CHAPTER 18
THE SCHEME
Konata stared at her cell phone blankly. Her look of concern was growing with each passing text message and missed phone call. Trying desperately to reach Kagami on her cell phone, Konata had no choice in her mind but to try again as she dialed her friend's number and listened. She heard the dial tone repeat itself six times until it went to voicemail yet again.
"She hasn't been responding to me…and she's missed two days of school." Konata said to herself as she lowered her phone again. "Something's happened again."
Sitting in a train car speeding towards the Hiiragi home, the blue-haired girl was taking matters into her own hands. She knew that Patricia Martin was responsible for the shrine desecration but couldn't prove it…yet. She had a plan set in motion and her ally Hiyori Tamura was in place and waiting to fulfill her end of the bargain, a debt she still felt she owed to Kagami, especially after she saw what Tsukasa had become at The Black Window. This was Konata's own trip to see her friend, though she was going to be in for quite a shock as she still didn't know about Kagami's meltdown that resulted in her butchering her hair and Tsukasa's drug overdose that led to the Hiiragi civil war.
She eventually arrived at their home and rang the buzzer, triggering Miki's weak and frail voice to respond and when she heard it was Konata, Miki was reluctant at first. Though she had to consider the long ride Konata had to take to get to her home so she was more or less morally obligated to let Konata in.
As soon as Konata entered their home, she felt a sudden and drastic change in the once vibrant household's persona. It wasn't as lively and peaceful as it once was and Konata felt as if she stepped into a haunted house as a chill ran down her spine and it was quiet in the Hiiragi home. Regrettably, it wasn't a peaceful and harmonious quiet. It was the quiet after a large storm that left carnage in its wake.
Konata knew she was going to be in more than she bargained for and wanted to ask a series of questions but knew she had to let Miki open up first. Konata had been to the Hiiragi residence before and noticed a few changes. She noticed a large and brutal hole in the wall that once held the telephone's cord. Another thing she noticed as she sat down at the dining room table as Miki fixed tea was another large gash in the wall made by the table when Tadao flipped it the previous day.
Miki brought two mugs of steaming tea to the table and sat one down in front of Konata as she too joined her. Konata began to analyze Miki herself. It was her eyes that gave it away. Something did happen and the blue-haired girl's otaku expertise kicked in when she saw the distraught Hiiragi's housewife's eyes.
Those eyes…is Miki-sama…yandere?
"Um…I wanted to come and make sure Kagami was okay," Konata said nervously as she sipped her tea. "She's missed school and she hasn't been replying to my texts or voicemails. I just wanted to make sure that everything's okay."
Miki's eyes remained lifeless as she sipped the hot liquid. "My husband and I have separated."
Konata, who was in the midst of another sip, nearly spat the tea out after hearing the shocking and devastating news. Never in her wildest nightmare would she think the Hiiragi family would split. This put the blue-haired girl in an awkward spot since Miki needed someone to open up to and to think this started with Konata simply wanting to see if Kagami was okay and nothing more.
"Something happened, didn't it?" Konata said softly.
Miki slowly nodded. "After you brought her home the other day, Kagami had a mental breakdown and tried to become Tsukasa. She tried cooking and later she cut all her hair to make herself look like Tsukasa."
Hearing the self-mutilation story made Konata gulp. She had always teased Kagami about her hair and how without her pigtails it wouldn't look natural, but she never thought she would actually cut it all off. Konata couldn't help but feel a little guilty after all the times she teased her but she was still smart enough to know that she wasn't the reason why Kagami took such drastic measures.
"Where is she?" Konata asked seriously.
"Upstairs in her room. She hasn't left since yesterday and I'm worried. She hasn't eaten anything for more than a day." Miki whispered in a defeated voice, a sound all too familiar in the Hiiragi household.
Konata slowly rose and replied, "I'll go and talk to her."
Miki didn't say anything as the blue-haired girl began to walk up the stairs to Kagami's room. What else was there to say? The passages of Tsukasa's diary continued to haunt her mind and it was clear to her now. Miki was in a way responsible for everything that had happened to the family since the night of Tsukasa's rape. Her mother's instincts not only kicked in, they went into overdrive and the more she squeezed Tsukasa, the more she slipped through her fingers. Miki's obsessive behavior and refusal to listen to her daughter resulted in Tsukasa breaking away from the family with sheer force. When Tadao told her that if she ever found out the full details of Tsukasa's rape, she too would want to go on suicide watch.
