Disclaimer: I do not own PoT. Sorry if this was long, I had no choice .
Chapter 22: Investigation part 1
It has only been 4 days since the Seigaku regulars bunked over into Tezuka's residence, but the rumors were growing immensely. For among the flock of regulars sat a very meek little lamb Ryuuzaki Sakuno. It was a given that she was walked to school by the team captain Tezuka Kunimitsu, but it was said he was doing it under Sakuno's grandmother's wishes.
But things were getting rather suspicious, the fans for every team member wanted to find out what is the situation exactly. Thus they paid someone to spy on Sakuno on her every move. For the task, they specifically chose the secretary of the news club Misao.
Misao was a girl on a mission, there was nothing that she could not find out, being the secretary of the news club, she knew almost everything on what the regulars do and when they leave. Even if the fan clubs had not hired Misao, she would have went on the trail anyway, for she was curious too. It was strange for many reasons...
Reason 1: Sakuno carries a duckling around and the duckling as observed obeys Tezuka and pecks the other team members.
Reason 2: The regulars leave school only to come to school supporting more cuts and injuries of what seems to be duckling attacks.
Reason 3: The regular's training schedule seems to be lighter than usual, yet the regulars managed to look utterly exhausted and somewhat afraid to go home.
Misao was more than ready, this was suspicious and there is only one logical solution. The regulars were having a secret and perhaps Sakuno is in the middle of all this. It has been of recent times that Sakuno was labeled 'Target', she was lucky she hadn't been attacked yet. Because no one from the fan clubs believed her to be a threat, after all she was a member of the Ryoma Echizen fan club.
Since her best friend was chairwomen of the fan club (because now she is only running it halfheartedly) Sakuno was given support and in turn she tells them what she has learned so they can complete their complied information on Ryoma.
It was no surprise that she was hunted, Eiji always leaps at her and only her, Momoshiro talks to her in a friendly manner and practically begs her to bring him lunch every day, Kaidoh is willing to sit next to Sakuno and listen to her speak for longer than any other girl could have gotten him to stay for, Oishi is doting to all people but they were pretty sure when they talk about Sakuno in front of Oishi his eyes will twinkle even if it was for a small split second.
Fuji is a sadist, but he is very sadistic when it comes to men surrounding Sakuno, Kawamura can manage only manage to speak to Sakuno when he was without his tennis racquet and when he was in racquet tennis fire mode he would never hit her or scream at her, Tezuka is extremely brotherly to her, he helps her with many of her things and is the extreme protective brother or so they choose to believe (because they believe Tezuka would choose someone WAY different) and finally Ryoma actually sticks up for her and allows her to stay close to him, plus he relies on her a lot if he needed a female counterpart to do something. (the duckling project was his).
Misao went to Sakuno's class to find the Ryoma fan club chairwoman, if there was anyone who would spill secrets, it would be her. It was easy to get information out of her and thus Misao's quest begins.
"Sumimasen, Osakada Tomoka?"
Tomoka wasn't looking her best recently, it was known that Horio and the chick was driving her bonkers. According to many of her classmates they believed the chick had unbelievably inherited Osakada's gift of loud voice and Horio's gift of gab which was a bad combination indeed. When the chick feels the need to squeak about anything it would do it in many squeaks plus a high pitch kind of voice.
Osakada's parents and Horio's parents had already decided to go on a long holiday, leaving Osakada to live with Horio, and many people know the end result of that. Plenty of pain and torture for both members, at least it teaches them how horrifying a combination they can prove to be. And perhaps they would change their habits.
"...yes?"
Tomoka asked in a drained voice which was softer and much quieter, Misao blinked, she seemed so tired and she wasn't best interviewed better to eavasdrop so she decided on another person to start with intsead..
"Is Horio-kun around?"
Tomoka looked at Misao as if she had just gone barking mad. Horio? He was sitting there with their baby... oh yes... this monster was definitely theirs... You can see him in plain sight whereas Tomoka was seated some obscure spot trying to steal some long loss sleep! She could have just called Horio, why did she make the drifting to sleep Tomoka come and answer her? She would have shouted at her provided she still had anymore voice left after trying to compete with the baby in their voice level. Horio probably went deaf already.
"h...Ho..horio..."
Tomoka tapped Horio on the shoulder, he turns to look at Tomoka, his face looked pretty colourless as well.
"Yes Tomoka?"
"so...someone wants to see you..."
Tomoka unwillingly took the monster from his side and allowed him to see this strange girl with strange ways. Horio was somewhat glad to have the burden taken off him, walked slightly light headed as he arrived at the door to see a girl. Perhaps with him chattering lesser, the girls are more willing to approach him.
Horio was pretty tired competing with his baby on who was a better chatterbox, so he decided to play the passive role. Now he barely ever says more than 5 sentences in one conversation.
"Yes?"
Misao stretched out her hand as she introduced herself.
"Hello, my name is Misao. I am the secretary of the news club. I would like to ask you a few questions regarding..."
Horio wondered, was it really that big a difference if he did not use his voice? Everyone seems rather celebratory on his lack of enthusiasm. Even his arrogance has turned down several notches. What can one do when a baby resembles you? Change yourself.
He has been trying to get Ryoma to change partners with him, but for odd reasons or another, Ryoma seemed to have darken on that point of view. He wondered though, why did their chick inherit their personalities? It just did not make any sense.
They weren't the only ones, the other chicks seemed to have been inheriting some bits of their personalities from their pseudo parents. It was just that theirs were so much more obvious because the teacher now days made a small store room for the chicks each labeled so the partners can tell which was which. However, they knew the teacher made it specifically for their little baby. For it makes too much noise to be an average chick anymore. The teacher in charge did say that their report would be very interesting to read.
