Of The Highest Degree

By Meganes Ultimate Fangirl

Chapter 6 – Addition

May 31st – 10:44 AM –

Kyoya pounded on the apartment door when they got there. "I used to come visit him with Riyuki," he muttered under his breath, "If he was in that apartment, he saw me there. He should've known better." He was partially angry at himself just as much as he was angry at Arashi. The door opened to reveal a man about 22-years-old with red hair and blue eyes. Obviously a foreigner, but he spoke perfect Japanese.

"Can I help you?"

Kyoya flashed his badge quickly. "Tokyo PD. Is Arashi Hirota here?"

"No," the red-head answered carefully. "He hasn't been home since yesterday. Is something wrong?"

"We have a warrant for his arrest."

"On what charges?"

"Breaking and entering," Haruhi interjected quickly. Kyoya shot her a look. She just looked ahead passively.

"He stays out all night a lot. He'll probably be back later." He looked nervous. The raven-haired male nodded his head while the brunette closed her eyes. "I can call when he gets home if I get a number." He was staring at Haruhi, who opened her eyes again and gave him a disgusted look. She was 9 years older than him at least.

Kyoya shoved his card under his face. "Mind if we look around a bit anyway?"

"Yes, I do mind," he grunted coldly, "Leave. I'll call when Arashi gets home."

Haruhi sighed and pulled on Kyoya's sleeve. He shot the younger man a look before turning and following her away. "Kyoya," she said softly, "I have a bad feeling. About Arashi."

"Trust me. I know," he mumbled in reply, opening her door for her before striding to his own. "Well, where to now?"

She was looking out the window, up at the apartment. "Pull away from the curb but stop at the end of the block and come back around," she murmured, a frown on her face. Kyoya nodded and did as she said. When they came back around she had her head ducked to look out his window. "He's leaving. I bet you he knows some inkling of where Arashi is."

"I would bet you're right," Kyoya muttered, "Either that or he's doing something illegal himself."

"Follow him."

"Which way? One or two?" She gave him a sarcastic look. "One, it is then. He'll never see us." She nodded.

May 31st – 11:13 AM –

"Nothing," Kyoya growled as they came to a stop back in front of the apartment after following Arashi's roommate to the store and back. "Absolutely nothing."

She heaved a sigh and picked up his radio, pressing the side button. "Be on the look out for an Arashi Hirota AKA Arashi Sachiru. Auburn hair, hazel eyes, about 5 feet 10 inches, 17-years-old."

He gave her a searing look. "You aren't allowed to do that, y'know."

"You aren't either. You're driving," she retorted snidely.

He rolled his eyes and opened his mouth only to be interrupted by a voice coming from the radio with static-like quality, "Person matching description of Hirota with us right now. Alley between 28th and 29th." Haruhi and Kyoya stared at each other.

"On our way," Haruhi muttered into the device as Kyoya sped down the block. They found the police car sitting outside the alleyway. He pulled up next to it, turning off the car before letting himself out with his partner on his tail. Much to their dismay there was yellow tape blocking off the entrance. They bi-passed it easily with a flash of Kyoya's badge though. The tape only meant one thing.

"Oh no," she groaned softly as she stared into the face of Arashi Sachiru.

He was lying on the ground with a bullet hole through his chest. Eyes wide open, the t-shirt and vest he was wearing stained with his blood Kyoya ran a hand through his hair and turned around, unable to look at him. "Dammit," he growled, "Dammit, dammit, dammit." He wanted to kick something. He really wanted to kick something or someone.

"Kyoya," she murmured with sympathy laced in her voice, "Are you ok?" Her hand fell on his shoulder.

"I'm fine," he stated bitterly. "He wouldn't have been Riyuki's killer anyway. She did more for him than their parents ever did. He has no motive." She took him by the arm and dragged him back down the alley toward their car.

"I wasn't talking about the case," she mumbled, "I was talking about are you ok? You knew him, Kyoya. Just like you knew Riyuki."

"I'm fine, Haruhi," he replied more forcefully.

"Alright," she said skeptically, "Remember that my couch is always free though."

