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Jiro violently kicked open the door to Saburo’s room, prompting his little brother to scream and rapidly try to close seventeen different tabs.
“Hey Saburo?” Jiro whispered, quietly glancing around the room, not at all noticing what his brother was doing. “Something is definitely up with Big Bro, right?”
“Okay, one,” Saburo said, desperately trying to pull himself back from a panic attack, “never enter someone’s room without knocking, bro! Ever! Never ever! ”
“Alright, yeesh, I’m sorry,” Jiro said, scratching the back of his head. “Wait, you said ‘one’. What’s thing two?”
“Two, NEVER EVER EVER! ” Saburo took one more deep breath, and fully pulled himself down. “And three… yeah, something is definitely up with Big Bro.”
“Oh good,” Jiro said, breathing a sigh of relief. “It’s not just me.”
“Yeah, there was that thing with the shower last week…”
~~~~
As Ichiro took a shower, he was cheerfully singing to himself.
“And then I saw his face… and now I’m a believer! Without a trace… of doubt in my mind! ”
On the other side in the hallway, Saburo had his ear to the bathroom door. He silently mouthed “ What? ” with an expression confused beyond measure.
~~~~
“Yeah, that was pretty weird,” Jiro agreed. “Oh, and don’t forget that thing when he was reading manga during the heatwave!”
~~~~
As Ichiro read the newest volume of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure Part 12: Rhapsody of These Hands , he laughed to himself, thoroughly enjoying seeing Jocelyn Joestar (Stand: [UPTOWN FUNK YOU UP] ) and the new team get jumped by an elite team of Stand wielding pelicans, who all shared the Stand [BABY SHARK]. All the while, he cooled himself with an improvised fan made up of a dozen or so bills of yen.
“Damn, bro, where did you get cash like that?” Jiro asked, stuck using his hand to fan himself lest he pass out in the vicious scorching heat.
“Oh, this?” Ichiro said. “I don’t actually remember.”
“Oh. Alright, I guess.”
~~~~
“Yeah, that was the most suspicious thing he could’ve possibly said to that,” Saburo said.
“And then there was the rain thing,” Jiro said.
“We don’t talk about the rain thing, ” Saburo instantly whispered.
~~~~
Ichiro walked through the rain with a skip in his step. Passing a nearby light pole, he casually reached out and swung around it, humming to himself without a care in the world. Everyone had stopped going about their day and was staring with confusion at the improvised performance, including several cute girls and boys.
“I DON’T KNOW THIS DUDE! ” Jiro yelled as ran away as fast as humanly possible.
“HE IS A STRANGER TO US BOTH! ” Saburo added, also running as fast as his short weeb legs could carry him.
~~~~
“I will never emotionally recover from that,” Saburo said.
“So… what do you think happened to him?” Jiro asked. “I mean, he seems happy, so I guess good for him, but…”
“We can’t risk another public embarrassment like that again,” Saburo said.
“We perform on stage in front of, like, thousands, as our job… and that made me cringe,” Jiro agreed.
“Hey, now there’s a thought,” Saburo said. “Maybe he got a new job that he wants to keep secret. That would explain all the cash he’s been throwing around.”
“Huh. I solved it. I’m a genius.”
“No, dipshit, we haven’t even started solving it,” Saburo snarked. “Alright, so what has this job been doing for him?”
“Well, it’s making him sing and dance,” Jiro said. “Even on light poles.”
They both shuddered at the memory.
“It’s made him cheerful,” Saburo said. “Weirdly, uncomfortably cheerful.”
“He’s made a lot of money,” Jiro added. “Like, a lot a lot of money. Most of it in like, bills and stuff.”
“Well, what job would Big Bro want to keep secret, inspire him to sing and dance, even on poles, make him cheerful, and give him lots of bills?”
They both thought about it for a minute before looking at each other in shock, having reached the exact same conclusion at the exact same time.
“He’s a male stripper!”
“This is great! ” Saburo yelled.
“It is?” Jiro asked.
“Hell yeah it is!” Saburo exclaimed. “We need to find out where he works!”
“We do?”
“Hell yeah we do! And we need to get photographic evidence of it. Even better if we can get video and audio recording!”
“ Why?! ”
“One word, brother,” Saburo said with a smile. “Blackmail.”
“Blackmail is one word?”
“Why is that what you’re focusing on?”
“Because I didn’t know!”
“Well… now you do! So, are you in?”
“Why would we want to blackmail Big Bro though?” Jiro asked genuinely. “He’s so chill.”
“Well first of all, it’s the easiest way to make sure he never does anything cringe again,” Saburo said.
“That makes sense,” Jiro said with a sagely nod.
“Second, remember when he didn’t want to get us that PS7 because ‘money is tight ’ and ‘we have to actually eat ’ or whatever?”
