A/N: Sorry for the late update. Last week I got a little sick and I lost my motivation...and well, this chapter turned out a little bigger than I thought, so I had to split it up in two. You'll probably see the next part late this week or the next week.

JadedBanana: Maria will make an appearance later on, however, but yes, this group and Oki are looking for them. And if you recall, the name Oki was mentioned in some of Reiko's parts in the story so you can imagine the trouble Maria and her friends are if this group finds them. Glad you are enjoying the story!

Noter: Well, that bear is very important but for now, he stays in the background. And no, Tae can't turn others into zombies, at least not in this story, so everyone's fine! For now, anyway.

Alright! Please enjoy this chapter and again sorry for the delay!

20 / Fantastic Lovers, the Remix Part I

Ryu "Renoir" Suzuhara was not having a good day.

A week ago, things seemed to be going great. His online classes were alright, his delivery job was okay and the old band was getting back together again and they needed a drummer and Renoir was all over it. Five days ago, everything was going so well. Then, came the weekend and that's when the bad news began.

First, due to department disputes, the online classes had been put on hold indefinitely. Next, he had lost his job because the shop where he was employed in was going through some family issues and had to close. Finally, the old band, those snakes, left him in the dust and got themselves some nobody drummer from Saga City, who just happened to be the boyfriend of the singer.

In just a couple of days, he had gotten annoyed at school, lost his job and had been stabbed in the back by a bunch of wannabe rock stars.

There had been a bright side to all of this, though.

The school thing was getting resolved by the end of the month and Renoir was already looking into new temporary jobs to hold him through until he found something more permanent. And maybe, while he was at it, he might as well find better friends.

A new day found him heading towards a small cafe, half asleep, still worried about school and work and still cursing that stupid Saga City drummer.

The cafe in question was one he had found while out job hunting. It was a small cafe, hidden between other businesses and houses with the beach not too far away. There was also that mansion by the end of the road, the one that looked abandoned. Rumor had it that it had been abandoned by its original owner after he or she had been cursed, or something along those lines. Others said that the mansion housed monsters, who lurked at night and ate the naughty children that were out after curfew.

Renoir had not believe the rumors, of course. Back in Shibuya, Renoir had heard his fair share of stories and rumors about monsters and ghosts.

That old mansion was probably a hot pot for them because no one dared to walk inside and find out what was really going on inside. Frankly, Renoir thought the whole place might collapse one day.

Ignoring everyone, including a waitress, Renoir, still half asleep, walked straight to the first table that had caught his attention, sat and tried to think of nicer things while he waited for a waitress to come and take his order. He was still muttering curses when a voice whispered, "Are you okay?" Imagine his surprise when he saw a pretty girl and a bored-looking fellow staring at him in confusion, asking him what he was doing at their table. Embarrassed, Renoir tried to leave only for the real trouble to being because he was still half asleep and not looking where he was going or who he was going to knock over. He ended up hitting some gangster type with the back of his head and, had the pretty girl and her companion not been there, Renoir would have been stuck home nursing a few broken bones by the end of the day.

Once they had outran the troublemakers, Renoir decided to go back home. He thanked the pair and made his way quickly back home. He was tired of running and he just wanted to sleep the stress off in his apartment.

Now, if he could only just figure out where he had seen that pretty girl before...

After getting a good night's sleep, Okoba decides he was being a little paranoid. Finding out that the dead were out there singing and dancing should have clued him in that those girls were probably not dangerous. Still, a part of him was dreading the future, replaying those old school zombie flicks he had watched when he was a teenager, telling him that the zombies were coming and that they were going to eat his brain...and...and...

Okay, so maybe he was being paranoid again.

(but what if he wasn't wrong about his worries?)

Sometime later, in the office, Okoba tries to work on this new project of his as discreetly as possible. He's in luck. No one is paying attention to him as they are all busy talking about some new internet sensation that arose over night back in Okinawa. Talk around the office mentioned some girl going by the internet moniker of Nikko, who had been doing covers of popular songs on the web for quite some time now but until recently had been a minor celebrity in her native Naha. Nikko had, according to the gossip passing from desk to desk, managed to attract the attention of a popular internet celebrity who in turn introduced millions to the signing voice of Nikko. Give or take a year or two, and everyone was sure that Nikko would be out there making her own mark in the world but for now, she was just a girl with a beautiful voice stuck behind a screen. At least the talk about Nikko drowned out the news about the bear, who seemed to have disappeared into thin air.

Okoba ignores the internet idol and the disappearing bear and instead focuses on the dead, making absolutely sure that his assistant or any of his coworkers don't catch wind of his work.

He needed to reevaluate the information before him.

The reporter already knew that Franchouchou was composed of dead girls, fact one. Dead girls from different eras, early 2000s, 90s, 80s and 1880s. All dead, all brought back to life to one purpose...uh, maybe. Had they been brought back to be idols? To take over the world? Eat...people…?

Okoba shook his head irritably.

His nerves were doing the thinking again.

