#zeroiv4

As she made her way around to me, I decided to play it cool. We were living together for nine days; it wouldn’t be difficult to find a more private time to have a conversation.

She held out her hand to me. For a moment, our eyes made contact. Her expression was difficult to read, but she almost looked… scared? Whatever it was, a moment later her face softened back into a calm smile. But her eyes were avoiding mine.

‘Nice to meet you!’ She said. It took me a couple of seconds to respond.

‘Junpei.’ I forced out coldly as I limply took her hand. It was warm.

I reluctantly let go, and she moved on. What the hell had that been about? Why was she acting like she didn’t even know me? It wasn’t there was any point in hiding it from the others. Wouldn’t people realise we were childhood friends just by watching us speak? Unless she was trying to tell me… to stay away.

‘Now that you’ve all met each other, we’ll take you out to the test site, ok?’ The man in charge of the experiment drew me out of my thoughts. ‘And from then, you’ll be on your own.’

He led us out into the hot afternoon and onto a bus, which our things had apparently already been packed into.

When I stepped on, I took a window seat near the back, making sure there was space next to me, and watched the others enter.

Akane sat at the front, next to two of the other participants. Sigma and Phi, as I recalled. I turned away, and leant my head against the window. I stared blankly at the endless sand until we arrived.

——————————————————

The test site was a series of strange, dome shaped structures, half buried in the sands.

As I stood there, under the hot Nevada sun, I felt the urge to laugh. It was just like a year ago; only this time I was stepping into a mysterious building. And, of course, this time I already knew the truth about Akane.

I was really regretting wearing a dark jacket out here. But then again, I barely owned any other clothes anymore. The only few items of my old, colourful wardrobe that still remained were those I had worn during the second Nonary Game. I couldn’t bring myself to throw those away.

‘What’s with that expression, Junpei?’ Carlos asked me. Mira was also staring at me. I realised I’d been getting caught up in my memories.

‘Oh, nothing. Just… psyched to be getting locked up in there.’ I responded semi-sarcastically.

But to tell the truth, I still was a little afraid to go inside. There were nine of us, entering a building in the desert after all. It was hard not to consider the possibility of this being a trap.

But I’d done some background research on the people running this thing, and none of them had any connection to the Crash Keys. And… Akane has already achieved what she wanted to. She wouldn’t force people into another game without a reason. Well, that’s what I thought, but…. did I even know Akane anymore?

And if something did happen, I had to be prepared. There was no way I was going to let her disappear in the confusion again.

I wondered how she felt, stepping into a building like this again. It must bring back some rough memories from ten years ago. You wouldn’t think she’d be willing to go back into an enclosed environment. Assuming this wasn’t a plan of hers, of course. I had to keep that in mind.

When the door was open, I waited for everyone else to enter before I did. I was keen to get out of the heat, but I wanted to see something.

As Akane stood in front of the imposing entrance to the test site, I noticed her hands fiddling with her long hair. Nervously. But a moment later, she took a single deep breath, and calmly strode inside.

——————————————————

When we’d all had time to settle into our rooms and look around the site, we ate. As one of the last to arrive, I found that only one table, with the couple on, had a seat left. Q was with Diana, the nurse who’d mostly taken charge of looking after him, and Carlos. Akane was sat with Sigma and Phi.

Eric tried to make small talk with me over our meal, but my mind was elsewhere. It wasn’t like I ignored him, but I kept my answers as short as possible. I couldn’t find the energy to elaborate. And all through the meal, I kept glancing across the room at the others.

I noticed his girlfriend wasn’t much for conversation either. And even when she did speak, her face remained just as cold and unchanging as it had been before. There was something weird about her. Although, who was I to talk?

Akane, Sigma and Phi were talking in hushed tones. It was impossible to make out what they were saying. While Sigma seemed to be getting more and more frustrated by the second, she maintained a calm outward appearance. Just what was going on with those people?

Frustrated, I turned my attention back to my own table, now sitting in slightly awkward silence.

‘So, why’d you two come to D-Com?’ I asked.

‘I signed up because Mira said she was going to.’ Eric replied first. ‘I wanted to do it together.’

So he signed himself up to be experimented on just because she did? Geez.

I looked at Mira quizzically. For a couple of seconds, she just stared back at me.

‘So why did you come?’ I finally asked.

‘Oh, well… I have to admit, the payment is helpful, but it was mostly curiosity. I wanted to see what would happen here.’ She answered quickly, but relatively bluntly.

‘What about you, Junpei?’

‘Oh, I… have kind of the same reason.’

‘You’re curious?’

‘Yeah, I guess. Y’know… it just seemed interesting.’

Of course, that wasn’t the truth. My real reason for coming here was more similar to Eric’s. Hopelessly following a woman into whatever situation she entered.

Of course, his situation was different. Mira and Eric were together. Just normal people in a relationship. No lies, no running away, no kidnappings and murders.

But no matter what she’d done, I had to be here. Partially to confront her about it, but also because I’d made a promise. Whatever was going on here, I would save Akane Kurashiki.

And just as I was thinking that, Sigma stood up from his table. He began to propose a toast; the usual boring stuff, hoping we could all get along and the experiment would be successful but then:

‘And… I also want to ask everyone to stay vigilant over these few days. Even if this is just an experiment, there’s still danger. And if we do let something bad happen, it could destroy humanity. All 6 billion humans could die out if we make a mistake here.’

Uh… what?

The rest of us all looked similarly confused. Then, after a moment of stunned silence, Phi tugged Sigma back into his seat and began to admonish him in a hissing whisper. I couldn’t make out any words, but she certainly wasn’t happy.

Shortly afterwards, they got up and left. The rest of us were still staring awkwardly at him. And a moment later, it was Akane who got stood up to apologise for him.

‘I think Sigma just has a weird sense of humour.’ She explained. ‘Phi’s telling him to try to tone it down.’

Nobody seemed to completely buy that explanation, but I was particularly sure he wasn’t just joking. Not that I believed him, exactly. But there definitely was something suspicious going on here.

‘Anyway, I think I’m going to go to bed as well. But it was really nice to meet you all!’

She left; her demeanour just as cheerful, and just as fake, as ever.

——————————————————

I didn’t get much sleep that night.

We’d all gradually gone back to our rooms last night, after sharing a quick muttered discussion and collectively deciding that Sigma was just being weird. Nothing that happened in here could directly affect that many people.

But still; it was becoming more and more clear to me that something was up. And I was pretty sure that something had to do with Akane.

But what could she be after? She’d already done what she wanted back in Building Q. Akane was alive now. And she wouldn’t endanger people like that again without a reason. I believed that.

But if Akane wasn’t the perpetrator… was she about to become a victim? If someone else was going to do something during this experiment, had she really just been caught up in it? Maybe she’d come here knowing something would happen. Trying to stop it. If she was instrumental to something about to happen, that might help explain why it was so important to save her-

I always did this. One day I was angry and resentful, the next I was trying to justify the Nonary Game. One minute Akane was the mysterious kidnapper who’d forced nine people into a deadly game, the next she was an innocent, quirky girl, heroically saving the life of a powerless child.

After all the horrible people I’d met over the past year, the powerful faith I’d held had been eroded. But whenever I thought about her… I knew she was different. I’d met charismatic criminals, of course, who’d put on an innocent front. But none of them could truly convince me. Akane could. Deep down, she was the girl I’d met at Building Q; the same girl I’d known in my childhood. I just knew that.

