Chapter 95

Early morning on Sunday wasn't a time of the day in which Kazuki was overly active.

He liked to think he worked hard, but he tried to relax a little more on weekends. He slept in a little, he didn't work too hard and he took some extra time to indulge his hobbies. All in all, he liked to think he was normal in that regard. Then again, maybe he was wrong, because he seemed incapable of doing anything normal, no matter how hard he tried.

That Sunday wasn't the case though, because he had stuff to do.

Hina and Itsuka were apparently going to spend some time together with their own stuff, their mentor – did she still count as a mentor outside of an official internship? Kazuki thought so, but he wasn't sure – coaching her in some of the things she was the most curious about, ads, modeling and so on. Not something that Kazuki was overly concerned with. Not to say that he didn't care though. It sounded interesting enough and maybe he'd give all that a try himself at some point.

Not then though, since there was nothing he wouldn't do to try and win over some good faith with the world. Was he desperate? Most definitely, but he thought it was with good reason and that it was worth it. If not for himself, then for the people whose reputation was tainted just by being close to him. If not for himself, then for the people like him. Because every victory he achieved was a victory for all of them, or so Io liked to tell him.

It was a nice sentiment, if nothing else.

Getting his mind back on track though – 'Too early for me to make any sense even in my own head.' –, Kazuki continued on his way to his destination. Bag on his back with his trusty notebooks – Hina's words, not his – and a cup carrier on each hand. Why did he have those? Well, one of them was for himself, because it was an ungodly hour to be awake and he needed more than the one cup he'd had for breakfast.

The rest of them though-

"Excuse me," he called softly to a passing employee of Hina's agency. Because there wasn't a single day or hour when the place wasn't running. Such was the nature of heroics. "Could I have a hand?" he asked, a helpless smile on his face as he tried to gesture towards the door by him.

With a kind smile – Kazuki really would never get used to those, especially from strangers –, the man reached for the door and opened it, reassuring him and waving off his words of gratitude.

Then he went away like nothing happened and like Kazuki hadn't been at least a little moved by the gesture.

He really was all kinds of broken, wasn't he?

'Not the time for those thoughts,' he told himself, mentally shaking his head and going through the door before it closed on his face. That'd just be sad and embarrassing. 'Self-pity later, Kazuki. Now you gotta learn.'

"Good morning," he said, trying to put his best foot forward and not be as awkward as he felt inside. Good thing he was kind of getting used to putting on that kind of mask. "I come with offerings in hopes of knowledge," he explained when everyone in the room turned to look at him, varying degrees of annoyance reaching him through his Quirk.

That is, until he raised the cup carriers with a smile on his face and all negative emotions swiftly disappeared.

"Coffee?"

"Coffee!"

"Thank you!"

"Yes!"

"Coffee!"

"I love you!"

"The Dark God graces us with mercy!"

"Coffee!"

"Coffeeeeee!"

Well, the plan was a success, it seemed. Maybe too much of one, considering he was almost tackled. He'd accomplished what he'd set out to do though. The PR department of Hina's agency was now very grateful and that meant he could afford to bother them, at least a little, with his questions and such.

Still though, wouldn't hurt to sell his case a little extra, right?

"Say, do you guys need any help around here? I don't know much about what you do, but an extra set of hands is always useful, right?" he asked, plastering his best friendly smile. He didn't get immediate responses, but that was understandable. Everyone was kind of getting their dose of caffeine.

"I was ready to sell my soul just for this," a man with bright yellow skin and cream-colored hair said, holding the paper cup like it was a baby. "You want lessons? I'll teach you all I know," he said jokingly. There were some agreements voiced around the room that made Kazuki grin wider.

There were some less enthused people too, admittedly, but they were the minority and they weren't too bothered by his request. He noticed that it kind of correlated to those that weren't that happy with their coffee. However, he was already putting together ideas in his head to deal with those even as he listened to some of them start babbling about what they did and such, happy for the distraction, or so Kazuki assumed.

