Chapter 11; Life Goes On

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The whole team sat at the table, otherwise known as their secret headquarters. The leader was second to last to arrive, his boyfriend trailing behind him. The two had woken up later that they wanted too. Their activities from the night before had left them drained of energy and in need of excessive sleep.

Souji tried his best to walk normally, which proved to be difficult since he had a sore ass. He didn't want to cause his team mates to question him though, so he took it one step at a time. He grimaced a bit in his mind as he looked to the seat that had been so thoughtfully saved for him. Instead of sitting though, he decided it would be fine to just stand. They weren't going to be spending too long in the food court anyway.

He saw Yosuke sitting next to Chie, his headphones over his ears as he sat casually. Souji had woken up to a text from Yosuke apologizing for worrying them, and that he just needed a day off from everything. Yosuke claimed to not have know what his teammates reactions would be and he wish he hadn't worried them.

"Good, everyone's here." He said as he leaned forward a bit, taking his hands out of his pockets to place on the table. Kanji found his way to his seat, sitting down in the chair across from his leader. Unlike his partner, he was feeling content with himself as he looked at the other boy, his skin seeming to glow a bit.

"I've chosen three people to accompany me today. The one's who aren't going have to wait at Junes as backup." Souji continued.

"Back up?" Chie repeated questionably.

The silver headed boy nodded, looking towards Chie to single her out. "If we don't return in two hours, you and Yosuke will enter the tv and find us." He moved his glance to look at the brunette next to her. Yosuke had his headphones in, drumming on the table with his fingers. Chie elbowed him, snapping him out of his trance. The boy removed his headphones, looking away as he became a bit embarrassed.

"Sorry, what were you saying?" he asked.

Souji rolled his eyes and continued, "And if it gets to the point where they don't return either, those remaining here should wait it out. If we don't come out that means that the danger level inside of the tv is extremely high and you should stay here so you don't get harmed."

"But I want to do somethin' besides sit here and be of no use." Kanji crossed his arms over his chest. "Why can't I go too?" he asked as if his boyfriend hadn't explained the reason the night before.

Souji half glared at the blonde, "Because you might get hurt." He moved his hand up to fix the collar of his shirt a little bit. "The people I picked also have abilities that we'll need. Rise can track, Teddie can heal, and Naoto's persona can deal almighty damage to our enemy."

Rise shot up out of her seat, throwing her hands up with a grin. "Yep yep! Because Rise is vital to the team, it'd be silly to leave her here!" she let her hand drop to her sides as she looked to Kanji, a cheerful smile on her face. The blonde disliked the idol's personality. It drove him insane just to have to listen to her talk. For the whole investigation crews sake though, he kept his mouth shut.

The red head moved her eyes to meet Souji's, "Plus Senpai is my boyfriend, so of course he'd bring me!"

Kanji bit down on his tongue, watching as the overly energetic girl clung onto his lovers arm. She rubbed the side of her face against the gray headed boy's bicep.

Idiot, if he really cared he would be leaving you behind like he's doing to me.

The leader could see the anger in his mate's eyes start to grow more intense. He pushed the idol away from himself gently, keeping his eyes on the rest of the group. "Sit Down." He demanded coldly.

Rise did as she was told, placing her bottom back in her seat. She let out a grunt of defeat as she crossed her arms.

Teddie leaned forward, resting his bottom jaw on both of his small palms. He kept his eyes fixed on his leader's neck, staring intensely. He sat almost completely still, his eyes focused on the older male's skin.

"So, that's why…" Souji moved his eyes to Teddie, able to feel the small male's eyes burning a hole in him. He looked back to the rest of team, trying to ignore the bear's glance. "um, that's why I'm only bringing a selected few." He tried to get back on topic.

"Senpai?" Teddie interrupted, looking at Souji with a faint smile.

The leader looked down at the tiny boy, "Yes?"

"What are those on your neck?" he asked in curiously. The silver headed boy's eyes widened as he blushed fiercely. He moved his hands up to fix his collar a bit. When he gotten ready that morning, he had tried to fix his collar so that none of the marks his boyfriend made were visible. His attempts had apparently failed though.

