Barking up the Wrong Tree - An Object "Fanfiction"

Chapter 10 - Introducing Someone on the Cover

"What are you doing here?" asked Tree.

"Well, you see, Book kind of kicked me out of my house since I forgot to pay rent again," admitted Taco.

There were many things that Tree could justifiably say in response. "Again?" was one of the front runners, right alongside "You do have a job, don't you?" 

In the end, Tree decided to go with "But why are you here?"

"Oh, well, you know..." Taco mumbled.

"False."

"Well, you're like a private investigator person, right?" Taco shifted from foot to foot.

"Yeah."

"Well, I was wondering if I could... be your assistant!"

Tree was not completely opposed to this proposal, since having an assistant meant having to do less work. Remote was just the receptionist and didn't actually do anything of note when it came to actually investigating.

"Sure," Tree said.

"Sweet! What do you want me to do?" Taco asked.

"You can take notes while I talk to Marshmallow again." Tree replied. Tree's original plan was to take a nap in order for an irrelevant filler dream sequence to occur, but since Taco had arrived, he decided to discard his plan since this seemed more interesting, despite taking more effort to write.

"Cool, let's go!" exclaimed Taco, as screams erupted from a few metres down the street. "Nevermind!" exclaimed Taco.

Tree and Taco rushed over to the location of the screaming, and found that there was a body lying on the ground surrounded by several other bodies that were not lying on the ground but were in fact screaming. The body that was lying down was in fact not taking a nap but rather had just been smashed on the back of the head.

Upon closer inspection of the body that was lying down, it was revealed that the body that was lying down was the body of Berry, who had just been smashed on the back of the head. A sizable chunk of her was completely missing.

"Someone call an ambulance!" cried someone. Since someone had cried for someone to call an ambulance, everyone assumed that someone else would call an ambulance, including the original someone. That is to say, no one called an ambulance. That is, until someone did.

That someone was Taco, who was a responsible citizen. As Taco was calling an ambulance, Tree stepped closer to Berry while holding out his badge to the others who were crowding around Berry's body.

"Berry, can you hear me?" Tree asked seriously.

"I had the back of my head smashed in, not my ears. Of course I can hear you," replied Berry somewhat quietly.

Tree had some inkling that Berry's bludgeoning had something to do with Apple's getting shot. "Did you see the one who smashed your head?"

"No, I had the back of my head smashed in. From the back." Berry muttered grouchily.

"Nuts."

Tree continued asking questions to the prone Berry, gaining literally no useful information whatsoever. Eventually the ambulance arrived, and Berry was loaded in.

As the ambulance drove away, Taco walked up beside Tree.

"So, any good information?" Taco asked optimistically.

"Nope."

"Aw nuts." The two started walking away.

"Wait, Tree!" called a voice from behind. Tree turned and spotted Pillow waving her arms at him.

"What," asked Tree.

"I saw Berry get hit in the head! I was across the street!" bleated Pillow.

"Oh, that's a pretty good thing if I do say so myself," said Tree so himself.

"And the person who did it..." said Pillow slowly, with Tree gesturing for her to hurry the hell up the entire time.

"Oops I forget," said Pillow, and walked away.