“Hey, what’s the big idea!? You can’t kick me out just like that!” “Of course I can! There’s no place for jobless freeloaders like you here!” “Come on, this is all happening so suddenly. Can’t you give m-” “Ohhhhh, no! Don’t you dare give me that dumbass excuse, you got that!?” As the argument with his landlord reached its crux, Naokuu was flung out of his apartment, past the open door and onto the outdoors walkway on the second floor. His back hit the balcony railing running opposite the side-by-side grouping of doors, making him bounce forward an inch or two as he came to a stop. He let out a pained grunt, slumping down to the walkway floor with his head hanging down. The skies above the rental apartment building in Setagaya were gloomy. Light enough to be seen as mere overcast and not a rainstorm, but gloomy nonetheless. It did nothing to help his current situation, his landlord marching to the door’s edge. He was a man of average size, with a lanky physique bordering on anorexic, with a bloated stomach to boot. His taupe-grey hair was heavily receded, exposing his forehead and the front third of the top of his head to almost impressive effect, and his mouth was missing some teeth, one on top and two on bottom as far as the incisors were concerned. He stood in the doorway, in a white chest-stained wifebeater whose bottom hem stopped short of his belly button and grey cotton sweatpants with a black drawstring, staring down at Naokuu with hands on his hips and a cock-eyed glare. “There’s no way you haven’t been hearin’ my knocks these past two weeks! If anything, your dumb ass should’ve seen this comin’ the moment you got discharged, you detective wannabe!” He pointed down at Naokuu as he continued, his right index crooking as it loomed over the soon-to-be former tenant. “Now get off my property, and don’t come back ‘til you’ve got my money!” Naokuu wasn’t intimidated in the slightest by the man that literally threw him out of his apartment. He sat himself up out of the slump he landed in, his left knee raised and his left arm resting atop it. His hair was another inch longer, the bangs grazing past his upper eyelashes, and his facial hair was in fuller form, still short but encompassing the lower half of his face in a mass of dark brown. He still wore his week-old T-shirt, though his unzipped black jacket covered up any visible pit-stains, and he put on a pair of denim jeans over his equally old boxers. Whether that was to look only a tad more civil for his landlord or to avoid walking around in his underwear following this inevitable eviction was unclear. Even so, the glare he gave the middle-aged proprietor of his former residence narrowed seconds after his command, his scowl widening in tune. “Fine. Have it your way.” With those parting words, Naokuu made his grand exit from his former residence. Swiftly and forcefully, he jerked his car key upwards as it rested firmly in the ignition, the engine revving to life with an aggressive roar. As his right hand tightly gripped the 2 o’clock position of the steering wheel, his left grabbed the transmission and shifted it down from P to R. Almost immediately, he slammed on the gas and backed out of the parking space. Even in the midst of his reckless maneuver, from the hard push against the accelerator to the equally strong shift to the brake, tires screeching at both the sudden start and sudden stop, he looked over his shoulder, out the rear window of his Civic. A habit from his driving school days, assuredly. With another grunt through clenched teeth, he turned his head back and shifted the transmission to the standard drive mode. He stepped on the accelerator again, the engine once more revving at as full a throttle as he could make it as he sped out of the parking lot and onto the two-lane street. The Civic swiftly turned into one of the opposite lots, then dropped a couple of inches onto the road as it made a swift right turn, the rear bumper jutting out and barely missing contact with the Shibuya Ward Police squad car, still parked on the side of the road by its lonesome. The vehicle eventually straightened itself out as it sped off along the straightaway, to location unknown. Gojiki’s lackeys, as they had the past two weeks, sat in the squad car’s front seats. Both witnessed Naokuu’s explosive departure from the lot, the ponytailed lackey in the passenger’s seat having turned his head to look out the