The Twin Fools

[Unhacker]

09/04/2017 - 13:00 - Tokyo - Arisato Minako

Arisato Minako and Arisato Minato were not sure how to feel about their current situation, they were finally not going to be living with a random member of their extended family until they got bored of them and then moved them onto the next member of their family.

Though right now, they were on their way to be taken care of one Sakura Sojiro, though one thing that they could do without is the fact that they were also on probation due to an assault charge. Which they got for a crime that they did not commit, well actually, if you squint and ignore the circumstances then they did but that's beside the point.

Besides the point, just because they took a wrong turn late at night and had to get involved then they ended up with an assault charge on their record and got them expelled from their high school (which they had been attending for a year, a new record for them as the often only stayed for a single term) This also then led to them being moved on from the latest distant relative, one of their many uncles on their dad's side.

The two were fraternal twins, Minako had brown hair done up in a short, high ponytail, complete with a set of hairclips which formed the Roman Numerals for 22, her eyes were a stark red colour that she could not explain as much as she tried.

Her brother, Minato had short blue hair which she would admit, was mostly fringe, he had grey eyes that looked almost lifeless if you looked at them, once again, he couldn't explain it.

While the difference between their looks was like the difference between night and day, the difference in their personalities was similar. Minako was cheerful and upbeat, always ready to hide whatever was wrong with her behind a cheesy grin and a bad joke, she was cheerful because she had to. In social situations, she was quick on her feet and bubbly, but also rather awkward and was rather plain looking.

Minato's demeanour could be described in one word: Listless. He was rather quiet and made efficient use of silence and words, not talking when it was needed. His worldview could be described as Nihilistic, even when the police were taking his photo he remained passive. Despite all this, he had something of a snarky personality and he's protective of his sister. In social situations, he spent more time reacting or just humming in response to something that someone said. He was less awkward than his sister and tended to also appear a bit more charming than her as well.

Though there were a few things that the twins had in common besides dead parents and a criminal record. They both had a rather sharp intellect, a powerful sense of justice and a want to protect people around them.

In terms of their current situation, they were on their way to Shibuya, where they would transfer trains to get to Yongen-Jaya to get to the house of their new legal guardian.

Both of them were dressed in the uniform of the new school they would be attending, Shujin Academy, a rather prestigious school which actually took them in despite their record which was ... surprising to say the least.

They both knew what they had to do in order for their probation to be completed and their criminal record wiped, they had to go through one full year at this school and not commit any crimes.

In terms of what they were doing on the train, it was simple, Minako was reading the manga which she had with her bag (and may have blown a small part of her budget on) while Minato was on his phone listening to music.

09/04/2017 - 14:00 - Yongen-Jaya - Arisato Minako

Eventually, they got their way through the fun that was the Tokyo public transport and made their way to Yongen-Jaya, moving through the backstreets, they realized that they might have looked a bit suspicious, especially considering the lack of high school students around due to the time of day.

Either way, they moved past some cafe and made their way to a rather small two-story house which looked rather respectable despite the fact that it was in a back alley. Though neither of them wanted to be the one to ring the bell, though the fact that owner was out of the house, as was informed by a deliveryman that Sojiro had apparently not taken the day off to meet the people who were going to be staying under his roof for the next year.

So they headed to the Cafe which was owned by their new Guardian, the Cafe known as "Leblanc" and made their way inside.

09/04/2017 - 14:10 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minako

The first thing that hit both of them was the smell of the place, it obviously smelt like coffee, but there was also the lingering scent of curry. The next thing was the decor, the floor and walls were all brown hardwood, clearly polished as well. The booths of the cafe had brown leather seats and off-colour white tables, in the corner of the main room there was an old CRT TV that appeared to be playing the tabloid news. The only other inhabitants of the room were an old couple who were getting up from their seats and a middle-aged man wearing a pink shirt with an apron over it, he appeared to be quite interested in the crossword puzzle that he was trying to solve.

When he looked up to see the next inhabitants of the room, he was surprised to see young people in his cafe "Not that many teenagers come around here." he said, his voice was rather grumpy sounding and it was clear that the years were getting to him, but despite that he was still rather good looking if you ignored his Crow's Feet. He didn't seem to realize that the two teenagers in front of him were his new charges.

"Actually sir." Minako, the more socially eager one began "You're supposed to be our guardian for the year." Her voice sort of trailed off near the end, she wasn't good at talking to adults and it showed.

He looked rather surprised at that, while the blue haired one looked like he might hurt someone the brunette seemed like she couldn't hurt a fly. "You? I would have thought it would be the blue haired guy." Minato responded to the reference to him

"Both of us are your new charges." He said, deciding to speak, his voice was quiet but it was mature

"Oh, yeah, come to think of it, they did tell me it was two kids I would be taking care of." Sojiro trailed off as he remembered the details of the file, two twins, both guilty of assault. "Come with me, I'll show you to your room." He said as he walked up the set of stairs next to the TV. Minato and Minako both followed him up the stairs, taking a slight note of every time the wood of the stairs creaked under their weight. When they arrived in the attic of the Cafe, there were a few things which could be seen at a glance: It was dusty, there was only one bed, it was cluttered, it was spacious.

"It's big..." Minako said despite herself upon seeing it.

"Hope you weren't expecting five-star accommodations, this isn't an all-expenses-paid trip to Tokyo, this is probation," Sojiro responded rather quickly "If you make any mistake, I won't hesitate to kick both of you out. Got it?" He finished, his voice was short and to the point, he was obviously not happy about their presence

"Yes, sir," Minako said, while her brother just nodded.

"Just to understand your situation, you were walking home late at night, when you saw a man trying to force himself onto a woman. You intervened and pushed him to the ground, he got injured and pressed charges against you which stuck, that's what you get-"

"For sticking our noses into a matter between two adults," Minako said, her voice was drained and it was clear that she did not want to be here. She realized what she said and tensed up in fear of a verbal or physical lashing, but instead, Sojiro looked at her slightly impressed at her courage.

"As a result, you got expelled from your old high school and got moved from your last guardian, in other words, they didn't want to deal with your sorry asses." He finished, his voice did have a tinge of sympathy but Minako was sure that she was imagining it, she was something of a bad judge of character. He made to go back downstairs, "Oh, your ... uncle, I think, sent your stuff over, it's in the box." There was indeed a cardboard box there.

Minato crouched down to open it, there were a few changes of clothes for both of them as well as few spare changes of the Shujin Academy uniform, in addition, there were also some school supplies, some notebooks, some pens, including both twin's fountain pens. "We need to change clothes." He said, pulling out a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt, throwing his sister her casual clothes, a black tank top and a pair of jean shorts. They both nodded, occupying different sides of the room, they changed clothes and set about making use of some of the cleaning supplies that Sojiro so carefully supplied, or left there in order to turn the attic from run-down to somewhere that was liveable.

09/04/2017 - 20:10 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minako

As darkness fell and the room looked livable, both twins were tired from cleaning the attic, but there was one important factor, there was a brown leather sofa and a single mattress that looked rather moth-bitten and lumpy.

"Alright brother, in order to see who gets the mattress, how about we flip a coin?" Minako said, pulling out a ten-yen coin from her purse, he nodded, looking a bit confused as to why she had a single ten yen coin on her in advance "Make a call."

"Heads." He said she flipped the coin and it had landed on heads, much to her dismay.

"You win again Minato..." Minako said, her voice dripping with faux anger, she laid down on the sofa, "I need a pillow." She heard the sound of creaking and immediately sat up on the sofa. Seeing Sojiro come in with two pillows and two duvets.

"Forgot to bring these up for you." He handed each twin one of each, "Heard such a racket downstairs, didn't imagine that you were actually cleaning." It was good to have such a vote of confidence from the Old Man.

They both knew that we would probably have to be up early tomorrow, so they both decided to get to sleep before long. The one thought that was on both of their minds before they fell asleep was "I hope this year goes well."

 

[Unhacker]

10/04/2018 - 06:30 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minato

Minato was the first one to wake up, naturally, though this was in part to his phone alarm, he almost forgot that he was staying in the attic of a Western Style Cafe. He casually got up out of bed, not really bothered to take much time to take account of his situation.

There wasn't much use on worrying about his situation when he could be more concerned with improving it. Though on that thought, it was likely that he would be given a tour of the school today, as such, he started to get dressed in his Shujin Academy Uniform. Black blazer with red buttons, white turtleneck shirt and sweater, both of which had the school emblem on it. The turtleneck had a small version around the neck area and the blazer had the emblem on its outside pocket. Next was the trousers, black, red and white plaid pattern, it was a rather interesting design, these trousers were complete with a pair of honest-to-god suspenders. He finished it off with a set of black dress shoes, not meant for running but would still be useful. In addition to this, there was a pin that had the number 2 on it, he guessed that it was meant to indicate the year he was in.

When he had finally managed to get dressed, which took him a few minutes, he set about waking up his sister. To do so, he got himself a stick as she could get violent when not properly woken up and he was not in a mood to take risks.

"Hm... five more minutes" She mumbled as he started poking her in the side with the stick. He poked again "Finnneeeeee" she moaned as she got up out of bed, her hair frazzled and her eyes still sleepy. She took in the sight of him in uniform, with frazzled hair himself and promptly started laughing, either at the sight of him in uniform or at the uniform itself.

"You have to wear this as well." He said, putting a stop to his twin's laughing as a look of faux-dread set in. "I'll get a brush for you." He said, turning around to fetch a brush from the cabinet next to the stairs as she set about getting dressed into uniform.

He would admit, he was extra slow at finding the brush and he also then spent some time brushing his hair back into its usual fringe. When he turned around, he saw his sister dressed in uniform as well.

A similar blazer, shirt and sweater (there was a hope that the requirements would be eased during late spring and summer) the differences were as follows: a small black ribbon was added to the turtleneck (though given his sister, this was done slightly messily) the trousers were replaced by a skirt with the same pattern, there was a pair of black nylon tights (which his sister had a vicious hatred of) and a sensible pair of Mary Janes. He threw the brush at her and she barely caught it and set about doing her hair.

This was similar to their normal morning routine, get dressed in the school uniform of the month, whoever got up first got to get the phones ready as well as earphones, it was a simple routine but the liked it for its simplicity.

Though their routine was interrupted by Sojiro coming upstairs, indicated by the loud creaking sounds that the obviously ageing wood made when weight was put on it. What both twins were not prepared for was what he was wearing.

He was wearing the same (or a similar) pair of khaki trousers and light pink shirt. Though it was what else he was wearing, he was wearing an off-colour white blazer and a white fedora. In short, he was dressed like a pimp, in the presence of two teenagers who he had custody over, oh this is going to be a funny story when they both arrived back in Juvie.

Minato handled it a lot better than his sister, he just raised a single eyebrow and a good half of his mouth twitched into a smirk. Minako, on the other hand, did everything possible to avoid bursting out laughing, this was done by actually holding her hand over her mouth. Sojiro's disapproval of Minako was palpable, but he seemed to be able to handle his disapproval and opened his mouth "Glad to see you're both dressed, come on, I've got to take you to Shujin. I'm going to introduce both of you to the Principal there." They both nodded, understanding the situation they were in. As they walked down the stairs, Minato handed his sister her phone and her red pair of earphones, slipping his own grey earphones into his ears and starting to play music on his phone.

10/04/2018 - 7:45 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minato

While it didn't take long by Tokyo standards to get there, it took long by most people's standards, the drive lasted just under an hour and this was on a good day. Either way, the twins and their guardian exited the off-colour white car (Minato decided that Sojiro probably had a fetish for that colour) and made their way to the principle's office, where Minako had to, successfully, manage to not laugh as she laid eyes on the large form of the principle.

It was hard to not laugh though, to say he was overweight would be an understatement, the best description of the man would be more fat than anything else, his double chin seemed to go all the way around his neck and it was a wonder how he was even still alive. The only hair on his head was his black eyebrows, which was thankfully not buried under the fat. He was clearly middle-aged based off both his Crow's Feet and his position. In terms of what he was wearing, he was wearing a beige suit, white dress shirt and red bow tie, though both twins, probably Sojiro and most likely all of his employees were probably wondering where he bought this suit from.

Standing next to him was a far more pleasant figure, a woman with black, shoulder-length, curly hair, dressed in a yellow sweater with a denim skirt that went down to her knees. Her face spoke of being long-suffering and tired beyond human comprehension.

"Principal Kobayakawa? I'm Sakura Sojiro, I'm here to introduce your transfer student to you." Sojiro said as he entered the room, his hat was respectfully removed. The twins stood off to the side, knowing that it would be best to remain completely silent during this exchange.

What followed was a long monologue from the Principal about how the twins were in his school and how they should behave and how if so much as took a piss, he'd know about it and he never seemed to stop talking so it sort of becomes white noise at some point. Eventually, he stopped talking for more than five seconds. Then, his mouth opened again

"I'll reiterate in order to be clear, you'll be expelled immediately if you cause any problems. To be honest, we only took you in because there were positive circumstances in our favour." In other words, the school would benefit from being able to reform a delinquent

Minato simply nodded while Minako, in an effort to be polite, said, "I understand." both bowed after that. While they did not like the situation or the man in front of them, they knew that being polite would make this problem a lot smoother.

"Glad to know that you understand your position." He motioned to the woman next to him, who looked a bit uncomfortable being in the principles office for so long "This is your homeroom teacher: Kawakami Sadayo."

The quiet woman spoke up upon hearing her name "I'm Kawakami Sadayo." She reiterated, she walked up to them and handed them something "Here's your student ID and handbook. Make sure to read the school rules, breaking them will have you sent straight to the guidance office. If you do cause any problems there is nothing I can do to protect you. You are responsible for all of your actions here." This was spoken with a level of apathy and general uninterest that one would expect from an accountant. "The schedule for this year is in the handbook. But in the event that you don't look at it, we have a volleyball rally on the 13th. Club activities begin next week, a list of clubs are in the book. Though I get the feeling you won't be welcome at any of them"

To be honest, both of the twins were getting annoyed, his homeroom teacher was making it clear that his presence was a burden and that he would not be welcome in the school, it wouldn't be so bad if she wasn't talking about it like they weren't standing right in front of her. Sojiro also appeared to be getting annoyed as he started tapping his foot on the floor.

"Can we go? I've got a store to get back to." Sojiro said, his patience eventually running out.

"Of course, but Sojiro, do make sure to keep an eye on them. Who knows what they did back in the country but here, we have to be sure to reform them."

"Of course, I understand how important this is."

The homeroom teacher spoke up again "Be sure to come to the faculty office on the second floor when you arrive here tomorrow. I'll show you to your class." She spoke, her attitude and her posture spoke volumes about how displeased she was at the existence of them and the fact that they were in her class. As they exited the principal's office, Minako was quietly counting down until the door to the principal's office closed.

"That could have gone better." She said, stretching slightly. Sojiro gave her a look of disappointment but found himself agreeing with them. As they walked through the school and made their way to the entrance, one thing was made clear to the twins and that was that no one here was too fond of their presence or their pure existence. Sojiro stopped them when they arrived at the shoe lockers

"They're treating you like a nuisance." He said, sighing slightly, he seemed slightly disappointed by that, like he seemed to be with everything else in his life.

"I think I'll scrape by," Minato said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

"I could save some time and kick you out right now if that's going to be your attitude." He sighed again. "Seems like school never changes." They walked out of the building and entered the car again.

