The coffee was hotter than I expected it to be, causing me to quickly spit it back into the cup with my eyes watering. Kaito, sitting across from me, smirked lightly while sipping from his own coffee, unphased as I covered my mouth in pain.

"You know Len, you're supposed to check the temperature before downing it." He said, hiding his face behind his drink and almost certainly covering a quiet laugh that came to him.

I wiped the water from my eyes with the back of my hand while responding, "This is the first time they've ever made it this hot. I wasn't expecting to be met with the fires from hell this early in the morning."

"Why not? I thought you lived with your sister?"

~

There was a loud banging at my bedroom door that woke me into a state of mild distress. I looked around my room in panic as the crashing fist against my room continued to fill my mind with a bursting headache. When I realized that it was just my sister waking me up, I turned over and pulled the blanket over my head without a second thought.

"Len! Why aren't you awake yet? You should've been in the shower by now!" Rin yelled from the other side of the wall.

"Yeah, I know, you always tell me this." I took the pillow from under my head and threw it at the door hard enough to knock down one of the framed posters from its nail. "Shit," I jumped out of bed and kneeled down to pick up the poster, relieved that it wasn't damaged, and put it back onto the wall, then I proceeded to throw open my door and stare furiously at the pest in front of me. "You know that your obnoxious banging gives me a headache," I half scolded, half complained.

"Well, how else am I supposed to wake you up? If I'm nice about it you'll go back to sleep like you always do, and then you'll yell at me for not waking you up sooner."

"I'm just saying, you don't have to kill my ears to get my attention. I'm going to go deaf before mom does if you keep this up."

"It's not my fault or my problem that you can't set a sleep schedule." She shot back, turning toward her room and starting to walk away as I respond.

"Then why do you keep waking me up to begin with?"

She looked at me for a second before coming back and, without warning, kicked me in the shin. My teeth clenched in pain as I tried to resist giving her the satisfaction of reacting to her violent tendencies, but my stoic face lasted all of four seconds before keeling over and holding my leg up to my chest in agony.

"Because you'll sleep through the entire day if someone lets you, and it's really difficult to participate in a partner-based dance class if you're here dreaming your week away."

Still gripping my leg, I ask between small gasps of pain, "What the hell are you talking about? School doesn't start until-"

Monday, August 23rd, 7:13 AM. The clock on the nightstand loomed above me as the realization slowly formed in my head.

"WHAAAA??? School starts today?"

~

"Now that you mention it, if she was some sort of demon I wouldn't be surprised," I said, simply holding my cup of coffee between my hands and refusing to drink out of it.

"In any case, what do your classes look like this time around?" Kaito said, pulling out his schedule from his wallet.

I loaded the email sent to my phone this morning with my schedule in it and compared mine to his. "Looks like we're not as lucky this year," I say, noting the shared speech class and seemingly nothing else.

"It's your fault for deciding to take it easy this year."

"I'm not taking it easy. I just know that dance is going to take up the majority of my time."

"Not taking singing lessons this year?"

I shook my head. "If the past two years have taught me anything, it's that those classes are more a test of tolerance than a test of singing ability."

"Oh? I quite enjoy them myself."

"You have a deeper voice, they don't push your range as heavily as they do for me. I felt like they were training me to be a cat with how high I was squealing sometimes."

"It was pretty funny how your eyes seemed to roll further into the back of your head each practice."

"My eyes don't do that," I say before he showed me a picture he had prepared on his phone.

"Your eyes most certainly do," He laughed.

I turned myself away from him and tilted my head against the top of my chair, annoyed that he actually took a photo like that. "Get that away from me," I say while noticing Miku walking into the cafe. Her light aqua hair seemed shorter than usual, possibly because it wasn't straightened as well as she normally does it. My eyes didn't linger on her hair for long though, as they began to trail down her body and to her-. I snapped back to look at Kaito, my eyes wide and my face flushed with a mixture of disappointment and embarrassment. He was midway through taking a sip from his coffee, giving me a questioning look before I muttered, "Miku just walked in."

"So?" He put his coffee down and looked back at me confused.

"I caught myself staring at her skirt. I don't know what I was thinking."

"Perhaps you weren't, exercise more self-control in the future and move on."

My head dropped to look at my lap, irritation filling me as I tried to calm down a bit. "That's easier said than done..."

"Take your hands off of your lap, it brings more attention to you when you do that."

"Alright," I crossed my arms and placed them on the table just as Miku pulled up a chair, sits down, and slams her face down with her coffee.

"If I die of exhaustion today, throw me into the river before anyone notices," She said, her voice muffled slightly.

