Refrain: Silent Interval

[November 14th, 20:40 JST]

Tokyo Prefecture – Harmonia Foundation Tama Facility, Western Tokyo.

When Reina opened her pale cerulean eyes, the ceiling felt too white, sterile light humming faintly above her. A cold sharpness lingered in the air. Her limbs were heavy, wrapped in thin blue cables that pulsed softly in rhythm with her heartbeat. Across the monitor beside her bed, lines of unknown symbols scrolled, half medical code and half arcane sigils, as if the room itself ran on a language between science and magic.

She blinked once. The last thing she remembered was the flash — the song, her voice turning into thunder, and then nothing.

Her gaze shifted. Beside the bed sat Producer Takeshi, his arm folded on the mattress, head resting against it, fast asleep.

Reina’s lips curved faintly. She lifted a trembling hand and brushed his short black hair aside with a quiet fondness. His breathing stirred against her palm, steady and familiar. It was the same rhythm that had once lulled her through sleepless nights of training.

They had always been like this.

Two years earlier, when the Harmonia Foundation first discovered her resonance potential, she’d been just another girl — an unstable spark barely able to control her own frequency, despite having awakened to one of the strongest elements in the Cantus system: lightning. Everyone said she would burn out, waste her gift. But Takeshi had seen something else beneath her silver-blue ponytail and uncertain eyes. At the time he was nineteen, the youngest producer the Foundation had ever appointed, dismissed by others as too inexperienced to handle a Diva.

He had chosen her anyway. Trained her harder than anyone. Stood by her through every collapse and failure, until her voice no longer cracked and her will no longer wavered. Through those long nights of exhaustion and quiet laughter, something fragile yet undeniable had taken root between them, something that never should have. She had been sixteen then.

“… Takeshi,” she whispered, her voice hoarse but steady. “Wake up.”

His eyes fluttered open, unfocused at first. The moment he saw her, his composure shattered.

“Reina—!”

He caught her in his arms, his voice shaking as though the word itself could vanish if he didn’t hold her.

“I thought I lost you,” he murmured against her shoulder. “I’m sorry. I should’ve stopped you. I shouldn’t have let you sing that song.”

Reina smiled faintly, resting her forehead against his.

“No” she said softly. “You know I’d have done it anyway. Even if you’d ordered me not to.”

He gave a shaky laugh, pulling back just enough to meet her eyes.

 “You have no idea how the board tore into me. They called you their precious weapon and kept asking the same thing — what if you never woke up? What if the Coda Cantus killed you? What if we lost one of our few Cantus Major Divas.”

Her smile tilted. “And yet, here I am. Awake. Breathing. You did your job well, Takeshi.”

He squeezed her hand gently. His voice lowering.

“You did more than survive,” he said. “You created a miracle. The first Diva to sing the Coda Cantus and still live. Even the temple walls swore it meant death, yet here you are, defying a prophecy carved in stone.”

For a moment, the room fell into a hush. Then he reached for the remote and switched on the television mounted opposite the bed. The evening broadcast replayed a recorded performance — the Tempesta Unit girls onstage, all smiles and choreographed grace beneath the bright studio lights.

Reina watched in silence, the faint echo of their songs leaking through the speakers

“Guess I missed today’s live.”

Takeshi smiled. “Emi-san took your center spot for now. She looked nervous as hell, but she did it anyway.”

Reina chuckled softly. “Of course she did. Emi-chan’s brave like that, always ready to follow my lead, never to overtake it. She says standing behind me makes her feel stronger.”

He exhaled in a breath that was half-laugh and half-sigh. “My office line hasn’t stopped ringing since the show. Your fans are relentless. Even after we said you were unwell, they kept calling.”

“That only means they care.” Reina’s smile softened.

His finger tightened around hers without meaning to.

She tilted her head, teasing. “… Is that jealousy I hear?”

“Me? Jealous?” He smirked, though his voice gentled beneath it. “Not a chance. I already know where your heart lives.”

He lifted her hand and pressed his lips against the back of it, a gesture so brief and natural it barely qualified as rebellion.

Reina’s laugh came quiet and genuine. For a moment, the sterile room felt warmer.

They both knew what this was — a line neither should cross, yet one they’d already stepped beyond. A Producer and His Diva. Onstage, she was his star; in battle, his command. In both worlds, the rule was absolute: no attachments, no entanglements. Discovery meant disbandment.