10/04/2018 - 18:00 - Some road in Tokyo, around Shibuya, maybe? - Arisato Minato

They were in a car that wasn't moving, a side effect of principal Kobayakawa talking for so long was that they were stuck in rush hour traffic. Minato was woken up by the sound of Sojiro pounding his fist on the dashboard of the car while growling in frustration. "Traffic's not moving at all..." He seemed to be considering something "You're taking the train to school tomorrow." he seemed like he wanted to take his mind off the fact that his car's engine could overheat in this traffic "So how is it, the school I mean. Think you can manage?"

Minato and Minako both answered at the same time "I'll live." "It'll be fun."

"What troublesome kids I've taken in," He said, seeming to regret all his decisions up until this point

Minako was looking for some way to ask the question that was on her mind without sounding rude but Minato beat her to the punch "Why did you take us in?"

Sojiro seemed to sweat a bit upon hearing this, "It's nothing, I was asked and I happened to agree." He said, unconvincingly, making Minato think that he was something of a Tsundere "I was paid as well, of course." Of course, that explained it fully. The car was not moving by much in this traffic and the hatred of everyone in the car for the asshole who was in the car in front of them was heavily present.

Both twins were reading through the Student Handbook and listening to music in order to pass the time, Minato never really saw the appeal of school clubs especially considering the fact that he was often times not involved in school's long enough to get to first name basis. Though there was something which interested him, the school did have a Martial Arts Club which he was a bit interested in, mostly because he wanted to be able to protect himself and his sister in the future. Minako, on the other hand, found her interests in the Shogi Club, while she wasn't all that good at the game, she was able to make some good progress, though in most cases she never really stuck around long enough to be able to get a good feel on the playstyles of her opponents. Though both knew that their aspirations of joining the school clubs were most likely not going to result in much, they weren't going to be welcome and chances are a few people would be able to come up with some rumours about these Sudden Transfer Students.

10/04/2018 - 22:00 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minato

In the end, Sojiro wasn't able to open up the store today and he did blame both of them for it. Neither saw fit to remind him that he could have just sent them on their way, this was mostly because they did not want to get kicked out.

In terms of living accommodations, they were to live in the Cafe and if they were spotted on the Cafe's Cameras or by the owner trying to steal anything, they would be dragged kicking and screaming back to Juvie, most likely literally. They basically ended up getting some convenience store noodles as a dinner, it wasn't all that filling, but it was better than nothing. They were both going to go upstairs when the bright yellow pay phone rang, Minato was the one who answered it.

"Hello?" He spoke into the phone. Waiting for a response

"Oh good, I was wondering if you were going to pick up." The voice was familiar, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it.

"Who is this?" He spoke, his voice was audibly tired and he was just hoping that nothing bad would happen.

"Have you forgotten my voice already?" The voice spoke, sounding annoyed "It's me, Sojiro." Ah, that explains why the voice was familiar. "I forgot to flip the sign from open to closed when I locked up, could you just flip it over for me?"

"Yes, Sir," Minato said, noting that Sojiro hung up after Minato said yes. He got up with a sigh and did one of the most difficult tasks he was ever tasked with, he flipped the sign to 'closed' and then felt accomplished at completing such a difficult task. He noted that his sister had already cleaned up the cup noodles and was upstairs.

He walked upstairs and saw that his sister was already in her sleeping clothes, a black tank top and a pair of grey sweatpants. He went to change into his sleeping clothes which were similar, a black t-shirt and a pair of grey sweatpants. She was looking in the other direction, out of politeness as she let her hair down.

He sat down on his bed as she looked like she was ready to say something. "Just to be clear, this entire situation is bullshit, right?" she spoke, she didn't really swear a lot so this was a bit unusual.

"I think they would rather we didn't exist," Minato said, answering the question and offering his viewpoint at the same time.

"That sounds about right." She sighed "Hopefully, the teacher doesn't let slip our criminal record. We do not need that." She plugged her phone into the charger "How many minutes do you think we'll need to be sure that we get into school?"

"Thirty to an hour." He answered, looking at the alarm on his phone as he set it back an hour. After doing so, he lay down on his bed and got to sleep.

 

[Unhacker]

11/04/2018 - 5:30 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minato

Both Minako and Minato got up at the same time and made their way to quickly get dressed in school uniforms. The thing that woke them up was Minato's alarm which was set to loud death metal in order to make sure that they would get up.

"Why'd we agree to get up at such an ungodly hour?" Minako asked, her voice was clearly in a whinging mode as she woke up. She couldn't actually remember the last time she got up at such a time.

"We'd need to add an hour to our schedule to figure out the route," Minato answered, his response was just as displeased with the situation. Neither of the twins was pleased with the fact that the School Uniform included suspenders, it was a minor complaint, but it was still important. Both managed to get ready in a few minutes with their earphones in their pockets and phones in hand, with schoolbags over their shoulder.

When they came down the stairs, they noticed Sojiro Sakura standing there behind the counter. In front of him were two plates of curry.

"You're actually going to school?" Sojiro questioned apparently surprised at that, he looked up at the clock on the wall "A bit early, you think?"

"Don't want to be late," Minato said, he was more of a morning person than his sister, who was almost nocturnal.

"Hold on." He placed a glass of water next to each of the plates of curry. "You'll probably need some breakfast. Just eat it up before the customers start lining up." They were surprised by the breakfast curry, but they were not complaining and they started eating it, loving just how good it tasted, either it was from the fact that it was for breakfast, or that it was from some sort of scientifically modified recipe. It didn't matter with the help of the curry, they felt their spirits soar, and the feeling of waking up at such an ungodly hour didn't seem so bad.

"Thanks for the food." Both the twins said, bowing slightly as they said that. On their way out, they flipped the sign to 'Open'.

11/04/2018 - 5:45 - Yongen-Jaya - Arisato Minako

The sun was just barely in the sky and the two twins were wondering how they would be able to get to the Subway.

Minako decided on the simplest option, she walked up to some rather old man who seemed to be in his early fifties. "Excuse me." She began. "Don't suppose you can tell me how to get to the Subway?"

"Just go back out this alley and turn left at the intersection. From there, you'll see the main road. Or you could keep going straight through here. It can get a bit tight though." He answered, surprisingly helpfully.

"Thank you very much." She said, bowing. She looked up to her brother "Come on, the trains won't wait for us." They both ran down the alley, casually shifting to get out of the way of a man who seemed to be walking out of the subway. true to the old man's word it was a tight fit but it wasn't surprising.

11/04/2018 - 7:35 - Aoyama-Itchome - Arisato Minako

Well, one thing was for sure, the rumours about the Tokyo Subway were true, it really was cramped to all hell. Another thing they knew was that it was raining like heavily raining, the best bit was: They forgot their umbrellas and everyone didn't seem to want to share with them.

As they stood under the awning of some shop, they looked up at the rain and then at the time, then back to the rain again, sizing up the odds of them being able to arrive on the school in time without looking like a drowned rat.

Minako looked at a figure that was next to her. Wearing a Shujin Academy Uniform only instead of the standard skirt and black nylons, this figure was instead wearing a white hoody with red tights. The hood was up on the hoody because the girl (based on the figure's curvature) was smart. She removed her hood and Minako swears that for a second time stopped.

The girl was beautiful, her features were certainly Japanese in origin, but her strawberry blonde hair (done up in two large pigtails) and sky blue eyes certainly dismissed that notion. The girl was certainly pretty, she could probably be an idol or a model with those looks. Though thinking about it, she was somewhat familiar. Minako realised that she was staring and looked at the ground, her face slightly red, though she heard the foreign girl laughing a beautiful sound.

A car pulled up in front of them, one of the windows on the car, revealing a man in a tracksuit with a massive chin, he had curly hair and seemed to radiate an aura of danger. "Wonderful day isn't it?" Minato seemed to start twitching at someone else using his schtick and it was a poor use of it as well. "You might want to get a ride to school." He said, while it was worded more like a suggestion, it sounded more like an order.

Now it was important to remember that both the Arisato Twins had one of the most basic rules in their heads 'Don't get into cars with strangers' which is why they were surprised by the blonde teen getting into the car, Minato didn't do anything if she wanted to make a poor life choice, it was on her. Minako was a bit worried though, she did notice that the blonde looked very uncomfortable about getting into the car, which did beg a question: why'd she take the ride?

"You two want a ride?" The man said, his voice was rich in just a feeling of wrongness. Both twins shook their heads, even Minato felt something wrong with this man. But they both couldn't put their finger on it to save their lives. The car pulled away and the twins were delighted to know that the rain had eased up, they were annoyed to find out that there was very little time left before school started.

"Goddammit!" Some blond kid shouted as he ran up to where the car previously was, he then kicked his foot into a puddle for effect. Of course, there would be another distraction. "Screw that piece of shit pervy teacher!"

"Pervy Teacher?" Minako asked, she was not sure but the kid could be referring to that guy in a tracksuit.

"What you going to rat me out to Kamoshida?" The boy responded, sneering slightly, it was at this point that both the twins got a good look at him. Unkempt and slightly spiky blonde hair that didn't quite look natural, black eyebrows, Japanese features. The boy was hunched over slightly, his hands in his pockets. He wore the Shujin Academy blazer and trousers (which were rolled up to his ankles) but that was the only uniform they could find, he also wore a pair of canvas shoes (that were quite wet from the rain and the puddle kicking) and a bright yellow graphic T-shirt, all in all, the boy gave one distinct impression, a delinquent.

But more to the matter, there was the question of who the hell is Kamoshida? "Who?" Minato said, voicing his question

"The guy who Takamaki-Chan got into a car with?" Yet another name they did not recognise, if they looked confused, this delinquent didn't seem to notice it as he continued "Piece of shit does whatever he wants, he thinks he's king of the castle or something."

"King of the - what the hell are you talking about?" Minako asked the fact that this boy was swearing like a sailor and wasn't making any sense made both the twins wonder if they should be associating with him.

"Wait you don't know about Kamoshida?" The boy stepped closer to her, looking specifically at her pin "That pin says your a second year. You should be used to this shit by now."

The boy was looking both of the twins up and down, frowning before he realised something "Wait, I don't recognise you, you a transfer student or something?" Well, didn't that sound like it could be insulting, but Minako didn't want to get into an argument with an obvious delinquent

"Yeah, also I don't want to be late on my first day." Minako voiced the opinion of both twins, the teenager pulled out his phone and almost jumped when he realised the time.

"Shit! Don't worry, I know a shortcut, it should shave a few minutes off." He moved down an until-then-unnoticed alleyway, "Follow me." both the twins looked at each other as if to say 'Is this guy trying to trick us?' but the then decided to follow him down the alley, at this point all they cared about was actually making it to school on time. They walked through a series of alleyways, thankfully the vulgar boy was not intent on making small talk eventually, they managed to get their way to Shujin. The building was rather impressive looking now that they thought about it.

"Well, here we are, its a college prep school. Though if you ask me, it's more like a fucking prison." The Vulgar boy said both of the twins knew that this boy was not giving the word its full justice.

"Thank you," Minato said, his voice cold and emotionless.

"No problem, I have to head to Homeroom." The Vulgar Boy said, "anything else you need before we break off?"

"Could you tell me how to get to the faculty office?" Minako said.

"Ah sure, not sure why'd you want to go there, just go up to the second floor, right next to the stairs, can't miss it really."

"Thanks!" Minako said as she ran ahead, Minato nodded and ran to catch up with his sister.

They went up to the shoe locker and replaced their shoes with school slippers and walked into the main area of the school. Minako was the first to hear it though, the incessant whispering.
"Hey isn't that them?"

"The school let in criminals"​

"People like them have no place in here."​

"The blue haired one's rather scary."​

Well, that rose several questions and Minako was shaken by it, why do they know about their criminal record, though there was a hope that they were just guessing, they started to walk up the stairs, noticing that other students were giving them space and more space than the common 'new kid' courtesy, this was more the 'being scared of someone' space.

"Hey, don't make eye contact."​

"My parents are pissed..."​

"The principal really is crazy."
More incessant whispering, there were a few which mentioned the words 'criminal' and 'assault'. When Minako heard this, she gripped hard on her phone which was in her pocket. She couldn't believe that they knew about this, even Minato looked a bit shaken.

When they made their way to the faculty office where a tired and annoyed looking Kawakami looked at them with a mixture of pity and surprise. "Take a seat." They both complied "I'm sure you've heard on your way here, there's no beating around the bush about it. Your records leaked." Minato's eyes widened, but Minako had a worse reaction to it.

"WHAT!" She shouted, before pausing "I'm sorry, I'm just a bit angry. Please continue." thank god for the breathing exercises that Minato told her about.

"We were informed in the morning that your records found their way onto the school forum," Kawakami explained a bit scared at the apparently violent temper of the girl in front of her "If it makes you feel any better, I didn't have a part in it. I'm sure you want to know who did it, but I don't know." She sighed "If you wanted to have a quiet school year and have some friends, you're probably out of luck. I can probably stop most of it in my homeroom class, however though, for the rest of the day, the best suggestion I can give is to make yourself as small as possible. Also, pay attention in class and go straight home after school." Kawakami got up and they decided to follow her, her movements led all the way to outside of a classroom, which they guessed was theirs.

"All right, this is your class. I'm going to introduce you to your class try not to say anything unnecessary." Kawakami instructed, she walked into the room and stopped in front of the blackboard. "Alright class, I'm sure you've heard the rumours, but we have some new transfer students joining us today." She waved the twins in, Minato entered easily, Minako took a small breath to calm herself and then entered. "These are our new transfer students, now I know you've heard about their unique circumstances, but I hope that you'll treat them with the same respect as any other member of the class." Both twins took that as the cue to introduce themselves

"I'm Arisato Minato. Pleased to meet you." Minato said first, bowing respectfully.

"I'm Arisato Minako, please take care of me," Minako said afterwards, bowing less respectfully. Both of their introductions had predictably caused more rumours to circulate.
"Oh, that boy is really cute."

"I hear she's demure, but when she loses it."​

"I heard they'll slug you if you look at one of them."​

"I hear she castrated a man."​

"I hear the boy carries a knife on him."​

Both of the twins kept their heads down upon hearing the rumours, Minato managed to successfully not let his anger show on his face, but Minako had no such luck, it was clear that she was angry. Just in time to see another student, a grey-haired boy with a bowl cut say something to his neighbour. "Careful, she'll shank you if you get too close."

Minako locked eyes with the grey-haired boy. "Alright, let's get you to your seats." Kawakami said, "Minako you'll sit behind Takamaki-san. Takamaki-san?" The blonde girl from earlier raised her hand, Minako took her seat, keeping her eyes locked with the grey-haired boy until she sat down, sending a clear message that she heard him. "Minato, sit in the desk next to your sister." Minato nodded and sat down at his desk. They just hoped that this wasn't the high point in their day.

11/04/2018 - 15:30 - Aoyama-Itchome - Airsato Minato

Minako and Minato were not lent any textbooks by other students, they were openly ridiculed and mocked by a good half of the students, most of the teachers saw fit to comment on the fact that they existed and they did this in a negative manner, there were at least ten different rumours about them started that day alone, ranging from what crimes they might have committed, to their sexual orientation, to whether or not they kick puppies as an exercise routine. In addition, it was obvious that the paper that was thrown at their heads was not someone missing the bin.

Though this led to different reactions from different twins, Minato didn't let this register on his face, much, but it was still present, the man could bottle up anger, but he'd need to have some way to release it soon. Minako on the other hand, while she tried to hide her anger and sadness behind a happy, smiling mask, that mask was slowly starting to crack. She did not like it when people talked about her behind her back, she rarely even minded bad shit said about her as long as she can hear it and respond to it.

They both stepped onto the train, taking Kawakami's advice to heart and immediately headed home.

04/11/2018 - 17:30 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minako

"Bad day?" Sojiro asked as they stepped through the door.