"...Sakuno..."
Horio snapped out of his reverie, now this was strange, so this wasn't about him. It was about Sakuno. What a surprise, because Sakuno was not very popular around school. No one really notices her unless Tomoka was next to her or the Seigaku regulars. Without them, she was pretty much invisible.
"What about Sakuno?"
Horio asked in a less than enthusiastic way, he was very tired, so he wasn't entirely too bothered.
"Well, I would like to know why is Sakuno travelling to school with the whole gang of Seigaku regulars."
Horio really didn't know why, he wasn't all too free lately to go around snooping and he was less enthusiastic about that after his chick decided to show Tomoka where he stashed his hentai magazines. Tomoka was not entirely surprised, she said her little brother has one of them and that she was used to boys having such items in their house.
Horio thought personally she would be the only one on the matter. Enough about TOMOKA and the BABY, he replied
"Honestly, I don't know... I have been busy."
With that Horio turned his head to see Tomoka trying to write up their chick diary as the chick pecked the table annoyingly. Misao felt like this change in personalities of Tomoka and Horio was not working to her favor, because now Horio knows nothing and Tomoka barely spoke louder than all the other girls in class. Misao clenched her fist onto her pencil hoping there was some other information they can get out of him.
"So how is Sakuno's duckling faring?"
Horio knew more or less something about it that was strange yet normal.
"It has been much better than ours. Funny fact is that instead of being more attached to Ryoma, it is more attached to our buchou."
Now this was news, Misao's eyes gleamed in hope and quickly leaped onto the sentence like a hungry wolf.
"Really? Shouldn't it be more attached to Ryoma?"
Horio nodded in agreement.
"Well yeah, but I can totally understand. I mean why the duck was so attached to Sakuno was probably because he had imprinted her as the mother."
Misao nodded in agreement, hoping to get more than short answers she pushed on trying to grasp at anything that is suspicious.
"I see... so why do you think it would follow your buchou?"
Horio shrugged, there was only one possibility he could think of, but it may mean laps. She is from the news club, he wouldn't risk it. In case something happens, he was exhausted enough without laps that he ran before practice.
"I don't know. Why not ask Ryuuzaki? She's just coming back from helping the teacher..."
Before Misao could reject, Horio called Sakuno over before he himself went to help Tomoka with the small little devil.
"Hai?"
Sakuno asked in a polite way. Misao evaluated her before she understood why so many of the fan club members would rather leave her alone. If they did anything to her, it felt like they were doing Satan a favor.
She was too nice and kind to do anything devious as many people could see other girls doing. She had decent looks but one that doesn't seem like the type to attract their handsome men of Seigaku.
"I am Misao, secretary of the News club. Can I ask you some questions?"
Sakuno thought to herself, something was strange. A girl who was pretty much invisible to Seishun gakuen high being interviewed? Hopefully they hadn't found anything yet. Misao noting that Sakuno looked rather wary of Misao decided to not ask her, better find a topic that sounded less suspicious as what is your relationship with the Seigaku team captain Tezuka Kunimitsu?
It would just increase the wary behavior and if what Misao believes is true, there would not be a chance to catch anything.
"Ok..."
"I would like to ask you about the chick project,"
Sakuno lighten up considerably, perhaps it was regards to this strange and intriguing system of marking and assessing their students.
"Anything I could do to help."
"Well, I was wondering about this chick project. Rumors have it that it would resemble the pseudo parent's personality?"
Sakuno jogged her memory, well it does, but if she agrees many people will be able to tell that Tezuka was most likely the guy whose personality the duck has picked up.
"I am not sure, Tomoka-san's chick seemed to be an example..."
Misao assessed the girl, if Misao were given a chance, she would really want to stay away from harming this girl as much as possible. She was harmless, absolutely harmless and so innocent. There was no way she would scheme anything. But being a reporter, one must discard all these feelings, as one says a journals eyewitness is the most important factor. What I see with my eyes and have a picture to show is the truth.
Ryoma who was waking up due to Tomoka's hell of a baby turned and noticed Sakuno and the unknown girl. He asked Horio who was she, Horio thinking Ryoma liked Misao told him she was the secretary from the news club.
Ryoma knew that was suspicious, and he should do something about it, he didn't want any trouble to fall upon her. He may seem like he is indifferent, but he still would do anything to protect her, and knowing more about her made him even more protective. Ryoma stood up and walked towards Sakuno and this Misao.
"So..."
"Ryuuzaki."
A familiar cold voice called out to Sakuno as she turned to see Ryoma appearing. She was somewhat relieved that Ryoma was here, for one, Ryoma always shows up when he perceives something is suspicious or dangerous, and he was pretty helpful whenever he showed it. He was in other words a prince charming.
Although her feelings faded over time, but her gratitude and appreciation of what he does for her never changed.
"Ryoma-kun?"
Ryoma scanned the girl top to toe and then turned his head to see Sakuno. Internally he noticed she looked rather relieved that he appeared. Had this woman asked awkward questions? Did she place Sakuno in any threatening disposition?
'Beat that Tezuka! I am the hero.'
Honestly Ryoma doesn't really care about defeating Tezuka, he just wanted to make sure she was fine.
"Ryuuzaki class is about to start, I need you to keep me awake."
"Hai!"
Sakuno nodded as she excused herself from Misao and walked alongside Ryoma as they went to take up their respective seats. Misao realizing that this means the conversation was over did make a quick note: Ryoma Echizen is protective when it comes to Sakuno.
She will have no choice but to follow Sakuno. See her behavior.
To be Cont.
Honestly this was long... when I wrote it intially and now... never changed in length. I hate it sorry, it was long. Bear with me = X