Contact and Information (Part 2)

As Sukai and his group were heading toward Irie, Ame, Norio, and Taiyō were finding their way to Spanner. At least, that was the plan. In the beginning, Ame was a bit distracted by the women of the campus, veering off to follow a pair or group of girls only to be pulled back by Norio. Norio, however, was distracted by the small robots that a few students had, Taiyō pulling him forward. It was getting monotonous, but they eventually reached a campus directory that showed a map of the entire campus. Norio examined it for a bit before turning to the others behind him.

"So, I don't think we'll find Spanner just by going building to building. We need some sort of clue or it'll take too long." It wasn't the greatest thing to say, but it was an unavoidable fact. Taiyō thought for a second, hoping to come up with some sort of idea.

"Well don't you know anything Norio? You were the one interested in this school," Taiyō asked. However, Norio shook his head.

"I may be interested, but I didn't research too much about it. Remember, my dad has a thing AGAINST robots, so I avoided researching with him around. I don't know much other than the basics about the university." That wasn't sound Taiyō wanted to hear, nor something Norio would like to admit. They were getting nowhere, but Ame just remained quiet, staring away from his two companions. Noticing the strange direction Ame was looking at, Norio eyed him suspiciously before following the gaze, which lead to a group of girls that were sitting on the grass, books open and most likely studying for something. Annoyed, Norio smacked the back of Ame's head with his palm, not caring whether or not it was hurtful or not. Ame noticed though.

"OW!" he exclaimed, glaring at Norio. "What was that for?"

"For not paying attention! We have something more serious to accomplish than looking at girls!" Norio returned. Although Ame didn't seem phased by the words, only giving a small smile to the future Cloud Guardian.

"Oh Norio. Poor, innocent Norio. I think you're missing something very important." Norio just stared back at him, Taiyō joining him in his confusion. Ame, smiling like a mad man, just walked away toward the group of girls he was staring at a moment ago. Norio and Taiyō just watched as he walked away from them, witnessing a strange turn of events: Ame waving at the girls, them turning toward him, lips moving and audible laughter's, followed by a short wave of goodbye as Ame turned back to the others, a large smile on his face.

"Spanner is located in…" he said, trailing off to look at the map, "this building!" Norio and Taiyō looked at the map and saw that Ame was pointing at a building close to where they were. More importantly though, they were surprised at how he got the knowledge.

"How did-" Taiyō began.

"I just used my charm on the women," Ame interrupted, "got them talking a bit, and asked them if they heard about Spanner. Apparently he's one of the girls' professor, so she knew where he would be at this time since he doesn't do much outside the university, so he's always around." Ame smiled at his two friends, pleased with his success at information gathering. Turning toward the building, he raised an arm and pointed out to their destination. "Now let's go." Ame marched onward, Norio and Taiyō eyeing one another before following his lead. They couldn't believe Uncle Takeshi raised a womanizer.

After a few minutes of walking, they reached and entered the building, looking around for an idea of where to go. The building itself seemed dedicated to studies, tables scattered this way and that and people with books and computers occupying them. There was little decoration, but it seemed no one cared to notice such a small aesthetic fact. Inside, Ame informed the others that Spanner's room was 2030, a room on the second floor of the building. They didn't need help finding a flight of stairs and climbing upward, entering the second floor. The three scoured the floor, Taiyō leading and began looking for the room that Spanner would be located in.

"2190…2100…2070…" Norio muttered. He wanted to make sure they didn't miss it and muttering to himself was helpful. After a bit more walking, Taiyō stopped, Ame and Norio pausing behind him.

"What's up Taiyō?" Ame asked.

"This is the room." Looking at the door, Norio and Ame saw the plaque to the side that read "2030."

"Yeah, this is it alright," Norio said. Taiyō looked at the others, nodding before he turned to the doorknob, grasping it and turning it, the door creaking it as it slowly opened. Once fully open, the three entered the room, a dark room with nothing illuminating it other than a bright light in the opposite side of the room. Facing the light, they saw the source was a laptop currently in use by a blonde haired man with goggles on his head, typing furiously at the keyboard. The man didn't seem to notice their entrance though, which was weird since they didn't try to conceal their arrival. Looking at one another in confusion, Norio eventually split from the trio and approached the man, tapping him on his shoulder. The blonde man stopped typing and turned around, facing Norio with a blank expression.

