i o u. -ishimondo story

chapter eight • thanks, i guess?

Five minutes earlier...

Chihiro dragged Kiyotaka out the room and towards Taichi, whisper yelling.

"Dad! Check your email!"

Taichi, who was half asleep, jumped out his seat and glanced at the two of them back and forth.

"What happened?"

"Doesn't matter, I'll explain in a second, just-"

The door to the station opened and a woman stood there at the entrance, out of breath.

"Hello? Is Monda Owado here?" She ran up to Taichi's desk and threw a paper full of notes in front of him. "A kid told me someone brought him here? I was worried he might be in trouble for something, he helped me."

Taichi glanced at Kiyotaka and Chihiro, then back to the woman. "Uh...yes! He was just brought in." He took the paper to read off the notes. "What did he do...exactly? Start a fight?"

The woman shook her head. "No, well yes. But for defense. He helped me from someone-I wrote the attacker's information-but I panicked and ran off without thinking of what would happen. A kid was leaving an alley and told me everything about him getting caught."

Kiyotaka looked away awkwardly, and the woman continued talking.

"I wanted to know if he's here so I can back him up as evidence?"

"You got here just in time!" Chihiro exclaimed. "Quick, follow me! Taka, help him with the email!" They lead the woman down to the interrogation room.

When they got there, they harshly knocked on the door.

"I'm busy!" They heard Yoshida snap. Chihiro rolled their eyes and answered back as calmly as they could.

"This is important evidence Officer Yoshida."

"Can it wai-"

I can't take this. Chihiro grabbed the door handle and flew the door open.

"Chihiro?!" Mondo sounded shocked.

The woman followed close behind and immediately recognized Mondo, pointed at him.

"You!"

Mondo suddenly looked nervous. "Uh...hello?"

"You helped me when I was attacked!"

Yoshida glared at the woman. "He did? Look, I'm on an important discussion here. Why did he run away then?"

"I didn't 'run away', that's for cowards! We just esca-"

Yoshida slammed his hand in front of Mondo again to shut him up. "I asked the woman, Owada. Not you."

The woman stomped her foot towards Yoshida. "Let him talk!"

The officer stayed quiet for a moment and sighed. "Fine. Continue."

Mondo just blinked at him. "Uh...right. We didn't run away, the dude had knives and we were with a younger kid so we couldn't let him get in danger either." He pointed towards Yoshida. "And it's not like if I explained it to you you'd listen anyways, cause ya never f-cking do."