Notes – For the gx_100. Set pre-GX, soon after the events at the abandoned dorm when Fubuki was taken by Darkness.
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Life was never going to be simple.
It would never be a case of getting on the metaphorical train at the station and going from home to work without any complications. There was always be something on the line along the way or some guy would pull a knife on you for unknown reasons, or if you got lucky than it would just be that the sandwich trolley had run out of egg and cress. The latter being unlikely, because train canteens always overstock on egg and cress sandwiches.
The point being that something would happen. You couldn't go through life without meeting any obstacles. Given it might well be possible to do so in theory, but there have been millions of people who have tried to put that into practise before and none of them have succeeded yet.
But Ryo admitted to himself that he would have liked to attend Duel Academia without too much drama happening. He was a studious boy, he always worked hard and his tutors thought highly of him. That was what he wanted from his time there. Anything life was going to throw at him he wanted it to throw after he'd gone out into the wide world and got his career on the go.
Life hadn't wanted that for Ryo.
Another thing that Ryo had found at Duel Academia was friends. Well, all right, one really good friend at any rate. But that really good friend was a popular guy, so Ryo knew a lot of other people in his year through knowing this one friend, Fubuki.
Fubuki was not a normal guy. It would be quite accurate to describe him as one of the obstacles you might come across on your train track. However he was a good person, albeit loud and excitable, so if he was the only unusual aspect of Ryo's education than he was quite happy to embrace that.
It turned out this wouldn't be the case.
A whole class of students disappeared from the academia without any explanation. Ryo's friends, including Fubuki, had been in that class. Ryo had to grit his teeth as people told him he was lucky to have been away on the day that it happened.
If being lucky meant losing your companionship in the blink of an eye then Ryo thought he could do with being a lot less lucky.
No one seemed to be able to come up with any reason into the madness of what had happened. Just this primitive notion that the dorm the students went missing from must be a bad place, so to reduce the risk of losing more students it was closed off. Students were forbidden to either go there or speak about what had happened. It would be too much bad press for the school if the media found out about the missing class.
Surely parents would tell, the students argued, but somehow the staff managed to cover that up too. To Ryo, the whole affair made no sense. All he could understand of it was that Fubuki and these other people were gone, and no bodies were found.
He drew up the summary that they had to be alive. There'd be no way that so many bodies could have been removed unnoticed if they had been killed. But where do so many people go when they magically disappear?
As often as he could spare he searched for them, Fubuki's image etched into the back of his mind. Any traces of a guy with long, brown hair being heard of and Ryo would be there, but he never found Fubuki.
It was hard to look for someone in secret without the staff being alerted, or at least becoming suspicious, as to what you were doing. The tutor who had been responsible for the missing class, Daitokuji, in particular seemed to keep turning up whenever Ryo felt he was getting closer to finding something out about what had happened. But it wasn't easy to be angry with Daitokuji; he had such a nice smile and seemed pleasantly absentminded. He wasn't the sort of person who should have been involved with something like this.
Regardless he still got in the way, and the weeks went by without the students returning. Weeks became months, months became a memory, and soon it was almost time for the students to take the boat trip back to the mainland.
Ryo sat on the dock, next to the lighthouse he always felt comforted by, and was thoroughly miserable. By the time they returned from the summer the scent would be stone cold. If the missing students were being held somewhere against their will than the few weeks would be plenty of time to transport them off the island. Or transport their bodies off.
He shook that treacherous thought from his mind.
"You really need to stop looking so sad Marufuji, nya," came a voice from behind him, the 'nya' sound confirming that it was Daitokuji talking, "You'll make the principal worry for you if you keep that up."
It was common knowledge that Ryo and principal Samejima had known each other for a long while, even before the boy had attended the academia.
"I just don't particularly feel very happy right now," said Ryo, looking over. He didn't feel he needed to waste anytime saying why, that should have been obvious.
Daitokuji came to join him at the edge of the pier, his cat Pharaoh watching the water with some distain from his position on Daitokuji's lap.
"You still worry for those missing students," observed Daitokuji, to which Ryo nodded, "But you can't carry on that way. I know you don't feel fortunate, but they are lucky that out of all of them it was you who was left behind. Because if anyone is able to find them you have the mind to do it."
"Thanks." It was all Ryo could reply. Not only did he not feel fortunate but he also didn't feel as if he was as up to the task as Daitokuji claimed him to be.
"But you can't put this entirely on yourself Marufuji. To you it seems as if the staff has forgotten about them, but we are still looking as much as you are. If you were to open your mind enough to allow for help then this strain would not seem so terrible to you."
"There is no one else outside of the academia that can help," Ryo argued, "Leaving for the summer would be a huge step backwards."
"Then you are independent to the point of being untrusting," Daitokuji responded, looking sterner than he usually did, "Did you forget that the students have families too? Even Tenjoin had relatives who could be trying to find him."
At the mention of Fubuki's surname Ryo snapped to attention. He'd never even stopped to think about Fubuki's family. Did he have parents and possibly even siblings who were trying to find him too?
Taking his silence as a prompt to leave, Daitokuji pulled himself to his feet, saying, "You should move on from this self imposed slump Marufuji. It will not help you."
With that he took to leave, Pharaoh seeming content to put some distance between him and the water.
As the day went on Ryo stayed there, other students loading their belongings onto the boat and passing him by. Eventually another member of staff got off the boat to ask if he was coming.
"If we leave you behind you'll be stuck here all summer," the man warned.
Ryo stood up and walked towards the boat.
"All right, I'm ready. I'm finally ready to move on."