This chapter is brought to you by ShadowMajin

Videl plopped down in the chair of the only unoccupied desk. No one even spared her a second glance as they worked diligently on their caseload. For the dark-haired woman, it was just a waiting game as the forensics team analyzed the clues they had recovered, which left her without anything to do.

That suited her perfectly.

Turning on the desk's computer, she was slightly surprised to not see a login menu, the desktop appearing before her. Various icons were scattered about on the screen, lying on top of an image of a shirtless man with an afro flexing his biceps, a large grin on his face. Videl paused at the sight before a shudder ran down her spin. She had no idea who this guy was, but she wanted nothing to do with him.

Accessing the criminal database using her brand new username, the young woman began searching through cases, particularly shootings in the last few weeks. Considering what she knew of Sword, it was likely he attempted shooting Gohan from long range rather than confront him in hand-to-hand combat. It wasn't long before she spotted the Agent Shinhan assassination case and accessed it.

Immediately, a window opened for her, revealing the case file. Scrolling through it, Videl skimmed through the pertinent information, clicking on a few tabs for more until she finally found the ballistics report. Opening the drawer to Afro Man's desk, she pulled it open and found a mess of office supplies, papers, and toys that made her crinkle her nose. There was no organization to it, everything seemingly tossed in there without a second thought. Seriously, the officer that worked at this desk needed to get his act together, because this was horrific.

Searching, it took her a moment to find a notepad and snatched it up. Slapping it down on top of the desk, she shoved the drawer back in, pulling out a pen from her pocket and clicking the button on the bottom to eject the ballpoint from the top. Twirling the pen around, Videl then looked back to the screen and began scratching down notes, particularly about the bullet size, rifle model, and known distance the bullet traveled from the barrel to the target.

Exiting the Shinhan file, Videl opened the search menu and began putting in her data in the bars. Hitting enter, she waited for the computer to process her command before it spat out what she wanted to see. According to the perimeters she imputed, her search should come up with only two cases, especially after narrowing the time frame to the last month.

And just as she predicted, a window opened up with two cases, the first being the Shinhan case and the second a shooting at a Yellow Grocery Store. Greedily she opened the grocery store file and began reading through it, this time taking her time. She didn't want to miss a single detail.

Male victim...early 20's...black spiky hair...approximately 6 foot tall… So far that sounded like Gohan. Victim was shot by .50 caliber bullet by high-power rifle. Shooter was approximately 150 yards away atop opposing building. Victim unconscious at scene...EMT arrived...and removed victim from scene…died in route...

Okay, so that was a start. Though she wasn't too happy to see that "died in route" part, she needed confirmation before she accepted it. Now Videl just had to figure out who the EMTs were and which hospital they went to. Most likely they would've headed to the nearest hospital, or perhaps one that specialized in treating gun wound victims. Wracking her brain, she thought about the hospitals in the area, specifically the ones close to Yellow Grocery Store and that part of town.

Blue Star Memorial-that was the first one to pop into her head. That was what, ten miles away from that particular store? Were there any others? She had to at least check it out. Even if Gohan died during transport, they EMTs would've taken him there for official confirmation.

Reaching for the keyboard, Videl brought up a search engine and typed in Blue Star Memorial Hospital. A second later she received her results, along with a physical address and phone number. Picking up the phone on the desk, Videl dialed in the number and waited.

"Blue Star Memorial, this is Cathy," a woman answered after the second ring.

"Hello, this is Detective Tanas of the Blue Star Police Department," Videl returned the greeting. "I'm doing follow up on a gunshot victim from…" She paused at this as she brought up the grocery store shooting, looking for the date. "A couple weeks ago."

"I'm sorry, but I cannot give out that information," Cathy said with practiced ease. Apparently she received a lot of calls like this. "Unless you have a legal reason, I am required by federal law to direct you to social services."

Well, that was unexpected. Who knew hospital people couldn't give out information? Videl needed to try a different tact. "Sorry for troubling you then. Is there any way you can tell me which EMT service frequents your hospital?"

"We accept all Emergency Medical Transports," Cathy answered, stonewalling the dark-haired woman again. "If you-"

"Thank you for your time," Videl interrupted before hanging up the phone. Now that was just irritating. No wonder she hated hospitals. Returning her attention to the computer, the young woman began another search, this time for EMT services. Unfortunately it turned out there were fourteen different ambulance services in Blue Star.

