Chapter ten. If you find yourself alone on a date...

Kyoko checked the last message again:

"At ten in the morning at the Soa station."

This station was the closest to the school, and from there, you could walk to one of the most luxurious parks in the city. Of course, it would have been better in spring, but the autumn leaf fall should also have been quite picturesque. Kyoko dreamily closed her eyes, and finally, Hideki-kun agreed! And she's going on a real date with him. Even the snide remarks of her younger sister, who criticized her outfit as "too old," could not spoil her mood.

— Are you still going on a date in this old lady outfit? And she put a funny hanging on her neck.

Kyoko looked down at herself, not reacting in any way to her younger sister's remark. She was wearing a silver-gray dress, stockings, and black ankle boots. She also wore a pendant on a chain in the form of a Mobius ribbon — a gift from Hideki around her neck and geometric earrings.

She didn't put on too much makeup—it couldn't be compared to how much makeup she put on a year ago during rehearsal training with her younger sister.

She took one last look at herself in the mirror and left an hour and a half before the date; she couldn't afford to be late.

The only thing that confused her was that she repeatedly wrote and erased messages for Hideki—kun last night. In the end, she decided that everything she had written to him was premature, and everything was erased. Now, there was one erased message in the history. Could it be that she wrote and sent it by mistake after all? And then she got embarrassed and erased it? Kyoko thought about it. It is quite possible. Okay, it's time for her to go out.

"I left," Kyoko told Ame and didn't hear any reaction, wishes to return or a good journey.

Hideki was gone at nine.

And at ten, on time, it wasn't.

He wasn't there after being late at one o'clock. And Kyoko did not respond to messages, even though they were marked as read.

At twelve, Kyoko went into a nearby cafe, keeping her eyes on the meeting place in order to immediately run out if Hideki-kun appeared.

Hideki-kun didn't show up.

At one o'clock in the afternoon, Kyoko sent the last message, already marked as unread. And I was going home. The mood, still so great in the morning, became gloomy. He decided to make fun of her or check how desperate she was. Kyoko was ready to throw away her pride, and in fact she had already done it when she was running after Hideki like a dog, but it didn't help her. The remnants of her pride prevented her from crying now, but she would not be able to restrain herself for long.

She was almost down to the subway when her cell phone rang:

"Kyoko—chan, is my brother with you?" Do you know why he's not responding?

"Yumiko—chan," Kyoko's voice sounded hoarse and raspy to her, "when did your brother leave the house today?"

— As you wrote to him early this morning, Kyoko-chan, by eight in the morning. I was still surprised; my brother seemed to be talking about a later time, he still overslept, and he was still lamenting that he woke up late and barely managed to get out on time.

Kyoko felt that the cool air of late autumn entering her throat had become especially hot and prickly.

—Yumi-chan," she practically croaked, "could you repeat that?"

Kyoko listened to Hideki's sister one more time and sat down exhausted on some stone fence next to which she was passing when Yumiko's call stopped her.

Hideki-kun didn't cheat on her! At least he went on a date with her.… About two hours before the scheduled meeting... and an hour before, she came by herself. She asked Yumiko again, and Yumiko answered, but she already began to suspect something was wrong:

"Kyoko—san, what's wrong with my brother?"

"We never met, Yumiko-chan,— Kyoko replied honestly. — I've been waiting for him since nine in the morning… And about five minutes ago, I despaired. After all, he definitely did not promise that he would come. He just said he would try…

— But he would…

"Yes, I understand now," Kyoko got to her feet. "Yumiko-chan, you said you were having a family gathering; you can cover Hideki until I find him."…

"I can," Yumiko said, no less confidently than Kyoko about the search."Just find my brother, Kyoko-chan.

"I'll find it,— Kyoko said confidently. And she was really sure that she could.

In fact, there were only so many options. One of them explained the erased message and showed Kyoko that the apartment where she lived with her sisters was no longer a safe place for her.

You don't have to be wiser than a Buddha to understand who exactly she annoyed and who she could ask for help. Or create the conditions under which they will volunteer themselves…

In general, the idea itself is even beautiful in some ways - after Hideki did not come on a date, and Kyoko waited for him for several hours to no avail, their relationship, which is still not the best, will become worse than that of the wind and the sakura flower.

That is, it is clear why, it is clear who, it is partially clear why, the composition of the actors is not completely clear, and it is completely unknown where.

More precisely, it is known where Hideki-kun was captured, but where he could have been taken is a question. There's just one caveat — they changed the date and time, but they didn't change the place, which means it was convenient for them that Hideki-kun would come here. Or... or they thought that changing both the time and the place would be too suspicious. By the way, she appointed a place absolutely out of the blue since it turned out to be convenient for those who fired Hideki-kun.

