Vann Akiyama was currently doing his best to disappear into his seat. Why did they have to move to Japan? Vann knew enough Japanese, so that wasn't really the problem. He had to leave his friends, his home behind. He even had a girlfriend, but they had broken up before he left. She had said that a long distance relationship just wouldn't work, and Vann agreed.
After Mom died in that car accident a few months ago, Dad had become...erratic. One day at breakfast, he, out of the blue, decided that he was moving back to Japan, and that Vann was coming with him.
He had moved to America when he was eighteen, because his Buddhist family had cut him off for his atheistic beliefs. Akiyama Naoki moved to America for a fresh start. It, however, was not the atheist's paradise he had evidently been hoping for.
In a nutshell, it sucked.
There was one bright spot, though. Janice Wilson. Vann still had no idea how the two met, they would never tell him, but he wasn't complaining about being alive.
Vann's eyes fell to the screen of the laptop his father was typing furiously away on. He wasn't even going to try and read the kanji or katakana, or whatever the writing was called. He could speak Japanese, but he sucked at reading it.
Feeling the eyes on him, Naoki glanced at his son.
"You seem...down," he said. Janice always said he had talent for stating the obvious.
"Do I?" Vann snarled. "Oh I wonder why?"
Naoki saved and closed his work. "Don't use that tone of voice with your father," he snapped, "and don't whine. This will be a great experience for you."
"No, it'll be great for you. Anyway, where are we gonna stay? Your family's not gonna have anything to do with us, and neither of us have any money."
"I have money."
"Yeah, how much?"
"¥216,000.00."
"And how much is that in dollars?"
About $1,856.00, enough for this month's utilities and a nice apartment."
Vann was about to remind him of mortgage, taxes, and ect., when the flight attendant spoke over him through the planes P.A. system.
"Attention, passengers," she said in Japanese, "please return to your seats and fasten your seat belts, we are about to land at the Rakuen City Airport."
Vann stared out the window beside his seat, fixated on the city that rested on an island, just beside the one they were about to land on. Calling the sprawling metropolis beautiful just didn't do it justice. The buildings were almost all stark white and glass, and rose almost impossibly high. From his vantage point, Vann could see the spidering streets that seemed to have no cohesive pattern whatsoever.
This was where his father had grown up?
Vann was amazed; it would take him weeks, possibly months, to learn how to find his way around this place.
As the plane began to descend, Vann leaned back into his seat, no longer interested in disappearing into it. He rested his head in his arms.
Things would pick up.
Hopefully.
---------------------------------------------
Vann had lived in smaller apartments before. Overall, the place that his father had purchased was great. They were walking distance from a small collection of stores, and like the rest Rakuen, anything more illegal then jaywalking was all but unheard of.
The apartment was pre-furnished, which was good.
Vann made himself comfortable on the fluffy couch. He had tried watching T.V., but didn't find anything interesting. Vann began to wish he had his PS3. He had put it in his suite case, but his luggage had apparently not made it onto the flight, so he planned to try and pick it up, hopefully tomorrow.
He was halfway through 'The Last of Us', and the suspense was killing him! Maybe he'd look into the Wii U to sate his video game needs for now. He was in Japan, so why not?
Vann sighed. His father was discussing rent with their landlord. In Vann's experience, rent usually wasn't negotiable. He stood. Maybe he'd explore. See the sights, both architectural and human. Japanese girls usually weren't anything to complain about... He headed towards the front door, which happened to be through the kitchen. And, of course, his father caught him before Vann's hand even touched the doorknob.
"Where are going?" Naoki asked in Japanese, albeit not severely.
'Seriously, the man has eyes in the back of his head!'
Vann turned to his father.
"Out. I wanna look around," Vann replied in English.
Naoki looked disappointed. "Vann, remember, we're in Japan now, speak the language."
Vann felt as disappointed as his father looked. "Alright," he said in Japanese.
"Good," his father said. "You may go."
Vann practically flung open the door and slammed it shut after he had stepped out. Now in the hall, Vann savored the quiet. Until a voice interrupted it, at least.
"Hi, I didn't know we had new neighbors."
Vann jumped and turned towards the voice. There stood a girl who's most noticeable features were her oddly bright pink hair and her impressive figure, that was partially hidden by two grocery-filled paper bags. To put it simply, the girl was hot.
