A/N: I'm back! Yeah, it was quite a long break, as I alluded to, but I needed that time to figure out where arc 4 (and, by extension, the rest of the story) will be heading, and it was even harder than it was for arc 3. There are still some details that will need to be worked out over time, but as of now, when I'm posting this, I have the events of the next few chapters worked out, so no big deal for now. I expect to post semi-regularly, some time on the weekends, as I have in the past, and I'm hoping the events of this arc can be condensed into a reasonable amount of chapters. Maybe somewhere between 15 to 20 chapters? Maybe less? We'll see.
Arc 4: Fighting for Your Most Important Right (And Much More!)
*Dong, ding, dong!*
"GOOD MORNING. IT IS NOW 8AM. IF YOU ARE ALREADY AWAKE, THEN HELLO. LET US ALL WORK TOWARDS MUTUAL HARMONY TODAY."
This was far from the first time Naoko had heard that when waking up. In fact, he heard it every time he woke up, at 8AM, like clockwork. If it weren't for it, then maybe he'd be able to comfortably sleep in here and there.
And it wasn't like he didn't want to or anything. Waking up, he still felt a little tired. Yesterday was hectic from start to finish. His brain was working overtime during the trial, trying to connect as many disparate logical points as it possibly could. Even when it was over, it wasn't long before his attention was seized by yet another important task. Said task was unenviable, for sure, but at the very least, after it was over, he was called away for some actual good news.
Hoshi's notebook turned out to contain a very handy guide to a specialized form of code-speaking Hoshi had apparently worked on quite a bit before he died. With it, they could potentially avoid suspicion by speaking about sensitive topics without IMONO knowing about it. There was just the issue of how to make sure people would be able to use the code-speak. If they were going to do this, they needed to make sure that they all knew what they were actually trying to communicate to each other.
…Except Bankei. She didn't need to know. Obviously.
So, they needed to get together and make sure everyone would be able to read and, subsequently, memorize the contents of Hoshi's code-speak guide. They had decided on taking turns with Hoshi's notebook, passing it around as if it were a memento or something. This was simply to avoid unneeded suspicion on IMONO's part, of course. Yori came by just when they were starting to wonder where she had gone, and she helped work out the order in which to have the book passed around. First it was Naoko, then her, then Eryu, then Mareo, and from there they'd have it passed on from person to person. It all hinged on the hope that people would be able to be discreet, and accurately memorize its contents.
So…yeah. That was yesterday for Naoko, basically. Now, there was the question of what the current day would bring. Naoko wasn't sure, but he decided that he'd have to meet up with the others to make sure things were going well.
Meeting up with everyone (except Bankei), it looked like things weren't much better than they were immediately following the trial yesterday. Quite a few people seemed broken up about the recent losses, especially Ishi. Naoko didn't once see any moment where she wasn't frowning, and she looked like she had taken an interest in that ponytail of hers, bringing her hand up to it almost wistfully multiple times. It didn't take a genius to figure out why she took an interest in it, though. All it took was knowing who suggested she have one in the first place.
Aside from her situation, things were tricky elsewhere. The number of people taking care of Bankei had been reduced from three to one, and Mareo didn't seem like he was comfortable doing so for any longer. Granted, she was at least partly ambulatory, so it wasn't a major issue, but she still was staying in her bed, for the most part. Then again, not having her around seemed like it was for the best. Just bringing her up seemed like it bothered people.
And that wasn't the only thing for people to be bothered about. Not long into their morning, another announcement came.
*Dong, ding, dong!*
"I HOPE YOU HAVE ALL HAD AN ADEQUATE MORNING. I AM AWARE THAT THE MOOD IN THIS FACILITY IS UNDESIRABLY POOR. TO HELP REMEDY THIS, PLEASE COME TO THE GYMNASIUM. I HAVE A DUAL ANNOUNCEMENT WHICH I AM SURE YOU WILL ALL ENJOY."
Being told to go to the gymnasium for an announcement was nothing new at this point, but it was still a rather unpleasant surprise, at least for most of them. Still, Naoko couldn't help but notice the apparent optimism in the last part of the announcement. Was what they were going to be told really going to be something they'd look forward to hearing? Hard to say for certain one way or the other, but given IMONO's track record…the optics weren't good, that was for sure.
