[fieldbox= Narita Taigi, grey, solid]
[ November 9th, Afternoon / Town of Hisakawa]
It was cold.
When he was some distance away from the school, Taigi felt his phone vibrate. He took it out to check what was on it. It was a reminder of a funeral this weekend he was compelled to go to; his friend's (from middle school that moved) grandfather had passed away. Though it was unintended, it was then that he remembered about his verbal promise to leave if there were any more incidents.
"Damn I totally forgot. I guess that beach trip isn't happening… And I should make preparations to leave…"
Taigi sighed then typed out responses to Michio and Ryuu. Once again he didn't send a group text even if it would be faster. He sent the same text individually to both of his friends.
"I was planning on having some fun with you this weekend, but I remembered that I had a prior obligation. Sorry."
Taigi purposely left out the part about the funeral: there were enough dreary events going on that he didn't want to burden his friends with another.
As he neared his home, he could see a figure in the distance, seemingly waiting for someone. As he walked closer, the figure's identity was revealed.
"Yo. How's life?"
"A-kun."
It was one of Taigi's friends from another class, Eiichi. Taigi couldn't remember what his family name was, since most of the time he called Eiichi "A-kun". The reason being that Eiichi's presence was akin to a background character, as in classmate A. He was normal that to Taigi, the name fit like a glove, despite Eiichi's protests.
"I'm fine. How are you?"
"Good. Would be better if you stopped calling me that-"
"Not gonna happen."
"Take this."
Eiichi handed him a thick envelope. If Taigi had to guess, there was a magazine inside. He opened the flap and peeked inside. He was right. It was promptly returned to its owner. The boy was visibly distraught.
"Ehhh??? This is one of the fines-"
"Your voice is too loud."
In a lowered voice, Taigi continued.
"Besides, I've already seen that one. But what's the deal?"
"Oh as expected. The ORG would have loved to have you..."
"The ORG? What's-nevermind. Just come on, get to the point."
Though Taigi wasn't in particularly a rush, this friend of his liked to have long meandering conversations that really didn't go anywhere. Usually he didn't mind, but today was not one of those days.
Prodded by Taigi's impatience, Eiichi spoke.
"Well, I'm gonna be taking a break from school. Going back to my parents' till this whole area calms down. It's been crazy, you know? And hah, another situation happened today of all days! Just the final nail in the coffin."
"When are you leaving?"
"Now."
Taigi frowned. In response, his friend slammed his hand down on his shoulder.
"Hey."
"Oooh, what's this what's this? You got bit of meat on ya, don'tcha? Keep in touch!"
Eiichi removed his hand and jogged off, looking back at Taigi while waving enthusiastically. Taigi waved back with not as much gusto.
With no further interruptions, Taigi continued on home. He touched the spot where his friend's hand was.
It was cold.
[ November 12th, Afternoon / Town of Hisakawa]
He sent Kyouko a card for her birthday. Though he didn't know her address, Taigi entrusted it to his teacher who told him to deliver coffee. The words were polite and nothing too special; the words were the sort that could be found preprinted and bought at a store. As they weren't particularly close he didn't give anything else. Initially Taigi was about to forego the notion, considering the incidents surrounding the school. But he decided that it was precisely because of these incidents that small actions were important.
("How many more will vanish?")
A familiar pain hurt his heart as he recalled Nyoko had apparently been arrested for a crime and was the leader of a gang called the Red Pandas. He never got that impression from her and suspected something was off about the official story.
("Well, in the end I only knew so much…")
He wrote a letter as soon as he found out and handed it over to the police department. Again, it contained polite words saying to hang in there and fight on. There was a niggling doubt that they would actually deliver the letter, but even they couldn't be that incompetent, could they?
("Oshiro too…")
Kira was gone as well, and while it didn't hurt as much as Nyoko, he never wished for her to disappear.
[November 13th, Elsewhere]
Taigi took the Shinkansen out of Hisakawa and attended the funeral. Though he planned for his visit to be a short one, after seeing how distraught his friend was, Taigi extended his stay to try and comfort her, missing the rest of school until the break started. But that wasn't all he did.