'Huh, interesting,' he thought, focusing on his sense for a bit. He noticed that the sense of taste assaulted him just like pain did, this time accentuating the bitterness of the coffee and other such issues. 'Maybe sugar for some of them? Maybe milk?' he wondered, blinking and making a mental note to address that in a later delivery.

"Actually," the first man said then, apparently snapping out of his mini-coffee break and rambling. "What do you need to know in particular?"

"Everything," Kazuki answered, beaming at him. "So, feel free to just talk. It's all fascinating," he added, not even having to lie. Sure, PR work wasn't the passion of his life, but it wasn't boring. It was interesting, especially since it was all stuff that he'd need and would very likely have to use. Anything those people could tell him would be useful.

"You're going to regret that," the man told him, half pitying and half amused.

"I don-"

"Anyone going to print?" someone called, either forgetting Kazuki's offer or thinking it hadn't been serious.

"What do you need?" he called back all the same.

Suddenly, he felt danger as everyone turned to him like he was God's gift to their department.

[}-o-{]

"Productive morning?"

"I wanna die," Kazuki said, elbows on the table and supporting his whole weight. "No wonder they love this stuff," he added, taking a sip from what was his fourth cup of coffee that day… Or maybe his fifth. He'd lost track of things with all the coming and going that had happened through the morning.

"You've seen nothing yet," Hina told him, sounding entirely too cheerful with her own cup of coffee. Speaking of though, that reminded him of something. So, with some mental grumbling, he tried to wake up his brain a little more, straightening on his seat. "What's up?"

"That coffee could use a bit more sugar, right?" he asked and the woman blinked at him. "I can sense the slight discomfort from the bitterness," he explained to her. "I'm right, aren't I? I don't know if that'll be useful, but I picked up on that in the morning and I thought it was interesting."

With that said, he went to take another sip from his cup. It was bitter, but that helped kick some life into him. Maybe people wanted that from time to time. He'd have to be careful, probably. Then again, if they wanted that, then he could fix it for the next batch or something like that.

Not a perfect system, but better than just guessing.

"You'll make a great boyfriend," Hina said and he choked on his drink. He wasn't even the only one, with Itsuka reacting almost the same. "Being able to tell that kind of thing will be nice. Although, I imagine it won't sometimes…" she commented distractedly before she seemed to drift off a little. "Actually, can you feel when girls and-?"

"Yes," he answered flatly. He could already tell where she was going and it was not a topic he wanted to address if he could avoid it. "It sucks."

"Yes, it does," Hina agreed solemnly while Itsuka seemed to catch on and turned bright red. "Ahem, anyway," she continued, noticing the wide-eyed look on her female intern – he still didn't know if they could be counted as interns anymore, but it was the best he could come up with – and deciding to move on. "You didn't answer the first question."

"Learned plenty," he answered, leaning back on his chair and trying to think of the best way to reply that would take as little effort as possible. "I'll visit them again in the afternoon."

"Different batch, for the most part. Except for Aimi, she doesn't need to sleep thanks to her Quirk. It's amazing," Hina told him absently and he grumbled a little. Some people had all the luck. A Quirk that prevented the need to sleep? How awesome was that, to be able to use every hour of the day? Then there was him, suffering like life had decided he was its red-headed step- "I know," his mentor added with an understanding nod. "She takes a double-shift most days, sometimes triple during emergencies. The department wouldn't be half as effective without her around. It helps to have someone that's around for multiple shifts. Means there's someone to communicate things better between them."

He wondered if there was someone at UA with a Quirk like that. Maybe he could have Chikuchi and the Management kids look around for someone with a Quirk that helped with that? He'd send them a message as soon as he had a moment.

"Good to know," was all he said outwardly, but there was a knowing glint in Hina's eyes and he could have sworn one of her snakes hissed a laugh. "So, how about you?"

"Productive too," Itsuka answered, still visibly uncomfortable but recovering quickly. "I think I'll give modeling a chance, if Hina finds me an opportunity."

"So, that's a yes," he said wryly.

