Chapter Text
It was finally the day. The day that Shun and Aren had both planned to begin the creation of their manga. Shun had spent days researching on how to make one and the competitions they could enter. He had spent so much time on it, that sleep had been hard to come by. From choosing the write one shot for the competition to its creation.
This one shot was a part of the story that was his life’s work, he had spent years cultivating every detail of the plot. The daydreams that would fill his head every class period, banger edits that he would vividly imagine as he listened to viral TikTok songs in his bedroom, and the fake interviews he would do with fake people in the shower about his genius story.
Though what had always set him back was his artwork. Shun could hardly draw a stick figure, so for his best friend to be a hell of an artist and want to do this with him, he was over the moon. They had decided to get together on Saturday, which was today. He had been waiting all week, hardly able to contain all of the thoughts swirling in his mind.
Shun scurried around his room, gathering all of his notebooks and art that he had done for this story. Aren was supposed to be coming around eleven, so until then Shun was preparing. He had told his mother that they were going to study, so if she walked in, all of the notebooks would appear to just look like notes he had taken. Shun had even shoved textbooks under his table so if his mother walked in they could quickly grab and flip them open to a random page.
“Shun! Your friend is here!” his mom yelled. Shun’s heart raced with excitement. He had so much to tell his friend about what he had found out and to show him the story he chose. Shun went to the front door to greet Aren, but he panicked when he saw what was in his arms. Colored pencils, a sketchbook, and other drawing utensils. While none of it was bad, it would make his mom question what they were actually up to.
“You two are studying… right?” she asked, her eyes going from the stuff in Aren’s hands to Shun. Crap, he thought. How was he going to explain this to his mom? If she found out what they were actually doing, she would reprimand him for sure, and she would find out about his stories. Before he could say anything, Aren stepped in.
“We have to memorize the Periodic Table, so I thought it would be good to draw it out and label things with colors ma’am,” he smiled. Shun’s mom’s expression changed immediately. Aren was always on top of things; he was quick thinking and smart, able to read the situation easily.
“Oh, of course! You two go have fun now!” she smiled. Aren bowed, and followed Shun, who was practically shaking at the rush.
“Phew! Thanks for covering… I thought we were screwed there for a minute!” he laughed nervously once they got out of earshot of his mother.
“It’s not a problem,” Aren replied. Once they made it to his room, Shun told him that he could set his stuff down on the table, and once Aren was settled, he spilled everything he had been planning.
Shun detailed the competition, the one he most had in mind was the Tezuka Award Competition. If they won, they could get their manga serialized and win a ton of money. This competition was also prestigious, and was a sure way to get them to fame. Aren watched him blabber with intent, nodding at everything he said, really listening to what he had to say. While Shun was not too sure about his friend’s motivations for wanting to make a manga, since he had never brought up the desire before, he was still over the moon that he was actually listening to him. Though, Aren always did.
“Some of the most famous mangakas have won it too! Like Eiichiro Oda who made One Piece, Yoshihiro Togashi who made Hunter x Hunter, and maybe one day people will look back and we will be one of those people too!” His voice was getting high pitched and squeaky from sheer excitement. Aren gave him a small smile, a little amused at his friend’s passion.
”Don’t get your hopes up too high, we’ll most likely lose rather than win after all,” he reminded him. Shun knew that, of course he did. But, he was the Jet Black Wings, and nothing could stop him. He was sure he was one of the best writers on this planet, and now that he had found his artist, nothing could stop him. Though, he would have to watch out since Dark Reunion would not want him to win, so they will do everything they can to sabotage him. Shun would have to watch his back, and Aren’s too.
“I know! But I have a feeling we will blow this out of the water!” he stated confidently.
“Shun! Shut up!” his sister shouted from a different room. Shun clapped his hand over his mouth, blushing in embarrassment. Aren chuckled.
“Let’s just get started,” Shun said, a lot quieter this time. Him and Aren settled down at his table, everything was organized with lots of blank sheets of paper, all of his notebooks, and more. Aren had already picked up the first notebook and had begun to read it.
“You’ll need to put it into a script,” he said, now just skimming through the pages. “But before you do that, write down the characters on this sheet of paper and give me a basic description of their appearance and personality so I can start to draw them all.”
“You know a lot about this,” Shun commented as he took a sheet of paper and began to write. “Do you read a lot of manga?”
“I guess so, but when I was younger, a lot of the time when we were looking for somebody, we had to describe them, but that would get confusing sometimes, so I would draw them instead. I realized I was pretty good and had fun doing it, so in my spare time I would try to draw manga. But I sucked at story telling,” he explained, putting down the notebook, “The stories would always end up being about gangs and crime. Once, I tried to draw a simple high school romance and then next thing y’know, they’re both robbing a bank to get bail money for their cat.”
Bail money for their cat? What kinda story was he writing?
