9. The Triangle Part 2

Day: 4

Lunch break

"What are you!?"

"..."

"I can't hear you!"

"....."

"You are my damn girlfriend, it gives you no right to ignore me!" The boy growled as he used his height to try and intimidate the girl who he was currently bullying.

They were currently standing under a sakura tree, during the school's lunch break. What was meant to be a chill date turned to be a gloating session from the guy before things escalated and turned heated like this, though according to the girl, this conversation was bound to happen.

This is some weird insecurity lashing out going on here...  the girl internally thought as she was currently in a shouting match with her current boyfriend.

Well it was a very one sided shouting match going on right now. She was currently facing the brunt of it.

"Pay attention to me Aoi!.."

The boy was about to reach out and grab her face, probably from a desperate need of control.

Alright asshole this is your last straw.

Aoi got into a fighting stance, she widened her leg stance and stomped her feet, her arms outstretched and brought close to her face in a boxer pose, to warn the boy from approaching her any closer. her ponytail flew slightly with her sudden pose as she angrily glared at the guy, who stopped in his tracks seeing her change.

"What you gonna do asshole?? Huh?? Touch me right now and we break up!" The girl snarled in the guy's direction, fed up with his entire asshole routine.

The guy was a bit taken aback with her sudden show of courage, he snickered at her attempt which just made her madder.

"What are you talking about Aoi? Remember our watches? We are destined to be lovers... Look at you acting all moody and tough now, I remember the first day how you were a bubbly little dumbass and now look at you, all gone is your stupid cute act..."

Aoi had enough of his ranting and threw a roundhouse kick to his face.

He grabbed her leg with ease, smirking at her, showing off his quick reaction speed. However that was all part of her plan as she made sure to telegraph that one. She quickly switched to pivoting her hip in the other direction, she was floating in the air while using her other leg to land a clean impact on his face, rocking that face sideways as he staggered and took a few defensive steps back to recover from the shockwave that reverberated through his body. 

She had calculated that with the shock his grip on her other leg would loosen, so she could rely on that leg and thus not come crashing down. All went to planned as she landed on that leg swiftly.

He angrily glared in her direction, the place she landed looked like it was going to swell up. He winced when he touched the part she hit on his forehead before he lashed out to her.

"What is wrong with you?! Are you insane? This is going overboard over a small argument!"

Aoi defaulted back to her fighting pose, ready if he strikes her again.

Screw him, she was going to dump all her harboured angry feelings and be done with this fool. Screw those watches, this compatible stuff on the watches are a total scam.

This is an anti confession scene.

The sakura leaves danced as they floated down as she dumped all the hate she had been holding in since the day they first started dating.

"The moment I first saw you...I knew you were an asshole. I knew you were just a rude delinquent with no respect for girls, but when you first came to me saying my name was on your watch, and I saw your name on mine...I had no other choice."

She paused a moment, the guy seemingly was hard to read right now, but he was listening.

"The first couple days I was being my usual self, all wanting to make new friends in my new year and have fun. I was upbeat but naïve...I thought you were going to be my new best friend and lover. I ignored the red flags at first but the only reason you kept me around was for my attention and praise. You are a narcissist who just enjoys a girl to call a girlfriend without working a day for it. You think I am sub-human, insult me whenever but pretend its just all jokes and that I am paranoid. You gaslighted me because you knew you could not handle a real woman the right way.  but you were a walking red flag that was verbally abusive all the time. That is all not even considering you sneaking off to do your delinquent stuff in the background..."

That revelation seemed to trigger the guy as he spoke up for the first time during the trauma dump.

"You know about me doing delinquent shit?"

Oh of course that is all he cares about, just about himself and if I know his secret... Aoi sighed as she frowned and realised this entire thing was pointless. She started walking off, while the guy's voice was trailing behind her as she left. He was not following her but he was making sure she could hear.

