And it's written all over your face." Jess finished the job.

"Especially when Maki gets close." I took a long breath. Right. Now I fully understood what a group beating feels like. Except this beating didn't use fists. Just mouths. And the most infuriating part was that the partner standing next to me — theoretically the person who should be pulling me out of this — was still, at this exact moment, the picture of composure. She pulled off her inner gloves, smoothed down the hair the helmet had flattened, and then, mildly:"Shimo." I turned on reflex.

"What?"

"Zipper's stuck."

"... Oh." Almost on instinct, I walked over and reached around to work the rear outer-layer retention zip free. The EVA suit was thick, loaded with clasps, and I had to stand close, fingers tracing the seam inch by inch to find where it had caught. The air around us went unnaturally quiet. Before I could catch the warning signs, an extremely deliberate throat-clear came from behind.

"Ahem." Jess.

"For the record, I am not reading into this," she said, sounding so sincere it made me want to hit her.

"But this scene really does look exactly like the daily routine of a long-married old couple." My hand slipped. I nearly tore the zipper clean off.

"Shut up!" Maki, apparently unaffected, just tilted her head slightly and asked, "Done?"

"... Almost."

"Your hand's shaking."

"That's because someone's standing here talking garbage!"

"Mm." That "mm" almost sounded like a laugh. The zipper finally came free. I stepped back immediately, like I'd just cleared a blast radius. Jess stood with her arms crossed, watching me, eyes and mouth both curved.

"You look exactly like someone who just did something she feels guilty about."

"I was just helping with a zipper!"

"I know. I didn't say anything else."

"Your face said plenty!"

"That's you, filling in the blanks yourself."

"Jess."

"Okay, okay." She finally waved a hand, magnanimous for the moment.

"I'll drop it. But I do have one genuinely serious question." I looked at her, on guard.

"What." She glanced toward Maki, then let her gaze drift back to my face, slow.

"Next time there's a formal EVA — do you want to keep being paired with her?" The second that landed, D stopped laughing. Harvey didn't cut in either. Even I went still for a moment. The changing bay fell into a rare quiet — nothing left but the distant clatter of someone breaking down gear, and the low hum of the ventilation system. I looked at Maki on reflex. She wasn't looking at me. Just sorting her tool clips, like she'd handed the answer over to me entirely. My throat went suddenly dry.

Honestly, the safe answer was obvious — something like depends on the assignment, or either's fine, or doesn't matter who. That would be the safest. That would be the least likely to say anything too plainly. I opened my mouth. What came out instead was:"... Yeah. I do." Jess's eyes lit up instantly. D let out a long, loaded "Oh—" Harvey delivered his conclusion, perfectly calm.

"Reasonable." The backs of my ears went hot immediately, and I was already reaching for a save — because her technique is good — when Maki spoke first. She set the clip back into the box, voice as flat as ever.

"Same." The entire changing bay went silent. Not half a second, this time. A genuine two full seconds. Then Jess sucked in a sharp breath, like she'd just unearthed classified military intelligence on the spot. D smacked his own thigh.

"No. That one's too much. I need to write that down." Harvey even added his own line.

"Confirmed. Today's best comms log has been updated." And I stood there feeling like I'd just gotten back from open space, only to be kicked straight back into the vacuum. Maki, apparently with no idea what a bomb she'd just dropped, simply set her removed gloves neatly into the storage box, and looked at me.

"Why are you still standing there?"

"... Huh?"

"Go shower." She said it like it was obvious.

"Your back's soaked through." Jess jumped straight back in, smiling like she'd just found round two of her material.

"Wow, even reminding you to shower. That's awfully attentive."

"Jess." I turned to look at her, expressionless.

"I am genuinely considering committing a crime right now."

"I know." She smiled, sweet as anything.

"But you're in a good mood today. So you won't."

"Where are you getting good mood from?"

"Because you answered so fast just now." She said that and, for once, didn't push further — just stepped aside, clearing the path to the showers. I gathered up my change of clothes. Walking past her, I still caught D murmuring behind me, voice dropped low.

"People like Maki, who barely talk most of the time — when they finally do say something, it really lands." Harvey made a quiet sound of agreement.

"Which is exactly why I said the observational data was valuable." My step caught. I almost turned around and threw my towel straight at their faces. In the end I didn't. Because if I stuck around one more second, I was fairly sure they'd hold a formal symposium right there in the changing bay, titled A Living Record of Hoshino Shimo's Social Death. Still — at the door to the shower room, I couldn't help glancing back once.

Maki was still standing where I'd left her, putting the disassembled gear back into place, piece by piece. Jess was leaning against a locker, still smiling, though the edge in it had dulled a little. D and Harvey stood flanking her, like two extremely bored but deeply invested theater critics. Maki, as if she'd felt my eyes on her, looked up. Across half the changing bay, I saw her pause, then give the faintest lift of her chin. Probably meant: go on. Or maybe: ignore them. Or — the worse interpretation.

We'll talk later. I turned my head back around fast and pushed through the door into the shower room. Good. The extravehicular repair assessment was over.