21 - Brainiac

[Author here. Updated the tags on the wn.]

It was still early morning. Satoshi sat comfortably in the principal's office, engrossed in his Gameboy.

Meanwhile, Nao, Kaede, and Kanoko stood by the side. Kanoko and Kaede's knees were beginning to hurt from standing motionless for over 30 minutes. Despite being the only one allowed to move, Nao felt more frozen than the others.

'It's... been a while... He's not caught yet... Will he really... Seriously save us?' Nao thought.

"Hey," Satoshi called, his focus still on his Gameboy, cutting through her thoughts.

"Y-yeah?" Nao replied, stammering.

"You can sit, you know. I never said you had to stand like the rest of them," Satoshi notified.

"A-ah... Y-yes, it's just that..."

"Just what? Hurry up and sit. Unlike these two, I want to keep you around for longer, so you need to give your knees some rest. They just need to look presentable for when Hiroki Morii is brought here," Satoshi said.

Nao's heart rate spiked as she glanced at Kanoko and Kaede, who could only feel the sting in their knees. They couldn't even move their eyelids to cast a judgmental gaze at Nao.

"Or... for some reason, do you want to stand like them?" Satoshi lowered his Gameboy as he spoke slower, his tone suggestive while turning his head to Nao.

Nao was taken aback, feeling his glare.

"N-no! I-I just..."

"Sir—... Satoshi," Tommy confidently interjected, "it could be possible that the young miss here is simply overwhelmed by the situation. After all, it is you she's around. Miss, you need not be startled. Though, I would suggest you sit down... There is no need for Satoshi to question your loyalty... Right?" Tommy ordered, fixing his monocle as he glanced at her.

With a small bite of her lip, Nao stepped away from Kanoko and Kaede and sat down on the sofa in the principal's office, looking away from them.

'Ah... I feel bad... but at least my legs don't hurt anymore,' Nao thought, relieved.

Several seconds later, the door gently opened; Tommy's gaze turned to face the person at the door.

A short character with blue hair, wearing reading glasses and carrying a notepad and pen, walked in.

"Hello, Jameson... It has been a while. Or should I say... Satoshi?" he said, fixing his glasses and confidently walking past Tommy.

Satoshi still looked down in disinterest at his gameboy.

Then, Tommy moved like the wind, blocking his path, his palm straightened at the person's throat.

"You shall stay where you are." Tommy declared, his expression now a calm glare.

Tommy startled Nao. 'I... didn't even see him move!' She thought.

"Hmph. Tommy Markov. The retired elite from the secret Russian Taskforce: Omega... I knew you would do that," he said with a triumphant smirk.

Tommy then felt the barrel of a gun pressing against his abdomen. He looked down, noticing it.

'What...!? H-how...?' Nao looked, dumbfounded.

Tommy remained calm, his posture unwavering.

"I've researched everything about you since our last... encounter. I know how you move. I knew that if someone other than you walked closer than 3.1 meters to your master, you would threaten them with this move. The moment I crossed the 3.102-meter line, I had my gun ready. I won this game," the figure said confidently with a smirk.

"Hah. Insolent as ever... Benson Berkley. Just one of you three is enough to grind my gears. If it weren't for your rather eccentric nature, you would have been the perfect servants to Satoshi," Tommy murmured.

"...Stand down, Tommy. I need him alive."

"Sir, why not just hypnotize him? I could take the gunshot wound, and you could just—" Tommy spoke in perfect English before being interjected by his master.

"Tommy. Stand. Down." Satoshi repeated, his tone louder.

With a sigh, Tommy removed his palm and walked to the side, clearing the way for Benson.

"As you wish..."

"Hmph..." Benson grunted, lowering his gun as he approached Satoshi.

"He's right, you know," Satoshi said, placing his Gameboy on the principal's desk, his entire attention directed at Benson.

"Oh?" Benson responded, intrigued.

Satoshi then took out his golden pendant, hovering it menacingly in front of Benson, who looked at it without flinching.

"If I just hypnotized you, I could guarantee Hiroki Morii's capture... Why shouldn't I do that?" Satoshi murmured, gauging Benson for any reaction.

"Hah," Benson smirked.

'For the same reason you didn't try to hypnotize Hiroki Morii when you faced him the first time...' Benson thought, fixing his glasses.

