Firsts
A Midori no Hibi Fanfic
(Disclaimer: I own nothing from Midori no Hibi, though if I had a choice I get dibs on Seiji.)
Chapter Thirteen: Hurting
Following Kouta's directions, Seiji whizzed past the first floor and entered the sports hall, a massive, glossy and brightly lit arena twice the size of the Sakuradamon gymnasium. According to Kouta, the other end of the sports hall opened up to the Western building, and one floor down from there was a parting to the left or right - the A and B wings. Midori could be in either wing, in any of the tens of rooms, and Seiji was already feeling desperately out of time.
As he skid to the end of the gleaming floors, a bunch of upset Ogurabashi basketball players insisted on knowing why a Sakuradamon student was ruining their sports hall with his school shoes, but Seiji only growled (he had been attempting to explain, really) before pushing them aside roughly. He sprinted into the Western building, where, to his consternation, he was stopped again by an elderly looking woman.
"You don't look like an Ogurabashi High student. Who are you, boy, and why are you running in the hallway?" She asked in a frail voice, her wrinkled eyes innocently curious.
Feeling that to push her roughly aside would be akin to drowning kittens, he only said shortly, "I'm sorry ma'am, I'm in a rush," as he sidled past her carefully, and then continued to run onwards.
He was trying hard not to think, because the boiling anger at the pit of his stomach could consume him. But when he met his next obstacle at the stairwell Kouta had indicated, Seiji was reminded forcefully of what Midori was up against. Two students in Hanzoumon uniforms were sitting on the steps, but at the sound of footsteps they glanced up. Upon registering who their intruder was, they shot to their feet, their hands tightening on their baseball bat handles.
Seiji knew they were the lookouts that Kouta had warned him about, but his mind was far more focused on the fact that Midori was probably fighting tooth and nail against these kind of people. And he knew she wouldn't be able to last long at all.
"Get out of the way," Seiji rasped, barely able to control his voice. His fists were clenched so tightly, he knew he was taking the skin off his palms with his fingernails, but he couldn't care less at this moment. His eyes were blazing into his opponents so piercingly, they were rooted to the spot with fear for a moment.
Remembering their roles, however, they lost their heads completely and charged at him. They swung their bats wildly, and Seiji ducked them easily. Before they could swing their bats back for another blow, Seiji swiftly socked one of them in the gut with enough force to throw the guy off his feet, and jammed his elbow into the other person's face. Though they fell to the ground with loud thuds, one still stood up quickly enough to whack Seiji in the ribs with his bat.
Cursing out loud, Seiji barreled into his attacker with his shoulder, slamming him against the wall. He quickly spun around to kick the other guy, who had just attempted to punch the back of Seiji's head, and grabbing the one against the wall he hurled him into his partner. They both crashed down the stairwell with a series of pained yelps before lying in a motionless heap at the bottom.
Seiji rubbed at his ribs, furious with himself for letting a flunkie like that bruise him. Though he hadn't vented out enough of his rage, his priority was Midori. Maybe once he knew for sure that she was safe, he would let himself go all out in punishing the losers. He jumped over his defeated attackers and had just started to run down the stairs, when he heard one of the Hanzoumon students wheeze with laughter,
"He's wastin' his time..."
Seiji halted halfway down, and bolted right back up to force that student up by the collar. "What do you mean?" He demanded, and the student - it was the one Seiji had elbowed in the face, so there was a bloody mess around his nose - gave a broken grin, staying silent. Seiji, with great difficulty, quelled the urge to punch the guy in the face one more time.
"If you don't elaborate," Seiji growled instead, grabbing one of the baseball bats that had rolled down with the attackers, "I'll smash this right where it hurts."
The broken grin collapsed into a look of utter horror. "Y-you wouldn't."
"Oh, I would," Seiji said easily, and gripping the bat tightly, he snapped his arm back with alarming speed, his eyes narrowed with an evil, calculating glint on a certain spot at the student's lower half of the body.
"I'll talk!" The Hanzoumon student yelped in panic, "I'll talk, so cool it, okay?" Seiji didn't look appeased at all, so he rapidly squeaked, "The girl's not here! She's not in this building. You're in the wrong place!"
"Then where is she?" Seiji thundered, his eyes burning into his informant.
"I-I don't know!" He whimpered, "I s-swear I don't know. O-only Hanabishi-san and Kiriyama-san know. O-oh, and Y-Yoshizaka."
