"I'm impressed, Max, really. As I thought, your brain more than makes up for your lack of a figure as good as the others."
Tyne nods in admiration, an appreciation that only makes me feel disgust, especially with his smile like a proud elder. But then his expression changes.
"However, girl, that still does not explain how you knew about cloud library, nor how you knew about the password. You didn't even try on another computer as if you knew that would alert me. You went straight for my computer and uploaded everything into another server. How?"
I purse my lips and step back again. This time, I hit the parapet and stop cold. My retreat and my expression is interpreted as a sign of resistance, so Tyne's face tightens, and I feel the fear and the apprehension within him, hidden behind the facade of fierceness.
"Damn freak. It doesn't matter if you won't say. You will talk, either now or later, I have my ways."
"Wait! Professor, wait!"
He didn't call me an insulator even in his mind, even though he is fuming for being unable to pry into my mind. That is where his fear is coming from. I don't know what to feel seeing that he will not be a clue toward the matter haunting me at the back of my mind, but for now, this is for the best. Really, for Emmie, me, and also Liz.
"I– I simply thought that most perverts and monsters keep trophies of their deeds."
"Huh!?"
'So she can not read minds! She is not like me! I'm still unique!'
His relief is so palpable that it almost makes me resonate with him and share that same emotion, just like I shared Emmie's sensations yesterday when I bent her over.
I shake the distracting thought out of my mind. Tyne hides his true thoughts and smirks.
"Oh? So I'm a pervert and a monster!"
I don't pay attention to those words. He knows himself well, and he knows how others will see him with everything he has done, but that doesn't prevent him from feeling proud inside, superior to the rest. So my voice is sharp and determined, filled with a woman's loathing when I reply to him.
"Yes, you are a monster, a pervert who abused his position to take advantage of the female students of this school when they did not have their guards up. Moreover, only with blackmail material could you have succeeded in keeping everyone you have abused on a leash. That is the only possible reason why some left, some committed suicide, and the rest stayed silent. I… I… I got a glimpse of your library of trophies yesterday, and you forgot to wipe off all your archives–"
"Alright, enough!"
He stops me when my voice starts to weaken.
"You can explain everything to me later. For now, give me the server where you uploaded everything."
"You… You mean the pictures and videos you took to blackmail the students you have abused physically and mentally?"
Tyne gives me a deep look that makes my heart skip a beat. For a moment, I think he busted my plan, but then he smirks.
"Why are you so afraid, besides being disgusted? Is it because you are foreseeing your own fate already?"
"..."
I want to step back again but the solid barrier behind me reminds me that I'm already at the edge of the rooftop. Tyne shows a smile he thinks is disarming and raises his hand to hold it out toward me as he slowly advances.
"Don't worry, Max. Give me what I want, and let me take a few pictures of you and your friend as an assurance, and I will go away, leaving you two alone. Do we have a deal?"
My voice cracks with hope, and the despair I have been holding back peeks out a little
"Re– Really, Mister Tyne? You are speaking the truth?"
"Of course, I am."
His smile is so reassuring that any helpless, inexperienced girl not knowing his true face, and unable to read his thoughts would have been moved, and convinced of his sincerity. Hope is something that can make the most suspicious situation look bright, because that is what the brain is seeking as it is being drowned in despair.
"But I don't want to have my pictures taken!"
"Then I will make do with your friend's."
"Not Emmie's either!"
Tyne pauses, then raises his eyebrows with a teasing edge to the light in his eyes.
"Why? Is she your girlfriend? Because that is quite the bad deal for me already. You will only be indirectly threatened. I will be the one losing out, because I will only be safe so long as you care about your… Now that I think about it, if you don't take the deal, the terms will change to a video of the two of you giving me a good spectacle. I salivate just thinking about it."
"No!"
I feel his slimy hands over my and Emmie's bodies as he imagines us entwined.
I gulp in fear at the depraved gleam in Tyne's eyes. My cry made him happy. I evade his eyes and lower my head to my phone. I hurriedly send the path to the server to Emmie's phone, and he smiles in satisfaction when he looks down at it.
"Now the passcode, Max~"
He glances upward at me. My breath is in disorder as I give it to him. My heart is beating in anxiety, and I stutteringly gives him the code. But with each letter, each number I give, his smile diminishes, until it is wiped off, and he raises his head to see me putting my phone in my bag, and looking at him without any more fear or despair.
"You–"
"Yes, I used the resume you have proudly compiled from your career as a pervert, and a monster, the same passcode you use for your own library, 'Mister' Tyne."
He frowns, but my smile grows as I zip my bag shut.
"Surprised? When I got your code I didn't take long to understand that you are just boasting with that which is your pride."
"No, that is not what I am surprised about. I locked the door to the rooftop, and there is no one to save you from me, so why the sudden change."
He smiles, but with a dangerous edge at the corner of his thin lips, while I give him a meaningful smile.
"It's simple. I can save myself, so I don't need to feel afraid anymore. You are the one who is supposed to start despairing now, dear teacher."