The Orange Bowl had been an incredible venue, how Neji got seats in the front wasn't surprising, given his family connections. 'Odd how family connections works in context of both rich families and the Mafia.' Kiba allowed himself a chuckle, which drew a look from Shino.

"It was a good concert Shino, going to miss those three but I think we've had enough time off the past day or two."

"They were quite affable to work with." Shino drove his car back to his place where Kiba had parked his car. No sense paying for two parking places at the stadium when one was good enough. Getting out of the car, Shino raised his voice and said, "Finally it's here."

Turning his head, Kiba saw a package on the porch that hadn't been there when they left. Shino went inside, rather more excited than usual. Figuring his partner wouldn't mind if he came to see what the fuss was about, Kiba followed him in and closed the door.

"What could get you this excited after a night with Phil Collins?" Kiba teased Shino before sitting down on the ground. Looking around Shino's apartment, he realized that Hinata really did have a point about the two of them needing new apartment furnishings.

"I have a friend in the record business back in London." Shino pulled out a pair of scissors and began to open the box. "You remember Mr Funeno, the music professor back in High School? Well he went to England in '84, worked the Live Aid event in '85, and became a minor player in the industry over there. He sends me advance copies of albums every now and then."

"I wasn't in music class, but I remember the guy." Kiba looked over to the entertainment center on the wall. In a box next to the Betamax were all the tapes from Live Aid, Shino had recorded over 16 hours of that concert, of which only a few of the tapes actually had numbers that were worth rewatching.

"Anyways, he's been going bananas over the new Phantom of the Opera musical that premiered last year and…" Getting through the packing material, Shino finally lifted the vinyl in his hands, "Here it is. An entire year before it's going to come out here in the US."

Kiba yawned and tapped the back of his head against the wall. "That's nice Shino." He had thought it was going to be something a little more exciting than a musical.

"All right, fine. You don't have to be impressed; you are free to go home any time." Shino didn't seem angry or disappointed, though longtime friends and partners, they had very different tastes.

"I'll see you tomorrow Shino." Kiba was already in his car, revving the engine by the time the pipe organ started blasting.

Konoha at night was his territory. All animals seemed to have a great sense of their territory and surroundings, odd that for Kiba it was less a geographic area but more of a temporal one. It was nearly 2 a.m., the streets were still alive, but it was still early March. The snowbirds were starting to migrate back north and the city was looking forward to warm spring nights and preparing for the hot summer afterwards.

Driving the red fang under the neon glow of city lights gave off a surreal impersonation of daylight. Every color transformed into an electric blend with another in the right light. Even the sky took on an odd mix of purple and orange at the same time. Driving along the strip, the sounds were much the same. Rock cafes with their high energy guitar solos faded away as island rhythm and Spanish vocals took over, only to be replaced by needles scratching vinyl records of the Konoha Bass clubs. Someone sounded like he was singing a song from the last 2 Live Crew album; looking over at the stop sign, Kiba recognized the man as Mr. Mixx, meaning it actually was 2 Live Crew.

Eventually reaching the beach, Kiba parked the car and took off his shoes to walk along the sand. It was early Sunday morning; a group of teenagers were fooling around by the bridge to a boom box playing some Cyndi Lauper song. They were just happy to have the weekend off; happy to live in a world with no limits. A homeless man sat on a bench, finishing a crossword puzzle in a newspaper before spreading the pages over himself as he lay down to sleep.

The tides were going out right now, likely be another hour before low tide though. Taking a moment to look at his situation, Kiba realized the reason he hadn't bothered to furnish his apartment was because it had never really felt like home. Putting stuff in there likely wouldn't help the situation. Picking up a sea shell and throwing it, he realized, "Guess I'm going to have to find a new place."

A vibration on his waist reminded Kiba that he had taken his pager with him. Checking the number, Kiba realized it was from Shino. Thankfully there was a pay phone nearby.

"What's the news Shino?"

"Got a call from the station. We need to get on it right away. You know the Fontainebleau Hotel?"

"Yeah, the one from Goldfinger, everyone in Konoha knows that place, it's a classic."

"Well we have a classic case of murder down there, and we're the ones getting stuck with it."

"Okay, I'm already down on the beach; I'm there in five minutes."

"Perfect, see you in fifteen." The one advantage to working at night was being able to accurately predict travel time due to the absence of other drivers.

