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This place... It hasn't changed a bit.
Nene felt a small smile appear on her face as she took in the nostalgic scenery around her.
It was late into the day, and the sun was already setting, with lesser and lesser people surrounding the songstress as they headed for the exit with a bright smile on their faces.
Soon, there was little to no one but herself left in the area.
Nene looked at her phone, the sudden realisation of the time then hitting her as she read the time.
"Ah, it's already this late." Nene pocketed her phone, "I should better get going."
Nene took one more glance at the attractions around her and started walking, heading towards the sign that still had the handwritten 'Wonderstage' on it.
...
"I see you have successfully become a world star songstress, Nene." A booming voice called out from behind Nene. "However, that is still no match for the World's Greatest Star... and that is Tenma Tsukasa!"
"Hah Hah Hah Hah!" Nene spun around at the familiar voice and laughter, only to meet the once self-proclaimed troupe leader(but yet it's something the rest of them agreed on, though Nene would never admit that to his face) of WonderlandsxShowtime, posing in one of his silly idiotic but yet iconic poses, smiling confidently.
She grinned slightly, before her expressions changes into that of 'annoyance', rolling her eyes. "...Still as loud as ever."
"W-What-!?" Tsukasa, ever so dramatic, looked taken aback, one of his hands placed on his chest and the other in the air. "That is no way to talk about your leader like that!"
Nene chuckled. Tsukasa smiled too.
"How has it been, Nene?" Tsukasa half-sprinted his way over to Nene to catch up to her. "It has been a while, hasn't it?"
"It's... been good. I'm surprised to see you actually remembered to come here. You've gotten busier, with all those appearances you have on screen." Nene had her hands to her side as she walked, a gesture her younger self would have never had done. She used to always fidget with her hands in nervousness, but after years with WonderlandsxShowtime she regain her confidence, bit by bit, which helped her in her path to become what she is today.
Tsukasa seemed to have noticed the change, so he could only smile, a proud but yet gentle expression on his face.
"Ugh... You're doing that thing again. What's with that look." An exasperated look appear on Nene's face as she stared at Tsukasa.
"Huh-!?"
"But nothing much has changed here, right...?" Nene looked forward, her head held high as she once again looked at her surroundings.
"Don't just say that and change the subject-!!" Tsukasa yelled, stomping his foot, but sighed as he sees Nene smiling in reminiscent. He begun to smile still. "But yeah, nothing much has changed. Emu really did do a great job, huh?"
"She really did." The smile on Nene's face grew even wider. "Do you think she'll come today? I'm pretty sure she's quite busy too, having to manage Phoenix Wonderland and it's sister location with her brothers, after all."
"We're also busy people, y'know. I had to beg-- uh persuade, my manager to give me time off today. Even then he told me that if I did take time off, he'll have to cram everything that I was suppose to do today into tomorrow to get today's and tomorrow's schedule done and over with. Can't wait for tomorrow to come." Tsukasa hunched over, seemingly dreading how busy he would be the next day, before perking up, grinning wide from ear to ear. "But it's Emu, I'm sure she'll make time for today even if she was busy."
"Yeah... Yeah, you're right." Nene nodded her head slightly, "This wouldn't be something she'll miss."
"I am, however, more worried about Rui. He might be so engrossed in tinkering with his machines or coming up with new ideas for his shows that he ends up loosing track of time and forgetting to come here." Tsukasa's shook his head slightly. Nene opened her mouth to respond, but was interrupted by yet another familiar voice.
"Oh how you wound me so, Tsukasa! You can't possibly think so lowly of me?"
Tsukasa quickly turned to face the sudden voice of the speaker, even before he had finished speaking his sentence, as soon as he heard his voice.
Nene took a step back due to shock from the immediate reaction of Tsukasa, before meeting her eyes with the yellow sharp eyes of their friend, their once(and still is, in their hearts) director.
"R-Rui!?" Tsukasa sprinted back to where Nene and him had came from. Nene did so too, slowly catching up behind him.
"Fufufu Tsukasa, I didn't know you were so eager to see me." Rui had his iconic smirk on his face, the one where he is either thinking of something genius for their shows or just something to annoy Tsukasa with, his arm in a somewhat thinking position. Tsukasa tried to reply, but Rui spoke once again.
"But hello Tsukasa, Nene, how has it been?" Rui brought his arms down, one on his hip and one to his side, his smirk still on his face.