"Uh...hi," Vann managed. "I'm Vann boo- I mean, I'm Vann Akiyama."
She giggled cutely. "Vann? That's an odd name."
"Yeah, my mom had a thing for weird names," Vann replied, doing his best to look suave.
She giggled again. "I like it."
Inwardly, Vann cheered. Barely an hour here, and he was already making progress.
"Anyway, I'm Akira Kobayashi. Nice to meet you."
"Yeah...," murmured Vann, still a bit mesmerized by her hair and, even more strangely, pink eyes.
"Oh, you're probably curious about the hair, right?" Akira asked, patting the top of her head.
Vann nodded.
"And the eyes," he added.
"Well, my brother used to have this chemistry set when we were young, and, well there was an...accident and now I look like an anime character," she smiled and laughed nervously as she patted tall strand of hair that stuck up from the rest of her hair, "ahoge included."
"I didn't know that was possible... Wait, you have a brother?"
Great, Vann thought to himself, he's probably gonna be extremely overprotective...
"He even dyes his hair silver so I won't be lonely. He's a pretty good brother. He won't let me talk to any boys, though..."
Called it.
"Anyway, he's out with a friend, and I've got groceries," she said indicating the paper bags she was carrying. "You can come in if you want. My father would be happy to meet our new neighbor, too."
Vann scratched the back of his neck. "Uh, sorry, I was just about to go out and look around town. I can come back later."
Akira set her bags down and reached into her skirt pocket.
"If you're gonna go look around, you'll need a map. This place can be confusing for people who's have never been here."
Vann reached into his own pocket and brought out his cellphone.
"It's fine; I have a GPS on my phone." He attempted to open the aforementioned app, but only got a blank screen.
"What...?" He mumbled. He zoomed the screen out, but there was a white hole where Rakuen Island should be, just off the north-eastern coast of Japan.
"What...?" He repeated.
He looked up, back at Akira to see her holding out an old paper map.
"Rakuen, for some reason, doesn't show up on any electronic map, so you'll just have to use one of these. I don't have plans for the rest of the day, so you can use mine."
Vann reached out for the map, but before he even touched it, Akira snatched it back.
"Just be back before 11:00, that's curfew for us teenagers," she ordered.
Vann nodded and took the map. "Uh, thanks," he managed. He unfolded it to find that several places and streets were marked in red.
"The marked areas are interesting places I've found. Most of them are clothing stores, but there are a few good cafés and stuff that you might like to visit while you're out. Anyway," she opened her apartment's door and picked up her bags, "be seein' ya."
"Yeah, see ya."
She stepped in and closed the door with her foot.
Vann scratched his head thoughtfully.
Overprotective brother... Well, there go my chances. Won't hurt to try, though.
Vann glanced at the map again. In the bottom right corner, 'Kobayashi Akira' was written in frilly romanji. Vann folded the map and placed it in his jacket pocket. Might as well head out. He had until 11:00, and it was 8:00 now, leaving him three hours to explore his entire neighborhood. Not a lot of time, but he'd probably get in some good sights. As he walked towards the elevator at the end of the hall, Vann texted his father.
Vann:
Could you tell me when it's about 10:15?
Dad:
Yes Just dont run into trouble
Vann:
Sure. See ya tonight.
Placing his cell back in his pocket, Vann looked up to see the elevator doors beginning to close. Vann sped up, and managed to catch it before it was closed. Breathing a relieved sigh, Vann turned his attention to his elevator companion.
Or companions, actually. Two children, a boy and girl, who looked almost exactly the same. Same brown eyes, same pasty skin. The only apparent difference was their clothes, hair color, and gender.
"Uh, hi," Vann said.
The girl played with the hem of her dress and scuffed her Mary Jane's on the floor, but didn't pay him any mind. The boy, however, looked up at him and smiled.
It wasn't a friendly smile.
"So, what're you're names?" Vann questioned. "Apparently, we're going to be neighbors, so we should get to know each other, I guess. I'm Vann. Vann Akiyama."
This time it was the girl's turn to respond.
"We're not neighbors," she said quietly. "We're visiting a...friend."
"Oh..."
"I'm Yumi," she continued. "And this is Apollyon."
She pointed to her brother.
"Apollyon? That's kind of an odd name," Vann observed.
