Disclaimer: Gundam Wing is not mine. Leave me the hell alone about it.

Note: This is my first AU. There is a rule I've found in AU's, and that's that a person can only walk a fine line before irritating everyone. This line goes between making everything similar to the Gundam Wing story, and the other is making everything completely and totally different. I don't like either; I also don't like people randomly placing original characters into the story just because new characters entered their AU. Therefore, this will be going off of what I think is acceptable. Please let me know if you think differently.

Second Note: I don't know much about cops or laws or anything since I'm a goody-goody. What I don't know, I'll make up. Feel free to correct me.

It was one of those days. You know, the ones that are so pretty they piss you off? Every so often they can be seen as beautiful, but that was only when your life was going well, too. Otherwise the days pissed you off.

It was a bright, sunny morning in the old city of Lynwood, with little thermals on the streets and dew drying on the grass. Heero glared at it all from his living room over his first cup of coffee. It was a bad morning, and there was no sign of things becoming magically better. The files on his coffee table were neatly arrayed to show every disadvantage point.

Bad. The situation was bad. The killer was good – no hair fibers, no blood, no nails, no skin, no clothing, no nothing. It wasn't like the victims had been cleaned, nor had the areas in which the victims had been found. It was nothing new to have a hard case, but it was something new for neither he nor his partner to have any clue as to what was going on.

He and Trowa had been together since Wufei had been put on a special case in the narcotics division. It had been three months, but Heero wasn't having too much of a problem with Trowa. He, like Wufei, was quiet, calm and intelligent. Trowa worked well with everyone. He was even-tempered and astute. Yes, Heero could work with him. There was no problem there. And they'd been able to crack their number of cases without slowing down. The man was quick, and it was no wonder he'd transferred from that small town of his to Lynwood.

It was this one case that was taking them down. They'd had two others, but they'd been completed a week ago. They'd gotten only one other, a quick case of robbery with complete amateurs. That one would finish by today or tomorrow.

No. That case wasn't in the least bit stressful. It was just this one, just this one bastard who went around looking for old men to pick up and cut to ribbons. How could such a bloody mess leave no clues? It was unbelievable.

And the news. Heero turned his gaze to glare at his television screen instead of the sunny sky. Of course they were labeling the homicide department incompetent. No matter that they'd solved twenty other cases in the past few months – oh no. Just one case left unsolved and the media jumps all over you like rabid hyenas.

He downed his coffee and placed it directly in the dishwasher. This case was eating at him. He wasn't one to have a case lay on his desk for long. All his colleagues, even his superiors, looked at him in amazement. The only reason he hadn't risen too far was that he wanted to remain active. Desk jobs didn't suit him.

He grabbed up his briefcase. Money wasn't an issue, since he'd inherited from an old man at a young age. He didn't remember much about Odin Lowe, just that the man had picked him up from the streets and housed him. Odin Lowe had often left the house – and Heero – alone on business, but the man had taken Heero in as his son. But then, one day, instead of Odin Lowe's return, a big man in a dark uniform came to the door and informed him that Odin Lowe had died while working. For Heero he had left everything – the house, the money, the freaking car.

Heero had been ten.

Heero's cars had changed, but the rest hadn't; he still lived in Odin Lowe's beautiful Victorian. But he'd gone into a vocation that gave him the opportunity to be granted forgiveness. For not being able to protect the one man who had been his family, he would forever work to save everyone else he possibly could. And then the world would be just that one step closer to peace.

He got into his police issue car and drove to work.

<*>

Duo didn't understand why cops even bothered with the normal-looking car thing, because with all those damn sticks popping out of it, it was more than obvious that the car was police-issued. Duo watched another one pass and shook his head. What was it about becoming a cop that made all of them complete idiots?

He went back into his shop and looked around. His job was simple enough, and hid his other abilities fairly well. Nobody ever suspected a mechanic of being intelligent, either. His other business, his money-bringer, sat at his house on hibernate.