"You don't know the half of it, Sakura-san," Minako said, "Our records were leaked, so I got to hear for a full day, that I apparently castrated a man, with my bare hands once." She was ready to vent at him, but she knew he didn't deserve it. "Sorry, I'm a bit annoyed," She said, knowing that when she started venting it was hard to stop.

"I can tell." Sojiro said, "You're radiating an aura of an angry, kicked puppy." There's a mental image.

"Please put me out of my misery. It would seriously help me out in the long run." Minako said, lying down on one of the booths. Thankfully, the cafe was empty.

"I'll consider it, for now, go upstairs, I don't want you scaring off any late customers."

Both the twins headed upstairs and looked at each other, they both decided that this month at least was going to be bullshit.

 

[Unhacker]

12/04/2018 - 7:10 - Tokyo Subway - Sakamoto Ryuji

Sakamoto Ryuji was a man who, quite honestly, was running out of things to care about in Shujin Academy, ever since the disbanding of the Track Team, he had lost his method of getting a College Scholarship, his friends became somewhat more distant to him ever since his branding as a "Delinquent" by the student body, a reputation he didn't help with his attitude and appearance. Of course, the branding his friends gave him of "Track Traitor" didn't help either.

Though the other day, there was something for him to care about, two new students who didn't seem to avoid him despite his appearance, well they kind of looked at him funny, but that was expected. The two students already had a heavy helping of rumours surrounding them and he was sure that about all of it was exaggerated, half-truths or straight up lies.

According to the rumours, the new students, Arisato Minato and Arisato Minako were criminals arrested for assault, but in addition, they probably trafficked drugs and people, assaulted several with knives, murdered a man and even did drugs. He knew that at least most of it was bullshit and he was actually very worried about them, from what little he was able to see from them yesterday, the brunette, Minako, was very angry looking and the Blue haired one, Minato, looked like low-key done.

He was currently on the train, holding onto the railing with his right hand and scrolling through the phone with his left, not even minding the fact that he was pushed up against a few random strangers

The number 1 trending topic on the forum was the thread marked "Scary New Students" the first poster was anonymous and it only had the link to two PDF files, the first one was for Minako, it showed an image of a rather distraught looking Minako, her assault charge, as well as some of her previous grades and previous schools (It only showed the first page, the rest of the pages were not on this file). One thing that seemed to stick out the most was the number of different schools that she seemed to go to, she seemed to jump between schools every term. He looked at it, not really understanding half of the Kanji in the forms, the next PDF was predictably about Minato, it showed an image of a rather listless looking Minato, his assault charge was once again, front and centre on the page. Under that was the previous schools and grades, his grades were the same as Minako and indicated that he was rather smart, though the number of schools was the same as his sister.

After glancing over the PDF files, he looked at the rest of the thread, the first few pages were comments on how the students were thankful or whoever leaked the Arisato twin's records (made him sick about it). The next few were comments from yesterday, it was about how they saw the Twins in school and how scary they looked. Including one which said "I said something that I heard about Minako and she just locked eyes with me for a solid thirty seconds. She sits in front of me as well."

Ryuji sighed upon looking at that, honestly what did they expect, the school's gossipers had terrible volume control at the best of times.

"The Train is now approaching Aoyama-Itchome Station. The Train is now approaching Aoyama-Itchome Station. Doors will be opening on the right side." The in-train announcement said, cutting off any new thoughts about the twins. Ryuji put his phone back into his pocket. He didn't want Shujin Academy to claim another victim.

12/04/2018 - 12:50 - Shujin Prison - Sakamoto Ryuji

He did some asking around, apparently, the twins were in class 2-D, the same class as Ann was in. He entered the classroom and saw both of the twins, at their desks, Minako seemed to be reading something while Minato seemed to be studying.

"Hey!" Ryuji began. causing both the twins to look up, Minako quickly hid her manga, flash a bit flushed, what the hell was she reading? Yaoi? Minato looked up from his work, a look of disinterest. "Could I have a chat with you, on the roof?" Both the twins looked at each other, shrugged and both got up. He wondered exactly how they both communicated, was it a case of reading facial cues. Minako visibly hid her manga in her left blazer pocket. From what Ryuji could see, the cover seemed to involve someone with a light-haired character and dark-haired character, so that narrowed it down to every other romance manga.

They walked up rather silently to the roof, the lock of which was removed sometime last year by Ryuji and the track team, it was a good hideout spot during lunch. If he remembered correctly, there were a few desks and chairs which would allow for a good meeting at some time or another. Either way, he sat down at one of the seats and looked at both of the twins expectedly.

"So..." Minako began, seeming to struggle with the conversation, tapping her foot lightly on the concrete of the roof. "Why'd you call us up here?"

"I wanted to see how you were doing?" Ryuji supplied, he would admit, it would nice to have friends again, but for now, his main focus was helping the twins. "The rumour mills have been wild about you, half of the shit they say is just plain ridiculous." Minato's left eye seemed to start twitching at that, probably hit a nerve

"I noticed," Minako said, supplying a response for both her and her brother. "I had to spend a whole school day hearing about how I castrated a man with my bare hands. Today, it's about how my brother is my pimp." definitely hit a nerve. "So yeah, I'm doing just fine."

"Ouch," Ryuji said, trying to figure out a way to ask about her record without pissing her off "For what little it's worth, I don't think you do any of the shit the school's accused you off."

"T-thanks..." Minako said, sounding genuinely shocked "You know you're the first person to have said that. Why though?"

"Well, last year, near the end of it anyway, I was the School Delinquent." Ryuji explained, not giving a full explanation, "So I suppose I know what its like, not fully, but I have some idea." He scratched the back of his neck "Hell, I read your leaked records, it only shows the first page." That caused Minato to raise an eyebrow.

"Really?" He said. Ryuji could tell what the other twin was thinking, but it probably wasn't something good.

"Yeah, just the first page, your criminal record and front and goddamn centre." he supplied, hoping that was the answer that the blue-haired twin wanted. it probably was, as the blue-haired boy wanted, as he put his hand to his chin in the universal 'thinking' pose.

"Hmm..." he hummed under his breath "only one page, record front and centre, would mean that's the first thing they see..." he mumbled under his breath, mumbling a few more things which Ryuji couldn't pick up. Minkao also seemed to be taking another 'thinking' pose.

"You think that they have an agenda against criminals?" She said

"You doesn't?" Minato said, "How did they get our record?" he then waved it off, "nevermind, I'll think about it later."

"Hey, I never caught your name blondie," Minako said, going out of the thinking pose.

"Oh, crap forgot all about it." Ryuji stood up, "My name is Sakamoto Ryuji Please, just call me Ryuji."

"Well okay then Ryuji, do you mind if we meet up after school?" Minako asked she looked at her brother who nodded, "Minato even wants to talk to you as well. So you know it's good!"

"Sure! I'll meet you in front of the second-floor stairs." Ryuji answered, just in time to hear the bell ring, signifying the end of the lunch break. There was something funny about watching the twins powerwalk down the stairs in order to not piss off the hall monitors.

12/04/2018 - 15:10 - Shujin Prison - Sakamoto Ryuji

"Hey, Minako!" Ryuji shouted, getting her attention as well as the attention of a good half of the school. Both the twins looked miserable as normal, though Minako also seemed to have a lump on her forehead. "where'd you get that lump?" Curiosity overtook politeness and he had to ask.

"The feared 'death-chalk of Ushimaru' I keep hearing about," Minako answered, raising her right hand up to smooth out the bump on her head "Also, watch your volume or the latest rumour would be about us forming a gang." Minato seemed to chuckle at that, it was a sound that Ryuji never thought he'd hear, a somewhat high sound that was very quiet, but noticeable.

"Where'd you want to go, I can give you a proper city welcome," Ryuji said, it was nice to have friends again and it showed, he felt one of the first genuine smiles on his face in a long time.

"Okay, but we'd have to cut it short, we have to get home at around eightish," Minako said, looking at her phone. they both walked down the stairs as Ryuji had an idea of where to go.

12/04/2018 - 16:30 - The best place in Tokyo - Sakamoto Ryuji

"Well here's the place," Ryuji said as Shujin's newly formed gang entered the beef bowl place, due to the time restrictions (and his own wallet) he made sure to bring them to his favourite place in the city to relax. After ordering three regulars, his treat, the gang sat at a table in the corner.

"So... Why exactly this place?" Minato asked, looking around, he had his earphones out, but there was still music spilling out from them, from what he could tell it sounded a bit like hip-hop stuff.

"Its the best place in Tokyo to give you a city welcome. Honestly, what couldn't you love about this place? Warm, fresh beef, ginger, good sauce and good company. It's what makes it one of the best places in Tokyo." Ryuji slouched on his stool as he held his arms up as if gesturing to everything in the shop. Both twins seemed to be considering what he had said.

He was right, the pace seemed quite warm and the smells of freshly cooked beef were constantly wafting from the kitchen, something which reminded them, quite loudly that none of them had actually had lunch. When the beef bowls actually arrived, it only made both the twins think he was even more right, they'd think that a place that got as many customers as it dead would have long frozen beef, but it was fresh, the food was cooked to near perfection and it was so warm.

12/04/2018 - 16:55 - The best place in Tokyo - Sakamoto Ryuji

After spending far too long chatting and eating from their bowls, the gang had finally finished, the filling beef in their stomachs. Ryuji was slouching slightly on his stool, Minato was sitting at his normal posture with a slight grin on his face, Minako was grinning ear to ear, checking her phone.

"I think we're good for time, we could go for something else." She said, looking at her phone. "Anything else we should go to for our proper city welcome?"

"No, I didn't really have anything planned out, you might want to get back to your folk's place, the subway at five should not be fucked with. But, as for the bill: well... consider it my treat." Ryuji was regretting his words already, each of the gang had eaten two bowls, this would be expensive.

"Hell no, we're splitting the bill," Minako said, pulling out her purse "No offence, but you do not want to be paying for our bullshit metabolism."

Minato also pulled out his wallet "We'll eat you out of house and home." He said with that smile on his face, it might have sounded very rude, but it looked like every time he smiled, a puppy died.

"Cheque please," Minako said, as the rest of the gang put in their third of the bill, the total came up to a few thousand yen, regrettably.

12/04/2018 - 19:00 - Ryuji's house - Sakamoto Ryuji

Ryuji sighed as he entered his house, the place was run down as always, though his mother's insistence that he doesn't get a job did not help things, he just wished that he could help, though his way of helping would probably be by getting good grades.

Even though he knew this, it didn't stop him from being pissed off, mainly at his dad and at the world. "I'm home!" He shouted into the small house, only to be greeted by silence, okay so he was alone in the house again.

As much as he was running out of things to care about, his new friends were reason enough to care about something. Minako Arisato and Minato Arisato, the twins guilty of assault and accused of several thousand other crimes by Shujin's rumour mill. He hoped that this friendship would be long-lasting and he already knew that what got them convicted was probably a miscarriage of justice.

He went around the house and dressed got dressed in his PJs, while he intended to do some studying later, he knew that he would be going to sleep soon, the stress of trying to make sure that he was able to get friends who he had no idea what he had in common with was stressful. He just hoped that the volleyball rally tomorrow wouldn't be such shit.

 

[Unhacker]

14/04/2018 - 7:40 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minako

Minako was nervous about a lot of things, her grades were one thing that made her super nervous, she got nervous when she was checking how much money she had left in the month's budget, all of these were very normal things to be worried about. She was worried about probation, she wanted this year to go smoothly and all, get Shujin academy on her resume and she might be able to go some places. She got worried about when her brother was acting so stoic when something bad happens, though she supposes that his calm does work well. These were normal things to be worried about.

In terms of what she was not worried about, would be the rumours, they were, after all, only rumours. Though that is not to say that she didn't care for them, she was morbidly curious about how Shujin's rumour mill would stretch the truth, replace words or flat out lie about her talk with Eiko, only the entrance of the resident class gossips would tell her.

"I hear she threatened Eiko-Senpai"​

"She invited her to the threesome"​

"Really?"

"Yeah, I was there."​

Speak of the devil, she was surprised about how they were relatively tame, though she'd have to find the other girls to see just how far they stretched. She put away her manga and listened up as Kawakami walked into the room, looking just as tired as normal.

Minako briefly wondered how exactly someone got that tired and stayed that tired without being hospitalised, not like she would be able to talk to the teacher, most of the students kept their distance, the teachers looked like they were one step away from flat-out threatening her at any given moment.

14/04/2018 - 10:00 - Shujin Academy - Suzui Shiho

Shiho had few things on her mind, one of them was the volleyball team, Kamoshida was another thought (specifically, the way he seemed to take out his frustrations on her) the third thing on her mind was Ann, her best-friend, how those wonderful blue eyes seemed to be so bereft of any of the light that they used to have, a light which she rarely saw when talking to Ann, the girl was carrying some weight, if she was to keep her ear to the ground and listen, she would hear all sorts of horrible rumours about how Ann and Kamoshida are dating and getting it on behind the scenes, though those rumours couldn't be true ... right?

To be honest, Shiho never managed to work up the courage to talk to Ann about the rumours, she was afraid of what Ann might say, especially if she knew about her feelings as well.

Shiho looked at the clock again, just five more hours until the next instalment of 'The things I do for a scholarship - Volleyball addition'.

She then looked back at her notebook, nothing was recorded down, the words of Ms Chouno's lecture on the English language not registering at all, did not exactly help that this lecture was delivered in Japanese and that her bright pink neon dress seemed to draw more attention than the accented words coming out of her mouth.

In short, Shiho's situation was rather shit, though she was sure that it couldn't get worse.

14/04/2018 - 12:30 - Shujin Academy - Suzui Shiho

Shiho was enjoying lunch, well about as much as the average person in this school could enjoy lunch.

"I hear, she's sleeping with Takamaki-san."​

"She's totally a dyke."

"I know, right?"​

"That's why she was flirting with Eiko-senpai?"​

Oh goody, the school gossips were talking, Shiho didn't really like listening into conversations of others, but with those girls, they had no concept of volume control.

Hearing the girls talk made Shiho sick slightly and she got out of the school cafeteria and made her way to the vending machines, deciding that an energy drink wouldn't go amiss in this situation. After all, it was bound to be a tiring day and some artificial energy would be welcome if only to help her survive the day.

As she passed the corner on the way to the vending machines, she bumped into someone knocking them onto the ground like it was one of those romance animes that Ann watched. She opened her eyes and realised that she knocked into Arisato Minato.

There was not a word in the Japanese Language to describe how quickly she shifted back from the supposed delinquent, he got up and picked up what he seemed to be carrying, which was a can of Coke, oddly enough.

"Sorry," he said, his voice was passive and sounds like he was done with life. "Hey, what's with that brace?"

"Oh nothing, nothing really!" Shiho said as she got up, in actuality, there was a large number of bruises under the brace and her leg felt like hell.

"I doubt you'd wear a brace for 'nothing'" Minato said, his voice in a slow drawl "though, Shiho-san, if you want to talk about, I'll listen." Though Shiho knew that this boy was most likely a delinquent or at the very least a boy who was capable of violence, she did feel some comfort from his words, it was possible that he was concerned for her.

14/04/2018 - 15:45 - Aoyama-Itchome - Takamaki Ann

Ann was very annoyed, for the entirety of the day, she heard nothing but rumours, the worse bit was the new rumours also involved her, saying that she was sleeping with Minako and Kamoshida or that she was hooking up with Minato or any other conjecture or flat out lie in the school.

