Naked Friend Friday

Chapter 6: Yuki


Tatsuha hung up the phone and tried ever so discreetly to hunch over the chair and make one more call.

“No more phone calls for you!” the booking officer said, snatching the cell out of Tats’s hands. “I said one call per assault and you’ve called everybody but pizza delivery!”

“But I need to call legal aid,” Tatsuha protested. “You can’t deny me my right to call legal aid so says Tokyo Juvenile Incarceration Statute number 159-A, Sub-Section C, Revision 6.”

“You can’t call legal aid because they’re closed.” The booking officer smiled evilly. “They close at 2 on Fridays. Right at the beginning of prime delinquency hours.”

Tatsuha blinked at him. “But the hotline is open 24 hours.”

The booking officer blinked back. “The hotline goes into a voicemail.”

Tatsuha leaned forward. “But the voicemail is checked every hour.”

The booking officer leaned forward. “Only Monday through Thursday. On Fridays through Sundays it’s checked every three hours.”

Tatsuha grit his teeth and put his hands on the desk. “But my case worker, Soto-san’s on duty, and he usually checks it every TWO hours.”

The booking officer put *his* hands on the desk. “Soto-san is on vacation.”

Tatsuha clenched his teeth. “Correction. He WAS on vacation. He left two weeks ago for Fiji. He comes back today and his flight, number 244 Japan Airlines, row 3, seat F, an aisle seat, was due back at Narita 10 am this morning. He’s still on the afternoon duty roster.”

Tatsuha leaned back in his seat and folded his arms. Now deal with that you pompous sack of shit!

The booking officer leaned back and laughed out loud. He brought up the weather channel on his computer and turned the flat screen so Tatsuha could see it.

“Yes, that WAS true, but due to Tropical Storm Hyde, head winds averaging 70 kph have delayed flights with layovers in Singapore by three hours. Soto-san’s flight, number 244 Japan Airlines became overbooked with people trying to get out of the wake of the storm. Soto-san was bumped and subsequently rescheduled for flight number 91 Singapore Air, row 15, seat A, a window seat. Since he was bumped, Japan Airlines gave Soto-san a half off coupon for his next flight with them and a free lunch at the airport restaurant of his choice, which turned out to be Quiznos, where he sat with his wife of three years, Aika, and had tuna salad on whole wheat, a bag of sour cream and onion potato chips and unsweetened ice-tea with lemon.”

“Quiznos?” Tatsuha exclaimed. “That’s an American restaurant chain. They’re not due for Asian expansion for another three years!”

“Their IPO came through early.”

The booking officer showed every tooth in his head in the widest, foulest grin Tatsuha had ever seen and being related to Yuki that was saying something. “Want to know what kind of pie they had for dessert?”

DAMN! Tatsuha shook his head with something that was a cross between absolute hate and top-notch respect. It was clear that he wasn’t dealing with a rank amateur. “I don’t suppose it was peach?” he asked sourly.

“Cherry—it’s a new menu item for the Asian expansion. Sign here stating that you’ve been read your rights and allowed your ONE phone call please.”

Fifteen minutes later Tatsuha was led to the offender storage area, also known as the jail cells. He was paraded through a gauntlet of cells on both sides of a narrow hallway to a bunch of catcalls and whistles, which he endured head held high all the way to the end of the line. There the guard stopped him at the last cell and swiped the electronic entry system beside the entrance with his key card. The barred metal door slid open.

“This isn’t even necessary,” Tats said petulantly to the guard. “My brother will be here to bail me out any minute now.”

“That’s what they all say,” said the guard. He gave Tats a shove inside. “In you go!” Then he swiped his key card through the reader on the wall right next to the cell and the barred metal door slid shut.

“Have fun, Butt-erscotch!” The guard threw back his head and laughed all the way back to his desk.

“That shit’s not even funny!” Tatsuha yelled back. “I’m definitely telling legal aid all about the mental abuse I’ve suffered here!”

“Hello, Nancy,” a voice said quietly behind him.

Startled, Tatsuha whipped around and looked up…and up…and up…and up some more.

Standing behind him was the tallest, biggest, beefiest, most muscular tree stump of a man he’d ever seen in his life.

Scuffed black boots, with permanent ass kicking indents on the toes.

Torn blue jeans—dirty.

Wide black belt with thick silver buckle that said “Killer.”

Dirty wife beater with mustard stains, under a ripped denim vest.

On the left bulging bicep was a tattoo of the left half of a broken heart that had scrolled across it: “Mama Didn’t Love Me.”

On the right bulging bicep was a tattoo of the other half of the broken heart that said: “Daddy Didn’t Either.”

A neck like a fireplug, atop which sat a potato shaped bald head.

Tatsuha tried to back himself through the metal bars that held him in place to get away from the monstrosity he’d suddenly found himself faced with.

“I’m glad you’ve come, Nancy. I was getting lonely.”

Talk about Butt-erscotch!

“Holy shit, Batman!” Tatsuha whispered to himself as his life flashed before his eyes.

“The end really is fucking nigh!”

*** ***

Less than an hour later…

Ring, ring…ring, ring…ring, ring…This is Yuki’s Wife! I can’t answer the phone right now, so leave a message at the tone! I love you Yuki!

“Damn!” Redial.

Ring, ring…ring, ring...ring, ring… This is Yuki’s Wife! I can’t answer the phone right now, so leave a message at the tone! I love you Yuki!

“Shit!” Redial.

Ring, ring…ring, ring…ring, ring… This is Yuki’s Wife! I can’t answer the phone right now, so leave a message at the tone! I love you Yuki!

“…”

*** ***

The front doors of the NG building opened and in from the bright sunlight of mid afternoon, walked a tall, lean man dressed in a custom-tailored business suit.

Yuki. Eiri Yuki.

Yuki walked into the lobby and his mouth fell open. There was water and glass everywhere and a squadron of custodians were mopping and wiping up the mess between a barricade of CAUTION: WET FLOOR SIGNS.

