Chapter 87, Chapter 86: Poirot: So many people!
Was our meeting destined?
No, it was something I painstakingly planned and schemed for, through all my cunning and painstaking efforts.
But I, Zhuge Tongzhi, have always acted with integrity and uprightness, so why have I ended up in this predicament today?!
The black-haired girl looked at the highly volatile group in Poirot Cafe, turned her face away in pain, pulled her hand out of Morofushi Hiromitsu's grasp, and turned to leave this place filled with the smell of gunpowder.
Actually, it would be better if she went to the hospital to get her knee injury treated. Noah's Ark will take care of the blood sample and everything else. Natalie, I still can't live without you!
Zhuge Tongzhi, who had taken a step back, bumped into a guest who was walking in as the welcoming bell rang. Matsuda Jinpei reached out to steady the girl who had lost her balance and casually said, "Why are you walking backwards? Do you have spider-sense?"
Zhuge Tongzhi, whose head had been pressed down to stand, felt a pang of guilt upon hearing this. If she had spider sense, she wouldn't have entered this coffee shop in the first place.
"Good afternoon, Kiri-chan and Midorikawa-kun." Hagiwara Kenji patted Zhuge Tongzhi's head skillfully, then raised his hand to greet Morofushi Kagemitsu. "Are you here to try Poirot's new product too? Jinpei and I have been looking forward to it for a long time."
Whether he'd get to try the new items was uncertain, but he was definitely going to have the limited-edition set meal, which was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Zhuge Tongzhi watched as Akai Shuichi calmly put down the menu despite Furuya Rei's impatient tapping, and looked in his direction, laughing his head off. He knew then that he wasn't going to get away.
The black-haired girl sighed, catching the curious gazes of Kenji Hagiwara and Jinpei Matsuda. Following the direction the girl was facing, the two quickly locked onto the pink-haired, squinty-eyed man.
"Good afternoon, Midorikawa-kun." Shuichi Akai smiled like a friendly older brother, and as the man pulled back his hood to reveal his disguise, he waved and warmly invited, "I didn't expect to run into you here. Would you like to have lunch together?"
“I said.” Standing next to Shuichi Akai, Rei Furuya looked down at him, casting a fierce shadow on his face under the sunlight. “Don’t disturb the other guests’ dining, sir.”
Shuichi Akai accepted the implied threat well, responding politely with a smile: "Mr. Midorikawa and I are classmates. Inviting him to dinner is not an intrusion. Mr. Amuro, please rest assured."
"You haven't ordered yet. If you're not going to order, you can leave now." Furuya Rei's fingers were clenched so tightly on the order form that they turned white. His smile became even more gentle and approachable, making Zhuge Tongzhi feel as if he had already set up his own stage.
"Please forgive me, this is my first time here, I need to choose carefully." Well, after all, a two-person arena can't be set up by just one person.
If it weren't for Rei Furuya's excellent character in doing every part-time job well, and his continued adherence to the professional standards of a waiter, he would probably have already gotten into a fight with that despicable Ai-ho.
If you want to fight, go to the dance studio!
Behind Zhuge Tongzhi, whose eyes were practically lifeless, Hagiwara Kenji was observing Akai Shuichi, who clearly didn't get along with Furuya Rei, with great interest. When Akai keenly noticed his gaze, Hagiwara nodded generously. Matsuda Jinpei, on the other hand, suppressed his smile and looked at Akai Shuichi through his sunglasses, seemingly judging something.
Among the crowd of people with varying expressions, Morofushi Kagemitsu smiled gently.
“What a coincidence! Let’s share a table then.” The droopy-eyed man with a small braid at the back of his head said in a light tone, then turned to look at Kenji Hagiwara and Jinpei Matsuda and invited, “It’s been a long time since we last met, officers. Let’s have lunch together.”
Kenji Hagiwara nodded with some reservation, while Jinpei Matsuda always followed his childhood friend's decisions. Shuichi Akai, who had already investigated the identities of both parties with Takaaki Morofushi, also had no objections.
"Also, there are some things I need to trouble Mr. Amuro with." After dealing with this, Morofushi Kagemitsu called out to his blond childhood friend, who had a sour face, and pushed the dead-fish-eyed Zhuge Tongzhi in front of him. "This child accidentally fell down and would like to borrow Poirot's first-aid kit."
