Movements Behind The Scene

It happened on the same day that the delinquents snatched a resounding victory despite the overwhelming odds. Later that night, around the time when most people were asleep and the streets were empty without a single soul in sight, a lone figure walked quickly under the cover of darkness. They wore a hooded jacket that cleverly hid their face and each step was eerily silent.

They stopped in front of a public payphone, a rare object nowadays that nearly went extinct because of smartphones. But for certain people, there was no better method of communication to avoid leaving any tracks than a public payphone.

I impatiently inserted the required coin before furiously punching the number I needed to dial.

“Damn, why do I need to go this far just to report back?!” I cursed under my breath. “I’ve been messaging and calling them so many times, but they haven’t responded at all! Are they serious about capturing her or not?! What a bunch of useless idiots!”

I kept muttering curses as I waited for the call to connect. The number I dialled was a hotline to the family head himself, a number reserved for emergency contact only. I expected him to quickly pick it up—regardless of the ungodly hour I was calling at now. And yet, my attempt was met with the cold, monotone voice of an operator telling me to leave a message.

“Damn it!” I hurled the phone back to its place in frustration. “Why is no one picking up—?!”

“Well, maybe it’s because they’re sleeping right now?”

A playful voice answered me out of nowhere.

I hurriedly turned around, just to have a wooden sword jabbed at my back, preventing me from making any moves.

“Don’t move, okay? I can always knock you out with this, but it’s a hassle to drag your unconscious body around, so I’d rather not.” The threat, delivered with the same playful tone as earlier, sent shivers down my spine. Despite her tone, I knew that she was absolutely serious.

“Aren’t you supposed to be sleeping at home like the good little girl you are?” I glanced back at the person holding the wooden sword. “Ojou-sama?”

Sakuya ignored my attempt at riling her up. “I see you’ve finally become desperate enough, Kikuchi. Honestly, it was quite tiring to wait night after night until you took the bait.”

At her words, I reflexively tried to turn around. Sakuya’s wooden sword smacked my back without any mercy, nearly toppling me off balance.

“What did I tell you? Stay there like a good dog.” Sakuya warned me coldly.

“Never mind that! What are you talking about?! Are you telling me that you’ve been monitoring me this whole time?!” I shouted.

“I suggest you keep your voice down, lest you wake everyone up.” Sakuya glanced around, making sure that no one heard the ruckus.

“I don’t care about that!” I ignored Sakuya’s warning and marched toward her with a terrifying look on my face. “All those ignored calls, text messages, and even letters, are you behind all of them?!”

I was about to grab her shoulder when Sakuya smacked my hands away, snapping me back into my senses.

“Yeah, it was me.” The edge of her lips curled into a victorious smirk. “I did it from the night you came here. You so daringly stepped into my territory, surely you didn’t expect me to stay quiet, did you?”

I was stunned when I heard that. From the day I arrived at this town, I had been sending regular reports every night, be it through messages, mails, or even carrier pigeons. I’d always receive a response from the family, up until the moment I revealed Kagura Sakuya’s presence in this town two weeks ago. Are you telling me that she had been intercepting all of my communications and sent back false responses—thoroughly playing me for a fool this whole time?!

The all-knowing smile on Sakuya’s face had answered my questions.

“Whose fault was it that I collapsed the other day? Care to make a guess?” Sakuya took a step forward and peered closely at me, enjoying the confusion written all over my face.

“I-Impossible…” I blanched when every piece fell perfectly into its place.

So the lack of sleep was caused by monitoring my movement every night, not because of helping those brats study?!

“How did you even intercept the call to family head’s number?! I’ve used the payphone to hide my track!” I slammed my hand on the payphone machine.

“Do you remember where you got that number in the first place?” Sakuya answered carefreely.

“From the letters…you mean that number is a fake?!” I inadvertently stepped back. She wouldn’t have to intercept the call if the phone number was fake in the first place.

“Bingo.” Sakuya grinned. “As expected of the former Sakurasaki Academy Student Council President. Your time overseas surely didn’t disappoint.”

I took a deep breath and forcefully calmed myself down. Even if I’d fallen into her traps, line, hook, and sinker, I still had to do something about it. The family head would cut my throat if he ever heard of this failure!

“Then, what do you want? Why did you bother to wait until tonight to tell me all of this?” I questioned her.

“Yeah, you see…” Sakuya nodded with a serious look on her face. “The number you just called isn’t necessarily a fake one. While it’s true that it’s not the old man’s number, calling that number will alert a particular police detective I knew. Congratulations, you’ve just gotten yourself arrested!” She said it with such a cheerful voice that I was utterly dumbfounded.

“H-Huh?! Arrested?! What the hell are you talking about?!” I shouted.

“You’re going to be arrested for kidnapping and trafficking an underage girl, of course!” Sakuya beamed at me. “You see, you are a part of a human trafficking syndicate, who is disguising himself as a school teacher to find new prey. You’ve even employed common delinquents to terrorize the students and make it easier for you to corner your target.

Alas, when you tried to kidnap your target in the middle of the night, the poor girl managed to escape from you and called the police. What do you think? Do you like this backstory I came up with for you?"

My face went paler and paler the more I listened to Sakuya’s ramblings. If Sakuya showed the police all of my reports about her that she had intercepted up until now, she would have the perfect evidence to frame me as a human trafficker.

“You have nowhere to run, Kikuchi.” Sakuya levelled her wooden sword at me. “Just quietly go to prison and repent for disturbing my peaceful life here. Who knows, maybe the old man would keel over and pass away by the time you got out of prison.”

I gritted my teeth. “Do you really think I’ll quietly let the police catch me? You knew what the family head did to anyone who attracted the police’s attention! Not even his own family member would be able to keep their neck intact!” I shouted indignantly.

