With the decision made about what to do about Alter Ego's request, Naegi felt a little more confident. It might still be dangerous, but at least they had a plan now. And it felt good to be working with Kirigiri again, the way they'd done before.
He picked up Alter Ego's laptop and tucked it under his hoodie. It was an awkward fit, and he would need to keep one of his arms close to his side to keep the laptop from crashing to the ground, but it seemed like it would work.
"Ahaha, it tickles!" Alter Ego said. Although Naegi's clothes muffled the speaker a little, the voice was still plainly audible.
"Shh!" Naegi cautioned him. "You can't talk right now! We're going to move you to another room, and you can't talk until we get there!"
"Understood," Alter Ego said. "Your command has been implemented."
"Uh – good." Naegi blinked at the sudden robotic response. Alter Ego so rarely spoke like a machine that it was easy to forget his true nature. It was strange to hear him say something that sounded so much like a program, at the same time that he was doing something that wasn't anything like a simple computer program at all.
Once the laptop was as securely settled as it was likely to get, Kirigiri turned to Naegi. "In the hidden room, there are a bunch of different cables in one of the desk drawers. There might be a network cable in there, assuming the mastermind hasn't taken it already."
Naegi nodded. "Well, all we can do is go check for ourselves."
"Agreed. Let's go."
Kirigiri led the way out of the bathhouse and back up to the second floor. At least this time she walked a little slower than her usual brisk pace, though Naegi wasn't sure if this was due to his slowness or to the possibility that he might drop Alter Ego if he tried to walk too fast.
When they reached the second floor hallway outside the boy's bathroom, Kirigiri spun towards him, all her icy anger back in full force. "So you're still claiming that all the documents are gone? Well, after all the lies you've been telling, I don't believe you."
Naegi stared at her, taken aback by this sudden onslaught of fury. "What?"
"If you expect me to believe a word you say, you can go back and check," she snapped. "And to make sure you don't try to run off, I'm going to wait right here!"
And then Naegi realized – Kirigiri was faking it. She was only pretending to be angry so that he'd have an excuse to go into the hidden room again, in case the mastermind was watching. It was unsettling to hear, though – this burst of fake anger looked identical to the way she'd acted earlier, when she'd been so angry at him and Togami. If he hadn't been talking to her in the bathhouse just a few minutes ago, he wouldn't have been able to tell the difference at all.
"Why are you just standing there?" Kirigiri glared at him. "Hurry up and go!"
"Okay, okay, I'm going," Naegi said, pushing open the door and heading through the bathroom to the hidden room.
It was just as empty as it had been the last time he'd entered, with nothing but a few scattered sheets of blank paper on the floor. Still, Kirigiri had said she remembered cables in the desk drawer, so Naegi knelt down in front of the desk to check.
To his surprise, the drawer did actually still contain a tangled selection of cables for various devices. Apparently the mastermind hadn't thought these were important enough to remove when they'd emptied the room. After sorting through them for a moment, Naegi found one that he was pretty sure was a network cable.
Carefully, Naegi slid Alter Ego's laptop out from underneath his hoodie, moving slowly so as not to risk dropping or damaging the machine. He set it onto the desk and used the network cable to connect the laptop to the Ethernet port on the back wall.
"That should do it!" he said, looking over at the computer screen.
"Um…" Alter Ego considered for a moment, then brightened. "Yes, I think it worked. Just leave the rest to me! I swear I'll find something! I might even be able to connect to the outside world. If I can, I'll see if I can call for help!"
Naegi bit his lip, then placed his hands on the keyboard. "Please be careful. Kirigiri and I will come back for you one day from now."
"All right. I'll see what I can find out in that time," Alter Ego said. "So please just wait a little longer. Just hold tight and put your faith in me!"
Naegi hesitated, then decided that he wanted to leave Alter Ego with one last message. "No matter what, we're gonna get out of here. You and all the rest of us, as friends!"