"Hey, Toru-nii." Zhuge Tongzhi, like a child being pushed out by his parents to greet people during the New Year, called out to Furuya Rei and then waved slightly to Akai Shuichi on the other side, "And Subaru-nii too."
Shuichi Akai smiled and nodded, while Rei Furuya simply put away the menu and went to get the store's first-aid kit to disinfect and bandage Zhuge Tongzhi.
“If Okiya-kun hasn’t ordered anything, just order the same set meal as me.” Morofushi Kagemitsu handed the girl in his hand to Furuya Rei and said gently, “Thank you for your hard work, Amuro-kun.”
"It was just a small favor."
Zhuge Tongzhi watched in amazement as the blond, dark-skinned waiter's expression changed from gloomy to sunny in just a few words. He then obediently sat down on a chair and asked Furuya Rei to get him saline solution and hydrogen peroxide to rinse and disinfect his wound.
There's no other way; if the wound gets dirty or dusty, it has to be disinfected with hydrogen peroxide.
That's the taste of blood reacting with hydrogen peroxide and bubbling – sour and refreshing!
Zhuge Tongzhi, who gave the wound treatment a five-star negative review with a thumbs-up, sat down with a stiff expression and limped to the VIP C seat that Hagiwara Kenji and Matsuda Jinpei had reserved for her, and made eye contact with Morofushi Kagemitsu and Akai Shuichi sitting side by side opposite her.
Zhuge Tongzhi, who knows that Shuichi Akai is waiting for him but doesn't know why: chuckles.
"It seems that this Mr. Okiya knows Amuro-kun before?" Kenji Hagiwara, a social butterfly, a pillar of social gatherings, and a master of reading conversation, took the initiative to start the conversation. "But I don't think I've seen you before."
"This is my first time at this cafe." Shuichi Akai didn't hide anything and said with a smile, "The new house I moved into is very close to here, and my neighbors always recommend this place, so I wanted to give it a try."
“The Kudo residence is indeed very close to here,” Morofushi Hiromitsu replied. “It was recommended to you by those little detectives, right? But only one kid named Conan lives nearby; the others aren’t really neighbors.”
Living in the Kudo residence means they're connected to the two Public Security officers who were working undercover together. It seems they've already teamed up with that Kudo Shinichi. Plus, why is Furuya Rei's attitude so bad... The twins of the "Broken Virgin Group" basically have a plan in mind.
"I see." Shuichi Akai didn't mind that the other party had given them a heads-up. Looking at the Poirot sandwich and tamagoyaki that Rei Furuya brought over, he sincerely praised, "It looks delicious."
Without changing his expression, Furuya Rei served three cups of milk tea and two Americanos, then turned around and went back to continue cooking.
Morofushi Hiromitsu and Akai Shuichi took their Americanos, while the remaining three shared milk tea. One raised an eyebrow and watched the show, another ate his meal in silence waiting for the topic to turn to him, and the third chugged his milk tea casually, each with their own ulterior motives.
Sure enough, after only a couple of casual words, Shuichi Akai pulled Zhuge Tongzhi, who was eating tamagoyaki rice with his wife, into the conversation, "Speaking of which, thanks to Tongzhi-chan's inspiration, I realized that I haven't been in contact with my mother for a long time."
The black-haired girl slowed down her chewing, savoring the rich aroma of cheese, sauce, butter, and eggs spreading between her lips and teeth, while listening to what the pink-haired girl with squinty eyes was hinting at.
"I didn't expect her to run into trouble too." After listening to El's suggestion and contacting his mother, Shuichi Akai found that there was another missing person report for M16. He put his hands in front of his lips and looked at the black-haired girl who was slowly puffing out her cheeks.
"Thanks to you, I wasn't the last person to find out about this." The pink-haired man, who had already found out that Akai Mary and Sera Masumi had come to Japan, smiled. "However, this trouble is a bit of a problem for me."
Oh, so you're talking about Mary Akai. Zhuge Tongzhi successfully deciphered Shuichi Akai's meaning from the suggestive words, slowly swallowed the tamagoyaki in his mouth, and took a sip of milk tea to clear his mind.
She also vaguely remembered that the Akai family had a rather complicated relationship of "you know what I don't know" and "I don't know what you know," and everyone had a different situation.
