"What?!"

Kotori exclaimed it, leaving Umi and Honoka in silence, but for different reasons. They were walking home as usual, but all of the girls were different. "M-Mom would never..."

"Come on, Kotori. This isn't just about money," Honoka says. "Something else is up. I can sense it." Umi sighs.

"I know you always have these crazy ideas, but, Honoka-" Honoka stops in the middle of their walk, forcing them all to stand in place. It had begun to rain. Honoka's eyes were set to the clouds.

"I don't know how, but I'll prove it." The others had already deployed their umbrellas, and were standing next to their friend, who was starting to cry again. "I'll prove it, and I'll do anything it takes to stop it. Even if it means I have to fail Love Live again and again!"

"Honoka, come on...this isn't the place to break down like this..." Umi slung Honoka's right arm over the former's shoulder, propping them both up appropriately. Awkward glances from across the street were cast their way. "Let's get out of this rain..."

They were sitting awkwardly around the table in Honoka's room, silently waiting for her to say something. Every once in a while, Umi and Kotori would cast defensive glances at Honoka, as if she was going to burst out any moment, and then glance at each other in anxiety. They felt like they were sitting next to a ticking time bomb that none of them could defuse.

Honoka mumbles, catching them all by surprise. "I think we need to figure out why she's closing the school." Umi sighs, not wanting to repeat herself. Kotori fully understood as well, and didn't want to hurt their friend. "Come on, I know one of you agrees with me. Kotori?" The sound of her name catches her by surprise.

"Huh?"

"I can't be the only one seeing something deeper. Umi?" Umi started to say something, but stopped herself. Perhaps this was another one of Honoka's delusional spells of denial. Something about this one felt different, something eerie behind it enough to make Umi shiver. She felt a deadly seriousness emanating from Honoka's voice. Honoka wasn't desperately clawing for someone to take her side, she was searching for the truth, a truth she gravely knows is there.

A part of Umi wanted to believe her, and not just so Honoka could calm down, but Umi risked falling into another endeavor she fears she will regret. Yet again, she went along with the school idol group, and yet that was arguably one of the best experiences she's had in her life. Perhaps this adventure, whatever it may entail, might not be as bad.

Honoka took their silences and intent stares as an invitation to explain herself. "I just found it interesting that UTX is a part of this. Why would they be interested in this part of town?"

"Maybe because it's an old competitor?" Kotori suggests. Honoka nods, but isn't satisfied with the answer. Somehow, Umi and Kotori felt that nothing was going to answer her question.

"It still doesn't explain why there's such a need for money. We shouldn't be at the verge of giving up the school because 'we're out of money'," Honoka's voice didn't sound natural. At this point, the other two had given up trying to reason with her. Honoka may be determined, but she can also be stubborn as a result. Honoka's emotional grip was strong, and denial was certainly pulling her strings at the moment. Kotori and Umi wordlessly decided that she be best left alone.

"U-Uh...sorry, Honoka, but, I have to get to my archery..." Umi excuses, motioning Kotori to do the same.

"I have...to go too..." How unrealistic it sounded didn't matter. Honoka realized she was rambling.

"S-Sorry..." Before their sense of belonging got a hold of them, the other two excused themselves and hurriedly left in unison. Their silence was enough to lock Honoka up by herself.

Soon enough, Honoka found herself with her friends the next morning. The tense, awkward air forced them to the brink of fleeing from each other. Umi looked at Kotori for support, but the latter shrugged her shoulders in silence. Maybe Honoka was right about this, or maybe Kotori and Umi were just being too nice to her. The walk to school, usually bursting with excited conversation talking about anything they could possibly think of turned into a dismal silence.

"Hey, Honoka, wake up! Class is over!" The redhead's senses slowly reactivated as she felt Kotori's gentle but stern grip shaking her awake. "Come on, I thought we were done with being idols. How can you just sleep like this?" Honoka's hand reached around and grabbed Kotori, using her as a sort of rail to get on her feet.

"S-Sorry about that, Umi..." Before objecting, Kotori stops herself, noting her friend's current vegetative state.

"I know you're always procrastinating, so we better get to the student council room and finish up the papers for-" Kotori tugged on her friend's arm, motioning the latter to follow her, but Honoka didn't budge from her spot. There was no doubt Honoka was wide awake at this point, but her silence scared Kotori. After a moment of silence and a depressed sigh, Honoka followed Kotori out of the room and into the office Nozomi and Eli used to inhabit. Of course, all of their things had been cleaned by the time Honoka took Eli's place, but there's no doubt she could feel their presence every once in a while.

Midway through their work, Honoka asks Kotori, "Kotori, do you know where the Tennis Club budget spreadsheet is?"

"Sure..." the latter responds with unconvincing enthusiasm. Being left in a room with a somewhat angry, somewhat sad Honoka while Umi was gone didn't leave the best impression of security for Kotori. Handing Honoka the chart, Honoka looks it up and down to confirm it was the right sheet and stops herself. "Wh-What? Is it the right one?"

"Y-Yeah...I just wondered..." Kotori thought Honoka was going to let it go, but, much to her dismay, Honoka says,

"Why has the budget not gone down...at all?" Kotori nervously smiles and laughs, not wanting to get involved. But, judging by Honoka's expression, she knew that the redhead wasn't letting it go. "Wait, look, the budget for the Tennis Club has only gone up since...since this February!"

