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All he wanted was a break from being a superhero, yet here he was, being dragged into rescuing a fellow civilian. It was all an accident, really. Sho had been on his way to the grocery store when he saw these strange men in black cloaks who were kidnapping someone right in front of him in broad daylight before disappearing. Then suddenly, out of nowhere, a rough looking man who looked like he’d just walked out of a pirate movie ran straight into him.
The man in question began to ask an array of questions about what he had just witnessed without letting him get any answer in. Sho didn’t even know what to say, witnessing a kidnapping then being harassed by a weird pirate demanding to know what was going on. He really didn’t want to be dealing with this right now.
Sho took a deep breath.
“If you would please shut your mouth for a second so I can get an answer in, I would be grateful.” That shut the other man up real fast. “Now I’m not exactly sure what happened but out of nowhere, these two cloaked men grabbed the man in front of me and disappeared in thin air.” Sho knew what they were but as a civilian, knowing detailed information about that would be seen as suspicious. The question was what were vampires doing in Japan, kidnapping people in broad daylight?
“They just kidnapped him? Did you happen to see what the civilian looked like?” Sho shook his head. The other man cursed, tugging at his hair in frustration. “Shit, Kame is going to kill me.” the man mutter under his breath. “Sorry about this, I’m the Ultimate Boxer of the Seven Seas but you can just call me Tatsu. This is the third time this week someone's been kidnapped by men in black cloaks. If you happen to see anything suspicious like this, do not hesitate to contact me.”
Tatsu handed him a business card before running off. It read ‘Tatsu of the Cherry Shoko in the Sky Aniki-kai’. Sho let out a strangled noise. Really? That man was part of his fanclub? Sho hadn’t heard anything about this before even though he’d been making sure to know everything that was reported about him despite being retired. It seemed that that those people were following his footsteps by becoming superheroes. Not that it was unusual nowadays, just rare.
Now the fact that there were vampires roaming around here in Japan, even though they were a species which was mostly exclusive to Europe definitely left Sho with more questions than he had answers to. The last time he had faced vampires was over ten years ago, when both him and Gamer Boy had been kidnapped by their leader because he was interested in knowing more about the two heroes who were constantly taking down villains. It hadn’t really been a bad experience, since the guy was actually pretty nice. Matsumoto-something if he recalled. Sho did end up accidentally saving the man’s life, and if he remembered correctly, he still had the guy’s phone number. Maybe he knew something.
Sho knew he really shouldn’t get involved but a part of him just couldn’t stay away. Gamer Boy always used to tell him he had a savior complex. He wasn’t wrong, as Sho’s actions always unintentionally proved him right.
Sho missed his partner. It had been so long since they had seen each other – or, at least, since Sho had seen him. Gamer Boy had suddenly stopped turning up one day and they didn’t have any way to contact each other, not even knowing each other’s civilian identities, so there wasn't much he could do about it. They had been partners for fifteen years, and Sho thought that had meant something to the other man but disappearing like that despite promising to see each other the next day had left him very disappointed. However, what was done was done, and he just hoped nothing had happened to Gamer Boy.
Sho looked down at the card in his hand, as he decided right then and there that he was going to help one way or another, even if that meant that the retired superhero Cherry Shoko in the Sky had to return.
-
Ninomiya Kazunari wondered where he had gone wrong in life. It was probably the day he had found out that he could bring his game characters to life. It was a very startling realization that he still didn’t understand well to this day.
In recent times, powers had begun to surface in few individuals, and no one knew where they came from or how they manifested. Most people tended to ignore them, but some individuals had decided to become superheroes or vidualantis, but with them villains also surfaced. Where there is good there will always be bad, nothing's perfect after all.