He rolled his shoulders. His mechanic business, despite the fact that he never advertised in any way, was slowly growing thanks to word-of-mouth. He'd gotten a request for an oil change and a busted rear fender just yesterday. The rear fender awaited him.

Whatever the idiot did, he'd managed to tear up the back of his car pretty well. The fender had to be completely replaced, the paint redone. A few bumps needed un-bumping, and Duo thanked the miracle-invention that made doing such a thousand times easier.

It was, of course, when he was almost done that he was bothered by a knock on the garage door. He put down the paint and turned, a mega-watt grin already in place. It was Hilde. His grin became a bit more real, and he kindly turned down his rock music for her. She was a pop fan. Freak.

“Hey there, Duo!” she called, waving. As if he hadn't seen her.

“Hey, Hilde!” he called back anyway. “You're looking quite like the artist today!” She did, in fact, have one of those French artist cap things and a striped shirt on.

She giggled a bit. “Oh, stop it, Duo. I came to see how you were doing.” She looked around. “Still not too busy, huh? I could always-”

“No, thanks, Hilde. In a big ol' city like this, I like having a small shop. Especially since there's only me.” He looked around, as well. There was enough room for four cars plus him and his gear. That was because of his other job – one not even Hilde knew about. She was a stick in the mud, and she wouldn't like hearing about his... eccentricities.

“Oh, Duo.” She perked up. “Hey, Duo, why don't you came with me to lunch today? There's this new pasta place I want to check out.”

Duo weighed his options and shrugged. He had to socialize sometime, right? Besides, he always ended up enjoying himself despite everything. “Sure. Where is it?”

“It's just off of Newberry. 'Pasta Plus.' Everybody keeps raving about it.”

Hilde, as a Neo-painter or whatever, lived for raves. “Really? What would I do without you, Hilde?”

“Go to those same boring places,” she answered immediately. “See? I save you from a life of boredom. So when will you settle down with some appropriately hot rich guy and introduce me to his cousin?”

Duo laughed. They could never go through an entire conversation without Hilde bringing up this topic. It was like a ritual. “When he walks in that door.” And he pointed to the door of his garage.

Nobody entered.

“See? Not today. Now scat. I've got work to do.” And he shooed her out.

Duo turned back to his shop and frowned. His life didn't need any more complications. Between this job and his other, between carefully teetering between the Jester and, online, Shinigami, he just couldn't take much more. It was difficult enough.

He wasn't just some guy who'd made a shop. He wasn't just another mechanic. After all, he'd once been a street rat. A kid on the city streets without anyone to help him but the other little rats. And then, after pneumonia had taken most down one winter, he'd been picked up by Father Maxwell and his nuns, Sisters Helen and Mary. And then after that disaster, he'd been shoved back onto the streets.

That's where Shinigami had been born.

Duo shook off his thoughts and looked around. There was only the paint job to finish, then he'd be done for a while, unless some cruel soul decided to walk in. His clock on the wall said that he had an hour to wait before Hilde's lunchtime began.

But he'd learned how to wait patiently before he began his little side-show. It would be bad if he were caught now, after all his hard work.

<*>

Heero stared at the files he'd already memorized with his third cup of coffee cooling at his side. New information wasn't going to just magically appear. Unfortunately, for anything new to potentially show up, another body was necessary.

Trowa came up beside him and leaned over his shoulder. There were no words spoke, but nothing needed to be said. They were both agitated over the lack of evidence and the non-existence of the case. Their frustration could be read by one another, and that was all they needed to communicate.

“Wufei is still hip-deep,” Trowa told him.

“Of course. He wouldn't have been called in otherwise. The man used to be in the narcs, after all.” Heero idly took a sip of his cold coffee. “We can't expect him to be brought back to us any time soon.”

Trowa nodded, cradling his own cup. “I agree.”

Heero pushed back from his desk and stood. “We need to find something. Doing nothing only leaves him the chance to strike again.”

