ｉ'ｍ ｎｏｔ a ｋｉｄ

『 your p.o.v 』

Sitting down on the floor near the large window that overlooks much of the city, I vaguely tuned in and out of the conversation taking place in the living room while I charged my laptop and typed away on a freshly made note doc.

"What the hell do you mean those punk ass twerps are now our competition?" Ranmaru very nearly growled before taking a bite of his banana, his eyebrows twitching some as he looks from AI to Reiji.

Camus scoffed. "Are you too stupid to understand the situation at hand, Kurosaki?"

"You're lucky our brat is sitting over there right now or I'd kick your royal ass right here and now you pompous earl."

"An animals bark is always more terrifying than it's bite."

"Now now guys, let's calm down!" Reiji said with a laugh, trying to keep his band from falling apart.

AI typed some things on his laptop, the four of them all sitting around the small coffee table in the center of Reiji's apartment's living room. "It appears that in this current moment, HE★VENS has just about if not slightly more popularity than us." He said monotonously. "If we do not wish to lose our time in the spotlight, it would be best for Quartet Night to act quickly."

He's right, Quartet Night needs to do something to not get overshadowed by HE★VENS though that's a lot easier said than done when you look at the current situation.

Quartet Night debuted a little over a week ago now and not even two days later, HE★VENS had their debut. Almost immediately the two bands have been named rivals of one another and it looks like HE★VENS has the upper hand when it comes to the younger fans considering they do have the cute strawberry blonde idol on their side. Seriously, Nagi is a force to be reckoned with if any of his fangirls at Saotome are signs of his increasing popularity among the general population.

But okay, something has to be done on Quartet Night's side of things to keep them in the lime light for a little longer. I'm currently composing five songs for school and need to have these done before the end of next week so that my four friends can write their lyrics, have me make changes to their songs, and record them all in order to get the highest grades. Composing anything for Quartet Night on top of this amount of work is nearly impossible...

But I can't think of anything else to do.

Quartet Night has more or less made the rounds on music shows, interviews, radio broadcasts, the whole nine-yards essentially so they've depleted those resources and that route is no longer an option. Thanks to Shining Saotome's advertisement department, Quartet Night has had their photos plastered all across Tokyo and even across into other large cities like Nagoya and Kyoto meaning we can't do anything more on that front either. Sales were through the roof for their debut song but even those have slowed what with HE★VENS now taking over social media. Unless new songs are created for Quartet Night to sing, it looks like HE★VENS might win this initial battle of the debut songs and I cannot allow that to happen.

I told Quartet Night that all I want to do is to help them succeed in reaching their goals and allowing HE★VENS to surpass them at such a crucial point as this, well, I think we all know that anything but good things would come out of this if I didn't keep Quartet Night as the number one trending band right now. Though there's little that I can do as both a student and as their composer. I'm just some girl who composes songs, cool. Guess I'll have to use my only talent to keep my boys growing their fandom and compose some more songs for them as quickly as possible.

"Okay, there's no damn way we can just keep going on shows you dumbass." Ranmaru snapped as he threw the banana peel at Reiji's face.

The cautiously smiling brunette managed to dodge the peel at the last second, the sound of the yellow food trash slamming into the wall echoing some. "I don't know what else to tell you RanRan, we can't really do much more."

"Interviews have been done, performances as well." Camus murmured before taking a sip of his tea. "What more is there for us to do? Of course this wouldn't work. What a stupid decision Shining made in forcing us to become a unit."

The four of them fell silent as I stopped typing on my laptop. Glancing up to my four idols, I couldn't help but frown some. They all look more or less defeated- even Ranmaru and Camus who both swear on their lives they hate being apart of this band.

At the end of the day, these four men are idols and not a single one of them want to fail their fans or themselves like this.

Placing my laptop down onto the carpeted floor beside me, I pushed myself up and wandered over into the kitchen. The boys stayed quiet as I mingled about, grabbing mugs and filling them with milk before shoving them one by one into the microwave to heat up. I then dug around some in Reiji's pantry to find a few hot chocolate powder things- the ones with the tiny marshmallows in them. You know the ones, they're great.