Kotori glanced at the bottom of the table and, sure enough, the total allocated budget for the Tennis Club has indeed increased, much higher than the ordinary threshold of a club activity. Honoka grabs another budget spreadsheet. The Art Club also followed a similar increase in funds. So did the Computer Club, and the Swim Club, and so on. Every club was steadily given more and more each progressive month. Even Kotori found it peculiar.

"Then why don't they ever say anything about it? Aren't clubs one of the first things funds are reduced? We can't be the only ones that found this out," Kotori asks, genuinely curious for herself. Honoka's eyes went wide with an opportunity to fit her conspiracy theory into this.

"It's because the school's being extorted by UTX!" Kotori wanted to laugh, she really did, but the utter graveness on Honoka's face would kill the mood. "How come they never feel the effects of their club budget being increased then? Don't they just keep asking for us to up it a little more every time we all meet?" As right as Honoka was, Kotori wasn't ready to believe that they were being forced to bankruptcy, especially out of a respectable establishment like UTX.

"What do you mean it doesn't make sense? Haven't you heard? UTX took two more schools in neighboring prefectures, just this week! Please, Kotori. Think about it. They're growing and growing, but when will they stop? They're taking all of Japan now-"

"I-I really don't think..." Kotori quieted down when she noticed that Honoka wasn't going to be listening to her. The latter was in deep rumination, her eyebrows furrowed in thought and her hand holding her chin.

"Proof."

Kotori looked up from the work she resumed. "Huh?"

"You want proof, don't you?" Kotori sheepishly grins again, resounding an obvious "yes". "Very well. I'll give you proof."

"And how do you suppose you'll do that?" The sharp sound of Umi's slightly disgruntled voice caught them both by surprise, but Honoka's tone didn't waver. "I totally forgot we had this to do, sorry to abandon you guys like that." While Kotori forgave Umi, Honoka cut in.

"Just give me this one chance, and I'll prove to you that UTX has something to do with it." With eyes of skepticism and doubt, the two reluctantly listened to their former idol leader.

"A-Are..." Much to their surprise, Honoka's wacky plan did manage to leave them speechless.

"Well...I don't know, my mom doesn't really like to talk about business to me that much."

"And on top of that, why would we do something like that?" Umi adds, making Honoka sigh, acting as if it was the two of them that didn't understand her, rather than the other way around.

"It's not...illegal. It is for the greater good, isn't it?" Honoka replies. Umi fumes.

"Don't even think that you can pull something so ridiculous like that on-"

"Come on, just this one chance. This one chance and I'll stop bothering you again. I'll never mention UTX and their plans of world domination ever. Please? I know I can do this!" Just by the pleading sound of her voice, Umi already doesn't trust her. Whenever the redhead gets desperate, she tends to depend on the mercy of others to get her way. Not today, despite how tempting the thought of her returning to reality felt.

"Kotori, think really hard about this. Are you sure the end goal is meeting the intended purpose? What if it fails? Then what? Don't you see the disparity between the risk and the reward?" Umi urged the brunette to make the right decision, but what the right decision is unfortunately didn't fall into Umi's hands.

"Uh..." Kotori always had a small inclination to do investigative work since she was a little kid. Other than fashion designing, the thought of solving mysteries with minimal evidence and meager hints piqued her interest. But this was different. This wasn't the case of who ate the pudding, or where the toy went. "Well...I..."

Yet again, she wants to know more herself. Honoka wasn't the only one that wanted to find the truth behind the situation. Perhaps she wasn't willing to acknowledge the opportunity to find the truth in fear that she would fail, or that she wouldn't be trying hard enough, or that she would be caught in a downward spiral to crime. After all, Kotori's academic situation was at a tense tightrope at the moment. Was doing this worth it in the end? Was she doing it for the greater good and discovering the truth, or for herself?

"I...I'll do it..." Situations in which Kotori had to choose sides were very slim. The thought of leaving her school, the pressure by Honoka, the mental state of her friend and her dream of investigation had all played a part of her decision. Obviously, her indeciveness and the hot glare from Umi made her regret her choice immediately, but what's said's been said.

Umi slams her hand down. "I'm not letting this happen. You both know it." Despite her anger between both Honoka and Kotori, she put her friends above anything. The last thing she wanted them to do was to hurt themselves. "Please, listen to yourselves for a minute! Do you realize what you're making yourselves do?" she says desperately. Despite her friend's desperation, Honoka was too deep into her fantasy to listen. Was it just her fantasy that was blinding her, or something else?

Kotori and Umi leave a while after Honoka does. The two best friends were by themselves in front of the school, the sunset reminiscently glinting on the windows. "I'm not going to be friends with a criminal," Umi says flatly, staring forward at the ground as she kept walking. It felt strange, suddenly transitioning from begging her friends to suddenly denouncing them. Kotori wasn't sure if she meant it at first, but Umi was dead silent. "You either choose me or Honoka. I'm not putting myself through this. Not anymore."

Kotori was left alone as her friend walked off to the street. Umi felt bad about this too, her pace turning into a heavy trudge, who had gone from pleading her friends to stop to detaching herself from them. Kotori had never had such a grave fate put upon her like this. First, μ's was disbanding, now her one circle of friends might be as well. Her mind was racing with only one question in her mind.

"Did I do the right thing?"

I've been asked what kind of mafia this story was based around. If any of you have seen The Godfather (and if you haven't, you should), this is more of what this is going for. An underground, organized, Sicilian syndicate. This one is a little more goal-based however, as you will see later on.

Thanks anyways,
-DWalkthroughGuy