I was loved ever since I was a child. My parents love me, my teachers love me, my friends love me and when I got older and taller, the girls fall for me. Everyone adored me and would do anything for me. I felt like God and they were my followers. One who would not follow me, though, was Kei. He hated me. But it seemed he hated everything around him because it was always bitterness that I see in everything he says and does.
He was not always that way when we were growing up. He was my big brother - the person who would stand up for me and protect me even when I was being a pain in the ass. He started to change when I turned 7. It was around that time when people started to realise how smart I was, how beautiful I was and how quick at sports I was. I was so proud that I could now stand as tall as my older brother and as soon as I reached 14, I really did literally stand as tall as he. Taller even. But instead of feeling happy for me, he grew resentful. He did not talk and play with me anymore like he did when we were younger and soon he went through pains to avoid me altogether when we were at home.

It was at that time that I began to hate him as he hated me. His hate opened my eyes and he began to look like a weakling and a loser. How much hate, bitterness and disdain I could see in his cold and uncaring eyes. People often compared me to him - how young and small he looks for an older brother and I'd snap at them saying that there was nothing worth in him to compare me to him.

My parents gave up on him even before I got into middle school and when he asked to move out, they obliged without a fuss. I was just glad I did not have to see him at home anymore.

Life continued well for me. People continued to love me and I continued to live happily. But soon, somehow, things became too easy for me, too predictable and I began to lose interest. Everything changed as soon as I met my devil saviours in their dark suits and piercing eyes. They changed me - turned me into one of them and showed me how to look, to feel, to see, to hear and to taste a world different from where I have been living in. I have become God and Devil wrapped in one - evolving from where I thought was the end of what life could give me. With my mutation I was able to overcome that human barrier and step out of the light and into the dark and revel myself in both worlds.

Imagine my surprise when I find in the dangerous gloom of darkness, my brother Kei. He was in a group they call the vampire hunters, all decked in black - darker than the suits my comrades wore and as dangerous with the amount of blood they heedlessly shed. When I first saw him in the battle in Ikebukuro, I could not believe my eyes. No way was Kei this fighter that shoots and slashes at monsters, getting into all sort of hurt that would've killed ordinary people, all for the sake of useless low-rate humans. But I know Kei anywhere, I could even recognise him from the back of his head. His eyes looked different, though. The coldness was gone and instead held some spark that lit my soul. But it was not the first time that I've seen him different.

The first time was at the train station with some dull-looking girl who somehow knew who I was. Did Kei talk to her about me I wonder? Remembering Kei's attitude towards me before, it was difficult to fathom what sort of things he would tell her . But the way he looked at me then made me pause because other than surprise and hesitancy, there was slight affection in his eyes. It felt like we were back when we were kids and I was still his little brother who he would help and protect whatever may come. I began to feel tongue-tied and awkward and before I realised what I was doing I was running away from him. I've always had something to say to him - to his face or to his back (loser, pathetic, weakling, geek) but those words doesn't seem to suit him anymore. It was absurd that I've come to that decision in the span of a few seconds after he looked at me and called my name. It was as if that caring look and that voice calling out my name shattered all the hatred I have felt for him. He has become my brother again. Not the weakling, not to loser. But my brother.

Now the vampires want him dead and they have devised a plan to ambush him in his apartment. I needed to warn him so I called to his handphone to persuade him to find a safe place to hide but he was being difficult and all I managed was to swear at him before I was cut off. Literally. And That was all I remember. Kei... Kei... you stupid, stubborn fuck.

And that was what I was remembering when I opened my eyes and saw him in that stupid black costume, looking at me like I was the second coming. "Akira!" and he lunged at me, nearly toppling me over. I grabbed ahold of what my flailing arms can grab to push him away and realised that the weakling was not a weakling anymore. He was still as short and slight as ever but there was strength underneath that tight fitting suit and it sent a slight zing through my body that for a moment I felt a shortness of breath.

A scoff on my right made me turn and when I saw who it was I took an alarmed step away. It was him with his infuriatingly smug look and bright piercing eyes from under a shaggy fall of blueish hair as he took in the look on my face upon seeing him and his similiarly damned girlfriend.

