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'NEW. Unofficial Vivid Bad Squad, photo shoot specific nuis blind boxes. GET YOURS TODAY!' That was the advertisement that had caught Toya's eye earlier. He knew their popularity had grown exponentially ever since Rad Blast, but he never thought they'd get to the point where people were making plushies of them. It was strange, seeing a little mini you in stuffed animal form. They had truly thought of everything, even down to the little mole beneath his eye, and the freckles that Akito had. Not only that but the creators hadn't seemed to cheap out on materials either, they seemed fairly good quality for the price they were asking for them.
Even if these plushies were just a quick cash grab, it was clear the artists had worked hard to make sure you got the most for your money. It was safe to say that Toya wanted one. The only issue was, they were blind boxes meaning that there was no way to guarantee he would get what he wanted. He had never been all to fond of blind boxes or gacha mechanics, sure, he loved claw machines, but those were far different from blind boxes in his eyes. Where as for claw machines, a level of skill went into securing the prize you wanted, for these, it was all just sheer luck.
He hated the idea of wasting money on something that he might already own, and being let down upon seeing what he got. He liked being in control of how he spent his money, he liked know what he was buying. Still, those plushies were really cute, and they weren't entirely blind either. While he couldn't guarantee the outfit he would get wasn't one he already owned, he was able to choose which member of their group he wanted. They had probably done that knowing that if they had made it completely random, no one would buy them.
A smart tactic, really, because even Toya had to admit that if they were completely random he wouldn't have even considered buying them. Still, he wondered if he truly had the time, energy and funds to commit to starting a collection of these. They were around 1500 yen ($10), which honestly wasn't to expensive, and was manageable thanks to both the allowance he got from his dad and his part time job, he was able to afford a hundred of these if he so chose to.
"They are really cute." Toya would mumble to himself as he scrolled through the artist's webpage, they had a list of every single outfit that was possible within the boxes. They had everything from their normal every day outfit, to even the new years photo shoot they had done earlier that year. His resolve was breaking the more he looked at them, he wanted these so so badly, but it was such a huge commitment.
It didn't take long for his resolve to completely shatter one day as the artist reached out to them asking if they could sponsor them. They would give them 150000 yen ($1000) in exchange for them reviewing the plushies on their Instagram. This was the perfect excuse for him to start his collection, the only problem? They had only agreed to send them 1 of each member, so that they would all have a miniature version of them. That was an issue, Toya was in no way interested in starting a collection of himself, he wanted to start and Akito collection.
In his eyes the Akito nuis were the cutest thing in the world, however he would never imagine forcing his partner to hand his plushie over, so he had to settle with only having his own for now. While he was kind of bummed out about it, it wasn't exactly the worst thing in the world, his plushie was cute to, he had to admit. With the inclusion of 150000 yen, their group had graciously accepted the outfit, and within a day their plushies had finally arrived. They had set the address to Ken's cafe so that they could all open them together.
VIVID GAY SQUAD
An Shiraishi
AHHHHH they've finally arrived!
You guys wanna come over after school
to open them together?????
Kohane Azusawa
Wait, already?! That was fast!!
I'd love to come check them out.
Akito Shinonome
wow.. that was.. fast
they were desperate for a shout out
Toya Aoyagi
They're already there???
I'd love to come over so we can all open
them together as a team !
An Shiraishi
Great! come over around 4.
no new messages.
As the school day came and went, Toya met up with Akito at the school gate just like always, except instead of heading towards Akito's house like usual, they headed towards Ken's cafe. "Are you excited for the plushies?" Toya asked him with a smile.
He only received a small shrug in return, "Eh, I've never really been much of a plushie person. Most of the one's I own are from you and your obsession with claw machines." he chuckled as he teased his partner. "Not like I need anymore stuffed animals, you've given me enough for a life time."
"You keep them?" Toya asked in confusion, eyes widening slightly, he had given Akito all of those plushies to give to Ena, he never expected that his 'bad boy' partner would end up keeping some of them for himself. It was true that most of the plushies he won, he had ended up giving to Akito, telling him to hand them off to Ena. So to hear his partner kept some came as a surprise.
Akito went silent for a moment before shrugging again, "Well.. they're a gift from you, and of course I can't let Ena hog all of them, I deserve some to." he pouted slightly, causing Toya to release a small chuckle, ah, of course Akito had somehow made plushie owning into a competition with Ena.