I went ahead and grabbed some coffee creamer as well knowing Camus is going to want his hot chocolate to be disgustingly sweet as is all of his drinks. I went ahead and stirred the powder into each of the mugs as my four idols began quietly talking about alternatives to their current dilemma; anything that isn't them breaking up right this second that is.

Honestly, the four of them breaking up now would be a little dramatic. There's always time to bring their popularity back up if they can't beat HE★VENS right at this very moment. The world isn't going to end. If I work hard to compose them amazing songs, then there's no other outcome than for them to come out on top in the end.

Carrying a large plate with four cute cat mugs of steaming hot chocolate on it, I made my way back over to my idols and placed the hot chocolate down on the coffee table. "You guys need to stop worrying so much, I won't let anything bad happen to Quartet Night." I said with a bright smile, turning on my heels to place the plate back up in one of the cabinets in the kitchen once my four idols had somewhat snapped out of their desolate trances.

"Kiddo, I think this is something even your songs can't fix." Reiji said, carefully grabbing his pastel green mug and blowing on the steaming hot chocolate some to cool it.

AI was unfazed as he just drank the steaming drink without a care in the world. "Do you have a plan?" He asked.

I plopped down on the couch beside Ranmaru as he skeptically glared at the pale red cat mug that's currently staring back at him from the coffee table. Glancing between the mug and the silverette sitting beside me, I shook my head with a fond smile dancing across my lips. "I'll compose a single solo song for each of you as well as one new group song by the end of this week. If you guys can work out lyrics and have everything done three weeks from now, you'll for sure be ahead of HE★VENS and should regain the spotlight for another two to three months realistically." I said thoughtfully as I looked between my four idols who are currently looking back at me as if I've grown a second head. "Normal groups have a comeback every three to six months or longer depending on their individual circumstances meaning HE★VENS won't be coming back with something new for at least three more months. We can just play these new songs off as a second part to your debut, part two with more content for your fans to fall in love with."

Camus silently took a sip from his pastel blue mug, ice blue eyes closed and everything before he opened them to look at me once he had placed his mug back down on the coffee table. "You really believe composing us solo songs and a new group song will propel us back into the number one spot?"

"It has to." I said with an added nod of my head. "I already thought of everything you guys were saying earlier; music shows and interviews are out of the question since you've done them all, photoshoots are pointless, you've performed everywhere you could already and have even done some fansignings to solidify a small and dedicated fanbase. You've done everything by the books up to this point so it's up to us now to do something a little crazy to show HE★VENS who the real professionals are."

Ranmaru lifted his hand closest to me to ruffle my hair some. "Brat, you and your crazy ideas are going to be your downfall." He said with an annoyed click of his tongue, the small smile tugging at the corners of his lips betraying the cold tone his voice normally has. "But you might be on to something."

Reiji stood up and immediately began pacing back and forth near the large window. "No, there's no way you can compose five songs in a week on top of the songs you're composing for class right now. We can always beat out HE★VENS when it's time for our first comeback." The handsome brunette said as he looked to me, Ranmaru patting my head one last time before finally taking a sip of his hot chocolate. "You need to graduate and not put yourself in the hospital from overworking yourself, you understand me ___? I'm not losing you because you're always willing to put yourself through hell for everyone around you."

I frowned some as I sunk deeper into the couch, lazily leaning into Ranmaru's side now as he's forced to more or less place his arm over the back of the couch. "I'm old enough to make my own decisions Rei-chan. I'm not the same orphan you met a year ago. I've grown, I've learned to compose faster than ever to make the impossible possible, and it's all because I want to see you, my friends, and you four as a band succeed. Don't tell me that I can't do this because I've already decided that I'm going to go through with this."

"This is new." AI mumbled under his breath, glancing at me with his teal colored eyes before hurrying to type something down on his laptop.

Almost instantly, Reiji stopped pacing as he met my gaze head on. "You're going to neglect your health to compose these five songs, are you not?"

