Rule 51

By E.M. Megs

Chapter 2 – The Discovery

– November 15th – 3:49 PM –

Haruhi and Kyoya arrived on the scene minutes after Ken announced it's existence to them. The sight – and smell – that hit their eyes and noses was not a pleasant one.

Miyuu's eyes were wide with fear even though they were completely unseeing. That wasn't what made Haruhi almost upchuck her lunch though. It was the fact that she'd been slashed, cut open, and disemboweled. Blood was everywhere. Flies were everywhere, working to make sure the body decayed. Her left leg was mostly detached and hanging limply off to the side.

The lawyer had to turn away from it, close her eyes, and cover her mouth with her hand just to keep down the vomit that was working its way up. Kyoya smirked at her. "Never seen a dead body?" he asked mockingly.

She opened her eyes briefly to glare at him. "Not... Not such a gory one," she retorted, her voice an octave higher than normal. She saw Ken smack him on the back of the head lightly, causing the younger man to glower at his mentor. A smirk of her own lighted her face.

"We're short CSIs," the older man grumbled, seemingly distracted by something. He wouldn't look directly at the body. Haruhi rolled her eyes and took out her kit. Ken nodded at her. "You're one. Unless you want to be here for most of the night though, you'll want at least two or three. Kyoya, go interview the person who found the body."

Never in all his life had Kyoya hated this job so much. A lawyer was going to process his scene. What the hell was the world coming to? "Two CSI/forensic specialists are on their way from Osaka as we speak. And Tamaki's agreed to help out where he can. That gives you a 5-person team, not including Nekozawa and Fukiko."

Kyoya's head snapped up from where it was looking at the body. "Fukiko's coming back?"

"Yup. She's been jumping from place to place but she's taken interest in this case it seems. So she's coming back to work with Nekozawa. I'll be around as well if you need an extra. Only if you need it though. I'm supposed to observe."

Haruhi nodded as she squatted again, covering her nose and mouth with a handkerchief. She plucked a bug larvae up with her tweezers and set it in clear plastic cup. "Flies," she mumbled to herself, "Body's probably been here at least a day." The urge to puke was still there and her head was spinning from the effort not to. She stood abruptly, unable to hold it any longer. "Excuse me a moment," she choked to the two men still standing there as she ran toward the car again.

Kyoya was vastly amused despite the fact that a 15-year-old girl had been murdered and mutilated. "You got me a lawyer with a weak stomach. Thanks," he muttered sarcastically to his mentor, who just smirked.

"She'll get used to it. And you'll get used to her too. In fact, I'm betting that by the end of this case, you'll get along just fine." The younger snorted doubtfully, noticing his mentor's edginess but deciding to ignore it. "At least she's making an effort to work with you."

"I don't need anyone to work with," Kyoya retorted harshly, "I work better alone."

"Which is exactly why you've been assigned a partner. To test that theory and to see how you work with others. Your job could be on the line if you can't work with others properly, Kyoya. So if I were you I'd suck it up and give a little leniency to Rule 13."

He grumbled softly under his breath as Haruhi returned from emptying her stomach into a paper bag. "That's better," she mumbled, hands visibly shaking with weariness from retching.

"You're alright?" Ken asked with an uneasy chuckle. She nodded, glancing over at the body again really quick then back at his face. "The urge to be sick will pass. Trust me." She merely placed her handkerchief over her mouth again and squatted, not trusting her mouth to talk. "I... need to head back." Kyoya turned around and headed to where a stunned young man was standing, shivering slightly in the light fall breeze and wide-eyed with shock.

"You found the body?" he asked softly, knowing that it was better to gently coax statements out of shocked people. And this man was definitely in shock. He nodded stiffly, still staring in the direction of Miyuu's corpse. "What's your name?"

"Ry-Ryoku Churi," he stuttered.

"Can you run me through how you came upon the body?" Ryoku nodded but hesitated, tearing his eyes away at last. "Take your time."