Toya didn't necessarily play claw machines for the prizes, he played for the fun of it, he liked deducing which path was the best to take in order to get what he wanted. That's what he found fun about claw machines, winning the prize was more worth it than the prize itself. The main reason he didn't keep most of the prizes was because of his father, his father was a very modern, boring traditional type of person. He hated any splash of color in his house and thought it looked tacky and ugly, that also included stuffed animals so he usually wasn't allowed to own any.
So he always gave them to Akito assuming that either Ena would like them, or would end up giving them to Mizuki, either way they went to a loving home. He never would have imagined Akito would keep some for himself.
As the two finally arrived at the cafe, Akito opened the door. "Knock, Knock." he said as he entered the place, as usual Ken had graciously closed the shop for a while until they were done using it for what they needed. An & Kohane were at the corner booth fawning over something.
"Awwww, they're adorable!" Kohane exclaimed as she held her plushie up to her face. "Look at yours An1" she said excitedly as she grabbed An's out of the box and handed it to her.
"It's me! but i think yours is way cuter.~" she teased as she held up her An plushie against Kohane's plushie. Judging by the outfits, they seemed to have only sent their usual, every day outfits. Toya expected as much, there's no way they'd send them one of the rarer ones.
As the boys approached, they peaked into the box and saw their plushies at the very bottom. "Hey, what happened to waitin'?" Akito asked as hew pulled his plushie out of the box, they had agreed to open them all together and yet the girls had taken it upon themselves to open it alone.
"Ah.. sorry Akito, you two were taking so long and we couldn't wait to see them." she said with an apologetic smile plastered on her face, Akito doubted they were waiting for long. All of them except Kohane literally attended the same school, how could they have been possibly waiting for long? Then again, Akito had noticed that An immediately bolted out of class the moment the bell rung.
"No worries Shiraishi." Toya said as he finally grabbed his plushie and examined it, they really had gotten every single detail about him correct. It was kind of uncanny holding a smaller version of him that could literally fit in the middle of his palm. Toya's eyes silently drifted over to Akito's plushie, sure his was cute, but that was the plushie he really wanted. They had captured his partners appearance so well, they had gotten everything just right about him.
Akito was silently examining his plushie with a somewhat confused but also fascinated expression on his face, eventually his eyes met Toya's, and he immediately understood what he wanted. He would know that look anywhere, that was his 'I want something, but I don't want to impose' look. He recognized it because he had actually used that look with Ken once before when he requested another cup of coffee, but Ken had cut him off because he'd already had 4 that day. It kind of made him look like a sad cat in a way, even if Toya didn't know he was doing it. Most wouldn't notice because it was such a subtle change, but Akito could tell when the down curve of his mouth was just a little to far down, when his eyes were slanted a little, his eyebrows furrowing slightly, he could just tell.
"You want it?" Akito asked as he handed the plushie to Toya, which caused Toya's eyes to widen slightly at the sudden offer.
"Akito— I, No. It's yours, you should keep it." Toya said with a shake of the head as he rejected the offer.
"C'mon, I know you want it." Akito chuckled as he pressed his plushie to Toya's face, teasing him a little about just how much he wanted that plushie. "Dude. Just take it."
Toya was silent for a moment before sighing and putting down his own plushie, as he took Akito's. He looked at it and softly smiled. It was adorable, it really was. "Are you sure?" he asked.
"Considering how happy it clearly makes you, of course I'm sure." he said as he picked up the Toya plushie he had discarded on the table. "Yours is cuter anyways…" he mumbled softly as he ran his thumb along the little mole beneath the plushies eye.
The girls chuckled before exchange their own plushies with each other, it was just like them to all prefer their partners plushies over their own. That's the kind of bond they had.
"AH! Right, the sponsorship." An exclaimed as she pulled out her phone, they had almost completely forgotten why they had even gotten these plushies to begin with. She set up her phone against a napkin holder and backed up slightly. They hadn't rehearsed this before hand, but who cared? The company just wanted to be promoted, they didn't care how.
She then pressed play as she started talking in this really high pitched influencey type of voice. "Heyyyyy everyone. We just wanted to hop on here to show you guys these plushies. BloomBebe, the ones behind these beautiful creations have graciously sponsored us. They sent us a free package and asked us to share it with you guys. We received the original outfit nui's, isn't Kohane's just adorable?? Look at her little overall dress." she cooed as she fawned over the Kohane doll.
"An—" Kohane started as a small blush started to form, she held her An plushie tightly as she held it up to the camera. "I think An's is the cutest. Look, they even got the blue tint in her hair right, and the stars! I would gladly buy more of these."
