Notes: This is Terazuma's backstory, or at least my version of it. It is pretty much all made up, as in not official canon or anything like that. I maybe use the two or three lines that we have on Terazuma that Matsushita-senei has given us, but otherwise this is all my work and my take on Terazuma's character. If you dont' like, tough, if you do, thank you. And if you want to use (for whatever crazy reason that might be) ask me or give credit.
Disclaimer: Hajime Terazuma, Wakaba Kannuki, Tatsumi Seiichirou, and Tsuzuki Asato belong to Yoko Matsushita. Kazuki Noboru belong to me. I made him, he's mine. Besides, anyone who wants an old fart of a detective is crazed in my opinion. The same will go for all of Terazuma's girlfriends later in the fic, though they're slightly more attractive, and one is a bitch.
Without further ado, the fic.

*~*

Sights of Fading Eyes -- Prologue
By TK Date

Nothing ever worked right the first time. That was just the way things went for Terazuma Hajime. He'd never once experienced what people seemed to call beginner's luck. If he felt like being blunt with a person, which he often did, he would insist that he had whatever was opposite to beginner's luck.

His first case as a detective was no exception. Usually rookies got the easy cases; it helped calm the anticipation and got rid of the nerves. Just in and out, not too much work, right? Wrong. When Terazuma came in, they were short officers. Immediately he got paired up and was sent off to handle a kidnapping. Of course, Terazuma made the mistake of thinking that all kidnappings were easy as pie.

This case involved one Wakaba Kannuki who had disappeared after coming home from school one day. Her friends had witnessed the kidnapping and had given a perfect description of the suspect. Leads told exactly where he was hiding out, and everything was expected to work like clockwork, or as easily as kidnappings can work.

However, none of this went right for Terazuma. Being fresh out of training did nothing to calm his first-case jitters. Even though he was paired up with an old-timer named Kazuhika Noboru, who was experienced in his work-the perfect guy to show a rookie the ropes. With the evidence they had, it didn't take them too long to track down the suspect, though admittedly Noboru did all the work. From what Terazuma had seen of the evidence, what with the sighting and witnesses, he figured that this criminal had left a rather sloppy trail. Like most rookie cops, Terazuma assumed the easier the trail was, the less experienced the criminal was, and usually, the easier the case tied up. He got overconfident.

For Terazuma, none of these so-called 'advantages' did him any good. He and his partner tracked the kidnapper down to an older apartment building in one of the more shady areas of Yamaguchi. Terazuma had also made the mistake of assuming that this guy did not have a gun. As he and his partner approached the building, one well-placed shot out a fifth story window put Noboru out of commission with a leg wound. This alone was enough to shatter any shred of confidence that Terazuma had gained from the apparent ease of the case. However, if they gave up the chase, their crook would get away, and they'd have to spend more time chasing after him. Plus that would give the nitwit the time to demand a ransom, a thing which he surprisingly had not done yet.

So with no other options left, Terazuma pursued him.

The building was dilapidated to say the least, the walls were moldy, doors were cracked, and every stair he stepped on creaked. Some were so loud that he swore that they would give out right under his feet. Fortunately, they didn't.

For some reason, even though the criminal was crazed enough to have stolen a gun, he hadn't moved. This wasn't an uncommon thing at all, but usually only the crazed ones actually stole guns, and they were usually the criminals who ran. But this guy hadn't. There was just something all together too strange about that.

Nevertheless, he still had to go in. Even a strange kidnapper was a kidnapper. Calmly, Terazuma pulled his gun out. He knew this guy was armed, though probably not well. The Japanese legal system didn't let civilians have dangerous weapons. And it was probably likely that this guy had stolen his from someone else.

The rotten door of the fifth floor room stood before him, numbers worn and nearly falling off. It beckoned him, and he heeded the siren's call. Pushing gently, he winced at the obnoxious creak that the hinges sounded as it swung open. Well, if the kidnapper didn't know he was here already, he knew now.

There were no outward signs of either the man or his captive in the first room. Everything seemed normal. Terazuma almost gave in to the natural urge to toe his shoes off at the front door, but he quickly stopped himself.

'What are you thinking Hajime?' he berated himself, 'This is a case, not some walk in the park. You have to keep yourself alert. Keep calm.'

He nodded to himself once.

'Right, let's go.'

Keeping his footsteps light so as not to draw attention, Terazuma crept toward the doorway that he suspected led into the bedroom. He held his gun up in a tight grasp that had his knuckles turning white. It was quite possible that he'd left the imprint of his own fingers on the gun, yet somehow he doubted that. Plus he didn't really have time to look now.

After what seemed like an eternity he reached the door. Once again the wooden frame stood there before him, mocking and taunting. It knew he was afraid to go through, and was looking entirely too smug about that fact, if doors could look smug.

