Chapter 7?

"Sorry, just a reflex reaction. Why're you here anyway?"

After having slammed the door once in Nino's face, Futaro now opened the door, still irritated that she was taking up some of his precious studying time.

"Well, I have something to give to you, obviously." the red head quickly retorted, already in a sour mood whilst being in the presence of her tutor, not to mention the fact that he slammed the door in her face just a moment ago.

Suddenly a third party entered the conversation, changing the mood entirely.

"Oh! Nino-san! Are you here to hang out!?" enthusiastically asked Riaha, excited to see her brother having invited over his friend yet again, completely misunderstanding the situation.

"Here! Come in, come in!" quickly motioned Riaha, inviting her into their little apartment, something Nino was unable to refuse.

After having come into the main room of the apartment, Riaha went to go get some drinks for everyone while Futaro sat at the table with Nino.

"So, what do you even have to give me?"

"Your pay, obviously."

"Ok. It's only two days though so I don't really expect much." the boy said

However, he quickly began to eat his words, opening the small envelope to see 50,000 yen in his hands.

"You came over for tutoring 2 times, so 5,000 times 5 for two days gets you 50,000 yen" explained Nino, seemingly unfazed by the large amount of money she just handed over to the boy.

"Look mon, Onii-chan did it!" exclaimed Riaha talking to a photo of their late mother.

"A-Awesome. If things continue like this, the debt will be paid off in no time."

However, before putting away the money in a box used to pay off their debt, Futaro thought of his beloved little sister. She almost never had the opportunity to do what many kids her age would like to do due to their financial situation. So why not indulge her just this once?

"Say, Riaha. To celebrate my first paycheck, is there anywhere you'd like to go?"

"Oh wow! This place is huge!" yelled Riaha as she walked into the arcade, head spinning at all the bright attractions and games that called to her, wondering which one to play.

"So, why did you come along?"

Yes, Nino decided to accompany the Uesugis to the arcade after being done in by Riaha's brilliant puppy dog eyes.

"I couldn't say no to her! She's so cute! It's hard to understand how someone as cute as her could be related to you."

"You could have gone without saying that last bit." grumble Futaro.

"Onii-chan! Let's play this one!" said Riaha, pointing at a game where one shoots small plastic balls to knock over pins.

"Hmph. To like games like this, I guess she really is still a kid."

"Impossible….. This game doesn't follow the laws of physics! One more time!" complained the tutor, irritated at his apparent lack of skill for a game he found so childish.

"Come on Onii-chan, let's go!" spoke Riaha, trying to pull her brother away from the impossible game in fear of wasting any more tokens while Nino stood there chuckling at the boy's inability to beat such a simple game.

"Nino! You still have some tokens right? Put them in and beat this thing!"

"Why? Even if you say that, I doubt I could hit the mark…"

Suddenly she felt another body get extremely close to hers, to the point where it's uncomfortable.

"Here, you have to move the barrel in the right position and then calculate the shooting range."

'Too close!'

However, before Futaro could explain how to beat the game(the game he failed to beat himself) any further, Nino quickly spun around and shot Futaro square in the nose.

"Huh, what do you know? I guess I did hit the mark." said a now smirking Nino, her face having a slight tinge of red, leaving Futaro to glare at her and Riaha to laugh at her brother's misfortune.'

After that little incident, the three continued to play a multitude of the arcade games present for a while, from air hockey to basketball, all 3 of them having a fun enough time, Riaha especially enjoying the two high schoolers bickering with each other every time they played a game against each other.

After a short while, Riaha had run ahead of Futaro and Nino, going onto play a game on her own.

"Hey uh, sorry for making you come with us today. It's just that Riaha is always working hard for the sake of our family, and I wanted to allow her a little release."

"You really love your sister don't you?"

"More than you could possibly imagine."

Suddenly the two were called out to by the subject of their conversation.

"Onii-chan, Nino! Let's play this one before we go!" called Riaha, pointing at a photo both for the three of them to go into.

'I'd rather not'

"H-hey, doesn't that one look more interesting?" asked Futaro, attempting to suggest a different game, preferably one where he doesn't have to take pictures. However, he was quickly stopped by Nino.

