Rainbow

Friend and Family

The sun was rising. The alarm clocks were ringing. The boy and the girl were waking up.

Akira Tsuchiya woke up in his room. It was a bare bedroom now. Many of his computers and tablets had been confiscated by the police, even before he accepted the plea deal that spared him a jail sentence. He had resigned himself to the fact that he would most likely never see them again. All he had for entertainment was a little handheld that couldn't really do much aside from play games. That was of no concern to him right now.

Marin Mizuta woke up in her room. It was full of shelves, full of monitors, full of data. She had maps, records, charts, everything that was needed for her to have the 100% accuracy rating she had been hailed for. And a few plush toys; she was still a child at heart, and she liked plush toys. She knew Ayumu had a giant black cat plush back at home; a fitting symbol of the Fujimori heir's comically bad luck. But she digressed.

He was quick to make his toast, eat it, brush his teeth, get dressed, tell his mother what he would be doing for perhaps the first time since the Killing Game concluded and promptly head on his merry way. She, on the other hand, took almost a hour and a half before she was ready for the day. In fairness, it was Sunday. The day of rest.

Just as the Mizuta family had finished their early morning preparations, the doorbell rang. The mother took it upon herself to answer, for the sake of both her husband and daughter. She was faced with what amounted to a complete stranger. She had saw his face on the news, but it had become a fuzzy memory since then. A pale boy, with shadows under his eyes and dark, unkempt blue hair.

"Hi." he awkwardly greeted. "I'm Akira Tsuchiya; a friend of hers."

"A friend of hers? Where from?" Mrs. Mizuta understandingly asked.

"Uh... Precept's Peak Academy..." Akira muttered.

The memories flooded back. Of those days both husband and wife wouldn't hear their daughter's voice through the house. Of those days her face would be on a MISSING poster. Of those days they would go to sleep with nightmares of her dying a brutal death. But it was all in the past now. Marin was safe and sound. She was one of the lucky ones. She dreaded to think about the other parents.

"Precept's... Peak..." Mrs. Mizuta stammered, beginning to become overtaken by fear.

"Mom? That's... uh... that's Akira-kun! My friend! My best friend!" her daughter chimed in, speaking on Akira's behalf. Akira himself turned his head towards her, and cracked a smile in response. Not a lot of people understood him. But she did, and that was all that mattered.

A moment of awkward silence followed, before Akira was let into the house. He promptly made himself comfortable on a living room's seat, and Marin sat on the opposite side of the room, facing him.

Akira expected a quick chat about what their friends were doing; nothing more, nothing less. But he wasn't expecting the gift she had planned for him.