It was near midnight at this point. Otonashi couldn't sleep, he lied in his bed in the boys dorm, but he couldn't rest. He was worried, he still couldn't shoot that Fake Kanade. And to make things worse Fake Kanade's abilities seemed to counteract all of real Kanade's. Otonashi figured that was intentional by whoever developed her abilities. There was risk all over the place, if he wasn't careful, Fake Kanade could attack the NPC's or his own students in the night while he couldn't even protect them, but he knew that Fake Kanade probably wouldn't take that path. If that was Kanade's goal then she would have done it a lot earlier since Otonashi had been knocked down by her twice and she displayed the means of escape in the case things got tricky, it would be unlikely for her to attack randomly. 'It hurts just to think about it.' He decided to try and sleep for the night, there was no way he'd win the fight if he was tired. He wasn't going to deal with Fake Kanade 24-seven, at the least no one could die, so it wasn't something to be worried about every second of the day.

Otonashi awoke the next day. He wasn't in a good mood. Fake Kanade was making things so difficult at the moment. 'Wait a minute.' Otonashi gasped, this was when he realized maybe he was going on the wrong approach.

Flashback

"Kanade is not like that. She doesn't imply violence to solve problems, but rather uses methods of interrogation and compromise to solve problems. Quite a civilized person for her age. You're wrong about Kanade, she would be ashamed of you." Fake Kanade to Otonashi.

Flashback Ends

'That's it!' Otonashi realized, that was what Fake Kanade meant. She didn't just mean to taunt Otonashi, that was how Otonashi needed to deal with fake Kanade. Otonashi would do it the next time he met with Fake Kanade. He would end the problem.

It was two days later. Otonashi made sure to have guards all over the high school to keep an eye if Fake Kanade appeared. Though she wasn't anywhere. Otonashi also checked in the computer room below, but no one was there either and all the computer parts were also gone, probably relocated to another location. Otonashi could do nothing, but wait until Fake Kanade revealed herself. Otonashi knew the world didn't seem to go beyond the school grounds, so clearly Fake Kanade was still somewhere on the school grounds, unfortunately, the tunnels below the school were winding on and on for miles underground. Fake Kanade could be anywhere in the tunnels, and with the luck Otonashi has, it would always be the last place he looked. 'So, why not look there first?' Otonashi thought, it was dumb logic, but who knows, maybe it could work? So where was the last place Otonashi would look? The guild of course, that would be the dumbest place to hide.

Otonashi went to the guild, it was far below the high school. Undetectable by anyone from the surface, it was hidden good so that no one could find it. People such as Kanade, when the SSS opposed her, or perhaps anyone else who was a threat to the SSS. The last time Kanade invaded the guild, it was destroyed by the SSS in an attempt to hide all the evidence. Since then the guild was just a wreckage of rock and scrap metal.

'Dumb logic does work.' Otonashi briefly thought. On one of the collapsed crane arms in the wreckage, Fake Kanade stood there with her eyes on the guild's destroyed fields. Otonashi run up and went closer to her and then looked up at the girl. "Kanade!" He yelled out, the sound echoing through the caves and reaching Kanade's ears. "Otonashi. It seems you never give up." Kanade mumbled. "Have you come to get rid of me?" Otonashi held his hands up at Kanade, open and clear to her, as if he was surrendering to her. "No." Otonashi only briefly replied, this time it surprised Kanade that Otonashi would say such a thing. 'Has he changed?' Fake Kanade thought. "I don't want us to fight anymore." Otonashi began to say. "I came here with no weapons. Nothing against you. I'm you to join me." Otonashi held out his hand to her. "Please join me, we can be friends." He said reaching out his hand to Fake Kanade. Kanade looked at her hand and then jumped down from the edge of the giant crane. She grew her black angel wings and slowly descended onto the ground.

"Why?" Fake Kanade asked, she wasn't too quick to trust Otonashi. As she said before, he could still have the intent to erase her from the world. Otonashi only replied with the truth, "I don't want us to be enemies. I don't want us to destroy each other. I promise, I have no intent to erase you." Fake Kanade didn't believe him. "Merely a trap to get me to trust you." Kanade held out her palm ready to attack Otonashi once more. Otonashi didn't flinch, "I don't want to fight you. I don't." He said. Kanade was curious on what made Otonashi think like this. "Nothing good will come of us fighting each other. You know that." Otonashi said.

