Third Person's Point of View
SOMETIMES A DEEP, heavy noise echoed throughout the dark level. Perhaps it was the sound of the ship changing course, or maybe it was because the ship had bumped into something. A lone girl came here, a place where all you could hear was the sound of machines.
"What's going on? I can't connect to... There's no signal."
There were still over ten minutes left before her arranged meeting with Hirata. Maybe she'd arrived a little early to calm herself down. After she realized that she couldn't use her phone, she put it back in her pocket and leaned against the wall, apparently bored.
Once four o'clock rolled around, the door opened. The two boys heard the dull sound of it. Three girls from Class C stepped through Manabe and her friends. Wait... there was one other person with them. She seemed meek, rather like Sakura.
This was probably Rika.
"It's all right." Manabe said as she reassured Rika. Then she saw Karuizawa. Naturally, Karuizawa noticed them, too.
"Wh-what are you doing here?!" Karuizawa yelled at them. She is so confused about what is happening. The passageways inside the ship were narrow, so there weren't many escape routes. Running away would be difficult.
"I just happened to see you come in here, that's all. Well, I suppose this is the perfect opportunity. Let me introduce you. This is Rika. Do you remember her, Karuizawa-san?" Manabe said as she smirked.
Manabe grabbed Rika, who was hiding behind her, and pulled her forward. She and Karuizawa were now facing each other. Karuizawa averted her eyes, pretending like she didn't know her, but judging from her behavior it was obvious she remembered.
"Hey, Rika. Karuizawa-san was the one who shoved you, right?" Manabe asked Rika.
"Y-Yeah... she's the one." Rika replied.
After hearing such a clear answer, Manabe smiled, looking happy as could be. Karuizawa, on the other hand, appeared increasingly anxious and confused. Axel and Kiyotaka, who are on the top floor staring at the scene, the only thing they could do now was stay quiet and observe the miserable events that were about to unfold.
"Apologize to Rika." Manabe demand.
"H-huh? Who's apologizing? I haven't done anything wrong."
"Still acting tough. You're a real piece of work, aren't you? But I think I understand now, more or less."
"What do you mean?"
"Your behavior. You're unusually fearful. Karuizawa-san, you were bullied, weren't you?" Manabe said, making Karuizawa flinced.
"Wha—?!" She had been trying to hide the truth, but her past had caught up with her.
"I hit the nail on the head, didn't I? I knew it. I could feel it right from the start." Manabe continued.
"No, you're wrong!" Her denial was weak. It wasn't as though Manabe was highly perceptive or anything. She knew because I'd told her everything beforehand.
"If you get down on your knees and beg right now, I might forgive you. How about it? I mean, you're good at groveling, right? Being on your knees?" Manabe suggested.
"N-no, I won't! I've never done that kind of thing before!"
Karuizawa tried to slip past Manabe, but Manabe snatched her long hair and pulled her back, slamming her into the wall.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.───
Kiyotaka's Point of View
KARUIZAWA SHOULD HAVE agonized over whether to use violence. However, when she finally had the chance to be alone with Karuizawa, she let go of all other concerns. Because her friends were expecting her to get back at Karuizawa, I couldn't imagine that this would end until Manabe had dished out a great deal of punishment. That's what I'd been aiming for, anyway.
"Ow, ow! It hurts! Let me go!" Karuizawa wept at having her hair pulled, and pleaded, but Manabe only laughed like she was enjoying it. Right now, they were on the lowest level of the ship, a closed environment. I'd successfully set the stage for her 'revenge', after all. Seeing Karuizawa suffer, especially after her proud behavior, probably felt great to them.
"Whoa, Shiho. Don't you think you're hitting her a little too much? Wow, you're harsh." Yamashita
Manabe continued to drive her knee into Karuizawa's stomach. Of course, Manabe wasn't used to hitting someone like that, so her movements were sluggish. It shouldn't have hurt much. But Karuizawa's pain was Manabe's greatest reward.
