One Can Only Ring Twice (noir-style AU)

Why is Six Afraid of Seven?

Not only Detective One like to solve puzzles and cases, but she also enjoys watching her friends showing off their talents on stage.

Usually, Three is their MC, but today, it was Six. One did like Six as the host than Three, unlike Three, Six compliments, and sometimes give useful feedback to the performers, while Three compares her talent to theirs (as a joke.)

Right now, it was Five who were performing. In her sweet, soft voice singing, "Numberblobs are a Girl's Best Friend." But what the audience most enjoyed about Five's performance was the sudden change of genre. Five would carelessly rip off her nice dress, showing a new set of clothing and whips out her guitar. Somehow smoothly transitioning from a calm song to a rock song.

But of course, this didn't stop One from still solving other mysteries. Like why Seven pays full attention when Five is performing and just rests his head and does his "sciencey" stuff. Seven was a scientist, and also was self training to be a psychologist. One always thought Seven was an odd Numberhuman (and odd looking.)

"Thank you, Five for your performance! Oh! And that's a nice fragrance," Six slightly bows down to Five. "Now that it's intermission, it's time for our questions!" Six pulled out some cards she prepared. "Now this is a hard one! Everyone put your thinking caps on, 'cause we're gonna have fun!" Six quickly glanced at Seven, giving him a mischievous grin. "How many colors are there in a rainbow?" Of course One was the first to raise her hands up.

"Seven!" She happily squealed, smiling at Seven.

"You'd be in heaven if that was true; it's more than seven, that's your clue."

One always had a Plan B when she answered a question. If wasn't the most common answer, it should be the second common.

"Infinity!" One squealed.

"Ding ding ding! We've got a win!" Six clapped. "Round of applause for One, everyone!" Though it was just Seven and One in this room, Seven still clapped for One.

...

Seven sat behind a plastic window. Face to face with Numberland's, or more like the entire Learning Block World's infamous bad guy. World's happiest, luckiest, and colorful Numberhuman tries is best to give the guy a cold, hard, stare.

"Have you heard about the news about Twelve.., Octonaughty?"

Small pupils, abnormally large front teeth, smirking; he clearly did not care what was going on.

"Do you think they hand out newspaper to their only prisoner?"

"Well, I actually hadn't thought about that," Seven answered, embarrassed.

"Don't worry, bud, they do."

Feeling reassured, Seven was about to speak again, but-

"But I don't bother reading it though. I just made a bunch of paper bird collections, would you like to see them?" Octonaughty's very small pupils shrank even more, for some reason it gave Seven chills.

"No. That's not why I'm here," Seven pushed his yellow glasses up his nose. "Our well known criminal, Octonaughty. I am planning to bail you out."

Surprised, Octonaughty placed his face right in front of the window. "And what makes you want to do that?"

"So remember that I mentioned about the Twelve case?"

"Yeahh.. my memory span isn't that short. But you didn't get too specific. So tell me about it."

"Hmmff..." Seven sighs. "So just a couple of days ago, Twelve has been assaulted in her house and it's up to Detective One to solve the case. The thing is, One still doesn't have any suspects yet, or just does not want to share her list with me. So as a criminal-"

"Former criminal-" Octonaughty interrupts. 

"Pardon me?"

"Former criminal now. I've officially retired! Now bail me out, we can talk about this later."

"No. We must talk about this now," Seven narrowed his eyes, trying to give Octonaughty the impression of how serious this is. It only gave Octonaughty a drop of sweat down his forehead. "You definitely should have motives for your crime, right?"

"I was bored."

"We'll move onto this later. Why I need you is I want to know the criminal thoughts on why someone would randomly attack Twelve."

"... That's it?"

"'Fraid so."

"Are you gonna send me back after I finish telling you my thoughts?"

"Not unless you're a good boy."

"Huh?"

"Come on, I already paid. I'll meet you in front of the police station."

While Seven and Octonaughty walked outside, someone was following Seven, just for curiosity.

"Oh no! I've got to tell Eight! This is not gonna be great!"

...

???????????????: Is the plan working well in progress?

???: What plan?

???????????????: Oh right, you weren't here.

???: OF COURSE I WASN'T HERE. YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MANY CAREERS I HAVE

???????????????: Alright calm down, agent. We must not get caught. Especially when we're near the mayor.

??????????: I'm afraid I have some bad news. As you know, she's pretty stubborn. But our plan on him is working and he may temporarily resign

???????????????: Thank you, Agent. You may leave.

??????????: Also you, have you found any working medicine yet?

???: Nope, he's just like that. He's not gonna die from it anyway

...

Outside was Twenty, watching those chaotic Numberhumans... just being chaotic. But he does know what they're up to.

"I don't understand what I did to them."

And he knows they're not gonna succeed with their plan.

Maybe not today.