"Who the hell are they?"
"Ha-Hanabishi-san is the new Shin Sakura High gang leader. Yoshizaka is some Ogurabashi dweeb Kiriyama-san has the goods on."
"Who the hell is this Kiriyama?"
"N-none of us really know!" Judging by the way his informant was cowering when Seiji tried feinting with the baseball bat again, Seiji thought he probably was telling the truth. Kiriyama... why did it sound kind of familiar? Suddenly, a white-hot, sick feeling shot through Seiji's stomach as he thought, 'It can't be...'
"This Kiriyama," Seiji muttered, "It's not Kiriyama Satoshi... is it?"
"I-I think it is."
'Damn it, Kiriyama,' Seiji thought angrily, 'What the hell do you think you're doing?'
"Where are they?" He snarled out loud, "Tell me where the hell they are!"
"Ki-Kiriyama-san is with the g-girl. I don't know where they are, I swear I don't. Hanabishi-san said he would be walking around, so I d-don't know where he is, either." Seiji's eye twitched dangerously, so he squealed, "B-but Yoshizaka, he's probably still on lookout duty. H-he should be at the Eastern building, at the landing that connects to some other building. I d-don't know much more than that. I swear."
Finally satisfied, Seiji slammed his informant's head into the concrete with relish, knocking him out for the count.
When they finally reached their destination, Kiriyama thew his captive unceremoniously into a room.
"Get the equipment," He muttered to the others, his eyes on Midori struggling to get to her feet on her shaking knees, "Hanabishi'll know where they are." When they looked at each other shiftily, as though trying to figure who was going to have to do such lame, menial work, Kiriyama snapped, "That means all of you. Go!"
His underlings exchanged slightly surprised and disappointed glances, but they exited the musty room, and Kiriyama shut the door behind them. The room had layers of dust coating its insides, with a single window that faced the steadily darkening sky. It was freezing in this room, and other than the light filtering through the dirty glass of the window, the room was dark. All she could see of bleached-head was half of his face, his eyes seeming to glow eerily at her in the darkness.
Midori found her heart thumping uncomfortably, as though too much blood was being forced through it at once, but she tried to calm down. This guy had a pincer grip and his eyes were scary, but he hadn't hurt her too badly yet. She rubbed at her reddening wrists as she weighed out her options.
She'd stretched a lot of muscles running recklessly like she had, and she was out of breath. She needed time to recover some strength before attempting to get past this guy, and run away again. She watched him leaning against the door from her position on the floor for a moment, and wondered if he was someone who could be talked out of this whole situation. Though she doubted it, it never hurt to try.
"What do you have against Seiji-kun?" Her words came out slightly brokenly, partly from her breathlessness and partly from the cold. She tried her best to control her voice. "Were you his friend?"
Kiriyama let out a snort, and replied without looking at her.
"We used to be friends, once. Back in middle school." He paused, his eyes briefly lifting, and Midori thought she saw them soften. "He was good ol' Mad Dog back then. Didn't care about grades, or rules, and he kicked major ass. He wasn't afraid of having a good time, or consequences."
Realising he was reminiscing out loud, Kiriyama shook his head sharply and scowled at Midori.
"When I saw him again a few months ago, though, he was a complete wuss. I told him we weren't friends after that, and he didn't even try to explain himself. He knew what he'd become. 'Course," Kiriyama added, his eyes narrowing, "Now I know, he was probably influenced by you at the time." He rolled his eyes, leaning back into the door and sighing out loud. "He wasn't like that before. What a loser."
"Seiji-kun is not a loser," Midori said indignantly, "He's doing his best, all the time."
"Oh, I'm sure he isn't, not to you. It's your fault he's this way, after all," Kiriyama snapped, but Midori hadn't quite finished having her say. After three years of watching Seiji, and now finally being with him, she knew what Kiriyama meant by the change that had come in her boyfriend. Though she didn't know exactly why, because it had happened before she woke up from her mysterious coma, she knew more than anyone how much Seiji had calmed down and opened himself up to people and relationships.
"Maybe he has changed," She said, her voice not loud but resolute, "But he has changed for the better, and what's more, he changed on his own accord. He chose to start caring more about certain things before I started dating him. Why would I be so arrogant to claim the good change in him was my doing?"
Kiriyama just kept his mouth pulled back in a grimace, without replying, and Midori took the opportunity to voice out loud something that had been bothering her since Kiriyama had started talking about Seiji's past.
