Act 29 – TBM Job Assignment
As Kyoko was walking down the hallway of LME, trying to figure out a way to tell Corn that though she appreciated his offer to pay for high school, she would have to try to find some other way to do it or find out if there was a debt she could pay to someone. High school was expensive and Corn had already given her a lot.
It was amazing how close their ties were. She would have never gone to Tokyo if it wasn't for Shotaro and if she had never gone to Tokyo then she wouldn't have been ditched by Shotaro. If she had never been ditched by Shotaro, she wouldn't have been led back to Corn. It was long and complicated but their relationship was made even more special because of it.
As she tried to think of the best way of telling Corn, she heard a voice call out from behind her. "Mogami-san!"
Kyoko turned and saw Sawara-san there, she bowed politely to him.
"It's a good thing that I caught you when I did," Sawara-san told her and Kyoko blinked confused. "How is it going with Kotonami-san?" he asked and Kyoko felt a chill in the air. She wasn't making much progress with the second love me member despite now having an open heart to her. If they were supposed to be teammates then they had to work with one another.
"Right," Sawara-san said as he looked off into the distance, "Maybe, but, hmm…" he said as he started to think of something before Kyoko had even answered his first question. "Well," he continued to tell her, "It could be fine. You might learn something from it," he said before smiling widely and Kyoko still tilted her head to the side. She felt rather confused about this but then Sawara stopped talking to himself and she was put on alert even more.
"Mogami-san, if you have nothing going on today, would you like to take part in a television job?" he asked her and Kyoko blinked. She only had a tiny bit of acting experience and if you count that she was relying on others it really wasn't much at all, next to nothing. Right now Sawara-san was asking her to do an acting role. Well, she wanted to do it but was it okay since she wasn't an actress.
She was definitely interested at least.
…..
…..
Kyoko rushed into the back room area where Kanae had been relaxing and smiled happily. This was something to bond over. An acting job was what they both would want as Love Me members so how could Kotonami-san not be thrilled about the offer. "News!" Kyoko yelled loudly, "News! Big News! Kanae-chan!"
Kanae looked at her as if she were some insignificant flea as a dark aura clouded over her. She growled whilst feeling startled as she glared at Kyoko who felt a little embarrassed that she had yelled that. "Kanae?" the brunette asked, "Did you just call me Kanae!? Don't speak to me so intimately," she continued and Kyoko paused and rubbed the back of her neck.
"I'm sorry," she laugh softly, "I wanted to try it once because I never had a single female friend," she said as she thought back on all the bullying that she had experienced during her life. She had been told that she was a fly and had various things taken from her. She didn't have a happy childhood. All of this was because she had been close to Shotaro. If it wasn't for him then maybe she would have made some friends of her own.
Kanae looked at Kyoko as the grudges seemed to pull out and the aura was a scary black one. Kanae wanted this darkness to stop and so, without realizing what she was doing, she snapped at the other girl. "Mo. The big news you mentioned! What is it?" she asked and Kyoko seemed to come back to life as the scary atmosphere disappeared.
"Moko-san," Kyoko smiled as she latched onto the word that the brunette had commonly said since they had met, "You finally decided to talk to me! I'm so happy! Love Me Section is back" she said with a huge smile and Kanae stared at her in horror. She had let her guard down and now Kyoko was going to attack her with this sentiment that they should be close friends and comrades. She didn't want to experience that with her.
…
…
Ren looked around nervously. His manager had accidentally killed his cell phone without meaning to which was the first disaster but now that he had the script that he would be performing in just under two hours, he felt nervous. He didn't want to admit to not knowing things that the director had said and he couldn't find a cell phone that didn't come with strings attached to it.
He felt lost. There weren't many times he had felt lost whilst in Japan but he felt completely uneasy right now. Taking a deep breath in he decided to just focus on the problem in front of him. There would soon be a break and maybe he could find somebody who wouldn't judge him for this or he was missing something in the script that would give him the answer.
He sighed and Yashiro approached him.
"Don't tell me that sigh has to do with Kyoko," he told his client and Ren shook his head with a gentleman's smile on his face which told Yashiro that something wasn't quite right but he couldn't put his finger on it. "You know, you are acting a little immature when it comes to her," he said and Ren turned to him in shock.
"Immature?" he asked, trying to make sure that that was the word that Yashiro had used.
"Either consider dating her or focus on your friendship," he said and Ren shook his head, bowing it. "Well, if it's not to do with Kyoko then I hope you find the answer soon," he tried to encourage Ren. "If it's too hard, come to me for help."
Ren nodded. He would feel embarrassed now to be asking what that word meant, especially since there were so many people around who could overhear him.