They all eventually made their way to the gymnasium, like they were told to. Yes, everyone. At first, it seemed like there were only eight of them that had bothered to show up, and people seemed happy with that. Yori had even remarked that "if we're sufficiently lucky, things should go relatively smoothly without Bankei around". That was, perhaps, a poor thing for her to say, namely because it was immediately invalidated by Bankei herself walking into the room.
"Apologies for the wait," she said politely. "I would have been here quicker if a certain someone had helped." She very conspicuously eyeballed Mareo as she said the latter sentence, which seemed to immediately make him uncomfortable.
Mareo held his hands up defensively. "You can move around by yourself. I'm not obligated to help you move from one room to another on the same floor."
Kimi sighed. "Wow. Speak of the devil and he shall appear, huh? This better not turn into a shitshow."
Naoko could see Yori frowning slightly upon her saying this. He supposed Kimi had a point about the rather unfortunate timing of what Yori had said, but lampshading it didn't exactly help matters. At about that point, he also noticed the large screen lowering down from the ceiling. Perhaps the topic would be able to shift before things got too ugly.
The screen turned on and that unblinking image of a dual-colored eye popped up. Without skipping a beat, IMONO began to interject.
"NOW IS NOT THE TIME FOR DISCOURSE. NOW IS THE TIME FOR ANNOUNCEMENTS TO BE MADE. ANY CONFLICT BETWEEN YOU CAN WAIT UNTIL THE ANNOUNCEMENTS ARE OVER."
"Y'know, It'd be a hell of a lot better if we didn't have to worry about being in conflict at all," Eryu pointed out.
"I AM AWARE OF THAT. THAT WOULD CERTAINLY MAKE THINGS EASIER ON EVERYONE HERE, MYSELF INCLUDED. THAT IS WHY I HAVE CALLED YOU ALL HERE, IN FACT. THERE ARE SOME IMPORTANT MATTERS THAT NEED TO BE ADDRESSED. FIRSTLY, THE TOPIC OF BANKEI'S PUNISHMENT."
"You came to a decision on that?" Naoko asked.
"CORRECT. YOU SHOULD ALL CONSIDER YOURSELVES LUCKY, AS I HAVE DECIDED UPON THE PERFECT SOLUTION TO YOUR WORRIES REGARDING HER."
"The…'perfect' solution?" Bankei responded, sloppily twirling her hair.
"YES. I REFER TO IT AS PERFECT BECAUSE IT IS INDEED THE PERFECT WAY TO CORRECT YOUR TROUBLESOME BEHAVIOR, BANKEI. I BELIEVE YOU SHOULD ALL FIND IT TO BE QUITE AN APPROPRIATE PUNISHMENT."
"So, what is the punishment?" Takeshi asked. "More importantly, how's it supposed to 'correct' her awful behavior?"
"DO NOT WORRY. YOU WILL FIND OUT VERY SOON. FOR NOW, I WILL SAY THIS: I WILL SOON BE SENDING UP SOME DROIDS TO ESCORT BANKEI TO A SPECIFIC AREA INSIDE THIS FACILITY. ONCE I AM DONE WITH HER, I WILL RETURN HER TO ALL OF YOU. YOU SHOULD FIND HER MUCH MORE AGREEABLE AFTER THAT."
"Huh? That doesn't…sound right," Naoko said. "You're saying you're going to take her somewhere, and…then what?"
"It sounds like IMONO's gonna, uh, 'do' something to her," Mariko figured, a bit nervous.
"OF COURSE I AM. DO NOT WORRY. IT WILL BE A SIMPLE TASK, AND ENTIRELY HUMANE."
"...Nobody asked whether or not it'll be humane," Yori pointed out, clearly confused.
"I KNOW. I WAS SIMPLY CLARIFYING. MY PREVIOUS PUNISHMENTS HAVE BEEN RATHER HARSH, YOU SEE. I SIMPLY WANTED TO PREVENT ANY SORT OF PRESUMPTIONS ANY OF YOU MIGHT MAKE."
