The first thing Akira notices is the noise.
Not the normal kind – not lockers slamming, not teachers barking, not sneakers squeaking across the tile.
Whispers.
Everywhere.
He walks down the main hall with his hood half up, bag slung over one shoulder, hands in his pockets. The strip lights hum above, flickering in places where the building's too old and no one cares. Students peel away from the middle like he's carrying a sickness.
A girl tugs her friend's sleeve when he passes.
"That's him," she hisses.
"The transfer. The one who dropped Daigo's guys."
He doesn't glance their way. He's done this walk in a dozen schools, down a dozen halls. New rumors, same weight.
Behind him, the echoes of his crew trail close like shadows.
Kenji strolls with his blazer hanging off one shoulder, half his shirt untucked, backpack unzipped. He moves like he owns the floor, like he's waiting for the world to give him another excuse to swing.
Nikki walks on Akira's other side, gum clicking softly, skirt just barely regulation-length, thumbs flicking across her phone screen with practiced boredom. Her eyes, though, are always moving. Always clocking faces.
Near the end of the hall, leaning against the wall under a "NO RUNNING" sign, Vincent stands with his head bowed and his earbuds in. His eyes are closed behind his bangs, but Akira has seen him fight – he knows Vincent is never really not watching.
Phones come up. Screens flash. Some kids pretend they're checking messages. Some don't bother pretending at all.
STUDENT 1 (whispering):
"That's the kid who dropped three seniors yesterday."
STUDENT 2:
"Nah, I heard it was five. And the quiet one in the hoodie just watched."
Kenji smirks like the noise feeds him.
"Look at that," he murmurs, loud enough for Akira to hear. "Didn't even need a poster. We're already a show."
Nikki hums under her breath. "We're famous now."
Akira's eyes stay forward. The words slide past him like wind around a stone.
They reach Vincent. For a second, the four of them are a single point in the hall. Students edge around them like water around rocks, hoping not to be noticed.
Akira stops beside him. Vincent opens his eyes, just briefly. Their gazes meet – one heartbeat, two – then Vincent looks away again, tilting his head as if the music in his ear matters more than the war building outside it.
The bell rings. The sound shatters the tension, but the whispers keep going.
Akira adjusts his bag strap and moves on.
Echoes follow.
Classroom 2-B smells like dry markers and cheap floor cleaner.
The AC rattles in the ceiling but barely cuts through the heat. Half the blinds are crooked, letting in uneven lines of harsh morning light that slice across desks and faces.
Akira sits near the window, as always. He's got his notebook open, but there's nothing written on the page. Outside, he can see the strip of cracked pavement where yesterday's mess ended – the faint scuffs where shoes slid, where backs hit the wall.
From here, the courtyard looks calm. Like someone painted over the violence and called it a good day.
Kenji leans his chair back on two legs, tapping a pen against his lip, eyes on the ceiling. Nikki is half turned in her seat, whispering something to a girl behind her and laughing like nothing's wrong.
The teacher drones through attendance in that dead, half-bored tone adults get when they've repeated the same names for too many years.
But outside, under the window, a group of delinquents stands in a cluster, not even pretending to be somewhere else.
They're not the ones from yesterday. New faces. More bruises. Different school jackets. They're staring straight up at the classroom window. Straight up at him.
Akira's fingers tighten around his pen.
Kenji follows his gaze, then huffs a quiet laugh. "They're gonna come for us after school," he mutters.
Nikki, without looking, says, "Finally. I was getting bored."
Akira doesn't answer.
His heartbeat is calm. Always is before it starts.
Kenji leans closer, voice lower. "You act like you don't care," he whispers, eyes glinting. "But I've seen the way you fight, man. You care too much."
Akira's jaw shifts. The pen in his hand rolls, then stops.
"That's why," he says quietly, "I don't want to do it again."
The teacher slams a workbook on the desk at the front. "Eyes up," she snaps. "Class isn't a social club."
They settle into the same rhythm anyway – scribbling, pretending. The minutes stumble by. The air feels thicker with every tick of the clock.
