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You've reached Detective Nick Burkhardt. If this is an emergency, please call 911. Otherwise leave a message and I'll get back to you ASAP.

[Calls, texts, and emails are a-okay! He has both a work email and personal email, and an office phone and cell phone. Just specify which one.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

...of course you do, but why?

because i need to take them right now

Are you sick what's wrong?

...fuck that I'm coming over.

yes im sick thats all

[Nick doesn't text back to that, because he doesn't buy it at all. Instead, he just heads over to his partner's, and a little while later, he's knocking on the door.]

It's me, man, let me in.

[A little while later, he's still bundled up in bed with his phone, so the door stays shut.]

[But a text pops up.]

u have a key

[That reply doesn't do anything to make him less worried, but Nick dutifully pulls out his key and opens the door, heading in. He calls his partner's name as he walks through to Yuji's bed, stopping when he spots him.

Then he's at his side immediately.]

What's wrong?

[He does look a mess. A very big mess. There are circles under his eyes, his hair hasn't seen a brush, or a dye packet. He's in the rumpled, sloppy clothes he usually wears while "sulking".]

[But he doesn't look sick.]

[Oops.]

What you said. About the police. It... stuck in the head.

[Oh, and his accent is so thick you could cut it with a knife. That's never a good sign.]

[Exactly none of that is a good sign.

Nick sits down on the bed next to him, making himself at home. He has a feeling he's not going to be going anywhere for a long time.]

What part?

Shūseida. The... modifying. The changes. The corrupt people.

[He pulls his pillow up over his head.]

Wasn't what I wanted. Dore mo nai.

[None of it.]

[Nick's quiet for a minute. Then he moves forward, not to try to pull the pillow away, but just to put his hand on top of Yuji's.]

I know. It isn't what any of us wanted.

[Dammit you. Why do you know all the tricks with this one.]

[His hand closes tight around his partner's.]

Supposed to help. To make things right. None of this is right.

No, it isn't.

[He squeezes his partner's hand.]

We've always dealt with what isn't right, man. To a normal person, looking in on what we deal with as homicide detectives, they'd think none of it is right, even the stuff we're used to. Maybe we're finally figuring out how they feel.

[His grip tightens.]

But that -- we help then. We solve cases then. Make things better.

What can be made better... with this?

I don't know. We... we figure out something. A way to make things better. We try to figure out a way to stop this, and we deal with what's thrown at us.

[He shakes his head, because he know how that sounds.]

I wish I had the answers for you. But I don't.

Figure something out. Deal with it.

[He repeats them, drawing the words out skeptically. He's still lying curled in bed, his face downcast.]

I don't know if... I can do this. Much more is too much.

[Nick stretches out a little, until he's half lying on the bed as well, next to his partner.]

Tell me about it?

[For once, it's actual question, not just a phrase.]

[There's a slight shrug. He falls silent for a while.]

I became police... to help. To fix problems. Stop criminal. You know.

[Nick knows the whole deal with his dad and all -- so he doesn't bother going into it.]

Be good man. A good man. These are not good men.

[Nick does know, so he doesn't reply to that.

He's on a little bit firmer ground with the last part, anyway, at least as far as he thinks.]

No. They're not. That's why we're going to stop them. We stop the bad guys - sometimes, those are other cops.

And that feels wrong.

It should not be that way.

Shit, man, I know. I used to think the likelihood of having a third of a police force be corrupt was just as far-fetched as werewolves.

[But it's not like he has to tell Yuji that. Yuji's the one who was partnered for years with a guy who always thought the law was black and white, that cops were automatically to be trusted far above anyone else.

Part of him still does, even after all this, and it makes him reluctant to admit the next part.]

I was wrong. Internal affairs exists for a reason, after all, even if it feels like they're usually the enemy.

It should be like werewolves. It should be like that.

[Part of him feels the same -- most of him does, actually. He doesn't want to accept this. He doesn't want to think people he'd always thought were inherently good and decent ... aren't.]

[He makes a quiet scoffing sound.]

I don't think they will help this one.

Werewolves aren't even like werewolves anymore. But you're right, it should. And if nothing else, I think that's something we can change. We can make it like that, we can make them regret they ever thought they could take advantage of being cops to hurt people.

[He's angry about this, and that's obvious, but... it's a quiet kind of anger.

Then he echoes that sound, a soft huff.]

Someone suggested that. I didn't know how to explain how unlikely it was.

Whole police force. Against two people. Is -- it is too big.

[It feels seriously hopeless right now. He'd be more upbeat, normally, but... the memories aren't helping anything. They're just making it worse.]

[Dragging everything down.]

Use analogy.

A third of the police force. And we're partners. There isn't anything we can't face together.

[Pulse memories make shit really difficult, man, Nick gets that.

He is firmly in the Land of Denial about his, so for now, Nick can be the upbeat one.

Except he really does believe it.]

I was pretending to be Kotetsu at the time.

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