Yuki looked up. Almost an entire row of halogen lamps was shattered, broken and or busted. One of the few lamps that had remained intact was spitting violent sparks, giving the ladder straddling electrician trying to work with it fits.

“CUT THE POWER, CUT THE POWER!” he screamed, shielding himself from the fiery downpour. Several employees scrambled around the corner to the junction box and seconds later, all the halogens in the lobby went dark. Thankfully it was a sunny day. The afternoon sunlight filtering in through the front windows and doors along with the emergency lights, which had kicked in, lit the lobby to almost its normal state.

Yuki frowned. Were all of the lights connected to one another on the same grid? If so, that was a stupid mistake, Tohma, he thought. If there’s ever an emergency where a row of lamps gets damaged or worse, an event like this where my stupid brother decides to decimate your building, you’re shit out of luck for lights down here. If SOME are damaged they’ll ALL need to be turned off. And Yuki was certain that’s exactly what had happened. Tatsuha HAD decided to decimate their brother-in-law’s lobby and the small crew of policemen that was taking pictures of the devastation and questioning witnesses was proof!

Shaking his head, Yuki was about to head off toward the bank of elevators when a heavy hand clamped down on his shoulder.

“I swear I don’t know why they didn’t just SHOOT you!” a voice behind him yelled.

Turning around Yuki saw Aoki. He recognized the man as the head of security from the few occasions he’d seen him when he’d come to pick up Shuichi.

Yuki eyed the shorter man up and down with an arched brow. Aoki had definitely seen better days. His hair was standing on spiky end and his eyes were glazed, swollen and tinged with deep rings of red around the outside. Out of nowhere, he was suddenly seized with a hard twitch that shook him from head to toe as if an invisible foot had just violently shoved itself into his spleen.

“Oh!” Aoki let up off Yuki’s shoulder when he realized he had the wrong person. “Sorry Yuki-san. I thought you were…someone else…in disguise.” Twitch.

Yuki nodded, starting to put two and two together. It equaled Tatsuha. “Do you mean my brother?” he asked.

Aoki bared his teeth at Yuki. “I don’t want to talk about it!” he snapped. Twitch! A phone ringing at the reception desk drew his annoyed attention. “It’s been ringing (Twitch!) off the hook (Twitch!) for the past hour!”

Yuki looked around for the receptionist cutie that he usually flirted with on his rare visits to the building.

“Where’s Hikaru?” he asked.

TWITCH! Aoki threw Yuki a puffy-eyed glare and stalked away to answer the phone himself.

It was then that Yuki realized Tatsuha was telling the truth. He really was in jail and he had absolutely no doubt that all the damage that surrounded him was his brother’s fault.

Yuki shook his as he entered one of the elevators and rode up to the studio floor.

What could possibly have been going through Tatsuha’s mind? Yuki thought to himself. I mean, I know he’s daft and I’m certain Mika dropped him on his head when he was a baby…several times…outside on the sidewalk, but still. As the car slid upwards, Yuki seriously considered leaving Tatsuha to rot in jail til the end of his days, then briefly wondered if there was a way to make the torture continue after that.

The doors opened up and he exited. The hallway was empty and quiet save for a lone custodian who was furiously scrubbing the wall further down the hall.

Ignoring the janitor, Yuki began reading the studio occupancy signs. He went from one to the other looking for the one Shuichi was in. He stopped when he saw Bad Luck’s name next to Studio G. Curiously, the studio he was seeking turned out to be the one right next to the janitor who, Yuki could now see, was scrubbing determinedly at what looked a lot like a large bloodstain that was smearing the wall.

Yuki stood there watching the man work his sponge over the smear that led all the way to the floor. He shook his head. Tatsuha!

Beside him the door opened and out came Ryuichi holding an empty plate.

“Hello, Yuki-san!” he said somewhat brightly. He looked around. “Did you get Ta-kun out of jail yet?”

“No,” Yuki answered, “not yet. Is Shu and this Ichimoto character inside there?”

“Yep, they sure are. They’re dancing.”

Yuki’s eyes became pissy slits. “Are they now?” He moved past Ryu to go in.

“Yuki-san?”

Yuki turned back around. “Yeah?”

Ryu looked up at him hopefully. “No pie?”

Yuki rolled his eyes and for the millionth time wondered what it was that his brother saw in this very, very strange man. He ignored the question and went into the studio leaving Ryu pouting with his empty plate in the hallway.

“No pie,” he said sadly to the janitor. “Oh well, at least there’s more cheese.” He headed off to the break room with plate in hand and the janitor, who had ignored everybody, continued to scrub hot mama nosebleed off the wall.

Studio G was one of half a dozen on the studio floor that also boasted a rehearsal dance floor. Most of the studios were set up with a sound engineering room and an accompanying recording booth for the vocalists or in some cases a larger room that could accommodate an entire band and their instruments. Studio G had both of those as well as a large open space, just past the recording booth. The area had a wooden floor and was flanked on two sides by floor to ceiling, wall-to-wall mirrors. It was in those mirrors that Yuki saw his boy and Ichimoto-san reflected…again…and again…and again…

The song “So Fine,” was blaring full volume from the ceiling speakers, vibrating the space with the sensual, erotic grooves it had been written to evoke. In the middle of the dance floor, Ichimoto-san had Shuichi captured before him, backed up against him and pinned in a hunched over embrace that left his hands free to roam the length of Shu’s legs, the sides of Shu’s hips and the front of Shu’s…

“AHEM!” Yuki made himself heard over the music as he stepped out onto the floor in full “glare mode.”

“YUKIIII!” Shuichi immediately disentangled himself from the gay man net that had been cast over him and bounced into Yuki’s arms.

“You’re late!” he said showering his man with kisses.

