Mastermind Seiko Kimura

Don't Trust a Peace Offering

Seiko's POV

'Stupid bitch. They really haven't changed at all, have they?'

I didn't think they changed, though it was still a little shocking having them out my forbidden action to everyone like that. And to think just a year ago I almost let them ruin this entire plan for me.

It was right before my lunch break that day, I was gathering test tubes from the drop off room near the exit. I was worried I wouldn't be able to count all 170 by hand and get back to my lab before my break because my mind was elsewhere. At the time I didn't think anything of it, just figured it was one of those off days. I wasn't thinking of anything in particular, I just couldn't focus. I remembered getting so frustrated I made the decision to count them in my lab after I ate something small.

Just as I was putting a group of them carefully back into the box they came from, I heard a knock on the door. It was strange because I had never heard a knock on the door while collecting my things. Anyone who wanted just walked in and out of the room. I raised an eyebrow, stopping what I was doing all together when I called out to whoever had been knocking, "Yeah?"

I stared at the corner leading to the door, thinking I was dreaming at first when I saw the dreadfully familiar pale pink color emerge. It was Ruruka. I didn't know what they wanted or if they just didn't know I was in there. I didn't know if Sonosuke was with them and they were both going to threaten me. This had been the first time we came into contact with each other, not by force, since we were expelled. I was terrified the plan would go to shit right then and there.

"H... Hi Seiko....," they whispered with an innocent smile on their face, their hands behind their back. It was as innocent as it looked, I'd seen that same manipulative smile countless times before - which is pretty obvious.

My eyes widened and my breathing picked up. "What do you want? Who sent you here?," I hissed at her, looking away from her and back down at my brand new test tubes. I couldn't focus on getting them in the box safely anymore, that was for sure, but I wasn't going to just stare at her.

She sighed, "No one sent me..." Suddenly, she was right next to me, placing something on the table next to me. I gasped, jumping up in the air and backing away from her. "Jeez, Seiko... I'm not that scary...," she mumbled at my reaction.

I looked at what she placed on the table. It was a hot dog. It looked good enough at the time, but it didn't make any sense. "I wanted to... apologize," she trailed off. It almost sounded like saying that physically hurt her. "Ya know, for all the things I said and did..."

"You wanted to...," I looked up at her nervous face and back down at the hot dog, then back up at her face. "Apologize?" I picked up the hot dog, examining it.

"Yup. That's... what I just said."

"Mhm... You wanted to apologize... With a hot dog?," I held it up to her with one hand, pointing at it with my free hand, giving her a questioning look.

They rolled their eyes and threw their arms up in defeat. "Look, hot dogs don't have any sugar in them, so I wanted to make it as like... I don't know... a peace treaty?"

I bursted out into laughter for a second, placing the food back on the table to put my last few test tubes back in their box. "A peace treaty?! Ruruka... You can't be serious." They didn't say anything for a few more seconds. "Plus, it's hard to believe you can even make something without sugar. That's your whole purpose for living." I rolled my eyes, closing the box, careful not to disrupt the glass test tubes.

"Seiko, I might be the Former Ultimate Confectioner, but putting sugar anywhere near a hot dog sounds like a crime punishable by death," they giggled a bit under her breath. At the time, I just smiled back at them. Their smile may have been misleading, but they did sound sincere enough. They never even mentioned my allergy before this, so I thought maybe they were being serious.