"Come on Rika. You give it a try, too."
Seemingly in a great mood, she invited Rika to join in. Rika had been standing some distance away, watching anxiously.
Rika wanted to refuse taking revenge, but that wasn't allowed right now. She knew that if Manabe's anger were redirected at her, she could become the next victim.
Rika: O-okay. I'll try.
There was the sound of a pathetically light slap.
'...What? That's technically not a slap.' In my thoughts. I heard a chuckle beside me. I looked at Axel, I just sighed and went back to the scene.
"L-Like that?" Rika asked.
"No, no, that's no good at all. You need to put more force into it, like this!" Manabe said.
The sound echoed through the room. Karuizawa looked like she was in pain after that hit. Rika slapped Karuizawa again and again, just as she was instructed. Her slaps gradually grew more forceful.
"S-s-s-stop it! Please, forgive me!"
Seeing her like that must have felt euphoric for Manabe and the others. Rika started to punch and kick rather strongly, to the point where I couldn't believe she'd ever been scared. Karuizawa collapsed in fear, tears streaming down her face.
"Axel, stay here." I said while looking at him/ Axel on the other hand just nod his head.
"Don't do any reckless thing." Axel said, I nod
I moved without making a sound. I quietly opened the door, taking care that Manabe and her friends wouldn't see. They would all continue to take out their frustrations on Karuizawa a little longer.
After all, if something has been thoroughly destroyed, it saves me time and effort when I need to build it back up. I quietly closed the door and was no longer able to hear Karuizawa's screams.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.───
Third Person's Point of View
'SO THIS IS THE TRUE FACE of the egotistic and unyielding class' girls' leader?' Kiyotaka stared at the female before him.
"Karuizawa."
"Wh-Wh-how...?!" Karuizawa gasped as she looked up.
She started to panic. But the experience was too traumatic for her to stop crying at once and pretend everything is fine. After a while, Kei sobbing gradually turned to quiet subdues.
"Calm down yet?" Kiyotaka asked.
"A little..." Kiyotaka reached out his hand to help her up, but she didn't take it.
"Where is Hirata.."
"Even though you two were supposed to meet here, I believe the teacher called him. I was with him then, so I came in place of him. So, why are you crying?" Kiyotaka planned to make it simple and ask to distract her from anything else.
"It's Manabe and her gang......I will not let them get away with this. Do not tell anyone that I cried. If you do, I will not forgive you. You know, to get back at them, even someone like you can do it. They are just girls after all." Karuizawa said.
On the other hand, Axel is hiding on the ground floor. He is quite listening to their conversation. He popped his head, and looked at their situation.
"What an unreasonable request." Kiyotaka said.
"Are you afraid that they will pay you back? And you claim that you are a man." Karuizawa muttered.
"It is apparent from Sudou's incident that a simple 'payback' is not going to solve anything. An eye for an eye would only escalate the conflict. It would also bring the school in and start an investigation. This is not what you wish for, yes?"
"So you are telling to suck it up? Like, they would, no; for sure they would continue to do all kinds of things to me." Karuizawa asked, slightly angry.
"It would be a shame if things returned back to how they were before. I can empathize with you on this."
"What did you say? What do you mean?"
"What do I mean? Exactly what the sentence meant. Against all odds you escaped to this isolated ward, and even claimed the throne of the D class leader. But the fact that you are a victim of bullying has not changed." Kiyotaka said as he tilted his head, his eyes still unto Karuizawa.
"Who, who did you say is a victim of bullying!" Karuizawa said she was clearly embarrassed right now.
"I mean you, Karuizawa!" Kiyotaka grabbed Karuizawai's wrist and dragged her up.
"Wait, what are you doing?!" Kiyotaka then pinned Karuizawa onto the wall and forced her face towards him.
Axel is in his hiding place with his hand on his mouth and starting to become red.