Now that school was over for the day, Ann was ready to head home and enjoy the rest of her Thursday, and by 'enjoy', she meant to ignore the existence of Kamoshida and fantasise about the wasteland that was her love life not being so barren, especially after the, still on-going, agreement she has with Kamoshida. Though there was some annoyance, she was constantly hearing her phone vibrating form something, either texts or someone was calling her. She pulled her phone out of the pocket and she felt her mood worsen as she looked at the contact, 'Disgust Incarnate', or as he was known to the rest of the world, 'Kamoshida'. Twenty Texts and a few missed calls. She finally answered the phone after a few seconds of hesitation.

"Now you're finally taking my calls" The voice of Kamoshida spoke, he sounded annoyed and a bit tense, as always just the sound of his voice made her want to vomit.

"What do you want?" Ann spoke, her tone was very frosty and she admitted, this was not working for her facade of being his 'girlfriend' but she was beyond caring.

"That's not how we agreed you'd talk to me." Kamoshida said, though the term agreement would be a bit liberal, it was more like an order on how to talk to him "Are you still at school?"

"I left after a talk with Shiho, I noticed that she has a few extra bruises on her face." Ann realised that he might be preparing to raise his demands, again.

"No biggie, my hands slipped, I didn't really mean it. Really." Kamoshida said with such nonchalance that almost made her want to punch the man in the face. "anyway, I wanted to ask you to come over to the P.E. office but since your own your way home, do you think you could instead just stop by my place."

"This again?" Ann said, she was getting angry, he had made this request before, several times, each time he was denied, but he kept asking. "How many times do I have to say it 'I don't feel comfortable with it.'" What followed was the tale-tell sound of Kamoshida blocking the mic on his phone as he no-doubt muttered to himself about his next move.

"Well isn't that a shame," He said, his voice dripping with fake-sympathy and faux-sorrow in equal measure "Suzui-san was doing so well, but it seems that I'm going to have to get a new starter, her performance just isn't cutting it anymore."

"What!?" Ann shouted, pulling a Minako "You said that it was just going to be a few dates and that was it."

"Wellllll," He said, drawing out the word as he seemed to be thinking of something "Considering the stress that I've been under getting my beloved team into shape for the nationals. I've decided that our agreement needed a few new amendments to it. Hope you don't mind." Ann felt her stomach twist even more and she felt the need to puke at the sheer thought of it. "Anyway, let me know when you're stopping by." This was spoken with the insufferable tone of a man who he thinks has someone backed into a corner.

Then there was the dial tone as he hung up, Ann felt angry, used, useless and above all, sad, she was a failure of a friend and because of her, Shiho's not going to be able to fulfil her dream. Before she knew it, she felt tears dropping off her face and she decided that the best idea was to drop to her knees and maybe curl up in a ball, given the circumstances that she was given.

"Ann?" She heard a voice call, she looked around and saw the concerned face of Minako as well as the passive face of Minato, who looked slightly concerned as well. "I know this is a stupid question, but are you okay?"

"How much did you hear?" Ann asked if she could avoid this conversation, she could

"Something about dates and you shouting," Minato said, his voice bored and his tone was clinical. "Don't want to talk about it?" he said, sparing a second to glance around the station, where a few people were looking at them. What a strange combination they made.

She looked at both the twins more closely, despite the passive attitude of Minato, she guessed that there was some genuine concern hidden in those grey eyes, he just stood there, left hand in his pocket and right holding onto the strap of his bag. Minako looked very concerned but looked more uncomfortable, her right hand was held up to Ann while the left was holding onto the strap of her bag, she seemed to be shifting her weight from foot to foot slightly.

"Sure," Ann said, she knew that Minako would probably listen and the fact that Minato hanged around with Ryuji probably meant that he was a good enough person. "Just not here."

14/04/2018 - 16:10 - Rocket Diner - Takamaki Ann

Inside the small, Western-style diner, the three of them took a seat on one of the booths, with her back to the window sat Ann, on the other side of the table sat the Arisato Twins, both of whom were ready to listen intently. Ann just ordered a glass of water for two reasons, one was because she wanted something to grip in order to let out some of her anger and the other was that she needed something to drink because talking to or about Kamoshida made her mouth feel dirty.

"I'm sorry about overhearing your call, I didn't mean to eavesdrop," Minako said, looking a bit apologetic, she was shifting uncomfortably,

"It's fine, but you can probably guess who I was speaking to, if anything, I wouldn't be surprised if you already knew," Ann said, brushing Minako's apology under the rug. "I know you're both speaking with Ryuji-kun, so I can assume that he told you about the rumours. Well, unlike most of the crap that gets through the rumour mill, the rumours about the volleyball team is true." She took a small sip of her water

"So he is abusing the volleyball teams," Minato said, he seemed to be taking up the famous Gendo pose as he processed the new piece of information "'Normal for practice' indeed," he muttered

"Getting back on topic, there was nothing that we could do about it." Ann sighed, it was time to talk about disgust made manifest "At least, that's what I thought, I have this friend, her name is Shiho."

"The girl who dominated the boys at the rally," Minako said she knew the girl by name because of Ann's loud shouting yesterday, her ears were still ringing a little.

"Dominated is putting it lightly," Ann said she found it in herself to smile, talking about Shiho almost always made her smile and she could never figure out why. "When I first saw the bruises on her leg, I went and talked to Kamoshida about it," and like that, her smile and her good mood went "There we managed to strike a deal: I would go out with him and he would go easy on Shiho." Minato and Minako both gave her the flattest possible look they could muster "It seemed like a good idea at the time. Shiho got to be happy and Kamoshida got the 'exotic girlfriend'," She put up air quotes around the words "that he always wanted." She sighed as she thought about it, "It made my rep go to shit, but hell, my rep was never that good, to begin with, so I wasn't loosing much. I should have known that this deal was too good to be true, at first it was a few dates but after the new year hit, he's been demanding more, at first it was my phone number so that he could call me for dates, then it was always accepting rides to the school with him, now it is well..." she looked at her glass of water and really wished it was vodka or something similar, anything to give her the courage to face the gazes of the two teenagers.

"Everyone thinks you're both having sex," Minato said with all the grace of a swan on fire and all the subtly of a thermonuclear first strike.

"Yes, because of the rumours, everyone thinks that we're getting it on. Unfortunately, he's now got the idea into his head," Ann took a drink, cleansing her mouth of the words that she just said, "The call he just made was him asking me to come to my place, you know what that means, correct?" Both the twins nodded "He told me that he would take Shiho of the team if I didn't sleep with him, a part of me wants to go just to protect her, but I don't want to sleep with that disgusting man. I guess... I don't really know what to do." Ann said, looking down at the now empty glass of water.

"Don't go," Minako said, "you don't know if he is even going to keep his end of the bargain." She added. Minato remained passive but Ann couldn't help but wonder why he looked both concerned and conflicted.

"You're right, there's no guarantee that he won't keep pushing for more and more or if he even will keep Shiho on the team. Sex was never part of our agreement, if he wants it so bad, I'm sure that his old darling, a sweaty gym sock, will still love him." She then realised exactly what she said and almost laughed slightly "Oh, you have no idea how much I love being able to say something like that." Minako was grinning like an idiot upon hearing that and Minato was giving what was probably his version of a smile, which was a half grin. "I'm surprised that you two are the ones that I talk to about this."

"We haven't been corrupted by Shujin's madness yet." Minato provided, getting a laugh out of both Minako and Ann.

"I know that most of what they say about you is crap, but is it true that you're bad people?" Ann asked though her tone was somewhat jokey.

"We're bad to the bone," Minako said, her tone was faux-grave, her face was clearly not all that serious, she was still grinning like an idiot.

Ann giggled despite herself, the brunette knew how to break an atmosphere, "Thanks for hanging out." She called as the two twins left

"No problem," Minato called back as he and his sister left.

Ann sighed to herself, she wasn't entirely sure what to do about the Kamoshida situation, but she had a better idea now. She pulled out her phone and texted Kamoshida.

Ann: Go fuck a Gym Sock.

Satisfied, she got up out of her seat and made her way home, trying to forget about the fact that she still had homework.

14/04/2018 - 17:25 - Shujin Academy - Suzui Shiho

Shiho was wondering what was wrong with Kamoshida this afternoon, he was tenser than usual and acted more aggressively than before, his hands came closer to some of the girls and he hit harder and more frequently over the session, worst yet, even though Shiho tried to perform harder out of fear of getting hit, she was called out to go to the P.E. Office.

Which is why she's currently trying to gather her courage as she is standing in front of the door, she knew that if she refused Kamoshida's summons he'd beat her harder next session if she was lucky, if she was unlucky she'd get beat to a pulp and then thrown out of the Volleyball Club. taking a deep breath, she knocked her knuckles on the door to the P.E. Office.

"The door is open." Came the voice of Kamoshida from behind the door "Please lock the door when you come in." he added as Shiho opened the door.

 

[Unhacker]

15/04/2018 - 7:32 - Shujin Academy Entrance - Arisato Minako

Minako had to admit, the rumours about her being a gang were annoying as all hell, the fact that she walked into school with Ryuji and her brother like they were in Reservoir Dogs probably didn't help the situation, though there was little chance of the rumour dying off, due to the fact that the three of them were good friends and she didn't care for the rumours enough to be bothered by them, unless, of course, it was the threesome rumour, but those had died down, a few glares had ensured that.

Her thoughts drifted towards the events of yesterday, did her advice to Ann help her, or would it make the situation worse, she would have to talk to Ann to find out. Though one thing which concerned her further was Shiho, she looked even worse than usual, her appearance seemed even more gloomy and she generally seemed more down, if Minako was sure of anything, she was sure that this might have been an indirect result of her advice to Ann, either Shiho was kicked from the team, or something worse. Either way, she should be able to find out at lunch.

15/04/2018 - 9:00 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minako

There was something about Ushimaru that annoyed Minako, if she was to think about it, she would probably come to the conclusion of that it was a trifecta of points: Firstly, he was self-righteous, believing his own viewpoint to be the only true view. Secondly, his lectures tended to be long and waffly, it was rather hard to pick out the useful information over the cavalcade of poor metaphors and long-winded explanations. Thirdly, there was the fact that he seemed to feel the need to single out her and her brother in his class, due to their status as criminals and therefore, the fact that they are on his shitlist.

Though an annoying addition to the third point was the fact that he was a Social Science teacher and thus had an excuse to comment on criminals and single them out. Such a shame really, Social Science was a fascinating subject, when taught correctly, he did not teach it correctly.

"Arisato Minako!" He shouted, snapping the brunette out of her thoughts, "What are the three main branches of the Japanese Government?"

"Judiciary, Legislative and Executive, much like most governments, sir." She answered smoothly, adding the last bit on as an afterthought. A small habit of hers was to read the textbook in advance in order to get some good notes ready on the subjects that she struggled more in.

"Correct. The Supreme Court is Judiciary, the National Diet is Legislative and the Cabinet is Executive." Ushimaru said, his voice in a low monotone, she wondered exactly how someone might not have got that question wrong. Minako was still taking down some notes to make sure that she got this down "Each branch has a series of checks and balances that makes sure that each can be kept in check and not become unstoppable."

She was still writing down notes, though as her mind started to wander as Ushimaru's lecture, Her gaze drifted to the windows, she looked outside and was suddenly glad that she was inside this room, if only because of the weather conditions, in this case, there were plenty of dark clouds, which hinted that there would be rain later today, if not soon. Her gaze drifted back to her teacher as words continued to drift out of his mouth, it wasn't really a worry to record down all the important parts of his waffly lecture, considering that Minato had her covered due to the fact that he had elevated note making to an art-form, so much so that he could've probably taken a part-time job as a tutor, where it not for the record. She then wondered about Shiho, she thought about how exactly, she'd open that line of inquiry based on what's caused her to be so down.

Suddenly, a student got up from his seat, drawing the undivided attention of everyone in the class. "What's that?" He said, sounding confused.

"Oda-san, sit do-" Ushimaru began but was cut off

"Oh my God, she's going to jump!" A girl said, standing up from her chair.

Minako followed her gaze and knew that her face had gone pale, standing on the roof, dangerously close to the edge, was Suzui Shiho. Some students rushed out of their seats, either to get to the window and some seemed to be leaving the room entirely, Minako herself got out of her chair and ran towards, the roof disregarding her teacher's attempts at restoring order to the class.

If there was one thing she wanted to do, it was to get Shiho to not try to take her own life.

15/04/2018 - 9:15 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minato

He knew that he shouldn't have stuck his nose into the matter of Ann and Kamoshida or at the very least encouraged caution on the part of the blonde. But instead this situation just got worse, he knew that Minako was running to get to the roof, but on the other hand, he was running to the courtyard, pulling out his phone along the way. There were very little words that described his panic in this situation, sure teenagers killing themselves were normal in Japan, but those ones usually didn't have much talent, but, Shiho, she had talent galore, which would mean that the field of causes for this attempt would be significantly narrowed, unfortunately, it mostly has to do with Volleyball and, by extension, Kamoshida.

15/04/2018 - 9:19 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minako

Minako arrived at the roof, it was raining and standing in front of her, back turned, was the girl, Suzui Shiho.

"Shiho!" Minako shouted, wincing at her own volume "Don't jump." She added

The dark-haired girl looked at her, "I'm going to jump, don't you try to stop me." Minako took a single, subtle step closer as she decided her next reaction, she wasn't really the sort of person who had to say what she was thinking through.

"Just tell me what's wrong and I'm sure I can help," Minako said, silently cursing herself for picking the most cliche line she could think of. She took another step forward

"You couldn't know what's wrong!" Shiho shouted back, by this point Minako was sure that there was some confusion in the courtyard. Shiho was looking nervous, she clearly didn't want to tell anyone what was wrong, an admirable, if unhelpful position. She took another step and opened her mouth.

"Which is why I'm asking you to tell me." Minako calmly explained, doing one of the best impression of her brother she could. "Tell me and I'm sure I- no, we will be able to help you." She added, she needed to remind Shiho that she was here to help.

"Why should I?" Shiho asked

"Trust me Shiho, I've had a brush with death before, want to know what I felt when that happened?" Minako said "It was regret, regret about all the things that I wanted to do and who I wanted to meet. So, I'm asking you, please don't jump." She took another step, getting closer to Shiho, she needed to be within dashing distance at least.

"Why should I? My life is over, I lost the only thing in this school I can care for and Kamoshida ..." Shiho went quietly with the mention of Kamoshida, Minako took a step closer.

"We can deal with Kamoshida together, bring him to justice together," Minako reassured Shiho, though she knew it was hard, she'd need more than one confession against Kamoshida, she took a step closer. "I just need you to step away from the ledge." She took another step, getting daringly close.

"Do you want to know what Kamoshida did to me?" Shiho said she was visibly tearing up. Minako knew that the girl got more than just being normally beaten. Minako nodded as she took another step closer, "Well, he beat me, he groped me, he raped me..." She said, her voice was quiet and it was clear that she was ashamed.

"We can still help you," Minako said, she knew that this was still what she could do, she wasn't sure how she could help but stopping her from jumping would be a step in the right direction. "Just give me the chance." She held out her right hand to Shiho who looked indecisive. "Or do you want to bring your parents and your friends further heartache and give Kamoshida what he wants." A guilt trip tactic, it left her with a bad taste in her mouth, but it would be effective. Shiho seemed to comply and took Minako's hand and stepped away from the edge.

That was one problem solved, though it would most likely cause a metaphoric storm of other problems.

"Congrats Sis." Minato said, looking out of breath as he got to the roof, Ann came up behind him, "I didn't think you'd be able to do something like that." he added, finally regaining his breath.

"Should we leave Ann and Shiho alone?" Minako asked, looking at the two girls, it would probably be for the best.

