Tanaka Naoki was a brilliantly gifted musician, and a bad example of "artistic" personality. He was intensely enthusiastic about everything that interested him, and utterly bored by anything that didn't. s.h.i.+nichi had never been entirely sure what about himself was so interesting to Naoki, but the extroverted musician had "adopted" him the day they'd met.

s.h.i.+nichi had been in the system for a year already, when he'd quietly sung the lines he'd been writing in his head while doing the scrubbing a.s.signed to him, and the older boy had flung the stall door open and demanded, "What are you, a Disney princess? What song is that?"

"It doesn't have a name," s.h.i.+nichi had replied.

Naoki had not only given the song a name, but had created a recording of it. And considering the state of the instruments and recording devices available to a kid stuck in the system, it had been amazing.

s.h.i.+nichi soon learned that Naoki was probably only in the dorms because he couldn't keep a job. The ordinary jobs available to a kid who hadn't finished school bored him to death. He was already 17 when they met, and if he'd been able to maintain his own income, the overloaded caseworkers would likely have granted him permission to live independently.

s.h.i.+nichi bullied Naoki into re-enrolling in high school, by the simple expedient of refusing to talk to him until he did it. Then he tutored the older boy in the subjects he'd hated, and did enough of the homework for him to let him pa.s.s. When Naoki turned 18, he was within two months of graduating.

s.h.i.+nichi had been afraid that having to get a new job and maintain a place to live would be the end of Naoki's education, but Naoki had surprised him. "How can I let all that extra homework you've done go to waste? Don't think I don't know how many hours you've spent studying for cla.s.ses you won't take for another couple years," Naoki had declared.

--

Kobayas.h.i.+ Ryuske had enrolled both of them in the combined campus private school that s.h.i.+nichi had selected, despite having previously said that s.h.i.+nichi would have to a.s.sist his friend on his own. He was pretty certain that both influence and money had been used to get them in.

The school turned out to be the ideal environment for Naoki. He sucked up the musical education like a sponge and gloried in the access to top of the line equipment and training. No one who hadn't known him previously would ever have guessed that he almost hadn't finished school at all.

It was h.e.l.l for s.h.i.+nichi, but it was a h.e.l.l that he'd asked for. He hated the way his songs were rejected as "lazy" attempts. He hated having to write things according to the strictures a.s.signed by his teachers. He struggled with trying to learn instruments. Even the math cla.s.ses drove him nuts, because they were more advanced than the ones he'd been enrolled in previously.

Mori Kimitos.h.i.+ was the latest school prodigy, and shared a number of college cla.s.ses with Naoki, despite being only a couple of months older than s.h.i.+nichi. He had already produced a professional single as a solo artist. Why he became friends with Naoki was a mystery to s.h.i.+nichi, but when Naoki refused to form a duo with him, s.h.i.+nichi got really angry with his friend for the first time.

"This is the opportunity! This is what we're here for! How can you not take it!?" s.h.i.+nichi demanded angrily.

Naoki just ruffled s.h.i.+nichi's hair and said cheerfully, "You just said it, it's what we are here for? And I'd rather sing your songs."

s.h.i.+nichi didn't know how to convince Naoki. He tried everything he could think of. In the end, Naoki convinced Mori Kimitos.h.i.+. When Kimitos.h.i.+ presented the revision to the company he was working with it was immediately rejected. But an alternate possibility was offered. If they could find at least one other member, they could enter an upcoming compet.i.tion for the company's next boyband.

They held their own compet.i.tion within the school, and found Ando Hideki. Sasaki Akito found them through the company Kimitos.h.i.+ was working with. The five of them worked together for only a week before the compet.i.tion.

They won, and then… everything got really complicated. There were so many conditions put forth on the "prize" contract, and some of them were intolerable to s.h.i.+nichi. He complained about the most ridiculous clause, the one that said they could replace any member who became older than 21 at their discretion, to his adoptive father.

That's when he discovered that there was an even more difficult obstacle. Kobayas.h.i.+ Ryuske refused. He wanted s.h.i.+nichi to wait until he was out of highschool. s.h.i.+nichi pointed out rather sarcastically that Ryuske himself hadn't waited to start his own career. Ryuske pointed out even more bitterly that that gave him experience to speak from.

In the end it turned into an actual screaming fight, and s.h.i.+nichi left. He walked about 10 kilometers with no destination before he realized that he was so angry because the man he'd known for only two years was acting like the child he'd raised from birth was trying to make some horrible mistake that would ruin his life. And s.h.i.+nichi cared what he thought.

More than Ryuske's refusal to sign the contract that he himself doubted, he was angry that Ryuske refused to see what an opportunity it was. He was angry that Ryuske's opinion didn't match his own. He went home, for the first time since his mother had died. He went home to the place he'd been living for two years.

Ryuske was waiting, with a pot of the tea he liked and two cups. And he watched s.h.i.+nichi come in with a nervous expression. He cleared his throat and said, "I'm sorry, you're right, and it is your life."

s.h.i.+nichi gave him a wry grin and replied, "Well, I guess I ought to at least listen to my dad's opinions, and try to convince you to agree instead of throwing a temper tantrum like the kid you think I am and walking out."

He sat down and poured a cup of the tea while Ryuske stared at him. "Calling me your dad won't convince me that this is a good idea. The problems with this contract that you're complaining about aren't even the real issues."

"Well, I'll listen to your arguments too," s.h.i.+nichi agreed, "but this isn't just about me, it's a chance for all five of us. Even if it's not perfect, and some things about it suck. But that's not why I called you my dad."

Ryuske raised an eyebrow, and s.h.i.+nichi studied his lined face for a long moment. "If we're going to scream at each other like family, I just figured that I ought to admit that we're already family," s.h.i.+nichi explained.

Ryuske's startled expression s.h.i.+fted and his eyes crinkled as he smiled. "I never thought of that as part of the definition of family, but given my relations.h.i.+ps with my parents and siblings, that's really accurate," he admitted ruefully. He ran his hand through his short silver hair and added, "And I suppose I sounded just like my dad, yelling about how you're making a mistake. It's not really my place to decide if it's a mistake for you or not."

They discussed the contract and its various problems. And then Ryuske discussed it with Naoki. And when Naoki also firmly stuck to the idea of making it work for as long as they could, Ryuske discussed it with the other parents. And then he called in favors and talked to people who knew people, and s.h.i.+nichi and the other four members of the newly formed band Underneath started their careers, with the harsher corners of their first contract sanded off by old fas.h.i.+oned nepotism.

It was still hard. And five years later when the contract ended, they were both triumphant and clear in the knowledge that real lasting success was still something that they had to fight for. They had become another sort of family to each other in that five years. Sometimes they fought, sometimes they hated each other. Sometimes they were best friends. But they were always Underneath.