Chapter 8

Asuna looked down at the piece of paper in her hand to ensure that the string

of letters written on it indeed matched the title on the side of the large

building.

She was in the Tsuzuki ward of Yokohama. The building sat nestled between

hills rich with greenery. Given its fairly low height, the design surrounded by

plants and trees, and the rolling hills, it didn't seem like they were in a big city

at all. But in fact, it was less than thirty minutes away from Asuna's home in

Setagaya, using the Tokyu Line.

The building was still new, and the brown tiles on the exterior gleamed in the

low winter sun. It struck Asuna as similar to the place where she had slept for so

long. She put the piece of paper back in her pocket.

"Are you in there, Yuuki?" she muttered. She wanted to see the girl, but she

also hoped that she wasn't in there.

After a brief period of uncertainty, Asuna straightened up the lapels of the

coat she was wearing over her uniform, and she started walking toward the

front entrance.

Three days had passed since Yuuki the Absolute Sword disappeared from

Aincrad.

When Asuna closed her eyes, she could still see her tears, just before she

logged out at the Monument of Swordsmen. She didn't think she would ever

forget them, even if she tried. She needed to see her again so they could talk.

But all the in-game messages she sent received a stock "this user is not logged

in" response, and they hadn't been opened yet.

She figured that the other Sleeping Knights would know where Yuuki was, but

when she visited their favorite hangout place, the inn in Rombal, only Siune was

there. She had looked down and shaken her head.

"We haven't been able to contact Yuuki since then, either. She hasn't been

full-diving at all, much less playing ALO, and we hardly know anything about her

real-life details. Plus…"

Siune stopped there. She gave Asuna a somewhat anxious look. "Asuna, I

don't think that Yuuki wants to see you again. Not for her sake, but for yours."

Asuna was stunned into silence. She finally found her voice a few seconds

later.

"Wh…why? I mean…I could tell that Yuuki and the rest of you were trying

hard not to get too close to me. If I'm just bothering you, I'll leave her alone.

But…I don't understand what you mean by saying it's for my sake."

"It's not bothering!" Siune said vehemently, her perpetually serene attitude

broken for this one instant as she shook her head. "We truly are very happy to

have found you. The fact that we were able to create such wonderful memories

here at the end is thanks to you, Asuna. We cannot thank you enough for your

help with the boss and your desire to join our guild. I'm sure Yuuki agrees with

me there. But…please, I beg of you, just forget about us now."

She waved her hand to call up a window. A trade prompt appeared in front of

Asuna.

"It's a bit earlier than we expected, but the Sleeping Knights should be

breaking up soon. I am putting together our payment to you here. It is the loot

the boss dropped, as well as all of our items…"

"I…I don't want it. I can't take them," Asuna said, smacking the CANCEL button.

She stepped closer to Siune. "Is this really good-bye? I…I like you, and Yuuki,

and everyone else. I thought that even if the guild broke up, I could still be

friends with all of you. Or was that just me…?"

The old Asuna would never have said such things. But in just the few days that

she'd been working with Yuuki's party, she could feel herself changing. And that

just made their imminent farewell that much worse.

Siune looked down and shook her head. "I'm sorry…I'm sorry. But it's for the

best if we say good-bye here…I'm sorry, Asuna."

And she, too, opened her window and logged out to escape the scene. After

that, it wasn't just Yuuki; Siune, Jun, Nori, and the others did not log in to ALO

at all.

It had only been a few days together. Asuna had assumed they were friends,

but maybe she was wrong about that. But the Sleeping Knights left a deep,

unshakeable impression on Asuna's heart. She knew she could never forget

them.

The third term at school had already begun, but even seeing Kazuto (Kirito),

Rika (Lisbeth), and Keiko (Silica) in real life for the first time in weeks did not

bring Asuna cheer. Behind her eyelids and deep in her ears, she saw and heard

Yuuki. "Big Sis," she had called Asuna. And when she realized that she had done

it, she cried. Asuna wanted to know why.

And then Asuna got a text message from Kazuto yesterday, saying he would

be waiting for her on the school roof at lunch.

There were no other students on the roof of the concrete building, exposed

to the chill northern wind. Kazuto was leaning on a thick air circulation pipe as

he waited for Asuna.

