"And all the roads that lead to you were winding
And all the lights that light the way are blinding
There are many things that I would like to say to you
I don't know how
I said maybe
You're gonna be the one who saves me?
And after all
You're my wonderwall"
Oasis, Wonderwall
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"Hello?" Duo yelled out as he brushed aside the curtain that marked the entrance to Solo's apartment building. It was a beautiful day out, but the building still gave off a shadowy appearance, as if it were perpetually stuck in winter.
Compared to the previous day, the apartment was calm. No was seemed to be awake yet, or even living there. The dust was piling up in the corners and when the two Preventers entered, it drifted across the floor away from them.
Heero looked around, searching for the annoying blond who seemed to have all too easily swayed Duo. 'You're imagining things. Duo knows what he's doing.' But he kept his eyes trained a little more closely on Duo than normal.
"What you boys doin?" The clear voice of the girl named Trish echoed around the top of the apartment. She casually came out of her room, a ratty pair of pajama pants and an enormous t-shirt hanging off of her.
"Hey Trish. We came by to pick up Solo," Duo cheerily called back. The girl yawned and stretched her arms out, bending backwards and cracking her back in the process.
"Ain't awake yet. Wait around a bit," She began to slowly descend the staircase, a girl who should have been moaning about going to school, but was still sore from working as a whore the night before.
"It's ten o'clock," Heero said to Duo. He crossed his arms and put on his best exasperated expression. Duo just slapped him playfully on the arm.
"Give the guy half an hour. If he isn't ready by then, we leave without him."
Just as Trish reached the bottom of the old staircase, a loud thunk echoed around the building. A cloud of dust billowed from somewhere above them and sprinkled down like a mist through the rays of sunlight.
"He be awake now."
With a casual scratch in her green hair, Trish exited through a side door of the lobby that led to the kitchen.
"Does he always wake up like that?" Heero said, looking towards where the loud sound had come from.
"He didn't used to," Duo just laughed and took the advantage of being alone to wrap an arm around Heero's shoulders. He leaned his head on him and sighed heavily. "Why do I get the feeling this is not going to be an easy mission…"
"Let's see: a homicidal maniac, no leads, no suspects, and your psychotic ex," Heero snorted after this and shook his head hopelessly.
"Well, when you put it that way…" Duo grumbled then turned from Heero when he heard more signs of life from the third floor and caught a glimpse of someone opening a door. Solo's dull blond hair peeked up over the railings before he turned around and locked his room. He only had on a large button up shirt and a pair of boxers. When he saw Heero and Duo, he smiled and gave a halfheartedly salute.
"Mornin."
"Barely," Heero muttered. Solo just seemed to enjoy this and practically fell down the stairs, trying to rub the sleep out of his eyes and comb his hair at the same time.
"Afraid of someone stealing your stuff?" Duo jerked his head up towards Solo room, which was once again locked off from the rest of the apartment. The honeyed eyes opened up and contained no fog of sleep as Solo stared at him. Duo felt a shiver go through him at the unusually focused expression.
"So do you guys have a plan or are we just gonna wander around and see what we see?"
The boy was once again his lazy self, oblivious to any tension that had appeared and made his way towards the kitchen.
"We should start by checking in with the L2 police. They should be able to give us the attacker's record," Heero's words became slow and distracted as he watched Solo walk in and out of the room, sometimes carrying food, and sometimes with his cheeks filled with pieces of breakfast.
"Thugh, at thouns koo—" Solo's half choke, half reply was cut off as a thin hand slapped the back of his head.
"Ya got no manners. Didn'cha ma ever tell ya not to talk wit ya mouth full."
Trish continued to take scoops of cereal into her mouth as she walked gracefully past Solo and headed up the stairs again. Solo just retaliated with a quick showing of his middle finger towards the back of the young girl's head.
"Okay. Fine. Police station it is. How about I meet you guys out front of the place in about fifteen minutes?" Solo lightly hit himself on the chest and crossed his eyes as he felt the indigestion from his breakfast flare up. He coughed a few times before heading towards his room again, not even waiting for a reply.
"Duo, do you know where the police station is?" Heero was thankful to leave the stuffy building and breathe in the fresher air of the streets. It held a bitter taste of the pollution on the colony, but at least it had a breeze.
"Yep. Got dragged down by the fuzz a few times as a kid."
Duo smiled mysteriously and headed down the street, with Heero following close behind.
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"Duo where IS he?" Heero growled for the fifth time.