"How many of us have this time slot free?" Kaito asked.

She lifted her head slightly. "I'm not entirely sure. I saw Luka but she seemed to be heading to another end of the campus."

"Knowing Lapis she's either lost somewhere or is currently crying in a corner," I said smirking.

"Yes, for someone who's character persona is that of a life-giving fairy, she isn't exactly the most socially apt," Kaito replied.

I let out a low sigh and groaned out, "Don't talk to me about personas."

"Oh, why not?" Kaito asked as Miku seemed to fall asleep on the table.

"You may not have any issues with yours, but my entire character is based on being Rin's twin. If I knew that's all it took to become an actor or singer I wouldn't have tried so hard in high school." I looked over at Miku and the urge to poke her suddenly came over me. "Is she really asleep?"

"Probably."

"Should we take her back to her dorm?"

"No, the last thing we need is someone thinking we're fans trying to kidnap her."

"Then do you have the next hour open as well? I can't stay." I say, standing up from my chair and pulling my backpack strap over my shoulder.

"Yeah, go ahead, I'll stay here with her."

~

The majority of the practice rooms appeared to be empty as I walked past them toward my Audio Engineering class, a few occupied by upper classmates trying to get a head start on their releases. At one of the rooms, I stopped to take a quick peek at what they were playing and was slightly disappointed to see them taking pictures of themselves at a piano instead. Seeing this, I decided to pull out my phone and opened up Rippleto remind myself of the last image I posted on my profile. Unsurprisingly, after scrolling down a few seconds, the first image was of Rin and me sharing a pair of earbuds and leaning our heads against each other, acting as though we were asleep. What did surprise me, however, was the number of comments on the thread, prompting me to click on the post and search through it a bit.

-You two are so cute together ~

-I wish I had a nicer relationship with my brother...

-Great picture as always!!!!

-Get better hair products today with promo code: LEMON BUTTER

I entered the classroom, laughing a bit at the bot ads that were running rampant on my feed. Two seconds after walking through the door, I looked down at my phone to see a notification appear in my private messages from Gumi reading "Back left". Sure enough, there she was, beaming at me with a huge smile on her face and waving at me until she got my attention. Naturally, I sat next to her, letting out a heavy breath as I was relieved to know someone during, what I assumed was going to be, the dullest two hours of my schedule.

"I can't believe it, the famous Len Kagamine, sitting next to me. Wait a moment! Can I get an autograph?" Gumi's overly excited tone of voice was almost enough to hide the sarcasm that oozed between her lips, a fact that often unsettled me whenever I was launched into a conversation with her.

"Yes, hi Gumi, how are you doing?"

"I am bored out of my fucking mind!" She slammed her hands down on my desk and let out a sigh. "But, what can you do? First day back, you having a good start?"

"Well, Rin woke me up violently. Otherwise, yeah, slow but can't hate."

"Good. Small talk over with! Looking for anyone recently?"

I choked on the air I was inhaling and looked at her with a half-shocked, half-deadly stare. "What's with this all of a sudden?"

"Oh, you should know how all this works at this point, Len. We're in a special position, our group of friends. We're growing in popularity by the day, and we haven't even graduated yet. Surely you've gotten fan letters from girls you might have an interest in, maybe even girls at this school. It's inevitable. I've been receiving such messages from various boys myself."

"I'll give you that. I have been getting drops from people on Ripple, but I have no interest in having relationships with fans. I'm worried that can get out of hand a little too quickly. Besides, what if drama starts up between jealous followers? If you've seen Miku's feed she's already got in fighting about who would make the best husband."

"While that may be true, I also don't think you're the type of person to ignore love entirely. So instead of stepping around it, why don't you answer my question."

"No, I haven't been looking into anyone. You make all of this sound shallow."

"You fucking liar. You looked away. Perhaps it's me?!" She smirked evilly at the prospect which irritated me. "Oh, Len. I'm sorry! I should have seen the signs. How long have you been hinting at this? Months? Years?" Her eyes closed and her hands cupped her cheeks as her thoughts went into a trance of mockery and facetious love.

"No Gumi. I'm really not looking." I repeat, actively ignoring this morning when I started subconsciously checking out Miku.

"Well, in any case. I asked the professor if I'd be able to spend time in a sound room instead, considering audio isn't exactly a weak point for me. I'm sure he'd be willing to let you go with me considering your status."

"Thanks, I was dreading this class honestly."

"So was I, until I found out how close the practice rooms were. Won't be able to talk the entire time though, since I do have a song I should be finishing up for the end of the week. If I don't release something soon people will start wondering if I've quit music."