[November 14th, Elsewhere]
"Ahh, I told you so. What a doozy."
"…"
"And by the way, I looked more into that chip business. And the thing you told me about being 'unable to remove it till you get older', isn't entirely accurate. It's more like it will fuck up your spine if you get it removed at this point. Some guy did and his legs were crippled. Alternatively, you can hit the spot where the chip is real hard but it would probably damage the spine in the process. Magnets also allegedly can have an effect but it will cause hallucinations. Man I said it before but I'll say it again: the chip is insane."
"Right?"
"Man oh man… Fun fact, apparently the guy that got his chip removed and crippled said it was 100% worth it. Funny thing too, considering he was an athlete. Oh, there was a girl accused of raping a boy. She claimed she did, but that she wasn't in control of her body. No dice. Trial is still ongoing. There's a bunch of weird shit going on and it's not pretty."
"Hmm…"
"But still, to think not even the Faraday worked… I'm flabbergasted."
"…? Fara what?"
"Yeah, Faraday cage suit. Didn't we talk about it? Isn't that why you're talking about removing it or breaking it? Hello?"
Taigi used his chip to access the Internet; even though he didn't like it, he still knew how to use it. After finding the information about a Faraday cage, his jaw dropped. He was so flustered that he didn't respond for nearly a minute. Such a simple solution to the chip that he felt foolish that he didn't think of it before. If it was infeasible to remove or destroy the chip, then why not block the incoming signals from possible hacking?
"Hello? I'm gonna hang up then you assho-"
"You're a genius."
"Hah?"
"How come I never thought of that?"
"Oh, so we didn't?"
"No! Fuck! Fuck! That is such a simple solution! Ahhhh!"
He stomped around and pulled on his hair with one hand, the other still holding the phone to his ear.
"Puh. Wow. Well, I guess you're welcome."
"Thank you! God! Wow! Wowowowowowow!"
"I still think you should leave though. There is no guarantee that a Faraday cage suit will prevent you from being hacked."
"Wait what? It's a wireless signal isn't it? As such, it should block any incoming wireless transmissions, if I got my science right…"
"I'm not a computer or science guy. And from what I could find from like 5 minutes of searching, a Faraday suit might not be a true Faraday cage. Maybe the chip uses a super special frequency that goes through? And maybe you can get hacked through sound. Like if someone says 'shut down' you get knocked out?"
"That sounds… Dumb as hell. I mean what. That's a zero-day exploit or something then, isn't it? Wouldn't such a vulnerability have been widely reported? Or were the engineers behind the chip malicious or retarded? There's really no defense if these chips..."
"Let me look it up…"
After a couple of minutes…
"Hey. So. Apparently it should block cellular and wireless signals. Again, could be wrong but that's what it seems."
His cousin snapped his fingers.
"I got it. Your chip is already infected with something like a worm and it's near impossible to detect for casuals and get rid of even with a system reset. And you would need a team of specialists to fix it. So you're fucked anyways."
"…"
Taigi sighed.
"That can't possib-"
"Stuxnet. And that was ages ago."
"Stuxwhat?"
"Stuxnet. I'll give you the short version. It was a worm that was super sophisticated and basically had the properties of what I told you your hypothetical infected chip has. It was designed to infiltrate a specific nuclear plant and fuck with it. If they had that back in 2010, it's not much of a stretch to think that Japan can pump out a similar baby. Again though, flaw in that reasoning is that putting a spotlight on these playground trivial hacking incidents isn't what you want to do when you create such a thing."
"…"
"Like I said, safest option would be to leave but… Man you a homo?"
"No you fucker."
"Calm calm. Only joke friend. It was because you said Michio-"
"Yeah I get it. And it's not funny this is serious. My friend is involved in some bullshit succession game and even if his debt is paid he's somehow fucked!"
"Wait, what? Did you ask for more details?"