Instead of saying something, the boy continued to smile.
"It's not so unusual, I think," Yumi finally said after a few moments of uncomfortable silence.
Finally, the elevator stopped. Yumi and Apollyon moved for the door.
"This is our stop," Yumi said, continuing to stare at the floor and play with her dress. "Goodbye."
Apollyon slurped a bit of drool that had fallen from his mouth.
"Yeah," he said as the door began to close between us, "see ya, meat."
Yumi proceeded to slap him so hard on the back of his head, Vann could have sworn he heard bone crack.
When the doors had shut, Vann looked to see what floor they had stopped on. The fourth.
The fourth?
Japanese buildings usually wouldn't have a fourth floor because the Japanese pronunciation of 4 (shi), was the same as the Japanese word for 'death' or 'dead'. Creepy.
On that happy note, Vann stepped out of the elevator when it reached the ground floor. Vann finally felt that he was able to breathe easy, and took full advantage of that.
The lobby was crawling with people. Not so much that it felt crowded, but still too much as far as Vann was concerned.
As he weaves his way through the small groups of people, he felt eyes at his back.
Odd...
Why would anyone be watching him? He wasn't that impressive. But he turned back anyway, just to be sure.
And he was right.
Two more people were watching him, except, these two were even stranger then Yumi and Apollyon. Wait, that's an understatement.
A girl who looked about Vann's age, and a...man? At least, Vann was pretty sure this guy was a man.
He was at least eight feet tall!
And he seemed...skinny? Was that the word? No, rawboned. He looked rawboned, lanky, almost like he shouldn't even be able to stand up. He wore a hood over his head, which contrasted heavily with his expensive looking business suit. The suit hung off him, almost like it was a size too big. Even weirder was the guy seemed dressed for winter.
He had a thick scarf wrapped around his face, and thick sunglasses over his eyes. Leather gloves adorned his hands.
His daughter (at least, that's who Vann guessed she was) had her fair share of weirdness. She must have been an albino. Her skin was impossibly white, even paler then those two kids', and her hair was white, even for an albino.
Then she smiled.
Even from this distance, Vann could see her white teeth.
White, and disturbingly shark-like.
Vann looked to the man beside the girl.
He felt his heart skip a beat, and felt like it wouldn't resume its beating.
The man had taken off his sunglasses and scarf, and was starring right at Vann, who was wondering why no one was running and screaming in the opposite direction.
Why would they be doing that?
The guy had no face.
He. Had. No. Face.
HE.
HAD.
NO.
FACE.
Just a skull with eyes in their sockets.
He ran, faster then he knew he could. He ignored his now jelly-like legs and his fast beating heart.
After ten minutes of running like a maniac, Vann began to tire. But he couldn't stop! He looked back. What if they were-!?
He'd hit someone!
It felt like hitting a brick wall.
"Hey, you okay?"
Vann nearly jumped out of his skin.
He looked up and his heart skipped another beat.
In front of him, were the girl and the skeleton. The skeleton's head was lowered so that you couldn't see under his hood.
"Are you all right?" The girl asked again.
She looked exactly the same. Same nondescript T-shirt, jeans, and cowboy boots? Vann hadn't noticed those.
The girl bent down further and Vann tried to avoid looking at her.
"Hey, seriously, are you all right?"
Finally, Vann got the courage to look up at her. She was smiling broadly, but with her mouth closed, so the sharp teeth weren't evident.
She stuck out her hand to help him up.
"I'm Kasuno Misaki."
Not accepting the hand, Vann stood.
Vann wasn't sure whether or not he wanted these two to know his name. It was rather unique. Even if he didn't give his full name, they'd probably be able to find him.
Kasuno elbowed her skeleton where his stomach would be.
"Take off the hood," she ordered, "can't you see he's terrified of something?"
"Fine, fine," said a voice from under the hood.
Gloved hands reached up, and pulled the hood down to reveal...
...an abnormally tall Japanese man.
What?
Vann was far beyond confused now.
"Lee," he said. "Lee Akiyama."
Vann wondered for a second weather or not they'd find it odd he'd have a Chinese name, but nothing was said.
Kasuno gave a cheerful grin.
"Nice to meet you, Lee."
Vann's eyes were immediately drawn to the tall man. He could have sworn he'd seen a skeleton under that hood...
