A unit of the Kirijo group

(Chapter originally by faith on writing.com)

Minako didn't recognize the small army of suits and ties that marched towards their little gathering. Aegis and Junpei seemed equally clueless, but the dawning horror spreading across Mitsuru's face and the smug look of satisfaction from Akihiko said that their seniors must know more.

"Iori!" Mitsuru bellowed. "Cover us, now!"

"Huh? Uh, er, sure..." Junpei complied, acting mostly on reflex, moving to intercept the group of businessmen and obstructing their view of the naked women.

"Senpai?..." Minako asked. Certainly, she was in no great hurry to be seen naked once again by a group of gawking strangers, but Mitsuru was panicking more in this moment than she had in the theater at the prospect of orgasming (for the first time) in front of an audience.

"Akihiko! How could you!!" Mitsuru hissed.

"What? Don't they have a right to know how their CEO is doing?" Akihiko asked.

Mitsuru was trembling in rage and humiliation despite being well covered by her underclassmen.

"Wait..are these...?" Minako began, a sudden insight occuring to her.

"What's the big deal. Haven't you been seen by a million people by now already?" Junpei asked.

"...thanks for that." Minako whispered. "But no. These are her board of directors! She knows all these guys! She has to report to them and do business with them all the time."

"Precisely." Mitsuru whispered, cowering behind Junpei. "These are the men I must prove to every day that I have the skills and ability to carry on my father's legacy! To see me in such a disgraceful state would...would..."

"Destroy any ability you had garnered to assert dominance in the board room. Your intimidation factor would be completely dead since you are no longer the furious daughter of the former CEO but now a pathetic school girl they've all seen naked and ashamed in a helpless situation. Most of them are shrewd enough business men that you can probably still run the company by reason and outlining how your ideas will make money, but it definitely puts you in an inferior role. No more brow beating and cajoling them into line. You might actually have to learn to persuade and flatter them instead." Akihiko said, his arms crossed.

Mitsuru glared at him. "I hate you..."

"I know."

Minako found her mind awash with images of Mitsuru conducting her Kirijo meetings in a room full of these suited executives, trying to stay cool and professional without a single thread of clothing to hide her amazing body, her words lost on her gawking audience...

"Poor Mi-chan." She whispered.

"Feeling sorry for her?" Akihiko asked.

"Of course! She works so hard to maintain her own huge standards of good grades and attending to her duty as class president AND coordinatng operations with SEES and now running a huge company. And now she has to do all of that totally naked! And her so called friends would rather enjoy her humiliation rather than help her out!"

"So you believe I'm taking her execution too far?"

"You? I was talking about me." Minako said, grabbing Junpei's arm and gently but quickly pulling him away from a surprised Mitsuru.

"Arisato!!" Mitsuru screamed as the men gasped at her suddenly accessible naked body.

"Us juniors have to get to class, Mi-chan! Talk to you later!" Minako called as she, Junpei and Aegis made a sudden retreat as Mitsuru screamed after them.

"She's...gonna get you for that one, you know." Junpei said as they rounded a corner.

"Obviously! Really, Junpei, you don't understand girls at all. As fun as seeing my girls being humiliated is by itself, that pit of dread and anticipation I feel in the aftermath, knowing that they are embarrassed and furious and are already planning to up the ante and humiliate me even worse and that it could come at any time and its going to be SOOOOOO bad...besides, its not fair to my girls to expect them to get really emotionally invested in a big humiliating punishment if I've just been sitting around all day minding my own business. This is an equal partnership. If I don't do something naughty and mean enough to be worthy a good punishment then I'm just not holding up my end of the relationship."

"Ugh. This whole dynamic is weird. You know that, right?"

"What surprises me is that I'm explaining all this to you and not once has Aegis chimed in to ask...ummm...where is Aegis?"

The pair stopped, looking around the empty halls. The robot had vanished sometime during the conversation....

Author's Note: Buckle up people. Comedy and the sexy bits are once more taking a back seat to the FEELS because that's how my writers brain works. Sorry...