One deep breath in, one out. Right, ready to go.

Keeping his gun held tight in one hand, Terazuma cautiously reached for the doorknob. Yet somewhere between the roar of his pulse in his ears and the ache in his muscles from the tension that kept him from shaking he heard it. Faint whispers, they were in there.

Somehow the impact of the reality that he had really made it and now had the kidnapper cornered stuck Terazuma dumb for a moment.

'Get over it, you can do this,' he assured himself.

One more breath. He put his hand on the door, steeled himself, and pushed it open, gun held before his face.

"Freeze," he shouted in a voice that he hoped would be threatening and firm enough to hid the trace of nervous fear that he felt throughout his body.

And there she was.

Wakaba Kannuki was a teenage girl. She was old, but not yet at the full level of maturity. Only a few years younger than Terazuma, now that he thought about it. Her hair was caramel brown, flowing in waves and curls with flashes of shimmering pink ribbons tied through it. But that wasn't what caught Terazuma's interest. It was her eyes.

'They're…'

The girl had quite possibly the strangest and most stunning eyes that Terazuma had ever seen. As she sad there, tied to a chair in the middle of the room, two shocked mismatched orbs stared at him, one golden amber, one chocolate brown.

It was then that Terazuma noticed the gun held to her head, and the quivering man holding it whose eyes were also wide and white with fear.

"Don't move…" he stammered, "If you move I'll kill her. I swear it, I'll kill her!"

'Shit. Hostage negotiations.'

"Listen…" Terazuma started slowly, not sure exactly what he should say, "I don't want to kill you… Just let her go, and you can come down to the station, and this'll be all over."

Calmly he moved his other hand to hold his gun in a tight grip, hoping that the guy would listen to him. According to his partner, that usually worked. People hardly ever went so far as to holding hostages, and even then they usually gave up once an officer showed up and they realized the entire situation was real.

This guy, however, wouldn't.

"You know that's not true…" he spoke, his voice wavering, "It's torture in there."

Pausing for a moment, Terazuma blinked. "What?"

"Don't pretend like you don't know what I'm talking about!" the man shouted, "It's awful in there. They don't' let you do anything, they torment you, and for what? What the fuck did I do to deserve that?"

'Probably did something, if you were in jail,' Terazuma thought cynically to himself, a pathetic attempt at humor to calm his nerves.

"Listen, I don't know what happened…but this time-"

"Cut the crap!" he screamed, "Of course you know! You all know! All you guys are the same, you've all got something against me. First it was my dad…my brother…and now you're after me, aren't you? It doesn't matter if I don't do anything, you're still going to come after me…"

"I don't think that really matters now," Terazuma spoke in a low growl. This guy's talk was really beginning to irritate him. What was so hard to understand about the legal system? The guy committed a crime and he was put in jail, simple as that. "If you let the girl go, you won't have to stay in there, I promise."

The man snorted derisively and pushed his gun harder into the Kannuki's temple. Her eyes grew wider as Terazuma saw her back stiffen. She was afraid.

"What do you know. It doesn't matter how short it is; it's all the same. The same torment…the same torture…"

His hand twitched, the finger on the trigger moved just a millimeter closer. Just a bit more and it would…

"Stop it!" Terazuma shouted, hoping to distract the crazed man from his gun. "Why is that any reason to take her?"

"What reason?" the man asked with a smirk on his face. He laughed, a short and clipped sounded that did nothing to further any claims of sanity he might have had. "I've got plenty of reasons. Why is it fair that if you guys keep on torturing me that people like her" he gun pressed harder, "Can keep on living happily? How come you don't' come after her? Why not? Is she so much better than me?" the twitch was there, in his finger on the trigger. "Is she someone above me?" It was getting closer...too close. "Why does she deserve to-"

"Just stop it!" Terazuma shouted. Only a mere moment after the sound of his voice vanished it was replaced by the loud rapport of two shots nearly fired in tandem.

He'd done it…he really had.

Slowly, Terazuma opened his eyes, not knowing when he had clenched them shut.

All he saw was red.

The red covered the white collar of her dress. It crept across the floor from where the kidnapper, no…from where the killer had fallen. Shocked, Terazuma felt his fingers release the death-grip that they had on his own gun. Slowly it fell from his hands and clattered on the wooden floor.

Somehow, the sound didn't register in his ears. Neither did the fact that the murder would make national news. He could quite possibly lose his work as a detective. None of this effected him. The only thought in Terazuma's mind was the vivid image of those eyes, one amber, one brown, that had once shone brightly, but now were glazed and dull with the cover of death.

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There you are, the prologue. The rest of the fic is expected to be over eight chapters long. I'm covering from this point in time until Terazuma pairs up with Wakaba. Any comments, praise, critiques, etc are muchly appreciated.