"You go home with Ann and Shiho and inform me via text if anything happens. I'll take notes for you." Minato said.

This may not have been what they were supposed to do, but it would seriously help their situation. That was what they were sure of, before both their phones vibrated.

Ryuji: Mishima's running.
Ryuji: Heading for the locker room.

Both the twins looked at each other.

Min: OMW
Ko: Helping Ann & Shiho

15/04/2018 - 9:25 - Locker Room - Minato Arisato

Mishima had been cornered by Ryuji and Minato, he may have been a member of the Volleyball team, but he had nothing on Ryuji who ran like a blue hedgehog and Minato who was smart enough to think on his feet in order to outdo Mishima's attempt at losing them.

They had Mishima backed into a corner, in an event that was eerily similar to the events just a couple of days ago. Though the difference was that Ryuji was already pissed off and had Mishima's left wrist in his grip already to keep the boy from running away. Minato was impressed by Ryuji's intelligence.

"Why did you follow me?" Mishima asked, feigning ignorance.

"Shiho was about to kill herself and you ran away, if you know something, spill it!" Ryuji said, tightening his grip on Mishima's left wrist, which was hidden under a brace.

"Let go of my arm," Mishima asked, his face was contorted from pain. Minato nodded at Ryuji who released the boy's wrist.

"Okay now, we've something for you, you should do something for us: spill everything you know," Minato said, looking Mishima in the eye. "What happens here stays between us."

"Suzui-san was called out by Kamoshida," Mishima said, looking down, Ryuji paled at the words, he knew what they meant. "Practice was worse than usual as well. Kamoshida made us run extra laps, ran us more ragged, threw more spikes at people's faces. Normally when he's in a bad mood, he'd just call whoever did the worst to his office and beat them." He shuddered at the thought "But yesterday, he called out Suzui-san despite the fact that she didn't do anything wrong." He also seemed to remember something else "I don't know why, but he seemed to be really pissed off and a bit tense yesterday, spent more time on the phone as well." Minato's face darkened, whatever Ann had told Kamoshida had really pissed him off.

"Don't tell me.." Ryuji began, coming to a conclusion, Mishima avoided looking him in the eye, the dead air between them told everything, revealing their worst fears.

Ryuji's face turned redder and redder from anger, he turned around and almost begin to run, only to be stopped by Minato grabbing his wrist.

"Let go of me!" Ryuji shouted into Minato's passive face.

"Calm yourself Ryuji, we both know what he did," Minato said calmly despite the fact that he had a very angry delinquent in front of him which is what many would consider being a formidable force. "However, we currently hold all the cards, let's not give Kamoshida what he wants and act rashly." He then turned his head to Mishima, "And you, don't say a word about this if anyone asks, you went to the bathroom. Understood." He ordered, satisfied when Mishima nodded "Good, you can leave." He turned his attention back to Ryuji, "Feeling better?"

"Not really..." The blond muttered, he was still pissed off, though his anger was dwindling, he did see the wisdom in Minato's words. "Are we really not going to do anything?"

"I didn't say anything about that, I suggest that we be patient, with that, we can stop Kamoshida." He said, "We have two confessions, but we need a confession that can't be dismissed as students slandering their teacher."

Ryuji nodded, once again seeing wisdom "I got it, I guess we're playing to win here." Minato nodded and then released Ryuji's arm "You have a really good grip, you know that?"

"Must be from all the knife fights I've been in." Minato joked, while his face was serious, there was clearly a sarcastic tone to his voice. "Come on, if we're lucky, school will be closed for today and we can get some noodles."

15/04/2018 - 19:30 - Cafe Leblanc - Minato Arisato

Borth the twins had cleared up some books off the work desk and set about putting together their case, using a ring binder and some file pages.

"Okay, from what we know so far..." Minako began, "Kamoshida had raped Shiho and beat her as well, correct." Minato nodded, Minkao felt dirty talking about the man "Mishima ran and informed you that Kamoshida beats the entirety of the volleyball team."

"We already knew, we just now have a confession."

"Just a dodgy confession, Minato and Kamoshida have apparently been at odds this year. Ann made a deal to be Kamoshida's girlfriend in order to protect Shiho. Kamoshida himself wanted to have sex with Ann as well, correct?" Another nod. "In short, if we get some confessions and possibly a reputable source to report these, we may be able to get rid of Kamoshida." Both the twins looked at each other, satisfied with their work,

"Think we might need to get a cork board and some red string for this?" Minato asked jokingly, his humour cutting through the atmosphere like a knife.

"No, but I think I'm going to need to go to the bathhouse to wash away the dirt from school." Minato couldn't blame her.

 

[Unhacker]

16/04/2018 - 5:25 - Ann's House - Takamaki Ann

When Ann woke up, the first thing she heard was her phone's beeping sound. She picked up the infernal device when she saw who the text was from, Ryuji, she had given him her phone number earlier on in the year, when they were still on speaking terms.

Ryuji: Hey Ann
Ryuji: Ann
Ryuji: A N N

Ann looked at it with slight annoyance and typed in her response.

Ann: It's five in the morning the hell do you want.
Ryuji: Needed to text you, hope you don't mind, I'm adding the Arisatos to the chat.

[Min] has been added to [Kamoshida Investigation Chat]
[Ko] has been added to [Kamoshida Investigation Chat]

Ko: 'sup
Ko: So we're kinda planning an investigation of Kamoshida
but I'm worried, so can you go look after Shiho for today.
Min: Don't worry, I take good notes, you'll be perfectly caught up

Ann was surprised at the efficiency of this, if she didn't know any better, she'd say that they planned this out. Her fingers swiftly moved across the phone's keyboard

Ann: you planned this out
Ko: Yep
Min: Yeah
Ko: Remember, we have no lives outside of school!
Ann: Do you mind if Shiho's added?
Ryuji: np

[Shizu] has been added [Kamoshida Investigation Chat]

Shizu: Why am I being added to this group chat?
Ko: We're investigating 'Shida and need you to stay home in case he tries something. I asked Ann to stay with you for today.

Minako was surprisingly quick on the keyboard, she probably has predictive text on

Min: Hope you don't mind
Shizu: Not at all.
Ko: Are we clear on what to do today?
Ryuji: What am I supposed to do?
Min: Be pretty

Ann stopped for a second and resisted the urge to tell Minato that his gay was showing.

Ann: Moving on, know what to do.
Shizu: Know what to do.
Min: good, you may go about your lives now.

Ann wondered what the hell was up with her new friends, they were pretty weird, which was one way to put it, crazy was another way she could put it.

She sighed and went to her wardrobe to pick up some casual clothes.

16/04/2018 - 5:45 - Cafe Leblanc - Sakura Sojiro

If there was one thing which confused the hell out of Sojiro, it would be the twins that he had taken in, they looked alright, after the 13th, they didn't seem to be miserable, when they were asked, they simply said that they had made some friends.

He had given the two some curry this morning, as usual, they enjoyed the curry and it clearly did lift their spirits, a thing that made early mornings more bearable. Both of the twins had a slight smirk on their face, though it was clear that they were suffering from something or that there was something on their mind.

"Hey, kid, is there anything wrong at school?" Sojiro asked the two twins looked at each other with a look that clearly said that they were hiding something. "I want you two, to be honest with me."

"Well, there's a girl at our school who tried to commit suicide." Minako began, putting her fork down "I managed to talk her out of it," She continued "Minato's helping, so it's a bit mentally challenging." That was something, if it was true, though the two didn't seem to be lying, most people usually didn't tell a lie with such confidence.

"What exactly is it you're trying to do?"

"I hope you don't mind, but I think that it would be preferable if we keep that one to ourselves," Minato said, taking over from his sister who was nervously laughing. He then went back to eating the curry along with his sister.

"Thanks for the food." Both of them said at the same time when they finished, the two of them were probably stressed out from what they mentioned, provided that it was true.

16/04/2018 - 7:12 - Tokyo Subway - Arisato Minako

"Hey Minato" Minako began, looking at her brother with curious eyes. "How do you think the rumour mill will interpret yesterday?" She asked, while there was, as previously mentioned, curiosity in her eyes, there was also a hint of mischief, like usual for her, she was having far too much fun with that.

Minako pulled out her phone, when it didn't look like her brother would answer her, possibly due to the fact that she broke the sacred rule of public transport, 'don't talk, especially during the morning', either way, she had time to kill and she needed to keep on top of how everything was going.

Ko: Hey Ann, at Shiho's place yet?
Ann: Yes. Why do you ask
Ko: Bored and on the train, why do you think?
Ann: because you were worried...
Ko: That too.

"The Train is now approaching Aoyama-Itchome Station. The Train is now approaching Aoyama-Itchome Station. Doors will be opening on the right side." The in-train announcement said Minako looked down at her phone.

Ko: wait trains stopping, cya

She put her phone into her blazer pocket and sighed, she could almost hear Ushimaru lecturing her for skipping half a day of school.

16/04/2018 - 7:40 - Shujin Academy - Minako Arisato

When Minako walked into the room, what she expected to hear was the average daily chatter of students as they chattered about their life or what was going on or the next insufferable rumour, however, when she and her brother walked in, they were met with an uncomfortable silence. Hell, even the class gossips had nothing to say, as gratifying as that was.

The only sound as they stepped into the room was the sound of their footsteps as they made their way to their chairs. The fact that anyone had yet to say a word was starting to creep her out, at this point, she would welcome some asinine rumour about how she was in a gang or involved in human trafficking.

As they sat down noise suddenly returned to the classroom, though most people were even more cautious to look at them, that's when they heard it

"I hear she stopped Suzui-san from killing herself"​

"Her? No way."​

"But she did!"​

"Why'd she do it though?"

"Maybe she's actually nice."​

"I think she's got a soft spot for girls."​

Ah, rumours how she missed those, the constant asinine chatter of her classmates made it easier for her to think, oddly enough. They provided some nice white noise when she stopped really paying attention to them to flush out other distractions.

Kawakami walked into the room and for the first time since arriving at the school, a teacher looked like they weren't disgusted with the twins' very existence. The woman actually had something which could resemble a smile on her face, though it probably didn't show given how eternally tired this woman seemed to be. Though this would be a step in the right direction.

16/04/2018 - 9:20 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minato

if Minato had one thought at this moment, it would be that Mishima looked absolutely terrified to be in the same room as him, the boy looked over his shoulder roughly every 10.5 seconds and the look was always in the direction of Minato.

Though that was his one thought as he was trying to ignore just how pissed off Ushimaru was when he looked at Minako, yeah turns out 'A student almost jumped off the school' was not a good enough excuse to exit his class, though it could just be Ushimaru's standard hatred of criminals.

Either way, he started off the class by, in his slow, plodding way, recapping what was learned yesterday, how each branch had a series of checks and balances in place in order to make sure that no one branch of government becomes unstoppable, then he led this into an examination of the justice system, Minato couldn't tell if this was Ushimaru's standard teaching style, or if he was commenting on the new transfer students. This was going to be a long class...

16/04/2018 - 12:00 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minako

When lunchtime hit, the gang, consisting of Ryuji, Minato and herself all gathered together on the roof to plot out their next move. Minako briefly realised that she was accepting the idea that they were, in fact, a gang, she shook her head to get rid of the idea and then focus back on the topic at hand.

"So .... any ideas?" Ryuji asked, fiddling with the cuff of his blazer, he was clearly out of his depth, "We know that Kamoshida beats the volleyball team, but we're going to need to find out something else that not even he can ignore."

"That's the problem though," Minako said, "We need to get something that doesn't reveal or intentions to him, but something that not even Phoenix Wright could ignore. But what could we use?" She put her hand to her chin, in one the many universal versions of the 'thinker' pose.

"Student testimonies..." Minato mumbled, considering ideas "No, too risky if word gets out, he'd know, plus they probably won't be so easily kowtowed as Mishima. Recordings... no, too risky, if it was possible a student would have already done it."

"Teachers... would need to find one that doesn't hate our very existence." Minako said, before snapping her fingers "We just need to find a teacher, they would be able to question students with impunity, they could also be seen as a reputable source."

"However, we need to get proof that not even they could ignore." Minato shot back, he didn't hate the idea, per-say, it was actually a good idea, it's just that he didn't like only having one idea.

"Mishima's bruises and testimony?" Minako asked, "No, too risky, Mishima doesn't trust us nearly enough to allow that." She mulled over several options over in her head "I'd say the principal, however..."

"He doesn't give a shit, as long as it doesn't damage the school's rep, Kamoshida could fucking murder someone and he'd help dispose of the body," Ryuji added, in his own blunt way, "The Student Council Prez doesn't care either."

"Hold up," Minato said, stopping Ryuji, "I think I have an idea, while it would be hard for any of us to get a teacher to trust us, they'd trust the Student Council President." He muttered

"Though aren't they just basically a puppet for the principal?" Minako proposed it seemed like a fair enough assumption, a teacher wouldn't want a student to have more power than them in the running of the school.

"However," Minato said, beginning his counter-argument, "The Student Council President, a girl named Nijima Makoto, is a straight A-student and generally regarded as one of those 'goody-two-shoes' types." Minato looked up "In other words, the perfect vehicle for our investigation, she's trustworthy, not the sort to kick the hornet's nest for no reason, smart, able to think things through and, most importantly, I doubt she's satisfied with the state of the school." Minato rattled off like he was resiting from a list of her personal qualities.

"Though all that information is second hand." Minako countered "We need to confirm it ourselves if we were to make any decision on it."

"I agree, I was simply backing up my points with what I heard." He looked at his phone, "Lunchtimes almost up, can't believe that this brainstorming section only really yielded two results that we can work with."

"Thanks for putting up with our bullshit, Ryuji," Minako said as she wrote down the two ideas on a blank piece of file paper.

"No problem," Ryuji said, he had to admit, he really just wanted to punch Kamoshida in the face, but he remembers just how well that worked out for him last time. Minako pulled out a ring binder and put the file paper into the binder. "Hey what's that file for anyway?"

"It's our Kamoshida Investigation File," Minako said, look rather proud of herself, Minato looked just slightly passive though mostly like he wanted to hurry back to class. Both the twins left the rooftop, leaving Ryuji alone, how stood up from the old school chair and stretched before going back down to his classroom.

16/04/2018 - 13:00 - Shiho's House - Takamaki Ann

If there was one thing that Ann was surprised by, it was the fact that Shiho's parents didn't even raise an eyebrow at the fact that their daughter was staying at home on a school day and that they didn't even question why some foreign girl was staying with their daughter during that day either.

Though that was far from the most surprising thing that Ann found out today, the next surprising thing was Shiho's room.

A dull white paint covered the walls, though that was hard to tell as most of the wall was covered by a surprisingly expansive wardrobe and several posters of volleyball teams and other sports teams, though these covered the posters for some old video games and anime that Shiho used to play/watch back when she was still in middle school. The floor was just basic hardwood, with a rather old looking carpet in the middle, the carpet's original colour was hard to figure out as at this point it was a black and stunk of air freshener and fabric cleaner. The only pieces of furniture worth pointing out in Shiho's room were her bed, western-styled with sky blue covers. A kotatsu (because no room in a Japanese house is complete without one) and an old CRT TV and PS2, with several games still visible, though, when Ann entered the room there was a fine coating of dust over all the games and the TV looked like it hadn't been used in ages.

Though, it turned out that Shiho had quite a good collection of PS Vita games, as indicated by the fact that she hid those games in her wardrobe and it took up almost an eighth of the space in the wardrobe.

In terms of what they were wearing, Ann was wearing her lavender dress shirt, a white skirt and black nylons with red converse, this was complete with a red and white letterman jacket, she had a collection of those jackets.

