"Sounds like she was messing with files she shouldn't have been."
Ren's voice played through a set of headphones. The girl wearing them sat in a dark room, the headphones resting around her neck. She was wearing glasses and had reddish-orange hair. It wasn't her natural color. But she preferred it this way. It didn't remind her of…
Shaking her head, the girl listened to the conversation between Ren and Sojiro. She was listening on her phone because she had tried to access the new messenger Ren was using.
She should have known this would happen.
She had tried to access the chat log between Ren and the person with the handle [Seeker] a few days prior and was hit with an immediate hack. Having to replace her hard drive and operating system. Not to mention all the scripts she had to rewrite! Now her entire PC was bricked!
"Who puts fake endpoints WITHIN endpoints?" she grumbled. "The person protecting his privacy is scary…"
"But who could it be? That encryption is something I've never seen before… It doesn't even feel like it should work," she continued. "That is clearly a black hat, but who is it?"
. .
"Ren Amamiya, who are you?"
---
Ren was bored at school, and apparently so was Ryuji.
BZZT. BZZT. BZZT.
Ren's phone wouldn't stop vibrating, so he opened his messages.
---
ShadOP messenger: CHAT LOG
----
[Skull] This app is dope dude. Did that Lucia girl make this?
[Skull] Anyone have plans today? Let's do team bonding or something. There are batting cages next to Leblanc.
[Skull] Hello?
[Panther] Stop spamming, we are in class!
[Dove] Muting for the time being.
[Dove] is offline
[Skull] ?? Sorry….
[J0ker] Meet up to make plans after school? Team bonding sounds good. We can tackle the Palace after another day of relaxing.
[Panther] Are you sure?
[J0ker] Morgana and I are working on a timetable.
---
"Don't lie about that," Morgana chuckled.
"Well, we probably should do that," Ren replied quietly.
"Amamiya!" Kawakami called to Ren. "Since you're paying attention so well, answer this question!"
She was smirking. Definitely revenge for her embarrassment before. Too bad for her, Ren knew the answer!
Ren stood up and began his explanation, and Kawakami's smirk dropped into a brief pout before returning to her professional demeanor. She was definitely a committed teacher.
"Wow, that pout was cute."
"Kawakami is kind of hot?"
"She isn't THAT old. Like her mid or late twenties, right?"
"BE QUIET!"
Arsene let out a chuckle, and Ren gave a mischievous grin, which irked Kawakami even more.
---
The day ended calmly without any other issues. Kamoshida didn't even cause any problems for a change. Well, it was more like he didn't see Ryuji, and it was difficult to get a rise out of Ren.
Whenever Kamoshida saw him, the teacher gave a victorious grin dripping with disdain. But Ren just ignored it with a flat face.
Ren was tempted to give him the finger, but Silky talked him out of it.
No thanks to Pixie and Pyro-Jack rooting him on.
---
Soon meeting the group, Ren noticed tension between Ann and Shiho. That surprised him deeply. But unless they asked for his help, he wasn't going to interfere. Ann and Shiho's relationship didn't need him interfering. They were strong and understanding of each other. They would figure it out themselves.
Ryuji seemed to notice as well but was trying to ignore it. He was strangely perceptive sometimes.
"Ladies," Morgana attempted to be smooth, then completely ruined it with, "And monkey."
"Screw you, cat," Ryuji scoffed.
"So, anyone have an idea?" Ren asked. "I'm personally not in the mood to go to the batting cages, but whatever is good with you guys."
"Nah, if you aren't into it, we can go somewhere else."
"Shopping!"
"Arcade."
Ann and Shiho's voices sounded. But they weren't in sync with each other like usual.
"Is everything okay?" Morgana asked in worry.
"It's fine!" they snapped together.
Morgana flattened his ears with a nod.
"We can do both. The arcade is close to some shops we can go to," Ryuji offered.
"Underground mall," Ren nodded. "Where to first?"
Glancing at Shiho, Ann gave a sigh. "Arcade first. I'll take too long to shop otherwise."
Shiho suddenly felt ashamed, shutting her mouth.
"Sounds good to me!" Ryuji cheered as he spun on his heel to head to Shibuya Station.
Ren glanced at the two girls, who were awkwardly looking at each other, nodded to them, and began to follow Ryuji.
"He's perceptive, huh?" Ann whispered.
"I'm sorry, Ann," Shiho choked out, on the verge of tears.
"It's okay. Our first fight ever and it was over a boy," Ann giggled. "We'll figure this out."
'Not quite,' Shiho thought sadly, but still replied with a smile.
"Yes, we can do anything together."
---
Soon the team arrived at the arcade. The atmosphere was abuzz with excited teens and children. An extremely young boy with a backwards cap was playing a high schooler in the game Gun About. The hat said "GET SMOKED!" and that was exactly what he was doing, completely smoking his opponent in the game.
"That's King. He whoops everyone in Gun About. Don't worry about him," Ryuji patted Ren's shoulder. "Ready to get your ass kicked in Tekken?"
"How about Smash?" Ann suggested.
"Later, later!" Ryuji said impatiently, dragging Ren over toward the arcade cabinet.
Ann gave a gentle smile and turned to Shiho.
"Wanna play Dance Dance Revolution for now?"
"Sure," Shiho replied with a big grin. Her worry over their argument easing for the moment.
---
The team retired from their fighting games and dancing games. Ren beat Ryuji in Tekken, claiming that button mashing was the way, the truth, and the life, irritating Ryuji. Ann completely destroyed everyone in Smash Bros, winning against everyone without losing a stock.
While Ryuji was distracted with an arcade cabinet port of Biohazard and the girls had wandered off, Ren noticed a crane game and decided to get everyone something.
A One Piece plush of the Thousand Sunny ship for Ryuji.
A Jack Frost plushie for Ann and Shiho each.
And a giant tuna plush for Morgana. Maybe he could nap on it.
Ren gave the gifts to Ryuji and Morgana as they waited for Ann and Shiho to return.
"Bro, you didn't need to get me anything," Ryuji mumbled, but then his eyes lit up when he saw his gift.
"Yooooo! It's the Thousand Sunny? How did you get this? Those crane games are scams!"
"Really?" Morgana asked. "Ren won on every attempt."
"Thanks for the tuna plush, by the way, Ren. I wasn't expecting a gift seeing as…" he trailed off.
"You're a cat?" Ryuji finished.
"I'm not a cat!!" Morgana responded in anger.
"Ryuji, stop picking on Mona," Shiho laughed as the two girls approached.
"Gifts," Ren simply said as he handed the two plushies to the girls.
Both Shiho and Ann were frozen for a moment before gingerly accepting the plushies. Both thanking him with a blush.
"It's so cute," Shiho whispered in glee, hugging it to her chest.
"I'll treasure it, Ren!" Ann said.
"Me too!" Shiho agreed.
"Take a look at mine!" Ryuji said, showing off.
"One Piece!" Shiho cheered.
"I don't really know much about it," Ren revealed. "It's way too long."
"Are you so afraid of good writing?" Shiho asked dramatically.
"You better read it before it breaks 1000 chapters, dude," Ryuji mentioned.
---