The table was empty of the usual chatter, the only sounds being the birds chirping and the sounds of the street floating up to the empty balcony.

Sipping away at her tea, Seia let the other two stew in the silence, purposefully making her sips louder than usual as she enjoyed the view of Nagisa squirming uncomfortably.

It was a game of bluff, mano a mano , and the loser was already decided.

"I told you so." Nagisa jumped as Seia placed down her cup and spoke, with not a little smugness in her voice. In fact, the smugness was overflowing from every single word she said, her smile that of the fox that ate the canary.

"Well… that is… yes…" Nagisa's voice trailed off as she knew that yes, Seia did say going to Abydos was a bad idea, and she still did it anyway.

"So what are the two of you going to do? Oh my, these chelsea buns are delicious. Where did you get these from?"

"A new bakery that opened up. I'll text you the address later. As for what…" Nagisa's head hung low. "I don't know."

Seia pointed towards Mika. "Is that why she's been like this all day?" The pinkette's head laid on the table, facing away from both of them. A breach in manners, but among friends manners mattered less, and technically speaking she wasn't a part of the Tea Party anymore. Technically. While her actions had caused her reputation to collapse, Pater was still finding someone to pick up the mantle, so until then it was accepted that she would stay there as the unofficial representative.

"Yes well, it was rather hard on her…" Seia shook her head in disbelief. 'Rather hard' was an understatement, in the same way that saying murder was a mild social deviance was an understatement. Mika had been like this since the two of them had come back from their fact-finding trip to Abydos, and her mood hadn't improved at all in that time.

"So? Are you two just going to mope then?"

Nagisa twitched. "I beg your pardon? What did you just say?"

Seia leaned over the table, looking her in the eyes. "I said, are the two of you just going to sit around going 'woe is me' while anticipating someone to tell Sensei what the two of you did and for his wrath to fall on you?" Ignoring Nagisa's shaking hands, Seia continued, "Honestly, how did the two of you even manage while I was in a coma? Is that why you immediately went out looking for heads?"

Glaring at Seia from the corner of her eye, Nagisa sipped at her tea before dignifying her with a response. Seia would have said she was trying to come up with a response. "You try finding a traitor while keeping it under wraps! It wasn't easy, you know!"

' You nearly burnt all your personal ties to find the traitor and in the end it took the real traitor revealing herself for you to find them' , Seia didn't say. Instead, she just shook her head and let Nagisa have her continue.

"Besides," Nagisa continued, "do you think you could've done much better? I tried my best to do what I could with what I had."

' She fell for it.' Hiding her smirk, Seia relaxed her body. "You hid yourself while letting others do the work, solving nothing in the process. And now, you're so scared you might've crossed the person who helped you that you're reverting to old behaviours." Seeing Nagisa twitch, Seia knew she had her. "Honestly, all over a silly little c-" A loud bang came from the table as Nagisa slammed her hands on it.

"That," Nagisa whispered, "was uncalled for."

Seia nodded. "It was. But you understand what I'm saying, right?"

Without saying a word, Nagisa grabbed Mika by the scruff of her dress and hoisted her up to her feet. "Mika! We're going!" Nagisa said, sharply.

"N-Nagi?! Where?!"

"To Schale!" Dragging a loudly protesting and panicking Mika, Nagisa slowly disappeared from view, allowing Seia to collapse into her chair.

"Honestly, does she really think Sensei would be that petty?..." She greedily drank her tea, allowing her dry mouth to soothe itself, while Nagisa's furious expression ran through her mind. "...I'll apologise to her later."

"But first..." She took out her phone.

Despite what she had said to Mika, Nagisa had no plan whatsoever, and only on the way there did she think about what she was going to do.

She had come up with exactly one idea that would probably work. The others had too many unknowns, too many variables out of her control, that they were discarded almost immediately.

"Uhm… Nagi? Are we really doing this?" Mika was still unsure of their course of action, but couldn't she see that it was the optimal way forward? That this was the only surefire way that no matter how much Sensei h-hated them for going behind his back and intruding on his privacy, he would definitely forgive them?!

"Nagi?" But wait! What if he still didn't forgive them even with this?! What if his anger required more?! B-b-b-b-b-but the only way to go further would be to-

"NAGI!" Mika's shouting snapped Nagisa out of her thoughts. "Are we seriously going to do this?!"

Irritated, Nagisa snapped back. "Of course we are! This is the most likely way he will forgive us!"

Red-faced, with her arms covering herself, Mika was a far cry from the boisterous gorilla she usually acted like. "But do we really have to wear bunny suits?!"

Clad in a pink bunny suit with matching rabbit ear headbands, with her usual tights on, the one-size too small leotard that made her large breasts look like they were about to burst out, Mika was the perfect image for eroticism, a pink haired goddess of fertility clad so skimpily no man would be able to resist her, and her adorable expressions.

Nagisa was, of course, wearing a similar outfit. Her leotard was white instead, but similarly smaller than comfortable, a calculated move to ensure that Sensei's eyes would be drawn to their bodies (even if the way it squeezed their bodies was incredibly uncomfortable). While Nagisa was usually a modest individual, at this moment, she was incredibly confident that no matter what mood Sensei was in, he would be unable to resist the two of them together.

"Of course we do. After all, how else are we going to seduce Sensei to ensure his anger dissipates itself after we confess what we did?"

Mika stared at her like she had grown a second head. "Nagi, are you mad? Have you gone insane?"