"Oh," Misaki said, "this is my big brother" -she snickered a little- "Mecurabe. He's the one you ran into."
There certainly was a resemblance. Really, there wasn't much of a difference between the two, except for Misaki's albino-ness her brother's ridiculous height, and their gender, obviously.
"Uh, yeah... Nice to meet you, to, Misaki...uh, -san."
He'd almost forgotten about the honorifics.
Misaki chuckled.
"Call me Kasuno, please, just Kasuno. I hate formalities."
Isn't calling someone by their given name a big deal in Japan? Vann thought.
"And you can call Mecurabe by his given name, to," Kasuno added.
"Hey," Mecurabe said, indignant, "just because you hate formalities doesn't mean I do!"
"Mecu* for short," Kasuno grinned wickedly.
"Oh for the love of..."
Vann's eyes flicked between the two. Had he been hallucinating? If so, then how come these two looked almost exactly like the girl and skeleton he had seen? To many questions, not enough answers.
How would he have been hallucinating, anyway?
"Anyway," Kasuno interrupted Vann's reverie, "since you're new to the city, let Mecu and I show you around."
Without waiting for a reply, she grabbed his wrist.
Mecurabe looked on, apologetic but amused.
"I'll show you all the good places. And there's a lot of them here."
She began to lead him down the street.
"If you're into anime and manga and stuff, I found a great anime store last week. It takes them a while to get the newer stuff, but other than that, it's like one of those flea market things."
Vann considered prying his hand out of her's, but thought better of it. If these two really were out to get him and thought they had him in their trap, he'd need to think this through. Besides, it's not every day you get to spend time with a pretty albino girl.
What am I thinking? They're probably going to kill me!
Vann pried Kasuno's fingers apart and pulled his hand away.
"Maybe some other time. I've...gotta get home, y'know... See ya."
He started to head back towards home.
"Oh, come on," Kasuno begged, "please? Just a quick trip. I promise you'll love it."
"I really shouldn't..."
"Oh, c'mon," Mecu said jovially, "it'll be a great way for you to look around!"
Vann considered his options.
Explore one of the most famous cities in the world with a cute girl vs. a small apartment with an overbearing father.
Let's see what's behind door number one! Vann shouted in his mind, suddenly changing his mind.
"All right," he said.
What had he been thinking? Had he just been paranoid? He never was good with crowds, so maybe he had just freaked out and his imagination played a trick on him. The people who he had projected those strange images on had just followed him to make sure he was okay. That was it!
Stranger things have happened.
But the crowd hadn't been that big... It hadn't even really been a crowd. More like a group really.
Vann shook the doubt from his mind and followed Kasuno and her brother.
---------------------------------------------
Vann squirmed uncomfortably in his seat.
Across from him, Kasuno looked amused.
They had come to the small café after a solid two hours of raiding every store within a three mile radius of Vann's apartment building. She had somehow managed to get him interested in three different manga, which he had never even read in the past, and got him to buy her six magazines. At least he didn't have to endure the embarrassment of buying any shoujo manga.
Mecu was in line inside waiting for his coffee and Kasuno was sipping a juice she had bought at a vending machine.
She sat the can down on the table.
"So...?" She asked, grinning crookedly.
Vann shrugged.
"It was fun," he said, a bit half-heartedly.
Kasuno leaned back, mock-pouting. "Okay, if me and Mecu are that boring, y'know you can just tell us."
Vann waved his hands out in front of him.
"Oh, n-no! I-it's not that!" He said a slight tone of panic in his voice. "It's just...anime and manga has never really been my thing, so I guess I wasn't really into it. But I enjoyed it anyway, so don't worry about it!"
Kasuno's smile returned.
"Well, I'm glad! I hope we can do it again sometime."
As the albino girl sipped her juice and flashed Vann crooked and friendly grins, it occurred to Vann just how pretty Kasuno was.
Her wavy, snow white hair fell just past her shoulders, and her bright red eyes, although the color would have been ominous on anyone else, shinned with shrewd intelligence. Saying that her beauty was undeniable was an understatement.
"You know, I had a lot of fun today, to," Kasuno said pulling Vann from his daydream. "We should really try to do this again sometime."
Her smile was becoming less and less cute and friendly and closer to seductive. She was leaning in.
She was leaning in!