In real life, he didn't seem to be gaining any weight, even though it had been

more than a year since he was released from SAO. His sister, Suguha, was

making sure he ate properly, so there was no concern about his nutrition, but

either he was working off all the calories with jogging or the gym, or his frenetic

virtual battles were somehow burning off his physical energy.

He had his hands in his pockets, top jacket button open, and long bangs

waving in the wind, an appearance that was the same as in the old Aincrad

days, just with a different outfit and height. Asuna rushed over to him and

bumped her forehead right into the cradle of his shoulder as he looked up.

She wanted to express all of the churning emotions that tortured her gut, but

Asuna couldn't even put what she was feeling into words. She squeezed her

eyelids shut, trying to stifle the oncoming sobs. Kazuto gently patted her back.

He murmured into her ear, "Do you still want to see the Absolute Sword?"

That simple question encompassed all of Asuna's desires. He was right: She

wanted to see Yuuki again; she believed in her heart that Yuuki wanted the

same thing.

Asuna nodded, and Kazuto continued. "She told you that you shouldn't see

her again, didn't she? And you still want to?"

She had already told him all about the results of the twenty-seventh-floor

boss battle, their unexpected parting afterward, and Siune's final comments, so

Kazuto's questions were coming after he had formulated his own thoughts

about the matter.

Asuna nodded again. "Yes, even still. I just want to see Yuuki and talk to her

again. I have to do it."

"I see," Kazuto replied. He put his hands on her shoulders to put space

between them, then pulled a small piece of paper out of his jacket pocket. "If

you go here, you might be able to meet her."

"Huh…?"

"It's just a possibility, nothing more. But…I happen to believe that she's

there."

"H…how do you know that…?" Asuna asked in a daze, taking the folded scrap

of paper.

Kazuto looked up at the sky. "Because that's the only place in Japan where

they're holding a Medicuboid clinical study."

"Medi…cuboid?" Asuna asked, turning the unfamiliar term over in her head.

She opened the scrap of paper.

Inside, it read: Yokohama Kohoku General Hospital, along with an address.

Asuna passed through the pristinely clean double set of automatic doors and

into the amply lit entrance, where she was greeted by the familiar scent of

disinfectant.

She passed through the lobby full of mothers with small children and elderly

patients in electric wheelchairs on her way to the reception desk.

On the form next to the window, she entered her name and address, but

stopped at the spot asking for the name of the patient she wanted to visit. All

Asuna knew was the name "Yuuki," and she didn't even know if that was the

girl's real name. Kazuto had said that even if she was there, there was no

guarantee Asuna could confirm that or be able to see her. But after coming this

far, she couldn't possibly give up. She steeled her courage and took the sheet to

the counter.

A nurse in a white uniform was on her computer terminal on the other side of

the desk. She looked up as Asuna approached. "Are you here for a visit?" she

asked, smiling.

Asuna nodded awkwardly. She handed over the form, still incomplete, and

said, "Um…I want to meet someone, but I don't know her name."

"Pardon?" the nurse asked, her eyebrows drawn together in suspicion.

"I think it's a girl around age fifteen, and her first name might be 'Yuuki,' but it

also might not."

"We have very many inpatients here, so I'm afraid that's not enough to

narrow it down."

"Um…I believe she might be here undergoing a Medicuboid test."

"Patient privacy rights means that we can't…"

Further back behind the counter, an older nurse looked up and stared at

Asuna. She leaned over and whispered something into the ear of the nurse who

was providing reception.

The original blinked in surprise and turned back to Asuna. In a more formal

tone, she awkwardly asked, "Pardon me, but what is your name?"

"Uh, er, my name is Asuna Yuuki."

She slid the form over the desk. The nurse took the sheet, glanced at it, and

handed it to her coworker.

"May I see some form of identification?"

"O-of course."

She pulled her wallet out of her coat pocket and extracted her student ID. The

nurse closely compared the photo on the card to Asuna's face, then nodded

with satisfaction and asked her to wait while she picked up the nearby phone.

After a few short comments on the internal line, she told Asuna, "Dr.

Kurahashi will see you in Internal Medicine Two. Go to the fourth floor in the

front elevator, then proceed to the right and give this to the receptionist there."

The tray she held out contained Asuna's ID and a silver pass card. Asuna

picked them up and bowed.