Fifteen years ago, Ninomiya had been rescued in attack on Tokyo by a new and upcoming hero, Cherry Shoko in the Sky. Nino had been absolutely captivated by them. They later inspired him to become a hero himself, thus Gamer Boy was born. A week into becoming a hero, he had been kidnapped by a villain wanting to commit revenge on all heroes for not being able to save his sister. Nino felt he was being ridiculous and overdramatic considering his sister was still alive and well – after he had been arrested, she had come over and gave him a terrible verbal lashing which the guy deserved. It turned out that his new hero Shoko had also been kidnapped, and they ended up using a combination of both their abilities to take down the idiot villain. Shoko had expressed that he had liked working with him and thus their partnership was born.
They had lasted ten years before Nino called it quits, and he regretted not saying anything, but he wasn’t able to do it anymore. He had loved being a hero, but he wasn’t getting any younger. Add that on top of his pre-existing back problems; he decided it was just time to retire.
As everyday passed, the temptation to go back to being a hero slowly disappeared but the ache he felt for his partner never did. He had fallen in love with them, even though he knew he didn’t have a chance with them. He also didn’t want to ruin their professional relationship with his feelings. He was a coward, and he had ended their relationship or whatever they had before he could be hurt by a possible rejection.
Five years had passed and as much as Nino hated to admit it, his feelings had not died down one bit.
Five years later and he once again found himself being kidnapped by vampires, in his civilian form of all things! Of course, this probably meant he wasn’t kidnapped because of being a hero but rather a random attack. It was still strange: every hero knew vampires were exclusive to Europe so what were they doing kidnaping people in Japan? And by the looks of it, he wasn’t the only one.
“Oh good you're awake, mistress will be very happy to know.” Mistress? Just what exactly had he woken up to? He looked up and came face to face with a dazzling pair of red eyes. Oh, he could recognize those eyes anywhere.
“Hello, my darling Kazunari.” of course, everything made sense now.
“Mother. Can’t say it's a pleasure. Might explain to me what I’m doing here?”
“I’ve been looking for a new young companion that I can turn, so I sent my lovely vampires to Japan to find me some young men. Imagine my surprise when they brought you, my only son, here. It’s been a long time, Kazunari.”
So she had been looking for a new boytoy when her minions kidnapped him thinking he fit the criteria only to find out he was actually her son? That must have gone down well, Nino thought to himself.
“Are you going to let me go anytime soon?”
“No. I think I’ll keep you around for a bit.”
Nino scowled, he really hated his mother sometimes. Why couldn’t she just talk to him the normal way if she really wanted to see him?
-
It felt weird to be back in drag again after all these years, it had been a very long time since he had been Cherry Shoko in the Sky. This was definitely going to be the last time he did this. Had the dress always been this tight? Considering it had been five years, he really shouldn’t be surprised by the fact that it didn’t fit properly. Maybe he shouldn’t have worn it for the meeting, if anything it would attract unnecessary attention. Yes, it would probably be for the best.
Sho had gotten in contact with Tatsu from Aniki-kai and scheduled a meeting with him, greatly implying he had information that would be very helpful to his course. Sho could be very persuasive when he wanted. And if this truly was his fanclub then he could not wait to see their faces when they realized who he was. It was true that he had been retired for some time, but he could never get tired of his admirers’ faces.
They had decided to meet up at a local coffee shop where the representative would escort him to their base, and they would have a discussion about what he knew. He walked into the cafe and found the familiar face of Tatsu. It felt strange to see him a normal clothing considering that he had been dressed as a pirate when they had first met.
“Hello, it’s good to see you again. My name’s Sakurai Sho, but you probably know me as Cherry Shoko in the Sky.” Sho was greatly amused at the shocked expression on the other man’s face, as Tastu looked up at him with an expression full of excitement.
“You’re The Cherry Shoko in the Sky? Oh my god, Aniki! You have no idea how happy I am to finally meet you! The others are not going to believe this! Come on, I’ll take you to our base and introduce you to everyone.”
