Work Text:
“Can’t you have a crush on a dentist instead?”
Ken snorted before dodging the pointy elbow that jabbed at his hip. On his other side, Emma glared at her brother, her hands curling into little fists. However dainty they looked, with her pink nails and silver bracelets, he knew from experience they packed a punch. She hadn’t been raised in a dojo for nothing.
Her brother too was also a good example of power compressed in small packages.
As though he could sense his thoughts - or because of his earlier laugh - Mikey shot him a narrow-eyed look before skipping ahead of them, sandals slapping the pavement. The gaze of shoppers idling along the street flicked over him before looking away, dismissing him as they would any other teenager, completely unaware that this particular teenager was the leader of a gang two hundred strong and capable of breaking ten cement blocks with his foot.
Ken reached out to steady the arm of an elderly woman who had leaned out of Mikey’s path, her knees not quite up to the task, before he sighed. “How much further, Mikey?”
“Almost there!” He turned on his heel and began walking backwards to the chagrin of people passing them on the sidewalk.
“Stop that,” chided Emma, flushing slightly under the irritated looks.
Mikey stretched his arms to the sky, his back curling like a cat and narrowly missing a salaryman on his left, before folding them behind his head. He grinned shamelessly. “Calm down, Emma. Look, I’ll buy you a whole can of konpeito.”
“With whose money?” she grumbled, her shoulders drooping. She’d worn a sleeveless black shirt for the trip, her delicate skin pinking under the sunlight. Ken quickly looked away. “And that’s not the point.”
Undaunted, Mikey asked, “Not feeling candy today? Well, they also have boba tea.”
Oh? Ken felt slightly less irritated about the trip at the prospect of matcha boba.
“That’s not why I’m angry- and come over here!” With a huff, she grabbed her brother’s wrist and tugged him to her side. Ken dropped back to walk behind them and make more room on the sidewalk. “You’re being a nuisance to others. Watch where you’re going.”
“Who cares?” Mikey rolled his eyes.
“I do!” She took a deep breath before sharing an exasperated look over her shoulder with him. He pressed his lips together to hide a smile. “If you’ve dragged me and Draken to the other side of town just to buy your broke ass candy, I swear I’ll - “
A mulish look took over Mikey’s expression. “What?”
“I’ll - “ she paused, thinking quickly, “I’ll make curry for the rest of the week. Maybe the month! I’ll even add extra chili oil.” She smirked at the look of disgust on his face. “And don’t think you’ll be able to eat ramen instead. You finished the last packet yesterday, and I won’t pick up any more from the store this afternoon if you’re messing around.”
Mikey blanched, before glancing around with a shifty expression.
Emma snapped her fingers in his face. “Don’t you dare think of bothering Draken for food either. I know where you sleep .”
“I got it, jeez,” Mikey waved her hand away. “Besides, I can pay for myself. I’ve been saving for this.”
“You have? That’s new.” Emma shot him a look full of suspicion before a light flickered in her eyes. A smirk grew across glossy lips. “What, don’t want to look pathetic asking your little sister for money in front of this guy?”
“As if,” Mikey scoffed, but his ears reddened. “Besides, we’re here on business.”
Ken’s attention sharpened on him, his curiosity peaking. “For Toman?”
“Mm! Recruitment.”
He blinked. “You want to…recruit the guy at the candy shop.”
Mikey nodded confidently. “Yeah. He’ll be a good fit. You’ll see, Ken-chin.”
Ken digested this for several moments as they walked down the street, his cardigan soaking up the sunlight and causing sweat to drip down his back, before he sighed. He’d reserve judgment until he saw the guy - if he wasn’t Toman material, he and Mitsuya could probably convince Mikey to let it go.
Emma, on the other hand, freely shared her doubts. “You want to recruit him into your gang? He’s got a part-time job. Why would he give that up to be a delinquent?”
“He wouldn’t have to quit. He’ll just do both.”
“Both? He’s our age too, right? When’s he going to find the time?”
Mikey stared at her, confused.
