A/N: I wrote this along time ago and never posted it, so I'll be re-editing the chapters and posting weekly-ish until I start writing new ones, and then it'll be updated less frequently. Thoughts are in italics
Somewhere, a single star shines. Weakly, yet somehow it cuts through the darkness.
Blue hair is passed in front of a face with a slightly trembling hand, slowly yet purposefully.
The two of them walk unnoticed in the crowd, exchanging a secret smile.
Blue, brown, purple, and green go about their daily lives, none the wiser.
And the final piece of the puzzle, she waits. It will begin...
And it will end...
With that star.
Megurine Luka crosses her arms underneath her breasts and taps her foot.
My train is late.
Sighing, she unfolds a small piece of paper and studies it carefully. Then she takes a small bottle out of her purse and upends some of the contents into her hand. Luka puts the paper away.
I wonder what kind of people I'll meet there...
Peeking in to the upper windows of 16 SakuradÅri at that moment would have yielded a very strange scene. In a small room on the third floor, a certain singer and her manager are having the domestic equivalent of WW3.
"WHAT PART OF 'DO NOT SCHEDULE A PUBLICITY EVENT FOR ME' DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND?"
The intended recipient of this (quite juvenile) outburst clicks his freshly manicured nails against the table he sits at, sighs delicately, and places a thick manila folder in front of the seething mass of rage otherwise known as Hatsune Miku. "Do you know what these are, Hatsune-san? No, I'm sure you don't, because you've not been bothered to look at them." Mr. Shion, the aforementioned well groomed nail clicker, levels his table-mate with a glare that could cut through steel.
"These are your fan letters from past week, which you so vehemently refuse to read. They almost all contain paragraphs of piteous begging for any kind of event involving you in a public capacity. I put up with a whole lot from you, Hatsune-san, and you're a damn good idol, but sometimes your complete selfishness and disrespect for your fans goes too far!
Across the table, a man wearing a yukata with an annoyingly cheerful eggplant print quietly observes the exchange between singer and manager. "Going for the guilt tactic, Kai-kun?" murmurs Kamui Gakupo. "You know that won't work on Miku-chan, she's awfully hard headed about this kind of thing. No offense, Miku-chan," he pours sugarily, aiming his most tried and true forgive-me eyes in Miku's direction. It isn't very effective.
"Shut up, Gakupo!" Kaito slams down the folder in the center of the table, knocking over Gakupo's cup of tea. Oh hell no.
"That was my last cup of the specialty tea Gumi-tan brought me back from Okinawa!" he whines. "Was that really necessary?"
Miku, (who feels like she hadn't gotten much say in the proceedings until now), is getting pissed. "Well, maybe if you hadn't stuck your nose where it didn't belong, you'd still have your goddamn tea and we would all be happily free of your unneeded advice," she seethes. "Now! Getting back to the topic." Miku stand up from her dilapidated office chair and takes a firm stance in the middle of the room. "Kaito, I sing for myself, not for legions of sweaty otaku and screaming teenage girls. You know that!"
"And you also know that being an idol kinda has that stuff in the job description," hisses Kaito.
"The only reason I even took this job was to be able to do what I wanted, which is sing, obviously, and make a living out of it," Miku snaps back.
"You guys are really high-strung," Gakupo mumbles, mopping up his spilled tea with the sleeve of Kaito's suit jacket, which had been hanging over the back of a chair.
"That isn't how this works! I understand you're never going to be as involved as Rin-chan, for instance, but you could at least make an effort to-" Kaito stops mid-lecture, staring open-mouthed at Gakupo.
"That jacket is NEW! I can't believe you sometimes!" Kaito furiously wrestles his jacket away from the purple haired man. "I swear, both of you have the mental age of four-year-olds," he huffs, wringing his jacket out onto the carpet. "Albeit in two completely different ways..."