‘Everyone’ ended up being a group of six members, some of which were familiar superheroes he’d seen on tv before. The look on their faces when Tatsu introduced him would remain in his mind for a long time. He always enjoyed these types of moments.
“What we are facing are vampires, which is rather concerning due to the fact they are mostly European exclusive creatures. The upside is that their teleportation skill has a limit to five-kilometer radius and due to it being broad daylight they’d need to have a hideout nearby. The sun is the vampires’ ultimate weakness, so the fact that they’re kidnapping people in broad daylight is really weird. I contacted an acquaintance of mine who is a vampire and they have some idea about who’s doing this. Ninomiya Karen. She’s not a vampire herself but she has a super power of ultimate deception and she’s ‘Convinced’ a group of vampires to follow her. She usually has them kidnap young looking handsome men to turn into her boy toys.” The whole thing was actually quite disturbing, because she kidnapped men and made them her toys by force. The whole thing really didn’t sit right with Sho.
“So, you're telling us this crazy lady has hypnotized vampires to kidnap men for her to play with as she likes? That's actually quite vile.” The one who had introduced himself as Junta, their tech support, looked absolutely disgusted.
“Unfortunately, it’s all true, but thankfully my acquaintance gave me an address so we can get this wrapped up pretty fast if she's there. The chances of that are pretty high. Seeing as it’s still daytime, her vampires won’t be very helpful. My powers being similar to hers make me immune to her hypnosis.” His fanclub all looked at each other before nodding their heads in agreement.
“Alright, let's do this then.”
-
They decided to split up into teams, Tatsu would rescue the hostage while Sho would confront Karen. The house itself was quite large but it looked like it hadn’t been lived in for years, and the furniture looked to be a couple of centuries old at least. This woman clearly had terrible taste. He entered the main dining hall to find who he assumed was Karen, who was passed out drunk judging by the bottles of alcohol that surrounded her. It was kind of anti-climactic...
“Oh hello, I guess you're here for the hostages.”
Sho looked up startled, where had that come from? He looked behind him and found a very familiar looking man, who seemed to be mid-twenties.
“Uh yeah, I actually am. You don’t happen to be involved with this, do you?”
“No not at all, my mother kind of kidnapped me as well and refused to let me go. Thankfully her men are quite stupid and easy to take out. It seems mother has done the job to get rid of herself without anyone’s help, that saves a lot of effort. By the way, you kinda look familiar, have we meet before?”
Sho chocked on his spit, mother? Oh he felt bad for this poor man if this was his mother.
“I’m Sho, but you might recognize me as Cherry Shoko in the Sky? It has been a while since I last used that name but it’s still me?”
The man’s eyes went impossibly wide and realization dawned on his face.
“No way, I never thought the day would come where I would run into you again, especially with both of us in civilian form. It’s good to see you again, Sho. Ah, right, you probably don’t recognize me but I’m, or well, was gamer boy.”
no way, no bloody way. It couldn’t be! The chances of this happening…. Sho was suddenly very grateful to this evil lady, because thanks to her, his Gamer Boy was right here on front of him!
“Oh you have some serious explaining to do about why you ditched me later, but for now I am going to give you a hug because I have seriously missed you.” Sho walked over to him and pulled him a long tight hug. “I guess we should officially introduce each other? I’m Sakurai sho, and it’s really good to see you again.”
“Ninomiya Kazunari.”
“Hey Aniki, I’ve freed the last of the- Hey it’s you again! why are you touching my Aniki!?” Tatsu growled in jealousy.
“Oh it's you again, Boxer Briefs! You should know that I have more rights over Sho than you ever will. He is my partner after all!” realization dawned on Tatsu’s face, Shoko only had one partner after all.
“I don't care if you’re partners! I still don’t like you all over my Aniki!”
Sho let out a deep laugh, which made them both turn to face him with confused expressions.
“You guys are hilarious! Come on, let’s get the hostages out of here first, then you can keep fighting over me.”
Sho was very much going to enjoy himself.