Yuki, however, was busy stank eyeing Ichimoto-san who was staring slackjawed at the novelist like he’d just seen a thick, scrumptious cheesecake walk through the door. He began licking his lips…

Shuichi, not happy that he was being ignored, pulled Yuki’s face down to him. “You’d better hurry and get dressed. K’s not here, but he’s sent Noriko to spy on us. She left to pick up lunch and doesn’t know what time you were supposed to get here, but she’s been asking about you and Suguru who STILL isn’t here. If you don’t want to make K mad, you’d better change now.”

It all came rushing out in a gush. All Yuki heard was K, mad and get changed. Get changed? That caught his attention.

“Changed? For what?” he asked unwrapping himself from Shu’s arms. He began looking around for his manuscript envelope.

“For the video, Yuki!” Shu frowned. He hadn’t forgotten had he? “I reminded you about the video rehearsals last night. You have to try on the outfit and have it checked by someone in wardrobe to make sure it fits and then Ichimoto-san is going to go over the choreography with everyone.”

Yuki vaguely remembered Shuichi talking about videos and outfits the night before but he hadn’t really been listening. Not with sex kitten mini shorts and platform boots tugging at his mind and tapping at his nether regions.

“Come on, I’ll show you where you can get changed.” Shu kept up the constant chatter as he dragged Yuki out of the studio without even enough time for Yuki to bark at Ichimoto-san for the unlicensed groping of property that wasn’t his.

Shu dragged Yuki past the janitor and a couple of policemen who were now on the floor taking pictures of the bloodstain to a room at the end of the hall. Inside were long racks of clothing and a few department store style dressing booths. Taking his man to one of the booths, Shu pulled back the curtain to let him in.

“I already put your clothes inside.”

Yuki sighed and rolled his eyes. “I don’t have time for this, Shuichi. I need to find out if Spaz accidentally got a hold of my manuscript and take it to Mizuki. Why can’t I do that and then come back?”

“It’s KAZ and you can’t be trusted. You won’t come back, I know it!” Shuichi said brightly. “If you’d stop talking and hurry up and change, you’ll be out of here before you know it and then we can go home with Tatsuha and Ryu for NAKED FRIEND FRIDAY!!!” Shu squeed with excitement.

The thought of Naked Friend Friday, garters and a pink cowboy hat with a chinstrap to keep in place while Shu humped upside down flashed before Yuki’s mind…and tapped at his nether regions.

Without another word, he went inside the booth. Two and a half seconds later he came right back out again.

“WHAT. IS. THIS?!!” He held up two articles of clothing with the tips of his fingers like they were lousy with disease. In his left hand he held a black see through mesh shirt that was missing at least half its fabulous rhinestone buttons. It was guaranteed to show everything but his modesty. In his right hand he held a pair of leather pants that could only be called pants because there wasn’t another word for them. The smallest pair of black leather pants Yuki had ever seen, they didn’t have a top button and the zipper looked like it was barely three inches long; guaranteeing that they’d ride dangerously low on his hips—exposing hip bone and the top of a well sculpted path down to his widow maker! And they SPARKLED! Embedded in the material were millions of tiny, glittery speckles that danced and twinkled in the light.

There was no way in hell!

“Do these pants belong to Sakuma? They have to be the most scandalously gay leather pants in all of Tokyo!”

“I know, aren’t they precious?” Shuichi beamed. He’d picked them out especially for Yuki and couldn’t wait to see him in them. “And it gets even better! Since you’re playing the demon that’s fighting to win my love from Hiro’s angel, you get to wear these too!” He held up a pair of black, feathery wings.

“Aw fuck no!” Yuki thrust the offending garments at Shuichi. “I changed my mind. There’s no way this side of hell I’m going anywhere close to those! Besides, I have to find my manuscript and get it back over to the publisher’s because they’re …waiting…for…me…”

Shuichi was slowly moving towards him…hesitantly at first then with more confidence. He ran his hands across the very little fabric there was to his shorts and looked up at his man with nothing short of unadulterated lust in his huge eyes.

“But…Yuki…don’t you want to dance with me?” He kept coming with purpose. “I thought you liked it when I danced.”

“I said NO, Shuichi!” The fact that his words were sharp and decisive didn’t keep Yuki from backing up into the dressing room. Shuichi kept coming.

“I was REALLY looking forward to dancing with you, Yuki…”

Yuki backed up against the booth mirror with nowhere left to go.

“I said NO!”

Shu’s bottom lip began to tremble and the beginnings of puppy ears started to sprout from the top of his head.

“NO, DAMMIT, NO!” Yuki tried to turn away, but the thumping tail protruding from his man’s booty shorted bottom was hypnotic. He watched it wag up and down, up and down, up and down…

“But, Yuki, please?” Shu begged as his voice turned chibi. He turned around and backed up against Yuki, wagging his tail as he went. He began to grind while he pleaded his case. “You already signed the paperwork stating that you’d do it. (grind, grind) You’ve already been paid the advance. (grind, grind) If you don’t do it, NG will sue you and K…sniff…K will put a foot on your throat and a shot in your ass!” (grind, grind!)

Shuichi began to wail as he envisioned Yuki’s ass full of more holes than he could handle. “I CAN’T LIVE WITH YOUR ASS FULL OF HOLES, YUKI, I JUST NEED ONE!!!”

Wagging tail. Grinding…

Walk away Yuki, just…oh….walk… ahhh, harder…away…

Booty shorts. Grinding…

Walk…ah…ah…away…Yuki struggled with himself while Shuichi continued to back hump him into submission.

Grinding. Grinding…

A little to the left…DAMMIT YUKI! This is how you got into this mess in the first place!

Grind… Sue…

Yuki was rapidly losing a barely fought battle and he knew it. With each passing boy-humped second, Yuki grew harder, his pants grew tighter and his will grew weaker until the word sue rang in his ears loud and clear.

