"HEY ANARI DON'T DROP THE DAMN SOCCER BALL!" Draken had shouted over the sound of his revving engine as they sped down the empty streets. Anari frowned and only held onto it tighter, along with her grip of dear life not to go flying off of the motorbike as Draken raced with Pah, Mitsuya, Kazutora and Baji who had Mikey riding in the back with him.
The month of June swept across the roads with a swirl of wind that caused the twelve year old to cover her face in defense from the blurring leaves that trickled off from the birch branches that provided shade in which they darted underneath as they all came to a quick stop to settle a petty argument that started with Baji's statement, "my Goki's the best in Tokyo!"
It was only then that Draken let out a scoff, spitting onto the asphalt road, hitting the brakes, causing Anari's nose to bump into his back. "Huh? Best in Tokyo?" Draken nearly laughed before a devious smirk made its way onto his face, tilting his chin upward and staring down at Baji. "My Zephyr's the best bike in Japan."
Draken, the oldest of all of them, but not by much, just a mere few months, yet also the tallest had sneered.
Mitsuya's bike slid by Draken's. "Whoa, whoa. Hold the phone. I can't just sit by and let that slide-- you guys think too small. My sweet little Impulse is the best in the world!"
While they continued arguing, Mikey who sat on the back of Baji's bike, and Anari behind Draken's, the two competed in a staring competition with one another. But Mikey's drowsy eyes gave in on him, desperate to be blinked to rehydrate themselves.
He slowly nodded off his head, accepting the fact that Anari had won, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a lollipop for her as she accepted it as a prize. Mikey's head began to slump onto Baji's back. "I'm sleepy .." The blonde mumbled, but the girl reached her arm over and pat his head, readjusting his head properly so he didn't flop off entirely.
A gust of air brushed past. "My CBX 400F's is the best. Dunno if its best in the world or the universe though. I'm just an idiot." Pah-chin who had gotten into a fight the other week with a busted lip still had stitches on the bottom portion of flesh that slowly mended itself.
He had a care not in the world and zoomed past the bickering group. "Enough talkin' about stupid crap. C'mon. Let's race to Musashi shrine."
All of them grew furious and began spurring up their bikes, accelerating it as they spewed profanities. "PAH THAT'S CHEATING! QUIT BEING SO DAMN LOGICAL YOU ASSHOLE!"
"Bring it on bitch!" Mitsuya shouted at the top of his lungs.
For the first few seconds, Baji broke the lead and was in front-- but he began to slow down after realizing his passenger .. had fallen asleep. "Hey .. hey! Mikey, why the hell are you asleep?!" The boy's snores rung out, finding his melatonin bliss in the shouting of his friends and the revving of their bikes that reminded him of his brother's shop.
"You're gonna fall off, damnit! Wake up! Anari, push him back on!" Baji slowly inched closer to Draken's bike. But Anari only shook her head, "if I push him too hard he'll go flying splat onto the road!" The girl pat Draken's shoulder, signaling him to go faster while she blew a raspberry just for the heck of it.
While all of them climbed the stairs of the not quite abandoned, but not frequently visited shrine lodged within the middle of the forest in an off path. Some of the stairs had roots of tree stumps that shattered through the stone, while other bits had emerald green moss growing on it.
It was still well maintained, cleaned and swept about once a month by locals.
Anari passed the ball to Draken who began kicking it in the air, starting a small little game with Pah-chin as she plopped down beside Mitsuya and Kazutora. It wasn't long before they noticed, Baji was severely lagged behind due to Mikey's sudden decision of a randomized nap time.
"Hope Baji didn't drop kick him down the stairs or something.." Anari spoke aloud as Mitsuya looked up to the sky, chuckling. "You already know that Mikey'd wake up and send him tumbling."
Their little quarrels weren't uncommon, rather it was the opposite.
Baji would always want to square up to Mikey to test or scale the progress of his strength, but what he forgot to realize was that while he also trained to grow stronger, so did Mikey, sparring with students at his grandfather's dojo.
He was a result of natural born talent-- of course mixed with hard work.
After a good fifteen minutes, they began to hear the stomps and panting of a certain male. "Finally made it!" And on his back, was a snoozed raccoon, a mop of blonde who left a patch of drool on his striped t-shirt. Anari gently clapped for Baji while Draken kicked the ball high up into the air, landing it right into Anari's arms as she placed it down carefully to not have it roll away.
"Sup last place, what took you?" Kazutora and Mitsuya mocked. June in Tokyo, specifically Shibuya was a little bit chilly as Anari blew a sneeze. Draken cringed, not wanting to take care of a sick Anari again, just like after she had gotten her flu shot and a fever right after it.