He began to write down the facts using simple words, leaving out the words "dead" and "zombie" in case someone would want to look over his shoulder and see his work. He used the nicknames of the girls and put the dates next to their numbers, 08 for One, 97 for Two, 08 for Three, 83, Five, uh, 182, and finally, 11 for Six. Zero, or whoever she was, didn't have a date nor did Okoba know her real name, so that girl he just gave a big zero next to her name adding a big question mark right after.

Okoba had all the pieces of the puzzle, he just needed to find their right place.

But even as he worked, the same thoughts began to cloud his mind.

(what if these girls were dangerous? what if this…? what if that…?)

Okoba shook his head once more, ripped the paper from the notebook, crumpled it up and threw it in the trash.

He wasn't going anywhere with this whole thing. His discovery of Franchouchou's real nature had just made the questions more complicated and morbid. He knew he couldn't up and go straight to the girls and reveal what he knew about them without expecting some sort of trouble coming his way. Okoba hated to admit that he was mildly frightened of the dead girls that had once been so full of life but now just pretended to be so.

Okoba knew he was just going in circles here. He was trying to find rhyme or reason to all this and he just couldn't. With shaking hands, and realizing he was going nowhere, he focused instead on the living once more, moving straight to the families of the deceased. From the research he had gathered on the dead girls, Okoba already had some names. He already knew who Takeo Go was, and already had the names of Ai Mizuno's, Junko Konno's and Sakura Minamoto's parents, along with Nikaido's grandparents. He didn't have any family for Yugiri for obvious reasons and Zero was still a big unknown as it were.

Their families needed to know, at least, the living ones needed to know. They deserved to know what he had discovered, consequences be damned.

Making a few other notes, and a couple of internet searches later, Okoba got to work getting addresses and phone numbers, anything he could get his hands on, the talk of Nikko and the bear lost in the background.

It took Kotaro and the others ten minutes to find Sakura and her brother. The siblings had left the mall and the stranger behind and were now making their way to some other unknown place, walking and talking.

As Kotaro inched the van closer, he could see Sakura smiling, talking rather animatedly with her brother, eyes shining with a strange emotion. Her brother gives her a fond smile which vanishes the moment he sees the van approaching. He gives the vehicle a flat stare which Sakura notices. She blinks in surprise, turns and suddenly the van is right next to the siblings.

Kotaro lowers the window and stares at the road in front of him for a bit before turning to look at Sakura and then at Genji, who's still staring at him with that flat look. The manager turns to look at the road again and says to Sakura a little cold, "Get in. We're going home." Sakura opens her mouth, then closes it, shakes her head and then turns and smiles sadly at her brother.

"I'll see you, then," she tells him as the van's door opens and the other girls turned to stare at her, everyone with certain degrees of worry, anger and annoyance. Tae just seemed happy to see her friend and groaned her way, causing Genji to slightly raised an eyebrow at the behavior before he nodded at his sister.

"Sure. Take care," he says and watches as Sakura gets inside the van, as blondie closes the door with a loud huff, and then watches as the van begins to move and then disappears around the corner.

/…..

The next day, Kotaro wakes up feeling as if something is about to change.

Yesterday, just as they made it back home, the girls had taken Sakura aside before their manager could begin his tirade about recent events, and had barricaded themselves in their room. There had been a lot of shouting, courtesy of Saki and a little bit from Ai, while Junko offered some calm with a few words here and there and Lily let out shocked gasps once in a while. Yugiri, well, Kotaro had heard nothing from her. It appeared that the courtesan had already figured something he himself had figured out a while back and was just keeping quiet, perhaps only wishing to interfere if the shouting got serious. Tae, for her part, had been rendered speechless by whatever the girls were talking about as he didn't hear a groan or a growl from her throughout it all. Eventually, the talk died down and a sort of peace was achieved between Saki, Ai and Sakura. Kotaro couldn't really hear what they talked about as they had kept themselves silent for a while. When he decided to barge into the room and demand an explanation from Sakura, he had been rather surprised to find resistance at the door. The girls had locked him out and Saki had yelled at him that they were not practicing today and that was that.

Kotaro, of course, yelled at them in order to get a reaction but still, Saki and the others wouldn't budge. And now, they had lost a day of practice because of Sakura's annoying little brother.

Still, he couldn't help but be concerned about what she had done. He had expected her doing something like this, of course. Kotaro knew he couldn't keep Sakura away from her brother, much less keep the brother away from her. He'll have to make some calls. The master would probably know what to do about all this. Sure, the old man might not really consider it a big deal but Kotaro just couldn't trust the guy. Sakura, he knew, and had known for a few years before her untimely death at seventeen, but her brother? What did he know about her brother beyond some gossip from classmates here and there? The only thing Inui remembered was that they both had a terrible relationship brought upon by their parents' divorce and that was that. And Inui, Kotaro remembers, had not cared for that bratty teenager at all. How could he trust a guy like that? What if everything was just a ploy to get back at his sister? No. He just couldn't. He wouldn't let him.

Kotaro sighed.

(what was he thinking?)

He was suddenly tired. He wasn't thinking straight because he was worried about Sakura, because he was worried about the project. He just knew he couldn't lose Sakura and he knew that keeping her away from her brother, while painful, was for the best. Maybe after they saved Saga...maybe then...but until then it was back to work.