"Because that would be..." He began.

"...Too boring for you. Isn't it, Jameson?" Benson muttered in English.

After a few seconds of Satoshi looking deeply into Benson's eyes, he sighed and tossed the pendant to Benson, who firmly grasped it as if he had been ready for Satoshi's toss.

"Just capture him. I don't care what you do with the other riff-raff at this school or outside of it. Just bring him here," Satoshi said, leaning against his table as he picked up his Gameboy again.

"Of course..."

'What!? He just gave him THAT!? That's the pendant that hypnotized everyone, isn't it!? Why would he...?' Nao thought as she looked at the pendant now in Benson's grasp.

"Of course..." Benson repeated, pocketing the pendant into his breast pocket as he turned around and left the principal's office.

'This... This doesn't make any sense! If I had that, I would just...!'

"I would like to reassure you, miss," Tommy started, turning Nao's attention to him. "It is the person, not the object, that is special in this case. Satoshi can hypnotize people with anything... be it a pencil, his fingers, or even his eyes, which are his mightiest weapon. A genius... Giving that impudent guest his pendant merely grants him power over those already hypnotized by it. Unlike in fairy tales and famous novels around the globe, our Satoshi here... Has no weak spots."

"A-ah... T-thanks... I was really worried for a second. That was good to hear," Nao muttered.

'Ridiculous! You want to tell me he used that pendant only for fun!? Impossible! Hiroki can't do anything against him... He's just... too grand... Is Satoshi even human!?' Nao thought, letting out a nervous chuckle.

'Shit... Hiroki... Run away from here...!! This guy's bad news...!! He's too much for you or even the police force...!!' Kanoko thought, momentarily ignoring the pain in her legs.

'Why do so many people want to hurt my Hiroki? Enough... Just stop it already... I can't live like this anymore... I can't keep going, not knowing if you're okay... Please... Hiroki, run away from here..!! Leave mommy alone!! I don't care what happens to me anymore as long as you live!!' Kaede begged internally. 

Meanwhile, just outside the door, Benson walked among rows of students teachers and police officers, obediently standing from each side; guarding the entrance to the principal's office.

'Seeing all of this charade, all for just one person... I find myself a little excited, Hiroki Morii. Don't disappoint me...' Benson thought, a smirk escaping his lips as he fixed his glasses.

Meanwhile...

"Ughh..." A raspy grunt. A pounding head. Aching muscles. Yuuto slowly opened his eyes, the fluorescent lights piercing through his eyelids, urging them to open.

Bright. The word echoed in his head as his vision adjusted and he narrowed his eyes to ease the strain of looking directly at the light above him. He was lying somewhere.

He stretched his palms, the feeling in his body returning with every waking moment. The surface beneath him was soft and smooth. His head was propped up slightly, most likely on a pillow, he figured.

'A hospital...? Am I captured?' he wondered, baffled that he could still move freely.

Tilting his head to the side, he noticed a person sitting right next to him.

He blinked, bringing his palm to his eyes and rubbing them as he tried to focus on the person sitting there so silently.

It was Saki.

"...Where are we?" he inquired.

"We're at the infirmary... still in the school," she uttered weakly, looking down.

"...Is it only us in here?" he asked, skeptical as he looked around the room, noticing how empty it was.

"Yes... just us. Nobody saw us get in here," she replied.

'What? You mean to tell me she carried me to the infirmary without getting caught?' he thought, straining himself to sit up.

"Are you sure you should sit?" she asked.

"Forget about that for a second," he instructed. "How did you get me here without anyone noticing?"

"Well... you are very light for a boy... and I've been avoiding people my whole life, so... it wasn't that hard, especially with how... automatic everyone seemed to move," Saki murmured.

'...This is starting to become a problem. This weak body... I figured I could work out before anything major happened, but that hypnotist shota bastard had to come here right after I recovered from my fight with Veiny Turd... Right, the gunshot wound!' Yuuto thought, glancing at his shoulder and noticing a bloody bandage taped in place. The scent of alcohol and iodine lingered around the bandage. His gaze then wandered to Saki's hands. Smooth, but her sleeves and part of her outfit were stained with dried blood.

"I... don't really know a lot of first aid... All I did was clean it and put a bandage on it, hoping it would stop on its own, somehow... I thought it wouldn't, considering how it looked... but then it just stopped bleeding," she said.