I was awake for hours more.

——————————————————

Sigma didn’t appear at breakfast the next day. Maybe he was worried how people would act around him now. But hey, it was his own fault anyway.

I decided to make use of the opportunity to sit with Akane and Phi. They both looked surprised as I sat down, probably expecting to see Sigma there instead.

‘Sigma still in his room?’ After a moment of silence I addressed the elephant in the room.

‘Yeah.’ Phi casually responded. ‘He’ll give in and come join us again soon. He’s just stubborn.’

Akane sighed, slightly.

‘What’s the deal with him and you guys anyway?’ I continued. ‘I mean, I know you and Sigma said you were friends, but what about you, Akane? You two secretly dating or something?’

‘What?’ Akane was flustered. ‘I wouldn’t- …no. We only really met here, but… it turns out we went to the same high school, so I’m sort of familiar with him. But we’re definitely not dating. I think Phi would be more likely to do that…’

As Akane added that final comment with a playful smile, the other girl scowled.

‘Not likely.’ She muttered.

‘What, are you three in some kind of love triangle? Sigma too into the aloof Phi to pay attention to you?’

‘Junpei.’ Akane pleaded me with her eyes. ‘I was only joking about Phi. And anyway, I wouldn’t want to date someone unless I planed on marrying them. And… I couldn’t see Sigma being that person. I don’t even know him well.’

Looking at her, I almost felt bad for poking fun of her. But… she must be hiding something about her relationship. Everything she was saying was just an act. She sure had been happy to flirt with me for nine hours before disappearing for an entire year. Even after I’d saved her life, and… how connected we’d felt during the game. But apparently I wasn’t good enough after all.

‘How did you end up here anyway, Junpei?’ Phi asked, clearly in an attempt to break the tension that had suddenly developed in the air. ‘You don’t seem like someone who’d be interested in a scientific study.

‘Does anyone here?’ I responded with a question of my own. ‘I was just curious. I saw an ad, and I signed up.’

Although I made it sound like something I’d done on a whim, getting into D-Com hadn’t been easy. I’d tried recruiting a certain mutual friend of my boss and I to hack their systems, but apparently it was pretty secure, I guessed. She’d kind of just spouted tech babble at me. I’d had to embarrass myself by asking one of her daughters for a translation on my way out.

I wasn’t proud of the method I’d used to actually get in here. The “intimidation” I’d had to use on one of the scientists was pretty bad. Still, it wasn’t like the dirt I’d found on him was false. And I’d been willing to do it for my goal; to see Akane again.

I felt like I was going in a circle. I wanted to see Akane, but I didn’t know what to say to her, and I didn’t trust her, so I didn’t confront her, so I started to believe her again, so I wanted to speak to her, but I didn’t know what to-

Suddenly, lost in my thoughts, I made eye contact with her. And I could tell she knew I was lying about why I came here. She looked… not sad, but regretful. Like she was mourning.

A sudden burst of irritation washed over me. I stood up and walked away.

——————————————————

Days at D-Com were boring. We had a few simulated tasks, like equipment repairs, to work on, but mostly we were just left to kill time.

It wasn’t too bad; there was a gym, a rec room, a shelf of books in one of the storage rooms. But none of it really interested me.

I spent a lot of time in my room. It was nice enough. Definitely better than a lot of the places I’d slept in before. I guess I probably should have been with the others. The point of the experiment was for us to interact, after all.

But I’d become used to being alone. After dropping out of college and becoming a detective, I hadn’t seen any of my old friends again. And it wasn’t like my job gave me many chances to socialise.

I remembered the last time I’d been like that. At the end of elementary school. Over that summer, Akane moved away. When I joined middle school, I found that everyone had already established groups of friends, back when I’d been spending all my time on one person.

Of course, things were a lot easier with children. But the real difference was that back then, I’d tried. I’d been enthusiastic to integrate myself into a group of friends. But I wasn’t really interested in other people anymore. It was just so tiring.

But on most days, I eventually got bored of sitting around waiting for time to pass. I would wander through the facility, almost automatically keeping track of what everyone was doing.

It was a few days into the experiment. Sigma was working out in the gym. Since our third day here, he’d rejoined the group, with agreeing to just let him be. We’d discussed locking him up that first night, but decided against it. Nobody brought up his weird speech; it would probably just upset him.

Carlos and Eric were playing pool in the rec room, with Mira watching from the room’s bar. Carlos has been getting along pretty well with everyone here. He was an alright guy, though definitely naïve. On the other hand, the couple spent most of their time with each other. Not that anybody seemed to miss their company much.

Phi was talking to Diana back in the dining hall. Q’s chair was next to them. The two girls had been spending a lot of time together over the past few days. Although I had noticed that Sigma avoided speaking to Diana much.

Finally, I ended up in the greenhouse, where I saw… her.

Akane was watering the plants, one of the regular duties we had to take care of in the test site. She’d really taken to it. Guess gardening was a hit with the ladies even when it was food more than flowers. Diana had liked it a lot too, hadn’t she?

Making an effort to seem casual, I walked in and picked up a bag of fertiliser. As I did, Akane turned and noticed me. Her momentary surprise quickly faded as she spoke.

‘I already did that. But thank you, Junpei.’ Her reply was nice enough, but there was a robotic undertone to it, like she was forcing it.

‘Weren’t you supposed to have a partner here anyway?’ As I recalled, her and Sigma had agreed to do the gardening sometime today.

‘I don’t mind doing it all. It’s relaxing here.’

‘He knew you wouldn’t snitch if he wanted to bunk off, huh?’ Watching her taking care of the plants brought back an old memory. And although I tried to suppress it, the hurt was clear in my voice.

‘Junpei, what do you-?’ She sounded concerned. But… her words were still just as forced.

‘Oh yeah, sorry. You wouldn’t know what I’m talking about.’ I quickly shot back. I couldn’t bear to listen to her any longer. Just listening to her say my name was enough to show just how much of a charade it all was.

‘You could at least stop pretending when we’re alone. I’ve let you get away with it in front of the others, haven’t I? Are you just trying to tell me to get lost? Or do you have some plan?’ When she didn’t respond, I added. ‘If you want to knock me out, a good hit with that can might do the trick.’

When I said that, her demeanour completely changed. She opened her mouth for a moment before breaking eye contact with me and staring at the ground.

She took a shaky breath, before looking up again, still avoiding my eyes. I could see that hers were beginning to brim with tears.

‘I… I’m sorry… Junpei.’

Suddenly, she darted past me and fled the greenhouse. A moment too late, I made a movement to stop her. It was futile.

——————————————————

Our eighth day at D-Com. I was having a drink in the rec room.

I’d built up quite a bit of tolerance over the past year. Which was a shame, because I really would’ve loved to just get hammered.

Sigma was with me. He’d tried to get me to play a game of pool with him, but I’d declined. Just didn’t have the energy.

We drank in silence for the most part, with the occasional bit of small talk thrown out by him. Credit to him for trying, but I really wasn’t in the mood for a conversation.

After a while, we were interrupted. It was Akane. She entered the room, but completely ignored my presence.

‘Sigma, can I talk to you and Phi later?’

‘Oh, yeah, sure.’

She nodded at him before quickly making her exit. A couple of seconds later, a laugh erupted from beside me.

‘What the hell?’ I turned to Sigma.

‘Sorry, Tenmyouji. You just had such an big scowl. It wouldn’t hurt to lighten up, you know?’

I turned back to my drink.