"You can run away Aoi, but remember you are bound to me by the watches. Whoever you run off to you, know that you will end up coming back to me. Double crossing me would be the last mistake you ever do"

"Big talk for someone who just got his ass beat by a girl." responded back Aoi, knowing that it was going to be the trigger to set him off and have him stomping at her.

And just as she predicted, she could hear his grunts and thunderous footsteps.

Well she was going to be ready for him.

However just as she was about to whip around him and have him kneeling on the ground from pain, he was already doing that.

What...how?...

She then looked up and noticed that there was already a guy standing a few paces away from her, his knee raised as if he had just dealt a blow with it. Her ex was on the ground clutching is stomach as he was squirming and flailing all over the place.

The guy who had just kneed her attacker turned to face her, his face filled with concern. A karate band was tied around his forehead, and she trailed her eyes over his current getup, he was wearing a karate gi.

Must be a member of the karate club...I mean...no shit...

"Are you alright miss?"

This guy seemed super polite too, normally, if this was a comedy, I would probably retort that I already had the guy on my sights and then banter with him

But it felt nice to just be able to talk to someone else, almost refreshing after being stuck with a headache for the past 5 days.

Aoi smiled at the guy who helped her out, nodding at his question to show that she was fine before asking for his name.

"Well my name is..."

His watch rang as a goofy voice rang out, a voicemail from his 'friend' apparently rang out.

"Hey That kid! Go call your boss! I found one of the important pieces of the puzzle! Let's meet up in the football field!"

The voicemail ended and all the guy had was a look of disgust on his face.

"Well it was nice meeting you miss, looks like I have some stuff to tend to but I will catch up to you sometime soon!" He already started sprinting as he finished saying that.

"Oh...would we meet again, Mr I don't know your name!" Aoi yelled at him, seeing him get smaller as he went further out.

"Call me Kenji! And I will hopefully catch you soon again miss!"

"Kenji..." she said, making sure she heard his name right as she continued watching him run off.

Well thanks to him I didn't have to waste energy beating up my asshole ex, I will have to make it up to him sometime soon.

*****

"Okay what in the bondage is this!" The girl giggled to herself as she was currently tied to a chair, ropes all bound around her and keeping her secure in her place.

Just what felt like a few moments ago to her, she was making her way to lunch, writing down notes with her trusty notepad and pen when she suddenly felt that her eyes were super heavy. Now, after blinking for a few times, she now found herself in an empty room surrounded by four guys who were standing around her like guards.

She came to the quick conclusion that she was possibly knocked unconscious with a potent drink or fragrance, and was dragged here and tied up. Of course time seemed like it barely moved for her due to all the time lost was during her unconsciousness phase but with a quick glance at a functional clock on the wall in the room, it seemed she was gone for 15 minutes.

She sort of expected some retaliation, given she was running a journalist hit piece on the delinquent underground system, but to happen on such an extreme scale and so blatantly like this was almost laughable.

Once she gets out of this pickle, the journalism club would have so much material to work with.

Right now though, she wanted to have some little fun.

The four guys surrounding her however did not appreciate the joke, they were solemnly staring at her, arms crossed as they tried their best to be intimidating.

They were currently in an empty classroom, the blinds were drawn and the door slid shut. They were in one of the abandoned classrooms, left bare in case a new club was to be formed. But as of now, it was basically an empty room that the underground delinquents could use as a storage for their supply and weapons.

Or at times like this, an interrogation room.

"Why did you challenge to expose our boss?" One of the guys asked, approaching the girl, keeping eye contact with her to show that they were not messing around.

The girl maintained the eye contact as she smirked.

"There is so any things wrong with what you all are doing. Kidnapping a girl just because she was planning to expose your boss's actions to the school? This is some mafia stuff right here, but honestly? Despite the world of trouble you all would get into if anyone finds out, congratulations on having balls to pull of something like this."

The girl then quietly muttered under her breath, "..almost as if this world is a story and it rewards good drama, rather than being logical or something..."

The guy who asked her the question was not happy with her response, yet was unsure what to do next.

