Chapter Text
“THIS IS AN ABSOLUTE DISASTER!”
Takano shouted from the rooftop of the prep school building as if he were announcing the apocalypse.
“Dude, calm down.”
Shinegobu Kanda, the fire boy, was losing his patience with his best friend’s unnecessary dramatics.
“HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO CALM DOWN? I’M OUT OF CIGARETTES!”
It was no secret that Takano smoked. It was practically routine for the dark-haired boy to sneak a pack of cigarettes into the prep school past the monitors and smoke during breaks. Shinegobu, of course, didn’t approve of the habit. He wished those damn cigarettes would disappear, but he never expected that it would actually happen someday, much less that Takano would become so desperate and emotional over it.
He grabbed the redhead’s jacket and began whining.
“Please, help me out, bro...”
Feeling a vein bulge in his forehead, the other boy tried to calm him down.
“Okay, okay, I’ll help you, but get off me!”
Shinegobu had the feeling that they were being watched. He turned around and saw the delinquent girl with the red braids.
“HEY, MAZE!”
He shouted. Another peculiar habit he had noticed was Maze’s constant following. The girl was always tailing him. Even though she was a bully, she seemed more curious than intimidating, so the redhead didn’t really mind.
Maze, who had been standing at a safe distance watching the two friends, jumped in surprise. Before she could come up with an excuse, Shinegobu asked her a question.
“By any chance, do you have any cigarettes?”
Since she was a delinquent, it was obvious that she took a few puffs every now and then, and she probably carried a pack with her. That was the logic, anyway.
Maze looked around, confused and slightly embarrassed, before answering.
“Sorry, I gave my last one to Nicole...”
Shinegobu and Takano, who had been listening to the conversation over the former’s shoulder, let out a disappointed sigh, expressions of Are you serious? written all over their faces.
Maze asked the most logical question at that moment.
“Why don’t you ask that emo guy who’s always smoking with Takano?”
Shinegobu nodded in agreement.
“Okay. Good ide—”
“IMPOSSIBLE!”
Takano shouted again. At this point, the two redheads were practically deaf.
“He’s walking around somewhere, being dragged around by his girlfriend, Airi!”
Maze looked shocked. She just couldn’t wrap her head around the fact that someone as grumpy as Inno had managed to get himself a girlfriend... But well... there’s a first time for everything, right?
(She was going to do the same with Nicole later.)
She shook her head, dispelling the thought. Right now, she had to help Shinegobu. There was no time to judge other people’s relationships.
For what seemed like two seconds, Maze Taylor remained quiet before an idea struck her like a bolt of lightning.
“THAT’S IT!”
Shinegobu’s head was starting to hurt from all the sudden shouting. He felt like a nut caught in a nutcracker. Takano, meanwhile, tilted his head toward Maze, loosening his grip on his best friend’s jacket as they questioned her together.
“‘That’s it’ what?”
“The nerdy scientist smokes too! We can go over there and take his cigarettes!”
The two boys shared the exact same thought upon hearing those words spoken with such pride.
‘Is she sure about that...?’
◆◇◆◇◆◇◆
Yaroslav had just taken his first drag to clear his mind from the exhausting, failed experiments when he heard a loud knock on the door.
It wasn’t common for anyone to knock. The only people who visited him during breaks were Yuito and Kariko—and she tended to turn a blind eye to him.
Within seconds, the usually calm scientist panicked. With an agility he rarely displayed, even during experiments that were on the verge of going wrong, he opened the window and tossed the cigarette outside.
“I’ll be there in a second!”
He began trying to blow the smoke out, hoping to get rid of the lingering smell of tobacco. Yaroslav smoothed down his clothes, brushing off the remaining traces of ash, then finally grabbed the doorknob and pulled it open.
“Hello, how can I hel—”
The words caught in his throat from shock—not exactly negative shock—at the sight of Takano, Maze, and Shinegobu standing at the door to his laboratory. It was more than obvious that none of the three had any interest in science, nor were they close enough to Yaroslav to have any reason for a casual conversation.
Without giving the young scientist a chance to speak, Maze blurted out the words.
“Hey, nerd, we need cigarettes.”
Yaroslav stared at her. ‘Is this some kind of intimidation tactic?’ he wondered, considering the fact that Maze was a bully.
“Excuse me...” Shinegobu moved Maze aside so he could communicate with the scientist more easily. “Well, Takano is going through cigarette withdrawal, but we don’t have any...”
“Oh! You want some, right?”
“Yes!” Takano exclaimed.
Yaroslav glanced down both sides of the hallway before opening the door and letting the trio inside.
Maze sat down on top of one of the tables, nearly knocking over a beaker. Shinegobu caught it just before it hit the floor and shattered.
Takano, meanwhile, was interested in the cigarettes, but he found himself staring at the definitely dangerous substances carelessly scattered across the floor and shelves, books tossed around with crumpled pages, and dirty laboratory glassware. If any teacher walked in there, Yaroslav was sure to get a hefty suspension.
After closing the door with a click, he turned toward the trio, looking more relaxed.
“There’s a box in the second drawer. Help yourselves.”
The dark-haired boy wasted no time and quickly grabbed the pack from the drawer. Maze, pleased with the success of her “mission,” pulled out her phone and started scrolling through her LINE notifications.
Shinegobu glanced at Yaroslav, who was already pulling a lighter from his pocket.
“Why did you accept our request so easily?”
The redhead asked, raising an eyebrow, making the scientist laugh.
“People tend to judge smokers, and I don’t mind helping others.”
The answer seemed convincing enough, as everyone in the room listened attentively and nodded in agreement—even though Shinegobu genuinely got annoyed by Takano’s addiction and sometimes felt like shoving those stinking little cylinders down his best friend’s throat.
A few minutes passed with the group in complete silence.
Suddenly, the principal’s stern voice echoed through the speakers.
“Yaroslav Lysenko, please report to the principal’s office.”
Maze, Shinegobu, and Takano’s blood ran cold.
Had they been caught? Were they going to be suspended?
The supplier of the pack, however, remained remarkably calm, as if he had been expecting it.
“Don’t worry, it’s just a warning about the risks of my experiments.”
He said it with a nervous smile and a wave of his hand, reassuring the others.
“I’ll go over there and be back in a little while. Be careful and don’t touch anything!”
With that, he opened the door and closed it behind him as he headed down the hallway toward the principal’s office.
Maze narrowed her eyes and watched until Yaroslav disappeared from sight. A mischievous smile slowly spread across her face, accompanied by a predatory glint in her eyes.
She was going to get Shinegobu’s attention somehow, and she was ready—or perhaps not—for the consequences...