‘Why are you and Akane acting so weird anyway?’ Apparently he was going to continue. ‘I thought you two were old friends.’

‘Huh?’ How did Sigma know anything about the two of us.

‘Oh, Akane mentioned it one time. But you two aren’t being very subtle about avoiding each other anyway. So tell me; what happened to you guys?’

‘You’re really not gonna quit, huh?’ I replied. ‘Look, there’s nothing to tell you. We haven’t seen each other since we were kids. She’s a different person now. And not one I want to get to know.’

‘Haven’t you too though? I mean, you’re not exactly acting normal, are you?’

‘Excuse me? We don’t know each other, man. How do you know if I’ve changed or not. And hey, you’re one to talk about acting weird with all your “apocalypse” nonsense. You’re just lucky we decided not to lock you in the confinement room.’

That seemed to silence him for a moment. He looked just as serious as he always did when saying his “fate of humanity” crap. There was seriously something wrong with the guy.

‘If you want to find out the problem, go talk to Akane. Maybe she’ll tell you what she’s really doing here.’

I stood up, leaving my now empty bottle behind.

‘I have spoken to her. She sounded like she was worried about you, Tenmyouji.’

With one foot out the door, I scoffed back.

‘Yeah, you’d think so.’

——————————————————

Our ninth day at D-Com was when our isolation started. Since there was a lunar eclipse happening, we would be left without any communications from the researchers for a couple of days, to simulate transmissions being blocked.

Not like they’d been much help anyway. Apparently they hadn’t even noticed whatever was clearly wrong with Sigma.

Still, everyone did have the sense that it would be a different atmosphere. But I guess some of them wanted to celebrate it. Get off to a positive start, or whatever.

So, after eating that evening, we’d gathered in the rec room. Well, Q had been left in his room; it wasn’t like he could drink or celebrate anyway. But as the rest of the group drunk and talked, everyone was in a good mood. Sigma’s whole “fate of mankind” speech, which he made yet again for some reason, even got some laughs out of Diana and Phi.

The light hearted atmosphere didn’t spread to me, however. While none of the others were exactly close to each other, I couldn’t even call myself an acquaintance to most of them.

And… I still didn’t feel comfortable here. Though nothing had happened for all the time we’d been here, my suspicion hadn’t ceased. But at the same time, I didn’t know who to be suspicious of. The scientists hadn’t done anything yet despite having us locked up, Sigma was too blatantly strange, and Akane…

Well, she just didn’t seem like she would do something. She’d looked so sincerely hurt when I’d last spoken to her. But, honestly, I wouldn’t know what she was really feeling. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d trusted her too much.

But still, I…

‘Junpei, you alright?’ My thoughts were interrupted by Carlos.

‘Uh, yeah. Why?’

‘You were staring off into the distance. I just wanted to make sure nothing was wrong.’

‘Nope. All good here. Thanks for looking out, Mr. Hero.’

‘Huh?’

‘Never mind.’ I probably should have seen it coming that he couldn’t take a joke. And it wasn’t like I really wanted to make fun of him anyway.

‘Well, anyway,’ He continued,slightly awkwardly. ‘We were all starting to make toasts while you were zoned out, if you want to join in.’

‘I think I’m good. I mean, what is there to say past “working together” and “good luck”, or whatever?’

‘Oh! Speaking of luck…’

To my surprise, Akane followed on from my speech. Despite the fact that she’d been avoiding me for days, well, and basically the whole time we’d been here.

‘Do you know the meaning of four leaved clovers?’

‘No.’ I responded after a moment of hesitation. It wasn’t true, but… I didn’t want to be forced to sit here explaining all that nonsense.

She looked around the room, but the others didn’t seem to know either. So apparently she took it upon herself to explain it.

‘Well, the story goes that the four leaves are supposed to represent faith, hope, love-‘

I suddenly stood up.

‘You know what, I think I have heard this one before. And I’m pretty tired anyway, so I’m just gonna go.’

‘Oh, uh…’

I ignored Akane’s feeble attempt to protest and got myself out the door as fast as I could. I made a beeline for my room.

Once inside, I didn’t even bother to take my clothes off before flopping onto my bed and closing my eyes.

I lay there for a long time, thinking. After a while, I heard the others going back to their rooms, but after that it was silent.

I kind of regretted storming out of the rec room just now, but I couldn’t bear listening to her… and thinking about clovers. It was so hypocritical. That was the exact story we’d had to use to survive the game she put us through, and here she was trying to use it on these other people.

But that wasn’t true. I knew it, but… I could never admit it. I mean, she’d been trapped in a Nonary Game long before I had. And her game… was necessary. If I’d known what it was for, I would’ve joined it willingly. I could understand Akane. There was no reason for me to hate her, or distrust her. I just told myself that I did, because… it was easier.

The truth I’d hidden from myself was that I was scared. When I realised what she’d done last year, I’d been shocked at first, but after that I’d just wanted to speak to her. So I could understand what had happened to her… and then I could forgive her.

But when she disappeared with her brother… I didn’t know what to think. I still wanted to find her. But as I searched, my desire to confront her and my desire to forgive her both kept growing, and fighting each other.

When I finally saw her again, my emotions were too strong for me to know what to say to her. And now I’d ended up here, too lost and afraid of my feelings to even be in the same room as her.

I was sick of this. Sick of going back and forth, of not reaching out, of not lashing out, of letting this chance pass by.

I had to make a decision. And deep down, I knew what I wanted. Akane Kurashiki had done bad things, things I couldn’t let go. But despite everything she’d done, I… I loved her.

I rolled over onto my side, and opened my eyes. I reached into the drawer of my bedside table, and took out a ring. It was simple, small and silver, but I’d kept it so polished that I could see reflections of the room in its surface.

That was when I noticed it. I whipped my head around and confirmed it. A cloud of thick grey smoke, sneaking in around the edges of the door.

Gas. The same type that had been used on me a year ago. It couldn’t be…? No. It wasn’t her. It had to be somebody else. But that meant she-

I ran to the door in panicked desperation. As I began to inhale the gas, I became certain that it was soporil. Was Cradle Pharmaceutical involved in this? But there was no time to think about that. I had to stop this.

As I burst out of my room, I glanced around, looking for a trace of where the gas was coming from. But the world was becoming clouded… and so was my brain. What little consciousness I had left was filled with fear. Why… why was this happening again?

Suddenly, a shape leapt at me from the smoke. A dark silhouette. I tried to summon my remaining strength, to fight them off, or at least get a glimpse at their face.

But as it got closer, what appeared wasn’t a gas mask.

Akane Kurashiki stumbled vaguely towards me. As she came near, her body gave in, and she fell straight into me. I was too weak to resist the force; we both toppled to the ground.

The sharp exhale brought on by the impact forced me to take a deep breath. I forced my eyelids open.

Akane’s face was just above mine. Hadn’t this… happened before? When I’d been… so happy to see her… and we were both victims… again…

Maybe it was just the smoke, but… her eyes… seemed to move. And I thought… I heard her… fading voice… unconsciously let out a word.

‘J-jumpy…’

She didn’t say… anything more. But… that was enough. As my own… mind went black… I reaffirmed a vow… I’d once made.

Whatever… is about to happen…

I will…

Adding that to the huge crash of Cradle Pharmaceutical stock and Junpei’s… interesting adventure with bitcoin investment, every single person in the group was flat out broke.

