The Argument

Chapter 1: Beijing
Chaoyung District, Beijing in China.

August 3th 2019.

21-year old Andrei Ming was helping his 16-year old sister pack, they were going to an anime convention, both parents agreed, Thomas agreed to meet up with the siblings when they got to the airport.

Andrei Ming dyed his hair blond to complete the look and packed his outfit, which was in a plastic bag and extra clothes, he used toy play knives to complete the character.

” (Andrei, Do not offer your sister chocolate and keep her away, Xiaomei, listen to your brother)” Khristina said.

Bohai nodded aswell, Xiaomei was allergic to chocolate and Andrei had to be careful not to eat it near his sister.

Adrian walked in, Since his son’s death, he tried to pressure Bohai and Khristina to allow him to send their son to Moscow so he could run his business when he retires.

” (Andrei, My ruling is final, You are not going to that convention, You are going to work with me)” Adrian said.

“ (Uncle, we talked about this, I am not leaving Beijing, I like Beijing)” Andrei replied back.

“ (This is for your own good, Andrei, Look at all the smog, You don’t want to live here, Your parents spoil you!)” Olga, Adrian’s wife said.

” (But Uncle!)” Andrei protested.

Almost everyone was against Andrei moving to Moscow, a place he hasn’t been before.

“ (No buts, You’re leaving next week!)” Adrian shouted.

” (I don’t want to be apart of this damn family!)” Andrei shouted, then ran inside his room.

The night before the convention, Khristina came in to comfort Andrei.

“ (I don’t want to, mom)” He said.

Chapter 2: Your son is dead
The next four days was quiet, Andrei hadn’t called like he was promised, but he sent them photos of himself in cosplay.

The last photo sent to them was a JoJo group photo with Andrei and Xiaomei in cosplay two days ago.

They noticed that their son was eating Pocky at the time when the photo was taken.

” (They’re both lovely, aren’t they?)” Khristina said.

Then they heard a phone ring.

Bohai picked it up.

” (Is this the Ming residence, Beijing?)” They heard a Chinese-speaking voice.

” (Who’s this?)” Bohai asked.

” (This is Mei Cloud.....Your son......the DIO cosplayer in photo.....he’s dead....)” She said.

Bohai went into shock, His son, Andrei was dead.

” (How....did he die?)” He asked.

Then he heard a Chinese-accented man speaking in English.

“Mei, give me the phone, I’ll tell him.” He said.

Mei handed the phone to Feng, The Nanjing native was aware that Andrei had family in Beijing and Xiaomei gave him the house phone number.

“ (Mr. Ming, Your son was fatally poisoned by Pocky served in the convention, we caught the man who done this, He said that he wanted “to poison some Japs”, Your son ate nineteen sticks, 10 people fell critically ill and he eventually died, I am the one identifying the poisons, I am Dushuqiang)” He said.

” (Dushuqiang?)” Bohai said as if saying “Excuse me?!”

Dushuqiang was TETS-based rat poison in China, It meant “Super-Strong Rat Poisoner” and Bohai thought he was being set up by the man on the other end and thought he was lying.

” (I did not poison your son, but we would kindly ask if we have you and your wife’s permission to perform an autopsy on Andrei’s organs, samples will be sent to me and will be returned)” He said.

“ (Sure, Mr. Dushuqiang)” He said.

“ (Don’t hate the people who made Pocky, hate the man that decided to poison your son)” He said.

“ (Okay, Thank you Mr. Dushuqiang)” He said.

Bohai put the phone down and began to cry, his son Andrei, was dead.

Bohai’s grandmother, an elderly Chinese woman at 95 years entered the room.

Meling Ming entered the room, the old woman looked her weeping grandson.

” (So, Andrei is dead....)” She said, she went inside his room.

Meiling was a survivor of the Second Sino-Japanese war where half of her family was killed, she gently felt the anime posters, manga books and bed.

” (What did he do wrong?)” She said.

The Chinese woman exited her deceased great-grandson’s room.