Videl felt her eye twitch as she stared at the computer screen. What the hell were fourteen different ambulance companies doing in one freaking city?! Grounding her teeth, the dark-haired woman grabbed the phone again, perhaps a tad more roughly than was necessary, and shoved it against the side of her face. Punching in the number to the first service, she waited impatiently for someone to answer.

As it turned out, she went through six phone numbers before she found the one she wanted. Dialing in the seventh ambulance service, Videl sat annoyed through one ring when someone picked up. "First Responders Services," a man greeted her.

"Hello, this is Detective Tanas of the BSPD," Videl said for the seventh time. "I'm calling about one of your ambulances, the one that transported the victim of the Yellow Grocery Store shooting. Our records show he survived the shooting and we're trying to get in touch with the victim concerning the case."

"Just give me a sec," the man replied and silence came over the line. Leaning back in her chair, the dark-haired woman gazed up at the ceiling, wonder just how much time she was going to waste on this call.

Then, "Sorry to tell you this, but the victim died during transport," the EMT spoke.

Videl jerked up in her chair, leaning forward as she got ready to write on her notepad. "Are you sure?" she practically demanded. "That's not what our records show."

"I'm pretty sure about it. I was on dispatch when the call came in." Suddenly there was a snort. "Now that I think about it, the driver on that unit asked questions about the shooting. Very unprofessional if you ask me. Though…"

When the man trailed off, that prompted Videl to ask, "What is it?"

"The guys on that unit were assaulted if I recall right. According to the file I got, both paramedics were admitted to Blue Star Memorial. They were found unconscious in the parking lot with the engine running."

The dark-haired woman considered this. Why would two EMTs be unconscious in their own truck? Perhaps Sword followed them to make sure that Gohan was dead and jumped them outside of the hospital? "What about the victim?" she pressed, feeling herself growing apprehensive.

The two seconds it took for the man to answer her stretched for what felt like two minutes. "I guess he was delivered to the hospital since the body wasn't in the truck. The paramedics didn't remember if they had or not and we don't have access to the hospital logs due to federal statute."

Or perhaps Sword didn't attack the EMTs. From an assassin's standpoint, it made more sense just to kill any witnesses instead of knocking them out and leaving them in their vehicle. And if the driver had been the one to ask about the shooter and didn't recall doing it, perhaps he didn't make that call at all. Maybe...just maybe Gohan was the one to knock them out, which made him the alleged driver to ask about the shooting. Conveniently, he declared himself dead and then slipped out. The more Videl thought about it, the more she liked that line of thinking. Throw in the unusually burned hole in Wildcat-though completely circumstantial-and it looked more and more like Gohan survived his shooting and…

And what? Why would he go to the Kouzoff subdivision? It couldn't be to to kill Wildcat; that just wasn't him. Was it for Sword? If so, why wasn't Sword also found in that house? In spite of the rising hope she had felt, this point began to deflate her a little.

"I see," the young woman murmured out absently. "Well, thank you for your time."

"You're welcome. Have a good day, ma'am."

And with that, the call ended, Videl gently placing the phone down on the stand. She was beginning to build a timeline of that fateful day, but the most important part was still in limbo: the presence of a body.

Yet, she had a pretty good idea of how to get that information. Everything was pointing at Blue Star Memorial and while the employees wouldn't be giving her the proof she sought, there was another way to do it. Unfortunately the precinct wasn't the best place to do that, so it was best that she go elsewhere. Since the necessary equipment was at her new apartment, that's where she'd be going.

Standing up, Videl made to leave, ignoring the other officers in the bullpen. None of them had the guts to ask where she was going and also didn't have her phone number to call her up once she was gone. Only the LT had that info and if he called, she would just tell him she was going back to canvass the Kouzoff crime scene again.

It's what any good police officer would do.

Due to the sensitive nature of hospital admissions, hospitals went out of their way to make sure their records and networks couldn't be hacked. The same could be said of law enforcement and all sorts of businesses. However, since Videl had already hacked into the BCPD, she was ready to crack Blue Star Memorial wide open.

It took her twenty minutes to do just that.

"Okay, hospital admissions…" the dark-haired woman murmured to herself. She was alone in her apartment, the glow from her computer monitor the only source of light in the room. Searching through the admissions, she worked her way through the records until she found the day of the Yellow Grocery Store shooting.

