The cheers still hummed in the air, like incense clinging to the skin. Victory should have felt heavier—louder. But for Akira Hayama, it settled like dust. Quiet. Incomplete.

He stepped away from the judges’ table, letting the noise fade behind him as he pushed open the side door into a cooler, dimly lit corridor.

And then he saw him.

Pale hair. Sharp, grey eyes. Lean frame, smaller than Ryo’s—but unmistakably related. Standing alone outside the locker room, spine pressed to the wall as though he were holding it up. His presence was quiet, almost brittle, like a glass bottle balanced too close to the edge.

Akira’s steps slowed.

He looked at the boy.

The boy looked back.

A pause stretched between them—tense but unthreatening. And Akira, for once, didn’t look away.

He inclined his head slightly, then spoke—his voice even, but soft.

“…You’re his brother, aren’t you?”

No answer, but the boy didn’t move. That was enough.

Akira’s eyes lingered on the boy’s posture—the way his hands curled tight into his sleeves, the faint redness at the rims of his eyes.

“He’ll be fine. He’s not the kind of person who stays broken for long.”

Still no reply.

But the way the boy looked at him—steady, unflinching—unsettled something in Akira.

He shifted, just slightly.

“I didn’t expect it to feel like this. Winning.”

“He pushed me further than I’ve ever gone. Your brother… he’s strong. Fierce. And proud.”

The words came slower now, like steam rising off the edge of a dish cooling in silence.

“But you… you’re not like him.”

He exhaled, more to himself than anything else. His eyes lowered, then met the boy’s again.

“You watched everything. Didn’t look away once.”

Another pause. Akira tilted his head, taking in the lines of the boy’s face, the restraint in his body. Controlled, just like Ryo. But not hardened.

There was gentleness here. And something else Akira couldn’t name yet.

“You saw me.”

It wasn’t a question.

His voice dropped—quiet, nearly lost in the silence between them.

“What’s your name?”