“Bokuchu” Us vs the Police: 700-Day War

It was the next day when Saijoh-kun called all the members together. This day, he had called all of the members on top of Yuko-chan who had just come yesterday, so we got together wondering what was going on.

Since we had close to twenty people, we couldn’t congregate in the hospital room or in the lobby, so Saijoh-kun left the hospital room and brought us together under a big tree in the inner courtyard.

“All right! Everyone’s here. I apologize for having called you folks to a place with such bad terrain.”

“No, Saijoh. It’s perfectly fine. Your Japanese is not correct.”

“Don’t say things you aren’t used to, Idiot.”

Hmm. What an unpopular guy.

“So then. On this day, I have gathered you here for none other than.”

“Like I said, stop forcefully using respectful language.”

“On this day. My plan was for you to thoroughly enjoy beautiful girls in swimsuits. It’s not bad, right?”

“Huh?”
We responded.

“Saijoh, by that you don’t mean Yuko do you?”
Great Inoue-kun was overcome with uneasiness. Especially because he was dealing with Saijoh-kun. Yuko-chan was in the hospital lobby, not here.

“No, no, I’m not. Yuko-chan’s an A-cup anyways.”

“Leave it!”

“I’m ok with an A-cup.” Takaaki-kun responded.
“I am, too.” “Me, too.” “I am, also.” “As well as myself.”

“I shouldn’t have brought… Yuko…”
Great Inoue-kun was reconsidering. If you ask me, I think it was an obvious development.

“That’s not it. There’s a lot of young lively girls.”

What’s the catch…? We were all very doubtful.

“Ok! You guys brought your swim trunks?”

“Yeah.”

“I will now announce today’s plan. I will ask you… to go to the public pool with her.”
He called Mika-chan (6 years old, real name), his “lover,” from yesterday.

“W-what did you say!?”

Mika-chan was understandably hesitant in front of this number of people. There was no blaming her. Especially with twenty mean looking guys.

“What? You took the time to get twenty people together just to take one little girl?”

“No. That’s not it, but to begin with, in the morning, take her to the pool.”

“So basically, play with Mika-chan in the morning?”

“That’s it. She’s at the hospital everyday. She doesn’t even have one summer memory.”

“If things continue like this, she won’t even be able to write her picture diary…”

We lost our words.

“I see. So that’s why you called Yuko, too?” Great Inoue-kun said.

“Yeah. There’s changing and stuff. If it’s just you guys, you guys will do bad things right?”
We’re not the same as you!

Mika-chan.
“Um… All of you retainers of Saijoe, please take care of me.”

“Retainers…”
“Saijoh’s…”
“Retainers…”

Of course, we didn’t refute a six year old, but all of us were stunned. What kind of introduction was Saijoh-kun making?
“… No, thank YOU for taking care of us…”
We were so shocked we mumbled our reply.

“Retainers…”

Saijoh-kun, after handing me one 100 yen coin,
“With this money, you can eat and drink all you want. In return give Mika a strawberry milk shaved ice to eat.”

Hmm. Even if you tell me all that I want… Strawberry milk costs at least 150 yen…… It was already not enough…

“On top of that…”
Saijoh-kun brought out 4 large packages.

“These. I had my mom make them. Lunch for all of you.”

“What!?”

This surprised us. We had twenty big eaters. It was mostly freshly made. We understood that Saijoh-kun was a lot more serious than we had thought.

“Mika. If you have something troubling you, consult this Retainer Number 1.”
He grabbed me and introduced me, but Mika-chan…
“Please take care of me! Retainer Number 1.”

It didn’t even have a -san. Retainer Number 1…

“Please take care of me… Consult about anything. To this… Retainer… Number 1…”

The feeling of humiliation left me speechless. I get that she wouldn’t be able to remember twenty names, but… Retainer Number 1. He probably got his hint from Chuzai-san’s “Bicycle Number 1.”

So that’s how twenty of us squalid sixteen or seventeen year old guys ended up taking Mika-chan to the public swimming pool.

“I guess it can’t be helped… I’ll do this for Saijoh…”
Said Takaaki-kun. But although he had said it couldn’t be helped, his legs were skip, skipping.

“Let’s go together!”
Yuko-chan, who finally joined us, took Mika-chan by the hand.

The public swimming pool was split into adult use and child use. Because our objective was to play with Mika-chan, of course we all tried to go to the child use pool.

But,
Pi pi pi pi pi-

Predictably we were warned over the speaker by the lifeguard.
“Over there. High schoolers, please don’t go into the small pool.”

Because it couldn’t be helped, we brought Mika-chan, who had a inner tube, to play in the adult pool. As much as everyone was grumbling about things, we really had a good time.
Mika-chan couldn’t swim until that day, but Chiba-kun, who was on the swim team, taught her how to swim before long. Mika-chan was overjoyed at being able to swim for the first time.
Great Inoue-kun thought up game after game that kids enjoy, and we lost ourselves in games such as treasure hunting and diving races.
I myself, when we were playing tag alongside the pool, tripped over a grate and fell hard, hitting my chest and face hard.
But even to this, Mika-chan was laughing hard.

We must have been a bizarre group to those around us, but we did stuff like eating shaved ice and catching bugs at the park and enjoyed the summer fully.

Finally, a little after 2 pm, Mika-chan, tired from playing, had fallen asleep on Murayama-kun’s back.

Yuko-chan.
“Mika-chan made some good memories for sure.”
“I think so… It was a lot of fun.”
“Her picture diary will be full for sure!”
In truth, we also had a lot of fun.

Mika-chan’s mom was the one who greeted our return to the hospital. The mom, after thanking us over and over, took the still sleeping Mika-chan and went back to the hospital room.

I’m moving ahead of myself, but Mika-chan showed me her picture diary for this day.
A day that we did many things.
In her picture diary was a picture of the poolside and

“Today, Retainer Number 1 fell at the pool.”

That was your best memory!?

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