Fake Kanade lowered her palm. "Why should I trust you?" She asked, her guard was up to attack in the case Otonashi made a sudden move. Otonashi speaks, "We've never met until days ago. We don't know each other, I have no reason to erase you, even with what you did to me, I believe you have reasons. I have no reason to oppose you." Fake Kanade speaks calmly, "You don't know me. That's true, but I know you. Yuzuru Otonashi." Fake Kanade spoke shocking words to Otonashi, he didn't remember telling anyone out of the SSS his first name. "I know you. I know all of you. You, Kanade Tachibana, Yuri Nakamura, Hinata Hideki, Ayato Naoi, all of you." Otonashi grunted, "But how?" Otonashi asked clenching onto reality once more. Kanade begins to explain. "I've had eyes on you." Kanade begins to explain.

FLASHBACK

Fake Kanade talks through the flashback.

"I am a spy, I've had eyes on you as a spy for my partner. Do you recall the guy Yuri discovered in the computer room below the guild?" Kanade asks.

Yuri goes into a room below the guild to confront who was creating the shadows using the angel player system. Yuri destroys the computers and the system stopping all the shadows that were being created and ending the existence of the shadows pathing the path for the people in the afterlife to go to the next life.

"Yeah, I know him." Otonashi responded.

"Well. That person is my partner." Kanade said surprising Otonashi. "He was your partner?!"

"Correct."

Fake Kanade steps off an operating table. "This is, I'm, Kanade?" She asked after her appearance was changed to match Kanade's appearance.

"Correct." The unknown person said. "This is your disguise. You are to use this form to find out about the people on the surface above us."

"You promise me?" Fake Kanade asks.

"Yes, I will tell you if you do this for me." The unknown male gives fake Kanade a black cloak and hat. "Wear this, just in case."

Fake Kanade explains, "From there I observed you from the shadows. Kanade doesn't talk much, she's unsociable and the SSS stays away from her. It was the perfect disguise in order to spy on you. I saw many things at the time. Do you recall Kanade's test scores being messed with by you and the SSS?"

"You saw that?"

"Correct. I was always nearby, but you never saw me."

"Do you remember that rumor that spread afterwards?"

"That rumor about Kanade screwing up the tests to disgrace the teachers?" Otonashi asked.

"Yes. That was my doing."

"What?!" Otonashi gasped.

"It's true. Rumors don't spread on their own. I spread that rumor. My partner wanted to lower Kanade's position in the school as well, which eventually turned into a failed plan. I used my appearance as Kanade to spread that rumor myself." Fake Kanade explained.

"So, that was you…." Otonashi grumbled. "You, what else did you see?" Otonashi asked.

"Everything…." Fake Kanade said. "Your battle with Naoi, the time you went fishing, the time you fought with Kanade's harmonic clones, when you fought with the shadows, I was there for all of those events. I'm actually surprised it took you this long for you to figure out my existence." Fake Kanade was behind the scenes of each of those events, hiding behind the shadows and never noticed by any of the members of the SSS.

"Although, there was one time I was seen." Fake Kanade mentions. Sometime after the time Yuri destroyed the angel player system.

"Kanade?" Otonashi goes up to 'Kanade.'

"Otonashi?" Fake Kanade says, trying not to reveal her identity.

"What's with the new cloak? It's not very angel-like, I know you're not an angel, but come on?" Otonashi points out Kanade's black cloak.

"I'm sorry, do you hate it?" Kanade asked. Otonashi shook his hands. "No, no. It looks nice actually. Although maybe a different colored cloak would work better?" Otonashi asked sheepishly. Kanade only gave him a glare. "No huh…." Otonashi deadpanned. "I must go." Kanade leaves Otonashi hanging. Otonashi would have chased Kanade, but he knew she had her responsibilities.