In fact, why did she set up a meeting here? Because there are many interesting themed cafes and there is a local museum of mechanics and the development of motorism in Japan, she thought Hideki-kun would be interested.

But it was the elder sister who said about the museum!

She remembered a conversation the night before last with her older and younger sister.

"So, are you going on a date, after all, Kyoko?" With that "junior mechanic"?

— None of your business, sister! You're so cruel, Kyoko-chan!

"Don't make fun of Kyoko, sister! And by the way, where would you go with a "junior mechanic"? So, is it something close?

— You don't even have to think about it… There is one near your school…

It turns out that Aoi's older sister said about the museum… But it was Katari's younger sister who provoked her to tell the story.

Moreover, Aoi was no longer at home in the morning, and Katari had already left in the morning, and shortly before Kyoko herself came out, she returned. And she began to mock her.

Okay, she'll deal with the relatives later; the main question is: why here?

Right next to the school?

Kyoko's thoughts raced: next to the school, open all weekend, in which there is no one except a young and lazy guard who rarely goes around. The school, which has an entire old clubhouse, is a little off the beaten path, and even the guard still needs to enter.

That's the answer to the question of where.

***

When Kyoko Ame, who was walking towards him from afar, motioned for him to follow her, Hideki immediately suspected that something was wrong. Still, he needed help understanding what exactly. The convulsive packing and running in an attempt not to be late had greatly unsettled him.

Hideki had almost left the square and into the park surrounding their school, which had grown almost to the point that it could be called a forest. But already standing on the aisle, he realized exactly what was wrong. The girl who cosplayed Kyoko had the same hairstyle, clothes, and a very similar way of moving. But her smile was definitely not the same, even if it was similar. Hideki could tell this for sure because a very rare smile that just lit up his face, the same smile that he almost or not almost fell in love with long before the unfortunate confession, was definitely not the smile that he saw in front of him now.

Suspecting something very wrong, he tried to take a step back, but it was too late. A classmate who disliked him so much jumped out of the aisle, and two more came out of the aisle into the park. There was a crash…

"Thank you, Kyoko—chan," one of the attackers said, and Hideki still managed to hear it.

— It hurts, — Hideki only managed to think, — like a punch in the gut, only 10 times more painful.

Hideki tried to exhale, but everything went black in front of his eyes, and he lost consciousness.

And "three friends took an unconscious classmate to school."

Hideki regained consciousness in the middle of transportation but only managed to open his eyes and turn his head as he was hit by a shocker in the solar plexus once again.

No one who saw the strange transportation scene even thought to ask and intervene.

One of the trio checked the location of the guard, and after making sure that he was far from the entrance to the park, he stayed to make sure that he would still be far away. The remaining two dragged Hideki through a hole in the fence from the side of the wooded park.

***

Hideki woke up from cold water splashed on his face. Judging by the condition of his clothes, this is not the first time.

— Are you aware that you can go to jail for a long time for kidnapping?

— Ha, word against word, today three more people will confirm that we drove to Sonka all day. That's if you want the whole school to see your fucked-up look at all. No, don't think about it; we'll leave you here until tomorrow. Kyoko is our good obedient dog, she will call you at home and tell you that you are spending the night with her. And tomorrow, if you're lucky, we'll let you out... after we take a few pictures, so be it.

— That's if you beg us. — he continued after a short pause, and if you don't, then the girls from the home economics club will find you by lunch. You'll see, they'll even untie or wash it.

You can't cry, you can't give up. Begging and humiliating yourself never helps. It remains only to endure and hope for revenge. Yes, that's all that remains.

In the meantime, he needs to hold on. In his desire to remain silent, the kidnappers themselves helped him by wrapping some rags around his mouth.

I must say that initially, his kidnappers did not transgress a certain line, limiting themselves to insults. However, their level did not shine:

"You filthy, stinking fat man! How could Ame-san spend any time with you and not throw up? No wonder she came up with this date plan to finally bury you as a student so that everyone, and not just us, could see you, a nasty piece of garbage. What you really are!

Haire, who wore a mask, poured insults, and it was not particularly scary but rather tedious since he began to repeat himself quite quickly.

Hideki was silent —even though he was sure it wasn't Kyoko who lured him, he still had some doubts. He was receiving messages from her so that she couldn't have been completely uninvolved. Or could she?

However, they managed to undermine his confidence a little. Although Hideki got to know Kyoko Ame a little, he couldn't say that he understood her well and completely, although he had formed some opinions about Kyoko. Kyoko Ame was quite impressionable, bending to public opinion but up to a certain limit. And if she set a goal for herself, she went to it, breaking through obstacles. In this sense, she was definitely better than Hideki, and he had no motivation for anything other than being as inconspicuous as possible.

