"When I'll luck begins, it does not come in sprinkles, but in showers."
― Mark Twain, Pudd'nhead Wilson
Chapter 7
Komaeda felt restless. That feeling of wrongness was back, but he didn't understand. Nothing remotely bad had happened to him and his friends had seemed fine during lunch; had something changed during their last encounter?
He glanced at Hinata and Chiaki from his seat at his desk. Hinata looked like he was on the verge of falling asleep right then and there on his desk and Chiaki was looking down at her lap. He'd bet twenty dollars that she had a game console down there. They were both fine, which meant that something was happening to either Togami or Naegi.
He glanced at his teacher, Miss Wallace, and once he was satisfied that she wasn't paying attention to him, he quickly typed a message to both his friends and waited for them to answer. After two minutes of absolutely nothing from either of them, Komaeda began to panic.
Togami not answering immediately was nothing new, sometimes the heir would take twenty to thirty minutes to answer but eventually he did. Naegi on the other hand messaged him back after a minute, no matter what she was doing.
So the fact that not one but two minutes had passed without either of his friends replying was worrying. Komaeda glanced at the clock in front of the classroom. There was about five minutes left for class and school to be over. If he remembered correctly, Naegi and Togami had P.E. as their last class so they've be at the gym.
Decision made, Komaeda pushed back his chair and got to his feet. He'd tried to be as quiet as possible but the chair let out a loud squeaky noise that alerted the rest of the class of his actions. Ms. Wallace frowned at him.
"Mr. Komaeda, class isn't over yet. Please take your seat."
Komaeda shook his head and started heading for the door. "I'm terribly sorry, but I really have to go."
"Mr. Komaeda-" whatever else the teacher was about to say was cut off as the school's fire alarm rang out throughout the entire school. Komaeda paled and started running. He didn't have to turn around to know that the two sets of footsteps behind him belonged to Hinata and Chiaki.
"Dude, what's wrong?" Hinata asked catching up to him.
"Remember what I told you about my luck cycle?" Komaeda asked him. Hinata nodded. " I think the bad luck has already started; and I think its chosen either Naegi or Togami to take the full force of it."
"Then we'd better hurry, those two have P.E. so they should be at the gym." Chiaki said. Hinata and Komaeda both nodded and sped up. Getting out was proving to be difficult though. All the other classes had started evacuating and the sudden flood of students was making it harder to leave the building. It shouldn't have been difficult since they were all heading in the same direction, but since most students thought this was just a drill, they were taking their sweet time.
It wasn't until the sound of a police siren followed by an ambulance that students finally started speeding up. The sound only made Komaeda start pushing people out his way until he was finally outside.
Hinata and Chiaki appeared behind him a second later and they all started running again. They were almost at the gym before Chiaki shouted at them to stop. Hinata and Komaeda almost tripped on their feet but managed to stop just in time. They were all panting.
"What is it Chiaki?" Hinata asked her. In response Chiaki pointed towards the ambulance a little ways off from them. They both turned to look in the direction she was pointing and their eyes widened.
Sitting inside the ambulance was Naegi Makoto, an oversized coat around her shoulders, and Sakakura the head of security by her side. Komaeda let out the breath he was holding. Naegi was fine
"Let me call Togami and see if he's okay." Chiaki said. Komaeda nodded distractedly, Togami was probably fine, if he wasn't Naegi would be rushing to leave and look for him.
"Hey wait! Somebody stop that man!"
Komaeda turned in the direction of the shout and his eyes widened in horror. An obese man had overpowered one of the guards before they could handcuff him and taken his gun. The man shot at the sky and everyone instantly crouched down. Satisfied, the man made a beeline towards the ambulance and pointed the gun right at Naegi.
Togami was almost at the school building when he heard the sirens. Togami hesitated; already students were coming out of the building. If Naegi were indeed with the other students she'd be coming out soon. After a minute of debate, he decided to wait where he could see the throng of students and quickly took out his phone to check for any messages. He was about to reply back to Komaeda's message when his phone started ringing. It was Chiaki. Confused as to why she would be calling him, he was about to hit the talk button when a shot rang out. Togami instantly went down on the floor and looked in the direction the noise had come from.
His eyes spotted a man who clearly had to go on a diet and followed his line of a sight. A second later he was on his feet and halfway to Naegi before he could think about it.
He reached Naegi in record time and wrapped his arms around her to shield her from the shot. The only way that man was going to get to Naegi was over his dead body. He could faintly hear Naegi begging him not to do this and oh god please move. His hold tightened and Naegi let out a sob.
Before he could try to console his girlfriend, the obese man pulled the trigger in their direction. Togami closed his eyes and waited for the pain.
But nothing happened. The man pulled the trigger two more times before Togami realized that the gun had jammed. Suddenly the looming figure of Sakakura Juzo standing in front of him snapped him to attention. Sakakura moved one foot back, drew back his right hand, and punched the man right on the nose.
Togami heard a crunch of bone as the man was thrown a few feet away. Sakakura shook his hand. "Damn bastard got cocky."
