09 Mobbed

Mikan hummed as she watched the passersby around her. She had perched on the side of the barricade placed beside the street, totally minding her own business and just randomly watched whatever she could get from the open streets.

Three guys came near her. The three of them looked close to being Asians but their overly tanned skin gave them away. One with brown eyes, had a military shaved hairstyle with a very intricate hair tattoos on the sides. The other brown eyed one had his golden hair fell around his ears and ended at the nape of his neck. The black haired one had purple eyes. His hair was long down and ended just nicely below his shoulders.

Mikan looked at them. With bright colors and patterned tank tops and overly not needed skin exposure that reveal their tattoos on their arms, their whole presence screamed out suspicious. She inwardly groaned thinking that the whole attire combination didn't match up with their tats and ludicrous height. And their faces weren't of trusted civilians either.

"You're here long?" The purpled eyes asked her. The other two stood behind him. One looked extremely bored while the other one had a very warm grin on his face.

Mikan shrugged. "Not really."

Mikan raised her brows when he handed one palm out. "What?" She asked.

"I need money." He grinned wide.

"Seriously, Akira?" Mikan gave him an incredulous stare. Nonetheless, she took out a wallet and handed him a few cash. Akira motioned for more and Mikan raised her brows higher this time. "Seriously, what are you guys buying? A freaking iPhone?!"

Akira rolled his eyes and took the wallet from her. "You think this would be enough to feed us for a week? You would starve us on the third day with this amount." He took out a thick amount of paper from the wallet. "This should do it." He tossed the wallet back to her just in time for her to catch it in her hand.

"You guys eat like pigs," she mumbled while shaking her head.

"Oh come on, pigs aren't as godly looking as us," Akira grinned cheekily. He handed the stack of money to the blonde who happily pocketed it in his khaki.

Mikan frowned. "Where's your damn wallet, Kaname?"

"Come on Mikan-chan, nobody would dare to steal from us," he grinned broadly and placed a hand around the shaved head, "Especially with Mochu around."

Mikan looked at them skeptically. She then narrowed her eyes. "I'm more concerned about you dropping them yourself."

Kaname pat Mochu's back. "No worries, Mochu can track it!" he said in triumph.

"You just need to feed him two boxes of large pepperoni pizza and it's a done deal," Akira added with a very huge grin on his face.

As in on cue, Mochu mumbled with an impassive expression, "Can we go now? I'm hungry." He was the least bit interested in anything at all except for food. "I wanna try the cheezy crust today."

Kaname pat his back again before pocketing his hands in his khakis. "Yes yes, we would get some before we head out for delivery later," he assured him.

Akira leaned closer to Mikan and whispered, "Mochu's the biggest pig here." He leaned back and raised his hands out in defense with a conspiratorial grin. "I'm just saying."

He noticed Mikan's hair was up and his affable side immediately switched to a sullen one. "Your hair is up," he pointed out grimly.

Mikan unconsciously reached out behind her head to her hair, now feeling slightly fidgety by the sudden change of topic. "Oh yeah, it was hot so," she trailed off.

"Did you cover it?" He asked sternly. Mikan was fine talking back and called Akira stupid names when they were both messing around but when Akira had his serious switch on, it was nearly impossible to even argue anything with him. His overwhelming aura won't let her to. So most of the time, Mikan would end up giving in.

Mikan answered reluctantly, "…..No."

Kaname sighed. "Mikan-chan, you know that's a no-no, right?"

Mochu's gaze was heavy on her. "Baka Mi-chan, we want you to graduate here, not expelled."

Mikan sighed. "But I'm not in school right now," she exclaimed, trying to defend herself, and huffed, "and I had my hair down throughout school today so cut me some slack for once."

Akira looked at her sternly and shook his head. "NO." He reached out a hand behind her head. "We can't afford having a teacher bump into you and get exposed here. We need you to graduate highschool."

Mikan reached out her hand to stop Akira. "No!"