“He’s got school and a part-time job,” she said, enunciating slowly as though speaking to a toddler. Mikey puffed up at her tone. “He probably works after school and then studies until midnight or something. He doesn’t have time for your nonsense.” She paused, her expression darkening as a thought occurred to her. “Unless we’re here to bully him into quitting his job.”
“Like I’d do that.”
He would. He absolutely would, to a point. Ken cleared his throat and looked away. He’d had that suspicion as well.
“Mikey, I swear to god, I will put chili oil in everything we eat for the next month . I will dye your laundry pink .”
“We’re not here for that!” He interrupted, speaking over her threats as he rubbed a hand through his hair. “I’ll figure something out. Takemitchy won’t have to quit.”
Emma examined his expression carefully before deciding he was being honest. She folded her arms across her chest. “I believe you, if only because I bet you don’t want to lose a supply of free candy.”
Ken coughed to cover his laugh. Emma glanced back at him before smiling.
“Shut up already. Oh!” Mikey straightened up, his arms falling to his sides, a hop in his step. “There it is!”
Ken followed his gaze to a corner shop at the end of the block. The sign beamed on the front of the building, bright red letters set against pastel candy images. Massive carts of candy sit below the steps leading into the store, each with a little banner proclaiming sales by the pound.
Mikey took two skips forward before freezing. He paused there for a second as they looked on, confused, before he turned and checked his appearance in the reflection of the neighboring shop.
Emma snorted immediately before covering her mouth with a hand, blushing.
Ken swallowed his laugh and tried to look as stoic as possible when Mikey shot a look back before heading forward.
He didn’t stop by the barrels of candy as Ken expected but headed for the large window on the other side of the door. As they trailed behind him, he realized it showed a view into the workshop rather than the store. Two employees were visible, one bent over the workstation closest to the glass.
Mikey let out a laugh before waving. “There he is!” He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted. “Takemitchy!”
The nearest one jumped and turned around. Bright blue eyes peered at them through the glass before he spotted Mikey. A wide grin spread over his face. He waved with one gloved hand, his gaze darting over Ken and Emma, before returning Mikey, who was leaning against the front of the store on his tiptoes, trying to see what was on the workbench.
Takemitchy stepped back so they could see. A shiny, golden goo was slowly oozing across his work bench. As they watched, he turned toward the other person in the room, another boy with red hair pressed back in a headband, and gestured. The redhead looked at them - no, at Mikey - with a mixture of resignation and humor, before nodding.
With a quick bow to his coworker, Takemitchy turned back toward them and held up his finger before he picked up two tools on the bench. They reminded Ken of scrapers that he’d use to scratch ice off their windows at the brothel. As they watched, Takemitchy used them to push and pull the molten candy back and forth across the bench mixing the yellow coloring into the sugar.
“So this is the guy,” Ken asked, just to be sure, though the sparkles in Mikey’s eyes were answer enough.
“Yep!”
Emma too was standing up on her toes, watching the process with a look of interest. “So this is how candy’s made? Kinda cool.”
It was. He wondered if they had toffee flavors for sale. Ken found himself staring, mesmerized at the folding candy and oozing colors, before he forced himself back to the job at hand.
It was difficult to know, without talking to him and feeling him out, whether this Takemitchy would make a good Toman member. Ken inspected his arms - what he could see of them from his sleeves. Tanned skin, a couple small scars. Not much in the way of bulk. At the very least, he wasn’t too out of shape or too skinny.
Still, even through a pane of glass, Ken had a sense that this was a guy who wouldn’t go out of his way to look for a fight. Which was essentially what they’d be asking him to do. He sighed and watched as the boy bundled up the small pile of molten candy in his hands. From what he’d seen so far, Ken didn’t think this was going anywhere.
Then Takemitchy molded the candy into a thick curve, turned to a hook on the wall, and began to pull. Over and over again, stretching the candy, looping it back over, until the colors blended smoothly.
The boy’s sleeves fell back into his shoulders. Thick, corded muscle appeared, his biceps bunching beneath his skin with every motion. Two thin veins rose under his forearm and across the meat of his muscle. His shoulders rolled back and forth, impossibly wide beneath the thin black shirt.