"I-I was just taking a short cut home. And... I tr-tripped over her leg." He shuddered and pulled his coat tighter around him. "I ran, vomited somewhere over there-" he paused to wave his hand in a direction, shaking his head. "-and called the police." Kyoya bobbed his head lightly, scribbling notes down on his pocket-book. "Wh-Who is she?"

The detective swallowed slowly then murmured, "Miyuu Mana." Ryoku was silent but didn't react any worse than he had been before with this news, signaling that he hadn't known the victim.

"C-Can I go now?"

"Of course," Kyoya answered smoothly, turning back around to look at the scene again. He was thankful that it was secluded for once. Scenes inside the city tended to draw unwanted crowds. Now, there was just a few people – suits and a few other necessary people.

Trees were spread out in different places. Leaves covered the ground and the smell of freshly fallen rain filled the air, tainted slightly with the rusty scent of blood. The river was only a few yards away. Haruhi – his partner, he begrudgingly admitted – was squatted a few feet away, swiping at the ground a bit with gloved hands. He watched her look back at Miyuu quickly then back at the ground in front of her, sucking in a breath. "She was disemboweled here. Can't be sure if she was dead or not though. I'm not a coroner," she called softly, closing her eyes. "I need a mold of this track." A few camera snapshots followed this.

Kyoya pursed his lips at her demanding nature, taking note of the van that was pulling up. Their coroner, Umehito Nekozawa stepped out followed by a woman with black hair and bright green eyes. The rookie detective smirked to himself. "Fukiko," he addressed as the two approached. "Nekozawa."

"Kyoya," Fukiko replied, nodding and turning her eyes to the woman squatting near the body. "Who's she?"

Gritting his teeth, his simple reply was, "My partner for this case."

She looked slightly surprised, then scowled at him. She heard the note of distaste in his voice. "What's her name and what's wrong with her?"

Haruhi glanced up at them and stood, pulling off one of her gloves carefully. She shook Fukiko's hand, introducing herself with a slight cheerfully air, "Haruhi Fujioka. Lawyer and forensic scientist." The older's eyebrows raised as she glanced at Kyoya quickly before turning her gaze back to Haruhi.

"Fukiko Amura. Government coroner and anthropologist."

The brunette blinked a few times. "You work for the government?" she asked, intrigued, "Why this case then?"

The older one looked around for someone. "Where's Ken?" she muttered, ignoring the lawyer's question and looking at Kyoya.

He shrugged. "Said he had to head back to the office." He glanced at Haruhi, noticing the woman looking at him. He sighed inwardly and shifted his gaze away once again. "Fukiko, what's going on?"

"They sent me to check on this crime scene." The two partners looked confused. She pointed at the corpse behind them silently. "Approximately 15 to 25 years old, mutilated." She walked closer, squatting to pick up Miyuu's wrist. "Electrocution burns." Her fingers pushed her head to the side a bit, revealing two identical burn marks. "Tazer." The 34-year-old sighed softly. "That's why Ken left. This girl was a victim of the same person who killed his niece. He recognized the scene."

Haruhi brought her hand to her mouth. Kyoya just blinked. "A... serial killer?"

She nodded gravely. "The discovery of this body also matches that of Michio Corlet in 2000 and a family of 4 in 1990. Three girls and their father, Toshiro, Hiroko, Miroko, and Kokoro Choukichi. Their murderer was never caught."

The brunette closed her eyes, feeling oddly determined after hearing that there were so many victims. "I'm going to catch this bastard," she whispered under her breath, turning back to the victim with a new kind of determination. "Amura-san, I assume you and Nekozawa-san will be doing the autopsy. I'll continue to work here, with the other two CSIs when they arrive from Osaka. Ohtori-san you can handle all the rest and I'm sure you will, with or without my help."

Something caught her eye on the body. She held her breath while she took her tweezers and plucked it up. Her camera came up, snapping a close up of it. "Odd," she mumbled to herself. Kyoya just watched her with slight suspicion as well as disgust. Haruhi placed it very carefully in a small little bag, scribbling something on the front then placing it back into the case.