I narrowed my eyes some. "Reiji, I can do this."

"I'm not letting you kill yourself for our sake."

"I'm not. I'm more than capable of this-"

"Did you not learn anything from me?!" Reiji snapped, his eyes widening some as he realized he just raised his voice with me for the first time ever. "I-I'm sorry, it's just, I can't lose my special girl." He said much softer now, all three of his bandmates looking to him slightly surprised.

It's rare to see Reiji lose his cool even for a millisecond. And not a single one of these boys ever imagined he'd snap at me of all people. Hell, even that caught me a little off guard. But, it was bound to happen eventually because we are so close...

Sighing, I got up from the couch and walked over to pick up the banana peel that's been left on the floor behind the couch courtesy of Ranmaru. "Look Rei-chan, Quartet Night needs to get ahead right now if you guys want to become a truly amazing band. Having me compose five songs for you and making it possible for a part two to your debut will make you guys even more unique than you already are." I explained, walking back into the kitchen to throw out the gross banana peel. "Just let me do this. I'll skip class to compose your songs and the songs I need to compose for class- and before you tell me not to, Ryuuya already gave me the okay to do just this if I ever needed to. I'm grown up enough to make my own decisions Reiji. I may be younger than you, but I'm not a kid."

"She's older than me by a few years," AI spoke up. "If you trust me so much, why is it you don't trust your own step-sibling Reiji?"

Everyone stayed quiet at that as Reiji just stared at the back of AI's head, totally stunned into silence. He can't answer a question like that. I don't think even he knows why he's always so protective of me. He just is. It'll be a lot longer down the line before he realizes that our relationship isn't exactly the most typical between step-siblings...

"I do trust her." Reiji finally spoke up as I walked past him to grab my laptop off the floor and moving to this time sit beside Camus who's still silently sipping at his coffee. "I just don't want to see her hurt herself for our sakes."

"If she says she can do it, have faith in the peasant. We've told her once to not make promises she cannot keep. She's been warned so now it's up to her to fulfill her promise to us." Camus said coldly as he looked to Reiji with a stony expression. "The peasant is correct in saying we need to put out more songs in order to stay relevant so it's only natural we put our blind faith in her to further our careers."

I shook my head, giggling some as I do so. "How can you say something so sweet yet so cruel at the same time Camus?" I asked with a smile, the platinum blonde sparring me a glance before once again sipping away at his hot chocolate.

AI typed some more things down before looking up from his laptop to myself. "How many songs are you currently composing for class right now?" He asked.

"Currently..." My voice trailed off as I thought. "Well, six songs in total, four solo songs and two duets." I then responded, my smile never faltering even slightly as Reiji looked mere seconds from fainting right then and there.

"Oi brat, when do you have to have those done by?" Ranmaru then asked.

I shrugged. "By the end of next week."

"You're not composing for us." Reiji said matter of factly as he leaned over the back of the couch AI is sitting on, the tealette leaning away from their bands oldest member. "No way am I going to let you compose eleven songs- I'd hate myself if I didn't stop you."

"Good thing I don't need your permission to compose songs." I said with an innocent smile towards my handsome step-sibling, my idol. "I told you all I would fight you in order to ensure Quartet Night's success and I wasn't lying." I paused as I closed my laptop and got up from the couch for the final time. "I should be heading back to Saotome now to talk with my friends about their songs. Each of you, your homework tonight is to shoot me some ideas of what you want your solo songs to sound like, we can meet again in a few days to discuss your group song once I've composed the solo's."

Reiji jumped over the couch as he hurried to catch up with me as I walked towards the front of his apartment, me waving to my other three other idols as he does so. "W-Wait kiddo! We didn't agree to this-"

"I agree with her composing our songs." Camus spoke up, easily cutting the brunette off from the living room.

"I'll call you later tonight, brat." Ranmaru tacked on.

"As will I." AI then said.