Ken’s jaw dropped.
Snickering, Mikey leaned in close and murmured, “See what I mean?”
He looked around, spotting Mikey’s smug expression before catching sight of Emma, her eyes now much rounder as she stared, nose almost pressed to the glass.
A sour taste appeared in his mouth.
Ken cleared his throat and stifled the embarrassing urge to do something with his arms - he could probably lift that barrel of candy, that’d be something harder, much more impressive than molding candy - by stuffing his hands in his pockets.
Takemitchy had moved back to the workbench with his candy and began rolling it into long shapes. He did the same to several piles of other colors: black, pink, white, and blue. All with different amounts and curved edges before packing them together into a massive roll. Again, hidden muscles appeared beneath his skin like heavy waves beneath a still ocean as he worked the candy into a smooth cylinder.
Mikey hummed beneath his breath, eyeing the scene with a glint of hunger in his eyes. Ken couldn’t tell exactly where he was looking, the candy or the boy molding it.
The other employee brought one of those scrapers back over and hovered for a minute, his eyes darting between the taffy roll, Takemitchy’s face, and the three of them beyond the window. His mouth moved, murmuring something they couldn’t hear, but the other boy flushed to his blonde hairline. Redhead laughed and slapped his shoulder before he helped haul the massive log of candy into the air.
With a pinching movement, they separated a chunk from the end and pulled the tapered side out into a long tail. Takemitchy then began to roll the candy back and forth as Redhead tugged the end before snapping sections of thin pole with a clean swipe of his scraper.
This process took several minutes, in which Takemitchy split his attention between smiling at them sheepishly from beyond the window to focusing intently on the thin bars of candy being snapped, his surprisingly thick muscles rising and bunching. Once they’d reached the end, he set the thick end piece to the side and began helping his coworker cut the candy bars into small bits, centimeters long.
Takemitchy paused, inspecting a piece before beaming. He returned eagerly to the window and held out his hand, a piece of candy between his thumb and forefinger.
They leaned in together.
Ken’s brows rose. To his left, Emma gasped.
A tiny image was printed on the face of the candy, a mischievous yellow cat with curled eyes, little black nose and whiskers, with a pink tongue sticking out.
The detail was so sharp, the outline of the cat so clear and precise, that Ken would have assumed it had been machine made if not for having stood there and watched it happen himself. Was that what that had been, all that strange packing and shaping of the different colored candy? How the hell did they do that?
Takemitchy was grinning at them, at Mikey specifically, before pointing first at the workstation where his coworker was sliding the candies into little bottles for sale, then at the front door.
Ken and Emma followed an eager Mikey into the shop, where a girl restocked the counter with the candy jars as they finished bottling. She took one look at Mikey before laughing. “I thought I saw you outside. No wonder we’ve got a fresh batch of these,” she said, shaking a jar in hand.
Emma hesitated before asking curiously, “Hello. Um, sorry, but what do you mean?”
The girl offered Emma a friendly if impish smile. Her name tag read Izumi, with purple candies around the corners. “The face.” She pointed at the cat again before gesturing at Mikey. “They look just like him.”
Ken had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from snickering. Mikey flushed, seeming both indignant and pleased with himself.
“It does!” Emma agreed after holding the piece of candy next to her brother’s face. “Wow. It matches his greedy face perfectly.”
Mikey swatted at her, like a cat swiping at a bug.
Izumi twisted the cap back on the candy and slid it across the counter. “Here, on the house.”
Mikey immediately snatched it up and tucked several candies in his mouth even as Emma tried to protest. Izumi smirked and shook her head.
“Mikey, seriously. So rude.”
“Don’t worry about it. It’s the hottest style we’ve got right now. Kids love it. We can barely keep it in stock at the end of the day.” She watched Mikey with an amused look. “The shop can afford a freebie for the guy that inspired the design. One freebie per week,” she clarified when the boy in question perked up ominously.
“Inspired the design?”
Izumi nodded as she finished refilling the shelves and closed the display case with a snap. “Hanagaki came up with it a month ago. Sano-kun’s been one of our best customers for ages now, so the shopkeeper let him run with it as a special. It’s so popular though, we’ll add it to the menu.”