He nodded once and pulled out his cellphone. "Calling Nekozawa. Your kit's in the car. Process what you can." Haruhi gave him a searing look before leaving him to his own devices with a soft sigh. He would talk to her when he was ready. For now, she had a scene to process. And this one would be way more informational than Riyuki's had been.

She pulled out her camera, snapping pictures of the body before, and tucked it under her arm to pull on her gloves. She knelt down slowly. This was two Sachirus for the same case. Two bodies. It was more than she wanted or needed from it. Who knew how many there would be by the end of it.

She fished in Arashi's vest pockets and pulled out a wad of cash. "Holy crap," she muttered under her breath. She counted it quickly. 'Who carries 20,000 yen in cash?' she thought incredulously. It could be from her apartment, but she rarely ever left cash just lying around. She rarely ever used cash at all besides loose change. Let alone that much.

She rolled the body carefully. The damn bullet was a through-and-through. Meaning that she had to find the damn thing embedded in the wall somewhere. Great. Bullet hunting was her least favorite part of this job.

She jumped when she heard a voice behind her. "Nekozawa's on his way."

"Kyoya! Jesus Christ!" she exclaimed, glaring up at his smirking face while trying to get her heart rate under control again. "Trying to give me a heart attack?"

He ignored her and asked, "What do you have?"

"I have 20,000 yen in cash in his front pocket, a pool of blood, and the knowledge that we have to go bullet hunting. You?"

"Bullet casing a bit closer to the entrance. He was probably shot at short range," he replied, squatting next to her. "Arashi... Never carried cash. And he was in your apartment. He was into drugs not theft."

"So... He didn't kill himself. And he mysteriously has a huge wad of cash. Someone killed him after he was in my apartment."

"It looks like he was heading home."

"Y'know," Haruhi muttered softly, "He might've been paid to break in and leave that note. That would explain the cash."

"But why the hell would they leave the money?"

"Desperation murder?"

"Meaning he would have to know something the murderer didn't want him to know."

"Maybe... Arashi saw you sleeping in my apartment, knew you were investigating his sister's murder and the contents of the note and put one and two together."

"He confronted him about it. Killer kills again to keep the secret."

"Exactly. But it won't be a secret much longer. Now, help me find that goddamn bullet. It's gotta be in the wall somewhere," she mumbled, starting to scan the walls carefully.

He sighed softly. "Based on the position of the body in relation to the casing," he muttered to himself, walking to the casing only a few feet away. He walked forward in a straight line toward the victim slowly, stepping over it cautiously when he reached it. Finally he stopped when he reached the wall about a foot away from the corpse. "It's got to be somewhere along this stretch." He spread his arms along a two-foot span. She nodded, looking with him.

"I doubt it'd bounce off. The velocity would crack the stone..."

"Got it," Kyoya said quietly, pointing at a small bullet that was partially embedded in the stone wall about 5 feet up. She smiled with a pair of tweezers ready to pull it out. Haruhi plucked the bullet out, smirking.

"What's that look like to you? A 9millimeter?" she asked, holding it up slightly to the light.

"I'd say that's about correct," he replied, looking at her and back at the bullet again with a smug look on his face. "I'll check which kind of gun exactly and run records of registered 9mils when we get back." She nodded, snapping a picture of the bullet and the hole it had come from as well as the slight blood splatter. "You ready?"

"Yeah. I think so," she murmured, shifting her gaze to him as she placed the bullet in the little container he was holding out to her. He screwed on the black top on and turned toward the car with her in tow. They passed Nekozawa on the way there. "Gunshot wound to the chest. Should be a fun one for you," Haruhi called. He cackled softly. She suppressed a shudder and slid into the front seat of Kyoya's SUV.

May 31st – 11:58 AM –

"Haruhi, will you please run the evidence from Arashi's murder?" Kyoya asked tiredly. "Hikaru's busy with the computers, Renge still has the clothes, Kaoru and Mori are doing the dumpster, and Hunny's running finger prints."

"What about you?" she snorted.

He closed his eyes. "I'm... Will you just do it, please?"

