Authors note:

Hi everyone, just thought I'd inform you this is my first fanfic ever, please have mercy on me. Also, English definitely isn't my first language and I'm not exactly fluent, so please tell me when you find mistakes in spelling, grammar etc. (Already apologising)

The story will include fem!Finland and fem!Iceland, some pairings (SuFin and maybe some DenNor) and all those things you get when you read detective stories (blood, violence, harsh language and the crimes themselves.). The first chapter is going to be a prologue and the actual storyline starts in chapter two, right after we've met our main characters. (there will be, btw., my own original characters too because I think it's quite unrealistic to have 15 different nationalities in one investigation, isn't it?) This story was originally something totally different, not a fanfic at all, so it may become a bit complicated, just tell me when that happens and I'll try to fix it. Okay, enough chatter, please read and give me a chance.

I don't own all of these characters, but some of them are mine. Tiina (fem!Finland), Berwald/Sten (Sweden), Lukas (Norway), Emilia (fem!Iceland) and Krister/Alex (Denmark) belong to Hidekazu Himaruya. Other characters are mine; I'll mention if there'll be any exceptions. (Oh, Wind of Change by Scorpions, as you surely know.)

I don't know if you like it or not, but this chapter is also going to be longer than the other ones, just warning.

Hide and Seek

Prologue – Wind of Change

The sun was setting fast below the horizon. Everything was coloured in bright oranges, pinks and purples. Last rays of the evening sun shone in my eyes and made me squint. In the east sky was already dark blue, almost black. I walked in the middle of the empty road that made its way across the fields. There was no one to be seen, not a single car, not a single farmer, not a single woman, man or child with dogs, the landscape was empty. And as if that wasn't enough, it was quiet too. I could hear my own shoes hitting the asphalt steadily, I could hear my breath, my heartbeat and occasionally my bag would rustle when I adjusted it little better. Birds were unnaturally quiet too. It was cold, really cold, and it wasn't even October yet. I glanced my phone and sighed, how long was it going to take until someone dro- wait, that's a car! I stepped out of black Volkswagen's way and lifted my thumb. This was fool's play, but maybe someone was nice enough to give me a ride. Well, they say that miracles still exist, and I guess I almost thanked God when I saw the car slow down and the driver roll the window down. We exchanged couple of words, and I felt even luckier when the older man opened the door of his van and told me to put my bag on the floor. He worked at construction sites and needed to be in Lund tomorrow morning. I chatted with him, mostly about weather. I didn't want to spoil this now. I was going to cross the border in time and call my boss the moment I got to Malmö. My new passport felt heavy in the pocket of my leather jacket. Except, it wasn't originally mine. It had belonged to one Aleksander Sørensen. My first job in Sweden was to get rid of him for good.

My sister had been coughing all the time since last February. Lately she had also been tired and phlegmatic. If she could, she'd sleep through her days and stop doing anything else. My mother makes horrible jokes and we all know that she can say unbelievable things. It was in July when she said: "maybe she just has a cancer in her throat, wouldn't that be cliché!" It made me quite pissed off, her attitude, but then again that was nothing new. It was only when we were together at our family's summer cottage, my sister and I, when she became nauseous. I remembered my mother's so called joke when she started to throw up something reddish and pretty dark. Luckily it was only the remains of blueberry soup. We had to wait till the next night before we got to see blood. We came back home and I told my mother. My sister was really sick all the time now, and my mother still couldn't see what was wrong. "Well, why should I know what to do with her, she's not mine anyway, go find her real mom and tell her," she said and I finally got it, she wanted to get rid of my half sister. I had just quitted my old job because of, well, that's personal. Anyway, I got couple of offers before I even started to look for a new job, and it seemed like the Swedes paid better than Norwegians, so I was going to move. I got it all planned out, but now there was this little fact: I should take my sister with me, see that she gets proper medical help and continues her education. Emilia was more than happy to hear she was moving with me, she never liked her far and "mor".* All those thoughts run through my head again when I sat in the train, my coat on my lap and my sister's head on my shoulder. Pleasant female voice announced that the train was nearing Göteborg and passengers on their way to Stockholm should change the train. I nudged my sister's ribs lightly and called her: "Emilia, wake up, we got to get off the train." She stirred and yawned, still half asleep she blinked at me couple of times before she seemed to realize who I was, where she was and what did I actually say. Her hair was a mess and there were red marks from my shirt in her cheeks, she looked adorable. After her brains had started functioning again she cracked me one of her tiny smiles and muttered: "Thanks Lukas. Feel like takeaway coffee and junk food? I'm hungry."

