Uemura Tatsuaki
TATSUAKI WAS FEELING isolated.
He had boldly infiltrated that Impatiens movie theater event to expose Julia’s true nature, only for her to trip up of her own accord that same night. On the topic of her problematic tweet, the general opinion clearly leaned more toward his own for once. Even the most brainwashed fans were connecting the dots with her other behavior and washing their hands of her.
Normally he would have joined the growing trend, insulted Julia, and positioned himself as a champion for all those she had deceived, using it as a justification for his favorite method of stress relief…but he just couldn’t get into it. The masses were starting to see something that only he and a select few comrades had been privy to thus far, and it made him feel ostracized, like he was in his classroom at school. These sheep latched on to whatever was thrown directly in their faces, whereas he had actually kept his eyes open and paid attention.
But obviously this line of thinking wasn’t enough to make him recognize what was at the root of these emotions he felt, or else he would have stopped long ago.
Tatsuaki wanted to stand above the rest. For that purpose, he had searched far and wide for any information that was likely to put Julia at a disadvantage, but all he had ever found was either common knowledge or merely groundless rumors. Perhaps there was simply nothing left to find in her past.
He had already bought a ticket to the livestream of tonight’s concert. Julia hadn’t shown herself in public since the Twitter drama, and he sensed there was a good chance she would expose herself yet again. But when he arrived home from school and restlessly pulled out his phone, he found an alert from the official Impatiens account, whose Twitter notifications he had enabled.
“Due to circumstances beyond our control, tonight’s concert will not feature Gotou Julia.”
In a thread, they explained that they were in contact with her, that there was no cause for concern, and that they would not be honoring any refunds over it. In regards to having wasted his money on an event Julia would no longer be a part of, Tatsuaki rapidly moved through the five stages of grief. Then, at last, he turned his attention to the most important wording: circumstances beyond our control. What could she have possibly done? If he could find out, it would bring him closer to the truth than anyone else.
The concept was, to him, a very convenient ray of hope.
Today’s freshly filmed classroom footage would have to wait. He raced around the internet, digging for clues about what Julia was doing at that moment. Then, at long last, he found exactly one eyewitness account, though its credibility was extremely low. They claimed to have seen someone who looked like her in that very district, but she was dressed in a completely different style, so it “probably wasn’t really her.”
If he needed to, he could always watch the archive of the livestream later. Though it would surely prove fruitless, he was curious about this piece of intel, and so he decided to take a chance. He pulled on a beanie and stepped into his shoes, taking with him only the bare minimum.
It was—or at least it felt like—his only shot.