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“MATSUNO BROTHERS!”
The five mentioned boys were shocked out of their depressed stupor by the voice of their childhood obsession, Totoko-chan. Choromatsu’s the only one that musters enough strength to lean out the window, though, looking down sadly at Totoko.
“What is it, Totoko-chan?” he asks and Totoko waves her phone up at him vigorously, glaring.
“Get off your lazy asses and get down here, right now!” she demands.
Choromatsu glances behind at his brothers, all in various states of half-living, and turns back to Totoko with a shake of his head. “I’m sorry, Totoko-chan. We’re not in the mood to come out.”
He’s thrown aback when Totoko viciously starts shouting, “YOU SHITTY SEXTUPLETS! GET DOWN HERE RIGHT THE FUCK NOW OR I’LL CASTRATE ALL OF YOU SACKLESS PIECES OF SHIT!”
Terrified, Choromatsu shouts back, “What? What’s so important?”
Totoko takes a deep breath before screaming again, “IT’S ABOUT KARAMATSU, YOU FUCKING DUMBASS!”
Immediately, Osomatsu dashes to lean out the window next to Choromatsu. “What did you find?!” he demands, and he leans too far forward in his anticipation, tripping over and falling out before Choromatsu can even try to catch him. He lands on the first floor with a loud ‘THUD’, but he still manages to turn over painfully to look up at Totoko.
“Di-did you find our brother?” he groans out.
Totoko just shakes her head at him, frowning in disgust.
They’re all staring down at the photo that Totoko had taken, none of them really registering what they’re seeing.
“Totoko-chan,” Choromatsu finally says after a long silence. Totoko looks at him expectantly and Choromatsu rubs the back of his neck nervously, not wanting to be the one to say what everyone’s thinking.
“That’s a girl!” Jyushimatsu says first, saving him.
Totoko glares at him. “That’s Karamatsu!” she insists.
“Girl! It’s a girl!” Jyushimatsu keeps saying loudly, and Totoko rises from the floor to punch him.
Choromatsu holds her back, trying to calm her down. “Totoko-chan, wait!” he says hastily. “He’s not wrong! That’s a girl in your photo, although she does look an awful lot like us!”
That said, the rest of them tilt their head and take a closer look at the photo, realizing that Choromatsu is right; the girl looks identical to them. In fact, if they squinted their eyes, and stared a bit harder...
“That’s an Adam’s apple!” Todomatsu gasps, eyes widening in shock at the discovery.
“And her brows are way too thick!” Osomatsu adds.
“She’s probably got a shitty personality, too,” Ichimatsu mutters, looking away.
“Karamatsuu-niisan is Karamatsu-neesan!” Jyushimatsu says, awed.
“I told you it was him!” Totoko says triumphantly.
Choromatsu gapes at the photo for a moment before shaking his head and frowning. “But that doesn’t make sense! Why would Karamatsu dress up like a girl?” he asks incredulously.
“Is he... Is he trying to hide from us?” Ichimatsu asks hesitantly. “Did he really run away and tried to live a life without us?”
Todomatsu frowns, shaking his head firmly. “I don’t think so,” he says grimly, pointing at the man that’s sitting next to Karamatsu in the photo. “I didn’t realize it just now,” he continues, “but I’ve seen that guy before.”
They all push closer together to peer down at the man in question as Todomatsu adds, “One of my followers posted a photo of him before and said that he’s a creepy recluse that likes to take photos of women’s underwear. They say he moved here from Tokyo about a year ago.”
Osomatsu punches a fist into his hand in realization, shocking them all. “I’ve seen him, too!” he says angrily. “He was at the pachinko parlour, once, banged right into me like he owned the fucking place! Karamatsu was there, so I didn’t get to beat his face in!”
Choromatsu frowns at his story, and the pieces start falling together in his mind, as other remnants of his memories start surfacing. “Come to think of it,” he says quietly, “I’ve seen him a lot.”
The others gasp, looking at him. Choromatsu starts counting off on his fingers, getting steadily angrier and angrier as he recalls, “He was at the oden stand once, talking to Chibita before we arrived. And there was once I saw him at the ball park, watching Jyushimatsu and Karamatsu play. And then there was the time we were at the bathhouse and I saw him leaving as we went inside. He was even at the supermarket once when I went with mom and dad and Karamatsu!”
“Could it be just a coincidence?” Totoko asks quietly as everyone thinks about the implications of Choromatsu’s words.
Osomatsu’s hands are clenched into fists and he crosses his arms to keep himself from punching something. “It can’t be,” he says roughly. “We’ve lived in this town forever. We know everyone, and everyone knows us. Before that time at the pachinko parlour, I’ve never even seen this guy before. And now Choromatsu’s remembering him all over the place?”
Choromatsu shudders, nodding in agreement. “He’s been stalking us,” he says quietly.
“He’s been stalking Karamatsu-niisan,” Todomatsu corrects.
Their first thought had been to bring their discovery up with the police.
Osomatsu, however, is reluctant. He’d asked Totoko to send the photo she’d taken to Totty’s phone and then for her to delete it. She’d protested, but the look on his face must’ve been something, because she gave in, and then made excuses to go home, but not before making them promise to bring Karamatsu back.
The police had been useless thus far, and Osomatsu refuses to let this creep that Totty’s follower had identified get away with kidnapping and forcing one of his younger brothers to crossdress.
He doesn’t care that Karamatsu looks happy in the photo. He knows that there’s something wrong in that situation, something wrong with Karamatsu, and he’ll be damned if he lets his brothers down a second time.
“So, what’s the plan?” Choromatsu asks when Totoko’s gone.
Osomatsu has half the mind to tell him and their other brothers to stay out of this; he wants to deal with this alone. He doesn’t want to put any of them in danger, and he’s definitely not condoning them doing anything that could land themselves in jail.
However, they all share the same stubborn, determined look in their eyes, the same righteous indignation that he knows is reflected in his own.
There’s no way they’ll let him do this on his own, so, rubbing his index finger under his nose, Osomatsu grins sharply and says, “We find out where this motherfucker lives.”
It takes them a sickening half an hour (out the four months they’ve spent tirelessly looking for their brother) to find out from the residents around the area of the ice cream parlour Totoko had spotted Karamatsu with his captor that said captor apparently lives in a well-maintained apartment block a few streets away. Incidentally, the same people they’d asked had also witnessed their ‘sister’ being dragged violently along the same streets, though they noted with some distaste that she had offered no resistance.
It pisses Osomatsu off, the way they talk about Karamatsu, but Choromatsu and Ichimatsu calm him down with a stern look and a firm touch to the shoulder, reminding him to save his fists for the man that really deserves them.
They start running as soon as they get a specific address, and Osomatsu can hear the rapid beating of his heart ringing loudly in his ears. The anticipation is killing him, and when they’re finally standing outside the right door, he’s kicking it down with little to no effort before anyone has a chance to say anything.
He vaguely hears Choromatsu groaning in dismay behind him, but he ignores him. The only thing he can think of is finding the guy that has Karamatsu.
He wants blood.