Story: St Doria's

 

Y'know something? Speaking entirely from the point of view of the writer here, this story has been going on for a long, long time. Over ten years actually. Remarkable. On and off again, it's received updates over that time, and we've all had plenty of fun with it while wondering at the mystery.

What caused all of these girls to go undercover as a boy at this all boy's school? I mean, Christ. Unanimity paradox anyone? It's come up in the story already but - 100% of an entire year? Can you even begin to comprehend how unlikely that is? It brings to mind the debate between Evolution and Intelligent Design, in at least one sense.

Now, bear in mind that the writer thinks Intelligent Design is a crock of shit. But he will, at least, attempt to give the devil its due in making this comparison, so that the metaphor does not fall flat on its face. Intelligent Design generally posits that the state of the world is so unlikely that it had to spring from intention. The blind watch maker, yes? How likely is it that a hurricane will pick up the pieces that makes a watch and assemble them just so, to form such a perfect machine?

It is very, very hard for me to not point out the fairly obvious problems in that line of logic right now, I am biting my tongue so hard right now, I might draw blood.

Anyway, evolution posits that, over an extremely lengthy period of time the process of natural selection resulted in a huge divergence of variety in lifeforms across the globe, which eventually became suited to their habitat due to myriad pressures, genetic mutation and the sheer passage of sufficient time. That's the simple version. There's more to it than that. A lot more, but we don't really have time for a lecture - let's be frank about why we're really here, shall we?

Because really, if we’re being honest - and I do believe in honesty, especially when it’s uncomfortable - this whole thing, this setup, this premise, is a goddamn miracle. Not in the spiritual sense. No, don’t mistake me. There are no halos here, no divine blueprints. But a miracle in the improbable, low-probability, back-of-the-napkin-math way that makes statisticians weep and novelists raise an eyebrow about potentially breaking immersion.

One hundred percent infiltration. A full class year. Every. Single. One.

Do you know how many logistics that involves? Fake IDs. Forged documents. Facial recognition evasion. Voice training. Living arrangements. Bathroom protocols. Social camouflage that is so intricate it makes Cold War spycraft look like amateur hour. And they pulled it off with the cool, practiced grace of a Broadway ensemble. No missed cues. No wardrobe malfunctions. Just perfectly timed entrances and exits in a farce that borders on Greek tragedy with better lighting.

Now, a reasonable person would look at that and say: “Come on. That’s not plausible. That’s not how reality works.”

And you’re right. It’s not.

So let’s go back to Intelligent Design for a moment. The idea that something - Someone - sat down with a plan and said, “Yes. A boy’s school. Yes. All girls in disguise. Yes. Let’s make it stick.” That's a tempting thought. Because otherwise, probability just took a flying kick in the balls. But that leads to a very important question.

Why?

Okay, so maybe I, the writer, have been indulging in Umineko a little more than I should have recently, but that's an important question for a mystery like this. The motive. Did the killer shoot the victim due to financial reasons? Romantic tension? Had they unearthed some dark secret and were threatening to reveal it? Motive is forever the beating heart of a mystery: What might compel someone to take such a drastic action? For murder and theft, these things are commonplace and motives abound.

What kind of motive would someone have to arrange for every. Single. Student. Brought into St Doria's Boy's School on this particular year. To be female instead of male? That's a really weird motive isn't it? I mean. Was it a kink thing? Was it because the person responsible had been reading too many shoujo series where the premise was 'girl sneaks into boy's school for reasons' and they thought it would be funny if it happened to an entire year simultaneously?

I mean. That was my reason for writing the story. It could almost work as an in universe reason as well. Right?

It's probably about time for us to stop messing around. It's been fun seeing these girls flounder, uncover each other's secrets and so on, but realistically we should rip off that sticking plaster sooner or later should we not? As it was put in Umineko?

Let's rip the guts of this story out.

=====

Nathaniel was left grumbling to himself. So, apparently, he was not gonna get him some hot secretary ass until he proved that all the 'boys' in the first year were actually girls. They'd already determined a significant number of them through observation and, y'know, actually knowing them before they attended. Like his own little sis. Just to take one example of many.