When the bell finally rings, the room empties faster than usual. Nobody wants to be in the halls when whoever's waiting outside decides the game starts.
Kenji stands, stretching so hard his shoulder cracks. "Showtime," he says, grinning.
Nikki slings her bag over one shoulder and pops another piece of gum. "Don't get suspended," she sings. "I'm not visiting you in some off-brand school."
Vincent is already at the door, hands in his pockets, eyes half-lidded. "Don't die," he says lazily. "Paperwork's annoying."
Akira pushes his chair in. His notebook page is still blank.
He closes it.
Lunchtime.
The sun cuts through a layer of thin gray clouds, turning the courtyard into a pale, washed-out box. The concrete still looks scarred from past fights; no one's bothered to buff out the marks.
A small crowd forms near the rusted bleachers, drawn like flies to the smell of another mess. Some kids sit on the steps, pretending to eat while they watch. Others stand in loose circles, arms crossed, faces hungry.
Five upperclassmen wait in the open space like they booked the room. One of them has a jaw swollen and yellowing from a hit that didn't land softly a few days ago.
He's glaring at Akira the moment the transfer steps out the double doors.
"You think you run this school already?" he calls out. His voice carries over the murmurs. "You're just new blood. Let's see if it bleeds."
Kenji cracks his neck, one side then the other. His grin looks eager, not nervous. Nikki is tying her hair up, looping an elastic around it with practiced flicks.
Akira exhales like he's just been told the homework assignment again.
He steps down into the courtyard, the crowd opening to swallow them.
Vincent is on the outskirts, spine against a fence post, eyes hooded. He could turn away. Could walk off. He doesn't.
Akira stops a comfortable distance from the group of upperclassmen. The air between them is empty, but it feels crowded with expectation.
"We don't run anything," Akira says, voice light, almost bored. "But if you want to find out who's standing, go ahead."
A ripple runs through the onlookers at his words. Phones rise a little higher. Kenji whistles under his breath.
The leader, bruised jaw twitching, rolls his shoulders. "You got a mouth for someone hiding behind rumors."
Akira doesn't answer. He doesn't need to. The ground's already chosen a side.
The first punch flies.
The courtyard erupts.
Kenji moves first, body exploding forward like a spring let loose. His fist collides with somebody's chest, sending the boy stumbling back, air punched right out of him. Kenji laughs, a wild, delighted sound.
Another swings at him from the side. Kenji ducks without looking, shoulder crashing into the guy's stomach, grabbing his shirt and using the momentum to slam him into the ground.
Nikki doesn't rush in. She slides around the edges like smoke. When one big guy goes for Kenji's blind side, she's already there, foot hooking around his ankle. His balance disappears; he crashes down hard, cursing.
"Eyes up, big man," she chirps, flicking his forehead before stepping back again.
Akira doesn't move until the first one is right in front of him.
The leader lunges, fist cutting through the air toward Akira's face.
Akira shifts his weight just enough. The punch grazes his cheek. His hand snaps up to catch the wrist, twisting, stepping into the space the upperclassman left open. One quick shot to the ribs. Another to the jaw. He doesn't go for a third. Doesn't need to.
The boy staggers, legs shaking.
Someone else barrels in from behind, arm cocked back, metal glinting in his hand – a pipe, thin but enough to open bone.
Akira doesn't have time to turn.
Fingers clamp around the attacker's wrist mid-swing.
"You just don't learn, do you?" Vincent's voice is cold, flat, right at the man's ear.
For a moment, everything narrows. The crowd's noise blurs out.
Then Vincent's knee drives into the guy's gut with a dull thud. The pipe drops. Vincent's foot sweeps his legs. The boy hits the ground and doesn't get back up.
Kenji looks up from where he's pinning another delinquent, eyes bright. "Huh," he calls. "So the wolf bites after all."
Vincent ignores him. He's already stepping away, jaw clenched, the music in his pocket still humming as if nothing happened.
The rest goes fast.