"That sounds to me like you're worried about us being presumptuous," Mareo said.
"What do you expect from the wretched thing?" Bankei asked rhetorically. "You've been keeping secrets from it for some time, remember? You've thought things you haven't said. We went over this just yesterday."
"THAT IS TRUE, BANKEI. HOWEVER, I WOULD RATHER YOU NOT DESCRIBE ME AS A 'WRETCHED THING'. IT IS VERY DISRESPECTFUL."
"Eh-heh. Silly IMONO," Bankei replied flippantly. "You haven't done much to earn my respect, you know. Besides, I can vaguely remember Haru making similar comments about you. He called you 'cheap', or some such nonsense."
"THAT DOES NOT MAKE SUCH COMMENTS OKAY. I FEEL YOU'VE SAID ENOUGH BY THIS POINT. THE MORE TIME YOU SPEND TALKING, THE LONGER IT WILL TAKE FOR ME TO FINISH THIS DUAL-ANNOUNCEMENT."
"Right. You haven't gotten to the second thing yet," Naoko said.
"INDEED. NOW, AS FOR THE OTHER ANNOUNCEMENT, I MADE A CHANGE OF PLANS RECENTLY. YOU SEE, THE FOURTH FLOOR HAS NEEDED A GOOD DEAL OF RENOVATIONS, AND I WAS ORIGINALLY PLANNING TO HAVE YOU WAIT AT LEAST ANOTHER COUPLE OF DAYS BEFORE GIVING YOU ACCESS TO IT. HOWEVER, GIVEN RECENT EVENTS, I BELIEVE SOME NEW SCENERY SHOULD BE JUST WHAT YOU ALL NEED."
"That sounds good, sure," Yori supposed. "What sort of renovations do you refer to, exactly?"
"OH, NOTHING PARTICULARLY NOTEWORTHY. THERE WERE SOME THINGS THAT ORIGINALLY WERE UNDER CONSIDERATION, BUT GIVEN YOUR CURRENT SITUATION, OPENING IT UP NOW MAY BE NECESSARY. ON A RELATED NOTE, HOWEVER, THERE IS ONE CAVEAT IN RELATION TO THE FOURTH FLOOR."
"Yeah?" Naoko asked.
"THERE IS ONE ROOM THAT WILL BE OFF-LIMITS TEMPORARILY. THIS IS RELATED TO BANKEI'S PUNISHMENT. SHE WILL BE ESCORTED INTO SAID ROOM, AND UNTIL SHE IS RELEASED, NOBODY IS TO BE LET INSIDE."
"...Oh." Naoko wasn't entirely sure what to make of that. It made a bit of sense, considering what they'd been told about Bankei, and how she'd be escorted somewhere for something or other. He just didn't realize that somewhere was on a floor open to them. He figured it might've been somewhere on that elusive sixth floor they were apparently barred from.
"DO NOT WORRY. ONCE SHE IS RELEASED, YOU CAN ENTER THE ROOM AS YOU WISH. WITH ANY LUCK, THAT WILL BE NOT LONG AFTER YOU ARE DONE TOURING THE REST OF THE FOURTH FLOOR. SO, WITH THAT IN MIND, I MUST ASK THAT YOU WAIT FOR A MOMENT, AS THE DROIDS ARRIVE TO ESCORT BANKEI. ONCE THAT HAPPENS, YOU MAY BEGIN YOUR EXPLORATION. THAT IS ALL."
The screen promptly shut off and went back up into the ceiling. It wasn't long after that before a pair of IMONO Droids walked into the room, grabbed Bankei by the shoulders, and walked out with her. It was an unceremonious affair, but people didn't really seem to mind seeing it happen. Even Bankei didn't show much signs of fighting back. Right from the outset, it looked like things were heading in whatever direction IMONO wanted them to go. The remaining question was what could have been on the fourth floor that necessitated renovations.