This wasn't like a mathematical proof though. It wasn't like a proof by induction. He couldn't just go 'Well, we know it’s true for case n, and therefore it must be true for n+1,' and call it a day. No, this was more like trying to solve a 500-piece jigsaw puzzle where every piece had a different art style, half of them were flipped upside down, and one was actively trying to punch you in the face for good measure. Probably because he'd tried to see what they were packing between their legs, or got a bit too handsy with their chest area.

Nathaniel muttered something under his breath about his life becoming a bad rom-com written by an AI that had only been trained on manga tropes. Which, frankly, was starting to feel uncomfortably accurate. Hold up a sec, let's check here - any em dashes up there? How are we doing on rules of three? Well, there was one, and the metaphor was a little forced and weird but everything else looked fine, so probably not...?

Bah, whatever. Checking all of them, the whole damned roster, that would take time, and worse yet, it would be noticed pretty sharpish what he was up to. Best he could manage was a little spying action making use of some carefully planted cameras, but even this was going to be far from enough.  

<i>"Anyway!"</I> That was Alex.<i> "We can't just... sit around doing nothing. We need to investigate whether they really are all girls!"</i>

"You and me both, sister!" Nathaniel muttered.

<i>"Yeah, sure, I bet they'll all consent to an immediate stripsearch,"</i> 'Frank' scoffed. <i>"Or, what, you gonna go up to each and every one of them and say help right to their... Their..."</i>

Hrm? What was this, now? From the moment Frank had spoken up, a sort of glassy eyed stare had gone through all the 'boys' in the room. For some reason, they were all looking at Alex with weird smiles, and repeating the word 'help' to him, and - 

"Oh wow, those are definitely all girls," he said a moment later, then, with his eyes glued to the screen he scrambled for the remote. "Jesus, wow. Those girls are really going at it, huh? Damn, is that Patricia...? Maybe I shouldn't be watching this."

"No, you definitely shouldn't be watching this," a familiar voice said. "It is really hot though."

"Yeah, goddamn," Nathaniel gulped. "It's not my imagination is it? Their boobs are definitely getting bigger."

"Their butts as well," that very, very familiar voice said. "Their butts are definitely bigger and - hey, wait, those are the St Doria's uniforms aren't they? Why the hell is Patricia in your porn?"

Wait, wait, wait. Hold on a second here. His survival instincts had been overridden by the combination of breast expansion and yuri orgy. Normally, they would have told him - screamed at him - that there was another presence in the room and he should not be watching this. He really, really should not be watching this!

He quickly slammed his hand onto the off button and turned, red faced, to see his younger sister pouting and fiddling with the button at the top of her shirt.

"Is this the part where you say 'I can explain' but you clearly cannot?" Reggie asked. "Oh dear, oh dear. Are those spy cameras in the dorm rooms? Did you sneak some girls in to have some fun? Oh, oh dear, what would the faculty say about this?"

Great. Just great! His manipulative little sister was about to use this blackmail material on him, and there was nothing he could - 

"Ohhh, help me with that won't you?" Alex's voice moaned through the speakers. Crap, why were they on a different button than the freaking monitor?! He scrambled to turn that off -

"Help," Reggie repeated, seeming transfixed. Her breathing was getting heavy, and she was squirming quite a lot. "Oooh, which room was that!"

"Huh? Why do you want to -"

"If you don't fucking tell me which room that was I will crush your balls!"

"Eek!" he jumped. "Um! That was Alex's room in the first year dorms! She's -"

"I know which one it is!" Reggie yelled, then turned around and rushed from the room. "Help, help, help, help..."

On the one hand, he probably ought to give chase. On the other... No, hurrying after the girl that just threatened to 'crush your balls' did not seem like a really tremendously great plan.

Well... Nothing much for it but to continue watching this. That was really weird though. That 'help' thing really set Reggie off, huh? Actually, the yuri orgy kinda started when -

When the word 'help' had been said.

Huh. Huh! Interesting. Very interesting. He put the monitor back on, just in time to see Reggie rush into the room and practically scream the word in Alex's face, and then - Oh dear, now that was something he really did not need to see, thanks! He wasn't even going to internalise what he'd actually seen, and instead - 

Instead... He was going to pick up a little plan. Yes. Yes, that might well work. Why not? Why not, indeed?

"My many thanks Miss Spina," Nathaniel chuckled darkly. "You have been the most tremendous source of... Help!"