Kenji's raw instinct and stupid fearlessness bulldoze through another two. Nikki's cheap shots and quick feet keep them from being overwhelmed. Akira's movements stitch the chaos together – stepping in where someone's too slow, dragging a punch away from Nikki's face, planting a heel where it will stop a kick from landing.
It's not pretty. Not clean. There's no choreography in it. Just real hits and real breath and the ragged edge of teenagers who know how it feels to lose.
When the last upperclassman hits the concrete and stays there, the silence after feels loud.
Heavy breathing. The buzz of a vending machine in the corner. A crow calling from somewhere above the gym.
Phones lower, slowly. Nobody starts clapping.
Akira straightens, chest rising and falling, a new bruise blooming under his eye.
He looks at the bodies, then at his own hands.
Didn't ask for this.
Didn't want it.
But somehow, he keeps finding people who swing the same way.
Nikki wipes blood off her lip with the back of her hand and pulls out her phone. "If anyone asks," she says, snapping a photo of the wreckage, "I don't know you guys."
Kenji barks a laugh. Vincent's mouth twitches like he almost smiles before he catches himself.
They start walking off in different directions, letting the crowd swallow them again and rebuild the story however it wants.
Akira stays a moment longer.
He stares at a new crack in the pavement where somebody's head hit too hard. The rumor will say he did that, whether he did or not.
"New school," he mutters under his breath, voice too low for anyone else. "Same battlefield."
Then he turns and leaves too.
The rooftop always feels like another world.
By late afternoon, the sky over Yokosaki is a dull, hazy blue. A breeze rolls in off the water, bringing the smell of salt and exhaust. The metal fence rattles softly whenever the wind hits it just right.
Akira sits with his back against that fence, legs stretched out, blazer unbuttoned. Every muscle feels heavy in that good way – the way that says nothing broke, nothing sprained. Just bruises that'll color and fade.
Kenji paces near the edge, restless energy still fizzing in his bones. Nikki is flat on her back on the concrete, arms spread, chewing gum and blowing little bubbles that pop and stick to her lip.
"So what's the plan now?" Kenji asks, kicking at nothing.
Akira doesn't answer immediately. He watches a gull cruise over the courtyard, lazy and unbothered. The rumor machine down there is probably already at work. By the time the sun sets, the story will be better than the truth.
"There is no plan," he says eventually. "I'm just here to stay out of trouble."
Nikki snorts without opening her eyes. "Yeah," she says. "You're doing great at that."
Kenji scoffs. "Look, man. You fight like someone who's done this before. People notice. They're gonna keep coming. Either we stick together, or we get picked off one by one."
The word together hangs there. No one grabs it.
Akira remembers standing on a different rooftop, with different faces. Ichigo's crooked grin. Eino's quiet side-eye. Desiree's easy smirk with blood on her knuckles.
"When I call," he'd told them. "We rise again."
He'd meant it. Still does.
He just had hoped he wouldn't have to call.
He doesn't answer Kenji. Doesn't promise anything. Doesn't refuse either.
He just stares past the school, toward the faint smear of the city skyline, and feels the weight of the island pressing back.
He hears Ichigo's voice in his head anyway, loud and amused:
You're the kind of guy the storm follows.
Kenji grumbles, stretching his arms above his head. Nikki's phone buzzes. They start bickering about something small – snacks, music, old jokes that don't need context.
Their noise washes over him, familiar and far at the same time.
Akira closes his eyes for a second. The bruise under one lid throbs in time with his heartbeat.
He doesn't want to lead anything again.
But he can already feel it: the school, the rumors, the fear – all of it turning toward him like a compass needle finding north.
He exhales. The wind tugs at his hair.
Below them, Yokosaki keeps spinning.
Night hits Vincent's apartment like a closed door.
The place is small, clean in that slightly suffocating way. The lights are low, casting long shadows across the living room. The TV's on but muted – some news anchor moving their mouth about something that doesn't matter here.