"Didn't you say you loved your sister more than I could 'possibly imagine?"

'Dammit'

The two then followed Riaha into the small photo booth, both allowing Riaha to fit nicely between them.

"Onii-chan, your face looks so stiff haha!"

"Why can't you two do this alone?" asked the awkward teenager, making an exit from the booth, only to have his sleeve pulled on by his younger sister

"Nope! You can't run away!"

The three quickly got into position, with Riaha between Nino and Futaro, flashing a bright smile herself. Nino has a picture perfect smile, not all too phased by the situation at hand, and Futaro looked like cardboard.

"3… 2…1..."

"It feels like we're taking a family picture, doesn't it?"

*click*

This sudden interjection from Riaha quickly took both present aback for a moment, with Nino's face gaining a slight blush and Futaro looking even more irritated. The three then walked out to collect their photos.

"Hahaha! The face you made is so funny!" laughed Futaro after seeing Nino's blush during the photo.

"At least I know how to take a picture!"

Riaha then handed both Nino and Futaro their copies of the photos, with Nino putting her copy in her purse and Futaro placing his in his pocket.

"Onii-chan, thank you for today. I'll treasure this in my memories forever." beamed Riaha as she thanked her older brother for taking her to the arcade for the day.

"And thank you for coming with us today Nino!" added Riaha, to which she then went to wrap the quintuplet in a brilliant hug.

"N-no problem." responded Nino, taken aback by the sudden hug, but quickly returned it with joy.

The three of them then began to walk to the train station to drop Nino off before heading home themselves, tired from a fun day at the arcade, even if only one of them would admit to having a great time.

"Well I guess today is over. There goes my plans to study, completely in the waste." lamented Futaro before remembering that the night is still young. "Well, I guess I do have the rest of the night…"

He then remembered that there are 5 individuals that need to study far more aggressively than himself.

"Hey, you and your sisters better remember to study tonight if you wanna stay afloat."

However, Nino only scoffed at this suggestion, saying "Sorry Uesugi, but we have something far more important than studying tonight, so you'll have to forgive us." as she began to walk away from her tutor and towards the train station.

"What's more important than studying? You 5 don't have any evil plans cooped up for tonight, do you?" he said as he began to follow the red head, intent on learning why she couldn't possibly study tonight.

"There was a lot of homework for this weekend. You did it right?"

"S-stop following me!" cried out Nino, trying to escape his insistent questioning.

Suddenly, they were interrupted when Riaha called out, "Onii-chan, why are there 3 Nino-sans?"

"What?"

'Why would they be here? There's no way they'd be here right now.'

However, despite Futaro's belief that the quintuplets wouldn't be appearing out of nowhere, he was quickly mistaken, finding 3 more of his students all staring at him and Nino, all having different reactions to the argument that was being had at the present.

"Sorry for interrupting your date, you two." teased the eldest.

"Everyone's here, let's just head to the festival now." spoke the despondent middle sister.

"Don't worry Nino, we brought your Kimono!" exclaimed Yotsuba, before running over to the little girl who noticed the three of them first.

"Who are you? Are you Uesugi-san's sister? Why don't you come with us to the festival!"

"Ahh! Sorry, we can't Yotsuba. We have some homework, so you 4(?) will have to go on without us." politely declined the tutor, with good reasoning as well. However no reasoning in the world can stand up to Futaro's little sister and her pleading.

"We can't go with them?"

"S-sure we can…" was all Futaro could say, being utterly defeated by his younger sister.

"But not before you all finish your homework!"

Yes, although the tutor did agree to take Riaha to the fire works with his students, he first had to make sure that they got their homework out the way, of course earning him complaints from the quints.

"Seriously, the fireworks are about to start… Why are we stuck doing homework! We can do it after the festival" cried Nino.

"Because you guys haven't finished your homework! And I have great doubts that you'll finish it later!"

'Hmmm. Wouldn't Itsuki normally be with them? Maybe I'll ask about it before we go.'

However, before Futaro could ask where the youngest quintuplet was, Nino, who had been thinking the same thing, asked in his place.