In terms of what Shiho was wearing, it was a pair of light blue jeans and a white polo shirt, (she claimed that it was laundry day, not that Ann cared, Shiho looked good no matter what she wore).

If Ann had one massive complaint, it was that being in the same room as Shiho for so long made her very nervous, she did have some feelings for the black haired girl, not that she'd actually tell Shiho this, especially considering recent events. Though for some reason, Shiho seemed to be just as nervous, not that it made it better, any case of contact with the girl made Ann blush lightly.

In terms of what they were currently doing, it was simple, they were lying there on Shiho's bed (the thought made Ann blush) and playing some random mystery game on her Vita, not that Ann cared about the game, she was too busy trying not to do her best impression of a tomato. In terms of the game, Shiho was stuck on the same section for the better part of an hour now and was getting progressively more and more frustrated with each subsequent game over screen,

Ann was glad to see that Shiho wasn't lingering on the thoughts of what happened a few days ago, though it filled Ann with a lot of guilt as she figured that one of the reasons for this was because of what she said to Kamoshida over the phone, though she didn't regret what she did, she just hated the outcome of it. She shook her head to rid herself of these thoughts, they really wouldn't do her much good.

"Why is this game so hard?" Shiho moaned, it seemed like she had got another game over screen.

"Because its a sequel," Ann said, she knew that much due to the fact that she bought it as a gift for Shiho earlier on in the year "Sequels are usually harder than the first game, y'know except for when it's easier."

"Can I have easier?" Shiho asked, in a moment of wit that made Ann laugh.

"No." She said as she finished laughing "However, I do have an alternative. I could look up the walkthrough on my phone." Ann offered, as adorable as it was to see Shiho fail at a video game for the better part of an hour, she preferred to see Shiho smile. Shiho nodded and Ann made her way through the in-game wikis annoyed at how they were mostly in English, not that she couldn't read English, it was just that it was annoying translating between English and Japanese at the best of times, that and the English on these sites had a habit of being really hard to read.

16/04/2018 - 16:30 - Shiho's House - Ann Takamaki

Ann heard the sound of someone knocking at the door. "Who is it?" Ann asked she was slightly on edge considering who it could be. Kamoshida was the sort of person who would actually be inclined to do something like that.

"It's Minato and Minako," Minako said, her tone was jubilant as always. "Please let us in, its cold and there's wolves after me." Ann let her in and tried not to groan at the Simpsons reference that the girl just made. The two twins entered and took off their shoes, as was proper.

"Was that seriously the best you could do?" Ann asked, looking at Minako "A Simpsons reference, really?" she demanded.

"I couldn't think of any jokes," Minako answered, looking somewhat ashamed, "anyway, my brother and I are here to catch you up on what you missed today at school, only without the waffly lecture from Ushimaru." She said, her tone was jubilant and reminded Ann of Tanaka, though she probably actually sold something that worked.

"Also, you guys make any progress on the investigation?" Ann asked she was genuinely curious

"No, we just came up with two new avenues of investigation." Minato answered, "Using either the Student Council President or a teacher to help with the investigation, people are more likely to consider them as reputable sources."

"Y'know, instead of this," Minako said, gesturing to herself with a sweep of her right arm "and that," she added, sweeping her left arm in the direction of Minato, "Or Ryuji or you." She finished "No offence"

"Some taken" Ann responded, "Though you're probably right. Though speaking of Ryuji, where is he?"

"He's on his way home, he needs to help out at his house," Minako answered

"And you don't?"

"Don't tempt me." Minato said with a joking tone. "don't make me leave you alone with Minako." That was an actual threat, like a genuine one.

The rest of the night was spent teaching the two girls what had happened in a single school day, in a few hours. It was surprisingly easy, Minato made a habit of taking good notes and even gave them a few tricks that they could use, it also seemed that he had the perfect disposition when it came to taking what was essentially a case of cram class on steroids, in other words, the disposition of a man who had long stopped caring and just wants to get these notes quickly done, hell, he even left them his notebook.

Not that the notebook was as useful as his deadpan voice when it came to teaching, to put it simply, the boy had terrible handwriting, his sister's handwriting wasn't much better for that matter.

 

[Unhacker]

17/04/2018 - 6:00 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minato

Minato woke up lazily and immediately looked at his phone. His first thought was something along the lines of "oh shit, I'm late!" though that was then replaced by a thought of "Oh wait, it's Sunday, I can get away with sleeping in." The next thing he noticed was the fact that Minako was poking him with a stick, repeatedly and in the side.

"Come on, get up," Minako said, sounding a bit annoyed at the fact that she had to get up in the morning. "We got to meet the gang." A trio of jabs hit him in the side, oh great, she was still calling them a gang, another trio of jabs. "We got to discuss our plans."

"I'm getting up, just stop jabbing me, you keep hitting my kidney."

"Whoops," Minako said, not sounding sorry in the slightest, he could hear her shit-eating grin.

17/04/2018 - 8:00 - Shibuya - Arisato Minako

The gang had gathered together and had met up at the square in Shibuya.

In terms of what they were wearing, Shiho was wearing a light blue pair of jeans and a white tank top with a light blue zip-up hoody. In addition, she was wearing a pair of white unbranded sports trainers. Minako approved deeply of the colour scheme and liked how it suited Shiho.

Ryuji was wearing a pair of black tracksuit bottoms, a dark-grey t-shirt with a yellow face wearing a pair of sunglasses, over than he was wearing a deep purple tracksuit top with red stripes along the sleeves and the number '777' on the back. Furthermore, he was also wearing yellow trainers, in other words, Minako found her sense of aesthetics being offended at the very sight of his trainers and how it worked with the rest of his clothes.

Ann was wearing the same outfit she was wearing yesterday, though Minako assumed that it was just a similar set of clothing rather than the same because that raised questions that Minako was comfortable with. In addition, she also seemed to be carrying two thin notebooks for whatever reason.

Her brother was wearing a pair of dark blue jeans with black boots, furthermore, he was wearing an off-colour white (oh god the obsession with the colour is spreading) t-shirt and an unbuttoned, black-ish brown blazer. He was also carrying a brown book bag which contained the Kamoshida Investigation File and a spare notebook for whatever, he also finally managed to get some hair dye the other day and his hair was finally a vibrant midnight blue, the redying of the hair was a reason why it took them two hours to meet up.

She was wearing a pair of non-prescription half-rim glasses with black frames, a Nuckeleeve hoody (that she bought from America last year), a black tank top, a pair of dark blue jeans and a pair of black trainers. In short, she looked like a bit of a hipster. her hair was still done up in the same way as normal.

The group, all five of them had met up in the square and looked like normal-ish teenagers, however, if you listened to the shit that they, it would be obvious that they were not normal.

"So Minato, Minako." Ann began "You left your notes at Shiho's place." She handed him the two thin notebooks that she was holding. He took them without complaint and went to put them into his bag.

"I hope they were useful," Minato said, his voice was somewhat confident in that, after all, he had elevated note-taking to an art form.

"They weren't," Shiho said, with a finality to her words that seemed like a guillotine coming down on a neck "We couldn't read your handwriting."

"See I to-" Minako began, only to be cut off by Ann who said

"We couldn't read yours either. Seriously, we've seen parts of your record, how the hell do you get such good grades considering your shitty handwriting?" Ann asked it was a genuine question

"We write neater for exams, it's just that it's easier to take things down in quick hand when we're taking notes," Minato explained with the same lack of conviction that was present during the informal cram session.

"So... do you guys want to go anywhere, a Cafe perhaps?" Minako asked she wanted to be discussing their nefarious (benevolent) plans indoors where she could sit down.

"Which one?" Ann asked, gesturing her arms out to the large number of Cafes which occupied the large district

"I don't know, pick one." Minako threw back at the blonde.

17/04/2018 - 8:10 - Diner - Arisato Minako

When the gang made their way to the diner, which apparently just liked to be called 'Diner' for some odd reason. They settled down into one of the large booths, then they realised that there wasn't enough space for all of them in the large booths and as such, with permission from the staff, borrowed a chair from one of the unused tables and placed it next to their booth in order to seat all of them.

Minato pulled out the Kamoshida Investigation File "Alright, here's our current options," he said as he opened it on the table "We have currently got two main options for investigation, talking with one of the teachers and using them to conduct our investigation or getting the Student Council President to conduct the investigation."

No one at the table was terribly pleased with the options that were being put on display. "So those are our options?" Shiho asked, sounding uncertain and a bit disappointed.

"Unfortunately, if we do not want to risk the possibility of Kamoshida discovering our investigation than these are the best possible solutions." Minako explained from her borrowed chair, pushing up her glasses as she finished the sentence and continued "The option of asking some pupils has turned out to be and will continue to be a bust, while videoing Kamoshdia in the act would prove to be impossible, if it were, someone would have already done it by now." She sighed "So, yes, these are our options."

"Well, I think that we should go to Nijima-senpai," Shiho said, "It's better than asking one of the teachers and Nijima-senpai has proved to be very passionate once sufficiently motivated."

"Define: Sufficiently Motivated." Minato requested, taking up a Gendo pose

"Well, if you convince her that it's in the best interests of the student body, that would motivate her enough, another method would be a good letter of recommendation to a college, though we obviously can't do that," Shiho answered, sounding a bit bitter at the second method of motivation, Minako was sure that Shiho had muttered a few venomous words under her breath as well, but decided not to comment on it.

"I think the waitress wants our orders, or she's going to kick us out," Ryuji said, looking at a very pissed off waitress who was tapping her foot very impatiently.

17/04/2018 - 9:30 - Shibuya - Arisato Minato

So after a rather nice brunch and a brief discussion, all of the group wondered what they would do next. He would rather get his laptop and spend the day online, however, Uncle Akito hadn't seen fit to send his Nephew's laptop to him, or the majority of his sister's manga collection, it was fun to tease her over it.

Anyway, the gang (oh god, even he was thinking of them as a gang) had split up as they couldn't really agree on what to do afterwards, so Shiho went off the follow Ann like a puppy or someone who was horribly in love, the latter simile seemed to be more applicable in this situation. Ryuji limped back home, saying that he had to do his homework, Ann went off to the underground mall to do some window-shopping. So that just left the twins, who both were sitting down on a bench, Minako was reading some manga and letting the world pass her by, while Minato was checking the notes and then the file and then the notes again making sure that nothing was out of place and that everything that needed to be written down was written down.

17/04/2018 - 9:35 - The Niijima Sisters' Flat - Niijima Makoto

Makoto had a few thoughts on her mind at this hour, one of them was relating to the volleyball team, they all seemed to be so injured and depressed, yet when she asked all of them just brushed her off with various different responses and obvious excuses that she couldn't be bothered to get through.

The second thought was about that girl, the second-year, Suzui Shiho who was so ready to kill herself but was talked down by one of the transfer students of all people, a third thought was on the transfer students, they seemed to be really intelligent teenagers with a troubled past, and, not counting the assault charge, they had a perfect record, it didn't seem to make sense why would two people who are, by all previous reports, calm and stable suddenly decide to out of nowhere assault a man.

Though now that she thought about it, there was also the problem that their record seemed to be leaked on the school website, this meant that there was someone who had access to the records, most likely a teacher, who decided to ruin the two kid's lives.

She was currently just staring off into space, a notebook full of notes about schoolwork sitting open but neglected in front of her. The open window in her room providing a breath of fresh air that so different from the student council room, where, despite spending the entirety of last year and all of her time in third year requesting, the principal hadn't sent anyone to fix the air conditioner or the windows in the room, which basically meant that during the winter the room was too cold, during the summer it was flat out uninhabitable and during the spring it was stuffy.

Bringing her thoughts back to the transfer students, they were two twins who seemed to be moved across the entire country hopping from big cities to country towns, both of them were, by all teacher's accounts, very sharp minded, hell those comments even continued from the current teachers, even Ushimaru commented that she was rather intelligent, if a bit mouthy, which was basically about as high a praise as most people would get from the feared wielder of the death chalk.

Her phone, which was off to the side of her desk started to ring, playing the first few cords of 'Rivers in the Desert' before she picked it up, glad that there was something to distract her from her thoughts

"Makoto speaking." She said crisply into the phone.

"Hello Makoto-san" The familiar voice of Akechi Goro, the junior detective drifted through the phone's speaker "Do you wanna go see a movie?"

"When?" Makoto asked, despite how awkward Akechi Goro (though most just referred to him exclusively by his last name, even his friends) was, he was rumoured to be something of a lady killer, Makoto has never seen any evidence of this, ever, even before Sae had a talk with him, she wasn't very sure what happened during that talk that for some reason required Sae to bring a shotgun along with her, but hey at least she wasn't getting on Makoto's back the second she so much as talked to Akechi.

"Right now, if that's okay, of course," Akechi said with all the confidence of that second-year boy Mishima when asked to do anything.

"Sure, why not?" She said, 'Not like I'm studying anyway' was what she wanted to add. The events of the recent week were interesting and she was sure that she needed more time to process those and what better way of doing so than by going to watch some action flick with the only teenager who she knows to have a mullet in the year of 2018.

She put away her book and her pen and prepared to go outside for the first time today. Though first, she'd have to talk to her, somewhat, overprotective sister.

17/04/2018 - 10:00 - Toyo Cinemas - Niijima Makoto

When she powerwalked there, she saw Akechi standing there in clothes that were so outdated that it was hilarious, he was wearing brown suit pants that didn't quite fit him, brown leather shoes, a white collared shirt (which wasn't so bad) and, the pièce de résistance, his dark blue sweater vest, complete with a pattern of turquoise and light grey diamonds. He looked like he should be an old man telling her about what happened 'back in my days', but instead, he was a teenager who had several fangirls as a result of his few TV appearances, wealth and a Youtube series, he got bored quickly.

"Hey, Makoto." He said, greeting her with a nice nod and she swore she heard a few girls swooning behind her, "want to see 'Super Troopers 2'?" he asked, oh for once, it wasn't an action flick, it was instead a goddamn crime movie, she thought, it probably was.

She sighed heavily and nodded, making sure that he would pay for the tickets, he could spare the money.

17/04/2018 - 11:00 - Shibuya - Arisato Minako

After spending about an hour and so reading in the humid spring air, Minako got up and stretched, she really hoped no one saw her blushing while reading, it wasn't her fault that her favourite characters were happy again.

She wasn't entirely sure what to do now, there were a few cafes if she felt like spending some money on nothing that she'd like, she was sure that Ann, and by extension, Shiho were still in the underground mall, there were also a few bookstores that probably be happy to actually have someone even look at their stock. Of course, there was also the existence of the arcade, if she felt like being cheated out of some of her money in exchange for tickets, that actually felt really good.

She shook her head, this was too idiotic, she would be fine if her uncle actually sent her most of her manga, though knowing that man, he probably didn't approve of at least half of her collection, if not three quarters of her collection, so it was a wonder she got about a third of it, the other two thirds are most likely being burned on his fireplace. Actually, thinking of things that her uncle wouldn't approve of, it was time to tease some girl over her love life, she needed to find Ann.

17/04/2018 - 12:00 - Toyo Cinemas - Niijima Makoto

"What'd you think of the movie?" Akechi asked Makoto, he was a bit apprehensive. Though Makoto didn't really notice many things about the movie, she was still thinking about school.

The situation called for careful and delicate movements, something which the principal was not known and quite frankly, she doubted that he'd let her do anything that he could interpret as damaging the school's reputation. Which was really wide-ranging subject.

This could range from breathing out of place, too, hell, revealing that one of the teachers was, in fact, a rapist who liked abusing kids, but that was unlikely. "huh?" she responded eloquently.

