The last bell rang for the day and it was time to head home. Lucio and Suiren made plans beforehand and decided to meet up at the entrance to walk together to the forest. But they had to hurry because the sun was about to set.

Lucio was already there waiting for Suiren. In the meantime, he decided to talk to Lyney. “Lyney, what am I supposed to do? I can’t let her find out about you!”

“Why is that a problem?”

“Sigh… You won’t understand. It’s my job to protect you from the world, if I fail it would be detrimental and chaos would ensue. By the way, you said you knew her right? Can you elaborate on her personality besides being scary.”

“Sure. Suiren is kind hearted and thoughtful. She is also meticulous and focused on anything she sets her mind to. She is intelligent and great with people and is a natural born leader.”

“An amazing description! She’s surely talented alright. Thanks, Lyney. I still don’t know if I can trust her though but since you know her maybe I can play with the odds.”

“Happy to help Lucio! But what about attempting a warp today?”

“I’ll have to think about it, Lyney, especially after the screw up from last time. You said it yourself, we can’t mess with the natural order.”

Suiren finally arrived rushing to Lucio. There seemed to be something pressed on the inside of her palm.

“Sorry, I’m late!” She came panting.

“That’s alright, but we’ve got to hurry now!” Lucio started walking ahead.

“Wait! How’s your stomach?”

“Why? What’s wrong with it?”

“You said you had constipation earlier today and I also remember you being sick last week.”

“Huh? Oh, right! I barfed last week because of the Time Machine… Woah, how does she remember that?” Lucio pondered in his mind about how perceptive Suiren really is, and that gave him more reason to be careful with what he says.

“I’m fine, nothing to worry about!” Lucio reassured her that he’s perfectly alright.

“Well anyway, I got this for you.” She presented a little plastic pouch filled with juice. “It’s lemonade, I heard it helps some people with constipation.”

“Oh… thank you.” Lucio, a little dazed, took it regardless. As he turned back up her long dark hair zoomed past quickly leaving him a little startled by the sudden speed. “You seem to be in a rush.”

“Well, I’ve got places to be after this, and if you don’t mind we could wrap this up quickly…”

Lucio snickered at her cluelessness. “I’m afraid this will take a while.”

“What could possibly be there–” she continued upon realisation, “Is there something important I should be knowing?”

“Guess you’ll have to find out for yourself since you seem dead set on solving this mystery even after countless warnings.”

“I don’t recall you warning me about my safety, I only remember you stalling and lying the entire time, though badly at the same time.”

“Wipe that smug look off your face, you don’t know what I’ve been through!”

“Okay buddy, anything you say!”

The next thirty minutes were the most silent those two have ever been. In that time they were both enlightened of the fact that every time they open their mouths it will end in an argument. So, naturally, they didn’t feel the need to expend more of their energy and decided to go into low power mode instead. But in that moment of silence, Suiren began to realise something important.

“Wait…,” she pondered even harder, “This is too easy. How can he just accept after denying it so much all this time? Is he luring me away by distracting me towards another location? Jeez, I can’t trust this guy one bit!”

Her expressions grew sharp and glared incessantly at him.

Lucio, oddly, wasn't all that fazed by her suspicions but instead accepted his fate and decided to leave out every detail concerning a Time Machine when they actually reach Lyney. He began his operation in his head, “So first, I will take her there. Then continue to spew nonsense to distract her even more and finally pretend to give in and lead her to Lyney. To any normal person, Lyney would look like a refrigerator, so surely I can buy some more time and tell her it is one!”

He began to look a little deranged with a creepy grin he couldn’t shake off.

Suiren noticed his sudden pleasure and despised it.

Soon enough they arrived at the mountain road but realised there was something out of the ordinary in the distance. A white car parked at one end with flashing blue and red lights; a bunch of men in white uniforms and blue hats stood scattered around the width of the road talking in their radios. Suiren turned to Lucio completely aware that this is not normal and quickly realised it might have been his fault that this is happening.

“Crap, the police?!” Suiren turned to Lucio expecting a full blown panic attack underway but to her surprise he was quite composed.

“I think that’s the end of this adventure, we should head back home before they spot us…”

“Hey..? Lucio?”

Hidden behind a mask of a straight face was a dooming realisation and a tremor of fear running through every inch of his body.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

“OH MAH GOD!? I’M SCREWED IF THEY FIND LYNEY!! THEY ARE GONNA TAKE HIM AWAY AND THE WORLD WOULD END UP IN THE SAME DYSTOPIA AS IT WAS DESTINED TO BE!” He bent over, clasping his head and screamed to the ground.

“Huh?! Who’s Lyney?! What are you talking about??” It seems his thoughts weren’t actually internalised.

“Ack- That wasn’t meant to be heard by your ears! Erase it now!” He pointed his finger and flailed it around at Suiren.

“W-What?! Why are you freaking out? What have you been doing in that hole?! Don’t tell me I’m colluding with criminal scum like you!!” For some reason, even Suiren’s adrenaline started to kick in.

“Criminal scum, how dare you?! I’m doing this for the greater good of the world, so even self-righteous people like you can live to see a desirable future!”

“Excuse me?! Do you realise how brazen and arrogant you sound?! What is this ‘saving the world’ crap? What kind of delusion are you living in?!”

Both grew red and steam escaped from their ears, they couldn’t stand to look at eachother anymore and turned away with their hands locked refusing to even make eye contact with each other. With all this ruckus surely the gentlemen in white would have noticed the disturbance and they did.

“You two..,” an angry looking officer with an intimidating face approached them, “what are you doing here? You are causing a hindrance with the investigation.”

