Trail

The morning after, even though it was their day off, the students didn't feel like doing any of their usual activities. By this time, all the parents and the press had all left the premises. The students gathered in the student lounge at the top floor of the student building.

For a room filled with teenagers, it was unusually quiet. Most of the students were still in shock from the events that had transpired the day before.

They were only there for a few minutes before Ichisuda, Izume and Zuno walked into the room.

"how are you all?" Ichisuda asked

There were barely any responses. "Yeah, I thought as much" He said

"I know as teachers, we've let you down " Izume said, taking over from Ichisuda. "We're here to promise that nothing like this will ever happen to any of you again"

The students noticed the anger in her face as she said this. It hadn't occurred to them that what they needed was reassurance.

"I also think you should all know that Shihata is okay. Her injury was severe but the doctors managed to stabilise her thanks to Tanori, Sando and Dr Hirime. If it will make you feel better, you can all go visit her at the hospital today." After a brief pause, Ichisuda sighed and stopped himself from saying something. Realising the detrimental effects it would have on some of the students.

Instead, he said "Mika, Rando, Yashiro, Minako, Rani, Sando, Tanori, Koda, Dota, Murake, Hayasato, and Takeyomi, Could you come with me please?"

He walked them out of the room slowly and down the hallway.

When he was certain they were out of earshot from the rest of the group, he started speaking.

"I wanted you all to be away from the rest of the group before we spoke. As your teacher, I have to tell you that you were all reckless and if the situation were different, more than one of you could've ended up like Shihata, or worse. I know you were looking out for your teachers and you realised the incapacitating agent could potentially have killed us but after contacting the police, no further action was required. Taking on those enemies was incredibly dangerous."

As he said this their heads all dropped because they already believed what happened to Shihata was their fault.

"However, that being said. You all were extremely brave yesterday. Risking your young and bright lives to aid the teachers. It wouldn't be right for me to only admonish or praise you in front of the others incase they felt worse about themselves for not trying to help as much as the rest of you did.

Takeyomi and Hayasato, you showed great initiative in going to the police. They were able to get there in time because of that.

(Ichisuda had gotten a rough account of what each student did during the incident, after going around to each of the students the day before)

Koda and Dota, you did well in cutting off their escape route and carefully immobilising one of them.

Rani, Minako and Mika, you all did great with on the spot thinking; coming up with a plan to increase oxygen flow in the room we were in.

Sando and Tanori, your quick thinking medical skills and knowledge may have saved Shihata's life. You did a good job.

Murake, you hid your friends and supported Mika while she was breaking into the office. In plain sight might I add. Impressive use of your powers.

Rando, Yashiro and Mika, taking on the enemies who didn't care that you were children, and winning. Good job.

The rest of you too, mustering the courage to go up against such enemies was very impressive. I thank you for helping us."

The moods of the students in front of him were visibly lifted and they felt much better about themselves.

"I'm extremely proud of all of you and proud to call you my students. I do not want you to take our promise as nothing. As long as you're in this Academy, that will never happen again. Never. I'm also very sorry you had to see your friend like that..."

Meanwhile, as he was speaking to the group who walked out with him, Izume was doing the same with the group who stayed back. The general gist of what she was saying was that the students there did the right thing by staying inside and not endangering themselves, but some of them didn't feel that way. They felt as though they were cowards despite Izume's kind words.

The group became whole again as Ichisuda and the students walked back in. Shortly afterwards, Izume told them that there wouldn't be many lessons the coming week as they deserved a break after recent events. The students rejoiced.

Elsewhere, Fujimoto, Hirowa,Zuno and some higher ups in the police department were at a meeting with some government officials to discuss the incident, but only one of them was speaking.

"This was a big mess. We've got a child in critical condition, a police officer who was a member of the so called "Order of Blight", right under your noses. (he was referring to the officers when he said this) How did this happen?"

Yanagara Sashi was first to speak, "Officer Asaka has been with us for a number of years now. This could mean one of two things. He was either approached by the group known as the order of Blight at some point during these years, or he's always been a member. Either way, it was impossible for us to know what he was up to. That being said, the Police department take full responsibility for this incident and we will work closely with the Academy to make sure something like this never happens again"

Fujimoto spoke next. "The teachers and I should've done our own background checks and improved our security when we heard there was a threat. Like commissioner Yanagara said, we will make sure-"

He was cut off before he finished, "That's not going to help the parents who currently doubt you. We aren't looking "would have" or "should have" excuses.

Look, Mr Yanagara this incident was an embarrassment to the police force. Children did a better job at taking down members of that group than the police and frankly Mr Fujimoto, We here have all decided this is your only warning. As an institution, an incident like this should never have occurred. If anything like this repeats itself, the horizon Academy will cease to exist."

After a few seconds, he continued. "If there's nothing else, that will be all gentlemen. Have a good day."

Then men bowed their heads and walked out of the room. Before they parted ways, Yanagara said, "Mr Fujimoto, you still aren't completely off the hook yet. You still need to explain to us why the last fragment was in your office. Fujimoto said nothing, turned and walked away.

A few hours later, some of the kids went out to the hospital to check on their friend. They weren't surprised to find out that she still wasn't awake and that her parents were by her side.

Minako didn't want to go in as she felt it was her carelessness that got Shihata into her current predicament.

Yashiro and Rando walked in first, greeted her parents, and introduced themselves as her friends. They sat and talked for a few seconds before the other students, including Minako walked in.

After brief introductions, everyone sat down and Yashiro began speaking again.

"We're really sorry this happened. We thought they wouldn't harm us because we were kids, that's why we went to help"

Shihata's father, Yujiro Saki responded, "Do not blame yourselves. Most people would've assumed they weren't going to harm you"

Mishi Saki, his wife, spoke next with a slight smile on her face. "She gets this from her father. Rushing head first into danger when others are at risk of being hurt. Thank you all for looking after her"

The students nodded.

They all spoke for a few more minutes and during that time, Minako opened up to the parents explaining and apologising for not being careful enough. They managed to reassure her that she did nothing wrong and by the end of those few minutes, everyone in the room was smiling.

*

The order wasted no time in beginning the next, albeit improvised phase of their plan. They had already started trying to research the kids and seeing how possible their plan was. Now that they had lost their police contact; Asaka, the research was much harder to do. It meant they had to do everything in person, which put them at great risk.

1 sent 2 and 3 on a reconnaissance mission to find out anything they could. Throughout the day, they had little to no luck. They didn't know any of the children's names and there was no way to access the names of Academy students without being affiliated with the particular Academy.

They found a news article that said a child was injured during the incident at the Academy but didn't release the name. They knew they also couldn't risk going to the hospital because the police were obviously going to be there.

2 eventually called 1.

"1, there's no way we can get information about these kids. The girl 5 injured, luckily isn't dead but we can't get any information about her either. What do we do?"

1 thought for a few seconds before responding. "We may have to bring him in, despite his volatile nature"

"who?" 2 asked

"11"