Bowling Tourney!

We all met in the Dining Room the next morning for breakfast, and I noticed a few of the others chatting eagerly. Hina, Kirumi, and Nagito seemed to have something in mind, but I could only catch bits and pieces of it. Something about a tournament, but I didn't catch it all. After breakfast, I decided to head back to my room for a bit, to clear my head from recent events.

We started off with 16 students, 8 boys and 8 girls. At present, we're down to 10 students, 6 girls and 4 boys. We've only unlocked 4 out of 5 floors. Byakuya is gathering information on Hope's Peak Academy. Kokichi and Nagito are, apparently, concocting a plan of their own. And none of us were any closer to escaping this place.

I was interrupted from my pondering by my doorbell ringing. Not expecting anyone, I opened my door, and saw Hina, Nagito, and Kirumi at my door. Curious, I approached the trio, wondering why they were gathered outside my door. Hina, of course, was all too eager to answer me.

"We've decided to have a bowling tournament on the Fourth Floor, to try to raise everyone's spirits! What do you think?"

I thought for a few moments, then nodded. "That actually sounds like a lot of fun. Let's do it! When?"

Nagito responded, "Well, we're still working all of that out, but it'll probably be late this afternoon, maybe early evening."

I nodded. "Well, count me in! Let me know who else will show up, and when, and I'll be there."

Hina hugged me, excitedly, while Kirumi merely curtsied. Nagito turned to walk down the hallway nearest me, apparently to check on Byakuya and Kokichi.

No longer interested in dwelling on my situation, I decided to head upstairs, to the batting cages, to hit some balls until the Bowling Tournament was ready. I swiped my E-Handbook in front of a scanner to get a set of 20 balls pitched to me. I had four speeds to choose from; Softball (lobbed slowly at an arc), Slow (straight, with a speed similar to a casual game of catch), Medium (straight, with a speed typical of a high school pitcher), and Fast (straight, like what you would probably see from a professional baseball pitcher).

I batted right-handed, with an tall open stance, wagging the bat back and forth away from me, and awaited my pitches. Fast was WAY beyond what I could deal with, and Softball was far too easy, so I mostly alternated between Slow and Medium, doing Medium when I felt Slow was too easy, and doing Slow when I felt Medium was getting too hard.

After several hours of hitting balls in increments of 20, I decided to give the Batting Cage a break. While I was happy with my hand-eye coordination, my power swing wasn't what it used to be. Guess I've been out of practice for too long; I used to play baseball a lot more before I moved back to Japan.

I returned to my room to take a quick shower, then took a short nap to kill some time and rest my body. Between several hours of hitting baseballs, and walking up and down those steps, I was a bit tired, and wanted to be at my best for this bowling tournament. Glancing at my E-Handbook, it was 3:15pm. I laid it on the nightstand, next to my bed, and zonked out.

I woke up a few hours later, to the sound of someone ringing my doorbell. Looking at my E-Handbook, it was 6pm. Normally, everyone would eat dinner at this time, but I wasn't particularly hungry. Stretching, I got up, grabbed my E-Handbook, and opened the door.

Hina was there, looking at me eagerly. "The Bowling Tournament starts in half an hour! Everyone's gonna be there, except for Byakuya, who's being a jerk again!" Hina glanced off to the side, clearly irked by Byakuya. I decided not to comment on it.

"Alright, I'll head up there then," I replied, and made my way to the Fourth Floor.

Upon arrival, everyone except Byakuya, Hina, and Mikan were inside the Bowling Alley, talking amongst themselves. Nagito was sitting by himself, looking dejected for some reason.

Sitting next to him, I asked him what was wrong. Nagito looked up at me, then responded, "I just finished bowling a perfect 300 game! But now the others won't let me join in the Bowling Tournament, saying my luck would ruin the tournament. What despair..."

I knew Nagito was known as the Ultimate Lucky Student, but this seemed rather incredulous. He was so lucky, that he became unlucky...I couldn't help but notice the irony of Nagito's situation.

Before I could say anything else to Nagito, Hina showed up with Mikan, and everyone seemed ready for the bowling tournament. Since Byakuya didn't show up, and the others kicked Nagito out, we decided to just have the remaining 8 of us have a playoff-style tournament, with the top 4 advancing to the second round, then the top two of that round facing off in a final round.

