Chapter One
I just came back from the fifth raising in the night. I was one popular animator. Yeah, Duo Maxwell at your service. Dried chicken blood underneath the fingernails is as annoying as heck, did you know that? Granted, if it wasn't my blood or any other human blood under there, it was a good night. I went to the bathroom to wash my hands. Luckily, I only got blood on my hands; the chicken's blood didn't do the fairly common spray all over me. My clothes were all clean, amazing. As I was rinsing my hands out with soap in the sink, I heard the phone ring. After holding them under water for a short moment, I walked to the phone, wiping my hands on my shirt.
"Speak to me, Bubba." I love original salutations.
"Sorry, I'm not Bubba." The wry voice said, "You must have the wrong guy."
"Oh, Tro-man! Great to hear from you!" It was Trowa Barton, the head of the RPIT team. Well, actually, it was the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team. The Spook Squad. We dealt with the supernatural stuff. Yeah. Like murders by rogue vampires, murders by the old Master Vampire of the City (granted, she was killed, so its all good), murders by animal like zombies, murders by ghouls, and that kind of stuff. The usual. Okay, maybe not the usual.
"Get your ass over here. We're in Glenview, Vantage Lane. By the hospital." The joking tone left his voice as he spoke. Damn. And he cussed. Double Damn.
"I'll be there as fast as I can, Tro." We hung up. Yep, who cares about goodbyes? I grabbed my stuff, which was basically my coveralls, and left for the car.
After driving for about thirty minutes, I got to the hospital. I slowed down a bit, looking at the street signs for a "Vantage Lane." I found it, after ten minutes. I followed the line of police cars to the first cul de sac. Pretty big houses, but not rich rich. With my badge handy, okay, maybe it wasn't a badge, but still, I parked the car. Walking over to the yellow tape set up by the police, I ducked under it, and kept going. Most of the people there knew me, so I had no trouble from them. Trowa met me in the middle.
"So, what exactly is this?" I almost asked if it was a murder, but I decided not too. I seriously hoped that it wasn't.
"You'll see." Arg. I hate it when Trowa does that big silent guy thing. It's so annoying. Mr. Stoic. He led me to the driveway of a big brown and white house. Uh oh, nothing good is ever on a driveway. I walked up to it, ready to see any horrific sight.
The moment was ruined when I had to push past a guy, he was standing in my way. He gave me the wierdest look as I passed him. There was something about his eyes… I glanced at his name tag. The letters were written in some bizarre scrawl. The only thing I could read in a glimpse was a T and a K. The first letters of his first and last name. I shrugged it off. Okay, so a guy looked at me strangely. Nothing new.
"Craaaaap." I saw the body. It — yes it, not he or she— was laying on the off white asphalt, inside a circle of blood. The shorts and tank top the body wore were stuck to its skin, covered in blood, so the color was unknown. Seeing the circle, I cautiously walked over it. Unlike times before, I felt no sensation of power crawling down my back or of something smothering me, it was… normal…
I began to study the body. The man was short, maybe a little taller than me, maybe not, about five foot three ish. His dark brown hair was plastered to his head in places with blood, probably his own. It was still oozing the dark red liquid from various wounds around his body. I checked down the body. There was a cut on the face, from temple to chin, rather deep. Red had dried from it over the face. Neck. Bend of the elbow. Wrist. Groin. All had bite marks. Hm. That was sort of typical. Those were the usual spots where vampires bit people, what was so odd about this case? I was generally called when there was something mysterious. Or murderous.
I turned around and was about to ask Trowa why there was nobody working on the body. All of the police men and women were just looking at me, staring actually.
"What?"
"No one was able to pass the circle." Trowa said, face solemn. "Only you."
"Are you for real? No one?" I asked, mouth gaping open.
"No one." He replied seriously.
"And that would make one assume that you made the circle in the first place." A voice spoke up. I turned. It was Relena Darlian, local witch (yes, witch, not bitch.). Crap. She hated me. I was in deep doggie doo doo.
"Why would I do a thing like that?" I questioned. "I'm not really into the whole 'Killing Random Strangers' thing." I turned back to the body, "Unless I know the person." I studied the face, or what was seen from under the blood.
Suddenly, something clicked. I gasped. Could it be…? No, it couldn't. I frantically checked the body over again. Yellow sneakers. Spandex shorts. Boney knees. Knuckley hands. Muscular in a wiry way... My eyes skimmed up to the face. Dark brown, unruly hair, not all of it was stuck to his skin. As if it could never be tamed. Just like… No, it's not. I continued the look. Closed eyes, no way of seeing the color. I paused, looking at the face in general. My breath caught in my throat. It can't be.
I turned away. Oh my god. It was Heero. Heero "The Perfect" Yuy. Holy…
"Are you okay?" It was Trowa.
I forced my eyes up to his face, trying to control my frantic heartbeat and panting breath. "Yes," I choked out, "Just fine."
"You know him?" Trowa again.