How should I start? Where should I begin? Zhuge Tongzhi struggled to recall the information in his head.
Suddenly, a cheerful voice said in her ear, "Just remember that the second son of the Akai family, Haneda Hideyoshi, knows everything."
It was Chinese, and Zhuge Tongzhi, who had suddenly been pulled out of the Japanese environment, was taken aback.
The voice continued to complain, "This chess prodigy is busy dating, he didn't tell his mom, brother, or sister at all. Mary and Masumi both thought Akai was really dead."
“They’re missing a family gathering.” Another voice rang out, and the original female voice burst out laughing. “That’s because the Red Team doesn’t share intelligence. Of course, they are also missing a mouth to feed.”
"Actually, many things are like that," the voice said slowly, "even just..."
"Even if it's just one person saying it..." Zhuge Tongzhi murmured softly, instantly sorting out all the relationships between the people, only to find that all four people on the table were suddenly looking at him when he looked up.
She suddenly realized that she had spoken that sentence in Chinese, and quickly waved her hand to activate her temporarily disordered language system, switching to Japanese to explain: "Ah, no, I mean, I just mentioned it casually."
"As for that troublesome matter," Zhuge Tongzhi looked at Akai Shuichi, knowing that the other party was asking about the solution to Akai Mary's shrinking. He would probably ask Conan, who was in the same situation, after asking him, and most likely want to know about the progress of the antidote research.
"I think it will be resolved properly, as long as everyone works together." She gave a big smile, picked up another tamagoyaki with her chopsticks and stuffed it into her mouth, saying indistinctly, "Especially family issues, as long as we find a table to sit down and talk, everything will be fine."
The most important issue for your Akai family right now is not finding an antidote for Akai Mary, but finding a place where the three children with different surnames and their mother can have a proper chat.
Regarding the APTX4869 issue, Ai Haibara has control over the antidote. She needs it as a backup, and Conan probably doesn't have enough for his needs. He might have to borrow it from Zhuge Tongzhi if necessary.
So you should ask your cousin about this later.
"Professor Agasa often tells us this principle, so I'm sharing it with Cat Bro." Zhuge Tongzhi gave a very simple and easy-to-understand clue, smiled sweetly and skillfully acted cute, and then continued to eat in silence, still thinking about the voice that had suddenly appeared earlier.
"I see." Shuichi Akai squinted, nodded, and deftly changed the subject, returning to meaningless small talk.
After listening for a while and confirming from the words that Furuya Rei hadn't really suffered any losses at the hands of this guy, Matsuda Jinpei lost interest in Akai Shuichi.
But his childhood friend was still interested in the pink-haired, squinty-eyed girl. The curly-haired police officer, having finished his meal and drink, leaned back in his chair and looked around at the actors on the table, who were putting on fake smiles. He noticed the girl next to him, quietly drinking her milk tea and also lost in thought outside the stage.
I dressed up nicely today, which is unusual for me, and I look like a watermelon.
Matsuda Jinpei thought for a moment, then nudged Zhuge Tongzhi's shoulder with his elbow and asked in a low, magnetic voice, "Why do you call him Cat Brother but me Matsuda-kun?"
Zhuge Tongzhi, who was suddenly jolted off his thoughts by an elbow strike: ?
The somewhat dazed girl paused, her memory automatically rewinding to help her recall what Matsuda Jinpei had just said.
Zhuge Tongzhi, having understood the question: =.=
"That's true, they still call me Hagiwara-kun, it feels so distant." Hagiwara Kenji, never one to miss a chance to stir things up, chimed in, "Kenji-chan is going to be sad."
Zhuge Tongzhi: ...
That's enough! Do you all still remember that I'm a transfer student from America? There are so many ways to address someone in Japanese, it's perfectly normal for me to use a casual term!
Stop teasing me, I'm not really six years old!
-----------------------
Author's note: But in reality, the two are more than ten years apart.
Whether it's Da Tong or Xiao Tong, they're both children in the eyes of the police academy team and Akai.
He looks even cuter at six years old.
(But actually, the cold-faced ale is quite funny (?))
…
P.S. Zhuge and Akai are not related by blood!
Her shrinking was due to a combination of luck and some clever maneuvering.
But I won't tell you the specifics of how to do it yet (shyly).
…
Mwah!
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