In the first round, Maki won overall, with me finishing second, ahead of Peko and Kirumi. Hina narrowly missed out, needing a Strike on the 10th Frame to tie Kirumi (and hit a single pin in the bonus round to beat her), but Hina only got 9 pins down. Mikan couldn't even hit triple digits on her game, frequently tripping and gutter-balling, showing everyone her ass in the process. Part of me wondered if she was doing this on purpose, but it seemed inappropriate at the time to blurt this out.

We took a 5 minute break to chat amongst ourselves, with Hina disappointed that she missed some critical shots, and Maki nearly hurling a bowling ball at Kokichi's head (before being stopped by Kirumi, thankfully). Kokichi, Nagito, and Akane all left, with Mikan remaining to watch the rest of us play the next round.

This time, I narrowly beat Maki, hitting a Strike and a Spare on the 10th Frame to beat her. Peko was only 3 pins short of tying Maki, and Kirumi was getting unlucky with splits.

After another 5 minute break, Kirumi and Mikan left us to prepare dinner, with Peko wishing to see who won. With that said me and Maki faced off, and Maki wiped the floor with me, hitting 4 consecutive strikes to start off the game and never really looking back. Feeling somewhat defeated, but knowing Maki was going to be a tough opponent, but reasonably happy with my performance, since I did beat her in the second round. Maki merely nodded at my congratulations, and the three of us walked together to the lunch room.

Maki and Peko didn't seem to be much in the mood for conversation, so we just walked down the stairs in silence. Maki left us to return to her dorm room, so Peko and I walked together to the Dining Room. Suddenly curious about something, I stopped Peko, who eyed me warily.

"I'm curious about someone you mentioned a week or so ago, if you don't mind my asking."

Peko crossed her arms. "What is it?"

"I remember you mentioning a "young master" about a week or so ago, that you desired to see him again. Do you mind if I inquire about him?"

Peko glanced off to the side, contemplating, then met my eyes again. "I suppose I can answer a few questions, but I will not speak his name."

So this "Young Master" was a male. Noted.

"Ok, so how long have you known this "young master", and how do you serve him?" I cautiously asked, as I suddenly disliked the posture change I saw in Peko.

"I have served him since my birth. I would prefer not to disclose the nature of my servitude, if that is ok with you."

I put my hands, defensively. "Fair enough. I don't really require specific details, anyway. So you've known him your entire life, and with you being the Ultimate Swordswoman..." I thought for a few moments. "Is it safe to say you were like a bodyguard to him?"

Peko thought for a moment. "Of a sort, yes. Anyone who threatened Young Master's life, I was responsible for...dealing with." I didn't really like that pause in her sentence, but decided not to press her on it. I could already tell she was uncomfortable with where this conversation was going, and that wasn't really my goal to begin with.

"I think I get the gist of it. Alright, let's get to the Dining Room." Peko seemed to slightly loosen up, and we headed inside the Dining Room together, to meet with the others.

Peko confirmed to the others that Maki beat me in the final round, and won the Bowling Tournament. I, at the meanwhile, was more focused on what seemed to be an argument between Hina and Akane, with Kirumi standing between them.

"Whatcha mean, you can outeat me in donuts? I can outeat ya in anything!" Akane shouted.

Hina cocked her head and crossed her arms at Akane, in the international girl pose for "Oh, you just said the WRONG thing to me!", and retorted, "I don't think so! I bet you a week's worth of dishes duty that I can beat you in an eating contest!"

Akane had that wolfish grin again, and shot back, "You're on! Two days from today, at 4pm, we'll start the contest! I don't care what we eat, I KNOW I can beatcha!"

Kirumi responded to both of them, "So two days from today, at 4pm, we shall have an eating contest in this Dining Room. Any food goes, and the loser has to do dishes for the next seven days, breakfast and dinner both. Do I understand this correctly?"

Akane and Hina both voiced their agreements. I just hoped they wouldn't eat themselves to death over dish duties for a week.

So we just finished one contest, and are now going into another, in two days...I was looking forward to this eating contest!