He slipped off the geometric wool knit cardigan that Anari made for him for Christmas and slipped it onto her. "Don't start sneezing on me now."
She only nodded, turning her head to Baji who let out a squawking fuss. "This mother fucker's been dead asleep this whole time!"
"Excuses, excuses. You're just making yourself look worse now." They shook their heads in disappointment, although it was just a friendly little joke. Anari slid off of the dried up stone well and went to go check on if Mikey was really alive or not. As if he could sense by natural animalistic instinct that someone was about to make skin to skin contact with him, his eyes twitched and fluttered open, wiping the drool that dribbled down from his lips. "Huh .. we're here already ..?"
"Already ..? It's been twenty minutes." Mitsuya snorted.
Draken turned around, "didn't you have something to tell everyone? That's why you called us all here right, Mikey?"
Hopping off of Baji's back, letting the twelve year old breathe a gasp of fresh air, bending and haunching his back over from the pains of carrying Mikey up a painstakingly long flight of stairs. The pale blonde stretched his limbs before hopping up on a fence railing in front of a bonsai tree painting, helping Anari up to sit beside him and Draken standing on the side with Baji having a well deserved sit.
"You guys know about this one biker gang .. the Black Dragons?" Either it was the topic of the sentence, Anari's sea-foam gaze, or both, but upon the words uttered, Kazutora noticeably flinched in her peripheral vision that gazed upon the ravenette.
The day, just almost a week ago, Kazutora had come crumpling to her doorstep.
Although, he hadn't a single clue that Mikey had come that day to check on him-- for he was asleep the entire time until the very next day when the rain cleared up and he had left while Anari had fallen asleep while tending to replacing the cloth on his forehead, making sure he didn't catch a cold from the rain.
"I heard they're cold stone bastards. Three years above us, I think?" Draken had voiced the knowledge he had on hand whilst Mikey confirmed it, nodding his head.
They were a gang that had started off well respected, and somewhere along the way, their cruel ways had been frowned upon by the very delinquents who looked up to them as a guidepost to pave their futures.
Putting the luminatory spotlight on the very boy who was currently sweating beads .. Mikey turned his head, as did everyone else. "Why didn't you ask for help .. Kazutora? Rin told me about it .. you fought the Black Dragons alone, didn't you? She was pretty damn worried." Anari who stared at the ground, delecting on her lollipop merely swung her feet back and forth.
"Huh? Kazutora took on the Black Dragons?" Mitsuya had now pieced the puzzle together. From the slight limp in his ankles five days ago, and his bandaged knuckles along with multitude of band-aids that seemed awfully familiar to the color that Anari had used once when burning herself on a hot pan.
"Kazutora does live on their turf .." Pah-chin muttered.
Draken let out a scoff, not of discontent toward Kazutora, but rather the disdain set upon the biker gang who'd messed him up.
"You plannin' to fight the Black Dragons, Mikey?" Draken already had a subtle idea of where this began to lead. Especially considering the rather thick serious atmosphere after learning one of their own was beaten by a gang who wrecked havoc and would likely now be targetting Kazutora specifically after he confronted them first.
Mikey wanted to do all in his power to lift the atlas burden upon Kazutora's shoulders. A burden he alone shouldn't bear by himself, and battles in which he should have people standing beside him.
"Yup! The Black Dragons are a huge gang. I want a just cause for taking them on!" He stood up, dusting up the cargo pants he wore.
Mikey and his sister who were practically raised by their elder brother who was so soft that he wouldn't even hurt a fly, yet carried the charisma to become a founding president of a gang and earn the respect and esteemed reverence from the heaps of delinquents occupying Shibuya and Tokyo all over.
Not all delinquents were bad. There was a sterotype everyone disassociated and thought otherwise.
The first thing many people did after hearing about delinquents is assuming they had bad grades, committed atrocious acts and had the guts to murder people off the bat. Although it wasn't entirely off the mark, going against the law, socially was frowned upon, it shouldn't have been necessarily been categorized as bad in the eyes of others while they lived in a world with failed systems and an even more corrupt government.
That was something Shinichiro Sano strived to change.
The pacifist who founded one of the most infamous gangs wanted to change the title in which the general public misled them by.
What a misled world they lived in. Fed and dosed on all too many cans of intoxication that allowed them to believe every delusion they picked from the floating categorizing rumors.
"I got an idea."
All eyes and attention flew to Baji who also stood up. His toothy grin that shone out his two impeccably sharp canines that Anari used to mistake for vampire teeth for the longest time. More like she refused to accept the fact that they were actual human teeth.
Academically, Baji wasn't exactly the brightest in the room, but like any other person, he had his moments to shine, making up for his lack of intellect in school, out of it, he used his noggin in a battle, surprisingly.
