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It should have been the end.
When that weird purple haired guy had given Touma his card, he was going to accept the offer that came with it. It wasn’t like he’d been wrong about the way TRIGGER had gone about things with their flashy promotions and huge agency backing them up. If he was going to be a loser, it might as well be a loser with money and an agency backing him up.
He still had the skill, even if the passion was gone, and with NO_MAD disbanded…
“You know, Touma, even if your group has disbanded, you still made me so happy with your singing.” His mother smiles ruefully into the distance, and she doesn’t even notice that Touma sees that happy but slightly nostalgic aura to it. “I’m sorry they left you like that. It’s a shame they won’t let you keep at it alone.”
“Keep at it alone…”
It took a little time and some persuasion, but in the end, the production company NO_MAD had worked underneath had let him keep the rights to the songs and the names. Touma suspected it was his old manager’s doing—maybe guilt or obligation or whatever.
He wouldn’t forgive his old manager for abandoning them, abandoning him, but he would be grateful for this.
Smile for the audience. Even though the fans abandoned you, there’s still some who showed up, he tells himself, putting on one of the old outfits from NO_MAD’s better days.
He waves at the audience, who look unsure and curious.
They’re probably here to see why NO_MAD is still here. After all, we were supposed to disband and then suddenly, I managed to find a venue for a small live.
Though, if this didn’t generate some more revenue, he might as well disband it anyway. Thank the acting school that he’d managed to figure out how to navigate the colder world of business dealings and management. And thank his grandparents and mom for supporting him continuing this final grab at a fantasy.
But at least things couldn’t get colder from there.
“Hello, everyone,” he yells at the audience, smiling but not quite managing to make it reach his eyes. “First of all, thank you for coming! I’m not much for words, but I can at least say that I’m very grateful you came!”
He tries another smile, and this one—to his surprise—warms his heart.
Maybe he is grateful for the people that showed up today. Even if they came out of curiosity or vindictiveness or to laugh at him, at least they saved him from debt.
“I’m sure you’re curious about why it’s only me up here,” Touma continues, clearing his throat and not quite managing to hide the sadness. “Again, I’m not much for words, and there were many personal reasons behind this decision. Just…”
Can he say these next words?
“Just know that my three friends are here with me on stage! And, more importantly, that they also are cheering for you, grateful that you’re here to see NO_MAD continue and survive!”
He can say it, after all.
All those lies.
But that’s what this industry is built upon anyway. Skill and talent and passion didn’t matter in the end, did they? It was all about the money, about having the right production agency to back you, about having the revenue to buy skilled advertisers and tempt good sponsors.
“I know it won’t be the same. I know I may not be enough to complete NO_MAD. I know you’re sad that the other members have to leave, but it’s…”
It’s not okay…
“Everything is okay! Because I want to keep singing for anyone who wants to hear me!” Touma isn’t speaking to the audience now. He looks at his parents and grandparents, sitting in special seats reserved for them.
In the span of a second, he’s thrown back into the body of his childhood self, singing a song for his mother and grandparents and having them clap in delight over his wobbly tunes. They tell him that he’s just like an idol, that he sang and made them happy.
Even if tonight really marks the end of NO_MAD on stage, he can still make his family happy.
“I want to keep singing!” he repeats, like a declaration of war against this industry of lies.
But he’s not an idol anymore, not officially anyway. He’s an indie artist, and one with a lot less restrictions than that.
His grin now is more twisted, a little bitter, a little reckless.
“I’ll show you punks what I’ve got!”
…………
“My, my, isn’t that the dog that Ryo-san wanted to leash?”
Minami lounges in front of the TV, not doing much of anything but waiting for his turn at the live. Next to him, Haruka is playing some game on his phone while Torao is idly texting away—probably sending messages to some poor unfortunate woman cursed with his existence.
“Hm?” is Haruka’s inattentive grunt, at least before he gives out a whine of frustration and deigns to look up at the big screen they’re supposed to be watching together.
Minami notes with amusement how his eyes grow wide.
“Woah! He wanted Inumaru Touma from NO_MAD to join ZOOL?” Haruka exclaims, standing up suddenly despite having nowhere to go. He then catches the looks from his two teammates and sinks back down. “Bah, we wouldn’t have needed him anyway. I’m good enough as a centre and Minami’s good enough a leader for us!”
“Thank you, Isumi-san.”
The high schooler shoots a look of irritation at him. “That wasn’t a compliment. I’m just saying we don’t need a loser solo idol to crush TRIGGER!”
“Looks like that loser’s doing well, though,” Torao says, his voice as neutral as someone who sounds like they’re constantly trying to seduce you can be. “Apparently, he’s rebuilt NO_MAD all by himself. A pretty good production company also signed him on just three weeks ago, too, so he’s been making more TV appearances.”
“Jealous?”