Hmmm, where was it? Considering the shooting had been in the morning, it made sense to begin looking at the start of the day. Ignoring anything before the shift change at 7, Videl scoured the list, going beyond what she felt was the approximate time Gohan should've been admitted. When she started coming across cases around 2 in the afternoon without so much as a peep of a shooting victim or the arrival of First Responders, she had to backtrack. Just to make sure she didn't miss anything, she looked into each and every admission until she was sure that none of them were Gohan.

This just provided her more evidence to the belief that Gohan wasn't dead, something she was becoming quite giddy about. Despite the room being dark, it seemed as if everything was brighter.

Of course, now this presented her with the problem of finding the dark-haired man all over again. He had obviously went underground since he was shot and had remained off the grid until now. Great, not only was she searching for a person that not only abandoned their previous life, but did it twice. This...this was going to be a pain.

So where did she start? It was likely that the old trail she'd been following wasn't of any use any more. Aside from the fact that it was frigid cold at this point, it was likely Gohan made sure to keep his latest disappearance even more clean. If the young woman was in his position, she would do the same thing. It just made her job even harder.

It didn't help matters when her phone began ringing then. Irked, Videl pulled out the mobile device and answered it, "Det. Tanas."

"Where the hell are you?" Lt. Hoss demanded into her ear.

The dark-haired woman perked up, unconsciously straightening out her posture. It was a habit she had during her first run as a police officer and apparently she hadn't completely gotten rid of it. "I'm on my way to the Kouzoff subdivision," she rattled off easily. "Thought I would-"

"Turn your ass around then," Hoss interrupted her. "I've got a situation. Looks like there's another Tactical Securities in town."

What? Videl blinked her eyes owlishly at the reference. Was Frieza's former agency making a come back? Had Gohan's attack not terminated everyone there and the survivors were staging an attempt at revenge? Videl was really not liking those possibilities. "I'm not following you," the young woman admitted.

"There's calls coming in from witnesses on the outskirts of town. Apparently people heard explosions or something. First responders found a basement level underneath the Royal and Rayne Real Estate-"

This time the blood in Videl's veins froze. Oh...oh shit. No, no, no, this wasn't happening. The police had not just found her agency. They would find out all about her the moment they accessed Father's files. She'd have to be on the run the moment someone found that out, which would severely hamper her efforts. That didn't include the fact that the NAIE would be all over the scene the moment word reached them.

So consumed by her thoughts, the dark-haired woman didn't hear the rest of what the police lieutenant had to say. It really didn't matter at this time since if he knew about her, he wouldn't be wasting time calling her. She had to get to base as quickly as she could in that case. With the encryptions Father had, that should buy her enough to time to remove herself from the system and save her cover.

"I'll be there," she said into her phone receiver, ignoring whatever Hoss was saying before she hung up. Standing up, Videl pushed over her chair, which landed hard on the floor. Closing her laptop, the young woman then marched into her bedroom, heading right for the closet. She hadn't had time to place all of her belongings in appropriate places, so when she tore open the closet doors, she saw a duffle bag that consisted of her emergency supplies, the very ones she used to become Det. Tanas. Snatching up the back, Videl stormed back to the main room, picking up the laptop and headed for the door. These were really all she needed in the event she had to make a quick exit and it was best she had them with her instead of waiting for the police to find them in the apartment should they storm it.

Swinging the door open and closing it behind her, Videl didn't bother locking it as she hurried down a set of stairs and then to the parking lot. Finding her car, she pulled out her keys from her pocket and popped open the trunk. Forcing it open, she then tossed the duffle bag onto the bed, zipping it open before stuffing the laptop into it. After zipping it closed, she slammed the truck closed before making her way to the driver's door. The clock was ticking for her to beat the police's computer techs and this was a game she couldn't afford to lose.

The number of squad cars outside of the real estate agency was discerning. It felt...wrong to see the street blocked off with SWAT rushing through the front door. Getting out of her car, Videl swallowed deeply as she pulled her shoulders back.

This was it. Either she was going right into a race to save her ass or she was walking right into a trap, both of which ended with the young woman in handcuffs. Walking with a confidence she didn't quite feel, Videl approached the familiar building front, doing her best to ignore the sudden insurgence of law enforcement.

Entering the building, the woman couldn't help but think how disturbing it was to find people actually in the office. Officers and forensics were tearing the place apart as they rifled through desks, shelves, and what have you. Janus' desk had a tech rapidly typing on the keyboard, trying to access it. Videl was less concerned about that as all surface floor computers only had real estate business on them.