"You bet it is," Hina readily agreed. "I'll have offers for you by the end of the week, if that."

Kazuki had no problems believing that. This was the woman that had taken literally a day – or maybe two? He didn't remember – to find him a movie to star in, with a good role at that. If she didn't have a list of offers about as long as the one that Shoto got after the Sports Festival for Itsuka to model, then he wouldn't know what to think anymore. The world would have stopped making any sense whatsoever.

"Glad to hear," he said with a slight smile, because he really was. Not only was Itsuka a friend – though not as close as his friend circles –, but it was also nice to just have people around him be happy in general. It drove away most of their bad emotions and that was great. Any person that could feel good around him instead of pouring more negativity onto him was welcome. "Anything in particular you're going for? I'll admit I don't know much about modeling."

"I'll try some different things," Itsuka answered a shy but excited smile on her face. "I just want to see if I like it, honestly. From there…" she added, trailing off and vaguely waving her hand in the air at the end. He just nodded, because he kind of got it.

"I felt kind of like that about the movie thing," he confessed with a slight smile of his own. "Now I'm kind of excited. I hope it goes well for you too."

"It will, of course," Hina told him, rolling her eyes as if he were silly. "You'll see. People will be falling over themselves trying to get you in their movies soon enough too, I guarantee it."

"I'll take your word for it," he replied, but his words didn't come out nearly as half-hearted as he himself expected. He guessed she was kind of convincing him. Or maybe it was because of his – admittedly supposed – resounding success in his interview.

He really hoped he hadn't been imagining things going well back then.

"You should," Hina told him with a firm nod.

[}-o-{]

"You're addicted to that stuff now, aren't you?" Itsuka asked, sitting beside him on the train back home and grinning at the paper cup in his hand. "What's so good about it?"

"Nothing," he grumbled, taking another sip and contradicting himself. "It's bitter and even with sugar and milk it's not that great," he commented, leaning back on his seat. "It's the only thing keeping me going though. Damn was this a busy day. I wanna die."

"That bad?"

"Lots of menial work around the office, as it turns out. Lots of moving papers around or organizing sheets and folders. Lots of coffee being delivered all over the place. Lot's of having to check certain things with people across the office," he explained, deflating more and more with every point he made. "I feel like I worked out more today than during any of my visits to the training facilities."

"Now, that's something," Itsuka replied, giggling. If she thought he was joking or exaggerating, she was very much mistaken. "Good thing I didn't go for that."

"Lucky," he continued grumbling. "I don't know how they do it over there. I feel like I'd actually get addicted to this shit if I had to put up with that every day. No wonder me bringing coffee for everyone worked so well," he commented, dropping his head back.

"At least it was useful…?" Itsuka tried and he had to concede the point there.

"Fair enough," he admittedly, albeit not without some reluctance. God was he happy that he had a team of Management students that would do most of that work for him. He made a mental note to take good care of those, because he'd fall apart without them. "On a different note, any idea when your training box will arrive at your place?"

"A day or two, according to Hina," Itsuka answered, looking up as if trying to remember well. "You really liked that thing, huh?" she added, looking at where he was holding his violin with the arm not holding coffee. He'd hardly let go of the instrument since they left and he wasn't embarrassed to admit that.

"It's the greatest gift I've gotten in… It's the greatest gift I've gotten," he said with a shrug and a slight, fond smile. "I'm happy just holding it, honestly," he added, running his fingers over the case. "Can't wait to get home and start practicing new songs."

"How'd you do that before?" Itsuka asked then. "Did you have a rented one or something?"

"I didn't, but I got to play songs I remembered from my childhood at a friend's family store. They sell instruments and other music stuff," he explained, feeling some life come back to him as his mind was allowed to relax. He certainly preferred talking about the violin than going through all the stuff that he'd learned. It was all useful, but he felt like someone had taken a jackhammer to his brain right about then. "What?" he asked then, turning to look at Itsuka and noticing that she was staring at him.

"You didn't have anything to practice with?"

