Fallout - Quintessential Quintuplets alt ending

Ichika's support

"She's gone," Itsuki says, as she enters the classroom.

Nino is pacing the back of the room, bending a plastic ruler she picked up in the classroom, muttering to herself. "This is impossible. Her? How? Why? Has he lost his mind? This makes no sense. Has she tricked him somehow?"

Itsuki walks past Miku, sitting on the floor against the wall, silent and still as a statue, tears slowly seeping from her eyes. Itsuki walks over and sits in the desk next to Ichika.

Itsuki made the right choice to come to me. Talking to those two right now is a terrible idea. I have to be the big sister right now. I'll have to swallow my feelings for now.

"I think he is chasing her," says Itsuki. "But it's Yotsuba. There's no way he can catch her."

She is the fastest. She was always the fastest of us.

And she won the race. Haha.

...

If he lets her go, this will all be for nothing. Our pain will amount to nothing. He should be happy at least.

Ichika tilts her phone so that Itsuki can see the screen, then types a message to Fuutarou.

Ichika: You have to catch her, Fuutarou-kun. This is it.

Ichika is surprised to see a response almost immediately.

Fuutarou: I think I know where she's going.

"I think Nino has lost it," Ichika says to Itsuki, "but she's kind of right. This doesn't make a lot of sense. Why did he go to Yotsuba? Was that his way of not choosing anyone? Did he scheme this with her to avoid making a choice? That does sound like something they'd both do."

"Ichika...have you really not noticed?" Itsuki asks.

Huh?

"Oh you mean the thing from six years ago?"

Did he really pick her just because of that?

"No, not that. I think you three have been too distracted by...Well if you had been paying attention to him...I...think he has liked Yotsuba for a while."

"WHAT?" Nino calls out from the back of the room. "That's ridiculous!"

"Raiha and I have been talking about it for a while," Itsuki says.

"Where is this coming from?" Ichika asks. "Did he say something?"

"No but...he is always looking at her. Even though we all look the same, he always seems to be looking at her. He always tends to drift toward her. He smiles a lot more when he is around her. Raiha says he talks about her way more than the rest of us. Raiha and I think he might be too dense to even be aware of it himself. But I guess he has figured it out at some point, judging from tonight."

Oh.

It's true.

Of course.

Why couldn't I see it?

Why wasn't I paying attention?

That night when I made him choose a drink, he had already made his decision. I wonder if he made it months ago.

"UUGGGHHH!" Nino growls. "Why her?! She hasn't done shit! It's just gonna fall in her lap? No. I'm the one-"

Ichika's thoughts drown out Nino's rant.

You don't get it, Nino. You made the same mistake I did. And we dragged Miku in with us. We kept pushing her to join in. I'm so sorry, Miku.

"We were fighting over him," says Ichika out loud. "We were treating him like an object. We never stopped to consider his feelings."