The Simulacrum - Chapter 52 - Part 1

"It's been a while," I whispered under my breath and stretched my back under the sunny, if not particularly warm, autumn sky.

"What's been a while?" Judy inquired without looking up from the lunchbox she was unpacking at the moment, so I told her:

"Since the last time we had lunch on the school rooftop like this."

"That's true. You have been on sick leave a lot lately." There was just a tiny bit of edge to her words, but I decided to ignore it and instead I sidled closer to her on the bench.

Even though the weather was just a touch wintry at the moment, which also resulted in the placeholders avoiding the place like the plague and the two of us being alone on the rooftop, Josh and company already picked the cafeteria in the morning. That meant we could either eat in the classroom, or here, and Judy voted on the latter, probably so that we could spend some quality time together for a change. As for why we decided to separate ourselves from the rest of the group, it was so that they could have their strategic discussions about how to capture Labcoat Guy without my unwitting interference. 

I mean, the whole point was to make Josh a bit more independent and protagonist-y, and subconsciously seeking validation from me all the time got in the way of that. I truly hoped that he would get rid of that bad habit, and although it pained to me to admit it, I was fairly guilty when it came to him developing it in the first place, so I figured I might as well help course-correct. As Angie had pointed out, I have been acting too much of a 'leader-type' as of late, so I couldn't blame them for mistaking me for one. Hopefully I would have the time and opportunity to correct that impression. 

Nevertheless, that was a fairly distant goal, and I had much more important things on my mind at the moment. Such as lunch. 

"What are we going to have today?"

"Sandwiches," Judy answered as she handed a wrapper-covered piece of food over to me.

"We are back to our roots, huh?" I muttered as I unwrapped my package and checked the contents between the buns. "Fried chicken. A classic."

"Yes," my girlfriend nodded and reached behind the lunchbox. "You should also have this."

I was just about to take a bite out of my food when I laid my eyes upon the thing in Judy's hand and I immediately rolled them. My eyes, I mean, not Judy's hands. That would've been just plain weird.

"Are you serious, Dormouse? It's the lunch-break. How am I supposed to enjoy the tasty sandwiches my lovely girlfriend prepared for me like this?"

"Don't even try to butter me up," my dearest assistant scolded me and placed the open history textbook onto my lap. "You have been missing a lot of lessons lately. If you don't catch up, your grades are going to suffer."

"I know, but can't I catch up later?"

"That's something a slacker would say," Judy suddenly declared with a voice more wooden than an entire Viking longship. "Are you a slacker?"

"… Where did that come from?" I asked, mildly bewildered.

"What do you mean?" she responded innocently, but by this point I was proficient enough when it came to reading her to tell that she was embarrassed by her previous words.

"That sounded like something you rehearsed ahead of time," I pressed on, and after a few short seconds of silence she finally gave in.

"It's from a self-help book. For motivation."

I continued to scrutinize her for a moment, but it appeared she was entirely sincere, so I stated, "Okay, I bite. Why did you read a book like that?"

"To motivate you to study, obviously," she answered as if it was entirely self-evident. "Recent studies show that school performance and financial success scale linearly, and financial success and financial stability is one of the key sources of a conflict-free and relaxed family life, so in order to ensure our future happiness, I decided it was necessary to motivate you."

"Just for the record, you do know that I am technically a millionaire, right?"

"That's not an excuse to slack off," she countered as she unwrapped one of her own sandwiches. "You are going to have to provide for exactly two wives, and at least four kids."

"At least?" I asked back absent-mindedly between two bites, and she gave me a firm nod in response.

"Yes. I want at least three, and Elly said she wants one for sure."

"I think you two are thinking just a smidgen too far ahead. Also, it's not like I really have to 'provide' for you two. Elly is silly rich, and with your grades, I'm pretty sure you are going to do great."

"You are still going to provide me," she countered with a huff. "You have to pay for my assistant's fees, and my contract lasts for a lifetime."

"If you insist," I told her with a chuckle.

"I do, so you better start studying."