On the way to the Fontainebleau, Kiba couldn't help but recognize his mother's Toyota MR2 parked by the Golf Course's hotel; the black body and red fangs painted on the car were unmistakable. As curious as he was to know whether his mother's weekend fling was one of the golf pros, a rich club member, or one of the working boys, he knew couldn't waste his time thinking about his mother's promiscuity. There was blood in the air, work to do.

The hotel clerk looked in a panic as Kiba came in, a flash of his badge put Kiba in control of the scene immediately. "When you called the station, did you call for an ambulance as well?" The portly little man scratched across his chest before nodding. Kiba knew he was trying his best to remain genial, but murder was at play and things were tense.

"Your staff staying away from the rooms?" The man nodded. "Good. My partner is going to be here in a few seconds, he's straight out of a Corey Hart song, can't miss him." The night usher led Kiba up the stairs to the third floor, room 312 before handing him the keys to room 311 as well.

Peeking into room 312, Kiba saw that the room was completely trashed; the bed's mattress had literally been cut in half. There were stains of every kind on the floor, but out of the corner of his eye he saw her. Lying dead in the bathtub was the body of a woman, on the other side of a sea of shattered mirror, tile, porcelain, toilet water, and what smelled like vodka.

Before he could take a closer look to examine, Shino arrived, without his signature sunglasses. "I don't always wear my sunglasses at night," pausing a moment, "but I will admit that was kind of funny."

"Funnier than this scene anyways." Kiba took a step back to let Shino enter the bathroom. "Wanted to see what was going on before I started interviewing people."

"Whatever way you want to do it, this is your show Kiba."

Walking next door to 311, Kiba opened the door to find the likely cause of the scene. Three men and three women were sprawled across the apartment, bottles of alcohol were in various levels of full, and the mess of bodies were all in various stages of dress.

"Go down to the lobby, call forensics to come down and take a look at her body. Also call backup so we can process this lot in here. Then interview the hotel staff and see what the story is with these two rooms. I'll keep an eye on things here until we get some support." Closing the door to the room, Kiba took a chair from 312 and sat down in the hallway as Shino went off to make inquiries.

A sudden flash of curiosity hit Kiba and he opened room 311 again. Sure enough his memory hadn't been incorrect. Along the back wall of the room were two guitars and one giant blond wig. Smeared face paint was another clue, but two drumsticks were also present, though Kiba felt a little sick when he finally saw them.

Locking the door again, Kiba sat back in the hall and sat down angrily. This was definitely not the way he had wanted to spend the rest of his night.

Shino was up by the time two more squad cars and the ambulance arrived. Flipping open his notepad he began to list the facts.

"Local band, play metal and work the local club scene. For all the hairspray they use it's a good thing they weren't smoking, or this would be a completely different crime scene." Kiba chuckled, it was never funny to laugh at the dead, but laughing at dead beats was another matter.

"What's their band called?" Scratching his face, Kiba waved the officers coming down the hall to the occupied bedroom.

"Gold Fox. Apparently only three members of the band checked in tonight, two of them never came to the hotel."

"That covers room 311, what about 312?"

"Here's where things get complicated. Mr. and Mrs. Yamada checked into the hotel tonight. The clerk confirmed that 'Mrs. Yamada' is the one lying dead in the bathtub, while 'Mr. Yamada' checked out a couple of hours ago without her."

Pacing back and forth, Kiba wiggled his nose and exhaled. "This whole thing stinks. Going to be hard not to jump to any conclusions in this case."

"Until we get some facts, it's going to be hard to make any conclusions at all." Shino closed his notebook and went in with the forensics team to room 312. The girls and the band members were woken up from their drunken stupor by the officers.

"Take them down to the station for destruction of property right now. Process them and keep them in jail for a day or two, at least until we get things clear here."

"That's easy for you to say," The officer on duty quipped back, "You don't have to drive them back in your squad car with them smelling like this."

"We could always switch jobs; I've got to go through the mess in there looking for evidence." The officer turned his head to look back to the hotel room before shaking his head in disgust. "Thought so, get them out."

Finally inside the empty room, Kiba turned on the lights and saw what he had missed in the darkness. The giant claymore was a first, but it explained the broken bed in the other room. First impressions weren't always reliable, but it was clear that the band not only trashed their room but the one next door.

The disappearance of 'Mr. Yamato' disturbed him more. That sort of name was as common as 'Mr. Smith' and just as likely to be phony. Which most likely make "Mrs. Yamato' a prostitute by trade and 'Mr. Yamato' her customer.

There was a sequence to events here, one that needed to be carefully pieced together; but there was a sinking feeling in Kiba's gut that it might already be too late to do anything about it.