Taigi snapped.
"I don't know! I don't know fucking shit! Apparently I was like the only fucking guy that didn't know about the Red Pandas! Classmates are disappearing for no reason and the police aren't saying shit! The press doesn't even care that a fuckton of my classmates and friends have disappeared in a matter of weeks! People can turn fucking invisible and manipulate people and probably a lot of fuck more that I forgot to mention! Fuck it all! Why did things turn out like this! Why is nobody helping?! Why are they gone?! Why are they gone?! Why?! Where did they go?! Who's next?! I-"
Taigi caught his breath in his throat. Though the urge to cry was strong, he managed to hold it back.
"…Sorry."
Taigi didn't respond to that, but merely tried to regain his composure. Only the faint sound of breathing could be heard.
"Fuck!"
Taigi threw a fist towards a wall, but stopped just short of making contact; he knew he would just regret it later. After several more minutes passed, Taigi spoke.
"Ok."
"You ok?"
"No."
"Figures. Dumb question, sorry."
"No. No. I shouldn't have blown up on you like that. That was immature of me."
"Hey, don't sweat it. I can't even imagine how painful it must be. Sometimes it's good to let it out. Preferably a little at a time than letting it out all at once like a volcano."
"…Thanks."
"Woah! You thanking m-"
"That has never been funny."
"Everyone's a critic."
Despite what Taigi said, he was still smiling.
"Taigi. I get that I won't be able to convince you. So let me try to give you directions on how to proceed from here, since apparently nobody is doing anything about it. First things first, how about hiring a bodyguard or something? Probably someone from outside Hisakawa, since I suspect if the Mikado has such influence any bodyguards in the area would be compromised. Petition the school to disable all VR environments at school besides a few key areas. The whole reason the attackers were able to turn invisible was because of that tech, wasn't it? And while you're at it, maybe petition the school to cover the cost of Faraday suits for the whole student body. Ask for psychiatrists or counselors for the students. Like jesus fucking Christ even in America middle schools provide free counseling when a kid offs himself. Fact that your school doesn't even provide these services is appalling. Ask for a police officer present on campus till even club activities are over. Sons of bitches can afford to put one on there, I'm sure. 24 minutes to fucking settle the incident at school, how ridiculously incompetent. Having an officer on the premises should cut down on the response time. Ask the neighborhood or something for volunteers to escort kids when they walk to and from school. Preferably adults, so they can subdue any hacked kids. Hell, even fucking pay them if it's needed. How Hisakawa is still operating despite all these fucking incidents is stupid, really… And fucking social morals kids patrolling the school with wooden swords despite them owning chips? Zeus almighty..."
He grumbled a bit more before continuing.
"Well that's as much as I can think of right now. If you need help, ask me. And remember that your life doesn't belong to you alone. Lots of people will be sad if you die. Now for a change of topic..."
The two of them continued their conversation talking about menial and trivial subjects.
[November 17th, Afternoon / A Certain Detective's Office]
"So whaddaya want kid?"
Taigi didn't even frown at the belittling remark. He knew what the detective before him was like from his internet research and getting angry over such a comment would only waste time.
"I want you to find out what happened to my classmates. The police still haven't released any information."
Instead of responding, the man moved his fingers in a "come on" fashion. Ignoring the rudeness, Taigi dropped the photos of the three and their files onto the table. The man lazily picked them up and after looking at a document for two seconds, dropped it.
"Hisakawa, eh? I refuse kid. Why? That's the Mikado's playground. And if the police haven't said anything yet at this point, then that's just even a bigger sign it's their work. And if the Mikado plays, ya don't interrupt if ya know what's good for ya."
"You're scared?"
"Kid, the only people that aren't afraid of 'em are monsters that can play ball on the same level as 'em, fools, and ignorants. Ya can go ahead and ask around others, but nobody will take this job. Maybe a different country, you'll have better luck."
The man snorted and took another sip of his drink. Taigi didn't move or say anything, but glared at the man. Time passed until the detective broke the silence.