I was anxious, I didn't know what to do and I felt completely, utterly lost. What if he wakes up and can't find me, will he come after me? Have I forgotten something? Are there any clues for him? Can he guess where I'm going? What if he thinks it's obvious that I've decided to take a ship to Sweden and flee him; he'll surely come after me as long as I'm still in Finland. And what if he won't leave me alone at all? I was panicking, and I'm sure I looked like I had a bomb in my bag or something. I really should consider myself lucky because no one actually treated me like they would treat a terrorist. I decided to play safe and go to my cabin. It was surely the cheapest one in the whole ship, and if this pathetic boat were to sink, I would probably be the first one to die. I sat on my bed and listened the engines hum. Soon, very soon I'd be leaving my home country which I used to love, but which had also became my prison and the stage for the miserable play that was my life. But even though they say that I can stand everything and love everyone (not true, by the way. I'm just very good at hiding it) I eventually got enough and decided to seek work somewhere else after my graduation. So today I sent the divorce papers, contacted Swedish tax Administration Skattverket in order to get my samordningsnummer,* made sure all the paperwork was done, called my landlady to be and took the train to Turku. I'm sure my father will be very proud of me since he was always repeating something like: "Odotas vaan flikka, ni näet miten käy kun nait ryssän!"*. I of course called him racist and told him to shut up because of course my Russian wasn't like the others. Well, father was right, again, and I proved myself strong enough to leave despite "my Russian's" threats. After the ship had been moving for some time I decided it was safe enough to leave my horrible little cabin and get out to the deck. It was Friday night and I tried to ignore the noise, thick smell of alcohol and Finns drinking like no tomorrow and managed my way out. It was colder than I had imagined and sea wind blew mercilessly straight to my bones. I leaned on the railing, closed my eyes and inhaled slow and deep. I just hoped that I'd get the divorce quickly so I could be really free from my past and start a new life. The idea of spending my whole life as Mrs. Braginski was nauseating. Whatever the text in my passport said, I would introduce myself as Tiina Väinämöinen, I had decided that. For a moment, life felt good. I sighed once more, lit a cigarette and smiled.

Though there were no clouds in the sky at sea, it was raining in Stockholm, and it was raining hard. I lifted the last cardboard box from the back of the van and slammed the door shut. My lovely Olle hold the door open for me and together we took the lift to the fifth floor and stepped in our new apartment, the first one we shared. It was nice, cozy and not too big. Olle had managed to find it by accident, and once we went to see it, it was love at the first sight. The building itself was quite cheap, most apartments were rented, small and crappy in every possible way, but ours was actually made up of two smaller apartments and renovated only couple of years ago. We should do some seriously wall painting to get rid of the pale yellow walls, but that was just a detail. Or it was to me. Olle was more feminine than I, and he really got a great eye for colours and shapes, so I just let him do what he wants. There had been some big changes in line-up at work and bunch of new guys were going to start next Monday. The group I've been working with last three years didn't change anyway, and I find myself quite happy it didn't. We've grown really accustomed to each other, and of course I don't mind we do a lot of cases with Olle's department. My parents also moved out of the city, Olle's sister is pregnant, we have to find a new place to do the grocery shopping, we got new computers at work (finally, I got to say, the old ones were ancient!) and I might need new glasses. Yeah, everything is changing. I must have stared into nothingness lost in my thoughts again, since Olle started to sound a bit worried and I apparently needed a hug before I snapped out of my trance. "Robban, this is the earth callin', you hear me? Welcome home sweetheart", he said and kissed my cheek briefly. "Welcome home Olle", I answered and turned to look out of the window. Everything is changing, sure, but somehow it all feels so good.

I woke up when the stewardess came with her cart, selling chocolate, wine and toys. I bought nothing, adjusted my blanket and tried to sleep some more. It was quite dim and quiet, but sleeping had suddenly became impossible. I didn't want to spend my money on newspapers and I had already read all the airlines magazines. I felt myself little stupid for not buying a paperback from the airport, some silly book would've been just what I needed. Or then I could have bought a phrase book or something, I was on my way to land totally strange to me after all. I had strict schedule and rules, what to do and when. My boss doesn't trust people, so he'd just decided to take control over everything. I read my papers once again, even though I already know them by heart. After the plane has landed I have to hop in the bus and drive to Centralstationen, where I'll meet my colleague. After that we were to find a rented apartment, spend the night there and start driving towards the capital at 7 am. The car is waiting us in the parking lot of the house we're going to sleep in. We'd receive new instruction later, but our work will probably include a lot of waiting and just fooling around, since we'll be the first once in the city doing what we are doing. I felt a little stab of pain when I thought about the turn my life had taken. I'd never wanted any of this, and I'm quite sure my colleague is in the same situation. I feel horrible when I even think what my parents would say to me now. I feel so guilty I'd like to go running to the next police station and sing them everything I've done and everything I know, yet I can't. There are no more so much clouds and I can see the lights under us. The plane starts to lower its altitude as we're flying over some rather big city, over Copenhagen, over the sea. I've never liked flying. I was prepared, but the air still feels shockingly cold when I step out of the plane. In the bus on my way to terminal my mobile receives texts. The usual ones about the prices etc. and one I wasn't expecting. I open the multimedia message and look at the picture of a blond man with wild hair and grin. The picture is taken in a football match, I guess, and under it there's one sentence: "Time to play, Hamlet." I try to memorize the face on my way to the city.