While he was sure Tohma wouldn’t sue him, he WASN’T so sure about NG’s board of directors. Even though he hadn’t been in his right mind the day he’d signed the papers, due to a SPECTACULAR bobbing and weaving session he’d had with Shuichi just prior to going to NG, he remembered clearly what’d happened when he’d signed his name on the dotted line. They’d played “Ode to Joy” over the loudspeakers and passed out flutes of champagne. Even his publisher had jumped in on the action, making a deal with NG to commission an art book of the whole affair. If he reneged now, he was certain it’d be his ass.

“Dammit Shuichi, why is it every time you don’t get your way, you turn into a boy tart?!” Without waiting for an answer, Yuki snatched the outfit, kicked Shu out of the booth and went back in to change.

“Because it works,” Shuichi murmured through a half smile behind him. Of course, he’d never let Yuki know that…

Inside the booth, Yuki quickly disrobed and threw on the shirt, cursing the entire time. It stopped buttoning half way up his chest.

“What the…” Yuki looked at himself in the mirror. Fully half his chest, including the right nipple was exposed.

“Oh my fucking god!” He closed his eyes against the sight, covered himself as best he could with what little of the flimsy material he had available, then went to work on the pants. Not only were they the smallest sparkly leather pants he’d ever seen, they also turned out to be the tightest. Yuki could barely get one leg in them. When he finally got his right leg the whole way through, he tried to lift his left leg and shove it through the opening only to tip over and fall head first into the mirror! His right knee wouldn’t bend! The pants were so tight, they’d become a leather tourniquet wrapped around him. After several minutes of grunting and cursing and sweating and dropping at least two pounds from the Herculean effort it’d taken to get his left leg into the pants at the same time as his right leg, Yuki managed to get into the pants and pull them up by tucking in his ass into his navel and mashing his stomach up against his spine. He could feel his kidneys twitching as he zipped up the pants.

Yuki leaned against the wall for support. He wanted to curse but couldn’t. He barely had breath to breathe, so he certainly couldn’t waste any on four lettered words even though he wanted to. Badly.

“Yuki?” Shu poked his head through the curtain. “Are you fin..is…he..d?”

The sight of Yuki done up like a demonic Bishounen rock star took Shu’s breath away. And he didn’t even have on tight pants!

“Can’t…breathe…” Yuki leaned against Shu heavily. “Kidneys…twitching…dying…changed mind…sue me!”

Shuichi laughed. “That’s because you have them pulled up too high, Silly! Here.” Shuichi gave the pants a hard tug and pulled them ass crack even.

The slack the pants now had gave Yuki his circulation back and allowed him to breathe and move his legs in a reasonably normal fashion, though he’d never be able to run or kick someone in the shins—hell, he wasn’t taking bets that he’d even be able to sit down. And he sure as hell couldn’t bend over to pick anything up!

He looked at himself in the mirror eyeing how the glittery pants framed him in a halo of sparkles and hugged his every lower body muscle. They rode almost halfway down his behind and the front dropped sharply to outline and magnify things that were best left unoutlined and unmagnified (not that he didn’t notice the effect it was having on Shuichi—the boy was standing in a puddle of his own drool).

I was wrong, Yuki thought. These aren’t the most scandalously gay leather pants in all of Tokyo. They’re the TIGHTEST, most scandalously gay leather pants in all of Tokyo!

“There. How do you feel now?” Shuichi asked through the waterfall of appreciation gushing from his mouth.

“Exposed.”

“Great! Then my work here is done. I’ll carry your envelope, so you can put these boots on and then we’ll get back to Kaz so you can get fitted, get your book, go to your publishers and then NFF! NFF, Yuki! We’re almost there! You can leave your clothes here, ok?”

When he was done, Shuichi led Yuki back down the hall past the cops and the janitor and the bloodstain and back into the studio.

“Wait, I gotta rest,” said Yuki panting. It was becoming easier to move around in the pants but his lungs were still oxygen deprived from the ordeal of putting them on.

Shu’s face melted with worry. “Ok, Yuki. Why don’t you go on in and while I go get the lady from wardrobe, I’ll get you something to drink. Something hot should perk you up! He handed Yuki the envelope and zipped off leaving Yuki alone…with Ichimoto.

At that thought, Yuki straightened up and shuffled to the back of the studio to find his book…and the man who’d trespassed on his property.

Kaz Ichimoto sat alone in the studio thinking morose thoughts. He was regretting having taken this assignment. While he was getting paid a king’s ransom for the project, it was turning out to be waaay more trouble than it was worth. First he’d gotten a plate of cheddar upside the head and had had to spend hours in the hospital trying to convince the registration nurse that his name was Ichimoto-san and NOT in fact Velveeta…all of which had been done around a concussion. Then today, half of Bad Luck hadn’t shown up, an armed gunman had attacked the building and made it up to the very same floor where his very own precious body was in the midst of working and then every time he thought he was getting somewhere with either that delectable Sakuma-san or the delicious Shindou-san, he got interrupted. Knowing that the tall, cool redhead was off limits, a fact that had been made crystal clear during an initial discussion with Bad Luck’s manager and two delightful gals named Mary Ann and Ginger, he’d been looking forward to having his fill of the rest of the bewitchingly Bishounen group. Hell, that’s the real reason he’d taken the gig in the first place. While he worked with the best and the prettiest in the industry, he hadn’t come cross so many hot men in one place since he’d choreographed L’Arc~en~Ciel’s last video and now his dick was itching to be Awake.

Maybe I should just leave, he thought to himself in the empty silence of the studio. I mean, even that green-haired elf looking boy hasn’t shown up. This whole thing has been a mighty disappointment, I don’t mind saying.

He was just about to get his things and go when he heard the studio door open and close. Soft footsteps sounded down the hallway—past the engineering station…past the recording booth and into the rehearsal space. A few seconds later, a demonic rock star wet dream walked onto the dance floor and made Ichimoto’s mind do a quick 360 degree turnaround…and his dick a hard 90 degree turn…up.

Ichimoto-san’s eyes and his mouth watered at the same time.

Shiny black boots with silver buckles.

Ohhhh….