Grabbing my hand that isn't holding my laptop, Reiji stopped me just as I was about to reach the front door. I exhaled a soft sigh before turning around to look at him, his classic kicked puppy dog expression now gracing his features and gosh do his eyes look beautiful when he's like this. "Rei-chan, let me do this for you." I murmured, taking a step forward and going up on my tiptoes to place just the softest of kisses to his cheek. "I'm not doing this because I feel like I have to or that you four are forcing me into composing you songs, you know that. I'm doing this because I love you and Quartet Night with all my heart. Call me later tonight and we can talk after we get some ideas down for your solo song, okay?"

His grip on my wrist tightened some as he looked to me with a conflicted expression now. "You're absolutely certain that you can do this?"

Laughing, I nodded as I shook his hand off my wrist and then lifted my hand to gently ruffle and brush through his soft dark brown hair. "Reiji, I can do anything if it's for you. I'll talk to you tonight so don't look so worried. Ringo and Ryuuya will make sure I'm doing just fine when I tell them I'll be skipping class and you can call them to check up on me if that will make you feel better. I have to go now, my friends are about to get out of class."

With pursed lips, Reiji reluctantly allowed me to walk out of his apartment, not closing the door until I had disappeared down the hallway and he had heard the ding to the elevator go off signaling that I had already made it down to the first floor and was probably out on the streets by then.

Taking the subway back to Saotome, I kept my laptop close to my chest as I sat on the train. I need to compose five songs before the end of this week and then focus heavily on my school songs next week. That should be doable as long as I don't burn myself out too quickly and actually remember to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner and a few snacks here and there. I just have to keep telling myself that I'm doing this for my friends because I care for them. As long as I do that, I should be able to burn through these songs with little to no problems.~

Walking through the hallways of Saotome Academy, I smiled some to the students who stared as I walked past them, not particularly caring about the whispers anymore despite them being far more deafening than before now that Quartet Night has debuted. I hurried towards the older part of the Academy where my friends and I have more or less claimed our little hiding spot up in one of the practice rooms with the large grand piano. It's pretty secluded so it works out well as our meeting place away from prying ears.

I opened the door to our practice room with a soft click, the boys too busy talking to one another to notice me slipping inside the room.

"Okay but do we have to make our group song a lyrical ballad?" Otoya asked with a pout. "You heard Quartet Night's song- we can't get on their level with a ballad!"

Masato sighed. "Ittoki, both Quartet Night and HE★VENS have upbeat debut songs so it would be best for us to be different."

"I agree with Hijirikawa on this one." Tokiya spoke up.

Natsuki shook his head. "An upbeat song is just what we need!" He said with a stern expression that still somehow managed to look cute.

Syo took off his fedora and ran his fingers through his light blonde locks. "For once I actually agree with you Natsuki."

"As do I." Ren then said. "An upbeat song would help us catch our lovely ladies heart."

"Are you wanting to capture our fans hearts as well, Jinguji?" Masato then asked with slightly narrowed eyes.

The orangette simply winked to his blue haired roommate, everyone groaning and rolling their eyes at our precious Ren's typical flirtatious antics.

"How about, I compose both a ballad and an upbeat pop song for you six?" I asked, placing my laptop down onto the top of the closed grand piano before taking a seat on the arm of one of the two couches, Syo sitting closest to me. "Having two group songs along with your solo and duet songs wouldn't hurt for your debut if we win the debut auditions."

"Welcome back little lamb, enjoy your little date with your other group?" Ren asked with a breathtaking smile.

Rolling my eyes at him, I shrugged. "Reiji got a little upset with me and it took the other three being on my side for him to reluctantly agree to allowing me to compose them five new songs this week."

Otoya's jaw dropped from across the coffee table where he sits on the other couch with Natsuki, Masato, and Tokiya. "You're going to what?"

"I knew you were crazy, but this is just insane." Syo chuckled as he patted my thigh. "You're a tough girl though, you got this."

"She's going to kill herself trying." Tokiya sighed.

The blue haired boy sitting beside the silent S-Class student looked to me with his fists clenched over his knees. "Are you sure you can compose both their songs and ours without sacrificing your own wellbeing?" Masato asked with slight concern lacing his words.