"I just told you that I practiced-"

"I don't think playing a few times at a store counts as practicing, Kazuki," the girl interrupted dryly, which had him blinking. "You know, if your Quirk wasn't an absolute nightmare, I'd call you unfair."

"I feel like I'm unfair th-"

"Yeah, but I meant the other way around," Itsuka told him, once more not letting him finish. That was kind of rude. He had half a mind to get back at her for that somehow.

"Why?" he asked instead, genuinely confused.

"The fact that you can sincerely ask that makes it all the more annoying," she told him, sounding and feeling exasperated. Although, she did feel noticeably less so than she was showing outwardly. That was reassuring, if nothing else. Kazuki would have been concerned otherwise.

"Sorry?" he said all the same, not at all trying to hide how he felt. He got a frustrated huff from his fellow intern and that's when he decided that maybe it was better to change topics. "Any plans for the night?" he asked, for lack of a better thing to say.

All the training in the world wouldn't turn him into a good conversationalist, or so Kazuki thought. He might be getting good at dealing with reporters and now acting in general, but there was an entire world between that and normal conversations. Especially with people not in his closest circles of friends. Hell, even with those he found himself stumbling and fumbling more often than not.

"Not really. Just get home, have dinner and probably call it a day. I might not have suffered what you did, but I am plenty tired myself," Itsuka replied in good humor. He was grateful that she didn't seem to mind him changing subjects too. "What about you?"

"Get home, eat and die… maybe not in that order," he answered flatly, drawing another giggle from her. "If I manage not to die instantly, I'll check on my friends and play for a bit, probably. Might even give this beauty a try, if I feel more alive," he added, finishing with an emphatic pat on his violin's case.

It'd all help him forget about the fact that he'd made his first post in social media. Well, the Management kids had done it, but it was his post anyway. Everyone else was dealing with that, the whole thing being out of his hands, but that didn't make it any less nerve wracking.

"Sounds good," Itsuka replied with a beaming smile. That alone gave away that something was wrong. She was a little too upbeat for the subject matter. There was also the pang of pity to really wrap things up in Kazuki's mind.

Was she feeling bad for him because he was going back to an empty home? He guessed that made sense. He didn't feel too bad about it, really. She had her parents at home and that was great. He wasn't sad not to have his parents at home, honestly. It was just the usual sadness for how his parents were, but that was always there, not just at the prospect of going home.

Actually, that was worse though, right?

Oh well.

"We didn't talk about training much, right? Anything you're working on?" he asked, deciding it was time for another change of topics. He was really hoping he wouldn't need too many more of those, because he could only come up with so much.

Fingers crossed…

[}-o-{]

In the end, he was still dead on his feet when he got home.

Even like that though, Kazuki still wanted to play.

So, taking out his phone and his new violin, he looked for a song to start practicing. Exhausted as he was, he could still muster the strength to play. He was that excited to try new things, he supposed. All that he'd played were songs from his childhood, all of them tainted, mixed with memories of his mother, his father or both.

Now though, he could do something else with something that he'd come to love. He'd picked up the violin almost against his will and he'd made himself like it. Now though, it was something that went beyond his parents, his mother, and the desire to be accepted and loved. He just liked the music and he wanted to play it.

So, Kazuki wanted clean new memories, with songs that he had never tried or maybe had never even known about before. He could try those without fear either. There wouldn't be shouts or complaints from his father. There wouldn't be hissed and hurtful words from his mother. It was just him and the peace of his apartment. It was just him, the violin and the sheet music.

He felt free as he played, because he could play whatever he wanted. He might be exhausted and sweat might have started to cover him, but Kazuki could play whatever he wanted. The music could be whatever he wanted it to. He could move around, he could mess up, he could try new things, he could experiment and enjoy. All of that was right there for him to do and nothing could stop him.

So, he used the few hours he had before needing to go to bed to do just that. There was no studying nor training. There was no gacha or time wasters. It was him and his instrument, filling the usual silence of his apartment with so much life that he almost could forget that he was alone. Truly, it made the loneliness seem like a positive thing instead of a negative.