…..
…..
Kanae looked around as she had a clenched jaw and a look that was begging for the earth to swallow her up. She and Kyoko were in the audience for some interview show that was airing their first episode. They weren't going to make an impression if all they were doing was clapping and laughing. She looked at Kyoko who had a simple smile on her face as if she were actually enjoying such a mundane routine.
"The big news you mentioned, this is it?" she asked and Kyoko smiled before nodding. This was a way to get experience right, they were at a TV station and maybe somebody would notice them. They both clapped their hands as the signal was given.
"But this is also a job for the TV station, right?" Kyoko said innocently, "and can be taken as an experiment for going on TV, Sawara-san said so. Plus," Kyoko said eagerly as she lifted her finger as if she had had a brilliant bright idea, "We can take this chance to debut"
Kanae rolled her eyes looking extremely pissed off, "How can we debut if we're just audience members in the airing of a new variety show. I don't even know if we can attract any attention. Did they really need us to come?" she said and as Kyoko looked around, the same question was on her own mind.
"That's true," she said wondering why Sawara-san had assigned them this task when there were already enough people in the audience. People also seemed incredibly restless so it must be a huge star that they had for the first interview. Ren had already told her that he would be filming a drama that night and Kyoko hadn't told him that she'd be here so it wasn't him but it was somebody who was important enough in the acting world.
Kyoko blinked as she saw a well dressed man approaching them.
"Hey! Excuse me, you two!" he said and both Kanae and Kyoko looked at him, trying to figure out who he was and where he had come from. Was there more to the job other than clapping and cheering? "I heard from Sawara-san that there were people from LME who came to watch the show – did he mean the two of you?" he asked nervously and Kyoko nodded not sure what had led to this man becoming so flustered.
"I am Bridge Rock's Manager," he said as he held out a card to them showing that he was employed by LME to be the manager to the band. So, he was an important person after all but he seemed so worried. Had something happened to the group? "Well, the job I'm asking you to do is what I explained but Bridge Rock is hosting for the first time so they're worried. You know that the first episode is a live broadcast right?" he asked and Kyoko nodded as she followed along, she saw Kanae start to study him as if looking for something that Kyoko couldn't quite see. Well, Kanae was a professional after all.
"At the last second," the man continued, "one of our regulars decided he couldn't make it. He had a small scene to appear in and that's why we're in trouble now," he tried to explain and Kanae stood up, her back perfectly straight as she looked at the man with maturity and determination which greatly impressed Kyoko.
"I understand," she told him and Kyoko looked at her impressed, "We accept the job."
"Moko-san?" Kyoko asked as she gasped. She would have never had the guts to just accept an offer like that but Kanae had done it with ease. She was a match that Kyoko was going to have to work even harder to match up to.
The man smiled in relief, "Oh, you're willing to appear on air?" he asked and Kyoko continued to stare at the other Love Me member in amazement. They hadn't had scripts or time to prepare, well, Moko didn't really have to look at a script for very long to get into her role.
"Leave it to us," Kanae said, the confidence showing in her facial expression as well as body language. "This is what we specialize in because the most important thing is our mission. We have to make the audience – no, the people in this world – love our work because we are members of LME's Love Me Section."
Kyoko was almost knocked back by the pride that Moko had had when she had said those words. She was impressive and wasn't treating this as a joke. Even Kyoko was blown away as if she had been watching a drama where Moko had said that she would protect someone with all of her heart and energy. She truly was meant to be an actress.
"You're really trustworthy," the manager smiled happily, "You're the kind of people whom the president has his eyes on"
Moko nodded as she closed her eyes, "Of course," she told him passionately and the manager gestured for the two of them to follow him. Kyoko was beyond excited to see this transformation. Moko could debut easily and that meant that maybe Kyoko could as well.
"Then please begin the preparations at once," the manager said, "This way," he led them down the hallway and Kyoko had to hurry to keep up with Moko's long and elegant strides. "If you do well this time, you could become a regular member of the show."
…..
…..
Kyoko froze in the dressing room as she was put into the mascot suit and the wardrobe department was attempting to get her ready on time. She couldn't quite understand how this had gone from Moko accepting the assignment to her being the one who was going to act on the program.
Why was she being dressed as a rooster?
End of Act 29
Thank you for reading, reviews are appreciated
Thank you to the reviewers of Act 28
H-Nala, Kaname671, Kris XD, musherukuro, The Real Jackie-O
Author Response
Since there will be some trouble between Kyoko and Ren causing for Kyoko to start living at the Daruma-ya, the parental issues (apart from between Maria and Kyoko) will be kept until the Dark Moon arc but little foreshadowing on that.