A/N: I know I have been gone for a very long time and a lot of you probably forgot what this story is even about. Don't worry, I did too. So here's a recap of what happened in the story so far.
Mikan is a novelist who writes murder mysteries. One day when she goes to celebrate the release of her new book with her father she finds him dead. That's how she meets Natsume. He is the detective that is working on her father's case. They don't exactly hit it off right away but when Mikan suggest that she and a couple of their friends team up to create the ultimate murder mystery solving team Natsume has no choice but joining (courtesy of Hotaru's blackmailing ways). As their meetings increase a friendship begins to grow between the two. After another murder is committed and a little girl (Emi) is left parentless Mikan and Natsume take up the job of playing mom and dad to the little girl. They even move in together to get the job done. Once another murder is committed the gang finds believes that the killer is going after fathers and their illegitimate children which made perfect sense since Emi's mom was Mikan's father's illegitimate child. Ruka discovers that the killer is leaving a note on the bodies of the ones he kills and tracking their every movement. The killer leaves a note in his house with the words, "She was suppose to die too." He calls his friends up for a conference at their meeting place (Alice Café). During their meeting gunshots ring out and they realize that either Mikan or Emi must be dead.
Natsume
Twenty hours. That's how long it had been since she died. It had been even longer since he had been home. Ever since she was pronounced dead Natsume had spent every moment in his office working on the case. He wanted- no needed - to solve the case before someone else got hurt. He realized he had been slacking off on the case. He was spending more time with Mikan, the very, very beautiful Mikan, than he was on the case. With his new goal to solve the case and solve it quickly, Natsume spent all night tracking down their prime suspect. His name is Narumi Anju and not only was he the owner of one of the few copies of The End he was also mentioned by the man that had committed suicide.
As Natsume got up to leave, his intention set on finding this Narumi person, Kokoro walked into the room.
"What do you want, Yome?" He grumbled. "If it has nothing to do with the case, I'm not in the mood."
"It's too bad I don't care what you're in the mood for isn't it?" Kokoro asked before ordering, "Sit."
"I've got places to be. I'm going to interview our prime suspect."
"No, you're going to sit."
Natsume glared daggers at him. Who did he think he was? They might be partners but he shouldn't, he didn't, have the balls to talk to Natsume like that. It took a whole lot of restrain on Natsume's part to abstain from punching him in the face.
"Listen Yome-"
"No you listen," Koko growled. "If you don't sit your ass down I'm marching right up to Misaki's office and telling her that you're not emotionally able to handle the case."
Natsume, still glaring daggers, refused to move an inch.
"Before you decide if you're going to sit or not I'd like to have you know that Misaki pulled me aside and asked me if you seemed emotionally stable enough to work on this case. I told her I would get back to her. So try me. Walk out of here and see what happens."
Natsume took a seat for that seemed to be his only option.
"Guess where I'm coming from," Koko started.
"I really don't care."
"Your house."
Natsume's expression changed for a fraction of a second then it returned to being stoic.
"Mikan's there waiting for you to come home. She hasn't slept, she hasn't eaten, she hasn't done anything but sit stare at the door. Hotaru tried to get her to go home but she won't. She keeps insisting that you're almost there. She said that you're the only one that can make her feel better. Yet here you are with no intention of going home."
Natsume tried to swallow but he couldn't. She hadn't ate or slept? Sure he had done the exact same thing but at least he had work to keep his mind preoccupied.
"I know you haven't had a girlfriend in a long time but I just want you to know that this is not the way you treat someone you care about. And I know you have this cold hearted façade to keep up but you really should show your true self to her sometime."
"Is that all?" Natsume asked his voice hoarse.
Koko studied him incredulously. He seemed indifferent to the whole situation. That, however, was far from the truth. Natsume's soul was in turmoil. How could he have allowed this to happen?
Koko cleared his throat. "Yeah," He said before turning to take his leave. He changed his mind and turned back to face Natsume. "Don't bother visiting Narumi, we already have another detective on that."
Natsume gave him a small nod.
As Koko turned to move once more, Natsume stopped him. "Koko," he called.
Koko stopped his movements but did not face Natsume.
"Thanks," Natsume said so softly Koko barely heard it.
Koko smiled and made his way out of Natsume's office.
Mikan
She was dead. Her precious Emi was dead. They had only known each other for a day and now she was dead. Unless she had some other sister she didn't know existed Mikan did not have any living family members left. She did have Natsume, however. Ever since they departed at the hospital she had been yearning to see his face. Something about him drew her in. All she wanted was for him take the pain away. She knew Natsume had formed the same connection with Emi as she had, so, as she rationed, he would be the only one who understood what she was going through. She realized how pathetic she sounded as she spoke to all her friends. She knew they thought she was being incredibly unreasonable as she decided that she would not eat or sleep until she saw Natsume but she couldn't bring herself to care. She needed to see him.
While she sat lost in thought the doorbell rang.
She had been disappointed so many times before as she answered the door waiting for Natsume to make an appearance, so, as she made her way to the door she was sure that this time it would be no different.
That's why she was so surprised that as she opened the door she was enveloped in the warm welcoming arms of Natsume Hyuuga.
