'Missing,' the poster read, 'Que Wisev (pron. Quay Whi-zev), son of millionaires Tet and Raei Wisev. Was last seen on December 8, 2496 in System Beslock. Any information concerning the boy and his whereabouts should be directed to the local Guardian headquarters. There is a large reward for his safe return to his grieving parents.' It went on to tell a few other facts and show a picture of a young male sprite of about thirteen with pale blue skin and loose golden yellow hair.  

A tanned human hand reached up and ripped the poster down, crumpled it, and tossed it in the closest recycle bin, before returning to the pocket of large black coat it's owner was wearing. Decian Minnel grinned under his baseball cap, thinking, One down, another three billion to go. He trudged on through the darkened, rainy streets of System Kessil, toward the apartment he shared with the missing heir. Several of the people he passed, sprite, human, or anthro, later found their wallets mysteriously empty of credits.

The heir in question currently sat on his couch facing the television, but he wasn't watching it. As a matter of fact, he was barely awake. His sea green eyes were slightly glassed over and his tousled golden yellow hair fell in his face, although he didn't seem to notice. Que didn't even notice when the door opened with a bang behind him and Decian stepped in, stamping his feet to dislodge some mud from his boots.

"Que? Hey man, you awake?" asked Decian waving a hand in his friend's face.

Que blinked, startled. He stared at the human boy who was leaning over the back of the couch. Decian's hair was cut much shorter than his own and was currently green, the human had a thing for dying it. His eyes were cobalt blue, his skin tanned, and he was wearing all black, something else he had a thing for. It took a moment for Que's mind to to reawaken and he said slowly, "Where the hell you been, Decian?"

"Just pulling down a couple mil 'missing' posters, 's'all," Decian laughed lightly and threw his jacket at the coat rack. It missed, but neither of them noticed.

"Couple mil?" asked Que, scooting over to make room on the couch.

"Well, maybe not a couple mil, but quite a lot. They seem to be getting frantic to find you. Any idea why?"

"Nope."

"Oh. So, whatcha' watchin?"

"No idea."

"Oh."   

The two sat in silence staring at the television. Aside from the fact that one was a sprite and the other was a human, they were almost brothers.

Que had grown up in a system on the other side of the Metaverse called Beslock as the heir to one of the wealthiest sprite families on the 'Net, but at thirteen had grown sick of being a good little heir and run away, finally ending up in Kessil and literally ran headlong into Decian as soon as he stepped off the transport.

Decian was orphaned by a terrorist attack when he was two and had lived on the streets of Kessil for as long as he could remember. Some might have put him down to a common theif, since that had been how he'd lived for quite a while. He'd been running from a group of guardians when he'd run into Que three years ago.

They had struck a deal right then: Decian would show Que the way around the system and Que would divert the guardians' attention from Decian. Somehow they had ended up sticking together after that and had rented an apartment (well, Que rented it, he had the almost unlimited amount of money) a few months later. They still couldn't figure out how they'd convinced the landlord to rent out to a pair of thirteen year olds. They now spent their time at school, working odd jobs around the town, and goofing off whenever they could. Of course, Que often had to avoid the few detectives that made their way to Kessil on his parents' orders, but their wasn't any record of Que Wisev ever being in Kessil, only a sprite who called himself Setra Roque and claimed to come from Mainframe. Decian claimed not to have anything to do with the creating records for Setra, but Que was certain that his friend had some hacking abilities.

Eventually they got tired of staring uncomprehendingly at the documentary on ancient plant life and headed off to their rooms. They did have school tomorrow after all.

Detective Drew Bekker leaned back in his chair, waiting for the phone to ring with his next case. He'd neatly finished off his last case just the day before and had been richly paid that evening. Now, well into the next morning, he was starting to get bored.

The light shown brightly on the system outside, but Drew's office, true to the standard old detective ways, was shadowed and dusty. He grinned slightly thinking about it.Adds a bit of mystique to the old place, he thought. His desk sat in front of the room's only window, which was shaded with old 'sun bleached' blinds. File cabinets stood in militaristic rows on either side of the room, but were covered in messy piles of papers that were more for show than actual use. Who actually used paper files anymore?

As boredom set more and more in, he began to look through his disorganized desk drawers and the incredibly messy desktop for something to occupy his mind. Finally he came up with one of the few paper books he owned. It was a compilation of all the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Drew thought a moment about returning it to it's place in the desk. Ah, what the hell, he thought, haven't read it in years... Then settled back into his creaky chair to read.