He was right.
Konata arrived at Kagami's door and gently knocked. "K…Kagami? It's me, Konata. Can I come in?"
"…Yes." Konata was able to hear a faint voice whisper in response.
She slowly turned the doorknob and opened Kagami's door and saw her. She was sitting in the furthest corner of her room away from the door and facing the wall with her legs held tightly to her chest as she sat. She was wearing long pants and a hooded sweatshirt with the hood still secured around her head. Kagami was like a statue sitting in the corner.
Konata slowly entered and approached her friend. Standing behind her, she said, "Will you turn and look at me, please?"
Kagami pulled the drawstrings of her hoodie tighter. "Only if you promise not to make fun of me."
"I promise."
Slowly standing and visibly trembling, Kagami slowly turned and looked at her shorter friend. The red and puffiness in her eyes showed she had been crying recently and she slowly lowered her hood, allowing her hair to fall the short distance from the top of her head to the back of her neck. Konata held firm and kept a poker face for her friend and suddenly smiled, surprising Kagami.
"You look like your biggest sister, Inori." Konata said with her smile. "You two have the same eyes. I never really noticed it before until you cut your hair. Inori is tall and beautiful, you know."
Kagami quickly looked away in embarrassment. "Dad always told me the same thing when I was younger. I remember when I was little and my hair was still growing and when it was the same style as Inori's that was when we were the closest. Tsukasa was always attached to mom up until middle school and I was always lonely, and that's when Inori was my best friend."
Nodding slowly, Konata took a seat on Kagami's bed and the former twin-tailed girl soon joined her. "What are you doing here, Konata?" Kagami asked as she kept looking at the floor, still trying to adjust to her new hairstyle being in the public.
"You haven't been replying to any of my text messages or voicemails. You know it's pretty bad when I'm the one that has to chase you down to reply to a simple text message." Konata replied slyly, earning a grin from Kagami. "Next thing we know, it'll be you copying my homework. And that's when we'll also have to deal with the four horsemen, the reign of fire, and the end of days."
Her tactic had worked and Kagami released a playful giggle. It was too short for Konata however when Kagami ceased her happy response and became serious again. "Thank you for coming to see me, Konata, and I'm sorry about that. I keep getting hurtful messages from people at school or the streets about Tsukasa's billboard."
Konata felt rage, a rarity for her, but these were her friends that were being harassed like this and it ruffled the feathers of the usually placid female otaku. Nevertheless, Konata wanted to keep quiet about Patty's suspected involvement for Konata knew if she let it slip, Kagami would end up killing the foreign girl. She wasn't here for that anyway, at least not yet. She just wanted to be with Kagami for the both of them and Konata still hoped that there was still a chance she was wrong about Patty.
"I can understand why you wouldn't want to talk to anybody; I was just worried about you." Konata replied and scooted closer to Kagami. "We want you back at school. Misakichi won't leave Miyuki and I alone and she's more clingy than a leech."
Kagami huffed. "That sounds like Misao. But I don't think I'm going back to school this year. I might end up repeating our last year."
Konata quickly turned her head to the short-haired tsundere. "But, Kagamin…what about law school?"
The blue-haired girl saw the question hurt Kagami and she could see it in her eyes. Kagami slowly shook her head and more tears began to fill her eyes. "I'm gonna have to forget about all that, Konata. My parents are getting a divorce, my sister is banished from the family, and I haven't been feeling myself since The Black Window incident. I'll probably have to take on a full-time job for my family or maybe drop out of school completely."
"It can't be that bad." Konata stated.
Silence swallowed them for several second until Kagami slowly looked up and stared into space. "I remember my first day of school. I had been looking forward to it for so long and I was literally pulling my dad all the way to the school. Tsukasa on the other hand was latched onto mom and we practically needed the jaws-of-life to pry her off. That was so long ago…and now look where we are. We're defeated, Konata. It's over. I've lost the will to go on or work hard."
"But Kagami—"
"Remember when I once said I used to work hard in school every day to stay a step ahead of Tsukasa and you said that that wasn't much of a challenge?" Kagami interrupted. "I was wrong. All those times I would study hard or work hard or even flaunt my good grades, it was all because I knew Tsukasa had my back and the way she looked up to me; it gave me the confidence I needed and the pride in myself. Without her beside me, I'm just an empty shell."
