"How much farther do we have to walk?"
"It shouldn't be too far now."
"But that's what you said a few miles ago!"
"But we're closer to the city than when I said it, so it shouldn't be too far now."
"Gah!"
On the way to the city, Miku was complaining the whole way. Luka was pretty sick of the complaints about the distance, but she kept her cool and annoyed Miku until she burnt out, only for her to ask the same question a few minutes later.
"Did anyone bring any duct tape?" Meiko asked. "If Miku won't be quiet, then I'll have to make her be quiet!"
"I don't think we did." Len answered. "Other than making us silent, what else could we use it for?"
"Technically, we can use duct tape for just about everything." Kaito said. "You can eat it, keep yourself warm with it, wear it, build a house with it, breathe it, you name it, and you can do it!"
Everyone just stopped and stared at Kaito around the middle of his sentence. He looked around and saw all of the confused faces and made one himself. "Why isn't anyone still walking?"
"Because duct tape." Rin told him before walking away.
"She has a point." Gakupo said as he walked past Kaito.
"Yay! We're walking!" GUMI cheered.
"Ugh… We're walking…" Complained Miku.
"Can you stop complaining?" Luka asked.
"No. No I can't."
Everyone else followed the ones who left without any words said. Kaito fell behind as the last to leave, but he caught up with everyone fairly quickly. They all walked in silence for just a bit longer before Miku suddenly yelled.
"WE DID IT! I CAN SEE THE CITY! WE DON'TT HAVE TO WALK MILLIONS OF MILES ANY MORE!"
"Miku, I think you're exaggerating. There' weren't 'millions' of miles, just about fi-"
"WHO CARES? WE MADE IT!"
"We may have gotten to the city, but we need to eat breakfast." Gakupo told her. "You don't want to get there hungry, do you?"
"No, I don't. Fine. Let's eat."
Meiko dropped her backpack and began to unload the food inside. The twins did the same thing while Miku set up a table. The cooler Meiko brought was opened up and some bottled water was taken out. Everyone who didn't have the supplies to set up just let their bags hit the ground and they helped out as much as possible.
After everyone finished their food and cleaned up their supplies, they continued their journey to the city. It only took minutes for them to get there, but they realized one fatal mistake as soon as they stepped into the borders. Rabid fans.
"LOOK! IT'S LEN!"
"I CALL GAKUPO'S KATANA!"
"WHERE'S LUKA? SHE'S MINE!"
"I'M GETTING THEIR SHIRTS!"
Miku slowly started backing away from the crowd of people running toward them, getting faster every couple of steps until she was sprinting. Her friends were running next to her, all of them going as fast as they could, but the fans were keeping up and getting closer to them.
"Why can't we just go to places without having millions of people run after us?" Rin asked out loud while trying to get away from one crazy man who was trying to get her in a butterfly net.
"I don't know!" GUMI shouted. "Maybe it's because they're crazy and want to stalk our every move!"
"I don't know what these weirdoes want to do to us, but we need to lose them and hide!" Len called out to everyone. "We can figure out a plan once we get away!"
"Should we split up?" Meiko asked. "It'll be harder for them to find us, but we'll be putting ourselves in danger!"
"Right now, that's our only chance!" Gakupo told Meiko. "Everyone, run off in different directions, and don't ever look back!"
"You DO realize that the fans can hear us, right?" Kaito asked.
"That's the point!"
"How does that even work?"
"Just trust me, now go!"
Everyone ran off into different areas of the city, not looking to see who made it or if anyone got swallowed up by the people swarming after them. Gakupo climbed onto a building to try and get away by heights, Meiko opened a manhole and went into the sewers, Kaito ran into a narrow alleyway, Miku escaped into a hedge, Rin went into a skyscraper, Luka continued on the path they were running on before, GUMI turned completely around and got away from them by sprinting around the cluster of people, and Len managed to jump into a store and hide in the racks that happened to obstruct the view of him.
The speed of the fans slowed down a bit before they split off into groups. They had some people who were good with climbing go catch Gakupo, people good with mazes try to get Meiko, small people run after Kaito, people who were good at finding the differences in something find Miku, the ones who could pace themselves go after Rin, those with no extraordinary qualities chase Luka, people good at dealing with confusion chase after GUMI, and the ones best at finding things within stores had to go after Len.
The Vocaloids escaped to their own places to hide before the fans could spot them. They couldn't leave their hiding spots though, because the fans were in the general area and would easily be able to spot them before they could regroup. All of them had to find a way to get past the fans, and fast. They couldn't waste any more time or else the remaining six days would fly past.
Len was cautiously moving between racks and hiding whenever someone could possibly see him. He held his breath for a good long time when people stared in his general direction and only let it go when they walked away. He inched toward the back of the store, where he would hopefully be able to find a back door and escape through it. But when he managed to get to that area, he was bitterly disappointed. The only thing in the back of the store were girl clothes.
'And I can't go back unless I want someone to see me! Darn it! I think my only choice is to… Wear this stuff and get out of here. I just hope I look enough like Rin to get away while looking like a girl.'