"You look like you're troubled, need to vent on me?" Akechi asked, he was usually smart, but here he was a moron, he had no idea what he was getting himself into.

"Yeah, sure in my room. I need to vent." Makoto said to him.

17/04/2018 - 13:30 - The Niijima Sisters' Flat - Niijima Makoto

Akechi took a seat for himself at the desk in Makoto's bedroom, while Makoto took a seat for herself on her bed. "So what did you want to talk about?" Akechi asked.

"It's about school..." Makoto began "Don't roll your eyes at me, I'm being serious."

"I wasn't rolling my eyes," Akechi said, pleading innocence, "continue with your story."

"Anyway, there's these new transfer students, a pair of second-years." Makoto continued, mentally searching for the right words to use "They're both twins who were convicted of assault, but I can't seem to make heads or tails of them."

"What do you mean?" Akechi asked, looking rather interested now.

"Well, while they were convicted, they've shown no violent tendencies at school so far, most of the teachers say that they're a bit mouthy and the worse one of them did was verbally shredding a third-year." She sighs "However, they have exceedingly high test scores and all previous reports before their assault charge mark them as being harmless and very intelligent."

"Well, not all criminals are mindless thugs." Akechi said, offering his point of view "A good way to see how they act is to check with who they're associating with."

"Well, they're associating themselves with Sakamoto-san, a student who once punched the gym teacher and is considered the school delinquent, they are also associating themselves with Takamaki-san, who is actively shunned by most of the school." Makoto supplied. "Though the most interesting thing that happened is on the 15th, one of Takamaki-san's few friends, Suzui-san was about to jump off the school's roof, when Minako-san, one of the two transfer students, seemed to talk Suzui-san out of jumping."

Akechi put his hand on his chin and rubbed it slightly, "Well, it might be a case of Minako-san feeling remorse for her crimes," he started "While, for their friends, it makes sense that criminals would make friends with the ones in the school who are social pariahs. What about the other one?"

"He's called Minato, regarded as the more intimidating of the two and the quietest of the two. The worst he does is be a friend for Sakamoto-san." Makoto answered "He really hasn't done much, which just makes me nervous that he's doing something behind the scenes.

"You talk about them a bit like most knew that they were criminals," Akechi observed, rubbing his clean-shaven chin some more

"That's correct, the day before they entered school, their records were leaked to the school forums, specifically just one page of their record, it was the one that showed both their face and their criminal record." Makoto said, "I'm one of the few people who has seen their entire record."

"And what do you think of it?" Akechi asked

"Confused, they seemed to have been moved around the country from an early year, they change school every term except for last year, where they attended school for a full year before they were expelled for assaulting a man." Makoto answered, "Though, what confuses me is why they both assaulted the same person, at the same time."

"Have you tried talking to them?" Akechi asked.

"No, not yet, I've been drowned in Student Council Work and Suzui-san almost jumping as well as the Volleyball rally has me swamped in work." She answered. Her mind turned to other topics, "Furthermore, I wasn't able to ascertain why Suzui-san tried to jump off the roof, due to the fact that Minako-san went home with Suzui-san afterwards, it hints that the twins might know the reason why she did it."

"But, you don't know."

"Yes, it didn't help that Suzui-san was off yesterday. She, understandably, called in sick."

"This actually sounds vaguely interesting," Akechi said, "Do make sure that you'll keep me informed about this process, better yet, see if you can't get a recording of you talking to the new transfer students. What did you say their names were again?"

"Oh right, they're Arisato Minato and Arisato Minako." Makoto answered "Wait, why do you want to know this?"

"If you ever need any help, I'm sure I could access their police files, you'll be surprised about some of the holes in their security."

Makoto checked her phone, it was 15:00, huh, that was fast. "Thanks but I'm sure I won't need you to access their police files." She showed him the time on her phone "I'm pretty sure that you'll need to go soon, I don't want to keep you." This was her version of politely asking for him to leave, thankfully, he understood and saw himself out.

Honestly, checking their police records, why the hell would she need those?

17/02/2018 - 18:00 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minako

Minako was wondering why when they got home, Sojiro threw a couple of aprons at them and told them to wait for when he closed the store.

Minako, knowing full well that things were going to get messy when aprons involved removed her hoody and put the apron on over her tank-top. Minato was of a similar disposition and removed his blazer, hanging it up on a coat hanger in the corner of the room and put the blazer over his t-shirt.

They were both standing behind the counter at Cafe Leblanc with a very intense looking Sojiro standing in front of them.

"Listen up kids," He began, his voice firm but at the same time, somewhat soft "Considering that you're living with me, you will soon have to be earning your keep. So I'm going to teach you how to make Coffee, Leblanc style."

Minako's eyes widened, while his curry was figuratively, and possibly literally, divine, the coffee was what most people came here for, she couldn't imagine how good it would taste.

Maybe this year wouldn't be so bad after all...

 

[Unhacker]

18/04/2018 - 7:30 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minato

Minato was on the hunt, specifically for a certain goody-two-shoes third year. From all accounts, the girl has auburn brown hair with a weird braid that could very well be a hairband, though more importantly, she has striking red eyes like she's an albino.

Though quite a lot of the third years are avoiding him like he's got the plague. Though some of them were wondering what a delinquent was doing around the school hallways, clearly looking for something

That was until, he found what he was looking for, the student council room. he knocked on the door and opened it, not even waiting for a response.

18/04/2018 - 7:35 – Student Council Room - Arisato Minato

When he entered the student council room, the thing that struck him the most was just how stuffy the room was, none of the windows were open and the room was at that kind of warm temperature that goes from wanting to put you to sleep and had reached that level where it became physically uncomfortable. There was a whiteboard in the corner of the room that had various things written down in scrawling handwriting in black marker pen, various stacks of paper littered the desks of the room, either stacks of unbound permission and funding forms or spiral bound requests or something similar.

There was only one person in the room, sitting down at the desk closest to the windows. It was the person who he was looking for, Nijima Makoto.

Just as what he heard, the girl had auburn hair that went down to her chin, combined with a weird braid on her hair that looked kind of like a hairband. Her features were angular and her skin was pale, probably from the amount of time she spends working in this room. Her eyes were focused on a piece of paper that she was holding, clearly reading it intently to the point where she hadn't even noticed him enter the room. Though when it looked at them they were a very striking shade of red, it almost made him think that she was an albino, though the natural shine of the hair convinced him otherwise.

In terms of what she was wearing, it was most likely, though he couldn't see it, she was wearing the Shujin Academy Uniform skirt, though he could be wrong considering who everyone in this school seems to take the uniform policy and throw it out a window and she was no exception to this. She was wearing a typical white dress shirt and instead of wearing the school jumper, she went with a black waistcoat. In addition, it seemed that she was wearing a black wrist brace, no really, she was actually wearing one, he wasn't sure how someone would do that much work that they'd get RSI from it, but he sure that she'd be willing to tell him that that's how you know you're working hard. Her school blazer hung on one of the empty chairs in the room.

After sufficiently analysing her appearance for future reference, he coughed into his fist in order to get her attention, causing her to slightly jump in her chair and put the paper down and look at him.

"Niijima-senpai, I presume?" Minato began, getting himself a seat with his right hand dragging it up to himself, the question was rhetorical, the school forum had a disturbingly large amount of threads dedicated to Makoto's appearance "What if I told you about the reason why Suzui-san was about to try to kill herself."

Makoto raised a single eyebrow at this, apparently intrigued. "Go on..."

18/04/2018 - 7:40 - Student Council Room - Niijima Makoto

Makoto felt the urge to be sick at all the things that Minato had told her, he told her this in the most clinical and apathetic tone that she had heard in her life.

Kamoshida was worse than she thought it would be, beating the entirety of the volleyball team, punishing specific members harshly for minor mistakes and then, well, what he did to Suzui.

She wasn't really sure how to respond to that. Or to the next thing Minato asked.

"Could you please help me in bringing Kamoshida to justice?" He asked, his tone just as emotionless as before.

"What?" She asked she wasn't entirely sure how to respond to that, every instinct was telling her to side with them, but her better judgement said that this wouldn't result in much.

"I wouldn't have told you everything I just told you if I didn't believe that you wanted to improve the school." Minato said, "So, I'll ask again, would you please help me bring Kamoshida to justice?"

"Why not go to the teachers?"

"Really? I'll give you a hint, leaked criminal record, most of the teachers look like they are disgusted with my very existence." That did make sense, most of the teachers were wary of people with a history of violence, she remembered something similar a year or so ago with one of her senpais. Troublesome, really. "You, on the other hand, teachers would trust you." He said, being utterly unashamed that he was going to be using her.

"So, you're using me."

"Yes." Minato said with no dancing around it "But the fact that I am using you says that you're worth using. I can feel it, you're just as sick with this school as I am." he paused for a second, in a motion that looks natural but felt practised "Or was I wrong and are you just going to think that nothing is wrong even as your kohai are suffering." He stood up from his seat. "I'm already late for homeroom, tch. If you want to do the right thing, meet me on the roof at lunchtime."

He walked out of the room, closing the door behind him and leaving her alone in the stuffy student council room.

18/04/2018 - 12:00 - Shujin Academy - Niijima Makoto

Makoto walked up to the roof, ignoring the fact that she was breaking at least several school rules and noting the fact that the door should be locked, but the padlock she remembered putting up last year had been removed.

She opened the door and found herself on the roof, standing around at a corner, at some of the old desks and chairs, there was Sakamoto, both the Arisatos, Suzui and Takamaki. Quite a collection of people.

"Ah, so you do want to do the right thing," Minato said, he turned to Sakamoto, a clearly playful expression on his face "So what was that about the Student Council President not caring?"

"Alright, you were right," Sakamoto said, sounding annoyed

"Damn right I was..." He cleared his throat and his face turned from having a playful expression to a more neutral expression "Anyway, Nijima-senpai, I'm going to assume that this means you accept the offer."

"You are correct," Makoto said, she wasn't all that comfortable in the presence of the school delinquents.

"Excellent." Minako said, taking over for her brother, her expression was a bit more cheerful, but her cheer did feel somewhat out of place "We've tried investigating Kamoshida in order to bring him to justice, but we have hit something of a roadblock. You see, we're kind of conspicuous and no-one really wants to open up to the people who have previously assaulted someone, even if they ask nicely." She said, her tone out of place but definitely a change from her brother's listlessness "That's where you come in, apparently, teachers trust you and are more likely to not take what you're saying with a grain of salt. In other words..."

"We need you to help with our investigation and try to get one of the teachers on our side." Minato finished. His words quick and to the point. She could appreciate that,

"So, you want me, the Student Council President, the one with connections to one of the country's up and coming prosecutors, to help tell the teachers, on another teacher?" Makoto said, making sure that she was hearing this correctly.

"Who said I was done talking?" Minako said, "That is a part of your job, yes, but another part would be to help us gather evidence, you could probably help us get some more confessions out of members of the Volleyball team, or actually talk to the head of the school newspaper who is absolutely terrified of us." Minako explained, at the end, her tone was a bit annoyed and somewhat bitter. "Surprisingly good at hiding that one and we even checked all the person-sized cardboard boxes..."

"She's changed her tactics," Makoto said to herself, Yori, as she was known as had a habit of pulling a solid snake, her changing tactics was ... unsettling. Makoto checked her phone and saw the time. "I must be going, I've got a few things I have to organise with the Student Council," Neither of the twins looked pleased with that, but let her go.

18/04/2018 - 15:30 - Shujin Academy - Suzui Shiho

One thing that felt really weird to Shiho nowadays was actually not attending Volleyball Practice and to be honest, it was kind of hard not to, the practice, no matter how painful it was, became a part of her daily schedule and she had to actively stop herself from not going to practice like she was on autopilot.

They had a clear plan worked out for after school, she'd meet up with Ann at the shoe locker and get to her place, constantly checking to make sure that Kamoshida didn't have a Shujin Student following her.

Shame that no plan really survives contact with the enemy, when she made her way down to the shoe lockers, she heard the voice of Kamoshida "Why are you no longer taking my calls?" He asked an unknown participant of the conversation, Shiho ducked behind the shoe lockers and listened in.

"I thought it was obvious." The voice of ... Ann said, clearly disgusted with Kamoshida "Fuck a gym sock, sex was never part of the agreement." What the hell was she talking about

"Bu-" Kamoshida began

"But nothing, I told it to you thrice, I'm not interested in sex." Ann sighed "In fact, I wanted to drop this subtly, but the entire agreement is off. I'm blocking your number."

What was this about, Ann was dating Kamoshida, why? What was this about an agreement?

"You know what will happen to Suzui-san if you do, right?" Kamoshida said, she could almost hear his predatory grin, this was a man who had decades of experience at manipulating people

"You know that's a bluff, right?" Ann shot back, her voice as hard as steel "It's funny thinking that I would fall for such an obvious bluff." There was the sound of a shoe locker opening.

"Wha-"

"Shut up, sensei," Ann said, putting a sarcastic emphasis on the word 'sensei' "I imagine that you have a volleyball team to 'coach'"

Shiho turned a corner and heard the heavy footfalls of a very pissed off Kamoshida moving past her hiding place. This was so much to process, what did they mean 'agreement', what did it have to do with her, it did explain why Kamoshida stopped beating her as much last year, or at least, tried to make the bruises less visible.

She stepped out from her hiding place and went to replace her school slippers with her shoes, there were a few tears in her eyes, this meant that Ann was straight, all of Shiho's hopes of a bright future alone with the foreign girl went spiralling down the drain.

"Hey Shiho, nice timing," Ann said, her voice like a melody and oh god, Shiho couldn't help it, even if Ann was most likely straight, "Want to head home or stop someplace else?" She asked she was always so nice, Shiho wondered how Ann's lips would feel or if she would oblige Shiho's fantasies,

"Could we stop by that diner, you know the one in Shibuya," Shiho asked, she resisted the urge to look at Ann, those eyes would just make Shiho fall in love all over again.

"Sure, just don't be surprised if the Arisatos jump in, they mentioned that they might have spare time today," Ann said, her voice was somewhat annoyed by that.

18/04/2018 - 16:10 - Diner - Takamaki Ann

If there were three things that Ann was sure of, one would be that she was glad to have officially broken up with Kamoshida, the man was at least fifty (he never said what his actual age was) and he always smelled like cheap deodorant and sweat. That and she was his trophy girlfriend.

Second would be that she had it really bad, even if Ann was sometimes oblivious to her own feelings, she could acknowledge that Shiho was one of the most beautiful people she'd ever met and that Ann was not-biased in that regard at all, she'd also be happier if Minako didn't tease her over her crush.

The third was that Shiho was hiding something, despite her normal misery, the girl seemed to be carrying extra weight on her shoulders, which was just even more fun.

Both the girls had spent some money on some Coffee, Shiho's was black and Ann's was a flat white. They were sitting opposite from each other as they sat in a booth near the exit, Shiho looked like she wanted to talk about something, but was trying to gather the courage to say something.

"Something on your mind?" Ann asked, taking a sip of her coffee.

"What was the conversation with Kamoshida about?" Shiho asked, oh shit, she was actually asking about that. "Why were you in a relationship with him?"

"I..." Ann stumbled, at a loss for words for one of the first few times in her life "I was dating him to protect you." she said finally, there was no point lying about it, Ann could stretch the truth and be a liar by omission, but now that Shiho was asking, there was no point, she let the twins know. "It was when I first noticed the bruises last year. However, he kept steadily increasing the demands, it came to a head last week when he asked for sex, again." Ann spilt the beans, knowing there was no point in lying to Shiho. "He offered me an ultimatum, I'd either stop by his place or you'd be removed from the team."