Whether it came out of gaging an opponent's strength, or predicting how much strength he'd put into each swing to conserve for the next knock out, Baji was more concerned about things he was passionate about rather than useless grades that were just numbers belonging to an unsure unstable future that he didn't even want, working in an office cubicle in the first place.
"Let's form .. our own gang."
For a second there was momentary silence needed to process his words. "A gang .. of our own?"
"Yeah." Draken was the first to spring to his feet, an ambitious grin tugged onto the corner of his lips upward. "Nice idea! Sound like hell of fun to me!"
Baji continued on his suggestion, "I already decided our positions in the gang, too."
Almost as if this idea had been tugging on his train of thought for some time now, a dream in which he had come up with when they were still just elementary school kids that met up with each other after school diving off of bridges or spray painting parks.
And slowly, this was the beginning brush strokes of their canvas painted in the glory to be displayed upon a cathedral's glass tales.
"Our leader, the most strongest and full of himself in the universe, Mikey!!" As per matching description, Mikey replied to the flattery with a smug grin. "Our vice-leader, the dependable big bro type, Draken!" The male elbow bumped Anari who only let out a whine.
"Mitsuya, our mediator will command our elite guard! The powerful Pah-chin will carry out banner!!" The two of them were semi confused by their roles but nodded nonetheless, filled with upright determination.
"Alice, our support in the shadows .. and Kazutora! You and I will form the attack unit!" At first, the bruised boy seemed reluctant, his self esteem was flattened along with his pride after being kicked around like a rag doll by the Black Dragons.
A little bit of courage would serve satisfactory. ".. But can we really form a gang so easily?"
Mikey lazily plopped himself into the concern at hand, "I've already thought of a gang-name."
Anticipation heightened the deluded air as Mikey grinned, "the Tokyo Manjirou Gang!"
"Lame!" They all chorused, much to his bafflement, pouting as he always did, although this time it got him nowhere except a pinch on the cheek by Anari's part.
"I already have a design for the uniforms in mind, and Yaya is gonna help me!" Mitsuya sighed, being dragged head-first into Anari's quick sprouting ideas that he couldn't get rid of from the bud itself, for he was too slow.
"So we'll leave that to you two .. gang name aside, I agree." Draken was always one in for the fun of things, after all, it was how he had met Mikey in the first place. His urge and nature to have a thrilling and wilding excitement of adrenaline to surge through his veins and chorus into his running blood.
"Yeah, with six as a gang plus one in the shadows, our fights will finally have a purpose .. gang name aside." Although Mitsuya was the biggest pacifist of the group and the source of positivity, thus making him the perfect person as a mediator, he was also one of the best fighters, and wouldn't hesitate to use his strength to knock those blocking the path ahead and who were in the way.
"A gang huh .. that sounds badass! Gang name aside .." Pah-chin had a wide grin, ear to ear, if anything it was the happiest Anari had seen the grumpy male. His resting face was rather scary.
"All of you are so mean .. It's a good name .." Mikey griped, whining as he clung on to the side of Anari who nonchalantly lifted her arm up and used the top of his head as an elbow rest. "I'll get to negotiating fabrics and persuading Yaya .. and as for the flags, I have an idea too."
Baji fist bumped the girl, "so that settles it! We'll give you all we got. Make a new age for us .. Mikey." On the date of June 19th, they had formed the Tokyo Manjiro gang, later to be known as Toman. They placed their faiths and ideals all in the invincible hands of Mikey where they instinctively knew it would be safe,
protected by his very life that he would live in order to achieve the perfect ideal goal they strived. The brush swirled and a new painting came to life, blending each individual as a single color, margining into a symbol of their unity.
From what started as a black canvas, spider web cracks that crawled through to shatter a mirage, leaving the untouched ivory white surface, perfect for a starting point.
"What kind of gang do you want?" The question was out of blue, not one with an answer yet prepared by Baji as he hummed. "Let me think .." Snapping his fingers, the thought came to mind.
"All for one and one for all, we put our lives on the line for each other! That's the kind of gang I want!" His echoing voice was heard loud and clear. Mikey smiled. "Got it."
Anari who eyed Mikey carefully .. that day, she could have sworn.
A speckle of light had come to life in his eyes. Like a star. The birth of a star as bright as the sun in the blazing day with the scorching brilliance that became a specter in the sky, to create the road and the beginning of their new era.
He turned to her with a smile, crossing pinkies with her, silently making a promise to swear, this was the type of gang he'd create.
One that was just like Baji's ideals, and one that was like Anari's vitality and morality.
"Let's buy charms to celebrate!"
No protest was heard as they all got up, shoulders higher and backs straighter, allowing themselves to be called the founding members of the future of delinquents.