"You were the one who was crying! Meanwhile, I've come up with an idea to get us out of this situation!"

"B-by throwing away our dignity?" The sentence came out as a screech, as Mika's face bloomed red like a rose.

Nagisa held her head up high as she looked right into Mika's eyes. "One must be prepared to sacrifice everything."

"Ahahaha… Nagi has gone mad… it must be my fault… all the stress I put on her caused her to snap…" Ignoring Mika's words, Nagisa confidently turned towards the door and made to knock, only for the door to swing open by itself.

And for Sensei to be standing in the doorway, staring at the two of them.

Not a word passed between the three of them for what felt like hours, until the silence was broken by him awkwardly coughing. "Uh, did Halloween come early this year?"

I let the two of them get comfortable as we sat down around the table, the blush on Mika's face still as bright as the sun.

"So, uh, interesting outfits." I gestured towards them. Interesting was not necessarily the right word for this situation, but given what I knew Nagisa was here for, I felt understatement was the right move.

Said girl was strutting like a peacock, metaphorically speaking. In truth, she was trying her best to show off her chest, leaning forward to emphasise her cleavage as she tried to seduce me in the awkward manner of a hormonal teenager trying to seduce someone to get out of trouble.

Maybe if I was a decade or two younger I would fall for it, but I had experience on my side, and more importantly, seen much larger ones. Both fully clothed and naked.

She had passed them down to Yume, after all.

"Thank you Sensei," Nagisa said, trying and failing to look like a dignified woman showing off just a little too much skin. "We thought it might be a good change from the usual-"

"A good change?" I muttered.

"-and we thought we should get an opinion on it." She finished. Holding her hands out, she stood up and gave a little twirl, finishing with a wink at the end. "How does it look?"

"Well, I think Mika is going to explode in a few minutes." Her face was nearly completely red, from her chin to her ears, in embarrassment. I put on my best thinking expression, with my hand on my chin, and continued. "Besides that? You do make it look good, both of you. The contrast between your usual outfits and this would definitely make some folks happy." Nagisa preened as Mika became even redder. "But, you shouldn't really shout your plans outside the door." I gestured towards it. "The soundproofing sucks."

Instantly, Nagisa broke out into a cold sweat, while Mika buried her face into her hands. I could see Nagisa darting her eyes around, and I quickly continued before she did something. "Now, uh, I'm flattered really, but I won't get angry no matter what you two did, you know? So just feel free to tell me what's on your mind-"

"I'm sorry Sensei!" Wailing loudly, Mika cut me off. "We went heard the rumours going around, and that time you were sleeping over I heard you say something, so I did some digging and found your daughters name and we went to Abydos to see if we could talk to her but then after talking to Hoshino we found out what happened to her and your wife and we just felt so horrible about it and we wanted to apologise but then Nagi had this stupid idea and I followed her like an idiot and now we're here and I'm sorrrrryyyyyyyyy!" The words came like an avalanche, and by the time it was over the girl was sobbing into her hands, the light sounds of weeping a backdrop of noise over the silence in the room.

Avoiding my eyes, Nagisa spoke. "I-it is as she said, Sensei." She bowed deeply. "I'm sorry for betraying the trust you placed in us."

I sat there watching it unfold, absolutely flabbergasted. When I was sleeping over… that time she got me locked in her dorm? I remembered having a bad dream then, I must have been speaking in my sleep as well. But more to the point…

"There's nothing to apologise about though?" As he spoke, his tone was full of emotions, amusement, confusion, concern… but not anger.

Nagisa felt a warm hand on her head, ruffling her hair gently. "I wasn't exactly hiding anything, just not mentioning it. And it's not like I wear a ring or anything or keep photos around." A low chuckle, followed by something muttered too softly for her to hear.

"You're not angry?" A pang of anger flashed through Nagisa at herself for letting her voice crack on the sentence, but the hand mussing up her hair just redoubled its efforts.

"Why would I be? It's about things that happened years ago, that I never even mentioned anything about. If Yume was still around, you wouldn't be here apologising, would you?" Another chuckle. "You'd just have a nice chat with her about the past and that would be it. It's just bad circumstances, that's all."

The hand left her head, and before she could feel sadness over it she felt it gently tugging her chin. "So come on, look at me."

She closed her eyes and followed it, fully braced for whatever that would happen.

Only to be met with a fatherly face smiling at her, filled with concern for her wellbeing. "There we go." A tender tissue dabbed at her eyes, and touching them she was surprised to find there were tears in them. When was the last time?…

"Come here Mika, let's clean you up." Doing the same for Mika, it gave Nagisa a chance to think without the panic clouding her thoughts. What was she even doing? When had Sensei been anything but fair to them? ' I ought to have trusted Seia more… '

A cloth fell over her shoulders, and before she could jump she heard a voice coming from behind her. "Here." After draping another blanket around Mika, he sat back down opposite them.

"If there's anything you want to ask, I'll try to answer it as best as I can." He gave that silly smile he always made, the one that made Nagisa's heart flutter. "And don't worry you two, I won't stare." He gave a wink, and it made Nagisa realise just how much the bunny suit showed off.

She couldn't hide the blush that covered her face, or the smile when she batted Mika for teasing her about it.

Sorted

The message from Sensei was short but comforting. Letting out a breath she didn't realise she was holding, Seia looked out at the trees, and listened to the birds chirping.

Another peaceful day in Kivotos.

Authors note: This is probably the end, unless they bring back Yume from the dead. In which case, I have ideas.