"GOOD MORNING LAD….ies…!?"

Kotaro stopped dead when he noticed the new face inside the dungeon.

The young man was seated, arms crossed, staring at the manager with an unimpressed look, his blue eyes alert and dangerous. Next to him, looking a bit nervous but determined, sat Sakura, taking Tae's usual place while the older woman sat in Saki's, leaning her head on the pink haired girl's shoulder. The other girls, too, had changed their seating arrangements, too. Saki sat in the middle, followed by Ai and Yugiri to her right and Junko and Lily to her left. They all stared at Kotaro with calm expressions, Ai and Saki glancing once or twice at the newcomer.

Everyone sat there, silent for a whole solid minute before Kotaro finally recovered his composure, pointed an accusing finger at Genji and cried out, "What...what is this!? Are we just letting outsiders in or what!?" He glared at Genji behind his sunglasses. "How did you even get inside!? Romero should have kept you outside!" As he said this, Romero walked underneath Genji's chair, and sat down, staring at Kotaro cutely as he stuck his tongue out. "Well! Are you going to tell me how you got insiー"

"I broke in," Genji tells him, expression unchanged.

Kotaro just keeps glaring at him, and begins to walk from left to right, hands on his hips, fuming. "So!? SO!? You broke in!? Eh!? EH!? I should call the police!" Genji didn't seemed to be bothered by the threat.

"Do it, then."

"FINE!" Kotaro begins walking towards the door of the dungeon before he suddenly stops and much more calmly, asks Sakura, "What is he doing here?"

"I let him in," she answers.

And it's this response that lets Kotaro know that he has already lost. There's no going back now. He can't possibly keep this brat away from Sakura now. Sakura wasn't going to let him.

Kotaro stares at Sakura and asks, "...why did you?" But before Sakura can respond her brother does it for her.

"I was bored."

That stops Kotaro, making him stare at Genji while Sakura sighs exasperatedly next to him. "Genji…"

"What…?"

"Look, Shades…" Saki began before Kotaro could say or scream anything else. "We talked about it and we figured it was fine. It was going to happen eventually, right?" The ex-biker glanced at Sakura and then shook her head. "We aren't exactly happy about it...but well..." Saki turned to Ai, who nodded Genji's way.

"He says he wants to give us a hand...to save Saga."

Genji's eyes brightened a bit and he said to Kotaro, "The girls tell me you write and compose their songs." Kotaro stared at him, unsure of where he was getting at.

"So?"

"I'm a freelance sound designer...I also do music compositions here and there." Genji uncrossed his arms and placed his hands over his lap. "I figured if I'm sticking around, I might as well be useful, yeah?"

Kotaro pursed his lips, crossed his arms over his chest and scoffed. "You think I don't have what it takes for these idols, is that it!?"

"No. I think I should just strangle you and get this over with."

"Genji!" Sakura gasped. "You promised you wouldn't…"

"Hey, I promised I wouldn't touch him. You said nothing about threats." Genji glared at Kotaro. "Look, I'm only doing this because I want to help my sister with whatever this is…" he raised a hand and waved it for emphasis before continuing, "and I'm planning to do it for free, so don't give me that attitude."

Before Kotaro could retort, Ai interrupted. "Is it really that bad that he's going to be helping us?" she asked. "We know you're upset about this. We are, too. But we are willing to give him the benefit of the doubt…why can't you?" Kotaro let out a deep breath.

"FINE! YOU STUPID ZOMBIES! YOU CAN TRUST HIM FOR ALL I CARE! BUT...HE'S NOT HELPING US JUST YET!" He pointed a finger at Genji. "YOU! WHERE'S YOUR PORTFOLIO!? How do I know you aren't going to screw it up!?" For the first time since this shouting began, Genji offered Kotaro a genuine smile and the older man was surprised on how much his smile resembled his older sister's.

"You're on."

Aoi Mizuno, from what little he could find of the woman, was a doctor of some prestige. Dr. Mizuno and her daughter had kept themselves at a distance at least when it came to the whole idol business that Ai was part of. Rumor had it that there had been some disagreement between mother and daughter but that happened everywhere.

From the bits and pieces Okoba could find, the doctor had kept herself out of the public eye for years now and many probably didn't know she was Ai Mizuno's mother. Reporters had hounded her for a few months after her daughter's death but even after all that media attention, the world had just forgotten about her. Okoba figured that was a good thing.

If people only remember you because your daughter had been burned alive by lightning in public, well, Okoba didn't even want to think about it.

Still, he didn't even know how she would react if he told her about Ai. Dr. Mizuno probably wouldn't believe him, most likely. He could show him the pictures in the calendar, of course, the ones were they showed their true form (probably) and confirm whether this was Ai or not. Maybe get her to Three and Ai's voice side by side and try to confirm it by herself.

There was a chance that she wasn't going to believe him, either way. Or maybe she would, after all, she had recently moved to Karatsu just a few months ago. Maybe she saw the same thing Takeo Go saw and wanted to prove it. It was just up to Okoba to prove it was all real.

The only thing he truly dreaded, however, was if Aoi Mizuno did believe him, how she was going to act at the end of it all?