My chuckles immediately turned into a stifled groan as I rolled my eyes and pleaded, "Come on Dormouse. Think of the situation. Winter is coming, and soon we won't be able to have lunches together up here. Do you really want me to waste what very well might be my last opportunity to have a rooftop rendezvous with my girlfriend by ignoring her and studying instead?"

"If you put it like that…" she finally relented, and so I quickly picked up the history book and put it aside before she could change her mind. 

"There you go. I promise I will look over the parts I missed later. For now, how about we just relax a little."

"Fine," she spoke with just a hint of sulkiness in her voice, and for a few short minutes we silently consumed our required dose of calories for the afternoon. 

"Chief?" 

"Hm?" I turned to Judy, and I admit I was a little surprised by the way she called out to me out of the blue.

"This feels nostalgic."

"Now that you mention it, it kind of does," I agreed with her after considering it for a moment. "This roof is where we first met."

"Yes," Judy said, with a nod. "It's also the place where you hired me to become your assistant."

"I believe we are talking about the same event," I muttered a little uncertainly, but then I added, "That said, it really feels like it's been ages since that day."

"A lot of things happened. Back then, you even thought this was just a school life harem setting." She waited for a beat, probably to see if I would add anything, then she flatly added, "You were wrong."

"I wasn't wrong, I just didn't see the whole picture. Just because Newton didn't know about relativity, it doesn't make Newtonian Physics wrong, just incomplete."

"I will now graciously skim over the fact that you likened yourself to Sir Isaac Newton and I won't make fun of you for it."

"Thank you for your small mercies."

"You are welcome."

"That said," I began as I nimbly unwrapped my next sandwich, "It feels like we have come far, yet at the same time we are still standing by the start-line."

"Mmmm," Judy… agreed, I think? It was hard to tell, because her mouth was currently so full she reminded me of a chipmunk, but once she swallowed, she properly agreed by saying, "True. We have discovered many things, but just as many things are shrouded in mystery."

"Let's hope that once we weather the coming flustercuck with the knights, we are finally going to have some downtime and can get some research done for a change. For example, I'm itching to experiment with the supernatural stratum through enchantments, but I can't really do it if it knocks me out for half a week every time I meddle with it."

"I don't want to rain on your parade, Chief, but I think the main reason why we have a hard time is exactly because of your meddling. With the narrative, I mean."

This comment made me pause for a moment and give my assistant a wry look, but since she didn't seem to want to back down, I decided to just outright tell her, "I thought we were over this. Not every single thing that happens to us has to be because of the narrative jerking everyone's strings. There might be perfectly reasonable explanations for the sudden appearance of the Knights."

"Really? Do you have a sensible Watsonian explanation then?"

"Maybe," I countered with a frown. "Do you have a sensible Doylist one?"

"I do," Judy stated with perfect confidence, but then she continued to chew on her food without actually saying it.

"So?" I prompted her, just a tiny bit impatiently, and after she finished up the last bite she finally turned to me and began to explain herself.

"I believe we have already discussed this, but let's reiterate our theory regarding the main plot of the Narrative: You have saved Joshua from Noire and ended the last arc."

"Technically 'we' saved him, and Snowy too, kinda, but otherwise you are correct."

"In conclusion, the first arc existed to set things up and then expose Joshua to the supernatural elements of the setting in a dramatic fashion. Are we in agreement on that?"

"More or less," I granted her with some minor reservations.

"If that is the case, then the second arc would be about an introductory villain, and the main characters learning how to work together in order to overcome them."

"That would be Labcoat Guy."

"Precisely," she declared quite firmly, for some reason.

"And if that's the main plot, then Mountain Girl and the stray Chimera are just side-plots."

"Not only that," my assistant raised her voice while also extending an index finger in front of her, "That side-plot has nothing to do with Joshua. This tells us that the Narrative created it just for you, either as an acknowledgment of your impact on the original plot, or as a way to keep you busy and away from the main plot."

"U-huh," I grunted in what could be best described as 'skeptical agreement'. "So, in your interpretation of the situation, where do the Knights fit into the arc?"