“Yeah, I know.” Sakuya’s blazing ruby eyes cooled down in an instant. “Think of this as your just desserts for getting him killed.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “Are you still angry about Kazuya—?”

“Don’t say his name with your filthy mouth!” Sakuya lashed out and swung her wooden sword.

But this was the moment I’d been waiting for.

I caught the sword with one hand and grabbed her arm with the other hand. I easily forced her to let go of the sword by twisting her arm, producing a pained scream from Sakuya. Before she could recover, I pinned her on the ground and threw the sword as far as possible.

Frankly, it was far too easy to disarm her this way. But then again, she had just been discharged from the hospital. There was no way she could recover from her injuries that quickly.

“Maybe you shouldn’t get discharged from the hospital too quickly next time.” I sneered at her. “After all, your body is an important asset, Ojou-sama.”

Sakuya glared at me defiantly. “I won’t go back to that damned house. Your scheme ends here, Kikuchi.”

“Oh, we’ll see about that.” I twisted her arm even further, enjoying her scream of pain. “I’ll have to leave for now, but you can be rest assured that I’ll be back with more reinforcements. Enjoy your remaining time, Ojou—”

“Freeze! This is the police!”

I nearly leapt out of my skin the moment I heard that shout. I turned my head around and saw a shocking sight.

“Impossible! This is too fast!” I cried out.

I was completely surrounded by police officers, who had their guns trained at me. No matter how I thought it over, their arrival was way too fast. It had only been ten minutes since I accidentally called them. How could they pinpoint this location so fast? It was as if they were guided by someone—

I realized something and shot a glare at Sakuya. She was acting like a pitiful victim who was cowering in fear, yet I caught her lips moving to say something.

“Checkmate. Serves you right, Kikuchi.”

Following those words, the night was closed with my arrest.

*****

I stretched my stiff body the moment I got out of the police station. The sky was still dark when I came with the police to give my statements, but now it had started to brighten up. I swore to myself not to rely on police next time if I could avoid it. They were surely useful, but their long and winding procedures cost me a good chunk of time that I could use to sleep.

“It seems everything went well, eh? Ojou-sama.”

I turned toward the man approaching me. He had a lanky built, with messy black hair and dark red eyes hidden behind thick glasses. His unhealthily pale skin, untouched by the sun, made him stand out like a ghost in this time of the day.

“Shinji. I’ve told you many times to drop that title.” I replied wearily. “Putting that aside, thanks for your hard work. If it weren’t for you, the prodigy hacker of the Kagura Family, I wouldn’t be able to trap Kikuchi like this.”

“My bad, so can you stop with that cringy title as well?” Shinji shuddered as if he just heard something disgusting. “I’m just a lazy guy who doesn’t want to have anything to do with the Kagura Family anymore. It’s been, like, 8 years since I threw away my surname.”

I smiled thinly. As someone who also ran away from the Kagura Family, I understood his feelings painfully well. Though, Shinji was in a better position than me, since he hailed from a far, far off branch family. Even if he disappeared from the main house, no one would care to chase after him. Unlike me, who would get dragged back the moment they caught wind of my existence.

“Anyway, I thought Kikuchi-ojisan was smarter than this.” Shinji clicked his tongue. “Or does this mean you’re the scary one for outsmarting him, Sakuya-chan?”

“While I do admit that I’m smarter than your average person, I had to thank Kikuchi for looking down on me.” I shrugged. “I’m surprised he didn’t think that I have another collaborator, actually. I mean, how else am I able to escape Kagura Family’s radar for two years?”

The one who helped me escape and hide for two whole years was Shinji here. Using his prodigious talent with hacking and a sharp mind that didn’t lose out to his talent, Shinji was able to protect my peaceful school life—provided that I didn’t stand out too much. Admittedly, the war last time was a bit too much for his ability, which resulted in this whole incident.

“Well yeah, someone with my level of talent is pretty rare, after all.” Shinji replied casually, which should be the biggest understatement of the century. “But it’s not surprising that Kikuchi-ojisan let his guard down. Normal people wouldn’t go out of their way to monitor their target twenty-four seven like you did.” There was a hint of exasperation in his voice. “Don’t you think you’re overdoing it this time?”

“But as a result, we’re able to gather enough evidence to frame him.” I refuted. “It was thanks to you that the police immediately rushed to save me after that phone call. Your idea for sending pre-recorded voicemail to lure the police there worked wonders.”

Shinji sighed. “Your acting also plays a big role in convincing them. You purposely let Kikuchi overpower you to cement the impression that he’s the perpetrator, didn’t you?”

I stuck out a tongue at him. “I will use anything and anyone that can be used—that’s how I survived.”

Shinji crossed his arms. “Then why didn’t you ask for your henchmen’s help? You got some useful people, right? Pochi, Tarou, and…what was his name again…I’m sure if you asked, they’d gladly help you trap Kikuchi, and you won’t have to go with such a risky plan.”

I stiffened the moment he mentioned my delinquent friends. “I don’t want to get them involved in family matters. If something goes wrong and they end up like him…” I lowered my gaze, unable to continue my sentence.

A warm hand patted my head. His gentle touch reminded me of someone else who used to pat my head like this. I closed my eyes, pretending that it was that person’s hand instead of Shinji.

“I get it—I won’t talk about this again. Just make sure to go home and get some rest, okay? Your big brother will nag me endlessly if you don’t take good care of yourself.” Shinji retracted his hand from my head.

“…yeah, thanks for everything, Shinji.” I thanked him quietly.

“Don’t mention it. I owed your big brother a lot, after all.” He waved casually before returning back to his own hideout.

I sighed, letting the tension leave my shoulders. Finally, I could have some peace and quiet after this whole fiasco. I looked forward to have a relaxing summer break…