A see through mesh shirt that was deliberately missing at least half of its fabulous rhinestone buttons was unbuttoned to expose the smoothest, most tightly muscled chest this side of a Michelangelo sculpture. And Lawd Help Me, we have NIPPLE!

Myyyyy…..

Thick, unruly blonde hair and piercing gold eyes. Eyes that burned. Eyes that scowled. Eyes that were looking at him like a piece of well- seasoned tenderloin.

GODDDDD!!!

And as Ichimoto-san’s eyes slid down the length of the Adonis stalking toward him like a tawny lion, he saw that the whole heavenly package was wrapped up in what had to be the tightest, most scandalously gay leather pants in all of Tokyo.

Ichimoto sank to his knees in prayerful thanks and deeply apologized to the gods for his abject stupidity. He had just been about to leave and if he had, he would’ve missed his chance to be the loving hand puppet of the most magnificent creature he’d ever laid eyes on…Eiri fuck-me-upside down Yuki!

“Thank you gods. Thank you, thank you, thank you! Your humble servant Dwight Dingleberry (only you know my real name Lord, so if you don’t mind, keep that shit to yourself)-- Yay-man!”

“Yuki-san,” Kaz cooed lustfully—he couldn’t take his eyes off the pants—“I must say this is an honor. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would ever have the privilege of dancing with you.”

He slid closer to Yuki.

“Of moving with you…”

He came up behind Yuki.

“Of moving you…”

Yuki stood in the middle of the dance floor watching the reflection of Ichimoto-san sidle up to the back side of him. It was all he could do not to turn around and beat the man like a redheaded step child.

“Ichimoto-san,” Yuki said, trying desperately to ignore the heat from the other man’s body as he hovered in back of him. “Do you have a large brown envelope like this one?” He held up the envelope of mug shots.

“Ooooo,” Ichimoto-san squeed with delight. “You mean my autographs? You WANT one, don’t you?” He went over to his duffle bag and extracted an envelope that looked almost identical to the one Yuki held.

“I haven’t given out a picture since yesterday afternoon and that was to an ungrateful punk kid! Can you believe he tossed it over his shoulder like a expired coupon for diapers?! But you,” Kaz leered at Yuki in all his tight pants glory, “you, I firmly believe can appreciate a work of art when you see one…being a work of art yourself.” He gestured at Yuki with his envelope. “And believe me, it would be my entire privilege if I could give one to you.” Kaz went back to sidling. “Or better yet,” he said silkily, “I could give you AND that wonderful strawberry-flavored boy toy of yours personal autographs later at my place after we’re done here.”

He clung to the back of Yuki like a gay fungus and slid his hand and the envelope up Yuki’s thigh.

“You would be the main course.”

Hand. Sliding. Higher.

“And Shuichi could be the dessert.”

Temper. Getting. Hotter.

Kaz whispered in Yuki’s ear as he pressed himself into Yuki’s body. “I could eat steak and strawberries for days…”

The studio door opened and closed.

“Mmm….for days…”

“Yuki-san!” Ryu came out onto the dance floor holding a fresh plate piled high with Gouda. He walked over to where Yuki was being molested.

“Want some?” he asked offering the plate to Yuki.

“Don’t mind if I do.”

In one instant, Yuki snatched the plate from Ryu.

BAM!

In the next, he turned and whopped Kaz Ichimoto dead center face with it. The plate cracked in two and a shower of Gouda went everywhere.

Kaz went down in a dark yellow heap and took Yuki with him.

“NOOO!” Seeing his cheese fix fly across the room, Ryu screamed with high-pitched dismay.

Yuki ignored Ryu and tried to get back on his feet, but like a flipped turtle, he succeeded in doing nothing but rolling from side to side with a moaning Kaz Ichimoto trapped beneath him.

Yuki looked over at Ryu who was standing in the middle of the room crying over his lost cheese.

“Hey!” he snapped. “A little help?”

Tearfully, Ryu bent down and pulled Yuki to a straight-legged stand. Immediately Yuki turned around and tried to bend over to snatch the envelope that was on the floor next to Kaz, however with his tourniquet on, he only made it half way to the floor before threatening to pass out. He turned to Ryu.

“Uh, a little more help, please?” He pointed to the envelope.

“Mmm…” Kaz moaned pitifully as Ryu, who was still crying loudly, bent over to grab what Yuki was pointing to. “You wouldn’t happen to be related to an ungrateful punk kid that doesn’t appreciate art would you?”

Yuki took the envelope from Ryu.

“He’s my brother.” And with that, he started shuffling as fast as his pants would let him to the door.

“Imagine that,” sighed Ichimoto, right before he passed out from his second concussion in as many days. As he did so, he rolled over revealing the second large brown envelope that he had fallen on top of during his tumble from grace.

Yuki, trying his best to hightail it out of the studio, ran smack into Suguru who was doing his best to hightail it in.

“Yuki-san!” Suguru’s eyes traveled the length of Yuki’s outfit. “Err…whoa!” Tight. “Umm…Man!” Scandalously gay. “Uhh…is…everything alright? I thought I heard someone scream?”

Behind him the two officers that had been taking pictures of the hot mama nosebleed were peering inside with investigative curiosity. Apparently they too had heard Ryu’s cheese wail of agony.

“Hello, Suguru,” Yuki said in a rush. “Goodbye!” He yanked Suguru inside and shuffled his body outside, quickly closing the door behind him to keep the sight of Ichimoto’s unconscious, cheese covered body from the two cops.

“Is everything alright in there?” one of them asked him, or…tried to ask him. His eyes were glued to the bulging front of Yuki’s pants.

“Everything’s fine,” Yuki said as calmly as he could. “I was just leaving. Good day.” He minced off toward the dressing room to retrieve his clothes as fast and as nonchalantly as the pants would let him.

The officers watched him go.

“Those have to be the tightest, most scandalously gay leather pants in all of Tokyo,” one of them said as he observed Yuki’s man wiggle.