"No problem, I'll just hang out in the background when you start recording."

"What, like some sort of stalker?" She shot back much faster than I would've liked.

A few minutes later, we entered a practice room to see nothing but a piano and an accompanying bench inside. This didn't seem to bother her though as she quickly jumped into the seat and flew open the fallboard with an energy I could only describe as "Gumi". "Welp, this'll have to do for now. I can always add edit it in post." She ran her fingers up the keys in a single fluid string that would've normally been pleasant had she not misplaced two notes at the end. Her eyes glanced at mine, half wincing at her melodic torture, and smirked in satisfaction before she began to play. I sat down in the corner behind her as she did, listening intently while the waves of sound encompassed the room. The figure in front of me blurred as my mind disconnected and the world faded in and out of conscious thought, my heart seeing in place of my eyes.

Images swirled into view, materializing to see a dark-haired boy laying next to me, a gun in his hand that he clutched to his chest as he slept. I was concerned but unphased, feeling as though I knew him from somewhere, but I couldn't remember where. Slowly, I nudged his shoulder, poking it lightly so as to not irritate or scare him, but there was a feeling of safety around him, regardless of the weapon. Eventually, he woke up, sitting up as we both looked for the first time the kind of room we were in, a classroom. Remembering the shooting that had occurred moments ago, I panicked and jumped back away from him, the boy who killed me. He must have realized too, because his hand desperately reached for his pistol and brought it up to face me, the barrel leering at me for what I knew was the second time. Before I knew it, the bullet was slowly leaving the chamber, flying toward me as I, paralyzed, merely watched it inch closer to my eye. Then, the tempo changed. Shot after shot pierced through my body as the magazine was unloaded into me. My body felt hot with blood, but I didn't feel pain. I reached out toward him, my vision blurry as I tried to adjust to the bleeding in one and the loss of focus in the other. Why did he seem so scared? He killed me first didn't he? With each small shift of my knees, I closed the gap between us, not entirely sure what I hoped to achieve by doing so. There was a thought in my mind, that I could go back, that I could live again. If only I could get rid of him.

"Len? Are you okay?"

I came to just as Gumi was leaving her seat to check on my, almost certainly, dazed state. "Huh? Oh, yeah, I'm fine. Just got a bit lost in the music."

"No doubt taking a nap," She replied with a fake pout, to which I began to raise my hands in defense. "I'm kidding, I'm kidding. But, what do you think? At least so far."

"I'm confused. The song seems darker than your usual style. Any reason for the change?"

"It is. My persona has slowly become darker since my fan base seems to enjoy it. Not the most ideal transition, but for fame and steady living, what more can you ask for?"

I paused and stared at her blank expression. "I suppose it allows you to explore new areas. I've been stuck singing duet songs for the past year and could use a change."

"Yeah, you and your sister seem to have a lot of fun in your songs." For a moment, I thought I saw her teeth clench. "It's nice to see the happy pop songs are still popular even after all this time."

I pushed myself off the ground to stand up, eyeing her fingers as they gripped onto her skirt. "You don't like this persona, do you?"

"Len..." She muttered. "Please leave..."

~

Hopefully the others were having a better day. Miku was stressed. Rin was irritated. Gumi was... The only two I hadn't seen struggle yet were Luka and Lapis, but that was only because I hadn't seen them at all. Considering I had four hours till my next class, I figured I'd spend some time looking around, thinking I would eventually run into at least one of them. Knowing Lapis she was probably hiding in a corner somewhere on the edge of campus, so it would take a bit of time to stumble upon her. Out of the seven of us, Lapis probably had the most inverted persona. To think someone so isolated would be forced into putting on a mask of extroversion in order to grow in popularity.

As I was passing by the large pond on the east side of the grounds, I noticed a small group of people crowding around something that was blocked from my view. Just ducks, I decided, until a phonecall hit my phone from none other than Lapis. The call request timed out while I walked over to the circle of, probably, Freshman asking for support with their fanbases, some of them looking up, seeing me, and rushing to strike up a conversation with me. Pushing past them, I moved to stand next to Lapis, who was on the grass with her legs pulled up to her chest, and started directing those surrounding us.

"Who the fuck are you? Disrespectful fans? I don't get what any of your problems are but get lost. No point in trying to get an endorsement from someone you can't show common decency toward." Slowly they dispersed, evidently oblivious to the concept that their actions had any impact on those around them. Knowing from experience, they'll use the interaction to claim they were able to meet both Len and Lapis, without the context that it was far from a mutual enjoyment, in order to boost their own popularity, but that's how the industry works.