“One of their best customers,” Emma repeated under her breath before smacking her brother on the back of the head. “Is this the reason why your dentist insisted on meeting with Grandpa? Why you’ve had three cavities filled this year? You’ve been coming here so much that they made candy about you ?”
Mikey rolled his eyes and stuffed another handful of his candies in his mouth. Ken reached over and held Emma’s wrists before she could enact punishment on her brother.
A bell rang behind the counter. “Mikey-kun!”
Hurrying through the door to the workshop, Takemitchy approached the counter. He’d removed his gloves and was absentmindedly massaging the area around his thumb and palm. Everything about his presence read off as harmless to Ken’s battle senses, like a blonde puppy welcoming a visitor to the house, but that glimpse of sturdy, beefy muscle flashed through his head. His battle instincts wouldn’t let him forget.
“It’s been a while,” he was saying, a little breathlessly, as he stopped across from Mikey.
“Five days,” Izumi corrected flatly.
Takemitchy flustered for a moment, “Ah, well.”
The latched window to the workshop opened. Redhead snickered, only his eyes visible above the sill. “For the guy who comes every other day, it’s been ‘a while.’”
“Akkun,” chided Takemitchy, his face flushing.
Ken held firm as Emma’s arms twitched. “You come here every other day? Seriously?” She turned a bewildered look on Ken, who swallowed dryly. “Did you know about this?”
“Not - not the details…” Now that he thought about it, Mikey’s frequent disappearances over the past couple months were more than a little suspicious. He’d assumed the other boy was just going for solo rides on his bike - which he undoubtedly was, but there’d apparently been an actual destination in mind.
Mikey ignored the both of them to slouch over the counter, his chin propped on his palm as he leaned closer to Takemitchy. “Some stuff came up, but it’s finished.” Ken’s brow rose. By ‘stuff,’ he must be referring to the new gang that had been brewing in the south, the one they’d crushed like trash and absorbed over the weekend. “Whatcha been workin’ on?”
“What indeed,” Izumi mocked from her position by the register.
Takemitchy tugged his headband into place, smiling nervously. “Well, we’ve been pretty swamped this week, but I’ve been working on a new flavor.”
Mikey grinned. “Nice! Where is it?”
“It’s not really - ready yet. Sorry,” he admitted, looking down at his hands and fidgeting.
“Eh? Takemitchy~”
Ken watched with familiar exasperation as his captain, feared all over Shibuya, draped himself over the counter and whined, his arms flopping over the sides and brushing against the other boy. At the touch, Mikey’s hands wrapped around his wrists like shackles. “We came all the way here. Took the train and everything. Don’t I deserve a reward for that effort?”
Izumi coughed, pointedly staring at the jar of candy sticking out of Mikey’s pocket that he’d been given for free, almost the moment he walked in.
Takemitchy flushed from his headband to the collar of his shirt. “The train? You didn’t ride your bike?”
“Yeah, and it was so boring,” he whined, sagging against the countertops as though seconds from passing out of hunger. “And the whole ride here, Emma was bit - “ He paused before a glint appeared in his eyes. “Oh, that’s right.” He rolled his head back up, his chin still resting on the counter. “I brought my sister and Ken-chin this time.”
Ken dropped Emma’s wrists as they turned toward him. He nodded once, his gaze flickering over each of them. “Hey. Ryuguji Ken.”
“On behalf of my family, I’m so sorry for all the trouble this idiot’s caused you,” Emma sighed.
“Don’t mind it. Like we said, he’s a valued customer.” Akkun’s lips twitched. He shared a look with Izumi before ducking behind the window for a moment. When his face reappeared, he was smothering a grin. “In more ways than one.”
Izumi nodded. “He’s at least doubled Hanagaki’s commission this quarter. We should get a picture for the wall.”
“ You two .” Takemitchy grabbed a towel from the counter and snapped it at her. His face was flushing, almost the same color as the cotton-candy pearls on display. “Stop. You’ll embarrass Mikey-kun.”