"I know I'm handsome, but I'm gonna havta charge ya if you keep lookin' at me like that.
Taigi collected the papers and moved to leave. The man's voice stopped him just as he took a step out of the door.
"Oi, kid. If ya know what's good for ya, leave Hisakawa. My gut tells me things are gonna get worse before they get better. Ya have good eyes kid, and I'd hate to see ya in the obituaries."
Taigi paused and voiced his lie.
"I will take your advice into consideration."
Then, he left.
[November / Elsewhere]
Taigi sent the government a letter through mail. The contents being that they wouldn't have to worry about him when his chip's signal would be obstructed, along with a subtle-not-subtle piece about how the government was being incompetent in Hisakawa. It was obviously not just a simple letter though; he had to get it notarized and other such tedious work. Fortunately having Kenta saved him a lot of headache and it was able to be done without much hassle.
Kenta Miyake. A friend of his father. Taigi had met him coincidentally while he was trying to procure a bodyguard. Ironically, Kenta was only passing by and not actually employed as a bodyguard. But Taigi asked for his help anyways, as his bodyguard search didn't go well; whenever Hisakawa was brought up, the agencies would make up excuses. Such as none of them were available, or the prices were exorbitantly high for a inexperienced guard, and other such obvious refusals. Other than that, while Kenta himself did not have any bodyguard experience, he had participated in several Japan-wide MMA competitions, even placing quite high in some of them.
While sending the letter was simple, getting a suit that wasn't cumbersome was a trying task. Still, Taigi was able to purchase one that didn't impair his vision or movements though it took time. Taigi thought of purchasing one for every one of his classmates in advance without the school's assistance, and did so. He ordered a few extra just in case some of them didn't fit the sizes he guessed. Due to some issues on the supplier's end though, those suits would be delivered to his place after the break was over. Other than helping his grieving friend, Taigi kept up his exercise and tried to find suitable dojos for sparring practice. Though there were few differences, Taigi felt like it was better than back at Hisakawa. It was a tad unfounded, but he felt safe from any would-be hackers and thus was able to move his body more freely.
[December 7th / Elsewhere, Clinic]
It took nearly a whole day for his chip's system reboot. Taigi slowly got up from the operating table and stretched. The employee was still typing away on a computer. And Kenta, while holding a video recorder in one hand, waved at Taigi.
"So, is that all then?"
The employee adjusted his glasses.
"Yes, you're all set. You might still feel tired but that will pass in a few days."
"Oh, and while I'm here, do you know if a Faraday suit would block incoming wireless transmissions to my chip? Would my chip be adversely affected by it?"
"I don't see why not. You would be unable to send calls either, but the rest of the chip's functions that don't rely on wireless signals should still work."
"Would this suit prevent me from seeing VR holograms?"
"No, I don't think so. But if you are concerned about people hiding in holograms, there is always thermal imaging."
"Thermal imaging?"
"Yes. As it doesn't require light but detects heat instead, it can prove useful for that purpose. If you don't mind, I have other business to attend to…"
"I see… I'll look more into it. Thank you."
[December 11th, Evening / Taigi's Home]
"Bocchan, I really don't like this place."
"What do you me-"
"It feels nasty on my skin. Air is bad. No good, bocchan. This area… Bocchan, you're sure making me work my keep."
"I'm sorry, if-"
"Stop stoppuuu! It's fine, bocchan. I'm just complaining, is all. I understand a man's need to stand his ground, ok ok ok."
Kenta rubbed the top of Taigi's head affectionately, to the latter's displeasure.
"Haha! Ok ok ok ok! Even though the pachinko machines are awful here too, I'll do my best!"
"Still-"
"I told you before bocchan and I'll repeat it as many times as it takes. I owe Hayato-chan my life. And if his son is troubled, I'm gonna help out. My honey knows that and in the end it'll all work out, okay? Chin up!"
Taigi sighed.
"I just can't, Miyake-sa-"
A quick chop to his head.
"Oww!"