She ended up waiting at the fourth-floor reception bench for nearly ten

minutes before she noticed someone in white rushing over to her.

"Hi! I'm sorry, forgive me. My apologies for the wait," said the small, plump

doctor, who looked to be in his early thirties. His hair was parted to the side

over his gleaming forehead, and he wore thick-rimmed glasses.

Asuna quickly got to her feet and bowed deeply. "N-not at all! I'm sorry to just

show up out of the blue like this. I can wait as long as you need me to."

"No, it's perfectly all right. I'm off duty this afternoon. So you are, um, Asuna

Yuuki, yes?" he said, his drooping eyes narrowing slightly as he smiled.

"Yes, that's me."

"Well, my name is Kurahashi. I'm Miss Konno's physician. I'm glad you've

come to visit."

"Miss…Konno?"

"Ah. Her full name is Yuuki Konno. 'Yuuki' is written with the characters for

'cotton' and 'season.' I usually just call her Yuuki…She's been talking all about

you every day, Miss Asuna. Oh, forgive me for being forward. I'm just used to

hearing your name."

"No, Asuna is fine," she reassured him, beaming.

Dr. Kurahashi smiled shyly and pointed toward the elevator. "Why don't we

go visit the lounge up above, rather than stand around here?"

They ended up sitting across from each other in the back of a wide-open

waiting room. There was a nice view of the spacious hospital lot and the

verdant area surrounding it through the large glass window. There were few

people around, so the only disturbance to the room's air was the gentle

humming of the air-conditioning.

Asuna wasn't sure which of the many questions she ought to ask first.

Instead, it was Dr. Kurahashi who broke the silence.

"I understand you met Yuuki in a VR world, Asuna? Did she tell you about this

hospital?"

"Er, no…She didn't, actually…"

"Ahh. I'm surprised you found us, then. In fact, Yuuki said that someone

named Asuna Yuuki might be coming to visit her and to let the front desk know,

so we were surprised to learn that she hadn't told you. I figured you wouldn't

be able to find the place, so when they just called from downstairs a few

minutes ago, it was quite a shock to me."

"Um…did Yuuki tell you much about me?" Asuna asked, to which the doctor

nodded eagerly.

"Oh, indeed. The last few days, she hasn't spoken about anything else during

my visits. However, every time she spoke to me about you, she always cried at

the end. She's never been the type to cry about her own issues."

"But…wh-why…?"

"She wanted to be better friends, but she couldn't; she wanted to see you,

but she couldn't. I'll admit, I can understand that feeling…"

For the first time, Dr. Kurahashi's face was pained. Asuna took a deep breath

and summoned her courage to ask, "Yuuki and her friends said the same thing

to me in the VR world before we broke apart. Why is that? Why can't she see

me?"

She leaned forward, trying to avoid thinking about the steadily growing

suspicion inside of her ever since she saw the word hospital on the note. Dr.

Kurahashi looked down at his hands atop the table. Eventually, he said quietly,

"To explain that, I need to start with the Medicuboid first. You are an

AmuSphere user, I assume?"

"Er…yes, that's right."

The young doctor nodded and looked up. To her surprise, he said, "While it

might not be fair to say this to you, it pains me to no end that full-dive

technology was developed solely for entertainment purposes."

"Huh…?"

"The government ought to have put in the money and developed that tech for

medical research. We would be a full year or two ahead of where we are now."

This direction of the conversation took Asuna by surprise. The doctor held up

a finger and continued. "Just think about it. Imagine how useful the AmuSphere

could be in a medical context. To people who are sight-or hearing-impaired,

that machine is a gift from God. Unfortunately, those with hereditary brain

damage are excluded, but consider anyone with nerve damage between the

eyes and the nervous system. With the AmuSphere, that information goes

straight to the processing center instead. The same applies to hearing. People

who have lived their lives without the concept of light or sound can now

experience the world the way it should be experienced, just by using that

machine."

Asuna nodded at Dr. Kurahashi's impassioned explanation. The use of the

AmuSphere in this field wasn't a recent development. Once the headgear was

made even smaller and had its own special lenses, the blind and deaf would be

able to function exactly as everyone else in society.