"She gets right to work," Fukiko noted with slight amusement, glancing at Kyoya. "Course she's a lawyer, so you don't like her do you?"

Muddy footprints were close to the tire tracks. Haruhi placed a yellow maker next to it, snapping pictures. "Take it away," she murmured to the two coroners, stepping back. Nekozawa silently moved forward to start transferring the body into a body bag. Kyoya stood with pursed lips, watching for a few more moments before turning on his heel. "Where're you going?" Haruhi called after him.

"Takahiro," was all he replied, heading for his vehicle. The engine was just starting when a thought occurred to her.

If he left, she wouldn't have a ride back to the department.

"Wait, Ohtori-san! I won't have a ri-!" she cut herself off with a huff of frustration once realizing that he couldn't hear her and was still driving slowly away from her. She sighed under her breath and rubbed her forehead tiredly. A soft chuckle pulled her out of her thoughts.

"He doesn't normally work completely on impulse. Normally thinks about the people he works with. He's either incredibly distracted or he really doesn't like you," Fukiko murmured with a mischievous glance at the lawyer. Haruhi rolled her eyes toward the sky, silently asking her mother to help her not to strangle of troublesome man she was being forced to work with.

"He doesn't understand," she mumbled, squatting again next to where the body had been. There was a slight blood stain, not as much as there would have been if she had been alive when she had been disemboweled. She almost winced as the picture of the 15-year-old screaming while her torso was slashed open.

"Understand what?" Fukiko asked, sounding slightly amused as she helped Nekozawa pile the body bag onto the gurney. "Make sure you get a sample of the soil."

"That I'm not completely a lawyer. And even if I was a full one, I wouldn't be a shark like most of the ones that he's dealt with." The 23-year-old took a small scoop from her kit and did as her elder told her to, digging it into the soil a bit and shaking it into a little baggy.

The 34-year-old paused, seeming almost hesitant to answer. "It's not really my place to say... But he probably thinks sorely of you – because of your occupation of course – because of what happened to his family during his mother's case." Haruhi's eyes shot up in confusion. Did she just say his mother's case? She was about to open her mouth to ask a question when she interrupted the thought, "As I said, it's not my place to talk about it. You'd have to ask him."

"Hmm," the younger woman hummed in thought under her breath for a moment, making a mental note to badger her 'partner' later. "From what you saw, would you say that the victim was dead when she was slashed apart?" she asked, switching topics to something slightly less depressing and that didn't remind her of her own mother.

Fukiko nodded, a small smile. "Did you get that from the lack of blood on the ground?" Haruhi bobbed her head. "Very observant, Fujioka-san. Yes, I'd say that's correct. Medically speaking her body was probably still a bit warm when she was disemboweled. However her heart wasn't beating so the blood that flowed from the antimortem wounds was significantly less."

"Thought so," the younger nodded, snapping more pictures of the ground. A leaf, though there were hundreds spread out on the ground, caught her eye. She glanced up at the treetops above her, frowning slightly. "Body was definitely moved. I don't think there are any kind of this leaf's tree anywhere nearby."

Fukiko smiled to herself as she and Nekozawa closed the doors of the back of the van. Yes, Fujioka was a very observant person. Perfect for the job if only her stubborn friend would realize that and acknowledge her. "Come on, Fujioka-san. You can catch a ride with us and return when the other CSIs arrive at the station."

– November 15th – 4:36 PM –

Kyoya was sick and tired of running around in circles. The really big circles hadn't even started connecting yet but he was already sick of it. It happened every single time. Every time there was a murder case, they would start running in circles with suspects until they finally found some ground-breaking evidence that would put everything in perspective.

"What happened to your daughter, Mana-san?" he asked for what had to be the 10th time. Fortunately, this time he was rather sober from being locked up in jail for a few days. That didn't brighten the conversation any though.