It was when Kagami covered her face and released her tears that Konata's anger grew. Ryosuke may have led the gang-rape on Tsukasa that sent them down this fast lane to Hell itself, but it was Patty that did this to Kagami. Patty drove this wedge further between the Hiiragi twins and she was going to pay.
Konata stood and wrapped her arms around Kagami's head. She held her friend tightly and Kagami's heart raced when she felt her blue-haired friend gently kiss her on the top of her head.
Don't you worry, Kagami. I'm going to make this right for you and your family no matter what. You mean a lot to me after all…
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Patricia Martin walked alone down the street of Otome Road and was taking in all the sights as an escape. Hiding herself in the cosplaying crowd, she felt more paranoid in recent days ever since her altercation with Konata regarding her involvement in the Hiiragi family shrine desecration. She knew the blue-haired otaku was on to her but took some comfort in the fact that she had no evidence. Patty continued to indulge herself in manga to forget her troubles as she tried her best to scurry through the crowd to isolate herself in her apartment for the rest of the day.
Hearing a new voice call her name nearly made her skeleton rip out of her body when it called, "Patty-chan!"
Patty quickly turned and saw Hiyori Tamura waving at her with a vibrant smile and her fellow otaku began to navigate through the mass of humans to join her. Seeing her with her usual innocent meganekko face made Patty breathe a sigh of relief as the two friends joined together in the gathering on Otome Road.
"How have you been, Patty-chan?" Hiyori exclaimed happily as they began to walk side-by-side down the street.
Patty hesitated at first to try and craft her alibi but soon replied. "I've been doing fine. Just going to school and working at the cosplay café with Konata, same as always."
"That's good. Hey did you hear about that billboard of Tsukasa Hiiragi posted near here?" Hiyori asked.
The question once again made Patty nervous. Was she discovered?
"Uh…I heard about it but haven't seen it. Why, is it bad?" Her high-pitched voice somehow reached higher altitudes.
Hiyori to her surprise, smiled and laughed. "Yeah it's bad. And it serves that family right. I've hated them for so long. Prancing all about Saitama thinking they're God's gift to the damn world. Whoever did that was a genius and really knocked them down a peg. I gotta tell you, I was talking to Konata the other day and she says the Hiiragi family is dead. I hear that the parents are getting a divorce."
This was news to Patty and she couldn't help but feel even more satisfied with herself knowing that Tadao and Miki were splitting up. However, she still held her guard up when Hiyori told her she was talking with Konata. Patty feared that maybe Konata let the story of their tense standoff slip.
"Did Konata tell you anything else?" Patty asked and prepared herself for anything.
Hiyori gave a confused look and shook her head. "Not really, no. The only other thing she told me was that she's upset with how devastated Kagami is over it."
Patty tried to hide her sadistic smirk and turned to Hiyori. "Well I kinda have to agree with you. I'm not a big fan of the Hiiragi family anymore either."
"I would hope not, since I know it was you that did those billboards." Hiyori spoke.
She nearly had a heart attack right there on the spot. Trying to hide her mounting rage and panic, Patty turned her head and said, "Wha…what makes you say that, Hiyorin?"
To her surprise, Hiyori grinned again and started laughing. "You don't have to hide it, Patty. That was hands down the coolest and greatest move I've ever seen. You took ecchi and yuri to a whole new level! I think we could take it a step further and really drive that family insane."
"Whoa…we?" Patty asked. "And I have no idea what you're talking about."
"You don't have to play innocent with me, Patty. And don't worry; your secret is safe with me because I want to help. I have a few ideas of how to keep this flowing and keep that bitch Kagami out of school and even make her drop out." Hiyori proclaimed with a sinister grin.
Patty was stunned at what she was hearing. She always thought Hiyori was on the side of Konata, which would make her side with the Hiiragi family as well but her fellow otaku was beginning to prove her wrong. Either way, Patty ordered, "Prove it to me."
Still surprising Patty, Hiyori reached into her pocket and pulled out her cell phone. To Patty's slight surprise, the phone was pink in color and Patty remembered it being blue, but she didn't think much of it and assumed it was a new model.