"Hey, why didn't you guys have Itsuki with you when you came to give me my Kimono? Unless we were planning to head back here before the fireworks, although I don't think we originally planned that?"

"Oh! Itsuki said she wasn't feeling well, so she told us to go on without her this year." responded Yotsuba, giving cause for Itsuki's absence.

"What?! We can't let her miss out on tonight! None of us have ever missed tonight for being sick before! Here, I'll go get her." said Nino as she began to stand up and walk towards the stairs leading to the quintuplet's rooms, only to be stopped by her single older sister.

"Ne, Nino-Chan, it's alright isn't it? She really wasn't feeling well at all, so why don't we just let her miss out this year, ok? We don't want her getting any worse."

This pulled at Nino's heart strings. The five of them had always stuck together for the fireworks ever since they had lost their mother. To miss this would signify to her that the other 4 were leaving her behind even further, something that hurts her immensely. So she could only offer up a fragile resistance to Ichika's reasoning to go without Itsuki for the year.

"But…"

Ichika continued her older sister role and consoled Nino, telling her that "It's ok, there's always next year, isn't there?" to which Nino could only nod before going back to finish the homework they all had started.

After having finished their homework for the evening, the 6 of them then went to enjoy themselves at the festival the best they could, even if they were missing one fifth of the quintuplet package.

"Let's go enjoy the festival! Hey Miku, what time do the fireworks start!" asked Yotsuba, arms enthusiastically pumping up and down, excited to have some fun.

"The fireworks go from 7 to 8pm."

"Ah, so we still have an hour before they start. Why don't we split up and go check out some food stalls?"

"Ok! Uesugi-san, come on and catch up!" waved Yotsuba as she dragged his younger sister along towards the stalls.

'I should be studying right now'

"Ok…"

'It's strange how excited they are tonight or the fireworks, or how broken up Nino seemed to be about Itsuki not being able to come. I hope she gets better before Monday.'

Futaro was quickly pulled out of his thoughts when he felt a tug on his sleeve, a tug that revealed itself to be from a Nino Nakano who has decided to bun up her hair for the occasion.

"Hey, are you going to keep that frown the whole time while we're here? You're killing my mood."

Futaro didn't respond at first, and only looked intently at the figure who had pulled his sleeve, which had begun to creep out the stare's recipient.

"W-why are you looking at me all funny?" asked Nino, with a slight blush on her cheeks from the intense staring.

"Who're you?"

"Huh?!"

"You're not Itsuki because she didn't come, but then….Hmmm…. Y'know, It's hard to distinguish your faces. You guys shouldn't change hair styles." The boy began to ponder which quintuplet could be standing before him at the moment, before offering some advice that would benefit no one but himself.

"I'm Nino! I can wear whatever hairstyle I want, thank you very much!" she screamed, before walking away in a huff to a nearby stall.

Nino's presence was quickly replaced by two more of the quintuplets, those two being Miku and Ichika.

"You know Futaro-kun, when a girl changes her hair, the first thing you should do is compliment it. You should try to understand girls more."

"I don't care." was the only response Ichika received.

The three of them then went throughout the festival for a short while. They eventually caught up with Nino, who was trying to round everyone together to go to the rooftop she had rented, something Futaro could only scoff at 'pfft, must be nice to be that wealthy' However he kept these thoughts to himself. The 4 then found Yotsuba and Riaha, one of the two carrying 7 bags of goldfish, supposedly from one of the many stalls that hosted games.

"Onii-chan look! Yotsuba caught all these fish for me!" proudly exclaimed Riaha, as if she herself had won all the fish.

"Are there no better games to play?"

"Ahaha, Riaha looked so cute, but I didn't know what to give her, so I decided on the fish!"

"And you clearly showed no restraint… Regardless, Riaha, did you say thank you to Yotsuba here for all the fish?"

"Ah! Thank you Yotsuba! I really like you!" she said as she wrapped Yotsuba in a large bear hug.

Yotsuba's heart jumped at the affection displayed to her, and quickly hugged the young girl back, commenting "Ah you're so adorable I wish you were my little sister!"

She then quickly pondered something privately before muttering "Wait, if I marry Uesugi-san, then technically Riaha would be my little sister by law…."