"Bocchan, just call me Kenta. I'm not even that old!"
"Aren't you like four-"
And another.
"Guh!"
"Bocchan, you wound me."
"…"
"Awww, I'm sorry bocchan. Forgive me. And what are those papers?"
Instead of responding, Taigi just sighed and waved the papers in front of Kenta's face.
"I'm planning on having a meeting with the principal to discuss and implement new measures for Hisakawa in light of the recent incidents. These are some of the proposals and my talking points. Want to see?"
Instead of saying anything, Kenta snatched the papers from Taigi's hand and started to read.
"Ok ok ok ok! Interesting! Disabling VR at school, subsidizing the cost of those suits, free counseling… Not bad at all, bocchan. Haha!"
Kenta smacked Taigi's back several times in jubilation.
"Ouch… There's more you know?"
"Yeah, but I trust you. No way the principal is gonna refuse, believe me. And reading all this kanji is giving me a headache."
"Hah…"
"Good going, council pres."
"I'm not though?"
Kenta recoiled in shock.
"Wait, you're not?"
"No, what gave you that impression?"
"You have these papers. If you're not the pres, who the hell is and why are you doing it?"
"I-That's a… Hmm…"
He could understand Kokoro being incompetent, that was made clear from the first hacking incident. But Michio and all the other Social Morals officers?
("Michio was probably just too busy with other stuff. I should find out why he had those bandages that day though…")
"Well, they weren't doing it so I guess I'm just picking up the slack. Or maybe it's they submitted it already but it's been delayed…?"
"That was a long pause, bocchan. But I approve."
[December 12th, Evening / Taigi's Home]
"What's that dour look for, bocchan?"
Taigi sighed.
"Ayama…"
"Ayama? Who?"
"She's a childhood friend of mine, and is a problem…"
"That's mean to say, bocchan."
Ignoring Kenta, Taigi continued.
"She can be stubborn. If she has come back, she likely knows all about the situation. She probably won't go back to America even if I beg her. But if I talk to her guardians about this, I think it'll work out. A bit sly of me to go around her and to her guardians, but I'd rather have her be safe and hating me than dead and liking me."
"Guardians, bocchan?"
"She's being taken care of by her relatives."
"I see…"
"Not going to ask for more details?"
"Not unless you want me to, bocchan. Even I have some sense of tact."
"Thank you."
Kenta nodded his head while Taigi sighed again.
"I… Want some time alone, Kenta."
Kenta placed a hand on Taigi's shoulder.
"Sure."
Then, he left the room.
[December 15th, Evening / Okudera's Home]
"...So I will be in your care."
Taigi got up from the sofa and lightly bowed towards an elderly woman. Kenta, who was already standing didn't need to get up but mimicked the bow.
"No no, I'm the one that will be. I do hope you'll pull through."
"Thank you."
"Such a grand endeavor boy. To undertake it all by yourself..."
Taigi waved his hands in denial.
"Oh that's not it at all. I also have the support of the Behavioral Development Club members."
"My, is that so?"
"Yes ma'am."
"I wonder how you've managed to get them all on board."
"More or less the same way I managed to get you on my team ma'am."
The woman grinned, but that quickly turned into a grimace.
"Yukitani-kun was truly truly truly talented. Truly. How I miss that flute..."
An awkward silence lingered after those words. The faculty member shook her head.
"Well, young men let's do our best."
Two men simultaneously answered.
"Of course." "Yes."
As the two of them left the house, Kenta put his arms around his head and whistled.
"Behavioral Development Club?"
"...We just met them all yesterday. Were you not watching nearby?"
"Oh."
"...You're joking right?"
"Bocchan of course I'm joking. I'm taking this gig seriously."
"Name one of the members."
"Nokia Koizumi, Risa Taneda, Hiroshi Ikehata, Natsuko Takahashi, Kazuchika Kise, Noriyasu Yamauchi."
Taigi blinked several times while Kenta just responded with a grin. Taigi grumbled as he headed home.[/fieldbox]