An hour or so later he was well into the twelfth story, the only sound in the room was the creak of his chair from time to time and the flip of pages every few minutes. The complete silence didn't seem to ever be going to break and Drew was starting to forget what sound was. He was lost in the story, most likely never to return.

Suddenly, like a knife through the air, the phone rang, startling Drew out of his reverie. He jumped from his chair and looked around wildly searching for what could be making that noise. It took him a moment to remember that he wasn't in the late nineteenth century, but in his office in System Beslock in the middle of the Metaverse. Stupid! he berated himself. He took a deep breath and answered the phone.

"Drew Bekker, how may I help you?"

"Mr. Bekker," said a chilled voice.

"Yes, that's me, Metaverse detective at your service," replied Drew nervously.

"Mr. Bekker, have you, per chance heard about the missing heir to the Wisev family?"

"Que Wisev? Yessir, I have. Who hasn't?"

"My employer, Mr. Tet Wisev has asked that every skilled detective in the Metaverse be put to the task of finding his son," said the voice sourly.

"So, in other words, you're hiring me to find the kid?"

"In so few words, yes."

There was a short silence.

"Just wondering, the kid's been missing for almost three years, why the sudden interest in finding him?" queried the detective.

The person on the other end took a moment before replying, but when he did, his voice seemed frozen as though trying to hide anger, "Do you believe, sir, that we have not been looking for the boy since his disappearance?"

"Well, uh-" began Drew.   

"Several detectives have been hired since the hour his absence was noticed! Not one of them has found a trace!"

"I, well, um..." Drew stuttered, at a loss for words. He ran a hand through his close cropped sandy blonde hair, thinking hard. He slowly drew a breath and started speaking again, "All right, I'll take the case. What information can you give me?"

"That's more like it. The boy was last seen in Beslock," began the voice. It continued on through the usual stuff that Drew already knew from news reports and finally came to the information he didn't: "Que is suspected to be in System Kessil, under a false alias. There is no trace of him staying there more than a day or so, but we cannot find any sign of him ever entering Mainframe which is where the records show him to have left Kessil for. Hackers are suspected in helping him."

"What about his PID code, has it shown up in either system?"

"No. We assume it was altered to hide where he was."

"Anything else I should know sir?"

"No. You will be handsomly rewarded if you find him. If not, well, this never happened if you don't."

"Um, ri-ight."

There was a click and the line went dead. Drew stared at the phone for a moment before dialing up the nearest transport station to get a ticket to Kessil.

"Hey," said Decian, looking up from the junk the school called lunch and jabbing his comrade in the ribs, "cute chick alert!"

Que turned his head in the direction Decian indicated, already beginning to tell the nincompoop off for being chauvinistic. The words died in his mouth.

A young sprite girl was making her way across the courtyard in the general direction of their table. Her dark purple hair was pulled back in a loose braid, a few wisps framing her small pale lavender face. She paused a few feet from them, her emerald green eyes searching for somewhere to sit. She wore a loose blue jacket over a tight white shirt and grey leggings and ankle height brown soft leather boots. In her arms were an assortment of data files and a lunch bag hung from her wrist. She turned her gaze toward the two boys, apparently noticing that they were the only two at their table. Hesitantly she stepped forward, her grip on the data files shifted slightly and they all dropped to the ground. "Oh crash it!" she murmured.

Que finally remembered to shut his mouth and rose from his seat to help the girl, but Decian beat him by seconds.

"Need some help?" asked the human boy, crouching to pick up a stray data file. Que looked a bit miffed at his friend's actions, but went about helping nonetheless.   

"Oh, gee, uh, thanks," replied the girl.

Minutes later all the files had been gathered in a neat pile on the table and Que still hadn't managed to get a word in edge wise.    

"I'm Decian Minnel, "said Decian, offering his hand to the girl, "This is my pal Qu- Setra Roque," he indicated Que with a jab of his thumb.        

"Kala Speil," she said, shaking his hand, "Pleased to make both your acquaintances." Kala grinned slightly.

"Um, would you like to sit with us?" invited Que, finally finding his voice, "We've got several extra seats here..."  

Kala complied, gratefully taking a seat at the table across from the boys.

"So, you new here or somethin?" asked Decian, ever the talkative one.

"Yeah, I just transferred here from Shelton High, " she replied, studying Setra from the side of her eye. There's something familiar about this sprite... Do I know him? And what was that Decian was starting to say? 'Q' something, I think...

Her thoughts were interrupted bye a shrill whistle from Decian, "Shelton, huh? Wow, pretty expensive place, why'd you leave for such a dump like Krixton?"

Que elbowed Decian in the side, muttering, "Don't be so rude, eh?"

