20b - Senior x Junior

It was evening, and with dusk, the school building of Scola Sanctus was lit up vividly.

Two students were standing in an empty classroom.

“Senior… we’ve done something terrible…” one of them said.

The one with her hands put together in front of her chest was a small, anxious-looking student, a headband keeping her bangs up and exposing her forehead.

“It will be fine. You remember what I said before, right?” so answers the student with the braid over her left shoulder.

Her expression is bright, and she smiles cheerfully, showing her teeth.

“But……” the junior said.

“No use worrying about what happened,” the senior said.

“I’m still worried about it,” the junior said.

The senior smiled wryly at her pitiful junior already on the verge of tears and patted her on the head.

“What we did was permitted Scola Sanctus’s administration, in other words, the military, you know?

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“Still…”

The senior hugged her junior as she trembled like a small animal.

Due to the height difference, the junior’s face is buried in the senior’s plump chest, and every time the junior says something, the senior can feel a small vibration there.

If she applies some light strength around her back, her junior’s hands will also go around her waist and hug her back.

The senior smiled with satisfaction.

“It’ll be fine. My seniors and their seniors have done it, too. They’ve never been caught until now and if you do it, there’s nothing but benefits.”

So what did these girls do?

It was stealing the heat ray guns stocked by the Manufacturing Department they belong to, and selling them to a certain group.

Of course, replacements were prepared, and there was no excess or deficiency in the inventory.

Scola Sanctus had some hidden traditions that they couldn’t make public.

One of them is occasionally using official equipment for private uses and causing disturbances.

A good example was the incident in which Iniuria Joculatus and her Stulti piloted Stella Corpuses for a personal grudge.

There’s no way such delinquent students can snatch a heat ray gun or hijack a Stella Corpus just by sneaking around.

Behind the evil deeds of Iniuria and her Stulti were the actions of those involved in the hidden traditions.

The two hugged each other in an empty classroom and then handed the heat ray guns to Iniuria and her Stulti under threat.

For the seniors, this act is nothing more than a traditional event that has been handed down uninterrupted.

Because she was also invited by her own senior to participate in this tradition and learned about the situation.

Why did such illegal activities continue?

There are various reasons for that, but if you asked for one in particular, it would be part of recreation.

Scola Sanctus is a military personnel training institution.

But in reality, it’s just a school.

Although it is a military facility, it has a warm environment of good friends.

No tension or urgency.

Many of them become soldiers after leaving here, and some of them have to go to the front lines and risk their lives to carry out operations.

However, were human resources who grew up in such a warm environment useful there?

They cannot be.

Despite that, it is obvious that there will be people who break before they mature if they are subjected to harsh treatment.

As a compromise plan, they dared to cause a commotion from time to time to create a sense of tension.

If you unravel the history of Scola Sanctus, you’ll likely find frequent instances of the students’ mischief and crimes.

So, if you were to ask who is leading this tradition, it would be the Security Department.

They were launched with the goal of maintaining public order in Mixture space station. They are well-armed and staffed, and highly skilled. If the enemy attacks, it is the unit that sorties as the first line.

However, they don’t have much need for such equipment in a warm school environment.

In addition, the air and outer-space area where Mixture is located is within the Federation Space Force’s sphere of influence, and since countless cargo ships bringing necessary materials are constantly coming and going, military patrol routes keep the place safe, and the probabilities of an enemy attack here are infinitesimally low.

It’s natural to continue training, but from the point of view of motivation, it’s not very good to keep preparing for an emergency that will come someday even if it never happens in your time. 1

So, why not intentionally create an enemy attack so they can deploy?

With such a counter-intuitive idea, the Security Department dared to provoke students who behaved badly, but it didn’t work out very well.

The frustration gradually builds up, and eventually, the behavior escalates.

The scale was expanded by diverting equipment.

However, it would be troublesome if someone from the Security Department found out that they were antagonizing directly, so this time they started getting the students involved.

They created an environment where they could enjoy themselves to their heart’s content by picking up the qualified students from each Department, giving them rewards to get them to cooperate, and inciting more and more turmoil.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” the senior repeats like her junior is a baby.

These two people—more precisely, they are upper-level students—are also cooperators in recreational activities led by the Security Department.

This senior was also invited by her senior, and she was worried like her junior now, but now she’s used to it and is dignified.

“If you cooperate with them, there will be plenty of rewards. The dining hall is free, credits are guaranteed, and tuition fees are exempted,” the senior said. “It really helps, doesn’t it?”

With a muffled voice, the junior agrees and nods up and down, the senior can feel a sweet numbness where her face is planted.

A common feature of the students selected by the Security Department is that they are not very self-assertive, and many of them are economically disadvantaged and want to join the military and earn a stable salary in the future.

There may be more detailed criteria, but roughly speaking, that was it.

Such students are given preferential treatment financially, guaranteed credits, and guaranteed a career path after graduation if they fulfill their roles.

They would start cooperating like they were clinging to straws in desperation and then become so entangled they weren’t able to escape.

“Both me and my senior were scared at first,” the senior said. “But you know, she did her part and was able to get into the Department of her choice with a recommendation. She was able to start sending money back to her hometown.”

Behind every sweet deal is who pays to make it so.

But if you accept that cost, it’s a sweet deal after all.

“My family doesn’t have a lot of money, so it’s a relief for me,” the senior said. “If I hadn’t done this, I would have been cutting back on food and studying harder, and I wouldn’t have been able to enjoy my student life.”

Scola Sanctus also has a scholarship system, but the competition is ridiculously high.

This senior is an ordinary student. She has no such thing as an extraordinary talent.

There was no such thing as a future where she could become a scholarship student.

If there was even the slightest chance, she would have been found by a corporation already.

That’s why she agreed when she was invited by her senior.

And then, with the cycle going round and round, she herself became an upperclassman and invited the junior she was hugging right now.

She, too, was a below-average student, financially destitute, and exactly the sort of personality the Security Department wanted.

“Remember that I’m here. Don’t worry.”

And as the senior speaks softly, she remembers:

About the woman, the one she admired when she was a junior.

She also hugged her when she trembled with anxiety. She soothed her. She loved her.

She felt relieved and enchanted by that, and entrusted her body and mind to this person, thinking that if only this person was there, she would be fine.

As a result, she also chased after her beloved senior.

Even though she whispered so much love to her, she was easily thrown away.

This girl was a substitute for her true love. She was just a doll to satisfy her excess emotions and lust.

She learned firsthand what despair was.

“Senior…” the junior said, turning her gaze upward from her senior’s chest and meeting her gaze.

The wet eyes make her heart flutter.

“It’s okay. I’m here. You’re not in this alone.

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After the senior smiled and nodded, the junior finally softened her expression.

(Yes. I won’t betray you.)

She put a little more force into the arms embracing her and bringing them closer together.

(I won’t betray you. So, I won’t let you betray me, either.)

While feeling the warmth of her junior, she earnestly wished to melt and become one.

(Hey, why don’t you hurry up and fall already?)

She kisses her junior’s iconic broad forehead.

The sound of her lips on her skin makes her junior squirm.

She seems embarrassed.

(Because I won’t let you go.)

Once again, she drops a kiss, and this time takes a deep breath.

She will mark this girl as hers.

Footnotes

In the real military, this is oftentimes characterized as “Hurry up and stand around!” Much of a soldier’s time in the military is going to be extremely boring, composed of maintenance, exercise, administrative work, and trying not to die of boredom in the time between. If there ever is fighting, it’s only a very small percentage of their time and even then, there are countless support and backline troops that will never see combat unless something has gone horribly wrong.