"And it's not just signal reception that it can help with. The AmuSphere can

also cancel bodily signals," he said, tapping the base of his neck. "By sending an

electric pulse here, you can temporarily paralyze the nerves, producing the

same effect as full-body anesthesia. So using an AmuSphere during an

operation can also remove the remote chance of something going wrong with

the anesthetic."

Asuna was surprised to find herself engrossed in the doctor's stories. But

something occurred to her. Careful to mind her words around the medical

expert, she timidly said, "But…isn't that impossible? The AmuSphere's

interrupting signals are intentionally limited. I don't think an AmuSphere—or

even the original NerveGear—could block out the pain of a doctor's scalpel…

And even if you canceled out the spinal column signals, the nerves are still alive,

so they'd react, right…?"

"Y-yes…that's true," Dr. Kurahashi said, startled at her knowledge. He

recovered quickly and nodded several times. "No, that's absolutely true. The

AmuSphere has low pulse output and a power-saving CPU, so there's a sharp

limit on its processing power. It's fine for making a full dive into a Virtual Reality

space, but the specs aren't up to the level necessary to provide Augmented

Reality with the combination of a lens and the physical world. So for the

moment, the biggest rush in government development is for the Medicuboid:

the world's first medical-use full-dive device."

"Medi…cuboid," Asuna said, rolling the word on her tongue. She recognized

that it had to be a combination of medical and cuboid.

The doctor grinned and continued. "It's still just a codename. Essentially, it

boosts the AmuSphere's output, multiplies the density of the pulse-generating

nodes, and increases processing speed. This is embedded into the bed so that it

can cover the entire spine and not just the brain. It looks just like a white box…

but if they can be built practically and put into use at hospitals all over, it will

have a dramatic effect on medicine. Anesthesia will be unnecessary in nearly all

operations, and we might even be able to communicate with patients suffering

from locked-in syndrome."

"Locked-in…?"

"It's also known as a pseudocoma. The conscious, thinking parts of the brain

are intact and functioning, but there's something wrong with the parts that

control the body, so they cannot express their own will. The Medicuboid can

connect to the deepest parts of the brain, so even someone in a state of

paralysis might be able to rejoin society through the use of VR."

"I see…so this really is a 'machine of dreams' in the truest sense…even more

than the AmuSphere built for playing games," Asuna murmured. But although

Dr. Kurahashi had just been speaking of lofty dreams, this comment seemed to

bring him back to reality. He looked downcast, removed his glasses, and sighed

heavily.

With a little shake of his head, he smiled sadly. "Yes, that's it. A machine of

dreams. But…machines have a limit, of course. One of the areas in which the

Medicuboid is most highly anticipated is…terminal care."

"Terminal care…" Asuna repeated, unfamiliar with the English term.

"It's also known as hospice care," the doctor explained softly. Asuna felt as

though she'd been doused with freezing water. She gaped, her eyes wide. Dr.

Kurahashi put his glasses back on with a kindly smile. "Later on, you might wish

that you had stopped listening here. No one will criticize you for making that

choice now. Yuuki and her friends really are thinking of you when they said

this."

But Asuna didn't hesitate. She was ready to face whatever reality had in store,

and she felt she had a duty to do it. She looked up and said, "No…please

continue. This is why I came here."

"I see," Dr. Kurahashi said, smiling again and nodding. "Yuuki told me that if

you desired to know, I could tell you everything about her. Her hospital room is

on the top floor of the center ward. It's a long hike, so we can talk as we go."

As she walked after the doctor, out of the lounge and toward the elevator,

Asuna felt the same term repeating over and over in her head.

Terminal care. She felt that she had a very clear and simple idea of what that

meant, but she didn't want to think that they would have such a direct term to

refer to that "final" stage of life.

The only thing she knew for certain was that she needed to face and accept

the truth that would be revealed to her soon. Yuuki allowed her to come into

contact with her reality because she believed that Asuna could handle it.

In the lobby of the center ward building, there were three elevators. The

rightmost said STAFF ONLY. The doctor ran the card he hung around his neck over

the panel, and the door binged open at once.

They entered the box full of white glow, and the elevator began to ascend

with almost no sound or sense of acceleration.

"Have you ever heard of the term window period?" Dr. Kurahashi suddenly

asked. Asuna blinked and consulted her memory index.

