Yes, I'm back again. Chapter Two isn't all that long, but at least here, we get to finally meet the self-proclaimed princess of Ieyasu… Miyoko! Let's see how Seiji deals with her.

Disclaimer: I don't know how many times I'm going to write this, but… (sigh) I don't own Initial D, or any of its characters. They belong to Shigeno and Kodansha. Alex, Jin and Miyoko belong to me, though.

Follow The Leader

by BoomChish

Chapter Two

Save Me

"Oh, dear God, no! We wish, though," Jin spoke wistfully. "It's just that we need practice… lots of it… and the closest mountain pass here is Irohazaka, but that's Emperor territory… and no way do we wanna practice on their turf… They'd decimate us in a heartbeat…"

Aha… so Jin had heard of Emperor. How interesting. Did he know that I used to be a member of Emperor until recently? I'd already fallen out of contact with him when I'd first joined Emperor, so who knows?

"Yeah… I'd heard about those Emperor guys… They're ruthless on the mountain passes…" I answered vaguely. Alex regarded me with interest.

"Tell me, Seiji… you seem to know a lot about Emperor… are you a road racer? Or is your information secondhand… like from a friend who's a road racer?"

My eyebrows shot up and I stared at Alex in open amusement. "No, no… you were right the first time… I was a road racer… But I recently retired." Seeing the look of combined shock and disappointment on both their faces, I continued; "Maintaining a car for racing is expensive, you know… I think that in the whole time I've been racing, I've replaced my tires maybe eight to nine times in total. Not to mention the fact that I also shelled out a bundle to replace my intake system, tweak my suspension and change my brakes. And with my current job, I can't really afford it."

Jin and Alex exchanged glances before they started to laugh. I scowled at that open display of mockery… mockery, which was so blatantly at my expense. "What's so funny?"

Alex managed to calm down first. "Okay… maybe we should start at the beginning… You see… the three of us, Miyoko, Jin and myself, are a bunch of amateur road racers… who lack the necessary skills to even be considered a challenge by the big boys out there. With Miyoko's patronage, if I may speak so pompously of her, car maintenance isn't even an issue with us. We can afford anything. What we do lack is the racing skills… Now here's where you come in, Seiji. Since you were a road racer, you should know at least some tricks of the trade in mountain racing… think you could help us out?"

I stared at Alex with open disgust. "Are you suggesting that I'm someone who could be bribed into giving away my knowledge of road racing?" Hey, I had some dignity after all. At least I paid for my own car upgrades with my own blood and sweat. Not like those rich brats in Gunma, Project D. Everyone knew that those Takahashi brats had more than enough money - their parents' money - to actually have a team of mechanics constantly available for keeping two - count them, two! - cars in top-notch shape. Well, if everyone had that, of course everyone would be unstoppable. But almost no one else has that kind of money to throw away. And some of us, myself included, were proud to be the few who pay for our own maintenance with our own money.

Alex exchanged a glance with Jin, who quickly cut in, "No, no! Nothing of that sort, aniki! Besides, right now, our team isn't even official. How can we be, we suck! We're just asking for a few tips of the trade. So that we can have a better chance at actually ranking against the better road racers out there." He fixed me with his puppy-dog look (which he probably used on countless women with success… save for one problem here… I'm not a woman…) and just stared at me, as if to say Please? Pretty please?

I let out a huge sigh. Suddenly, there was a feminine voice behind me. "Cut out the sissy look Jin; you look ridiculous. And besides, isn't it your turn to cook dinner today?"

I turned around and stared at Miyoko, who had obviously just arrived from whatever it was she was doing. She was a full head shorter than me; with long dark hair similar to mine and Jin, a well-defined heart-shaped face and full lips turned downward in a disapproving frown. But what disconcerted me the most about her were her eyes… they were a deep emerald green and they stared around like pointed daggers. Considering the house was hers, it made sense that she'd be the domineering force around here. But if I had to live under her rule, things may be very difficult…

"So… you're Jin's aniki, Seiji. Well, it's nice to meet you." She bowed slightly and I did the same.

"And I you, Miyoko-chan. You have a nice house here," I spoke politely. No point in antagonizing the mistress of the house.

She shrugged selflessly. "Thank you."

Jin suddenly sprang to life. "Well now… I guess I'll get started on dinner. Hey aniki, why not join us? I'm not so bad at the stove, if I say so myself!" He gave an impish grin, which Miyoko shot down almost immediately with her lethal gaze.

