Chapter Text
Gyroaxia’s practice is finally over and Nayuta lets out a long, annoyed sigh. It feels like nothing is going his way. Reon’s guitar was too slow, Miyuki’s drumming a bit sloppy. It was nowhere near the level of perfection Nayuta expects from someone in a band like Gyroaxia.
He impatiently waits for the other members to leave the room before picking up the mic again, putting on a back-up track to practice one of their songs one last time.
Sometimes it’s liberating to let it all out, all by himself in a soundproof room. He can get as loud as he wants, but differently from when he is on stage, he doesn't need to worry about the fans’ stares on him.
As the song comes to a close, he feels a light knocking on the door. He puts his stuff away quickly and goes to let himself out. A small pink haired man looks back at him with his eyes wide.
“Oh-uhm, sorry. Your time is up and I thought...”.
“Tch. Whatever”.
As he walks away he notices four more men standing behind him. Their faces are somewhat familiar but he isn’t sure. Maybe it’s just some band he saw perform at some point in time. He glances at them quickly before taking a step, when an arm grabs his elbow.
“Are you from Gyroaxia?”
He snatches away from the grasp, looking back at the man with spiky orange hair in front of him. “Yes. Now leave me alone”.
As he makes his way out of the building he can hear the men’s loud voices behind him.
“Dude!! That’s the Nayuta Asahi! From Gyroaxia!!”
“...Who?”
Yamato is feeling okay. It’s a normal day. The only difference is that his band chose to practice in a different studio this time. He doesn’t care. It is a bit further away than usual, but he isn’t the one driving, so it doesn’t make a difference. When they arrive, Aoi and Kohei take care of their reservation and the employee walks them to the room they were assigned. He lets them know that the band inside tends to draw out their time till the last second, so they might have to wait.
Yamato shrugs. He takes out his phone and opens his new favorite app, Rice Crush. It might be just a parody of a more popular game, but it’s enjoyable and sometimes challenging, plus it pleases Yamato’s obsessive interest in rice.
“Whoever is inside there is really giving it their all, huh”, Misaki speaks.
“They sound like they’re having fun! I wish I could join! Don’t you, Yamato?”
Yamato looks up from his phone at Fuuta, his head cocking to the side. He takes a second to actually listen to the voice coming from inside. It’s really good. That person is clearly performing with a back-up track, but they’re not holding back. The sound is a bit muffled because of the wall in-between them, but Yamato finds himself curious to hear more. He wants to put his ear on the door, but before he can do so, Aoi steps in front of him and knocks on the door.
“Their time is up. I don’t want to waste ours”, he explains.
After just a couple minutes the man that beautiful voice belongs to walks out of the room. Yamato notices how his hair is white like rice, and that perks his attention. He wouldn’t mind getting to know this person.
Fuuta seems to be his fan as he excitedly asks him if he’s in some band Yamato has never heard of. Maybe they could all be friends.
Fuuta jumps from foot to foot as they all get ready to head out for their weekly practice session.
“Do you think we’ll meet Nayuta again?” he asks, to no one in particular.
Yamato looks at him, squinting his eyes, “Who is that?”
Aoi steps in, letting out a long sigh, “How many times have we told you this now. He’s the singer for Gyroaxia. You know that band we’re competing against…?”
“Ah yes, the man we met last week with the white hair. Do you think he’ll want to practice with us?”
The smaller man’s face looks dumbfounded. “Why would he…?”
“I bet we could ask him!”, Fuuta interrupts, “His band is so good, he definitely could give us some good advice”.
Aoi drags his hand on his face. He isn’t sure why he ever agreed to put up with this.
Sure enough, Yamato hears that voice again. It’s the same situation as last time, but this time he is determined to talk to the man. He might have forgotten his name once again, but that doesn’t mean he won’t try his best to make him a friend. His music advice could be really useful to them after all, as Fuuta had said.
When the man steps out, Yamato doesn’t waste any time. He offers his hand to shake and greets the man, an uncharacteristic shyness in him.
“Hello, I am Yamato Tsubaki, Fujin Rizing’s guitarist. I would like you to watch us practice”.
Out of the corner of his eye he notices Aoi’s face twisting with annoyance, but he knows there’s no reason to be annoyed. This could only be a good thing for them.
“Why the fuck would I?”
Yamato is a little startled by the other man’s loud voice, but he doesn’t let that get him down.
“Because we need help. Our music is bad, and you are good”.
Nayuta just grunts before turning away from Yamato, as the other members of Fujin Rizing complain about him calling their music bad. The guitarist ignores them, he has bigger plates of rice to fry.
“You”, he shouts out (once again forgetting that name that had been repeated to him so many times), “If you stay for our practice, I’ll pay you”.
Kohei grabs him by the shoulders, “What the hell, Yamato! We don’t have money to waste”.
Yamato shrugs him off, his attention remaining on his person of interest, who has now stopped walking.
“I’ll pay well”.
The man looks behind his shoulder at Yamato, with a cold look. He clicks his tongue and leaves.
“I want to go practice somewhere else today”.
“You know we can’t go anywhere else. It’s the easiest place for everyone to reach, especially for Miyuki and Reon with their part time jobs…
This is a weird request coming from you. Is something wrong?”, Kenta questions.
“It’s nothing important”.
Kenta stares at Nayuta a little more closely, his head tilting to the side. Nayuta just wants him to leave, but he knows that when he gets like this there’s only one thing he can do - spill the beans.
“Some kid from Fujin Rizing won’t stop asking me to watch them practice. As if I’m a tutor or some shit. He even offered me money”.
Kenta let out a light chuckle, “This is interesting. I think you should go for it”.
“ Why , though?”
“If you do it once they’ll stop bugging you. And you’re getting paid anyways”.
Nayuta sighed. He hated when Kenta was right.
Yamato struts towards the practice room, seeing Nayuta walk out. He stands in front of him and opens his mouth to make the same request he had been making for about three weeks, but he gets interrupted.
“I’ll do it. Just once”.
Yamato gasps, but the rest of Fujin Rizing standing behind him gasp even louder.
“You’re bad”.
“That’s what I said. The timing is off, Misaki always does whatever he wants and Fuuta changes up the lyrics as he likes. It’s terrible”.
Nayuta squints his eyes at Yamato, “I don’t like ad-libbing, but it’s certainly better than whatever the fuck you were doing. Are you sure you’ve picked up a guitar before today?”
“I’m still learning”, Yamato says, matter-of-factly.
“You all shouldn’t be allowed to be at LRFes. Your performance is lacking and full of mistakes. I feel embarrassed that I will have to stand on the same stage as all of you”.
Everyone goes completely silent, their mouths agape, but not Yamato. He is nodding along like he’s listening to a teacher giving his lesson.
“You’re right. We need to get on Gyroasphia’s level”.
Nayuta slams his palm on his forehead. Something is seriously wrong with this kid and, to his dismay, he has the feeling it won’t be easy to get rid of him.