When she said "the plan is simple" I wasn't quite expecting it to be this simple. I kind of expected something more grandiose than "get to her train station early in the morning and catch her before she goes to school" from the person meticulously who documented every part of this girl's life for the better part of a week. Then again, I suppose I should just be glad that Amai's stalking hadn't amounted to us putting ourselves in an overtly dangerous situation.
Still, I felt like a total creep doing this. Ambushing a stranger because you're a fan? Aren't we just doing exactly what annoying paparazzi and stalkers do? Maybe I shouldn't be enabling this… then again, there's no way I could have talked these three out of this. At least if I come along I can manage the situation to make sure they don't get themselves killed or something.
"I'm really not sure we should be doing this…" the voice from the seat on my right confirmed my suspicion that I wasn't the only one having doubts. Sunao, who I considered the only one of the idiot trio to actually have critical thinking skills, seemed to get cold feet some time after Mai explained the plan. I guess once the excitement of the prospect of a magical girl wore off, she realised the same thing I did: that this is a majorly creepy way to meet your idol. I guess I was only able to think critically from the beginning because I didn't share their obsession.
"Eh, what's the worst that can happen? We're just gonna talk to 'er." Saki, ever the optimist she was, seemed not to share our worries. She was standing with her foot against the wall without a care in the world, completely and utterly casual. I found myself momentarily envying her natural calmness, though it was counterbalanced by her complete immunity to reason and logic.
Of course, her optimism was nothing compared to that of our enigmatic fourth member.
"She should be here within the next three minutes, assuming the route map I drew up was correct…" pacing up and down the station was Mai, the mastermind behind this operation. Since the day we witnessed the magical girl fight outside the school, I had found myself dumbstruck by the sudden change in Mai's attitude.
Amai Sugi was, to put it bluntly, an awful student. She was late to class regularly, she barely paid attention when she was there, and she put practically zero effort into homework and exams. That's not to say she was stupid, though. Contrary to my jabs, Amai had a good head on her shoulders. She just never seemed to care about anything enough to put any real effort into anything.
That's why this whole magical girl debacle has been such a surprise to me. Not only is she motivated, she's motivated to the absolute extreme. The time and effort she's put into everything, from the binder of student information to the meticulous mapping of Aya Shiko's daily life, was frankly absurd. This was the first thing I had seen her truly interested in, and she seemed like the polar opposite of the person she was before it.
Though I certainly didn't approve of the stalking, it had hit me that Amai was a damn smart girl when she put her mind to something.
I like this new side of her. Though I do wish it came with a tad less obsession and… y'know… criminal activity.
It was while I was pondering Mai's dramatic personality change that the one we were waiting for finally showed up. Being a third year, Aya was a little taller than the other three, though slightly shorter than myself. She had few stand out features, though her black hair was quite a bit shorter than in her photo, stopping just above her shoulders.
As soon as she walked in, my confidence in the plan dropped dramatically. Something about her seemed… unfriendly, I suppose. Not just in the way that someone who's tired on the morning journey to school seems, but more in an arrogant sort of way. Perhaps it was just my anxiety at the idea of approaching a stranger and exposing her most important secret, but something was raising red flags in my mind and I just couldn't shake them.
Mai, of course, had no such misgivings.
"Hey hey, you're Shiko-senpai, right? The third year?" Without the slightest amount of caution, Mai walked straight up to the girl and immediately started talking to her, without care in the world for her obviously unfriendly disposition.
"Huh? Yeah, that's me. What's it to you, kid?" Her tone was rough, and very much conveyed the connotations of 'why aren't you minding your own business?' Plus the way she spoke down to Amai as if she was a child, despite only being a year older, seemed to confirm my earlier misgivings.
"There was just something I wanted to ask you about, is all." Mai, both the most socially adept and socially unaware person I had ever met, bulldozed right through that first barrier. "I was wandering around in the south area of Shibuya the other day, and I thought I saw you there. I thought it was weird, since you live so far the opposite way."
"So? Was visiting a friend, 's all." That was a bluff on Mai's part. We had come to learn that, despite her adamant stalking efforts, Mai hadn't actually managed to catch Shiko in Shibuya at any point. The response confirmed that she had been in the area where the base was.
"Well, the strangest thing happened when I saw you. I thought to go up and say hi since it was rare to see other students from our school there, but you seemed to disappear completely at random when I lost sight of you. It was super weird, and I was kinda curious what happened."
"Prolly just saw me right before I went into my friend's house, I guess."
"But that's just the thing. It was right in front of an empty lot."
"Kh-" Shiko fell right into Amai's trap. That reaction pretty much proved she had something to hide. She seemingly realised her mistake immediately, as her expression turned from annoyance to a barely concealed panic. It was then that she seemed to notice the other three of us standing behind Mai.
After a few seconds of her eyes darting between the three of us, all of us wearing varying expressions of triumph, she sighed and seemed to give in.
"Alright. Just how much do you girls know?"
"We know there's some sort of structure, some 20-ish metres above ground in that empty lot, invisible to the naked eye and with some sort of automated defence system against intruders." This time it was my turn to speak, and I stated the information we had as matter-of-factly as I could. I was chosen for this job because I 'have a sort of oppressive aura' according to Mai. Basically, she wanted me to play bad cop.
"We also know it's related to Magical Girls. And we swear we're not gonna let anyone else know, not a soul. We're just really big fans, and desperately wanted to meet our heroes. Think you could help us out? Please?" Mai followed up my blunt statement with her good cop act, giving a sweet smile that feigned total innocence, while also deliberately bringing up the possibility of leaking the secret. She was both lording our ammunition over Shiko's head and playing the kind soul that would never betray your trust in one single move.
To be frank, it was almost scary. I had always known Mai to be a genuinely kind and affectionate person, if a little ditzy. To now see her talking circles around someone with carefully planned manipulation tactics was a shock I'd have never expected a few weeks ago.
Seeing the four of us before her and realising she had no way out, Shiko sighed once more.
"Meet me on the roof after school. We can discuss this then."
My companions spent the rest of the day abuzz with excitement. I, however, still couldn't shake the feeling that something was amiss.