Side Story: Black Metal (Ibuki Mioda)

The concert hall was packed to the brim with people, each bunched up together to the point where they were almost shoulder-to-shoulder. Fire codes were undoubtedly being violated, but none of them seemed to care as they chatted idly with one another and sipped their drinks. Some of the people there were dressed in normal clothes, and some were wearing shirts with a large Black Cherry logos emblazoned on them, but most of the people there were wearing ‘punk’ fashions; spiked hair, dyed hair, leather jackets, ripped jeans, and piercings at almost every opportunity.

Then, the lights to the arena suddenly dimmed, and the whole crowd grew quiet. They all held their breath in anticipation as they waited for the main event to start. A moment later, the lights turned back on and the crowd let out a thundering cheer as they saw six women step onto the stage.

On the far left, there was a redheaded woman twirling drumsticks with multiple rings embedded in her lower lip and a long black jacket riddled with bullet holes; Coal. Next to her, there was a girl with long silver hair, an icy expression, tight black clothes, and a guitar shaped like a scythe; Abyss. Next to her, there was a woman with a green Mohawk, her face painted white and black, and wearing a torn grey straitjacket and an electronic keyboard over her neck; Ink. On the other side of the stage, on the far right, was a woman with dyed purple hair, a tight black tube top that showed off her pale stomach, a large nose piercing, and a bass guitar; Jet. Next to her was a woman shoulder-length blue hair, blue eyes, heavy black lipstick, a long black dress that seemed to flow like water, silk white gloves, diamonds studding her ears, and a microphone in her hand; Kuro.

And, standing at the head mic in the middle of the group, between Ink and Kuro, was none other than the star of the show herself; Pitch, who needs no introduction.

“Hello, Nagoya!” Pitch shouted into her microphone, her many piercings glinting off the stage lights as the crowd went wild in the pit bellow her. “Are you ready to rock!?” The crowd shouted again, this time even louder than before. “I can’t hear you! I said… Are you ready to rock!?”

Pitch stepped forward and smashed her foot on a big red button on the floor in front of her, causing jets of flame to shoot up out of the stage all around her. The crowd of adoring fans screamed so loudly that the foundations of the arena shook.

“Now that’s what I like to hear!” Pitch shouted into her mic. “I hope you’re all ready to party all night long, because once Black Cherry gets started… we don’t stop ‘till the sun comes up! Ready, girls? A one… a two… a one, two, three!”

And so they began the first song of their setlist, screaming into their microphones and abusing their instruments as hard as they could while the crowd cheered them on. Black Cherry concerts didn’t really last all night, but they were so intense that they certainly felt like they did. All around them people were shouting and jumping and banging their heads to the music while the band onstage poured their hearts and souls into their music. Then, after playing their way through three powerful songs, the band stopped playing and took a bow to the audience.

“How’s it going out there, Nagoya? You still havin’ a rockin’, sockin’, popin’ good time?” Pitch put a hand to her ear as the crowd cheered for her. “Awesome! You’ve all been an incredible audience! You guys rule!”

Pitch then stuck out her long tongue and pretended to play her mic stand like a guitar while she hopped her way over to Jet, who she handed the microphone to.

“Alright… now, these next few songs are dedicated to the night… that time when darkness covers the world and evil spirits come out from hiding,” Jet began. “The time when the only light to guide you is the moon…”

While Jet continued to hype up the crowd, Pitch and Kuro both snuck backstage and found their roadie, Rantaro Amami, waiting for them holding two bottles of water. He was wearing a pair of baggy grey pants and a loose black shirt, and he smiled as he watched his two friends approach him.

“Hey there! If it isn’t my favorite piece of cellary!” Ibuki Mioda, aka Pitch, said as she took one of Rantaro’s bottles of water. “How are we doing so far?”

“Well, no one got set on fire this time when you hit the flame button, so I’d say things are off to a pretty good start,” Rantaro replied. “Plus, we have a full house and we already sold most of our merchandise. This is looking like it’ll be one of your most successful nights yet!”

“Heck yeah! I told you this city was ripe for the cherry-picking, Sayaka,” Ibuki said, nudging Kuro in the ribs.

“Yes, I suppose you were right after all,” Sayaka Maizono, aka Kuro, replied as she took her water bottle. “I still wish that you’d get rid of those pyrotechnics already, though. Those things are dangerous, and you know management has been asking us to-“

“Pfft! Who cares about management? They’re all just a bunch of big-wigs who can’t tell their oboes from their elbows!” Ibuki interjected while her mouth was still full of water. “Anyways, Rantaro; is my ‘mosh pit’ set up yet? You know I’m thirsty for more than just water.”

“Yes; it took a little creativity, but I managed to get it set up right underneath the stage,” Rantaro replied.