What was he supposed to do?!
Luckily, he didn't have to answer that question, thanks to Mecu's suddenly setting down a cup of coffee in front of Vann. The man set down with his own paper cup and motioned that he'd be watching his sister's new friend.
Vann sighed, slightly relieved.
"We should start heading home soon," Mecu said. "We have that meeting tonight."
Kasuno seemed to be attempting to recall what her brother was talking about.
"Oh yeah!" She finally said, pulling a cell phone out of her pocket. Despite the skull and crossbones that adorned the front of the black flip phone, the side was decorated with Pikachu and 'Hello Kitty!' charms.
She opened the phone and checked something.
Kasuno looked as if she had just been caught stealing from the cookie jar.
"We really are late!" She exclaimed. "Well, almost, anyway. We still have enough time to walk Vann home."
Vann scratched the back of his neck and smiled awkwardly.
"You don't have to do that, really! I know where my building is, so don't worry about it."
In truth, he didn't. But that creeping feeling was returning.
He looked left. "See, we came this way, remember?"
"No we didn't," Mecu deadpanned.
"Oh, right..." Vann turned the other way. "This way, then?"
"Nope."
Vann slumped, bewildered.
"...all right, I'll follow you..."
Kasuno looked smug. "Good. Come on, then."
Vann followed the two.
As he did so, Vann's eyes kept watching Kasuno. He decided that he was fine back here. He had always had a thing for petite girls, and Kasuno definitely looked the part.
Her hips swayed as she walked and her white hair seemed to glow as the sunlight seeped through it.
"Like what you see?"
Kasuno's voice only sounded amused, but it still felt like Vann had been kicked in the chest.
"I...uh...yeah...uh..."
"Don't worry about it. I'm not exactly the common image of beauty," she said indicating her less than impressive figure, "and then there's the whole albino thing. Most of the time, whenever someone pays any attention to me, it's usually to toss out some stupid insults, so I guess having someone looking at me like I'm actually pretty can make me a bit of a pushover. Just don't let Mecu see you," at this, she pointed to her brother, who was angrily pressing the button on the walk sign at an intersection.
"Oh. Uh. Okay, I guess."
Kasuno grinned and headed up to wait with her brother, Vann behind her.
When they reached Mecu, he examined the two.
"What exactly were you doing back there, eh?"
Kasuno gave an innocent smile.
"We saw a poster for 'The Wolverine' and got distracted. Sorry."
Vann was amazed at Kasuno's ability to lie. To her own brother, even! But he did his best not to let any of this show on his face. Best not to let Mecu get suspicious, after all.
Finally, the light turned to 'WALK' and the crowds at the intersection began to walk their desired ways.
Being in the midst of so many people was really starting to make Vann nervous, but he pushed through anyway, if only to impress Kasuno. He reminded himself just how much he wanted her approval.
'Wait,' he thought to himself, 'where did that come from? I've never thought like that about anyone except my ex-girlfriend back home.'
This was odd. He really hadn't ever thought of many people like that.
Soon the three resumed their conversations.
They discussed comics, movies, books, anything they could come up with, really, as they walked down the street. So far, so good.
Never say that.
It automatically makes you a bad luck target.
As they came to the next intersection, Vann had ended up a little behind Kasuno and Mecu. Across the street, there was a girl staring at him. She seemed to be watching him with suspicion. Why? He didn't look suspicious, did he? As far as he knew, he hadn't done anything wrong.
What if she was some kind of stalker?
She appeared just as odd as Kasuno. Everything about her was eerie and mysterious. Her hair was blacker than any he had ever seen and porcelain skin. But the most unusual thing about her was her eyes.
Even from across the street, Vann could tell they weren't normal.
They almost looked like a cat's, with slit pupils and wide irises. But they were also blood red and seemed to be making direct eye contact with him.
The crosswalk light turned green and Vann followed Kasuno and Mecu across the street.
As Vann stepped out into the street his eyes remained on the girl.
She must have been wearing contacts.
No-one's eyes looked like that.
He turned away from the girl to watch where he was going and bumped right into Mecurabe.
It had felt like hitting a brick wall! Again!
Vann looked up into the tall man's black eyes.
"Oh, sorry," the boy murmured.
Mecu grunted while Kasuno looked on in amusement.