Well, bar Lotus, but almost the money she made was all going into her kids, and Aoi couldn’t really argue with that. He had tried once, but that only left him with a rather large bruise that he told Akane came from a confrontation with a rogue member of Free the Soul. Fortunately, she didn’t question it.

Anyway, due to their lack of both money and time, juggling work and their search for the mysterious ‘fanatic’, the group decided to go for a ‘Secret Santa’ approach, so each of them would only have to buy one gift.

And guess who was lucky enough to be picked to organise the whole thing? Aoi was really regretting his choice of code name, but it was a little too late to change that by the time Junpei had ever so helpfully put him forward for the job.

Eric, Mira and Sean had opted out so they could give each other gifts instead. Aoi was glad they were happy… and also that Mira wouldn’t be involved. She still didn’t have any idea how emotional things like gift-giving worked, and Aoi was petrified at what she might send.

Sigma had also suggested just having a quiet family Christmas to Diana and Phi, but the latter had disagreed, saying she “didn’t want to continue the family tradition of getting gassed and playing a death game, as merry as the last time was”. The girl made Aoi smile. And she did have excellent fashion taste.

Anyway, despite Sigma’s repeated protests that that had only happened one time, it was left up to Diana to mediate, and after a little ‘girl talk’, which from Aoi’s experience just consisted of the two hugging until Phi told Diana her issues, she found out the real issue Phi was having was that she still felt weird being the same age as her father. So the two had decided to continue acting as friends until all this fanatic stuff was over.

Anyway, Aoi had gotten distracted. He heard far too much about the others in the group from Akane. He guessed all the meaningless gossip was just one of the downsides of living with his sister into adulthood. Not that he’d ever want to live anywhere without Akane, he just liked to complain a little.

So Aoi had found himself cluelessly sitting in front of a list of all his friends’ names. And in the moment, all he could think of was how much he hated “Secret Santa”. For one thing, there was never any secrecy involved. It was so easy to tell who bought a certain present, especially with people as different as their group. And Aoi was really not a fan of the whole ‘Santa’ thing in general, as a failed Santa himself.

And right then, as he was thinking about that Christmas, eleven years ago by then, an idea struck Aoi. He was conflicted for a while, but eventually he just thought “What the hell?” and went ahead with it. Maybe not the best way to make a decision, but Aoi couldn’t exactly change his mind afterwards.

And it had worked out fine. Aoi was looking forward to this Christmas… Until Akane told him she’d invited everyone over here on Christmas Eve.

And no matter how much Aoi protested, Akane assured him that they couldn’t just swap presents without a Christmas party. And once again, it was too late for Aoi to stop it. Aoi was almost beginning to hope he would be attacked by Free the Soul, if that would allow him to SHIfT back and change his mind.

But unfortunately, nobody tried to kill him, so when the day came, Aoi finally swallowed his pride and approached Akane.

‘Hey, Akane?’ As his upbeat sister turned towards him, Aoi cleared his throat. ‘Do you remember when we were kids? How we had to live on our own?’

‘It’d be kind of hard to forget that…’ Akane replied with a little giggle. Aoi never understood why she could be so casual about their past. ‘But… what’s wrong, Aoi? Why are you bringing that up all of a sudden.’

‘Yeah, well…’ I’d almost forgotten how good Akane was at reading me. ‘Do you remember how every year, I’d save up money for Christmas? And I’d always try to get you presents, but it was a struggle to afford anything.’

Aoi definitely remembered those days, at least. The way Akane’s face would light up as she tore the paper off her gift was an image that would never leave Aoi’s mind. It was pretty much the only thing that kept him going through those difficult years.

‘Where are you going with this, Aoi?’ Akane was beginning to look really concerned. Damn.

‘Here, just- come and take a look.’ Before she had a chance to respond, Aoi turned and walked to his room, where he’d been storing all the gifts he’d been sent. Everyone had sent theirs to him in advance, except Junpei, who was being characteristically unreliable and still hadn’t given him anything.

Akane let out a small gasp as Aoi swung open the door. At his instruction, she took a closer look at the four neatly stacked items under the fake Christmas tree that was kept in there. They really did look like the image he’d imagined for years. A pile of colourful presents lying under a tree on Christmas morning, all left by “Santa”. And they all had one recipient listed on them.

Akane Kurashiki.

‘A-Aoi?’ Akane couldn’t seem to figure out how to respond. She turned to her brother, whose eyes were firmly fixed on the floor. ‘How did you do this?’

‘I, uh…’ Aoi wasn’t sure how to explain himself, but he could see Akane figuring it out as he tried to figure out how to word it. He decided to just skip a bit.

‘I took the fall.’ Aoi explained. ‘It’s just five of them - one isn’t here yet - , and I told them all I was meant to be getting them something but ran out of cash. A few of them are pretty pissed, but they’ll get over it. I got Clover something so her and Light won’t get talking about how they both didn’t get anything. And I said we’d exchange the gifts on another day ‘cause exchanging them all’s got messed up as well. So there’s no problem.’

‘There’s a big problem, Aoi!’ Akane protested. Her mouth was wide open in disbelief. ‘You can’t just do that!’

‘Yeah, I know, it’s… pretty bad.’ Aoi admitted. ‘But it’s too late now, so we just gotta go with it, I guess.’

‘No, there’s got to be something we can do…’ Akane’s forehead furrowed in thought. ‘I wish we could get to the transporter. Then I could just create a bunch of Akanes to make presents for everyone…’ The thought of a whole horde of Akane’s running around the place sent a little shiver down Aoi’s spine. Taking care of one was difficult enough.

‘Yeah, well…’ Not having any ideas himself, Aoi trailed off into silence. Akane and he remained there staring blankly in thought until they were eventually interrupted by the buzz of a timer.

‘Oh, that’s the food!’ Akane hurried off to deal with that. She’d been cooking all morning, although she refused to let Aoi see what it was. She was there until the doorbell rang.

Aoi counted the time in his head as it was rung again. Two seconds. A pause. Seven seconds. Six seconds. The code.

Akane was also satisfied that it was safe, and she made it to the door far before Aoi. He chose to watch from his doorway.

As it opened, he saw Diana give an awkward smile as the silence of the apartment was broken by the sounds of bickering from outside.

‘Look, I know how to drive, ok?’

‘Are you serious? That’s the worst experience I’ve ever had in a car, including being kidnapped.’

‘Maybe it would’ve been easier if you shouted less.’

Sigma opened his mouth to snap back at Phi, but was cut off by Diana before he could start.

‘Uh, guys…’ As she began to speak, the pair suddenly gained awareness of their surroundings.

As the four exchanged greetings, I ducked back into my room. Thankfully, these three were the only ones I hadn’t messed with. I’d kind of picked up on the weird situation between them, and being forced to exchange presents might help. As much as Aoi wanted to get presents for Akane, he wasn’t selfish enough not to do that for them. And from the entrance they’d made, it looked like Aoi was right. They needed help. Badly.

So after grabbing the three items exchanged between the three of them, Aoi made his way to their living room, where Akane had led them.

‘I thought we weren’t doing the gifts today?’ Diana looked up at Aoi confusedly from the sofa Akane had invited the three to sit on before going back to her cooking.

‘Oh, well, you guys’ are ready now, and since nobody else has shown up yet, I thought you may as well have them now.’ Aoi tried to explain himself, as he doubted the truth of “You guys seem to hate each other right now so I thought this might help” would go down well.