"What does kidnapping me accomplish?" She demanded to know, "How is that going to make Seiji-kun change back to the way you want him to be?"
He looked at her for a moment, and she was surprised to see his eyes flicker for a moment to something quite sad, and detached. When he spoke, however, it was with his previous calm, clipped tones.
"We're not looking to change him back to the old Mad Dog. Trying to bring Sawamura back by force has done nothing. He's way gone by now."
"Is this about revenge?" She asked, now a little confused, but Kiriyama snorted.
"I guess it is, for the majority of the delinquents who agreed to this plan. Load of sore losers who can't get over the fact Sawamura could beat them all with his hands tied behind his back. I'm not one of them, though. Neither is Hanabishi."
"Then... Why have you taken me here?" She asked uncertainly, but her captor just looked away and did not say anything for a long time. Midori just sat back, blowing on her fingers to try and warm them a little in the freezing room.
Just as she thought she might try standing up to sit in one of the dusty chairs, he suddenly spoke.
"We need you to make a blackmail tape. One great enough to tame the Mad Dog, and take control."
"Shingyouji," Seiji said the moment Kouta picked up, "Is there a landing in the Eastern building that connects to another building?"
"Uhm... there are several."
Cursing under his breath, Seiji asked urgently, "I'm going there as fast as I can, but you and Miyahara gotta try and do this faster. We need to find some guy called Yoshizaka. Apparently, he's some Ogurabashi kid who knows where Midori is, and he's on one of those landings."
Kouta inhaled sharply. After a short pause, he said grimly, "Leave it to us. I'll get back to you."
Seiji was glad to hear such confident words, because he had just passed the sports hall once more and right ahead, in the long corridor along the main building, several more lookouts were making a beeline straight for him. It looked as though he'd get a chance to vent some of his suppressed rage and frustration whether he liked it or not, after all.
The looks on their faces, however, told Seiji how reluctant they were. They knew they were going to get grinded by him pretty badly. So what were they still approaching him for? The answer came quickly to Seiji. They were only trying to divert him, and waste his time so by the time he reached Midori, it would be too late.
Too late... He couldn't even imagine that scenario. Like hell he'd let that happen, anyway. These unlucky bastards had no clue just how quickly Seiji could dispatch them. They were waiting for him to make the first move, their eyes trained on him anxiously.
He cracked his knuckles, let his breath out in a harsh puff of air and raised his fists.
Miyahara was regretting having discarded the Ogurabashi long coat, because now, certain lookouts with huge muscly arms and practically no eyebrows had caught sight of him and - finding the mon-kou uniform highly suspicious - they gave chase with far too much vigour, in Miyahara's opinion.
Though he liked to think he wasn't weak, Miyahara knew his limits - they were no where near Sawamura's - and thus found himself employing his best maneuver: running away with enthusiasm.
He had just managed to lose them at some stairwell, when his cellphone rang. Gripping onto the railing with one hand and panting, he pulled out his phone with the other hand and puffed, "Any news?"
"Yes," Shingyouji said without preamble, "Do you remember Yoshizaka? The Ogurabashi student helping these people hurt Midori-chan?"
"Yeah?"
"He knows where Midori-chan is. At least, that is what someone told Sawamura-san."
Miyahara was pretty sure that 'someone' wasn't exactly a friend, and couldn't help a grin as he thought - for perhaps the millionth time - that Sawamura was awesome, getting information like that.
"So where is this guy right now?" Miyahara asked as he climbed up the stairs.
"He's supposed to be in the Eastern building. Miyahara-san, where are you? I don't see you anywhere."
"Er, yeah." Miyahara took a moment to take in his surroundings, grinning a little sheepishly. "I got out of the basement area pretty quickly, 'cause no one was around on my side 'cept for a couple of goons who chased me a good way along..." He pushed open a door at the landing he had reached, and peered out of it. "I think I'm still in the Eastern building, though."
"Well, according to Sawamura-san's informant, he's patrolling a landing between the Eastern building and another extension. That means either the third, fifth or seventh floor."
"The shiny silver number says I'm on the third floor. So what does the dude look like?"
"Er... Let me think... He has really dark-brown hair, and it's kind of long..." Miyahara heard Shingyouji's friend, Iwasaki, chime in aside of him,
"Not to mention really drop-dead good-looking!"
He frowned, looking ahead of him intently.
"By drop-dead good-looking, does she mean those types that annoy the hell outta me?"
