Author's notes: So this is a small update, so as not to keep you waiting. And I'm terribly sorry, I had planned to post this at New Year's but I fell ill and had to go the hospital. Therefore, it's here now.

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MangekyoMasta510: Thanks for the review. I hope you'll enjoy this chapter. The next will be up soon too.

Black Seconds

Yamcha took a sheet of paper out of the printer in order to make a little airplane. Meanwhile he was listening to what was happening in the hallway. The chief of the department was having a conversation with a journalist from TV2Be. No one could accuse Piccolo for getting his job because of his charming personality; he was very unpleasant in front of the camera and neither did he have much to say, aside from the many hollow phrases he always used.

'Yes,' he said, 'we are investigating this as a crime.'

'Does this mean that you have given up hope of ever finding Marron alive?' the journalist asked, young and blonde, dressed in a black skirt with matching blouse. Not exactly a question that could be answerd affirmatively by Piccolo. That's why he said what he should say.

'We always have hope, off course.'

But he didn't look at her when he said that, he had his attention on the buttons of her blouse, wooden buttons that were decorated with an intricate design.

'The problem in this case,' he went on, because he wanted to be done with this as soon as possible, so he could retreat in his own office, 'is that the number of tips is a lot smaller than normal in this kind of cases.'

The journalist quickly fired her next question. 'What might be the cause for that, you think?' she asked. Piccolo pondered it for a while, then Yamcha heard his dry voice again. 'It means that at any rate this doesn't mean that this case doesn't preoccupy people. Because it does. But there just haven't been sightings that could help us further.'

He became more reluctant before the camera and the journalist increased the speed in order to ask all the questions that were jotted down on her notepad.

'Are there acctually concrete leads, or theories about what might have happened to Marron Chestnut?' she asked.

'Off course we have our theories,' Piccolo said, again with his attention fixed on the buttons of her blouse, 'but unfortunately we have to recognize that there are few leads in this case.' He paused a second. Then he ended the conversation by laying all the authority he could muster in his voice. 'Unfortunately I can't say any more at this moment.'

Finally he could flee to his office. Yamcha kept folding the plane. He knew Tien was just as reluctant, if it meant talking to journalists. But he also knew that Tien would have made another impression. He would have looked the journalist directly in the eye and his voice would have sounded steady and self assured. At the same time he was so present, so involved with his job, that people who were watching the news would feel this case was entrusted in the best hands. They could read from his face and could hear from his steady voice that he was engaged in it very deeply and very personally. As if he wanted to tell them: I take full responsibility for this case. I will find out what happened.

Yamcha had always been a master in folding paper planes. But now he was having a hard time. The paper was too thick. His fingers were too big and his nails too short, the creases weren't sharp enough. He scrunched up the paper and took a new sheet. When he held it between his fingers, a gust of wind made it wave. He felt shivery. On that moment Tien appeared in the doorway. He cast a long look on the journalist and her cameraman who were just disappearing in the lift.

'I went to a party last night', mumbled Yamcha, because Tien had noticed the box of paracetamol and the can of coke on his desk.

'Was it rough?' asked Tien, who looked at the white sheet of paper that was still waving between his fingers.

'You could say that', Yamcha said, with a brave smile. 'I had to arrest somebody.'

Tien blinked his eyes in confusion. 'You weren't at work, were you?'

Yamcha continued folding. Suddenly it was very important that this plane would work out. 'Do you also have that?' he asked. 'That you wait till the last moment before you say what kind of work you do? I mean, if you're around people, that is. At parties and all?'

'I don't go to a lot of parties,' Tien said. 'But I know the problem.'

Yamcha kept working on the plane. 'There was a very pedantic guy walking around there. The kind that has an opinion about everything. When I said I was working here, it was as if I stoked up a burning fire. He immediately flared up. Especially about the penal system he had a very clear opinion. I have heard it a lot before and normally I don't answer. But with this guy I felt an uncontrollable urge to give him a sconce.'