Trowa eyed Heero carefully. He seemed as cool and calm as ever, but inside he was burning with the need to take action. So was he. “I've asked the chief to make this case our only one.”

Heero turned to him sharply. “And?”

Trowa nodded. “He agreed.”

Heero snatched up his cup with his usual sharp grace. “I see. That means he's desperate, too.”

“You didn't notice that when he put us three on this one case?” Trowa asked dryly.

“Are we allowed workers?”

“Yes. Three.”

Heero nodded, then tapped the files. “Let's get them rounded up and inform them of the details of the case.”

“There are details?” Trowa returned, then pointed out his choices. “I think Carlton, O'Hara, and Winner should be on this case.”

“Winner?” Heero questioned. Carlton and O'Hara were veterans in the force, but Winner had only joined recently.

“Yes. I've watched him closely. He seems... he almost seems to know what's happening before it does, especially in one-on-one interaction with the enemy. He's smart, too.”

Heero nodded. “I'll trust your judgment on this one, Barton.”

Trowa smiled a bit. He knew it was an extremely rare privilege. “Thank you.”

Heero just huffed. “Let's get them all rounded up.”

<*>

Duo wasn't a crook. He would tell everyone that, and though he may run and hide, he never lied. His money-maker wasn't illegal. Every once in a while he even did something as boring as making sites for someone or some business.

But mostly he just found money and sold it to the highest bidder. He wasn't some terrorist kind of information-taker. But let's say a genius hacker just happened to find someone taking money from the bank. Then say he asked both the bank and the crook to cash out for the name. Granted, he always ended up giving the information to the side of good, it was more a safety precaution than a belief that good should win. If the crooks got away, they may start trying to find him. That wouldn't be good. So he took as much money from the banks and the companies and the publishers as he could. On-line and in the papers, he was known as Shinigami, the God of Death, the Man of Judgment. For a price, he will take down any baddie born.

It was fun, and he got some good dough out of it. And of course he hid it; he wasn't stupid. He managed to keep it all over the place, carefully encrypted.

The only people he refused to work with were cops.

He would never forget that day, when he'd returned from school to find some uniforms beating Father Maxwell.

The next day the church had gone up in flames.

But he'd come further than that. He'd lived. It seemed to be his curse. That was why he'd taken the name Shinigami – because he never died. He would live on for a good, long while. Maybe.

But now wasn't the time to deal on these matters. For now he was with Hilde, listening to her complain about some guy at her art show who had dared to say that she was trying to impersonate Monet while her art looked more like an Ed Sullivan cartoon. Duo had no idea what that meant, but commiserated with her nonetheless.

He thought about the latest crimes he'd heard about on the news that morning as she continued. Even he had to disagree with the newscasters on that score: the police weren't incompetent. There simply were no clues. And he should know; he'd been keeping tabs on the case from the beginning. Because the first death had started that day when he'd lost his first home.

<*>

“The bodies have been left in strategic areas to be found at certain times. One in a diner that opened at noon, another in a back alley known to be used by a gang at nine-thirty at night every Saturday. The culprit wanted us to find these bodies at these times. Here are the pictures.” Heero handed out five pictures of each body – twenty pictures in total. “The only thing left with each body is a letter, as you can see. G, O, S, and H.”

“Gosh?” Quatre Winner questioned.

“Yes, and in that order.”

“That makes no sense,” O'Hara, a fairly wide man with graying black hair, replied. “It's ridiculous.”

“Yes,” Trowa agreed. “We believe the murderer wants us to run in circles with these letters. The men's records have been found. G is Larry Nomann, O: Ham Anchee, S: Jack Johnson, and H: Carl Jay.”

“They don't match,” Carlton noted.

“No,” Quatre put in. “Those names aren't real.”

“That's right,” Heero agreed, impressed. “Larry Nomann: There ain't no man. Ham Anchee: Ham and cheese. Jack Johnson, or John Johnson: a simple fake name. Carl Jay: Call J.”

“J?” Carlton repeated. “Who the hell is that?”