However this line of reasoning was quickly interrupted by Nino, interjecting her to 'stop saying stupid things.'

She then quickly turned her attention to Futaro, pointing an accusing finger towards the boy.

"And you! Don't you go teaching any weird things to Yotsuba!"

Futaro quickly stumbled back at the finger thrown towards his face, answering "Wha- I'm not!"

During the time when he stumbled back due to Nino, his arm quickly landed over Miku's shoulder, causing the middle quintuplet to blush heavily for a moment, before contact was then broken between them.

"Ah, sorry Miku."

"I-Its o-ok.." was all she could respond.

Suddenly, Futaro thought of a question.

"Hey Miku, is today something important for you 5? I saw how Nino was upset that Itsuki couldn't come so I was just wondering."

Miku was quiet for a moment, perhaps thinking about how she should answer the boy's question, before going,

"Today is the day we share with our mother. Our mother really loved the fireworks, so when she was with us she took us to watch them every year. Now, we five go to watch them in her place together. That's what it means for us. "

'I see. That's why Nino was so worked up about Itsuki missing out.'

Suddenly, the crowd began to get rather rough for seemingly no reason. Was it perhaps just people wishing to get towards a better viewing place for fireworks? No one knew. However, one thing that was apparent was that everyone had gotten separated.

Nino desperately looked around for her sisters, hoping to at least stay with one of them so they would have an easier time maneuvering throughout the crowd, but to no avail.

'Crap! I forgot to tell them where the rooftop is!'

She then began to panic further, calling their names, hoping for an answer.

"Miku! Yotsuba! Ichika!"

Her hand was suddenly grabbed by the boy she had spent a good portion of the day with, telling her to 'Grab onto my shirt.'

At first she hesitated, but quickly relented to the boy's request, and grabbed tightly onto his sleeve.

The two then began to weave their way throughout the crowd until eventually they had arrived at the rooftop Nino had rented out for everyone's viewing pleasure.

Nino then tried her cellphone to contact at least one of her sisters, but unfortunately, there was no service available in her area.

"Ok, now that you know where it is, do you think we could split up and try to find the other 3? We have an hour, so it should be possible." asked Nino, knowing that she most likely couldn't locate the other 4 individuals they needed before the fireworks started.

"Yeah, that sounds like it should work." responded Futaro as they both looked over the railing before they both suddenly spotted the eldest quintuplet.

"Hey, isn't that Ichika?!"

"It is! Uesugi, you go look for Yotsuba or Miku and I'll go grab Ichika and bring her here real quick!" was the plan Nino proposed, before quickly earning a nod from Futaro, and thus they both headed off into the crowd at separate directions, Nino going one way to retrieve Ichika, and Futaro going another to seemingly look for the other 2 missing quintuplets.

Futaro quickly discovered, or more specifically, was discovered by Miku whilst walking through the crowded streets when she called out his name.

"Ah, Miku! Thank goodness you found me!"

"You were kind of standing out."

"Anyway, I know where the rooftop Nino rented is, follow me!" he said as he grabbed Miku's arm to pull her along, before realizing that she wasn't moving at the pace he was setting.

"Ah! W-wait!"

She then revealed that her foot was stepped on, and was hurting too much to properly jog along with Futaro to the viewing spot.

'Her foot hurts? This could be an issue…'

The tutor then bent his back, motioning her to jump on so he could carry her to the viewing spot, a suggestion that flushed Miku's face.

"Ok, are you on?" asked Futaro, making sure she was comfortable before he began walking towards the stairs that led to the rooftop.

"Y-yeah, L-lets go."

Thus, the two then began to walk towards the viewing area, however just before they were to walk up towards the rooftop, they were stopped by what appeared to be two people assuming the looks of reporters.

"Hi! We're doing a survey about the festival! We were just wondering what sort of relationship you two had with each other?" the two politely asked, one of them with a clipboard and pen at the ready.

'M-my relationship with Futaro?'

"We are…. We..." Miku began to fumble her words, as she didn't exactly know what to call their relationship, and certainly didn't want to give off the wrong impression to Futaro and possibly weird him out in any way. After all, they have only known each other for a short time. Would he even consider her his friend? Could they even be considered anything more than acquaintances?