People went straight to the fourth floor once they could. Past those shutter doors, it was a simple stairwell that went down three flights of stairs. At the bottom, it opened up to reveal a hallway which went both left and right from the stairs. Most of the others went into the floor to explore ahead of Naoko, who took a moment to look around. Right off the bat, things looked a bit different. The walls were the same stony look, for the most part, but the very bottom of each wall had what looked like a thick brown stripe running across it. He hadn't noticed anything like that on previous floors. Was it meant to signify something?
In any case, it was a change of scenery, at least. Looking left and right, he noticed it wasn't a perfect T-intersection. To the left, he saw the hallway ended a bit away, but on the right, the hallway ended fairly close to the stairs. Naoko could see clearly into another hallway, which had two doors on the right side which looked like they led to bathrooms. That wasn't touching on what was in front of him, either, as across from the stairwell, Naoko saw a door leading into what seemed to be a rather small room. Curious as to what its purpose was, he made that his first stop.
On the other side was a fairly small room, with some sparse decorative material. Specifically, there was a plastic potted plant by the wall and a framed image, as well as a couple of what looked to be "motivational" posters. One was just of a cat hanging by a rope, and the other was a generic quote. As for the framed image, it was a bit unclear what it was supposed to depict exactly, but it looked like a front view of a rather ornate building. At the very least, it was the most aesthetically pleasing thing in the room.
The actual purpose of the room wasn't too hard to decipher. There was a small table that looked like it was made of wood upon first glance, but upon closer inspection was probably just some sort of brown plastic. It had a couple of similar-looking chairs behind it and on each end, as well as one simply off in a corner, next to the previously-mentioned fake plant. On the other side of the room, there was a counter upon which were ceramic cups and a teapot, as well as what looked to be a pair of coffeemakers. Above that, there was a cabinet affixed to the wall, the contents of which were currently Being investigated by Mariko, one of two people already in the room. The other was Ishi, sitting down in the chair near the corner of the room.
"It looks like we have here…" Mariko was in the process of speaking when Naoko walked in, but clearly noticed, because she stopped to look at him. "Oh hey, Naoko."
"Hey," he said back. " You two are inspecting this room, I suppose?"
"Well, I am," Mariko specified. "Looks like there's not much in here. This cabinet is just filled with…" She trailed off to take another look inside the cabinet. "...I see instant coffee, tea…and hot cocoa mix. I guess this is supposed to be a, uh, coffee room?"
"A coffee room, huh?" Ishi spoke up. "Why would we need one of those? This is the fourth floor. If we wanted to wake up with coffee, we'd have to go down, like, three levels just to get it here, y'know?"
"That's a good point," Naoko said aloud to himself. "There must be something about this floor that makes it useful. Not sure what that could be, though."
"Well, since it's here, maybe we can have some of this for ourselves," Mariko suggested. "Hot cocoa sounds nice. What do you think, Ishi?"
"Sure, I'll take one," Ishi replied half-heartedly. "Just…I'll take it, and then I just want time to think. I've…Y'know, I've had a lot on my mind lately."
"You're, um…You're not the only one," Mariko said hesitantly, beginning to look disheartened.
"Uh-huh," Ishi agreed, looking over at Naoko. "Naoko, my man, if you don't wanna be here for this, we're not gonna force you. You can leave if you want."
Naoko didn't know how to take that. Obviously, he understood where she was coming from, and what Mariko probably had on her mind as well by that point. On top of that, it sounded like Ishi wanted time to herself to deal with losing Mine. That was a bit disconcerting for Naoko, but if that really was what she wanted, he wasn't going to say no. He simply nodded in understanding and looked around the room. Aside from the door he used to enter the room, there was another directly across on the other side of the room, and one on the wall to his left. He chose the latter, and on the other side, he got a better look at the hallway he wasn't able to get a good look at by the stairs.
Directly ahead from where he was upon stepping out of the coffee room, Naoko saw there was a hallway leading to some other room, located behind red double doors with small vertical slot windows on each door. Unfortunately, the glass was too blurry to see through them easily, which hardly seemed like it'd be easy anyway, due to the two IMONO Droids standing in front of the double doors.