‘Are you sure you don’t want us to wait until the others’ gifts are ready?’ Diana’s reaction told Aoi that she bought it, and Sigma’s expression made it pretty clear he did too. But Phi was giving Aoi a glare that made him wonder if she’d figured him out. He really hoped she hadnt.

‘Oh, no, it’s totally fine.’ Aoi reassured Diana. ‘Go ahead.’ But despite that, Diana yet again tried to protest. She really was stubborn for someone who seemed so shy. But thankfully for Aoi, the doorbell rang before she could finish.

As the echo of the third ring of the code faded, Aoi excused himself to answer the door. But as he walked through the kitchen, he was accosted by Akane.

‘Aoi, how did you have presents for them all?’ Akane questioned him. ‘Did you just give them some random ones?’

‘Huh? No, I just had theirs. I gave them each other from the start. It was just the others who I… y’know.’ Akane seemed satisfied by the explanation, but Aoi himself was left wondering something as he made his way to the door.

As he opened it, Aoi came face to face with Clover, Light and Lotus. Well, Clover, Light and Hazuki. Aoi was still a little used to using Hazuki’s code name, since they hadn’t known each other before the Nonary Game.

‘Oh, hey.’ Aoi casually greeted them, not paying much attention to them, until something suddenly hit him. ‘Wait, hang on. Did you all come here together?’ The Field siblings always seemed to be with Alice, when she wasn’t off undercover like she was now. Did they bring in Hazuki as a replacement permanently underdressed and angry woman? Aoi could make so many jokes out of that.

‘Ah, no. We arrived at similar times and just met here in the hallway.’ Unfortunately, Light explained before Aoi could make a single joke. He really just had to ruin it, didn’t he? Oh well. Aoi wasn’t really looking forward to spending Christmas in the hospital.

‘Right. Well, you can all go on and head through.’ Aoi gestured to the living room before quickly stepping towards his room, explaining that he just had to grab something.

‘Hmph.’ Hazuki indignantly marched through, clearly upset at not being personally led like this was some kind of fancy restaurant. Aoi could already tell he was going to get a lot of complaints about his hosting from her.

But Aoi continued on, unperturbed by the grumpy old lady. In his room, he spread the six presents he had out on top of his bed. Well, there was what he’d gotten for Clover. He set that one aside. He also set the one from Seven aside

Seven sent a picture of himself and his coworkers with his. It wasn’t exactly “Secret” Santa per se… but whatever. Aoi shouldn’t even be focusing on his. It was a present for Hazuki.

Her and Seven were good friends… at least, Aoi thought so. He could never really figure out what their relationship was. It seemed like some kind of love/hate thing. He thought maybe letting him give her a present might reduce the hate side of things a little, but giving them both each other would be a little suspicious.

But as he thought about all that, Aoi was distracted by the photograph. He hadn’t seen Seven in a long time, and the man looked very different. He’d grown a beard, and even seemed to have lost a little weight, Aoi guessed to look less recognisable to Free the Soul members. Weird.

Anyway, with the others, Aoi could try to use Akane’s idea. Well, sort of. He wasn’t going to do it randomly, but Aoi might be able to reuse these presents. It might turn out horribly, but it was worth a shot.

He just needed to pick someone’s present to give to Light, then. Well… Aoi had no clue. He thought through each of the five others whose gifts sat in front of him again and again, but none held any special relation to Light. Well, Clover did, but the two of them had already exchanged presents of their own, being siblings and all, so that wouldn’t work either.

And as Aoi was trying to figure out if his whole swapping idea would even work, the doorbell began to ring again. Great.

Two seconds. A pause. Four seconds? And nothing else. What the hell was that? Was someone trying to guess their code? Aoi peeked our of his room, and the door was still. At least there was nobody trying to bash it in.

Aoi guessed it was safe to take a quick look through the door’s peephole. He tried to approach the door as silently as he could in the hopes that whoever was out there wouldn’t notice him.

Through the peephole he saw a teenage girl. She was hunched over with her hands on either side of her head. What the hell?

While Aoi was still trying to figure out what was going on, an arm reached down and put a hand on the girl’s shoulder. A very muscular arm.

As the man bent down next to the girl, Aoi was able to get a look at him. Satisfied, he slowly opened the door.

‘So this is Maria?’ Aoi asked the man. ‘You never told us she was coming too. It’s kinda weird if she’s not included in the whole gift exchange thing.’ Aoi still refused to call it a ‘Secret Santa’

But the only response Aoi received was a hand help up to stop him. Thus he was left to just wait awkwardly while Carlos slowly coaxed his sister’s hands away from her ears and helped her to stand up straight.

Then, finally, he stepped over to Aoi. Maria slowly followed behind, giving a nervous smile to Aoi as she was introduced.

‘Yeah, this is Maria.’ Carlos went ahead and answered his question as if he had just asked it. Apparently he hadn’t noticed the fact that he’d completely ignored Aoi for a while.

‘Well, she’s recovered from her Reverie Syndrome, but she still has some issues with getting overwhelmed sometimes. She’s doing pretty bad today, so I didn’t want to leave her all alone back at home. That’s not a problem, right?’

So the doorbell had just set her off or something, Aoi guessed. That made sense, but he didn’t exactly understand why Carlos thought a party was going to be the best place for Maria not to be disturbed. But Aoi couldn’t really stop him from having bad ideas, could he?

‘No, it’s fine.’ Aoi told him, returning Maria’s smile as he did so. But as he looked down at the rather short girl, he noticed her tugging on Carlos’ arm and staring intently down the corridor. ‘Uh, is there something there?’

The girl nodded. ‘There’s a big man… coming this way.’ She was painfully quiet. Aoi guessed being in a coma for so long would make someone a little awkward, but still, Maria seemed to be struggling just to get the words out. Aoi felt a wave of pity for the girl.

‘Hm?’ Carlos seemed to finally notice Maria pulling him. Instinctively, he stepped around Maria in order to get between her and the approaching man, nudging her inside towards Aoi, and irritatingly preventing him from being able to take a look.

‘Oh, it’s just Seven.’ Carlos announced. Aoi breathed a silent sigh of relief.. But then he remembered the photo. Would Carlos recognise him?

‘Hey, does he have a beard?’ Aoi shot out at Carlos.

‘Huh? No, why?’ Carlos turned back to look at Aoi inquisitively. He actually turned away from the man. Aoi could not believe how screwed they were.

‘Shit!’ Aoi thrust his hand out and grabbed the doorknob, but barely managed to move it with Carlos in the way. Why didn’t he move, damnit?

Seeming to notice the slight movement, the man shouted to hold the door. His voice did sound really familiar… Aoi could hear his huge thudding footsteps speed up. Within moments, he arrived at the door and flung it completely open.

It was Seven. But… the old Seven. There was no sign of a beard, and he was just as big as before. Aoi didn’t get it. He’d thought the man could be an impostor, but looking at him this close, there was no way. Aoi didn’t know how to react, so he was left just stood there staring for a few very long seconds, before he was interrupted.

‘Hey, somethin’ wrong?’ Seven tilted his head a little as he looked at Aoi. ‘What’re you lookin’ so surprised for?’

‘You…’ It took Aoi a few seconds to regain his composure.. ‘You changed back from that photo. What’s up with that?’

‘There’s a photo?’ Carlos chimed in, clearly having no idea what was going on. I quickly whispered that I would show him later, without taking my eyes off Seven.