Hiyori navigated her way through her mobile device and when she retrieved what she was looking for, she handed it to Patty. Grasping the phone, Patty nearly dropped it when she saw the images. She didn't know the older Hiiragi sisters personally, but did know their names and what they looked like and she felt her heart race when she saw a picture of what appeared to be Inori Hiiragi in a compromising situation with some man. They were making out heavily as the man was feeling her chest with one hand and pulling her Miko outfit down her shoulders with the other. They were also appeared to be making out in a dark alley behind a building.
"Is that…Inori Hiiragi?!" Patty exclaimed.
"Sure is. It seems she has a casual fling every week with a guy who has a thing for shrine maidens." Hiyori laughed. "The next one is just as good."
Patty couldn't be restrained and when she clicked to the next picture, it once again blew her mind. She saw the other Hiiragi daughter named Matsuri also in a compromising situation. She was in bright pink lingerie and sitting in the lap of an unknown man dressed in a business suit and the two appeared to be in a private club where men were smoking cigars and drinking expensive alcohol.
"What's the story here?" Patty's voice quivered over how scandalous the pictures were.
"From what I've heard, Matsuri has a sugar daddy from some big corporation." Hiyori added, still with a satisfied smirk across her face. "That is one screwed up family. It's easy to see why Tsukasa is the way she is now after coming from that mental house."
"This is…this is…great, Hiyorin." Patty said, practically drooling over the pictures. "Could…could you forward these pics to me? I'll have these posted all over town and their shrine this week."
Hiyori was very happy. "Only if you promise to let me help."
Patty handed the pink phone back to Hiyori. "What do you say we go back to my place and…collaborate?"
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The two girls arrived back at Patty's apartment a few hours later and continued their unholy plot to further plunge the Hiiragi family into despair. They had really cemented their new alliance with each other through their continuous bashing of the broken family and Patty showed Hiyori the contents of her computer. Sure enough, Patty had the cell phone images of Tsukasa's drug-induced dance and craze on her computer and she even showed Hiyori how she put the hurtful captions across the pictures.
"And once you can add the text boxes like that, it's a snap." The foreign girl said with a laugh.
"That's amazing. So what would you do with these new ones of Inori and Matsuri?" Hiyori asked as she backed away from Patty's computer desk and reached into her pocket and grabbed something. She moved her hands across it and placed her thumb on one of its buttons.
Patty kept her eyes locked on her screen and pondered the idea. "I don't know, but I think these could go without saying. They're all the same it appears; they both have no morals underneath their so-called cloaks of righteousness."
"If I can ask you something, why did you hit the shrine the way you did anyway?" Hiyori asked and it made Patty look up from her screen. "I mean, Tsukasa was expelled, her parents are splitting up, and her family's broken up, so why go through all that extra trouble?"
The question made Patty slowly turn her head to show a look of anger and hate. There was a long and uncomfortable pause between them until she replied, "I was humiliated in front of everyone because of Tsukasa. I was only trying to help and when she attacked me like that and mocked me for being into the things I'm interested, I took it personally. She doesn't deserve anything in her worthless life and to think that her family continues to puff and flash their shit all over the place like they're the gift to the world. I wanted to take them down several pegs and to make them feel as humiliated and defeated as possible, and that's why I did what I did to that pathetic Hiiragi shrine. I'm proud that I took those pictures of Tsukasa at that rave and spread them around and let the idiots of school continue it for me. I would do it all over again if I had the chance."
Hiyori shifted her fingers that grasped the device in her pocket and slowly withdrew her empty hand and sat down. "I understand what you mean when you say you want to knock that smug family down a few notches. Now, with these new images of the other Hiiragi bitches, we'll bury all of them at once."
Patty's angry expression melted away and another look of satisfaction replaced it. "Damn right. By the way, you will send me those pictures to my email, right?"
Hiyori deepened her grin and pulled out her pink cell phone and began to attach the photos to a text message addressed to Patty. As she did this, Patty couldn't help but notice the striking similarities between their two phones. Patty took her phone out of her pocket and compared it to Hiyori's as she continued to construct the message.
"When did you get the new phone, Hiyorin?" Patty asked. "It looks just like mine."
Hiyori pressed the send button and closed her phone. "A few days ago. The only problem I have with this one is that it sometimes takes too long for it to send pictures so just give it some time."
Patty nodded and placed her phone on the computer desk and asked Hiyori to see it. She complied and tossed it to Patty, who held it and only observed the outside of it and didn't open it. "I know how that is with phones and computers. It took me awhile to figure out this software to crop and caption those pictures of Tsukasa."
