Image Training

By: Aviantei

Tuesday, April 16

"Come on, Tanae-san, please give it back," Mukui Shinju asked quietly, looking up at his classmate with wide eyes. Tanae, sitting idly on the banister by the building's entrance, flicked a coin up into the air, catching it without looking. Besides the fact that he wasn't in a uniform, he looked the very part of the high school bully, bleached hair messy and a superior sneer on his face. Mukui winced, his eyes watching the flicker of silver as it streaked through the air, again and again. "Tanae-san… please be careful with that…"

"What for?" Tanae asked, his expression unfazed by Mukui's protests. "It's just a coin, right? What's it matter? It's only 100 yen anyway. It's useless." He faked tossing the coin across the courtyard, causing Mukui to whip his head around in panic. He only looked back once Tanae laughed and showed the coin in his palm. "Come on, man. I can't even buy a soda with this…"

"Well, yes, but…" Mukui blushed a little beside himself. "It's actually a good luck charm. I've had it for years, so if you'd please just give it back…" It took all the effort he had to look the other boy in the eyes as he made his request. Mukui recoiled as Tanae laughed again.

"Well if it got stolen it can't be that lucky." Mukui's eyes shot down to the ground. "Sides, how can you even keep this one apart from any other 100 yen coin? At least put it on a string or something. Protect what's valuable to you. I bet this isn't even the same coin you thought was lucky in the first place!"

Mukui shifted on his feet, but didn't move otherwise. He was powerless in a situation like this. While he had never been bullied before, it wasn't a situation he was accustomed to dealing with. His nervousness throughout the day had made him an easy target. Not knowing what else to do, Mukui decided it would probably be better to agree with his oppressor.

"Aren't you a little old for bullying?" a voice interrupted before Mukui could speak. Both males turned to look down the stairs in surprise.

"Huh?" Tanae was confused, his mouth hanging open. He seemed ready to say something but was too stunned by the sudden appearance of the third person to respond properly.

"Suzuki-san!" Mukui smiled at the girl. There was some sort of power in numbers that would be helpful here, right? Between the two of them, there should be something they could do to protect themselves. His elation lasted until Tanae shot a glare at him, not concerned that someone else had come to oppose him. "Suzuki-san, stay out of this, it's fine…" Mukui muttered, disheartened.

"You heard the kid, Suzuki," Tanae chimed in. "He doesn't want you here, and neither do I. Besides, it's none of your business anyway. The only people that should stick their heads into this are his friends and it's not like he has any of those." He snickered, amused by his own joke.

Suzuki frowned, her lips pursing together. "Well it's true I'm not his friend," she admitted. Mukui felt his spirits drop even lower. At the very least, he still hoped Suzuki wouldn't just abandon him, even if it meant being bullied together. Despite his expectations, the girl didn't walk away. "But I really can't let this go. Mukui-san and I have a tutoring session to attend to and I hate wasting time. So just give him the coin back and go home, will ya? You're in my way."

It wasn't perfect, but it was a better scenario than Mukui could have imagined. Or rather, it wasn't the worst case scenario, which was enough. Even so, his nerves shook against each other while his classmates stared each other down. Tanae was annoyed, and Suzuki continued to glare daggers back in the male's direction.

"Fine, fine," Tanae relented with a heavy sigh. He flipped the coin over the tops of his fingers before tossing it back to its owner. Mukui was so shocked, he almost didn't see it. After a few fumbling moments of almost dropping the coin, he was able to hold it in his hands and clutch it to his chest.

"Thank goodness…"

"I was getting bored anyway," Tanae continued with far too much confidence to be beaten. He shoved his hands into his pockets, still smirking. "I don't need a lame little toy like that. Not when I got this."

Suzuki's eyes widened before turning into a glare. Mukui tentatively followed her gaze back to Tanae's hands. The taller boy had pulled something out of his pocket, holding it up in the air. Looking closer, it could be seen that the item was a purple wireless mouse. "That's mine!" Suzuki shouted, more out of anger than desperation. "Give it back!"

