ｎａｔｕｒａｌ   ｓｕｎｓｈｉｎｅ
ｅｆｆｅｃｔ

『 your p.o.v 』

With my laptop open on my desk, I tuned in and out of today's lesson while Ryuuya droned on and on about the importance for idols to land themselves a longterm job on some sort of program whether that be a movie series, a television show that airs weekly, or some weekend radio show and everything in between. Most of his lessons are directed at the idol students nowadays considering more and more composers continue to drop out of Saotome Academy. It's almost sad really. Now a little less than a third of our S-Class are composer students and that's including myself.

          I glanced around some, my eyes stalling on the orangette sitting behind Syo who's eating up every last one of Ryuuya's words like they're the holiest words to have ever been spoken. Ren looks, to put it shortly, bored. He's resting the side of his face on the palm of his hand as he lazily looks on to our teacher, surprisingly still listening despite obviously not being even remotely as interested in all this as Syo and some of the other students are. But, you have to give him some credit for at least trying to pay attention. He's doing better than Tokiya who's dozing in and out of sleep behind me right now.

          Tokiya's recording yesterday for that Piyo-Chan jingle ended up taking far longer than expected and, without him knowing, his manager decided to book him on two variety shows later in the evening so he didn't return to the dorms until a little after three in the morning. Poor thing is dead tired right now and could really use the sleep. Maybe I should tell him we can discuss his and Otoya's duet ideas another day when he isn't so drained. Tokiya should catch up on sleep while he can before we're swamped with more work...

          "That's it for today's lesson." Ryuuya said as he moved to lean against the front of his desk. "But before I dismiss you all, I have the final grades for the duet project as well as the specifications for your next assignment so listen up."

          Ren sat up a little straighter at the mention of the duet projects while I simply saved the song for Otoya I had been working on and began shutting down my laptop. The other students flicked their attention to myself and the orangette before refocusing their gazes on our teacher.

          Ryuuya cleared his throat. "As many of you have already guessed, the group with the top scores this duet project and the winners who get to perform at the Saotome Music Festival next week are none other than Jinguji Ren, Hijirikawa Masato, and Kotobuki ___." He said, glancing to Ren and I now. "You two along with Hijirikawa should stop by the teacher's lounge tomorrow morning for more information on the Music Festival and how to prepare for it, understood?"

          "We hear you loud and clear." Ren said with an absentminded wave of his hand while I simply nodded with a smile in response.

          "Anyways," the orange haired actor continued as he scanned over the other students, "no one else came even relatively close to beating their scores. At this rate, none of you are going to get to have your professional debuts so start taking this far more seriously than you have been. Also keep in mind that even if you don't win the graduation auditions, having consistent high marks on songs will look appealing to future employers so just because you feel defeated now, don't let that stop you from putting forth your best effort or else you're just shooting yourselves in the foot for no reason."

          Shizu, the composer student Ren had initially worked with, rose her hand from where she sits more near the center of all the desks. Ryuuya nodded to her to speak. "Um, I'm sure everyone's thinking this so I'll just go right out and ask- is it really fair for Kotobuki ___ to be getting the top marks on everything when she's already the composer to Shining Saotome's new boy group? I heard they'll be debuting officially at the Saotome Music Festival and everyone knows one of the idols is her brother so why should she also win the chance for the two idols she composed for to perform there as well?"

          "And she's obviously going to win the graduation auditions too!" Another composer student spoke up. "It isn't fair that she's getting so far ahead and none of us have even a chance to beat her."

          Ryuuya sighed, flicking those golden colored eyes of his over to myself. "___, care to explain to them how the whole graduation auditions thing is going to go for you? They might as well know before they lose all hope at beating you."

          "Um, sure." I said hesitantly as I slowly looked around to my fellow classmates. "The reason I'm composing for my brother's idol group is because he asked me to and his bandmates thought my compositions were good enough for them, but we still had to get Shining's approval which is why you saw me and those four idols all going into his office a few days ago. During that meeting, I talked with Shining about the graduation auditions as well." I paused as I glanced to Ren, Syo, and Tokiya who all offered me small, reassuring smiles. "My six friends want to create a band with me as their composer and so, to have them debut as a band, Shining and I decided that in order to make it fair for all of you to have a chance at having your professional debuts, we'd have my six friends all audition individually-"

          "So we're up against six of the strongest idol students?" A different student then asked, one that I'm pretty sure is apart of the idol program.

