On The Side Of The Pitch With You

The Truth You Hid

"Kimiko! Are you okay?!"

"How are you feeling?"

"Should you be out of bed?!"

She took a deep breath. "I'm alive. Now, will you let me sit down?"

All eyes went wide, none of them expecting her change in attitude. Still, despite the discomfort, none of them let her take a single step further into the room.

"Kimiko, you..." Shindou's eyes narrowed on her. "You knew too, didn't you?"

She crossed her arms at that. Looking around the room, all eyes were on her. Some were wary, others suspicious. The three behind her were no different.

Tenma was next to confront her, his voice just barely shaking, his eyes with a bit of hurt in them. "Why didn't you tell us?"

"You just need to look in a mirror and you'll find the answer to that." She replied bluntly. "The amount of stress and worry you're all feeling would've messed up your plays if we were still early on into this tournament."

"That's not―" Surprisingly, Tetsukado cut himself short. "No, you're... you're right..."

"I don't like it though..." Sakura muttered, earning an uncaring shrug.

"How long have you known?" Aoi asked.

"Since it happened. I saw the fake replacing him with someone else's help right before we left Sandorias."

"That long?!"

"There's no point in beating yourself up about it. I actively covered for the guy whenever he made a mistake or if any of you started being suspicious, so of course you wouldn't have thought further about it."

It was Shindou's turn to cross his arms. "So that's why you kept saying he's sick..."

"And why you were so ready to confront him too." Matatagi scratched the back of his head with a look towards her belt, where her gun was held. She wasn't even trying to hide it anymore.

"Oh yeah! How is your wound?" Ibuki's eyes turned worried upon remembering. "You got shot, and―!"

"There's none." She cut off. She then turned to those from Raimon. "I know it looks like my sense of fashion hasn't changed a bit since I left, and to be fair, it hasn't, but this isn't the same shirt you always used to see me wear."

She took off the blue jacket to better show it off. Though it took some squinting, they could just barely see the way it shined almost unnaturally. The material it was made from was definitely not cotton.

"It's a custom-made armor by Feida, with the purpose of making sure I survive anything Zanark would try to put me through. It's bulletproof, heat-resistant, cold-resistant, waterproof, and so on and so forth."

"So that's why you could stand Gardon's heat so easily..."

She nodded at the brunette captain and then threw the jacket back on with a roll of her shoulders. "Manuuba's shot just knocked me back and made me hit the chair hard enough to knock me out."

"Manuuba?" Minaho's ear twitched.

"The fake's name."

"Oh..."

"Guessing you read his mind for that?" Ibuki said.

"I can't read alien minds. But he didn't know that. All he knew, even with Kyousuke's memories, is that I can read the minds of anyone within range. He'd tell me everything I needed to know if I just asked..." She clicked her tongue. "But I didn't expect that he had new orders after Ratoniik."