"Y-yes?" Mai choked out, completely frozen in Naru's grip. This was it. Naru had figured out that she was Mai and he was going to lash out, calling Mai an idiot for everything she'd done: dying her hair, joining aging, all the things he'd find out once she got to talking about how she spent her time during his stay in England. She'd truly never here the end of it. But maybe it would be better that way. Naru would order her to quit the Red Tails and even if the girls backlashed (which Mai was sure they would, it wasn't easy to leave the group with the exception of "graduating," but the odds of that happening were slim to none in any yanki's case.) But even if they came after her, Naru would surely protect her, right?

"At least take my card," he dug through his pockets, pulling out a wallet and a small business card, "I'd really appreciate if you went and asked around your school and called me if you found her. I'm looking for her and it's extremely urgent."

Mai allowed herself a brief glance down at the card; it had the name Kazuya Shibuya. When Mai saw that she almost couldn't stop herself from grinning, so he was still was using that stupid alias.

"Yeah, whatever," She said, trying to act as sullenly as possible and ducked away, feeling Naru's eyes boring holes into her back.

-x-

Mai made it back to her small, one room apartment without further incident. She sighed leaning against the closed door as she shut it behind her, before entering and stripping off her clothes, heading straight for the shower.

Inside, she stood under the scalding spray. Mai allowed herself to fantasize for a brief moment that Naru had come to decide that he liked her and had come back to Japan to tell her so. That Naru had come to propose romantically and they'd have a whirlwind romance, ending in her graduating with minimal injuries.

But all too quickly that fantasy came crashing down. The only girls who graduated were the ones who managed to snag a bosozoku or another yanki or –god forbid- a real yakuza. Just recently Mai had heard about a girl who had tried to get out. She'd found an honor's student who said he'd love her except for the fact she was a sukeban. He told her if she cleaned up her act and became an appropriate girl to show off to his parent's he'd gladly date her and they could put her sordid past behind them.

It didn't end well for either of them, both ended up needing to visit the ER. When his parents found out, the boy was forbidden to so much as look at the girl ever again, they even tried to press charges, but how could they press charges when they didn't know who the assailants were other than "a rabid group of teenage girls"?

The girl ended up staying in the gang, but being demoted so low, it was like she was a newbie all over again.

She was so stupid to think Naru had come to be her knight in shining armor.

-x-

True to her word, Mai'd showered and changed into some simple street clothes – of course, she was still sporting a long skirt with a deep red inner lining – and began walking back to meet Makoto and a few other girls, probably Myao and Yuriko, maybe Aki and Hikaru. They'd messaged her with their location; giving such obscure directions Mai was sure that she'd be lucky to find it.

Sure enough, it took her much longer than it should've to find them, she called out to them the second she caught a glimpse of the girls.

"Mairu-kun!" Hikaru waved, "We were just talking about what we wanted to do today, Myao wants to just hang out, but Yuri-tan wants ta go and rough up some chicks in Onigashi-whatever since they've been crossing the line and beating up some of the junior members. Whaddaya think?"

"Let's just hang out, I'm tired today." Mai said, she wasn't in the mood for confrontation since her nerves were unsettled from her close call with Naru that morning.

"Fine," Hikaru drew out the word, "Tomorrow, maybe?"

-x-

The girls decided to wander through town, laughing as crowds parted easily in their way.

But Mai's laugh was not genuine in the least, the card Naru had given her felt like it would burn a hole through her pocket and Mai couldn't stop her hand from straying to her pocket to check that it was in fact still there and hadn't fallen out to be lost in the crowded streets of Tokyo.

"Hey, Mairu, why don't we get you a scooter?" Makoto said.

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