We finally make it to our destination without much further incident. We all pile off the bullet train and wait in the terminal lobby for a while due to the octopus being ill from the train ride. Kanzaki and Kayano sit on a couch across from the exhausted and nauseated creature. I shamelessly take a seat on the floor about a foot away from them.
"We should go over the itinerary for tomorrow while we're waiting here," Kanzaki suggests in her soft voice.
I nod in agreement and Kayano gives an enthusiastic nod of her own. Kayano zips open her bag and scrounges through the bag for a couple of minutes before coming to an unfortunate realization.
"That's strange… It's not in here. I could have sworn I put it in my bag before we left," she mumbles, clearly confused about the disappearance of the item.
This revelation causes dread to form in my stomach, though I have no idea why. I shift uncomfortably on the floor, trying to make the unwanted feeling go away. After a short back and forth about the strangeness of the situation and the recovery of the octopus we head to our inn. As we file inside, Mr. Karasuma pulls me aside before I can enter the building. He waits for the last of the students to go inside before he starts speaking.
"Unfourtantly, due to the school's denial, we couldn't get you a separate accommodation so you're going to have to sleep with the other boys to maintain your cover," he explains in an empathetic tone.
I kind of figured that was going to be the case, but still, the prospect of sleeping in a room full of teenage boys feels weird. Despite that feeling, I just give him an understanding nod in return, not bothering to tell him about Karma. With that issue now settled, we finally enter the building as well. I reach the room where all the boys are going to be sleeping to find Karma waiting outside. He's already managed to change into a casual yukata to sleep in. In his hands appears to be another sleeping yukata.
"I wouldn't go in there yet. Well, unless you are interested in seeing our classmates without clothes," Karma informs, his mouth curling into an evil smirk as he speaks the last sentence. He offers the clothing in his possession towards me. I roll my eyes as I gratefully grab the sleepwear from him. "That'll give us some time to talk too. Let's go somewhere else though," he adds once I secure the clothing in my arms.
I give a slight nod, an agreement to follow him. With that, he begins down the hallway with me following close behind. I follow him down the hallways until we're far enough away from the rooms our classmates are staying in and the bathrooms. We both check up and down the hallway before either of us dares to speak.
"When exactly did you figure out that I wasn't a boy?" I question first after confirming there isn't anyone nearby.
"After you explained why you don't talk," he immediately answered with total confidence.
He figured it out that quickly. He's known this entire time and somehow I didn't even notice. With this information revealed, all of his strange behavior towards me suddenly seems to be explained.
"Alright… Then, if you knew from the beginning, why do you keep hanging around me?" I ask after a moment of contemplation.
"I wanted to know exactly why you were hiding you were a girl. I have part of the answer but only you can tell the full story. What's the point of your dad forcing you to hide you're a girl?" He answers almost instantly, adding a question of your own.
"It's because all I am is a mistake. I was born a mistake and I'll die as a mistake. All I have ever been and all I will ever be is a mistake. I just don't understand how you aren't disgusted by me. I can't even stand myself," My reply comes out low and shaky in my efforts to keep my emotions from spilling over.
My gaze flicks to the floor as the words fall from my mouth. It's silent for a moment, Karma clearly at a loss for words. After a long, heavy silence I decide to put an end to it.
"I gotta go changed, so please excuse me," I manage to mutter out, turning my back on the red-haired boy.
Before I can get very far, my arm is grabbed and I'm turned around. Karma pulls me into a tight hug, not saying a single word. I feel anxiety well up inside me from the physical contact. I stand there dumbfounded for a moment, unable to fully process this situation.
Why is Karma hugging me? I don't understand. Isn't he disgusted by me?
Trying to pull myself from Karma's embrace, he only wraps his arms around me tighter, preventing my escape. After a few more moments, I finally allow myself to relax enough to hug him back. The feeling of having his arms wrapped around me like this makes my heart rate increase, my stomach to do backflips, and my chest to feel warm and light. Closing my eyes, I allow myself to feel these feelings for another moment before pulling away. This time Karma allows me to free myself from his embrace. We walk back down the hallway together, neither of us bothering to speak a word. I get changed once we reach the bathrooms and we enter the boys' room together. By the time we get there, all the boys are either already asleep or sitting up on their futons and chatting in little groups. We each grab an empty futon and almost immediately I'm asleep.