“Sweet! I knew I could count on you, Rantaro!” Ibuki gave her roadie a high-five and an honorary air guitar. “Now, let’s see how many girls I can teach to sing before we have to start the next song!’

“Do you really have to do this in the middle of a concert?” Sayaka asked with a blush as she followed Ibuki to a nearby trapdoor. “Can’t this wait until after the show?”

“Well… why not do it now?” Ibuki asked with her hand on the trapdoor handle. “It’s like, people say you’re not supposed to chocolate sauce on your salad, but there’s nothing actually stopping you! I’m just living my life, free as a fish in the sea, or penguin in the desert!”

She then pulled up the trapdoor and revealed that the area beneath the stage was packed full of women, all between the ages of 18 and 25 and most dressed in either their underwear or less.

“Hellooooo my Pitichy Pals!” Ibuki shouted, throwing herself into the crowd and landing face-first between the breasts of a blonde woman who was sitting down. “How are you all doing? Do you need any water? Food? I think I’ve got some champagne kicking around if any of you want it!”

“Don’t worry, your green-haired friend has been taking good care of us,” the blonde Ibuki was lying on said as she caressed the rock star’s face. “We were getting awfully lonely in here without you, though. We were worried that we were going to have to start the fun without you.”

“Aww, you waited for me? You girls didn’t have to do that!” Ibuki lifted the blonde’s bra and began to suck on her tit while her free hand reached down to massage the woman’s labia. “After all, rehearsals make everything better! That goes for rock concerts, orgies, cow slaughters, tattoos, you name it!”

“Sorry, but… we are all here for you, you know~” A naked girl with long purple hair said as she walked up to Ibuki.

“Hehehe… well then, you’ll get all the Pitch you want and more!” Ibuki grabbed the woman by the hips and pulled her close enough that her mouth could reach her pussy. Ibuki’s tongue reached out and slid across the woman’s lower lips, making her groan in pleasure as Ibuki playfully explored her hole. The other girls in the room took that as their cues to get started as well, making out with and rubbing each other’s bodies as Sayaka looked on with a bright blush.

“D-don’t take too long, Pitch,” Sayaka called out over the rising moans around her. “I can hear Jet starting to finish speaking up there.”

“Hold on one sec! I’m almost done here!” Ibuki held the hips of the purple-haired woman tightly as she shoved her tongue as deep as it could go inside the woman’s snatch. Ibuki thrashed her tongue around in every direction, hitting every spot she could find while her lips rubbed against the groupie’s sensitive clit until she threw her head back and screamed as loud as she could. The purple-haired woman’s body shivered in pure ecstasy for a few moments before Ibuki finally let her go and she collapsed on top of a pair of women who were eating each other out behind her.

“There we go!” Ibuki licked her lips and wiped her mouth as she stood up and went back towards the exit. “Alright, everyone, I’ll be back in a little bit, but feel free to have fun while I’m gone! Oh, and enjoy the show, because you have some of the best seats in the house!”

Sayaka let out a sigh of relief as they arrived back on stage just in time to start the next song, which they blared out over the concert hall’s massive sound system while Ibuki’s groupies down bellow listened in and continued having sex with each other. The rest of the concert went on exactly like this, with Black Cherry playing a few songs before one or two of the band members would take the microphones to speak to the crowd while the rest went backstage to refresh themselves. Only Ibuki ever went down to the orgy pit beneath the stage, though, but she took every single opportunity to do so she could to make as many of the women there howl in ecstasy she could before returning to the stage. Most of the people in the crowd never suspected a thing, though a few did notice some of the juices she failed to wipe off her chin while she sang.

Then, when their last encore was said and done, Ibuki went beneath the stage one last time, tossing off her clothes and launching herself into the sea of women like a diver into a pool. She’d stay there for the next few hours, having her body massaged and licked from every angle as her most loyal fans brought her to orgasm over and over again. By the time the venue finally **** them all to leave, the rock star was a sweaty, arousal-drenched mess, her fingers so sore from fingering pussies that they were still twitching when they dragged her back to their loaded tour bus.

“Aaah… now that… is what I call a slip-and-slide…” Ibuki moaned, still dazed from the orgy as Rantaro dragged her re-dressed body up the stairs of the bus.

“Wow, you really are out of it tonight,” Rantaro said as he sat Ibuki down her seat and her bandmates took their seats around her. “Maybe next time you should take things a little easier.”

“What? No way, Jose! My fans don’t tire me out; they just add fuel to my fire!” Ibuki said as she sat up in her seat. “I can keep going all night if I wanted to!”

“Well, I don’t doubt that, but I suggest getting some sleep anyways when we get to our next hotel,” Rantaro replied as he started the bus. “We should get there in about an hour or so.”

“An hour? Perfect! That’s more than enough time to write our next big jam!” Ibuki reached underneath her seat and pulled out a notebook and a pen while several of her bandmates groaned around her.

