Hello!
A Thank you goes out to Jjinks for reviewing. I greatly appreciate it. Now if only everyone else would. Even if you don't like it, review anyway. I don't know if anyone liked that last chapter, since almost no one reviewed.
PLEASE REVIEW!
Jjinks: Correct. The 'forces' are magic. And, no – Duo knows less than you do as of now (he didn't get to read the prologue), but as he meets Shinigami (and he will) he may start to find himself knowing things. And I'm trying to get out a little more about the Shinigami each chapter. THANK YOU for your review.
Disclaimer: Yes, I own Gundam Wing. Not. Would I be writing Fanfiction if I did?
Please enjoy! (and review…)
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Shinigami
(3 months have passed)
Duo was in the kitchen, looking for something to eat. He finally decided on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, which he made. He was in the middle of eating it when Quatre called for the others to come and see the new.
Duo tried to ignore the sinking feeling in his stomach as he trotted on over to the living room, still eating his sandwich, and hoping that it wasn't what he thought it was.
It was.
For the fifth time in the past two months, someone had been murdered. There were little or no similarities in the victims, cause of death, etc., except for a circle and cross type symbol burned into a wall or floor nearby the body.
The first person murdered was a middle-class man who was found in his home, dead; circle and cross had been burned onto the wall. Once examined by a coroner, the cause of death was suffocation – his body had not been able to get enough air. The only problem was that nothing was found that could have suffocated him.
The second victim, a well-know businessman, died in the middle of a meeting. He suddenly began grasping his throat, as though choking, and collapsed. When they picked him up, they found the burned circle and cross underneath him. The coroner confirmed that he seemed to have choked, except that there was nothing in his throat.
The third victim was actually on the wanted list – she was a professional thief. She was found dead in an alleyway, with the circle and cross burned into the wall behind her. Word was that she had died of fright.
The fourth victim had been a common thug. It was assumed that he knew someone was out to get him, because he was found in a room locked from the inside and without windows. He was found in a mangled mound – body parts twisted and out of shape, warped. The burned circle and cross had been on the floor. That had been the last murder, and had taken place the week before.
Now a fifth victim had been claimed. There would have been no way to tell who he was had he not been in the police station at the time. He had come to the police for help, knowing that he was being hunted. They put him in a questioning room for a few minutes, alone, before going in to ask him about who was chasing him. When they came back, there was nothing left of him that was bigger that a hand. He had been completely shredded. On a corner of the metal table that was miraculously free of the carnage was the burnt circle and cross. When the police checked the video, they found that for those few minutes, there was nothing but static.
The news report came to an end, with a last statement about how the Preventers were going to have to get involved now that the police very obviously couldn't handle it. Wufei shut off the TV. The former pilots sat there in silence for a few minutes.
"Do you think that those Shinigami people are doing this?" Duo asked Heero.
"No – it isn't their style. And the symbol is all wrong; it looks nothing like the scythe and whip that the Shinigami have used in the past." Heero replied.
"What on Earth and the colonies are 'Shinigami'?" Wufei snapped.
Heero just sighed, and went to his room to get his folder. When he came back, he explained what he had found. With sarcastic inserts from Duo.
"This sounds more like the thing that the Shinigami were trying to stop each time, actually." Trowa said thoughtfully. "It doesn't sound like something they would do."
"They literally drained three bodies of blood to write a few messages on some walls, and you think there is something they wouldn't do?" Wufei said, sounding shocked.
"I think they're kind of honorable." Duo said thoughtfully, which got everyone staring at him. Duo? Being thoughtful? And he continued to surprise them more.
"You know, they kill these murderers, and while they could be seen as heroes for it, they chose to stay in the shadows. That sounds humble. Besides, now that I think about it, I don't think they'd do something like that at all."
They all just stared.
Even Duo seemed a little surprised with what he had said. Then he grinned.
"So who wants a sandwich?"
(space)
Duo heard the phone ring. Blinking, he went and picked it up.
"Winner residence."
"Duo?" To his surprise, it was Lady Une. "Duo, I really need to speak to Heero. Now."
"Got it, Lady. Hold on one sec." Duo answered. Then he called out to Heero in the loudest voice he could manage so Heero would hear him: "HEERO! LADY UNE IS ON THE PHONE AND SHE WANTS YOU RIGHT NOW!"
"Duo! Did you really have to scream it out to the world!" Une snapped.
Heero appeared from out of nowhere and wrestled the phone from Duo, throwing him a look that said "get out if you feel like living." "Yes, he did, he doesn't know any other way. What did…" Heero's voice faded as Duo ran for his life.
And smashed into Wufei.
And after several minutes of Wufei chasing him around the house, he smashed into Heero. Who grabbed his braid and pulled him along, calling to Wufei to follow.
Heero brought them to the living room, where Trowa and Quatre already were. He tossed Duo to the floor and waited for Wufei to catch up. Once they were all there, Heero preceded to tell them the news.
"Une wants us to come for a meeting at Preventers Headquarters. She didn't tell me why, but I think that you all know that if she's asking us for help then she's desperate."
And they did. The government did not want them to be doing anything even remotely related to guns, and told her as much. They did not want them in close proximity with dangerous weapons, and made it clear to her that if she hired them, they would shut down the whole program.
So to even ask them for help, she had to get the government's permission. And that was no easy task.
They also knew that to turn down that plea for help would be near suicide – the government would tear them to pieces.
Quatre sighed. "So when are we leaving?"