Tanae chuckled and put the mouse back into his pocket. "Heh. You talk tough, Suzuki, but you're no different from Mukui," he said. "Well, besides from your volume levels. All you can do is complain when you're at a disadvantage. It's really sad just how many people are willing to just lay there and let the 'bullies' walk right over you. I expected better of you."

"Like hell I will!" Suzuki shouted, her glare transferring into full-blown anger. She dropped her bag off her shoulders, and it made a loud thump as it hit the ground. Leaving it behind, Suzuki started to make her way up the stairs. Even though she wasn't angry at him, Mukui still felt intimidated. "I'm sorry, Mukui-san, but we're going to have to reschedule."

"Suzuki-san, don't…" Mukui said, but his voice was too quiet to make any impact. The girl walked right past him, and Tanae slipped down from his seat on the railing. On instinct, Mukui took a few small steps away from the pair.

"You're gonna fight?" Tanae asked. Suzuki didn't respond, just walked. "No thanks, I don't care for that sort of thing. It just ain't my style. So instead of beating me up for your mouse and my lunch money, why don't you find some other way to get it back?" Faster than expected, Tanae opened the door behind him, slipping into the building.

"You bastard!" Suzuki ran up the rest of the stairs, chasing him inside. Mukui was left behind, wanting to somehow help but not able to follow.

"Co-come on, Suzuki, it doesn't have to be like this. I-it was just a joke," Tanae Jun said, his voice shaking. He hadn't been ready for anything like this in the slightest. For one, he didn't expect for someone that wasn't even on the track team to be so fast, let alone able to catch up with him. Just who was this monster anyway?

"You have a shitty sense of humor." Suzuki frowned leaning over Tanae. The boy winced, backing up further against the wall. The door back into the building was close, but he couldn't gather the courage to try to move towards it, towards his salvation. All that he could manage was a whimper.

"I'm sorry, Suzuki-san!" he apologized, bowing his head and clapping his hands in front of him. His eyes were slammed tight in desperation, a feeling he had joked about concerning others but had never felt for himself. It was the cause of the desperate begging. "I promise I won't do it again! I'll leave you and Mukui alone, I swear!"

"Hey, you know why I don't like guys like you?" Suzuki spoke as if Tanae hadn't said a word. The rejection of his apology—no, this denial that his apology even existed—jarred into him harder than his impact with the wall had been. "I guess I really have more reason than others to dislike you, but it's really nothing like that. Although, it is true that I dislike bullies.

"I'm not some righteous hero or anything. I don't have a good heart, and I don't think all people should be treated with kindness. And really, I don't have the mindset to argue against people who suppress others either. So when it comes down to it, I lack all the right qualifiers. It really does make someone wonder why I don't like bullies."

Suzuki squatted down next to Tanae, eliminating her vertical advantage over him. He recoiled, bumping his head against the wall. The physical threat was still there, but her words were a truth without any clouding from society. The presence of another person's true self without intimacy was what was truly scary.

"I don't like cowards," Suzuki said, looking Tanae straight in the eye. "That's it, really. There's nothing more to it, bullies are just big cowards. They don't attack anyone they know they can't beat. Some could say it's strategy, but it's more of an illusion of strength than anything. Their power doesn't mean anything at all.

"And you're even worse, Tanae-san. You only use verbal tactics. The most physical you get is stealing things from others. That's not even direct confrontation, it's stealth. That's all you can really hold over them. And when someone stands up to you—well, 'it ain't your style' to fight, huh? You're barely a bully, so give it up."