"I told you, I don't know," the older commented drily, sitting there looking tired yet somehow relaxed at the same time.

With his daughter dead, you would have thought that he'd be absolutely distraught. This man seemed almost nonchalant. Like nothing bothered him at all. It disgusted Kyoya even more that his own father did. His fist came down hard on the table. "You picked her up! You better as hell know what happened to your own daughter! She's lying dead on an autopsy table right now, and I want to know how she got that way!"

Takahiro stared ahead, seemingly emotionless. Which only eerily reminded him of his father's way of dealing with grief and made him angrier. "Do you care at all about her? What happened?"

"I don't know."

"Were you too goddamned drunk to even notice that she was in the car? Too excited by the concept of beer and whores to get the idea in your head that you might actually take care of your own daughter for once?"

The 36-year-old tore his eyes away from the detective's gaze, a sign that he had hit the nail straight on the head. "I see. Well then. Next question: where's your car, Mana-san?"

– November 15th – 4:53 PM –

It was a stripper bar where Takahiro Mana had left his vehicle. A stripper bar not far from the hotel that he had been arrested at. Unfortunately, these places normally meant scantily dressed girls flirting with him and/or drunk men and women. None of which Kyoya particularly enjoyed dealing with.

He flashed his badge at the guy behind the bar, completely ignoring the few girls that were passing glances at him. "Your manager, please?"

"Yer looking at 'im," he replied with a cheeky grin. "What can I do for ya, officer?"

"Detective actually," Kyoya muttered drily. "Were you working here three nights ago?"

"Yessir, I was."

"Did you see this man here at that time?" He pulled a photo of Miyuu's father from his pocket and held it up for the other to take a look at. A simple nod was all the reply he needed. "Was he with a girl about 15?"

"No, sir. Anyone und'r 21 ain't allowed in here. We follo' National Regulations, Detective." He began to look slightly skittish, or worried. Like someone had found out something that they shouldn't have or reported them or something. "Did this guy... Do somethin'?"

Kyoya ignored the question, knowing it was unwise to possibly start a public panic over this serial killer. "Does the parking lot have surveillance?" Another nod. "I'll need the tapes from three nights ago if it isn't too much trouble."

A scowl found its way onto the bar-tender's lips. "No can do, Detective. If yer gonna ask for 'em, I need ta know why. Ta make sure ya ain't gonna try and persecute my fine place here for somethin' or 'nother."

The bespectacled detective just barely managed to suppress an annoyed sigh from leaving his mouth. Between this guys accent and his body language that clearly screamed that he didn't like cops, he was very annoyed.

"His daughter is missing. Last seen with him. His car's here, he was found in a nearby hotel. I believe that her father was too drunk to notice that she was in the car, she got frustrated and decided to get home on her own somehow, leaving from this location. The police are not going to bear down on you if she happens to show up on the tapes. I'm just trying to find her." The half-truth, half-lie easily fell through his well practiced lips, with hardly a thought from him.

The bar-tender stared at him skeptically for the longest time before nodding a bit, waving his hand in circles and heading toward the back to retrieve the tapes. Or at least Kyoya hoped that was what he was doing.

Several crashes and a squawk of pain later, the rather bald bar-tender returned with a single tape in hand, rubbing the top of his head where a slight red mark was starting to form. He handed the tape over wordlessly and asked, "That all?"

The detective nodded his head and turned on his heel, throwing a thank you and good bye over his shoulder on the way out the door.

– November 15th – 7: 28 PM –

Haruhi was going through all the current case files that were open on victims of the serial killer, as she had been for nearly 2 hours, just trying to find some connection between 7 victims. Granted, four of them were related, but beyond that there was nothing really that held any of them together.

She nibbled on the end of her pencil. None of them knew each other, according to these files. She did notice that all the females – Kokoro, Hiroko, Miroko, Mitsuyo, and Miyuu – all were ages ranging from 15 to 17 while the two males – Toshiro and Michio – were older than that, one being 41 and the other 23.