‘Oh, yeah!’ Seven seemed to suddenly remember his complete change in appearance, as if it was something trivial and easily forgotten. ‘I tried changing for a bit, ‘cause I thought it might make it harder for all those cult weirdos to recognise me. I didn’t like it though, so I stopped. I thought you all might wanna see the photo.’

Aoi felt impossibly underwhelmed. He’d really just done it all for no reason. Geez…

‘Sure, sounds about right.’ Aoi replied, completely aloof. He shook his head slightly as he did so, just so it would be clear to everyone that he was being sarcastic. Carlos was so nice and boring he didn’t understand Aoi sometimes. ‘Well, come in then.’

He motioned for all three of the guests to come inside, and sent them off to sit with the others while he grabbed the presents. But before he did so, Aoi quickly sent Junpei a text. Everyone else had arrived now, and he just wanted to be sure that Junpei was actually going to make it. He wasn’t exactly known for being reliable.

Having done that, Aoi took another look at the gifts. He just needed to swap them around enough that they wouldn’t go down horribly. And after a little shuffling, Aoi managed to get it sorted. Sorted well enough, at least.

Aoi stacked them up, but before taking them in, checked his phone to see if Junpei replied. He had. Aoi couldn’t wrap his head around it, but Junpei was somehow always too busy to pick up a phone call yet able to reply to a text in seconds. But anyway, the message read:

“Omw but stuck in traffic”

“U guys don’t wait tho”

Aoi let out a sigh. He wasn’t exactly surprised. Junpei was the kind of guy who’d be late to his own funeral. And his wedding. Oh god, that was going to be with Akane. Aoi shuddered at the thought. Sadly, he couldn’t do anything about it, since Akane was way too wrapped up in love to recognise Junpei’s many flaws.

But that was an issue for later. For now, Aoi grabbed the presents and headed over to the others. On his way to the kitchen, he noticed that Akane was finally done there. And sure enough, there were now snacks laid out all over the coffee table. Most people had politely taken just a couple, but Seven was completely demolishing a plate of sausage rolls. Aoi wasn’t sure if there was enough food in the country for him.

As soon as everyone noticed Aoi, the conversation came to a halt. He cleared his throat before speaking to the group.

‘Ok, so… there were some… logistical issues… so we’ve had to swap the presents around a bit. It should all be fine still, but just to keep things from getting weird, could we all not talk about who was meant to get everything?’

‘What kind of “logistical issues” do you have with Secret Santa? It’s not exactly a complicated thing, Aoi.’ Damn. Hazuki didn’t seem to be buying it.

‘Uh…’ Aoi didn’t really have a response to that. Hazuki was making a good point. But thankfully, she was pretty easy to distract.

‘Probably the same logistical issues you had trying to find actual clothes.’ Aoi said dismissively. Hazuki let out a guttural roar, and stood up, poised to lunge at Aoi, when she was grabbed around the waist by Seven, who was perfectly positioned next to her. He’d probably seen something like this coming.

Hazuki shook and protested, but Seven was too strong for her to escape. Eventually she wore herself out and sat down again. The moment she did, Aoi apologised. She turned away from him with an indignant grunt, but seemed to accept it. And that was how to handle Hazuki.

‘Ok, so.’ Aoi broke the awkward silence that had formed. He’d forgotten that not everyone here was as used to Hazuki as he was. Fortunately, their shock did mean that they didn’t object to Aoi’s present swap. Akane was giving him a confused look, but she seemed to understand just to go along with it. ‘Here are the presents.’

He walked around the room, placing four of the carefully wrapped items in front of the people he’d chosen, and holding two himself, his and Junpei’s. Sigma, Diana and Phi already had theirs, but none of them had touched them yet. Akane and Carlos were left without one, however.

‘Oh!’ When she noticed him, Akane jumped up and ran off to the kitchen. She returned carrying a tray, which she laid in front of Carlos. ‘Here’s your present! Oh, guess I kind of ruined the “secret part” though…’

‘Don’t worry about it.’ Carlos smiled at Akane. ‘So what is this anyway? Wait-‘ He lifted something up out of the tray. It was a gingerbread man. And there was black icing all over it. Especially on the head. It seemed to have some really emo vibes going on.

‘Is this Junpei?’ He asked. Akane nodded, and they both burst out into laughter, quickly being joined by Sigma, Diana, Phi and Seven. It took Aoi a second longer to get it, but then he recognised the gingerbread man. It was Junpei a year ago, when he dressed all edgy and shit.

To help those who hadn’t known Junpei then, Aoi quickly grabbed his phone from his pocket and pulled up a picture of Junpei that Seven had sent him once. When he held it up next to the gingerbread man, everyone except Light finally got it too.

After a couple of minutes, when they had finally managed to stop laughing, Carlos began to look through the other gingerbread men. There were nine of them, each decorated to look like the nine people who had been at the Mars Mission site, but greatly exxagerated.

‘Akane!’ Carlos chided, still laughing, as he pulled out one that was covered with red icing. Mira. ‘You can’t just have all that blood on her! What if she was here?’

‘She’d probably like it.’ Clover interjected. When everyone stared at her, she continued. ‘What? It’s true. I’ve seen her in prison. She tries to make jokes, but she doesn’t really get humour.’

‘Is this supposed to be me?’ Sigma picked up one of the remaining ones. ‘Hey! Why’s it covered in wrinkles. I’m not old!’

Luckily, he was stopped by a tap on the arm by Diana before he could launch into a whole tirade about his age.

‘Sigma… I’m pretty sure that’s Delta.’ Sigma went bright red as he realised his mistake. But Diana carried on anyway. ‘See, the dark glasses here?’

‘Wait you thought you were the one with glasses?’ Phi jumped in to join the mockery of Sigma. ‘Why would that be you?’

‘I-I dunno!’ Sigma shouted. ‘I thought they were just like… cool shades or something.’

‘“Cool shades”? Since when have you been cool?’

‘Since when haven’t I?’

‘Guys…’ Diana stopped the two from arguing yet again. Doing so seemed to be her main job as a mother/girlfriend.

‘Thank you, Akane.’ Carlos seemed to really appreciate the gift. So did Maria, according to the headless body of Eric in her hand.

‘Ok.’ Now that the interest was dying down again, Aoi took it upon himself to get things moving. ‘Let’s all get to it and open these, right?’

Everyone else nodded and began tearing coloured paper into tiny scraps and making a huge mess that Aoi would definitely have to clean up later. Great.

But instead of opening his, Aoi watched Sigma, Diana and Phi. He’d hoped having them but presents for each other would help them be closer, but there was honestly just as much of a chance of this backfiring completely and screwing up their relationship forever. So there was no pressure there.

Diana was the first to get hers open, due to the kind of half-assed wrapping job. Sigma had somehow wrapped to be about ten times as thick as what was inside it. Apparently it had been done so weirdly to prevent the present from being damaged, but Aoi was pretty sure Sigma’s incompetence was also a major factor.

Whatever the reason, the wrapping fell apart almost as it was picked up by Diana, and she quickly salvaged a sheet of paper from inside. There was a drawing on it. It was tough for Aoi to make out, but it looked like a desert at night. And there was some kind of dome in the ground.

‘Oh…’ Diana turned to face Sigma, who sat on her right. ‘That’s so sweet! I always have wondered what it looked like…’

‘Yeah,’ Sigma returned her warm smile. ‘Well, the moon was a pretty interesting honeymoon destination. I thought you’d want to be able to see it. I know it’s not really realistic, but you can kind of get the idea.’