"As long as you don't cook that cheese casserole of yours… I could swear that my stomach had joined the circus for three whole days after eating that stuff. And I'm sure you'd want to spare your aniki that awful sensation, right?" She cast me a sidelong glance, in which I merely raised my eyebrows in response.

"Yes Miyoko," Jin answered dutifully before he sauntered off towards the kitchen.

Alex opened his mouth to speak when out of nowhere the telephone rang shrilly. He snapped to attention. "Ooh, that should be for me. Wait here; I won't be long!" and then he dashed off, leaving me alone with the proverbial princess of Ieyasu. Fairly easygoing and fun to be around, my foot. She looked ready to kill someone. And I was the only one readily available.

"So… did you tell them that you used to be a member of the Irohazaka Emperors?" she asked out of the blue. My eyes snapped wide open and I stared down at her in unguarded shock.

"H-how did you know that?!" I demanded, half scared, half angry.

Miyoko shrugged. "Hey, when Jin told me that he'd be offering the spare bedroom to his beloved aniki, I took the time to run a complete and thorough background check on you. After all, I am the eldest daughter of Hiroji Ieyasu… so I have to take every precaution necessary before allowing someone to stay in my home, no?"

She had a point. I shrugged and inclined my head. "Makes sense…" Then I gave her a direct stare of my own. "Are you going to tell them? That I used to be a member of Emperor, I mean."

"Maybe… maybe not. It all depends," she said lightly as she tousled her hair.

"Depends on what?" I had to ask.

She paced around the room a bit before she turned to face me again. "I'm sure either Alex or Jin told you about our supposed racing team, Evo Prime, right?" Evo Prime? Clever, considering their car colors… "Well, I'll make no beans about it… Our skills are horrible. Other road racers would laugh at us if we even tried right now. But since you used to be the second-best driver in Emperor, you have to have at least a certain amount of skills in road racing…" Miyoko paused again, then shook her head. "I was always bad at being tactful, so I'll be blunt." Here, she stabbed a finger at the air towards me. "I want you as our team leader. You're going to teach us how to be good road racers."

Talk about blunt. I folded my arms across my chest and glared at her. No way was some woman - no, no, kid (I recalled Jin mentioning that Miyoko is only twenty-one, so to me, she's still a kid) - going to tell me what to do. "And if I don't want to?"

She made a sweeping gesture, as if to indicate her surroundings. "You want to live here, or at your crappy little apartment with the overpriced rent and the pain-in-the-ass landlord?" I was about to ask how she knew about that, then remembered that she'd done a goddamn background check on me. Well, if she did a background check on me and told my brother that he could tell me to check the place out for consideration, it must mean that she considers me to be a trustworthy person. Before I could even help myself, I realized that I was grinning. Why would I give this up for my apartment? I'm not that dumb!

"You're a very shrewd businesswoman, Miyoko-chan," I commented.

"Comes with the territory, Seiji. My father expects me to take over the business for him someday, so I have to be shrewd in business matters. And what better way to practice than now?"

I inclined my head at that, then I wrinkled my nose. "So… in exchange for your permission for me to stay here, I must agree to become Evo Prime's leader?" When she nodded, I continued, "I'll accept… but only on consideration. If I don't like how things are going, I'd like the permission to back down."

Miyoko merely shrugged. "Then your permission to stay here is only on consideration. If you back down, you can't stay. Sounds fair?"

Despite myself, I shook my head at her. "You just don't give up until you get your way, don't you?" I demanded, half in amusement, half in exasperation.

"Absolutely not. So you understand my point now, yes?"

I could do nothing but shrug. "Indeed I do." I then sighed and extended my hand to her. "Miyoko-chan, I do believe we have a deal."

She then grinned broadly and shook it fervently. "You won't be disappointed, Seiji."

Won't I? We'll just see about that…

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So that's that for Chapter Two. Told you it wasn't long.

A/N: I know at this point, Miyoko seems to act more like Seiji than Seiji does himself, but that's the whole point of her character, as I mentioned before. She's going to be a thorn in his side and he'll definitely have problems with her, especially considering that even though he's the team leader, she owns the house. It was hard enough for him to have to deal with Kyouichi as an overbearing leader when in Emperor, but how's he going to handle dealing with an overbearing witch who's not only a head shorter than he, but eight years younger?

Yes, Sparky conveniently disappeared after his brief introduction to Seiji. He'll be back later on; don't worry.

-BoomChish