Tanae nodded. Any trace of pride he could try to cling onto was gone. His actions were only trying to show complacency so that he could dded. Any trace of pride he could try to cling onto was gone. His actions were only trying to show complacency so that hsomehow escape. Hearing such a blunt analysis of himself was causing Tanae to panic. "I-I told you, Suzuki! I said I'd never do it again! I promised! You're right, I'm a shitty bully so I'll quit! I'll never try to take advantage of anyone again!" Suzuki stood up, making Tanae stop short.

"It's really pathetic that there are still people with that mindset in university…" she muttered, not elaborating on what she meant. She shrugged, shifting her weight. "Oh well!"

With a kick, Tanae was given his escape in the form of unconsciousness. His head and shoulders slumped, a bruise already forming on the side of his face. Suzuki kneeled back down, going through the unconscious students pockets.

"Really, running away is a form of cowardice, too… Especially if it's running away from yourself…"

She spoke to no one at all. After a bit of searching, Suzuki was able to find the mouse in Tanae's back pocket. She turned it over in her hand, checking to see if there had been any damage when she had pushed Tanae against the wall. "It seems okay… Oh, come on!"

Upon investigating mouse, it was obvious that the back cover had been removed, the battery and USB plug-in missing as well. Tanae had probably taken the mouse apart, hiding the parts to mess with her. Since Suzuki hadn't found them in the boy's pockets while searching, it was only logical to assume the only person who knew where they were was currently unconscious.

"I can live without the cover and just get a new battery from home, but the USB can't be replaced…" Suzuki sighed. She had had the mouse before the initial encounter, so it hadn't been stolen before then. Tanae had only gone through the Student Success Building, and Suzuki had been able to stay close behind him the whole time. "I should just have to retrace our steps and it should be easy!"

When the door closed, Tanae was the one who was left behind.

The mouse's back cover had been ungraciously dumped in the middle of a hallway, where it had landed propped up against the wall beside a trashcan. It had been returned to its rightful place, and the in-progress assembled mouse was safely tucked into its owner's pocket. Suzuki was sitting on the floor, double-checking the trashcan even though it was empty.

"They didn't just take the trash out, did they?" she said to herself, setting the trashcan back down. It wasn't a necessity, so she could live without it, but Suzuki didn't have the money lying around to get a new mouse anytime soon.

"The trash is picked up a total of two times on a weekday in this building," a voice said, with a casualty that was reserved for talking about the weather. "Once after the faculty lunch break, and the second during the night shift. Though the janitors will come and dump it out if a particular trashcan is overflowing. Other buildings have more complex schedules."

Suzuki scoffed, giving an uninterested look to the person addressing her. While it was reassuring to know the USB adapter wasn't lost in a dumpster, she wasn't a big fan of being found digging through a trashcan. "Do you know anything that's not useless, Fukube?"

The boy, Fukube, laughed, a pure sound that took the insult in stride. He even had the gall to smile about it. "Not really," he said. His tone made it sound like a statement of fact as opposed to a confession. "Though I'm curious as to why someone like you would be digging through the trash, Suzuki-san. Did you lose something?"

Suzuki stood up, kicking the trashcan in annoyance. It made a low sound as the plastic hit the wall, but fell back into place. "My wireless mouse's USB adapter," she said, holding up her index finger and thumb to show its size. "I lost it in this hallway so I thought…" Suzuki couldn't finish the sentence. There was no need to fabricate an excuse. Saying she had lost it should be enough.

"You mean this?" Fukube held up the small adapter between his fingers, a mirror of Suzuki's own action. The girl tried to hide her surprise, holding out her hand. Fukube returned the adaptor, taking care not to drop it onto the floor. "My tutor dropped some papers when we were leaving and I was helping her pick them up. I found it on complete accident. I was gonna drop it off at the front desk, but since it's yours, there's no need to."

"Yeah, thanks." Suzuki reassembled the mouse, the back cover clicking back into place. She put it back in her pocket. "Any chance you happened to find a battery lying around, too?" she asked, a faint hope. If the USB adaptor had been in some other hallway, then it would take a search of most of the building to find the battery on her own.