'Can't believe I ever thought this was boring and a pain,' Kazuki thought to himself, grinning widely almost without realizing. Each movement, each sound, it made him feel better. Like every single thing he did pushed away the memories of playing at home with his parents around. He was at home now and he was free. Nobody could stop him and nobody could ruin things for him.

In a way, it made his new "home" that much more powerful, sentimentally speaking. If that made any sense, that is, because Kazuki wasn't sure it did. In actuality, he didn't know how to explain how he felt or why he felt so motivated to play, but he did and it was awesome, so he just kept going.

He knew that probably none of all that had been Hina's intention, or at least he thought it wasn't. Because if she had planned for that, then she was some sort of angel fallen from heaven. Even if it had been purely coincidental though, which he imagined it was, Kazuki still greatly appreciated it all.

And he decided that he might as well express that, even with something small and simple.

'Thank you,' he sent her during a break from playing, feeling more tired than before, sweating and a little out of breath. He felt stiff, tense and his arm, fingers and neck were screaming at him. And yet he still felt so very alive… 'You're the best,' he added in a second message, smiling like an idiot.

"I know and you're welcome," she sent back, throwing in a smug emoji right afterwards and making him chuckle to himself. "It's getting late though."

He rolled his eyes at that fondly.

'I'm enjoying your gift like you wouldn't believe,' he said, hoping that such messages would get what he felt across. Which was stupid, he knew, but he was a little out of it. Maybe it had all mixed together, the exhaustion, the too many cups of coffee and the rush of playing the violin. That made about as much sense as any other theory he could come up with, he supposed.

"And I'm happy to hear that, but tomorrow is a school day," Hina replied and she was clearly not getting it. Not that he blamed her, of course, but it was a little frustrating… although it was also amusing.

He was having some real trouble with his emotions in an entirely new way that day, evidently. For once though, that wasn't an entirely bad thing, which was a new experience all on its own. Kazuki could only hope the rest of his new experiences sentimentally speaking would be half as good as that one was turning out to be.

'Hina, can you be the fun adult I know you to be for a bit?' he told her, chuckling to himself as he leaned back on his chair and took a gulp from the glass of water he'd gotten for himself. 'I'm having a great time over here. This is great.'

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you're high or drunk," the heroine replied and he could almost see her disappointed look. It stung a fair bit, he'd admit. "You can play more tomorrow after school, Kazuki. Go to sleep."

He read the message and then read it again, sighing and deflating before moving to set his new violin back in its case. It was a little bit of a bummer, but it was what it was. It made sense that she'd be the responsible adult instead of the fun one, he supposed.

Still though, that sucked.

'Fine, mom,' he wrote back, rolling his eyes and deciding to do the responsible thing as he was told. He wasn't enthusiastic about it, but that wasn't important, right? God, he couldn't wait to have another moment to play.

At that moment though, staring at the screen of his phone, maybe because of how out of it he was, a truly nonsensical, terrible thought crossed his mind.

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How's it going?

So comes the end of the weekend at Uwabami's. Plenty happened here, but it feels like it was all so fast. Then again, it was a matter of two days, so there's that. All the same, I got to more or less address everything I wanted and plans didn't even get derailed!... much.

I call that a victory anyway.

That said, I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter.

As always, if you can't wait until next week for next chapter, or if you just feel like supporting my writing, there's up to three new chapters in my Pa tre on:

P a treon . com (slash) AdrianKing

Discord Link: discord .gg/UTDransjJZ

Cover Art! Thanks to Aoi from the Discord server, we have a cover picture for this story now. Do tell her that she's amazing, yeah? And if you wanna see more or a better quality picture, drop by the Discord server. She's made several sketches and such.

Random Question: Any plans for the weekend? I have none for this one other than to give away clothes I'm never gonna use (whether because I don't like them or because they don't fit anymore). I kind of need the space. Other than that, no idea.

See you.

PS: We have cover art now! All thanks to Aoi from the Discord server, who has been awesome and dropped off many sketches about this series.