Torao shoots Minami a somewhat dirty side-glance. “No, why would I be? He’s just like all those other idols Ryo-san hates for some reason. Only a matter of time before he’s burned. It’s not like he’s that famous anyway. He’s just got a really protective fanbase.”
“Our time will come,” Haruka breaks him, sitting up straight and glaring at Inumaru Touma’s smiling face. “And Inumaru Touma will fall just like everyone else. He’ll be just another idol to add over TRIGGER’s graveyard.”
…………
“What do you mean we can’t rejoin NO_MAD?!” Hiroto shouts.
Touma flinches, feeling the words of the blow despite having already looked away from his teammates’ faces.
“I’m sorry…I tried to tell them that people would love to see us together but…they said no.”
What his new manager had actually said was that NO_MAD’s image as a solo idol was more appealing than it had been as a group effort.
At first, Touma had been happy to hear those words, his resentment against his former teammates for abandoning him jumping at them. And then…came the memories.
Them starting NO_MAD, performing small lives in bars and cafes, getting scouted by an agency, their debut, their Black or White win…the way they had tried to keep it going and then…
And then they’d left him.
Before, they had done everything together. He wouldn’t be here alone if they hadn’t started this group with him. But he wouldn’t be here alone if they hadn’t abandoned him when things had become hard.
Right now, though? All he wanted was for them to be back together again, and once again his hands were bound by an agency’s whims.
“I’m sorry…” Touma repeats when they don’t respond.
But they’re already leaving. “Forget it,” Hiroto mutters, jerking back as if pushed away. “Guess the fame got to you, in the end, and you don’t want your friends anymore to get in the way,” he leaves as a parting blow.
“That’s not—” And they’re gone.
He stands there behind the sets of a new TV show he’s supposed to be a prominent supporting character of, trying to find a way to say what he wants to say.
But words weren’t his strong suit, and his manager finds him like this.
“You good, Touma-kun?” they ask him in their brisk way, holding out a water bottle.
Touma tries to say something honest, but…
“I’m fine.”
Well, this is an industry of lies.
What’s one more said to another liar? What’s another lie to an industry that had lied to him?
His producers who had lied. His managers who had lied. His groupmates who had lied. The fans who had lied and then abandoned him…
…while a lot of them hadn’t either. And there were also so many who had cheered him on when he’d restarted NO_MAD from the dirt.
Money and power and connections still mattered too much—he couldn’t get into the league of groups like TRIGGER or Re:vale or even IDOLiSH7. But…the passion he had, the fans, and the smiles of the family members who attended his concerts when they could? They still mattered…
“You know, they’re wrong.”
Touma finally looks up, straight into the soul-piercing eyes of his new manager. “What…?”
They shrug and end up tossing him the bottle of water, which he catches instinctively. “I couldn’t help hearing some of the stuff the old NO_MAD members said,” they explain, crossing their arms. “And they’re wrong. You didn’t abandon your friends. They abandoned you and came crawling back when you started succeeding again. People like that will just abandon you again when things get hard.”
“And you won’t?”
Ah. That came out a little ruder than he intended.
His manager hums thoughtfully, actually considering the question. “Who knows. Maybe. It depends on how much I end up liking you,” they answer with surprisingly brutal honesty, then grin at his open shock. “Don’t look like that. I still have my career to think about, after all, but so do you. Friendships are all nice, and I admire your interactions with the fans, but I’m here to make the cold and cruel decisions for you. So don’t worry and just keep being yourself, okay?”
“Uh…”
“Come on.” His manager beckons him to come with her before Touma can properly process that. “The director wants to talk to you about the next scene. No more dawdling!”
Touma’s a bit stunned and robotically follows them back to where the other actors and showrunners are. He’s still processing the words until the director starts talking, in which case his attention is caught fully by her.
Maybe…it’s a lie. But maybe I can still believe in that lie in my own way…
It’s not ideal. Far from it, in fact.
He still has a production company who would drop him once he starts failing to give more than he takes. And his manager had been brutally honest about the nature of this industry and their relationship.
Still. I think they’re protecting me in their own way, Touma muses. They make difficult decisions I could never make, so I can still feel like I would have invited my old friends back.
Would he have? Or would he have not?
His heart screams that he would have. But it also reminds me that he was about ready to give up on everything and join that creepy purple-haired guy in destroying idols or something.
Touma just wants to sing, make his mom and grandparents and people like them smile like he’d always wanted to. He wishes money and prestige didn’t matter so much, but they weren’t so bad, what with the way he could support the family that had always supported him and the fact that there were fans who remained so loyal to NO_MAD—to him.
They might abandon him again, but…he couldn’t call their love fake, as much as he couldn’t call the love his friends had for music and performing back when they had started NO_MAD fake.
All of this is not ideal. Far from it.
But he can work with that.
It’s a little lonely, sure, but that’s nothing he can’t handle.
After all, he’s Inumaru Touma of NO_MAD.