"I already had this exact conversation with Quartet Night, don't make me go through it again." I said with a small laugh, flashing my boys a reassuring smile afterward. "I'll be fine. I'm going to skip class, make sure I eat and get enough sleep, and am probably just going to haul myself up in this room while I compose all of these songs. I might go out every now and again to meet with Quartet Night, but I'll text in our group chat if I leave so you don't come looking for me." I mused.

Otoya's smile wavered some. "If you say you can do it then we support you. Just take care of yourself, okay ___?"

"Yeah ___-chan! We don't want you to get sick and end up in the hospital again!" Natsuki added on with a playfully serious expression.

"I already have Toki's song done so I'm doing good." I said as I got up from the arm of the couch to walk over towards the windows, Kuppuru once again playing out in the snow as he always is nowadays. "I'll be working on Quartet Night's songs until Friday night. Once the weekend starts, those songs should be finished and I'll begin working on Otoya's song and then Natsuki and Syo's before tackling both of your duets. The class songs will be finished no later than next Friday giving you guys about two weeks to write lyrics, perfect dances or whatever you idols do, and record. That sound good to everyone?"

Ren cleared his throat some. "Well Lady, you went through all the trouble of figuring everything out yourself that we can't exactly be going against you now can we?" He asked with soft chuckles. "I'll be coming around often to make sure you're eating properly. Let's go out on a walk together sometime too." He then said, bright blue eyes sparkling with just an ounce of mischief. Glad to see the old Ren is finally back after all this time.

Smiling, I nodded as I leaned against the windowsill to the large window behind me. "I'd love to."

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mildly angry reiji = what i actually live and would die for omg *but don't worry, we'll get truly angry reiji soon enough when he finds out about otoyan's little secret~*

Question of the Chapter: From the three original HE★VENS boys, Kira, Eiichi, and Nagi, who do you like the most? Plot twist: you can only choose one :'))) I CHOOSE EIICHI GOODBYE CRUEL WORLD okay but like seriously all of the heavens bois have grown on me like all seven of them have stolen my heart lol but i think nagi is still at the bottom of my list whoops sorry smol bean of pure fiesty pre-teen sass (i want to see nagi and ringo locked in a room together cuz their combined sass levels would actually cause the world to implode)

Okay I know this chapter was long and kinda redundant but lowkey it was important for plot because lookey! The protagonist stood up to Reiji and we got to see him get a little upset/ panicky and just ugh I needed more QN band development from the anime and I didn't get it so I'm going to make it happen in my fanfic cuz my boys are precious and need all the love they can get.~ Also next chapter we're finally going to get a true Ryuuya moment so all of ya Ryuuya lovers better get ready for your boi ^^ he won't be pulling a full Ringo on this first major encounter but lowkey he's gonna be cute and sweet and everything we love from our stoic S-Class teacher :3

OH YEAH BY THE WAY i'm back in America lol Japan was amazing like I cannot explain to you all how happy I was to be there and getting to see everything from major cities to pure rural Japan off in the mountains up north- it was all stunning and I HIGHLY recommend visiting Japan just once if you have any interest in the country (also I bought utapri and dialovers merch there for like half the price it normally is buying it from Amazon so ya know *dabs*) I'll be updating my journal about my study abroad experience in Japan probably over the course of this next week tbh I won't be posting a day by day diary like I wanted to but instead I'll give you like short stories from my time there because honestly the drama and things as well as the sightseeting are all worth hearing.

All you need to know now is I went to a University in Nagoya for about ten days, met a really cute Japanese student there who happened to work at a little hangout place for international students, and now I kinda sorta have a Japanese Uni student for a boyfriend lol his personality is a lot like Kira's too lmaO kill me I don't deserve him ;-; you'll get the full story time in my journal within the next few days.~

I love each and every last one of you lovely cuties and thanks so much for taking the time to read this chapter <3

~ ｋａｔ ♡

( for all of ya adults reading this fanfic, a fun drinking game would be taking a drink every time I write HE★VENS or Quartet Night lololol )