Toya stayed silent for a moment as he played with his Akito plushie, messing with the hair sticking out, touching it's little nose. He was truly infatuated with the thing. An elbowed him to get his attention and whispered, "Hey, say something…"
"Huh? Oh—" he cleared his throat as he held up the plushie. "I think they're amazing quality for the price. They managed to get every single little detail about us and our outfit's right. Even down to the little freckles on Akito, look…" he held the plushie closer to the camera ass he smiled softly, he was truly happy with now being the rightful owner of this Akito Nui.
It was then Akito's turn to speak as he held up the Toya plushie, "I like them. but someone clearly likes them more than the rest of us." he said teasingly as he elbowed Toya slightly who had gone back to paying attention to the Akito plushie, basically tuning out the entire world around him. "Overall. I think if you're interested in this type of thing, it's a good use of your money. It might be fun to try and collect them all. Thanks to BloomBebe for sponsoring us." he said as he ended the video and posted it on their instagram with the caption. "Opening the BloomBebe nuis, SPONSORED!".
"Ah,,, now that that's through." he said as he stuck the Toya plushie into his pocket, it was getting a bit late and they had spent so long messing around with these plushies, they had forgotten all about practice, well, they'd just skip it today, the other three members seemed to be preoccupied anyways. "I'm heading off, ya'll enjoy." he said as he turned to leave. It wasn't that he wasn't interested in the plushies, more that he didn't want to show his interest in front of the others. Honestly, he was kinda glad that Toya wanted to switch as badly as he did, he found Toya's to be leagues cuter than his.
He didn't plan on collecting them, but he would gladly put this one next to his desk lamp. A little perch for the little boy to see the world, who knows, if Akito had the money, he might get him a friend one day. Wait— no, no, he couldn't let himself fall into the blind box trap. One was enough, he had to tell himself to avoid wasting all of his hard earned cash on stupid little stuffed animals.
It took a moment, but Toya finally came to and realized that Akito was gone, he had been so engrossed int taking selfies with the miniature Akito, he had forgotten about the real Akito. Toya felt apologetic as he quickly pulled out his phone and texted a quick apology about how distracted he was, to which Akito had simply said it was fine.
After a few moments, he waved goodbye to the girls and headed towards home, he was lucky that these were basically the size of his palm. Unlike the ones he won with the claw machine, these would be easy to hide from his father. He could make a mini Akito shine in his desk draw if he wanted to, it might be fun to collect them and give any left duplicates he got to Akito.
As Toya arrived at home, he greeted his father before immediately heading upstairs and hopping onto his laptop. He pulled up the website and selected Akito as the character he wanted to receive. He counted and they had about 10 outfits available for him, so Toya decided to just buy around 35 up front, of course there was no guarantee that he would end up getting all 10, but buying so many improved his odds greatly, right? Without a second thought, he put in his card information and brought them, once again using Ken's cafe as an address, worried he might get scolded by his father for wasting money on 'such useless products.'
He quickly texted Ken about the situation to which Ken didn't seem to mind, thankfully, and he asked that he keep this a secret from An and especially Akito. He didn't need his team members to know how infatuated he really was with these things. Toya placed his order and headed for bed, their shipping was very speedy, He had originally thought it was a one time thing, simply because they wanted to make a good first impression on those they were sponsoring, but seems their shipping really was just that fast.
After placing the order, Toya headed for bed, he'd pick up his package after practice. He'd just ask Ken to hide it in the back room for the time being. Night came and went as his routine for the day remained the same. He walked to school with Akito, focused during class, or at the very least TRIED to focus, and then walked towards vivid street with Akito.
They talked about anything and everything as they arrived at their meeting spot and headed for sekai, 'God. This is going to be the longest practice of my life' Toya thought to himself. He wanted to open his package now, but he knew it would have to wait until after wards. Akito seemed to notice a change in his partners attitude while they were practicing, so he called for a 5 minute break and went to talk to him.
Toya was at the vending machine grabbing a couple of waters for the both of them when Akito came up behind him, "Dude, whats with you today?" he asked as he leaned against the wall beside the machine.
Toya gave him a genuinely confused look as he handed him the water and shrugged, he unscrewed the cap of his own bottle and looked at his partner. "What do you mean?" he asked.
"You seem… distracted today. Not in a bad way, but as if you can't wait for practice to be over, somethings up.. I know you." Akito said, eyes narrowing. "You always know you can tell me anything."
Toya feigned innocent again as he just shrugged his shoulders and drank from his bottle. "I know, I promise I'm fine. Lets finish so we can go home, ok?" he flashed a soft smile as he went to regroup with then girls and continue their practice session. Soon they had finished and said goodbye as they all left Sekai. They all arrived back at Ken's cafe and started to go their separate ways, but Toya didn't follow Akito like he usually did.