(space)
(3 days later, Preventer HQ)
Duo, Heero, Quatre, Trowa, and Wufei all sat in chairs across from Lady Une, who was sitting at her desk. She had had them shown in immediately upon arrival, and they were given folders to look over while waiting for her to become free. The folders had all the police reports, evidence, data, etc. for the 'circle and cross' murder cases. Une had come in about 10 minutes after their arrival.
"Let me guess – you want us to find and stop whoever is doing this." Duo stated.
Une looked at him. "Yes, that is exactly what I want you to do. You would been seen as an independent team working for the Preventers for a while as you worked on the case, giving you Preventer access to whatever you need, and additional high security clearance, if you need it. You will also either be on the team or be the team that goes in to neutralize the threat."
"All of this? Why is the government letting us have all that access to stuff we could never get to – legally, anyway." It was Quatre who spoke. "We know the government doesn't exactly like us."
"They're allowing this for two reasons. One, they don't want the public to panic; and two, they don't want to be next. They know that you five are the only people who have the abilities to bring down this criminal with any amount of speed. So they are going to cooperate in any way possible." Une looked pleased, and with good reason. She had wanted the former Pilots on the Preventers before, but had not been allowed to hire them.
Wufei spoke up. "What if we don't want to do it? I mean, why should we come to there aid only because now it's convenient for them to have a bunch of highly trained specialists?"
Une shrugged. "It's your call. But they will make life very difficult for you if you refuse."
The pilots looked at each other. Finally Heero spoke. "We'll do it. But not for you, and not for the government. We just don't want to see anyone else dead over this."
"Besides," Duo muttered. "If I'm right, then we'll be getting help from even more dangerous people anyway."
(space)
The next few weeks went by pretty quickly. There were two more murders, both of gang leaders. One's head seemed to have exploded, and the other was half burnt to a crisp and half frozen solid. There was no doubt about it, the murders were getting stranger as they went.
Heero spent most of the time on the computer, trying to find connections between the murders, and finding background info on possible leads. Duo, Trowa, and Wufei met with people who said they had leads, and did the actual tracking. Quatre looked in the upper circles for suspects.
Finally, they got an actual lead. One they could work with.
It turned out that the victims were all connected in one way or another with one of the criminal overlords – Denis Darigne, or DD. The thief had been hired by him at one point, but had cheated him out of one too many profits; the gang leaders had opposed him; the businessman had been giving him money, but had pulled his support for some reason. As the Pilots dug deeper, they found more than enough evidence to pull DD in for questioning. Even if he hadn't been the one to actually kill the people, he would have been the one to hire the assassin or assassins.
So they set their dates, and prepared to move in.
(space)
"Positions?" Heero's voice came through the walkie-talkies. Duo shifted where he was; he didn't like waiting, but Heero was mission leader.
"Death, in position." He replied, listening as Quatre, Trowa, and Wufei all sent their affirmatives as well, using their chosen code names. Heero was Odin, Duo was Death, Trowa was Silence, Quatre was Sand, and Wufei was Dragon.
The command came. "Move in." As soon as Heero finished speaking Duo was moving in with the silence and grace as a cat, knowing that the others were doing the same.
They had tracked DD down to a warehouse on the outskirts of Tokyo. Once they knew for certain that he was in there, they had surrounded the place and prepared to move in.
Which was what they were doing now.
Duo jumped from his position and landed on a sort of side roof on the target building. There was a window in easy access from the side roof that was where Duo would enter. Before he went in he looked in, and saw Denis in there, sitting at a table, playing what looked to be solitaire. "He's in there." Duo whispered through the walkie-talkie. He didn't get an answer, but he didn't expect one either. He paused outside the window –
"NOW!" Came Heero's command. Instantly Duo had thrown himself through the window and landed on the rafters (a/n: I don't know how he did it, but take my word for it.), gun loaded and ready. He heard Heero shout, "Freeze!" And he knew that they had DD surrounded.
And Denis Darigne laughed.
Duo frowned, Denis shouldn't have been laughing. Heero had knocked down the front door, and was kneeling where it used to be with a pistol pointed at Denis' head. Duo was in the rafters, with his own gun pointed at Denis. Quatre and Trowa had entered through the ground floor windows to either side of Denis and Wufei was guarding the back. There wouldn't be any way for Denis to escape, and even if he did manage to get past the five of them, he would have to get through the Preventers surrounding the building.
And even though they had him surrounded and outnumbered, something didn't feel quite right.
Denis held up his hand – it was empty. Then a red ball of flame appeared hanging over his palm. He laughed again, and threw it at Heero.
Heero managed to throw himself to cover, and it was a good thing that he had to. The part of what remained of the door went up in flames, and then died down, nothing left but ash. Duo could hear Quatre reporting what had happened to the other Preventers using the walkie-talkie. Again Denis began to gather flame.
"Stop."
Denis' flame went out. Angrily his eyes narrowed as he tried to call the flames back. Nothing happened. "Who said that?" He snarled, trying to figure out what happened.
"I did."
A woman with long ash-blond hair pulled into a ponytail appeared in the middle of the room, standing opposite Denis. She was wearing all black, and her eyes were glowing violet.
"My name is Ferrana, and I have come on behalf of my people, the Shinigami. I have come to kill you"
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Well, how was it?
I'm not psychic, or even emphatic. I need reviews to know what people think. So please review!
I hope this was long enough.
Thanks for reading!
DarkLady