"Huh?"
"This Yoshi guy... Is he broad-shouldered, kinda tan, green-eyed and around six feet tall?"
"Y-yes," Shingyouji said, startled, "How did you know that?"
Miyahara raised an eyebrow. "Because I'm looking right at him." He paused to take a deep breath; he hadn't expected any real action from his upperclassman's request to investigate, but now wasn't the time to get nervous, not when he thought about what was at stake. "Give me a minute."
Sliding the phone into his pocket, Miyahara squared his shoulders and strode towards Yoshizaka. The door shut with a loud creak and a bang, and Yoshizaka, who had been in a sort of stupor, snapped to immediate attention.
Before he could assess the situation properly, Miyahara asked innocently, "Hey, are you Yoshizaka?"
"Uhm, yes." A little closer, Miyahara could see cold sweat, shining dully under the bluish light of the corridor, on Yoshizaka's brow. Trying to look less apprehensive, Yoshizaka tried a smile. "May I know who-?"
Before he could finish his question, Miyahara rushed forward and rammed Yoshizaka against the wall, his fist against his throat, and Yoshizaka let out a choked cry of surprise and pain. Narrowing his eyes, Miyahara glared at Yoshizaka as his hissed through his teeth menacingly,
"You're gonna tell me where Sawamura-san's girlfriend is, and you're going to tell me now. Or else I'll beat the living crap out of you."
"What's going on?" Iwasaki asked the moment he hung up, something she'd been asking repeatedly since they had left the locker room.
"Stop asking me. Miyahara-san will call me back soon to tell me," Kouta replied curtly, "Let's just keep searching for Midori-chan."
"Fine," She said, sounding a little bruised, and Kouta realised how he had sounded like. He tried to make amends, saying hastily but sincerely,
"I didn't mean to be short with you, Iwasaki-san. I'm just... really worried, and stressed out with it. I'm sorry."
As they walked briskly along the hallway, she looked at him. Kouta had always thought her eyes were quite startling in how piercing they could be, even when she wasn't intending to be. Then she gave a small nod.
"I get it, Kouta."
She turned her head away as Kouta flinched inwardly.
'Kouta.'
He was never sure how to feel about this certain classmate, especially recently. In their first term, when she had befriended Midori, he had had no idea why, considering the fact she was as outgoing and boisterous as Midori was withdrawn and shy.
He got an idea, though, of what kind of person she was when he had first approached Midori to ask if she was catching up alright with class around a month ago. Iwasaki had been sitting with her at the time, and when Midori introduced him as her childhood friend, Iwasaki had said - with a rather derisive look in her eyes - 'Hi, Kouta.'
She had talked to him in passing before, when it came to asking for help with wringing out the cloth or wiping the board when they had clean-up duty on the same days, but she had never had to call him by name until then. When it came to it, she had not bothered with any honorifics, not even bothering to call him by his surname, choosing to call him in an incredibly familiar manner.
At that time, Kouta had thought it was a bit rude, but it didn't affect him enough to bother reprimanding her - he had only smiled and laughed a little nervously in response. After all, she was Midori's friend, and though she might look down on him, that was nothing new. Everyone looked down at him, and he couldn't blame them - he was still small and scrawny and girly-looking, and the Crimson Angels were still able to force him into the most ridiculously frilly getups after school every week.
Still, he'd been trying so hard to try and get a little tougher on the inside by starting with the outside. Sawamura had shown him that determination was what got you anywhere when you wanted to defend yourself, and so he'd been attending the Iwasaki Karate Dojo. And he knew he wasn't quite that muscular yet, nor was he really that strong, but he'd been learning some things and started feeling a little more confidence in his masculinity.
The thing about Iwasaki, out of all the people who looked down on him, was that she was the one person who knew he was attending her father's dojo. Which was why, as time wore on, the more she called him just 'Kouta', the more it began to irk him. She made him feel like his efforts were worth nothing, because no matter how hard he was trying to prove himself, she just looked at him like he was pathetic and called him 'Kouta' - not because she wanted to be familiar with him, but because she didn't think he was worth more respect than that.
It was why he had began to harbour, even unwittingly to himself, a sort of grudge against her. It was actually in this moment, when he was spoke so cuttingly to her, that he realised he would have never done that to any other girl.