“OH NO, NOT AGAIN?!” The sound of Suguru’s screams sliced through the air and the officers rushed into the studio.

Yuki turned and saw the cops make a dash toward the commotion.

“Shit!” Yuki hesitated. If he went to get his clothes the cops would surely catch up with him and he’d never get his book to Mizuki what with the questioning and the assault charges and more than likely the jail. If he made a break for it now, he might be able to get to the street, hail a cab and get his book back to his publisher’s. He could deal with the rest after that.

Yuki hesitated again. The right thing to do would be to wait and explain what happened to the cops. He’d calmly give them a perfectly reasonable, perfectly rational, certainly plausible explanation for why there was a gay perv currently beaten into cheese-filled submission on the studio floor and then he’d be on his merry way. He was Japan’s best selling novelist for gawd’s sake, surely he could do something as simple as lie.

“WE HAVE A REPEAT ASSAULT, CALL FOR BACKUP!”

Yuki bucked with alarm. They were calling for backup! Without a second thought, he immediately did an about face and started straight legging it to the elevators.

“Fuck it then, I don’t like the flaming ass clown anyway!”

He skid to a stop in front of the elevators and pushed the down button.

“Come on, come on…”

Any minute now they’d come out of the studio and…

The elevator doors opened. So did the studio door.

Yuki went in. The cops came out.

Yuki pushed the down button and just as the doors were about to close…

“Hey you in the pants! Wait!”

The doors dinged shut.

Less than a minute later, the doors dinged and opened in the lobby. Yuki, fully aware of how he looked, slicked back his hair, clutched the envelope and walked as casually as he could toward the front doors, keeping his eyes straight ahead and ignoring the slight hysteria he was causing on his way out.

All around him people stopped. People dropped things. People walked into things. People walked into people. People stared. People drooled. People got wet. And more than a few people got hard.

Just keep walking, just keep walking, just keep walking…

He made it past the building directory sign.

He made it past the small fountain that was situated against one wall.

He made it past the electrician straddling the tall ladder, now busily working with the dead lamp above his head.

“Yuki-san!” A heavy hand clamped down on his shoulder. Correction, he ALMOST made it past the electrician straddling the tall ladder now busily working with the dead lamp above his head. Turning around slowly, Yuki saw Aoki. The man didn’t look any better than he had before. In fact, he looked worse. His eyes, in addition to being red and puffed swollen, were misting over in something that was either anger or regret. Yuki couldn’t tell which.

Yuki flicked his eyes behind Aoki’s head and watched the elevators. Any second now…“Yes?” he asked quietly. Did Aoki already know? Should he make a run—er shuffle for it?

Aoki sighed. “I’m really sorry about before, Yuki-san.” Aoki hung his head. “I was quite mean to you and you didn’t deserve it. I really wanted to apologize.”

If Yuki could have breathed properly, he would have breathed a sigh of relief. Aoki wasn’t on to him.

“That’s ok, we all make mistakes. Well, good day then.” Yuki turned and tried to walk away, but Aoki rushed around him and blocked him.

“No, it’s not ok. Today has just been hell because of your brother but that’s no reason to take it out on you. You are not your brother. You would never assault someone with a plate of cheese like he did or cause destruction like this just because you were…ahem, with “need” and I just wanted to say that I’m sorry I was awful to you earlier.”

“It’s ok.” Yuki tried to brush past him. Aoki blocked him.

“I mean, I’m usually such a calm man…a fair man. Even my wife says so. Speaking of my wife, did you know that she’s a huge Eiri Yuki fan?” Aoki beamed up at Yuki.

“No, I didn’t.” Yuki tried to brush past him in the *other* direction. Aoki blocked him…in the *other* direction. Yuki bared his teeth at Aoki.

“Well, she is and, well, I know it’s a lot to ask of you—especially in light of all that’s happened here today with your brother and all, but she would just adore it if you could give her an autograph?” Aoki was gearing up to go into full begging mode.

“I’m a bit busy right now.” Yuki faked a right, then tried to brush past him on the left. Aoki hit him with NG Security Threat Crisis Prevention Blocking Maneuver Number Eight--Faked Lunge to the Side with Triple Axle Reverse Roundabout aka Been Caught Cheating. He stuck the landing and blocked Yuki dead center.

“Well, I’m sure you are, but this won’t take but a second and it sure would make my wife happy. Please, I humbly…”

A beeping sound on Aoki’s walkie-talkie cut through his begging.

“Sorry Yuki-san, just a minute, please.” He turned around to answer the call.

Yuki made an attempt to go around Aoki, when suddenly…

“Oh my God, he did what?!” Aoki jammed an arm out like a railroad-crossing bar and blocked Yuki.

Still blocking him, Aoki whipped around on the demon rock star and glared at him through a haze of red, puffy anguish.

“You DIDN’T!” he cried unhappily, hitting the red panic button on his talkie.

“Shit!” Knowing the game was done, Yuki cursed and tried to do a straight leg roll right over Aoki and keep going. Unfortunately for him, a second after the thought entered his mind, he found himself staring down the barrel of something that looked a lot like a gun. It was aiming dead center at him.

“Why, Yuki-san, WHY???” Aoki looked so disappointed, Yuki almost felt sorry for him. Almost. The sudden sound of a multitude of feet echoing with half-hearted quickness against the marble floors cut off all feelings to the sympathetic. Yuki turned and found himself faced with a wall of a dozen black-suited NG Security agents.

Yuki took one look at the guards and almost laughed out loud. The wrecked state of the crew was obvious. Though they all had their security game faces on, most of them seemed to be in the same state as Aoki. Almost all of them were in various stages of dishevelment, with hair askew and suits not quite straight. Most of their eyes were red and puffed and more than a few of them were shifting uncomfortably left and right as if they were trying to relieve some unseen tension somewhere in the vicinity of their nether regions. All of them however, had their “guns” drawn and aimed dead center at Yuki and every last one of them looked pissed to death.