Hiyori nodded and watched Patty place the two identical phones side-by-side on the desk.
"Could you wait here for a moment? I need to use the bathroom." Patty said and left the room for a very quick moment. When she returned, Hiyori informed her that she had received a text message from her big brother and that she needed to return home ASAP. The two girls bid each other goodbye and said they'd see each other the next morning at school to continue their plots of the Hiiragi downfall.
Patty sat alone at her computer desk again and pondered what she would do with those new images of Inori and Matsuri. She looked at her pink cell phone sitting on her desk and saw it wasn't blinking, meaning she hadn't received the pictures yet. It had been about twenty minutes since Hiyori left and even longer factoring in when she sent the pictures so she was perked with curiosity. Patty leaned forward and opened her phone.
Something was different about it. Her phone's wallpaper, which was a screenshot of the final position of the dance in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya was gone and it was replaced with a bland wallpaper pattern consisting of a zebra pattern. It was the type of wallpaper that came standard to any newly issued phone.
Not knowing what to make of the situation, Patty navigated through the menu options and looked for anything that would be in her phone whether it was phone numbers, ringtones, or custom wallpapers that would tell her she was still holding her phone. She began to panic when she couldn't find anything about her identity in her phone and when she looked in the image gallery, she realized something was truly wrong when the images of Inori and Matsuri were gone.
What the hell just happened? That was Patty's only thought as she paced back and forth and forth in her apartment with fear. She feared her day of reckoning was just around the corner.
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The next day at school was normal and status quo for everybody as Patty made her way through the crowd of her fellow students. She glanced at every face she could to see if there was anything telling that her cover was blown. Every time she met eyes with someone, they either looked away casually or wished her good morning if they knew her. Nothing was out of the ordinary.
Her day progressed slowly but still normally and with each passing status quo update, she felt more at ease but still knew something was up. She concluded the previous night that Hiyori took her phone but the big question was if it was a mistake or not. What made Patty more paranoid was that Hiyori was a no-show all day for school. That was until lunch.
When the lunch bell sounded and Patty joined Minami and Yutaka in their classroom, they heard Hiyori's voice announce, "Hey guys!"
They turned and saw her enter the classroom with her lunch and she quickly joined them at the conjoined desks. Yutaka presented her usual cheerful charm while Minami remained reserved about showing emotions to Hiyori's late arrival. Patty on the other hand nearly blew her own cover with a near outburst when she asked, "Where were you?"
"I wasn't feeling well this morning but I'm better now." Hiyori said as she sat. "By the way, Patty, I have your phone. I took it by mistake last night."
Patty breathed a sigh of relief as Hiyori reached into her pocket and slid her phone to the foreign student. "Thanks a lot. I was really looking for my phone last night."
The four friends continued to eat together and once again, it was business as usual. It wasn't until near the end of their meal that Ryōō High School was once again rocked by scandal. From the intercom, the school's chimes sounded, announcing that a message was about to come.
"Attention everyone, may I have your attention please?" A familiar voice said, perking Yutaka's ears up.
"Is that…onee-chan?" Yutaka asked with a wide-eyed expression.
What came next drained Patty's skin of its color. A familiar voice came that announced, "She doesn't deserve anything in her worthless life and to think that her family continues to puff and flash their shit all over the place like they're the gift to the world. I wanted to take them down several pegs and to make them feel as humiliated and defeated as possible, and that's why I did what I did to that pathetic Hiiragi shrine. I'm proud that I took those pictures of Tsukasa at that rave and spread them around and let the idiots of school continue it for me. I would do it all over again if I had the chance. She doesn't deserve anything in her worthless life and to think that her family continues to puff and flash their shit all over the place like they're the gift to the world. I wanted to take them down several pegs and to make them feel as humiliated and defeated as possible, and that's why I did what I did to that pathetic Hiiragi shrine. I'm proud that I took those pictures of Tsukasa at that rave and spread them around and let the idiots of school continue it for me. I would do it all over again if I had the chance."
It was Patty's voice and she was repeating the conversation she had with Hiyori last night. Hiyori recorded every word she said and now it was played over the intercom for the whole school to hear. When the recording ended, all eyes turned on Patricia Martin, who now sat as pale as a ghost. Yutaka's innocent face presented a show of horror as she shied away from Patty and closer to Minami.