Noticing the hesitance of the guys surrounding her the girl sighed and then tried to understand what was going on.

"Let me get this straight, the four of you decided it would be best to kidnap me in the middle of a school day, and scare me into never trying to expose your boss? But you guys did not even think past step one so now you all are waiting stupidly for one of y'all to come with a plan to do something?"

With great resistance, the boys could not stop themselves from agreeing with her and nodding.

"Well gentlemen, sit close while I tell you the good method of interrogating a witness"

When they did not budge she sighed once again.

"This delinquent underground is a sorry state of affairs, so many little gangs with stupid members and even stupider leaders, its just a huge distraction that if you think deep enough was spurred by the government to create an illusion of freedom to the rebels in this broken system..."

She snapped out of her monologuing trance as her gold eyes studied the boys and noticed that they suddenly seemed like they were in deep thought.

She seemed like she was cracking through their thick skin.

"Listen, you all are pawns in gang wars that would just result in the bigger guys winning. The end results would not even satisfy your current bosses, in fact you all knuckleheads would be bashing heads with each other ,going at each other's throats for eternity, while we are all getting walked over by the ones in power..."

She paused to see the boys were now intently listening to her. She was impressed but not surprised by her persuasive power.

I should have just ran for school president instead of joining this stupid journalism club, heck, maybe it's time I change clubs...researching this is fun and all but I want a club where I can get a direct link into the underground, get a better picture.

The girl continued "...The end result is that you all become the fall guys for carrying out the sins of the behest of your leaders under the pretence ideology of loyalty, such as this stupid stunt you all pulled off, you guys know you cannot do anything to get information out of me, and you must have all realised that whatever you guys do to me I will still be able to identify you all next time so....let me go and we can handle this like real adults."

The silence was loud as the reality of the situation hit the boys slowly.

They saw that they were becoming monsters by pushing the limits of morality and slowly they judged themselves for the crimes they have just committed.

They all also had intense flashbacks, reminding them of the good days of when they were innocent before they succumbed to the dark side (while they were standing their having their own personal journey moments like anime characters do, the girl was patiently waiting for them to finish their dramatic turns).

After that, the boys decided it would be best if they let her go, apologise for the mishap and even as a extra step of gratitude, own up to the fact they had access to knockout drugs and to drop out of the delinquent system.

This will of course lead to them facing the consequences of their actions but with the girl feeling merciful maybe with her good word they would only get a suspension and will be enrolled into a rehabilitation course for students who act out.

All in all, she was able to get way more information on the gang mentality, the affiliation of some of the gang members and what they use for interrogation. All of this before the lunch bell even sounded.

After the boys untied her, severely apologising for their stupidity and left her to her own devices in the room, the girl went ahead and scouted the room. Any new piece of information she could make a mental note of would be helpful for her report afterwards.

*****

"Ah ha!" She yelled, spotting her deerstalker hat on the ground near where she was forced to sit. "Cannot do my smart detective stuff without the generic outfit for it! Thankfully those boys brought that along with them otherwise I would have been pissed!"

She tucked her lime green and yellow hair (there were strands of yellow in the mess of lime green) inside the hat so it does not look unruly and out of place when she wears it, and then decided that she was ready to have her lunch.

"Well after finishing my lunch and if there is any time left, I have got to also go investigate that football field, been hearing whispers of there been a bit of commotion going on there recently"

The girl spoke out loud to herself, just to remind herself what she had initially planned on doing, as she made her way out of the room.

"These delinquents are going to be the death of any unity and harmony in this school if we just let them grow and fester, it doesn't matter what happens, I must be their enemy and put an end to them anyway possible..."

She was now striding down the hallway, the recent altercation making her feel that she was on the right track.

"I, Detective Airi, will be the enemy of their stories, and will bring them to justice. I will make them realise that they are just part of a bigger game, and show them what is actually really important in life..."

With this silent vow (not silent since she was practically monologuing as she walked by) she was on her way to have a good lunch.