          I slowly nodded. "Kind of. Part of the agreement for them to debut as a band is that my six idols have to get the top six spots in the graduation auditions. If any of you other idol students beat out one of my idols, then you get your professional debut regardless of if you take the number one spot or the sixth. You just have to be better than one of them and you'll get your professional debut and my friends won't debut as a band." I explained. "There's actually a higher chance that one of you will debut since even if my friends take the six top spots in the graduation auditions, they still need to perform their debut song for Shining and if he doesn't approve of their song, then the next top idol student will have their professional debut in their place."

          "Meaning ___ and those idol students she's composing for have to pull off the impossible to debut." Ryuuya concluded as he smirked some while looking to the other students. "See? It's not unfair that she's composing for Saotome's new boy band considering there's one more stipulation to that agreement of theirs. If any one of you beat out one of her six idols, then she'll be kicked from Shining Agency all together and will have to quit composing for those professional idols."

          "Little Lamb here likes to gamble." Ren chuckled, drawing the attention of the other students now.

          "It is quite the challenge even for us so the probability of us debuting is slim." Tokiya tacked on.

          Syo scoffed as he grinned wolfishly to the other students. "But you guys like a challenge right?" He asked as he leaned back in his chair and kicked up his feet onto his desk. "We have no chance of debuting and then ___ is going to lose out big time so don't get all mad that she keeps getting top scores. It's not going to mean anything when one of you beats us out in the graduation audition-"

          "If you take this seriously and beat us out that is." Tokiya cut the short blonde off. "It would be in all of your best interests to work hard at besting us."

          Ren shot me a flirty wink before handsomely smirking as he looks to the rest of the students. "We won't go down without a fight and neither will ___."

          I simply smiled as some of the students began glancing to me with slightly shocked expressions. "I don't cheat my way to the top. You don't get anywhere in this industry unless you work hard and produce results," I said sounding strangely like something Camus would say. "Originally, I proposed this way of having the graduation auditions for my friends and I so that it would remain fair for all of you so I hope you all continue to work hard at improving yourselves. We'll be working hard as well so let's make the graduation auditions fun for everyone."

          Shizu's smile widened. "A friendly competition between you seven and the rest of the students here? Sounds like fun!" She said happily. "I look forward to taking you all on when the graduation auditions come around."

          Many of the other students looked more at ease seeing as that the graduation auditions are more or less in their favor rather than my own. Though a few still shot death glares at me from across the room. Guess that can't be helped considering I am composing for professionals as we speak...

          "As for your next assignments," Ryuuya continued on, "you all will be given another duet project. One composer per every two idols just as it was for your last assignment, a month long for this one just like the last. The group with the top score will get a professionally taken photoshoot as well as an interview that will all be posted on the popular music blog "Sacred Song Sanctuary". As for you ___, you'll be composing for four idols during the time span of one month so you'll actually be creating six songs instead of three as I told you you would yesterday morning."

          Nodding, I smiled as most of the other students looked to me wide-eyed. "Understood."

          "One month to compose six songs..." I vaguely heard the other students beginning to whisper. "She's not going to be able to get the top scores with that amount of work so maybe we really do have a shot at beating her and her idol student friends."

          Good, I'm glad the other students are starting to see that they really have a shot at winning the graduation auditions here. It's far better to have a competition going rather than everyone just hating on my friends and I for this last stretch of school leading up to the graduation auditions. It'll make things much more interesting and not to mention it'll actually force everyone to work harder too.

          School is finally becoming fun.

          Once Ryuuya had dismissed us for lunch and most of the other students began packing up their things, I turned around in my chair and looked to the navy haired idol student. "Toki," I said just as he was beginning to doze off yet again, "go back to your dorm and sleep." I said with a gentle smile. "I'll go ahead and buy you some lunch and we can talk about the duet another evening."