However, before she could come up with a definitive answer, Futaro answered the question for them.

"We're friends."

"Ok! Thank you two! Here's a 100 yen coupon for some of the stalls!" The two quickly handed Futaro a small coupon and quickly began to walk towards the next couple they could see.

Miku didn't hear the surveyors and what they handed Futaro, she didn't care. She was more focused on what the boy in question had said.

'He thinks of me as a friend?'

She then quickly began to bear flushed cheeks and a slight smile, before walking up the stairs with the assistance of the boy who caused this smile to crawl across her face.

"Hey Miku, do you know the number to get into your guy's apartment?"

Miku tilted her head at this. "Yeah, it's ****. Why?"

"I see. Ok thanks a bunch, now you stay here, and I'll go get Itsuki for you guys."

'Huh? Itsuki?'

"B-but isn't she sick right now? Do you think that's a good idea?" questioned Miku, not believing it would be worth the risk if Futaro or perhaps others were also to become sick.

"It's ok, I made a deal with Nino to bring her sisters, you guys, here in time for the fireworks, and I can't sit right knowing that we would be leaving Itsuki out. Don't worry, I'll be right back." He then flashed the middle quintuplet a brilliant smile, and with that, the boy began to run in the direction of the apartment to retrieve Itsuki, leaving Miku there by herself to wait for the others to appear.

'Why is he going so far for us?' she thought, her opinion of the boy growing ever more fonder.

After a short while, Yotsuba and Riaha both appeared on the rooftop, explaining to Miku that Nino bumped into them while she was trying to follow Ichika, and told them where to go.

"Riaha here is so good with directions, she surprised even me!" spoke Yotsuba as she patted Riaha's head, thanking her for being able to understand Nino's less than stellar directions.

She quickly then swirled her head around looking for the other party member they arrived at the festival with.

"Where's Uesugi-san?"

"Futaro went to get Itsuki from the apartment and bring her here."

"Wah! Doesn't he know she's sick!"

Miku only nodded at this, but then whispered under her breath so slightly that Yotsuba only thought she heard it, "He's really going above and beyond for us."

However, one thing that Yotsuba knew wasn't just her imagination was the shine within Miku's eyes, a faint blush on her cheeks, and a radiant little smile.

'Miku's in Love with Uesugi-san, isn't she?'

After finally arriving at the apartment and almost dying of exhaustion trying to get there, and entering the number combination that Miku had told him, Futaro was not surprised to see that one one occupied the living room of the apartment.

'I guess I really will have to drag her out of bed.' were the thoughts floating around in his head as he began to walk up the stairs to what he believed to be Itsuki's room, first knocking on the door.

"Itsuki? Are you still awake?"

After he knocked on the door and called out the girl's name, he suddenly heard the sound of things crashing towards the floor, and quickly assumed the worst, bursting open the door.

"Itsuki, are you alright!?" he frantically asked as he pushed the door open, fearing that at worst she may have collapsed, only to be met with a teary-eyed Itsuki who seems to have just finished crying her heart out, sitting at her desk, a plentiful amount of items recently thrown on the floor.

"Itsuki?"

Nino was running towards where she had seen Ichika, however she quickly lost her, and became even more distressed. She had just sent Yotsuba and Riaha to the rooftop, and assuming Futaro was able to collect Miku, Ichika was the last one of their group to get.

"Ichika! Wait!" cried out Nino, only to be met with the rumblings of the large crowd surrounding her.

Suddenly she felt a strong grip grab her wrist, and instantly turned to see who was being so bold as to grab her out of nowhere.

"H-hey! Let go of me!" she cried

"Ichika, come on, we have to go or else we'll be late for the audition!" the man before her firmly told her.

'Audition?'

Author's Note: Uh, this was a bit longer than previous chapters, but that's because I couldn't think of the perfect place to end it until I got to where I was! I really liked writing Nino taking Itsuki's place at the arcade! And I'm switching some things up for the festival arc! Why could Itsuki be crying?! Who grabbed Nino? Who knows! Anyway I hope y'all enjoyed this chapter, reviews are dope, and peace!