Patty looked at Hiyori, who had a stern look plastered across her head. Patty couldn't help but huff with a weak grin and say, "Good one, Hiyorin. Good one."
The foreign exchange student found herself in the principal's office so fast, she barely had time to stand from her chair. Hiyori Tamura and Konata Izumi also stood before the same principal that handed down sentences to Kagami and Tsukasa weeks earlier.
"Okay, I want the truth from all of you." The older principal spat with anger. "What is going on here? Izumi, you first."
Konata stepped forward, her head hanging low. "Sir, Patty is responsible for vandalizing the Hiiragi family shrine, which I'm sure you know of by now. She's also the one who spread those scandalous pictures of Tsukasa-san around the school. I always knew she did it, but I couldn't prove it, until Tamura-san helped by recording a conversation she had with Patty a few days ago."
Hearing this altered version of the story prompted Patty to respond. "Hiyori was at my home last night and she stole my cell phone!"
"Please, Martin, you'll get your turn!" The principal thundered, immediately silencing her. "You were saying, Izumi?"
"Tamura-san and I were texting last night on what we should do and I took this matter into my own hands when I heard the recording." Konata said with only semi-honest shame. "That's why I uploaded the recording to the school's PA system. So that Patty would know the embarrassment she caused for the Hiiragi family."
Turning his attention to Patty, the principal, with a horrid look of anger on his face, said, "Is this true, Martin?"
Patty's stuttering and slurred speech confirmed it for him. Patty still tried to make a defense though. "Tamura-san was at my home last night and she too has pictures of the other Hiiragi daughters in such positions and was planning on spreading them to the school! Look in her cell phone and you'll see them and the fact that she wasn't texting Izumi last night because she was with me!"
The principal looked at Hiyori. "Let me see your cell phone, Tamura."
Hiyori was reluctant but slowly retracted her hand into her pocket and pulled out her phone. To Patty's sudden horror, she saw Hiyori was now holding her old blue phone as she handed it to the principal.
"That's not her phone! She must've used a fake one or—"
"Martin, I'm not going to tell you, again!" The principal yelled and began to look through the image gallery of the phone. He wouldn't admit it but he was a little impressed to see so many pictures of avid cosplayers, but he found no images of either Matsuri or Inori Hiiragi. He also looked through the text messages and also asked for Konata's phone and compared the two. They checked out. There was a text conversation between Hiyori and Konata last night that ranged from 6:30 to 8:00 the previous night.
"There story seems credible to me, Martin. What's your excuse?" The principal said and handed the girls' phones back to them.
Patty didn't know what to do as it seemed she was in a corner. "I didn't vandalize the shrine! That recording doesn't prove jack!"
"Sir, if I may interject," Hiyori said quietly and submissively, grabbing the principal's attention. "I didn't catch this on the recording, but Patty-chan did say that she still had the images of Tsukasa on her phone and all who she sent them to, who kept forwarding them."
The principal looked back at Patty and held out his hand. "Let me see your phone, Martin."
To everyone's surprise, Patty became enraged. "I'm not staying here and taking this anymore! All I ever wanted was to come here and be a good student and make friends but this is shit! You all can go to hell and fuck this school!"
Patty stormed out of the principal's office, leaving everyone stunned. Silence surrounded them until the principal sighed. "Tamura, wait outside. Izumi, you stay here."
Hiyori bowed to her principal and closed the door on her way out, leaving just the principal and Konata alone.
"I understand what you did and why you did it, but the fact is, Izumi, you broke school rules by using that recording over our PA system. There will be consequences for that." The principal calmly stated.
"I know, sir, but with all due respect, I don't think the Hiiragi's would've gotten justice if I didn't do what I did." Konata stood tall in defense of her friends. "I'm sure you know this but Kagami Hiiragi hasn't been in school for three days straight."
The principal nodded. "I know. Her mother called me this morning and told me she still wasn't feeling herself and that she may have to repeat her senior year. It's a shame what happened to that family. A damn shame. They didn't deserve anything that happened to them, especially Tsukasa."
Konata nodded slightly with a depressed look. "I was talking to Kagami yesterday and she was saying the same things about repeating the year."
"You seem to be pretty close to Kagami and her family, Izumi." The principal added as he sat back in his chair.