Vincent sits at the table, sleeves rolled up, a half-finished homework sheet in front of him. His arm is bandaged from wrist to elbow, white tape peeking out from under the edge of his hoodie. His knuckles are swollen but flex easily. He's used to the ache.
From down the hall, his father's voice cuts through the quiet.
"I expect better than this, Vincent."
The words are flat, practiced. He doesn't need to raise his voice; the way he says Vincent's name is enough.
Vincent's pencil pauses on the paper.
"You're slipping," his father continues. "Your grades are dropping, there are rumors at school, and you come home looking like you've been in a warzone."
Vincent keeps his eyes on the page. The homework question in front of him is about equations. He'd answered it five minutes ago.
"You can't fight your way through life forever," his father says. "That's not how this works."
Vincent swallows down the laugh that wants to come out.
Wanna bet?
He doesn't say it.
He just mutters, "Got it," and hears his father's scoff before the footsteps move away.
The apartment sinks back into a heavy quiet.
Vincent drops the pencil and leans back in his chair, staring at the ceiling for a long moment.
When he finally looks down, his phone is on the table, screen dark. He taps it awake.
One new message from an unknown number.
We saw what you did today. You're wasted at that school. Come meet us.
There's a pin dropped on a map near the docks, blinking patiently.
Vincent's jaw tightens. He stares at the screen so long it starts to dim again.
He deletes the message. The little bubble disappears. The map goes with it.
But the idea doesn't.
He sets the phone down face first, rubbing the bridge of his nose.
VINCENT (V.O.):
You pick one wrong fight here, you're done.
He hears his own voice from earlier, thrown at Akira like a warning.
He doesn't know yet whether he was talking about the school… or himself.
His little brother's laugh echoes faint from the next room, something about a game, a joke. His father's voice follows, stern and clipped.
Vincent gets up, crosses to his bedroom, and closes the door before the sound can catch him.
Inside, the room is simpler. Bed. Desk. A pair of boxing gloves on the floor. A cracked mirror leaning against the wall, reflecting him back in pieces.
He stares at his own eyes. At the faint wildness he saw earlier down in the courtyard when the pipe swung toward someone else's skull.
He'd moved before thinking.
That bothers him more than he'll admit.
His phone buzzes again on the desk.
Another unknown message, from a different number this time, pops up on the lock screen.
He doesn't check it.
Not tonight.
The school at night looks like it's holding its breath.
The courtyard is empty now. No crowds. No fights. No laughter. Just shadows stretching long under the dim security lights, pooling around tables and benches.
Blood stains, thinned with water from a lazy sprinkler system, spread in faint pink smears across the concrete. Nobody bothered to scrub too hard. There'll be new marks soon enough.
A single vending machine hums near the wall, its fluorescent glow painting the nearest tiles a sickly white-blue. The glass reflects whatever stands in front of it.
Akira's reflection appears there now, faint and doubled. Hood up. Hands buried in his pockets.
He stands alone in front of the machine, the click of cooling metal and the buzz of the light the only sounds. The night air is cooler, brushing against the back of his neck.
He stares at his own face, at the bruise under his eye, at the calm he's wearing like a mask.
AKIRA (V.O.):
Yokosaki doesn't care who you were.
He sees flashes of who he was anyway – rooftop laughter with Red Ash, alleys that smelled like wet concrete and smoke, the dock where he turned his back on it all for a little while.
It only asks one question.
He looks away from the glass, gaze drifting across the silent courtyard, up toward the black windows of the classrooms, then higher to where the rooftop fence cuts a jagged line across the sky.
How long can you last?
The question isn't just the school's.
It's the island's.
The city's.
The past's.
His phone buzzes in his pocket.
He doesn't take it out.
Not yet.
He takes one last look around the courtyard – the scars, the empty benches, the ghost of a crowd that will be back tomorrow. The echo of his crew's voices somewhere above, on the rooftop, in the hallways, dripping down through rumors like water through cracks.
Then he turns and walks away, leaving the vending machine humming to itself in the dark.
Behind him, the lights of Yokosaki flicker a dull, warning red against the low clouds.