"It's what I'm here for. I'll talk to you in a bit."

Tōkan is already on his feet and striding away, food and cigarette forgotten. "I have to go, I'm sorry," he says, throwing the other three an apologetic look and flying off.

He arrives at the Yamadas' at the same time as Kuroji does, having taken the rest of the day off work. Suzume is at school, so Harutsugu writes a note and leaves it on the fridge for if she arrives before they're back, and then drives them to the nearby police precinct.

Ōta Kaiyō is recognisable at a glance: he looks professional, well-put-together, busy, and very unapproachable, which is quite striking in this environment. This is a police precinct and even the people that work here who aren't themselves police officers (who are mostly alphas) deal with police officers all day, and there is this palpable air of authority everywhere, like you should know better than to be here wasting the time of law enforcement, plus he's small for an omega, and despite all of that he gives off the strong impression that he is the one who owns the place.

When he notices Tōkan and the Yamadas he shuts the file he's been reading and puts it in a folder and the folder into a suitcase, stands up, and strides over to them. "Yamada Kuroji-san, Yamada Harutsugu-san, Kokonoe Tōkan-san," he says, bowing. "I am honoured to meet you. I am Ōta Kaiyō."

The other three bow, too. "The honour is ours," says Kuroji.

"My wife is already in the interrogation room with Inori-san. You need not worry, he is in excellent hands."

"Interrogation room? 😥" asks Harutsugu, blanching.

"This is normal praxis, when police detain a suspect of a crime. It is very good that you contacted her so quickly, that means Inori-san was not very long in there without a lawyer."

"—oh I had not thought of that. I hope Inori didn't—" but he cuts himself off and shakes his head. "My apologies. Inori can sometimes be... very headstrong, and this is not the best of situations."

"It is unlikely to be a problem." He gestures towards the cushioned benches around a table which is where he'd been working and when they all take their seats he continues. "They don't have a case at all and they know it, use of force is permissible for self-defence against alphas, especially if they are in rut, and the only way they could build anything at all would be by denying that it was self-defence."

"But they could do that, couldn't they? Get some of those alphas together, get them all to say it was out of the blue, and then who's the judge going to believe, them or the omega riffraff," he says, with a high degree of distaste leaking through his voice and his face, "that come to testify in Inori's favour? If any even come, rape and attempted rape cases are..."

"Kokonoe-san is correct, but even a single alpha coming against this story would suffice to practically guarantee that no prosecutor will take the case if we can find one, and even if we cannot the more victims we get the less likely it will be to work. But the most important ace we have is actually Inori-san's reputation. He is well-known in many Tokyo high schools as the 'Shikiri demon'—their words, not mine," he adds, with a small smile. "The guardian angel of those oppressed by alphas, the rumours of him rescuing people from such dangerous situations have become very widespread."

"...back at school people just say he's crazy, violent, and unstable."

"At Kokonoe High, the elite all-alpha school, that may be the case. My son is a senior at Wani High and has heard many different stories about Inori-san, without having ever met him. And my wife and I have been keeping track of him for a while, now."

"...you have?" wonders Kuroji, seemingly unable to decide what emotion he's feeling right now.

"Certainly. And that, more than anything, almost guarantees this will not go forward. Prosecutors do not accept cases they do not know for a fact they will win, in this country."

Wait... their son is at Wani High? Ōta... Aoki? Well isn't that interesting. He'll file that for later, though, this is more pressing.

"What about the money, though? I... would've expected this wouldn't have even started, normally, it must be Hirune pulling strings."

"We have no evidence of this, of course, and we must work with what we have regardless. That said, even if hypothetically such a situation were to be the case, that is not outside the realm of our expertise. Trust, if not my word, my track record. This will be, at worst, a headache."

"So... what happens next?" wonders Harutsugu.

"Police may hold him in custody for up to two days before they either get a prosecutor to pursue the case or let him out, although with Makino here it'll likely be less. Then the prosecutor has another day to accept the case, and if they do, Inori-san may be held up for another twenty days at most while prosecution and police gather evidence."

"Twenty-three days?"

"It either gets dropped or goes to trial before that in the majority of cases," Kaiyō reassures them. "And each step here is less likely to lead to the following. A prosecutor will only take the case if they are being paid enough to overcome the hit to their reputation in the likely chance that they lose such a high-profile case—which I must warn you this will become, if it advances, I'm afraid—but the Hirune are not likely to be willing to part with that much money. And then if they do, we will have a long time to gather our own witnesses and," in a lowered voice, "learn more about whatever may be motivating this, if hypothetically there were anything less than fully legal happening in this investigation."

"Ōta-san, this actually makes me feel a lot better to know. Thank you so much."

"Trust in us, Kokonoe-san. We will be keeping you updated. Right now all we must do is wait; Inori-san's interrogation may last a while, but Makino is more than ready to be at his side for however long it takes. You will be able to visit him afterwards."

And so they wait. Ōta excuses himself after a while to go back to reviewing some cases and at one point gets up to go have a teleconference meeting with a client. Morning turns to afternoon, and Harutsugu goes to get them all takeout for lunch since they're definitely not leaving the precinct until Inori's been released and it seems the cops are being dicks and taking their sweet time. They are required by law to provide Inori with food and water, at least, he's not being tortured or anything, but it's still many hours to be questioned for.