side window as the Civic passed them by. “Looks like he’s on the move.” He turned his head back and buckled his seatbelt. “Prepare to pursue.” The shorter-haired lackey in the driver’s seat grinned wide, buckling his own seatbelt one-handed as his right gripped the top of the steering wheel. “Hn. It’s about damn time. Been getting’ sick of waitin’ around for him to do somethin’.” The squad car slowly pulled forward, shifting to the left before turning around on the main street. Its speed gradually increased as it turned around, and once it faced the direction in which Naokuu was headed, it took off just as fast, blazing down the barren stretch of asphalt in pursuit of its target. Up on the second floor walkway of the rental apartments, the landlord stood at the end facing the street, where the staircase up was placed. He held one hand on the rust-brown railing as he watched the squad car chase after Naokuu’s Civic, in spite of the head start the former had on them. It wasn’t long before it too disappeared behind the turn following the straightaway. “I see,” he quietly commented as the early morning wind blew through what hair surrounded his balding head. “So that explains it…” 原作: 濠沢彼太 原案キャラクター: JAM-ORBITAL 企画: 川崎由紀夫 (テレビ東京) 上田憲伯 シリーズ構成: 濠沢彼太 キャラクターデザイン: 鈴木博文 総作画監督: 田中比呂人 CINDY H. YAMAUCHI 美術監督: 上野秀行 色彩設計: 長島真弓 撮影監督: 和田直己 編集: 森田清次 音響監督: えびなやすのり 録音演出: 神尾千春 音楽: BLANCO BILLIONS 音楽協力: CANTI 音楽制作: ランティス 音楽プロデューサー： 伊藤善之 音楽制作協力: テレビ東京ミュージック オープニングテーマ: 「Primary period」 歌: 少女病 作詞: 少女病 作曲/編曲: ピクセルビー RD-Sounds (ランティス) OPENING ANIMATION 絵コンテ・演出: 黒津安明 作画監督: 鈴木博文 原画: 川崎博嗣 高見沢孝弘 崔ふみひで 西尾鉄也 中嶋敦子 櫻井親良 りんしん 黄成希 鈴木博文 動画チェック: 山田玲子 動画: ぴえろ作画室 誠品動画 色指定・検査: 長島真弓 彩色: ぴえろD.A.R 誠品動画 背景: スタジオワイエス 撮影: ぴえろD.A.R 制作進行: 名嘉真彩 プロデューサー: 土方真 (テレビ東京) 萩野賢 プランニングマネジャー: 番泰之 (テレビ東京) 監督: 黒津安明 製作: テレビ東京 studioぴえろ キンキーくノ一 KINKY KUNOICHI It was minutes past dawn in Tokyo, and much like in Setagaya, it felt as if the barely colorless overcast had encompassed the entire city. That much was for certain in the Nakano ward, where the blanket of clouds laid above made it impossible tell if the sun had risen or if it was still hiding the civil twilight1. Even so, as expected for 5:30 A.M. in the suburbs in the ward’s Honcho neighborhood, there was barely anybody outside. Along the southbound downslope due west of Yamate-Dori Avenue, the only living being above microscopic scale was a black cat, sitting in the middle of the asphalt passageway as it licked at one of its front paws and then started running it multiple times over its head and left ear. “I’m heading out.” “Alright. Be safe out there.” “Yeah, yeah.” After bidding his mother farewell for the morning, Shin emerged onto the downslope past the foyer entrance and the porch gate beyond. The moment he laid his skate shoe-clad foot on the asphalt the first time, the black cat quit cleaning itself and dashed off down the incline. He took a few more steps before stopping in the middle of the road, facing the concrete wall and the ivy-infested chain-link fence built atop it. He gazed upwards past it, the trees peeking out above the fence’s hidden top edge, and the electrical lines above those, his sights ultimately aimed at the overcast sky. His eyes still baggy from 1 Civil twilight is the phase of twilight where the sky is brightest, taking place before sunrise and after sunset. waking up so early just to leave the house, he kept his gaze fixed for several seconds, long enough to question whether he was going to actually go anywhere. (MUSIC: “human music” by CANTI2) Before long, those several seconds ran their course for Shin, and he lowered his head with closed eyes and a sigh. “I’d better get going,” he muttered to himself, despite the lack of anyone else traversing the beginning stretch of his morning commute to places unknown. He turned to his left and started walking along the downslope in his attire of choice: a space cadet blue long-sleeve shirt with the number “720” in crème colors stitched into the front, and a pair of denim blue jeans that fit somewhat tight around the waist but left enough breathing room for everything below. His fingers rested in both jean pockets to the second knuckle from the tips, his thumbs hanging out as they did. With each step he took south, towards the Kanda River serving as the border for his neighborhood, the sky to the east started to get a little brighter, a tinge of yellow presenting itself in the cloud cover.