pokemon-champion-brendan requested: okay, i have another one. a ittan-momen attaches itself to hirahara after a mission but instead of trying to suffocate him, it wraps itself around him and tagami's arm and the two are joint at the wrist until the other escorts can figure out how to unstuck them.
Admin Notes: This made me laugh for longer than I should have probably been laughing. Hirahara and Tagami attached at the wrist is probably the worst thing that could happen to them! What if they got into a fight?! -Admin Hirahara
After another successful mission, Hirahara was returning to headquarters when he thought something wasn't right. During the escapade of some old factory that, at some point in time, made clothes, he had the sneaking suspicion that something, or someone, was following him. He atoned it to the deceased one that was probably haunting the place, but now that everything was said and done, he couldn't shake that feeling. It wasn't a threatening feeling, though. Maybe it was just paranoia. Hirahara debated what it could be, and made sure to search his surroundings before settling his suspicions as just that: suspicions.
"I'm hooome!" He exclaimed, happily coming through the doors of the headquarters. No one was really around to hear him. He stepped in and entered the hallway, where he planned to go straight to his room and maybe play some video games. No one else should have been back yet, and he supposed that was fine too. He could move to the break room, then. However, it turned out that just as he got settled to use the television, he heard someone else come through the door. Maybe it was Rokkaku asking for his incident report (of which he was not ready to give yet).
Instead, it was Tagami, looking dreary eyed and dragging his pick axe behind him. He looked a little under the weather, although that could be attributed to his rather long mission of searching for a deceased one all over the city. Hirahara thought about going over to greet him, but for once, chose not to. He might get punched in the face, and it wasn't like he ever wanted to be punched in the face. However, Tagami spotted him anyways.
"Ah…!" Hirahara paused. "Welcome back, Tagami!" He chimed. Tagami blinked once, picked up his pick axe, and started walking over to the golden eyed escort. Hirahara became absolutely petrified. "T-T-Tagami…?" He asked, backing up from the approaching escort.
"Don't move." Tagami said, lifting the pick axe above his head and ready to smack it down into Hirahara. It would have been a good time for any reasonable person to tell Hirahara that there was an Ittanmomen stuck to his back and should be removed before it tired to suffocate him in his sleep, but Tagami wasn't exactly reasonable. He was more of a 'quickly get it over with' kind of a person. Hirahara did the first thing he could think of and grabbed Tagami's hand to try and stop him from carrying out his painful plan.
The Ittanmomen did not agree with getting hit with a pick axe either. Out of fear, it leaped from Hirahara's back and onto Tagami's arm, trying to help stop the blow from the pick axe. In the process, it also wrapped around Hirahara's wrist, which was trying to stop Tagami from hitting him. In surprise, Tagami dropped his pick axe.
"Huh?" He realized, as he tried to move his arm away from Hirahara and couldn't. It was unfortunate, but it would seem the Ittanmomen was too scared to move, and was stuck with the two's wrists attached in it's death grip. Hirahara, just now noticing the youkai, blinked and tried to pull his hand back. He ended up pulling Tagami forward and the two nearly stumbled onto the floor.
"Eh? Was this on me the entire time?" He asked, shaking his arm and, in turn, shaking Tagami's arm as well. "Ah. It's really stuck…"
"Idiot…" Tagami hissed. "It's an Ittanmomen. It's supposed to be strong enough to suffocate you." The amber eyed escort also tried to tug the youkai off with no success. "This is ridiculous. Let's just get Kirishima to cut it off." With that, the Ittanmomen became even more scared, and tightened it's grip.
"Ah! It's starting to hurt!" Hirahara exclaimed. However, when he tried to flail back, he took Tagami down with him, and this time, the two did end up falling on the floor.
"Stop moving so much!" Tagami groaned, trying to get up with just one useable arm. It was not working. The two somehow managed to work together (after a lot of yelling) to standing, but they didn't really know where to go from there. In the end, they ended up just sitting on the couch, Hirahara talking a lot about why this could have possibly happened, and Tagami holding back every muscle to keep him from hitting Hirahara over the head.
—
"So… you two are stuck together?" Saeki asked as he and the remaining escorts finally got home and found Tagami and Hirahara in a strange situation. Previously, the two had suffered Tagami wanting to get changed, which concluded in twisted limbs and a ripped shirt, Hirahara wanting to go check on Giara, but the cow ended up kicking Tagami and both escorts were sent flying, and Tagami sleeping on the ground as Hirahara dragged him around the halls. After the two did their best to explain the circumstance, the others tried to think up solutions to fix the problem. "It would be best to get it off right away. Kirishima," he looked over to the swordsman, "can you cut it off?"
Kirishima looked over at the two joint wrists, but shook his head. "Not without cutting either of their arms off. It's very stuck."
"No amputations!" Both Tagami and Hirahara yelled in unison. Neither wanted to go through that.
"Can't you just shoot it and kill it?" Tanizaki asked. "It'll loosen it's grip if it's dead."
"I would," Saeki admitted, "but I can't find it's face. I'm worried it's too close to one of their wrists to shoot."
"We could make it really, really drunk, and then it'll loosen up." Kinoshita offered. It was turned down because Saeki said it was 'just another excuse to use alcohol in the situation'. Without any further ideas, Saeki could only come up with one thing. "Just stay connected for the next few days. By then, the Ittanmomen will get tired and let go by itself."
"NO." Tagami replied without even waiting to think about it. He didn't, under any circumstance, want to be attached to Hirahara any longer. "I'd rather have my arm amputated."
"Hey…" Hirahara whined, a little upset. Still, he supposed he couldn't drag Tagami on missions either, so this was a serious problem. It was then that Rokkaku happened to walk by the break room and see the predicament that the two were in.
"Hoh? I haven't seen an Ittanmomen in a while." He said, walking closer and inspecting it. "It seems to have taken a liking to the two of you."
"It's trying to prevent Tagami from hitting me with a pick axe!" Hirahara explained.
"I was trying to hit it with a pick axe, not you!" Tagami argued back. Rokkaku stepped in before they could fight any further.
"Now now," Rokkaku sighed. "If that's the case, we could just try this…" He took out his pipe and placed it under the Ittanmomen, letting the smoke hit it's cotton body. Within a few minutes, the cotton caught a spark, and in another few minutes, it began catching fire. The Ittanmomen the proceeded to panic and released it's grip on the two escorts, fluttering away as it tried to put out the fire.
"As expected, Rokkaku-san!" Tanizaki praised the older man. "You were able to get it off right away!"
"The task isn't over yet, though." Rokkaku said. "Now that it's flown off, it's probably setting things on fire. Please go and track it down and keep the damage to a minimum." The escorts saluted the colonel as he left, and quickly began their search for the mischievous Ittanmomen.
"Hey, Hirahara," Tagami said, stopping the escort. "Let's go look together…"
"Eh?" Hirahara blinked, "I thought you didn't want to be with me."
"I- I never said that, okay?" Tagami said, walking passed Hirahara and grabbing him by the back of his shirt. "Now come on, this is your mess in the first place." The two continued bickering for a while as they hurried out the door, leaving the others to wonder if it really would have been a problem to have just left them attached together.