"They don't," she told me with just the barest hint of smugness permeating her tone. "The Knights were most definitely supposed to be the focus of the next arc. If we follow genre conventions, the first couple of arcs would each focus on a different harem member. However, since you have disrupted the current arc by sabotaging the sentai elements and revealing Doctor Robatto's connection to the arch-mage of the island, it upset the natural progression of the narrative and led to the next arc bleeding into the current one."

"… You are talking awfully confidently, considering you have little evidence for any of this," I grumbled while reaching for the thermos by the lunch box. "For a start, I'm not entirely sure about your 'arc' hypothesis. It's just as likely that the original scenario had a branching route structure."

"Would that mean that, since the Dracis and the Knights are coming into focus, we are entering Eleanor's route?"

"I don't know, and I don't dare to guess just yet," I answered as I unscrewed the beverage holder and took a whiff of its contents. "Huh. That's new."

"Sebastian gifted me some of his tea blends when I visited the Dracis Library the last time," Judy stated off-handedly, yet she couldn't hide how attentively she was looking at my reaction. "He said you would like it."

"I very much do so," I answered with a smile, and then I poured a portion into my plastic travel cup. "Thanks for the treat."

"You are welcome." 

I took a cautious sip from my cup, and even though it couldn't exactly match up to the brew the old man made himself, it was still really, really good. 

"So, where were we?" I asked after savoring the taste for a moment, and Judy told me right away.

"We were at the part where you poked holes into my theory without providing a reasonable Watsonian alternative."

"Well then, I suppose I better do that right away." I flashed her my perfected roguish smile, and once it achieved the desired effect, I moved on by stating, "According to how I view it, while the narrative scaffoldings of a pre-planned plot almost certainly exist around us, the current events are best explained by the consequences of our individual actions, and there is no guiding intelligence that constantly tries to maintain said pre-planned plot."

"Does that make you a Narrative Deist?" my dear assistant leveled an unexpected question at me, and after a moment of thinking, I answered with a tentative nod.

"I suppose?" I granted her, but then I quickly returned to the main topic by telling her, "So, let's take the elements of your 'arcs' into consideration for a second: Labcoat Guy, while certainly fits the role of a mostly harmless starting villain, is technically just Lord Grandpa's flunky. On the same note, it turns out that while he covered his tracks a little better with Rinne, he still used my student ID photograph to prime her to look for me, and I'm fairly sure that he is behind the appearance of the Chimera as well. I've talked with Brang and Snowy about it, and apparently those creatures are really, really dumb. Without someone giving them direct orders, they would even forget to eat and starve to death."

"Really?"

"It was an extreme example, but Snowy said so, so it must be true. She said it's some kind of failsafe mechanic so that they wouldn't go out of control and start hunting anything that moved. Anyhow, since it's sending out its spawns to forage and keeps moving around the city, it means that someone must have given it the orders to do so."

"And you still think that's Lord Amadeus."

"It's not like we have a huge list of suspects," I gave a firm answer, thought I would have been the first to admit my reasoning was based on way more conjecture than I would have preferred. "There are no more Abyssals on the island, the Dracis have nothing to do with it, we would know if the Celestials had a hand in it because of the Hub, it doesn't fit the Knights' MO, and as for Labcoat Guy, I figure he would have slipped up in the time I have been observing him. Oh, by the way, he is already moving out to ambush Josh after school today. Please remind me to tell them, in case I forget."

"Noted," she replied, and then she filled her own mug with tea. I waited for her to finish, and only then did I continue.

"The point I was trying to get at is that the entire 'arc' you are talking about is the handiwork of Lord Grandpa, no ubiquitous narrative involvement required. Not only that, but your theory doesn't explain why we almost had a genre shift, which would have made your proposed next arc about the Knights and Elly's family moot, because then we wouldn't have been in a battle harem narrative anymore."

"If so, then how do you explain the sudden appearance of the Knights?"

"Thank you for asking," I said with a not at all cheeky smile. "For a start, remember how I handed over a lot of sensitive intelligence to Sebastian about them? According to Moose, a lot of their bases were hit by what I presume to be other draconians, which would explain why they would speed up whatever operation they had in mind on the island."