She gave a soft huff before sighing. "Fine," she muttered, "Fine. But you owe me lunch." He nodded in consent as he turned back to his computer. "I feel like fancy tuna today, by the way." Her eyes twinkled as she left his office and went toward the twins lab where she could properly use her forensic skills.

"Hey Haruhi," the twins chorused as she walked through the door. She gave them a tired yawn in response. It was only noon. She shouldn't be so tired. She'd even had a good night's sleep last night, despite the extra body in her bed. Hikaru was working on the computers still while Kaoru ran tests on take out containers and coffee cups from the dumpster.

"Kyoya's got me running evidence from Arashi's murder," she mumbled, rubbing her eyes briefly before blinking.

"Well... That's better than my job," the younger twin grumbled, "How often do these teachers go out to eat? And why do they all eat take out? And most of them are from the same damn restaurant the victim ate at."

"Could've been the killer planting boxes to confuse us."

"But the donuts remaining in the box were laced with high levels of arsenic. You'd think that would cause it to be written off as taken care of."

"Her body would have automatically tried to dispose of it, Kaoru. Extra exposure increases chance of death," she muttered, taking a magnifying glass to Arashi's clothing after lying them down on the table in front of her. She picked a small thread off with tweezers, holding it to the light. "Is that... aramid?"

Hikaru and Kaoru both looked at her with odd looks. "Bring it here," Hikaru muttered, motioning over to a microscope. He shuffled around in a cabinet until he found the aramid sample they had on file for comparing. He put both of the fibers on a slide and pushed them under the small scope. "My god. Haruhi, you've been doing this job for too long." He turned back to his computer.

She scooted in front of the scope and looked in it. Identical images met her eyes. "Not too bad," she said to herself, pleased. "His t-shirt is polyester. Meaning that his killer got close enough to brush his flame-retardant clothing on him. And given the winkles where it was found I'd say there was a bit of a fight."

Both twins were silent. Then Kaoru said, "Who the hell wears cut-proof and/or flame-retardant gloves on a regular basis?"

"Someone who works with chemicals, fire, glass, or metal on a regular basis," Haruhi muttered. She scratched her chin. "That leaves the chemistry, metal-smiting, and ceramics teachers at the school..." She picked up her phone quickly and called her partner. He answered on the third ring. "Chemistry, metal-smiting, and ceramics."

"What?" Kyoya asked incredulously.

"Teachers who teach those subjects are viable suspects. As well as anyone who has access to cut-proof or flame-retardant gloves. There was an aramid fiber on the front of his t-shirt."

"Got it," he muttered, hanging up. She heaved a sigh and pulled her fiber of the slide, pushing it into a little baggy and turning back to the clothing. The right sleeve was partially torn, perhaps from a struggle. She snapped a picture of it.

"That's all I can tell there is," she grunted, ignoring her stomach's small gurgles of hunger. She was hungry. And it was about time for lunch. She briefly wondered if Kyoya had even been paying attention when she'd said she was in the mood for fancy tuna. She sighed and pulled the bullet and casing from the bag, screwing off the tops of their containers and plucking them out with gloved fingers.

Mori wandered in at that moment, carting a few more take out boxes for Kaoru, who glared at them as they were sat on their table. "Hey Mori," Haruhi mumbled.

"Haruhi," he acknowledged in return before turning to leave.

"Lunch hour whenever you want to take it."

"Okay."

She'd only known Mori and Hunny for about 5 years when they'd joined the team that had consisted of Hikaru, Kaoru, she, and Kyoya at the time. Renge joined 6 months later and Nekozawa was the head coroner for the entire department so he'd been there before she'd even started working with Kyoya.

She always had to laugh at herself when she thought about her first case with her partner. He'd been stubbornly sticking to Rule 13 and tried to leave her out of everything due to the fact that she was a lawyer. However, he'd quickly learned that Rule 15 overruled that statement and that she had just as much forensics knowledge as law. He'd been such an arrogant bastard back then.

Oh wait, he still was.

Haruhi set the bullet down carefully and dusted it for prints regardless of the fact that it was pretty damn banged up. As expected, nothing came up. Upon dusting the casing however, she found a few which she tape-lifted and smirked at. "Oh the wonders of prints," she muttered under her breath.