FLASHBACK ENDS

"That was you?!" Otonashi gasped. "I was lucky to leave that situation without revealing my identity." Fake Kanade finished explaining. "That was your first time meeting me." Otonashi grunted, he had questions. "Why would you work with someone like him anyways. Why didn't you just come join the SSS?" Otonashi asked, if fake Kanade knew they were there, why didn't she reveal herself. "You members of the SSS erased my partner from existence. I hid out of fear that the same would occur to me." Fake Kanade explained. "But, your partner can't die." Otonashi suggested. "True. But he was nowhere to be found after the incident. I looked all over, high and low, I even checked all the tunnels more than once as well. I even managed to scan the area using angel player's systems. Nothing, this concludes that my partner is now no longer here. And." Fake Kanade paused before angrily yelling, "I REMAIN STUCK IN THIS ACCURSED BODY FOREVER AND IT'S ALL YOUR FAULTS!" Otonashi flinched at how angry fake Kanade was. It was very different from Kanade's regularly quiet expression. "Do you know, how angry I am, to lose my real body to this?!" Fake Kanade quietly mumbles, "You can't even understand how pathetic I feel. I feel as if I don't even matter, I'm just Kanade's shadow. A worthless clone." Otonashi gasped, he now saw it, how hurt fake Kanade actually was. "You're not…." Otonashi tried to say, but Fake Kanade didn't listen. "You can try and make me feel better. It won't help. I'm a pathetic loser who can't even show the world who I truly am." Otonashi pitifully spoke, "Kanade." Fake Kanade held up her palm, "Don't call me that. I don't need your pity. There is nothing more to talk about." Kanade begins leaving.

"Wait!" Otonashi tried to reach out to her. Fake Kanade begins to make a run for it. Otonashi runs after her. They start going up piles of scrap rocks and metal from the destroyed guild. Otonashi jumped from rock to rock keeping up with fake Kanade, who jumped gracefully, it was obvious she had training put into her way of fighting, as if she was an acrobat. Fake Kanade starts running up the crane arm closer to the air, Otonashi quickly regains his balance and runs after her up the crane arm. It was thin and the slightest mistake would send someone down to their deaths, or at least temporary death. Fake Kanade reaches the end of the crane arm and jumps off without hesitation. Otonashi sees her grow her massive black wings and descend quickly. If he didn't act now, she would get away for sure. He quickly pulled out the only handgun he brought. He kept it in his sock covered by his pants so no one would notice it. He aimed at Kanade.

It was this situation again. Otonashi froze up realizing it, could he shoot this time? 'My finger, it's paralyzed again….' Otonashi couldn't move his finger to shoot fake Kanade. 'No, I have to. In order to…..help her.' Otonashi knew how to do it now, he had finally gotten the nerves, he wasn't doing this to hurt fake Kanade, but he would help her, he wanted to save her from this life. Otonashi clenched his gun trigger and pulled it like he always waited for this moment. The gunshot was loud, it echoed around the cave, it didn't waver as it shot right through Kanade's back through her heart. Otonashi gasped, he actually did it. He finally did it. 'I did it.' Otonashi gasped again. He had a brief sense of accomplishment. 'He, did it.' Fake Kanade thought before her conscience faded away and she closed her eyes. Her black wings dispelled into light as she fell and landed hard on the dirt floor, blood spilled all around her, she only thought. 'It's over, for me…..' She now knew she was going to be erased.

School Infirmary

It was an hour before Kanade regained consciousness. "Ugh…" Fake Kanade looked to see Otonashi. "Otonashi?" She said weakly. She took a look around, they were in the school's infirmary. "You're awake." Otonashi sighed. Fake Kanade gasped, it was painful dying like that. "Why, didn't, you?" She said weakly taking deep breaths. "Erase you?" Otonashi finished for her. "I told you. I don't want to fight you." Fake Kanade sighed. "I want you to join me. Please, trust me." Otonashi pleaded, he wanted the fighting to stop. "How, do, I, know, you won't turn on me." Fake Kanade asked still waking up from her death state. Otonashi put his hand on fake Kanade's face and gently turned her head to face him eye to eye. "I wouldn't have done this, if I was." Otonashi said in a gentle voice. Fake Kanade sighed herself and then smiled. Otonashi had chances to erase her, but he didn't take them, it was at this time that fake Kanade started to believe that Otonashi really was trying to help her. "Please, tell me. Why are you like this? What's your story before you died?" Otonashi was curious, he needed to understand fake Kanade.

