Blades of Despair

-Chapter Forty-One-

Are You Scared, Little Traitor?

One week had passed since we had searched the fourth floor, and life had begun to quiet down again. At least, that's what I was trying to convince myself; I knew that life would never be the same. But Seiko Academy had been very quiet, almost too quiet. Nobody had seen the bears since the investigation of the fourth floor, and they never normally waited this long before bringing us another reason to kill each other, so even though things were more peaceful, there was still unrest.

To make matters worse, Yoneda had similarly disappeared from our group. He didn't show up to meals, and when Iowa left food at his door, she would walk by again to see that it had been untouched. Furthermore, Mina discovered that all the binders on the fourth floor had gone missing - we had spent a day searching for them but ended up concluding that Yoneda must have taken them. We did not know why he had taken them, but his complete disengagement from us was almost more worrying than the bears'.

However, there was a sliver of good fortune. Gawa and I had continued our swimming contests every day since the first one. Annoyingly, he had won every subsequent series of races, and I wanted to smack his face every time I surfaced from the waters and saw him smiling smugly and shouting 'too slow.' Then again, the blush on his face when I rewarded him with a kiss was worth the loss - the poor boy could barely string a sentence together whenever I did it. Unfortunately, I had to reward him when we were alone, as Iowa, Mina and Saza asked to join us in the pool one day. Iowa had told us, with smoke coming out of her ears, that she had tried to teach the other two how to bake and it had gone horribly wrong. Miyagawa and I agreed, and I would give him his prize once we were certain nobody could see us. Despite everything that was going on, swimming with Gawa was now the highlight of my days at Seiko Academy.

The morning was progressing like any other morning of the killing game, and we had all gathered in the cafeteria for our breakfast. Iowa had made us all pancakes, but had reluctantly agreed to let Mina help. To my pleasant surprise, Mina's contribution to the breakfast, a blueberry and banana hotpot, was surprisingly tasty. I wolfed it down, and Mina reacted to my ravenousness with a smile so large I was scared she would break her own jaw. As I was chewing my pancakes, I looked across the table at Gawa. He noticed me looking, and I felt his foot nudge my own under the table. He winked at me, and I blushed, which only caused him to smirk. So I kicked him, by my own admission a little too forcefully, on his shin. The shock and pain prompted Gawa to choke on his mouthful of pancake and he coughed, food spraying out of his mouth as he gasped for oxygen. The food flew in the direction of the person sitting across from him, which happened to be me.

"Gross!" I screamed. "Gawa, don't spit your food!"

"Don't kick me under the table then, stupid!" He wheezed his retort as he thumped his chest and coughed loudly. The others just looked at us in confusion.

"Um, are you guys okay?" Saza asked, her eyes rolling as she watched us.

"And who is Gawa?" Mina asked, equally bemused. "Is there a new student? I don't want any last-minute twists!"

"No, Mina, they are not a new student," Morino informed her coolly, "it's just a nickname that Ori uses to refer to Miyagawa."

"Oh my gosh, she has a nickname for him? You two must be dating by now!" Morihei giggled as Gawa and I spluttered a response.

"No, we-"

"We're not dating," I told them all, "we're just trying to get along better. Besides, Nishi has a nickname for Mitsumi, right?" The two boys looked down at their pancakes simultaneously.