Takeo suggested to have lunch outside instead of in the classroom like they did usually. The weather outside was nice, so no one objected.
Soon, their little lunch group was walking out onto the grounds. Takeo leading them all to an area close to the gardens, where there was this big tree for them to sit under.
Then something... strange happened.
While Kotori knew that accidentally stealing an event from Mari was possible, never in her wildest dreams would she have expected that it could happen to Takeo too.
One moment he was sitting underneath the tree, chatting away happily, when the next there was a rustle from up in the tree and then a grown man was falling out, only to land in Takeo's lap.
Kotori, Chidori and Miwa could only stare in shock at Masao, who had for some reason been up in the tree, but was now sat on Takeo.
Masao looked at Takeo, then at the rest of the group and said, "Shame. I would've preferred to land on one of these pretty ladies instead." before standing up, dusting himself off, and walking away.
Kotori couldn't help it, she burst out into laughter, closely followed by Chidori and Miwa. Takeo, meanwhile, looked half horrified and half like he wanted to cry.
If it was possible for Takeo to accidentally trigger an event like that, did that mean other students were doing the same while she wasn't looking? That sounded very funny... and a little concerning at the same time. She could only hope that not too many people were unexpectedly kissing a capture target on accident.
The rest of the afternoon passed by normally, with no more surprise events or people falling out of trees, though Takeo did move to sit somewhere else just incase.
The four of them were packing up to go back to the classroom when they caught sight of Mari running out from the school and to the gym. They all shared a confused glance, as classes were about to start again, so there was no reason for her to be going to the gym.
In the end they just shrugged and left though, whatever she was doing it wasn't any of their business.
Kotori thought that Mari would arrive in the classroom on her own when class started again, but she never showed up. In fact, Kotori didn't see her at all, not even when the last bell rang and school was over.
"Suzuki-san didn't come back this whole time." Miwa commented.
So Kotori wasn't the only one who noticed she wasn't there.
"Do you think something happened to her when she went to the gym?" Chidori asked.
"Lets go check." Takeo suggested.
The four of them made their way to the gym, only to find it was empty. Kotori was about to turn and leave when suddenly there was a sound from inside the storage room. Miwa hurriedly went over to unlock the storage room door, and there they discovered that Mari had been locked in the entire time.
Mari looked confused to see Miwa there for a second, as if she was expecting something else, but then she thanked her profusely for letting her out and stepped out of the room. When she saw Kotori, she seemed even more surprised.
"Are you alright, Suzuki-san?"
Mari nodded. "Y-yes, I'm fine now! Thank you for coming to get me..."
"Do you know who locked you in?" Takeo asked.
According to Mari, she received a note from somebody saying they wanted to meet in the storage room, so she went, only to get locked in after stepping inside the room. Since her back was faced to the door, she didn't catch who locked her inside.
They all frowned at the news. It was clear that somebody had intentionally locked Mari in.
"Are there cameras here? Maybe they caught who did it on there."
Mari didn't seem to want to make that big of a fuss about what happened, but the rest of them felt that it would be better to catch who did it before they did anything worse. In the end all five of them went to the school's security office to see if they could find any footage of what happened in the afternoon.
There was no one in the room. The guard must have been on a break.
Kotori pushed ahead anyway, scrolling through the footage herself even while Mari and Chidori protested. Takeo was looking around the room with some fascination as Miwa seemed distracted by one of the cameras set up in the student council office, and was watching Sosuke work with a dazed smile on her face.
It didn't take Kotori long to find what she needed, and as she called for the rest of them to come, they all watched as Mari entered the gym and walked into the storage room. Then, another girl showed herself and quickly closed and locked the door after Mari went in. Kotori didn't recognise who it was, but judging by the way Chidori gasped, she guessed that Chidori knew exactly who it was.
"That's Yurina!"
"Yurina? Who's that?"
"Yurina Takahashi! She was the captain of Hayama senpai's fan club! She's a third year, and she was running the fan club for a while but then... but then she started to stray and the fan club discovered that she defected to Ishijima senpai's side and so she was kicked out of Hayama senpai's fan club."
Takeo rolled his eyes at the dramatics of the fan clubs and Kotori tried to keep her amusement to herself.
"She's been trying to get into Ishijima senpai's fan club this entire time, but they keep rejecting her, saying that they couldn't fully trust her as she used to be part of Hayama senpai's fan club."
"Why is she targeting Suzuki-san, though?" Kotori asked.
They all turned to Mari, who shrugged helplessly. "I've never met her before... so I don't know..."
"Yurina's actually done this kind of stuff a lot before. When she was part of Hayama senpai's fan club she used to bully the girls who liked him very badly. She gets very scary when it comes to the person she likes."
Mari flushed. "Ah... she... she must have seen me and Ishijima senpai talking before... he was just trying to help me! I'd gotten lost and he helped me find the way to the library but... maybe she saw us talking and got the wrong idea?"
"Yurina has always been the type to over react... but I think she probably won't do anything further if you don't talk to Ishijima senpai for a couple days. She'll forget about you after a while."
It looked like Mari wanted to protest for a moment before she sighed and agreed that it was a good idea.
Afterwards they all split up and went their different ways, Kotori smiling as she climbed into the car, thinking that her high school life was really becoming interesting in a way her past life's never was.