With his height and body size towering over Mikan, Akira easily clasped both her hands in his grasp with his strength while his other hand proceeded to pull off her hair string. Her hair came cascading down behind her back. "Put a plaster to cover it or something next time if you wanna put your hair—"

In his peripheral vision, a punch suddenly came flying near Akira's face just as he managed to dodge it in the nick of time with his survival instinct. If he didn't move his head slightly back, he would have experienced the blow. With his survival instinct now kicking in, in a swift nimble motion, he immediately had the perpetrator doubled over in a headlock with Kaname holding the perpetrator's arms behind his back and Mochu, pushing a pointed object on the side of his stomach.

"WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?" Akira snapped with Mochu beside him making guttural throat sounds. In his angered state, his Japanese accent came out funny since his words were rushed. But nobody really noticed it with the intense situation happening right now.

It was happening way too fast, Mikan didn't even see what actually happened. But now she's looking at a guy who's wearing the same school uniform as her, who apparently got restrained by three suspicious looking guys that's probably one size bigger than him. She could only see the top of his raven haired head.

Despite being overwhelmingly overpowered, he still growled out, "Don't touch her."

Mikan blinked. "Natsume?"

The three's heads spun towards her. "You know him?"

Mikan quickly jumped down from the barricade. "Yeah, he's in my class." Good lord, why is he here?

She saw Natsume strained his neck, trying to get his head up from the headlock. His face was red and flushed. Bummer, Akira must had him in zero chance of escape with that headlock. "You know these people?" His voice croaked. Now he looked far from cool.

"Yeah." She proceeded to tell the guys to let Natsume go. Now looking close, she could see each of them three all had one hand reaching their backs and she knew damn well why those hands were there. "He's a friend, guys so take your hands out." She tried to ease the situation. "We don't need any more drama here." Damn, she didn't know these guys were packing! Things would have gone terribly wrong if she didn't realized that sooner.

Akira immediately released his arms. So did Kaname and Mochu too, stepped away.

"Shit, sorry man." Akira raised his hands in front of him in defense. "My survival instincts kicked in and I just…" He trailed off. He rubbed the back of his head apologetically and continued in a sheepish mutter, "We almost had you killed."

"Crippled! He meant we almost had you crippled," Mikan immediately jumped in to clear up the ideas that probably now were making their ways towards Natsume's mind. Mikan sent a death glare towards Akira who looked the least bit concerned of the consequences of his words would lead to.

But Natsume clearly heard what he had heard. And besides, he definitely felt someone pressing something sharp and pointy on his side just now. He glimpsed at the one standing next to him and saw the shaved haired guy holding a sausage stick in his hand.

What the actual fuck? Natsume was never this horribly bewildered in his life as he was right this moment. He knew damn well it was no sausage stick that nearly made a hole through his stomach just now! His silent eyes unconsciously gave Mochu an accusing look. Seeing it, Mochu raised his brows a little but then he smirked. Not breaking their eyes contact, he teared off the plastic, bit the sausage off and chewed, still smirking. It was definitely a taunt, Natsume realized Mochu knew what he was thinking right now.

Back then, they weren't trying to cripple him for sure. It's something else more horrible. Definitely.

"So Natsume-kun, was it?" A blonde popped infront of his eyes, smiling wide. Natsume inwardly peeved at the mentioned of his first name being used despite them being complete strangers. "A friend of Mikan-chan is also a friend of ours!" He held out a hand, "Pleased to make your acquaintance!"

"No no no, Kaname. You have enough friends as it is." Mikan pulled Kaname away by his shirt and tossed him to Akira. "Please don't start this again. Especially not now."

She turned to look at Natsume. "So I figured you must had misunderstood something for you to blindly swing your punch here? Which you don't normally do."

"I thought you were being mobbed," he said quietly.

She heard Akira's mumbles at the back, questioning from which angle of his godly looks that made him looked like a freaking mob.