'Is that Kabedon!? Wait wait! It's Happening in front of me! It's live! I never thought Kiyo would put on a show like these.' On his thoughts. He began to imagine.
'Karuizawa-san is so lucky..she got a Kabedon on Kiyo..Haaa...I'm embarrassed to request that from Kiyo.' He shook his head and began to listen again to their conversation.
"You were being tormented by Manabe, weren't you? They dragged your hair. They slapped your face. They kicked your breasts, your waist, and your stomach. And that's how you ended up on the ground, miserable, humiliated, pitifully sobbing. Ever since you were little you were a victim. Grade school middle school the bullying was non-stop. Isn't this why you want to put a stop to it?" Kiyotaka said.
"Did you hear...from Hirata?" Karuizawa asked nervously.
"I don't know if I should tell you this or not. Hirata fancies himself as everyone's trusted companion. He will help you, and he will help others. Even if you did secure your place in D class by pretending to be his girlfriend, he will not be much use to you in situations like this. In other words, as a parasite, he is not a good host."
"Why you.... What gives you the right to pretentiously lecture me!"
"My right? You haven't realized it yet?" Kiyotaka bored into his glare.
"You should know your place. Do you know who is in front of you? It's not Hirata. It's me. I know your checkered past. I know about the fake relationship between you and Hirata. I know that Manabe just physically assailed you and all you could do was haplessly cry. I know all these. In other words? If you become too much of a handful, I can at any time release this information."
"Don't, don't joke around! Who do you think you are!" Karuizawa started to get scared.
'Wh-Where is Axel..Axel please save me.'
"Someone who knows the truth. That's all there is to it. Isn't this all you care about?" Kiyotaka bluntly replied as he grabbed Karuizawa cheeks forcing face back towards him.
"What! What do you want from me! Are you aiming for my body?" Karuizawa said, she began to cry. Kiyotaka stared at her and looked at her.
"Your body huh. That might not be a bad idea." Kiyotaka fingertips slide across Karuizawa's thighs.
"No!!"
Karuizawa fidget aggresively as she tried to escape Kiyotaka's grasp. It only resulted in Kiyotaka strengthening his hold on her cheeks and making her look into his eyes.
"Do not resist. If you do then I will release everything about you to the school." This line, like a curse, had cursed her body into a constrained stiffness.
"Spread your legs."
Axel scrunched his face on both of his hands. His face is a mess right now. He doesn't know that Kiyotaka has these sides! He is so shocked to the point that he wants to go out to stop what he is doing to Karuizawa.
He wants to move. But his mind says that if he shows his face Kiyotaka's plan will go to waste, so he just stays in his hiding place.
Karuizawa's tears began to drop as she slowly spread them. Kiyotaka placed his hand on his belt and intentionally played with the metal buckle. Even then, Karuizawa did not run away.
'Karuizawa Kei is a usable tool. My goal is not her body and never will be. I am threatening her to see how far she would go to protect what she has.'
"I will not bow down to you. I am not being bullied by you.You merely got hold of my weakness and used me! You asshole just do whatever you want and violate me! But it's fine. This is not the first time I've succumbed to forces...Hey, do you know? When an immutable truth is presented, how do humans react? I give up. Yes, I was preyed on and devoured. I was reduced to mechanically reacting to stimulus. I couldn't even muster the courage to resist. I couldn't do anything else. All I can do is receive them." Karuizawa said while she was crying.
"What did you receive? Where were the pains that tormented you?" Kiyotaka asked her.
"What happened? All sorts of things. Everything and anything. They'd put tacks in my shoes or stuff my desk full of roadkill. When I went to the bathroom, I'd get splashed with dirty water. They wrote words like 'whore' on my uniform. They pulled my hair and punched and kicked me. Anything you could imagine, basically. I was bullied in every way. Countless times. What I've just told you was just a fraction of what I've experienced. Those were the 'gentler' ways I've been bullied, too."