Eventually, I sat down. Trying to seem slick, I dropped into the same legs-to-chest position that she was already sitting in with the fatal error of clocking myself in the face with my knee when I hit the ground. "Fucking damn it!" I cried out, cupping my nose and eye in pain as I leaned back against the small hill.

Lapis seemed startled by my sudden yelling, her eyes darting around in confusion before resting them on me and staring. "Len, what happened?!"

"Oh, nothing. Karma decided to bite back a bit. Nothing major going on here."

"Don't worry, I'll heal you a bit!" She placed her hands on top of each other, then on top of mine, closed her eyes, pressed lightly into my face, and commenced the silent reciting of some incantation.

"You know those don't work, right?" I asked, my eye involuntarily watering from the impact.

"It does if you want it to." Her response didn't come until after she finished, but the atmosphere became calmer when she opened back up.

Letting go, I decided to bite and tried to look around, feeling the persistent blurry stinging that survived the charm. "Nope, it didn't work, and I sure as hell wanted it to."

"That's not what I meant," she retorted quietly.

"Anyway, since I'm not going to try and walk like this, mind telling me what happened just now? They seemed like they were trying to attack you or something."

"No, no, it was far from that. They wanted to ask what to do to grow on Ripple, but there were so many of them, and they had so many questions that I kind of shut down."

"Why'd the come to you? Normally people like that go to Miku or Kaito."

"They've started rejecting impromptu meetings with fans, so I guess some of them saw me as a mutual friend, or at least another up and comer who could give advice."

"Yeah, kind of sucks being an elite in this school," I said, seeing her mentally gag at the words.

"I hate being an elite. It doesn't matter where I am, no one leaves me alone..."

"It has its perks. There's no worrying about how we're going to make a living for ourselves anymore. We've already got publishers and sponsors for our work, and fans who enjoy what we do. It's not perfect, but it's more than nothing."

"Part of me couldn't care less about the money... If it meant I could go back to writing songs without anyone knowing my name, I just might drop the money altogether."

"Little late for that," I bluntly stated, sitting up now that my eye wasn't throbbing anymore.

"My only solace is that my fame is nowhere near Miku's. Have you seen her page recently?" I shook my head and opened up the app, looking around for Miku's Ripple and searching through the posts from today. "She puts something up almost every ten minutes, it's insanity. And every time she does, there are people instantly flocking toward her feed to try and talk to her or share their two cents, like, as if she needs advice on how to act and make music."

"Yeah, insanity..." I mindlessly repeat while my attention was captured by a small video clip of Miku's upcoming song where she, most notably, has a much smaller skirt on than she normally does.

Lapis shifted closer to watch over my shoulder and gasped lightly in awe. "Wow! The new music video looks amazing! I didn't even know the school had a stage that big for the students to use."

"It's not open to the students. As far as I can remember, Miku is the only one allowed access to it in our class. It's normally reserved for senior classes, but the school's clearly willing to invest in her."

"No surprise. The board wouldn't be caught dead passing her up as an opportunity. Must be an awful lot of work."

Curiosity pulled me into clicking on the video thread and opening up the comments, annoyed to be met with exactly what I expected the top messages to be.

-You're so cute! I want you to sit on my face with those thighs!!!

-If you pause it at 0:13 you can see a small bit under her skirt

-She could totally work as a stripper if music doesn't work out I'd go out to see her

Part of me was disgusted at how open they were about their fantasies, yet another felt like a hypocrite for condemning them. Really, the only difference between online dwellers and myself was that I wasn't as open about what was running through my head. Even after feeling bad for Miku, I couldn't help imagining her in much skimpier an outfit, or even no outfit at all. The thoughts flickered in and out of view rapidly as I tried, and failed, to rid myself of the images when they came to mind. I shook my head violently and put my phone away. "Wanna go get something to eat? I was originally off to lunch until you called me over." Her eyes glazed over at my question, and I realized that going to eat meant handling crowds. "Never mind, hope you have a good afternoon. Message me if people start bothering you again."

She nodded and I got up to leave.

~

By the end of the day, I was exhausted. The dance lessons dragged on for much longer than I anticipated, and it was difficult keeping a stoic face when being made to stand in front of her for so long. If ever I have the ability to get rid of her as a music partner I will take it without hesitation. Maybe I could collaborate with Miku or something.

I collapsed onto the bed and buried my face into the pillow, trying to process the events of the past twelve hours. The difficulties that came with growing a fanbase had passed, and the pains of keeping one loomed above us all. And in all the chaos, only one thing was certain.

None of us were ready.