The door to the conference room where the three were talking creaks open, capturing everyone's attention, and a green head pokes in. Gumi looks around the room and sighed. "I thought I heard the sounds of a rampage. Kai-kun, you do love making more work for me." She surveys the spilled tea, sodden carpet, and scattered papers with a critical eye.
Gakupo jumps up from his chair. "Gumi-tan! he exclaims, a smile lighting up his face. "Just the person I needed to talk some sense into these two."
Miku really feels neglected now. Honestly, one could almost forget the she's the main character with the amount of screen time Gakupo's been getting compared to her. "It's kind of pathetic that you think an idol and her manager need to be talked down by the agency's janitor, however true that may be," says Miku, frowning. "But all dysfunctionality aside, what are you even doing here, Kamui-san? Rin and Len are doing a shoot somewhere, right? You should be with them, not sitting here drinking tea and bothering us."
Gumi comes all the way into the room and closes the door. "I think that there is nothing wrong with the higher-ups occasionally getting pushed back on track by the help, Miku."
"Rin-pyon and Len-kun had a shoot scheduled today? Oh, it completely slipped my mind," muses Gakupo. Miku and Gumi look at him with the same "I can't believe people like this actually exist" expression. Kaito radiates an aura of doom.
"Yooooou're problem," he singsongs, waving a finger in the air. "But you can bet you're pretty purple hair dye that mean Rin will be out for blood when she realizes you bailed on them. But about the original discussion-"
"I do NOT dye it!" cries Gakupo. "That you would even suggest that blasphemy is shocking!" Miku stares at him incredulously. "You expect us to believe that your purple hair is natural?"
"COULD YOU GUYS GET IT UNDER CONTROL FOR TWO SECONDS?!" yells Gumi, kicking over a chair. Three pairs of eyes lock onto the green haired girl, and the chatter trails off somewhat awkwardly.
Kaito sits up in his chair, coughing a little embarrassedly. "Thank you, Gumi. You can be much more helpful than these two idiots when you put your mind to it. Isn't this so much better? Now, I have three things to say, and if any of you interrupt me so help me God. First, Hatsune Miku, you are doing an autograph signing, no way around it. If you still tried to refuse, remember who is your manager, and who could just so easily decline your next record deal as easily as he could accept it." You know what they say, desperate times... "Second, please tell Aoki to bill that purple idiot for the dry-cleaning for my jacket, Gumi, and if it's ruined, I'm expecting a new one to a new one to appear one my desk by next Monday morning, taken out of Gakupo's paycheck. And lastly, Gumi, could you also tell Aoki to make sure that the housing arrangements for the new arrival are finalized? I wouldn't like her to arrive at her new job and find herself homeless."
Gumi saunters her way back to the door. "Right-o, Kai-kun, and I'll just have Aoki take that straight from Gakupo-san's paycheck, no dry-cleaning bullshit." Gakupo winced. "That's completely ruined." And with that, she flounces of the room, yelling for somebody to find the damn Windex.
Kaito smiles wryly after her, and then looks at Miku sharply. "Well?"
"Fine, I'll do the damn autograph signing, you sure can be persistent," groans Miku, flopping down into her chair again. "Just don't be surprised if all the fan blogs report me as being standoffish and impossibly bored." She twirls a lock of her long blue hair around her finger, and glares at the cieling. Lord, this is going to be a debacle... Suddenly she froze, turning slowly to stare at Kaito.
"What did you just say about a new arrival?!" she asks disbelievingly, her eyes boring holes into her manager's skull. I couldn't have heard that right!
Kaito blanches. "Well, I wanted it to be a surprise, and now that the cat's out of the bag you might kill me if I don't tell you what's going on so-"
Gakupo cackles with glee. "I can't believe Kai-kun didn't tell you," he says, grinning so widely Miku thinks his face might fall off.
"A new idol will be transferring to our agency, STAr45 Pro, tomorrow. Her name is Megurine Luka... and she'll be rooming with you!"