Len gulped before jumping into one of the racks and pulling out a few clothes that were his size. He crawled into the dressing room and hid in one of the stalls before swapping out his clothes for the girl ones and looking in the mirror. He was wearing a light pink skirt with ruffles that matched the hat that hid his hair, which was also light pink. His shirt was neon purple with electric blue designs of flowers all over it.
'At least I look girly. But the guys are NEVER let me live this down!'
Len put on a pair of blue sunglasses before walking out of the dressing room. He looked around and saw a few people he recognized as fans look at him, but they bought the disguise and left him alone. He smiled as he left the store in a hurry, getting past every fan along the way.
GUMI was VERY grateful for her ability to run quickly and pace herself the whole way. She ran around in confusing way to try and mess up her pursuers, but she wasn't as successful as she hoped. They narrowed down her options by blocking her until she moved to where they wanted her to. That slowed her down, but sometimes she could surprise the fans. Like when they wanted to corner her, she ran up a wall and climbed over it, and that let her relax for a minute or two.
GUMI managed to lose the fans again, but she had to act quickly. She had to hide in plain sight or risk getting found again. She looked around in the place she ran into, and noticed a few empty market stalls. The stalls had a miscellaneous selection of everything, including crates. She opened up the lid of one of the crates and climbed in just before the crowd of fans ran past.
'Looks like that worked. Now I just have to get out of here.'
Luka was the most successful. She actually managed to lose her group of fans fairly quickly. They couldn't run as fast as she could, plus she threw fish at them whenever they got too close. That led to some decently amusing events, including all of them tripping over each other into a tangled mess.
The one way Luka managed to lose them for good was when she jumped into a pond. Sure, the water was dirty from all of the fish, but there was a dock right above her head for her to breathe under. Nobody wanted to go after her, so they left.
Once she was alone, Luka swam out of the pond and squeezed her clothes dry. She then found a bush beside he pond and pulled it out of the ground. She took some of the branches and made a mask and a shawl, and tied it all together with some pond reeds she found. Overall, she looked like a water monster, and was barely recognizable.
Miku wasn't having much luck. Her hair was too long for her to hide properly, so the fans were able to point her out fairly quickly. Plus her clothes stood out, so she had to constantly be on the move or risk getting seen and grabbed at. Yet the movement always let the pursuers find her, so she wasn't getting very far.
Eventually Miku just gave up and ran out of the hedge, dragging leaves and branches the whole way. She ran away from the fans and toward a busy street, hoping to lose them in the traffic. She jumped in front of cars and trucks, barely making it past them without getting hurt, and she made it to the other side of the road covered in some black, sticky substance.
Miku looked back and noticed that the fans were still behind her and couldn't raise enough courage to run in front of the vehicles. She smiled triumphantly and ran further away from them until they were out of sight. Because she was covered in the strange substance, people didn't seem to recognize her, and just backed away.
'Whatever this is might be too gross for some people. I could use this to my advantage! I can get away without being noticed by anyone!'
Kaito was exhausted. He wasn't the athletic type, nor did he have to most energy in the world to run. He was lucky that he could think strategically fast enough so he could get away. He ran into small areas and places that were dark so it'd be harder to find him, and he ended up running into a huge maze of buildings that made his goal easier.
Kaito hid in a corner which was placed within the intersection of two buildings. He was completely blocked from the sun, and the only light coming from him was the tiny bit of light in his eyes. He held his breath as the fans crept past him, staying quiet so they wouldn't scare him. What they didn't notice was that they were making more noise than they hoped, alerting him of their presence.
After the fans went back to the entrance from which they came, Kaito began to move again. When he noticed that they went to look somewhere else, he ran off in the other direction to try and find his friends.
Meiko ran through the maze of the sewers, hoping to get away from the crazy fans. She didn't care about how disgusting the whole place was, so long as she could get away without too many problems. She constantly jumped over the greenish river of sludge in order to get to a more confusing place. She eventually managed to find another manhole for her to climb up, but there were still people chasing after her.
'How do I get rid of them?' Meiko asked herself before looking at the river slightly below her. 'If I can get myself out of their view for a bit, I might be able to hide. Even though it'll be completely disgusting, I'd rather have to clean myself later than get eaten alive by those fans.'
Meiko turned around a corner before anyone could see her and slid into the mess of water and whatever went into sewers. She used her backpack to guard her face before sinking below the watery sludge. Luckily, her pursuers ran past her and away, which let her rise out and get back onto land.
'I have NO intention of doing THAT again.' She told herself before climbing up the rusty ladder and out onto the street.
Gakupo was actually having a lot of fun escaping from the fans. He leaped from building to building, teasing the fans by getting close but then running right out of their reach. He laughed as he jumped onto a balcony of an apartment complex and back onto the streets. He looked up and saw that his pursuers were having difficulty getting down safely, and that gave him a chance to get away.
Gakupo ran into an alleyway and hid behind some crates before reversing his outfit. He rarely did that, but in the event of an emergency, he had an alternate outfit sewn inside of his robes. It wasn't anything extravagant, but a simple suit and wig along with a pair of shades could easily hide him.
Just to see if the fans could recognize him, Gakupo calmly walked back to where they were before and watched them get down from the balcony. They looked at him, but didn't point him out or yell where he was. He smiled and waved before walking down the sidewalk to see if he could find his friends.