"You said that the man on the phone said that the attack would proceed as planned," Judy countered. "Wouldn't that mean that the date was fixed well ahead of time?"

"I… suppose, yes…"

"If so, then that means they didn't bring any of their plans ahead."

The two of us locked eyes for a few seconds, but since I couldn't come up with a snappy comeback, in the end I was forced to roll mine and grudgingly admit, "Fine, my theory doesn't explain everything either."

"Mine explains this one though," my girlfriend told me with a triumphant smirk (which, for the uninitiated, probably looked nothing more than the corner of her lips twitching a little). "Since the day of the attack was information that everyone was unaware of, it meant that the Narrative could have retro-actively changed the date in order to fit the pace of the plot."

"I find that impossible to refute on account of it being a black box."

"Which also means that it's impossible for me to prove it as well," she concluded, earning her a nod.

"Almost everything we discuss about the narrative boils down to this. To be honest though, I'm starting to think that the truth lies somewhere between the two extremes of our interpretations."

"Possibly. It's sad but true that until we learn more about the underlying principles of the world, the best we can do is post-hoc rationalizations of events and the occasional prediction based on genre conventions."

"Oh, thanks for reminding me," I snapped my finger and then pointed at her. "In your opinion, how will Josh's attempt at catching Labcoat Guy turn out?"

"Depends," Judy answered a little distractedly, no doubt because she was too busy unpacking the desserts she brought.

"What are those?" I asked while redirecting my finger at the round pastries in her lap.

"Jaffa cakes. Angeline's recommendation," she answered and handed one over to me, which I graciously accepted.

"Thank you very much. On a separate note, what do you mean by 'depends'?"

"It depends on whether or not Robatto operates on Battle Harem or Sentai tropes," she explained as she picked a cake for herself and began nibbling on it. "If he stays within the Battle Harem framework, then it is likely that once he is captured, he would turn into a tertiary character, possibly a comic relief one."

"I can kind of see that happening," I answered while sneakily snatching another cake from Judy's lap.

"If he follows Sentai tropes, it's a little harder to tell."

"I guess. For a start, Sentai villains are not supposed to be defeated before the end of the season," I mused as I quickly devoured the surprisingly delicious confectionery in my hand.

"Not unless they are a bait-and-switch paving the way for another antagonist or, in rare cases, an eeeeeevil organization of—"

"Bfff!" 

Oh my god, I almost choked! What was that completely wooden 'eeeeevil' just now?! And why was it so gosh darn adorable?! Dammit Dormouse, do you want to assassinate me with cuteness!? Because at this rate, it might actually work…

"Chief? Are you all right?"

"Um… Yes, perfectly fine. I just need to drink a little," I mumbled as I reached for my mug and downed the remaining tea in it with a single gulp. "So, you were saying something about bait-and-switch antagonists, right?"

My dear assistant was eyeing me through suspiciously squinted eyes, but at last she continued with, "I think that the Knights are supposed to be the antagonists to swoop in and one-up Robatto by posing a more competent threat."

"Is that part of your hypothesis about arcs, or is this a separate one?"

"No, but the two are not entirely incompatible."

"Fair enough. It does feel like you are really pushing the idea that the coming of the Knights is going to completely change the status quo once again."

"Do you think it wouldn't?"

"Well, maybe if it happened before I healed Emese…" I mused aloud, and Judy gave me such an intrigued look that I couldn't help but explain to her my idea of how things might have gone down if I didn't mess around with Emese's curse, and how it related to the two 'plot-devices' I've found so far. 

She listened to me attentively, and once I reached the end of it, she let out an unsubtle sigh and told me, "Chief, if you keep this up, you might trigger the third arc before we even start the second one."

"What would that be about?" I wondered as I picked out the last piece of cake, broke it in half, and handed the slightly larger piece over to Judy.

"Considering that we already had Noire, Robatto, possibly Lord Endymonion, and the Knights for antagonists, I would guess it would be the Celestials' turn. 

