Spy's Act

 The day of the school festival has arrived, and Denji has made significant changes that severely deviate from the tradition, but the teachers succumbed to Denji due to his social standing. His father is not pleased but did not oppose him.

In the previous festivals, the school did not allow any outsiders that have no relation to the students and are not highly esteemed in the social ranking to attend. And all the activities only included a ball, party, eating, and drinking which is far more mundane to a common school’s festival. But Denji has changed that. He has researched and prepared for this festival extensively, and it is showing in his stature, but he didn’t let others worry for himself, and he persevered through the trials.

Booths and stalls are lined up in the spacious hallway. Many classrooms are converted to what their classes decided it should be. And the main event, the play, is about to start. Numerous people crowd in the auditorium as they struggle to get their seats in an orderly fashion. Many wanted to see Kurosaki’s son’s act on stage. Even the adults have attended solely for this. And Nana is on high alert.

“Where is Denji?” Nana asks worryingly.

“We don’t know. He is supposed to be here at this time. The play is about to start. Shouldn’t you know where he is?”

“Well, I do not know where he is,” Nana calls out Juusaki who is busily inspecting the stage behind the curtains that are to unravel when the action starts, “Hachiko-kun, do you know where Denji is?”

Juusaki faces her and shakes his head, “No, I don’t. He isn’t here yet?”

“Nope, not yet.”

“That’s unfortunate. No, that’s troubling,” Juusaki replies.

The cast of the play starts to discuss among themselves, “Denji is our main man. If we don’t have him here right now, we cannot continue with the play.”

“Can’t we replace him with another?” another member asks.

“We can’t do that. That’ll disappoint our guests. Many have come here for him, you know?” another reply.

“But Nana couldn't even find him. How can we ever have him? We can only delay and wait if Denji comes,” another state.

“It can’t be helped, can it? We must replace Denji, A-S-A-P!”

“Fine, but do you know his script?” the club leader asks as he faces a specific person.

“No I don’t,” that person shakes his head.

“I do!” a girl raises her hand.

“But you are a girl. That’s impossible,” the leader rejects, “the character’s a male lead. Is there a male who knows Denji’s script?”

The boys in the cast look at each other but shake their heads to one another, “None of us can.”

“I can,” Juusaki walks toward the commotion as he raises his hand, “I’m the scriptwriter after all.”

“Wait, you memorized the script? The entire script? You only wrote half of it,” the club leader asks.

“Denji rehearsed his script with me frequently. It’s only a matter of time before I can memorize it completely,” Juusaki replies.

“Then, let’s have Hachiko as our—”

“Wait!” a member interrupts and beckons them closer and whispers, “can he even act? He never produced any kind of expression.”

“That’s true…” they say as they ponder.

“I can act,” Juusaki butts in, “I memorized Denji’s expressions every time he read the script. I know precisely what to do,” Juusaki turns to Nana, “I’ll buy time. Find Denji for me.”

“Wait, but, they will notice the change in actors, won’t they?” Nana asks.

“Wait,” a member’s face brightens, “Juusaki is a genius! We can make it line up!” That member starts to explain, “You see the protagonist, in the early part of the story, is a different guy until the halfway point of the story. We can show character development by changing the actors!” And look, doesn’t he look similar to Denji, but younger?”

“Wait, him?” some of them say in disbelief as they simultaneously peer at Juusaki’s face.“Ah, he kinda does. He could be Denji’s sibling if he has one.”

“We can just place a little makeup to look as close as Denji.”

“Yeah! We can do that!”

“Sure, we will go with you, Hachiko-kun,” the leader of the club faces Nana, “when the scene where the male lead saves the female lead in the forest, you should have Denji with you. That is the halfway point. Juusaki will buy time for you.”

“Leave it to me!” Nana says as she rushes out the door.

“Alright, it’s time to start!”

“But we need to place make-up on Juusaki.”

“No, we don’t need. We want to let the audience see the difference as much as possible.”“Got it. We are ready!” one of the students hails.