May 31st – 12:18 PM –

Kyoya went down to autopsy after he got a short break to gather his thoughts. Two murders in three days, both from the same family, both he knew, and both by the same killer most likely. Great. Just great. "Defensive wounds on both his wrists," Nekozawa commented dryly, turning the bruised wrists carefully.

"Of course. He practically lived on the streets," Kyoya grumbled, not at all pleased to be having to look at the body of another friend. At least this one wasn't cut open yet though.

"These are recent and right before death."

"So he did fight with his killer," the raven-haired male muttered under his breath. "Meaning, mine and Haruhi's theory is probably correct."

"Ohtori, there was something gripped in his hand. It's a piece of paper." He looked up at the creepy 31-year-old. "It's hard to read it due to the bit of blood, but perhaps you or Fujioka could pull something from it." Kyoya nodded, murmuring to himself under his breath.

"I'll take it to Haruhi." He was handed a small plastic bag with the paper carefully slipped inside. And then she'd probably want lunch too, knowing her. It was almost 12:30 though. He couldn't very easily let her go home to eat either. Her apartment was still a crime scene. Which also meant that she'd probably have to stay with him tonight. Wonderful.

He pushed open the doors to the morgue and headed for the elevator once more. Hopefully Haruhi had found something besides the fiber. And if the fiber was really all that relevant, than they might just have a few more suspects to look at.

May 31st – 12:26 PM –

Haruhi glanced up from her work of lifting fingerprints from the money when Kyoya walked through the door. "Are you here to bring me my lunch?" she asked with a cocked eyebrow.

He smirked. "Not quite. I have something else for you to run." She let out a soft groan.

"Kyoya, the twins have already gone home to eat. I let Mori and Hunny off as well. Why don't I get a break?"

"I never said that you didn't," he murmured bemusedly. "You'll run that-" he pointed at the plastic bag with the paper briefly, "-after we eat." She sighed with relief and stood up eagerly. She was really hungry, her stomach gurgling as if to make the point. She grabbed her coat. "That hungry?"

"Yeah. I haven't eaten since 8:45 if you hadn't noticed. I'm human. Unlike some people," she retorted with a pointed look in his direction. Then she added in a mumble under her breath, "Mr. I-skipped-lunch-yesterday."

He resisted the urge to roll his eyes and bumped her jokingly. "I only skipped because you weren't around to nag me to eat. Miss I-was-pissed-and-ignoring-my-partner-yesterday."

Haruhi shot a glare in his direction as they exited her lab. "I was not ignoring you. I was angry at and avoiding you. There's a difference."

After a short barking fit of laughter, he answered with a quick. "How?"

"Simple. Ignoring requires someone talking or doing and then being ignorant toward what they're saying or doing. Avoiding is not wanting to be in the presence of a certain person and then acting on that desire by avoiding the person at all costs," she explained with a small smile on her face.

He snorted. 'She'd probably try to explain the difference between friendship and love in the same manner,' he thought with slight amusement. She was looking at him oddly but he just shook his head.

"You never cease to amaze me, Haruhi," he murmured as they passed his office. He popped in quickly to grab his car keys, badge, and gun. Then they were on their way once more, joking and bumping each other like they'd never fought in the first place.

May 31st – 12:39 PM –

"Kyoya," she muttered quizzically as he came to a stop in the parking lot of a restaurant that was fancier than they normally would have eaten at. "Why are we here?"

"You said you were in the mood for fancy tuna didn't you?" she replied with a small smirk on his face.

"But you could have just gone to the Sushi Diner on 9th," she grumbled with a frown. "Can you even afford this place?"

"Haruhi," he said bluntly, "My father and both my brothers are doctors. I'm a top murder investigator. You're a top lawyer and forensic scientist. I think I can afford it. And if I can't we can."

She mumbled something about rich bastards and climbed out of the car reluctantly. She really wouldn't have eaten somewhere like this normally. And normally he wouldn't have wasted the money to either. Especially not in the middle of a case. Even more importantly, in the middle of a case as high profile and personal as this one was. She narrowed her eyes at him briefly. "Why did you want to come here instead?"