'Haaah... So, it didn't hit anything vital... That's good...' Yuuto thought, sighing in slight relief.

"Thanks," Yuuto said.

Saki merely nodded.

"How long has it been since I passed out?" Yuuto thought.

"Not long... About 30 minutes." She said, still unable to hold his gaze, clearly in discomfort around him.

'I guess she's shaken up...' Yuuto noticed as he scrutinized her reaction.

"D-do... you mind if I ask yo—"

"Where's my baseball bat?" Yuuto interrupted, looking around for his trusty weapon.

"It's... I didn't have room in my hands to carry it, so... it's still there," she reluctantly answered.

"Damn it!" Yuuto called out quietly, slamming his fist on the bed, causing Saki to flinch.

"S-sorry..."

"No, it's not your fault. I'll just find another one or something. But before that..." He replied, getting up from the bed and hastily walking to the nearby faucet. He leaned his head beneath it, opening the tap and drinking water frantically.

'I've never been so thirsty in my life... Is this because of the blood loss? I did bleed quite a lot... And I had to fight that crazy bastard in that condition... Too reckless. I got caught up in his rhythm and thoughtlessly fell into his provocation like some amateur, when I should've just run away whenever I could... Is it because I have that dumbfuck of a brain of Hiroki's?'

[When you lose blood, your body loses not only blood cells but also plasma, which is largely composed of water. This can lead to a decrease in blood volume and blood pressure, triggering thirst as a way for your body to signal that it needs to replenish fluids. Additionally, the body releases certain hormones in response to blood loss that can increase thirst.]

'So weird,' Saki thought as she watched him chug water. 'Just half an hour ago, he was pinning me in the bathroom... I thought it would just end up being that kind of day again... Am I dreaming, I wonder? Because... none of this makes any sense. It turned out... that everyone really is under some spell. The way they were walking with each other, like they were in sync,' she thought.

'...Walking together like that... If I was also hypnotized, I bet they wouldn't mind me walking with them...' she thought, clutching her skirt a little.

'Alright...' Yuuto then closed the tap. 'I'm still feeling thirsty, but I shouldn't drink too much in one go. It'll make my movements heavier, and I'd feel nauseous if I have to do any excessive physical activity shortly after,' he thought as he rose from the sink.

He glanced over at the TV screen in the infirmary, noticing it was turned off. '...Good.' He mused as he glanced around, noticing a wooden broomstick lying about.

He took the broom's head off and gave the stick a twirl.

'Too fragile. It'll break in a real fight... I'll just do this, then!' Yuuto snapped the stick on his knee, splitting it into two separate wooden sticks, which he then put between his belt and his pants.

'Well, this has to do for now. I have to go to a storage house and find something more fitting...'

"Alright. Come on. We need to go," he said to Saki after noticing his bloodied tank top resting on a nearby chair and putting it on.

'So now I gotta drag her around, find a weapon, and locate that shota bastard while avoiding getting hypnotized. Damn it... Things just got a lot more complicated,' Yuuto thought, a smirk stretching at the corner of his lip.

'What a thrill...'

Saki nodded as she looked at his back, preparing herself to get up from the chair.

'Is it just me... or does he seem... just a tiny bit bigger than half an hour ago?' Saki thought as she looked at his back, which appeared somewhat broader.

'Must be just the angle, right?' She got up from the chair and followed Hiroki without saying a word as they left the infirmary.

-------------------SOMEWHERE IN THE SCHOOL...-----------------

"Hmm... I've been walking for a while, but I haven't seen Hiro—... ahem, Yuuto Sakurai anywhere. How odd~ Is he part of the hypnotized group, maybe?" Nazuna muttered to herself, walking with her arms raised nonchalantly behind her head.

"Oh well~ If he's one of them, I'll just take him out like the rest. No biggie~" she mused with a relaxed smile, looking up at the ceiling as she stepped over dozens of unconscious students, teachers, and police officers.

"He might've beaten Akito... but I'm much stronger~ Some hypnotized lame-o couldn't even hope to scratch me... I hope you didn't get hypnotized, Yuuto Sakurai-chan~..." She added, casually jumping off the pile of bodies to the floor.

"Oh! Considering he fought Akito, maybe he went to the infirmary? Stupid, didn't think of that~" She murmured with a pout.