Getting restful sleep for the first time in my life. The morning passes uneventfully and soon we're off to do whatever in our individual groups. Kanzaki, Sugino, Okuda, Kayano, Nagisa, Karma, and I all spend the day eating various street foods, seeing the sights, and exploring the city. As we walk down the city sidewalk and approach one of the sniper points, my groupmates begin to excitedly chatter about assassination and its relation to the field trip. Something about their eagerness makes my heart feel bitter.
"It must be pretty amazing to be in a place like this when you're a real assassin," Nagisa comments, clearly referencing me.
All eyes land on me and for some reason the attention irritates me. They're all looking at me with such excited expressions, except Karma, of course, he's playing it cool as always. I just give a half-hearted shrug and push past the lot of them, taking a bite from my crepe filled with green tea ice cream.
"Look who's trying to play it cool," Sugino tosses out playfully, slinging an arm around my shoulders.
I brush off his arm and continue down the path without acknowledging his words. Why is everyone so enthusiastic about assassination? It's not a glamorous job. It's dirty and should only be done by dirty people. I take another angry bite from my tasty treat, not wanting to be a part of the conversation anymore.
"Well he does it for a living, I'm sure that's the last thing he wants to talk about on vacation," Karma butts in, as if reading my mind and putting an end to the conversation.
With that, the discussion changes to the next thing on our agenda, Yashika shrine. Karma asks if the lot of us could get some coffee first and we all agree. We make our way to an alleyway as it's fairly common to have restaurants tucked away in such places. As we enter the alleyway I notice, from the corner of my eye, some older-looking boys, maybe in their late teens, loitering nearby. Once we all fully step into the dark alley, the boys follow us, concealing themselves but clearly tailing us. I grit my teeth, having a strong feeling of what's about to happen. Catching up to Karma, I tug on his sleeve urgently.
"We're being followed, be ready in case of an ambush,' I whisper into Karma's ear, not minding that we're still around our peers due to the importance of the situation.
He gives me an understanding nod in response as we trek on. Karma makes his way to the front of the group as our classmates chatter on, unaware of the lurking danger.
"-secluded, lots of good hiding places, it's ideal for assassination. That's why I made sure to put it on the itinerary," Kanzaki explains happily, clearly just as invested in assassination as the others.
With no time to be irritated about the conversation shifting back to assassination, I pull the knife I always keep on me from its sheath, preparing myself for a fight.
"Ideal is right. It's also a great spot for kidnappers to plan their trade," a man's voice speaks up as three boys appear in front of us.
Shit. There's more of them than I thought. This might get a little hairy if we aren't careful. I think to myself as I hear the footsteps of eight more teen boys approach from behind. Spinning on my heels to face them, I bring my knife up waiting for them to make the first move.
"Looky here, this one's got a knife. Don't make things more difficult than they have to be kid," The teen right in front of me says, cocking his head to the side.
"I hope you don't take this the wrong way but, you gentlemen don't seem to be tourists," Karma tosses out cooly, keeping his composer despite the situation.
"Don't try to be a hero carrot top, hand over your lady friends and we'll-" his sentence is cut off by the unmistakable sound of a body hitting the asphalt.
I take that as my cue as I rush toward the boy closest to me. Thrusting my knife right for his face, he side-steps me causing me to miss completely. I can hear more commotion from Karma's end. He seems to be handling himself well, I should hurry up and take care of these guys before they can hurt anyone. I go for another swipe at him, this time aimed right for his chest. No luck once again as he evades my attack with ease.
"Hey! Let go of me!" I hear Kayano call out, catching my attention.
Some of the boys slipped past me while I was trying to handle things and are now holding Kanzaki and Kayano hostage. Before I can rush to the rescue my legs are swept from beneath me and I'm hitting the ground. My gaze shifts to Karma right as he's being hit from behind and plummeting to the ground.
"KARMA!" I scream out desperately, my mind now fixed on nothing but going to him.
As I try to scramble to my feet, I'm pulled up by my wig.
"What's this? You really sounded like a girl just now, how about you say something else sweetheart," the teen coos, a smug grin crossing his face.
"Fuck you," I spit, as I bring my knife up to stab his hand.
Before my weapon can reach its destination, my arm is grabbed, stopping me from freeing myself. The knife is pried from my hand and tossed away like a piece of trash. With another yank of my fake hair, my wig slips from my head, the glue once holding it in place now long gone. My hair, now free from its prison inside of the wig, falls down around me, revealing the truth to everyone around me. Before I can make any moves I'm scooped up from the ground and tossed over a shoulder. I beat relentlessly against the back of my captor, trying to make him falter.