Fukube shook his head. "Nope, nope. Sorry, Suzuki-san. You want me to help you look for that, too? What kind was it?"

Suzuki sighed at the offer. "No don't," she said. Even though the search would go faster with Fukube's assistance, it wasn't something she was willing to accept. Owing people wasn't something she was interested in, either. "It'd just be a waste of time. I'm not crawling around on the floor for some half-dead battery I can easily replace. I give up."

"Suzuki-san, a question." Fukube didn't seem to put off of the idea of not searching, either.

"Hm?" Suzuki hadn't meant to respond, but the sound escaped anyway. It would probably only be a few moments, and she could even refuse to answer, too. It wasn't like it would take too much time, but all she really wanted was to go home and take a bath.

Fukube smiled, like he was genuinely glad that he could ask his question. "I know I haven't known you very long, so I may be wrong. Not to mention a person like me shouldn't be drawing conclusions in the first place," he said. Suzuki thought it was weird, but the orange-eyed boy was eccentric so she didn't bother to say anything. "But you seem to be pretty organized, and you even keep the mouse put together when you're not using it. Isn't it weird to lose something like that in parts?"

"…" Suzuki scowled. Not only had he asked a question that was begging for a long answer, it would seem strange to refuse to answer. Not sure of a proper way to leave without seeming suspicious, Suzuki merely abstained from responding. Fukube was quick to insist.

"Ne?"

"…"

"Ne, ne?" The boy leaned towards Suzuki without fully invading her personal space. Even so, she felt uncomfortable with his eyes locked on her, waiting for an answer. She turned her head away, staring at the wall with its uninteresting wallpaper border. At this rate, there was no way out of it.

"… I got into a fight," Suzuki said.

"Ah." Fukube's smile fell back into place, and he stood up straight. He winked, pointing his index finger into the air like some anime character posing for dramatic effect. "That explains why your bag's outside on the ground and why you're not in your tutoring session with Mukui-san right now."

Suzuki grimaced. She had at least hoped Mukui would move her bag inside, but it seemed this was not the case. No one had taken the bag, but that didn't mean no one had stolen from it either. As concerning as that was, the fact that her classmate recognized her bag on sight and knew her schedule was just plain unnerving. "That's just creepy, Fukube."

"Sorry, sorry." The boy dismissed the issue with a wave of his hand. While she wasn't fully willing to let it go, Suzuki wasn't entirely willing to argue about it, either. "How 'bout I make up for it? You obviously don't intend to work on your education, so how about we go and talk about this over food?"

"Like I said, Fukube; you're creepy," Suzuki repeated. Fukube seemed disappointed, almost frowning. Suzuki felt like she had just kicked a puppy in the back alley instead of Tanae.

"I'll pay," Fukube said. It was almost like he could read her like a book, if that was his backup plan. It was a tempting offer in the first place, and it would save her the effort of scraping together dinner later.

"Fine."

He was just lucky Suzuki was even hungry at all.

"Ah, so that's how it went." Fukube Satoshi nodded a few times, hand supporting his chin. Suzuki nodded herself, biting into one of the hamburgers Fukube had bought her. "You really do have an interesting way of handling things, Suzuki-san."

"Whatever." The girl seemed far more focused on eating than actually participating in the conversation. Fukube left his own meal untouched. While he had ordered a normal meal combo from the menu, it seemed minimal in comparison to the amount of food Suzuki had amassed on her side of the table. Just watching her eat was enough to feel like he was full.

"You were bullied in elementary and middle school weren't you?" Fukube commented out of thin air. Suzuki almost choked on her food, coughing and reaching for her drink. Fukube pushed it towards her, making it easier to get. Once she had swallowed, Suzuki converted her remaining energy into a glare.