The sound of clapping hands let Togami know that it was over. He loosened his hold and looked down at Naegi and noticed for the first time that she was only wearing her bra and gym shorts under the oversized cloak. He stiffened.
"Did he-?" he couldn't even finish the question. The thought of that man putting his hands on Naegi sent him into a white rage. Naegi shook her head. She wouldn't look at him. "Naegi?" he took hold of her face with both hands and lifted it up so he could see her. His hands tightened ever so slightly.
"It doesn't hurt that much, I'm fine." She said. Togami gritted his teeth. He welcomed the burning hatred he felt towards the man, how dare he lay a finger on Naegi. Naegi who is one of the best people he knew of, whose nice and loved by pretty much everyone who ever met her? Togami took a step towards the man before Naegi intertwined one of her hands with his and gave him a one handed hug with the other.
"I'm okay Togami. Calm down. All that anger you're feeling; let it go. Let it go and stay with me."
Togami honestly felt like crying. He was so angry. The man who'd hurt someone so precious to him was just a few feet away and he couldn't do anything about it. He glanced down at Naegi. She looked like she wanted to cry.
Of course she did. After what she had to go through of course she'd want to cry. He couldn't let her see him break down. What Naegi needed from him right now was for him to be her rock. Forcing the tears of frustration away, Togami turned around and pulled her close.
"I'm not going anywhere." he whispered into her hair.
After that, everything went by pretty smoothly. The cops took the man down to the station and asked for Naegi to come down later to answer a few questions.
Naegi wasn't hurt too badly, so they only asked her to put some ice on her cheek to make the swelling go down; Togami never left her side. Chiaki, Hinata and Komaeda joined them afterward to see how Naegi was doing. Chiaki clung to Naegi and kept crying about how happy she was that Naegi was okay. Hinata gave Naegi a fist bump and told her not to scare him like that again. And Komaeda-Komaeda smiled and kept his distance. Naegi frowned; she'd have to talk to him soon. She had a pretty good idea of what he was thinking.
After a while the rest of their classmates all clamored around Naegi and asked if she was okay and suggested that perhaps they should cancel the sleepover after all. Naegi shook her head said that she didn't want to be alone, she wanted to have a good time and forget recent events. Sakakura chimed him from he was standing.
"It's better to surround yourself with friends right now. You should have that get together like you planned. By the way, you should get down to the station. Here, I'll give you a ride."
"Wait wait wait!" Junko Enoshima pushed herself to the front. She thrust a black long sleeved shirt in Naegi's arms. " You weren't planning on going down to the station in your bra and shorts were you?" Naegi smiled at her gratefully and turned around so she could put on the shirt. Togami placed himself in front of her so no one could see and a minute later they were in Sakakura's car on their way to the station.
Naegi relayed everything that happened to the cops and that she had felt someone following her the last few weeks but hadn't been sure. According to the police, the molesters name was Taichi Karasawa, thirty-seven years old and apparently this was not the first time police had apprehended him. This was the third school that he'd broken into and stolen clothes belonging to some of the female students. However, it seems this was his first attempt at making contact with one of his victims.
The police had found a backpack belonging to the suspect containing women's underwear, some LSD and a bunch of photographs of Naegi from different angles and different days. The suspect in question denied owning the pictures and the drugs but proudly claimed that he did steal the underwear. Naegi frowned at that but the police assured her that all the evidence that they gathered so far points to Taichi stalking her at school and that he would be going away for a while.
When Naegi exited the office, Togami was patiently waiting for her. She relayed what the cops told her and said everything was over. Togami let out a relieved sigh and called his driver to pick them up. A few minutes later a limo parked in front of them and the driver went up to Naegi.
"Miss Naegi, are you alright? I heard the news from Master Togami." Naegi smiled.
"I'm alright Hideki, how have you been? Did you dye your hair black again?" Hideki smiled sheepishly.
"My wife said brown wasn't my color."
"Well, I think it looked good. But this ones nice too."
"Ahem."
Naegi and Hideki both turned towards Togami.
"Ah right. You both must be tired. Ill take you back to the dorms." Hideki hurridly opened the door and once Naegi and Togami were inside, he began to drive.
"Did it work?" Dmtri asked leaning on the wall.
Christoph hanged up his phone and said, "According to our informant, everything went according to plan. All the blame will be put to that Taichi fellow. With all the evidence pointing towards him, the girl will put her guard down."
Sitting down on one of the chairs, Chad rubbed his hands together and gave grin. "So when do we strike boss?"
Dmitri thought about it. "We'll give her a few months of freedom. School break starts Friday after school, so the student will be back around August. There's a certain event that the school does every year. That's when we'll strike. In the meantime, we should head to the other cities and gather more girls for the next auction in a few weeks."
Christoph and Chad gave a salute and walked away. Left alone, Dmitri pulled out the last photo copy of Naegi Makoto from his pocket.
"Enjoy your last moments of freedom my dear. I can't wait to meet you."