"Okay, I'll tell you everything." Fake Kanade starts telling her story of her previous life. "Where shall I begin. When I was young, I was kidnapped by two people, a man and a woman. They raised my in a suburban home. I believed for years and years, that they were my real parents. I lived a pretty good life, in fact, a certain someone brightened my world." Otonashi now realized who she meant. "Kanade Tachibana. She was the student council president at my high school. She was wonderful, a real role model to students. She inspired me to be a better person. I was insignificant compared to her. I always wanted to be exactly like her." Otonashi nodded, that explained why fake Kanade knew the real one. "Hehehe, I guess my wish came true. In an oddly specific way." Otonashi chuckled at what she meant.

"One day, I heard a rumor that Kanade's heart was failing her. I was worried. Though, I wasn't around to see it through. One day, I came home, in the evening, two people invaded my home. Another man, another woman. My real parents had tracked me down. My life crashed that day, my entire life, who I was, who I thought I was, it was all a lie." Otonashi now pitied fake Kanade. It was painful indeed. "My real parents and my fake ones began fighting, it was bloodshed, bullets and gunshots were fired. I hid in fear. It was horrible. And then. One of them shot the fireplace. Fire soon spread across the house and ended up killing me and both my sets of parents. I died never knowing who I was, what was my true self, or my real name." Otonashi realized what she had said before, "That's why you said you didn't know who you were." Otonashi mentions, 'This must be why she appeared in this world.'

Fake Kanade continued. "When I came into this world. I was scared and frightened. I didn't know what to do. That was when my partner showed up. He promised me, he would tell me my real name and who my real parents were, if I worked for him." Otonashi nodded, "That was when you started spying on us." He commented. "Correct. My partner also surgically implanted the angel player system into my nervous system, that's how how I can use the abilities you've seen me use." Otonashi nods, that was the secret to her abilities. "However, after awhile, I doubted my partner ever wanted to help me. He just used me, I was a fool."

"I've told you my story. Do you understand? I'm not anyone you'd want to be with." Fake Kanade said. "If you're going to erase me, just do it. I don't have anything left." Otonashi shook his head. "No. I told you, I don't want to erase you. I couldn't even if I wanted to, I don't even know how your partner was erased." Fake Kanade sighed. "And." Otonashi spoke calmly. "You're not nothing, you're still yourself on the inside, you are. You did things Kanade never did. You're unique, you stand out to her, I can see it in your eyes. You're not just a shadow, I see you. Please, trust me and I'll help you." Fake Kanade turned her head away. She still had doubts. "You're you. If you think I'd erase you, I'd do it here and now." Fake Kanade sighs, Otonashi spoke once more. "This is what Kanade would want you to do." Fake Kanade sighed once more, she finally smiles at Otonashi. "Okay...you win. I'll join you."

Otonashi sighs as well, he finally ended this problem. "So, Kanade? Or, what should I call you?" Fake Kanade shrugged, "I told you, I don't know my name." Otonashi recommends, "Okay then, what was your previous name? The one your fake parents called you?" Fake Kanade answered, "It's Akira, Akira Akitsura." Otonashi smiles at that, she was finally opening up to him. "Okay, Akira. I have something to ask you." Akira gets up from the bed and sits next to Otonashi. "What is it?" Otonashi looks to the horizon seeing the sun was starting to set. "I haven't picked the members of student council yet. I, want you to be my vice-president." Akira gasps, she was honored. "Me? I'm honored." Otonashi nodded back at Akira agreeing. "You showed me, I still have some ways to go before I can be a good student body president. But thanks to you, I'm now closer than I was before. Kanade would have done the same for me, she should be proud of you." Akira nodded, "Thank you, Otonashi, I won't fail you."

On the roof of the building….

"I love coming up here, it's my favorite place to de-stress myself." Akira mentioned. Otonashi breathes in the fresh night air breezing by. Wind blew on their clothes and hair. "We'll be a great team, Akira." Otonashi said. Akira could hear it, Otonashi had that tone of voice. She was embarrassed that he would think such things. "There's one more thing I should tell you." Akira said getting Otonashi's attention. Saying the next words in the most innocently way possible, Akira spoke.

"I'm a boy."