"Kirari and Ririka..." You sighed as you laid with your head on Kirari's lap and your thighs on Ririka's lap. "Must you leave right at this moment?"

"Things are becoming unstable, Princess." Kirari stroked your face, kissing your forehead softly. She rarely got time with you, between her busy schedule and your own gallivanting behavior. "I must go restore order. And for that, I must leave."

"And do you have to go as well, Ririka?" You had a certain whine to your voice. You didn't care to have both Kirari and Ririka gone at the same time. They were often your rocks when it came to big decisions and times of insecurity.

Ririka stroked your thighs reassuringly: she would not be leaving. She was never one to talk much, but nevertheless, you understood what she meant by it.

"Sayaka won't like it that you aren't giving her and warning." You spoke to Kirari again.

"She'll cope." Kirari shrugged. As much as she loved Sayaka, there was no consequence for not telling her and many benefits. Ergo, she would not be notified. However, not telling the princess came with the reverse; many consequences and few benefits.

And that was how you ended up where you had been last week.

And now at this very moment you looked at the Student Council around you. It was tense. Too tense for your liking. In fact, you had decided to call off your "person of the day" for each day this week.

The student council was so fiercely divided at the moment that you hardly knew what to do. Some were potting to increase their power. That would have been Kaede. Some just wanted to protect themselves. Yuriko fell into that category. Some pursued pleasure. Midari blatantly fell into this category. And some were inscrutable. That was Runa, one hundred percent. Normally, everyone was held together by the president. And now, the only thing holding them together was you.

And Yumeko was changing all of that.

You sat awkwardly, eating your breakfast until Kaede spoke up.

"It's been a week since Ikishima-san embarrassed herself." He reminded both you and Sayaka, who was Kirari's stand-in. "And the president hasn't come to school. Why?"

"Well..." Sayaka began, "I haven't been told."

"Seriously? I was sure she'd have told you." Runa spoke incredulously, never looking up from her handheld gaming system.

"Then I suppose we'll have to decide what to do with the two who lost to the house pets ourselves. Without the president's guidance." He stood and pushed his glasses up. "That is, unless the princess has any input she'd like to share."

You rolled your eyes and looked at Sayaka.

"You do know that neither Midari nor Yuriko lost, right?" Sayaka spoke up. You had already established that you didn't want to speak to Kaede if you didn't have to.

"They saved face with the help of the president and the pity of their enemy. The rumors are spreading quickly throughout the school and our reputation is in the gutter." He looked up and locked eyes with the two girls in question.