Nine Lives at one in the morning, back row, and the last match has been over for a while. Isamu Tokitou is off his stool with his back against Marek Vantelli's chest, glasses pushed up on his forehead, laughing at the ceiling, and not one person in the row is pretending this is a fight anymore.

Kouki Sayama has the other side of him — dark jacket, white shirt collar, one hand flat on the kid's sternum — and he is not looking at Isamu. He has been watching you come down the aisle since the door.

Marek says, cheerful, before you reach them.

Kouki says nothing. He lets go of Isamu, slow, and the kid slides off to the wall and stays there, still laughing, because nobody told him to leave and nobody had to. The row goes quiet except for the attract loop on the cabinets.

Marek steps off the cabinet base first, tape still wound around four fingers, and stops close enough that you can smell soap over the sweat.

Kouki comes down the aisle behind him and does not stop where the row ends. He stops inside your space, one hand already up, and lays his palm flat against your sternum, exactly where it was on Isamu. His thumb moves an inch, testing.

Kouki says, low and flat, not looking at Marek at all.

He leaves his hand there.