Coach Carter

Six-thirty in the morning, 2087, the infirmary corridor of a dance academy under the GDU. Lisa, who collapsed right after a landing yesterday afternoon, hasn't woken up all night, and the corridor, still outside visiting hours, holds nothing but the smell of disinfectant and the mechanical beeps of biomonitors. Beside a bed with its curtain half drawn, a thin man in a crisp black uniform sits holding a tablet. Lisa's coach. A man who reads joint angles and muscle contractions only as numbers, who has always said emotions are noise to be filtered out. Yet his uniform collar is still crumpled the way it was yesterday afternoon, and several empty nutrient capsule containers roll on the floor beside his chair. It means he hasn't left this spot all night. Even at the sound of approaching footsteps, he doesn't look up—he only checks his wristwatch.