He turned the paper and kept on folding. 'He started to elaborate about the well kept prisons, with showers and heating and libraries and a cinema and a computer in the cell. About concerts with famous artists, and about shrinks and other staff who always stand ready for the prisoners. About fitness and excursions and vacation and visits. It was an endless enumeration of advantages, that normal citizens couldn't ever possess. In short: he thought you couldn't count a stay in a hotel with three meals a day as a punishment.'

'And that's why you locked him up?' said Tien, while he surpressed a smile. He himself had outgrown such behaviour already.

'The party was held at a friend of mine in Pepper city', Yamcha explained. 'He lives in one of those appartments there. He's married and has a son. Because of the party the kid was with his grandparents. The nursery was empty. Let us play a game, I proposed to that asshole. You are hereby condemned to six years of prison. And those years you have to sit out in a space of eight square meter. He thought it funny. Took his glass of cognac and immediately wanted to go to there. I reminded him that alcohol wasn't allowed in prison. He got that, so he put his glass down and we walked with the whole group to the nursery. I would say that room was approximately eight square meter, so the size was correct. I asked if they had a key of the room and they had it. We pushed the moron inside, with lots of yelling and shouting off course, he had no idea what waited him. There was a bunk in the room, and a tv, a bookcase, some comic books, a cd player and a couple of cd's. Afterwards we locked the door.'

Yamcha smiled contentedly, while he disapproved at the same time.

'And then?' asked Tien.

'Then we continued the party', said Yamcha. He had started on a new plane. 'But it didn't last long before he started screaming. That appartment is on the second floor,' he added, 'so he couldn't escape through the window. We let him yell till we were drunk. Then I walked over to the door and asked him what the problem was. Stop this stupid nonsens, he yelled.' Yamcha chuckled at the thought. 'Do you find this room too small, I asked. Yes, he admitted. You acctually need to sit out six more years, I said, but it's alright. You have been in prison for twenty minutes and you're already in panic.

We heard some noise in there and started to get worried. I said he shouldn't oppose me, then it would be even more difficult. Just surrender, I said. Surrender to time. Then it all goes automatically. Then it became quiet inside and we opened the door. You have never seen such a piece of thunder cloud before.'

'Do you find such behaviour good publicity for the department?' asked Tien.

'Yes,' said Yamcha. 'But you know, he didn't even get that the police and the prison are two completely different departments.'

'F-16,' he finally said, while he held up the plane.

'It looks more like a Hercules,' said Tien.

Yamcha let the plane fly away. It made a suprisingly gracious arc and landed softly on the ground.

'What did you come for anyway?' he asked, looking at Tien.

'I want you to go talk to Trunks Vegeta Briefs,' he said. 'The son of Eighteen's best friend.'

Yamcha stood up in order to retrieve the plane. Under the bottom some dust of the floor had been collected.

'You think it might give us something?'

'Most probably not,' Tien admitted. 'But that dear Yajirobe Sandwell was very nervous when I entered his garage. You can guess why. Likely I'm on the wrong trail. But Trunks left his home at around six. On the first of September. According to his mother he went to see his friend Goten, who lives in the center of the village. In order to get to Goten, he must have taken the same route which Marron took with her bike. He could have seen something. And about Yajirobe Sandwell, he's got a past. A conditional sentence for car theft a couple of years ago. He was also suspected of selling and using drugs, but there has never been a complaint filed against him. He drives in a huge Scorpio and works at a bowling business. I don't believe Sandwell kan live so expensively with his wages. It's possible he might also run a small business next to it.'

'Do you have to spend time on that, while we're in the middle of the case-Marron?'

'As long as we don't find her, we have time for such side trails. Trunks is going to school in the Orange Star High School. So if you're not feeling too lousy, I want you to go talk to him.'

Author's notes: So next chapter will also be short. But after that It'll be the usual length. Happy new year all of you!

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