“I’m not sure that’s possible,” Izumi quipped.
“It’s not,” Ken and Emma answered immediately. She glanced at him from beneath her fringe, her lips curling.
Not the least deterred, Mikey propped his chin on his palm and heaved a sigh. “Not even a taste? Takemitchy. I’ve brought extra customers to the shop - my family even - just for a couple pieces of your candy. You don’t want to disappoint them, right?” He peered up at the other boy from beneath his lashes.
Ken stared hard at the back of his head.
“I - well - “
“Don’t let him bully you, Hanagaki-kun,” Emma cut in, her boot kicking at the back of her brother’s leg. “We’re fine with whatever’s available, like normal customers .”
If she’d hoped to give him breathing room, it’d backfired.
Mikey immediately dialed up the pout, his dark eyes looking suspiciously shiny. “Am I just a ‘normal customer’ to you?”
Takemitchy’s mouth opened, his lips moving fruitlessly for a long moment, before he stammered out, “Just a moment!” and disappeared back into the shop.
Mikey immediately dropped the sulking boyfriend act and smirked into his palm, looking pleased with himself.
“For goodness sake,” Emma grumbled, landing one last kick on his shin. “Can’t take you anywhere.”
They loitered for a few minutes, sitting down at a small table by the back door. Emma bought drinks between the handful of other customers filtering in the shop, leaning over the counter to carry on a hushed conversation with Izumi. Ken slowly sucked boba up through his straw as he watched the other boy, Akkun, wind a massive river of bright red candy around the hook in the back.
Mikey whistled under his breath, taking turns staring off into space or peering into the shadow of the back room. He shot up when Takemitchy finally appeared in the doorway carrying a box wrapped in plastic.
“Like I said, it’s not finished - the taste isn’t quite right, but - “ he paused, glancing up at Mikey before looking away bashfully, “it’d be good to get feedback on it.”
There was no need to say more. Mikey, his invitation obvious, strode forward, reached inside, and picked up a few pale balls of candy. He tossed the pieces in and asked, his voice clacking as the candy hit his teeth, “What’s the flavor?”
Strangely, Takemitchy hesitated. “... salted red bean.”
For a long moment, Mikey’s cheeks dipped inward, sucking on the candy. Then his hand returned to the box. The sides of the box. Where Takemitchy’s hands were.
To his right, Ken heard Emma let out a strangled sound.
“One handful’s not enough,” Mikey said, tugging the box - and the boy - closer until he leaned into the other boy’s space, staring intently, his voice thick with the suggestive subtext that Ken had heard countless times across the counter at the brothel.
“Sure…” Takemitchy replied breathlessly, his body carried forward as though caught in Mikey’s gravitational pull. One of the many moons revolving around the blistering giant Jupiter. “Take the whole thing.”
Mikey grinned - that savage grin that appeared, blood-smattered and sharp, at the end of a night pounding fists to bones. “I will.”
Ken watched, the familiar sense of foreboding settling in his stomach, before he stepped into Mikey’s blind spot, snapped his hand into the box, and grabbed the candy. Half a second later, he ducked away from the kick aimed at his head with pinpoint precision and lightning speed.
“ Oi! Ken-chin!” Mikey swatted at him again, reaching for the candy trapped in his fist.
Tipping his head back out of reach, he dropped them in his mouth. Sweet, nutty flavor began to dissolve onto his tongue, coating the roof of his mouth. “Yum.”
Murder in his gaze, Mikey crouched low and planted his left foot, readying himself for another kick - only for Emma to pinch his ear and yank him off balance. He yelped before shooting her an indignant look. “Emma! He started it!”
“I thought the entire point of this trip was for your family to try Hanagaki-kun’s candy,” she retorted, her fingers twisting viciously as she peered into the box. “This looks a little different from the other candy you serve.”
Ken followed her gaze. In the glass bottles along the walls and in the case, most of the candy was shaped into tiny, brightly-colored cylinders. The salted red bean were flatter and softer, more like Go stones.
“The owner doesn’t mind experimenting with new types of candy,” Takemitchy explained, tucking his hands into the pockets of his apron. “But we do mostly sell old-fashioned candy.”