She stood in silence, listening to the sound of the soda can kerplunking in the dispenser and the metallic clinking of the yen plotting into the change drawer. Yukari took the coins and returned them to her bookbag. Mechanically she retrieved the drink, opening the metal cylinder and softly sipping the sugary liquid without really registering the taste.

"Go ahead. Say it." She whispered to the air before taking another sip.

The nubile young girl turned to a bench near the vending machine, seating herself by pressing her bare knees up against herself, resting the soda on top of her leg and staring at it.

"You know you want to." Yukari again said no nothing.

"What exactly do you expect me to say?" Nothing answered back.

"That I fucked it up. That I drove her off. That I took the only good thing about this whole fucked up situation- being with her...being with them...and crushed it like a bug!" Yukari snapped, taking a longer sip of her drink. "That I'm a stupid, bitchy idiot! All the things you love telling me! Go ahead!"

"No thanks. I'm not a charity case. And there's no fun in ripping into someone whose already kicking their own ass." Shadow Yukari whispered inside the young girl's mind.

"But that's all you ever do." Yukari said darkly. "That is you, right? The part of me that glares at kids complaining about their parents because they haven't lost them? The part that said Mitsuru-senpai's dad should have been the one to die...before I got my wish? Every stupid, angry, awful thing I've ever blurted out when I was feeling hurt or scared- including all the things I said to her just now!- that's all you, right?"

"Pretty much."

"So why the hell would you hold back now? You've won. You've ruined my life just like we always knew you would!" Yukari snapped.

"First off, you did all that shit by yourself. I didn't lift a finger. Second, don't be so melodramatic. This is not the first or the worst time you've gone psycho bitch on little Miss Leader-chan here. Trust me, if she was going to dump your crazy ass she would have done it way before now. And third...what the hell makes you think I want to fuck up our life?"

"Uh, aside from the fact you've turned me into a walking centerfold?? How about the fact that you HATE me more than anything else? I know you feel that way because its how I feel about...about these stupid temper tantrums."

"Oh, brilliant deductions, little miss bare ass sherlock. Just one tiny problem. I'm not just the living embodiment of all your petty bullshit. Yeah, I inherited all the bile and envy and loathing for myself and everyone else you shoved down your subconscious throat. But I got a nice thick layer of GUILT on top of everything else. You don't just love screaming at the world, you also love feeling guilty about every last scream you make. That includes all the anger you aim at yourself, kiddo. Thanks for that, by the way. Not only does your subconscious get to loath you and all of creation beyond all reason, it also gets to feel BAD about doing it. And just as intensely. Sure do love being a walking contradiction in terms, me."

"If its so hard on you, feel free to go back where you came from and let me put on some pants!" Yukari spat.

"I appreciate the offer, me, but I'll pass. As painful as it is being the living incarnation of your irrational impulses (and sweet Buddha is that a long, exhausting list to embody!) tormenting you has been an incredibly fulfilling experience. Especially since I know exactly how to twist the situation so you'll be absolutely ashamed of yourself and even more ashamed how much you LOVE it all at once! Tell me who could do that better than I can?"

"No idea. But I'd be willing to find out!" Yukari snapped.

"Sick burn, me, Feeling better?"

"....no."

"Sigh. Look...I know you hate blurting it out like you did. Trust me, I know all too well. But this isn't the worst thing you've said while being wound up. And let's be honest- you aren't exactly wrong here. She does take on too much, she does leave her minions in the dark, and she could have gotten herself killed just now! You have a right to be scared. You have a right to demand her trust."

"...but what if she-"

"What? Calls your bluff? Cuts off the relationship? Please. She's seen worse from you without flinching. And the only thing she loves more than getting all of you naked is forgiving all your stupid flaws. Its really the most annoying thing about her."

"Don't talk about her like that!"

"What? Like she's human? That has to stop, Me. She makes mistakes. She isn't perfect. Honestly, the only one you've ever had a bigger hero complex for than her is the old ma-"

"Shut up. We're not talking about dad!"

"...You ever think not talking about dad is the whole reason there was a part of you that Temptation could turn into me in the first place?"

"....."