Chapter 23
Rowan stared at the lipstick print on the envelope and felt a twitch run through the corner of his eye.
The stamp was enormous. Circular. Nothing remotely resembling Alexis Rhodes's mouth.
Far more reminiscent of the wide, round opening of a Pot of Greed.
He genuinely could not work out how, in the original timeline, Syrus had looked at this thing and believed for even a second that it came from Alexis.
That print size was one of a kind on this entire island.
He rubbed his chin, thought it over for a moment, and then slid the letter into the locker next to his.
Syrus's locker.
Letting things play out as they originally did seemed perfectly fine. Better than fine, actually.
It would draw Crowler out into the open, and then Rowan could deal with him properly.
With that settled, he walked back into the classroom without a trace of guilt on his face and returned to paying attention to the health teacher.
Out of sincere academic dedication, naturally.
...
A short while later, Syrus came skidding up to the lockers at a near-sprint, muttering about being late.
He yanked his locker open and an envelope fell straight out onto the floor.
"Huh? What's this?"
He picked it up, tore it open, and went red in about half a second.
"I fell for you the moment I saw you. Meet me tonight behind the Obelisk Blue girls' dormitory. From Alexis Rhodes."
"No way!"
Syrus stumbled backwards three full steps and sat down hard on the floor, the letter clutched to his chest, face burning.
He scrambled back to his feet, stuffed the letter away, and told himself he would absolutely, definitely go check it out tonight.
What he had not done was read the whole thing.
He had made it through the opening lines, gone too flustered to continue, and skipped straight to the signature at the bottom.
The part he missed was the name written just after "behind the dormitory".
Rowan.
Professor Crowler's forged love letter, combined with Syrus reading exactly enough to get his face completely red before stopping, had assembled every ingredient for a perfect disaster.
...
That night.
Behind the Obelisk Blue girls' dormitory.
A solid iron gate sealed off the only entrance from the rear.
Beyond the gate, a small island lake served as a natural second barrier, making any unauthorized approach from behind seem effectively impossible.
And yet, at that moment, a figure in a black wetsuit was hauling itself up the steps from the lake with the nimble efficiency of someone who did this regularly.
Golden mushroom hair, barely contained. Crowler produced a pair of wire cutters, snapped the chain on the gate, and quietly pulled the door open.
Then he dropped into a crouch and shot from one low shrub to the next with a speed that had no business coming from that body.
Rowan, watching from behind a tree just outside the gate, felt his expression go strange.
He had paddled across in the small rowboat tied up at the lake's edge and positioned himself on a patch of shore beside the gate steps, tucked behind the shortest tree he could find that still offered any cover.
He had arrived just before Crowler. He had no intention of going inside.
He just wanted to watch the old man walk into his own trap.
Now, watching Crowler perform what could only be described as actual ninja movement between the bushes, Rowan reached into the pocket of his Slifer Red coat and pulled out the compact camera he had bought from the school shop that afternoon.
He raised it and pointed it at Crowler's position.
The man in the wetsuit, completely unaware, was already giggling to himself in the dark.
"The indoor hot spring bath is just past those walls. The design means you can't see anything without actually going inside, but once that slacker boy Rowan shows up, I'll have all the photos I need! Anyone who sees them will naturally assume the worst, and then..."
He trailed off into more giggling, waterproof camera raised, eyes fixed on the path leading from the gate.
The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind it.
...
A soft sound of water. Oars.
Crowler perked up as a small figure came into view through the iron gate, stepping off a rowboat and walking toward the entrance.
Moving quickly. Not looking at the broken chain on the gate at all.
The figure, however, looked nothing like Rowan.
"Mamma mia! Why is it Syrus and not the slacker boy?!"
The moment Crowler got a slightly clearer look, his entire body locked up. He stared in disbelief.
Then, from somewhere near the tree just outside the gate, a faint camera flash blinked in the dark.
And in the brief light of it, Crowler could just barely make out Rowan's face peering around the side of that short tree.
Grinning. Holding up a peace sign.
"SUPER MAMMA MIA!"
Crowler grabbed his own head with both hands and launched straight up off the ground.
How was the slacker boy over there? Why did he have a camera? Why was he pointing it at him?
"Who's out there?! Is someone outside?!"
A voice from the direction of the indoor bath, sharp and alert.
One of Alexis's friends, by the sound of it.
Crowler's blood ran cold.
He threw both hands over his face, bolted through two more shrubs in rapid succession, and flung himself directly into the lake.
The splash echoed in the dark.
Syrus, who had just walked through the gate, jumped at the sudden figure bursting out of the bushes beside him.
He barely caught a glimpse of black wetsuit and blond hair before it was gone, moving too fast in the dark to identify.
By the time he collected himself and turned to run, the bath house door had already opened.
Several fully dressed Obelisk Blue students stepped out.
They looked at Syrus.
Syrus looked at them.
"This kid just cannot catch a break," Rowan muttered from behind his tree, genuinely considering covering his own face.
He had assumed that once he got the photo of Crowler, the whole farce would be more or less finished.
He had not expected Crowler to literally jump out of the bushes in a panic, nor anticipated whatever unholy speed that man was somehow capable of producing.
In the end, the situation had somehow traced the exact same path as the original timeline.