She held on to him as if he was her life line and before she knew it she began to sob. He maneuvered them out of the doorway and into the living room to sit on the couch. Sobs racked her body as tears danced from her eyes and expelled down her cheeks. She was so caught up in her tears at first that she failed to notice that Natsume had begun to cry too. They weren't the loud body rocking sobs like hers, but the silent, manlier way of crying.
As her tears began to dry and her sobs ceased to rock her body Natsume tilted her head up from where she had buried it in his chest and began kissing the tears from her eyes.
"C'mon," he murmured. "Let's get you some food."
She went without any complaint.
~The Next Day~
Mikan was feeling considerably happier. She and Natsume had spent the afternoon talking. They talked about everything from Mikan's father and Emi dying to the new book MIkan had started plotting out. They fell asleep together on Natsume's bed and when they awoke, unfortunately, it was business as usual. Koko had called Natsume to update him on the case and once he received this information he called a meeting with Hotaru, Ruka, and Youchi at their designated meeting place, the Alice Café.
"Our prime suspect as of yesterday was Narumi L. Anju," Natsume had begun once they were all gathered.
"What?" MIkan and Hotaru questioned at the same time with varying levels of surprise.
"Narumi would never kill anyone!" Mikan complained. "How could you even consider him?"
"Well, considering he is one of your college professors, his name was mentioned by Rebecca's father, and the fact that he is an illegitimate child, I would say he was a great prime suspect."
"But-" MIkan began only to be cut off by Hotaru.
"You said 'was'?"
Natsume nodded. "Narumi has been in Paris for a month now so there is no way he could have committed the crime."
"I knew it!" chirped Mikan.
"That does not mean, however, that someone is not trying to frame him," Youchi pointed out.
"That's true but without a prime suspects and any leads I'm afraid this case has come to a dead end," Ruka said.
A heavy silence hung between them. None of them wanted to consider the possibility that Ruka might be right.
"Now wait a minute!" said an ever cheerful Mikan. "Let's review what we know about the case so far and maybe we can find a new lead."
Natsume cleared his throat. "Well, we know that the killer has killed two illegitimate children, one father of an illegitimate child, and an innocent three year old-"
"Unless," Youchi cut in. "Emi wasn't innocent."
Everyone at the table stared at him incredulously. Mikan couldn't believe what he was saying. Of course Emi was innocent!
"Wait!" Youchi said trying another approach. "What I mean is how do we know that Emi wasn't another illegitimate child?"
"We were unable to get a hold of the father," Natsume pointed out.
"So if we are right about this killer taking the life of illegitimate children and their parents this man might be next," Hotaru concluded.
"So what do we do next?" asked Mikan.
"There's not much we can do," Natsume said. "Besides watch and wait."
Hotaru sighed, clearly annoyed at the situation they had found themselves in. "If someone's framing Narumi, we know why we found a blond synthetic hair on Mikan's father. The maid that aided in the deaths of Mr. Sakura and Emi's mom did not wear a wig," Hotaru mumbled more to herself than anyone else.
"So, someone dressed as one of my favorite teachers is committing mass murder that was influenced by my book?" MIkan asked rhetorically. "Wonderful. This is even worst than the time that I found out that you were leaving," MIkan said to Hotaru. "And that was hell."
There was a silence then Mikan and Hotaru both looked at each other in surprise. Hotaru then jumped up, grabbed her keys and said, "C'mon guys we're going for a ride."
Hotaru
"Where are we?" Youchi asked as they walked up to the front door of what looked like a laboratory.
"My old lab. Now it's just a storage place. Mikan's in there," explained Hotaru.
"Mikan's right here," Youchi rationalized.
"Not that Mikan you dummy," Hotaru said as she opened the door to the lab, "The mechanic Mikan."
"And why would this 'mechanic Mikan" be helpful?" asked Natsume as he cautiously made his way into what looked like a creaking death trap.
"Mikan explain," Hotaru ordered exasperated. As Mikan turned to explain she disappeared into one of the unmarked doors of the lab.
"Back when we were in collage Hotaru had to go overseas to work on a project," Mikan began.
"I remember that," Ruka chirped.
"So," Mikan continued. "She built this robot. It was kind of like a replacement me so when she was off doing her project she would always have me- well something that looked like and sounded like me. Anyway, Hotaru had imputed all my stories into 'mechanical Mikan' so it could read to her when she didn't have the time. We think that The End might be in there somewhere."
"Wait," said Youchi, "So Hotaru is like some mechanical genius?"
Mikan and Ruka nodded.
"So why is she and M.E. now?" Youchi questioned.
"That," said Hotaru, "Is none of your business."
"Did you find the robot?" asked Natsume.
Hotaru nodded but clenched her teeth in frustration, "Someone broke into my lab and hacked into my robot and deleted one thing from mechanical MIkan's hard drive."
Mikan was almost afraid to ask but she did anyway, "The End?"
Hotaru nodded solemnly. "But the little fuckers forgot one thing. My back up memory."
Everyone exchanged glances that were expertly mixed with surprise and happiness.
"So you have it?" asked Youchi.
Hotaru nodded once more and waved a flashdrive in front of their faces, "It's all right here."
A/N: So I'm finally back! I'm so excited to start writing again. How have you guys been? I hope you haven't lost interest in my story. If you haven't, review.
~Jay~
Oh and check out my Deviantart page! The link is on my profile.