"What- What's going on?" I turned to Kei who already took a step back to wipe the tears in his eyes. I would've winced in embarassment at his blubbering state if not for the hand clasping at his shoulder from one of the hunters who was a feet taller than him and looking at my brother with a lot like love. And calling him "Kei-chan" like he knew him since forever. It made me sick and I wanted nothing more than to run away from there. After punching the guy's face in and grabbing Kei along with me, that is. We were in dangerous company after all but the two other vampires made no move other than to look bored while everyone waited for Kei to recover his composure.

When Kei managed to speak it was to say that we are all a team now and that we should work and fight together to survive, no matter who we are in the real world. Everyone in the room listened to him and I was not the only one electrified by his presence and by the strength of determination in his voice. He has become more than who I remembered him to be and I find myself in the danger of falling short for the second time in a long while.

Then my brother's admirer - Katou, from what I heard Kei called him - spoke and he suggested a practice session tomorrow night. With the way everyone's attention was also riveted to him, and how he hovered/stuck close to my brother, it looked as if he and Kei were king and queen talking to their loyal subjects before the country goes out to war. It was getting ridiculous. It was during that brief but hurtful loathing that the light-haired samurai walked over to stand beside me without me being aware and said, "So, he is the person who you lost your life to out of sheer stupidity. The leader of Gantz."

I looked at him, wary but interested. "Gantz?"

"The vampire hunters. Well, in Tokyo anyway."

"Kei?" I looked away from him and turned to stare back at my brother who was still listening to his friend talk, his arms crossed showing off some muscles that have would have probably been unseen and covered by the plain clothes he used last time I saw him. He has an unfamiliar look of seriousness and confidence in his face and I find myself riveted until my ex-comrade spoke again. The waft of cigarette smoke showed that he has lit one up while waiting for me to process what he was told me.

"The second leader, actually. From what I gathered, it was Katou at first before he died a few months back. The one that we thought was the leader - Izumi - was a lone fighter but a powerful one. I wouldn't be surprised if they revived him next just to keep their survival rate up."

"Why? What is their purpose for fighting? To defeat us? The vampires? The monstors?"

"Maybe humanity," he answered, taking a deep and lazy drag from his cigarrette, "Gantz wants to destroy humanity and they are just His pawns in His Game. Of course, you are probably more human than you are a vampire with how blatant you look pining after your brother."

I stared hard at him before looking over at the female vampire who pretended not to be listening in on our conversation. I looked back at him and with satisfaction saw that his eyes flickered momentarily. I met his stare with a look of my own and it was Kei's voice laced with authority that made me break our childish stalemate.

"Alright. So we will meet as agreed to practice for our next battle. If we get called before we have a chance to do so we'll do what we have been doing before. Surviving."

The odd group of fighters gave their farewells to each other, a few calling Kei "leader" which my brother reacted with embarassment, before parting ways out the door. Katou gave Kei another shoulder squeeze, smiled stupidly at me for a moment and then left like a puppy who just pleased its master.

Kei looked at me and smiled uncertainly. "I don't know why Gantz took you into the team but you're stuck with us now. I think you should join us tomorrow night and I can teach you how to use the suit -"

"What do you care? We've not talked ever since you moved out, no - even before that, so why start now?" I knew it was abrupt but the fact that we hated each other was there and both of us could not pretend that it does not exist.

"Because you are my brother," Kei answered without hesitation, "And I know it was you who called me before the vampires came to get me and I was the reason you got killed by them -"

"I am a vampire too."

Kei went silent before hesitatingly saying, "I guess I kinda figured. Your two team-mates... sometimes say something that makes me think that you are. And I didn't find it hard to believe. With how smart you are, how good looking, how quick... how perfect you seem to be."

I nearly growled. "Me being a vampire makes me more than that. I am not your brother anymore."

"You always will be. No matter what you are." And that force of conviction alone made me take a step back to regard my brother fully. There was that fire in his eyes again, but it was all for me and I feel burned that I had to turn away before he sees how affected I am by him.

"Idiot," I said before walking away.

"Akira..."

And I left him just like that. Probably staring at my back and I think that I kind of liked it. Maybe tomorrow night, if I don't have any plans, I'd drop by and watch them practice. And maybe then I'll find out what kind of person my brother has become.

=End=