Upon realizing that Toya wasn't following him, he turned around and saw Toya staring at the cafe door. "You coming?" he asked.
"Ah… go on without me. I need to talk to Ken about something.. I'll see you tomorrow, Akito." he smiled softly before disappearing into the cafe. Leaving Akito to wonder what all that was about.
Toya headed for the bar, to which Ken smiled and went to grab his package from the back room. He handed it to Toya as Toya thanked him and left the cafe. He was about halfway home when he felt an arm sling itself around his shoulders. "Gotcha." a familiar voice said as a mop of ginger hair peaked over his shoulder.
"Whatcha got there?" the voice he now knew belonged to Akito said. "I knew you were hiding something from me, but the question is… what?" he asked curiously.
Toya sighed, he knew he was caught and there was no use hiding it anymore, not like it'd do him any good. Akito would just keep pestering him until he told him. "Follow me." he mumbled as they headed towards the park. There was no way he could sneak BOTH Akito and this big old box into the house, so he had already planned on opening it up at the park, originally.
As they arrived at the park, Toya sat on a bench and put the box next to him, he pulled out his house keys to use as a makeshift knife as he opened the box. Upon opening the box, he saw stacks upon stacks of Akito blind box plushies.
Akito peaked inside and his eyes widened, "Jesus, dude. How many did you buy?"
"35."
Akito's eyes practically popped out of his head upon hearing that number, "3…35?" he repeated as he watched Toya started to pull out some of the boxes.
"Mhm." he mumbled , "I want the full collection and this will greatly improve my odds. Any extra I'll either give to you or we could do a give away for our fans," he said as he started opening them, he had 35 chances to get every single one, those were good odds when there were only 10 possible choices, 1 of which he already owned.
It was embarrassing to admit but, he knew every single outfit available in the pull. Every single outfit had been a photo shoot they had done in the past, and he remembered all of them. These were the available outfits in the pack: 1. His original yellow sweatshirt he was always seen in, that was the one he had gotten from the sponsor. 2. There was also his new outfit which consisted of a white sweatshirt that said RAD and an orange jacket over the top with the words 'scorching sun' on it.
3. Another one was called 'smoldering feelings'. It consisted of Akito in a black shirt with a blue flame on the shirt, he was wearing some ripped jeans covered in chains from top to bottom. 4. They also had the outfit where they had all dressed in sports uniforms for the day, it was a photo shoot that was not meant to be taken seriously at all, he never thought that THAT outfit out of all outfits would become a plushie.
5. They of course had their outfits from when they did Rad Blast, he had expected as much considering that was the biggest moment of their life. If he ever decided to get any of the Toya's, this would definitely be the one he'd want since he was matching super well with Akito in this one. 6. They had his white knight outfit from when they did a fantasy photo shoot. 7. For some reason, they had his school uniform, out of all outfits they chose his uniform. Funny choice, but hey.. he still wanted it. 8. They had the outfit of their photo shoot as animals, when Akito had dressed up as a dog for the day. Funny that out of all animals to dress up as, he had chosen a dog.
9. They had his outfit from when they all dressed in suits for the day, including the girls. and lastly 10. They had his outfit from new years day, this was his personal favorite and the one he wanted most out of any of them. He liked the little ponytail Akito had worn that day and thought the beautiful traditional Japanese outfit really suited him.
Toya took a deep breath as he started to open each every single box he had brought. He started off good, getting a different Akito each and every single time, but then his bad luck streak started and he started to get dupe, after dupe, after dupe. A frown formed as he realized he was on his very last box and had only acquired 9 of them. Ironically, the one he hadn't managed to get yet was the one he wanted the most. He took a deep breath before opening the final box and pulling it out.
His heart broke as he pulled out school uniform Akito, he had gotten every single one except the one he wanted the most. "…that's.. OK, I can just.. try again." he said softly as he started to pile his winnings back into the box. "You're free to take the duplicates if you want, give them to friends or fans of yours."
Akito frowned, 'fans of his' but he knew no one was a bigger fan of his than Toya. He wished he could help somehow but these were blind boxes, there was no way to guarantee what you would get… unless. An idea popped into his head, a rather stupid idea, but still an idea nonetheless. He decided to email the company making a proposal.
He agreed to pay back his portion of the sponsorship money in exchange for the new years Akito plushie, was it a rather stupid move to pay back a quarter of 150000 yen back just for a 1500 yen plushie? Yes, but he couldn't get the heart-broken expression that Toya had on his face out of his head. Making his partner smile meant more to him than any amount of money, they had planned to split it 4 ways anyways, so he just paid back his half and the other 3 would still get what they were owed.