"I believe…I learned that one in health class. Does it have something to do

with virus…infections?"

"That's right. When a person is suspected of contracting a viral infection, you

usually run a blood test. There's an antibody test, where you test the blood with

antibodies that will react to the virus, and there's a more sensitive option called

a NAT test that amplifies the virus's DNA and RNA. Even with the more powerful

NAT test, it cannot detect a virus within the first ten days of infection. That time

span is called the window period."

Dr. Kurahashi paused. They felt a very slight slowdown, and the door binged

open again. The twelfth (and top) floor was prohibited to general visitors, and

there was an imposing gateway right outside the elevator. The doctor ran his

card over another sensor, then placed his palm on a panel for a biometric

reading. The panel beeped, and the metal barricade bar sank out of the way. He

motioned Asuna through the gate.

Unlike the lower floors, there were no windows in sight. It was just a long

hallway with white panels and a left-right intersection up ahead.

Dr. Kurahashi took the lead again and turned down the left branch. The

inorganic hallway, lit by soft white lights, continued on endlessly. They passed a

few nurses dressed in white, but there was otherwise no hint of sound from the

outside world.

"The existence of this window period inevitably gives rise to a certain

phenomenon," the doctor said abruptly, continuing his earlier explanation,

"and that is, the contamination of the transfusion liquid we collect through

blood drives. Of course, the likelihood is very small. The probability of catching

a virus from a single transfusion has to be one in hundreds of thousands. But

modern medical science is unable to reduce that chance to zero."

He sighed faintly. Asuna felt a hint of helplessness in his mannerism.

"Yuuki was born in May of 2011. It was a difficult birth, and she had to be

delivered by C-section. During the operation…it was unlabeled in the records,

but there was some kind of accident that resulted in significant blood loss,

requiring an emergency transfusion. And sadly, the blood that was used turned

out to be contaminated with a virus."

"…!"

Asuna held her breath. The doctor glanced at her for an instant, then turned

away and continued. "We don't know for certain at this point, but Yuuki was

infected either at birth or shortly thereafter. Her father was infected within the

month. The infection wasn't detected until September, via a post-transfusion

blood test her mother received. At that point…it was too late for the entire

family…"

He sighed heavily and came to a halt. There was a sliding door on the right

wall, with a metal panel built into the wall next to it. The plate inserted there

carried the imposing title of First Special Instrument Room.

The doctor slid his card through the slit below the panel. The machine binged

and the door slid open with a hiss.

Asuna followed Dr. Kurahashi through the door, grappling with a pain like her

chest was being wrung by a giant set of hands. The room was oddly long and

narrow. On the far wall ahead was another door like the one they'd just passed

through, and the right wall was lined with a number of consoles and monitors.

The left wall was covered with an enormous horizontal window, but the glass

was black, the space beyond invisible to her.

"The room on the other side of the glass is sterilized by air control systems, so

I'm afraid you can't go in there," he said, approaching the black window and

activating the control panel below it. The window hummed a bit, the dark color

rapidly draining away until it was transparent enough to reveal the other side.

It was a small room. Actually, in terms of measurements, it was large. It only

looked small because the space was crammed full of various machines. Some

were tall, some were short, some were simple boxes, and some were rather

complex. So it took her a little time before she noticed the gel bed at the center

of the room.

Asuna got as close to the glass as she could, squinting at the bed. There was a

small figure half sunken in to the blue gel. It was covered by a white sheet up to

the chest, but the bare shoulders poking out above it were painfully thin. A

number of tubes ran to the figure's throat and arms, connecting them to the

array of machinery.

She couldn't see the face of the person on the bed directly. It was covered by

a white cube, built into the bed, that swallowed almost her entire head inside

of it. All she could see were thin, colorless lips and a pointed chin. There was a

side monitor on the cube pointing toward them, shifting with a number of

colored readouts. Above the monitor was a simple logo reading Medicuboid.

"…Yuuki…?" Asuna rasped. At last, she had found Yuuki in real life. But now

that she was almost there, the last several feet were separated by a thick glass

wall that could never be breached.

Without turning to him, Asuna timidly, hesitantly asked, "Doctor…what does

Yuuki have…?"

His answer was short, but unbearably heavy.

"Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome…She has AIDS."