Chaoskouji

Chapter 11 - Negotiations

When lunchtime came, I jumped to my feet and headed towards the cafeteria, giving a glance to Kushida and signalling her to follow. It would probably be difficult for her to fend off her 'friends' and find an excuse to follow me, but that was her problem not mine. Knowing her, she would figure something out, probably even turning the situation to her favour.

As I walked, I went over the plan one more time in my head. Part two was now in motion. Everything hinged on this going successfully. Even if Part two fails it doesn't particularly matter, but part 1 was essential to the situation playing out as I anticipate it will.

I could have done this without Kushida's help, and even now I could still tell her to leave but having her understand what I did would be beneficial. For her to see how far ahead I could plan, and how I could act perfectly depending on the situation would force her to hesitate any retaliation against me.

And she inevitably would retaliate. Despite her being my most useful pawn, she was also the biggest risk. Her attitude from what I have seen so far would never allow her to serve someone unwillingly. She would do everything in her power and had already made an attempt with the false rape claim, to shut me down. Kushida would continue to gather evidence against me, and I against her, and eventually both of us would drag the other down.

That was a situation I most certainly wanted to avoid, and so there were two objectives to using her. Firstly, to make her fear or at least become wary of me. This would be easily accomplished, partially today, by allowing her to see behind my schemes. That was simple enough.

The second objective was to get her to willingly side with me. This was infinitely harder. The only sure-fire way to have her as a semi-trustworthy pawn was to have her choose to help me. If I had to spend the next three years constantly planning to foil her sabotage, I would expel her at the first opportunity. A loss, but better than three years of worry. Part 2 would put into motion my strategy to have her side with me. I had promised to make her the center of the grade, to make her the most popular person, and that started here. By giving her rewards, and constantly in small ways helping her out, the benefits of her siding with me would far outweigh any reason to betray me. Only then could I truly trust her.

Or as much as I can trust any person.

Once reaching the cafeteria, I navigated my way through the crowd and finally reached the meal ticket machine. I bought tickets for two portions but didn't line up at the counter. Instead, I went to the side of the vending machine and looked at students perusing the menu.

"What are we doing here, Ayanokouji-kun?" It seemed Kushida had finally joined me, with her perfect angel act turned up to max. Reasonable considering the setting, but personally I found it to be a little irritable.

"Waiting for my target. Did you escape our classmates ok?"

"Yeah, it wasn't hard. I just told them I had to meet some other friends and they waved me off with a smile." A grin formed on her face at this, one that didn't quite match her usual exterior. It seemed the kindness of her friends amused her to no end.

"Good. No need for anyone to get suspicious. Now, come on." Saying this I walked towards the student I had spotted, indicating for Kushida to follow. I collected the two meals, one for each of us and sat down in front of the upperclassman.

"Um, excuse me. Are you an upperclassman?" I asked.

"Hmm? Who are you?" The student regarded us calmly, a look of complete disinterest on his face.

"Are you a second-year student? Third-year?"

"Third-year. Let me guess, you're a first year?"

"I'm Ayanokouji, from Class D. You're also in Class D, aren't you?" At my name his eyes showed some recognition, and his face closed off with caution. It was for this reason I had brought Kushida with me, as it was unlikely a student from upper classes would trust me.