Looking at the flat line on the monitor, Stacy unmoving in the bed like so, and the fact that Gary couldn’t hear a heartbeat at all confirmed everything. Gritting his teeth, the high schooler couldn’t believe it, and with the hospital workers rushing to get him out of the room, they started to pull him back.

Gary didn’t resist though, he lacked the energy to do so. Despite the system telling him he had energy, he certainly didn’t feel like it. The incoming security guards were able to easily pull him away, but since he didn’t make a scene, they just returned the teenager back to the reception room.

It was something that they had experienced with others before and at times, Gary wasn’t an exception.

There, a nurse came to ask Gary questions about the now deceased girl. Since the high schooler had brought her earlier, the hospital didn’t know her name yet. There seemed to be no form of ID on her either, perhaps a condition from the Pincer gang when working in a place like that. However, seeing the state the green haired teenager was in, Kai voluntarily took over.

He subtly motioned for the rest of the group to get Gary out of the place and let him handle things. With Stacy having died due to blood loss from knife injuries, police were bound to get on this case. Whether someone from the Pincers would cover it up or not was another thing.

Marie and the others were extremely worried about Gary. He had yet to say a single word, simply following behind his friends as if he was on autopilot. All three teenagers tried to reach out to him a couple of times, but there was no response at all.

In the end, the Howlers ended up returning to the Wolf’s Pool Club to discuss what to do next. However, they agreed to wait for Gary to be back to his usual self.

Sitting down in one of the sofa seats that the pool club had, his head was coming back a bit.

‘When did we get back to the pool club?’ He wondered as he touched his head. The high schooler was so out of it he hadn’t even registered what his body had been doing. His mind wasn’t even thinking straight, but now that he had some time he could think clearly.

‘How could it have happened? I don’t understand… the system gave me a Quest to get her to the hospital within 20 minutes. Why didn’t it work?! I even made it with a few minutes to spare!!!

‘Did the timer include operation time? No, that makes no sense! I brought her back and even got a reward, so then why did Stacy still die?’

In his head, Gary was angrily waiting for an answer, yet there was nothing. The system kept as eerily silent as always. Looking over the system’s log, he still saw the notification congratulating him, which made him think back to the other option the Quest had given him at the time.

‘I guess in the end… the system can’t change what actually happens in real life… this is entirely my fault. I SHOULDN’T HAVE PUT MY TRUST INTO A DAMN GAME SCREEN!!!’ Gary got up from his seat and angrily swiped the screen interface he had opened, yet to the others he seemed like a madman throwing a fit.

“Gary, are you with us?” Kai asked, since he had finally moved and there looked to be life in his eyes for the first time.

“Huh? Oh, yeah.” Gary replied, noticing the strange gazes the others gave him.

“Good, I was just explaining to everyone that for now, if anyone comes to you and asks we didn’t have anything to do with that girl at the hospital. We can’t afford to get in trouble with the police, not at this stage. Not that I think it will go that far.

“Unless you’ve had better luck, we don’t have any information on the Pincers’ base or their boss’s whereabouts. So we will have to try to do some more digging.”

In the middle of Kai summing things up to Gary, the teenager got up and headed to the door.

“Sorry, Kai. I won’t tell anyone, but I don’t think I’m in the right mindset to talk about taking over their gang right now. Also… she’s not ‘that girl’. Her name is… was Stacy.” Gary said as he closed the door behind him.

The others looked at each other.

“Let’s give him some time.” Austin finally said. “He said he knew the gi- … Stacy. I saw how he acted in that place… he really gave it his all to save her. ”

Although Austin was somewhat right, it was troubling Gary even more because for one, he had trusted the system, and for two if he had chosen differently, he might have saved her. Eventually, Gary ended up coming home.

——

His sister rushed to the door, seeing him, but she could immediately tell something was up. For one, his footsteps had been quite heavy.

“Gary?” Amy called out.

He continued to walk forward, dragging his feet, until eventually his head was being held up by Amy’s body. The teenage boy felt like he needed to cry, yet for some reason no tears were coming out. Seeing her brother in such a state, Amy placed her hands around him and gave him a big hug.

“You have a lot on your plate, huh?” Amy spoke softly. “Whatever’s troubling you, I know you won’t just let it build up. You'll deal with it. And if you want to talk about it or need me, I’m also here for you.”

Amy patted her brother’s head, leading him to hug her a bit tighter.

“Remember what Mum used to say. ‘We can’t keep thinking about the past, it's already happened. If you think too much about the future, you’ll miss what's happening now. We need to treasure the present, treasure the now, and that’s why it's a gift.”

“That wasn’t Mum, I’m pretty sure that was that old turtle from that panda movie? Master Genbu or something?” Gary chuckled as he lifted his head.

He didn’t expect it, but his sister had managed to cheer him up and bring him back down to his senses.

“I wanted to ask you something…do you hate Stacy for what she did that day to you?” Gary asked.

It took a while for Amy to answer, as it seemed like she was really considering the question, and Gary was a little afraid of the answer. He didn’t want his sister to speak ill of the dead.

“You know, if you had asked me that question the day when she left me on my own in that cafe, I wouldn’t have hesitated to answer that with a yes.” Amy replied. “But now… after not saying her for a bit… I actually realised how good of a friend she was, not counting that day… or with Hawk…

“As far as I can remember, Stacy was always a bit of a scaredy-cat and a pushover. Even though she began playing tough after we came to Bayles, her facade would always break at the smallest sign of trouble.

“Honestly, it’s impressive that she managed to keep everything about you for so long. I didn’t even have to ask her to. She knew I didn’t want her to tell that psycho a word about you and decided to keep it a secret. It wasn’t until the situation had gotten desperate, until she confessed to everything.

“I often think if the roles were reversed if I would have done the same thing… what if I had a family… or what if you were sick. I dunno… maybe I'm just being stupid and looking for reasons to forgive her. I tried staying mad at her, but after the first day at school without her, I realised that I missed her.

“It’s lonely not having her greet me in the morning, having her there to talk to during our breaks. I feel like an outcast now, being the only girl to eat my homemade packed lunch. As stupid as she was in recent times, she always did her best to cheer me up, especially after what happened to Mum…

“I even tried to reach out to her, but she never replied. The most frustrating thing is that I never got the chance to tell her off for what she had done back then. Maybe then I could have forgiven her… but now she’s gone.”

Those words at the end pained Gary more than his sister could have realised. Lifting his hand up, he placed it softly on her shoulder.

“Stacy really was a good friend to you…right?”

Amy didn’t know why, but hearing her brother say that made her start to cry. She rubbed her eyes, not quite understanding where these emotions were coming from. Now, it was Gary’s turn to hold her for a bit, before she excused herself and went into their room.

Still, talking to his sister had allowed him to make up his mind. He took out his phone and entered the Howlers’ group chat, typing away. The others, who were still at the Wolf’s Pool Club, received the message, and shared a smile as they read it.

I’ve decided, I'm going to take out the whole of that damned Pincers gang tomorrow!

Let me know if you are in or out.

In less than half a minute, he got replies from the other four.

In! x4

*****

Top 10 in golden tickets = 5 chapter mass release

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