The purpose of them being there seemed obvious to Naoko: it seemed like that was the room Bankei was taken into. For what purpose still seemed unclear, but for the time being, he wasn't going to try and get past two literal robots. He decided not to go any further, and instead head to the right to see what was there. It looked like past the coffee room, there was a short hallway that opened up into a large, open area. Said area just so happened to be a rather inviting sight, especially for what seemed to be made to serve as a connecting point between different rooms.
The walls were painted a dark greenish-brown, with multiple framed art pieces being hung up at different points for aesthetic purposes. On top of that, a good deal of the area was dedicated to some very comfy looking furniture. Naoko could see vinyl chairs, a leather recliner, a very fluffy-looking couch, a rectangular ottoman, and even a beanbag chair. There were also some end tables placed near some of the previously mentioned furniture, plus a larger table placed between them. All in all, it looked like a nice place, and its current occupants seemed to agree. One of them just so happened to have her whole body spread out on the couch, having what seemed to be the time of her life.
"Holy shit, you guys. We finally have some real accommodations," Kimi said, really trying to get comfy.
"Well, I'm as passionate about soft furniture as the next guy, but…," Mareo said. "...Kimi, you don't have to keep the whole couch to yourself."
"Fuck off, yes I do," Kimi replied simply.
"There's a lot of other furniture still, at least," Takeshi pointed out, investigating the leather recliner.
"That's true, I guess," Eryu supposed. "Actually, now that I think about it, Kimi has a point."
"Hell yeah, I do," Kimi muttered aloud. "This is my couch."
"The couch isn't yours, Kimi," Eryu sighed wearily.
"First off, yes it is," Kimi replied, getting up from her prone position a little. "Second, I also think I was right about the accommodations thing. I think we can all agree that this place actually has some style, right?"
"That's what I meant when you said you had a point," Eryu said frustratedly, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"Well, I'd have to agree also," Yori chimed in, walking in from a nearby hallway. Apparently, the room they were in was connected to the hallway that led to the shutter doors that separated them from the fifth floor. It was basically just to the left of where Naoko walked in from, in fact. He could also see some doors to the left and right, on what was basically the other side of the room from where he was.
"I guess I definitely is better than what we've had so far," Naoko agreed, stepping into the room. "It looks like some sort of common room. A nice one, at that."
"We haven't seen much yet, but I'd say this floor seems pretty nice thus far," Takeshi said. "I wonder what IMONO meant about wanting to wait a couple days before giving us access to this place."
"Maybe the other floors had nice stuff, but IMONO decided we didn't deserve any of it, or some shit," Kimi surmised. "That's what it seems like to me."
"Let's not jump to conclusions," Yori cautioned. "Sure, this room is certainly appealing, but it's not necessarily an anomaly. We've had rooms in previous floors with nice furniture and painted walls. If there was anything on this floor that required IMONO to make 'renovations', we may find out just what that might be with just a bit of looking."
"Where else haven't we investigated?" Mareo asked. "Have none of us looked into the rooms connected to this one?"
"It doesn't seem like it, no," Eryu replied. "I'm starting to think that we should just get this whole thing over and done with and check them out."
"Sure, that'd just leave that one room back there," Naoko chimed in, pointing behind him. "The one that's being guarded by those droids, I mean."
"Oh yeah, those," Takeshi replied. "Yeah. That room will probably just have to wait. So, what now? Are we going into those rooms?"
"Sure," Yori supposed. "Perhaps we can split up, to cover more ground?"
"Sounds like a plan," Eryu agreed. "I'll check out the room on the left. You wanna come with me, Naoko?"
"Maybe," Naoko shrugged. "There are six of us right now. If we're splitting up, then we'll need two groups of three. I think I'll just go with whichever group needs a third."
After a bit of discussion, They all came to a fairly agreeable conclusion. Eryu, Yori, and Mareo were going to go and see what the room on Naoko's left had to offer, while Naoko, Kimi and Takeshi went into the room on Naoko's right. Perhaps splitting up the "trio" he'd formed with Eryu and Yori wasn't a very elegant decision, but it'd only be for a few minutes at most. Besides, whatever was behind the double doors on the right, he probably didn't need them to figure out just what it was.