"How am I supposed to know? We need to put a tracker on that guy or something," Duo sat on a cement wall next to the stairs that led into the old police station. He swung his feet and kicked the cement wall each time, waiting for the last of their party to arrive.
"Hola," A warm voice said in his ear, and Duo craned his neck up to see Solo's grin above him.
"You're late."
"What's new?" Solo casually threw back before sitting on the cement wall, facing the opposite way as Duo.
"Are you two going to sit there all day or are we going to go into the damn station?" His arms were folded and he tapped his foot impatiently as he watched Solo and Duo waste his time. Not that he minded Duo, or even acknowledged to himself that the boy wasn't exactly sprinting for the door either.
"Oh, forceful," Solo snickered but agreed to go inside. With one condition, Duo and Heero went first. By this time Heero didn't care, just as long as they all got inside the station and could begin their investigation.
The police station was dimly lit by a light bulb hanging from the ceiling. The lamps on the officer's desks drew the focus down to the ground, and away from the creaking ceiling fan. One middle-aged policeman was standing at the front desk, typing on a computer mechanically.
"How can I help you?" He said without looking up.
Duo grinned and walked directly up to the cop, leaning over his desk and getting in the tired man's face. He flipped his badge open dramatically.
"We're from Preventers HQ," He then smiled at the surprise on the policeman's face.
"Oh," Was the cop's only response.
Heero rolled his eyes. Next thing he knew Duo would be quoting gangster movies. 'If he says the word "copper" I'm out of here.'
"You think you could give us the record on the attacker who leaves numbers on people?"
The man turned to the computer and began to type faster than before, and stuck his tongue out of his mouth as he concentrated on his work. An overly loud hacking cough caused the man to stop perusing the files on the computer to gaze at Solo. The man grinned sheepishly back and covered his mouth, coughing gently a few times. He was standing in front of the board where the police stuck up announcements, notes, and wanted posters. He turned his back towards the three law enforcers and bent down, looking at every piece of paper stuck to the corkboard.
"So why were you boys brought in here?" The man questioned as he clicked with his mouse and the computer began to whir loudly.
"The anonymous call of the most recent victim. Our supervisor found the article and sent us in," Heero tried to sound as little patronizing as he could. He also completely omitted the part about the police of L2 being unable to catch this man for 20 years.
"Well, I hope you guys have good luck. This disk has all the records we have for him, and a complete list of the known victims. If you need our help, just give us a call."
Heero took the disk and headed for the door. Duo said a polite goodbye before motioning to Solo that it was time to leave. The blond did just that, grinning from ear to ear the whole time.
As they left the rundown police station with their disk, Solo began to whistle and grin cheekily at Duo and Heero. Duo's patience wore thin and he groaned at what he was about to do.
"Solo, why are you so happy?" He mumbled, more like an order than a question.
"Check it," Solo reached into his worn out jacket and pulled out a piece of paper, a corner torn off of it. On the paper was a faded black and white picture of a boy with a goofy grin and a mischievous look on his face, his hair ruffled and messed up. Had there been color, Duo and Heero knew that they would have been able to see the gold eyes and hair that took up the picture. Below it read "Wanted."
"You swiped your own wanted poster?" Heero said in a pitying tone of disbelief.
"Oh come on. Like you wouldn't have," Solo stopped looking at Heero as he saw Duo push his face closer to the poster. He squinted his eyes at it and was intently focused on the picture of Solo. For once, Solo and Heero seemed to have the same thought and looked at each other in confusion of their shorter acquaintance's sudden case of farsightedness.
"You have a black eye here." Duo said with childlike pride at his brilliant notice. Solo folded up the poster and slipped it into a pocket again before heading down the zig zag path that would take them back to his apartment.
"It's amazing how nice those bastards get if you flash them the right badge."
The two Preventers followed after the taller man, without a response to the piece of truth he had hissed at them.
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Right, so, I fail at getting reviews. And I fail at making threats to get them. I still hope you guys decide to review, but I'm not putting up any amounts to get before I update again. If you reviewed the first two chapters, please feel free to update the rest, makes me know you didn't forget bout me.
Slipknotrulez: Thanks for the support, yeah, I'm hoping for reviews too. But ah well, as long as at least one person is enjoying this story I'm happy.
Duo's right & left nuts: Love the anonymous names. You'll have to see about the pairing thing. I didn't plan it that way, but I'm not going to give anything away quite yet.
A Group of Yaoi Fangirls: Wow…kickass FFN name. I'm guessing its self explanatory, ne? I'm glad you like where the story is going, and if you like the convoluted love story, it only gets worse from here on out. Enjoy!