As the trio resumed their walk, Vann checked behind him for the red eyed girl, but she had melted back into the crowd.
Thankfully, the rest of the walk back to the apartment building was uneventful.
"This place is fancy," said Kasuno as she looked up at the tall building, a hand on her hip.
It was almost a skyscraper, with plane white walls that seemed to glow in the setting sun and windows so clean they were almost invisible.
"Yeah, can't believe you live here, Mecu added.
Vann stared at his two new friends, blinking in confusion.
"Is it really that impressive?" He asked.
"Yeah, compared to where we live, anyway. Me and Mecu have a crappy apartment a couple of streets over from here."
Vann was almost gawking. "You live alone? No parents, or supervision, or...anything like that?"
Kasuno smirked. "Surprised? It's not all that unusual to find kids and teenagers living by themselves here. This city's not all it's cracked up to be."
"Wow," Vann murmured. "Anyway, I guess I'll see you guys around."
For a second, Kasuno's smile looked strange, almost as if she was forcing it. It was a little creepy. But in a flash, the smile seemed genuine again. "Yeah, see ya," she said and began to walk in the other direction, Mecu in tow.
Vann starred up at the building, with a bit of new admiration for it. He started to head for the door, but stopped as he spotted someone out of the corner of his eye. Just a second ago, the street had been empty except for him, Kasuno, and Mecu.
Vann began to turn his head.
Whoever it was, he already knew they were watching him.
He could feel their eyes boring into him.
When he finally made eye contact with his stalker, Vann's heart was hammering at his chest.
And it only got worse.
Standing there, not even a block away, was the red eyed girl from earlier.
She looked as if she were trying to conceal pure, distilled rage.
Then she began to walk towards him.
Vann scrambled to the door. He pulled at the handles, but the doors were firmly locked.
A key!
He had a key!
He pulled it out of his pocket, and fumbled to get it into the keyhole. He felt like a character in a horror movie. Trying and failing to unlock a door while a sadistic killer bears down on him.
Finally, he got the key in and twisted it.
There was a satisfying click as the lock opened.
Someone tapped his shoulder.
Vann became stiff. His entire body seemed to go into lockdown. Slowly, he turned around.
Up close, the girl really was quite pretty.
Porcelain skin, a cute, round face, and inky black hair put a definite air of eerie beauty about her. Wait. Why was Vann afraid of this girl? She couldn't have been taller than four feet! If she tried anything, she wouldn't even be a problem!
"Hello," she said quietly, her expression unchanged.
Vann pressed himself against the door. "Hi," he squeaked.
And, she's still terrifying, he thought to himself.
"You are not my target," the girl continued. "I suggest that you abandon your hopes of friendship with the albino. I have no intention of involving an innocent in my squabble with that girl."
"K-Kasuno? You mean Kasuno? What did she do?"
The girl held up a finger.
"Please, do not ask questions. It is none of your business."
Vann was starting to get a little braver. "Hey, when somebody's stalking my friend I make it my business!"
The girl looked him in the eye. Her expression had changed a little, and he could tell that his comment had not been a good idea.
"You are friends with Kasuno?"
Vann nodded.
Well that didn't last long.
He looked on confused as the girl reached into the waistband of her skirt and began to pull out an object.
Before Vann could react, the girl was holding a Bowie knife to his throat. He began to reach for it, but the girl pressed into the skin of his neck.
Blood began to trickle from the small cut.
"If you move, I will sever your jugular vein. Your brain will be cut off from receiving any blood and you will die in about ninety seconds. Do you consider yourself friends with this girl?"
Vann looked into those bright red eyes. They were the same color as blood.
He gulped.
"Answer the question!"
The girl was shouting now.
All of Vann's bravery was gone. "N-no, she's not my friend!"
The girl pulled the knife away from Vann's neck and bowed low.
"I apologize for frightening you," she monotoned. She stood straight and pulled a cloth from her jacket pocket. She began to clean the knife with it. "Please, stay away from the albino."
The girl began to walk away but turned and bowed again. Then she left in the same direction Kasuno and Mecu had.
Vann slid down the door to sit on the ground. He placed his hand on the shallow cut the girl had given him.
"W-what...what the hell?" He mumbled to himself.
/A.N./
Mecu is meant to be pronounced Mee-koo. Just throwing that out there.