Page 326 of Mercy Written in Blood

Sakamoto continued.

"You are compromised."

"I am the most experienced surgeon in this building."

"You are emotionally involved."

"Yes."

Renji discarded the towel. The admission silenced the corridor. Sakamoto had expected denial. Renji had no use for it.

"Does that make you more capable?" Sakamoto asked.

"No."

"Then step back."

"No."

"You could kill him."

Renji looked through the narrow window in the theatre door. Haruki lay beneath blue drapes. Only fragments of him visible — a shoulder, the curve of his jaw beneath tape, one hand secured at his side. The monitors spoke in numbers: pulse one hundred and forty-two, pressure falling, temperature low, coagulation failing. Renji could hear the blood moving through him. Not normally. The sound should have been impossible through glass, machinery and walls. Yet he felt each damaged vessel as though Haruki's circulatory system had been drawn in light behind his eyes.

The Archive's diagrams returned. Dual circulation. Regenerative force controlled by a human pulse. The Takahara had built safeguards because power without limitation became predation. Renji understood that. He also understood safeguards had been designed for time. For consent obtained before the body failed. Haruki had neither.

"Doctor Takahara."

Sakamoto's voice brought him back. Renji turned.

"I will not use Hemomancy without necessity."

Sakamoto's face tightened.

"I did not mention Hemomancy."

"You were thinking it."

"I was thinking you should not be near him."

"Because you believe I may lose control."

"I believe you already did."

Renji looked at his clean hands.

"No."

The answer came quietly. Sakamoto's expression changed. Renji met his gaze.

"At the depot, I lost restraint. Not control."

"That distinction does not comfort me."

"It should not."

The theatre doors opened. A nurse looked out.

"Pressure is sixty over thirty."