But in any case, she had succeeded.
Returning along the same route from the security room, Irene successfully slipped back into the pool.
She pretended to swim for a while, then signed in for roll call one last time.
At present, the entire school and the outer perimeter surveillance were already paralyzed.
The little tricks she learned online had worked.
Actually they weren’t hacker tricks; she’d just seen on a forum people raging that the school’s cameras were so unreliable their computers were stolen and nothing was done.
Obviously the school had no intention of fixing it, and it had failed again.
So now…
In the locker room, Irene put on her civilian clothes: an Adidas hoodie, a pair of Nike pants, and Adidas shoes.
With the hood up she looked like a spirited kid, with her face showing she could pass for a cute JK.
And most importantly… the Makarov pistol fit perfectly in her pocket.
Irene checked the bullets — very nice.
The prosecutor’s rounds were expensive armor-piercing bullets.
These rounds have higher muzzle velocity and can penetrate body armor, though they wear rifling quickly.
Although Layton of course wouldn’t be wearing body armor, Irene was only giving him a warning.
If these were hollow-points she wouldn’t pull the trigger—killing someone with one shot would be a catastrophe.
That’s right, Irene planned something ruthless: shoot the principal and tell him not to mess with her.
Revenge? Consequences? Irene didn’t care.
After this shot, she believed he’d be polite to people from then on.
To avoid suspicion, Irene took a long detour to the school’s back playground.
She expertly moved through the bushes, skirted piles of smooching couples locked in intense embraces, and slipped out through a broken fence gate.
This area led straight to the city park with many paths — the perfect place to run.
At the central fountain, Irene saw a familiar figure — Whitney.
She leaned alone against the fountain in the middle of the park, dressed in gothic clothes and wearing high heels.
She kept taking drag after drag from a cigarette, her face marked by red palm prints, and her lip and ear piercings were somewhat swollen and red.
But she stared expressionlessly at the sky as if nothing had happened.
Damn… she’d been hit?
Irene had originally wanted to keep her distance, but for some reason, seeing Whitney like that made her hesitate.
After all, Whitney had gotten hurt because of her, and had sold a favor for her — she had to repay that debt.
In that case…
…..
Irene took out a pack of cigarettes — the kind Utoya liked to smoke.
She figured Whitney would probably like them too.
“Whitney?”
At Irene’s approach from behind, Whitney paused, the same cynical smile returning to her face.
But when she saw the cigarette, her smile vanished for a moment, and her eyes flickered with an almost unbelievable… glint of tears?
The light came and went so fast that Irene wondered if she’d imagined it.
“Oh, for me?”
Whitney casually snatched the cigarette from Irene’s hand as if it had always been hers.
Only after taking it did she frown and shake her head in disgust.
“Ugh, forgive me, you’ve never smoked.
You bought the weakest pack—I’d have to chain three or four of these from a plastic bottle to feel anything.
But… fine, this counts as the first gift I’ve ever gotten, I’ll take it as a token.”
“Here, a kiss for you…”
Whitney blew a playful kiss, and Irene quickly stepped back, waving her hand in disgust.
“Get lost.”
Irene actually found this delinquent somewhat likable; at least she wasn’t like the gloomy, pretentious Utoya—she was straightforward.
“Fine, if you don’t want it, you don’t want it.
Why curse me then?
Hey, you’re not straight, right?
Your face was all flushed just now, your breathing got rapid…”
“Stop! Don’t say that.
I’m here to thank you, and… I won’t lie, this isn’t a trivial matter, it’s prison-worthy.”
Irene truly feared that if they kept talking, Whitney would drag her into messing around and waste precious time, and this really wasn’t a small matter.
“Huh? You don’t think I’m scared, do you?
You know who my dad is.
Nice, woman, you’ve caught my attention.
Teachers don’t dare mess with me.”
Whitney’s mouth curved up; clearly she wasn’t the kind to be scared — her father was the police chief, and going to prison was like playtime for her.
“Then who hit you in the face?”
Irene was curious; those two slaps had left a mark.
“My dad, of course.
I’m used to it…
Alright, tell me what you want to do and I’ll see how to use this to blackmail you and get some action.”
Whitney’s careless words oddly put Irene at ease.
Also, if Irene wanted to live safely at school, maybe scaring Whitney a little would work.
Snap.
Under Whitney’s widened gaze, Irene deftly pulled out the Makarov pistol.
“I’m planning to cause some trouble for the principal.”
“You wanna do it?!”