“We don't know,” Trowa replied. “But it will probably be the next note on the next body.”

The silence in the room seemed to drip. “What do we do?” Quatre asked finally.

“We have to find out these men's real names,” Heero told him. “That's the only thing we can do. If we find out these men's real names and real pasts, we may stop the next killing from taking place.”

“All right.” Quatre hesitated. “This... would be mostly a computer thing, right?”

“Of course, shrimp,” O'Hara said good-naturedly. “Don't you know how to operate a comp?”

“No, I know how to work a computer.” Still he hesitated.

“What is it, Winner?” Trowa asked.

Quatre looked at him. “Well, we have a computer team, and I'm sure they're working hard, but...”

“Just spit it out, kid,” O'Hara advised.

“Well... there's one man out there who can find any information.”

“He's considered a vigilante, Quatre,” Carlton said. “Shinigami is an info merc.”

“Yes, but he's able to find anything,” Quatre argued. “We may have something against him, but working with him may mean being able to save this 'J' person and find out what this person wants.”

“No,” Heero said decisively. “Besides, Shinigami doesn't work with cops. He said so himself one year ago.”

Quatre chewed his bottom lip. “I understand.”

Heero nodded. “If that's it, then this meeting's over. If you find anything, let the rest of the team know immediately. We'll all take the next step together.”

“Right.” Carlton stood and stretched. “Well, this should be interesting. Let's see if my index fingers will cramp.”

O'Hara rolled his eyes.

<*>

Quatre went to his desk and stared at the screen. He'd said he understood. He didn't say he wouldn't try.

He went onto a fan-site of Shinigami's and sent a letter to the owner of the site, reading:

Please send this to Shinigami.

Shinigami, this is Quatre Winner from the Lynwood City Police. I would like to request your assistance on a certain investigation. Please get in touch with me as soon as you can. Thank you.

He stared at the message for a minute. The man – or woman – could completely ignore his plea. Still, Quatre had the feeling that Shinigami wasn't bad.

In any case, it was a long shot. He sent it off and began his own search.

<*>

Duo got the message via his phone at one-thirty-eight pm. He smirked at it. So the police were that desperate, were they? Pathetic. But who was this Quatre Winner person? He wasn't high up in the list, and according to Duo's info, he wasn't a part of the investigation.

“I see,” Duo murmured. So they'd taken it to the next level.

Duo looked around. The fender-replacement had been returned shortly after he'd returned from lunch. Nothing else had occurred so far.

Breaking code, he closed up shop for the day and left his number on the door in case there was an emergency. Then he left to check out the latest.

------:)

He'd been right. Winner and two vets, Simon O'Hara and Charles Carlton had been assigned to the team already including Yuy, Barton, and Chang, the three smartest in the division – hell, any division. And they were all looking for the same thing he'd been searching for for the past three days – names. The four handed out were obvious fakes when put side-by-side. The four had been together, and they'd all decided to disappear together. And they'd been able to.

Criminals, maybe, but... they were old. If they were criminals, they're buddy had been in jail for a while. But no one had recently been released, and no one's escaped, either. That was out.

So what, then? Doctors? Businessmen? Scientists? CIA? They'd completely erased themselves from the network, then replaced the information with fakes. And they'd been careful; they'd been in touch with one another. They'd kept the information completely different for each one. One called himself a dentist, one a fisherman, one a plumber, one a PE teacher. One went to a community college in America, another in Spain, another to a private college in Britain, and the last dropped out of high school.

They were lying. But there was no proof.

There were always traces, no matter what. There was always a hole. Duo just had to find it.

Dammit, he wouldn't be shown up by a bunch of dead codgers.

He worked tirelessly until seven. He hadn't gotten far, but he'd found a pretty little smuggling ring occurring in exports. Duo sent off a note to those idiots and fixed dinner.

In another hour he'd received a reply for $40,000 if he kept his mouth shut. He let the shippings manager know he was in the market for information on lost items and then rerouted his phone all over the place. The phone would eventually lead the police to Italy. Only then did he make his reply.