He also relied on Mato-san's opinion, which he expressed when Kyoko left after visiting his work:

"Trust a not—so—young man, Hide-kun; if you miss her now, you'll regret it a lot later.

Actually, this was the main reason why he decided to come on a date at all, and when the time changed, he tried very hard not to be late.

— Don't sleep, you freak!

A slap on the cheek, which was hardly a blow, brought him out of his thoughts. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and his kidnappers wanted to show that they could do anything with a man tied hand and foot. Hideki, as before, decided to ignore their attempts; he still had no better plan of action. Don't talk to them, don't moan, and don't show that he's in pain. Of course, there was a chance that his passivity would cause additional irritation, but the chance that his moans and response to their verbal attack would only provoke those stronger was higher. Therefore, Hideki remained silent, gritting his teeth.

Having received no reaction, Haire began to beat him with increasing frenzy, or rather, slap him on the cheeks and got the natural result — he broke Hideki's nose, and blood dripped.

"Tiger, you're going to get dirty all over," one of the henchmen remarked to him, "and it should act soon. We'd better leave."

His kidnappers did not act in the dumbest way: the masks they were wearing were not simple but festival ones. Yesterday, the festival began and continued today, something summer in the neighboring area of the city, where he was thinking of taking Kyoko, later. Ha! However, according to Hideki, if Haire was a tiger, it was only a paper one. He also felt that his hands were starting to go numb, which was a very bad sign, but it was useless to ask them for help. Perhaps if Hideki had been older, he would have thought differently, but now he was ready to lose his hands to get revenge.

Hideki's phone beeped, signaling the incoming message, and Haire smiled contentedly:

— Even though it's been a long time, that's all. We'll leave you here, fat man. I'll leave your phone, anyway; geolocation doesn't work for him. Wait for the cutting and sewing members tomorrow. Oh, I forgot. While you were unconscious, we gave you medicine to cleanse your stomach — you will be cleansed of everything superfluous. Oh, yes. He added, grinning, "and another fast—digesting sleeping pill." Enjoy it! I wonder how long you'll last. My brother was talking about laxatives — a powerful thing, half an hour maximum — and everything would come out.

Echoing Haire's words, Hideki's stomach rumbled.

— Well, yes, we have to go.

And the door slammed shut behind the kidnappers.

***

It was hot in the classroom. Hideki wanted to drink in the morning, he ran to the place very quickly, did not have time to drink, then there was a kidnapping, then a stupid scene where Haire played an operetta villain, they did not even think to give him a drink. Hideki's stomach rumbled even more, and he could barely feel his hands anymore.

He should have tried to do something, but his path needed to be fixed, but firmly. His legs were tied to the front legs of the chair. His hands were tied behind his back, tied and also tied to the back. If the chair had been wooden, he could still have tried to fall on the back and break it, but it was a pretty sturdy chair with a metal base and a wood—fiber back and seat. Hideki twitched his hands. Of course, it didn't work out, but he seemed to feel his hands a little. He tugged again, with no result. I couldn't get up either; my legs weren't tied as tightly as my arms, but they were also tight. Hideki looked around the room. There was nothing sharp to grind and untie the ropes with. The door cannot be opened. The window cannot be opened. You can try to go to the door and beat it... Oh, if he had at least the simplest stationery knife in his pocket! At least a piece of the blade is like a keychain, as he once wore.

Hideki swore to himself that if he did get out of it today, he would not be caught off guard again. Well, if not… He can synthesize something that explodes without hands, even if it takes more time, and he will definitely be able to…

A sharp pain in his stomach pushed out his thoughts. I wanted to howl and cry, but I had neither the strength nor the opportunity.

Hideki didn't know how much time had passed since his captors left. He tried to rub the ropes on his hands against the ledge of the wall, barely restraining himself from losing consciousness, which was helped by abdominal pain. But gradually, he could control himself less and less. He seemed to hear some footsteps, but most likely, it was a hallucination from sleeping pills and dehydration.

Hideki swore to himself that he would get out, and when he got out, he would try his best to help his tormentors die. They weren't going to kill him. They were going to make him look extremely pathetic and disgusting. What other feelings besides disgust could his ragged, disgusting, and dirty appearance cause? But he will not die; he will not make such a gift to the creatures who humiliated him. He would survive, and even if it was the last thing he would do, at least he would drag someone to hell with him. He was even more thirsty…

"Well, at least I was able to loosen the ropes on my hands a little," was his last thought before he finally lost consciousness.