He couldn't have helped it, though. He was easily his friendly, good-natured and weak self with Midori's other friends, like Chika and Igarashi, but Iwasaki always seemed to be judging him on the spot, with her strong, clear gaze. With her, he was still himself, but something in him always felt uncomfortably tight, and he knew it was because he found it difficult to listen to her call him 'Kouta' so indifferently.
Just yesterday, when she had been walking towards Midori's home and he had stopped her because Sawamura and Midori didn't look like they ought to be bothered, she had finally made him snap. She had looked at him with those judgmental eyes of hers and said in an incredulous voice, 'Kouta?' The utter lack of respect for him had never been so evident, and though he had managed to suppress how upset he had been, he had never had to control himself so much before.
Of course, it hadn't helped matters much that she had bit his hand quite painfully (the tooth marks stayed all evening), and also watching Sawamura and Midori kiss so tenderly had brought about a rush of such mixed, confused feelings, he forgot about Iwasaki completely.
What he did remember, however, was that the look in her eyes when he had spoken back to her had been... different. He had never seen it before and wasn't sure what it meant, but ever since then, Iwasaki had been treating him differently. She still called him 'Kouta' in her infuriatingly over-familiar way, but there was a definite change in the way she was talking to him and looking at him.
She even seemed to be paying more attention to him, which was a little unnerving because not only was Iwasaki rather popular and rowdier than most girls, she was also tall and pretty, what with her sleek dark hair and flawless complexion. Plus, despite the fact he found her intimidating, especially in regards to his self-worth, she didn't seem to be doing it out of spite. She was a genuine person who didn't bother with two-facing or false politeness, as far as he could tell. In that, he thought he could detect a similarity between Iwasaki and Sawamura.
He wasn't sure what to make of it, but whatever it was, Kouta knew he shouldn't let his guard down around her. There was no telling how much of him she'd poke too hard with her abrasive attitude, and he really didn't care to be pushed around by her much more.
"So," Iwasaki said, peering into one of the classrooms in the C wing she and Kouta were searching, "Are you going to tell me about Midori-chan, or not?"
"Right," Kouta said, shaken out of his thoughts with the abrupt pull back to grim reality, "I will. Basically... Sawamura-san's enemies have decided to do something a little more than just use Midori-chan as bait to lure Sawamura-san. They've decided to make a blackmail tape."
"A blackmail tape? How?"
In the dark corridors, Kouta's words were spoken quietly, but the echoes carried eerily around the grey-blue walls. "They're going to force Midori-chan to do... unspeakable things in front of a video camera, and blackmail Sawamura-san with it. They want to make it so he has to listen to every word they say, or else they'll put the video up onto the internet."
"Unspeakable things...?" Iwasaki sounded confused, but with one look at Kouta's face, she let out a gasp that make him visibly wince. He cringed further as Iwasaki yelped loudly, "You mean, they want to make an ADULT tape with MIDORI-CHAN?"
It took a few seconds for his words to sink in, and Midori just gaped at him as she stammered, "A-adult v-video? M-me?"
"Yup. You're gonna star in one, today." Kiriyama sighed, leaning back slightly. "You're not that sexy at all, really. You're kinda dull and really short. But you're cute, at least. Once the guys come back with the video recording equipment, we'll set it up, and they'll have a go with you. Might be kind of interesting, actually. Can you figure out the rest now, princess?"
She could scarcely breathe, let alone speak, but Kiriyama seemed quite satisfied at that reaction.
"Sawamura can't do a thing to us with a video like that in our hands. He's gonna have to do what we tell him, or else the video'll go all over the internet." He laughed wheezily. "Isn't it great? It's like a double whammy, too, 'cause I picked Ogurabashi High to do this in. Can you imagine, adult videos being taken in a high-class school like this? It's reputation will go right down the drain." He whistled here, imitating a cheery high to a low, hollow end. "Say goodbye to your neat little escalator system."
"Y-you can't get away with that," Midori gasped, "If you put it online- people would know you did wr-wrong-"
"Oh, really now?" Kiriyama smirked at her now, in a way that made her feel cold inside. "When I heard Sawamura had a girlfriend after the Shin Sakura attack, I went about trying to find out more about her. I figured she might have something to do with the drastic change in my old buddy. I even ran an internet search." He laughed a little here, but it was entirely mirthless. "Guess what I found?"
She didn't think he could have found anything, since she didn't think she'd done anything worth appearing on the web for, but Kiriyama now raised himself from the door and took a step towards her, saying, "Kasugano Midori. An Internet Idol. Real little cutie who won the hearts of quite a lot of people before suddenly disappearing. Who'd've thunk?"