"You really are a treasure trove of useless information, aren't you?" she countered. The fact that she didn't deny it was enough to confirm his assumption as the truth.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to make you angry." Fukube pushed the order of fries on his side of the tray over to Suzuki's, next to her own. She picked one up and bit into it with a grudging look on her face. Apology accepted. "Although, I guess I can see where you're coming from. A few weeks of knowing each other is a bit too early to be bringing things like this up."

"I'd say considering that we've barely talked in the past few weeks it's the perfect time to prove you're a stalker."

Fukube winced. "Ah, that's pretty harsh…" Stalker was not a word he wanted to be associated with, even if he could see where she had gotten the idea from. For someone with his interests, it was only a matter of time before someone referred to him in that way. Deciding it would be best to not be bothered by those sorts of comments all the time, Fukube regained his composure.

"You deserve it," Suzuki said, obviously put off by how easily he had recovered. "Any other useless information you wish to share while I'm here, Data Base-san?"

Fukube smiled. While he wasn't sure how he felt about being referred to in that way, it was what he was. If she wanted useless information, he could give her useless information. "Suzuki Akiko, age 19. Birthday: June 5, Gemini. Blood type: AB. Height: 160 centimeters. Weight: 49 kilograms. As for the rest of her measurements—"

Suzuki reached her hand across the table, shoving it into Fukube's face and covering his mouth. "Stop it," she said. "You're only proving the point that you're a stalker, not to mention a pervert." Fukube pushed over the parfait he had no interest in eating. Suzuki looked down at it, moving her hand so that the boy could breathe properly again. "But I forgive you so long as you have a good reason."

"I'll still apologize, though. I don't know if my answer will satisfy you at all," Fukube said. "When we first met, you were reminding me of someone else I used to know, so I got curious and looked into you. I did it all legally, too. It's kind of surprising how easy it is to do that."

"Someone you used to know, huh…?" Suzuki wasn't taking the bait to distract her from his reasons. She stated at Fukube, and he had to force himself not to react.

"Yeah…" he said. Suzuki waited for him to elaborate, and Fukube took his opportunity to change the topic. "So how bout we just talk? Little snippets of data like that don't mean a thing in real life. They tell you nothing of what a person is really like. I'm interested in the 'real Suzuki Akiko,' if that's alright."

"Whatever," the girl assented, biting into her second hamburger. It would have been disturbing how uninterested she was if Fukube hadn't been so used to it. Maybe he had misplaced her personality and mixed it up with somebody else. Dismissing the thought, Fukube smiled and spread his hands out in the air.

"Let's start simple," he said. "Why'd you choose to come to this university?"

"They had a good gym and athletics support system," Suzuki answered between bites. It hadn't been the answer Fukube had been expecting, but he pressed on.

"But you're not on any sports teams, Suzuki-san."

This time she didn't comment on his knowledge. "I'm a self-trained athlete."

"If you look at the definition and societal stigmas attached to being an athlete then you really aren't one," Fukube said.

"I suppose. But it's just kind of lame to say 'I exercise a lot' or 'I'm an exerciser.' That last one doesn't even make sense." Suzuki shrugged. "Doing athletic things is good stress relief for me. This school has a gym open to all students and I could find a place to live nearby that I could afford. That's my whole reason, really." She took a large sip from her drink. Fukube could hear the ice shift inside the cup.

"Ah, that explains why you're undecided for your major. It's more about the convenience than the actual schooling you can receive."

"Well what about you?" Suzuki snapped.

"I'm undecided as well," Fukube admitted.

"Then I don't wanna hear it! What did you come to this school for then?" The boy hadn't expected to be answering questions, but Suzuki was so irritated with him that he figured it was best to at least do his best to comply.

"How about I give you some clues and you can guess?" Fukube proposed. Suzuki frowned into her straw. "As you can see, I'm in tutoring. Take in mind that this is not for just one or two of my classes, but all of them. With this in mind and he qualifiers for getting into this school, what do you think the answer to your question is?"