"Detective Tanas!" Looking up ahead, Videl noticed a young officer waving at her over by the secret entrance to the lower floors. Considering the man looked as if he were leaning, one of his hands disappearing into the wall, it was very likely the elevator had been discovered and the officer was holding it open. As she approached him, the dark-haired woman's suspicious was correct. "Lt. Hoss said you'd be here," the man continued to greet her as she came to a stop in front of him.

"Tell me what we have," Videl inquired, looking the officer dead in the eye. Either the man was a good actor or he was unaware as to her association with this agency. She was betting on the latter at this point.

"Two whole sublevels, Detective," the officer answered, stepping back so as to allow Videl to enter the elevator, which she did. The officer stepped in as well, dropping his hand away from the doors and continued his debrief. "It gigantic down there; some folks are guessing it covers several city blocks. There's also a lot of bodies, security we're assuming."

A flash of the pictures of the Tactical Security building appeared before Videl's eyes. While she hadn't been part of the investigation, the girls had recorded everything with cameras. The description she was receiving from the uni was reminding her of those photos-no wonder Hoss mentioned T.S. In a moment she would see just how similar.

"Anyone else, or just the security?" she asked.

"We've got two other bodies in an office. One's a woman, blonde, late 20s, early 30s. Looks as if she had the stuffing knocked out of her."

Serpent's dead? Videl hadn't known Serpent was back. She had been on assignment the last the dark-haired woman had heard.

"The other is a man, though that's about all I can tell ya. We're trying to figure out who he is at the moment."

A man? Who? Gohan? "Why the trouble?"

The elevator came to a stop them, the doors beginning to open. "Cause he doesn't have a head," the officer replied with a shrug. "Along with most of his upper body. No one's sure how that happened."

That wasn't informative at all. Unfortunately, the conversation didn't go much further the moment Videl stepped out of the open elevator and into the hall. Immediately, she stopped at the sight of a spider's web of cracks displayed on the wall at the end of the corridor. There were a couple of guards lying there, one of which was slumped up against the wall. Frowning, Videl began to walk towards the intersection, the police officer following behind her.

When they reached the end, it was there they found more extensive damage. Looking left and then right, Videl saw portions of walls were gone, scorch marks outlining the gaps. There were even more bodies here, scattered about the floor limply. This...this was definitely much more similar to the T.S. attack.

Gohan's handiwork.

"This does look like Tactical Securities," the officer spoke in awe, looking at the devastation. "I've never seen anything like it."

"Me neither," Videl replied before turning around to look down the other hall, seeing the same sight. "So where are the other officers?"

The man seemed stumped by the question before a light bulb went off in his head. "Oh yeah, this way." Immediately, he began leading the woman through the halls, heading right for Father's office. Videl did her best to look as if she never been here and succeeded due to the destruction everywhere. She didn't even bother hiding her surprise when they found several police officers standing by a gaping hole in a wall, just next to the door to Father's office. Picking up her pace, she pushed by her guide and reached the group first. "Officers," she greeted them.

When everyone looked to her, one of them immediately responded, "Detective."

"So, what do any of you make of this?"

There were a bunch of heads turning this way and that as each policeman looked for agreement with their fellow officers. Finally one worked up the courage to answer her. "A Kami damn warzone, ma'am. That's about all we've got at the moment."

"How about forensics?"

"Nothing, ma'am. A couple of them are trying to access the computer inside, but they haven't had much luck."

Videl gave a sharp nod. Things were looking up for her. "Pull everyone back. I'd like to have a quick look without any distractions."

Again, the men looked to each other for reassurance before someone protested her order. "But what about the techs? Shouldn't they keep working on the computer?"

The dark-haired woman shook her head before replying, "No distractions, even them. I just want ten minutes-no more, no less-to get an idea of what happened. They can get right back to work when I'm done."

Choosing to heed her words, the officers went about calling people out of the office, much to the forensics chagrin. They gave in though, and soon it was all Videl in the office. Just as she had been told, there were two bodies that weren't part of the security detail. Serpent looked like she went through hell, her body practically broken as it lay on the floor. Over by the hole in the wall was the partial remains of the other and just as it had been described to her, the upper body and head were gone, the stump cauterized just like Wildcat's wound.

Well, it looked as if she didn't have to worry about Father anymore.