Yuki frowned. Tatsuha had really done a number on this group. None of them looked like an autograph would get him through, including Aoki at this point, so Yuki stood his ground and tried the high and mighty approach.

Really, it was all he had left.

“What’s the meaning of this!” he spat out in his best Yuki voice. “I demand to know what’s going on!”

Cr…

“I just got a call from the police officers up on the studio floor and they seem to think you have something to do with a repeat assault on Kaz Ichimoto! He was found unconscious with a plate of Gouda cracked over his head…right after you were observed making a hasty retreat from the scene of the crime.” Aoki shook his head with utter dismay.

Crrr…

“Why can’t you and your brother leave your DAIRY fetishes at HOME…far, far away from public witness! This is a place of business for God’s sake!”

CRRRR….

Yuki played dumb. He was innocent until proven guilty and right now all they could do was place him at the scene. Cheese assault coincidences happened all the time, right?

CRRREAAKKK…

“I don’t know what you mean!” he said haughtily. “I have a perfectly legitimate reason for being in Studio G. As if you couldn’t tell by the way I’m dressed in this ridiculous outfit, I’m participating in a video and had a wardrobe fitting. And if you hadn’t noticed, there’s no way I could beat a hasty retreat from anything, including a burning building in these pants! They’re the tightest, most scandalously gay leather pants in all of Tokyo! How the HELL am I going to RUN from ANYTHING?”

Aoki narrowed his eyes at Yuki and yanked the safety off his “gun.”

“I never said it was STUDIO G!”

Yuki’s mouth fell open. He’d done himself in!

And then as if that wasn’t enough…

CRRREAAAK PLOP!!!

A slice of cheese, which, in the plate-cracking commotion had stuck itself to the back of Yuki’s pants, peeled off with an echoing crreeaaak and plopped to the floor for everyone to see. At once, all heads bent down to take in the sight of the offending evidence.

By the time everyone returned their attention back to Yuki, he was already trying to turn himself in the direction of the doors.

“STOP!” Aoki yelled.

Yuki screeched to a standstill as the sound of a dozen safeties being clicked off filled the air with metallic menace. Yuki waddled back around slowly with his hands and the envelope in the air.

“I’ve been ordered to detain you until the police can finish on the studio floor and their back up arrives!”

Yuki arched a brow in confusion as the NG Security Agents dropped into NG Security Threat Crises Prevention Detainment Maneuver Number Seven aka The Double Blade. Since their so called Threat Prevention maneuver went so heinously wrong the first time, the agents forwent The Noose and instead formed two lines of six bodies. The first line went down on one knee and aimed at Yuki’s lower half while the second line stood just behind them aiming at Yuki’s upper half over the heads of the first line. Even if Yuki somehow managed to defeat some of them, with both of the lines firing a staggered volley…one right after the other aiming both high and low, he was bound to get hit one way or the other.

Yuki froze. Though he didn’t know what kind of weapons the agents were holding, as they didn’t look like regular guns, and they certainly weren’t the standard .38’s the normal Honest-to-God Tokyo police carried, he DID know one thing. Whatever the guns were, they all equaled Whoop Ass for Yuki!

He continued to try to bluff his way through.

“I will have my team of lawyers down here before you can say UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS and I’ll OWN this building and every last one of your asses if you don’t release me at once!”

RED TO YELLOW, RED TO YELLOW, RED TO YELLOW…high-pitched whine…

“I’ll publicize far and wide how you treated Japan’s number one romance author…an innocent man just trying to do the LOVE OF HIS LIFE a favor by appearing in his video…do you know how you’ll be crucified in the papers for standing in the way of TRUE LOVE???”

YELLOW TO GREEN, YELLOW TO GREEN, YELLOW TO GREEN…loud high-pitched whine…

“Uhh…True Love? Ok, intense fondness!”

Shit!!

Yuki saw the LEDs go hot and even though he didn’t know what it all meant, his mind wasn’t trying to let his body stick around long enough to find out.

Out of survival instinct he took…one…step…backward.

“FIRE!”

The men were only too happy to comply. They hadn’t gotten Tatsuha, but Yuki looked enough like the Super Soaker Menace to make up the difference. The kneeling front line fired first, launching a squad of tasers at Yuki’s legs. A split second later, the backup line prepared to fire their tasers at Yuki’s chest.

Unfortunately for them, a split second was all it took.

The first line of tasers made perfect contact with Yuki’s legs. They slammed into Yuki with rocket force one right after the other—THUMP, THUMP, TH-THUMP, then…SCHPING, SCHPING, SCHA-PING…BOUNCED BACK AT THE FIRST LINE!

Yuki’s pants, the tightest, most scandalously gay leather pants in all of Tokyo were so restricting in fact that not only could Yuki not breathe or run—hell, he could barely walk, they stretched over his legs so tightly that they had no give. The dart end of the tasers could find no purchase, nor could they penetrate the buffer of leather Yuki had wrapped himself in. The pants acted like a tight, scandalously gay deflector shield and sent the first line’s tasers ricocheting back at them faster than the eye could blink. Before they could say “I quit!” the first line fell smack backwards against the second line, smoking, foaming messes, courtesy of their own tasers!

And thus, the domino effect was born.

The first line fell back against the second line. The second line, having their aiming and firing stances disrupted by the first line, fell backwards and shot upwards in the air. The renegade darts went everywhere, hither and yon, several of which ended up in the hither, yon derriere of the ladder-straddling electrician. Shaking from the high voltage Yuki Whoop Ass he’d received, the electrician grabbed at the lamp he had been working on in either an electrified jerk reaction or an involuntary attempt to keep his balance. Either way, it didn’t work. The ladder fell, taking the electrician with it and the lamp, still clutched in his smoking hands, went with him.

The cable wrapped wiring from which the lamp hung was the first thing to go.

The suspended ceiling panel the lamp wiring was strung through was the second thing to go.

