Chapter 5.5 — Ren's Definitely-Not-Official Documentary Club Presents...

Interview Booth — Interview #1

Q: What's your role in this documentary?
Ren: Founder. Director. Lead investigator. Cameraman. I also do the theme music, which is just me humming, but with conviction.
Q: You're one person.
Ren: A very efficient person.
Q: Do you think you'll actually solve the mystery?
Ren: I solve mysteries constantly. Last month someone kept leaving one shoe in the third-floor bathroom. I never found out who. But I FELT close.

3:15 PM — After School, Empty Classroom

Nobody had asked for this documentary. Ren had announced it that morning with a hand-drawn logo taped to the whiteboard, a ghost wearing sunglasses and, for reasons never explained, a tiny detective hat, and by lunch he'd propped a borrowed camcorder on a stack of textbooks, hit record, and simply abandoned it there, unmanned, occasionally wandering back into frame.

"Okay, testing, testing." Ren tapped the lens twice, which is not, and has never been, how microphones work. "This is Investigator Ren, reporting live from the scene of the greatest unsolved mystery in Meirin Academy history."

The camera, propped at a slight downward angle, mostly captured his chin.

"This is a crime scene."

"Nothing was stolen," came a voice from somewhere out of frame that was unmistakably Kazuki's.

"The crime is the truth being hidden from us, and also you're not supposed to be commentating from off camera, that's MY job."

Somewhere further off, Godai-sensei's voice drifted through the hallway, flat as ever. "If that camera catches fire too, I'm billing the club."

"THE CLUB DOESN'T HAVE A BUDGET, SENSEI."

"Then I'm billing you personally, and I'm rounding up."

Interview Booth — Interview #2

Q: Any leads so far?
Ren: Multiple. I've got a suspect board.
Q: What's the current leading theory?
Ren: Okay, don't laugh. Time loop. Every time we see "her," it's the same Tuesday, replaying slightly differently, which is why the personality shifts.
Q: That's insane.
Ren: It's a WORKING theory.
Q: Is it working?
Ren: It's a theory.

3:40 PM — The Suspect Board Reveal

The board, when the camera finally swung around to it, was exactly as advertised: poster paper, red string radiating out from Kazuki's yearbook photo like he was the center of a very poorly funded conspiracy.

ALWAYS PRESENT AT PARANORMAL EVENTS
KNOWS THINGS HE SHOULDN'T
ONE TIME SAID "THAT'S NOT TOO F—" AND STOPPED HIMSELF (GUILTY BEHAVIOR)
EATS LUNCH NEAR THE CURSED POND
POSSIBLY A TIME TRAVELER
POSSIBLY THE GHOST'S HANDLER
POSSIBLY BOTH

"The pond isn't cursed," said Kazuki, appearing in the doorway at possibly the worst possible moment. "I checked. There's just fish."

"This is — okay, this isn't what it looks like." Ren threw both arms out in front of the board like he could physically block a poster with his body. "This is a totally normal, unrelated documentary about school legends. You're not even in it."

"My yearbook photo is currently three feet behind you."

"That's a different person who looks exactly like you."

"That's not a real defense."

"It's the defense I HAVE."

Interview Booth — Interview #3

Q: Reaction to being a suspect?
Kazuki: I'd like it on record that I have never, at any point, time traveled.
Q: The board also lists you as a possible "handler."
Kazuki: A handler of what.
Q: It doesn't specify.
Kazuki: That feels like a problem with the theory, not with me.
Q: The "that's not too f—" comment?
Kazuki: Homework-related.
Q: What homework requires that reaction?
Kazuki: ...Math. It was a hard problem.
Q: Any comment on the pond?
Kazuki: There's just fish.

4:00 PM — An Unplanned Second Interview

Sora walked past the open classroom door at exactly the wrong moment, which meant she got roped in before she'd fully processed what was happening.

"Wait, wait, hang on, one question." Ren scrambled the camera around, nearly knocking it off its stack of textbooks. "Sora. Off the record. Do YOU believe in the ghost?"

She considered this for a beat, arms crossed, entirely too composed for someone being ambushed by a documentary. "I believe there's an explanation."

"See, that's suspiciously diplomatic. That's a non-answer."

"It's an accurate answer."

"It's what someone would say if they were HIDING something."

"Or it's what someone would say if a boy with a broken camcorder cornered them in a hallway."

Ren opened his mouth. Closed it. "...Fair."

4:10 PM — A Very Brief, Very Unauthorized Interruption

The footage cuts, without warning, to an entirely different room, a desk buried in crumpled paper, a laptop glowing over a half-finished sentence. A mug clinks down somewhere off camera. A voice, suspiciously like whoever's actually responsible for all of this, exhales.

"We were supposed to be writing Chapter Six," the voice says, to nobody. "This isn't Chapter Six."

A pause.

"...Fine. Bonus chapter. Let Ren cook."

The footage snaps back to Ren mid-sentence, blissfully unaware, still trying to physically peel his own suspect board off the wall before the evidence could be confiscated.

Interview Booth — Final Interview

Q: Final thoughts on the investigation?
Ren: We're close. I can feel it. Current leading theories, in order: time loop, secret twin situation, ghost with a really complicated legal arrangement, or, and I want full credit for this one, Godai-sensei's coffee is sentient and running the whole operation from inside the cup.
Q: The coffee.
Ren: It's ALWAYS full. Nobody's ever seen him refill it. Connect the dots.
Q: Coffee doesn't have motives.
Ren: That's exactly what sentient coffee would want you to think.
Q: Will the investigation continue?
Ren: Obviously. Truth doesn't investigate itself.

Final shot: The empty classroom, chalkboard tally reset to a suspicious zero in the corner. The suspect board leans crooked against a desk, one string dangling loose where Kazuki yanked his own photo down on the way out. A single unattended coffee cup sits on the teacher's desk, steam still rising, saying nothing, giving nothing away.

Down the hall, faint and fading, Ren can still be heard.

"—no but hear me out, what if the coffee is ALSO the ghost—"