"Hm…" Suzuki meditated the problem over for a few minutes, eating half the fries Fukube had given her. Halfway through bringing a fry to her mouth, it seemed something had dawned on her. "Could it be that you performed so poorly on your other entrance exams you couldn't go anywhere else? This school doesn't make you take an entrance exam so it serves as a default if you can afford it."

Fukube nodded without shame. "That's right," he said, voice filled with unnecessary pride. The university they were both attending was an anomaly in Japan, the first to not require its students take an entrance exam in order to attend. The trade-off was that it was more expensive than a normal university. It still hosted an entrance exam for appearances' sake, giving healthy scholarships to the students who had scored the best.

"I was just joking don't play along with me like that!" Suzuki exclaimed. Fukube stayed silent, and her expression descended into shock. "That's terrible! That's really terrible, Fukube!" She shuddered in horror, and Fukube didn't think she was acting.

"Ah, that's better than what Houtarou did, though," he said. Suzuki seemed skeptical that something could be worse than that. "He came here so he wouldn't even have to try and take an entrance exam."

"Houtarou…" Suzuki pondered over the name. "Oh, you mean Oreki Houtarou-san?" Fukube nodded. The girl seemed confused by the comment. "Is he really that lazy? He always has his homework in the one class that I have with him. He usually has pretty good grades, too."

"Don't let that fool you. He'll do what's needed and not much else." Fukube chuckled, the sound trailing off sadly. "At least that's how he used to be. Now he makes exceptions for wasting energy. I'm his best friend and I'm still shocked that he even wanted to go to school after high school in the first place…"

Suzuki frowned, pausing her work on the second carton of fries. "Fukube, I really don't know that much about Oreki-san, but is it really something to look that worried about?" she asked. Fukube tried to adjust his expression while she spoke. "I mean, most kids these days go to university because it's expected, right? 'You can't get anywhere without an education.' That's been drilled into our heads since day one."

"That just won't do, Suzuki-san," Fukube said, shaking his head. He hadn't been looking for a theory about Oreki in this conversation, but he couldn't just accept the one he had been given either. It was too simple of a solution. "Houtarou just isn't like that at all. The problem is that he wouldn't want to get anywhere, so an education is kind of irrelevant."

"Sorry I'm not much use," Suzuki said, pulling the top off of the parfait's container and unwrapping the spoon from its plastic. She had somehow finished off the fries when he wasn't paying attention. The tray was a wasteland of trash, almost like a fast food elephant graveyard. "Maybe if I knew Oreki-san better I could help?"

"No, I can't ask that of you," Fukube said. "It's my problem with him, so we need to solve it after all. Besides, that's not why I asked you to come here with me."

"It was to ask about the fight with Tanae, right?" Suzuki was eating the parfait with a speed usually reserved for garbage disposals removing clogs from the sink.

"Not exactly." There was a different problem, one that he could ask help with, that needed to be solved. Suzuki was the person that could help him with it.

"Then what was it?"

"Suzuki-san would you like to go on a date with me?"

The girl in question stared at Fukube, eyes wide and spoon hanging from her mouth. The faintest traces of pink were emerging on her cheeks. The spoon slipped out of her open jaw, clattering as it landed in the empty parfait container. The sound seemed to be enough to break Suzuki out of her stupor.

"Huh?"

This story definitely has some interesting points to it. To start off, it was inspired by a dream I had a while ago, which just so happened to involve a lot of OCs and Satoshi... This just happened to be the result of putting those things down on paper and thinking about how the story would go from there.

As such, I'm using this story to try out some narration and organization techniques with my writing, as well as hopefully play around with some characters and scenarios within Hyouka my brain has been toying around with. I hope that everybody can enjoy this story as it continues.

Now enough slacking, back to NaNoWriMo I go and I'm a bit behind today~.

Next time, Tanae gets scolded by an old friend, Fukube discusses the state of things with Houtarou, Mukui makes a decision, and Suzuki works off some steam. Please look forward to it!