The third thing to go was the neighboring lamp in the same row to which the first lamp was connected.

The fourth thing to go was the suspended ceiling panel through which THAT lamp was strung.

And the fifth thing to go was the lamp next to the second lamp.

RIP went the wiring!

DOWN went the lamp!

CRASH went the suspended ceiling panel!

Everyone on the floor, including Yuki, stood still and horrified as they witnessed the complete and utter destruction of the NG Lobby.

RIP went the wiring!

DOWN went the lamp!

CRASH went the suspended ceiling panel!

Their heads turning in unison, they followed the progression of the connected line of lamps from one halogen to next.


RIP went the wiring!

DOWN went the lamp!

CRASH went the suspended ceiling panel!


All the way up one row of lamps…


RIP went the wiring!

DOWN went the lamp!

CRASH went the suspended ceiling panel!


All the way down the next.


RIP went the wiring!

DOWN went the lamp!

CRASH went the suspended ceiling panel!


The mortified onlookers watched as the wiring, the lamps and the ceiling fell in neat orderly rows among the dust and insulation and glass and general chaotic destruction that rained down on those below.


RIP went the wiring!

DOWN went the lamp!

CRASH went the suspended ceiling panel!


When the last of the wiring had RIPPED, when the last lamp went DOWN, and when the last of the ceiling panels CRASHED to the floor, the remaining wiring that was embedded in the ceiling backtracked through plaster cracks, leaving a zig-zagging trail all the way across the remaining ceiling, through the lobby, down the elevator wall and around the corner to the junction box. Three seconds later:

RIP!

DOWN!

CRASH!

“OH MY FACE!!!”

The junction box ripped itself out of the wall and smacked with a smoking and sparking BAM into the face of an innocent passerby and then with an earsplitting CLANG, onto what used to be highly polished marble floors. The body of the assaulted passerby fell right beside it.

The immediate silence that followed the sudden cessation of destruction was deafening.

Yuki turned his head. All around him, dust, plaster and fluffy insulation bits flittered down from what used to be the ceiling like lazy party confetti and coated everyone and everything from head to toe in white, powdery debris. What was left of the NG Security Agent Team stood around him, slack jawed in disbelief. They looked up to where, just a few scant seconds before, their ceiling had been hanging. They looked down at their fallen comrades who were still smoking and foaming on the floor where they had fallen-- victims of their own tasers. They looked at the toppled ladder and the only part of the smoking, foaming electrician they could still see that wasn’t buried under rubble—his foot. It too was smoking courtesy of an ass full of tasers. It was also twitching. They looked over at Aoki who, like the rest of them stood slack jawed with glazed eyes, his mind having vacated several seconds earlier, unable to take the carnage that it was witnessing.

Finally they all looked at Yuki--or they would have looked at Yuki had he still be standing where they’d left him. All that was left in that very same spot was a portion of highly polished marble floor in the shape of two empty footprints. Following a dusty trail of ceiling and insulation, they found Yuki busy making a man shuffle for the doors.

“Stop him!” Aoki said weakly around a mouthful of insulation.

The security team bucked at Aoki as if he’d lost his mind. They were tired, earlier, liquid whoop ass had pulverized them, and now they’d just been beaten to a pulp with their own ceiling! And after all that, this dusty sonuvabitch wanted them to STOP someone?

Click…click…click…the sound of high heels clicking seductively against the sidewalk outside echoed against the pavement…

Yuki wiggled his way to the door as fast as he could.

Bouncy curls, porcelain skin and luscious, full lips parted in a small smile…

Yuki bunny hopped over a pile of ceiling in his way and kept going, leaving a powdery trail of insulation in his wake.

An off the shoulder top revealed cleavage that would make any self respecting Victoria’s Secret model quit and become a librarian…

Yuki dodged a lamp to his left, then ducked a late falling ceiling panel to his right without stopping.

A white skirt had a thigh split so high, sightings of a Hello Kitty panty line could be spotted at twenty paces…

Yuki made it to the door in man-mincing record time and reached out for the large chrome handles to pull open his gate to freedom. Looking back to see where he stood with the security team, he saw them still standing in shell-shocked place.

“So long, suckers!” Yuki spat as he turned around and…

BAM! …

…got hit face first with the same heavy glass door that he had been about to open—a heavy glass door that he might have seen trying to collide with his nose had his eyes not been drawn downward and distracted by the most shapely bum he’d seen in many a day. It had been pushed up against the glass and used to wedge the door open in lieu of hands that were busy holding heavy bags of boxed lunches.

Yuki didn’t see the lunches or the door. He DID, however, see the ass. He saw it first and the ragged hole where the ceiling used to be second, as he tumbled backwards. Unable to catch himself or bend his legs for balance, Yuki fell straight down and hit the debris riddled lobby floor with a dust kicking “OOMPH!”

Staring up from where he lay amid the rubble and the insulation fluff he saw Hello Kitty staring back down at him.

Noriko Ukai! Noriko stood there, blinking down at him in all of her bodacious C-Cup glory.

Back down on the floor, Yuki sprang a nosebleed. Whether it was a delayed reaction from being banged in the face with the door or an instant reaction to Hello Kitty, he didn’t know. What he DID know was that as the police back up arrived and made a beeline for his immobile form, he had absolutely no resistance to offer them whatsoever. He casually reached into his pocket and withdrew a smoke, which he lit and dragged on as the police picked Yuki up, two to each side, and carried him between them like a piece of dumb lumber from the building.

Suspended between the four officers, Yuki looked over at Noriko as he passed her by.

“I didn’t know you liked Hello Kitty,” he observed calmly around his dangling cig and trickling nosebleed. And then he was gone.

Behind the closing doors, the lobby emergency lights stuttered, fluttered, then winked out for good.

End Chapter 6: Yuki


Next time on NFF:

The problem with mid-shifts…
The power of codpieces…
The Service industry at NG…
How to beat your meat…
Brotherly love?…
Do you hear something? What’s that noise?…