Unfortunately, there was a ticking clock and Videl didn't have much time to waste on admiring Father's corpse. She'd do that once she was done. Taking a seat in the chair behind the desk, the dark-haired woman accessed the computer, typing in her username and password as her gloved fingers banged on the keyboard keys, and successfully logging in. Glancing to the wall gap and seeing no one in sight, the young woman reached into a pocket on her jacket and pulled out a portable hard drive. Plugging it into the USB port, she then accessed the security program and began backing up all the data onto her hard drive.

Confident it wouldn't take long, the dark-haired woman then sought out the agent files Father kept, opening the folder they were in and began searching through it. Skipping through most of them, Videl actively sought out her own file, fully intent on wiping it from the mainframe. Commando...Mistress...Serpent...Hawkeye...Janus...Wildcat...Pirate...Maid…

Videl frowned. Where was her file? She should've found it, if not before Maids, then certainly at the end. Yet...she couldn't find it. Deciding to perform a search, she typed in Devil and hit the enter button.

Much to her shock and annoyance she received nothing. "What the?" Videl was not liking this; her file with all her information could be anywhere in this hunk of junk and she was running out of time to find it. Did Father hide it somewhere else? Though she wouldn't have put it past the bastard, she couldn't think of a legitimate reason for why he'd do such a thing. Okay, yeah, she was AWOL at the moment, but it wasn't like the dark-haired man had a special place for ex-agents. Commando, Mistress, and Hawkeye were proof of that, each one killed on the job, or terminated follow a screwed op. Videl hadn't gotten details on those ladies and didn't care enough to do much follow up after Serpent blew off her questions.

Minimizing the window, Videl searched the desktop icons for any clues as to where her file could be. It didn't take more than a few seconds to rule out each one out, which only frustrated her. Hell, the recycle bin had as much chance of holding her information as any of them.

Looking the the icon sourly, the dark-haired woman moved the cursor to it and clicked on it, just for the hell of it. When a window popped up, it was just a blank square, no indication of any files. That made the young woman frown. There was no way Father didn't delete anything, be it a document, file, or a picture. Something wasn't right here…

Fingers began dancing on the keyboard until Videl brought up the computer's history. A list of computer commands appeared line after line before her until they reached the bottom of the window, though the dark-haired woman was sure they were still going. Starting from the top, Videl saw her own actions over the last few minutes. Scanning downwards, she was quick to find what she wanted, a command to empty the recycle bin...and some command she didn't recognized. Puzzling it out in her head, if Videl wasn't mistaken, the command was to wipe the computer's hard drive of the contents of the recycle bin.

Eyes darting to the time of this command, Videl saw it was very recent, perhaps around the time the witnesses reported hearing explosions. Or maybe after? Regardless, either Father had made sure to wipe the hard drive, or someone else had done so, the reason being lost to Videl.

Letting her attention drop down the list, another command caught the young woman's eye. Before the hard drive wipe, someone did a backup of the computer's records, much like she was doing now. Very interesting.

However, now that she thought about that, she realized her time was nearly up. Clicking on her activities, she deleted the records before closing the window, quickly closing the others windows as well until she reached the security program. She was just in time to see it go from 97 percent to 98 with about a minute to go. With bated breath, Videl watched the screen, constantly glancing to the hole in the wall in case someone decided to be noisy and poke their head in.

It took longer than she wanted, but finally the backup finished and Videl closed the window, logging out as she nearly ripped the portable hard drive out of the USB port. Shoving the device back into her pocket, the young woman shot out of the chair, being sure to push it back to the way it was before she sat in it. Taking large strides, she then knelt down next to the bodies, narrowing her eyes as she began to study them.

Not a second later, a couple officers did as expected and appeared in the wall gap. "Can we come back in?" one of them asked.

"Yeah," the dark-haired woman nodded distractedly, playing her part to a T. The door to the office flew open and the forensics team rushed back in, shooting her dirty looks before they got back to trying to access the computer.

They would eventually do that, but Videl was confident that it would take them quite awhile to do just that. She would just have to keep an eye on the moment they did it so she could catch any potential mention of her. Until then, she would do her job and investigate this scene.

After all, it was her newest lead on Gohan.

For those who are interested, we are a group of collaborative writers who combine our efforts to bring you stories such as this one. We're an open group, meaning that anyone can apply to join. Feel free to check out our forums, our Facebook page, and perhaps apply to join the group, via the link on our profile. It's a great opportunity for those who would like to better their own writing abilities and exchange skills of the trade with fellow authors, or to simply be more a part of a writing community.