“I thought I was decent at making up twists in a story though, just not the overall direction of the plot.” That seemed right, Aren did seem good at that, he had probably gone through a ton of book worthy experiences being in a gang. With betrayals, rivals, and a ton of action. Heck, Aren’s life story could be a manga itself.
Shun scribbled out the last couple of characters and pushed the paper toward Aren. “Here you go! These are all of the characters.”
“Alright then, let’s get started,” he said after scanning the sheet. Shun felt a surge of anticipation as he grabbed the first notebook and began to write. He had researched tirelessly about how to make a good script. While it was his first time, he could always go back and fix it later. The oneshot he had chosen was one of the short spinoff stories he had written, in the same universe as the main one of course, to submit to the competition.
This one was the origin story about one of the characters in Kaito’s group. The character’s name was Mugen Ryuusei. He was the epic archer of Kaito’s group, and while he could never be as good as him, he was still super powerful. Mugen joined Kaito to get revenge for the death of his lover, Akemi Onna, and the one shot was all about the love story between Mugen and Akemi along with everything that defined Mugen, at least up until Akemi’s death.
While he was still working on the title, Shun was confident this story would win. It was his best one shot, and had the coolest fight scenes. It was also his most recent, and he had gotten a lot better at writing over the years, which was obvious when he was reading through the other oneshots last night. He could just imagine it now: all of his adoring fans looking back on the oneshot that got him to make his serialized manga. All of the fanart, fanfiction, and theories people would whisper about from people all over the country, and even overseas!
And it would all start with him and Aren. He then realized how hard he was gripping the pencil, in an effort to write neatly and quickly. Shun flexed his hand, and peered over to see how Aren was coming along. His eyes were nearly blown out of his head when he saw the sketches.
“Those are so good!” he squealed, and then he cleared his throat in a panic when he realized how girly he sounded. “I mean those look great,” Shun said again with a deeper voice. Aren smiled, not looking up at him. He was currently coloring in his drawing of Akemi, now doing her dark purple hair. Shun had spent a lot of time trying to illustrate her beauty with just words: her hair that looked like the galaxy with eyes to match, her harsh look with a soft personality, and how the glasses she wore reflected all of her hopes and dreams… He was quite proud of her character. Shun had always had trouble with the female characters, since he was not a woman himself and did not have many female friends. And reflecting on the ones he did have, he is not too sure that making Akemi any of them would be the best idea. They were great and all, but not what he had in mind when he imagined this character.
She was not a stereotype with big boobs or always a maiden in distress, she was strong, calm, and had a violent side she would show if her loved ones were in danger. Akemi was an equal to Mugen, and had died saving him. Her body type was realistic, and she was strong too, in fact the whole reason she had even met Mugen was because he admired her skill at the bow, and wanted her to teach him. Girl readers loved when the female characters were strong and dependable, and Shun made sure that his story would appeal to them too.
Shun admired Aren’s drawing, he had drawn her so perfectly. While it was a little embarrassing to say, Akemi was one of his favorite characters, and in some ways, he both wanted to be her and date her at the same time. He looked up at Aren to compliment him, but that is when he realized something. They look really similar. Heat rushed to his face, and he quickly looked away, and stared down at his script.
I-I didn’t mean for them to look the same! Aren wasn’t even on my mind when I made her! Embarrassment washed over him, he did not want Aren to think Akemi was based on him. Calm down! He probably has not even noticed the similarities! Shun peeked back at the drawing, and saw just how similar the two were. The hair, the eyes, even the color of the glasses! For heaven’s sake, Shun even made them the same height. He had to say something, something that would deter Aren from ever thinking that Akemi was based on him, because she was not, and he had to fix this stupid coincidence. It was only a matter of time before he would figure it out, and he knew if he did not say something now, there was not a doubt in his mind that Aren would point it out. His friend was too good of an artist, and anyone would figure out who Akemi was based off of if they had seen Aren.
“Oh! Did I um write down that her hair was purple?” Shun choked out, not accomplishing the ‘natural tone’ he had wanted.. Aren stopped drawing and looked over at her description.
“Yeah, it says it right—“
“My bad, it should say blue! Like um… Teruhashi’s hair!” he blabbered, his mouth spewing out words without him even thinking. Aren clicked his tongue.
“Damn, well I’ll try to fix it, but color pencils are hard to erase,” he sighed, now erasing the purple. Shun practically collapsed in relief. It would have been so embarrassing if Aren called out Akemi’s similarity to him. Now he could only laugh at the coincidence that he had made them so similar.
“Sorry about that, everyone else’s descriptions are correct, my mind must have been somewhere else when I wrote her hair color down,” he replied. Shun felt guilty about making him recolor the hair, but it would be better than having to explain himself. After he collected himself, he continued to write the script. Now Akemi would look like some love child of Teruhashi and Aren. Shun frowned, for some reason he did not like the thought of that. Teruhashi and Aren would not make a good couple, they just don’t click. I wonder if he likes her… what am I saying? Everyone likes Teruhashi. I would go out with her if she asked, and the same is for Aren. The negative feeling still did not go away.