“We’re going to blackmail him into getting us a PS7?!” Jiro said, suddenly very excited.
“Oh, my beloved himbo of an older brother, you are thinking way too small,” Saburo said, walking up to Jiro and putting his arm around him. He motioned to the sky (or rather, the dusty ass ceiling) in a grandiose wave as he said the words “We can blackmail him into getting us anything! ”
Jiro’s eyes lit up. He high fived his brother, and they got ready for an adventure in trying to stalk their brother to get footage of him taking his clothes off.
“Now let’s go on an adventure in trying to stalk our brother to get footage of him taking his clothes off!” Saburo yelled.
“Wow, when you say it like that, we sound like crazy people,” Jiro mused to himself.
“Meh, we’re adults,” Saburo, a noted 14 year old, said. “We can do whatever the fuck we want!”
~~~~
“Alright,” Saburo said, standing outside the massive strip club that lit up the Ikebukuro night sky. “I’m almost positive he’s in here.”
“How? Did you track his phone?” Jiro asked.
“Well, no,” Saburo admitted. “He turned his phone off. Probably because he doesn’t want me tracking him here.”
“Then how’d you figure it out?”
“Oh, it’s simple. This is the only strip club for dudes in the city that could give payouts like the ones he’s getting. He could only be here.”
“Then let’s do this,” Jiro said.
They both walked towards the entrance.
And were immediately stopped by a bouncer.
“Hey,” he growled at them. “Are you two even old to be here?”
“Of course we are,” Jiro said, before leaning over to Saburo and whispering “Are we?”
“Fuck no,” Saburo whispered back. “Obviously. But I made something just for an occasion like this.”
He pulled out two IDs.
“Yes, we are,” Saburo said. “As you can see by these very official driver’s licenses, we are Ren and Ryuji Kujo, esteemed brothers of ages 23 and 21.”
The bouncer looked at the IDs incredulously, before looking up at Saburo.
“You’re the 23 year old?”
“Naturally.”
The bouncer looked at the both of them, even more incredulous.
“You know you’re both local celebrities, right?” he said to them.
An awkward silence descended between the three of them.
“...You know, I somehow did genuinely forget that,” Saburo admitted.
“Well, since we’re basically superheroes, you’ll let us in, right?” Jiro asked.
They were promptly lifted by the backs of their collars and literally tossed into the street.
They both lay there in silence, staring up at the night sky.
“...I’m gonna kill him,” Saburo said, reaching for his Hypnosis Mic.
“Hey, nonono—!”
After a few minutes of violent struggle, Jiro managed to make Saburo stand down, if only just.
“Then what do you suggest?” Saburo finally said, newly sporting a black eye.
“Breaking and entering,” Jiro said nonchalantly, also newly sporting a black eye. “Obviously.”
“Oh yeah that makes sense. Should be easy.”
~~~~
“Who the hell puts security glass in the windows of a strip club?!” Saburo whined, he and his brother thoroughly defeated.
“This one, I guess,” Jiro said, moping.
As they were returning to the front entrance of the club, they saw the bouncer who had given them a hard time leaving.
“Oh shit,” Saburo said. “Maybe we can get in now!”
“Good luck,” the bouncer said as he had weirdly good hearing. “My replacement is an even tougher dude than me.”
“I guess we have no choice,” Saburo said.
“Lure the new guy into an alley and mic ‘em?” Jiro asked.
“Lure the new guy into an alley and mic ‘em,” Saburo confirmed.
They approached the entrance, ready to jump the new bouncer…
Only for the bouncer to turn around and reveal himself to be Rio Mason Busujima.
“Oh. It’s you two.”
“Oh, heeeeey Busujima-san!” Saburo said in a panic, both brothers stopping cold.
“Dude, what are you doing here?” Jiro asked. “Why are you bouncing for a strip club?”
“Through what he calls 'a bunch of BS', Samatoki apparently accrued a significant amount of debt,” Rio explained. “I agreed to help him out by picking up odd jobs. I saw an ad for this one, and realized I hadn't been to Ikebukuro for a while, so I took it.”
“What about the other guy on your team?” Saburo asked. “Isn't he going to help?”
~~~~
“Samatoki you stupid son of a bitch,” Jyuto said, pinching the bridge of his nose, “I am not helping you clean up a mess this idiotic.”
“Well fuck you too.”
~~~~
“I heard he was unavailable,” Rio said, casually dancing around the truth.
“Well whatever,” Saburo said. “I don't suppose you'd let us in? As a favor from one division rep to another?”
“Absolutely not.”
“But—”
“Absolutely. Not.”
Rio was firm. He would not budge.
“...We can still jump him,” Saburo whispered to Jiro.
“Nah, I got this,” Jiro whispered back. “Please, Busujima-san! It's for the sake of finding our brother— our comrade in arms!”
“You can enter,” Rio said, budging instantly.