Lucio was completely speechless in the presence of a superior authority and grew quiet. That meant Suiren was the only one left to do the talking.

“Um… we were just going home from school… but it seems the road is blocked?”

“That is correct. I advise you to take a different path home, if you require assistance on a different path ask away.”

“Oh? Um, that won’t be necessary but thank you for the offer, but what exactly is happening here? It’s usually pretty calm around this route and this is a first for police to be around here…”

“Do the two of you take this route often?”

“Y-Yes..?”

“Then, let me ask you a few questions before you leave.”

“Uhhh– I don’t know,” she glanced at Lucio who had finally gotten up from the ground, “do we have to?”

“I’m not giving you a choice.” He was firm on his words and two obediently complied.

“We’ve been alerted of break-ins in the forest since last week and we’ve also located suspicious activity around these parts which include… nuclear materials. Since there is a school nearby, actions have advanced rather quickly, so any information you can give is good.”

“Nuclear materials…? This place was in the war zone about eighty years ago so hasn’t it already been taken care of by the government.”

“This is a newer threat and has been located towards the edge of the forest near the creek. If it is an old bomb then it has to be detonated or disassembled immediately after discovery.”

“And how is this connected to the break-ins? Either they would’ve left the nuclear material there on purpose or it has been resurfacing and somebody is breaking in to get their hands on it?”

“…” He paused for a moment and continued, “You are well versed. Yes, that is most likely the case, somebody wants to get their hands on that material for who knows what reason but fret not we’ve already got the location of the target and we will excavate it soon. Regardless, I advise you two to stay away from this route for a while…”

“Understood.” Suiren said confidently and bowed her head to greet him farewell.

As the two scuttled away in a hopeless attempt of discretion, the radio on the police officer’s chest started to toss around static noise and finally a whisper from another officer followed.

“Don’t let those kids go, they go to Korr Higher secondary.”

“Okay.”

A blaring voice screamed at full force towards the poor kids which caused them to abruptly halt their getaway.

“Hold it, kids! I’m not done with you yet!”

***

Hey there, I’m Lucio. A helpless, hopeless and extremely innocent high schooler living my life mostly under the radar. I like to keep it low-key most of the time but things have been getting out of hand lately. And now, here I am, in the principal’s office sitting with my knees together with police officers all around and finally, accompanied by another student whom I really can not tolerate at the moment. You might be wondering how the hell I ended up in this situation, well, I’d blame Lyney for it I suppose.

“Look here, I know you’ve been doing suspicious things down there so now’s a good time to spill everything so we can get out of this unscathed!” Suiren pulled her chair closer and whispered to him with determination.

“B-But… I can’t tell you..!”

“I can help you alter the truth! Just tell me what you’ve been doing in there. They already know we’ve been in there last week, heck, even the entire school knows! So stop beating around the bush and tell me!”

Lucio bent his head, his pupils wavered just as much as his courage. To face the police wasn’t something he had planned ahead of time, but the cat was out of the bag and he had to come up with something to fill in the blank spaces to get away from imprisonment.

As he heard the officers talking with the principal in the background, he knew he was next in line for the questioning. He glanced up at the translucent screen covered in half with blinders from the steel chairs directly opposite to the door with the golden plate.

“Inside the hatch…,” he held his breath, “that I’ve been visiting this past week contains…”

“A Time Machine!”

A great burden lifted itself from his chest as he finally breathed easily after a long period of congestion. But the receiving end of it seemed rather unenthused.

“A wha..?”

“A TIME MACHINE!”

He clenched his fists and felt out of breath as he uttered those words once more. And now he waits expectantly for her reaction in hopes that it would help appease the situation a little.

Suiren’s eyebrows dropped and so did the tips of her lips into an unmistakable expression of disbelief, but quickly she too realised that there was more to this charade than she thought.

“I understand,” she said looking away sympathetically, “you are in desperate need of medical attention.”

“THANK YOU! Wait–”

“This whole facade of pretending that there is something otherworldly out there when in reality there isn’t, is certainly disheartening. But, I too, have been in that situation myself. But overwhelmingly obsessing over that fantasy is not good…”

“W-Wait, wait, wait! Hold up..!”

He began to rise from his seat to interrupt her but she wasn’t going to let that happen just yet and sat him back down to continue her therapy.

“Or don’t tell me you hit yourself too hard on the day of the marathon when you fell down the slope?”

“DUDE!?”

An old and husky voice approached them interrupting their heated conversation, “Wrap it up, kids! Remember where you are? Did you forget you are here because of your actions?” He said sternly.

They piped down and stood up from their seats.

Suiren started, “Sir…”

“Ms Kanbaki, I don’t wish to hear your explanations!”

“It’s Kanzaki… Nevermind!”

“You kids are not in any trouble, the school has dealt with the police situation but I still have to give you stern warnings about the dangers of the woods. I’m sure you are well aware that the place is off-limits and you still wandered in there..” He glanced at Lucio, “I’m looking at you Mr Mentos!”

“M-Men-t-tos..??” Lucio felt completely revolted by the unexpected change of his last name. Even the police officer from earlier chuckled at his predicament.

“Anyway I must praise you for handling the situation on your own, but please, never repeat this mistake ever again. Am I understood?”

“Yes… sir…” Both sounded unenthusiastically.

“Then I shall leave you to it. Get home safe, by the way I called your guardians beforehand to inform them of the situation. They might already be here now…” He turned away to face the clock hung up on the wall.

“You what?!” Lucio screamed upon hearing the word guardian.

“Today really isn’t your day, huh?” Suiren muttered unnoticed as she crouched down to pat Lucio’s back as he continued to melt on the floor.