A couple of hours went by, and occasionally they would chat about school, video games, and manga, and when they both finally finished, they swapped to look at what each other had done.
Shun could hardly believe how Aren had drawn exactly what he had always imagined the characters to look like. Mugen with his dashing red hair that resembled fire, and the eyepatch over his right eye when he had lost it as a child. Aren had also captured the beauty of Akemi that Shun had spent so long trying to capture. His eyes lingered on her for a little longer than the others. I wish her hair were still purple. He waited for Aren to finish reading the script, and waited by spending his time admiring every dip and curve of the characters.
“The story is really good, but there are a couple of things like the fight scenes, they’re good but maybe there could be less? We need to really focus on the characters, and maybe we could leave just one for the end since we have to make each panel count,” Aren commented after he finished reading the script.
Shun had been worrying about this part. When Aren, Saiki, and Nendo had come over and he told them about his main story, they thought it would be way cooler for Eden to be the skeleton man, and completely ruled out that Kaito was actually it because that would be too boring and obvious. Shun had been really upset about how they reiterated the story, and made it totally different from the original one he had spent so long on. So of course he had been worried that Aren would think his writing was bad.
That’s why he chose this story, because he had spent so much time, blood, sweat, and tears on it. It’s just one critique, I have to be open to those. And it isn’t a huge one to fix, and it makes sense.
“Got it, shouldn’t be too hard to fix,” he said as nonchalantly as he could.
“I also wonder if Mugen is too… what’s the word…” Aren trailed off thinking, “Basic? Not that it’s a bad thing, but many protagonists are similar to this. Maybe we would add a quirk or two to him to make him stand out.”
Shun forced a smile on his face. “Yeah, that tracks.” Basic? How? He’s super unique! Aren listed a couple other critiques, and each one a punch to the gut. He said that the monologues were too drawn out, too much information, and to show and not tell more. He knew that getting advice was all a part of being a writer, but it was still brutal to hear.
“So,” Aren said after he finished, “What do you think of the drawings?” Shun felt his eyes burn, but he could not cry now. He would not let Aren see him sob over a little criticism, after all, Aren would not have tears running down his face if Shun were to start critiquing his art. But, out of all of Shun’s friends, he did not want Aren to see him cry the most. Sure, he had seen Shun cry before, but each time was still mortifying. It was more embarrassing than if someone like Saiki or Nendo saw him. Saiki would just say ‘good grief’ and walk away while Nendo would point and laugh, but it was still Nendo. Shun never took anything Nendo said to him to heart. Aren on the other hand… he was different. He couldn’t explain the feeling, but it had been there ever since he had first laid eyes on him.
Like his subconscious telling him to be his best self around him. That any embarrassing moment would be ten times worse than it would be around anyone else. Shun admired Aren, because he was many of the things Shun wanted to be. Strong, confident, attractive, and liked. So no matter what, he could not let him see him cry. He took a deep breath, and forced words out of his mouth.
“No, they look amazing. Every single one of them,” Shun told him, the feeling of wanting to cry slowly vanishing as he saw Aren’s pleased face. A tender smile that warmed his heart in a way only he could do. “You are a great artist Aren, truly.”
His best friend stared at him for a moment, before he replied. “Thanks, and the overall story you have is great. Together I think we will make something amazing.” He reached out his arm in a fist, and Shun curled his own hand, and they fist bumped.
“Yeah, I think we will.”
“Do you want to meet up again tomorrow? We can meet at the hideout this time. Tell your mom you’re going to the library,” Aren offered. Shun beamed and nodded, over the moon that Aren still wanted to keep going.
“Sure! I’ll make sure to tweak the script tonight!”
“All right then,” Aren said, gathering his stuff.
Shun walked Aren to his front door and they waved each other goodbye. Once his door was shut, Shun went over to the window and watched his best friend walk away.
“Did you two get a lot done?” Shun’s mom asked as she passed by. He nodded.
“Yeah, we’re going to meet up at the library tomorrow to study some more. Is that okay?” he asked, still watching Aren as he finally went out of Shun’s eyesight.
“Yes! That’s perfectly fine! I’m so glad you found a study buddy! Especially since all you friends are so smart!” she agreed. “Anywho, dinner will be ready soon, I’ll call you when it is done.”
“Okay, thank you.” Shun went back to his room and immediately began to edit the script, remembering what Aren had said. While he did not agree with everything he had said, he wanted Aren to like this script, so he did everything he had suggested. If it wasn’t enough, he could always go back and change it.
His heart raced as he wrote, but he did not know why.