"Yeah. Heero Yuy." The tall brunette took a notebook from a pocket and began to write.
"Name, Heero Yuy." He paused, then sort of glanced at me, "How do you know him?" My mind raced. How did I know him? Shit. How was I supposed to answer the question? I could just imagine it, Yeah, I met him when I was hunting down the old master of the city, what? Why was I doing that? Oh, because Heero was paid money to do it, and he invited me along. Nothing big. We only killed about five other vampires. And a human servant. And a bodyguard. A human bodyguard that is. Nothing at all.
"Duo?"
"Oh. Yeah. I know, er… knew him from before. He helped me out a while back." Good. Stay vague, keep it simple. Trowa raised an eyebrow, "Uh huh." I don't think be believed me. I wonder why.
"Know any possible reasons he'd be targeted?" Trowa assumed it was a vampire kill. To be truthful, so did I.
I shook my head. Well… I might, he only killed a few of them. Twelve? Thirteen? Okay, maybe it was a lot. "Wait, he's killed a vamp before. They might be bitter."
"He's killed a vamp?" Trowa had stressed 'killed.'
"He was attacked, and he had a cross around his neck. He did something, I don't really know the details." Except that he also had a gun and blasted away the vampires head and most of its chest. "He never really told me about it." Because I was there.
"I see." He scribbled down something.
It almost hurt to see Tro so calm. I felt like everyone should be yelling and screaming, doing what I wanted to be doing. Granted, no one had seen the way he fought, the lithe, wiry body in action, the way he was so perfect, so… stomach tighteningly beautiful. It wasn't fair. I had to force myself to turn away from Trowa. I just didn't want to see his face at the moment. I wasn't in the mood to see indifference, I wanted to see emotions. I whirled and stared down at the body lying prone in the circle. I was looking directly at him, but I didn't even see him. All I saw were memories.
~~
"So you're the notorious Duo Maxwell?" All I could see were two cold, hard, cobalt blue eyes behind a barrel of a gun.
"That's me." I said smartly, my mouth getting the better of me.
"Lean over." He gestured to the couch in my living room. I place my hands on the couch, and spread my legs. From the corner of my eye, I could see the stoic face, stunningly beautiful in its perfection. He ran his hands over me, looking for any weapons. He found all of them, even the two small knives I kept hidden in my braid. "Get up." I got up.
"You know where the Master of the City is?" The way he said it was so… elegantly demanding. I don't know, it just instantly appealed to me.
"Why?"
"Because," he paused, "I want to kill her."
That was the first time I met Heero Yuy. Assassin extrodinare.
~~
"DUO!!" I heard my name called. It was just a voice. I wanted to sleep. I felt a hard slap on my face.
"Huh?" The word wasn't much more than a confused sound that fell out of my mouth. I fought to open my eyes. The first thing I saw were piercing eyes.
"Heero?"
"Come on, we gotta go. Place is going to blow up in a few minutes."
"Oh." I struggled to get to my feet, but didn't make it. Heero picked me up, then began to run for the exit.
~~
"Here."
"What? Is this a machine gun?!"
"Just think of it as as gift."
"Gee whiz, Heero. I guess I'll just put it under my Christmas Tree."
~~
"Holy shit, Heero, what'd you do?!"
"What?" He glanced down at his torso. "Oh, those. Nothing much."
"Those are freaking claw marks!"
"I know."
"Lycanthrope? You planning on becoming furry?"
He just gave me a small smile.
~~
"Duo? You alright?" Trowa's voice brought me back from the nostalgia of memories.
"Wha?" I shook my head, trying to get rid of the wispy remains of the recollections. "Yeah. Just spiffy."
"I think you should go take a rest, Duo. You're in bad condition."
"NO!!" The word flew out of my mouth, louder and more empathetic than I planned. I just stared at Tro.
He gave me an appraising look. "Fine."
I grinned. "Thanks, man." We just looked at each other in silence.
"Can you go in the circle, then break it so the rest of us can get to the body?" Relena's voice interrupted the moment of perfect understanding. Okay, fine, maybe it wasn't really perfect understanding. It was more like… imperfect tolerance. Sort of. Whatever.
I glanced at the witch. "Yeah sure. Just hold on."
I walked over to the circle, keeping my eyes studiously away from Heero. When I got within the line of blood, I reached over with my foot, prepared to smear it. At that moment, something seemed to make me hesitate. My black Nikes were hovering over the red for a short moment.
By my foot, I could almost feel something. A barrier. I put my foot down. If this was what I thought it was, then I was in deeeeeeep shit. Carefully, I put my hand up to where the invisible wall was. I staggered back. My whole arm was crawling with the feeling of a countless amount of ants. They moved and writhed up to my shoulder. With a gasp, my other hand flew up to grasp my upper arm. Shuddering, I rubbed it up and down the length of it, trying to get rid of that feeling. When it was all gone, I finally realized what a big pile of crap I was in. I've never felt anything like that from any circle of blood. It was power, pure power. And it locked me in the circle. Shit.