There was also the strange fact that they were all brunettes or red-heads. Both the males and two of the females being brunette and the three other females being red-heads. Besides that there wasn't anything that she could see that would form a valid connection.

Kyoya was still off doing whatever it was that he did, while she was stuck there. Her grumbling stomach only reminded her of this fact. "It's not a good idea to starve yourself Haruhi!" two nearly identical voices chimed from the doorway to the office she shared with the Ohtori.

"Of course, you never were really-"

"-Good about healthy habits."

Her head shot up, not even bothering trying to place the familiar voices. Identical red-headed twins stood in the doorway, amber eyes shining mischievously. "Hikaru, Kaoru!" she exclaimed, a grin taking place on her previously gloomy features.

An arm from either twin wrapped around her, huge smiles on both their faces that nearly mirrored hers. "You two are the transfers from Osaka?"

Two sharp nods. "We heard that you were put on Tokyo!" they chimed simultaneously.

"So we decided-" Kaoru added.

"-To surprise our favorite toy!"

Her silly grin only grew wider. "How about dinner?" she asked, excited from the very prospect of having the opportunity to catch up with two of her college friends.

"Just what we were thinking!"

"Take Kyoya and Tamaki while you're at it," a fourth voice called from the door. Haruhi looked over, finding Ken leaning against the doorway. Her grin dimmed slightly at the mention of her 'partner' who had so rashly commented on her mother, turning it into a slight grimace. "Neither of them have eaten. Between Tamaki's schoolwork and trying to hold down this job until he gets his teaching degree, I'm not surprised. Kyoya probably just forgot though."

She sighed and glanced at the twins. "Mind if we have two more?"

– November 15th – 7:54 PM –

The air in the restaurant was so tense someone could cut through it with a knife and they still wouldn't have been able see through it. The 5 investigators sat at the table, waiting for their orders to arrive in silence. The twins sat next to Haruhi, Kyoya and Tamaki across from them. The blonde and two red-heads strained to stay silent while the brunette and raven-haired ones stared each other down.

"Uhh, Haruhi?" Kaoru muttered, breaking the tense silence.

"Who's the guy you're having a passionate staring contest with?" Hikaru asked.

She was silent, narrowing her eyes slightly at her 'partner' before answering the twins inquiry. "My supposed partner, Kyoya Ohtori. He doesn't seem to cooperate like a partner should though." She let her eyes trail to either twin on both her sides. Both of their eyes were on the man in question. "I assume this is Suoh-san?"

Kyoya nodded once while Tamaki started talking gallantly. "Yes Haruhi-san! I am Tamaki Suoh! I've heard much about you and you have certainly lived up to expectations!" She rose an eyebrow and tried not to twitch at his quick procession from her last name to first. It was their first meeting for crying out loud! More rambling followed.

"He always does that," Kyoya muttered, obviously just as displeased with this entire meeting as Haruhi was. "Can we just get this over with? I have work to get back to."

"You won't get anything done if you don't eat," she replied hotly. He stared at her with pursed lips. The twins looked between the two of them with obvious interest, wondering what either had done to piss the other off. Tamaki had grown silent as well. Hikaru coughed uncomfortably in the slightly awkward silence that had fallen over the table.

"Introductions have been made one way, but not the other," Kyoya commented drily, eying the twins with emphasis.

"Hikaru-"

"-And Kaoru Hitachiin-"

"-At your service!" they both finished with a nod of their heads. Haruhi tried not to roll her eyes at their twin telepathy.

"They were transferred in from Osaka PD. Old friends from college," she added in her own short comment before falling silent again in another staring contest with her partner. She would not crack before he did.

"Oh!" Tamaki exclaimed, "Kyoya and I have known each other since high school!"

"Unfortunately," the other grunted under his breath. The blonde pouted in his seat, drawing circles on the table with his finger. He kind of looked like a puppy who'd been scolded. Haruhi rose a single eyebrow at him but stayed quiet.