"You and Tsukasa really are still so similar..." Nene shivered slightly, pointing at Tsukasa. "He asked the same exact question."
"Is that so?" Rui chuckled, "But really, how have you guys been? We haven't managed to talk in quite some time now, I don't know what you guys have been up to. "
"...You make it sound like we've been doing something shady--" Tsukasa face scrunched up in dread, staring at Rui. He only laughed.
"I'm sure you know how I've been, our houses are still right next to each other. We're still neighbours." Nene raised an eyebrow. They have been neighbours since they were kids, and they still are, so Nene doesn't understand what Rui meant.
"That might be true, but you and I have gotten busier, so we don't have much chance to talk anymore." Rui shook his head dramatically, "My directing with Asahi and the rest has been giving me more obstacles lately and the only thing I heard from your mother is that you got casted as the female lead in an upcoming popular musical. Congratulations, by the way."
Surprised by the news, Tsukasa immediately congratulated the up and coming songstress as well. "As expected of our diva! Being the main lead of a well-known musical is a big accomplishment, so I have to congratulate you fairly as well."
His ego seemed to appear once again as he laughed, "However! I'm still aiming to be the World's Greatest Star! So I can't let you beat me. I'll get my chance to shine in the spotline once again soon. Just you wait! Hah Hah Hah Hah!"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever you say." Nene rolled her eyes, "But thank you."
Rui nodded, a sly smile on his face as he stared at Tsukasa, laughing once again. Nene couldn't help but feel that Rui still wanted Tsukasa to try out more of his seemingly dangerous equipments(but it's not, really, as Rui always made sure that its fully 100% safe before asking Tsukasa to try it), or in general to shoot Tsukasa up into the air. They really are such eccentrics. Even after all these years. Nene could not help but smile again.
Nothing much has changed, huh?
Rui interrupted her thoughts by voicing out a question the three of them shared. "Now, where's Emu? I'm surprised to see that she isn't the first one here."
"That is true, but Nene and I assumed Emu will just come by soon later."
"Oh right, she's been helping in managing Phoenix Wonderland the past few years with her brothers, hasn't she?" Rui played with the strap of his slingbag.
"Yep, she just messaged me last week about them opening up a new amusement park, but all the while keeping Phoenix Wonderland as their main attraction without it changing much at all." Nene chuckled. The nostalgia of this place with them...
She's glad.
"Well then that meant that Emu has been very busy for the past few weeks, since they're opening up another amusement park." Rui thought out loud. "But yeah, I doubt Emu would want to miss our gathering today regardless of how busy she gets."
As if on cue, a high pitched voice yelled out, followed by a set of running footsteps.
"Everybody!"
The three of them simultaneously knew who the voice belonged to, turning to meet the ever so energetic friend of theirs, her hand waving enthusiastically high up in the air.
Nene's face lit up, before getting squeezed by said friend into a tight hug with the other two members of their troupe.
"Emu! You're going to break our bones with how tight you're hugging us!" Tsukasa yelped out, trying to struggle out of the hug.
Rui laughed, grinning wide. "Don't be a spoilsport Tsukasa. Just let her have this."
"Tsukasa, Nene, Rui!" Emu never once tone down on her strength in her hug. "I missed you guys! It's been too long!"
"We missed you too Emu." Nene chuckled, again having a gentle smile on her face, before it got replaced by an expression of pain. "But please, like what Tsukasa said, please release us."
"Aye Aye!" Emu backed away from the hug, putting her hands behind her as she grinned, while the rest of them smiled back.
Tsukasa looked at the three of his closest friends in front of him, and could not help but feel a sense of pride towards the three of them, giving a wide but yet gentle smile. Emu still had a grin on her face, before noticing Tsukasa's smile and pointed at him, "Ah! Tsukasa is smiling weird!"
Both Nene and Rui quickly turned and caught just a quick sight of the gentle smile on the star's face, before it vanished. Tsukasa blinked, "H-Huh!?"
"...You were doing that face again, Tsukasa." Nene said, her tone deadpanned.
"Fufufu, I guess he still does it. I'm assuming he did it to you just now seeing as you said 'again'?" Rui chuckled, looking at Tsukasa with a sly look. A bright pink tint was increasingly growing on Tsukasa's face and the tip of his ears.
"...still?" Nene raised an eyebrow.
"Don't you remember? That's a smile that is only reserved for when Tsukasa is proud of something." Rui exposed, ignoring Tsukasa's voice of protest, his face and ears getting redder by the second. "I've seen it many times before, especially when he's with his sister, and us too if you guys never noticed."