But they had already lost too much to pretend indifference now.

Sometimes, breaking the rule was the only way to stay human.

They were still quietly enjoying each other’s company when faint voices drifted from the hallway: laughter, hurried footsteps, the rustle of uniforms.

Visitors.

The door clicked open.

Reina and Takeshi instinctively pulled apart. Her cheeks warmed as she straightened her posture; he cleared his throat and pretended to adjust his tie, composure snapping back into place a heartbeat too late.

Then Emi burst through the doorway.

“Reina-chan!”

Before anyone could speak, she dashed across the room and tackled Reina onto the bed, wrapping both arms around her. The impact made the monitors tremble.

“Reina-chan, I missed you so much! I thought you’d never wake up again! I thought I’d never hear you sing again…” Her soft lilac eyes shimmered, words breaking into small sobs. “I had no idea what I’d do if you were gone.”

Reina smiled faintly and slipped an arm around her, fingers sliding through Emi’s soft silver-gray hair that curled gently at the ends. She ruffled it the way she used to after training, gently and rhythmically.

“I know… I know. Don’t cry, okay? I trusted Tak—” she caught herself, “—our Producer to do everything he could to wake me.”

Emi only tightened her embrace, face buried against Reina’s shoulder. For someone seventeen, that childish streak surfaced only when she was with Reina.

The others exchanged knowing smiles; they’d seen this scene too many times.

“Reina-san,” Misaki teased, leaning against the doorway, her violet-gray eyes glinting with dry amusement beneath the fall of indigo hair that hid half her face. “Do you know Emi-san cried the whole night after we got back?”

Emi made a muffled protest and hugged tighter.

Emiko giggled, her tone soft and a little shy but bright with relief. Her pale-blond curls bounced gently as she leaned forward, golden eyes warm with quiet joy. “She refused to leave your side until P-kun arrived. We practically had to drag her out so she could rest and get ready for the live performance.”

Nana pumped a fist with a grin, her short red-orange spikes of hair bouncing with the motion. “I always knew Reina-san would wake up. She’s a Cantus Major-grade Diva, after all!”

“Says the one who kept pacing in front of the operating room,” Momoko shot back, laughter in her sky-blue eyes. Her twin mint-green braids swayed as she leaned against the bedrail. “Even Emi-san managed to sit still!”

Light laughter rippled through the room, softening the sterile air.

Mika crossed her arms, composed as ever. The soft gleam of the green ember stone on her choker caught the light when she spoke. “Still, Reina-senpai, can you move yet? I’ve never heard of any Diva surviving a Coda Cantus. When Emiko-san was healing you, I could feel your resonance fading. We thought you were gone.”

Reina kept patting Emi’s back, her tone steady but low. “You’re right. Even though I survived, it left scars. I can move my arms now, but not my legs. I can sense faint resonance from my D-Mic, but activating it? Not yet.” She smiled lightly, though her voice trembled. “Guess that’s the price for singing the forbidden song and living to tell it.”

“I talked to the doctor,” Takeshi said from the foot of the bed. “He said the symptoms are temporary. A few more days’ rest and you’ll be fit for deployment again.”

“As expected from our P-kun — always reliable!” Nana laughed, slapping him on the back so hard his shoulder jolted forward.

“Ow—hey!” he protested, rubbing the spot while the room erupted in laughter again.

Then the television’s volume spiked slightly, an urgent tone cutting through the glee, the familiar opening of NHK News Watch 9.

“…developing reports from several rural regions that have drawn the attention of both police and disaster-response teams…”

The laughter died instantly. Everyone turned toward the screen as the anchor’s voice continued:

“According to witnesses, the entire population of twenty-three residents has gone missing since last night.”

Reina’s faint smile faded, replaced by a distant, knowing look.

The public still had no idea what truly walked within the mist. To them, it was just another mystery on the news. But she knew, and everyone in this room knew, that the Foundation had already buried their Nagano operation beneath a hundred layers of silence.

The incident in Akashino wasn’t theirs to answer for, yet the pattern was the same. The vanished village, the blood, the mist. The signs were all too familiar.

No one spoke. The only sound was the low hum of the monitor until, at last, Takeshi reached for the remote and turned off the television.

The screen went dark, and the room settled into a silence thick with the weight of things they would never say aloud.