It had started to rain around 5pm. I glanced at my watch, 3:39. Am. I was sitting in the café of the gas station, at the same table as always. It was almost in the corner of room, there were no tables behind my back and I could see the whole place clearly. I tried to eat my sandwich, cheese, salami and salad, not good at all. It had been wrapped in plastic for a day, it was the last one left, and I could really well understand why. I should probably find a 24h open grocery store and buy a pizza or something 'cause god I was hungry. I stirred my coffee, familiar clinking making me relax just a little. Oh well, I guess you just can't have everything. There was a blunt pain just above my shoulder blades. I had been driving for quite a long time now, and I still got almost an hour to go, if I was lucky and there was no traffic in Stockholm, then a little less. I just wanted to eat something (not the sandwich), go home, turn my mobile off and go to sleep. And stay in the bed until the world ends. No work, please, just no work. Usually I liked my job, I worked hard and sometimes it was almost fun, (As fun as it can possibly be when you're dealing with those things.) but lately we've been having a lot of really nauseating, strange, difficult and annoying cases. Today was a very good example of the irritating ones. Drive for eight hours to nowhere, find out the one you're looking for has returned to the capital, on your way back home answer your phone just to hear "okay, wrong info, he's in Mora at the moment", drive to another town in the middle of nowhere, find some damn summer cottage, open the door to see the murderer swinging with rope around his neck, after all that, drive over six hours back home. Thank god I have tomorrow off. Rain was hitting the windowsills, radio plays Abba, someone is cleaning the floors. I don't know if there's anything more disgusting than service station floors at small hours, sticky, stinking and dirty in every way. I drank the rest of my coffee and was just going to stand up and leave, when my phone rang in my coat pocket. It was my work phone, the one with secret number and obviously the one I didn't want to answer. I left the sandwich on the table, walked out and sighed, didn't my boss ever sleep. Sighing again I chose the green button, "Oxenstierna, you'd better be here in an instant, this one is sick! And Berwald, bring some coffee with you." he shouted and added something about fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes? That wasn't enough, "I haven't even passed-" I tried to protest but he had already cut off. "-Sollentuna yet, vad jävla slavdrivare!"* Well, I won't bring him his freaking latte, that's sure!

In an elegantly decorated room there was a man sitting on a very comfortable looking armchair. There was a cat on the floor next to his Italian designer leather shoes that had cost so much money an average working class dad would faint. His phone started playing the fifth of Beethoven and he enjoyed the music for a while before picking up the mobile. "Sir, everything is soon ready for your flight, but I was wondering would you prefer Monopol of Remy Martin tonight?" The voice was pleasant, dark and soft, definitely feminine, very professional. The man seemed to think carefully before answering: "Remy tonight- oh, damn that, Jack Daniels please, just tonight, I'm celebrating. Send Noa to pick me up in five minutes. Yes, thank you darling. Oh and wait, some pistachios would be lovely too." The line went dead and the man stood up and lifted the cat from the floor. He stared out of the big window deep in his thoughts. The cat enjoyed herself as her master stroked her ears and hummed softly, Wind of change.

* She never liked her far and "mor". Dad and Mom in Norwegian, obviously.

*contacted Swedish tax Administration Skattverket in order to get my samordningsnummer If you come from a Nordic country, you can work in another one for one year without applying citizenship, permission to work... And Tiina is citizen of Finland, so naturally she needs to do awfully little paperwork to work in Sweden.

*"Odotas vaan flikka, ni näet miten käy kun nait ryssän!" Finnish: "Just wait my girl and you'll see what happens when ya marry a Russian!" Ryssä is actually quite a rude name, but it's still used as often as Venäläinen, which isjust plain Russian without offense.

*"-Sollentuna yet, vad jävla slavdrivare!" Sollentuna is located north from Stockholm. Something like "what a fucking slave driver!" Oh, and if someone who speaks better Swedish than I do (not difficult) ever finds any mistakes, again, please let me know.