"Are these the only torments that you experienced?"
"What?"
"What you said, were they the whole truth? What are you hiding?" Kiyotaka repeated his question.
"What nothing.."
Karuizawa turned her head to her left waist. Kiyotaka noticed that, and reached his hand to touch it.
"S-Stop!!' Kiyotaka grabbed her uniform and pulled it up. On her beautiful skin lay an ugly scar. Kiyotaka's eyes looked up at her.
"Is this your darkness?" Karuizawa nodded while she cried.
'In the last few days I have been observing Karuizawa Kei. This person, to protect herself, forcefully dragged surrounding people into her camps.'
"Despair comes in many shapes and forms, but what you have experienced was, indisputably, despair."
"Wha-What! Y-You!!" Before Karuizawa talked again, Kiyotaka began to talked again.
"I can promise you one thing, and that is from now on we will protect you from intimidation. We are much more reliable than Hirata and Machida."
Karuizawa looked surprised before she looked confused.
"Wait, what do you mean by 'we'?"
"He means me." Axel stepped out of his hiding place silently. When Karuizawa heard his voice, she quickly turned to him.
"A-Arison-kun.."
But before Karuizawa could finish her sentence, Axel quickly punched Kiyotaka on his shoulder, making Kiyotaka touch his shoulder.
"Ouch."
"This is your punishment for making a girl cry." Axel said puffed his cheeks. Really Axel is not really planning just to punch Kiyotaka on the shoulder. He wants to pinched his ears and scold him.
His plan is to way......wild. And his heart can't handle it and the second is Kiyotaka is doing that..in other people.. Well Axel is not really jealous! He confirmed it to himself!
"Sorry.." Kiyotaka said, making Karuizawa look at him deadpanned.
'Where the hell is that attitude earlier.. you bastard.'
Axel then turns to Karuizawa.
"Karuizawa-san, I'm sorry you had to endure that, but I and Kiyo needed to see what length you will go to save yourself. And now that we know that, we will help you." Axel said, as he patted and assured Karuizawa.
"You mean you can stop Manabe and her gang?" Karuizawa asked.
"What you should do now is to decide how trustworthy our words are. A tiny kinder is easy to blow out, but a larger flame would have the opposite effect."
"You will help us and with that We will protect you." Axel said as he put his hand in his pocket and got his phone and showed it to Karuizawa. On his phone was a photo of Karuizawa being assaulted by Manabe's gang. It made Kaurizawa want to blink a couple times because of her being completely speechless.
"This is..."
"If we send this to them, they should reconsider doing any more things to you." Kiyotaka reasoned.
"If they still decide to pursue you by spreading rumors, this would give us good ammunition to intervene. I am only seeking someone to assist us, beside Axel can act on his own. He is more confident than me. I hope that in the future, you will be our aid when needs arise." Kiyotaka continued.
"What, our aid? What do you want me to do?"
"If the current situation continues, D class will never overtake A class. While D class's members' individual abilities are passable, we are severely lacking in cohesion." Axel said and smiled at her.
"However, if you can control the girls for us, this situation will gradually turn for the better."
"What do you mean..."
"The first step of our cooperation shall be to lead our group to victory for this exam."
"Victory? But how do..."
"Because you are-, isn't that right?" Kiyotaka said sharply.
When Karuizawa heard the key word, she widened her eyes and looked at them.
'A parasite can only live by attaching itself to a host. And now that Karuizawa has attached to us a new host, her life now has no way to move forward but with us.' Kiyotaka stared at her.
Karuizawa lowered her head.
"You know..you two don't have to do these..ha..seriously." Karuizawa said while laughing a little, making Axel and Kiyotaka confused.
"What do you mean, Karuizawa-san?"
"I mean this planned...you could just ask me Axel. I will do anything, I trust you in the very beginning." Karuizawa said as she played with her hands.
'So this plan was...just...wasted time you mean?' The two boys thought as they looked at each other.