"Oh, I don't mind," said Kala, "Really, this is so much a nicer school than Shelton, much less stuck up at least."

"So, really, whatcha' doin here if you could be at Shelton?"

"I got sick of the atmosphere there," said Kala distractedly. She peered in suspiciously into her lunch bag, as though trying to discern whether there was something dangerous in it.    "

Whatever you've got in there can't possibly be worse than this junk that the school provides," observed Que.        

"True." Kala shrugged and went about unloading the bag.

They continued talking for a the remainder of the lunch break. Que managed to get in a few jeering remarks at some of the things Decian said, but still remained polite and courteous toward Kala.

As the transport ground slowly into the terminal, Drew glanced up from The Speckled Band and out the window, wondering if this was System Kessil.

"Attention, all passengers getting off at System Kessil, this is your stop. Repeat, all passengers for System Kessil, we have reached your destination. We will be continuing on to..."   

Aparently it was. Drew took a deep breath and stood up, stretched, grabbed his carry-on from the overhead storage compartment, and headed out to the station with the five or six others who were stopping by Kessil. He'd been on the transport since an hour after he'd gotten the call that morning. It felt as though he'd been sitting there for days. He glanced at his watch, noting that it was only 1300h even though it felt as though it should be 2200h or something.

He stepped out onto the the afternoon light of System Kessil and blinked, getting used to the light after being in relative shadow for most of the day. While not quite as bright as Beslock, it was certainly well lit, although there were signs of last night's rain in the few puddles still left on the street. Drew looked around for a taxi and saw that there were none going passed just then.   

"Figures," he sighed and went back into the station to find out about bus schedules.

     The bell rang out, signaling the end of the lunch period, just as the three teenagers were finishing their lunches.     

"So, which class you got next?" Decian asked , leading their party toward the recycle bins.      

"Um, English, I think," said Kala, wondering where she'd put her schedule.       

"Regular or advanced class?" inquired Que.    

"Advanced." she replied.     

"Hey, me too! Ms. Girare?" Que said.       

"Yeah!"       

"Cool, I'll show you where it is," said Que, "See ya' later Decian. "        

"Later Set, Kala," said Decian.        

"See ya," Kala said.        

Decian watched the two sprites head toward their class, actually quiet for once. He turned and walked casually in the direction of his class.  He couldn't shake the feeling of being watched now that his friends had left, but apon looking around he only saw Mil il'Rey, a F'Val in the next grade, who didn't appear to be paying him the slightest attention. Mil was the classic noncomformest classmate that everyone has, from combat boots to the frayed jeans and threadbare t-shirt. It was some sort of protest, Decian had decided, but what Mil was protesting, he wasn't sure. Mil apparently hadn't noticed that the bell had rung and was concentrating on writing something and humming.        

"Mil?"        

Mil looked up, startled, at Decian questioningly.        

"Um, the bell rang, time for class."        

"Oh, right," said Mil, "thanks man."        

"No prob. Whatcha writin' there?"        

"This? It's, uh, nothin'." Mil hurriedly stuffed the papers into his pack.        

"Oh, well, uh see ya' later then?"        

"Yeah, I guess."        

Decian and Mil parted ways there, Mil headed on toward theatre class and Decian was once again left alone in the cafeteria courtyard. He shook his head and looked at the one paper that Mil had neglected to pack due to Decian quickly snatching it when Mil hadn't been paying attention. It was aparently a song or a poem. He shook his head again and stuck it under the edge of the chair for when Mil would come back for it, doubtless in just a few minutes. Sticking his hands into his jacket pockets, Decian whistled a bit to fill the silence as he walked to math class, his least favorite class and he was already late wich his teacher would probably berate him for.        

At the corner of the courtyard a dark shadowy figure detached from the darkness. It slowly tread away from the school, going completely unnoticed.

In the shadows of a room, where the only light was the glow of a computer screen, two figures lurked just out of the light's reach.        

"So...," murmured a quiet male voice, "A new addition to their party... This will prove quite interesting, don't you agree, Kiiree?"        

The shadow looked up from the thing that held her attention, a wild gleam of anticipation in her pale yellow eyes, "Shall we kill it?"        

"Perhaps, perhaps not," said the man, not much more than a boy, as he leaned closer to the screen, his face barely illuinated by the glow. He was a sprite, just a bit taller than the girl he spoke with, his hair was velvet green and was pulled back in a tight poney-tail. He had aqua skin and feirce black eyes. His gaunt face was pulled into a dark grimace seemingly by habit more than by distaste.        