The brothers thanked him with a bow, and high fived each other on the way in.
~~~~
“Alright, so now what?” Jiro said, taking a seat with Saburo at a cushy table. “I feel really out of place here, bro.”
“Don’t let it get in your head,” Saburo said. “Until Big Bro’s set comes on, I say we just kick back and relax.”
“Alright, I guess,” Jiro said, before glancing to a pamphlet on the table. “Oh hey, they’ve got a program.”
He picked it up and started flipping through it.
“Damn, they don’t show any faces, just silhouettes,” he said. “But… I’m not seeing anybody that looks like Big Bro.”
“Wait, what? Let me see.”
Saburo snatched it from Jiro’s hands and rapidly began flipping through it.
“What the hell? I was positive…”
They were interrupted by an announcer loudly proclaiming the next dancers.
“AND NOW, GIVE IT UP FOR OUR SPECIAL GUESTS… MATENRO! ”
“WHAT?!” Jiro and Saburo both yelled, though it was drowned out by the roar of the crowd as man and woman alike lost their minds as a doctor, a host, and an office worker who really looked like he didn’t want to be there took to the stage.
“Is every division rep except our brother here tonight?!” Saburo asked, throwing his hands up.
“Oh, hey boys!”
They both turned to the sound of the voice who called out to them.
Rei Ayamado sat with scantily clad men and women hanging off his arms, the table he was at loaded with food and drinks.
“I see you have your old man’s taste! This is the best joint in Ikebukuro by far! Anyway, I’ll talk to you later. My set’s on in half an hour.”
He stood up and left his fawning fans behind, the brother’s mouths agape as they tried to process what just happened.
“Yeah, Ichiro isn’t here,” Saburo finally said.
“Man, you say that like we needed a reason to be leaving right now,” Jiro said, already rapidly heading to the exit.
~~~~
“So that was a bust,” Saburo said, lounging miserably on a couch.
“Well, it could’ve been worse,” Jiro said.
“How? ”
“We could’ve discovered our deadbeat dad strips part-time too.”
“We did. ”
“Let me have my denial! ”
“If I have to remember it, so do you! ”
“Hey guys,” Ichiro said, suddenly walking in and making both his younger brothers scream, “what’s up?”
“UP IS A DIRECTION!” Saburo yelled in a blind panic before running to his room.
Jiro and Ichiro were left awkwardly looking at the door Saburo escaped through, and then each other.
“Not much, what’s up with you?” Jiro asked nonchalantly.
“Eh,” he replied with a shrug.
“So… what were you up to today, bro?” Jiro asked.
“Not much. I have to stop by Yokohama to—”
“YOKOHAMA?! ” Saburo yelled from the other room. “OH COME ON! ”
~~~~
“Alright,” Saburo said, standing outside the biggest strip club in Yokohama the next night, “for real this time.”
“For real this time,” Jiro agreed.
“The fuck are you two twerps doing here?”
If the two had any emotional energy left, they would’ve screamed at how Samatoki seemingly just teleported behind them. But they didn’t, so they just kinda sighed.
“Hey, Aohitsuga-san,” Saburo said. “We’re on a mission here.”
“A mission.” Samatoki looked at the judgementally. “To a strip club?”
“Yeah,” Jiro said with a defeated look. “We’re looking for Big Bro. Have you seen him around?”
Samatoki froze. It was only for an instant, but Jiro and Saburo saw it.
“That little bitch? Nah.”
He turned and walked away. Jiro and Saburo shared a brief, revelatory look with each other.
“He knows where he is?!”
“He knows where he is! ”
The plan immediately pivoted to stalking Samatoki, which let’s be honest, doesn’t sound all that much better.
~~~~
Samatoki glanced back over his shoulder to make sure he wasn’t being followed. Satisfied that there was no one behind him, he stepped out on to the wharf, where Ichiro Yamada was waiting, looking out into the bay.
“It’s about time,” Ichiro said with a smile. “I was starting to think you stood me up.”
“Aw, shut up. That was one fucking time, and I had been fucking kidnapped by the local branch of the Korean Mafia.”
“Every time you tell me some shit about your life, you sound more and more like a video game character,” Ichiro said with a laugh. Samatoki chuckled a little too, lighting up a cigarette.
“Heh. Maybe.”
They shared a quiet moment looking out at the bay, Yokohama’s iconic ferris wheel lighting the water in a muted rainbow.
“I ran into your brothers earlier,” Samatoki said in between drags.
“Really?” Ichiro said. “What were they doing?”
“Looking for you. I think they think you’re a stripper.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
There was a moment of quiet before they both cracked and started laughing.
“I don’t know what the hell to do with those two sometimes,” Ichiro said.
“Don’t get all mopey on me, you’re doing fine. I honestly think some of my men could take after your brothers.”
