A Job for Children 6

Hinata: You can’t help someone unless you know them first.

If you want to reach out a hand to help them, or even just a finger really, you might end up hurting them instead—we’ve been around that block a time or two.

Yuuta: Yeah... Sure, but when you talked to Rinne-senpai, the first thing he did was take you to some shady-looking club.

Can’t you be more cautious, Aniki? I’m sure there’s tons of bad guys out there who want to get a cute idol like you in their clutches.

Hinata: Urgh. But I thought it’d be fiiiine... He’s an idol too, right? So he wouldn’t be a bad guy.

All the idols we met at Yumenosaki were good people. They were nice.

So I just, y’know, let my guard down and forgot that’s not always the case.

Ignorance is bliss, and all that—but I’ll be more careful from now on. It’ll be too late to regret things if I’m ever in serious danger.

Yuuta: Exactly. So whatever, this time’s fine, I guess... Looks like Rinne-senpai might be more respectable and decent than I thought. Especially since you like him, Aniki.

Hinata: Nah, I’m pretty sure he’s bad news.

At the very least, he’s definitely closer to the bad guys than the good. It’s like he’s willingly decided to play the villain.

Of course, I can sympathize with all that. And in hindsight, it’s not like he treated me badly or anything.

Actually, he even listened to all the complaints I couldn’t vent to anyone else, and he was nice to me. Kinda gave me this feeling like, wow, is this what an onii-chan’s like?

Yuuta: Ugh. Sorry, I still suck at playing onii-chan.

HiMERU: ...?

Yuuta: Oh, he doesn’t know what we’re talking about. We’re probably confusing him. So, we’re the kind of twins who switch around which one of us is the older brother and who’s the younger one. It just depends on how we feel.

HiMERU: —Hm. Do you not get confused by that? It seems as though the boundary lines between you two would disappear altogether, or rather that you would be unable to establish any sense of identity to begin with.

Of course, HiMERU has no right to say something like that.

Hinata: ...? Well anyway, I was talking to Rinne-senpai, and we really hit it off—

He ended up telling me about the little scheme he was planning to make use of this club while helping it out.

And since I was tasked with supporting Crazy:B, I thought I should lend my hand...

So I came and helped out any way I could.

I waited tables and washed dishes and cleaned up the place. Nothing Idol-y about it, actually.

But it felt nostalgic, so I enjoyed myself. It reminded me of when we were working in shifu’s Chinese restaurant.^[1]

Now that I think about it, though, I don’t really get what the point of working in this club was.

What the heck was Rinne-senpai’s “plan,” anyway?

HiMERU: Don’t look at HiMERU. In fact, HiMERU came here to investigate exactly that. If Amagi is doing underhanded things again, he intends to denounce him for it—

HiMERU has his own plans to return to solo activities and a career more suitable for HiMERU.

Hinata: Oh, so you wanna be a solo artist? We’ve never even considered that—since we’re twins.

Yuuta: Yep, we decided to become idols together.

We picked stuff up while doing street performances in front of our shifu’s restaurant. A bunch of people would gather around, and we loved all the praise and recognition.

They kept demanding more and more—and here we are now, still showing off our tricks.

HiMERU: Fufu. If you only show off your tricks, then you are performers. An idol’s business is to be loved. At least, that is how HiMERU defines an idol.

No, it is exactly the idol HiMERU is.

Which is why the position he’s in now, rampaging around, causing harm, being despised by everyone, is undesirable—

Rinne: Gyahaha. Well, lemme ask you something, Meru-Meru: you really think you can get back your lofty, beloved position if only you just fly solo?

HiMERU: —Amagi. Were you not asked to stay outside the club for the time being because you were interfering with our conversation?

Rinne: Hmm~? Well, whatever was I supposed to do? I had to show our guests to their seats, didn’t I?

Yuuta: Guests? Oh, I see Kagehira-senpai. Those guys must have gotten worried and followed me here... I guess our senpais at Yumenosaki are still as overprotective as ever.

HiMERU: ......

Yuuta: ? What’s up, HiMERU-san?

HiMERU: Nothing. It seemed that there was something of a trend among the clientele, but actually—

Rinne: Yep. Nice deduction skills there, Sherlock ♪

HiMERU: ......

Yuuta: Huh? What? What does that mean?

Rinne: Gyahaha! Don’t ask the culprit a question like that!

Putting your brain to good use is the greatest pleasure we humans have in this world, ain’t it?

And it doesn’t even cost a dime, so you can keep at it forever. No reason not to give it a try, amirite?

I mean, are you guys just gonna sit around and blather on? If you’ve sorted yourselves out, then get a move on. You can’t seriously be satisfied being nothing but part of the crowd forever, can you?