"Huh? Friends?" Alter Ego's puzzled face stared back out at him. "Even… me?" A small, contented smile shone from his face. "Thank you."
Naegi reached out and touched the edge of the laptop screen, the way he might grip a person's shoulder to say goodbye. With that last gesture, he turned and headed back out of the hidden room.
Back in the hall, Kirigiri was waiting for him, arms crossed and expression blank. "How did it go?"
"It went okay," Naegi told her, before recalling that they were supposed to be hiding their actions from the mastermind. "Uh, but all the documents really were gone, just like I told you."
"I see." Kirigiri's lips tightened. "So you really did cause us to lose one of the few sources of possible information we might have had. You've done nothing but hinder my investigation – I see that now."
"Huh?" Naegi stared at her, a little stung by the vitriol, even though he was pretty sure she didn't mean it.
"I'm done with you, Naegi," Kirigiri said coldly. "I hope you remember our conversation." With that, she turned and stalked off.
Naegi watched her go, trying to figure out what she was getting at. Remember their conversation? What conversation did she mean? Something from the bathhouse –
Oh. Of course. Naegi remembered the discussion they'd had about how to distract the mastermind from any of Alter Ego's network activity. This had to be part of her plan to fake a murder attempt. She was probably using this fake argument to set up a motive.
That made sense, of course, but it didn't mean Naegi liked hearing Kirigiri say those kinds of things about him. He hoped that it really was all an act, and that she didn't secretly feel that way. Maybe after they'd finished playing this out for the mastermind, Kirigiri would give him a more honest answer.
Naegi forced himself back down the stairs to the first floor, exhaustion dragging at him after all the running around he'd done today. It wasn't quite time for the nighttime announcement, but he figured it was close enough. He headed back to the dorms.
As he approached the dorm room hallway, he heard voices. "—don't want to talk to her right now."
Naegi looked further down the hall and saw Ogami standing near her room. And a little distance from her, carefully out of arm's reach – he saw Togami. Even from a distance, the sight of the other boy made his heart lift a little. Whatever else was going on, Togami was still all right – even if he did currently look pretty annoyed.
"I'm not interested in whatever game you're playing with Asahina," Togami said, his attention focused on Ogami. He clearly didn't notice Naegi back at the other end of the hall. "Do you want this key back or not?"
Ogami closed her eyes as Togami held up a room key. "No. I – I would feel better knowing that I am unable to open the door during the night. Please just open the door for me, as I asked."
"Fine." Togami gestured her aside.
Naegi had to shake his head as Togami made her go through the same ritual of keeping her distance as he unlocked the door for her. He never relented on anything, did he? A wave of fondness bubbled up in his chest, bringing a small smile to his lips.
And at that moment, Togami turned around – and his eyes went wide at the sight of Naegi watching him from across the hall. His fists clenched as he stared at Naegi, jaw tight with sudden tension. Naegi wanted to run over to him, to hold him close and bury his head in the taller boy's chest, to press kisses along the line of his throat until the tension eased – but he knew he couldn't. Not now that things were finally starting to turn around a little with the others. Naegi forced himself to take a step backwards.
A flicker of something – sadness, anger, or something else entirely – crossed Togami's face at the sight. He turned away and headed over to open the door to his room. He looked over his shoulder at Naegi one last time, and Naegi had to clench his mouth shut to stop any words from escaping. He just watched, and hoped Togami could read what he felt in his eyes.
Whatever Togami saw in his face, it was enough that he dropped his gaze and entered his room, shutting the door firmly behind him.
Naegi waited a moment to make sure that Togami was securely locked in his room before heading down the hall to open his own door. He resolutely didn't look behind him as he entered, not quite trusting himself not to run over and ring Togami's doorbell. There would be time for that later – after all, Kirigiri had agreed to end the separation tomorrow night. He only had to put up with one more day of this. Tomorrow, it would be all right.