"But it's in broad daylight, Natsume. And I'm in public space too," she reminded him.

"That's why I was mad that nobody was helping you even where a lot of people were passing by. So I thought I would settle it myself," he explained.

"Man, you're adorable," Akira snorted, earning a slap on his forearm by Mikan.

Mikan sighed. "I appreciate your concern, but I'm not. Probably that's why nobody jumped in to help because I'm not being robbed at all."

"But they took a lot of your money?" Natsume queried it in a statement.

Oh, he saw. "Technically, it's theirs. Plus," she held up the wallet, "This is Yuzu's wallet." When she saw how confused her words were by his crimson eyes, Mikan began explaining. "For the time being, they use only one bank account for everyone right now so Yuzu's taking care of the money flows."

"Nawh, it's not for the time being, Mikan-chan. This is gonna be forever while we're here in Japan," Kaname added in.

"It's definitely because you guys can't handle your own money," Mikan mumbled while looking at each one of them accusingly. "You guys will just buy anything and everything."

"You can't deprive Mochu of his sole reason for living!" Akira cried out.

"You guys took the damn money already! Which part of me telling you not to buy him food!" She huffed. "So shut up!"

"Anyways, from where did you see us?" She looked around. He must have watched from one of the stores nearby for him to see everything.

Natsume sighed. He pointed up towards a floor of the building on their left side that had glass walls all around them and dimly lit with orange lights. A restaurant. Mikan could make out a puff of blonde hair on the other side of the glass behind a table. She was definitely staring down, looking at them just like what Natsume probably was doing before he stormed down the street.

Mikan sighed. "You should get going. Don't let your lady wait." She shooed him away.

Natsume didn't move. His gaze lingered on Mikan longer. "Aren't you supposed to be with Horan right now?" He's just plain worried, especially leaving her alone with these huge three guys even if she said she knew them.

"That shithead was there all along." Mochu pointed towards the konbini store ahead of them where a tall guy was standing, leaning so casually against one of the entrance doors, with a half-eaten chocolate bar in one hand, watching them. He really stood out even behind the shades of the people. He smiled and waved at them, looking the least bit concerned about what just happened. And he certainly didn't look like he's coming over to them anytime soon.

"Yuzu's the type to enjoy watching by the sideline because he feels more entertained." Akira grinned. Looking at the look Natsume was giving him, he knew Natsume understood what he meant. Yuzu was watching everything from the start and he didn't step in because he was enjoying it.

With a lingering gaze on Natsume, Mochu added, "Mi-chan is not weak." Sure he's not interested in anything else except for food but he did have a tender spot for Mikan; in all likelihood the reason why he's the only one who called her Mi-chan among the guys. He found her annoying at times but he still felt like protecting her like a little sister. And like the rest of the guys, he's also worried about her. Though the rest of the guys actually top him in that context. Especially Yuzu and Akira. "So you need not be too concerned," he finished off. But unlike those guys, he figured he won't poke his nose in unless it's necessary. And now he deemed it necessary for him to get this Natsume guy to understand that Mikan was not a damsel in distress that needed saving.

Akira and Kaname exchanged glances with each other at Mochu's comment but nonetheless, they chuckled. Mochu's way of telling him to leave Mikan alone because she didn't need his help was veiled well behind his words and impassive looks. Also, it could be said because he didn't like the guy either.

Mikan rolled her brown eyes at Mochu's words. She placed a hand on Natsume's back and gave him a push. "Get going, Natsume. I'll see you later with Nogi and the rest." She waved him goodbye and shooed him away.

He apologized for the misunderstandings on his part before he walked away. He glanced back and saw Akira and Kaname both waving him goodbye and Mochu was standing still, looking directly at him. He headed towards the building where he was coming from.

Through the elevator glass wall, he saw Yuzu was back with them and Mikan was handing Akira a box that she took out from her bag. Kaname pat Mikan on the head before the three of them walked away, leaving the two alone.

TBC.