"I-I don't think that'll be necessary, Kamukura!" Souda stammered.
Kamukura turned his head towards Souda, who shrank back a little. "Do you think that your skills alone will be enough to bring back your friends from their comatose state? The Future Foundation made it clear: their chances of survival are microscopic at best, and an Ultimate Mechanic alone won't be able to bring anyone back to life by himself."
"You trying to pick a fight with us?" Kuzuryuu balled up his hands into fists and glared at Kamukura as menacingly as he could.
"I'm merely stating facts. If you want to maximize the chances of reviving your friends, the only logical conclusion would be if I helped you all out." Kamukura turned his attention towards Kuzuryuu. "Hinata agrees that this is the best course of action."
"Hinata?" Everyone perked up a little at the mention of their friend, and Kamukura had to force himself not to sigh at their predictable response. How boring.
"Yes, Hinata Hajime, your friend. It was actually him who wanted to have me help you after Naegi Makoto and his friends suggested it to him, and I see no problem with it."
"How do we know you're not gonna sabotage us, huh?!" Kuzuryuu yelled.
Souda nodded in agreement, though his eyes were wide with fear. "Y-yeah! You're the one who ruined everything before!"
"And how do you know that, again?" Silence followed his question once more. Their predictable responses was only making this conversation duller and duller. "While it is true that the operation to revive everyone from their pods wasn't a success because of my actions, that situation is now over and I'm willing to assist you his time. You may take it or leave it."
The four of them looked back at each other and began whispering, trying to quietly reason out what they should do.
"We can't trust that bastard," Kuzuryuu said. "Who knows what kind of shit he's got planned for us?"
"Eh, I dunno, man, he seems pretty chill to me," Owari said. She was leaning back against the wall as if she didn't care too much either way, though there was a slight waver in her voice that let Kamukura know she desperately wanted him to be able to save her friends.
Souda, unlike Owari, was shaking with fear. "Kuzuryuu's right, we don't know what he's gonna do to everyone! What if- what if they all wake up as zombies?"
"Dude, now you're just making things up." Owari rolled her eyes. "Seriously, if he wants to help us, where's the harm in that?"
"He could fuck us all over, that's what!" Kuzuryuu nearly shouted, forgetting for a moment that they were having this conversation under their breaths.
The whole time, Sonia had been silent, a thoughtful expression on her face. Souda turned to her and asked, "What do you think, Miss Sonia?"
Sonia, instead of answering Souda directly, turned her attention towards Kamukura. "Kamukura-san, could it be that you feel guilty for what happened to our classmates?"
Kamukura blinked. Humans could surprise him sometimes, though the emotion quickly faded as his analytical mind quickly came up with an answer. "I was made to be incapable of feeling such things," Kamukura replied. It wasn't a lie, though perhaps it wasn't the entire truth, either.
Sonia opened her mouth as if she was about to ask something else, but, judging from the look in her eyes, she soon decided that it would be better to accept the answer for what it was. Turning back towards her classmates, she announced, "I think we should do it."
"The hell?!" Kuzuryuu exclaimed. "That bastard's been nothing but trouble so far! Or did you forget everything he's done to us?"
"If he's the one who ruined the Neo World Program in the first place, shouldn't he be able to figure out how to fix it, too?" Souda said, his earlier suspicion of Kamukura nowhere to be seen. Kamukura suspected that it had something to do with Sonia.
"Come on, Kuzuryuu! Doesn't hurt to try, what's the worst that could happen anyways?" Owari wrapped her arm around Kuzuryuu, who groaned.
"Fine, but if he fucks up anything I'm gonna hand his ass to him!"
Kamukura didn't appear to be fazed by Kuzuryuu's threat. In fact, he looked to be even more bored after the outburst, as though he'd already predicted the other man's reaction ahead of time. Kamukura turned to address the group as a whole. "If we're done arguing, let's review the plan."
"Right," Sonia said, nodding. "So for now, Owari-san will lead us in daily exercises until our bodies become strong enough to support ourselves again. Once we get our strength back, a group of us will leave the room and explore around outside, and each day we will come back here to report what we have found. We can decide on the details once we have a better bearing of what we are dealing with out there."
"Uh, question." Souda raised his hand as if he was in school, then pointed towards Kamukura. "Am I going to be working with Mr. Emotionless here while you guys go out and have fun?"
"Yes."
"Aw, that's not fair to poor Souda!" Owari said as she grabbed the the person in question with her free arm. "He should be having fun with us outside. Being cooped up in here is no good for a guy like you, man!"
"S-suffocating, Owari-"
"I suppose that is true." Sonia didn't look very pleased, but she didn't argue further with them. Turning towards Kamukura, she asked, "Would you be alright staying here to watch over our friends, then?"
"I see no problem with that."
"Hey, we can't trust him to be here by himself!" Kuzuryuu forced Owari's arm off him and glared once more at Kamukura. "I'll stay behind and watch over him, in case he tries anything funny with our friends"
"Then I guess it's settled. Souda-san, Owari-san, and I will go out and look around, and Kuzuryuu-kun and Kamukura-san will stay behind to look after our friends. We can switch over the next day if we need to. That sound okay to everyone?" When everyone nodded back at her, Sonia smiled and went back to finishing her bagel.
The next few hours were generally uneventful; the group followed a simple pattern of exercise, rest, and eat. Kamukura didn't say anything else during that time, and nobody seemed to want to start a conversation with him anyways. Hinata had fallen back asleep, probably overwhelmed from everything that'd happened yesterday, and Kamukura didn't think it would be wise to wake him up. He needed that time to recharge.
After some time, the five of them all laid down on the floor, sweating and panting from all the exercise they'd done that day. "I think that's good for now," Owari managed to say between pants. Sonia, Souda, and Kuzuryuu all grunted back at her, and Kamukura just stared at the ceiling in silence. When she finally caught her breath, she said, "We should get some shut-eye, then. Hopefully if we keep this up, we'll be able to leave this place within the next couple of days."
"You'll need to make sure you don't overdo it," Kamukura said. Apparently, everyone was too tired to even act surprised that he spoke. "Otherwise, you'll have done all this for nothing."
"Yeah yeah, I know, smartass," Owari said; Kamukura could tell from her tone that she was merely teasing him and not genuinely annoyed. She got up, clutching onto the closest pod to brace herself as she made her way over to her bed. The others followed suit, and it didn't take long for everyone to pass out.
As he listened to the mechanical whirring of the pods, Kamukura also found himself starting to fall asleep. His body probably wasn't going to last much longer from all the working out he and Hinata had done, anyway. He closed his eyes and, for a moment, thought he could see a sleeping Hinata in the corner of his mind, curled around an invisible pillow.
Good night, Hinata, he said as he imagined himself settling down next to the other personality in his head.
Hinata didn't respond, but Kamukura didn't mind.