"Wh-what?" She looked up at Kiriyama, completely at sea. "I'm not an idol."
"Whatever, Princess." He sat down on his haunches, and gazed at her in an unsettling manner. "I have to tell you, though, I didn't think of the plan until later. It was when we were ironing out the kinks, wondering what to do if maybe someone else got hold of the video and held it against us, that I realised that was our safety."
Midori had no idea what he was talking about, and thought he was probably going out of his mind. He certainly had a manic glint in his eye as he said softly, "It wouldn't be weird for an idol to be making adult videos, right? No matter how much she might resist, it can all be chalked up to damn good acting, wouldn't you say?"
"You- you can't do this," She whispered, her mind still running endless laps. Her heart was thudding in her ears and she was trying, rapidly, to think of a way out, and ignoring the increasing screams in her head of pure panic. Kiriyama grimaced slightly.
"I say we can, Midori-chan. Who's to stop us?"
"Y-you can't do this," Midori repeated, looking at Kiriyama in the eye, "You can't force something like this on me, or Seiji-kun. This is... inhumane. Didn't you say you used to be Seiji-kun's friend? Seiji-kun would never condone something like this."
"Really, now?" No longer looking amused, Kiriyama looked at her coldly. "Let me tell you something. You think yourself a little angel to Sawamura, doncha? Gonna lead him the right way, towards the light, and make him let go of all his delinquent ways." His tone grew bitter, the words coming jaggedly. "That's what you think, isn't it?"
Midori was startled by such confrontational questions, and her eyes widened in alarm, but he wasn't watching her for a response at all. His words spilled forth, hot and vicious, rising in volume.
"You're a downright goody-two-shoes, complete opposite to Sawamura. You don't have to go to cram school every night like most kids, 'cause if you push all the right buttons in this pompous rich-ass school of yours, you go into any university or college you please, right off the bat. You eat all your high-class meals with a silver spoon, doncha? You don't work hard for anything."
Before she could say anything, a scary, wide-eyed look of fury overtook his stony expression and he was in front of her in a second, his wild eyes inches from hers as he yelled into her face, "It was you!"
He shoved her onto the floor, dust billowing into the air as she looked up at Kiriyama, stunned and winded. His fingers dug deep into her shoulder as he bellowed down at her, "You made him change! Do you know what he was like before? Do you have any idea what it's like to live with tough kids that kick you in the dirt and spit on you for fun? Do you know what it's like to have to rely on nothing but yourself when life treats you like that? You don't have a clue, Princess."
The settling dust was making her cough, but her eyes stayed open, unable to leave from its transfixed hold on Kiriyama. His voice was winding down, his wild eyes darkening into a quiet, bitter look, but his grip remained tight and painful. "You can't change him to whatever you like. Sawamura is too strong. Whenever he's with you, he's sacrificing that part of himself just to make you happy.
"He ditched the way he used to live, for the mediocre average kid life you want him to live. The way he used to be, when he was with me... he was invincible. But in your world, he's nothing. Don't you see that? You selfish little brat."
Midori's mind was buzzing; she knew she had to say something, anything, but nothing was coming out of her mouth. His hand shot forward and gripped her face painfully, locking her jaw in his hand tightly as he spoke softly.
"You've pushed me to this. He'll have you to thank for what I'm gonna hafta do, to get a damn set of reins on the bastard."
And before she knew what was happening, Kiriyama had crushed his mouth over hers.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Author's Notes: Reformatting continues to be a chore...
What I really wanted to do in this chapter was not just explain what was at stake, but also - as you might be able to tell - set the background for the relationship between Iwasaki and Kouta. I've been insinuating a lot of things so far from Iwasaki's side, but I had never written in Kouta's POV yet because I didn't have much confidence for it. I gave it a shot this chapter, however, and I hope it works and serves to show what he thinks about Iwasaki. (It's not that fluffy, is it?) The only thing I don't like about it is that is slows down the momentum a bit, but I guess it has to happen one time or another - and it might as well happen before the action really begins to kick up.
Thank you so much for all your reviews, everyone. I cannot tell you how much it matters to me, to be able to read someone's opinion on what I write for these fandoms. I love to know people appreciate the series enough to indulge in fanfictions of it, and it makes writing such stuff very satisfying and highly enjoyable. Thank you all, again!