She wasn’t really sure how the plastic tray had ended up in the room but there it was, with a plastic bottle with water and a paper plate of something that looked like it tried to be rice balls.

“...what?”

“Do they look that weird?”

Aoi’s head snapped toward the enforced window, and she saw that only one person was in the room. Not the creepy Horn guy, or the weirdo under the coat, or the scary nose-less guy, or the annoying girl that caught her, but the blond man. He was sitting by the microphone, a half-eaten similar weird-looking rice ball in the hand not on the speaker button.

“They’re weird!” she shouted, then shook her head violently. “That’s not what I meant! Why are they here!”

The blond man tilted his head, blinking. “I thought maybe you were hungry. And everyone else went to have something to eat…”

She looked at him with harrowed eyes. “These weird things just look weird!”

“So they do look weird after all..” He sighed. “I’ve never made onigiri before, I guess I need to practice.”

Her stare turned into one of disbelief. “You made them?” She was so surprised that she didn’t even yell, this time. He nodded.

“Yes, I thought, maybe something familiar might be better than the cafeteria food.. Should I have brought something from it instead?” He was so weird. Why would he go through the trouble of making weirdly shaped onigiri for a hostage? They were supposed to be evil enemies, they kidnapped her! They kidnapped Tai-nii and the others before, too! “...why?” she asked, suspicion clear on her face. He took another bite of the rice ball in his hand, and swallowed it before he could answer.

“You’re still young so you need food to grow,” he pointed out. And when she thought that was it, he continued. “And I think you Comrades are pretty amazing.”

Ste stared, in utter disbelief.

“What?”

“You too, that speed is cool. If you trained, you’d be even cooler and really strong.”

Was she being praised? By an enemy? By an evil kidnapper? “Are you serious?”

He looked at her with slight confusion. “Yes? I do.”

She stared at him for another long while. Her stomach growled, distracting her from her mix of confused happiness and confusion, and looked down, pulling her legs closer as she clutched her stomach with her hands. She stole a glance at the weird onigiri. Clearly they were edible since he ate them too but… She looked back up at him. “There’s nothing weird in them, right?”

“No, not at all,” he said, in a voice that actually sounded truthful. Not that he hadn’t sounded completely truthful before. She scooted closer to the tray, and picked up one of the rice balls. She eyed it suspiciously, then took a bite.

“This is horrible!” she shouted, sticking out her tongue at the salty taste that clashed with the sweetness of the meatball and then there was some other taste she couldn’t place that made it even weirder. Not the worst thing she’d eaten but it sure was up there among the top ten.

She glared at him.

“Is it?”

She couldn’t believe it, he sounded genuinely surprised.

“Yeah, and you said there weren’t any weird things in it too!”

“But there’s not.”

“There’s supposed to be things like pickled plums in these!”

“But pickles are so sour…”

What was with this guy, he had an expression similar to the ones her little siblings got when they were told to eat vegetables on his face. “Are you a child?!” she shouted. He grinned sheepishly. “No but it’s just, I never got over this hating vegetables thing, I just don’t like them, y’know?”

“What’s with you?! You’re weird!!”

She didn’t get it, she definitely didn’t get it, this guy was supposed to be evil, so what was up with this?! Act like a villain damn it!!