"Well, what a pleasant little surprise. You're not bad on the eyes either. Such a shame you were hiding yourself like that. I'll make sure to make you feel extra special," another teen, the one I was trying to slice earlier, says, bending over enough so we're eye level.
I spit on his face in defiance, and knee my captor in the chest with as much strength I could muster.
"Damn it, hold still. Don't make me do something rash in front of all your little friends," my captor spits out angrily, holding my legs tighter than before, giving me no more room to move them.
The other teen, who I assume to be some sort of leader for this bunch, wipes the spit from his face. He glares at me and grabs my chin roughly, his hand still wet with my saliva.
"Oh, so you like it a little rough then. Don't worry, I'll give you what you want. It's going to be fun taming you," He hisses, clearly pissed off by my actions. "Let's go boys, bring around the car," he calls out loudly.
I grit my teeth as we begin to move and then are tossed into the backseat of a car. Shortly after the car starts up and pulls away. Away from the alleyway, away from safety, away from Karma. We seem to drive for an eternity until we stop and are pulled out from the backseat. We enter some type of building. Trying to take in as much of our surroundings as I can, I figure it's an abandoned warehouse or something akin to that.
This is bad. There's no telling how far we are from the abduction point and we are very outnumbered. I might be able to get the other two out but I'd have to use myself as a distraction. Also, there's no telling if I could get them to agree to sacrifice one of their classmates. That thing has most likely already been alerted to the situation by now so if I can just hold them off until he arrives everything should work out.
While lost in my quiet contemplation, the three of us are tossed onto the dirty concrete floor. Once the three of us right ourselves, the 11 teenage boys that abducted us crowd around us.
"I gave our buddies a call, and they're in. We're gonna have ourselves a little commemorative photoshoot with you gals. Feel free to scream, no one will hear you except us," The leader of the group explains, looking over the three of us carefully. His eyes linger on Kanzaki. "You," he starts again. "I've seen you somewhere before right? Yeah… last year in Tokyo. I got a pic of you in that arcade," He continues pulling out a flip phone and showing for all to see a picture of Kanzaki leaning against a counter in an arcade, holding some kind of drink.
"Don't try to deny it. One of my boys spotted ya first, said to be on the lookout for a party girl. I was gonna take you then, but you gave me the slip before I could find ya." He pulls the phone away and leans into Kanzaki's face. "Who woulda figured you were going to that school for geniuses though? I get it though, the pressure gets to you. The higher you are the harder you wanna take a swan dive. Well, don't worry sweetheart, Professor ruin's gonna take all night teaching you to dive like a pro," He finally finishes, and with that, he and his buddies walk a few feet away to discuss whatever they need to discuss.
When he's enough out of earshot, I give an annoyed scoff at his words.
"Haven't met someone that full himself in a while," I mumble as I try to get a feel on how they tied my hands.
"We have a lot to talk about," Kayano states the obvious, casting a look in my direction.
Letting out a sigh, I pause my investigation of the rope for a moment.
"We do don't we? Would you like to start Kanzaki?" I ask trying to shift the conversation back to her.
"I think we should talk about how you were pretending to be a boy first," Kanzaki replies calmly, yet firmly.
"Fine, fine, I promise to explain all of the details at a later date, but I'll give you the basic run down now," I start, taking a deep breath. "I have been posing as a boy off and on for pretty much my whole life. I…I was born a mistake, and so to help hide that mistake from the world, I pretend to be boy. Though, for some of my missions in the last two years I've had to use being a woman to lure in some of my targets. Part of the reason for the disguise is to help keep me from getting too attached to anyone. After all, the people I'm around for my assignments are always temporary. Just passing faces in a sea of faces I'll never see again," Stating the facts about my life bluntly causes the two girls to look at me with a mixture of concern, sadness, and betrayal.
It's quiet for a long time as I go back to my restraints. The two girls talk amongst themselves, clearly keeping me out. My chest tightens in sadness at this fact. It's not like I can blame them, I lied to them and then basically told them that their friendships mean nothing to me. I know I shouldn't be so attached so why does it hurt so much? I only let those thoughts linger for a moment longer before shaking them away. I tug away at the knot, slowly but surely loosening the ropes from my wrists. Soon, I have them loose enough to where I can just slip them off.