"Umm, are you Spanner?" Norio asked.

"Yeah, that's me. Is there something you need Norio?" The three flinched; they were surprised that he knew Norio's name.

"You know him? What about us?" Ame asked, curiosity guiding him as he pointed at Taiyō and himself.

"Yeah, I do," Spanner replied, nodding his head at the same time. "I know all of you second generation people, at least by name anyways. Same with Irie. So, what do you guys need?"

Irie, wiping his glasses to clear it from all the dust, looked at the teens that stood in front of him, rubble by their feet.

"You guys didn't have to break the wall. I'm sure knocking would have been simpler." He examined his glasses before placing it back on. "So, what do you guys need?"

"Well, before we get to that, can you tell us why your room was hidden?" Sukai asked. "I don't see a reason for it." Irie smiled awkwardly and rubbed the back of his head, looking a bit embarrassed.

"Sorry about that. I use Mist Flames to hide the door when I want to focus on schematics for new robots. Don't tell the receptionist though; she's unaware of the fact," he said, laughing awkwardly a bit. "I'm sorry if it was difficult to see through, but I would have assumed Annalise would be able to see through it."

"Well, I was going to TRY, but Raiden insisted that he could handle it. Don't know why though," she replied.

"Well, I just wanted to blow up something," Raiden admitted. The others, even Irie, looked at him with a look of shame, but he didn't realize such a thing, only thinking they were squinting their eyes for no reason. "What?" Sighing, Sukai returned to face Irie.

"Let's move past the door. Anyways, would you mind helping us with something? It's important." Sukai turned serious, the others sensing it and getting their serious sides to surface.

"I'd be willing to help. Tsunayoshi has told me a lot about you guys, especially you Sukai. He has somewhat high expectations from you. Well, more Reborn than him, but don't think your father doesn't think you can reach high heights." Sukai blushed a bit. He took Irie's words as praise, something he felt that he had to earn through his actions rather than the words of his father. "Anyways," Irie continued, "want do you need help with?"

Getting serious again, Sukai quickly explained what happened the previous night, the invasion of their home, the capturing of their parents, how they narrowly escaped, and about their search for them two. At the end, Irie was surprised, but he grew serious, ready to help the teens.

"We don't know anything about this family that attacked us, but we know their from the mafia because of their use of flames. We were hoping that you would be able to find something out about them, anything that would give us some sort of clue." Sukai watched Irie think for a moment, followed by a quick nod.

"I'll try. I'm not the best at finding information about others, that would be Reborn, but if it's from a database, I'll find something." Irie turned his chair to face his laptop, opening single window and minimizing the others to keep his focus on the task at hand. Cracking his fingers to prepare, he placed his fingers on the keyboard, beginning the dance of online hacking.

The process confused everyone, even Arashi who was more intelligent than the others. As Irie typed, windows popped every several seconds, closing as quickly as they opened and words and sequences that made no sense to them. Irie's fingers quickly danced on the keyboard and it was several minutes of information searching until something the Neo Vongola children could understand popped up on the screen. On it, a document appeared that was mostly numbers and items.

"What is that?" Raiden asked.

"It seems to be a receipt of some sorts, someone purchasing various items from a foreign country," Arashi responded. Irie closely examined the document, looking it up and down in hopes of understanding it.

"The items listed here are a bunch of mechanical parts, something used for constructing robots, but even I don't know what these things build into. It seems whoever ordered these was thinking about constructing something no one's seen before."

"Is there any way to find out who ordered this?" Annalise asked. Irie, staring at the page a bit more, scrolled up and down the document, examining it more closely than before. The cursor on the screen moved slowly through the words and lines, slowly stopping at a signature at the bottom of the document.

"Here," Irie said. "I think this is it. The owner of the signature would end up being the person responsible for the attack, but I can't find anything else out. The signature is nothing more than an 'A' and an 'F' with a line through it."

"That doesn't really help," Raiden interjected.

"Yes, he's right. We need something more," Arashi commented.

"Well, it's something," Sukai said. "Irie, can you find out more about the owner of the signature?"

"I can try, but I can't promise anything."

"Just please try. We need something." It seemed that they were slowly gaining information about their enemy. Maybe now they could take the fight to them.