Title: Cold Cases
Fandom: xxxHOLIC
Pairing: None
Categories: Outside POV, Gen
Length: Medium (9,416)
Warnings: None

Author on LJ: sparklyfanta
Author Website: Dreamwidth | Tumblr

Author's Summary:
N/A (Roughly: A detective is investigating old cases and his lead turns up Watanuki, who is understandably reticent about what had happened.)

Review:
I love a lot of different things in fics, but one of my absolute favorite things (if a bit self-indulgent at times) is an outside character POV (whether minor character or a new one entirely) as they peer into the world of whatever fandom the fic is part of. This fic takes that premise and expands on it beautifully. The fic's POV character is an original character who's a detective investigating various cold cases--among those cold cases are a couple where Watanuki and Doumeki were involved in.

If you're familiar at all with the manga you'll recognize the cases that they're talking about and the circumstances revolving around the people who've died. But now you're seeing it through a fresh pair of eyes--a pair of eyes that isn't part of Watanuki and Doumeki's supernatural world.

You just start feeling rather gleeful and anticipatory about the fact that you, the reader, know what's going on, while the main character doesn't. What's also appreciated is that the POV character isn't treated like an idiot, but rather someone who is actually pretty good at their job (they did turn up Watanuki, after all) who just doesn't have nearly all of the facts.

Then you have Watanuki being so... him and Doumeki shouldering his way into the situation in his rather stoic way. It's so good and it makes me happy. This is just a great fic to read.

Cold Cases