“Ibuki, can we, like, not do this now?” Abyss groaned, clutching her forehead. “I’m super tired right now, and I just want to get some rest.”

“Don’t worry, I find that when your brain’s half working is the best time to write songs! Like how toothpaste always lasts the longest when it’s almost gone, or how lights are always brighter when it’s dark out,” Ibuki replied chipperly. “Now, I was thinking about calling this next song ‘I Witnessed The End Of Civilization And All I Got Was This Stupid T-Shirt’. I’m thinking it could maybe go ‘nah nah nah nay no nah nah’, or maybe ‘neeeeeow, bush bush, kaboosh, neeeee’. What do you girls think?”

The rest of Black Cherry just stared back at Ibuki with blank looks on their faces.

“You’re right, it should totally go ‘dun dun dun, do do do dooooo, dun dun’!” Ibuki furiously wrote notes onto the blank sheet of paper in front of her. Even though Ibuki tried to consult her friends when writing songs, she basically wrote them all herself ever since the band first formed when they were high school seniors.

“Actually, Ibuki… I wrote a song the other day,” Sayaka spoke up as she reached into one of her pockets and pulled out a few pieces of paper. “I was hoping you could tell me what you think of it.”

“Really? Sweet, let me see!” Ibuki snatched the papers out of Sayaka’s hand and began to read. “Hmm… this certainly has an interesting flavor to it, but… don’t you think it is a little ‘upbeat’ and ‘peppy’ compared to what we normally do?”

“Well, I was thinking maybe our old style of songs was growing a little… stale,” Sayaka replied carefully. “I was thinking maybe we could use this song to start taking the band in a new direction, and-“

“Wait, you didn’t write this because of our record label, did you?” Ibuki interrupted. “Dammit, for the last time, we’re not becoming another dime-a-dozen idol group! We’re fine just how we are!”

“But, Ibuki, there are so many idol groups because they’re so successful,” Sayaka pointed out. “We’re the only metal group in the country right now and, even if we had a full house tonight, our record and song sales have been declining for months. If it gets much worse, then our label is afraid we might not be profitable anymore.”

“So? We’re not doing this for the profits; we’re doing this for the music!” Ibuki played air guitar on her notebook, but Sayaka didn’t bother to watch. Instead, she looked around at her other bandmates and saw how sad they were, and how fear for their futures hid subtly behind their eyes.

“But… what if we can’t do our music anymore?” Sayaka asked. “We need to start preparing for what comes next.”

“Next? You know planning for that is pointless, Sayakitty,” Ibuki replied. “Even if your plans somehow work out, people are always changing. Who’s to say that your future self will even thank you for the preparations you make today?”

“I’m sorry, Ibuki, but… not all of us can live day to day like you do. Some of us would like the chance to retire someday,” Sayaka explained. “You know… being an idol group isn’t too different than being a metal band if you think about it. Plus, our record label is offering us all sorts of extra benefits if we switch; extra pay, vacation time, life insurance-“

“Life insurance!?” Ibuki let out a loud laugh that echoed through the bus. “Why would anyone want that? It only pays you when you’re dead, and money’s not worth much when you’re six feet under and playing poker with the worms!”

Ibuki expected her bandmates to laugh at that joke the same way they had for most of her other jokes, but she was met only by silence.

“Ibuki… please, just listen-“ Sayaka began to say before being cut off.

“No! Black Cherry is never selling out, and that is final!” Ibuki interrupted, putting her foot down and handing Sayaka’s song back to her. “Now then, I’ve got another idea for a song called ‘I Buried My Confession To You With A Landmine In Your Backyard’. I was thinking it could go ‘nu nu nu nay, nu nu nah’…”

Despite Ibuki’s confidence, Black Cherry in its original form would only last a few more months before things finally fell apart. Their record label demanded that Black Cherry convert into an idol group right away or be shut down permanently.

Sayaka and the other band members besides Ibuki sided with the label, hoping that this ultimatum could finally convince Ibuki to change her tune and start looking towards the future for once in her life. Instead, the rocker stuck to her guns and sued the record label, spending almost every yen she had on representation in court. While she ultimately won the legal battle and kept the rights to the band, her former bandmates all refused to keep playing with Ibuki and signed new contracts with their record label. Together, the former rock stars would go on to form one of the most popular idol groups in Japan, while what remained of Black Cherry sunk into obscurity.

And while Ibuki often told herself that she made the right choice, she couldn’t help but miss the sound of her friends’ laughter, the games and pranks they used to play with each other, and the way Sayaka held her hand as they hummed each other to sleep in their hotel rooms. And, several years later, as Ibuki sat alone in her new tour bus in a vacant lot at night, she couldn’t help but hold her own hand and imagine that Sayaka was still there with her as she hummed herself to sleep once again.