"W-what are you talking about?" he stood up straight, moving his eyes away from the others.

"On your neck, there are marks." He sat up straight in his seat, an innocent smile on his face.

"I think your seeing things, stupid bear." He giggled nervously, trying to get the others to ignore the tiny blonde teen.

"No! I swear they're there!" Teddie rose from his seat and walked over to his leader. He pulled Souji's hand away from the stiff collar. He popped the taller boy's collar down to reveal the hickey's that were on his neck.

The whole table's eyes widened as they saw the red and purple circles on his skin. The gray haired boy moved away quickly, moving his collar up to hide the marks again.

"No Way! Who did that?" Rise stood up again, slamming her hands on the table. "Senpai is mine!" Kanji lifted his eyes, glaring at the girl.

"Who decided that?" the large blonde asked.

"He did! He loves me and I love him!" she hugged the leader's arm with a smile as she leaned up and kissed Souji's face.

"What the hell make's you think that?" Kanji snapped, raising his voice at the red head.

"Well…" she thought, loosening her grip on the boy's arm.

"Nothing, right? So stop acting so desperate." Rise froze, her arms dropping to her sides. Her face turned pale as tears started to overflow out of her eyes.

"I-I'm sorry…I'll leave him alone.." she ran away from the other's, sobbing quietly. Yukiko stood up, hurrying after Rise.

Souji gave his partner a look of disappointment. He knew that their secret was now obvious to anyone who had thinking skills and had seen the past five minutes. He sighed, figuring that it didn't matter if they talked openly now or not. "You didn't have to hurt her feelings.." he said, looking to his blonde mate.

Kanji sunk in his seat a bit, "Sorry, it's just that I got…um…jealous … and a bit possessive…"The blonde looked around; remembering the rest of the team was still there. He looked back to his blushing boyfriend.

Souji laughed, moving his eyes to look at everyone. "I guess we suck at keeping secrets, huh?"

"Wait, you guys are…together?" Chie looked back and forth at both of the boys.

"Yeah, for a little over a month actually." The gray headed boy replied, the only one out of the two who still had enough courage to talk about their relationship.

"Well, I give you props for hiding it that long!" Yosuke winked, a fake smile pulling at his lips. It was obvious he wasn't really happy about hearing the news.

"Yeah..and if you think about it, you guys make a cute couple!" Chie said with a nervous laugh, a bit uncomfortable with her new knowledge. She smiled reassuringly though, crossing her legs.

Naoto smiled slyly, "It's about time they were informed." She leaned forward a bit, her fingers fidgeting with the oversized yellow tie she wore. "It was a bit bothersome being the only one who had knowledge about your relationship."

"You knew?" Chie asked, looking to the blue haired girl.

Naoto nodded with a smirk, "Actually, it was I who assisted their getting together and several other events."

Souji blinked a few times; a bit confused by the information he was being fed. He should have known that if Naoto could hide being a girl, it would be an easy task to hide the fact that she knew about their relationship.

"Does this mean Kanji is scoring with Sensei?" Teddy asked with a grin. The silver headed boy turned around to hide his face as the embarrassment became too much to stand. Everyone found amusement in his embarrassment and began to laugh.

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This chapter is another one thrown in there as a filler kind of thing. The next chapter is really long; it's in the TV world.

Naoto goes into depth more about her involvement too, so yea. It'll be an interesting one. ;D

And regarding the title; since I added that chapter that was supposed to be an extra, my chapter titles got messed up so I had to find some lyrics in between "Maze of Relationships" and "With or Without You.". Since "that goes on" was the only thing separating those lines, I had to use it. And since using that in the title would be weird, I changed it to life. Yep.

Spring break is soon. So I'll prolly be able to finish this story in the next week and a half. Once the plot is over though, there are still like 6 extras that I wrote. So it won't really be over for some time. -.-

Well, review. It'll make me very happy.

Thanks. :3