"What he'd do to piss you off?" either twin whispered in her ear, trying and failing at being discreet. She shook her head, indicating that they'd talk about it later. Their waiter returned before the two red-heads could prod her for more information.

Each person ordered in sequence. Haruhi sighed as soon as the waiter had left again, pulling a few files from the briefcase she'd brought with her. "I looked for similarities between victims, only one I could find is that they're all brunettes or red-heads. Females are all 15-17, males are over 20. No obvious connection besides that and how they were dumped and killed."

Kyoya glanced at the files that had been pushed in front of him, taking a gulp of the beer in front of him. "Ouran High," he muttered.

"Hmm?"

"Ouran High. All the females go to Ouran High School."

"How... How do you know that?"

"My sister works at the middle school. You're an alumni." She stared at him. "And Nami-san informed me of her daughter's school, I looked into it after Fukiko told us this is a serial killer."

The brunette blinked, eliciting the twins' instinct to want to run for cover. Immediately after her eyes narrowed. "You... Looked into my file?" A small amount of controlled anger rang clearly in her voice. "Do you know how much of an invasion of privacy that is?"

"I merely wanted to know about who I was going to be working with," he replied simply in his defense, folding his hands in front of him.

Her glare increased significantly. "There's this thing called human interaction. It's great for getting to know the people you're working with," she stated coldly, "You don't need to look into a person's file to do that."

"I find files more informative."

"I could be plenty informative if you would just act like a normal person and socialize." She'd suddenly lost her appetite to her anger. Shooting one more glare at the man sitting across from her, she stood and left, scooping up the files on the table on her way past.

The twins turned their gaze from her retreating figure to the two other men at the table. "Who invades people's privacy like that, Kaoru?"

"A cold-hearted bastard," the younger twin responded. Tamaki seemed to be a bit stricken with this answer. When the waiter returned with their food, noticing that they'd lost a person, the twins took their food and Haruhi's to go instead of staying there.

"That was interesting," Kyoya murmured, mostly to himself.

"They're right, Kyoya," Tamaki reprimanded lightly. "Interaction would have been better. I didn't expect anything less from you. Though, you could have been at least a bit more subtle about it."

The raven-haired man scoffed softly, "Since when in all the years that you've known me, have I ever not been subtle? She's just smarter than you are." That sent his best friend into a spiraling depression which he was sure would give him some peace at least until he had finished eating.

–

A/N: Sorry for the wait. School started two weeks ago and began it's horrible dragging-me-under-and-getting-me-sick routine. 4 IB classes are so much fun to deal with. Especially when you have a cold that's trying to kill you. I know there are people also waiting on LD and AN (For which if someone has a useful prompt for X it would be appreciated since I'm utterly STUCK). I'm working on it as well. (In my little free time. Might be quite a while before something actually gets posted for them though.)

I thought that I should mention that I'm American so instead of causing trouble for myself by trying to tune this to the Japanese justice system, I'm just going to use the American one that I'm familiar with from all those lovely crime shows that I watch endlessly. (NCIS Season 7 started Tuesday night SQWEE! Then Bones Thursday!)

Also, I... don't own any of the Ouran characters. But Ken, Fukiko, Miyuu, other OCs etc, I do. And, honestly, I don't really care if you use them as long as you ask first so that I know you didn't just try to rip me off or something. (So just ask me first, kay?)

I must be getting predictable or something... Someone guessed that Ken's niece was a victim (Kuramasredredrose. Great job!). And someone guessed that the guy's a serial killer (Enigmaticrose4). Damn. My life sucks. (Either that or my foreshadowing was WAAAAAY too painfully obvious.)

And now for the regular awarding of the Kudos (Now THAT'S a different phrasing for me...): Kuramasredredrose, idontseepenguins, Enigmaticrose4, The Phantom Devil, and YukiruandPercabeth.

(LONG Author's notes... Really must break that habit.)