"It's okay then; we already have a leg up the size of Italy on those guys, so I doubt they would cause too much trouble."

"… I can't decide if I should scold you for jinxing it, or for proactively ruining the third arc as well."

"How about neither?"

"That's not an option," she stated quite resolutely, but I could see a small glint in the corner of her eye, so I pressed on anyway.

"Okay, then what can I do to make it an option?"

"Chief, I can't believe you try to bribe me," she exclaimed in mock horror. "I want you to know that I am an upstanding, law-abiding citizen, and I most certainly won't look the other way for any less than ten kisses."

"That was refreshingly direct for an 'upstanding citizen'," I commented, and tried as I might, I failed to stop the corners of my lips from turning up in a smile. "Can I make my payment in installments?"

"Yes, but then I will have to charge an interest."

"Whoever heard of charging interest on bribes," I playfully scoffed, and in response, Judy sidled closer to me on the bench until our tights touched.

"It's not a bribe, it's a direct form of lobbying."

"If you say so," I said under my breath as I leaned in for a kiss, yet our lips barely touched for a second when we were interrupted by the opening of the roof access door.

"Look at the lovebirds getting along!" Josh called out with an irreverent grin, and I couldn't help but jab back at him on the spot.

"Is that jealously I hear in those words?" I inquired with a provocative smirk, which immediately made him pause on his tracks.

"Well, excuse me. Not all of us than be as popular as you are."

My smirk slowly wilted off my face, to be replaced by an incredulous grimace, but since he 85 seemed to be perfectly serious, I could only groan and tell him, "You know Josh, if lack of self-awareness hurt, I'm afraid you would be screaming twenty-four seven."

"What is that even supposed to mean?" my friend blurted out with invisible question marks over his head, but ultimately I decided it was more trouble than it was worth to explain myself, so I dismissed the topic with a wave of my hand.

"Never mind. More importantly, what are you doing up here?"

"Ammy said someone should warn you that lunch break is almost over, so I volunteered to come outside, into the cold, and tell you to come in."

"Uh-huh," I responded with a single and not-at-all convinced eyebrow raised high. "Let me guess; you actually lost a bet or something and had to come, am I right?"

The only answer I got to my question was a decidedly sheepish, "Lili is surprisingly good at rock-paper-scissors," and to be fair, it was good enough.

I stood up, turned to my slightly miffed girlfriend, and then I told her, "You've heard it Dormouse. I guess we better head back to the classroom before Ammy scolds us."

She only responded with a fairly noncommittal 'Mm,' but she began to pack the empty lunchbox away, so I figured she agreed with me. In the meantime I noticed that Josh was unsubtly gesturing for me to come closer, so I did just that.

"Hey, so, since I'm here already and stuff, can I ask you a favor?"

"Unless it's something silly, then sure," I responded a little nonchalantly, yet it seemed to take a huge weight off my friend's shoulders.

"You see, we kinda finalized our plan to take down Robatto, but before we do it, I wanted to run it by you before we give it a go. Are you free after school?"

"Chief." Hearing Judy's call, I turned to her, but she only said, "Be reminded."

It took me a long moment to realize what she was getting at, but then I let out a silent 'Oh, right,' and turned back to Josh at once.

"I don't think that's going to work. Labcoat guy is already setting up an ambush for after school."

I could see in his eyes that Joshua really wanted to know how I knew about that, but he held back the urge and instead he asked, "In that case, how about during the next class?"

I momentarily wondered what he meant by that, but then I realized that we were about to have PE class, and that I was going to sit on the sidelines because I was still recovering, and once I connected the dots, I immediately agreed with him.

"Sure, let's do that. What's going to be your excuse for sticking to me?"

"I'll think of something while we change," he answered just as Judy finished packing and walked up to us.

"Let's go," she urged us on as she gestured towards the door with her chin, only to pause and look me in the eye. "I'm still going to collect the installments, plus interest."

After saying that she walked past us, leaving Josh visibly flummoxed. 

"What was that about?"

"Oh, you know," I responded with a shrug. "Lovebird stuff…"