Sigma was starting to panic, but Diana’s expression stopped him. Then they leant in and kissed. Aoi wasn’t sure whether to look away or not. They just had to be awkward, didn’t they. Thankfully they stopped fairly soon, being interrupted by Phi.

‘Ah!’ Phi had turned away from the lovers and opened incredibly neatly wrapped package. She was completely taken back by what she found inside.

‘Diana? Is this your-?’ Phi spun around as she lifted up her present. It was a small golden birdcage on a similar chain. Inside the cage was a miniscule blue bird. But before Phi could ask her question about it, Diana pulled down the neck of her jumper to reveal an identical necklace of her own.

‘I found the shop where I got mine from,’ Diana explained as she smiled sweetly at her daughter. ‘And I asked them to make another one.’

Tears were starting to brim in Phi’s eyes. Diana wrapped her arms around her and the two embraced for a while. From Aoi’s knowledge, this was what most of their interactions consisted of. Still, these gifts all seemed to be going well.

‘Alright, then.’ Sigma took the opportunity to open his own. Beneath the wrapping paper was a rectangular box, and from that Sigma took… a mug.

Aoi winced when he saw that. A mug? That was one of the worst present ideas he could think of. A mug is the kind of thing a little kid buys on… father’s day or something. Not that Aoi had any experience with those kind of things from his childhood.

Then Sigma spun the mug around in his hand, giving Aoi a view of the other side. There was writing on it. It read

“#1 Dad”

Aoi stared. And stared. And stared. He was in complete disbelief. What kind of present? How would you even find one of those at Christmas? Why would you want to? Was it the very last thing left at the shop? So much for this helping their relationship…

‘Phi…’ Sigma interrupted Aoi’s thoughts as he met the eyes of the girl, who had finally been released from Diana’s hug. ‘This is… purr-fect.’

As Phi held her face in her hands to disguise her laughter, it finally hit Aoi. The point was, Phi was calling him her father. He smiled. Widely. Then stopped himself, since he didn’t want to be seen watching their intimate family moment so intently.

To give them a little privacy, Aoi turned to look at the others. Light had already opened his. It was a large canvas with some really weird art drawn on it. Ugh, abstract. Light was running his hands over it, but didn’t seem to be completely satisfied.

‘I believe I have the general sense of this piece.’ He announced. ‘But not being able to see the art probably detracts from it a little.’

‘Mm…’ Carlos seemed deep in thought. Right, he was the one who this present was from. Weird, Aoi never thought he was much of an artsy type.

‘Hey, Maria, why don’t you talk to Light about it?’ Carlos suggested out of the blue. Light tilted his head a little upon hearing that, prompting Carlos to speak a little more. ‘She’s the one who painted it. It’s based on what she felt during her time unconscious. Maybe it’d be interesting to hear about that, Light. I mean, maybe you can understand that feeling, without your, uh, sight.’

It was a fairly good improvised plan, seeing as the present hadn’t been designed for Light. So with Light’s agreement, Maria finally released Carlos’ arm from her grasp, and moved to sit next to Light.

‘Ah, but first.’ Light paused for a second to think. ‘Aoi, is it you who’s being given my gift?’

‘Uh, yeah, it’s me.’ Aoi wondered how he’d he managed to work that out before everyone had been given their presents. He’d probably been able to figure out how much everything weighed by the sound it made as Aoi put it down, or some crap. Light could do some serious shit without sight.

‘Ah.’ Light didn’t seem particularly thrilled with that. Well, there was no point in Aoi wasting time worrying about that. He ripped open the package and found… plants.

Clovers. Eleven four-leaved clovers. Well, Light wasn’t completely wrong. Aoi had never liked clovers. Not since the last time he’d been given some by Light.

But Aoi couldn’t just keep hanging onto that. Because in the end, Aoi guessed he was following the clovers all throughout those nine years. He’d been doing it all because of his love for Akane, and even though hope and faith were pretty much the same thing, Aoi had certainly needed all of them to work for so long on rescuing his sister.

But Aoi refused to believe that anything was up to luck. He couldn’t handle the idea that he could be unlucky, and the whole thing could fail. And honestly… that was a pretty dumb reason to hate a plant. So Aoi decided not to.

‘Thanks, Light.’ While the other boy couldn’t see it, Aoi did have a little smile on his face.

‘I didn’t think you liked clovers.’ Light mused. ‘Perhaps you’d prefer some different flowers… I could definitely buy some.’

‘I’ve changed my mind. And besides…’ Aoi explained, a little uncomfortable. ‘They weren’t meant for me anyway. They’re a cool present.’

Light looked like he was about to say something else, but Maria was very eager to talk to him, so he merely smiled at Aoi before turning to the girl and letting her speak.

Aoi realised as she launched into her description, Light nodding every so often, that she hadn’t spoken at all since they got in. It was weird to see her so animated all of a sudden. Still, Aoi guessed it was good.

‘Hey, Carlos.’ Aoi did have a little suspicion to confirm though, and so he leant towards him and whispered. ‘You just wanted a break for a little, right? Don’t worry, I’d do the same with Akane.’

‘Maybe a little.’ Carlos smirked, still shaking out his arm, which hadn’t moved in a while. ‘But it’s mainly because I want to see her speaking. She’s not really been good with people since her coma.’

‘Don’t worry, I’d do the same with Akane.’ Aoi’s sister could be very high maintenance, so he did enjoy a little time on his own every so often.

But as he was whispering, Aoi noticed the present he’d bought being opened. As he turned to her, Clover was excitedly tearing off the wrapping paper. Inside she found a pack of panties. Shocked, she looked up and immediately made accidental eye contact with Aoi. It was pretty clear she realised it was him Shit.

‘Aoi! What the heck are these?’ She waved the panties in the air, catching the attention of pretty much everyone in the room. Aoi was kind of forced to explain himself then. Oh well, at least it was a funny story. At the very least, Seven would enjoy it.

‘Ok, ok, I’ll explain.’ He hell his hands up defensively. ‘I thought you’d remember, Clover. It was the first time we went on a mission together. We had to climb up a fire escape to get into someone’s apartment. Then, being the gentleman I am, I let Clover climb the steps in front of me. And when she did-‘

‘Stop!’ Clover suddenly interrupted, remembering the story. ‘Why the hell were you still thinking about that, you perv?

‘Hey, believe me, it wasn’t a pleasant experience for me either.’ Aoi replied. There’d had been a lot of screaming on that fire escape. So much that they managed to alert the apartment’s owner and ruin the mission.

‘The stair trick.’ Sigma shook his head. ‘Classic.’

‘Ugh! Why are you all like this?’ Clover shoved the panties into her pocket and crossed her arms sulkily.

‘Y’know, I’m not sure you can be complainin’ about inappropriate presents, Clover.’ Seven held up his own, that he’d apparently opened earlier.

It was a photo of Clover, Lotus and Akane. Lotus was wearing a variation of her usual weird clothes, Clover had on her ‘disguise wear’, which was just as revealing, and Akane…

‘Akane?’ Aoi turned to confront his sister. Even with her looking as uncomfortable as she did in the photo, Aoi was not ok with it. ‘When was this?’

‘We’ve had girls’ outings!’ Akane protested. Aoi knew about those, but he had no idea this kind of stuff was what they did there.

‘Wait, hang on!’ Something had dawned on Clover. ‘How do you have that?’

‘What d’you mean?’ Seven asked. ‘It’s my present. Oh yeah, thanks for that, Clover.’