"Oh...," said she, sounding almost disappointed. The shadow developed wild electric purple hair and dark navy blue skin as her cloaking ability wore off. She grinned maliciously as she turned back to the thing wriggling in her hands. It was a very small animal, some sort of vermin. She stroked it's fur, crooning softly as one would to a frightened child. Still, it wriggled to be free of her grasp, not at all reassured. She walked away from the man, still crooning to the animal. Slowly, she shifted the animal to one hand and drew back the other. Her fingernails elongated into sharp pinpoint claws and she brought the clawed hand slowly to the animal as though debating her next move. It squeaked and tried desperately to get out of her gentle yet firm grip. A soft smile graced her lips and she brought the claws to the skin of the animal, dancing just on the brink of impaling the tiny thing.        

He turned away from his virus, not wishing to see any more. He heard another high-pitched squeak and then Kiiree's mirthful laughter. He put a hand to his temples as though trying to ward off a headache. Why couldn't she at least have been sane? he wondered deploringly. In an effort to ignore the virus, he turned his attention back to the latest turn of events concerning his enemies. He stared back into the glowing computer screen, murmering indistinctly under his breath. An arial view of Decian, Que, and Kala at lunch shimmered on the screen.

Decian jumped when he heard the final bell ring, signaling the end of classes for the day. Jumped out of his chair and out the door, that is. He raced down the hall toward the main entrance, paying no attention to anything else but reaching his destination. Rounding the final corner, he skidded to a halt before crashing headlong into the closed door.        

"You really should watch where you're going," commented Que, as he opened the door and headed outside.        

Decian stood mutely staring at Que's retreating figure, then, apon realizing how funny a picture he made, released his statue figure and raced out the door. Que was sitting on one of the ledges that were on either side of the steps, his arm draped over the head of the lion statue that resided there.        

"What took ya' so long?" Que teased. Decian glared at him. "All right, all right, lighten up!" Que put up his hands in mock-defense.        

Decian continued to glare at the sprite, then suddenly grinned and poked his friend in the ribs, causing him to drop his arms and almost double over in laughter, "Hey, no fair!"        

A few minutes later, after proper revenge had been taken out apon each other, the two decided to head home for a while. They walked since their apartment was only a few blocks from the school. On the way they passed the arcade. Decian stopped in front of the door, considering.        

"Hey, why don't we play for a bit? We don't have work for another few hours and we can put off homework 'till tomarrow or Sunday," he suggested.        

Que thought a moment, "But... oh, alright."        

An hour passed and with it passed several tokens and lost games, but they enjoyed themselves nontheless. Finally down to the last of their tokens, Decian challanged Que to a quick race in one of the multiplayer simulation hovercar races. They were both pretty good at this particular one, it was one of their favorites, so Que quickly agreed.        

Kala found them calling threats to each other, aparently tied for first and battling viciously over the place. She suppressed a laugh and watched them play. When the game finally came to an end, both still tied, although it had seemed as though Decian had won for a second, they searched their pockets for more tokens, still taking no notice of the girl standing behind them.        

Giving up, Decian turned to exchange the last of his money for another handful of tokens. "I'm gonna go get some more - Oh, hi Kala."        

"Hi. Hi Setra," she said, waving slightly. Que nodded slightly in response. Kala commented to herself, "I was wondering how long that was gonna take..."        

"Eh?"        

"Nevermind."        

The tokens forgotten, they found themselves heading in the general direction of the door, and then, once outside, in no general direction at all.        

"Why don't we grab something to eat at the diner there?" suggested Que, gesturing to a nice little building just down the street.        

The other two agreed and they started in that direction. Decian hummed quietly under his breath.        

"Stop that."        

"Why Set? I like that song."        

"It's five hundred years old!"        

"So?"        

"So it's five hundred years old."        

"And that has to do with what?"        

"BNL is ancient! I think you're probably the only person who even knows who they are anymore!"        

"You know who they are."        

"Gah! Nevermind..."        

Kala wondered wheather they were making a point of arguing over senseless things, or if this was a normal thing.        

Decian glanced up from their argument and stopped.        

"What-" Que saw what Decian was looking at and stopped as well.        

"What are you guys looking at?" asked Kala, looking confusedly ahead. All she saw was a pair of sprites, a man and woman. The man had aqua skin and dark green hair, the woman had navy blue skin and electric purple hair. They were heading toward them slowly, they probably hadn't even seen their little group. "It's just a couple of people, what are you guys so uptight about?"        

The man looked up and directly at them, even at this distance Kala could see the cold hatred in his black eyes. His glance seemed to freeze her to the sidewalk.        

Her companions spoke at the same time, in the same icy growl, "Troy."