Reticent | Nakahara Chūya; AU [✔]

t h r e e |

Maybe if she just took her father's word to sleep at 12:05, she wouldn't have been this late for class. And because it was already a tardiness of more than an hour, Orianna had to wait for her next subject in order to get in the classroom. Either way, even if she attends her eight to ten class, she would still be considered absent by her Physics professor.

Anyway, all they were doing was finish requirements so it's not much of a big deal to miss class.

Orianna sat in front of her classroom, waiting for her Physics professor to leave. She still has about ten minutes to wait, so she grabbed her pink-covered phone and opened the government files that she transferred from her computer.

∞

Everyone in that room on that day were rich; no one was flat broke. Even Nakajima earned millions -- or even billions -- of Yen just by going to space or wearing a spacesuit in an anti-gravity room. Almost all of them were blinded by the concept of money being the main requirement in order to stay alive.

Too blind that they may have forgotten something.

"Ah~! Not only that Akutagawa's food is surprisingly delicious," Edogawa interrupted, stretching out his body and slouching afterwards. "But I also like that painting of our batch, Dazai! Where did you get it?"

"I had asked our goddess to paint it for me, of course~" Dazai replied, looking at Sakagami with all appreciation. "No one else in Yokohama would do such beautiful art; as beautiful as she is!"

Sakagami looked down flustered. Others have labeled her the 'goddess of art', but she doesn't see her art and herself the same way. In her point of view, everything was like a smudged oil painting exposed in the rain.

"I don't really earn a lot from it," Sakagami belittled herself. "Maybe I should have listened to my parents about being a lawyer."

"No no no! It was a good decision that you didn't listen to them," Nakahara opposed, immediately thinking of an excuse to prevent the other from getting any other ideas from that statement. "If you were a lawyer today, your beauty will fade!"

"I agree with that one," Tanizaki Naomi added. "We wouldn't want to lose our goddess' beauty all because of law!"

Everybody nodded their heads to agree. Batch twenty-nine has been this protective towards Sakagami, considering her traumatizing experiences at home and that she needed extra care when exposed to the outside world. They make sure that she is safer when with them, than her being being rotten at her own house.

In between Nakahara and Montgomery was an introvert who hasn't spoke since the reunion has started. He was peeking under the table all this time, curious of the green bottle in between Dazai's feet.

"Hey weirdo," Edogawa called all the way from the other side, noticing the quiet man with a raccoon. "What are you looking down there?"

Having to be sitting next to a girl, Montgomery's face flushed red, getting weird ideas of what was the man doing. She slapped him in the head multiple times, making him panic even more.

"D-Don't get the wrong idea, Lucy," Poe said in his defense. "I was just curious of that bottle under Dazai's spot."

"Oh don't mind that~" Dazai grabbed the bottle; it was wine. "That's just my bait for Chuuya."

Nakahara looked at Dazai mockingly, in denial of the bait part. "Bait my ass! That wine better be as good as you claim it."

The businessman politely asked the astronaut to get some wine glasses from the shelf, in which he immediately followed. He got four at a time and gave each superior one glass so that they are all able to get a taste.

Dazai opened the wine, the cork popping across the other side of the table. He then started from the very left end of the table and poured each glass an adequate amount of wine, ending up with the bottle as empty as a lost human soul. He raised his glass in the air, engaging for a toast.

"For the success of the careers of batch twenty-nine; the Stray Dogs batch."

∞

What's a lunch break?

Orianna forgot about the concept of lunch and went ahead to the school library to continue her research. She brought her laptop along with her and searched for possible reference books that she can use. Unfortunately, it is really just the government's top secret and it is not to be exposed as a book.

She hid at the very corner table of the library, not wanting anyone else to see that she saved a heavily guarded file onto her personal computer. Continuing to scroll down where she last left off, her mind wandered back to The 0619 Case.

Investigator 2: Did you see what the perpetrator looked like, Mr. Nakahara?

Nakahara: I would have caught him if I saw him, but no. He would do shit in the dark or somewhere secluded. Tanizaki Naomi claimed to have witnessed him, though. However, Naomi was too much of a wimp to speak up.

Her thoughts were interrupted when a voice of a man rang in her head. She looked up from her screen, revealing a man in his 60's wearing his favorite gray tuxedo and black tie. It was her History professor; the one who has put her to this state of mental torture.

"Nakahara doing research in the library at lunch break?" her professor sarcastically stated, plastering a sly smirk on his face. "What a surprise. You look restless, too."

The Chuuya within her was starting to get triggered, but she knows well enough that that would be something that may be taken against her. She needs to maintain her good morale or she wouldn't be able to advance to college.

"What have you gotten so far?" Her professor sat on the chair on the other side of the table that she was using, engaging in a formal conversation with his student.

As if he said nothing hurtful at all, and the last thing she needed was for him to talk more.

"I was able to gather some files over the internet," Orianna replied as casual as she can, even if deep inside her blood was boiling in agitation. "This research you've asked me to do is supposed to be for the higher levels, and yet you're asking a senior high school student to do it."

The old man laughed. "You are the closest one to Nakahara Chuuya, which you can easily ask information for."

"This is a twenty-year old case, sir. The government files are enough source."

He laughed even more, standing up from his seat and walked towards Orianna, giving her a hold on her shoulder. "Ah, but you see, until this day, no one really knows who is the mastermind of The 0619 Case. Yes, it is a twenty-year old case, but the mystery of who the perpetrator was is still unknown."

"And you want me to squeeze more information from my dad?" Orianna blurted out, not being able to handle how irksome her History professor can be.

"You know," her professor continued to provoke her. "A lot of people think that your dad answered some pretty sugarcoated bullshit on the recorded one-on-one interview."

"So you're saying that my father is a liar?"

The old man turned his back on the student, shrugged off the triggered student's statement and left off with;

"Just because they write it down and call it history doesn't make it the truth. That is the purpose of research, Nakahara -- either to prove previous discoveries right or correct them."

Orianna waited for the damned professor to leave before releasing a sigh of relief. She can seriously hear her father at that situation, telling her to flip the old man upside down. She shut her laptop down and kept it back on her bag, preparing to leave the library for some stress reliever -- food.

Maybe skipping lunch was a bad idea. Remind her never to do it again.

Especially when a professor has made you suffer to do a college-leveled research just so he can diss your dad. Not good.