‘What? No! That wasn’t meant to be for you! I don’t want you doing all… creepy stuff with it!’

Clover made a grab for the photo, but Seven saw her coming. He stood up and held the picture high above his head.

‘Hey! Give me that, you sicko!’ Clover kept jumping and grabbing at it, but Seven kept it firmly out of her reach. Carlos apparently felt the need to try and stop them, but his efforts to reason with the pair were in vain.

As the fight was ongoing, the doorbell rang. Finally. That had to be Junpei. Aoi quickly excused himself and hurried to the door. Opening it, he was greeted by the sight of a black gas mask. The doorbell hadn’t been rung in the code.

‘Shit!’ Aoi put all his force into a shove, pushing the person backwards. They tripped over a cardboard box, and fell flat on the ground, the impact knocking off the mask. Aoi cautiously stepped towards him until he could see the person’s face.

‘Junpei? What the hell, man?’ Aoi could not believe this. It wasn’t enough for Junpei to be this late, he had to try and pull something like this too. ‘Use the damn code, at least.’

‘Oh, right.’ Junpei replies as he stood himself up again. ‘Sorry, guess I forgot about that. But come on, that was pretty funny.’

Aoi refused to give him the benefit of a laugh. Instead, he asked Junpei about the box.

‘Oh, that’s Akane’s present. Yeah, could you give me a hand carrying that in.’ Aoi obliged and they lifted the box together and walked into the apartment..

‘Oh, try to be gentle with it.’ Junpei instructed. When Aoi didn’t reply, Junpei sighed. ‘Look, man, I know you’re pissed at me for being late, but I’ve got a good reason, ok? I’ll explain it soon.’

‘Alright.’ I was pretty sure Junpei was just still trying to think of what excuse to give, but I figured I’d just let him go ahead and say whatever he was going to and then tell him it was bullshit.

As they made it over to the others and set the box down, Junpei got a few greetings from the others, and one especially excited one from Akane.

Aoi scooped up the present from Hazuki and threw it to Junpei, who barely managed to catch it without it falling on the floor. ‘Yeah, here’s yours.’

‘Hey! Be careful with that!’ Hazuki shouted. ‘It’s made of expensive stuff, so don’t go breaking it.’

‘I thought we weren’t spending much money?’ Sigma asked upon hearing that.’’Cause if not, I definitely want another mug.’

‘Oh, don’t worry, I didn’t buy any of it.’ Hazuki explained. ‘I got it from work.’

‘Wait, so you just stole expensive stuff from your job? Don’t they care about that?’ Seven questioned her. ‘Maybe I should arrest you.’

‘Everyone takes office supplies!’ Hazuki defended herself. ‘Don’t make such a big deal out of it.’

‘Yeah, but look at this thing!’ While we were all focused on Hazuki, Junpei had unwrapped his gift, and he now held it out for us all to see. It was a small square box with a screen set into it. ‘This is a computer. With a touchscreen. That stuff’s expensive. When people take office supplies they take, like… pens.’

‘Once I tried to take a pen from SOIS.’ Clover added. ‘Alice really did not like that… She still talks about it.

Ignoring her, Junpei turned on the box and tapped the screen a little before looking back up at Hazuki. ‘So you play sudoku on it?’

‘Well, I thought some practice was in order.’ Hazuki said, pointing at Junpei and Akane. ‘Last time you two had to play sudoku, we all almost got burnt to death.’

‘Geez…’ Junpei seemed to find it kind of funny. Then he turned it off and gasped. ‘When it goes off… it has… the Funyarinpa!’

‘It’s a dog, Junpei!’ Hazuki snapped back. Stop calling it that made up name.

‘Made up?’ Junpei sounded even more indignant than Hazuki, which was an achievement if I’d ever seen one. But sadly, I couldn’t just sit back and watch this.

‘Akane?’ I whispered to her. ‘We gotta stop this. You deal with Junpei.’

With that, I stepped towards Hazuki, and just as she stood up in rage, grabbed what she’d been sitting on. I’d noticed that her present had disappeared at some point, and from then on there was something peeking out from underneath her.

‘Hey, this is your present, right? From Seven?’ As Aoi said that, Hazuki wheeled around and found me holding some… official police documents. What a fun present.

But then Aoi opened the first page and saw was the documents were about.

“Gentarou Hongou, prison escapee was found crossing the border from Mexico to the U.S and taken into custody.”

‘Hey, wait, why were you hiding this?’ I asked Hazuki. Why would she keep good news like that from us.

‘It’s not real.’ Seven cut in. Before I could speak again, he continued. ‘Hazuki’s kids told me they were having nightmares about him after they saw he got out on the news. So I made those myself. Thought it might help ‘em.’

‘I hope it will…’ Hazuki avoided making eye contact with anyone. ‘They’re starting to feel like they did back when they first went through all that…’

‘They’ll be fine.’ Seven reassured her. ‘They’ve got a pretty good mother looking out for ‘em… even if she’s not much good at controllin’ her anger.’

The two of them smiled hopefully at each other. Aoi didn’t really know what to add, so he glanced around for something to detract from the awkwardness. Doing so, he saw Akane about to open her present. Perfect.

Aoi stepped over just in time to see Akane open the box and pick up something small. A tiny, black and white rabbit.

‘It’s just like…’ Akane began speaking.

‘The ones from school.’ Junpei finished her sentence. I did vaguely remember Akane showing me a rabbit hutch at her school one day, way back when we were kids. Oh yeah, she was in charge of taking care of it with Junpei. I guess they must’ve spent a lot of time together there.

I had to admit, it was a pretty sweet gesture, to think way back to something like that. Especially for someone like Junpei, who struggled to remember anything. Well, he wasn’t really as bad as Aoi made him out to be. He still had a lot of issues though. Like his lateness.

‘Oh, yeah, Aoi?’ Junpei somehow managed to interrupt Aoi’s thoughts just at the right time. ‘This is why I was so late. The shelter wanted to do a background check, to make sure I wasn’t going to abuse it or anything. And since I just disappeared for a year, they got suspicious and it ended up taking a long time to get it sorted out, and that made me late. So, yeah, I’m sorry for it though.’

‘Alright.’ It was a fair excuse. Aoi was being a little harsh on the guy, even if it was kind of his job as the older brother. ‘But don’t think you’re odd the hook for that gas mask stunt. That must have taken at least a little time. It was pretty funny, though, I’ll give you that.’

They shared a quick smile before Akane interrupted.

‘Oh, Jumpy? Does he have a name?’ She asked. Apparently she’d determined that the rabbit was male.

‘No, but I was thinking of calling him Santa.’ Junpei surprised Aoi with that. ‘Y’know, because it’s Christmas, and there’s that whole story with the Black Santa and the White Santa.’

Aoi had thought about about that story a lot, as a failed Santa. Well, he thought of himself as a failed Santa. But…

He had failed to give Akane what she wanted back then. For everything to stay the same. But looking around right now, Aoi couldn’t really say things were worse than back then. The pair were still broke, and they’d been through some terrible things, but Aoi had to admit that without all of that, they never would have met any of their friends here.

And looking around at the scene surrounding him; the Klim family joking with each other; Hazuki confiding in Seven about her daughters; Light helping Maria talk more confidently; Carlos offering Clover to eat Sigma as a symbolic victory against “the pervs”; and Junpei and Akane playing with their new pet, Aoi couldn’t really fall this a failure. It had all worked out pretty damn well.