"Uwweeeee~h!?" Emu directed her attention to Tsukasa, titlting her head, "Is that true, Tsukasa?"
Nene stayed silent before a mischievous smirk appeared on her face.
"Yeah~" Nene took this chance to join them in teasing Tsukasa, while Rui kept chuckling, "Is that true Tsukasa?"
Tsukasa stopped protesting and stood still, his head facing the ground but his face clearly red.
He slowly faced the rest of them, hiding the lower part of his face with his hand. "W-Well... I mean... Looking back at us in the past and now..."
He slowly lowered his hand, giving them an incredibly bright grin that suggest nothing but his pride towards all of them and their improvements, "We've all grown a lot since then, haven't we?"
Though he was smiling, his ears, as well as his face, were completely red as he admitted his words.
Upon hearing what Tsukasa said, the rest of them fell silent. For some reason they never expected Tsukasa to say that despite having heard him say something similar in the past. Perhaps it was the fact that they all shared the same feelings as Tsukasa did, but just never admitted it out loud like their star had done so. And so, hearing that come out from his mouth made them feel embarrassed, having their thoughts revealed by Tsukasa.
Tsukasa took a quick glance at them after hearing no response from them, and he could tell they were just as embarrassed(and speechless, probably) by the compliment as Tsukasa was from saying it. So in an attempt to not make this any more embarrassing, Tsukasa put both his hands on his hip turning his back towards them while laughing his iconic laughter out loud for the third time of the day. "Hah Hah Hah Hah-!"
His ears were still obviously red despite the lighting of the setting sun even though his back was facing the three of them.
"Now that the four of us are here, let's finally head to the Wonderstage, shall we?" Tsukasa's voice went up a pitch higher as he finished his incoherent sentence, but he still directed his head towards the direction of the Wonderstage.
The three of them nodded, still feeling mildly embarrassed, and together, the four members of WonderlandsxShowtime begun walking.
Or at least they tried to. Rui stopped them before they could take even one step forward.
"...Oh yeah," Rui coughed into his fist, stopping in his tracks, "I almost forgot."
The other members of their ex-troupe stopped and glanced at Rui, who opened his bag to seemingly find something in it.
Tsukasa sighed, his embarrassment gone, while his whole body slouched forward, "Seriously? We've been here for almost 30 minutes because we kept stopping each other by coincidences."
"I've been here for longer because I've been stopped by you, too, Tsukasa." Nene folded her arms, raising an eyebrow at Tsukasa.
The star blinked, and sighed in defeat. "...Right."
Rui searched his bag for a while longer, before taking out a familiar shape device from his bag, and played with the controls on it.
Tsukasa and Nene looked at Rui in confusion, while Emu looked at him with anticipation and curiosity, to which Rui only replied, giving a slight chuckle, "Wait for it..."
The three of them stood there in silence. Before long, the sound of something running towards them at an alarmingly high speed was heard. Tsukasa and Nene looked around alarmed and confused, but then they noticed Rui had his calm and mischievous expression on his face. It must be one of his inventions. Emu let out a yelp in surprise.
Well, it was good to know that their director has never stopped inventing.
The thing Rui had been controlling finally arrived at the scene, and begun tap-dancing as soon as it stopped in front of them.
"Nene-Robo-!?!?" The three of them had their eyes widened in shock, unable to comprehend the robot in front of the trio. Emu was the first one to have a change in expression, her mouth moving into a big 'U', "Nene-Robo!!!!!"
Tsukasa was the second. He yelled, his voice really was so loud still, face clearly mixed with confusion. "I thought you said you had to scrapped Nene-Robo-!?"
"...Yeah, I thought Nene-Robo was put out of commission for good after that incident?" Nene stood still, still unable to comprehend the robot in front of her.
Nene-Robo was apart of their troupe just as any other members of the troupe were. Rui had built Nene-Robo to allow Nene to perform without having to perform in person, and was also part of the reason and the first piece of the domino chain as to how Tsukasa had remembered his ambition to perform to make others smile again. And because of that, Rui had re-joined WonderlandsxShowtime, the name that Emu had came up with for their troupe, and gave them so many opportunities and even more memories from all those years.
But unfortunately, there had been an accident near the time where their troupe disbanded. Nene-Robo had gotten too damaged to the point that even Rui, with all his knowledge in machinery, was unable to repair her. Or at least, that was what they thought.