The play has started, and the audience is shocked as they see a different actor portray the protagonist. Some of them look disappointed, some disrespectfully leave the auditorium. Nevertheless, many remained as they expect Denji to debut any time soon.

But as diligent as Nana searched for Denji, she failed to find him, and the play has reached its halfway point. The previously packed auditorium felt lonely now as half of the attendees has left the auditorium. The actors and actresses have demoralized and are distinguishably less spirited in their actions than before. But Nana kept on searching.

The climax of the story is where the male protagonist has to make a painful decision. The story is set in a fantasy setting. And that decision for the protagonist is to abdicate the throne or to abandon the princess. This dilemma occurred because that princess came from a foreign land. The prince who was to be king befriended her. And concerned that she would be in trouble when the royal officials knew of her background, she would be deported, or worse, executed as a spy, for their kingdoms are at war.

The protagonist has a brother who is older than him, and yet he wasn’t chosen as the heir of the throne. This planted jealousy into his heart causing him to find and expose faults in the innocent protagonist’s image to win the favor of his parents and the people. If he wins the favor of his parents, he claims the right to the throne. If he wins the favor of the people, he will start a revolution to overthrow his father. It would be better, however, to have both parties favoring him. But his tactics and crafts haven’t damaged his brother’s image by one bit, but even made it better. But finally, he finds out a secret about his brother, and he takes that opportunity.

It would be strange if this were to be immediately brought to light for the princess has stayed as the royal family’s guest of honor and hasn’t suspected one thing about her. This would have the opposite effect, and instead, would have his whole family overthrown for the people will have thought that they have harbored the spy and collaborated with the enemy. The course of action the antagonist takes is blackmail.

Kidnapping the princess and threatening her life, the brother antagonist gives him two painful decisions. The protagonist highly values his country, but his love for the princess has grown to equal the value. And the protagonist was always rational. If he was who he was in the past, he would have not hesitated to have the princess killed, but the princess taught him mercy, not justice, love, not peace. Seemingly two pairs of similar meaning, but she showed him that they are disguised opposites causing the protagonist’s values to change to alter his views.

At this climax, the protagonist painfully decides to abdicate the throne for the life of the princess, and the antagonist is pleased leaving them alone in the forest.

Fast forward to the end, the princess is revealed as a spy, and she never had any love for him. Despite this, he helps her escape to return to her homeland. But his unrequited love will never be reciprocated, and he has lost everything, not just the throne, but his parent’s pleasant treatment of him.

The story isn’t all that amazing, but Juusaki’s acting caught the hearts of the audience and shocked the cast.

“He can act!” one of the casts who are behind the scene remarks as Juusaki’s tears fall down his face for the final act.

Juusaki sighs deeply to emphasize the emotions of the character before he says his last line, “Even if you never felt the same, the best I can give do is to cast you away along with my feelings.”

Silence befalls the auditorium as the audiences look in shock, some with their tears crawling down their faces before their applause and cheers fill the entire auditorium despite having about a quarter of the audience left as the curtains close after the final bow of the entire cast in the play. Cheers, shouts, and squeals are the reactions of the watchers, and some loudly compliment Juusaki's performance as they bob their heads in agreement.

The backstage, the cast gives their share of compliments to Juusaki, who has now returned to his expressionless state.

“That was amazing!”

“You moved me to tears!”

“I—I almost cried…”

“You are lying. You are definitely crying!”

“W—what? T—this is just sweat from my eyes… ah! Geez! Why were you hiding such prodigal talent!”

“To be fair,” Juusaki faces everyone, “I wrote half the script.”

Chuckles and giggles were the response of the cast as the door slams open and a tired Nana is revealed at the doorway. “I… I am so sorry, Juusaki. I couldn’t find him.”

“I—Is that for certain?” Juusaki asks with an expression of panic starting to show on his face.

(Thanks to kazesenken for the epic line!)