Kandice: Wow.... I am so sorry to everyone who's been reviewing this. I have not checked my email in almost half a year, well... at least not the email all these reviews are sent to. So when I did... wow. There's been a lot of people reviewing. In all honesty, I had forgotten about this story and got caught up in college and all the fun things that entails. I will try to finish this story without the year long gaps, but I cannot promise anything. Thicker Than Blood will be forgotten and taken down. If anyone wants to borrow that idea, feel free. But anyway, enough with the apologies, here's the next chapter of Frayed Edges.

Frayed Edges

Next To Nothing

"What the fuck, Quat!"

Noin rushed into the Police Department. Quatre sat in a chair, with Sally Po bent over his arm, applying antiseptic and bandaging to the small gash along the back of his shoulder.

"It's nothing, Luce. Just a graze," he soothed her. "I'm fine."

"You're not fine," Trowa snapped from his seat next to Quatre. "You got yourself *shot* trying to protect me. That was stupid."

Quatre rolled his eyes. Upon discovering the small wound on their way to the PD, Trowa'd not stopped acting like a mother hen. "Look at it this way, Trowa," he said reasonably, "If I hadn't pushed you down... then I would have been sitting up, and this little scratch could have been alot worse."

Trowa, about to object, fell silent. He obviously hadn't considered that scenario.

"Maxwell and Yuy are on their way," Captain Chang said,walking up. "Anything you can tell us about whoever did this?"

Quatre shook his head. "Not much. All I remember seeing is a shadow. It was too dark to see much else."

"And you?" Chang looked at Trowa.

"I didn't see anything."

"Nothing?" A black eyebrow arched.

"My seat was fully reclined. I didn't see anything outside of the car."

Chang's eyes narrowed. "So the two of you were sitting in a dark parking lot, and your seat was all the way reclined, and neither of you could notice someone walking up with a gun? What the hell were you doing out there?"

Quatre shifted in his seat, blushing. Trowa snapped his mouth shut, turning beet red.

"Oh, God, Wufei. You're clueless!" Sally laughed before leaning in and whispering something to him. Wufei's eyes dropped to both Quatre and Trowa's (rather stained and wrinkled) pants before the stoic captain blushed and looked away. "Ah... ah-hem. We'll... we'll just leave that part out of the report, shall we?"

"It was some guy, mid-fourties, named Otto. And he was with someone else and someone payed them to do it." Noin interupted.

"And you know this how?"

"I'm a psychic," she said. "And I often see things that will happen or are happening to the people I'm friends with. I saw Otto, and some other guy, talking about how the 'boss' will be pleased when they 'offed' the blond and the tall guy."

Trowa gulped. He didn't like the sound of someone being out there, wanting him and Quatre dead. As if sensing his friend's unease, Quatre patted his leg.

"It's alright, Trowa. We'll just have to keep an eye out. And hurry up and settle this case. I'd really, really like to meet this Kushrenada character."

"How much you wanna bet he's our mysterious 'boss'?" Trowa asked.

Sally smirked. "Never bet on a sure thing, kid."

"That's pure speculation," Wufei argued.

"Come on, Chang," Sally replied. "This is about the most clean-cut case we've ever had. Maxwell and Yuy are going to totally bust this guy, and you're going to give them the promotion's you promised and everyone's going to live happily ever after."

Noin raised an eyebrow at the blond officer. "If there's one thing I've learned in my life as a clairvoyant... it's that nothing is certain- and there's no such thing as happily ever after."

It didn't take Duo and Heero long to make it to the precinct. After a few moments of speaking between the people in the station, the two officers burst in.

"Chang! They said Winner had been shot?!?"

"I'm FINE!!!" The blond snapped. "It's just a graze!"

"What the hell happened?" Duo demanded.

"Me'n'Trowa were just sitting in the car outside the bowling alley, and someone took a shot through the car window at us. I'm fine, Trowa's fine... just... when you find whoever did this... let us have a crack at them."

Heero nodded. "Will do. And... what were the two of you doing just sitting in the car outside the bowling alley?"

Trowa blushed, and Quatre sighed. "Why does everyone want to know that? Listen good, cause I'm only going to say this once, got it? Trowa's my *boyfriend* and we were doing *boyfriend* things. If you've got a problem with that, then feel free to *build a bridge* and *get over it*."