“For a while there, we sold jellies,” Izumi piped up from the register. “The mess was unbelievable.”
Emma delicately put one candy in her mouth, ignoring her brother as he whined and writhed just behind her. “Mm. It’s good,” she quickly added at Takemitchy’s twitch, “Red bean’s just not my favorite. Grandpa would like it though. And this idiot, of course.”
“I can bottle up more samples for you,” Takemitchy offered shyly.
Emma beamed.
“Holding out on me, Takemitchy? Mean.” Mikey finally wrestled out of his sister’s grip and turned his back on them.
“Well, we actually do need to keep samples for other customers, Sano-kun,” Izumi drawled from the front.
“Why?”
“Unless you’ve got billions stashed somewhere, you’re not the only customer of this shop.” She smirked at him from over the register. “You’re only one of our customers - not our best customer.”
Mikey shot her a challenging glare. “And who the fuck’s that?”
“ Mikey ,” Emma hissed, elbowing him in the side.
“Takumi-san.” Izumi flipped her hair over her shoulder and sighed, her expression dreamy. “He’s always here, asking after Takemichi’s latest flavors. Sometimes even earlier than you.”
Black eyes narrowed. Ken felt a cold drip of warning slide down his back.
“He’s a representative from the local elementary schools,” Takemitchy explained, rubbing the back of his head. “They buy from the owner in bulk. He just handles the orders and tests out new flavors.”
The threat of violence in the air quickly subsided. “Oh, so he isn’t even buying for himself.” His tone made it clear what he thought about that - like a connoisseur turning his nose up at a dealer.
“Not everyone has your dedication - or stomach - to eat eight jars of candy a week.” Izumi snorted. “If we’re measuring by persona use, then the next person on the list would probably be… oh, Tanihara-san.”
Mikey’s brow rose imperiously. “How much?”
“Twelve.”
Tch .
Izumi’s mouth trembled. “She’s also eighty, with like twenty grandkids, so…”
Second place, even in this, still seemed to rankle Mikey. His chin jutted, arms clenched tight around his box of samples. “Obviously she’s not eating all of them. Even if she buys more, I still win.”
“If you say so.”
Fresh tension entered the vibe of the shop as Mikey’s temper flared.
It was little wonder that Mikey was burning through his allowance, Ken mused. Endless candy, a cute candy maker willing to bend over backwards for him, and a devilish cashier stoking his competitive nature at every turn.
“Mikey,” he intervened before they left the shop with twenty pounds worth of candy. He nodded to the clock on the wall by the shop front.
His commander followed his gaze, pouted, before rolling his shoulders back with a sigh. “Gotta run.” Mikey turned back to Takemitchy, smiling. “See you.”
Slumping, the other boy brushed his hands over his apron. “Soon?”
“Mm.”
“Text me. About what you think of the flavor,” he added, his face flushing.
“Always do!”
Ken watched the bright grin spread over Takemitchy’s face and the responding glow in Mikey’s, like shining a flashlight into a mirror.
Emma dug into her purse again for her wallet. “I’ll just get a couple jars then. For Gramps,” she empathized, with a venomous look at her brother who ignored her as he led the way out of the shop.
Outside, Ken rested his back on the wall as they waited for Emma to finish up, staring out at the busy street. “You sure you want him?”
Mikey stuffed his hands in his pockets and rocked on his feet, watching from the corner of his eye as Takemitchy returned to the back window and began folding candy alongside Akkun. “Yeah.”
“For Toman, or for yourself?"
“It’s the same thing, Ken-chin.”
It was… but it also definitely wasn’t.
Ken scratched the back of his head, his fingers catching on his braid, before he shrugged to himself. Mikey had a way of collecting people - he always had. Ken’s job was to protect the commander and marshal the troops.
He’d leave managing the inter-gang relationships to Mitsuya. Unlike some of their other acquisitions - Mucho and Kisaki, for one - Takemitchy seemed relatively harmless. Unlikely to cause waves.
(Months later, long after the sweet aftertaste had faded, he would call himself an idiot.)