"You chose to remove me from the team," Shiho said, her voice shaking and her eyes blazing with rage

"I told him to go fuck a gym sock, I didn't know if he would keep his end of the deal." Ann said, trying to calm Shiho down "I didn't know that, it would get this bad." She added, her voice low "I did everything in my power to protect you. But I couldn't go through with it, I must be some shitty friend." It was true, she had kept the relationship a secret for the same exact reason she entered that relationship. Shiho's eyes were still angry.

"But why never tell me? Didn't it concern you that I might want to know why my friend was looking so dead inside." Shiho asked, did Ann really look that bad when she was dating Kamoshida, she supposes that her eyes didn't shine nearly as much.

"I couldn't think of anything to do and I didn't know how you would react to the news, whenever I talked to you, I forgot about the relationship, or at least rationalised it in my head, it was worth it to see you smile again," Ann said, realising that she was coming dangerously close to confessing to Shiho, she wants a distraction, just literally anything else so that she doesn't have to tell Shiho the full truth, Ann didn't want to ruin her friendship like that.

"So you hid the minor fact that you were dating the gym teacher, from me?" Shiho asked, there were a few tears that were falling and her voice was shaky. Ann was extremely glad that the Diner was empty for this time of day, though she could feel the waitress there giving her a dirty look.

"Yes, I was," Ann said, she wasn't entirely sure how to proceed with this conversation, she really hoped that literally, anything else would happen, that was when her phone buzzed, several times, she would answer it, but Shiho wouldn't appreciate that "You never really asked and I thought I could dodge the topic. I'm going to assume that you heard how the conversation ended, I have broken up with Kamoshida." Ann held out one of her napkins to Shiho for her to use as a tissue. Which the dark haired girl accepted.

"Thanks, Ann." Shiho said, wiping away her tears "You've always been so nice to me." Ann's face was red from the praise, how was that dark-haired girl able to so quickly steal her heart? How was she able to mess with Ann's emotions so easily?

Ann just nodded, instead of saying what she really thought, Shiho still thought of Ann as a friend didn't she? Though she didn't want Shiho to figure this one out right now. Ann's phone vibrated several more times. "Do you mind if I look at these texts?" Shiho nodded "Good, you might want to drink your coffee."

Ko: Hey
Ko: Why'd none of you tell me how pretty Makoto was?
Ko: I figured she wouldn't be that good looking but damn
Ko: Why aren't you responding?
Ko: Managed to confess your undying love to Shiho?
Ko: If so, tell how it went.

Ann looked at these texts with a somewhat sour glare, Minako's teasing did not help with her feelings, though it seems that Minako had the hots for a senpai. She had teasing ammo against Minako

Ann: I thought her hotness was common knowledge
Ann: Didn't think you were the type to crush on a Senpai
Ko: Shut up
Ann: Only if you stop teasing me over Shiho
Ko: Fine, I'll try.
Ko: It's not my fault that Makoto is hot.
Ko: Moving on from Gay Stuff
Ko: How is Shiho actually?
Ann: Currently with me.
Ann: Found out that I was dating Kamoshida
Ann: Also found out that I just broke up with Kamoshida.
Ko: Still pretty?
Ann: Still pretty.
Ann: Wait, shit.
Ko: This is fun.
Ann: Shut up

"What's it about?" Shiho asked, curious at Ann's facial expression

"Minako's texting me." Ann remarked "She can be ... interesting when it comes to texts."

"How so?"

"She's benefitting from the fact that someone can't punch her through a screen, for one," Ann said, it was true, she did lack the ability to punch through a screen and Minako was certainly benefitting from that. "She also takes a large amount of joy in teasing people." Ann took a sip of her coffee and noticed that it was getting cold, she really should have drunk this coffee faster. As long as Shiho didn't take an interest in what the teasing was about Ann would be good.

18/04/2018 - 16:25 - Shujin Academy - Niijima Makoto

"Yori-san," Makoto called out as she ran up to the girl, who was one of the few people in the school who actually wore the full school uniform without swapping out anything, though her hair was longer than school regulations, but Makoto could list all the girls on one finger who cared about that rule, Makoto was one of the people who did care about the rule. "I just want to talk to you about something."

The long-haired girl stopped walking and faced Makoto, "What is it you want to talk about Niijima-san?"

"Has there been anything interesting happen with the volleyball team?" Makoto asked

"Nothing that interesting, Suzui-san seems to have left the club based on the fact that she missed two practice sessions. I also think this third year has left the volleyball team as well, Ikki-kun, I think." Yori than looked at Makoto oddly "That's about all I can think of, off the top of my head, why do you want to know this?"

"I'm sort of interested, you know, considering recent events," Makoto said, waving off the question with practised ease. "Thanks for telling me anyway, it's been good talking to you." Makoto bowed slightly and walked away from Yori.

18/04/2018 - 17:00 - Shibuya Station - Arisato Minako

To be honest, Minako would admit that she had long since blown her monthly budget and was dipping into next months budget, in short, she had severely underestimated the cost of living in Tokyo.

As such, she found herself looking at the pamphlets for part-time jobs, convenience store job, didn't pay that well but had low requirements, beef bowl place, required a hard worker but was also only in the evening, which immediately ruled it out due to the fact that Sojiro wasn't letting them out during the evening. Finally, there was a job offer at a flower shop, which looked like it would be easy money.

"What you looking at?" Minato asked, walking up behind his sister.

"Some job pamphlets." She answered "I think I found one for you." she handed him the flower shop pamphlet. She could hear his eye twitching.

"You blew your monthly budget, didn't you?" Minato asked, his voice stern

"Yes," Minako said, "Everything in this city is ridiculously expensive. I'll take a look round some of these pamphlets, I only took a quick glance." Minako looked around and saw one for 'Crossroads Bar' it was in the city's red light district, she saw another one, it was looking for a part-time tutor. Minako felt a grin creep its way onto her face from just seeing that "Scratch the job at the flower shop, here's one that's perfect." She handed him the tutor job, though a small part of her wanted to hand him the one for Crossroads Bar, "This one is also really good for you." She said as she passed him the aforementioned pamphlet. There was a moment of silence as Minato read through each pamphlet and then he slapped Minako upside the head.

"You're really funny." Minato said sarcastically "Though seriously, the tutor job was a good idea." He reached into the pamphlets and pulled out one, "Hm, it seems to be a maid cafe job in Akihabara." He laughed and Minako was somewhat amused by the boy's high pitched laughter.

"Yes, dress up in an embarrassing outfit, refer to everyone as 'master' and appeal to otakus and weeaboos alike." Minako said, taking a look at it "Though it pays well, and it does place me in an area relevant to my interests." She took the pamphlet and put it into her pocket, she couldn't tell what Minato put into his pocket but she figured that it was either the flower shop job or the tutor job.

"Do you think you'll get the job?" Minato asked

"Absolutely not, but it should give me some good practice for the actual process," she answered, her voice certain and bit humorous. Her phone vibrated, she looked down at it.

Makoto: Hey, Minako
Ko: Yeah,
Makoto: just talked to the school newspaper girl
Makoto: Some third-year left the volleyball team, Ikki-kun.
Ko: Thanks

Minako looked up from the phone, "Makoto just gave us another name."

"Another member of the volleyball team?" Minato asked

"Left it recently, goes by 'Ikki-kun' don't have any other details, Makoto will probably look up his file later," Minako answered.

"Another name and that means, another lead."

"The game is afoot," Minako said jokingly, with a tone of voice reminiscent of the old detective novels.

 

[Unhacker]

19/04/2018 - 7:10 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minako

Minako looked at the job pamphlet some more, while the concept of wearing a maid outfit as embarrassing, especially since she knew that it was a fetish of some people, however, the pay was really good, though given that it was Akihabara, it was likely that she would end up spending most of it in the same district, this would also give her an excuse to go to so many events, not that she needed one.

Money or Dignity? that was the question and dear god why was she treating this like she was prostituting herself? It was then that the door opened.

In walked her brother Minato, looking somewhat annoyed. He sat down in his chair with a huff, "Still can't find the head of the school newspaper, I think she's hiding in the lockers at this point." He said, in one of the rare moments when he let his annoyance show on his face. "You still checking out that job opportunity?"

"Yeah, I'm just wondering if the money is worth it," Minako said

"You're blowing your budget, you'll probably need the job." Minato responded, "Hell, it costs like 200 yen to get a ticket to Akihabara, right?"

"Yeah, something like that," Minako responded, taking a look at the pamphlet, I'll call them asking about the job after school." She stuffed the pamphlet back into her pocket.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say that you secretly wanted that job." He said, a grin on his face, he was right, Minako kinda had an interest in working in one of those cafes.

"No." She lied, her face turning a bit red, "Can we drop the subject, please?"

"Nerd." He said as he leaned away from her and pulled out the folder in his bag, reading through it and occasionally fiddling with the pages.

19/04/2018 - 9:40 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minato

It was time for a class with the lovely Hiruta, the school's youngest teacher (according to him) and had one of the weirdest fashion senses that Minato had laid eyes on.

In terms of what he looked like, Minato would start with the head, he had perfectly normal Japanese features, his hair was done in what could be considered a bowl cut with a fringe that went off to the left. He had a rather thin frame that seemed like it was perfect for a Latin dancer, in terms of what he was wearing, he was wearing a pair of maroon suit trousers, to add to this, there was a black suit shirt, combined with a black waistcoat with three light grey verticle stripes on each side in symmetrical fashion. To top it all off, he wore an off-colour white cravat. See why Minato thought of this guy like a Latin dancer?

Minato had his head down copying down notes, Hiruta's teaching style was one of talking really fast, he only wrote important concepts on the board and didn't focus on waffly lectures. His head only popped up to record down anything new if heard the sound of something being written on the blackboard.

"Arisato-san." He said, causing both of the twins to bring their heads up, "The male one." he added, narrowing it down. "Since you look like you're paying attention, tell me, what is line A connected to." he pointed towards an optical illusion that he had drawn on the board.

"It's connected to C." He said, crisply, Hiruta made a hand motion that clearly showed that he wanted Minato to explain further. "it's an optical illusion, line A looks like it should connect to line B, but drawing a line between the two easily shows that it is connected to line C." He finished, checking his notes to make sure that he had that written down.

"Correct, I initially thought that you were recording down information without understanding it, but it seems that you work a little differently." Was that a compliment, it sounded like one but at the same time, it also sounded like a thinly veiled insult.

He could hear some murmuring from other students, but he paid them little mind and went back to recording down notes as Hiruta described the concept of the optical illusion at warp speed. What a fun teacher.

19/04/2018 - 12:20 - Shujin Academy - Arisato Minato

The group was gathered on the rooftop once again, though they were waiting for Makoto, once again.

"We might as well set up a table here or something." Minako thought out loud.

"Why?" Ann asked

"We spend most of our lunchtimes here and it would make it easier to eat our lunches," Minako answered.

"Are we pretending that there aren't large scale logistical concerns about getting a table of any kind up here?" Minato asked, "Because I imagine that there are quite a few logistical concerns about that."

"It was just a stray thought," Minako said, "though, yeah there would be a large number of questions why the school delinquents are sneaking in flatpack furniture." said, "though that would be funny to explain."

It was at this moment that Makoto managed to make her appearance, her breathing was slightly increased and it was obvious that she was at the very least jogging up to the roof.

"I've managed to get a photo of Ikki-kun," Makoto said, she pulled out her phone and showed the photo to the gang.

The boy looked, well a bit ugly, though the broken nose and the fact that most of his face was bruised tissue probably had something to do with that. He long raven hair that was done up into a low ponytail, which in the photo was resting on his right shoulder. In the photo, he was posing next to a statue.

"It's a recent photo," Makoto explained, "One of the student council members was good friends with the guy and took his photo."

"How do they know each other." The thought of a member of the student council knowing someone who looked like he had been hit in the face with a baseball bat was a jarring image.

"All third-years know each other, to some extent," Makoto answered vaguely, clearly enjoying the fact that her answer just raised further questions.

19/04/2018 - 16:30 - Cafe Leblanc - Arisato Minako

The Arisato twins were sitting down at one of the booths in the corner of the cafe, not really scaring away customers (Because there were none) and biding their time until the store closed. Sojiro appeared to be enjoying himself and was sipping a cup of coffee that he had apparently brewed just before they came in, causing the room to smell of fresh coffee.

It was then that they heard an old-timey ringtone, that sounded oddly like an old Nokia ringtone.

Sojiro pulled out an old flip-phone and answered it. "Sakura speaking." He said, his voice was gruff but there was an undercurrent of a businessman in there as well. The twins heard something from his phone "Oh, it's you." he said, his mouth was curling into something that could be described as a smile and his tone of voice lightened from old salaryman to 'caring father' "Don't worry, I'm closing up soon. An hour at the most." He said, his tone was reassuring and it warmed Minako's heart to see that Sojiro had someone he cared for, that meant that there was a child of the God of Coffee that was Sojiro. "Fine, fifteen minutes and don't call me old." He put away the phone and saw that both the twins were looking at him.

"Hot date tonight?" Minato asked without a hint of sarcasm.

"Shut up." Sojiro said, "I think both of you still have some dishes to clean."

"By the way, Sakura-san," Minako began "Am I allowed to get a job?"

"Of course," Sojiro responded, "Though on that note." He took a set of keys and threw them at the twins, Minato caught them easily "Nice catch, these are a set of spare keys for Leblanc so that I don't have to wait for both of you to come home before I close up, just be sure to lock up before you go to sleep and don't go out of the street in the evening, got it."

Those were surprisingly generous terms, most people don't even trust them with anything sharper than a crayon. Both the twins nodded.

"Where's that job anyway?" Sojiro was taking a sip from a cup of coffee

"Akihabara," Minako said

"Do you know any of the details of this job?" He asked, his eyes looked a little disappointed at the mention of the district.

"Yeah," Minako answered, pulling the pamphlet out of her blazer pocket. "Its here, I did a search on my phone and the position is still open."

"Smart girl," Sojiro said, "You should actually call them about the job opening, part-time jobs like that don't really need much in the way of qualifications, though your record will affect your chances of getting a job,"

Minako was sure that Sojiro was probably the closest she'd get to a father, her uncles and aunties only really saw the both of them as a nuisance, the black sheep of the family, but Sojiro was treating them right, well, still as a pain but he was warming to the two.

"Okay," Minako picked up her smartphone and quickly typed in the phone number for the job.

"Hello, Grey Cloud Cafe. How can I help you?" The voice on the other end spoke in heavily accented Japanese, she thinks that it might be an American accent.

"Hello, I was wondering if your part-time job offer was still open?"

"That one, yeah, it's still open, I guess your applying?"

"I wouldn't be calling otherwise," Minako said, her voice was humorous and she could hear the receptionist on the other side laughing.

"Okay, we need to pencil in your interview, how's tomorrow at 5 PM for you?" the voice said, what followed was a few sounds that would have obviously been the receptionist reaching around for something.

"Okay," Minako said, she'd be lying if she didn't say that she was checking the train routes all the way back home, it was safe to say that she knew the route pretty well, theoretically at least. She looked at Sojiro "I think that went well."

"You are aware that there's a long-standing set of rules about talking over the phone?" Sojiro said to her.

"Yes and don't worry, it was an American on the other end, chances are they wouldn't know about those rules," Minako said, waving the problem off.

"Well, they got employed, so chances are that they do." Sojiro said, "Kids these days..." he stage-whispered, making sure that the twins could hear him. He looked at his watch and then back to the twins, he took off his apron, storing it under the counter and then proceeded to leave, just stopping to say "I should go." on his way out.

The twins looked at each other and said at the same time "This year might not be so bad."