“But the academy wouldn’t allow her to honor that promise…which is why she never should’ve gone to a school like that in the first place. She’s dead already, let it go…stupid kid.”
But Yuma Shisei─knew what would happen.
“When I think about the Director, though, or Shisei, it’s not like I don’t get it. Actually you know what? Never mind, I don’t get it.”
“But─I’m just going to come out and say this, Jun: you’re too soft. Where was your mindreading on this one? In retrospect, whose handiwork could that locked room have been but Hime-chan’s─”
“Not like you figured it out right away.”
“But I’m just incompetent.”
And this was never my riddle to solve in the first place.
“Hanh. Not to sound like Maeda Keijiro Toshimasu, but trusting and being betrayed feels better to me than being suspicious and staying safe.”
There was no visible hint of self-reflection in Aikawa’s indomitable smile. She didn’t even seem to have any regrets, no, nor was she even hurt.
“Jun, you really don’t think this calls for any kind of reconsideration?”
“Not at all. The fact that I care about Ichihime’s got nothing to do with what she’s done. Haha, same reason I’m not even mad that you were going to betray us, Iitan.”
She knew.
“You slippery bastard. Trying to beguile Ichihime like that as soon as your life was on the line. Why not come live with me─what the hell? You’d just betrayed her five minutes earlier.”
She knew everything.
“I…didn’t intend to betray her.”
Ultimately, the fact that Aikawa was “soft on her friends” stemmed from an overestimation of the rest of the world on her part. Because she herself was the best of the best, she couldn’t comprehend things like my and Hime-chan’s weakness. And even if she could comprehend it, she couldn’t accept that kind of compromise.
“Whether or not I’m soft, I can’t dismiss her feelings. Anyone would end up like that if they were stuck in a homicidal school like Hang ’Em High. Anyone would want to do what she did. It’s just that Ichihime was the only one with the skills to carry it out, that’s all.”
“Skills…”
“That strange little body of hers is a testament to her poor upbringing. She doesn’t even weigh seventy pounds. You’re friends with Kunagisa, you must get it. Though their circumstances are a little different.”
“…”
“Not that I’m saying you’ve gotta have sympathy for her or anything. But don’t blame her just because you happen to hate people who remind you of yourself.”
“I have no intention of blaming her. This whole thing is none of my business, from start to finish. If you hadn’t gotten me involved, I never would’ve known a thing about any of it.”
“Glad you feel that way.”
Whatever the case, Hime-chan…would probably not have been able to get out of there under her own steam. Zigzag was definitely a useful technique, but fundamentally a defensive one. Except for times when she could set a trap and lie in wait, like she did for Shiogi, it was no different from using an ordinary knife. Without the element of surprise, it was possible to avoid the Zigzag even if you weren’t Aikawa. Which is why─and yes, this was the same as Aikawa’s strategy─she struck at the core first. Though that may have involved a certain amount of resentment as well. Asking for Aikawa’s help after her wholesale slaughter of the faculty…
“But…that doesn’t add up. If she simply wanted to escape, the best thing would’ve been to leave it all to you, Jun. That would’ve been plenty good enough. I guess her primary goal must’ve been to kill the Director after all. If the death of the person she thought of as her master had something to do with the change in directorship, it’s even possible that she enrolled at the school with the intention of killing her all along.”
“They’re not unrelated…but I think you’re really overthinking it.”
If it were just the murder, Hime-chan would’ve been fine on her own. It was the escape after the murder for which she needed Aikawa’s help. She would get Aikawa’s cooperation in fleeing the scene of her crime, and then work it so that Aikawa would never suspect her. It was a completely self-contradictory, zigzagging plan─but was that the whole extent of Hime-chan’s strategy?
“Who knows, maybe she wanted me to figure out that she was the murderer. Maybe she was feeling remorseful, or penitent, something like that? Moronic as that might be.”
Uh huh…that seemed most likely. Achieve all her objectives, and have Aikawa render judgment on her to boot. That was such a compelling narrative that even someone like me had a hard time discarding it. If you’re going to get killed no matter what─at least let it be by a greater force than yourself.
A confused desire born of desperation.
We don’t get to choose our friends, so she at least wanted to choose the enemy that would destroy her.
“She deceived us in order to be found out…but that’s too irresponsible for words, Jun.”
“Responsibility, huh? What a strange notion.”
“Yeah. I…don’t really understand it.”
“Nope, me neither. Maybe all she wanted was to have some fun with me. There at the very end.”
At the very end?
She never intended to survive, never intended to succeed at keeping it hidden… I have a hard time believing that, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. Since I never could comprehend Hime-chan’s feelings, even at the end. Same way I still can’t comprehend “her” feelings, even now.
─Even thinking about it is pointless.
The history of the losers will never be told.