          Those crystal blue eyes of his narrowed some despite exhaustion being clearly written all over his face. "I'm perfectly fine. Let's go grab some lunch and then discuss the duet with Ittoki-"

          "Ichi, go take a nap. You're not you when you're tired." Ren mused as he stood up from his desk and stretched his arms up high above his head, the top of his unbuttoned white shirt shifting some and revealing far more of his upper chest than what was intended and I swear I just saw a couple of the other female student's noses start to bleed.

          "Yeah Tokiya, you're not going to get anything done if you're always tired." Syo added on as he hopped up from his chair and looked to me with a bright smile. "How about you and I have lunch together after you bring Mr. Workaholic over here some food?"

          The orangette placed his arm on Syo's head and easily leaned on him almost as if he was a railing or something. "Now now Ochibichan, no getting head starts. You have to play the game fairly."

          "Don't call me Ochibichan!" The short blonde snapped as he slapped Ren's arm off from his head, the orangette chuckling at Syo's typical feistiness. "And don't go telling me not to get a head start when you had ___ practically running after you when you were hell-bent on ignoring her and treating her like crap day in and day out before the Okinawa trip."

          "You think that was me playing the game?"

          "Well duh."

          "You're a funny one Ochibichan. If I was truly playing the game, I'd have already won by now." Ren said confidently as he looked down to the blonde with a cocky smirk.

          Syo scoffed at that. "You'd lose the second I really started playing since no one wants a playboy like you for a boyfriend."

          "And someone would want a short kid such as yourself in exchange?"

          "It's what's on the inside that counts- stop bringing my height up into everything!"

          Shaking my head at those two before looking to Tokiya once more, I wasn't all that surprised to see that he already dozed off with his head resting over his arms that are placed on his desk. "Hey guys, why don't you head off to lunch ahead of us. I actually need to talk to Toki for a sec before he goes to take his nap anyways." I said as I looked to my two friends with a small smile.

          Syo looked from me to Tokiya and then back to me. "Fine. But we're getting lunch together some other time, okay?"

          "Yeah yeah, just get going already Ochibichan. Sleeping ugly over there is getting the head start we both want so let's just get ourselves some lunch and make sure those A-Class boys haven't done anything stupid with Tomo-chan and Haruka yet." The orangette said as he placed his hands on Syo's shoulders and began pushing the shorter blonde out of the classroom.

          I watched them go for a moment, not particularly caring that a couple of the lingering students and Ryuuya as well are now glancing to me curiously as I refocus my attention on the sleeping idol student. Reaching over the back of my chair, I gently brushed some of Tokiya's bangs out from where they fell in front of his face, the handsome idol student unconsciously leaning into my touch some. "Toki, you're almost as much of a handful as Reiji I swear..." I murmured.

          Waiting a few minutes before lightly shaking his shoulder, I went ahead and picked up my laptop as the navy haired boy began to wake up. "Hey Toki, we should get going. Lunch isn't going to last forever and you should sleep in your bed rather than in the classroom." I mused, standing up now and walking over to grab the idol students bag. "What do you want for lunch anyways? They have that really good chicken platter thing today so I could get you that if you want?"

          Tokiya stood up and wobbled ever so slightly, obviously still far too tired to be awake right now. "I'm more than capable of buying my own food ___." He said as he made a grab for his bag. But I took a step back with a playful grin dancing across my lips just as he was about to get a hold of the bag's strap.

          "Nuh-uh. You're going straight to your dorm room to sleep and that's final." I said as I began making my way for the front of the class. "Now hurry up already! I want time to eat with everyone else too you know."

          With a sigh, Tokiya reluctantly began following behind me, the two of us passing by the teacher's desk where Ryuuya was pretending to be too caught up in grading some random paper despite me already knowing he was watching us this entire time. Honestly, Ryuuya probably thinks he's the slickest one of them all- more than even Ringo. But they're both pretty obvious considering nine times out of ten they're always somewhere nearby to keep tabs on me. Though I wonder why they're always so close by?

          It's probably just because I'm Reiji's younger sister...