Konata lowered her head and her depressed look deepened. "Kagami is my best friend. I love her with every fiber of my soul and to see her in so much pain and to see this happening to them is hurting me so."
The principal nodded slowly and more silence fell between them until he sighed again and broke it. "Look Izumi, I'm only telling you this because of how close you are to them and I can see how much you care about them. If all your accusations against Martin prove credible, then I'll have to bring the police in and if they drop the assault charges against Tsukasa and pursue criminal harassment and destruction of private property against Martin, then I'll reconsider my earlier decision and allow Tsukasa back in school."
Konata felt a smile tug at the corners of her mouth but she remained calm and serious. "Thank you sir, but why go through all that trouble?"
"I have a daughter, too. She's a few years older than you and the Hiiragi twins. She's studying at Tokyo University right now and I understand the pain the Hiiragi's are going through. If any of that happened to my only daughter and child, I wouldn't know how to deal with it." The principal finished.
Hiyori Tamura waited for another few minutes until Konata reemerged from the office and the two began to walk back to their classrooms together. When they were out of range of the principal's office, Hiyori had to confess.
"Did we do good, sempai?" Hiyori asked with deep guilt in her voice. "We lied to the principal about how we cornered Patty. I feel awful about this plan."
Konata rethought the entire chain of events that brought them to this. Konata had found those images of the shrine maiden making out with some guy and the girl in the lingerie on the other guy's lap on different websites. She was able to use her computer know-how to alter their faces and hair colors the best she could to make them look like Inori and Matsuri. Konata knew that Patty didn't know the oldest Hiiragi daughters that well and hoped that she could capitalize on that and it worked. She then forwarded the images to a phone she bought at an electronic store that could only receive pictures and texts that looked identical to Patty's. From there, Hiyori took that phone and gave Konata her real blue one. It had to be Hiyori that met with Patty the previous night because Konata and Patty were already wise to each other, thus Hiyori was the only person Konata could trust. Konata spent that night having a conversation with herself in a certain sense with her phone and Hiyori's phone. She would send a message from her phone to Hiyori's, then respond to it using Hiyori's phone and kept going back and forth. Hiyori had to put on her best acting skills and show those fake pictures of Inori and Matsuri to Patty to gain her trust. When Patty spilled her heart out to Hiyori, she recorded it with a voice recorder in her pocket. When Patty went to the bathroom, Hiyori switched the phones and took Patty's. After she left Patty's apartment, Hiyori and Konata met one final time and found the images of Tsukasa on the phone and once again using Konata's computer expertise, they were able to copy all the information regarding when the pictures were taken, which phone they were taken on, and ultimately, who sent them around first. It all linked back to Patty. They then sent it to the police in an email. It was now a matter of time until Patty would be getting a visit from some police officers.
"I think we did good, Hiyorin." Konata said quietly. "I know if feels strange to lie to the principal and others like that, but we did what we needed to do."
"But did it work for the Hiiragi's too?" Hiyori asked. "I wanted to help Kagami and her family out, but at what cost? My own conscience? My own sense of honesty?"
Konata grabbed Hiyori by the shoulders and looked at her in the eyes. "Don't fall apart on me, Hiyorin. What you did was very brave and courageous for Kagami and her family. The principal told me that he'll reconsider letting Tsukasa back into school now and dropping the assault charges for what you did. You helped save the Hiiragi family."
Hiyori slowly nodded. "But will Tsukasa take the opportunity? That's the question."
Konata looked away. "Only time will tell."
Was this a victory for Konata and Hiyori? Was this a victory for the Hiiragi family? Who was the true monster in this crime? Was it Tsukasa or was it Patty? The depth of this tragedy was so deep that friendships were now dissolving and hearts were being broken. In a way, everyone lost a little bit of innocence when Tsukasa was raped. It was no longer an innocent time for any of them. What was to become of Kagami's circle of friends by the end of this day was to be determined.
However, what lied ahead for the Hiiragi family was the day of reckoning. Everything they had been through as a family was now going to seem like a rainy day. Tomorrow night, every fiber of resilience and loyalty for the Hiiragi family would be tested. Tomorrow night, more blood would be shed. Tomorrow night, Tsukasa would have one final decision to make for not only her family, but for herself and what their destinies would become. The Hiiragi family day of reckoning would involve everything. Horror, tragedy, drama, emotions…death itself.