Rui smiled, "Nene-Robo, please explain."
"It's true that I had to be scrapped since Rui was unable to repair me after that incident. But that Rui then is different from the Rui now." Nene-Robo had similar voice to Nene, just more robotic, "The current Rui was able to fix me because he now has more knowledge that he had in the past, and so that's why I wasn't scrapped."
"Mhm, originally I was going to scrap Nene-Robo like I had said, but in the end I couldn't bear to and left her in the corner of my room. I recently found a book that had a similar problem to what Nene-Robo has and hence I manged to fix her after all these years."
Rui laughed, "And judging by the look on your faces, I'll say it's quite definitely worth it."
"T-This is amazing Rui!" Tsukasa was practically beaming, his eyes sparkling on Nene-Robo. Their director was still as amazing as he ever was. "To get Nene-Robo working so properly even after that unfortunate event... She was basically beyond repair... Rui you're amazing!"
Rui widened his eyes at the unexpected compliment, before smiling.
Nene nodded, looking at Emu jump around Nene-Robo excitedly, her cheers adding to their ever so lively surrounding. "Thank you Rui, for actually not scrapping her and fixing her as well."
Rui scratched at the back of his neck, his smile still on his face, mildly embarrassed. Yeah, guess it really was worth it.
--
"Guys, let's go to the Wonderstage." Nene interjected Emu's excitement around Nene-Robo, despite never actually making a move towards the Wonderstage. They have been in the same spot for an hour now, with all the coincidence stopping, and then Nene-Robo.
Emu stopped jumping around Nene-Robo, but her excitement was clear in her voice and body language, turning to hop close in front of Nene. "Yay Yay! Ready, set, go!"
She raised a fist high up into the air.
Tsukasa and Rui laughed at the dreamer friend of theirs. Nene did so too.
Tsukasa then clapped his hands together, before moving then onto his hip.
"Alright! Let's do our 'battlecry' before heading to the Wonderstage!"
"Oh?" Rui glanced at Tsukasa with curiosity, but could immediately understand what Tsukasa meant and thus was smirking.
"...What are you planning?" Nene backed up, face filled with uncertain over the blonde's plan. But then she remembered, and her posture shifted into something relaxed, another small smile on her face. It was still embarrassing to watch Tsukasa do all the stuff he does without feeling a tinge of embarrassment, his confidence knew no bounds, but Nene knew Tsukasa meant well. He only ever does, in his own eccentric manner.
Emu's face brights up tremendously at Tsukasa's suggestion, moving incredibly close to him, and Tsukasa had to turn his head away from the breathing ball of sunshine in front of him. Emu had her hands in front of her, slightly jumping in excitement, "You... you guys remember-?"
"Of course, why wouldn't we?" Tsukasa scratch at the back of his head, face flushed from embarrassment to have to admit, but yet even more confused as to why Emu thought they would not remember. "It might be years since we all last said it, but it's basically something that represents you, and it even influenced us all to find comfort in it too. It even became our troupe's motto of sort. Even though it was really embarrassing at the start. But anyways, the question is how can you not remember it-?"
"Tsukasa..." Emu was so happy she looked like she was about the cry. She wiped the tears threatening to fall at the corner of her eyes. Emu ran and tackled Tsukasa into a hug, "TSUKASAAAAAA!!!"
"Ah, Emu-!!!" Tsukasa tried to steady his footing, but due to the surprise of the tackle(it has been a long time since Emu last did that), he lost his footing and the two of them fell onto the ground. "Don't just tackle me like that-!?"
Nene and Rui looked at this interaction between Tsukasa and Emu, with Emu hugging Tsukasa tightly on the ground, and can only exchange glances with each other, all the while laughing.
Really, indeed nothing much has changed.
--
"Alright then, now that Emu has stopped tackling me, let's start-! You guys ready?"
"Yeah!" The three of them exclaimed. Nene-Robo gave a little short dance.
Tsukasa begun the countdown, "3... 2... 1!"
"Wonderhoy!" The four(+ one) of them cheered in unison, laughing after doing so. (Nene-Robo did another set of tap-dance as a cheer)
WonderlandsxShowtime might have ended as an official troupe and stopped making shows together at the Wonderstage, but the four members have not and will never forget about the reason why they started their troupe in the first place - and that is to bring people closer together and make them smile.
So with a smile on their faces, the four of them all walked towards the Wonderstage, the place that started it all.