          "Are you really going to force me to go back to my dorm?" Tokiya asked as we walked side by side down the hallways of Saotome Academy together.

          Smiling, I nudged his arm with my shoulder some. "Of course I am. I wouldn't be a good friend if I just allowed you to faint from exhaustion in the middle of the day now would I?"

          "I guess not."

          "Exactly." I responded with a laugh. "Ah, that reminds me actually but, when are you going to tell the others about you being Hayato?" I asked softer now as to prevent the prying ears of the other students from hearing this part of our conversation.

          Those crystal blue eyes of his flicked to me for just a fraction of a second as we turned down a different hallway. "I don't plan on telling them."

          A frown tugged at the corners of my lips. "But Toki, don't you think they should know? Your idol work is picking up and there's no way you're going to be able to make it to all of the rehearsals since you'll either be at work or too tired to do anything but sleep. They'll need some sort of explanation and us just telling them that you're busy with 'work' won't cut it." I explained. "And besides, you six are friends and friends don't keep things like this from each other. They can cover for you and help you when you ask if you'd just tell-"

          "I don't need their help." Tokiya cut me off with a colder tone. "I don't need them to succeed in this industry, but, I do need you." He murmured that last bit, successfully making my heart momentarily skip a small beat.

          "Toki, you're going to have to like them as friends at some point or else this band is never going to work out."

          "Professionals don't need to be friends to work together. I'm sure you've already figured that much out from Reiji's band."

          My frown deepened. "You six are different from them." I said matter-of-factly. "They're not a band but you guys are. You're Otoya's rival for heaven's sake! And Ren and Syo like you, Natsuki loves talking to you and I know you and Masato have that anti-social bond going on between you both so don't even try to tell me you don't appreciate our friends."

          "Anti-social bond?" Tokiya repeated with a small, amused smirk.

          "That's beside the point here Toki!" I said dramatically as we walked into the lunchroom now and headed straight for one of the shortest lines. "You need to rely on them. You're not some cool lone wolf."

          Grabbing two trays of food, one for me and one for himself, the navy haired idol student went ahead and paid for our food despite me trying to tell him I could pay for my own meal. "Let me be a gentleman and buy you your lunch. If you're going to insist on caring for me and everyone else, then it's only right I try to repay you if only a little bit." Tokiya said as we once again left the lunchroom and now made a beeline for his shared dorm room with Otoya.

          The inside of the room was the same as it always is, Otoya's side being slightly messier and brighter with all of his belongings while Tokiya's is spotless and quite dark considering his side of the room is painted a dark grey while the red heads is still a bright off-white color. I sat down Tokiya's bag beside his desk as he went ahead and placed the two food trays down on top of his bed.

          "Have you finished that secret song for me?" The navy haired boy suddenly asked once we were sitting across from one another on his bed, both of us munching away on our chicken strips that I'm positive Natsuki is also eating right about now.

          "It's a secret song for a reason." I said before taking a sip of my water. "But, if you must know, I'm a little stuck on how to proceed with the song. It just doesn't feel right yet so I need to play around with a few more melody ideas before committing to something for the rest of the song."

          Tokiya chuckled as he wiped the corners of his mouth with a napkin. "How about we use that song as my solo song for this duet project? I'm sure you could make a song that more or less matches for Ittoki if you agree."

          I thought for a moment before nodding. "I can figure something out for him." I said with a bright smile. "Are you looking forward to this project yet Toki?"

          Shrugging, Tokiya finished the chicken he had in his mouth before responding. "Well, I'm more accustomed to working on my own as Hayato so working with Ittoki this time around will be different to say the least. Though I can't see it being all that much different from how it is when I work with your brother."

          "And how do you like working with Reiji?"

          "He's a handful so I often try to avoid working directly with him."

          I couldn't help but to laugh at that. "Oh c'mon, he's not all that bad."

          Tokiya shook his head. "You know that man just as I do. He's always bouncing off the walls and cracking jokes and keeping the mood light and warm and I don't know how he does it."