"Thought it'd be a nice change," he replied softly. "And it's also a nice distraction. If only for awhile."

"We're going to be talking about the case the entire time, aren't we?"

"Probably, yes."

"And we can talk better without being overheard with a bunch of noise."

"Exactly."

She briefly had to curse his logic. Take Haruhi to a fancy restaurant and use the excuse of there being a lesser chance of them being overheard. Sure-fire way to get her to agree. Even if she got roped into paying for half. Of course, the food would probably be worth it.

It was then that she realized he had somehow gotten her inside and sat her down. And now she had a menu in front of her. She resisted the urge to glare at him as she perused the selection. She winced at the high-priced tuna. "You're paying if I remember correctly," she muttered under her breath, "Good. I'll be sure to cost you a good chunk for dragging me here."

He chuckled softly under his breath. "Order whatever you please. Just remember that you're paying tomorrow." Her face paled slightly. "And if you cost me too much I'll make you pay for the rest of the week."

"On second thought I think I'll stick to the tuna," she mumbled dejectedly. Leave it to him to rain on her parade. She set aside her menu and sipped at the water that had magically appeared in front of her.

"That's what I thought," he murmured softly, looking over his choices for himself.

"Now, I assume you looked up registered 9mils. And discovered which one it was exactly?"

"Correct," he replied, "M-9 Beretta. I didn't get around to looking them up but I left a note on the twins' desk for them to look it up when they get back from lunch."

She sighed exasperatedly. "You're going to overwork them." He smirked and set down his menu, having made his choice. "Seriously. You are. Kaoru's about to tear his hair out with those damn take out boxes."

"Anything found in the take out boxes probably won't be relevant anyway," he replied softly.

"Extra exposure to arsenic increases chances of death," she reminded pointedly as a waitress wandered over with a slight twinkle in her eye. Haruhi prepared to be ignored and slightly insulted as she often was when she went to lunch with Kyoya.

"Are you and your... girlfriend ready to order, Sir?" the peppy woman asked cheerfully. Haruhi stared at her then looked at him.

"I'm not his-"

"Of course we are," he interrupted quickly, giving her a look. "I'll have the sashimi and a lemonade. Haruhi?"

She looked at him oddly for a moment then muttered, "The tuna rolls and a cup of coffee please." The waitress nodded quickly, writing down the order and taking off toward the kitchen. "Why didn't you say that I'm not your girlfriend?"

"Would you rather be ignored and insulted by a waitress that I'm surely not going to take interest in anytime soon?" he retorted snidely. She grumbled in reply. "Anything else besides the aramid?"

"Prints on the money and the bullet casing. Computer running them as we sit here."

"Wonderful," Kyoya murmured, truly pleased with the progress they'd made. "And when we get back, that paper I left with you. Nekozawa found it clutched in Arashi's hand. I want to know what it is."

"I'll work on it when we get back."

May 31st – 1:35 PM –

The twins had seemed to move out of their lab and into a different one when Haruhi returned, in what she could only see as a way to give her a better way to concentrate. "I'll be back in about 10 minutes," Kyoya mumbled.

"Kay," she replied distractedly as he turned and left. She turned her gaze to the wad of money that was lying on the table in front of her, still waiting to be finished printed. That probably should be finished with before she started on the paper.

A/N: I know that I said I was going to get LD up. But I'm so stuck that it's not even funny. I even know EXACTLY what's going to happen. I just can't seem to write it correctly. You can thank the wifi that I finally got to work that's here for this though. (Even if the connection REALLY SUCKS.)

Ways one and two are obviously referring to the two ways from Rule 27: Two ways to follow: – First way, they never notice you, – second way they only notice you.

Rule 13: Never, ever involve a lawyer.

Rule 15: Always work as a team.

Aramid fibre (e.g. Twaron) is used for flame-retardant clothing, cut-protection, and armor. (From Wikipedia. I did my research!)

Kudos to: lostinlife88, Raines, Echizen, idontseepenguins, BlackestNight BrightestDay, and Koharu Veddette!