“Thanks, man. But don’t ever let one of them hear you say it. It would go to their heads So. Fast. ”
Halfway across town, Jiro and Saburo, who were watching the events from a small remote controlled drone, high fived.
“Wait— do you hear that?” Samatoki asked.
Jiro and Saburo froze.
“...Propeller blades?” Ichiro said, focusing in on the sound.
“Hey, there it is!” Samatoki said, pointing up at the drone’s camera, and by extension directly at Jiro and Saburo.
“We’re made! ” Saburo yelled.
“Get out of there! ” Jiro yelled.
But before the drone could escape, a rock thrown by Samatoki struck the propellers, and it went crashing to the ground. Ichiro ran over to it and picked it up, examining it closely.
“Hold on… I recognize this design…”
“Oh crap,” Jiro whispered.
“SABUROOOOOOOOOOOO!!! ”
“We should go,” Jiro said. “Like, right now.”
“Don’t worry dude,” Saburo said, folding up his laptop. “They don’t know where we are, and that gives us plausible deniability. If we get home as quickly as possible, we can get out of this.”
“Are you sure about that?” Samatoki asked from right behind them.
This time, the brothers did scream.
“HOW DID YOU EVEN DO THAT?! ” Saburo cried out.
“Yeah actually,” Ichiro said, looking around. “How did we do that?”
“Fast travel,” Samatoki said with deathly seriousness.
“Oh damn,” Jiro said. “Can we do that?”
Samatoki put his hands on the boys’ shoulders.
“You can’t fast travel while there are enemies nearby,” he said with murder in his eyes.
Jiro and Saburo gulped in fear.
~~~~
“So you two really did think I was a stripper?” Ichiro said to his brothers, both of whom were currently duct taped to chairs under bright lights in an abandoned warehouse.
“Well, you wouldn’t tell us what you were actually doing!” Saburo desperately said in his defense.
“You never asked!” Ichiro shot back with exasperation.
“You said you didn’t remember where you got the money!” Saburo said.
“The money…? What are you— oh, right, the money. In my defense, I genuinely forgot I had gotten it by beating Samatoki at poker so bad he had to take out a huge loan in his gang’s name.”
Samatoki groaned, having really preferred that detail not get out.
“Yeah, so we’re totally cool with Aohitsugi-san being your sugar daddy,” Jiro said, “so will you let us go?”
“His what? ” Samatoki snarled, prompting Ichiro to hold him back from doing something unspeakable to the two.
“EEP!” Saburo shrieked.
“WE’RE SORRY WE’RE SORRY! ” Jiro desperately yelled.
Samatoki sighed.
“They’re your brothers,” he said, lighting up another smoke. “What are we doing with ‘em? Forced yubitsume? Cement shoes? Please, please let me throw your brothers into the bay.”
“No! Obviously!” Ichiro said.
“Holy shit what do you see in this guy?” Saburo asked in pure terror.
“What do I see in him?” Ichiro said, genuinely unprepared for the question. “Damn, you ask the hard hitting stuff when you're scared out of your damn mind. Hey, both of you, what’s your favorite color?”
“Uhh… blue.”
“Yellow. Why?”
“Alright. Now imagine the world without that color. It’s a little more boring, but it’s not that it would make the biggest difference to you, right? If you had never seen it before, you wouldn’t know what you’re missing. But if you can see it after that… it’s everywhere. It’s beautiful. A small thing that changes everything. Falling in love is like seeing a color for the first time.”
Samatoki was genuinely taken aback, as were Saburo and Jiro.
“Big Bro…” Saburo said.
“Damn dude… that was gay as fuck,” Jiro said in quiet, sincerely impressed awe.
“It sure was, bro,” Ichiro said, patting his brothers on the shoulders. “It sure was.”
“Well, let’s get out of here,” Samatoki said, subtly wiping his eye a bit. “Can’t stand this sappy shit.”
“Heh. Alright. How do you feel about ramen?”
“Hell yeah.”
They both turned to leave.
“Hey, uh…” Jiro said. “What about us?”
“Yeah, you’re not just… gonna leave us duct taped to chairs inside an abandoned warehouse, right?” Saburo said.
“Of course that’s not just what we’re going to do,” Ichiro said.
“Oh thank god,” Saburo said. “Because like, this is definitely a ‘second location’, and you wouldn’t leave us at a terrifying second lo—”
“We’re gonna turn the lights off first,” Ichiro continued.
“What?”
Samatoki flipped the lightswitch, and Jiro and Saburo screamed again.
“Don’t worry, we’ll come back for you eventually,” Ichiro said. “Probably. Anyway, have fun guys, and don’t worry about the rats, only a few of them have a taste for human flesh. Later!”
Ichiro and Samatoki walked out, locking the door behind them.
The remaining brothers sat in silence for a moment.
“...I wish he had just been a stripper,” Saburo said.
“Word,” Jiro concluded.