[ARC 30: FRIEND OF THE PEOPLE]
When Olivia and Iris returned to Urasaria, Iris checked on Amelie and checked her mail. She had received a letter while out. It read:
'Iris Valentine,
This letter is regarding the samples of your Revenant 'Kairos' that were sent to me by Dr. Hirogane two weeks ago. I have finished my preliminary analysis. While I do not believe it will harm you to keep using it, and you most likely would continue using it even if I did, it is rather bizarre. I require more information. I have attached three forms to this letter for you to fill out and return to Hirogane, who will send them to me.
1. A questionnaire for you.
2. A consent form releasing your medical records and history to me.
3. A form waiving your right to privacy for any future scientific paper I may write.
I will contact you if I have any more questions or information.
[TIMEPACT]
Dr. Yuruko Kunst'
Iris was confused at why there was no address or phone number listed. (Because Yuruko would have rather eaten a plate of steaming turds than talk to a stranger.) But she felt violated, and so she kept the forms to herself. And that this Dr. Yuruko was doing this all for free made her more suspicious.
In the meantime, she had reached 2-star and had some time while her badge and costume were being made, two requests she had already made while she was out. With the lessening of grief's affliction she was renewed in her passion for training; she wished to see the limits of both herself and Meteorology even more.
Every day Iris would do an absurd weightlifting routine borrowed from Natasha, albeit with far less poundage, and this:
1000 pullups
1000 dips
1000 situps
30-mile run
Followed by reading up on all recently-scanned Revenants, and mentally strategizing through 5 fights. This would allow her rest, and for an hour, generally scattered throughout the day, she would use Kairos in various ways; a sustained wind or lava burst, or a looping chronoshift held for time like one does a plank.
As for her hero weapon, she visited a room in the second-year building that was done up like a cyberpunk den. Neon wires were organized along the walls and led to a blue, almost translucent table at the center of the room. Its edges were raised, and numbers & data were scrolling across the center.
A Japanese woman was sitting at the table. "My name is Masaki Kasunagi. I have to ask first if you have an electrical Revenant."
"I'm Iris." Iris sat down across. "I do. Is that good?"
"It increases your options. Let's get started. Sorry, this is gross: deal with it." Masaki took a finger to her face and began peeling off her own skin in strings; as they left her flesh, Iris realized that they were cybernetic wires, and that electronic components shifted below Masaki's skin. "Precursor." She plugged herself into the table. Half of her face was a cybernetic skull, cut into sections that looked detachable; presumably the other half was like this as well.
Iris saw blood moving in some of her wires; they didn't seem to correlate to any major veins or arteries. "You aren't a robot, are you?"
"I pass the Turing Test. Grab the wire I've plugged into the table and send your electricity through it. I'm immune."
Iris tentatively grabbed her and sent a white current through it. Masaki nodded and Iris upped it to green.
"Good. Take your hand off and I'll have something for you in an hour."
"I haven't said what I want yet."
Masaki's pupils rotated unnaturally. "Did someone tell you you would be in control of this?"
"…I suppose they didn't. Alright. I'll be back in an hour."
She came back after an hour. A pair of heavy drills were on the table, hollowed enough that she could wear them on her fists. She noticed that there were now open gashes on Masaki's hands; she seemed to have cut into the blood wires. But they were hosts: it would regenerate.
"What's with the blood?" said Iris.
"The blood AI?"
Iris stared at her. The drills seemed implausibly large to carry around with her, but she wouldn't need to.
"These work with your weather: wind, lava, electricity, earthquakes and whatever other unholy disaster you can conjure. Try it out on an enemy host. It'll be fun... particularly with your acceleration. The blood AI doesn't fully understand your time-shift ability yet, but you can book a contract with me for that."
Iris had not notified her of any of those abilities. "Er, I'll try these first. Thank you."
She left, placed the drills on, then went back home and placed them under her bed. She had moved into Olivia's home over the past few days, and subtly was grateful; she had worried it was disrespectful to Natasha to move out, yet... every night she spent in that old home she dreaded. Still, though she still missed Natasha, she had grown used to Kairos' presence and her absence.
A few days later and with some trepidation, she filled out Yuruko's privacy-violating forms, and was soon answered by another request: to schedule surgery so that she might examine Kairos while still-beating. Iris was pissed.
She went up to the infirmary and asked for Hirogane. "God damnit, you saw the forms she made me fill out. Just what the hell do I need to waive my privacy for? I didn't even need to do that for Urasaria, and they let us kill people."
Hirogane sighed. He had mostly referred students to Yuruko recently: none of it improved her communication skills. Whether this was because of her autism or she just didn't give a shit was unknown. "For one, she's misstating the purpose of these forms. The privacy one means that she can write about your Revenant for other scientists to read -- an anonymous case study. It doesn't mean she can use your name or publish your medical history beyond what's relevant."
"Well, I just feel suspicious of her. Isn't there another doctor I could use?" said Iris, secretly hoping there was not. Maybe if there was no doctor everyone would just forget about this.
"Yuruko's smart. She just doesn't like people." Hirogane sighed. "Tell you what. If you schedule the surgery, I'll have Olivia and myself in the room with her. I'll perform it just like I did the first time. And I'll see if I can get her to explain it to you -- in-person."
Iris glanced around as if to undo her unease. "... alright. But not any time soon. I don't wanna be laid up with ... whatever it is she's gonna do ... for the next few months."
"June, then?"
"I suppose June is fine."
"I'll let her know."
Iris nodded. She saw in another corner of the infirmary Emilia sewing fleshy patches, and felt guilty for how she had treated them when Natasha died. She went over and told them she was sorry for how she had acted then.
Emilia set their needle down. "Thank you, Iris, but it is alright. You vere understandably stressed."
"Right, but I shouldn't have let my temper out on you."
They smiled a little. "You think you were any worse to me than Germany's students? I used to verk for them, you know. They had far more abuse to hurl at me."
"That doesn't seem like a smart thing to do to your medic. Weren't you the only one?"
"Yes, and they made quite the offer to try to keep me. But I refused for my emotional well-being. I very much disliked Germany's academy... The view of students there is that a medical Revenant is an easy, permanent job; they justified their abuse by that I must be lazy and because of it I could not complain. Zhe common view in Germany, as elsevhere, is that morality is only correct vhen it is maximally judgmental."
"People don't like anyone they perceive as having an easier life than their own. Reality of it doesn't matter to them."
Emilia nodded and sighed. "…excuse me, Iris. I must go eat... using Flickendecke for hours leaves me with such a terrible appetite. Something you students typically do not have to deal with." They smiled. "Here, have a little souvenir." They handed Iris the half-finished Flickendecke patch; it had not yet been given the flesh finish that coated its blood.
As they were leaving, Iris looked over Emilia a bit. They were an attractive person and Iris's age, yet to Iris their most attractive trait would be that they did not fight; thus they could not... She blinked these thoughts from her mind and left the infirmary.
But she would keep the half-finished patch on a shelf in her bedroom, as a reminder of Emilia, even though she knew they were an employee and she a student: there could be nothing beyond professionalism. The patch was an expression of the divide between the possible and the probable; in times of grief, Iris would imagine its unity as a way to draw together her more frayed natures.