I understand you've lost four imaginary men.

Then he sent the message through and continued his investigation.

<*>

When Quatre received the message on his cell phone, he went straight to the superior he knew had given him his position.

“Um, Lieutenant Barton?”

Trowa looked up from his computer and caught Quatre's gaze. Quatre always had a strange feeling around Barton, as if he was on a slight buzz. He also found his breath oddly short at times, and felt heat trace its way up his back. He knew the symptoms.

“Yes, Sergeant Winner? Is there something I can do for you?”

Carefully Quatre entered the room. He could get into a lot of trouble for this. Should he just keep it a secret? Maybe that would be for the best...

Trowa leaned back in his chair. “So,” he started conversationally, “you contacted him.”

Quatre stiffened. “I...”

Trowa chuckled. “I knew you would. And?”

Just like that? Quatre walked forward and showed Trowa the message.

“I see. Respond.” Trowa smiled grimly. “Heero will never admit this, but we need all the help we can get.”

Surprised, it took Quatre a moment before he began to respond.

Yes. Is there anything you know?

Then he waited.

<*>

Duo pushed away from his computer in disgust. These four assholes had encrypted themselves six ways to Sunday. He was no closer to finding out their true identities.

It was evening now, and darkness was descending. Still he'd managed to find nothing. The only good thing about the day was that export deal. The manager offered only $1,000. duo upped the price to $1,500 and kissed the forty grand good-bye. Damn, but being bad paid a helluva lot better than being good.

Duo had the manager leave the money in his own account. In five hours, through an untraceable link, Duo would receive the money in one of his many accounts across the world.

But on this homicide case, there was nothing. These scientists triple-checked everything, and they'd had plenty of time to cover their tracks. No one would have suspected them – until now.

The last one had to have been killed last on purpose. The murderer knew the names were fake, and he knew that Carl Jay meant Call J. He knew who J was. In that, he was five steps ahead of the police. The police didn't even know who'd been killed. They were at point A while the bastard was at Point F.

But Duo was one step ahead of all of them, because he also knew that the person who'd killed those four geezers was also the same person who cut Father Maxwell and Sisters Helen and Mary to ribbons. He would never forget coming back from his little mission to find the three of them lying on the ground inside the church, already sliced and dying. Father Maxwell and Sister Mary had already met their God, but Sister Helen had held on... for him.

But her body had been drained, and she'd quickly left him, as well. He'd barely escaped before everything fell.

What the hell was the connection? He stared at the bodies and tried to imagine what those men had originally looked like. One of them looked almost familiar if he reconstructed the face, but he couldn't say from where. Or maybe he was just so tired from doing all this damn searching so far today.

He looked at his phone. Earlier he'd received a response from the dear Sergeant Winner asking if there was anything he knew about the murders. Duo hadn't yet responded. He didn't know if he wanted to react to the cry for help or not. Finally, he pulled it out and responded.

I don't help cops.

<*>

Quatre was about to give up on getting another reply when he got another one, short and sweet. This time he didn't bother to go to Trowa before he replied.

Then how about just helping me?

He waited with baited breath, hoping against hope that he would get an answer before he or Trowa left the station. It was past their hours, after all.

But this time it came quickly.

How much are you offering?

Quatre blew out a breath. Leave it to Shinigami to want money for cracking a murder case. Thankfully he had plenty of money, thanks to a family that was close to disowning him. And he also knew how to deal.

$1,000.

He waited. It was over five minutes before another response came.

$2,000.

He smiled. It would end at 1,500 – exactly where the both of them had wanted it.

Allah, he hoped he wasn't making a mistake.

<*>

Duo blew out a breath and changed his search, even as he completed the deal with one Quatre Raberba Winner.

Father Maxwell couldn't have been the only one charred beyond recognition with no apparent reason.

He pulled up the reports on the Fire of the Maxwell Church and sat back, sending one last message through his phone.

I'll keep you posted.