The company agreed, after all, they weren't really losing out on anything here. While they were meant to be BLIND boxes, they were making back , money through Akito's proposal, and that was always a plus for them.
Now all he had to do was wait.
Akito quickly texted Toya to make sure he didn't waste any more money on these things.
MY AIBOU <3
Akito Shinonome
hey, dont buy any more, ok?
Toya Aoyagi
What, why?
I know they're a waste of money but..
I really want it, Akito.
Akito Shinonome
Just trust me, alright?
see you tomorrow, partner.
no new messages.
Toya was left confused after the chat ended, but he did as told and decided to just trust in Akito. His partner had never steered him wrong before, so he didn't really have a reason to distrust him. Also besides, Akito had also just saved him thousands of yen as well, who knows how much he would have spent for that stupid little plush.
The next day, Akito wasn't acting any differently than usual, nor would he tell him the reason behind his message from the previous day. He simply said, "Come to my house, after school, and you'll find out." That only made him more curious as he patiently or rather impatiently waited for the day to end.
The long awaited bell finally rang as Toya went to the front gates to meet up with Akito, only to find he wasn't there. He frowned as he looked around, Akito was always the first to leave his classroom so why was he late?
A student studying by the tree near the front gates looked up, "Looking for Akito?" she asked, while she wasn't friends with either of them, she knew OF them and knew they were basically stuck together like glue. "He bolted the moment the bell rang, mumbling something about getting home."
"Ah… thank you." he said with a nod before exiting the gates and heading down the path towards Akito's place, why didn't Akito wait for him this time? He had so many questions and no answers. About 10 minutes later he arrived at the Shinonome's and knocked on the door.
The door opened and it was Ena, "Ah. Toya." she said before calling up to Akito. "Akito! Your friend's here!" she yelled up, only to receive no answer back, she tired again, yelling louder this time. She groaned, "This brat.. ignoring me." she mumbled.
"Go on up, I'm sure he won't mind." she said with a nod as she moved out of the way to let him in, Toya just nodded with a smile as he entered. He removed his shoes and put them to the side before heading up towards Akito's room.
Rat-tat-tat. He softly knocked on the door, "Akito.. it's me." he said softly. To which the door finally opened for him, Akito was standing there with a wide smile on his face as he let him in.
That caused Toya's alarm bells to go off, Akito only smiled like that when he had done something. "What did you do?…" Toya asked as he put down his bag and went to sit on the bed.
"Nothing! Nothing.." Akito said as he went over to his desk and pulled out something from the draw. "Now close your eyes and open your hands, I have something for you."
"Akito—"
"Just— trust me."
Toya sighed softly as he closed his eyes and opened his hands, he felt Akito place something into his hand. Something that felt like a wrapped birthday present of some sort.
"OK. Open your eyes."
Toya opened his eyes as he looked down at the gift in his hands, he tilted his head in confusion. "Akito, what is this?…" he asked as he examined the box , shaking it to try and determine what was in it.
"Open it." he chuckled as he sat next to Toya on he bed. His wrapping job wasn't the best, but its not like the wrappings the main attraction anyways. Toya delicately unwrapped the gift, eyes widening as he laid his eyes on a familiar looking box. "Akito, I appreciate the sentiment but… it's probably one I already own."
Akito chuckled as he shook his head, "Just open it." he had faith that it wasn't a duplicate, and besides he had actually opened the box first just to make sure that they hadn't scammed him, and sure enough it was the one he requested.
Toya sighed as he opened the box slowly and peaked inside, he froze as he saw the contents of the box, he slowly pulled out the tiny plushie. It was the Akito with the new years outfit, a huge smile formed on his face as he hugged the plushie against his chest. "Akito— how did—- how…" he asked, to which Akito just shrugged, he would never tell him what he had to do to get his hands on that plushie.
"Just knew you wanted it so…" he looked at silently, he was about to follow up his statement when he felt arms wrap around tackling him down on the the bed, as the Akito plush fell off the bed because of the impact.
"Thank you, Akito. I know this might not seem like it means much, after all it's just a plushie, but it means a lot to me. This means the world to me, I will cherish it to the end of time." Toya mumbled as he nuzzled his face into Akito's chest.
"OK.. calm down Shakespeare." he teased, "You're welcome." he looked down at Toya as he placed a hand on his head and ran his hand through his hair. This was so worth it, being able to see that smile meant more to him than any amount of money ever could.
Where these plushies meant the world to Toya.
Toya's smile meant the world to Akito.