          "It's the natural sunshine effect." I said as if that's a real thing. "Otoya has it too; that uncanny ability to just be a literal fluffball of light. It's truly something else and even I don't quite understand how they do it."

          "Natural sunshine effect?" Tokiya repeated with a laugh. "That's a good name for it. They truly do shine like the sun don't they?" He then asked before chuckling some more. "If only everyone could learn to shine like they do..."

          My smile softened some as I reached over and placed my hand gently over his own that's placed down on top of his bed sheets as to keep himself steady. "You already shine Toki so don't say things like that. You just shine a little differently is all."

          The navy haired boy tilted his head to the side some questioningly. "How so?"

          "Well," I paused as I retracted my hand and sat up a little straighter, "I don't know how to explain it really but you have your own charm that's special just to you, Toki. Just as Reiji and Otoya have that natural sunshine effect, you have a natural starlight effect. You're a cool, charming princely type and you shine every time you sing as Hayato. It's amazing really, but, lately you've begun to dim." My voice trailed off some. "You no longer shine like you once did..."

          "What do you mean by 'dim'?" He then asked.

          I shrugged. "It's not that you're singing badly or anything because every time you sing, it's perfect. Your voice is never flat or having too much or too little vibrato, and yet there's something missing. Like you're not singing with your heart in it anymore."

          Those crystal blue eyes of his studied me for a moment before he finished off his food. My shoulders fell some at that. I think I said something bad like I did back when Ren first got angry with me. Hopefully I don't go losing Tokiya like I almost lost that pesky orangette though. I don't think I could go through all that a second time...

          "I'm tired so let's talk about this in a few days or something," Tokiya spoke up softly as he gathered our trash and walked it over to the trashcan on Otoya's side of the room. "You have a lot to focus on with six of your idols all performing at the Saotome Music Festival in about a week now so don't worry so much about me. I'll pull through for our project and for the graduation auditions."

          Standing up before the navy haired boy could sit back down on his bed, I suddenly wrapped my arms around his larger frame and hugged him tightly, the taller boy going rigid at the surprising action. "Toki, I just want you to sing for you. I don't care if you stumble a bit on our projects or even during the graduation audition as long as one day you find that love for music you've seemed to lose along the way somehow. I'll always support you Toki, so, try to sing as Ichinose Tokiya while keeping all the things about Hayato you love close to your heart."

          Releasing my friend from my embrace, I went ahead and grabbed my laptop and said a soft "sleep well Toki" before exiting his room, the navy haired idol student still standing as still as a statue in the middle of the room as I quietly closed the door to his dorm room behind me.

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#ProtectToniSquad where ya at?

          Finally- finally after 42 chapters we're getting some good ol' Ichinose Tokiya moments ayyeeeeee Still can't believe this took me 42 chapters to get here tho oml this fic is going to be well over a 100 chapters at this rate for sure smh At least we get to finally see the whole "hey toki is really Hayato" thing come into play x3

          Question of the Chapter: How do you think the other STARFISH members are going to react when they find out Tokiya is actually Hayato? And how do you think QN + Ringo and Ryuuya will react as well? Honestly those starfishies are just a bag of what's-going-on? so I don't really know how they'll react tbh and this is my fic so rip one thing I do know for certain tho- QN is gonna have some words to say when they find out lmao (also I have no idea how Ringo and Ryuuya will handle the news either so that's something else for me to think up lulululul)

          What if Ringo gets all horrified cuz he's lowkey been flirting with Hayato as a joke and then realizes he was actually flirting with one of Ryuuya's students this entire time LMAO okay no nope i'm done *bye*

Anyways! I'm happy Toki is gonna get more screentime now along with Otoyan.~ They need more love in this fic since it's predominately been QN + MasaRen for the last like ten-ish chapters or so now lul (rip otoyan for confessing in like chapter 20 or something and nothing coming from it lul) And we'll also get Syo and Natsuki cute moments and maybe some Satsuki thrown in here and there too which will be fun.~ and of course Cesshi is gonna come in and do something stupid in his cat form with both QN and the other starfishies before graduation comes around so we all have that to look forward to lmaoooo (where is reiji's jacket cecil istg)

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 ♡